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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 8420622" data-attributes="member: 6785785">Looking at the list of Panic results, and the ones that I think are the biggest problem are the ones that are very connected to the turn structure used in Combat and Stealth mode. A lot of the results are much more about the double duty you mention of the spread of fear and content generation in the form of new complications or elements of play.The following Panic Results all seem to me to fit one of those duties very well, or both of them pretty well:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Nervous Twitch- kind of passes by being intentionally the most minor of the batch, but it certainly gets that peer contagion rolling.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Tremble- this has an ongoing penalty for Agility skills, which makes it unique among the results, so that's got some heft whether involved in combat or not.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Scream- a more severe version of Nervous Twitch, but also serves to potentially introduce new complications; I mean, something could hear the scream, right?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Berserk - seems to me to hit the peer contagion well although not through Stress or Panic, but instead by causing conflict within the group, and possibly new content as well (i.e. our scientist lost his ish and decked the officer, and is now in the brig, and we're dealing with some kind of pathogen situation, etc.).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Catatonic- pretty much game over man in combat, and still very bad in just about any other situation.</li> </ul>The ones that seem ill-suited (at times) are:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Drop an Item- obviously, this is potentially disastrous if you're facing off with a xeno, or if you're hauling the one piece of equipment needed to restart the land rover, etc. But it suffers a bit because if you're either not in the turn structure OR the fictional situation isn't in a dangerous environment (space, walking along a plank above a pit filled with alien eggs, etc) then dropping an item seems less consequential. You can just pick it up. Yes, you still increase stress, but by itself that's less severe than the lower panic results. So the Dropped Item has to really matter in order for this to be significant, and that may be tough to ensure.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Freeze- nearly irrelevant outside of the turn structure. The add on of increasing stress for you and nearby friendlies is good, but by itself is again, not quite enough, I don't think.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Seek Cover- situationally hard to narrate, as you already pointed out. Has the added element of reducing stress for the character, but raising that of nearby friendlies, so without the wasted turn or the forced movement being brought to bear, this is actually less harmful than the lower results.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Flee- I'm a little torn on this one. As Burke showed us, this can be a horrible idea. But, it's similar to Seek Cover in that it would really only apply in a situation where there is looming physical danger, unless you tweak it a bit. But it's much more severe in that it costs more than a turn, and it could cause others to Panic, as well. Also, depending on which way a character runs, maybe that brings in new fiction by alerting enemies or security measures or what have you. Forced movement can be really bad. But it's hard to imagine this being a response to anything less than severe immediate danger.</li> </ul>That's my assessment looking at them again now, months after having played the game. In our short campaign, not all of them came up, so I haven't seen them all in action. And our campaign was a cinematic scenario where there would have been plenty of opportunities for the results as written to make total sense. At the time, I really enjoyed how Stress and Panic can spread among the group. That seems perfectly suited and overall well implemented.But I think some are less suited for the job than others. They are assuming when and how they'll be applied, and not allowing for much beyond those specific situations.</blockquote>

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