Intimidate (Demoralize) x2 = frightened?

[ithuriel]

Let's say you use the Intimidate skill to demoralize an opponent and successfully make them shaken. Then the next round you use it again on the same opponent.

Is that opponent now frightened since you have imposed a shaken status on someone who already has it, thus moving them up the chain of fear conditions? Or is this meant to be a non-stackable use? If anyone knows of a solid rules reference here I would appreciate it.

[Argothe]

ithuriel wrote:

Let's say you use the Intimidate skill to demoralize an opponent and successfully make them shaken. Then the next round you use it again on the same opponent.

Is that opponent now frightened since you have imposed a shaken status on someone who already has it, thus moving them up the chain of fear conditions? Or is this meant to be a non-stackable use? If anyone knows of a solid rules reference here I would appreciate it.

It will be very difficult to use Intimidate to create the Shaken condition for more than 2-3 rounds since you have to beat your opponent's check by 5 for each additional round of effect. Even if you can stack the affect to force the frightened condition, that condition is unlikely to persist for more than 2 rounds at which point the target is back to shaken and ceases to flee.

[Rubia]

ithuriel wrote:

Let's say you use the Intimidate skill to demoralize an opponent and successfully make them shaken. Then the next round you use it again on the same opponent.

Is that opponent now frightened since you have imposed a shaken status on someone who already has it, thus moving them up the chain of fear conditions? Or is this meant to be a non-stackable use? If anyone knows of a solid rules reference here I would appreciate it.

Hi Ithuriel,

I couldn't find an exact reference for the fear stacking, but this bard ability Dirge of Doom suggests that it works as we played it yesterday. From the pathfinder SRD:

A bard of 8th level or higher can use his performance to foster a sense of growing dread in his enemies, causing them to take become shaken. To be affected, an enemy must be within 30 feet and able to see and hear the bard's performance. The effect persists for as long as the enemy is within 30 feet and the bard continues the performance. The performance cannot cause a creature to become frightened or panicked, even if the targets are already shaken from another effect. Dirge of doom is a mind-affecting fear effect, and it relies on audible and visual components.

Though it doesn't specifically say that stacking results, the implication of the bolded line strongly suggests that fear stacks. Now, it does mean that one must track when each shaken effect was added, since when one shaken effect ends, the frightened effect downgrades to shaken. I'll see if I can find a further reference.

Cheers,

Rubia

[Rubia]

ithuriel wrote:

Let's say you use the Intimidate skill to demoralize an opponent and successfully make them shaken. Then the next round you use it again on the same opponent.

Is that opponent now frightened since you have imposed a shaken status on someone who already has it, thus moving them up the chain of fear conditions? Or is this meant to be a non-stackable use? If anyone knows of a solid rules reference here I would appreciate it.

Found it! Pathfinder SRD: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/Home/special-abilities---final#TOC-Fear

Fear

Spells, magic items, and certain monsters can affect characters with fear. In most cases, the character makes a Will saving throw to resist this effect, and a failed roll means that the character is shaken, frightened, or panicked.

Shaken: Characters who are shaken take a –2 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.

Frightened: Characters who are frightened are shaken, and in addition they flee from the source of their fear as quickly as they can. They can choose the paths of their flight. Other than that stipulation, once they are out of sight (or hearing) of the source of their fear, they can act as they want. If the duration of their fear continues, however, characters can be forced to flee if the source of their fear presents itself again. Characters unable to flee can fight (though they are still shaken).

Panicked: Characters who are panicked are shaken, and they run away from the source of their fear as quickly as they can, dropping whatever they are holding. Other than running away from the source, their paths are random. They flee from all other dangers that confront them rather than facing those dangers. Once they are out of sight (or hearing) of any source of danger, they can act as they want. Panicked characters cower if they are prevented from fleeing.

Becoming Even More Fearful: Fear effects are cumulative. A shaken character who is made shaken again becomes frightened, and a shaken character who is made frightened becomes panicked instead. A frightened character who is made shaken or frightened becomes panicked instead.

Cheers,

Rubia

[ithuriel]

Well- I encountered a player with a very clever build using the bard's versatile performance. So he can sub his Perform Comedy for Intimidate and his perform is supercharged. (+17 at 2nd level) So that let's him easily make low level npc's shaken for 4 rounds which gives him time to work in a potential frightened condition. Just curious if it is meant to be possible so as to adjudicate that fairly for PFS.

[ithuriel]

Oh hey Rubia-

You are absolutely right about the stacking of fear effects, but what I'm not sure about is that all of those typically result from Supernatural, Spell-like abilities, or spells. I'm not sure that skills are meant to work in the same way, though they may very well be.

Edit: Just to be clear, I'm not looking for ways to nerf your character here. I just want to make sure I'm on the same page as other dms since I'm inexperienced from that side of the screen.

[brock]

ithuriel wrote:

Well- I encountered a player with a very clever build using the bard's versatile performance. So he can sub his Perform Comedy for Intimidate and his perform is supercharged. (+17 at 2nd level) So that let's him easily make low level npc's shaken for 4 rounds which gives him time to work in a potential frightened condition. Just curious if it is meant to be possible so as to adjudicate that fairly for PFS.

Teamed with another character with Intimidate they can make them Shaken on the first round and then team up to go Frightened, Panicked on the second. Then "... run away from the source of their fear as quickly as they can, dropping whatever they are holding. " means that they can scoop up weapons, wands, etc.

Profitable.

[Rubia]

ithuriel wrote:

Oh hey Rubia-

You are absolutely right about the stacking of fear effects, but what I'm not sure about is that all of those typically result from Supernatural, Spell-like abilities, or spells. I'm not sure that skills are meant to work in the same way, though they may very well be.

Edit: Just to be clear, I'm not looking for ways to nerf your character here. I just want to make sure I'm on the same page as other dms since I'm inexperienced from that side of the screen.

Trust me Ith, I understand that nerfing is not the goal. I would much rather prefer that we have it right and that it's fun for all. If the latter condition fails, I'm fine with moving onto other things.

That said, let's dive deep and figure out if it works. To me, it's a unique build that comes right out of the core books, and it's worth clarifying its strengths. At the moment, I see no exceptions for skills, but let's find out.

Besides, it's good to clarify this before Red gets to level 5, because then this may happen more than infrequently. :)

Rubia

[DigitalMage]

My Fighter in the RotRL campaign was built with this as one of his tricks. A decent Charisma, max ranks in the class skill, Skill Focus and the Persuasive Feat meant I could have an Intimidate modifier of +14 at 4th level (+2 Charisma, 4 ranks, +3 class bonus, +3 Skill Focus, +2 Persuasive).

AS Intimidate can be used in range in PF and can last more than 1 round, I was able to make foes flee. Even if only Frightened for one round, as they need to then get back into the fight they are likely not a threat for two rounds. :)

[ithuriel]

I did notice that Intimidate is size dependent (-4 if you are small and target is medium and so on) which I didn't include last night. It wouldn't have made any difference with the rolls you had last night, but it's worth noting for future encounters.

I think you most likely have it right and skills do operate under the general Fear guidelines.

EDIT: My concern is this- which is a mechanics concern and not really about this particular character. When you have a bonus so high that no level appropriate intelligent "boss" of normal size will ever be able to resist it, as your bonus increases with level it seems like you will come to a point where, if you could back your opponent into a corner with your allies, you would be able to have him panicked by round 4 nearly every encounter. Of course you will have devoted a significant part of your build and 4 rounds of combat to achieve that.

[Rubia]

ithuriel wrote:

I did notice that Intimidate is size dependent (-4 if you are small and target is medium and so on) which I didn't include last night. It wouldn't have made any difference with the rolls you had last night, but it's worth noting for future encounters.

I struggled with that as well. It turns out that the *entire* Intimidate modifier (including the size issue) is replaced by the perform check due to Versatile Performance, so I get neither the bonus for being larger nor the penalty for being smaller. There are several clarifying threads on Versatile Performance here for that. For instance, I also don't get the benefit of the Skill Focus (Intimidate) feat.

Again, I'm fine with how it's ruled overall, but that seems to be the way of it.

Rubia

[Murgen]

Additional checks to intimidate an opponent increase the DC by +5. But your bonus is still impressive.

[Rubia]

ithuriel wrote:

I did notice that Intimidate is size dependent (-4 if you are small and target is medium and so on) which I didn't include last night. It wouldn't have made any difference with the rolls you had last night, but it's worth noting for future encounters.

I think you most likely have it right and skills do operate under the general Fear guidelines.

EDIT: My concern is this- which is a mechanics concern and not really about this particular character. When you have a bonus so high that no level appropriate intelligent "boss" of normal size will ever be able to resist it, as your bonus increases with level it seems like you will come to a point where, if you could back your opponent into a corner with your allies, you would be able to have him panicked by round 4 nearly every encounter. Of course you will have devoted a significant part of your build and 4 rounds of combat to achieve that.

This is a fair concern. Here are a few (potentially) mitigating points. I do agree that even with the list below, it may diminish tension in the combats. It may be worth exploring whether it diminishes tension more or less than a character who hits frequently and does 18 damage per hit. The difference is, of course, that this ability "always" seems to frighten with 2 rounds to work with, and (if the first shaken hasn't faded), panic with 3 rounds to work with.

1) Generally, monster HD grow much faster than PC level, often on a 2 for 1 basis. This means that the check gets progressively harder as the PC levels, unless they also devote all magical items, abilities, and feats to achieve this goal.
2) It takes all combat actions of a character for 3 rounds to accomplish panicking an enemy. By the same token, a fighter, barbarian, rogue, or wizard could have damaged such an opponent into death using the same 3 rounds.
3) It is a fear effect, and therefore subject to standard fear rules -- mostly no undead (oops), constructs, paladins, and oozes. Other restrictions may also apply.
4) Frightened creatures can run intelligently, and do not need to provoke AoOs.

I definitely don't want this to devolve into an issue about this PC in particular, but for example, the boss in the adventure we played recently involved a creature whose DC against demoralize was 11. In two rounds, that boss could have been debilitated.

In a single attack roll made by a barbarian, the boss in question took 18 points of damage and went down. The boss in question was debilitated in one round. If such a character had two rounds, one might be able to argue that the chance of success by the barbarian is (though obviously not 100%), certainly not far off the mark.

I don't disagree that the ability is powerful. But it may not be more powerful than a combat-oriented "thug" style character.

Rubia

[Rubia]

Murgen wrote:

Additional checks to intimidate an opponent increase the DC by +5. But your bonus is still impressive.

Not intimidating. Performing. Not applicable, I think. Am I wrong?

Rubia

[hogarth]

Rubia wrote:

Murgen wrote:

Additional checks to intimidate an opponent increase the DC by +5. But your bonus is still impressive.

Not intimidating. Performing. Not applicable, I think. Am I wrong?

Rubia

That strikes me as a possible, but very strange interpretation. It would strike me as counter-intuitive if a bard with a couple of ranks in Perform (oratory) could ignore the massive Diplomacy penalties associated with "give dangerous aid", "give aid that could result in punishment", "reveal an important secret", etc.

I think a more reasonable interpretation is that normal bonuses and penalties apply, and that only the bard's intrinsic skill bonus (e.g. ranks+class skill bonus+feat bonus+trait bonus) is replaced by his Perform skill bonus.

[tejón]

hogarth wrote:

I think a more reasonable interpretation is that normal bonuses and penalties apply, and that only the bard's intrinsic skill bonus (e.g. ranks+class skill bonus+feat bonus+trait bonus) is replaced by his Perform skill bonus.

The +5 adjustment is to the DC, not the roll, so the point is moot.

[Rubia]

tejón wrote:

hogarth wrote:

I think a more reasonable interpretation is that normal bonuses and penalties apply, and that only the bard's intrinsic skill bonus (e.g. ranks+class skill bonus+feat bonus+trait bonus) is replaced by his Perform skill bonus.

The +5 adjustment is to the DC, not the roll, so the point is moot.

Yes, you're right on the DC adjustments. I thought about this some more, and Versatile Performance doesn't affect DC changes. That may also address the Diplomacy issues above, if they indicate that they adjust the DC, not the modifier.

EDIT: I just checked the skills that Versatile Performance applies to. It seems that they were careful in how those skills are "modified". Specifically, the modifications are mostly to the DC of the check, which VP does not affect in any way. The +5 DC adjustment essentially stops "fear-bouncing" creatures around the map. ;)

Rubia

[Calypsopoxta]

Stumbled upon this thread perusing for intimidate info and stacking fears after I came across a very nasty looking feat.

Cornugon Smash. It lets you make free action intimidate checks on an enemy EVERY TIME you hit them with power attack. So from what I've read here, score three hits, then intimidate once, then again at +5 DC, then finally again at +10 DC and you have a panic stricken enemy for 1 round (or if you're awesome, 2+)?

[DigitalMage]

Calypsopoxta wrote:

Stumbled upon this thread perusing for intimidate info and stacking fears after I came across a very nasty looking feat.

Cornugon Smash. It lets you make free action intimidate checks on an enemy EVERY TIME you hit them with power attack. So from what I've read here, score three hits, then intimidate once, then again at +5 DC, then finally again at +10 DC and you have a panic stricken enemy for 1 round (or if you're awesome, 2+)?

I think in another thread one of the Paizo crew said stacking of fear effects doesn't work with Demoralise.

...[goes looking]....

Apparently Joshua Frost put it in the PFS FAQ and it was confirmed by Jason Bulmahn in this post.

[d20pfsrd.com]

Unofficial FAQ on d20pfsrd.com wrote:

Q: (10/8/09) Intimidate Skill (Demoralize) - Can you demoralize the same being more than once, and have the effects stack?

A: (Joshua J. Frost) The shaken condition gained in this matter cannot be stacked to create a stronger condition. If you succeed at another demoralize attempt, you just extend the shaken condition's duration. There was a sentence left out of the skill description that will be noted in a future errata update. [Source]
A: (Jason Bulmahn) This is indeed the case...

Lot's of FAQ answers have been compiled on d20pfsrd.com due to the hard work and eagle eyes of Tim Shadow. Many people could save themselves some time by checking to see if the question (and answer) has been posted there first.

The Unofficial FAQ is just a collection of rulings made by Jason, James, and others, spread across the various threads and boards etc.

Joshua J. Frosts original post can be seen here.

[Stéphane Le Roux]

Argothe wrote:

It will be very difficult to use Intimidate to create the Shaken condition for more than 2-3 rounds since you have to beat your opponent's check by 5 for each additional round of effect. Even if you can stack the affect to force the frightened condition, that condition is unlikely to persist for more than 2 rounds at which point the target is back to shaken and ceases to flee.

It's not that difficult for an inquisitor :

Inquisitor : +1/2*level, +3 class skill
glory domain : +level (you need to touch yourself as a standard action, and then you can use the bonus once during the next hour as a non-action; it means : if you do multiple-Intimidate, you have this bonus only once)
1 rank/level

Total : 2.5*level+3+Cha (without any feat or spell). The DC is only 10+level+Sag...

Using only the core, a cleric can also have quite a good score...

[hogarth]

d20pfsrd.com wrote:

Lot's of FAQ answers have been compiled on d20pfsrd.com due to the hard work and eagle eyes of Tim Shadow. Many people could save themselves some time by checking to see if the question (and answer) has been posted there first.

The Unofficial FAQ is just a collection of rulings made by Jason, James, and others, spread across the various threads and boards etc.

Note that there is at least one case where the "Unofficial FAQ" conflicts with the "official FAQ" (unofficial FAQ says that Augment Summoning would work on a scroll, official FAQ says it wouldn't work). So take any rulings (official or unofficial) with a grain of salt.

[d20pfsrd.com]

Jason Bulmahn 08/09 wrote:

Augment Summoning does affect monsters summoned using scrolls. The reference provided above comes directly from the "Determining Effect" portion of the description.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing

Sean K. Reynolds 08/10 wrote:

Does using a potion, scroll, staff, or wand count as "casting a spell" for purposes of feats and special abilities like Augment Summoning, Spell Focus, an evoker's ability to do extra damage with evocation spells, bloodline abilities, and so on?

No. Unless they specifically state otherwise, feats and abilities that modify spells you cast only affect actual spellcasting, not using magic items that emulate spellcasting or work like spellcasting.

–Sean K Reynolds (08/31/10)

Since Sean's is from the "Official" FAQ, and more recent, and Jason's was an "off the cuff" response to a question on the boards, is it then safe to assume that Sean's response overrides Jason, or am I just not reading them correctly and both can be true?

[hogarth]

d20pfsrd.com wrote:

Since Sean's is from the "Official" FAQ, and more recent, and Jason's was an "off the cuff" response to a question on the boards, is it then safe to assume that Sean's response overrides Jason, or am I just not reading them correctly and both can be true?

Tim Shadow sent an e-mail to James Jacobs and I believe the response was something like: "Uh...we'll think about it and get back to you."

;-)

[Calypsopoxta]

So from what I'm getting regarding these posts:

Demoralizing a shaken, frightened, or panicked enemy merely increases the duration, and does NOT increase the fear step.

Using any other ability that causes fear on an already demoralized enemy upgrades the fear step appropriately.

Is that right?

[Immolate]

Calypsopoxta wrote:

So from what I'm getting regarding these posts:

Demoralizing a shaken, frightened, or panicked enemy merely increases the duration, and does NOT increase the fear step.

Using any other ability that causes fear on an already demoralized enemy upgrades the fear step appropriately.

Is that right?

Not entirely. If you are currently frightened or panicked, and someone demoralizes you, it then potentially extends the shaken condition only. It will not cause additional rounds of the frightened or panicked condition.

If you look at the Enforcer feat, that provides a free-action demoralize attempt with every non-lethal attack that lasts for the number of points of damage inflicted. A sixth level fighter with haste could potentially panic a powerful boss in one round for the duration of the battle. Think half orc fighter with high charisma, intimidating prowess, enforcer, persuasive, sixteen charisma and eighteen strength (racial bonus) and at sixth level you have 9+3+4+2+2=20 against a 10th level BBEG with 14 wisdom. Success on a 2 or better. Fright would be 7 and panic 12. Average damage with a great sword is 13 without magic or power attack, so the BBEG drops his magic weapon at your feet and runs away for 13 rounds. Yeah that would be game breaking.

[Ardenup]

Slightly off topic but let's remember the Conrugan Smash trick works better for a brute rogue. :)

Taking shatter defences, Conrugan Smash - means -2 to their attacks, (harder for them to hit you) denies them their dex (flatfooted) and makes SA automatic with no flank. Conrugan gives you a check EVERY round to keep it going.

(i bring this up a lot to knock that rediculous feint trick off its perch)

add scout Varient who auto SA on a move and there's no reason to not be SA all the time.

[Twowlves]

I have a similar build for my Pathfinder Society "Bard-Barian" character, and I have raised similar questions. Not that I think my conlusions are correct, this is nonetheless how I understand it to work:

Intimidate/Demoralize: Since it is the same source, it does not stack with itself, and it alone cannot increase a target's fear status beyond Shaken. This would mean that you can't use Dazzling Display and Intimidate/Demoralize on the same foe either.

Dirge of Doom: Specifically states in it's description that it is an exception to the fear stacking rules, in that it cannot advance a fear state (i.e. a foe Shaken from one effect cannot be made Frightened from Dirge of Doom). However, as written, Dirge of Doom can be itself advanced, so that if you lead with DoD to make foes Shaken you can follow up with another fear source (such as Intimidate/Demoralize) to push the enemy to Frightened.

Everything else: Fear levels stack as described in Appendix I, so long as the effects come from two different sources.

As far as I've been able to discern. However I would love official word on all of this myself, as my Pathfinder Society character is about 75% based on fear-stacking.