Frightful Presence


Rules Questions

Scarab Sages

There is some ambiguity in the description of Frightful Presence that needs to be clarified.

Per the Universal Monster Rules in the Bestiary:

Frightful Presence (Ex)
This special quality makes a creature’s very presence unsettling to foes. Activating this ability is a free action that is usually part of an attack or charge. Opponents within range who witness the action may become frightened or shaken. The range is usually 30 feet, and the duration is usually 5d6 rounds. This ability affects only opponents with fewer Hit Dice or levels than the creature has. An affected opponent can resist the effects with a successful Will save (DC 10 + 1/2 frightful creature’s racial HD + frightful creature’s Cha modifier; the exact DC is given in the creature’s descriptive text). On a failed save, the opponent is shaken, or panicked if 4 Hit Dice or fewer. An opponent that succeeds on the saving throw is immune to that same creature’s frightful presence for 24 hours. Frightful presence is a mind-affecting fear effect.

I'm not sure how to interpret that. In the first part it implies that you can be either frightened or shaken, but later it says shaken or panicked.

Is the first just a poor choice of words, and it is not describing the actual condition? To me, I can see the interpretation working this way...If a PC succeeds at the will save, he is shaken. If he fails but has more than 4 HD, he is frightened. If he fails and has 4 or fewer HD, he is panicked.

Any thoughts on this?


xyxrt wrote:
Any thoughts on this?

A few:


  • Why the hell is this sort of thing still ambiguous five years and three printings of the Bestiary down the road?
  • Can we get a 2nd edition yet?
...but I don't think that's what you meant. :P


You're overthinking the first bolded section. Those are fluff words in the fluff description. The only part that actually matters is the sentence talking about consequences of failed saves.

Scarab Sages

How is that fluff? The sentence before is talking about mechanics, as well as the sentence after.


Also, they should avoid using condition names if they aren't actually referring to conditions.


More generally, it would probably be good if they italicized or bolded all defined game terms, and left words which don't reference specific game terms (even if the words are the same) alone.

Same problem with wield, "precision damage", etc.

In this case: the latter part (shaken/panicked) would probably be italicized (I'm guessing), and the former not.

Or, this is just a typo, and both places are referring to the conditions (which should match).


Paizo should seriously consider hiring (or at least contracting with) a technical writer to review rules text. Not that I personally want RPG rules that require that sort of review, but if that's the game you're writing...


I agree it seems like an odd section, and I'd guess something's a little lost in the RAI, but as written is fairly clear, within the radius enemies need to save against a mind based fear attack. On a success, they're safe from it for 24 hours, on a fail, they're shaken. If the enemy's hit dice is less than the frightful presence user by 4 or more, they become panicked instead of shaken on a failed save.

Now it seems odd to me that we go from shaken, to panicked, with no stop at frightened, but RAW there you are, no more, no less.


Duderlybob wrote:


I agree it seems like an odd section, and I'd guess something's a little lost in the RAI, but as written is fairly clear, within the radius enemies need to save against a mind based fear attack. On a success, they're safe from it for 24 hours, on a fail, they're shaken. If the enemy's hit dice is less than the frightful presence user by 4 or more, they become panicked instead of shaken on a failed save.

Now it seems odd to me that we go from shaken, to panicked, with no stop at frightened, but RAW there you are, no more, no less.

The RAW don't seem clear to me at all. How do you square your (shaken | panicked) interpretation with the explicit mention of frightened:

PRD wrote:
Opponents within range who witness the action may become frightened or shaken.

?

If the passage read "panicked or shaken," then the RAW would be unambiguous (if unwieldy). As it is, the RAW are contradictory.


That's where I think that RAW, and RAI diverge. It does specify frightened or shaken at the front, but when it's explicitly saying what the effect of the failed will save is, it's shaken, our panicked, no mention of frightened at all.

Seems to me we've got a matter of editing problems, where the rules changed and a quick slap-dash edit was made to the wording that left the job half done. RAI, I'd probably guess it was more meant to be Shaken on success, Frightened on fail, Panicked on fail if your HD is more than four less than the source of Frightful Presence. But when it comes down to the pure RAW, shaken or panicked on a failed save with no mention of frightened in that section.

Is it what the writers were going for? I doubt it, but that's what it says when it's in the consequence section of the crunch.


Duderlybob wrote:

That's where I think that RAW, and RAI diverge. It does specify frightened or shaken at the front, but when it's explicitly saying what the effect of the failed will save is, it's shaken, our panicked, no mention of frightened at all.

Seems to me we've got a matter of editing problems, where the rules changed and a quick slap-dash edit was made to the wording that left the job half done. RAI, I'd probably guess it was more meant to be Shaken on success, Frightened on fail, Panicked on fail if your HD is more than four less than the source of Frightful Presence. But when it comes down to the pure RAW, shaken or panicked on a failed save with no mention of frightened in that section.

Is it what the writers were going for? I doubt it, but that's what it says when it's in the consequence section of the crunch.

Yeah, that sounds likely.


Yet another place where 3.5 did it better.

The above seems to be a horrible amalgamation between the original 3.5 generic "Frightful Presence" rule:
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#frightfulPresence

And the original 3.5 dragon-specific frightful presence entry:
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/dragonTrue.htm


Arnwyn wrote:

Yet another place where 3.5 did it better.

The above seems to be a horrible amalgamation between the original 3.5 generic "Frightful Presence" rule:
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#frightfulPresence

And the original 3.5 dragon-specific frightful presence entry:
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/dragonTrue.htm

*facepalm*


The upper section mentions condition names but has no rules in the sentence, so they aren't being used as official key words. Since the section further down uses key words and rules for what requirements are necessary to gain them, that sentence is the actual rules one.

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