Fear?

[TwoBits]

How exactly do your various Fear/moral check causing spells (like Terror or Panic) work? I swear, I've never seen any unit rout because of them.

In the manual, it says that units rout as entire squads (p.80). Does that mean a fear inducing spell needs to encompass the whole squad to have a chance of effectiveness? So they're basically worthless against large squads then?

Or can they cause individual units to rout (not that I've ever seen that - but then again, I'm not very observant)?

What am I missing?

[johnarryn]

Fear spells like Terror or Panic will lower the morale of the soldiers they effect... not the squad. However, it is my understanding that a squads' morale is basically an average of the morale of all the units in that squad.

Therefore, several units with reduced morale will drag down the rest of their squads' morale... think the first few units turning to run, and then the rest of the squad joining in.

Likewise, boosting the morale of several individuals in a squad (or just having several high-morale individuals)) will raise the morale of the squad as a whole.

[llamabeast]

I have seen lots of units run because of Frighten. I used it as the basis of my early expansion as LA T'ien Ch'i against a lot of high level independents that I just couldn't recruit enough troops to beat fairly.

[thejeff]

Do they force morale checks, or do you also have to do damage to have a chance of breaking the squad?

[llamabeast]

They force morale checks, I think. I'm pretty sure I've frightened off units which haven't taken any casualties.

[Shovah32]

Ctissian sauromancers spamming both raise skeletons(to hold the enemy and occasionally hit them) and terror can rout most troops with morale below 15 and probably higher(only used against 15 morale or less).

[TwoBits]

Well, for example, Frighten is supposed to cause a "Fear +15 attack". But what the heck does that mean?

Says nothing about lowering anyone's moral. I know a squad forced to make a moral check needs to beat a "fear roll" (p.80), but again, that's for the whole squad. If your spell only hits part of a squad, does the whole squad have to pass the check?

The mechanics are a bit confusing...

[Kristoffer O]

> They force morale checks, I think. I'm pretty sure I've frightened off units which haven't taken any casualties

Correct.

> If your spell only hits part of a squad, does the whole squad have to pass the check?

In the case of 'Frighten' and other single target fear effects- no.
In the case of all area fear spells - yes.

[llamabeast]

I think the whole squad has to take a check, against the average morale of the squad (which is lowered because some of its members have lowered morale - you can see this if you right click on them). But I don't know what the +15 means.

[Baalz]

Kristoffer O said:

> If your spell only hits part of a squad, does the whole squad have to pass the check?

In the case of 'Frighten' and other single target fear effects- no.
In the case of all area fear spells - yes.

I don't understand, I thought moral rolls were only checked at the squad level. Only whole squads can route, so how does a single unit making a check differ from a squad making a check? Presumably a failure routes the whole squad, right?

Also, I read somewhere somebody claiming that a fear aura effectively stacked with awe because it lowers moral, but that doesn't fit my understanding of how it works. Do the mechanics of a fear aura work the same way (forcing a moral check to people within the radius, but not effecting moral itself)?