Les Ombres d'Esteren - Forum officiel

Hello All,

I have troubles understanding the Trauma rules / thing. Perhaps some kind gent can help.

The rulebook says:

"When a PC faces very harsh scenes on an emotional level, the Leader may ask the Player to make a Mental Resistance roll. The Difficulty Threshold is secretly set by the Leader, according to the intensity of the situation."

Let's take an example.

Yldiane, Varigal

Sanity: Mental Resistance: 6. Trauma: 4.

She makes a Mental Resistance roll and she rolls 1D10 + 6.

She gets 6+6 = 12

The Difficulty Threshold secretly set by the Leader was 14 (Trauma Points 2).

So she fails the Test.

What is happening now?

Is Yldiane gaining 2 Trauma Points, bringing her Total Trauma Points to 6 or is she loosing 2 Trauma Points bringing her Trauma Points to 2 (4-2).

How many Trauma Points can a character "gain". What if a Character has now 40 Trauma Points?

It is very confusing, especially to a newbie.

Any help will be seriously appreciated.

Best to all.

Hello Orientalist! Since it's your first time here on the forum, why not take some time to introduce yourself? It's always good to get to know a little more about the guy behind the pseudonym.

As for your question, as the "Sanity" chapter on p.269 of Book 1 indicates, Trauma points are gained from horrific experiences. The more Trauma points a Character gets, the more he/she sinks into madness, his/her Mental Disorder becoming more and more pronounced.

So in your example, Yldiane's Trauma points would go from 4 to 6.

How many Trauma Points can a character "gain". What if a Character has now 40 Trauma Points?

Maximum is 40 points.

0-5 points - the madness of character isnt show itself at all
6-10 points - character can roleplay his madness but no game effect.
11-15 points - when char is fail resistance check he gains Crisis effect. Also he gains Special Ability and change his Ways.
16-20 points - Crisis become more serious. Also he gains another ability and changing of Ways.

So for first games you should know only that:
if char have 0-5 pts ignore it at all.
if char have 6-10 pts he can roleplay his disease as he wish. you can award this roleplay (but should not punish player if he didnt roleplay madness)

Thank you kindly both Clovis and Valenae.

I am starting to understand it but still a bit of confusion.

So, if Yldiane, Varigal starts the game with 4 Trauma Points do I have to check 4 Trauma Boxes on her sheet, BEFORE starting the game / session? I think so. Is that right?

What about the whole Hardening part? When is this taking into consideration? If Yldiane gains 2 Trauma Points, making her total to 6 Trauma Points now, do I have to check the boxes for Hardening as well or do I continue to check only the Symptom, Syndrome and finally Madness boxes?

The game is not easy to understand, despite the creators saying the rules are light. They might be light but I still need some serious explications in order to start teaching the game to other players.

When saying "the game system is light", means that you can keep using some parts of it, the "Psychologic system" is an example

For your question about Trauma and Hardening :

Trauma represents the toughness of the trauma the PC underwent. Seeing his whole family slaughtered by only one feond is really hard to handle, emotionally, so the PC can suffer Trauma, some points are added to his "Trauma" gauge. The more Trauma points you have, the more maniac and mad you become, depending of your mental disorder (paranoid, frenzy, etc.)

The Hardening gauge represents how much the PC endures trauma. Using the example about seeing his family is good : of course you suffer Trauma when seeing your whole family, but also, this is so traumatic that you will try, in the future, to avoid these emotional pain. The more Hardening you have, the more distant you are with emotional pains. This conducts the character to be more distant, less empathic, colder.

Trauma is not directly related to Hardening, but you can grow both gauges depending of the events. Note that a "full" Trauma gauge means that the character is emotionally insane, too mad to view the world with clean eyes, and probably too dangerous for him and his kind... A "full" Hardening gauge means that the character will avoid any kind of relational interaction, making him not care about anyone, even sometimes let attacks hurt him, he will be in the "Empty fortress" : only his worlds matters and he does not communicate with others, as it is "too dangerous for him".

What about the whole Hardening part? When is this taking into consideration? If Yldiane gains 2 Trauma Points, making her total to 6 Trauma Points now, do I have to check the boxes for Hardening as well or do I continue to check only the Symptom, Syndrome and finally Madness boxes?

No you only check symptome box for Yldi.

You check Hardering when you get 10 on mental resistance.
If you gain sufficient Hardering - you gain some special madness described in Hardering section.

Also you should note that Yildi have 4 permanent trauma, but when she fails check she gains temporary marks!
Only if you fail mental check with natural 1 you gain one trauma as permanent.

Temporary trauma is heals much easy than permanent.
For example I use short rule that if between sessions have passed some time character removes 2 temporary trauma.