Stress and fear

What stress and fear are, and whether they're on

• Stress is a score, counted out of 100, that builds up in fights. Fear sits on top of it: a bad enough fight can leave you afraid of one kind of enemy.
• Both are on from the start of a new game. The mod's quest runs from the first moment, and its stress and fear switches both start on. Setting
• Only you are tracked. The stress quest watches the player and nobody else.

Where you see it

• Once stress passes 25, a stress effect shows in your Active Effects: Minor, Moderate, Severe or Critical Combat Stress. Below that you see nothing.
• Small notes in the corner of the screen tell you how stressed you are when food, drink, a fear or some other effect changes it: one each for above 25, 45, 65 and 85 on the way up, and others on the way down. Getting hit never brings a note, and a fall is only noted if you were already somewhat stressed before it.
• Sitting down on a chair or bench also gives you a note on how stressed you are, if you're above 25.
• The exact number is in the Stress and Fear menu as Current Stress, out of 100. Setting
• The Character menu (the = key in GTS) has a round stress meter and a sliding panel listing the fears you have and the ones you've beaten. P on the keyboard, or clicking the left stick on a pad, opens and closes that panel. Setting
• The ring hides itself while stress is switched off, and the fear panel while fear is switched off.
• The Character menu's stats list also shows your stress as a percentage.
• A fear shows in Active Effects for as long as you have it, under the effect Reduced Combat Abilities.

What raises stress

• Getting hit in a fight. Each hit that lands adds 1 stress. A power attack, or any hit while you're below half health, adds 2. Setting
• Hits you block don't count, and neither do hits outside combat.
• Only weapon hits and bare-handed or creature blows count. A spell hitting you doesn't add stress this way.
• Hits, and rises from effects on you such as fear spells, can push stress past 100. It's only trimmed back to 100 when something you eat or drink changes it, or when you open the mod's menu.
• A fear or frenzy effect landing on you adds 25.
• Each time a fear you have flares up in a fight, you get 10 more stress.
• A follower dying for good adds 50. Setting
• Harvesting from a human body with Skills of the Wild adds 25, unless you're a Wood Elf.
• A bad skooma trip, or the craving that follows, adds 25 (Skyrim on Skooma).
• Playing a lute or drum badly with Skyrim's Got Talent adds 10.
• Carrying the Ebony Blade under Mephala's curse wears on you. Each day you hold it, stress rises by 30 at first, by 20 once four friends have died to it, by 10 after six, and not at all after eight.

What each level of stress does

• There are four bands: Minor above 25, Moderate above 45, Severe above 65 and Critical above 85. Each one lowers both your maximum Stamina and your maximum Magicka.
• How much you lose grows with the size of the pool. Minor takes 10, 15, 20, 30 or 40 points; Moderate 25, 40, 50, 75 or 100; Severe 50, 75, 100, 150 or 200; Critical 75, 115, 150, 225 or 300. The steps are for a base pool under 150, 150 to 199, 200 to 299, 300 to 399, and 400 or more.
• Stamina and Magicka are worked out apart, each from its own base pool.
• Only one band is on at a time; they don't stack.
• At Critical, a visual effect also shows on your character.

Fears: how you get one

• There are 24 fears: wolves, bears, sabre cats, spiders, chaurus, trolls, giants, spriggans, wispmothers, ice wraiths, hagravens, atronachs, Dwarven automatons, Dremora, dragons, vampires, werewolves, ghosts, the undead, mages, bandits, the Falmer, the Forsworn and the Thalmor.
• Mages here means warlocks and necromancers, and Dwarven automatons leave out ash spawn.
• A fear can start when a fight ends with you below a quarter of your health. It's about the enemy who last hit you hard: a power attack, or any hit while you were under half health.
• Even then it's a roll: about 3 fights in 11 that end like that leave you with the fear.
• You can't pick up a fear you already have, or one you've already beaten.
• When it happens the screen warps, your character reacts out loud, and a message box names the fear. Setting

Fears: what they do

• A fear only bites while your target in a fight is that kind of enemy. Then you deal a quarter less damage with weapons, and with Destruction and Restoration spells cast at others.
• Each time a fear flares you gain 10 stress, your character's breathing gives it away and the screen shifts.

Fears: how you beat one

• Kill the thing you fear. Each kill of that kind while the fear is flaring has a 1 in 10 chance of curing it.
• A fight that ends with that kind of enemy as the last one to hit you hard can also cure it, about 2 times in 11.
• Beating a fear removes it, plays the skill-up sound, takes 50 off your stress and gives you a lasting bonus: 10% more damage against that kind, with weapons and with Destruction and Restoration spells.
• Once beaten, that fear can never come back.

Lowering stress: food and drink

• Stress never wears off by itself; there's no timer that brings it down. Food, drink and the other things below are how you lower it.
• Comfort food takes off 10: sweet rolls, pies, crostatas, honey, butter, milk and cream, sweets, and soups and stews, hot or cold (beef, cabbage, potato, tomato, vegetable, horker and ash yam, goat cheese fondue, clam chowder, venison).
• Beyond Skyrim's Cyrodiil food counts too: Applewatch pie and cider, carrot cake, sweetcake, lollipops, mooncakes, Colovian beef stew, fish soup and the like take off 10.
• Ale, mead and wine take off 25: Ale, Mead, Black-Briar Mead, Honningbrew Mead, Alto Wine, red and white wine, Spiced Wine, Firebrand Wine, Colovian Brandy, Shein, Mazte, Stros M'Kai Rum, Ashfire Mead and more, plus Cyrodiil's ales, beers, brandies, meads and wines.
• GTS adds a few drinks of its own to the list: the Fellmoor wines, Dwarfsphere's wines, Loci Whiskey, Herbal Infusion and Jagga take off 25, and Kram Bam Bula 50.
• The strongest relief, 50, comes from a Homecooked Meal, the Ragged Flagon's specials (Velvet LeChance, White-Gold Tower, Cliff Racer), Sujamma, Mogo's Mead, Red Eagle's Rye, Wrothgarian Rum, and skooma or Balmora Blue.
• The relief lands a few seconds after you eat or drink, once the eating animation has played.
• Stress can't go below 0.

Lowering stress: other ways

• Praying at a shrine helps when the god grants you its blessing: the blessings of the Nine, Nocturnal, Auriel, Azura, Boethiah and Mephala each take off 10, and so do most of Pilgrim's added shrines. In GTS the shrines turn some people away, such as vampires, werewolves, people who've stolen a great deal and members of the Thieves Guild or Dark Brotherhood, and some Daedric shrines want deeds first.
• Feeding as a vampire takes off 25, and so does drinking a Potion of Blood, whoever drinks it.
• Catching a fish takes off 25.
• Washing with soap (Dirt and Blood) takes off 25.
• Skills of the Wild has a few: meditating outdoors takes off 25, cooking 10, and paying respects at a grave, cairn or pile of ash 10. Harvesting a body as a Wood Elf also takes off 10.
• Playing music well with Skyrim's Got Talent (lute, flute or drum) takes off 25.
• Immersive Interactions' little moments take off 25: petting a dog, clapping, reading a book that's worth something, and working out at a training dummy. Setting
• Exercising with the Stay In Shape power takes off 10.
• Beating a fear takes off 50. With the Ebony Blade under Mephala's curse, each friend you kill with it takes off 100.
• Caught Red Handed's quest expansion gives a stronger bonus after a night with Haelga, Experienced Lover's Comfort, which takes off 50. Unlike the usual sleep bonuses it isn't swapped out under Survival.

How it fits with the rest of GTS

• Survival's needs, Wounds and follower injuries don't feed stress, with one exception: a follower dying for good adds 50.
• Survival's hot soups and stews count as comfort food and take off 10 each.
• The GTS trait Unshaken only works while your stress is above 65, in the Severe or Critical bands.

Settings

• You can switch stress off in the Stress and Fear menu. That sets your stress to 0 and stops its effects and notes. Setting
• Stress still adds up quietly while it's switched off: hits, food, drink and the other things on this page keep changing the number. Switching it back on later can drop you straight into a band.
• Switching fear off stops new fears, turns off the ones you have (they still show in Active Effects, but do nothing), and turns off the bonus from the ones you've beaten. Setting
• Stress Rate sets how much each hit adds: Very Slow 0.25, Slow 0.5, Default 1, Fast 1.5, Very Fast 2. A power attack or a hit below half health always adds 1 on top. Setting
• Show Message Box picks how fear news reaches you: a box in the middle of the screen, or a note in the corner. The stress-level notes are always corner notes. Setting
• The Stress and Fear UI menu can hide the ring, the fear panel or its button hint, and change the panel's keys. Setting

GTS's setup

• GTS doesn't record any Stress and Fear settings of its own, so you start with the mod as it ships.
• The Balance Gear at the start asks you to pick Default Experience or Story Mode. Stress builds at the normal rate (1 a hit) unless you pick Story Mode, which makes an ordinary hit add 0.2; a power attack or a hit below half health then adds 1.2 instead of 2. Setting
• After Story Mode, the mod's own menu still shows Stress Rate as Default even though the real rate is 0.2. Picking a rate there replaces Story Mode's.

From base GTS 118's own files: the records as the game uses them, the mods' own settings files as Jay's collection ships them, and GTS's own menu setup. Each line was read by one reader and checked by a second. A line marked Setting is a menu or settings-file option: what it says is the default. Your own add-ons can change any of this.