Frightened is terrible

[keeper2161]

So I have making a Pow character and the guide I read kept saying how good frightened is. I think its terrible. Sure they can't take turns and they run which causes AoO but they run from the battle. Sure you might kill the creature when it runs but if it lives it ruins as fast as it can away. You have to chase after them. Plus they might get their friends. So you might have a lot more people then you can handle. My group has never really done the frightened inside of combat. We mainly use it at the start of combat to avoid combat. The few times we have used it it was to it easier to run. Because if both the party and monsters run in fear of each other then it just makes a better story. What does everyone else think?

[Malroth]

It's much better to frighten some of the enemies in a multiple enemy group. If for example a boss fight had minions with healing and dispel wands they continually used to support the BBEG, frightenign them would take them out of the fight easier and faster than hp damage or save vs loose spells directed at them would. Also imagine fighting a phalnax of hobgoblins in which you only frightened the front row who then had to retreat through their friends in order to escape.

[Segev]

So I have making a Pow character and the guide I read kept saying how good frightened is. I think its terrible. Sure they can't take turns and they run which causes AoO but they run from the battle. Sure you might kill the creature when it runs but if it lives it ruins as fast as it can away. You have to chase after them. Plus they might get their friends. So you might have a lot more people then you can handle. My group has never really done the frightened inside of combat. We mainly use it at the start of combat to avoid combat. The few times we have used it it was to it easier to run. Because if both the party and monsters run in fear of each other then it just makes a better story. What does everyone else think?

Frightened only seems bad by your own formulation if a) you want to be sure to kill the creature and/or b) you're concerned that they'll raise an alarm.

A lot of the time, all you need in a fight is for the enemy to stop fighting you and go away. Frightened accomplishes that quite nicely. It's a save/lose condition.

[heavyfuel]

[...] they run from the battle. [...] they might get their friends.

They can already do that even if they're not Frightened. Making them Frightened only forces them to do that.

If there was an alarm to be raised or friends to be gotten, why the hell would the opponent stay and fight you on his own? He wouldn't. Not unless it was somehow in his best interest to fight you alone. So now you force them to act in a way that's not in their best interest.

Also, good positioning on the "frightener's" part can make the enemy run away from where you'd expect more enemies to be, in fact forcing them to run away from their friends

I fail to see how Frightened isn't a terrific condition to inflict.