What does an Enemy ''Watcher'' actually do?

[ajardoor]

Originally Posted by DeathDaisy

As I see it, a Rival is actively trying to sabotage you by intervening; write untrue smear articles in the case of a journalist, spread false rumors or call the cops just to harass you in the middle of the night in case of a nasty neighbor etc. While a Watcher won't seek to ruin you in that way, but will be vigilant and seize the opportunity if you actually mess up.

J. Jonah Jameson.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by DeathDaisy

As I see it, a Rival is actively trying to sabotage you by intervening; write untrue smear articles in the case of a journalist, spread false rumors or call the cops just to harass you in the middle of the night in case of a nasty neighbor etc. While a Watcher won't seek to ruin you in that way, but will be vigilant and seize the opportunity if you actually mess up.

I always thought it funny that story of the news men in the Old West that put a bulletin board that said, "Challenges excepted between eleven and twelve only". Apparently he assumed so many people in town wanted to try to kill him that he had to ORGANIZE them.

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Back in the day, though, studios invested a fair bit of effort in giving the impression that their leading men were NOT HOMOSEXUAL, whether for fear that they wouldn't appeal to female audiences otherwise, or that they wouldn't be regarded as believable action heroes.

That, of course, is Watcher plus Secret - another dangerously synergising pair of disadvantages. If someone takes Secret plus Watcher on 15-, it may be quite difficult for the GM to avoid making the Secret a bigger problem than it should be. Though the classic Hollywood "beard" is a useful management strategy.

Originally Posted by jason taylor

Enemy "Watcher"(Paparazzi) is a good one for any famous person. Maybe even mandatory depending on setting.

I recently ran across a little story showing how this works in real life, and how it feels for a basically innocent bystander to be caught by the edge of the spotlight beam. In GURPS terms, Taylor Swift clearly has Watcher on 15- (if not "Full Time"), is entirely capable of handling it, and can almost turn it into an advantage; it's actually a prerequisite when your Very Wealthy job is "Celebrity". It's just a weird life by normal private citizen standards.

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

... Shyness plus Watcher (Press) is one of those Really Bad Idea disadvantage combos, though GURPS doesn't have explicit rules for being driven to a nervous breakdown.

I would think the Fright Check rules would work, with discovery that one has been watched yet again as the event that triggers a check.

[evileeyore]

Paranoia plus Watcher has got to drive someone right up the wall.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Paranoia plus Watcher has got to drive someone right up the wall.

That could itself be a result of Shyness plus Watcher, or of having a Watcher that you don't know why they're watching you (knowing one is being stalked is not good for one's mental health, even if the stalker never does anything overt).

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by ajardoor

J. Jonah Jameson.

Eventually. There was a time when Jameson was hiring mercenaries and tele-operating robots to outright attack Spider-Man.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by robkelk

I would think the Fright Check rules would work, with discovery that one has been watched yet again as the event that triggers a check.

I think we're leaning into the more severe forms of social anxiety here, but that's a complex subject. There's social anxiety as in straight up "fear of groups of people" (treating them like an irrational physical threat - like a phobia of dogs makes you afraid of puppies even though they're not particularly dangerous), and then there's the more common form of social anxiety where the sufferer is afraid of what other people think about them. In GURPS they're probably both dealt with the phobia mechanics, it's just the subtleties of when the phobia is triggered and what kinds of quirks/disads you get from your fright checks that distinguishes them.

I think the first kind of person would still hate the Watcher but would probably be "ok-ish" as long as they're not currently in their hair, but the second kind would still have the horrors between encounters about if the Watcher is out there somewhere, judging them.

[Flyndaran]

Sometimes social anxiety can be "just" like someone turned up your metabolic volume and fear without any thoughts involved.
During a severe attack, I lost 13 lbs in 9 days while still eating. This was long before I developed an actual hyperthyroid which didn't feel as intense as that attack.

Fear is often very individual in cause, effect, and response. So much so, that Fear Checks never sound very realistic to me. I use them as they're better than nothing, of course.

[CoyoteGestalt]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

Not personally taking direct action to immediately harm the watched isn't the same as "doing nothing".

It's also worth keeping in mind that a watcher can be a treasure trove of information for bad guys that themselves are more of the direct-action type. Someone that knows everything about you, your habits, and your weaknesses, and has no reason not to tell those bad guys can certainly be disadvantageous.

For an interesting variant, the risk doesn't even have to be that they expose your activities intentionally. A well-intentioned biographer of a socially prominent PC, or a nosy relative who's a compulsive diarist, could be a menace in this way just because they keep records of what you do and don't have very good security (either physical or electronic) on their notes, so some hostile party (whether a short-term opponent or another Enemy) could find out what you're doing by snooping on the Watcher instead.

In some settings, such a Watcher might even be your helpful house AI trying to predict your needs, or your enchanted magic-school yearbook that keeps a record of their graduates' adventures.