I'm having a little trouble reconciling Inhumanity with Intimidation. A character with Inhumanity suffers a negative to the reactions of non-similar others (lets say -2); this makes perfect sense when the character is trying to be charming, as an inhuman face is hard to trust. If a lizardman approached me and offered to sell me something, I'd think twice about it, regardless of it being a good deal. However, it doesn't make as much sense with Intimidation; between a human using Intimidation and an otherwise equal lizardman using Intimidation, I would think that the ugly, inhuman monster would be the more threatening when he suggests tearing off your legs as an alternate solution. Instead, the lizardman is actually less intimidating.
Maybe it's me being speciesist, but inhuman creatures seem more naturally intimidating. Are there any rules that allow a reaction bonus when using inhumanity to invoke fear?
I am not an Autarch, but one possible interpretation is that the inhuman creature may be more fearsome, but is less good at using that fear to get what they want.
A lizardman might be more convincing that they’re going to kill you, but people might be more likely to respond with something along the lines of “Go ahead, monster, I will fight you to the death!” instead of “Please don’t kill me here’s what you wanted!”
Or perhaps they give it the wrong thing, handing over all their money instead of telling him what he wanted to know.
Also not an Autarch, but this seems to be a good place to just do what seems reasonable and not worry about the specific wording of the rules. I might not offer a bonus, but I don't think the penalty to reaction rolls would apply in that circumstance. Every campaign is a law unto itself! :)
I concur with both of the above sentiments. There are certainly situations where Inhumanity could be a help to Intimidation, and others where it would remain a hindrance.
Still, that does make sense. A lizardman is one kind of inhumanity (an obvious monster), which may work for him to intimidate others, or at least not count against him. A fairy, on the other hand, is a completely different kind of inhumanity, so it would work against; trying to intimidate someone when you're a flighty pint-sized creature isn't going to work out well. Of course, now I have to figure out a good rule for my mighty lizardman... ignore inhumanity? Ignore half? If only I had a table for this!
For pure, brute force intimidation against humans (i.e., "Back off or I pull yer f***ing limbs off and beat you to death wit' 'em!"), I'd give In'umanity a +2 bonus. Seven feet tall and bulletproof is scary, no questions asked.
For anything that requires subtlety, a -2 penalty is in order. For one thing, the Thrassian's ability to insinuate is somewhat lacking when the target can't pick up on the pheremone markers. For another, a human's ability to make a detailed risk/reward assessment is seriously compromised by the presence of a primordial fight-or-flight instinct. So if your scare tactic doesn't work, you've escalated the situation directly to violence.
Some stuff might run up against both modifiers, in which case they cancel each other out and you roll it straight.