Physical

Degeneration (3 points)

There’s something wrong with your body that prevents you from healing normally. Without medical treatment or magick, you don’t recover health levels at all — not even from bashing damage!

Horrific (5 points)

Your looks are truly the stuff of nightmares. Anyone who sees you when you aren’t heavily disguised will probably run away in a spasm of Lovecraftian terror. You have an effective Appearance of zero (probably lower than that), and any Social rolls are made at +3 difficulty unless you’re trying to terrify someone, in which case they’re at -3 difficulty instead.

Mental

Feral Mind (3 points)

In some ways you’re a lot closer to a wild animal than a human — you have little in the way of social graces or even social awareness when it comes to how people work. Your academic schools are at an early grade school level at best. You have animalistic reactions, see no reason why you should hide your feelings, and generally aren’t interested in the trappings of what people call “civilization”. On most Social rolls, raise your difficulty by 3 — although for intimidation, or other situations where being feral and dangerous comes in handy, your difficulty may be lowered by 3 instead. You may not have more than three dots in the Language Merit, and dots in Abilities like Technology or Computer will need an extraordinary explanation.

Supernatural

Beast Within (5 points)

You have a truly volcanic and unpredictable temper, one that makes you a danger to everyone around you. As with the Berserker Merit, when under intense stress (when disgraced, humiliated, or especially in combat), you have a chance to be overcome with battle-madness, gaining three Bruised health levels, ignoring wound penalties, and adding two dice to Strength and Stamina rolls … at the cost of being unable to distinguish ally from enemy, being unable to make any tactical or strategic plans or to employ magick (other than perhaps swinging a magical sword if you already have one in hand), and attacking literally anything that even seems like a threat until all enemies are defeated (or you are).

The difference with this Flaw is that it happens more often. A lot more often. Rather than rolling Willpower, you must instead roll your Avatar rating plus one die, against a difficulty of 8. Failure sends you into a berserk rage. Success means you keep hold on your temper, for now. (This is a change from the version in Book of Secrets, in which the difficulty is based on Willpower. The Book of Secrets version also does not forbid magick, but, since the Merit version explicitly does, we’re ruling that the 5-point Flaw also prevents it.).

Bizarre Hunger (2 to 5 points)

A required element in your diet is something that’s unusual, illegal, dangerous, or maybe just really weird. Whatever it is, you can go a number of days equal to your Stamina without consuming it, but for every day after that you lose one health level, which cannot be soaked or healed by normal means. Once you begin eating again, you regain one health level per day until you’re back at full health. 2 points in this flaw represents something that’s odd but not especially hard to get hold of; 3 points is something very unpleasant and quite possibly illegal; 4 points is something expensive and extremely specialized; and 5 points is exceptionally rare and probably dangerous to ingest at all. The Cast-Iron Stomach merit is strongly recommended as a companion for this Flaw, especially at higher levels.

Blood Magick (5 points)

Your magick won’t work without blood … your own blood, specifically. You suffer one unsoakable level of bashing damage through injuring yourself in some way any time you cast an Effect. Besides being potentially dangerous (take enough damage and it upgrades to lethal), you probably have an unsavory reputation among other magi.

Branded (3-5 points)

You’ve been found guilty of a crime by a Tribunal of Traditions magi, and marked with a sigil that indicates your crime. To people who can see that Brand and know what it means, it’s a strong indicator that you’re to be treated with (at the least) caution by right-thinking folk. 3 points indicates a temporary Brand, one for a Low Crime, which imposes a +1 difficulty on Social rolls against Tradition magi and a +2 if they’re particularly law-abiding; this Flaw must be bought off within 1-3 months if you have the XP, and ASAP if you don’t. 4 points is a longer-lasting Brand for a more serious crime, and imposes difficulty penalties of +2 or +3; it cannot be bought off any sooner than a year, and it is not mandatory to buy it off at all. 5 points is an effectively permanent Brand, imposing a +3 difficulty penalty and possibly marking you out for further punishment; this Brand cannot be bought off absent some truly extraordinary circumstances.

Crucial Component (2 to 5 points)

Your magick requires something highly specialized to work at all. Select a particular Sphere (one that you have dots in) when you take this Flaw; you must have your Crucial Component in order to create Effects tied to that Sphere. (You do gain the benefit of a Personalized Instrument when using it, and possibly also a Unique Instrument if the Component is unique.) For 2 points, the component in question is common and easy to find, but it’s not available absolutely everywhere; for 3 points, it’s uncommon and requires some effort to get hold of; for 4 points, it’s rare and extremely challenging to find; and for 5 points, it’s unique, probably irreplaceable, and damned near impossible to find without a quest.

Devil’s Mark (1 point)

You have a small but noticeable deformation somewhere on your body. It might be a reminder of a deal you made with some otherworldly creature, or it might just be one of those strange things that happen when you deal with magick. Regardless, it’s odd enough that anyone who sees it will look askance at you, and you may become a target for witch-hunters if people find out about it. On the positive side, this deformation doesn’t feel any pain, and creatures can use it to draw Quintessence out from your body. On the third hand, your agreement is not required for them to do so …

Faithless (5 points)

You’ve lost faith in your magick and its source, and, as a result, you are unable to use (or buy) any but the first dot of your Spheres. While the version in Book of Secrets restricts this flaw to characters whose magick comes from gods or godlike figures, as long as there’s some way for your character to have plausibly lost faith in their magick, TowersMUX staff is willing to work with you on this Flaw. Please think carefully before selecting it, however — buying off a 5-point Flaw is not an easy process (see XP and Advancement).

Locked Vidare (1 point)

When viewing the Penumbra (see Umbral Cosmology), you are restricted to viewing either the Spirit Wilds, the Astral Plane, or the Shadowlands (chosen when you select this Flaw), and you also find it difficult or impossible to cross the Gauntlet into any Penumbra other than this one. Even if you’re brought across by someone else, you tend to see the Penumbral landscape in terms suited to your particular choice of Vidare, and your travel tends to bring you and your companions toward that area of the Penumbra if you aren’t constantly vigilant.

Permanent Paradox Flaw (2, 4, or 6 points)

You suffer from a Paradox Flaw that won’t go away: 2 points for a trivial Flaw, 4 points for a minor, and 6 points for a significant. The M20 Core Rulebook, p.551, provides information on Paradox Flaws and their different levels of severity.

Phylactery (7 points)

Your very ability to wield magick resides in an object (or, more rarely, a creature or location). Without physical contact with this phylactery, you cannot use magick at all. See Book of Secrets, p. 94-96, for details on this Flaw.

Primal Marks (3 points)

You’ve been marked in some way by a powerful being — a god, spirit, mythical creature, or something else along those lines. Whether it’s a physical feature that calls your Avatar to mind, an uncanny resemblance to whatever sinister beast marked you in the first place, or a particular way of speaking and acting that’s a dead-on match for how people think Jim Jones did, it’s difficult or impossible to hide, it’s pretty obvious even when you change your shape, and it means it’s very difficult to go unrecognized. Even if you have Arcane, people will remember the way you’re marked by this Flaw, although they may not remember anything else. The marks cause you to suffer a +1 difficulty to all Social rolls involving a particular group to whom they’re especially alarming or offensive (selected when you take this Flaw).

Prone to Quiet (4 or 5 points)

You tend to drop into Quiet (see the M20 Core Rulebook, p.554-561) more regularly than other magi. For 4 points, Quiet is your default Paradox backlash, meaning any discharge of five points of Paradox sends you into Quiet automatically. For 5 points, in addition to the above effect, you must also roll Intelligence + Enigmas whenever you face a particularly stressful situation, or fall into Quiet (difficulty 6 minimum, up to 10 for life-threatening situations that you have little or no experience with.

Sphere Inept (6 points)

One Sphere, which must be a Sphere you actually take dots in play, costs 30% more than normal, rounded up — 13 XP for the first dot, 11 for the second, 21 for the third, 32 for the fourth, and 42 for the fifth. You cannot choose your Affinity Sphere as the subject of this Flaw.

Strangeness (1 point)

Once per day, while involved in a scene, roll your Arete against a difficulty of 6. If you fail, nothing happens. If you succeed, a minor magical effect that’s outside your control occurs — typically something related to your Affinity Sphere. Whatever it is, it’s something small and weird and inexplicable. If you botch, though, you suffer a Paradox backlash, expelling a number of Paradox equally to the dots you have in your Affinity Sphere, or the number of points in your Paradox pool, whichever is less.

Thaumivore (3 points)

You must consume at least one point of Quintessence or Tass per day, whether you’re doing any magick or not. If you don’t, you lose one health level per day missed, which cannot be soaked or healed by normal means, as well as a cumulative -1 to all dice pools per day. Once you start feeding again, the penalty decreases by 1 and you regain one health level per day until you’re back to normal.

Uncanny (1 to 5 points)

The opposite of the Arcane Background, this Flaw makes you extremely memorable. For each point in this Flaw, anyone rolling to notice or recognize you adds 1 to their dice pool. You can temporarily cover up your particular variety of Uncannyness with a successful Intelligence + Subterfuge roll (difficulty of 5 + the number of points in this Flaw). The explanatory +note for this Flaw should describe the way in which you’re particularly remarkable, and why you stick in the head.