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View Full Version : Original System [Pact by Wildbow] Looking for Designers



unknownmercury
2016-10-11, 10:55 PM
Looking for 2-3 more people to help design a system based off of Wildbow's Pact (http://pactwebserial.wordpress.com) universe. Will basically be building it from the ground up. Preferably people who know what they're doing (but I don't, so it's whatever). You don't have to supply credentials, but if you have a background in game design, you're more likely to get invited to help.

Also looking for playtesters for the system once it gets far enough along. I'll probably invite about ten people, but we'll see what happens.

Grod_The_Giant
2016-10-13, 07:01 AM
I suggest customizing a generic system/engine like Fate or d6, rather than building from the ground up. Much less work, simpler balance concerns, and easier to find players that way.

Landis963
2016-10-13, 07:17 AM
FATE would actually be pretty good at Pact, I think. (Also seconding what mercury said: I tried this with Worm and it didn't exactly work)

JeenLeen
2016-10-13, 10:04 AM
An idea like this came up on the forums a while ago, and got me thinking. I've designed a dice-light system that is more inspired by Pact than directly trying to emulate its systems. The main difference is trying to quantify how much magical energy a person has a given time and making it how it costs experience to buy ranks of magic. It's a lot harder to be someone who uses a bit of Glamour, some Necromancy, and a decent bit of Scourge, like we see in the book with at least one character.

Also, what magic can do is somewhat fluffed. You are a apprentice, adept, or master, and that means you can do generally more or less the same stuff. An elementalist adept is about as good at attacking folk as a sympathetic adept.

It's also definitely in draft form. Magic types in particular are not written out completely.

Feel free to borrow any of this you'd like. Main inspirations are oWoD Werewolf's renown for the karma system, Exalted for the health track, and the Sam & Fuzzy RPG for how 'Rule of Three' and Strangeness are implemented.

Pact Game System v2
This is a dice-light system. You do have statistics, but they are either compared or simply used to determine what you can do. These rules document will describe the general setting, then go through the character sheet in order to explain the rules.
When dice are used, a d10 is rolled and a 6 or higher is a success.

Some mechanics (such as regaining power and karma) may work differently for non-humans.

Draft Character Sheet:
Name:
Current Power:
Personal Power Pool: Additional Power Pool:

Physical Status
Magically Enhanced
Healthy
Hurt
 Injured (movement slowed)
Crippled (+1 Contagion, movement greatly slowed)
Immobile (+2 Contagion, cannot move beyond slow crawl)
X Dead/Unconscious

Contagion Risk:

Strangeness:
Rule of Three: 
Fight: Defend:

Karma

-3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3
Bad karma Good karma
 

Skills



Tricks


Tools






Contagion 
General Setting

The spirits don’t care about good and evil. They care about right and wrong.

Terminology
• Karma – the general rule of reality. Translate into luck, how people react to you, etc. Someone who does good, keeps their word, and so on accrues good karma and the spirits of reality help you. Someone who lies, cheats, steals, etc. accrues bad karma and things just turn badly over time.
Karma cares more about supernatural beings than mundane ones.
The DM may roll for luck or if a person responds favorably. One’s karma rating is added to this roll.
• Practitioner – a human who can practice magic. As part of using magic, practitioners lose the ability to lie. (Or, rather, they can lie, but doing so drains power and forsaking an oath is very dangerous.)
• Other – a non-human. Includes goblins, faeries, demons, mythic beasts, undead, bogeymen, etc. Definitions are hard and can be misleading, so this turn is used for non-humans. Sometimes the line between practitioner and Other gets blurred as well. Others also cannot lie or they suffer as practitioners do.
• Council – the formal meeting of Practitioners and Others in a city. Generally, a city is ruled by a council (the leaders of various bodies of equal strength) or a Lord (one supernatural who rules). Either way, they generally hold Council once or twice a month, maybe weekly for big cities. In most cities, there is a ban on conflict for x-hours before or after a Council, so enemies can talk in peace. Breaking said ban is bad karma and gives all in the city free reign to attack you.
• Mundane – general term for non-practitioner, non-Others. Karma cares less about them, they can lie, and they can bypass most wards. Includes Innocents, Blackguards, and Witch Hunters (described below).
• Innocent – a human ignorant (or mostly ignorant of) the supernatural. They tend to naturally not notice supernatural things or to justify them after-the-fact. Innocents are afforded special protections, as it is bad karma for Others to attack them. Introducing an Innocent to the supernatural is bad karma.
• Blackguard – an Innocent who knows some about the supernatural but not enough to lose the protections afforded an Innocent. Generally acts as an ally to Practitioners, since they can lie.
• Witch Hunter – a human who fights Others and Practitioners. Not Innocent. Generally employed by a city’s Council to keep Others and Practitioners who get out of hand in check.
• Dreamer – euphemistic term for an Innocent who knows too much and no longer has the protections afforded them, but lacks the magic of a Practitioner or the training of a Witch Hunter. Many Others consider them food.
• Contagion – being contaminated by magical energy and/or possessed by spirits. Normally, it is safe to perform magic, but in certain circumstances it risks contagion. Enough contagion can turn someone into an Other.
• Rule of Three/Seven/Twelve – numbers hold power. “Third time’s the charm” holds true. If you win three victories over someone, that holds more power than winning two or four.
• Skills – magical knowledge. Skills are divided into three ranks: Apprentice, Adept, and Master.
• Trick – a simple magical trick you know. Basically, it’s an apprentice-rank spell you know without actually being an apprentice, like knowing how to bind a simple ghost without any ranks in Necromancy. (See “Skills” section for info on how many tricks a person can know.)
• Tools – magical tools. Can include magical places and allies.
• Focus – a unique magical tool. Each practitioner can choose one focus, which shapes their magic.
• Domain – a ritually-claimed domain. Each practitioner can claim one domain, a place where reality follows their will.
• Familiar – a magically-bonded ally. Each practitioner can bond with an Other, creating a life-long bond that (at least ideally) benefits both.
• Forsworn – a practitioner or Other who breaks an oath can be declared forsworn. Sometimes this happens automatically as the spirits of the world judge the oath-breaker; other times someone has to declare them forsworn and the spirits judge. (The spirits get annoyed and give bad karma for being nagged, so falsely declaring someone forsworn is costly.) A forsworn person loses all power, magical ability, good karma, and protections. Killing them has no penalty.
• Abyss – one of many terms for where the forgotten go. It takes various forms, from a wasteland to a sewer to a hellscape, but it is a land of entropy, corruption, and ruin. Someone who loses all ties to reality may fall there. Very dark Others can be called forth from there.
• Demon – a type of Other. Generally, agents of destroying reality in one way or another. Corruption risk increases when around demons (at least if unwarded.) Practitioners who summon or deal with them are called Diabolists.
• Celestials – a type of Other, also called angels. Seem to have helped create the world, they oppose demons and fight against entropy. Often work with Inquisitors.
• Goblin –a type of Other. Generally stupid (if cunning) and crude, and always violent, ugly, and smelly. Weak to refinement. Practitioners who bind or work with them are called Goblin Kings/Queens.
• Faerie – a type of Other. Use glamour to reshape themselves and others. Faerie Courts exist in parallel realities (or perhaps are just Domains that have been reshaped and enlarged over time.) Weak to crude things. They often make deals with practitioners to serve as familiars.
• Ghost – a type of Other. Usually a psychic echo left after a traumatic event, mostly but not always one’s death. Sometimes an actual soul that hasn’t moved on. Practitioners who bind them are called Necromancers.
• Bogeyman – a type of Other. General name for Others that come from or were shaped by the Abyss. Practitioners who summon them are called Scourges.
• Elemental – a type of Other. A spirit that embodies a certain element or substance. Practitioners who bind or work with these are called Elementalists.
• Gods – a type of Other, but one usually not seen. Some ‘small gods’ exist, but these are perhaps better called elementals or just strong, sentient spirits. Gods like Dionysius and Zeus employ practitioners, giving them divine power in exchange for favors. Such are called Acolytes.
• Inquisitors – a type of practitioner. Like acolytes, they use divine power, but they draw it from one of the major monotheistic religions. They also tend to work against all other practitioners and Others, though they reserve special hatred for diabolists and demons. Often only begrudgingly allowed to operate in a city.

The setting is our world, but underneath the mundane there is the supernatural. It’s not exactly safe to define the supernatural, although terms are used. Something might be called a faerie, but another calls it a goblin, or a demon. Titles can cause confusion, so supernaturals are generally called Others.

Power always comes at a cost, though. Most magic works through deals with Others. A necromancer negotiates with ghosts, and the cost of their service is whatever oaths he makes to bind them. Some are more subtle or esoteric. A chronomancer must sacrifice some of his time in order to cast spells that manipulate time, and an enchanter starts to see all relationships as threads to manipulate, making even her own relationships appear as movable threads. Someone who calls upon a god may lose that god’s favor if he fails or the god deems him to have been unwise.

Power Pool
You use ‘power’ to cast spells. This is called different names by different practitioners, but it is your source of energy. Your personal power pool is equal to 8 plus any bonuses from having a focus or familiar. Your additional power pool equals any power from tools.

You can use your blood to fuel spells, replenishing 2 power and taking 1 point of damage. Using blood also increases your contagion risk by 1, since you are carving out spiritual essence from your body, which opens a path spirits can take to get in. (That’s also why, if you are badly injured, you have a higher chance of contagion.)

Having a focus increases your personal power by 2-6.
Having a familiar increases your personal power by 1-3. You can also give power to your familiar or drain its stores of power.
Many tools increase your additional power pool by 1-3.
Your domain (and some tools) naturally accumulate power, that you can draw upon to restore your power pool.

If you have at least four hours of centering rest, you regain 4 power each day. This rate is doubled if you are in your domain.

• Spending Power
A spell’s cost in power depends on its rank. It costs 1 power to cast an apprentice-level spell, 2 to cast an adept-level spell, and 3 to cast a master-level spell. You can spend additional power, which helps assure the spells succeeds (makes it harder to counter) and increases its power. Details are covered in the “Skills” section.

Power can be spent on “The Sight”. Practitioners can turn on a magical sight, that lets them more easily see Others as they are (removing the veil Innocents see). It also lets them see the connections between themselves and others.
Without magical interference, you can see anyone paying attention to you and how much they are paying attention to you.
Lift rules from old document. In essence, both sides can spend power to break or increase connection.
(Note: Enchanters and Illusionists can do much more with the Sight, including directing others’ attention.)

Power can be spent on or against wards. See details under the “Skills” section.

The rituals to create a focus, domain, or familiar can cost power. This is covered under “Tools”.

Your focus increases the cost of some spells while decreasing the cost of others. If you perform a magical act in line with your focus, the act costs 1 less power if you incorporate your focus into the casting. For example, summoning forth a goblin while swinging your focus sword. (This means you can perform apprentice spells for free.) If the spell is contrary to your focus, regardless of whether you incorporate it or not, a spell costs an additional power. Your focus shapes you, and it makes such magic simply harder for you to cast.
This modification to cost includes spells, the Sight, rituals, and wards.


Physical Stats

• Health – the checkboxes note how healthy you are. If your last unchecked box is Crippled, you suffer a +1 to contagion risk. At Maimed, this increases to +2. If all your boxes are checked, you are dead or unconscious, depending on the narrative.
• Contagion Risk – this is the risk of contagion occurring, ranging from 0 to 10. It defaults to 0.
Mechanically, if you have 1+ Contagion risk, anytime you do something magical, the DM rolls a d10. If the result is equal to or lower than your contagion risk, you suffer contagion. The higher your contagion risk, the more extreme the contagion. The type of contagion depends on the spell you cast, what is happening around you, and what tools you have. (For example, if you have a lot of bound ghost on you, you might get a skeletal look even if you weren’t using necromancy.)

Being in the Abyss or around demons increases Contagion Risk. The DM will not necessarily tell you when or by how much this is increased.
Contagion Risk is usually increased when the player decides to use blood to gain power.
• Strangeness and Rule of Three
Your Strangeness reflects how mortal you are. Innocents and Blackguards have Strangeness 0. Most Practitioners and Witch Hunters have Strangeness 1. See chart below.
0 = Innocent, Blackguard
1 = Dreamer, most Practitioners
2 = Others who can pass as mundane (familiars in animal form), somewhat-Other practitioners
3 = most Others, ghosts, goblins, practitioners who are basically Others
4 = demons, very inhuman Others (mythic beasts), strong goblins
5 = utterly alien Others, powerful demons

If you are fighting something stranger than you, you can invoke the Rule of Three to avoid damage or guarantee a hit. See “Fight and Defend,” below. You can use a given method twice; if you use it a third time, “Third time’s the charm” comes into play and what you try to do fails.
• Fight and Defend (combat stats)
These reflect one’s ability to inflict physical harm (through whatever means) and to avoid physical harm (through dodging or parrying). These are abstract terms, incorporating a combination of physical ability, training, and intuition.

0 = average person who doesn’t really get into fights
1 = thug who knows how to throw a punch, person who took/internalized some self-defense
2 = experienced thug, cops, relatively weak Others
3 = most goblins or combat-oriented Others, highly trained fighters, most Witch Hunters
4 = strong Others, world-class fighters
5+ = very strong Others. Humans cannot reach this rank naturally.

Most practitioners don’t personally fight, instead using summoned or bound creatures, or they use a Fight value boosted by magic (an elemental flame or magically-guided bullets).

During an attack, the attacker rolls Fight + Karma and the defender rolls Defend + Karma. (On a tie, whoever has better karma succeeds. If that is tied, both parties suffer 1 damage.) If the attacker has more successes than the defender, it does that many levels of damage.
The spirits like theatrics, so you can get bonus dice through good description and roleplaying.

If one party is stranger than the other, it can invoke the Rule of Three to override the rolls and automatically succeed (dodging an attack, or doing at least 1 damage if trying to hit). It must shift tactics on the third time to not automatically fail.
Players must decide to use the Rule of Three before the dice are rolled. If the attacker is using Rule of Three to hit, they should still roll to see if they do more than 1 damage.

During character creation, PCs start with 2 points to distribute between Fight and Defend.
You can spend six months of training time to gain a +1 to Fight or Defend. Contagion can increase this at a cost of your humanity.

Karma
Karma is how much the world likes you and how the spirits that maintain reality feel about you. A Karma rating goes from -3 to 3. By default, you start with 0 Karma. It is possible to inherit the karmic debt from somebody, such as the heir of a magical line would when their predecessor dies, thereby giving karma that is not one’s own.

As the game advances, players should be awarded good or bad karma based on their actions. This gives ‘temporary karma’, displayed as Good Karma and Bad Karma on the character sheet. If you get 10 good karma, you get +1 Karma; likewise, if 10 bad karma, -1 Karma. You cannot have good and bad karma at the same time; for example, if you have 1 good karma and do something that gives you 2 bad karma, you wind up with 1 bad karma (1-2=-1).

Design Note: this is based off Renown from World of Darkness’ Werewolf, but with a ‘negative’ renown added in.

The following things give good and bad karma. Listed here are also costs to power, for those that have them.
Revealing supernatural to an Innocent: -5 karma.
Killing (includes indirectly, if obvious about it)
o Killing outside of a declared combat or for self-defense: add -2 to amount below

o Killing an Innocent (includes Blackguards): -10
o Killing a Dreamer: -5
o Killing a Practitioner or Witch Hunter: -2
o Killing an Other: -1
o Killing someone forsworn – no penalty
Lying
o Break a sworn oath – become forsworn. -30.
o Unintentionally lying (sarcasm, white lie, made a declaration (“You can’t leave”) that turns out false) – lose 4 power. -4 karma.
o Intentionally lying – lose all power. -6 karma.
o Generally using a lot of misdirection, deception, etc. (making the spirits work to understand if you’re lying) – -1 per month.
Note: if you lie within your domain, the power and karma penalties are halved.
On oaths: an oath does not have to be formal. It is a promise you make to another, including those made in haste or without formal declaration.
Theft
o Stealing: -1 to -3, depending on value of goods (anything to real expensive/valued)
o Stealing a focus: -5 karma
Hospitality (rules of being a guest offered food or water)
o Gross violation of hospitality (attacking a guest): -5 karma
o Minor violation of hospitality (being really rude to a host): -2 karma
o Rejecting hospitality: -1 karma
o Offering hospitality to a foe, with no benefit: +2 karma
o Offering hospitality to a neutral party, with no benefit: +1 karma
Helping Others
o Guiding someone you introduced to the supernatural: +4 karma.
o General good deeds (almsgiving, soup kitchen): +1 per month
For balance purposes, doing enough to count means you don’t have enough time to spend that month on magical study.
o Sparing a defeated foe (doesn’t count if you bind them): +1 to +3
o Significantly helping another for no gain: +1 to +3
Keeping your Word
o Making a formal, solemn oath: +1 karma.
If you make several or frivolously, the spirits get annoyed and this stops working. In other words, don’t try to game the system unless your character is also trying to.
o Fulfilling an oath: +1 to +3, depending on nature of the oath
o Generally being honest and straight-forward: +1 per month
Cool theatric declarations or actions accompanying declarations: +1

NOTE: If you fulfill an oath to kill someone, that does balance out with the karmic damage from killing them. Also, practitioners do intentionally build up good karma so they can kill someone when they need to. In general, though, they try to avoid killing.
Also, the spirits are ‘stupid’, in a sense, so if you set someone up to be killed by someone else or to kill themselves, the spirits likely won’t realize you are responsible. (It might be a Luck roll.)

Skills

Skills reflect your skill and training in different magical arts. At character creation, it is recommended to start PCs with Magic 1, another skill at 2, and another at 1. Skills range from 1-3: Apprentice, Adept, and Master.
DESIGN NOTE: to a degree, the type of magic is fluff. If you the player can envision how the PC can use a magic type to accomplish something, the PC should be able to. These are guidelines about what rank of knowledge one needs to accomplish so-strong a spell.

It takes 1 round to cast an apprentice spell, 2 for adept, and 3 for master. You can take other actions while casting a spell, but not other magical actions (warding, casting another spell, etc.)

In general, apprentice rank can change things so that, without magical counteraction, you can succeed at something you’d normally fail but that is humanly possible (land without injury, door happens to be unlocked, etc.). Apprentice rank can modify Fight/Defend by 1, directly do 1 point of damage, summon a weak minion, or do a 2-Fight attack. At this rank, you can create mild inconveniences; for example, an enchanter could make a cop suspicious enough of somebody to question them, creating a delay.

In general, adept rank can allow you to do something humanly impossible. It can modify Fight/Defend by 2, directly do 3 points of damage, summon moderate minions, or do a 4-Fight attack. At this rank, you can generally greatly inconvenience something at what they are trying to accomplish; for example, an enchanter could make cops suspicious of somebody, enough to try arresting them even if no evidence and to attack you if there is evidence.

In general, master rank can allow you to do the impossible. It can modify Fight/Defend by 4, directly do 5 points of damage, summon powerful minions, or do a 6-Fight attack. At this rank, you can just really screw folk over. For example, an enchanter could make normal people revile you, or cause your familiar to turn against you if there’s any ill feelings. Or a chronomancer could freeze you in time. When fighting a master, using your own power to counter-act their spells or to ward yourself is important.

• Magic – general knowledge of magical techniques, rituals, etc. This determines the base strength of any wards or bindings you make. Also, you can know up to 4*Rank tricks. Lastly, any Apprentice or higher ranked person can do the rituals to bond a focus, domain, or familiar. It is rare for a practitioner not to at least be an apprentice in general magical knowledge.
• Shamanism – knowledge of runes and acts that appease and negotiate with spirits that are the underpinning of reality. A very versatile type of magic, it lacks direct combat application and summons.
o Apprentice – can write runes on something to let the spirits something lighter, heavier, more durable, etc. Can modify Fight or Defend by 1.
o Adept – can write runes that change how things works. Can break or allow something to operate beyond normal means. Create an aura of silence via a silence rune, etc.
o Master – can alter the fundamental reality of things by convincing local spirits they are otherwise. This can also make spirits ignore some bad karma.
Note: if you spend blood to power a rune, you can trace a rune in the air and it takes effect.
If a rune is destroyed, the spell ends.
• Glyphs – knowledge of wards and bindings. While all practitioners can make basic wards and bindings, this path focuses on using it for a variety of things. The downside of this art is that it takes preparation time; many, however, have pre-made glyphs written on scrolls, boxes, etc.
A user of glyphs can use their Glyph rank instead of Magic rank to determine base strength of wards.
• Chronomancy –
• Illusions – magic of misdirection and false appearances.
• Enchantment – magic of connections
o Apprentice – can see the connections between others and spend power to influence and direct them.
o Adept – can now modify connections between things, such as helping a bullet find its target by increasing the connection between them, or make someone slip by disconnecting them from the ground.
o Master – can change the nature of connections (attention to hate, or love to distrust) and forge connections
The basic strength of your Sight is your increased by your Enchantment rank. See The Sight for details.
• Augury – In the short-term, it is very helpful for landing a hit or avoiding damage.
o Can get a sense if a future action is safe/wise or not. Can increase Fight/Defend by 2 by foreseeing where to move.
o Can divine the near future, seeing most likely outcomes of events. Can increase Fight/Defend by 3.
o Effectively can see the future with clarity, including knowing what outcome your actions will most likely cause. Can increase Fight/Defend by 5.
• Sympathy – knowledge of manipulating reality by using power to enforce sympathetic relationships between like things.
• Goblin Lore – s
o Apprentice – can bind goblins.
o Adept – can force goblins to take the form of a weapon or be sealed in small objects
o Master -
You can use your Goblin Lore rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of bindings/wards against goblins.
• Faerie Lore – s
You can use your Faerie Lore rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of bindings/wards against fey.
• Necromancy – knowledge of ghosts. Used primarily to bind and bargain, though adepts and masters can take on ghostly attributes.
You can use your Necromancy rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of bindings/wards against ghosts.
• Diabolism – knowledge of demons, though masters can take on demonic attributes. Used primarily to bind and bargain.
You can use your Diabolism rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of bindings/wards against demons.
• Elementalism – knowledge of elementals and magic handling elements through commanding the spirits
You can use your Elementalism rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of binding/wards against elementals.
• Scourge Lore – knowledge of the Abyss, its denizens, and the magic of entropy and decay
You can use your Scourge Lore rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of bindings/wards against bogeymen and others tainted by the Abyss.
• Acolyte Training – training in channeling divine powers of a particular deity.
You can use your Acolyte Training rank instead of Magic to determine the base strength of bindings/wards against Others linked to your deity.
NA for PCs.
• Inquisitor Training – training in channeling divine powers.
You can use your Inquisitor Training rank instead of Magic to determine base strength of bindings/wards against celestials.
NA for PCs





EDIT: forgot to mention that I changed the name of some things, mainly since I didn't like them or couldn't remember how to spell them. So an 'implement' is called a focus and a 'demense' a domain.
Also, here are the rules from an earlier version I tried to write up on Tools and The Sight/warding. They refer sometimes to some stats I dropped from the current version. This was a more... well, you had stats and skills like in Vampire: The Masquerade.


Items of Power

Each practitioner can have three major tools: their Focus, their Familiar, and their Domain. Once chosen, the Focus and Familiar cannot be changed. It is a difficult and soul-damaging process to abandon a Domain, but it can be done. (Mechanically, your Cope and Deal are permanently lowered by 1.)
A practitioner can have other items as well, generally called Tokens, Founts, or Vessels.

Things are generally ranked as lesser, modest, or greater. Part of what determines this is how much power is spent when creating the object. (Note that, generally, this power can be regenerated normally.) For this reason, some practitioners have only one of their major tools as a greater tool.
• Spend 1-5 power to create a Lesser tool, 5-10 to create a Modest tool, or 11+ to create a greater tool.
• Anyone with a magic rank of 1 or higher can do the ritual to create a Lesser or Modest tool. To create a Greater one, rank 2 is required.

• Focus – an item that resonates with the practitioner and shapes how their magic works and how the practitioner is viewed by the spiritual world. Magical workings in line with the Focus take 1 less power to fuel while using the Focus, while workings opposed to the Focus cost an extra power (whether or not you use the Focus). For example, a sword focus would help with many offensive magicks if you involve it in the casting, but make it harder to act defensively at all times.
Depending on the power invested in a focus and how fitting it is to the practitioner, a focus can be judged as Lesser, Modest, or Greater. This corresponds to increasing the practitioner’s power pool by 2, 4, or 6.
If you lose your Focus, your power pool is temporarily decreased by the amount it gives you. The universe knows your Focus belongs to you, so beings are generally hesitant to steal it, but they can safely keep it apart from you if you are captured.
• Familiar – an Other that agrees to a mutually-binding ritual. The Other gains an animal form it can freely turn into, enjoying the benefits of mortality, while not needing to feed to replenish power. Familiars are also very hard to kill, almost always recovering from harm in time even if slain. The practitioner gains an ally, an increase to their power pool, and a source to draw power from. (The familiar can draw power from its master, but rarely does.) A familiar has a personal power pool based on its stats, which the master can draw from as an action. The Other’s power impacts whether it is Lesser, Modest, or Greater. A weak spirit can only become a lesser familiar, no matter how much power is used when making the ritual. Most strong spirits will refuse to become a lesser or modest familiar.
When its master dies, the Other is released from the familiar ritual and becomes what it was before.
It is unwise to take a familiar that is too powerful. Sometimes an Other has a practitioner perform the familiar ritual, but the familiar is the real master.
• Domain – an area that works to the practitioner’s will. This ritual is dangerous because it sends a beacon to the surrounding area, calling any to challenge the practitioner. The practitioner must win any challenges, either through victory or by striking a bargain. The larger the domain, the greater the range of the call and the greater the rank the domain has. The ritual to claim a domain only costs 1 power (an exception to the general rule), but the larger one’s domain the harder others will fight to challenge you.
Reality works with the owner of a domain. You can warp reality (slowly – no combat application) to fit your needs and will. Also, the spirits there natural work with you; your magic gets +1 successes, while others suffer -1. And, while you cannot lie safely, small, accidental lies (a white lie, sarcasm) might not drain your power.
A domain gathers power and acts as a storage one can draw upon. A lesser domain (such as a room) can store up to 5 power and generates 1 point/day, a modest one (such as a building) up to 10 at 2/day, and a greater one (such as a city block) up to 15 at 3/day. Legendary domains are said to exist, but extremely rare.
You can only draw upon this power in your domain, pulling it into yourself to replenish your power pool. (Your familiar can also do this.) You can create a Key, permanently lowering your power pool by 1 to create a tool that lets you draw upon your domain’s power from outside it. The most traditional one is a literal key ritually tied to the domain, letting you tap into it by putting the key in any door.
• Token – a token is, in a sense, a weaker form of the Focus. They are generally created when besting an Other or practitioner and choosing part of their power as a reward. The Other’s power pool is permanently decreased, and you gain a token giving that power to you. Lesser = +1 to Greater = +3.
• Fount – a weaker form of a domain. It is an object or place that generally power. These are often naturally places of magic or, like tokens, objects won in contest. Instead of increasing the power pool, they generate power/day (Lesser = 2/day, Modest = 4/day, and Greater = 8/day); the giver suffers a permanent loss of power from 1-3, as with tokens. Unlike tokens, the power can only be used for things related to the fount and generally take a process to prepare. For example, a fount made of a fairy’s hair could be used to make ink for glamours, but not for other purposes. Once processed, the whatever that is made loses efficacy after a day, so no storing it up a lot for future use.
DESIGN NOTE: they give more power than tokens, but it is for limited use.
• Vessel – an object used to bind an Other. This generally serves one of two purposes: 1) to create a magical weapon or tool, or 2) to have a way to carry an Other until you want it to act on your behalf. Generally, these are created when you bind an Other, either after conflict or as a result of a deal.
For example, you bind a ghost that died of exposure to cold. The axe now does ice damage, and you can release the ghost temporarily to have it assault others with cold and despair. Or, in a more esoteric sense, you bind a time elemental into a watch. Its power lets you, once per day, rewind time to let you dodge an attack that had hit.
The power of it depends on the power used to bind the Other into the Vessel. This can be expensive, as you may have already spent power to call the Other or generate wards for safety while negotiating.
Note: a vessel can be used as a token or fount, letting one draw upon the power of the creature housed within instead of letting it use its power for your benefit.




The Sight – all practitioners can, with a little training, learn to turn on or off an extra sense, generally called the Sight. For some, it is literally viewing things differently, but for others it is a smell or some more obscure sensory information. Whatever its form, it lets you see the relationships between others, see spirits, and see the inner reflection of people and things.
When rolling to see if you notice something difficult, roll your Perception + Magic. You can substitute a specialization, if looking for something related to that specialty.

Connections – when using the Sight, you can see connections between yourself and others. While Enchantment focuses on this art, any practitioner can use power to try to strengthen or weaken their personal connections, making it easier to see others or harder to be seen.
Roll Cope + Magic (or Enchantment, if higher) to see connections between yourself and others. You can spend power to gain automatic successes.
Roll Deal + Magic (or Enchantment, if higher) to sever connections between yourself and others. You can spend power to gain automatic successes.

Simple rituals – all practitioners can perform some basic magicks without any specialized training. It takes training, but a Magic rank of 1 is sufficient. This includes the rituals to create a Domain, bond a Familiar, or create one’s Focus. These rituals do not cost power in themselves, but you can invest power to make a more powerful domain, familiar, or focus. Rules are later in this document.

Calling – names have power, and by calling out someone’s name, you can get their attention. You generally have to be within 10 miles to be ‘heard’, although repeatedly saying one’s name or saying it with style can overcome distances.

You can also know up to your (Cope or Deal, whichever if higher)*Magic of simple tricks specializing in magic you have no ranks in, such as knowing a rune for privacy despite no ranks in Shamanism. The higher your magic rank, the more complex these tricks can be.

Bindings/Wards – all practitioners can create magical wards, to either protect themselves or bind another. Mundanes can ignore wards.
You do not roll dice for bindings (although, if someone is attacking you as you try to make one, that might call for a dice roll to successfully design the ward). Instead, its base ‘power’ is your half your Magic rank (round up) or your rank in whatever you are trying to bind, whichever is higher. You can use your power pool to strengthen the binding.
When bound, a creature can spend power to try to break the binding.
Usually, you bind something or protect yourself when you want to bargain with an Other that is not safe. For example, when conversing with ghosts, demons, or goblins. You strike a deal, or you leave.
General bindings wear away over time. You can make a binding permanent by investing power into it, lowering your total power pool.
FLUFF NOTE: to create a binding/ward, you need to either use something similar to the creature or something opposed to it. (This makes binding practitioners difficult.) For example, a demon of decay could be bound with rotting viscera of a corpse or with orderly geometric patterns drawn with salt or cleansing elements. A binding/ward drawn with something opposing its target has +1 power, but it makes the target uncomfortable, so binding with like things is better if you are being diplomatic but safe.
DESIGN NOTE: it is easier to bind than to break free, assuming equal pools of power.
An Other can agree to be bound into an object, giving you boons. See Objects of Power, below.





FINAL EDIT: here's the link to the old post about a Pact system: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?489093-Pact-Roleplaying-Game-Feedback-Wanted&highlight=Wildbow