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Leliel
2008-10-22, 12:31 PM
Found this thread on the Wizards Boards:


We all know that Warlocks make Pacts with Devils (Infernal Pact), fairies (Fey Pact) and Elder Evils (Star Pact and Dark Pact) in exchange for power.

However, one thing that bothers me is that by the rules they aren't sacrificing anything. This is the effort to gather as many drawbacks to Warlock Pacts as possible.
Mind you, they should not have any mechanical effect so to not mess with game balance. Extremes (cannot accept divine healing and so on) should be worked out with the GM, if you insist, but (IMHO) does not belong here.

1) None! For whatever reason when you demanded power you received it and you haven't been asked for anything in return. Yet...

2) Sanity. Whether you became insane the moment you accepted the conditions or the powers are slowly taking their toll on you, you're fighting to maintain your sanity for as long as possible, but you know it's a losing battle.

3) Sickness. Ever since you signed the Pact, you've been wracked by disease. While the Pact ensures that the disease will never kill you, you are a lot weaker physically than you once were.

4) Soul. You signed away your soul to the Powers that Be. When you die you will not go to the Afterlife you once would, but to your Master.

5) Material sacrifice. You gave up your money, your home and your finest horse. Why your master would accept such things are a source of concern for you, but thus far he hasn't asked for more and you pray he never will.

6) Betrayal. You were ordered to betray your dearest loved one, whether by poisoning him/her or simply hurting them emotionally.

7) Tithe. Your pact wasn't paid for in full at once and every full moon you must tithe part of what your newfound power has granted you. This could be a monetary donation, the bones of your victims or something more intangible.

There, I started it off for y'all! :)

I'll post my own:

8) Birthright; There are no catches, since you were born with your power due to a generations-long contract.

9) ...And Birth-death; Same as above, only with generations-long consequnces. See above for potential catches.

evisiron
2008-10-22, 12:35 PM
10) Pound of flesh - A pound of flesh is leterally missing from your body. Could also be something like a finger or eye.

11) Praiseworthy - You may never miss a chance to proclaim your master the greatest, or risk losing your powers

12) Watched - Through the pact, your master can watch your every move (and therefore spy on your allies).

AKA_Bait
2008-10-22, 12:38 PM
13) Age. you gave up a year, or ten years, of your lifespan to some being in exchange for the power.

14) Dreams. Everynight you have the same or similar nightmares. alternatley, as you sleep you soul could actually be in service to the creature you got your power from.

15) Memories. Friends, good times, marriage, all the good memories of your life have been traded for power. Particularly interesting if the memory of why you made the trade was lost in the trade itself. Ex. Warlocky wanted the power to save his sister, who he now cannot remember.

16) Beauty. You were pretty, now you aren't. Good one for Fey pacts.

17) Emotions. You traded the ability to feel a particular emotion, or all of them, in exchange for power.

Tengu_temp
2008-10-22, 12:39 PM
I like the idea as something optional (and preferably without any mechanical repercussions), but demanding that every warlock had such a catch in his pact is like demanding that paladins would be able to fall again, and that wizards lose all their powers when they get separated from their spellbook - completely against the spirit of 4e.

18) Destiny - you are bound to play children's card games get into tough situations which need the use of your warlock powers to solve, forever - the pact gave you very bad karma. You can forget about peaceful retirement.

Duke of URL
2008-10-22, 12:43 PM
<SARCASM>

I'm sorry, but this topic is against the principles of 4e. Suggesting that any player character has any drawback or disability in any fashion is counter to the 4e concept that all PCs are awesome paragons of racial perfection, and have no penalties whatsoever. Because that wouldn't be any "fun".

What kind of evil troll are you, trying to ruin people's fun?

</SARCASM>

Edit: @V My comments are directed to the topic as a whole, not your post. Edit2: Was My use of <SARCASM> tags too subtle?

Tengu_temp
2008-10-22, 12:46 PM
I didn't mean personal drawbacks. I meant mandatory stuff that can negatively affect you mechanically, by making you lose your powers or whatnot. Which, I must add, I mentioned in my post, which you'd notice if you cared to read it carefully.

EDIT: In that case my rant is slightly less relevant. Still not completely out of place, though.

AKA_Bait
2008-10-22, 12:53 PM
Spirits or not, it's kinda fun. I think we are going with fluffly drawbacks here too.

19) Children. This can either be the old 'first born goes to the fairy' thing or the ability to have children at all, ever.

20) Phobia. The actual manner of getting the power was some short task or trial. However, the nature of the trial was so psychologically traumatic that now you are struck with panic when x occurrs.

21) Mouth of the Master. You are the voice in this world of your patron. Occasionally, and without warning, it will speak through you, taking momentary control of your mouth and vocal chords.

22) Luck Departed. Chance is against you. You always lose at cards and dice. If the outcome of something is essentially random, you are bound to lose.

Blackfang108
2008-10-22, 01:17 PM
23) My current 4e character has a nifty catch:

For his service to the Erlking, he was granted a measure of power. The price was not the service, however.

The price was having an image of the Feywild burned on his retinas, such that he sees the world as though it were a double-exposed photograph. He was also driven slightly insane.

in game terms, he takes a -2 to all perception checks and -2 to all insight checks (as his mind is no longer completely normal)

Edit: to be fair, the mechanical drawbacks came because I needed an extra feat at first level, and my DM let me take a flaw. Although the "image of the Feywild" and "slight insanity" were in the backstory I wrote before I realized I'd need to take a flaw.

potatocubed
2008-10-22, 01:20 PM
24) Pawn. One way or another, your patron is going to manouevre you into doing something awful. Giving you powers was just a way of getting you to where you needed to be.

Totally Guy
2008-10-22, 01:30 PM
25) Paranoia. The pact giver tells the Warlock something bad will happen, even in precise detail. The pact giver actually has no such knowledge but is aiming to feed off the paranoia that sets in.

Zeful
2008-10-22, 01:45 PM
22) Luck Departed. Chance is against you. You always lose at cards and dice. If the outcome of something is essentially random, you are bound to lose.

Of course in D&D everything is random, therefore you fail at life.

AKA_Bait
2008-10-22, 01:45 PM
Of course in D&D everything is random, therefore you fail at life.

In game you silly person. In game.

streakster
2008-10-22, 01:56 PM
26: You were forced to read a page of the rules of the Infernal Game, the pastime of demons...

(requires the player to read one page of the Fatal rulebook)

SadisticFishing
2008-10-22, 02:25 PM
Hrm, while I do mildly agree, if you read closely, the Infernal, Star, and Dark pacts are not so much pacts as just a different way of learning magic. You don't sign a deal with anyone, you just study them.

Fey on the other hand, being the least dangerous to have a pact with, can have exactly the same sort of consequences as worshiping a god. Do what they tell you or they get peeved.

Doomsy
2008-10-22, 03:22 PM
27. The Critics Eye. You see every flaw in every thing you look at, magnified a hundred fold. From peoples foibles to the tiny mar in an artists masterwork.

28. Cold Comfort. You are never warm again. You always feel a chill and nothing will ever change that. Your skin may or may not be cold.

29. Fever Season. You are always slightly delirious in the sick, disjointed feverish sort of way. People may assume you are ill.

30. An Ache In The Soul. Something went through your mind and took away everything that you loved. You sacrificed every good memory you ever had and you know it, but you can never know what it was you lost exactly. Even if told, the memory fades almost instantly.

31. Waking Dreams. You dream while awake and can no longer fully differentiate the two states.

32. Mirror, Mirror. You never see your own reflection anymore. Instead, you may see any number of things - from scenes of the life of the last person you killed to traumatic scenes from your past. This may be permanent or shifting, and others cannot see as you do.

33. Vagabond Soul. You can never settle permanently again, ever. You must keep moving. Fate will conspire to keep you ever on the move, hounded by ill luck and chance.

34. An Artists Touch. You have an artists sensibilities, but you can never create art. It never works for you. There is always something wrong, always something that prevents you from ever expressing your artistic urges in a way you find satisfying. Others may be repelled or just unable to grasp what you try to express in your work.

Tengu_temp
2008-10-22, 03:31 PM
35. Positive emotions - the pact was so emotionally straining that you can never feel happiness again, and will forever remain depressed. You will also probably be forever pale, tend to dress in black, and cry blood. On a positive side, you've discovered a talent in poetry in yourself.

Randel
2008-10-22, 03:50 PM
36) Selling your soul- The devil you got your powers from says that he had bought your soul and that you are now destined to go to hell when you die. You have his mark branded somewhere on your body and magical attempts to determine your alignment always register you as evil and chaotic. However in reality you can go to heaven just like anyone else if you are good, he just said that in the hopes that you will give up on being good and do evil... or that in the event you 'trick' him and regain your soul (which he never had in the first place) then people will hear about this and think they can gain powers by bargaining with devils and cheating them. You either turn evil and further his goals to cause mayhem on earth, or you turn good and make people think that devils can be cheated.

37) Trading space- You were an influential person who traded their life to a powerful devil or fey. The deal essentially switched bodies with the patron, letting them take your place and you get their body. This generally turns you from your original race into either a tiefling or a fey creature of some sort... and their body is usually old, frail, or featured prominently on wanted posters. If you tell anyone of your deal, then your powers will fail completly and nobody will believe you.

38) Body switching- Similar to the above, except the patrons goal is to switch bodies with someone younger than themselves to attain immortality. You run into them and agree to the pact, they switch bodies with you and then go on their way. You in turn gain a fraction of their arcane power that remains in their body which you can nurture and grow as you train. They don't mind if you tell others about the ritual to summon them since its easy to get younger bodies with more people who can initiate the deal.

39) Sacrifice- building on the above, you did not want to become a warlock, but were instead a 'virgin sacrifice' that was prepared for the powerful patron entity. The mage or priest who sacrificed you did so as part of a deal. You in turn had your mind switched with that of the patron, they got your younger body and you became an old hag (with residual magic power). For some reason, the patron let you live and dropped you off somewhere. They mention a second ritual that will allow you to get a younger body yourself, or even reclaim your old one if you provide a sacrifice and do some deed for them. Evidently your 'patron' is a body-stealing jerkass that likes creating a chaotic web of pain and misery.

40) Harvester of Hearts- Whenever you use your warlock power thats triggered when a creature under your curse dies... that creatures soul or some bit of their life energy is sent to your patron.

41) Beacon to the beyond- your patron is a cosmic horror that devourers worlds. When you made a pact with it you unwittingly became a tiny beacon that lets it home in on your world. By using your warlock powers or inspiring others to take the warlock path to contact it, you are makeing it easier for your 'patron' to zero in on your world. Once its finished devouring its latest world then it might decide to head for yours.

42) Lifestealer- As a Dark pact warlock, whenever you use your warlock powers to kill something then the positive energy in their body is sent to the shadowfell instead of being recycled into the worlds energy field. In essence, the more creatures you kill then the more life is drained from the world and that life doesn't just get replaced a normal. If too many warlocks do this, then the worlds ecosystem will become damaged and fail (though the process is too slow for mortals to really notice unless there are either alot of warlocks or some doomsday artifact is used to amplify the effect). Your patron is a long-lived and powerful undead who can afford to wait the time for the worlds life to end.

chiasaur11
2008-10-22, 03:51 PM
26: You were forced to read a page of the rules of the Infernal Game, the pastime of demons...

(requires the player to read one page of the Fatal rulebook)

I think even demons wouldn't play...
that.

Shiver...

Flickerdart
2008-10-22, 03:54 PM
43. Nobility: You were a powerful lord with many men under your control. All of that you chose to give away for the pact...
44. Your Followers: ...but little did you know, the surrender of your title and servants involved giving their very souls to the creature that gave you your power. Or even...
45. Your Land: ...your entire domain had been erased from history. Nobody recognizes your title, or remembers the name of the country. Events are altered so that it never existed. Can make a great plothook if the Warlock is a king whose nation once saved the world from a great evil, that you just made a pact with. Way to go.
46. Fame and Fortune: Your efforts will never bring you gain. Every attempt to be more than a wanderer will fail spectacularly.
47. The ability to do good/evil: Every act you commit with good or evil intent has the opposite outcome. Burned down an orphanage? They would grow up to betray their king, and you just saved the kingdom from millenia of brutal war. Saved an orphanage from the madman who wanted to burn it down? Orphans grow up to be evil, betray the king, plunge land into chaos, etcetera.

Might wanna fix your numbers up there. XD

Zeful
2008-10-22, 03:57 PM
32. Mirror, Mirror. You never see your own reflection anymore. Instead, you may see any number of things - from scenes of the life of the last person you killed to traumatic scenes from your past. This may be permanent or shifting, and others cannot see as you do.

This would be a great way to drop plot hooks on the players.

EDIT: What does XD mean anyway?

Corlis
2008-10-22, 04:17 PM
48) You were required to sign your part of the contract in blood, for which you made a small cut somewhere on your body. However, this little wound refuses to heal and you have to put fresh bandaging on it every so often.

49) Your mere presence seems to unnerve animals. Dogs bark furiously at you and then run away, and cats hiss and hide in the rafters. Bigger animals act normally but are visibly nervous around you.

50) Occasionally some poor villager will see the beauty of the fey power in you and fall into a deep and obsessive love with you. Might sometimes be useful, but if the mayor's wife decides to run away to follow you, you're going to have a lot of angry villagers on your trail.

51) You lose all sense of taste smell, so that even the best food tastes like cardboard to you.

FoE
2008-10-22, 04:40 PM
52. A Good Night's Sleep: You never have one again. Your dreams are filled with unspeakable horrors — visions of writhing abominations that move through the cold void of space, the images of souls being tortured in the pits of Hell, or terrifying fey creatures preying on the helpless and weak and you are unable to stop them. You sleep rarely, and only when needed.

53. Starry Starry Night (Star Pact Only): The open night sky no longer holds any comfort for you. Every time you look up at the stars, you see something different. Sometimes every star has been turned into an unblinking eye glaring down at you, or a mass of mouths mumbling incoherently. Sometimes you can see shapes in the darkness, or things moving on the moon. And sometimes it's simply a black void, completely blank of any light.

54. The Mark: The contract made between you and your dark masters is seared upon your very flesh. Your body is covered in scars that form elaborate runes and markings written in a language you can't understand. People of good alignments who view the marks are distinctly uneasy.

Flickerdart
2008-10-22, 04:48 PM
EDIT: What does XD mean anyway?
It's not an acronym, it's a smiley that displays amusement beyond :D. Anyways...
55. Soundtrack. A haunting melody is embedded in your mind, gnawing at your sanity and your Listen checks.

chiasaur11
2008-10-22, 04:54 PM
56) Boredom. The recepient of the pact will never again know a simple, peaceful day. Life may still be worth living, but consistancy... it's pretty much gone.

Inyssius Tor
2008-10-22, 05:08 PM
57. Harbinger of Sorrow: Ill luck follows in your wake, but it don't get too close--it stalks you quietly, months behind. The mansion where you used flames of phlegethos two years ago has since burned to the ground. Twice. Inns you sleep at go out of business; items you sell turn out to be cursed. Seven months after you left town, your previous lover gouged out her eyes. Your enemies are still fine, though; actually, it's kind of odd how well they've been doing...

58. Someone's Favor: Far from departing, your luck seems to be showing off. Jewelers you've never seen accost you in the streets, insisting that you forgot to pick up the diamond-encrusted crown you bought. Coworkers, all far better qualified than you, quit in protest when you don't get that raise. Kobolds will massacre whole villages to make sure you'll get plenty of loot when you show up to kill them...

(Ever read Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell? Think Stephen Black.)

quick_comment
2008-10-22, 05:27 PM
I take issue that the star pact is with Elder Evils. I read it as more a pact with the fates.

59) Star Pact: You are granted visions of the future, but are cursed so that nobody ever believes them. (ie, Cassandra)

60) Star Pact: You know the future, you know what horrors it holds, and you also know it cannot be changed.

61) Fey Pact: You have sold your love for power. You can never again know love.

62) Dark Pact: Children instinctively hate you. They dislike your appearance, and go out of their way to torture you and make you miserable.

63) Fey Pact: You become childlike. You regress to the morality and self control of a child.

Flickerdart
2008-10-22, 05:29 PM
64. You're certain you know the future, but you're not even close.

Erk
2008-10-22, 05:47 PM
64. [Star] You stared into the void, and now it stares back at you. Being outdoors by night gives you strange feelings, visions, and even shaking horrors. Sleeping outside is impossible.

65. [Fey] You have given up your human (or other racial) intuition for your patron to use. You no longer give off appropriate voice tone or body language, and are not able to read other human body language or voice tone.

66. [Infernal/Fey/Dark] Your shadow is owned by your master. When you are awake it remains attached to you, but moves of its own accord and sees and hears everything around you. By night, it sometimes moves free and does as it pleases.

67. [Star/Infernal] Any offspring you spawn will be the child of the powers that work through you, not your own. You may be aware of this and try to avoid any situation where you could become pregnant / impregnate anyone, for fear of bringing the antimessiah into the world. [in true lovecraftian pattern, of course, there should be a 100% fertility if you forget this restriction]

Draco Dracul
2008-10-22, 07:13 PM
68. Hellforged-Only offered to greathero's who now lay on their deathbed. A hero who makes this pact will awake from the grave 100 years after their deaths in a warforged body made in hell, however they will find that all their achievements and feets are misatributed to others, or religated to mear footnotes in history.

Swooper
2008-10-22, 07:17 PM
There were a couple of good ones suggested in the 3.5 PHB2.

Supernatural Strictures:
"I'm sorry, but I may not cross this threshold without an invitation. Won't you invite me in?"

69) You must choose a random path at crossroads, unless someone tells you the way (city streets and dungeon corridors don't count).

70) You cannot enter a home without an invitation.

71) You cannot set foot on sacred ground.

72) You are incapable of looking a blue-eyed person in the face.

Doomsy
2008-10-22, 07:23 PM
This would be a great way to drop plot hooks on the players.

It could, but I was thinking more like just screwing with the persons head by showing them the nameless mook they just killed playing with his daughter or just hanging out having a beer with his friends. It could work for plots as well as just being unsettling.

AgentPaper
2008-10-22, 07:28 PM
73) You hand, to be collected at a later date. (In marriage!)

Mewtarthio
2008-10-22, 07:43 PM
74) Code Yellow--Your patrons can do very bad things to you if you disobey them.

75) Temporal Displacement--Your patron did not have need of your services when you first signed the pact. If you're lucky, he sealed you inside a Rip van Winkle-esque sleep or some form of stasis... you know, anything where you aren't aware of how much time you're losing before you find out everyone you ever knew is now either dead or extremely old.

Arbitrarity
2008-10-22, 07:48 PM
75) Temporal Displacement--Your patron did not have need of your services when you first signed the pact. If you're lucky, he sealed you inside a Rip van Winkle-esque sleep or some form of stasis... you know, anything where you aren't aware of how much time you're losing before you find out everyone you ever knew is now either dead or extremely old.


So wake up, Mr. Freeman. Wake up... and smell the ashes.

76) Your right eye. The fey bit it out. Ouch.

AgentPaper
2008-10-22, 07:50 PM
77) Your left eye. A demon bit it out. Ouch.

Arbitrarity
2008-10-22, 07:51 PM
Oh god, I took twofold pact. What does this mean?

erikun
2008-10-22, 08:05 PM
Sounds like it means you're immune to blindness. :smallbiggrin:

Doomsy
2008-10-22, 08:44 PM
78. Your coccyx. The Star God thought it was pretty.

Draco Dracul
2008-10-22, 08:53 PM
80. Your sole. any left shoe you wear for the rest of eternaty will have a sole.:smalltongue:

Zeful
2008-10-22, 09:06 PM
It could, but I was thinking more like just screwing with the persons head by showing them the nameless mook they just killed playing with his daughter or just hanging out having a beer with his friends. It could work for plots as well as just being unsettling.

What's worse (from a player perspective) is after meeting [Important NPC] you look into your reflection to see yourself gleefully killing [approriate gender pronoun]. Later you run into a puppetmaster style enemy intent on killing [approriate gender pronoun]. I can imagine the players face when the group fighter starts trying to kill [Important NPC].

Roderick_BR
2008-10-23, 08:48 AM
19) Children. This can either be the old 'first born goes to the fairy' thing or the ability to have children at all, ever.

81. Variant: YOU was the child. Your parents traded you for their powers back then, and you was raised by a clan that worships your master, or by the fey themselves, or something.
Your loyalty belongs to them, rather than your parent's race. It mixes up with the "born" idea.

Siegel
2008-10-23, 08:54 AM
You know Faust ?


Mephistopheles : Here to your service I will bind me;
Beck when you will, I will not pause or rest;
But in return when yonder you will find me,
Then likewise shall you be at my behest.



Faust. If ever I lay me on a bed of sloth in peace,
That instant let for me existence cease!
If ever with lying flattery you can rule me
So that contented with myself I stay,
If with enjoyment you can fool me,
Be that for me the final day!
That bet I offer!

AKA_Bait
2008-10-23, 09:04 AM
82. Hunger. No matter how much or how often you eat, you are always hungry. You won't starve to death so long as you eat normally, but you will never feel full or satisfied after a meal again.

83. Thirst. Essentialy the same as hunger, but with thirst.

84. Weight. Moving or any other physical exertion feels like you are trying to do so underwater, with the world pushing back against you.

85. Blood. When you bleed, the blood is wrong. Depending upon your patron, it has changed. For example, it may be a sparkling white [star], a sticky brown like tree sap [fey], or smell of brimstone [infernal].

quick_comment
2008-10-23, 09:29 AM
83) Infernal: Everyone appears as demons to you.

84) Dark: To you, the world is non-Euclidian. You live and work in a hyperbolic world

AKA_Bait
2008-10-23, 09:33 AM
Ooh, that infernal one gave me this idea:

88. Stains on the Soul. Whenever you look at a person you see little stains of all the evil deeds they have committed over their life as a kind of overlay on them. Note that this is not determinative of alignment, merely of things done in the past. Even a great Paladin will have some smurches before they took up the faith.

Xallace
2008-10-23, 09:36 AM
[89] Sky's No Limit: You no longer see the blue sky. Instead, clear days appear to you as a starry night, with the addition of the Sun burning in the sky. This has no effect on illumination, and overcast days appear as normal. (Star Only)

[90] Barely There: You show no reflection and cast no shadow. You still block light if you are in front of a source of illumination, but there is no visible shadow.

[91] I Seeee Yooou: When peering into a reflective surface, you do not see your own reflection. Instead, the visage of your otherworldly patron stares back. It moves as you do, but it's expression is always one of insidious delight (Infernal), smug amusement (Fey), or unrelatable (Star). To all other eyes, your reflection shows normally.

Tokiko Mima
2008-10-23, 09:38 AM
92. Geis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geis) - In traditional Irish folklore fashion, you swore an oath or recieved a prophesy to obtain power. This could be something like Macbeth's 'No man of woman born can slay Macbeth' or it could be an oath like Cúchulainn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%BAchulainn) never to eat the flesh of dogs and always to accept food offered to you by a woman. Macbeth is of course, slain when he fights a man not born of a woman and Cúchulainn dies after he violates his geis. So the warlock is literally fated to die under certain conditions.

93. Quest - Similiarly, you must complete a task, unrelated to anything in the campaign. Whenever you aren't directly working to complete it, it haunts your thoughts. When you complete this task, you will die.

Erom
2008-10-23, 09:39 AM
85. Blood. When you bleed, the blood is wrong. Depending upon your patron, it has changed. For example, it may be a sparkling white [star], a sticky brown like tree sap [fey], or smell of brimstone [infernal].

You can do some fun things with homebrew and this - with the infernal, maybe your blood glowly brightly and burns when exposed to air. With time, you can master the fire in your blood (add damage to fire spells, or add a few more fire spells to your spell list, or similar) but your wounds will not heal of there own accord - magical healing is required to close your wounds.

86. Insects - You are inhabited by parasitic worms or other insects. They crawl under your skin, extremely uncomfortable and painful but without doing serious damage.

87. Rot - Same as above, but you have a rotting disease that slowly destroys non-essential surface features. Your hair falls out, your skin is cracked and peeling, make up some more horrible symptoms here.

88. Paragon - Inspired by some of the old science fiction tales, you have become perfection itself - you are tall and beautiful, powerful in magic, and kind, and just, and everyone hates you for it. You are resented and rejected by most people.

89. Blood Drinker - Your powers have given you a craving for human blood, like a vampire.

90. Bad Company - Undead seek you out to lead them, not able to understand why an agent of the Master would reject his role. Useful in that it occasionally causes helpful minions to turn up, but makes it impossible to live in normal society.

91. Invisible - You have become inconsequential. People don't pick you out of crowds, and forget you the moment you stop speaking to them, including your former friends and lovers. You will always be a stranger to people.

92. Lightblinded - You can see better in partial darkness or dim illumination, but bright light blinds you. A brightly lit interior is uncomfortable, and the daylight is agonizing - you can only see a short distance during the day.

93. Greedy - You crave gold more so even than a dragon, but any wealth you acquire slowly vanishes (no doubt into your Masters coffers).

Oh man, you could just go on and on with these.

Morty
2008-10-23, 10:00 AM
94. Death. Death follows your every step, but you stay alive. Instead, everyone you ever get close to dies because of you.

hamishspence
2008-10-23, 10:03 AM
I like Discworld's version: ""YOU WERE TOLD YOU WOULD WALK WITH DEATH EVERY DAY."

Athaniar
2008-10-23, 10:04 AM
95: Seriously Laughable - Nobody can take you seriously, except for when you are trying to be funny, then it's the reverse.

96: Fleshcraving - You have an unnatural need to devour the flesh of your own race.

97: Deathmouth - You have no skin around your mouth. Still, the pact allows you to speak mostly like normal, but with an eerie voice.

98: Curse of Argus - You have twice the amount of eyes you normally should have.

99: Chaosface - Your facial features are out of place: your nose may be on your forehead, and perhaps your mouth is below your chin.

100: Spirits of Vengeance - The restless spirits of those you kill and have killed constantly haunt you.

101: Evervoice - You are never silent, you are always saying something, even when asleep.

102: Sonic Reversal - When you try to act silently (sneaking, whispering), you instead make a lot of noise, and when you are trying to act loudly (shouting, drumming), you stay completely silent.

103: Berserker's Wrath - You are always angry and wrathful, and never hesitates to enter combat with everything you've got.

104: Indifference - You don't care much for anything.

105: Dread Footsteps - When you walk, you leave a trail of clearly evil burning footsteps after you.

106: Two Heads Are Better Than One - You grow another, smaller head next to your first. It's not very intelligent, but it likes to disagree with you. On occasions, your Master may choose to possess it.

107: Monochromatic Vision - You see the world only in shades of black, white, and grey.

108: Terrainwarp - You percieve solid ground as liquid, and liquid as solid ground. This doesn't affect how respective terrain works, however.

109: Seer's Touch - When you touch something, you may recieve a vision relating to the past, present, or future of whatever it is you touch.

110: Illiteracy - You cannot read or write, and can never learn to do so. An exception may be something your Master wishes you to read or write.

AslanCross
2008-10-23, 10:23 AM
111. Idle Hand (Fey or Infernal): Your left hand no longer obeys you completely. It sometimes acts of its own accord.

112. The Devil's Workshop (Infernal): Small, molten beads of an unearthly metal drip out of your mouth at midnight. They hurt like hell, but don't do enough damage to affect your HP. You are required to leave these beads as an offering whenever you break camp.

113. Brimstone: (Infernal) You bear the mark of a fiend of pestilence and fire. The stench of sulfur hangs about you at all times.

114. A Beautiful Mind: (Star Pact) The constellation of the Far Realm being you traffic with is forever branded into your mind. You see the pattern almost everywhere, even if it's not really there.

115. Ectoplasm: (Star Pact) A strange, supernatural slime leaks from your tear ducts whenever you use your warlock powers. It's uncomfortable at worst, but tends to unnerve your friends.

116. Chorea: (Fey) You lose control of your body whenever you pass by a standing stone circle, and perform a painful, frenetic dance in honor of your fey patron.

117. Fearful Symmetry (any, likely infernal) A bizarre obsession with symmetry overcomes you, and you compulsively correct minor aesthetic asymmetry in things around you.

118. Imaginary "Friend": (Star Pact) An "emissary" of your Far Realm patron accompanies you wherever you go, chronicling your actions and issuing you "orders". You are certain he exists, but your party members are certain he doesn't.

119. Blasphemous Presence: (Any) Your patron particularly hates deities and makes you a conduit of this. Holy symbols of deities of any sort deform around you. They are still usable, but serve as a reminder of whom you serve.

120. Taste-less: (Fey) A particularly gluttonous fey patron demands your sense of taste from you. Everything, no matter how delicious, tastes like wet paper.

Hzurr
2008-10-23, 10:42 AM
97: Deathmouth - You have no skin around your mouth. Still, the pact allows you to speak mostly like normal, but with an eerie voice.


See, this just makes me think of that one part in Dark Knight, where Two-face tries to take a drink and it spills out of half his mouth, because he has no skin.

So only use Deathmouth if you want people to laugh at you every time you drink.

AKA_Bait
2008-10-23, 10:45 AM
It occurs to me that most of these could also be pretty well translated into use for homebrew vestiges on 3.5 binders. Not that it's all that surprising, since the 4e warlock pretty much found the 3.5 binder in a darkened alley, beat the snot out of him and took his flavor.

Fishy
2008-10-23, 10:47 AM
121. Oath-Breaker: Part of your Pact is that you will never make another- you are fated to break every single promise you make, no matter how small. Over time, this has conditioned you to go to extraordinary lengths to avoid making them. (It's where the word comes from, dontcha know.)

hamishspence
2008-10-23, 10:51 AM
In 3rd party Quintessenial Paladin 2, code could be adjusted, and for honesty, option for paladin to treat every statement he makes as an oath which he has to keep or fall, existed.

Which also meant paladin went to extraordinary lengths to Not Make Oaths.

tbarrie
2008-10-23, 11:01 AM
92. ... or it could be an oath like Cúchulainn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%BAchulainn) never to eat the flesh of dogs and always to accept food offered to you by a woman.

That's a great pair of oaths to swear right there. I can't imagine how he wound up violating that.

Tokiko Mima
2008-10-23, 11:26 AM
That's a great pair of oaths to swear right there. I can't imagine how he wound up violating that.

Yeah. If I were Cú, the moment any female wielding a tray tries to speak to me, I'd stuff my fingers in my ears and start humming then run the other direction as fast as possible. That would make for some fun RP come to think of it, especially if the other PC's liked to stop in taverns. :smallbiggrin:

Blackfang108
2008-10-23, 11:35 AM
That's a great pair of oaths to swear right there. I can't imagine how he wound up violating that.

According to the wiki, there was only one geasa, the not eating dog-meat.

it was merely EXTREMEMLY rude to turn down hospitality.

Doomsy
2008-10-23, 11:45 AM
122. I Against I. Once a year, every year, possibly on your birthday, you have to kill your own double. They come into existence in the same general area with the exact same abilities, skills, personality, and knowledge that you possess. They exist as an exact duplicate of you down to the memories and the simple knowledge that only one of you can exist. You share everything, the same person made twice. Your party and others cannot see both of you at the same time - they merge the two automatically in their perceptions. It does not matter from a mechanical or rules stand point who wins, only that by midnight there is only one of you alive. There is no difference between you and your double - you are the same person in every respect. You must simply kill yourself to live another year, or both fade from existence. The corpse of the loser merges with the victor like overlapping photographs, becoming one slowly - including the memory of the death.

123. City Life. When you enter a populated area for the first time there is a small chance you see its entire life span condensed into one very momentary flash. There is no order to the time frames you see superimposed on each other over and over in a jumbled mess, all existing in simultaneous potential for those two or three seconds. There is no way to judge when the visions will come to pass or if they have already, as the vision is too confused and happens far too fast to make much sense of. There is no way to sort out the future or historic possibility, but it leaves you unsettled and disturbed to walk the streets of a town you saw simultaneously as charnel house, a collection of hovels, and built of glass spires.

124. The Music of the Stars. A starry night is far from romantic to you. You instead hear their inhuman music, each a discordant part of a greater whole that you can never quite put your finger on, an ever shifting pattern that threatens to become obsession if chased too hard.

125. The Unchained. (Fey or Infernal). You cannot be tethered or chained without suffering a furious, almost berserk reaction, a rage mixed with something close to a blind panic. This can come from either a rage against authority or your own restless spirit chafing at restrictions.

126. The Tides of Fate. (Star). You know what destiny is. The stars have seen everything since the beginning, and have told you that even such a word is false. There are no beginnings, no ends, no conclusions. Just the endless tide of repeating cycles and roles you are bound to, an idiot fate that fits all into a mindless rhythm. You have been shown a glimpse of the endless machine and the pointlessness of it, the lack of finality or conclusion in anything. You have witnessed eternity.

Capfalcon
2008-10-23, 11:45 AM
That's a great pair of oaths to swear right there. I can't imagine how he wound up violating that.

Well, if you have a woman who offers you the flesh of a dog...

AH HAH! The Celtic gods were the precursor to the 3.5 DM and the "Kill the Baby, or Let the Demon be Summoned." :)

That must make Cúchulainn a strange paladin variant.

Tokiko Mima
2008-10-23, 11:52 AM
Well, if you have a woman who offers you the flesh of a dog...

AH HAH! The Celtic gods were the precursor to the 3.5 DM and the "Kill the Baby, or Let the Demon be Summoned." :)

That must make Cúchulainn a strange paladin variant.

He was a pretty cool mythological guy. His ríastrad (and Achilles temper, to be fair) is also probably where we get Frenzied Berserker's Frenzy ability from too.

hamishspence
2008-10-23, 11:55 AM
I've seen it also called Warp-Spasm in dragon mag, and Slaine series calls it that.

Roderick_BR
2008-10-23, 12:59 PM
Thought about another.
127. Unreality check: Your master showed you the TRUTH! You, your friends, your family, everything you took for granted, is false. Nothing you witnessed or heard about is real. Everything, the realms themselves, are nothing more than a kid's game, played in a place called "Real World", where the beings there gamble with your people's lives using dice against a powerful being called simply "MASTER", that can create and destroy worlds on a mere whim.
You never had another good night's rest, afraid of being wiped out of existence by a bored MASTER that eventually grew tired of your existence. You feel like your every move, and thought, is controlled by an outerwordly being. You have problems focusing on your reality, as you grow detached, not being sure if anything you see is real or not.
Of course, no one else believes "such a silly statement."
Alternatively, on ocasion, you may make weird comments about "armor class", "hit points", "character level", and others nonsenses that makes your allies look at you in a weird way.

(For the Brazilian reader: Yes, it's inspired on Hit)

chiasaur11
2008-10-23, 01:21 PM
Thought about another.
127. Unreality check: Your master showed you the TRUTH! You, your friends, your family, everything you took for granted, is false. Nothing you witnessed or heard about is real. Everything, the realms themselves, are nothing more than a kid's game, played in a place called "Real World", where the beings there gamble with your people's lives using dice against a powerful being called simply "MASTER", that can create and destroy worlds on a mere whim.
You never had another good night's rest, afraid of being wiped out of existence by a bored MASTER that eventually grew tired of your existence. You feel like your every move, and thought, is controlled by an outerwordly being. You have problems focusing on your reality, as you grow detached, not being sure if anything you see is real or not.
Of course, no one else believes "such a silly statement."
Alternatively, on ocasion, you may make weird comments about "armor class", "hit points", "character level", and others nonsenses that makes your allies look at you in a weird way.

(For the Brazilian reader: Yes, it's inspired on Hit)

So, you're Red Mage.

Randel
2008-10-23, 02:21 PM
128) See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil - Your master has taken your ability to hear, see, or speak of bad things. Some words are censored out for you, either you hear a strange bleep that blocks them out, you speak a bleep when you try to say them, or an image is blurred from your vision when you see it. This does not severely hamper you in any tactical way, though it makes some social interaction frustrating.

129) Paladin who jumped down - You were once a paladin, sworn to follow through with every oath you made and to always work to fight evil. After realising how freaking impossible that would be to actually live like that you consorted with a devil who made you selectivly deaf, mute, and illiterate. Now if someone poses a challange to you, you simply don'e hear them, if someone does an evil act that doesn't affect you then you don't see it, and if you ever try to swear an oath then the words are stolen from your mouth and you can't say them.

130) From Liarsburg - Every sentence you say must be untrue. You can usually communicate with people around you by saying half-lies or just sounding sarcastic. Literal minded people may find it hard to talk with you. You can however write the truth if you wish. Any magic that attempts to force you to tell the truth instead nullifies your need to lie, allowing you to say whatever you wish (or remaining silent) without tripping whatever magical safeguards would detect such a thing. If Speak with Dead is cast on your corpse then your patron may put in whatever words they desire.

131) Soulstone - inside your chest is a shard of a soulstone which grows larger whenever a creature under your warlocks curse dies. Every once in a while your patron or a minion of theirs will find you and after a painful operation will extract the grown soulstone and replace it with another shard which will grow again. Attempting to harness the stones power for your own use will anger your patron if done without their permission. However, as a bonus if you die then your patron may remotley use the soulstones power to bring you back from the dead, consuming a good deal of its stored energy. In such a case then they would demand you harvest more souls.

132) Undead Creator - you have a channel to the necromantic energy of the shadowfell flowing through you. You may infuse that energy into corpses and after several days they will rise as undead. You are forbidden to slay or attempt to control these undead, though undead created from other sources are fair game. Your master wishes to create an undead army and you are helping him, and if that means wiping out someone elses undead army then so be it. Undead you create generally don't cause any damage in that area and instead just get up and walk away to some place your patron sends them.

Flickerdart
2008-10-23, 04:02 PM
You know Faust ?
I believe the quote is "Do you know Faust?" Anyways.

133. Winds of Fate [Star or Fey]. Wherever you are, you always feel a draft that wanes and waxes seemingly at random. At DM's option, this may or may not be visible to others.

134. Something Smells Fishy [Fey]. Your sense of smell is permanently tickled by something that feels familiar, yet you can never quite recognize.

135. I'm Rubber, You're Glue [Any]. Can be taken only with a double pact. Whatever the other pact you made, others around you feel its effects, slightly at first, and increasingly more severe as they travel with you.

Tokiko Mima
2008-10-23, 04:16 PM
I've seen it also called Warp-Spasm in dragon mag, and Slaine series calls it that.

A term they persumably took directly from Irish mythology.


The first warp-spasm seized Cúchulainn, and made him into a monstrous thing, hideous and shapeless, unheard of. His shanks and his joints, every knuckle and angle and organ from head to foot, shook like a tree in the flood or a reed in the stream. His body made a furious twist inside his skin, so that his feet and shins switched to the rear and his heels and calves switched to the front... On his head the temple-sinews stretched to the nape of his neck, each mighty, immense, measureless knob as big as the head of a month-old child... he sucked one eye so deep into his head that a wild crane couldn't probe it onto his cheek out of the depths of his skull; the other eye fell out along his cheek. His mouth weirdly distorted: his cheek peeled back from his jaws until the gullet appeared, his lungs and his liver flapped in his mouth and throat, his lower jaw struck the upper a lion-killing blow, and fiery flakes large as a ram's fleece reached his mouth from his throat... The hair of his head twisted like the tange of a red thornbush stuck in a gap; if a royal apple tree with all its kingly fruit were shaken above him, scarce an apple would reach the ground but each would be spiked on a bristle of his hair as it stood up on his scalp with rage.

"Borrowed" whole-cloth from wiki. I was going to put it back, honest! :smallbiggrin:

sleepy
2008-10-23, 06:59 PM
Colour. You will see only in shades of grey forever more.

Certainty. Even a mundane conclusion based on irrefutable logic and first-hand experience is at best tentative working hypothesis, and to assume it correct could cost you your life or worse... nothing is ever as it seems, and unimaginable horrors are intimately involved with the most innocuous things. After all, they answered your call, so many years ago...

(ok, that second one is a manifestation of the insanity thing, but I like the idea of a warlock who didn't really believe his attempt to form a pact would work, never really accepted what happened to him and now looks for elder evils under every chair)

Shades of Gray
2008-10-23, 07:22 PM
Colour. You will see only in shades of grey forever more.

I don't want to be seen in!

Flickerdart
2008-10-23, 07:41 PM
Someone already did the black/white vision thing.

Arutema
2008-10-23, 07:45 PM
Fey Lover: (Fey) Your were granted your powers because of a romance with a specific Fey being. You are incapable of loving (or at least "loving") any other person.

Tokiko Mima
2008-10-24, 12:13 PM
139. Quantum Leap - You wake up every morning, convinced you are in a body that is not your own. You are instead a time traveler from the future, and you are accompanied by a holographic friend only you can hear or see. You must put something right in your life at all costs, and if you succeed at doing so you forget everything and start from the beginning with a new mission. :smallamused:

140. Third Person - You've lost the ability to view yourself as yourself. Therefore, you must always refer to yourself in third person. This may or may not force you to refer to everyone in third person, but if it does it's going to make understanding you very difficult. :smallbiggrin:

141. Superstitious - Almost every folk tale is true for you. You really do get seven years bad luck for breaking a mirror, terrifying things happen when a black cat crosses your path, and the dark and unnatural forces rise up if you walk beneath a ladder. Obviously, this makes you exceedingly neurotic about obeying superstitions and the strictures therein. :smallsmile:

Flickerdart
2008-10-24, 01:40 PM
142: Wheel of Fortune [Fey]. Every day, you have a new, random consequence of your pact from this list that applies to the Fey pact.

Athaniar
2008-10-24, 03:52 PM
Here comes a large bunch of catches, please tell me if I accidentaly duplicated some.

(To ignore the duplicate Color catch, I'm starting at 142)

142: Everbleeding - Your blood does not congeal except when powerful healing magic is used.

143: Dead Men Tell Tales - The corpses of those you kill will constantly whisper your name, though they're dead and soulless.

144: Blankface - You lack any facial features whatsoever, but you still behave normally.

145: Delusions of Divinity - You believe yourself to be a god or goddess, and won't listen to evidence to the contrary.

146: Reflection of Terror - Instead of your own reflection, you see whatever it is you fear the most.

147: Reflection of Weakness - Your own reflection seems to have a life of it's own as it taunts you, pointing out your worst weaknesses and vulnerabilities. Nobody else is aware of this.

148: Absorption Curse - You take the pact catches of all other warlocks you slay, as long the catch is compatible. This is in addition to your other catches.

149: Persona Adaption - You take upon yourself a little of the personality of each being you kill.

150: Translucense - You appear slightly translucent.

151: Eyelight - Your eyes emit beams of light. Just closing or covering your eyes won't stop this.

152: Luminescense - You bear an eery aura of light, making it hard for you to remain hidden in the dark.

153: Tattershape - Every piece of clothing you wear, be it a suit of shining armor or the finest royal robes, appears tattered and dirty when worn by you.

154: Disgustment - Everything tastes and smells absolutely disgusting to you.

155: Painless - You are unable to feel pain.

156: Painfull - Even the slightest touch is painful to you.

157: Headweird - Your head appears upside-down.

158: Sonic Reversal - Every word you say comes out backwards.

159: No Confidence - People just won't do as you tell them, even if it appears to be the wisest solution.

160: Furcoat - You are completely covered in fur. If you already were covered in fur, then you lose it instead.

161: Thermal Reversal - You feel cold as heat, and heat as cold.

162: Paintouch - Your very touch produces pain in anyone you touch.

163: Spoiltouch - All food and drink you touch become spoiled.

164: Paranoia Mindspy - You hear the thoughts of those around you, but only the thoughts which can be percieved as negative towards you.

165: Fool's Gold - Nobody accepts any payment from you, considering it to be false money.

166: Fullbag - Each container you carry, even your pockets, is filled with a sticky, black liquid that cannot be removed, but disappears the moment you put the container away.

167: Fiend's Nameswap - Without realizing it, you go around calling people the names of archfiends (Infernal), fey lords (Fey), or elder evils (Star), instead of their own names.

168: Undeath's Bond - Your body is destined to become an undead monstrosity upon your death, and also to serve as a prison for your soul, forcing you to watch helplessly as your body commits atrocities in your name.

169: Meatbag - You produce a nasty, squishy sound when you move, and you take on a jellylike consistence.

170: Janus Curse - A face identical to your original one appears on the back of your head. This face acts in the same way as your first, so if you speak, your voice comes from both sides of your head.

171: Atlas's Burden - You constantly feel a heavy weight upon your shoulders.

172: Idiot Tinker - Every piece of machinery you work with breaks in some way, except for when you are actually trying to break it, then it works perfectly.

173: Foul Breath - You have a really disgusting, nauseating breath.

174: Murderer's Rest - Each time after you kill someone, you fall into a magical sleep that lasts for five minutes unless someone brings you out of it by magical means. During this sleep, you dream horrible nightmares about the person you just killed tormenting you.

Tokiko Mima
2008-10-24, 05:11 PM
Inspired by Ranma 1/2. :smallwink:

175. Formula 110 - Occassionally you forget one specific, very important person (it helps if they travel with you and/or are a lover/spouse.) You can remember nothing about this person, even if they are standing right in front of your face screaming at you. If told information about them (their name, the fact that you're married, etc.), you forget it instantly. If they leave your line of sight, in your mind its as if they never existed at all.

You will regain your memory of them just as suddenly, and next time your Pact may choose someone else to forget, or it may choose the same person. This makes maintaining good relationships very difficult, but also occassionally makes for a good alibi.

176. Cat's Tongue - Even lukewarm water feels boiling hot to you, causing you to reflexively leap away from it. In order to drink or have contact with any water, it must be absolutely cold.

Agrippa
2008-10-24, 07:15 PM
I like Discworld's version: ""YOU WERE TOLD YOU WOULD WALK WITH DEATH EVERY DAY."

Since this is Discworld's Death I'd gladly take that Warlock Pact Catch. I don't think that catch would come from either standard Pact (Star, Infernal, Fey or Dark). Maybe an Angelic, Time based or otherwise benign pact.

Inyssius Tor
2008-10-24, 07:32 PM
177. Everyone you've ever killed is still alive, in your head--seeing what you see, and hearing what you hear, but unable to take any action beyond mentally talking to you. Telling you their life stories, begging for help, screaming in deranged horror, et cetera. If you're lucky, most of them withdraw into fatalistic depression over time. If you're not, the cacophony grows mind-shattering.

chiasaur11
2008-10-24, 08:38 PM
Since this is Discworld's Death I'd gladly take that Warlock Pact Catch. I don't think that catch would come from either standard Pact (Star, Infernal, Fey or Dark). Maybe an Angelic, Time based or otherwise benign pact.

I'd be fine with that one, sure, but it'd still be awkward.

I mean seeing everything you kill get reaped...

Massively odd at minimum.

Draco Dracul
2008-10-25, 12:54 AM
178 Burning Man (Infernal only)- A portion of your body is always covered in an undying flame, this flame cannot harm you, but it can harm others.

vicente408
2008-10-25, 01:21 AM
178 Burning Man (Infernal only)- A portion of your body is always covered in an undying flame, this flame cannot harm you, but it can harm others.

How bad a person does it make me that the very first thing that came to my mind when reading this was the word "firecrotch"?

Athaniar
2008-10-25, 12:07 PM
A very bad person.

179: Fisheyes - Your eyes are twice as large as normal, bulging, and never blinking.

180: Vision of Ruin - You view the world as a broken, ruined, nightmarish place, with scorched, ruined buildings and horrible, deformed people.

181: Mindstalker - You see a dark shape moving in the corner of your eye, you hear ghoulish footsteps behind you, yet there is nothing there when you turn around, for these phenomena are a side-effect of your Pact.

182: Beastly Paranoia - The smallest housecat appears to you as a rabid, raging demoncat. And as for more dangerous beasts...

183: Rejection - You are doomed to be forever rejected by those you want to pursue a closer relationship with.

184: Idiot Telepath - You can read the minds of others, and you are sure you know everything about them. Only that every thought and memory you think you read is the exact opposite of what it actually is, and you refuse to realize this.

185: There Can Only Be One - You have a deep-seated, instinctual hatred for other warlocks of your Pact, or even other warlocks whatsoever, even if you don't know that they are warlocks.

186: Giving Offense - Without realizing it, you constantly do things that deeply offend those around you.

187: Under Surveillance [Star] - To you, everything appears to have eyes, everything from bushes and rocks to clouds and even the sun. Sometimes, a cheerful smile accompanies the eyes, making it even more unsettling.

188: Dread Gaze - People who look you in the eyes become deeply unsettled. Also, your eyes look unnatural, be it that they have an unusual color, a strange glow, or are completely featureless.

189: History of Death - Whenver you are at a location where many people have died an unnatural death, such as a battlefield or an execution yard, the restless spirits invades your mind and torments your soul for a brief but shocking period of time.

190: Signherald - You feel a compulsion to mark the world with the sign of your Master. You include it whenever you write something, you paint it on walls, and you carve sculptures of it.

191: Pariah - You are forever doomed to be shunned by those of your own race.

192: Fog of War - Everything a certain distance from you appears to be shrouded in a thick fog. This effect moves with you, making you unable to clearly view things which are far away.

193: Dark Writing - Everything you write is in the eldritch language of your Master, and the letters glow with an evil light, whether you want to write in that language or not.

194: Sonic Displacement - Everything you hear appears to come from a completely different direction than it actually comes from. For example, the voice of a person standing right in front of you and speaking to you may appear to come from behind you.

195: The Mouths of Others - You cannot use your own mouth to speak, but instead, you talk through the mouths of others, taking away their own voice in order for you to speak.

196: Those You Know - Other people appear to you as rough, faceless mannequins, speaking in the same, dull voice. You are unable to tell them apart.

197: Victim's Retribution - All the pain you afflict on others is also felt by you. You take no actual damage from this, but it's highly uncomfortable.

198: The Reaper Beckons - All of sudden, an image of the Reaper (or whatever represents death in your culture) may appear in front of you at a distance, beckoning for you to follow it.

199: Warlock's Infamy - Even if they have never even heard of you before, everyone that lays eyes upon you instantly know that you are a warlock, a wicked agent of evil and a harbinger of the apocalypse.

200: Time Flies - Somehow, you percieve the flow of time, either by hearing it, seeing it, feeling it, or even tasting it or smelling it. This experience will slowly drive you insane.

201: Ghostskin - Your skin is transluscent. This can appear quite unsettling.

202: A Thousand Faces - Each time you wake up after sleeping, your face has changed into a completely new, random one.

203: Dread Leper - One or more of body parts may suddenly fall off, only to be instantly regenerated. Note that this regeneration only applies to body parts lost as a consequence of this catch.

204: Bloodfluid - All of your bodily fluids appear as blood.

205: Curse of the Animal [Fey] - You take on the notable characteristics of a certain animal, and you also develop an irrational hatred for that kind of animal.

Flickerdart
2008-10-25, 12:45 PM
I think we should shy away from actual mechanical effects, such as losing eyes and whatnot. The Warlock is presumably balanced as is, and all catches should be purely RP ones to make it more interesting, but just as playable.

GolemsVoice
2008-10-25, 01:46 PM
206 Lord of the Flies You are always acompanied by a faint buzzing of flies and other insects. Though it is not actually enough to make you easier to hear, it is unnerving to those who stay in your vicinity for long.
207 Agent of Chaos This works best with the infernal pact, or maybe the fey pact. You are convinced that anarchy is the only true form of government, and that every other political system is a n insult to the people. Therefore, you will constantly seek to undermine order in any way you can. Though you will not go out in the streets and preach you views, you will lie, work against the system or speak bad of it any time you can.

Mewtarthio
2008-10-25, 04:45 PM
208) The Linderman-Petrelli Gambit You occasionally encounter a creature that only you can see or hear. It may give you advice or instructions, but it's up to you whether or not you act on its words (and, indeed, it's not necessarily the best thing for you to do). Note that there's no real way of telling whether this creature is a mouthpiece of your patron or just a hallucination you're suffering.

209) The Two Thrones As above, except you can't even see the creature: It is merely a voice inside your head. Nothing can drown this voice out or cause you to stop hearing it, including deafness. Note that there is no penalty associated with distraction from the voice, though it may taunt you at crucial moments it you disregard its advice.

210) Dark Prince You transform into a monster during combat. This occurs automatically as a free action as soon as either your turn comes up in the initiative order or you are hit by an enemy attack. You also transform when you use a utility power outside of combat. Your stats are unchanged (though you effectively only have access to warlock powers in your transformed state), and you shift back gradually over the course of your next short rest.

chiasaur11
2008-10-25, 05:35 PM
211) The Cube is my Friend.
You perceive a single inanimate object as alive. You hear it speak to you continually. On occasion it threatens to stab you.

kbk
2008-10-25, 06:39 PM
212 Scapegoat: Whenever an unsolved crime happens in your vicinity, you are blamed. This would work really well for a fey pact, but it could work for infernal too.

213 Visions of the Innocents: Children and true innocents see you in a form that matches your patron. This will work for any pact.

214 Your tongue: You may no longer speak in your native tongue. You still understand it. You can speak in other languages with no problems.

215 Beacon of False Hope: Those you meet are inspired by your presence, but their hopes are always let down.

DarknessLord
2008-10-25, 08:18 PM
216. Depth [fey]: Those around you see you only for your outward appearance and abilities and electrotypes based upon them, regardless of what you do to show them otherwise. Sometimes even you begin to wonder if there is anything more to you.

217. Mortality: You can not die. This does not stop you from aging, getting sick or taking damage, merely being killed by it. If you do take enough damage to be killed, your body merely re-forms anywhere from a few hours to weeks of agonizing pain and awareness later, to the minimum amount it can be to still be alive. Your release from eternal agony can only come if you find a way to bargen back for your mortality, or someone else's.

218. Mouth of Truth, Mouth of Lies: At any given time, you may only tell the absolute truth, or a total lie. This changes randomly, and may (or may not) change if you try to tell an obvious fact, or use some other method of cluing the listener in on which mode you're in. You yourself are even unaware of which until you actually try to speak.

JellyPooga
2008-10-25, 11:37 PM
219: The Devil Went Down to Georgia - You're just the best fiddle player there ever has been. A Devil challenged you to a fiddle contest: your stake; your soul, his; eldritch power (or a golden fiddle...)...simply put, you won.

Draco Dracul
2008-10-25, 11:59 PM
219: The Devil Went Down to Georgia - You're just the best fiddle player there ever has been. A Devil challenged you to a fiddle contest: your stake; your soul, his; eldritch power (or a golden fiddle...)...simply put, you won.

Would you only be able to use your Warlock powers while holding your golden fiddle? Could you use the golden fiddle as an implement?

Also, when PHBII comes out this would be a good excuse for a Bard to multiclass Warlock.

JellyPooga
2008-10-26, 12:07 AM
Would you only be able to use your Warlock powers while holding your golden fiddle? Could you use the golden fiddle as an implement?

Also, when PHBII comes out this would be a good excuse for a Bard to multiclass Warlock.

Quite possibly, my friend, quite possibly...(or it could just be an excuse to play a kick-A tune whilst playing D&D)

kbk
2008-10-26, 01:12 AM
220 Changeling: Every time someone meets you, you appear slightly different than you did the last time they met you. You maintain an appearance for the duration of an encounter. At any given time, you appear the same to everyone looking at you, but you're appearance will be different next time. Fay or Star pact.

221 Arcane: Unlike Changeling, everyone who sees you sees a slightly different person. Also unlike Changeling, to these people, your appearance does not change aside from normal aging, scaring, etc. Fay or star pact.

Learnedguy
2008-10-26, 05:07 AM
Moonchild: (Fey/Star pact) Somehow you are intensely fascinated, even mesmerized by the stars and the moon, and whenever you're outside during the night you can't help but stare at the sky in almost childish glee. Unfortunately this has a negative effect on your sleep, and after such nights you're tired and bleary.

Seeing Things: (Fey pact) You can see "The People" although no one else can. Your comrades might find you unsettling as you're often staring at nothing in particular (not to mention smiling and talking to nothing in particular).

The Guest: (Fey/Star/Infernal pact) There's someone in there with you. You have an intense feeling that someone is looking through your eyes, tasting your food, listening to your thoughts etc. The Guest never seems to communicate with you though.

Grand Theft Shadow: (- Pact) It seems as if your shadow is not quite your own. It doesn't look like you, sometimes it changes shape and you're certain you've seen it moving when you yourself haven't done anything. Furthermore, your shadow seems to be unaffected by light or absence of such. It's always walking two o'clock besides you.

Athaniar
2008-10-26, 07:20 AM
217. Mortality: You can not die. This does not stop you from aging, getting sick or taking damage, merely being killed by it. If you do take enough damage to be killed, your body merely re-forms anywhere from a few hours to weeks of agonizing pain and awareness later, to the minimum amount it can be to still be alive. Your release from eternal agony can only come if you find a way to bargen back for your mortality, or someone else's.

Isn't that a bit (over)powered for a catch?


226: Floodtears: You are always crying, no matter if you're actually sad or not.

227: Dancing Tattoos: Your body is covered with strange markings, and these markings constantly move across your body in a seemingly random pattern.

228: Fiendtooth: Your teeth are replaced with small, runed pieces of eldritch metal.

229: Eyes of Darkness: Your eyes are replaced with crimson-streaked black crystals. This causes you to view the world as mostly black and red.

AslanCross
2008-10-26, 08:50 AM
[QUOTE=DarknessLord;5173685]

227: Dancing Tattoos: Your body is covered with strange markings, and these markings constantly move across your body in a seemingly random pattern.


Reminds me of a certain bald NE warlock.
http://www.gamebanshee.com/neverwinternights2/companions/images/ammonjerro.jpg

kbk
2008-10-26, 02:16 PM
Just so everyone's clear, #1001 has to be "DM's Choice"'

Or maybe make #1001 PC's choice, and #1000 DM's choice, so that way I don't have to find a 1001 sided die.

Trizap
2008-10-26, 07:41 PM
230: Opposite Alignment pull: if your some heart of gold, you will constantly be haunted by the temptation to be evil, to be bad, to do whatever you want, while if your evil, your constantly plagued by your conscious and your guilt of your evil actions.

Tengu_temp
2008-10-26, 08:59 PM
226: Floodtears: You are always crying, no matter if you're actually sad or not.


Best for Darkness Warlocks - everyone knows they're the most emo!

231. Bad Advisor (preferably Star Pact) - all the eldritch knowledge you possess compels you to share your wisdom... but all of it is completely flawed. All the advise you give (and it's hard for you not to give advise when the situation asks for it) will be wrong and following it will, at best, ridicule the recipient. You don't realize it, however - there is no ill intent in your words.

Sometimes, I can't help but think I have this flaw.

Shadow_Elf
2008-10-26, 09:20 PM
232 - Air Headedness (Fey Pact esp)
You persistently sound naive and childish, no matter your actual intelligence (read: regardless of INT score). Your comments are typically irrelevant, and you mix up words that sound similar such as "unanimous" and "anonymous".

dspeyer
2008-10-27, 12:10 AM
233 Protective duty: You must protect those on the material plane which are of interest to your patron. This might be musicians (fey), lunatics (dark), arsonists (infernal), or even oak trees (fey). If you allow one to come to harm when you could have prevented it, your powers flicker. If you harm one, save in self-defense or support of your patron, you lose your powers altogether.

234 Poetics: You can only speak in verse. It doesn't have to be good.

235 Rune Forming: Random small objects in your vicinity re-arrange themselves to form strange symbols. They seem meaningless, but anyone who makes a dc 25 decipher script check will go permanently insane.

The_Werebear
2008-10-27, 05:35 AM
236- On a Mission: Your pact was given to you while making a specific promise to do something (I.E., assassinate a powerful leader, spread chaos, protect x location, free animals from zoos, whatever). Your power is contingent on working toward this mission. While your powers don't fade if you ignore this, you are subject to spontaneous audits at any time, where you have to explain your progress and justify any frivolous power use.

237- Animation: Posters and portraits on walls will talk with you. This may or may not be audible to others.

238- Stark Raving Sane: You are 100% mentally balanced and focused on task. You feel a great need to point this out to everyone else. The implications of this in relation to the absurdity of the world are up to the DM.

239- Hostages: The pact giver, as surety for the power they have given, have taken something precious of yours hostage. It could be valuables, sentimental, or an actual living person who you care about. If you cease to care about that person or thing, they will find another and start holding that. Occasional threats will be issued to control your behavior.

240- Power Receptacle: To safeguard their power, the pact giver has broken up their power into small pieces and passed it out to people to protect. You are one of them. Someday, they may decide the issue that made them break up their power and hide it in mortals is over, and come to reclaim it.

Suleman
2008-10-27, 06:13 AM
I just made a warlock character, and I thought I should post his background here. I hope it's on-topic. I'd say he paid a price.

Background: It's for 4e Forgotten Realms, and Koru is an old character of mine.

Koru, a dwarven priest of Mathammor Duin, was an extraordinary dwarf. Born into the great city of the gold dwarves, he began a great journey at a young age when a cave-in stranded him in the Underdark.
He survived for years and noticed signs of tremendously powerful but mysterious beasts that could threaten his nearby home.He emerged from the Underdark, but instead of returning home, he travelled around the world seeking knowledge and help against the monsters.
After years of searching and a tragic but not unexpected betrayal by his drow ally, he found very little of either, and returned home as a bitter man and believed by none.Returning right after the cataclysm that ravaged the city and opened the great hole to the Underdark, he was considered a traitor to his kind.
Though he found love of a sort, the outside world called for him and he eventually left again, leaving behind a wife and a son by the name of Hely. Hely shared his father’s fiery spirit but also his hunger for knowledge. Delving deep into the book mountains of the dwarven libraries, he found out that his father might be right after all.
Like his father, he found no further information, like it had all been erased or just disappeared. Desperate beyond imagination, he sought an eldritch ritual that enabled him to contact infernal spirits for information.
Such a ritual, however, is not without a price. He would have to live his life as a conduit for the powers of the Nine Hells. Within the unholy flames of the ritual brazier, Hely saw taunting glimpses of the beasts and some clues, but the visions begun to fade.
In order to see, Hely was forced to lean ever closer to the brazier. His beard caught flame, but Hely could not look away, to ensure the safety of his home. Even as the fire burned his face, Hely looked without blinking, and saw the crucial clue to the monsters’ identity.
He sustained severe burns and his chin is now covered in criss-crossing scars that, from a distance, might be mistaken a short beard. In addition to his disfigurement, he can never again grow a true beard, and instead of enduring the shame, he chose the vagabond life of his father and his old mission as well.
Hely, now known as Scarbeard, seeks the knowledge and help of the outside world against the threat that might rise and destroy even the remnants of his people and their civilization.

Note that if I had just said that
lol dwarf without beard
the effect wouldn't be quite the same. It isn't as simple as that.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-10-27, 06:14 AM
I've always been a fan of the classics.

241 - Witches' Mark: A hidden deformity on the body - maybe a rune, but more likely a third nipple or a pestilent growth - that is usually only found on Warlocks. There is at least one religious order in the land which disproves of Warlocks, and if they notice the Mark, they may react... harshly.

242 - Tears of Blood: When you weep, you weep tears of blood.

243 - Darkness Follows: When you pass a light source it will dim. Candles and other small flames will be quenched, while larger flames (lanterns and fireplaces) will be reduced to smoldering. Even magical lights are diminished when you are nearby.

244 - Soul Harvester: Everyone who dies under your Curse is consigned to your Pact Master. They can still be rezzed normally, of course, but if they are not then their soul is denied the normal afterlife they would have otherwise deserved. What your Master does with those souls is not always clear...

245 - Speaking in Tongues: Periodically, you will be seized by a power and compelled to speak in a language that is unintelligible to anyone, magically aided or not. You do not know what you are saying, but it always provokes a reaction from the listeners - whether it is awe, fear, anger, or something else.

246 - Poltergeist: Things... move about you sometimes. Flagons shift away from your grasp, gold pieces slide into your pockets, shudders rattle as you pass - it is as if a mischievous spirit follows you wherever you go. Generally, these effects are merely irritating, but occasionally they can land the Warlock in hot water (say, by knocking a flagon by your elbow into the lap of the burly man sitting next to you).

247 - Death Watch: Every face you see has a set of numbers above it. They change as time goes by, and while you can never quite figure out their pattern, you know that those numbers represent the time that person has left in this world. Needless to say, this puzzle can preoccupy the Warlock, and in that study the Warlock will spend long amounts of time staring at people with quizzical expressions on their faces.

248 - The Craving: Periodically, you find yourself craving some unusual substance. Perhaps a desire to drink rat's blood, or eat insects, or something else that is non-lethal but often vile. The Craving usually selects one such substance, and the Warlock will find himself maintaining a small amount of whatever it is wherever he goes. If he does not satisfy his Craving, then he will begin to have fits, as if going through an intense withdrawal. At worst, the Warlock goes catatonic until the new dawn, when even the fiercest Cravings subside.

249 - Ill Omens: Wherever you go, there are signs of ill omen about you. Black cats cross your path, mirrors break in your grasp, or whatever the local superstitions require. You are under no particular curse, and suffer no more ill-fortune than usual, but superstitious folks will treat you warily, and many will avoid you altogether.

250 - Abnormal Growth: Your fingernails, facial hair, toe nails, or some other continually growing part of your body twists itself every dawn. Perhaps your fingernails are 3 inches long and yellow, or your toenails curl up, or your ears sprout large tufts of white hair - whatever it is, it isn't normal. Worst of all, no matter what condition they are when the Warlock beds down for the night, when he awakes they will be regrown to the exact same state - shredding gloves and boots if need be.

Athaniar
2008-10-27, 06:19 AM
234 Poetics: You can only speak in verse. It doesn't have to be good.


I think the Headless Horseman (http://www.wowwiki.com/Headless Horseman) has that one.

251: Death's Harbinger - Your powers are a result of your Master placing your departed soul into a corpse. The race of your host body is the source of your racial abilities and physical attributes, but your mindset results from your previous life. You may or may not count as undead, but you do not gain any special powers from this peculiar state of being, except for your warlock ones.

252: Imaginary Lycanthrope - You are absolutely sure you are a lycanthrope (or some other therianthrope). Whatever to make of this is completely up to you.

253: Color Inversion - You see all colors inverted.

254: Healing Allergy - Whenever you are affected by a healing spell, a strange mark or growth appears on a visible place on your body, and disappears after a time depending on the strength of the spell (it stays longer if the spell was powerful).

Come to think of it, there really should be a Death pact.

Quincunx
2008-10-27, 06:50 AM
255: Dwarven Happiness - Your beard vibrates when you're happy, forks when you're angry, and otherwise makes concealing your general train of thought difficult. Female, you say? Either you sprout hair on your chin or some other patch of hair becomes animated. (Pray it's not an armpit. That tickles.)

Needless to say, shaving has no impact.

Draco Ignifer
2008-10-27, 10:45 AM
217. Mortality: You can not die. This does not stop you from aging, getting sick or taking damage, merely being killed by it. If you do take enough damage to be killed, your body merely re-forms anywhere from a few hours to weeks of agonizing pain and awareness later, to the minimum amount it can be to still be alive. Your release from eternal agony can only come if you find a way to bargen back for your mortality, or someone else's.
Isn't that a bit (over)powered for a catch?

Depends on how you run with it. Remember, 4E's grim reaper is a lot more forgiving than earlier editions - rather than piles of diamonds, levels, and constitution scores, you suffer the loss of 500 gold, 8 hours, and a -1 to all rolls until you reach three milestones. This avoids that cost, but instead places you in severe agony, and, unlike Raise Dead, doesn't return you as if you had taken a rest - the exact minimum HP needed to be alive, if I'm reading it right, in stable condition, of course, and probably with more severe minuses for having suffered that level of pain.

Not to mention that, if it's not eventually cured, your character ends up withering into a grasshopper or something similar...

Anyway, 256: Out of Memory - Yet another memory variant. Quite frankly, remembering the specifics of your rituals, powers, and the like, takes up a lot of your memory. The human mind can only store so much memory, of course, so as you learn more rituals, you start to forget more and more. At level 1, you're just going to have a hard time learning new things; as your levels increase, random memories, ranging from the banal to the important, will be copied over by memories burned into your brain of how to do these rituals and use these powers EXACTLY right.

257: Absolute Despair - There is a moment in your life where you will need this power more than ever before. The moment between happiness and misery - where your goals teeter on the brink of success and ruination, your loved ones between life and hideous death, or the like. At that moment, not only will it fail you, but all strength will depart your body - you will be unable to act in any way, shape, or form until it is all over. At any other moment, your power is untouched by this curse, but you always know that moment of failure is coming. Most suited to Infernal Pact, although Star Pact fits as well... in which case you might not know about this drawback.

Also? This cannot have happened in your background. It's still hanging over your head.

Saelvarath
2008-12-06, 05:48 AM
i just cant help but think of some quotes and quirks from various sources

'Tis the darkest Glyph thou barest. It sacrifices stray souls to summon unearthly force. Unearthly force shall obey and serve thee. 'Tis named "Chaos Legion".

The sinner shall be atoned. Even though no punishment will be enough for your sin. Siela! Why...? Why were you taken from me?

Hourglass Eyes: think Raistlin Maeger you see everything as it will be, the prettiest girl, the youngest dragon are all old and decrepit to your gaze. there is no inherent prophesy included in this vision, they may never have the opportunity to reach this wretched state but seeing everything at its worst doesn't leave you with a very bright outlook on the future

Fey Aversion: the touch of metal burns you and being near it weakens you, you loath having to use doorknobs or eating with a knife or fork, this one will be annoying to some people but the creative will enjoy finding solutions.

llamamushroom
2008-12-06, 09:00 AM
260 Stalker: You are always convinced that someone is following you. This person changes when you exit/enter an area, and you can instantly identify who it is from out of a crowd. They generally aren't.

261 Can't You See Him?: There is an individual who is always there. They are always in the centre of your field of vision, always looking directly at you, and completely ivisible to others. It seems like everyone goes out of their way to avoid being in the same place as it, but this is just a part of your skewed perception.

262 Recognition: There is an individual who is always there. You see some reasonably unimportant people as the same person, with the exact same facial and body features. Whether they are the innkeeper, the Duke's vassal, or the man on the street, they all look exactly the same, except that they are all wearing the clothing that they 'actually' are. Others can see them for who they are, and you instantly recognise one of these people. They stand out from the crowd, so you cannot avoid noticing one.

Please forgive bad wording - concept's in my head, but brain be tired. Also, they all seem to be Fey pact, but Star could work, too.

quick_comment
2008-12-06, 04:31 PM
263: Tears of Power - When you manifest your warlock powers, you cry tears of blood, weeping for your long lost soul (infernal)

264: Center of Attention - When you manifest your warlock powers, you are illuminated by light from the stars. They want to watch their agent in action. (star)

Draco Dracul
2008-12-06, 06:47 PM
Seeing Stars(star pact)-Everyone you meet reminds you of famous.