Contractual Magic - for an unnamed vote-created setting

[zabbarot]

First things first, voting is closed. So the universe enforces contracts, people just learn how to make them.

Moving one.

So I find this a very interesting idea, but I have a question:

Is the goal to contract (1) with entities, or (2) for services?

For example, if I want to become more resistant to fire, do I call up one of a wide variety of entities that might offer such a boon, be they devil or efreet or angel? Or do I call up an efreet first, and then negotiate for fire resistance as part of a larger package deal?

I would say the goal is to contract for whatever services you need. If you can get a fire effect just as easily from any of those three entities it should be more about which on you'd rather deal with, which gave me an idea I'll go into below.

Entity: Whom (or what) you're contracting with. Perhaps there is a token price just to bring them to the table, much like a spell component. To entice the imp to even consider your offer, you've got to bring some rancid meat for him to snack on.

This makes me think of a middle eastern custom. Usually a merchant will offer gifts so people feel obligated to return the favor by purchasing something. I think something like this could be a good optional price for a bonus to the contract making check.

Contracting DC: The DC to make the contract, obviously. What is the DC based on? An Intelligence check? A Charisma check? Diplomacy? Bluff? What kind of modifiers can you get? What are the benefits/penalties, if any, for spectacular success or tragic failure? How many contracts can you have at any one time? Are some contracts mutually exclusive?

Diplomacy is my first thought, but skill modifiers can vary so widely and are too easy to minmax. So I'm thinking it should probably be based on class level like the binder's check. I'm imagining this as a magic system to replace vancian casting completely for the setting we're using it in, so I'd like to see the check based on level and then Int, Wis, or Cha based on the flavor of the particular class using it.
So far possible modifiers I'm thinking are things like:

1. The number of contracts you're already in.
2. If you've upheld previous contracts.
3. If you've defaulted on previous contracts.
4. Your alignment.
5. What other entities you've contracted with.
6. Stress at time of contract making. (combat or imminent doom)

So in some ways you'll kind of have a cosmic credit score to manage. I imagine making contracts should be a noncombat action, like a wizard preparing his spells. Bonuses or penalties for criticals have yet to be determined mostly because the base effects haven't really been figured out either, but I feel that their severity should be based on what else a primary contract making class can do. If they're 1/2 BAB and full of miserable saves, we should probably keep the penalty from being too much so it doesn't become russian roulette. The max number of contracts you can have active also depends on their strength, but I was thinking it should get harder to form new contracts while you are under others. Like each additional contract past a certain point would have add an increasing negative modifier to your contracting check. And I'm not sure if some contracts should be mutually exclusive or some suppliers should be mutually exclusive. Ie you could get fire and water both from some flavor of archon, but you can't get one from a demon and the other from an archon.

Benefit: What you get when you successfully make the contract. I like the idea of using cleric domains here - maybe you get a "contract power" no matter what your contracting result was, and certain spell-like abilities if you succeed. For example, you make a contract with an efreet for his services. The DC is 25. Even if you fail the DC, you get Fire Resistance 10 for the day. If you meet the DC, you get to use Fireball 1/day as a spell-like ability. If you beat the DC by ten or more, you get to use it 3/day. Your skill at contracting allows you to negotiate better deals for the price.

This is definitely a possibility, we haven't actually nailed down what the contracts should do.

Price: What you have to pay for the benefit. I think services are better than items or gold (more interesting effects), but you could easily throw a wide range of payments here. An efreet might exact as payment: "Set fire to an inhabited structure today." Negative payments could be possible too - a dryad might exact as payment: "Do no harm to any plants today." Actually, the latter might be more interesting, as the efreet's requirement affords a lot of latitude in putting off the payment until the end of the day.

Being able to put off they payment just gives a larger chance that the contract will be breached, and the penalty is probably in favor of the entity you made a deal with.(Like a credit card ) But here is the idea I got earlier the contract will be arrayed by type (most likely using cleric domains) and by level of effect. Multiple entities could all give you fire, war, or light, but each would want a different price. So I'm thinking the payments will be linked to the entity you are contracting with and the level of the effect instead of the domain of the effect. So there will probably be some chart making involved in this... but I feel like that's probably a better way to break this down. The other idea I've had is to leave some payments a little open to interpretation by the DM. Like if a demon would like you to kill some people, he may want you to burn them up if you bargain for fire. Thematic interpretation, I guess.

Breach: What happens if you don't pay the price. Could be as simple as "the entity refuses to contract with you again for a week," or as dire as "the universe strikes you down for refusing to conform to its laws, take 4d6 CON damage."

This is very much in line with what I was thinking.