Merits & Flaws

You suffer from a lasting form of mental illness. Although a successful Willpower roll (Storyteller’s option) might allow you to cope with the effects for a short time, this insanity lingers until and unless it can be cured… which also involves buying off the Flaw. An essential Flaw for Marauder characters (though it’s not exclusive to the Mad), this Trait gives you one of the Derangements described in the sidebar of that name. This madness might also affect someone with a Genetic Flaw (see below), or who’s been subjected to Room 101 or Things

Man Was Not Meant to Know (see Chapters Five and Nine).

A minor 3-point derangement reflects a troubling but manageable level of insanity; the 5-point level, meanwhile, represents an intensity of madness that makes your character a danger to herself and everyone nearby, if only because she’s a crazy person with the power of a mage.

Organisms are complex. When you alter one aspect of a living thing, other aspects change in response. And so, Genetic Flaws – innate problems with altered or constructed organisms – crop up when mages make permanent changes to the Patterns of living things.

Each of the following Traits counts as one Genetic Flaw; these Traits don’t share the usual point-based ratio that normal Flaws have. For each dot in the Enhancement Background (see Chapter Six, pp. 312-313), a character must also take either one Genetic Flaw or one point of permanent Paradox (see Chapter Ten, pp. 547-548). The same character can take a mixture of both – say, two Genetic Flaws and one permanent Paradox to balance out three dots in Enhancements. The same holds true for permanent changes with Life Sphere magicks; if Jennifer Rollins permanently raises her Stamina to 6, her player must either select one Genetic Flaw or else give the character a point of Paradox that never goes away.

Despite the name, Genetic Flaws may be psychological, supernatural, or mechanical. The character in question could be a cyborg, a sell-soul bound by devilish pacts, a servant enhanced by witchcraft, or even a non-human entity whose strange nature breeds certain Flaws. Whatever their origins,

Amnesia

Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD)

Bipolar Affective Disorder (BAD)

Dementia

Fugue

Megalomania

Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD)

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Paranoia

Schizophrenia

these Flaws reflect complications that arise from major modification of a living organism’s Pattern. Any character can take them as Paradox Flaws or basic, one-point Flaws. A handful of basic Flaws can be used as Genetic Flaws as well; if you choose that option, though, each Flaw counts as a single Genetic Flaw, even if the usual Flaw costs more than 1 point. Note that the Construct Flaw cannot also be taken as a Genetic Flaw – that Flaw already assumes a certain uncanny quality that Genetic Flaws reflect as well.

Physical Flaws

The following Flaws come in two varieties: uncanny physical characteristics, and drawbacks that involve physical ailments. Each different type counts as a separate Flaw.

Enhanced Strength

Characteristics: grossly muscular build; visibly tense muscle fibers; dense body mass; unusual weight (too much or too little) for build; unwieldy proportions; hypersteroidal physique.

Drawbacks: constant hunger; bad temper; pervasive irritability; chronic pain; heart trouble; bone disease.

Enhanced Dexterity

Characteristics: long fingers or limbs; nervous tics; freakish reflexes; restless motion.

Drawbacks: hypertension; restlessness; impatience with the slow clumsiness of everyone else; heart problems; hyperflexibility/ hypermobility syndrome; muscle pain; cancer.

Enhanced Stamina

Characteristics: expanded chest capacity; dense body structure; immunity to minor pain; imperviousness to most weather conditions.

Drawbacks: ravenous hunger; obesity; unusual weight and density for build; gray, pale, leathery or otherwise discolored or oddly-textured skin.

Enhanced Appearance

Characteristics: Uncanny beauty; musky scent; too-perfect features and/ or proportions; lack of blemishes, scars, or birthmarks.

Drawbacks: “plasticky” skin; micropores or no pores at all (increased sensitivity to heat, inability to sweat); excessive