Additional Seeming Benefits for Contracts [2e]

[griffinguy24]

So, I finally noticed this tidbit when rereading the Arcadian Contracts (page 128), "The Contracts below present two seeming benefits each, but Storytellers are encouraged to add their own". This seems like a cool idea to me, so I figured, why not brainstorm a few new Seeming benefits for existing Contracts?

I began by looking at Fae Cunning, a Common Shield Contract (page 140), which is a fantastic defensive boost. We're provided with benefits for Elementals and Ogres, so I've designed additional benefits.

Beast: The Beast relies on her instincts to protect her, using the higher of Wits or Dexterity to determine her Defense. (This was the simplest. Animals have the greater Defense calculation, now so does the Beast)
Darkling: Attacks seem to fade through the Darkling’s body. Rolls to Dodge gain the 9-again quality. If they already have 9-again, they gain 8-again. (I'm ambivalent towards this one, but I wasn't sure how else to make this concept work mechanically)
Fairest: The Fairest beguiles her would-be assailants. If an attack against her fails, the attacker gains the Awestruck Condition. (It seemed like the Fairest would impose a condition when someone fails to hit them, and Awestruck fits perfectly)
Wizened: The Wizened is prepared even if her Defense fails her. She temporarily gains general and ballistic armor equal to half of her Wyrd (rounded down). This armor dissolves after a single hit. (This was the hardest to come up with. Given the Wizened's theme of creating, I felt that it made the most sense that this effect create something to help them if Defense fails. I wasn't sure how to do that, and figured that a one-use armor boost fit the mold best)

I tried to make these fit the milieu of each seeming, just as Ogres become tough enough to break weapons that strike them or Elementals become quicker. I would really appreciate feedback here, since I'm not sure if these are over- or under-powered, as well as your own ideas for Seeming Benefits.

[Draconis]

I tend to come up with these as the situation arises, so usually for my own characters or my players'. Here are a few I've used:

PRIMAL GLORY (Common Shield): builds lethally-dangerous armor out of an element.
Fairest: the Muse can reshape her armor to be impressive rather than hazardous. If she chooses this option, instead of doing lethal damage to attackers, she adds her Wyrd to her Presence for the duration.

RED REVENGE (Royal Sword): sends the user into a berserk frenzy.
Beast: the Grimm can grant this effect to willing packmates by paying an additional Glamour per person.

[HelmsDerp]

Chrysalis; Elemental benefit

The Torrent may choose an elemental form to replace one or both animals. The elemental form uses their normal physical stats, but is capable of appropriate environmental effects. Fire elementals can start fires, light elementals can pass through glass, etc. Physical or liquid elements like metal or water downgrade any damage taken. Agg becomes lethal, lethal becomes bashing. Intangible elementals like air or shadow can choose to be fully intangible and immune to physical attacks. On any turn where they attack or take and action that would require a semi solid form they add their wyrd to defense instead, as they reflexively shift states to avoid injury.

[Horodrigo]

Some Fairest benefits I created on my table:

(Will edit to add more as things go on on my table)

Glimpse of a Distant Mirror: The Fairest see things clearly, independent of the reflexive surface quality.
Red Revenge: The Fairest does suffer the Berserk condition.
Unravel the Royal Tapestry: The Fairest senses when someone is using this contract or a power similar to it, and as a protagonist on her story, can activate hers reflexively to follow the person.

[Unahim]

I finally finished writing a Seeming benefit for every Seeming/Contract last month. I like having them done in advance as it lets my players make more informed decisions about which ones they might like.

But it'll take a bit of cleaning up to post because:
- For ease of reference (it's a long list and took weeks of work, on-and-off over the course of a year) I put the descriptions of all the Contracts into my working document; I'd need to delete those before arriving at something I could share. (Is listing existing seeming benefits too much, or is that a small enough amount of information that it's alright? I didn't always mark which ones were "from the book" and which ones are the new ones. ^^)
- I've house ruled some details of some Contracts, which might influence some of the seeming benefits.
- I've house ruled some other systems (and use the range band rules from Hurt Locker), which also might influence some of the seeming benefits.

I'll likely eventually fix that first problem and post them, but as for #2 and #3 I'd likely just provide them as-is; a minority of benefits are impacted by house rules anyway. Those that are are usually easy enough for others to tweak.

[Horodrigo]

I finally finished writing a Seeming benefit for every Seeming/Contract last month. I like having them done in advance as it lets my players make more informed decisions about which ones they might like.

But it'll take a bit of cleaning up to post because:
- For ease of reference (it's a long list and took weeks of work, on-and-off over the course of a year) I put the descriptions of all the Contracts into my working document; I'd need to delete those before arriving at something I could share. (Is listing existing seeming benefits too much, or is that a small enough amount of information that it's alright? I didn't always mark which ones were "from the book" and which ones are the new ones. ^^)
- I've house ruled some details of some Contracts, which might influence some of the seeming benefits.
- I've house ruled some other systems (and use the range band rules from Hurt Locker), which also might influence some of the seeming benefits.

I'll likely eventually fix that first problem and post them, but as for #2 and #3 I'd likely just provide them as-is; a minority of benefits are impacted by house rules anyway. Those that are are usually easy enough for others to tweak.

I can't wait to see those. I really like those little perks that each seeming has when they activate contracts.

[Unahim]

Alright, I put some time into making a copy of my Seeming Benefits document that doesn't contain any text that appears in the Changeling book.

A couple of things to note here:
- I'm using a house-ruled combat system. Off the top of my head I can't think of anything that would be thrown off in terms of contracts and numbers (since I still use the same numbers underneath, essentially) but keep it in mind.
- I (loosely) use the optional movement rules from Hurt Locker. Some Seeming benefits might therefore refer to things like "within close range" rather than give meters. But others still use meters. Either way, they should be easy enough to translate if you need to.
- I've house ruled (or am in the process of) a lot of hedge navigation/oneiromancy stuff. Therefore, the Pathfinder and Dreamsteps Contracts are not in a complete state, but they're the only ones. Whatever benefits I come up with for them likely will be too different to work with the "normal" rules. Perhaps I'll get to making a version specifically for vanilla gameplay eventually.

Let me know if you see anything that seems off, I'll tweak it if need be. Some Contracts stray into incredibly similar niches by default, so when adding Seeming benefits to them it can be a challenge to keep them distinctive. I've written these over the course of a year or so, so my mindset may not have been 100% the same from start to finish, so let me know if something further down the list seems to clash with one of the earlier ones. ^^
33 (google doc) pages worth of Seeming benefits are bound to have some errors here or there.

I've tried to make it so that the Seeming benefits combo well together, so that they seem alluring to acquire for other Seemings. In some cases this worked out incredibly well (Summon The Faithful Servant comes to mind). In others less so, but I've tried to make sure that each Seeming has at least one or two other Seeming benefits within the same Contract that synergize well with their own benefit.
I've also clarified how seeming benefits work together where needed. Sometimes the whole is more than the sum of its parts. ^^

You'll have to keep the rulebook open to reference it as you go, but that's just how it is. ^^

Link!: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing

[Icefyer2]

Link!: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing

Is there any plan to update this with the new Kith and Kin stuff by any chance?