Merits & Flaws


Homebrew and House Rules


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I'll keep this fairly brief. We don't use traits, but are interested in replacing them. Always liked the idea of merits and flaws, but every system we've seen has been a bit of a let down. I stumbled upon the "Arcana" from 7th Seas d20 and really liked the feel of them. I'm considering working on a project to flesh these for our Pathfinder games, with some changes, of course - these are rough examples.

Monologue [Flaw]
Trope: Evil Gloating
Benefits: The GM or a player (who has discovered this flaw) can activate this flaw once per day in order to get you to tell them your scheme.

Hopeless Romantic [Flaw]
Trope: Serial Romeo
Benefits: The GM or a player (who has discovered this flaw) can activate this flaw once per day in order to shoot you with Cupid's arrow, yet again.

Upon selecting a Flaw at 1st level, the character may also select a single bonus feat or a single Merit. Basically, you get one flaw and one merit (or a bonus feat) if you choose at 1st level.

Seductive [Merit]
Trope: Femme Fatale.
Prerequisite: Charisma 13.
Benefits: You may activate your merit once per day in order to make a Bluff check to convince another character (NPC only) to commit a deed that he normally wouldn't perpetrate. You gain a +5 insight bonus to this roll.

Discerning [Merit]
I couldn't find a trope, but basically putting yourself in the opponent's shoes to anticipate his next move.
Benefits: You may activate your merit once per day to predict what an opponent's very next action is going to be. Once the GM has told you what the action is, he cannot change his mind based on your actions.

Hopefully, that will get the idea across. Mostly, I'm going to be adapting these directly (but removing mechanics specific to 7th Seas), but I plan to add some new ones in, as well. A lot of the originals are good or evil, only, and neutral characters aren't permitted to select them, which I found to be quite silly outside of a 7th Seas game, but I understand why in the context of the game.

For my games, I'm thinking I'll probably go with everyone selects a flaw and they gain one merit as a result. Anyway, was mostly wondering if this interested folks in terms of contributing to and using, and so on.

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