Benefits and Drawbacks

What is a benefit /drawback?
While the Universal Rules and Player Rules represent the mechanical “base game”, benefits and drawbacks are case-by-case overrides. A benefit’s rules override normal rules when relevant. A drawback’s rules always override normal rules. Only one benefit may be used at a time unless your GM allows it – many work well in unison, but all benefits are balanced as standalone overrides.

While Benefits represent capabilities and skills others may not have, drawbacks represent areas where your adventurer might need help from their allies to keep up. Many of these drawbacks represent real-world chronic illnesses and/or disabilities. When considering a drawback, remember that the best roleplay notes are the experiences of real people.

Weapon Fighting Styles
From small blades to great two-handed cleavers, from subtle sleeve-guns to thick-limbed recurves, fighters have many choices of weapon to avail themselves. As the more experienced fight and fight again, each finds some favourites eventually.

Duelist
You specialize in the use of a one-handed weapon (one-handed melee, compact, one-handed ranged) in one hand, with the other hand free. From the flying grace of a rapier duel to the mud-soaked panic of a hammer fight, you’ve adapted well to the lightweight style of the duelist. While holding a one-handed weapon (as described) in one hand and with the other hand free, you gain +2 to Damage, +3 to Grapple checks, and one extra square of melee reach.

Florentine
You specialize in the use of one one-handed weapon in each hand (one-handed melee, compact melee, one-handed ranged). From the elegant redwine rapier-and-dagger to the frantic two-sword of the mistborne hills, you’ve become enamored with the flow of two weapons – not two separate weapons, but two halves of the same whole. While holding a one-handed weapon (as described) in each hand, you gain +2 Threshold and +3 Damage. In addition, once per turn, when you Parry against an attacker, you may deal 2d6 damage back to them.

Warrior
You specialize in the use of two-handed weapons (two-handed melee weapons, NOT polearms; two-handed ranged weapons). Be it the sting of an estoc, the weight of a maul, or the butt of a bayoneted crossbow, your focus is singular – one weapon to channel your will. While holding a two-handed weapon (as described), you gain +3 Threshold and +2 Damage. In addition, once per turn, when attacking, you may deal 2d6 damage to a second target within your reach.

Pikemaster
You specialize in the use of polearms. Sweeping wide with a dominating reach and the swiftness of your haft, the wide and varied world of polearms is yours to command. Crow’s beaks, billhooks, spears, halberds, or even bare staves comprise your arsenal. While holding a polearm, you deal normal damage to adjacent squares, +5 damage within your reach, and +10 damage at the edge of your reach. In addition, once per turn, you may move an attacked target to any space within your reach.

Archer
You specialize in the use of bows (not crossbows). Used and perfected for millenia, the way of the bow is long-lived – and for good reason. Archers do not aim with their bow - they aim with their eyes, and the bow obeys. While firing a bow, you deal +5 damage, and when attacking a target within your minimum range, you deal 2d6 damage. In addition, you gain +1/+1 speed.

Arbalester
You specialize in the use of crossbows (not bows or guns). With the accuracy of the bow and stability of the gun, the crossbow is a force all its own. While firing a crossbow, your maximum range is doubled – you deal +5 damage across your whole range, and once per turn, may add an additional 2d6 damage to an attack between your normal maximum range and expanded maximum range. (Example: a heavy crossbow could deal this damage between 40 squares and 80 squares away.)

Musketeer
You specialize in the use of guns (not crossbows). With the dry slide of a paper cartridge and the slick ringing of a chamber loading, you deliver death with a bang. While firing a gun, you deal +5 damage. In addition, once per turn, you can deliver a heavy shot – dealing a bonus 2d6 damage, and pushing the target up to 5 squares away from you in a straight line.

Battlemage
You specialize in the use of weapons while casting spells. The hot-blooded physicality of melee and the calm academia of evocation draw from different crowds, but those who dip their toes in both find it easy to match the flow and snap of wandwork with the deft flick of the blade. You do not need a free hand to cast spells. You may consume off-turns to cast spells and attack simultaneously (e.g. swinging a longsword as an attack while casting a cone). In addition, once per turn, you may add 2d6 elemental damage to a weapon attack.

Sentinel
You specialize in the use of shields. From the heaving wall of a war door, the pivot and swing of a round shield, the off-hand flow of a buckler, or the ebb and flow of one shield in a rippling wall, your greatest weapon is the wall weapons are doomed to meet. While wielding a shield, you have +5 Threshold. In addition, your shield is considered a one-handed weapon. Lastly, once per turn, when attacking, you may push an enemy up to 3 squares with an attack, following them as a free movement action (which does not consume off-turn or main turn movement).

Knave
You specialize in the use of wielded or thrown compact melee weapons. Narrow alleys and castle walls, overgrown forests and twisting caverns – here, the speed and maneuvrability of compact weapons dominate. While wielding a compact weapon, you do not have a damage penalty when not flanking. In addition, you gain 10 worn encumberance. As a free action, you may attack an enemy while retreiving a thrown weapon. You may retreive any compact weapons (yours or those your enemies discard) as a free action. Lastly, you have +5 to Grapple checks.

Elemental Fighting Styles
To the elementalist, every form and substance has its place and usage; but we all get favourites over time. Maybe you find yourself in close quarters, or often supporting a fight with artillery blasts, or you just love the invigorating crack and flash of lightning. Nonetheless, your spells have focus.

Affinity (Element)
You specialize in a particular element (fire, water, earth, air, acid, poison, cold, lightning, pain, force). When casting spells using your preferred element, you deal +5 damage. In addition, your affinity to this element is instinctive – you may parry with your element, dealing 2d6 damage in retaliation. Lastly, once per turn, you may absorb, redirect, or nullify an attack of the same element, mundane or magical.

Spell Snipe
You specialize in ranged dart attacks. When casting dart attacks at range, once per turn, you may choose one of the following: a sniper dart (which deals +10 damage at double range), or a ricochet dart (which deals 3d6 damage to an enemy within 3 squares of the first enemy, then 2d6 to an enemy within 2 squares of the second enemy, then 1d6 damage to an enemy within 1 square of (adjacent to) the third enemy).

Hand-To-Spell
You specialize in melee dart attacks. When casting dart attacks in melee, you gain +5 Threshold, and each attack pushes an enemy up to two squares away.

Artillery
You specialize in area-of-effect (AOE) damage (cones, bursts, blasts). When casting AOE spells, you deal 2d6 damage to all targets adjacent to the spell’s damage area.

Weaver
You specialize in freeform casting. When casting freeform spells, you may paint any square adjacent to another painted square (the straight-line rule no longer applies).

Signature Moves
In the heat of battle, the showy moves used in sparring and practice often fail to work out as planned. With hard dedication, these delicate and complex tasks can become like instinct, bridging the gap and meeting the panic of a real fight.

Disarm
Three times per adventure, you may disarm a target of its weapon (if possible). When you do this, you may seize their weapon as a free action, or toss it up to 10sq away as a free action.

Trip
Five times per adventure, you may trip a target – they must use three squares of movement, or an off-turn (whichever is smaller), to stand back up. While tripped, your enemy counts as being flanked.

Surgical Strike
Twice per adventure, when you attack a target, you may deal a Surgical Strike. After a target has been dealt a Surgical Strike, it takes the damage of a second attack after one turn – whether you’re present, absent, alive, or dead.

Deathstroke
Once per adventure, when you attack a target which is wearing (or naturally possesses) light armour or no armour, you may deal a Deathstroke, killing them instantly. The GM may override this ability – when this happens, your charge is not expended.

Crush
Once per adventure, when you attack a target which is wearing (or naturally possesses) medium armour or heavy armour, you may Crush them, killing them instantly. The GM may override this ability – when this happens, your charge is not expended.

Line'em Up
Three times per adventure, when firing a ranged weapon, you may line up a shot that ripples though several targets. You deal damage to the first target as normal – drawing a straight line, you may damage up to three more creatures in that line that are within your weapon’s reach. The first takes 3d6 damage, the second takes 2d6 damage, and the third takes 1d6 damage.

Sniper
Twice per adventure, when firing a ranged weapon, you may Snipe a target. As an attack, you move into position, and consume all upcoming off-turns. On your next turn, you Snipe the target – roll damage with +50, then double it.

Split Shot
Three times per adventure, when firing a ranged weapon, you may prepare extra pieces of ammunition to fire simultaneously. When attacking, instead of damaging a single target, deal damage in a 3x3 area centred on the target.

Stonewall
Three times per adventure, as an off-turn in response to an attack (against you or an ally), you may select any number of willing allies in a 5x5 area and move them behind you. Every ally still targeted by the attack adds your Threshold to theirs. Any conditional bonuses to your Threshold against this attack still apply.

Alchemy/Ritual Specializations
While Elementalists work within set forms and substances, Alchemists and Ritualists work through practice and experimentation. Through the years, many specialized alchemical and ritual arts have arisen – arts that can be learned.

Grenadier
You specialize in alchemical bombs. Instead of preparing one bomb, you may create five small grenades – too unstable to be given to allies, you can use them to be more precise in your detonations. Instead of hurling one bomb that targets a 5x5 area, you may hurl five bombs, targeting five specific enemies in a 7x7 area instead.

Debilitator
You specialize in alchemical poisons. When you create a poison, you can create a Quick, Steady, or Slow poison. A Quick poison inflicts a -4/-4 speed penalty on its enemy for one turn, and deals 4d6 damage on the user’s next turn. A Steady poison inflicts a -2/-2 speed penalty on its enemy for two turns, and deals 2d6 damage on the user’s next two turns. A Slow poison inflicts a -1/-1 speed penalty on its enemy for four turns, and deals 1d6 damage on the user’s next four turns.

Fizzpopper
You specialize in miscellaneous concoctions. These are just fireworks, officer. You can create Smoke Bombs (which, instead of dealing damage, obscure the area for two turns), Flash Bombs (which blind and deafen all in the area for one turn), Colour Bombs (which paints the area), and Sticky Bombs (which makes an area cost double movement to traverse; slows all affected by -4/-4 for one turn for all in the bomb’s detonation area).

Hexer
You specialize in curses and boons. The way of the sailors and seaside witches, the muttered hex is a powerful thing. As an attack or off-turn, you may turn a creature’s roll to all 6s, or all 1s. It is obvious that you are doing this. Out of combat, you may do this five times per adventure; in combat, you may do it freely.

Warden
You specialize in magical protections. As long as you have eye of sight to an ally (as if casting a dart), you may consume one of your off-turns to add the result of a Magical (Ritual) roll to their Threshold. Your pre-cast wards have an extra +10 to their rolls.

Death-Hunter
You specialize in magical tracking. This is the way of Legbreaks justice. Using a significant quantity of blood – a vial, or a vial’s worth – you always sense the direction and distance to the blood’s former owner. While you have their blood, all your Ritual rolls against them have +10.

Elven Haze
You can turn into mist. Using one of the methods reconstructed from Elvish tradition, you can turn into mist, smoke, or fog. You may spend fifteen minutes performing a ritual – you may turn into fog/smoke/mist for a number of minutes equal to the roll. While in this form, you move and cling to ground like a walking person with 8/4. You may pass through small openings, like keyholes and cracks in floorboards, but it takes a whole turn in combat (or ten seconds out of combat) to seep through. You cannot perform any other action, aside from regaining your physical form as a free action.

Combat Support
A good unit doesn’t just have pikes and shields – it has eyes, ears, aid, and information. Even if you never swing a sword, you can still aid your allies in battle.

Size Up
You can identify the exact Stamina of any creature you can see as a free action.

Tactician
You may grant your off-turns and turn actions to allies – you consume them, and the ally gains them at your command, provided they decide to listen. You have one additional off-turn that can only be used in this manner.

War Medic
When bandaging a target, you also heal them 10 Stamina instantaneously. This counts as Doctoring. Their bandages always last at least one full turn before the bleed effect resumes, regardless of damage taken.

Trash Talk
You may roll Social (Performance) to startle, distract, and taunt your opponents. The result of your result is pending damage – you set them off-kilter, and the next attack against them deals extra damage equal to the result of your roll.

Pack Mule
You may access your worn inventory as a free action. You may access your stowed inventory as a minor action. You may access allies’ inventory as if it was yours (using your actions as described), and allies may access your inventory as if it’s theirs (using their actions as normal). In combat, you may use a major action to try and take something from an enemy’s worn inventory, rolling a Physical (Delicate) check as if attacking.

Bolster
You may cheer on your allies – in a 7x7 area centered on you, once per turn, you may use a major action to cheer on your allies. Roll Social (Understand) with a +10 bonus – this is a Stamina pool you may divide as you choose among allies in the area. This healing only works on Hurt/Tired allies.

Miscellaneous
Adventurers are hard to categorize, and so are these benefits.

Dwarven Lore
Be it tradition passed from great Dwarfborn houses or reverse-engineered tech from the Syndicate mountains, you have learned to rebuild (or newly build) dwarven-style mechanics. You may build a Mech Suit – it behaves as Medium or Heavy armour, is worth 25g (medium) or 40g (heavy), has a threshold equal to its value, has speed 7/3 (medium) or 6/2 (heavy), overriding the user’s speed, and has 50 health. When the mech runs out of health, you are ejected – while inside, you are invulnerable. Your mech requires a power source – generally, the resource is rare enough to only be usable in one fight per adventure.

Helper
Following instructions well is a valuable skill. As long as the GM allows it, you may help allies, rolling your relevant skill and adding it to theirs, with a +10 bonus.

Omen-Watcher
Mages weave the world’s magic, but all can see where the magic lies. You watch for ill omens and bad feelings. At any time, you can ask the GM “do I have a bad feeling about this?” an the GM must answer in a manner reflecting the adventure’s immediate future – yes or no.

Yes-And
Just as good players know how to share the spotlight, good adventurers know when to come in clutch. You may use this benefit to grant +10 to an ally’s roll – but you must be performing actions that make them the centre of attention, and aid their efforts.

Masterwork
(Prerequisite: Expert in a Craft)

You are the pinnacle of craftsfolk, and the things you make are incomparable. Using an extra 5g in materials, you may create a Masterwork item – its value is inflated (using the normal 5c in materials every two hours, you use the 5g to inflate the final value), and it has a +2 bonus. Masterwork armour and weapons allow for more than 10 base threshold, increasing the cap by 2 per item. (Example: you have a Masterwork buckler and Masterwork longsword – each item increases your Threshold, and your current maximum threshold is 14.)

Artifice
(Prerequisite: Masterwork)

There’s something inside you that takes over your mind sometimes. You can make it happen when you want, but sometimes it happens on its own. When completing a Masterwork item, you can go into a trance – without eating or sleeping, you mindlessly continue working, entranced. For the next 24 hours, increase the item’s value by the result of a relevant Craft roll, without consuming materials. You black out during this time. When the item is complete, it has a +5 bonus. The item is cursed, and the owner must roll 1d6 every hour out of game – on a 1-3, the item is dormant; on a 4-6, it is conscious, instilling in them a powerful thirst for violence and bloodshed – roleplaywise, it colours the owner’s decisions, but they still have ultimate control over their actions.

Close Call
That was a close one. Five times per adventure, you (or an ally you target) undergoes a Close Call – they are completely immune to an attack targeting them, by luck alone.

Researcher
When using a small tome, you have a 2d6 bonus to checks. When using a large tome, you have a 3d6 bonus.

Fleet-Footed
You're light and swift on the battlefield. You gain +2/+2 to your movement.

Drunken Master
You're not impaired, you're intoxicated! You may drink 2s worth of alcohol to gain +3 to damage and threshold for two hours. You must drink the same amount to maintain intoxication every two hours. For every two hours spent intoxicated, you set aside 1d6 - the cumulative pool is rolled at the end of your bender as Hangover Damage. Lastly, drinking alcohol can increase your Stamina above your Ready/Empowered threshold.

Juggernaut
Some people just don't stay down. You gain +10 to you Hurt/Tired threshold, +20 to your Tired/Ready threshold, +30 to your Ready/Empowered threshold, and +35 to your maximum Stamina. In addition, once per adventure, when you raft at 0 Stamina or would be forced to make a death roll, you instead tank the blow, and immediately regain Stamina equivalent to the result of a Physical (Brawn) roll.

Healing Restrictions
The following drawbacks restrict your access to typical healing. They also represent problems systemic to life – perhaps your resilience to medicine means you get sick often, your insomnia leaves you groggy and inattentive, or your ongoing potion use might be to treat an underlying problem. Healing and doctoring are similar to medicine in the mid-1800s – when taking drawbacks to represent real-world illness or disability, remember that you may never be able to remove the drawback... without replacing it with something else, at best.

Bleeder
Your body doesn’t heal well; physical medicine is riskier. You heal half (rounding down) from doctoring. It takes you a very long time to heal, with reasonable pain and repeated complications – even a stubbed toe might nag for a few hours.

Insomnia
You only need four hours of sleep, but you receive no healing from any sleep. The lack of rest leaves you sapped for your waking hours, only mostly there through the fog.

Hunger
You need a lot of food to maintain a metabolism that’s healthy for you – perhaps you’re simply a hulking fighter who needs to bulk hard to keep muscle mass, or maybe you’re anemic and need to eat more iron-heavy food to stay strong. You only heal half (rounding down) from food. Without the proper amount of food, your energy drops dramatically, and concerningly.

Unfocused
Practice and training don’t really help you; it’s difficult to keep your mind on the task. You only heal half (rounding down) from practising skills. It can be difficult to maintain long-term tasks with proper effort, while spinning and whirring thoughts persist long after you’ve left work behind.

Potion Popper
Too many fights with a little boost can leave the next dose ineffective. You only heal half from alchemy (rounding down). Alchemy can be used to treat a number of ongoing, debilitating conditions – and insufficient access to needed alchemy can allow these conditions to flare up.

Ongoing Needs
The following drawbacks represent ongoing, chronic needs. These, too, can be deeply-rooted – often representing the steps needed to keep difficult, ongoing issues at a point where they’re workable. Perhaps your routine is needed to counteract muscle inflammation, or your excessive sleep is necessary to keep your energy up during the day.

These can represent the needed self-care routines to keep chronic illness and disability at a manageable point – when taking these drawbacks, remember that these might not be behaviours you’ll really be able to stop doing without replacing them with other compensatory behaviours.

Chronic Illness
You require 10 points of Doctoring each day to treat an ongoing, debilitating condition. From examinations, to stretches, to gastric distress, your wellbeing is too chaotic to be left on one set regimen unsupervised.

Brick
You’re constantly asleep – you need at least eight continuous hours of sleep, and at least ten hours a day total. Without this sleep, life can be like mud; the bulk of your strength and energy simply devoted to staying awake. Even with sleep, you may be sluggish, finding yourself staring into space time and again.

Strict Diet
You need to eat at least 2 coppers of rations every 6 hours. Like life on the head of a pin, without rigorous observance of diet, your wellbeing starts to rapidly erode. From abundant manic energy to sunken-eyed anemia, the risks of inconsistent physical rituals is grave.

Routine
With the rigors and stresses of life, daily rituals and times of meditative focus can keep you grounded and stable. You require at least 2 hours of skill practice per day, uninterrupted. Without daily routine, your mood can begin to swing, your mind buzzing and racing in purposeless, chaotic directions.

Decohesion Syndrome
Often due to alchemical accidents, Decohesion Syndrome is an alchemical-systemic disorder where your body’s ability to hold itself together requires alchemy to sustain. You require at least 10 points of alchemical healing per day – without this, you slowly grow more fatigued, in severe pain – long-term, your bones, organs, and muscles risk permanent damage.

Chronic Conditions
These benefits represent ongoing problems. While some chronic problems represent things to be avoided and others represent ongoing needs, these represent problems that you have to learn to live with.

It’s common in tabletop RPGs to view some more visible, physical disabilities as more accessories than real issues. These drawbacks, once taken, might not ever be something your character “overcomes” - they may instead be a new normal, a different framework they have to learn to live life within. That doesn’t mean progress can’t be made – long, grueling recovery can still be recovery, even if only partial.

Poor Mobility
Pain permeates your movement, stilted and difficult. You may purchase this drawback multiple times. With the first purchase, you have -2/-2 speed, and a cane reduces this to -1/-1. With your second purchase, you have -4/-4 speed, -2/-2 speed with a cane, and -1/-1 with crutches or a walker. With your third purchase, you have speed 0/0; -4/-4 with a cane, -2/-2 with crutches or a walker, and -1/-1 with a wheelchair.

Fatigue
For every 4 consecutive hours awake and active, you must immediately spend 2 hours recuperating – doing only extremely light activity (reading, laying by the fire, cleaning pans). Forcing yourself past these limits provides diminishing returns – 6 hours active mean 4 resting, 8 hours active mean 6 resting, and 10 hours active will make you collapse, needing 24 hours of rest.

Dulled Reaction
Head trauma, spinal trauma, or lightning magic, or a variety of conditions can leave the nerves dulled and damaged. Whatever number of off-turns you have, you have one fewer – and you have -10 to all defensive rolls.

Atypical
What might be seen superficially as “quirks” can be a much deeper, personal difference in communication and understanding of the world. Whenever performing social checks, gain +5 on odd-numbered rolls, and -10 on even-numbered rolls.

Grounded
When selecting this benefit, select at least one person in-game who your character trusts; ensure that character’s player is comfortable with this. Certain things can send you spiralling – reminders of traumas, harsh sensory experiences, intense situations, and more can leave you in need of support. After an in-game trigger of your choice, you take 5 damage per minute until you can get a trusted friend’s help to ground you.

Limb Loss
Be it from birth, trauma, illness, or an ongoing condition, you have limited usage of a limb. One purchase renders the limb weakened – it can be used to lift and move small, light objects with decreased coordinaton. A second purchase renders it fully unusable – it is functionally nonexistent (if it isn’t literally nonexistent).

Sense Loss
Be it from birth, trauma, illness, or an ongoing condition, you have decreased usage of your senses. Your vision may be impaired by light sensitivity, intense near/farsightedness/astigmatism, or decreased functionality. Your hearing may be muddled, you may have difficulty parsing what you can hear, or you may be completely deaf. A single purchase of this drawback represents functional impairment – perhaps your vision is still usable but severely impaired, or you can hear in sufficiently controlled circumstances. A second purchase represents deep impairment – you may only be able to detect light and vague colours, or you may be deaf-mute (by choice or otherwise), requiring an interpreter, or signed communication. Tradersign, Imperial Sign, and Torgish Brut are the three most common sign languages.