Tome of Flaws: Descriptions of Addictions, Flaws and Phobias M (3.5e Sourcebook)
Magic Corrupting Touch (Flaw)
Description: You corrupt magical items that you touch.
Effect: A magic item that you touch, wear, or otherwise utilize for the first time has a 25% chance of becoming cursed. This roll is made in secret by the DM. If the item is cursed, the type of curse is chosen at random or selected by the DM. If the item was cursed prior to you touching it, it develops an additional curse.
Magical Drawback Curse
Description: You bring out the worst in magical items, granting you random drawbacks.
Effect: Every magical worn or wielded item, gains a random drawback, but just for you. The same item always provides the same drawback for you unless the item is already cursed or has a drawback. If you have no worn magical items, you gain a new random drawback which changes every 24 hours and lasts until you don a magical item. When you gain a drawback from having no worn magical items, any reference on the chart to changes to the item apply to you instead.
Special: You cannot become immune to curses. On the chart, ability damage and negative levels instead deal penalties of equal value without the actual loss.
Magical Mania (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Ability to cast arcane spells.
Description: You are particularly touched by the arcane to the point of it shaking your mind.
Effect: You suffer a -4 penalty to concentration, and have an innate 10% chance of arcane spell failure. This is in addition to any penalties you have from casting while wearing armor.
Magical Overload (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Ability to cast spells.
Description: You have difficulty controlling powerful magic, preferring lower level spells.
Effect: One of your highest level spell slots must be spent to gain a spell of any other level. You effectively have one less of your highest level spells slots to gain a lower level spell slot. The highest spell slot changes as you gain levels.
Magically Inept (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Able to cast spells (not spell-like abilities).
Description: You can't cast as many spells.
Effect: You can cast one spell less of every spell level you know per day.
Magnetic (Flaw)
Prerequisite: You must be wholly or partially made of a ferromagnetic material such as iron or steel.
Description: You are very attractive, but not in the way you might have hoped.
Effect: You suffer a -1 penalty to your AC against attacks made with metallic weapons. Furthermore, all melee and ranged attacks made with metallic weapons (or metal heads, such as arrows and spears) act as if they are seeking weapons when targeting you. Finally, your armor check penalty increases by 2 when wearing metal armor.
Maiden (Substance Addiction)
Description: The Maiden is a drug made from a Mu Spores and is boiled into a paste with other herbs. The drug causes the character feel as though they are falling. The drug starts to takes effect the next round after it is inhaled. The effect is very strong and lasts 1d4 hours.
Initial Effect: The feeling of falling causes the character to suffer a -2 on all Dexterity related skills, checks and bonuses.
Secondary Effect: If performing complex maneuvers, the character has a 10% chance of falling down.
Side Effects: When the effect ends, the character loses 1/2 their hit points as subdual damage. They call this effect the sudden stop.
Overdose: If more than one dose is taken within a 24-hour period, the character has a 10% chance per dose to be unable to stand.
Delivery: Inhaled with a pipe.
Addiction Rating: Low
Price: 1 Gold per dose.
Resistance DC: 10
Alchemy DC: 12
Malformed Vocal Cords (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Must be able to cast spells and must have a breath weapon.
Description: In gaining the breath weapon, somehow your vocal cords were altered so that you speak exclusively in draconic.
Effect: You suffer an innate 10% chance of spell failure with any spell with a verbal component. You cannot speak any language other than draconic, even if you know and understand other languages.
Malfunctioning Limbs (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Construct or Undead
Description: You have limbs which can malfunction when you are heavily damaged or take a serious hit.
Effect: If you are heavily damaged your limbs are prone to malfunctions, whenever you are brought below 60% of your maximum hit point and once again at below 30% a random limb malfunction. If the attack was against a specific limb (such as a called shot, at the GM's discretion) it disable the targeted limb instead. A natural 20 on attack roll which confirm also cause one of your limbs to malfunction, even if you are immune to critical hit.
If one of your arms malfunctions it goes limp, it cannot be used to perform skills or wield weapon and any weapon it held is dropped. You also suffer a 10% arcane spell failure on any spell with somatic component, this affect even divine spells. If both arms goes limp you cannot use spells or ability which require somatic component.
If one of your leg malfunction it jitters and break, cutting your speed in half. You also take a -4 penalty against checks made to forcibly move you. If both legs malfunction you lose your land speed and fall prone, you can still crawl.
If you are healed past 60% and 30% you do not regain the use of your limb, on the flip side you do not lose another limb if you cross the threshold again until you are fully repaired. You recover the use of your limbs after healing back to full hit point and taking a full-round action to properly reconnect with your limbs.
Masochist (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Chaotic alignment.
Description: You are incapable of spending a day without having pain inflicted upon you from another creature.
Effect: At least once per day, typically upon waking or beginning a journey (Essentially once per session), you must inflict at least 1d4 damage or 1d8 of non-lethal damage to yourself. If undone, you suffer a -4 on constitution and Fortitude Saves for the entire day. A party member cannot inflict this pain for you.
Meager Fortitude (Flaw)
Description: You are sickly and weak of stomach.
Effect: You take a –3 penalty on Fortitude Saves.
Mental Breakdown (Flaw)
Description: Some event can cause you enter a completely different state of mind.
Effect: Choose a triggering event, when exposed to such a trigger you enter a different state of mind, you may become irrationally angry, extremely sad or simply weird. Choose two other flaws, when exposed to the triggering event you take the penalties of both of those flaws for 10 minute or until the triggering event end, whichever last longer.
Special: The bonus feat granted by this flaw is directly proportional to how often you risk being exposed to the triggering event, for low occurrence (facing a vampire in a normal campaign) only a Moderate balance range or lower balance feat may be taken, for high occurrence (seeing oneself in a mirror) you may take a feat of any balance level.
Merciful (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Good alignment.
Description: Many times you don't have it in your heart to kill.
Effect: Whenever you or an ally you can see deals enough damage to an animal, dragon, giant, fey, humanoid, magical beast or monstrous humanoid to bring it below 0 hit points and dying, but not killed, you feel compelled to save that creature's life. You are Shaken until you or an ally makes a first aid check to stabilize that creature. If you or an ally willingly kills the creature, or you are otherwise unable to tend to it, you remain Shaken for the rest of the day.
Metafailure (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Any Spellcasting
Description: Your metamagic tends to fumble.
Effect: You mess up your metamagic spells. When you cast a metamagic spell, there is a 15% chance each time the spell will not carry the metamagic effects on it. You still pay the level-adjusted cost as if it had metamagic.
Special: The bonus feat obtained can only be a metamagic feat.
Mimosphobia (Phobia)
Trigger: Chest, trunk, ect.
Effect: You cannot open, be around or look at chests. If you are around a chest more than a few minutes, you being to fidget, become uneasy and fearful of the contents. You cannot be around when a chest is opened as well.
When a character is interacting with their Phobia they must roll a Will Saved with a DC of 10+their level.
Each round the character is in the presence of Phobia (animals, spells, natural effects and the like) they must make a Will Save and it is increased by one each round.
If they fail their save, they suffer from the following effects:
The first time they fail their check they become Shaken.
The second time they fail their check, they become Frightened.
The third time they fail their check, they become Panicked.
A character that is no longer in the presence of their Phobia can make a DC check based off their last failed roll to remove the effects of the Phobia. They can only make this roll once every ten minutes.
Misanthrope (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Non-Good
Description: You hate members of your own race.
Effect: You have a severe hatred for your own people. When you interact with members of your own race, all interactions begin at hostile, as anyone close enough to see your face can sense your seething hatred. You also take a −4 penalty on Charisma-based skills dealing with social interaction with your race. These are usually Bluff, Diplomacy, Disguise, Gather Information, and Perform; the only exception is Intimidate, which is not affected because you are not trying to be friendly.
Missing Chakra (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Must be able to use magic items.
Description: Some of your magic item slots are missing...
Effect: Choose four of your magic item slots. You no longer possess these magic item slots. You can wear items there, but they will have no effect.
Special: Perhaps you were born without the correct flow of arcana, or you somehow burned out your magic slots in a terrible accident.
Mole Sight (Substance Addiction)
Description: This blueish liquid is crushed Brain Mole brains mixed with various other drugs to enhance it.
Initial Effect: The user can read the thoughts of beings that they look at for 1d4 hours.
Secondary Effect: The character is unable to control what thoughts that they understand from the being. If they don't speak same language all they hear is gibberish.
Side Effects: The character has hard time understanding what is going on around them; they suffer a -4 check to all skills and has a -4 to hit in combat. Overdose: If more than one dose is taken within the same day, starts hearing the voices of all those around them as though they were being screamed at by everyone. The character cannot function normally and suffers a -8 check to all skills and to hit in combat.
Delivery: Drank.
Addiction Rating: Low.
Price: 1 Silver per dose.
Resistance DC: 18
Alchemy DC: 25
Monologuer (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Must be able to speak.
Description: It seems like every BBEG has this flaw; you can't help but monologue for a bit.
Effect: Whenever you enter a stressful situation or when initiative is rolled, you must spend your first move action to monologue, and you cannot take any offensive actions or attacks (such as anything that would break invisibility). If you are somehow prevented from speaking your monologue (such as a silence effect), you are automatically Shaken until you can make your monologue. This bypasses usual immunities, but does not stack.
Motion Sickness (Flaw)
Description: You have a hard time getting around, on anything else but your feet
Effect: Any time you move more than 15 feet, you become sickened until the end of the round. This effect is constantly in effect when riding on an animal or vehicle until dismounting.
Mudders Embrace (Substance Addiction)
Description: This derived from a flower located in most plains. The flowers are ground to a paste and dried. The drug is usually smoked with a pipe. Once lit, it must be smoked for at least one round, and will take two rounds to take effect.
Initial Effect: The character becomes Shaken.
Secondary Effect: None.
Side Effects: None.
Overdose: None.
Delivery: Smoked.
Addiction Rating: Negligible.
Price: 1 Copper per 10 doses.
Resistance DC: 10
Alchemy DC: 10
Murky-Eyed (Flaw)
Prerequisite: The ability to see.
Description: Your vision is obscured.
Effect: In combat, every time you attack an opponent that has concealment, roll your miss chance twice. If either or both results indicate that you miss, your attack fails.
Mushroom Powder (Substance Addiction)
Description: Taken from a rare blue mushroom, this powder must be inhaled. It is popular among arcane spellcasters.
Initial Effect: +2 alchemical bonus to Intelligence and Charisma for 1 hour.
Secondary Effect: 1 point of Strength damage for two hours.
Side Effects: This is a mild hallucinogen. The user takes a -2 alchemical penalty to Wisdom for 1d4 hours and a -2 alchemical penalty to Strength and Constitution for 2d4 hours.
Overdose: If more than one dose is taken in a 12-hour period, the user takes 2d6 points of damage. Using it more than three times in any 24-hour period deals 4d6 points of damage and paralyzes the user for 2d4 hours.
Delivery: Smoked.
Addiction Rating: Medium.
Price: 5 Silver per dose.
Resistance DC: 18
Alchemy DC: 12
Music Hater (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Character must have ears or similarly functioning organs.
Description: You cannot stand the noise of performed melodies.
Prerequisite: Character must have ears or similarly functioning organs.
Effect: You take a -4 penalty to saving throws against special attacks that are described as using song or music (such as a harpy's captivating song), and against bardic spells. In addition, you suffer a -4 penalty to concentration and a -2 penalty to general reflex saving throws when your character can hear song or music.
Music Lover (Flaw)
Description: You absolutely love to listen to music
Effect: You take a -4 penalty to saving throws against special attacks that are described as using song or music (such as a harpy's captivating song). In addition, if you go for a whole day without hearing song or music being performed by someone with at least 1 rank in Perform, you are Shaken until you hear such an artist.
Mute (Flaw)
Prerequisite: Must be a race which can speak.
Description: You are unable to speak.
Effect: Be it from mental trauma or a lack of tongue, you can't speak. You're unable to communicate with allies, make verbal components, or make vocal noise beyond the sound of breathing. While it is possible to learn and use sign language, sign language is unaffected by spells such as tongues, requiring knowledge of the actual language to communicate and understand. You can also pantomime, which is a bluff check DC 15 with a sense motive check for the receiver to pass a secret message, though you can only communicate broad concepts.
Special: If you ever gain telepathy or another similar communication method, you lose the benefit of this flaw. Spellcasters who take the Silent Spell feat may apply it to their spells without increase the casting time or spell level.
Mystical Taboo (Flaw)
Description: You have strange spellcasting traditions with strange and unusual restrictions on which spell you can or cannot cast and some restrictions on how you can act.
Effect: You have taboos associated with your spellcasting. First and foremost, you must choose two schools of magic that are not prohibited to you; they become disfavored schools. You cannot cast a spell that is in a disfavored school in your highest or second-highest level spell slots.
Secondly, you choose at least three taboos, such as not cutting your hair, not showing your ankles, praying facing east, etc. Whenever you violate one of these taboos, you lose a single spell slot as if you took a negative level. Special: Alternatively another spell which affects only your spellcasting may be taken as a bonus feat.
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