Corruption

If an Artificer casts using Power Points, using their

Spellcasting Skill rather than their Alchemy skill, they risk
Corruption. An Artificer may cast these spells out of their
accumulated Power Points pool, or even without Power
Points available to them.

If Corruption has been risked, the player will roll a d20

and must equal or beat the number of Power Points that
they have spent plus any points of Corruption that have
been previously gained. This number deriving from
Power Points spent is halved (totals rounded up) if the
player is spending out of existing Power Points in their
pool rather than casting without any Power Points
available to them, though points of Corruption are then
added as normal. The minimum score when risking
Corruption is a 2.

With a success, there is no effect and Corruption is not

earned.

Corruption rolls cannot be re-rolled with a Bennie.

With a failure, gain one point of Corruption and roll on the Corruption Table.

Points are calculated based on a single encounter, however, the GM handles that. If in combat, it is only
rolled once, having tracked the cumulative points over the course of combat. If out of combat, the GM
will use their discretion.

Corruption Table

d20 Result Corruption Type

1-15 Minor Corruption*
16-18 Major Corruption*
19-20 Severe Corruption

*A PC may only have 10 Minor Corruptions, and 5 Major Corruptions, if that maximum has been
reached, ignore the result and roll again.

Minor Corruption Table (Or GM’s Choice)

d100 Result
Skin becomes mottled and flaky
Uncontrollable cackling when you witness
violence
Gains a limp
 Fingernails begin to grow at an alarming rate
Eyes become (slightly) asymmetrically lopsided
Teeth brown and breath becomes incurably bad
Teeth become pointed and slightly sharp
Lower lip becomes droopy and you often drool by
accident
Dogs always bark at you
Everywhere you go you are followed at a distance
by 3 crows who caw most of the time when you
speak
Your throat must be cleared for flehm every time
you want to speak
A very large wart-like growth appears on your
face and does not go away
Your eyebrows fall out and cannot grow back
Your hands sweat grease continually and it tends
to drip from your fingernails

Major Corruption Table (Or GM’s Choice)

d100 Result
Eyes glow yellow at night
Gains a hunchback
Hands begin to sprout nasty claws (d4 Claw
damage)
Insects crawl all over your skin and skitter away
when you sit down
Creatures of the night flock to you if you sit still
for too long – rats, millipedes, ravens, bats, etc.
No matter where you travel, the sky will always
have a dark cloud between you and sun
Scabs that crack open appear randomly on your
body each morning
You wake up screaming once per night but when
you try to remember what frightened you the
memory is just out of grasp
When you are deliberating on a choice you
always unconsciously speak your thoughts out
loud.
Any room you are in will become chilly within
minutes and cannot warm up until you leave
Your mouth produces blood in place of saliva
Any part of you that becomes wet will suddenly
have leaches crawling on it
You cannot enter a Temple without experiencing
a panic attack
 Your touch causes iron and steel to rust reducing
it’s hardness by 1 over a one-hour time. Metal
items on your person will rust continuously
You lose the ability to recognize faces or voices
and can only identify people by other means
(Smarts roll may be required)
Any cooked food you touch becomes rotten
instantly. Eating rotten food may cause poisoning

Severe Corruption Table (Or GM’s Choice)

d100 Result
Begins to have nearly uncontrollable compulsions
to eat the recently dead (Spirit roll daily or must
seek it out at all costs)
Sunlight burns your skin, direct sunlight causes d4
damage per round
Must complete a task the GM provides you once
per session the task will be unspeakably evil and
possibly murderous
Your irises become yellow and your pupils
become hourglass shaped. Everything you ever
look at appears to rot, crumble, age, and decay in
front of you
A small second head sprouts from your shoulder.
All it does is make wheezy laugh sounds
whenever something sad or awful happens
Water no longer quenches your thirst; you must
have a few sips of fresh blood daily to stay
hydrated (see Thirst p129 SWADE)
Genuine words of care or love spoken to you will
sound like the screaming of tormented souls
Any time you speak you must roll a d6, a roll of 1
means you only utter nonsensical and profane
phrases. You are not aware of when this happens
Any voice above a whisper will be deafeningly
loud, inaudible, and gives -2 to any Smarts or
Spirit based skill
Footwear of any kind will cause unbearable pain;
your pace is reduced 1 die type and travel by foot
through snow or on rocky surfaces will be nearly
impossible.
When you become angry or sad about something
as it is happening your clothing lights on fire, you
suffer 2d6 damage each round until extinguished
 Anyone you care about or love must make a fear
check any time you make eye contact or are
adjacent (Large Blast Radius) to them (Spirit roll, -
2 penalty if they are especially close)

Dark Ones: Every 5 points of Corruption that a PC receives, regardless of type of result, one of the
Dark Ones arrives to your character to tempt them with great power for furthering their nefarious goals.
This may make the character unplayable.

The player can either choose to accept the new powers and work out what that might mean with the
GM, or attempt to resist, which is a Spirit Roll, with a penalty of -1 for every 5 points of Corruption that
the character has accumulated.