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Rules > Optional > Corruption > Shadow
Those who spend extended time on the Shadow Plane, are repeatedly exposed to shadow magic, or fall under the sway of creatures such as velstracs, certain undead, or shadowy fey, risk contracting shadow corruption. Shadow corruption is an affliction with the following parameters.
Type mental corruption; Save Will DC = 10 + half the
victim’s level + the number of manifestations the victim
has; on a failure, a victim can spend a number of Resolve
Points equal to 1 + the number of manifestations the
victim has to succeed instead
Frequency 1/day
Cure Destroy the creature, object, or effect that caused
the corruption, or the victim can purify themselves by
spending 1 month spreading joy, experiencing joy, and
living in the light of a habitable world’s sunlight. At the
end of each month spent this way, the victim can refuse
a previously accepted gift, allowing break enchantment
or remove affliction to remove the related manifestation.
Using a gift from any corruption while undergoing
purification means the victim has to start that month over.
When the corruption first takes hold, it’s dormant but gives you regular nightmares. In these dreams, you walk through familiar places, but many of the details are subtly wrong. You feel like you’re being watched from the shadows, a belief that lingers for a few moments after you wake. These visions don’t affect your health, but they make you irritable or jumpy for an hour or so after you awaken. After a few days, sudden flashes of bright light cause you to flinch, and you start to catch glimpses of movement in the shadows out of the corner of your eye.
When you gain your first manifestation, your nightmares
grow vivid, showing you individuals who have the faces
of your loved ones but are wrapped in chains and hanging
from the ceiling or walls, writhing in what might be pleasure
or pain. You still feel as if something watches you in these
dreams. During your waking hours, you can sometimes hear
the jingling of the nightmare chains, especially when alone
with your thoughts or in times of great stress. Sources of
joy start to lose their appeal—colors are muted, sounds are
muffled, smells and tastes are bland or bitter, a touch that
doesn’t bring extreme sensation might go unnoticed.
When you gain your second and third manifestations,
feelings of being disconnected from the world increase
dramatically. If you accepted your gifts, you feel this
detachment enlightens you, and upon accepting your third
gift, if your alignment is good, it shifts to neutral. Accepting
your corruption by using its gifts makes your nightmares
seem more like peaceful dreams, and you might attempt to
recreate these dreams in the real world. To feel anything,
you turn to pain and other extreme experiences. Forays into
self-harm might be easy to hide from others, but your need
for more slowly increases.
Once you accept your fourth gift, your normal emotions
are nearly dead. Your greatest pleasure comes from causing
harm and being harmed. You believe the corruption is a
personal improvement and try to explain its benefits to
others. If you see someone who has shadow corruption,
you sense the affliction even if it’s dormant. You focus on
encouraging such people to give in to the darkness.
If you accept a fifth gift, the corruption takes complete
control of you, and you become evil if you’re not already. You
undergo extreme body modifications and augmentations
that cause consistent if not constant pain. You might believe
yourself to be a prophet of pain, and you share this pain with
others, perhaps killing them in the process. Alternatively,
you could disappear into the Shadow Plane, where those
like you, who watched you from your nightmares, wait to
embrace you as one of their own.
Possible manifestations of shadow corruption follow.
The chill of the deep shadows has inured you to cold.
Gift: You gain cold resistance 5. If you have three or more
manifestations, this resistance increases to 10.
Stain: Your appearance becomes disturbing. Reduce your
Charisma score by 1.
Your touch is infused with the life-sapping gloom of the
Shadow Plane.
Prerequisites: Coldblooded, one other manifestation.
Gift: As a standard action, you can make a melee
attack against EAC that deals 2d4 cold damage for each
manifestation you have. If you deal damage with this
manifestation, the target must succeed at a Will saving
throw or become unable to benefit from morale bonuses for
1 minute. You can use this manifestation a number of times
per day equal to the number of manifestations you have.
Stain: Your body withers. Reduce your Strength, Dexterity,
and Constitution scores by 1 point each.
You are hollow inside.
Gift: You gain a +2 insight bonus to Bluff checks and saving
throws against mind-affecting effects. If another creature
attempts to read your mind (such as with detect thoughts)
and you succeed at the saving throw, you can render that
creature shaken for 1 round as a reaction. You can do the same
to a creature that fails a Bluff, Diplomacy, or Intimidate check
against you by directing your lifeless gaze at it. This is a mind
affecting fear effect. A creature affected by your deadened
emotions becomes immune to it for 24 hours.
Stain: Reduce any morale bonus you receive by 1.
Your eyes turn dull gray, milky white, or glossy black, and
you become more accustomed to the dark.
Gift: You gain low-light vision and darkvision with a
range of 60 feet. If you already have darkvision, its range
increases by 30 feet instead. In addition, if you are aware of
a creature’s location and that creature is hidden only due to
dim light, darkness, or invisibility, you are considered to be
observing that creature until it moves out of line of sight or
successfully hides from you again.
Stain: You gain light blindness: you’re blinded for 1 round
when first exposed to bright light,
and you are dazzled for as long
as you remain in an area of
bright light.
Fear is another tool in your
arsenal, and you use it skillfully.
Gift: You find joy in scaring
others, and have a knack for knowing
how to do so. You gain a +2 enhancement
bonus to Intimidate checks, and the save
DCs of your fear effects increase by 2.
You can use Intimidate skill demoralize
others as a move action.
Stain: Your mind is so focused on
spreading fear that you are susceptible
to mental manipulation. You take a –2
penalty to saving throws against mindaffecting
effects that aren’t illusions or
fear effects, and you lose any bonuses
against or immunities to such effects.
If you fail a saving throw against such
an effect, it lasts 1d3 additional rounds.
You have learned how to hurt those who
are afraid.
Prerequisites: Frightful.
Gift: Once per round, if you damage
a creature that is shaken, frightened,
panicked, or cowering, you deal extra damage
equal to half your level. If you damage multiple
fearful creatures with one attack or effect, choose
only one of them to take this bonus damage.
Stain: You are off your game in combat
until you hurt or scare someone.
Therefore, you take
a –2 penalty to
attack rolls and can’t gain morale bonuses on your attack
rolls until you deal damage to a significant foe or render
someone shaken, frightened, panicked, or cowering.
Your corporeal form can flicker into insubstantial shadow.
Prerequisites: Two other manifestations.
Gift: You have a 20% chance to treat a critical hit as a
normal hit, allowing you to ignore the critical hit’s extra
damage and critical hit effect. If the attack affects incorporeal
creatures normally, such as a weapon with the ghost killer
fusion, you can’t ignore it in this way.
Stain: If an ally targets you with a beneficial spell that has
a range of touch, you have a 20% chance to gain no benefit
from it. The spell is still cast and expended.
The lines between pleasure and pain are blurred for you.
Gift: The first time you take Hit Point damage in a given
combat, for 1 round you can roll attack rolls, saving throws,
and skill checks twice and take the better result. You
can do so again the first time you drop below half
your Hit Points in a given combat. During this time,
however, you can’t benefit from morale bonuses.
Stain: Increase any damage you take by an
amount equal to the number of manifestations
you have, up to a maximum of double the original
amount of damage.
Pain clears your mind.
Prerequisites: Pain Refuge.
Gift: As a reaction when you fail a saving
throw against a mind-affecting effect, you
can use a weapon you’re wielding to deal
yourself 4 damage, subtracted directly from
your Hit Points. If you do so, you can reroll
the saving throw. This benefit has no effect if
you reduce the damage you inflict on yourself
by any amount.
Stain: You thrive on pain, and thus
you always have a number of self-inflicted
wounds. Reduce your maximum Hit Points by a
number equal to half your level.
You easily blend in with shadows.
Gift: Provided you are in an area of dim
light or darkness, you can use Stealth to
hide even while being observed.
Stain: Your muscles weaken. When
you attempt any Strength-based
check, roll twice and take the
worse result.
You can jump from shadow to shadow with little effort.
Prerequisites: One other manifestation.
Gift: As a full action, you can teleport, as if using a
dimension door spell, from one area of dim light or darkness
to another, transporting only yourself and objects you
wear or carry. If you are overburdened, this teleportation
fails. Further, you can teleport only up to 60 feet. Once you
teleport, you can’t do so again until you take a 10-minute
rest during which you could regain Stamina Points. You
can use this ability a number of times per day equal to the
number of manifestations you have.
Stain: You are apathetic and difficult to stir into action.
When you roll your initiative check, roll twice and take the
worse result.
With a glance, you can fill your foes with regret for their
wasted potential.
Prerequisites: Frightful, one other manifestation.
Gift: You gain a gaze attack that causes foes within 30
feet of you to become shaken for 1d3 rounds unless they
succeed at a Will saving throw. As a swift action, you can
suppress or reactivate this ability, which is a mind-affecting
fear effect. A creature that succeeds at the saving throw is
immune to your unnerving gaze for 24 hours.
Stain: You have an unsettling aura. When you attempt
a Bluff or Diplomacy check, roll twice and take the worse
result. It also takes you twice as long to use the gather
information task of the Diplomacy skill.
Infused with shadow, you take on a trait of the velstracs.
Prerequisites: Pain Refuge, Painful Clarity.
Gift: You gain an amount of damage reduction equal to
twice the number of manifestations you have. Good-aligned
weapons and silver weapons overcome this DR.
Stain: If you touch a good-aligned item, a holy weapon
fusion, or a silver item, including being struck by a goodaligned
or silver weapon, you are sickened for 1 round.
Your immunities don’t prevent this sickened condition, and
you can’t remove it early by any means. You can hide your
aversion with a Bluff check opposed by Sense Motive checks.
You exist in a state between mortal and velstrac, placing you
at risk of becoming a velstrac when you die.
Prerequisites: Pain Refuge, Painful Clarity, Velstrac
Durability.
Gift: Twice per day, you can grant yourself fast healing 3
for 1 minute. Your fast healing functions only while you have
1 Hit Point or more.
Stain: Whenever you gain the dying condition, you lose
1 Resolve Point. In addition, it costs you 1 extra Resolve Point
(maximum of 4 instead of 3) to stabilize yourself. If you die,
you have a 50% chance to reincarnate as an NPC velstrac (an
outsider) on the Shadow Plane. If you do, you can be raised
from the dead only via miracle or wish along with a soul
beacon as if casting raise dead on an undead target.
The darkness in your soul can draw on the life force of allies.
Prerequisites: One other manifestation.
Gift: Once per day when you take ability damage, ability
drain, or Hit Point damage, you can divide the damage or drain
evenly between you and one ally within 30 feet of you. The
ally knows what you’re trying to do and can attempt a Will
saving throw to resist the link. This ability takes no action on
your part, and you can use it even if it isn’t your turn.
Stain: You struggle to remember the meaning of friendly
bonds. You can’t benefit from or use the aid another action.
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