Here is what I've discussed with one of my players a suggestion.

My problem with this particular table is that it invalidates the Radical's play-style completely, not to mention severely puts a dampen on puritans who, as part of their job, have to face corruption on a daily basis.

In the old system, Malignancies were just bad- and in way that's neither fun nor interesting. Players characters lost stats- and there's no quicker way to turn off a character to something than to make him lose stats.

Something that this new system brought to the table that's very interesting- extremely so- is "activated" malignancies.

ALL malignancies should be "activatable". This would be represent the slow temptation and corrupting influence of the warp.

When a character gains 10 corruption, he gains of the malignancies (not one of the broken ones, but one's thats "easy" to hide. [Psy rating should be a mutation, not a malignancy, Witch-mark! ])

Now the caveat is that an acolyte can CHOOSE to activate this power, gaining some minor advantage related to Corruption Bonus [Extra damage equal to CB, Unnatural senses with range Equal to CB, Acid Blood deals X Damage +CB]. Activating this inflicts automaticly ONE corruption point. If the malignancy stacks, the ability gains a FURTHER boost, making it AMAZING, but the Corruption cost goes up to Five.

The idea is that a puritan RESISTS the temptation to give into these unnatural powers, whereas the Radical is quick to succomb and use them in the time of need.

When the players hit 30, 55 and 80 corruption, they roll on mutations. But see- at the 30 Mark, they roll using the same old system, so pick two stats. If they fail, they roll on the Minor mutation table. On a 55, they roll on the major- and if they pass, they get a minor mutation. On the 80, they roll on the Minor AND twice on Major mutations, and if they pass [again, both Stat tests], they only get one major instead of 2 but still get the minor.

So at the end of the day, characters have stacked up at least two minors and one major, and lots of malignancies: but fun malignancies. Malignancies that nag at the players, constantly reminding him that he could use them to solve his problems, make encounters easier... but at the cost of corruption.

Instead of just like, robbing him 1d10 stats, or causing him to be killed on sight by... pretty much anyone with any common sense. After all, the only counter on that scale that should result in instant death should be the 100 Cp, the rest should be a matter of how radical the rest of his team is

You can always let a minor mutation slide, but when he hits a forced major, there's no two ways about where he stands.

Nice thoughts, Saldre.

I agree with Saldre, although I still think there should be a way to avoid major mutations at the end; if the Emperor truly watches over you, you should be able to remain pure, at least in appearance. Or at least until you get to 100, when the Emperor decides that enough is enough, and you become a Chaos Spawn.

Thats easily fixable by having the final roll on the major and minor, and on a failure, you just gain the minor.

Ultimately, if your still a puritan at that point, and have been exposed to 80+ Corruption, you should just get a surgery to cut off the corrupt "Extra limb/s".

You keep coming out with the good ideas, Saldre. That seems like a **** good way to handle things, simulates the temptation of radicalism really well.

Thanks!

But as one of my players pointed out when I suggested this him a few hours ago, Radical characters get all of the cool toys. And though they eventually burn out, for the several sessions that they do play they get to shine more so than anyone else without any "real penalties", often overshadowing the rest of the team by their power.

So even though I really like the above idea for Malignancies, I propose that Corruption itself should have a mechanic that punishes the player that directly relates to the number of CPs gained.

How about- when someone uses a fate point, roll a "Corruption roll"- on a success, the fate point is spent but there's no further effect.

Low corruption characters will have their fate points, and the emperor, to watch over them- but high corruption characters would need to rely on their unnatural malignancy powers to get an edge.

Thats easily fixable by having the final roll on the major and minor, and on a failure, you just gain the minor.

Ultimately, if your still a puritan at that point, and have been exposed to 80+ Corruption, you should just get a surgery to cut off the corrupt "Extra limb/s".

Unless the chaos gods were feeling very lenient, they'd just regrow

The corruption system used to represent the chaos gods toying with the acolytes. They could have just reached into their souls and turned them into crazed heretics or oozing warpstuff, but that's not how they work. PC's are important, they have a 'destiny'(which is why they have fate points) and its too much fun to see them slowly and unavoidable descend into damnation. I kinda liked malygnancies being mostly just bad. It meant you really didn't want CP, but the radical gear is so very very tempting in its power and lulzyness. I think positive/double edged sword stuff should be mostly kept to mutations, although some are fine as malygnancies. Just trading CP for power(like with deathsight) seems like it would fit more in BC than DH.

I'd say it fits MUCH better with Dark Heresy, honestly. Dark Heresy is a game where you want to be tempted by the ruinous powers, whereas in BC it's basically accepted that you're openly embracing the ruinous powers.

I agree with Tom: malignancies should be concealed, and present in the background: using radical gear is not the ONLY way to get malignancies, so why punish those puritans that didn't do anything "radical" but still acquire malignancies trough negatives and horrible effects?

A mutation,meaning a certain degree of constant exposure that's actually dangerous, should be "neutral"- you should not gain corruption for using your Extra arm. You should be more so worried about justifying it. Attempting to purge away the unholy flesh. Someone who gets "tough hide" can live with it, or can attempt to get rid of it before he detects as "Impure" on scans.

A mutation is just that, mutation. Why would it grant more corruption? its a permanent change.

Tempting the acolytes is all about what Malignancies are- like cancerous tumors that slowly fester and accelerate you to the mutation mark. The higher you get on that scale, the worst the mutation and on 55/80, your guaranteed to get two minor mutations. So even the most puritan of Inquisitors has a certain bestial aspect to him, unless he heavily alters and controls his body.

As a negative effect, I go back to proposing the sliding scale. Puritans would attempt to keep their # of CPs as LOW as possible, as it directly relates to their chances of a Fate-point being successfully used. If Iron Will table ends up being reworked with a [Resist corruption] branch, then this would be further room to add more talents that help with this test in particular.

Radicals, with a high corruption value, would instead have to rely on their malignancies to give them an edge- and corrupt faster.

For every 10 Corruption Points a character gains, he must Test
Willpower to see if his corruption has manifested as literal
damage to his body and soul. -

If the Test is
failed, the character’s corruption of spirit is given form. These
metaphysical and psychosomatic scars are called Malignancies,

This is from the old system. Notice also how all the listed malygnancies are nothing that would mark you a mutant or a heretic. I prefer this system, where malygnancies are not inherently chaotic so to speak. Mutations otoh mark that you have been touched by chaos.

I think with the system you're advocating, most people would just ignore malygnancies and never use them. All but the crazed radicals would too, because its not a compact they've made where they're given the illusion of control. Only a heretic would regard a gift from the dark gods as an actual gift :/

As to why punish puritans. Because grimdark. The universe isn't fair, and the dark gods see your despair and thrive on it.

I partially agree with you: but I think that mutations should be "Static" and "Uncontrollable"- they should be the actual manifestation of chaos. And they should be rare, and not happen every 10 steps. Every 30 steps, a literal manifestation of chaos is good. Or every 25 steps, with the 100 being the "explosion" into Chaos spawn or full fledged heretic.

I agree that Malignancies should not mark you a mutant, but all of them were "inherently chaotic"- as you mentioned, they are corruption "made flesh" [which should be the purview of mutation].

I don't think most people would ignore malignancies, and even if they ignore them- GOOD: malignancy should be another "screw you" to the players, its a table that does something bad the worst it gets, and here were talking about doing something bad at the ~25, ~50 ~75 Mark before ultimately killing off your character at 100.

And it is a compact where they are given the illusion of control: I'll just use it this one time for a mere ONE Cp. that's not much at all. Its just a single point. Why not? We can get 100 of them. More malignancies means more varied powers means more chances to use them and more temptation.

As to your final point: this is a game where the point is to have fun. The universe isn't fair and grimdark can only take you so far before people start randomly exterminatusing planets or staying home because there's really no point to it all. By combining BOTH of my suggestions [scaled Fate-point use based on corruption], you provide direct punishment for radicals [as the emperor turns his gaze away from their radical methods], making the scale suddenly count on a small scale [step by step], and you add the twist to allow it to self generate corruption points to compensate in case the player spend, I don't know, 20 years just fighting Orks [turning the entire table into a waste of space.] You never know when your going to need that extra +2 damage, or that extra success on a dodge skill, or that extra point of health that the malignancy can give you.

The Einsenhorn example shows a MULTITUDE of radical Inquisitors that are completely and utterly devoid of any mutations- and Quixos himself who, can be argued, has accumulated several malignancies [and perhaps even uses them] but has avoided any true "mutations." For all intents and purposes, he is an Inquisitor with 90 or so corruption. Some minor, maybe a major mutation- and lots of dark powers, but ultimately speaking, still completely playable.

And it is a compact where they are given the illusion of control: I'll just use it this one time for a mere ONE Cp. that's not much at all. Its just a single point. Why not? We can get 100 of them. More malignancies means more varied powers means more chances to use them and more temptation. By ignoring I mean, just not use it, at which point getting it is a pointless use of time. Scaling fate points with corruption would be horrible.

As for Compacts: This is an OOC argument, your character doesn't think in terms of CP. And there it makes sense but I'm talking about the larping man. Using something a chaos god forced on you is a pretty clear no go. After all, why would they give you power willingly?

I don't think grimdark is unfun. I think most people who like warhammer do enjoy the grimdark.

I don't think Eisenhorn should be used to justify mechanics. It's a book and by necessity it plays by different rules.

Why do you think scaling Fate points with corruption would be such an horrible thing? It seems like a brilliant idea to me. It seems more likely to me that the Emperor would help those who remained pure than those who crossed the line, or are on the verge of doing so.