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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elf Witch" data-source="post: 5739198" data-attributes="member: 9037">I sometimes feel that the designers of DnD don't trust DMs. In Shadowrun you take flaws to get edges and it is left up to the GM to work the flaws into the game. And in the 15 years I have been playing Shadowrun I have never seen them abused by either the players or the GMs. I have played with a lot of different GMs and I never really saw it being a major issue on the Dumpshock  forums. Yes the flaws have some mechanical applications someone with the flaw drug addict starts having issues if they don't get their fix and they take penalties to their rolls. Having a dependent means you have to support them and their lifestyles. I remember using flaws in a 2E DnD game my character had the flaw phobia of undead and I had to make a will save every time we encountered them if I failed I tried to run if I couldn't run I found a corner and cowered. It lead to some interesting encounters. I think that balance is sometimes highly overrated because I don't believe you can ever truly balance the game there are to many factors involved. And while I can see and agree that in some games flaws might unbalance or be to vague the flaws I read in the SRD are just plain downright boring and don't really do anything to enhance role playing. Again it is all crunch and no fluff. When I made my first Shadowrun character the flaws I took helped define her and inspired her background which came into play. It was from the flaws that I built her entire past. I took flashback , claustrophobia , police record, dark secret and dependent. From that I made a character who was born human to humans who were involved in human first groups, like a lot of adolescents she changed into a metahuman at puberty. Her father tried to kill her by smothering her with a pillow. While she was struggling she could smell the scent of night blooming jasmine wafting in the windows. Hence she got flashbacks that crippled her if she caught the scent and she could not stand having anything over her face. In Shadowrun they control mages by putting a skin tight hood over their heads.   She ran away from home got involved with a gang was arrested and ended up with a record which made it hard to function in the corp run world so she became a Shadowrunner. Her dark secret was her affair with a member of an Atzlan cartel and the birth of a daughter she keeps hidden from them and their blood magics. All of us playing in that game had interesting flaws that the GM wove into the game.  Some of the flaws had mechanical applications some more role playing. For example because of my phobia I would never let my character be arrested again being a mage she would rather die then have that hood put over her head. I know that good role players don't need a codified system I always give my characters some flaws when I make them and I play them with them even if no one really notices. But I do think they can add so much to the game and  can encourage a more three dimensional character.</blockquote>

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