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They did have a point, though. Even in a world of monsters and wizards, Changeling never really fit in or found a place for itself. It never struck the right balance between presenting the wonder of faerie tales and the horror of the original sources, and in practice a lot of Changeling games were more Disney than Brothers Grimm. In time, Changeling, the fairest of the games, got treated like the proverbial red-headed stepchild, and like the faeries themselves, withered under cynicism and disbelief, and faded away altogether.
Until now.
In August of 2007, White Wolf released its newest World of Darkness game, Changeling: The Lost. In folklore, the original concept of a changeling was when the faeries took a baby or young child away and replaced it with some odd simulacrum. Lost goes back to this legend by focusing on what happens to the human abductee when he escapes faerie-land and gets back home only to find that his family believes that the simulation is the real person, and that, having been altered by his time in the faerie world, he can no longer pass for "himself." Right away this flips the premise of Changeling: The Dreaming (CtD) - whereas the old game was about fae spirits who had to take human bodies to survive, and thus had to live in the normal world while trying to find their way home, the new game is about people FROM the normal world who are taken by the fae, try to come back to their human lives and find out for that one reason or another they can't. Thus the characters have to start from there and find out what their place is in the world. As the slogan goes: "You are Lost. Find yourself."
THE BOOK: Changeling: The Lost might actually not be as pretty as the other new World of Darkness (nWoD) books, but it has a certain unity of theme. The cover is a metallic/forest green done in a motif of interlocking hedge thorns, broken up only by the appearance of a light-colored moth that's been speared on one of the thorns. The interior colors are a minty green, as are the rather amazing chapter-heading illustrations by Matthew Stawicki. This green scheme certainly goes with the old Irish association with the fae, but it also ties to the "Hedge" that changelings/abducted humans have to pass to get back home... implying that they haven't really escaped.
The opening fiction, "What Alec Bourbon Said", is technically about a drunken bar lout who performs a certain favor for a young girl who shows up one day at his bar. The figurative descriptions make it a little too easy to figure out what Kith Alec is (especially if one has already read White Wolf's teaser materials) but the rest of the text is weird and mysterious enough to set the stage for the rest of the book without giving too much away.
The Introduction refers to Changeling as "A Game of Beautiful Madness." Touched by the faerie world, changelings come to see beauty in even the strangest things and the most mundane occasions, "not simply because they can, but because they try." Madness comes from abduction by the fae, or "Others," as the character is forced to adapt to their bizarre whims. Caught between the human and faerie worlds, instability is always a danger. The "Lost" have to keep a balance between both sides of themselves.
Chapter One: The World Behind the Mask elaborates on the premises of Changeling: The Lost (CtL). The text begins: "There are three places called Arcadia. One is the mortal Arcadia, a Greek prefecture in the Peleponessus. One is the mythical utopia, a land of incomparable natural beauty where all manners of joy and pleasure might be found. Unspoiled by man, that Arcadia is the home of supernatural beings that exist without conceit or greed, filling their days with idyllic pursuits among the verdant forests and meadows of plenty. And then there is the domain of the Fae."
Arcadia, or Faerie, is a land of pure magic, which means that "reality" is determined only by the powers of its natives and "a complexly woven tapestry of agreements and loopholes with no rhyme or reason intelligible to the human mind." Each player character in this game is a human who was taken at some point in life by the faeries, meaning that each one usually has a "Keeper" from among the natives of Arcadia, who are referred to as the (capitalized) True Fae, or the Gentry, the Others, the Good Folk or other such names. The interpretation of the Fae in this setting- which corresponds fairly closely with their antagonist role in most old fairy tales- reinforces why CtL is a game about humans forced to adapt to Arcadia rather than Arcadian fae forced to adapt to the human world. Basically, the Fae are royal bastards (so to speak). They are like unto pagan gods, but even more alien and capricious. The main thing the descriptions of them have in common is that even the 'nice' ones seem to have no capacity for empathy or understanding of someone else's perspective. In any case, if one is able to reshape the local reality at a whim, including the ability to create monsters or mold human servants, it's understandable that the True Fae would come off as sociopaths from a human perspective.
Because of the nature of reality in Arcadia, a human abductee cannot survive without becoming in some way part of it: "Everything in Arcadia exists and interacts as a result of Contracts and oaths with those around it, and without access to those oaths, humans will find no sustenance, no shelter, no rest and no healing. Even the simplest acts such as quenching one's thirst or warming one's self at a campfire are safely completed only at the behest of ancient Contracts between the elements of water and fire and the fae denizens of the realm." Thus the only way to survive is to submit to a Contract with one's Keeper, and in the process become fae- a changeling. This allows a human access to the power of Contracts, but permanently alters him. The human develops a seeming, one of a broad type of changeling creature (like Beast, Fairest, etc.) that may further differentiate into a kith (for instance the Elemental seeming can have kiths based on the four elements, or wood). If a changeling escapes to Earth, he retains the magical changes to his being, but they are concealed from mundane eyes by a supernatural "Mask" that makes the person appear much as he did (or would at his current age). These changes are real but not detectable with medical science, and they are also not genetic, and could not pass down to a child even if the changeling could have one (one minor aspect of the transformation is that changelings are rarely able to have children upon becoming fae, which is one reason that the True Fae have to recruit new servants instead of simply breeding the humans they have).
Obviously it is possible for a changeling to escape his Keeper, which usually happens by violence or stealth but often by successfully meeting a challenge from the Keeper for freedom. Rarely, the Keeper actually lets his charge go free, which always raises the question of "Why?" But as in the fairy tales, humans who stay in the Fae realms often find that time passes strangely- they may have aged years only to find that they've arrived home only days after the abduction, or conversely may have spent relatively little time in Arcadia only to find that years have passed on Earth. Thus the changeling may find that everyone who knew him is dead or unable to remember him, or they're still as they were but he has aged too much to be recognized.
The other possibility is that the character can't go home because apparently he never left. The Fae will often replace their captives with the aforementioned fake humans, here called fetches. The fetch is made out of some odd-bits of junk, a piece of the victim's shadow, and a little bit of elfin magic. What's interesting is that the fetch may have played the role for so long that it is more a member of the family than the original character, and may come to identify itself as the real person, forgetting its fae origins. However, the fetch becomes magically aware of its original whenever the changeling comes home, and thus the return of the changeling may be as much a shock to the fetch as the discovery of the fetch is to the changeling. The discovery also posits the important question of what to do next. One could always kill the fetch, but that still counts as a sin against Morality (Clarity for changelings). Moreover, the fact that the fetch is by now more familiar with the character's home than he is means that taking over where one left off is not always a bright idea. There are some who pull this off and "go stealth" among human beings, but this denies the changeling's fae nature and leads to inevitable problems if the Fae go hunting for that character again.
Thus the returned changeling often finds that his only choice is to make a new home and a new community among other changelings, the only other people who can understand his experience. Sometimes groups will make the same escape from Faerie together but they usually meet through informal methods. Their social organizations are much like those in Changeling: The Dreaming- small groups are 'motleys,' they get together in 'freeholds', and they even have titles from the ranks of nobility. The difference is that this culture is less an attempt to preserve the obsolete structures of the Fae nobility than a means of helping a changeling cope with his new circumstances. Freeholds offer a place for the changeling to be himself, and to reconcile his human and faerie natures. In exchange, he is expected to offer defense to his other changelings, but given that every changeling has reason to fear being taken again by the Others, they are already prone to find strength in numbers.
The local changeling communities usually organize themselves into larger groups, or Courts, which are based on the four seasons (an idea taken from Dark Ages: Fae, which in many ways is a better model for faerie characters than CtD). In CtL, it is traditional for the ruler of the local Court to step down from local leadership when the seasons change, with the Winter lord stepping down for the leader of the Spring Court, and so on. It is explained that this was deliberate on the part of the Courts' founders, in that the seasons are an organic aspect of the changing world that the Fae lords could not comprehend, and the seasonal change of lords makes it harder for the Fae to subvert the system. In game terms, each Court has a favored emotion that it draws power from, and Status in each Court creates a Mantle that alters the character's seeming and gives supernatural benefits. The Spring Court reacts to captivity in Arcadia through renewal and the creation of new pleasures and new ties to Earth. Their favored emotion is Desire. The Summer Court reacts to captivity directly, fueling thoughts of revenge and seeking to protect changelings and other humans from the depredations of the Fae. Their favored emotion is Wrath. The Autumn Court is most concerned with exploring the magic power that their captivity gave them, and they tend to specialize in occult studies. In keeping with their Halloween themes, their favored emotion is Fear. The Winter Court deals with the Fae (and many other unpleasant aspects of existence) by avoiding them, making them experts in steath and secrets. Their favored emotion is Sorrow (they spend a lot of time at funerals). There are also "Courtless" fae who do not join the Courts; there is no particular drawback to this choice but no particular reason NOT to choose a Court (other than the need to spend Merit points on Mantle).
In addition to fear of the Fae themselves, changelings also have reason to fear other changelings, including the "loyalists" and "privateers" who still serve the Gentry, and those "sick" or "soulless" ones who came out of the Hedge more "lost" than other changelings. There are also some Banished Fae who violated the rules of their realm, such as falling in love, seeking revenge or doing something else that makes them take existence seriously. Diminished in power, they become obsessed with getting back to Arcadia, not realizing that this very obsession is so un-Fae that it is the very thing that prevents them from being able to return. Chapter One also mentions "Those Outside the Gates", the vampires, werewolves and mages. Changelings can either fight or ally with these beings depending on the circumstances but the book says that mages are problematic in that many of them are trying to get to Arcadia for some reason and think the changelings can help, not realizing that the changelings don't want to go back, and that the soul-ripping thorns of the Hedge might make it impossible for human mages to use their powers by the time they pass the border. It's a theory no one wants to test.
Chapter Two: Character Creation is the helpfully-titled chapter for making a Changeling character. As in other WoD games, the base human character uses a certain block of points in different categories of Traits, with the book reiterating the basic rules. After defining the Traits of his human character, the player then decides how the character was changed by Faerie, and applies a changeling template. All changelings get a free Specialty in either Athletics, Brawl or Stealth, reflecting enhanced grace or even natural weaponry. All changelings get the game-specific Advantages of Wyrd and Glamour, and the modified Morality Advantage called Clarity. The player gets seven points in Merits, including options for changeling-specific Merits. The player defines the changeling's seeming (and possibly, specific kith) and picks the magical Contracts he knows.
Wyrd measures a fae's magical command over the world (aka the 'mystic power' stat, as opposed to Glamour, the 'magic points' stat). It provides its rating to most magical Dice Pools and gives a rating for how many Glamour points one can store, and how many can be used per turn. At higher levels it not only allows a changeling to boost his stats above human levels with experience points, but the character can "Induce Bedlam" and provoke emotion in a number of targets (though it works best when it's the signature emotion of the character's Court). As in the other nWoD games, high mystic power has inherent drawbacks. In this case, high Wyrd (over 5) makes the character more akin to the fae, which may alienate humans as the changeling's fae mien becomes more obvious even to them (a chill breeze in the room for a Winter Court fae, for instance). The character becomes physically addicted to Glamour, and at high Wyrd levels suffers frailties like a True Fae; he may flee from church bells or be forced to count all the grains of rice in a pile, for example. Worse than this, the character attracts the attention of the True Fae (other than his Keeper) because at higher than Wyrd 5, the character's magical power starts rivaling that of the greatest Fae enchanters. The authors actually give an option for the character to *lower* his Wyrd to reduce these threats or regain balance with his humanity, however this requires going "cold turkey" on all magic use other than harvesting Glamour for a period equal to one's Wyrd rating in months (a Wyrd 9 character would have to go cold turkey for nine whole months to reduce Wyrd to 8). Wyrd starts at rating 1 and can be raised 1 point for three Merit points.
Glamour starts at a rating equal to half one's maximum score (usually 5 out of 10). It is used to power most of a changeling's innate magical abilities and Contracts ('spells'). Changelings usually harvest (replenish) Glamour by 'drinking in' intense emotional displays, and again this works best with the signature emotion of one's Court. There are other methods of harvesting, including the use of magic to enter mortal dreams, entering into magical pledges, and gaining certain magical items from questing in the Hedge.
As in nMage, the Morality stat is modified, here called Clarity. In addition to the other acts in the Hierarchy of Sins, there are certain acts that can undermine a changeling's Clarity (sanity). Unlike with Morality, these are not always acts that threaten one's moral compass, rather they have the potential to threaten the changeling's precarious mental balance (becoming pregnant or spending time in Arcadia are counted as two examples of Clarity-threatening actions). Changelings with a "normal" Clarity (6 or more) can use a special sense called Kenning to detect the supernatural (much like in CtD, although it's not a skill per se). High Clarity changelings actually get 2 to perception-based rolls for their keen senses. Conversely a character whose Clarity deteriorates starts to lose dice in perception rolls as his sense of reality vs. fantasy blurs, in addition to the usual derangement risks for losing Morality. As in some of the other nWoD games, players have the option to exchange up to two Clarity points for five experience points each, reflecting useful but harrowing experiences.
Game-specific Merits include Court Goodwill (friendly relations with a Court that is not your own), Harvest (a steady supply of Glamour, not unlike the Vampire 'Herd' in effect), Hollow (a secret enchanted space, which again like Vampire can be customized and shared like Haven), Mantle (status and powers in one of the seasonal Courts), Token (a magic item) and New Identity, which on a scale of 1 to 4 Merit points determines how good the character's new "secret ID" is for documentation in the mortal world.
After Merits, Chapter Two describes the Seemings and Kiths. In a game that's even more invested in psychological metaphor than the original fairy tales, one's seeming can represent both the torture (Durance) one suffered in Arcadia and the coping mechanism one used to survive it. An Ogre, for instance, might not be a brute, but his time in Arcadia has taught him that one survives by force and intimidation, so his body has changed to reflect that. The seeming may also represent the role the character was made to serve in a Fae's realm; a fiery Efreet may have servants who become "Fireheart" Elementals but also guards who are Ogres and dancing girls who become Fairest. A kith is a subdivision of seeming, reflecting a natural subcategory (like fire or air for Elementals) or a cultural division (Ogres include the Raksha of India and the Stonebones of North America). Each of these kiths gets its own special ability- for example the Stonebones Ogre can spend 1 Glamour to harden his skin and give it an armor rating equal to the character's Wyrd for the scene. This is neat because it points up the fact that the fae in fairy tales are rarely quantified in terms of "Clans" or such and vary wildly depending on local lore. In fact the book confirms that the True Fae cannot be measured in these terms at all. CtL sets up a good compromise between the traditional White Wolf "splat" method of character generation and the fully customized system in Dark Ages: Fae, allowing a familiar base while still allowing the player to make a unique fairy-tale character. In case this gets confusing, the book does a very good job of describing the differences between kiths within a seeming in terms of both their fae miens and human appearances.
The seemings are: Beasts, who were literally turned into animals while in Faerie and must fight to regain not only their freedom but their human reason. These are not the cheerful, compulsive-liar Pooka but something more primal. Darklings, who survived in dark and grotesque spaces and escaped Faerie only after finding their way through shadows; they are attuned to darkness and fear. Pretty obvious analogs to the Sluagh, but including a wider range of kith. Elementals, who were often deliberately warped to some purpose by their Keepers (e.g. a Fireheart who was made into a fire source for a Winter Fae's home), and who are often the changelings most removed from humanity. Fairest are much like the CtD Sidhe; ideally beautiful and often arrogant, they won their way back to Earth by deliberately turning away from the magical beauty of Faerie, a memory that both tortures them and reinforces their arrogance, knowing how much strength of will was required to escape. Ogres are defined by the violence and physical abuse they suffered in Faerie, and had to escape by force without turning into the very monsters that captured them. Even then, they are sometimes tempted to extremes. Wizened come out of Faerie seeming somehow "smaller" than they were; worked upon and tortured by spiteful captors, they become the tinkers, old hags, faerie butlers and goblin surgeons of changeling society.
Each seeming has its own Contract affinity, one Contract list that costs less to raise with XP (the Fairest, for instance, have affinity in Vainglory). Each also has its own Blessing (e.g. the Fairest can spend Glamour to improve Social rolls for 1 point per die) and a Curse (like a Vampire Clan weakness- e.g. the Fairest are a bit more 'fragile' than other fae and roll one less die to avoid losing Clarity).
After the Kith splats you get the descriptions of faerie magic powers, here called Contracts. These Contracts usually require at least 1 Glamour to use, except if the character exploits a "Catch" that fits the theme of the power. For instance one "Contract of Stone" called Might of the Terrible Brute boosts the character's Strength by successes rolled for one action. The Catch is if the character uses it to fight multiple enemies bare-handed. Some of these contracts also apply dice modifiers depending on how emotional or expressive the changeling is at the time; for instance the above Contract gets 1 if the character "yells, grunts or boasts loudly about her great strength." Conversely it gets -1 if the character is acting calm or sedate. The Contracts of Hearth (which apply blesses and curses) have Bans instead of Catches, because the powers of Fate that grant these abilities can punish their misuse (for instance if 'Fickle Fate' is used to curse the same target more than once per hour). There are General Contracts (that all changelings are considered to have affinity in), Seeming Contracts (each seeming having its own affinity) and Court Contracts (that usually require Status or Court Goodwill in a Court to get; these are divided into 'Fleeting' Contracts for the Court's emotion and 'Eternal' Contracts for the season's elemental effects). Finally, there are so-called "Goblin Contracts," usually picked up at the "Goblin Market," that provide for a wide range of effects at little Glamour cost. The "catch" is that they all have a side effect- for instance, "Burden of Life" allows the changeling to heal someone else, but in doing so takes on the burden of his life- so that for the next day afterward any damage the recipient takes hits the changeling instead. These Contracts can also be learned "out of order" (a 3-dot Contract can be learned without any 1 or 2-dot Contracts) because they don't belong to a specific "chain." However, PCs are only allowed to take 1-dot Goblin Contracts at character creation. A beginning PC gets five dots in Contracts, at least 2 of which must be specific to his Seeming or Court.
Chapter Three: Special Rules and Systems details game-specific rules for Changeling. The chapter goes into more detail on how the seeming or 'fae mien' works in relation to the character's human Mask. It also touches on the legendary Fae bane of cold iron- interestingly, changelings are still too human for iron to count as a bane (like silver is for werewolves) but weapons made of iron (as opposed to steel alloy) ignore any protections from faerie magic, including Contracts that provide armor value. Cold iron DOES count as a bane against True Fae, doing aggravated damage. It's also pointed out that weapons that count as "cold iron" (forged with only tools, no heating and no alloys) are rare these days especially since they're not as efficient to use or make as machine-made tools.
(It's also worth noting in passing that unlike Mage Paradox, Werewolf Lunacy or the old Changeling's 'I-don't-believe-in-faeries' mechanic of Banality, CtL doesn't seem to limit faerie activity with human disbelief except in terms of the Mask. Which actually makes sense; after all, the characters were captured by Fae in the first place and probably didn't believe in faeries before then. Revealing oneself to humans does threaten Clarity, though, so that serves as a limiting factor is addition to the practical consequences of such revelations. Whereas mages fear Paradox and vampires fear humans who know their weaknesses, changelings fear getting discovered by the True Fae above all else.)
The old Changeling setting placed much stock in official vows and rituals, given the power of such vows to come literally true in fairy tales. Changeling: The Lost continues that tradition and expands it with a very detailed set of rules for crafting pledges. A character can swear a simple vow, make a pledge on his name (or the name of his God or even his Keeper, but in that case the Keeper automatically finds the changeling if the oath is broken) or pledge on a 'corporal' item (the Bible, the flag, a Court emblem, etc.). The pledge defines what tasks each party is responsible for and what boons accrue for swearing the pledge. Each pledge also includes a sanction, or curse that falls on the one who breaks the pledge. The powers and drawbacks of all these features are measured in terms of how much Willpower is required for each party to seal the pledge, where severe drawbacks (like a sanction of Death) reduce the requirement and increases in power or scope increase the Willpower cost ('Greatly' increasing the duration of a pledge to a year and a day, or a decade, will boost the cost by 3, and permanent or epic effects will require the expenditure of a permanent Willpower dot).
Chapter Three also discusses the changeling capacity for dream-craft. The book says that in dreams, past and future blend in a way that creates association with the Wyrd and the Hedge, which allows changelings to experience lucid dreaming, to shape their own dreams, or to enter the dreams of their own fetches or those mortals they have pledged with. However, the world of dreams also grants the True Fae an access to mortal or changeling minds, and the Fae have even greater powers of dream-craft than the Lost. Of course this presents the prospect of fighting within someone's dreamworld, and there are fast rules for that, complete with the option of Exalted-style "stunting" for crafting the environment in a stylish and descriptive manner.
This chapter also reviews sample Tokens, which are magic items of faerie power. They are (naturally) on a 1 to 5 dot scale, with the scale representing how likely an item is to be in currency- a five-dot Token is something that would normally be used only by the champion of a freehold. In addition to an automatic benefit, using the token applies an automatic drawback. The item must be activated either with a Wyrd roll or the spending of 1 Glamour, but there is also a Catch (minor curse) that allows the token to work even for a mortal or other non-changeling, or for a changeling who doesn't want to roll for Wyrd or use Glamour. However if the Catch is used it applies *in addition to* the drawback.
HEDGE!!! -The Tick
The final section of Chapter Three goes into great detail on the Hedge, the supernatural border between Arcadia and the physical world. This is a very important part of the game, with the Hedge being the closest analog to the "Near Dreaming" of the old game, and therefore the main supernatural environment of this setting. For one thing, Hollows have to be crafted out of the Hedge. It is also a native environment for certain magical herbs ('goblin fruits') that are of use to changelings, so the Lost often use the Hedge as a resource. It is of course an extremely dangerous one. In addition to the simple fact that the Fae and their servants can use the Hedge to lure changelings back to Arcadia, the reality-distorting perspective of the Hedge can serve to undermine the Morality (or equivalent stat) of characters, which in the case of mortals is especially insidious because every sin they commit in the Hedge is rolled for only AFTER leaving it. In the case of mages, going too far into the Thorns of the Hedge causes a Wisdom-draining effect that reduces one's power of magic. The Hedge is also psychoactive; that is, it responds to the thoughts and emotions of its inhabitants, which in the case of a stranger who is already spooked out by the environment will cause him to get more lost and more unable to take action due to fear. This also means that a Hollow or freehold will often reflect the trappings of its owner, creating certain landmarks in the environment that may allow a changeling to find his way. In addition to rules for the "goblin fruits," this section also contains ideas for "Hedge Dueling," where two changelings decide to fight it out in an environment that suits their powers. Of course with the other hazards of the Hedge, this practice is described as "a bit like engaging in an underwater knife-fight near a school of sharks."
Chapter Four: Storytelling gives advice to the potential Changeling Storyteller, starting with the concept that Changeling is "A Game of Beautiful Madness." The beauty, again, comes from the changeling perception of the magical and their enhanced sensitivity to the world, including their ability to gain Glamour from emotions. The madness is defined as an "inability to understand the relationship between cause and effect", which naturally follows when the characters are wrapped up in the world of the Fae. The book parallels beauty and madness in scenes with wonder and horror in story, pointing out that the original fairy tales had many elements of horror and grotesque (for example, with Cinderella's step-sisters), but were sanitized for children's media. The book's opinion: "Well, to hell with that. Let's bring back the terrorizing." In depicting horror, style is emphasized over gore, with a certain implication of insanity - is the monstrous appearance of the noble her real form, or a hallucination brought on by the changeling's declining Clarity? Several techniques for suggesting this insanity are suggested, including synesthesia (e.g. 'the computer printout whispers to you the smell of burning leaves'). Given that the Storyteller's descriptions ARE the characters' perception of the world, deliberately warping these descriptions will make it impossible for the players to determine game 'reality' and increase unease.
On more concrete matters, Chapter Four discusses where to set a chronicle, how to map out major antagonists, and how to distinguish between different types of conflict. While conflict is at the heart of a good story, this may be violence, physical challenge, social intrigue or more. The key is, a group is usually going to include characters who are specialized in different areas (the Ogre combat-monster, the Darkling spy, the Fairest courtier, etc.) so the Storyteller needs to have a number of conflicts ready that can bring out the specialty of each character. Generally, however, CtL emphasizes intrigue over combat, given that characters in nWoD are rather fragile compared to the old combat system, and except in specific cases, changelings are generally less tough than vampires or werewolves.
In planning a campaign ('chronicle') the Storyteller is advised to make sure that the characters' relationships (with each other, NPCs, and with their own goals) are established when the campaign begins. This makes it easier to determine a course for the chronicle so that it has dramatic weight and is not just a 'post-modern fairy tale' collection of events. The book advises plotting the course of a chronicle in steps so as to make it easier to determine the desired course. As an example of campaign brainstorming, the book uses an extended example starting with a beginning hook, a climactic scene, and five bullet points where the ST fills the holes by working backwards from the climax. Sort of like the Underpants Gnome scheme, but more serious.
Chapter Four details character creation rules and story ideas for the fetch. It is based on the original character's (base) human form, adjusted as the Storyteller sees fit for character concept. It doesn't have Contracts, of course. However, it does have its changeling's Wyrd rating and can gain special powers called "Echoes" as its changeling increases in Wyrd. It always has the Echo "Attuned to the Wyrd," which means it can detect the general presence of fae and changelings in its area and automatically detects its original (which means changelings will never be able to ambush a fetch). The other Echoes include abilities to manipulate or cancel Glamour. Story ideas for the fetch include fetch as adversary (again, the changeling can enter his fetch's dreams, although that invites retaliation), fetch as "other self" that the changeling may somehow integrate back into his being, or even fetch as myth- which means that if the person who has your original face and life is the REAL human being, then who are YOU?
There are sample changeling antagonists of the Madman, Soulless and Loyalist variety. There are also two examples of mortal contacts who are "ensorcelled" with pledges to be able to see the changeling world. Another example antagonist is one of the "Banished" True Fae, a persona that is considered bad news in that it is "difficult for humans to imagine what atrocities might be great enough for one of the Fae to be cast out of their homeland."
Finally this chapter discusses the story element of the Goblin Market, which is often found at the edge of a freehold, usually in the local Hedge. The major story hook, other than a PC's desire for an item and his need to pay whatever surreal price is charged, is the utterly mercenary nature of the sellers. ANYTHING can be sold at a Goblin Market, including human slaves, or the characters themselves. Time is money, friend. Just keepin' it real.
Appendix One: Entitlements describes noble orders of the changelings, "prestige classes" if you will, akin to Werewolf Lodges or Mage Legacies. As with a Legacy, taking on an Entitlement alters the character magically and spiritually, making him more than he was. All noble orders are formed by the same mystical means as the seasonal Courts; joining one requires a similar oath. In addition to certain Trait requirements (which in the examples are not too hard to meet) a prospect must meet certain roleplaying concepts, displaying interest in or loyalty to the concept of the noble order. For instance the "Margravates of the Brim" must not only pledge to live outside the Court system, but on the borders of changeling society, in order to protect their kin. Each description includes a short pledge, concept, a specific blessing (e.g. the Margravates gain 1 to certain dice pools when in the 'Brim' border area) and three disturbing rumors concerning that order. After the example orders, this section gives the Storyteller advice for making new orders along this pattern.
Appendix Two: The Freehold of Miami is the game's imaginative sample setting. Miami is already associated with decadence and danger in the popular media, and in this book the real-world aspects of the city combine with a potentially explosive political environment in the changeling community. As mentioned before, the tradition of the seasonal Courts is for each Court to make way for the leader of the next season in turn. However in Miami the Summer King has refused to yield his throne, turning the realm into a dictatorship. Now "the City of Endless Summer" is kept in simmering turmoil as rumors of a True Fae invasion increase while the Summer King keeps control through a bread-and-circuses policy, allowing his changelings to reap mortal Glamour from the violence of the city.
SUMMARY
Changeling: The Dreaming was a wonderful game, and my friends and I played it a great deal. But again, it didn't emphasize the horror of the original fairy tales enough, and to the extent that it included those elements (with the Redcaps, Sluagh and Unseelie Court) it did so with the typical White Wolf "splat" mentality that made such elements more predictable than scary. Moreover, the element of Banality meant that one's true faerie soul would eventually get crushed by the demands of modern reality, which is a lot more depressing than thrilling (that may be one reason why my friends rarely if ever played up the normal human world in the game).
With Changeling: The Lost, however, the rules system emphasizes variety in the creation of a character (even though the Contracts could use some expansion) and the setting goes back to the gritty, Grimm origins of the modern fairy tale. If the game has a flaw, it might be too dark and metaphorical in its references to abduction and abuse. One thing that does do, however, is give the characters a reason to desire their human lives and families over the magic of Arcadia, just as Dorothy got to see the wonders of Oz but always wanted to go back to Kansas. That desire for "home" gives the characters a grounding in reality that they never had in CtD, giving the fantasy elements greater weight. Individual Storytellers still have the option to emphasize the wonder and beauty over the horror and madness, but the new game strikes a firmer balance between the two sides of the changeling world.
Changeling: The Lost is everything that Changeling: The Dreaming was- and everything it should have been.
Style: 4
A typically well-designed White Wolf book that uses frequent fairy tale references to convey the essence of the game.
Substance: 4
Changeling: The Lost does even more to explore the psychology of fairy tales than Changeling: The Dreaming, and gives players a lot more creative options.
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