Trauma Conquering System for dealing with sanity in an elf game

This is a refresh of a post I previously made. I’m trying to make it simple to adjudicate.

A ghost touches your soul. An elder evil's face is glimpsed. Your whole family dies. So you had a bad day, and now you are not in your right mind.

When you fail to save vs insanity, take a condition. While you have a condition, you cannot gain XP, though exorcising your inner demons may come with a cathartic XP bonus. The good news is you cannot gain more than one condition at a time.

All the conditions' mechanical effects and XP nullification will go away once their requirements have been satisfied, but these should prompt lingering role-playing issues. You were broken, and like a kintsugi bowl, you will beautiful, but never the same.

One rule: Give these in secret to your players. They should keep their insanity secrect (act, it's a freakin RPG) and their motives mysterious.

1d12 Broken PC Conditions:

1. WHAT ARE YOU HIDING?!†: You're certain that a random ally or NPC has a secret, and you must find it out by any means necessary (the secret doesn't have to be true, but your character must be satisfied with the confession).
   • I hate the smell of honey, don't you? Anyways, best tell me where you hid the baby.
   • If you don't admit right now, by Mitra, what is in your pocket, I will drop this puppy.
   • This is potent wine, isn't it? You might slip and let me know anything and I would never tell a soul!
   
   
2. HIDE YOUR SOUL!: You must change your current, true name (use ceremonial methods) and hide it in a Matryoshka doll in a box in a chest within the pits of ______ (the DM can decide how to get you the name of the place).
   
   
3. I NEED TO TAKE HIM DOWN A PEG: You must secretly or suddenly set up a situation harmful to an NPC. This should expose them to significant loss of reputation. Tripping a guy in the street is not enough; you need this person to be shunned by their peers. If they get jailed or killed, well, they deserved it, right?!
   • Lady Chattery's brooch is missing? What is that dangling from Lord Tashertorn's boot?
   • Ha, little does the acolyte know that I gave him a scroll of explosive runes to take back to Sandelstin the Imperious.
   
   
4. I NEED THE POWER AND CONTROL: You must gain an office or station with sway over no less than 10×level sapient beings.
   • Some of you may die, but that is a risk I am willing to take.
   • I have received a revelation, and have been directed to marry all three sisters, brother Hyrum. As the humble representative of Xenu, I must obey.
   • Too long have orcs lived in the shadows!
   
   
5. PUZZLES ARE THE KEY TO REALITY: You have to solve one adventure puzzle or riddle on your own. If anyone tries to help you, not only is the chance to end this condition ruined, but you also have the Resentment condition (3) from above towards that character too!
   • Shut up, I know how knights move on the board!
   • All these squares make a circle...
   
   
6. MONSTERPHILIA: you have to woo one monster. Consummate the relationship somehow before regaining your wits. Oh lord, I hope your game has safety tools.
   • I roll to seduce the dragon.
   
   
7. GOLDFEVER: You need to collect at least 100 gold coins (no sharing!), then roll a (DC 15-1 for every 100 gold hoarded since you got unwell) Will save, or you still have this condition.
   • I need, like enough to swim in.
   
   
8. CRAVENNESS: Hire a body guard and cower during fights as long as the body guard lives. After they die, you reluctantly start taking care of business again.
   • Brave, brave sir Robin! You tell them, my henchman.
   
   
9. MY OATH WILL KEEP ME PURE: Chose a quest/mission/objective you have yet to fulfill (even if it is a really old one you kinda forgot), or throw yourself at the mercy of the DM and they will make up one for you. If possible, drop any other current objectives and single-mindedly pursue that one to completion.
   • I will not rest until the level one goblin chieftain is dead.
   
   
10. FAY-PRIMITIVISM: You abhor worked metal of any kind, and seize up with imagined allergic reactions at the touch of such. This condition ends once a foe has pierced you with such an implement and you survive.
    • It burnses us!
    
    
11. WATCH THE WORLD BURN: You must set some structures (occupants quite optional) ablaze. The amount of floors or burned structures must equal or exceed your current level.
    • Warms the soul.
    • Anyone know where I could get a fiddle?
    
    
12. I NEED A TOME TO HELP ME MAKE MY CREEPY NOTEBOOK: You become obsessed with finding esoteric information (of your choice) that you are convinced is to be found in the tome of ____ and won't be sane until you have studied it for a number of weeks numbering (roll until you roll under your Int). You must do some research to find the name of the tome, as well as clues to where it might be.  

†: This one is almost directly ripped from a False Machine post that started this idea for me.
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here's one I rejected for not being questy enough and overlong:
Body issues: You must (1d3) 1: loose 1d20 pounds, 2: gain 1d20 pounds of fat, or 3: gain 1d10 pounds of muscle. It will take 1 day of fasting to lose any 1 pound (roll over Con to confirm), and 1 week to gain any (roll under Str or Con to confirm). If you lose or gain fat, also lose or gain a point of Con when you reach your goal weight. If you gain the muscle, gain a point of Str, but you must eat double rations to maintain your body image/gained score.
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On the Procreation of Dwarves

It is a little known fact outside of dwarf communities, but dwarven kind do not reproduce by anything as silly as mingling gametes.* 

When a community decides they need a new dwarf, they start the great chiseling. They find a rock worthy of dwarfiness, such as good marble, and begin to carve away until a statue of a dwarf is made.

You may have noticed there are no dwarf women, or heard speculation that their females are bearded. This is because there are also no dwarf men. There are just dwarves. It's a species designation, and gender is a somewhat alien concept to them. But most people use male pronouns because dwarves don't correct them.

So the statue looks a lot like any other dwarf. Many clans have developed tribal embellishments over the years. Mohawks are a popular "mutation" for example. But all dwarves have beards, and usually mustaches. The statue will not become a flesh and blood dwarf without treasure. Gems, silver, gold, et cetera are added. Runes are inlaid with diamonds. Ancient words are chanted, and blessings intoning the names of the fourteen dour dwarf gods are muttered. The dwarf statue glows brilliantly, and is transfigured into blood and sinew. The newly born dwarf blinks and is handed a hammer, battle ax, or ale. This is the way. 

There are times when a tribe will fill a great need by crafting specific traits into a dwarf. Genetic engineering by another name. Usually it is to fight a threat. Other times it is to fulfill a task. Such creations often turn out to not be dwarves at all. Some tribes call them mulls. Others might use the word golem. And many think them abominations that shouldn't be created even as a last resort. There are rumors that these creations sometimes escape and become monsters capable of reproducing somehow. Dwarves don't talk about it to outsiders though, and their runed walls don't ever record this shameful secret.

The need to gather treasure is instinctual--nay holy--and pleasing to dwarvenkind. But this desire gets perverted into greed all too easily, especially if the dwarf is not around his own kind. If dwarves don't reproduce and instead hoard their wealth, they start to undergo a blasphemous transformation. They grow scales, wings, horns. They turn ravenous and consume great quantities. They become ogres, giants, and even dragons. They all guard their hoard jealously. So if you see a dwarf muttering to his treasure and hissing at anyone that gets too close, beware! 

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*: Now, non-dwarves that discover these things are mighty curious about certain facts of dwarf anatomy, but I'd rather not get into that. They eat and drink. They go to the bathroom. They don't like to peeped at in the bathroom. So don't. 

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I need a preview image for this post, so I'm going with a pic of a drow take I did previously on the blog. If you want to read on what's up with the drow on my world, you can't, because the pic is all I really need to say on that topic (old post will tell you much the same).

 ;-)

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