Old Familiar, yet less than faithful

Familiars are not an assumed default - magic users must seek them out and entreaty them to enter into the Familiar's Pact, the details of which the creature in question will dictate. Not any creature can be a familiar, but there appears to be no common trend amongst those which can besides some touch of magic about them. Not all can speak, and so the use of Comprehend Languages may be in order. Once the Pact is made, the MU and their familiar will be able to speak and understand each other.

Familiars have something to gain from the bargain - this much should be obvious. They are individual, intelligent beings and demand to be treated as such. They have their own agendas, which they may or may not share. Many will allow themselves to be used as magical batteries, re-usable scrolls - although there is no guarantee that the familiar will not use the stored spell to further their own agendas.

Due to the limited number of familiars in the world, a popular acquisition method is the murder of the previous owner followed by offering terms to the now-master-less familiar - familiars cannot break pacts, nor can MUs. Familiars tend to take a vicious glee in this, regardless of their stance on violence in normal contexts.

Familiars can be asked to do a variety of tasks, and will generally agree, although this will vary by temperament, and they will never follow through with tasks they feel are too dangerous. As mentioned before, they can cast spells stored in them, either on own their own initiative or at the caster's order. They have HD appropriate to creature.

The only common theme for a given pact is the permanent loss of d6 HP by the MU, to a minimum of one. General terms should be negotiated in-character, whilst more esoteric requirements can be rolled below. 

Roll as many times as the familiar tells you to.

**edit - blogspot swallowed my table, hence less than useful format.

D10

Terms

1

Other familiars you meet must be killed, or their plots discovered and thwarted.

2

Weekends off. The MU must not travel too far from the familiar, effectively halting movement beyond a day’s travel. Weekends off can be waived, but only in promise of next week off at the familiar’s choice.

3

They must not be watched eating, and will only eat incredibly specific foodstuffs which may or may not be easily acquired. The MU must provide this food.

4

The MU must remain celibate. If this is not followed, the MU’s lover will be found in chunks about the next adventure location. The familiar will not divulge information on how this was achieved.

5

Rituals must be performed to the familiar every full moon, often involving expensive perfumes and incenses.

6

The MU, and by extension the familiar, cannot enter sacred ground. If they enter said ground unawares, they have d4 minutes of uncomfortable itching before they burst into flames. These flames do not go out until put out conventionally, outside of the holy ground.

7

The MU must speak and write in verse – no prose can be read. Spells are pushing the envelope, but just about get by. The familiar will critique the poetry.

8

Whenever a tattooist is discovered, the MU must get tattoos of arcane symbols and of the familiar. The first 3 must be easily visible.

9

The familiar will drink the blood of the MU every night, reducing healing by 1 point every other night from constant cuts.

0

The familiar despises a spell, and completely bans the MU from casting it. Determine the spell randomly. The MU is physically incapable of that spell.

All familiar effects only last as long as the pact - barring the HP loss, which represents the binding of the MUs soul with the familiar itself. It is theorised this is not actually needed, but used as a method of keeping masters under control.

Familiars can appear in any form, although most prefer subtle, easily explained forms like conventional animals, travelling companions and the such. Others are highly unconventional and have varying difficulties being hidden, such as a disease-familiar or a huge fantastic beast. They have the dietary requirements (unless specifically mentioned in the pact) of a standard creature of their chosen type. The form cannot change. 

(In)Effective Policing

The party roll into town. An important thing to know is the laws and customs of such a place, whether this be to help out or to start working around the system...

Determine the budget of the force by either having it appropriate for the settlement, or rolling below.

D6	Budget
1	Destitute – Probably volunteer force or militia. Improvised weapons and no armour.
2	Poor – Few, poorly equipped watchmen. Leather amour, shields and spears.
3	Bearable – About what you’d expect for a settlement of this size, average equipment. Mostly leather, some chain. Shields, spears with the occasional side-arm.
4	Decent Funding – A decently sized, well equipped force. Chain shirts, pole arms and side-weapons. Slings, some bows. What you’d expect for a settlement of this size.
5	Great Funding – A notably large and well equipped force. Chain shirts, pole arms, shield and short sword. Crossbows for those guarding walls.
6	Incredible Funding – Full chain-mail for most, variety of pole arms, swords, maces with shields. Many crossbow-men on duty at any given time.

How corrupt is this force?

D8	Corruption
1	No corruption what-so-ever. This force is entirely given to upholding their laws and justice.
2	A tiny percentage of the force could be bribed for minor crimes. No large scale corruption.
3	Some minor, low-level corruption occurs. Locals could get away with middling crimes, outsides would have to pay quite the bribe to the right watchman.
4-6	Low-level corruption to the squad level. Sergeants could be convinced to look the other way for crimes which will not damage the populace. Most basic watchmen are open to bribes. Captains and the such believe firmly in the writ of the law.
7	Bribes are likely accepted for crimes less serious than murder, rape and arson. Whilst most of the captains are solid, a significant minority of the upper leadership is corrupt, and in the pocket of an interested party/parties.
8	Corruption is rampant. Honest watchmen are few and far between. The watch is effectively a joke, as is the law. Criminals are only brought in when they are incredibly obvious and/or dangerous – all other arrests are because one of the groups paying the watch want it to be so.

Who’s paying the watch off? Roll however many times seem appropriate.

D6	Entity
1	A Thieves guild, criminal gang or similar group.
2	The local nobility.
3	The local craftsman guilds.
4	A single or collection of religious establishment(s).
5	A single individual/ group of individuals with incredible wealth but no hereditary power.
6	A foreign power.

Oddities, quirks and strangeness. Roll as many times as you like

D20	Thing
1	A watchman will never permit skin-to-skin contact with the guilty.
2	The watch do not carry weapons – they only wrestle and fist-fight criminals. The money saved is spent training and armouring the watchmen.
3	The vast majority of the watch is made up of individuals too old to work. Young men are never of a rank above sergeant and invariably suffer discipline problems from the old folk.
4	The watch refuses to operate at night, pointing out the terrible beasts of the dark will deal with criminals for them. Crime rates at night are oddly low.
5	The watch only operates at night, saying a criminal in broad daylight will only get themselves caught. A skeleton crew runs the watch headquarters at day to accept criminals the populace in general catch.
6	Conviction of criminals require precisely 3 witnesses. Only women and children count. Far more women in the force than usual.
7	Watch is led by a team of settled-down adventurers, each establishing a branch of the guard – the Fighting-Men, a Spy network, the Holy Judges and a Magical Investigation wing.
8	Entire watch is made up of die-hard Justice-God worshippers. Very serious.
9	Every watchmen is required to carry a lit lantern, regardless of time or weather.
10	The entire watch uses only blunt weapons.
11	The entire watch uses the most thoroughly unpleasant weapons possible, whilst staying practical.
12	Watchmen are assigned 24 hour shifts with no sleep allowed.
13	Almost all of the watchmen are mercenaries who decided to settle down here.
14	No-one knows who is actually leading the watch, orders are simply pushed through the crack under the door.
15	Every watchman is accompanied by a dog, without fail.
16	The entire watch is made up of ex-criminals who have reneged their old ways.
17	The watch is composed of slaves which private owners must donate for a week at a time.
18	The watch avoid the trading and mercantile districts, citing that such businesses should pay for their own protection.
19	Every watch member has served previously as a watchmen in a different settlement.
20	Every watch member wears an identical full-face mask. All uniforms are identical.

A Conspiracy of Ravens

In every city and most towns, there is a tall wooden building. The walls are studded with holes, and offer little protection from the weather. Countless birds can be seen flying to and fro, day and night, navigating around each other with effortless ease. Regardless of the climate, the birds in questions are abnormally large ravens, without fail.

The wooden structures lack a door - in fact, the entire lower third is simple a solid support from the rest of the towering building. The function is to act as another stop in the Conspiracy - the finest and fastest messaging service in all the land - or so the rumour goes. There are no human handlers to these birds, for they are not any beast - some ancient happening gifted them twice over - both the ability to speak in the tongues of humanoids and the intelligence to use it. Combining this with their natural gift of flight, they established themselves as a de-facto postal service, either physically carrying the message or relaying it by word-of-beak. This service is offered at decent rates, affordable to those who would have need of such a service, as well as rumours of the truly destitute being given free service when it matters most. Governments and armies throughout the land use the Conspiracy, as the fees are substantially less than hiring magical help.

However, the service is not as benign as it seems. The ravens are privy to much knowledge best kept in secret, and are all too willing to sell the information on to parties they can trust. If one were to discover the truth and attempt to spread it, the Conspiracy would quickly utilize their considerable monetary wealth to hire a 'trouble-shooter' before the damage became too great.

The birds themselves are about as varied as any race in temperament, bar that they are all fiercely loyal. General trends include protecting their less-intelligent kin and looking down their beaks at the bird-familiars of magic users. Furthermore, they do not get along with druids, finding their naturalist outlook haughty, boring and backwards. They are far more in-tune with the industrious races and cultures.

Prices should be left to DM discretion, with costs increasing as distance increases. Physical mail should be roughly 1.5x more than word-of-beak services, with maximum weights being no more than could be carried by two ravens holding a piece of string attached to the object.