Stolen Lives by Robert J. Schwalb is a role playing game supplement published by Schwalb Entertainment for use with Shadow of the Demon Lord. This is part of the Victims of the Demon Lord series that covers ancestries in more detail. This supplement covers changelings.
This is a sixteen page PDF that is available from DriveThruRPG for $2.99 but was purchased at a greatly reduced price as part of a special bundle. Around half of the first page is an illustration and Credits.
The opening text discusses faeries in general and how they treat, or mistreat, humans, before going on to why faeries steal children. Which can be because they wanted a child of their own or they simply liked the child’s eyes or laugh. Stolen children are taken to the hidden kingdoms; some, those considered worthy, transform into faeries whilst most are sent to Diabolus in Hell for his tithe of souls.
When faeries take something, they leave something else behind; when what is taken is a child, what is left is a changeling, a homunculus made from mud, twigs and stone. Humans are the most common targets of child theft; more humans live on the borderlands than any others. Halflings live far from the borders, dwarfs are too fond of steel and iron and orcs are ugly and use corrupted magic – and also tend to have a lot of iron and steel weapons.
The spell for creating changelings is in Terrible Beauty, and it fades over time, leaving only the mud, twigs and stone behind where there was once a changeling. Except when it doesn’t fade. Sometimes changelings continue to exist long after they should have gone; some possible explanations are given. Eventually changelings discover the truth about what they are, and how this knowledge affects them depends on the individual. Changelings have many of the same traits as faeries, such as immunity to disease, defence against mental influence – and vulnerability to iron, which is usually how the truth about their nature is discovered. Changelings can take the form of many creatures – they must simply be alive and have a humanoid shape.
The last part of this section is how changelings get on with other races. Humans are the race that changelings are most often around, but humans are not safe. Changelings find clockworks unnatural, and will avoid them, but can also discover that they are kindred spirits. Fauns have many similarities to changelings, giving them common ground, and goblins are very accepting – but tend to use them. Halflings welcome changelings, as long as they behave themselves.
Next is a more complex way of creating changelings. This expands the normal few tables into several dozen, covering all aspects such as background, appearance, personality, family, professions, equipment, setbacks and windfalls.
Finally, there is a new Master path, the Doppelganger, which concentrates on taking anyone’s identity.
Stolen Lives in Review
The PDF lacks bookmarks and, although fairly short, has enough sections that they would have been appreciated. Navigation could be better. The text maintains a two column full colour format and appeared to be free of errors. There are a number of colour illustrations, up to about half a page in size, which look to be custom. Presentation is very good.
As with all entries in the Victims of the Demon Lord series, this has the same advantages and disadvantages. It can be used to create a more extensively detailed character than the core rules – which still produce a perfectly functional character. On the other hand, this character takes a lot longer to create – and Shadow of the Demon Lord can be deadly for characters. Stolen Lives greatly enhances the creation process for changelings and it can be found by clicking here.
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