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Property Flaws

Cursed Artifact
1-3pt Property flaw

Not all artifacts are safe to own or use. Much knowledge has been lost with the turning of the age, and the secrets of many artifacts have been lost forever...including how to use them safely. Others no longer function as they once did, having twisted under centuries of misuse by those who did not know the correct way to use them. Finally, some artifacts were always dangerous: these range from survival magical traps created by the Twilight Caste, to items that simply have very unfortunate 'side-effects'.
Artifacts bought with this flaw are fully functional (see the Damaged Artifact flaw instead), but possess some kind of side effect or unavoidable and unfortunate function that makes them dangerous to their wielders. The extent of the danger posed by the artifact governs how many points this flaw is worth.
One point indicates an annoying side-effect or potentially dangerous flaw that is unlikely to be encountered. An elemental lens might emit a noticably loud whine every time it activates, or a suit of Armor of the Immaculate Dragons might occasionally display incorrect information when Essence Sight is used due to poor maintnence.
Two points indicates a more substantial effect. The elemental lense might give off the mother of all booms when it's used, partially deafening the character (who takes a -1 to rolls from the shock) and alerting anyone within earshot as to the character's location. The Armor of the Immaculate Dragons might have gone vampiric, slowly draining the character's essence as it's worn.
Three points gives a truly crippling curse, making the item more than just a mixxed blessing -- it's an active menace. If the character has an artifact at this level, he should explain why he bothers with it at all! The Armor of the Immaculate Dragons above, in addition to being vampiric, might also constantly display erronenous essence sight information subjecting the character to occasional hallucinations that he has a hard time distinguishing from reality.
A variant of this flaw is called "Flawed Hearthstone", and functions similarly. If a character takes this flaw without an attached artifact, the curse should be difficult or impossible to get rid of for some reason. Maybe he doesn't realize what charm carries the curse, or perhaps he simply can't get rid of it no matter how hard he tries. Under normal circumstances, a character should not have more points in this flaw than he has in his actual artifact.