Pact-Shifting

AX.GHW.08.06 - Pact-Shifting

Every Skinchanger has the shift. The question is who is driving.

Most Skinchangers manage the pact by letting it operate, the transformation arrives in response to stress or instinct, the Skinchanger navigates the experience from inside it, and when it ends they return to their human form with whatever the shift accomplished. This is not control. It is an established negotiation with something that doesn't use words, and experienced Skinchangers learn that negotiation's patterns the way a rider learns a particular horse. They know what will set it off. They learn not to go near those things when going near them would be a problem.

Pact-Shifting is what a Skinchanger looks like when they decide to drive.

The distinction is subtle from outside and significant from inside. An uncontrolled shift is reactive, the pact asserts itself in response to threat, rage, or instinct. A practiced Pact-Shifting Skinchanger can shift a single feature (the claws and nothing else; the senses and not the physical changes; the muscle density without the obvious morphological shift) without triggering the full transformation, can suppress the shift completely in circumstances that would normally force it, and at developed levels can stay in a form they have chosen rather than falling back to the default when the pact would prefer otherwise.

This is harder than it sounds. The pact is not hostile, but it has its own preferences. A Skinchanger learning Pact-Shifting is learning to operate in deliberate tension with something they were born with, which requires both acceptance and control simultaneously, accepting what the pact is and choosing to direct it rather than be directed by it.

The tradition has three expressions. Partial Shift is the foundational skill, deliberate partial transformation, specific features on command without triggering the whole. Controlled Form is the management expression, directing, sustaining, and suppressing the full shift with intention. Deep Aspect is the advanced expression, borrowing from the pact's full depth temporarily, reaching past the normal transformation ceiling for effects the shift alone doesn't produce.

System Integration

Pact-Shifting as an Odd Talent

Pact-Shifting functions as an Odd Talent per AX.C.04. Standard rules apply:

• The roll is: Governing Attribute + Pact-Shifting (+ Focus if applicable)
• Pact-Shifting dice are purchased from the Talent budget at character creation, or improved through Advancement at standard cost (Governing Attribute × 2 XP for a new Tradition at 1D; current value × 2 XP to improve)
• Maximum Tradition rating: 5D. Maximum Focus rating: 3D
• All three Expressions draw on the same Odd Talent pool

Governing Attribute

The governing Attribute is chosen at character creation and is permanent.

Expression	Common Choice	Reasoning
Partial Shift	Body (default)	Physical transformation is physical work
Controlled Form	Body or Wit	Body for sustained physical effort; Wit for deliberate management and suppression
Deep Aspect	Body	Reaching the pact's full depth is somatic, not conceptual

Wit-governed Pact-Shifting is unusual but valid; it represents a practitioner who approaches the pact analytically, managing transformation through deliberate intention rather than embodied will. Wit-governed practitioners typically excel at Controlled Form (suppression, deliberate management) and find Partial Shift and Deep Aspect harder than Body-governed practitioners do.

Access

Skinchanger Lineage Affinity: Skinchangers who receive Profession access to Pact-Shifting begin with 2D rather than 1D. The pact is already present; formalizing its management takes less time when the substrate already exists.

Profession Access: Any Profession listed as granting Pact-Shifting access provides the Tradition at 1D (or 2D for Skinchangers) at no Talent cost.

Independent Study: Not available. Pact-Shifting requires the Skinchanger pact's biological substrate. No other lineage provides equivalent access, and no amount of study replicates it.

Mechanics Summary

Feature	Detail
Tradition Category	Form, deliberate management and extension of the pact's physical transformation
Default Attribute	Body
Action Type	Primary Action (most effects); Free Action (minor suppressions and minor features)
Signature Feel	The pact is not the enemy. But it has opinions. This tradition is about whose opinions govern.
Lineage Affinity	Skinchanger only, Independent Study not available
Signature Focus	The Shedding
Expressions	Partial Shift, Controlled Form, Deep Aspect

Threshold Scale:

Threshold	Scale of Effect
1	Minor; brief; a single small feature; suppressing one minor pact expression
2	Standard; a significant single feature at scene duration; basic controlled suppression
3	Significant; multiple features simultaneously; full shift management; sustained suppression
4	Major; deep partial form access; sustained features across extended time; strong suppression
5+	Profound; Deep Aspect at full depth; permanent management effects; pact-level negotiation

Expression: Partial Shift

You don't have to go all the way. You never had to go all the way.

Partial Shift is the most immediately useful expression of Pact-Shifting in practical, day-to-day hidden-world work. The ability to deploy claws without full transformation, enhance senses without triggering the morphological changes, or increase physical density without the obvious animal characteristics that mark a full shift; these are the capabilities that let a Skinchanger operate in human-facing environments without blowing the Veil every time they need an edge.

The full shift is a blunt instrument. It is powerful, unambiguous, and obvious. Partial Shift is the scalpel version: precise, controlled, useful in contexts where the sledgehammer approach would be a problem.

Partial Shift- Applications

Isolated Feature (Free Action, Threshold 1–2)

The practitioner deploys a single specific feature from their pact's physical expression without triggering the full transformation.

• Minor feature (cosmetic or minor sensory enhancement): Threshold 1. Examples: eyes shifting to reflect animal light-gathering (dim-light vision perk), sharpened hearing, slight increase in scent detection. No physical morphological change visible to casual observation.
• Significant feature (functional combat or physical enhancement): Threshold 2. Examples: claws extending to the Claws lineage perk's mechanical value; muscle density increasing for one physical action with the pact's full physical bonus; scent sharpening to full supernatural tracking quality. These changes are visible on close physical inspection and may be detectable as wrong to observers who look carefully.

Duration: Until the end of the current scene or until the practitioner deactivates the feature (Free Action). Multiple features can be active simultaneously, but each additional feature past the first requires its own roll, and the combined Threshold must be met in full on each (not cumulative, each roll is independent, but each subsequent roll in the scene is Strained).

Scaling: Excess successes on a significant feature extend its duration (1 excess = until Long Rest) or allow it to remain fully invisible to casual inspection, not just close observation (1 excess).

Functional Partial (Primary Action, Threshold 3)

The practitioner maintains two or more significant pact features simultaneously in a deliberately chosen partial-form configuration. This is the operational expression of Partial Shift, deploying the most useful elements of the pact's physical expression without the all-or-nothing of full transformation.

Example configurations (not exhaustive): - Enhanced physical performance partial: claws + increased muscle density + acute scent. Social viability: low. Combat effectiveness: high. - Observation partial: acute scent + enhanced hearing + eyes. Social viability: high (barely visible). Combat effectiveness: low. - Resilience partial: muscle density + Regeneration/Minor (if the lineage perk is available) + thickened skin equivalent. Social viability: moderate (the practitioner looks slightly wrong). Combat effectiveness: moderate.

The practitioner defines their intended configuration when rolling. The GM adjudicates what is possible within the pact's established features. Features not present in the Skinchanger's lineage perk list are not available through Partial Shift.

Duration: Scene.

Scaling: Excess successes allow one additional feature per 2 excess, or extend duration (1 excess = until Long Rest).

Backlash: - Minor: One feature the practitioner wasn't trying to activate comes online anyway, the pact insists. The GM chooses which feature from the pact's available options. It runs at full expression for the remainder of the scene and cannot be suppressed by the practitioner. - Moderate: The partial pushes toward full. The practitioner must succeed on a Controlled Form suppression roll (Threshold 3) as a Free Action or the shift triggers fully. If they succeed, they hold the partial but are Strained. If they fail, the full shift initiates on their next Turn. - Severe: Full shift triggers immediately, against the practitioner's intention. They are in full animal form as of the start of their next Turn. They retain their consciousness and motivation; they do not retain their human form, social access, or equipment. Duration: until the end of the current scene or until they successfully use Controlled Form to reverse it (Threshold 4 while in full form).

Expression: Controlled Form

The shift is not the enemy. But you get to decide when it happens.

Controlled Form is the management expression, the capacity to direct the full shift deliberately, maintain a chosen form under circumstances that would normally force a change, and suppress the shift in situations where it would be catastrophic. For most Skinchangers, the full shift is something that happens to them under the right (wrong) conditions. Controlled Form practitioners make it something they choose.

This expression is most important in high-stress situations that would normally trigger the pact involuntarily, in social contexts where maintaining human appearance is critical, and in combat situations where the shift's timing matters more than the shift's power.

Controlled Form- Applications

Deliberate Shift (Primary Action, Threshold 2)

The practitioner initiates the full shift on their own timetable, in their own chosen moment, rather than in reaction to stress or threat. This is not mechanically different from the lineage's standard shift in its end state, full animal form with the lineage perk's physical expressions. The difference is control: the practitioner has chosen this moment, not been pushed into it.

Practically: using Deliberate Shift means the practitioner is entering the full shift without an emotional catalyst, which means they are fully cognitively present during the shift and maintain their strategic capacity throughout.

Scaling: Excess successes allow the shift to be performed as a Free Action rather than Primary Action (2 excess), or allow the practitioner to choose a non-standard partial aspect rather than full animal form (3 excess, equivalent to Functional Partial but triggered as a full shift).

Suppress (Primary Action, Threshold 2–4)

The practitioner prevents the pact's shift response in circumstances that would normally trigger it. The Threshold scales with how forcefully the situation would ordinarily compel the shift:

• Minor stress or threat context (would cause an urge but not a forced trigger): Threshold 2.
• Significant threat, high fear, or physical injury that normally triggers the pact: Threshold 3.
• Extreme circumstances (mortal threat, significant injury to someone the practitioner is protecting): Threshold 4.

Suppression prevents the shift for the current scene. The practitioner maintains human form throughout regardless of what happens. The pact's energy has to go somewhere, however, Strained practitioners who successfully suppress find the Strain's social expression intensified: the animal characteristics that emerge under Strain are more pronounced when the shift has been suppressed rather than allowed.

Scaling: Excess successes on Suppress also allow the practitioner to suppress Strain's social expression (−1D on Social rolls while Strained) for the scene (2 excess).

Hold Form (Minor Action, ongoing, Threshold varies)

The practitioner maintains a shifted form, either full animal or a defined partial, beyond the conditions under which the pact would ordinarily return to human. This is used when the practitioner needs to stay in form for an extended time (surveillance, travel in animal form, sustained combat at full shift) without the pact cycling back.

Threshold for ongoing Hold Form is 1, rolled each time a relevant condition would trigger form return. The practitioner does not become Strained from this ongoing roll in the same way, each Hold Form check is a Minor Action and costs one success from the standard pool, but does not in itself trigger Veil Strain's first-use/subsequent-use structure. However, other Pact-Shifting rolls in the scene still apply Strain normally.

Backlash: - Minor: The suppression partially fails, the practitioner's pact characteristics manifest subtly but undeniably. One visible animal feature appears (GM chooses which) and persists until Strain clears. It cannot be suppressed again this scene. - Moderate: The pact retaliates by going the other direction. Instead of shifting, the practitioner finds their access to their lineage perks suppressed, Claws, Regeneration/Minor, Acute Scent, or equivalent lineage perk (GM chooses) does not function for the remainder of the scene. The pact is making a point. - Severe: Suppression catastrophically fails. The shift triggers involuntarily and uncontrollably, the practitioner enters full animal form with no cognitive retention of their human-side priorities. They behave as the animal would in this situation: fleeing from or attacking the highest threat depending on the animal's nature, with no access to human-strategic thought. This lasts until they receive significant external calming intervention (an ally succeeding at a Wit + Persuade vs Threshold 3 action toward them specifically) or the scene ends.

Expression: Deep Aspect

The pact goes further than the shift shows. Most practitioners never go that far.

Deep Aspect is the expression that reaches past the shift's normal ceiling, borrowing from the pact's full potential in ways that go beyond what the lineage's standard transformation produces. Where Partial Shift deploys features the pact makes normally available, Deep Aspect reaches for what the pact holds in reserve: capabilities the animal at the heart of the pact could theoretically provide, which the shift's standard expression doesn't include.

This is physically demanding and pact-taxing. Deep Aspect applications push the practitioner's body past its designed parameters using the pact's reserves rather than its standard allocation. The effects are significant. The cost of backlash is significant.

Non-practitioners sometimes confuse Deep Aspect with a different, more extreme form of shift. It isn't. The practitioner remains in whatever form they were in when they initiated the application; Deep Aspect adds to the current state rather than replacing it.

Deep Aspect- Applications

Speed Surge (Free Action, Threshold 3)

The practitioner draws on the pact's maximum expression of the animal's physical speed, a brief, extreme acceleration that goes beyond normal pact-enhanced capability. For one Turn:

• The practitioner's movement in the Turn doubles.
• They may make one additional attack action or movement this Turn as a Free Action.
• Speed-Save rolls made this Turn gain +2D.

After the Turn ends, the practitioner takes 1D3 physical stress damage (non-lethal; represents the physical cost of the surge) and must make a Body Save vs Threshold 2 or become Hindered until the end of their next Turn.

Apex Physical (Primary Action, Threshold 3)

The practitioner temporarily pushes all physical attributes toward the pact's potential ceiling. For the remainder of the scene:

• Body attribute for the purpose of physical strength and Health-related rolls is treated as if it were one die higher (a 3D practitioner rolls with 4D for these specific rolls).
• Physical damage dealt by the practitioner's natural weapons (Claws perk or equivalent) increases by 1.
• Physical endurance rolls gain +1D.

The surge ends at the scene's end or when the practitioner uses any other Deep Aspect application. At the end of the scene in which Apex Physical was used, the practitioner is Fatigued until their next Long Rest, the body borrowed and must pay it back.

Apex Sense (Primary Action, Threshold 3)

The practitioner pushes the pact's sensory expression to its maximum, a depth of animal perception that goes beyond what the shift normally provides. For the remainder of the scene:

• The practitioner can track any target by scent at up to Distant range regardless of physical barriers (scent carries; walls don't stop it).
• The practitioner's hearing becomes precise enough to identify individuals by heartbeat and hear sounds through standard barriers (walls, doors, vehicles) without penalty.
• All Notice rolls gain +2D.
• The practitioner cannot be surprised; they always have a round of awareness before unexpected threats arrive.

The sensory surge is overwhelming at scale: if the practitioner is in an environment with heavy sensory input (combat, crowded areas, strong olfactory sources), they must make a Wit Save vs Threshold 2 each Turn or become Shaken as the input exceeds what they can process.

Backlash: - Minor: The aspect expresses without invitation for the rest of the scene, the practitioner is at the apex-sense or apex-physical state permanently until the scene ends, with no ability to moderate it. This isn't harmful but it's conspicuous and in social contexts actively problematic. - Moderate: The pact reclaims the surplus. All of the Deep Aspect's benefits end immediately. The practitioner takes 1D6 physical stress damage and their primary pact feature (whichever the GM determines is most characteristic, Claws, Regeneration/Minor, or similar) does not function for the rest of the scene. The pact provided too much too fast and the balance is off. - Severe: The practitioner's form becomes unstable. They undergo a partial, uncontrolled, incomplete transformation that doesn't settle into a functional form; they are in obvious supernatural distress, visually distinct from both human and animal form, and have −2D to all physical rolls until they receive a Long Rest. The Veil is catastrophically broken for any scene this is visible in. This is the kind of event that creates problems in the hidden world.

The Shedding (Pact-Shifting Focus)

A shed element from the practitioner's own pact expression, fur from a recent full transformation, a claw sheath, a piece of shed skin or scale if the pact's animal expression produces one. This is what the pact leaves behind when it passes through the practitioner. Carried as a physical reminder of the pact's nature, it functions as a grounding anchor when the work of deliberate form becomes difficult.

The Shedding | Focus | Pact-Shifting
Mechanical Effect:
  +2D to all Controlled Form Expression rolls (the
  shedding grounds the practitioner in the pact's
  physical reality, holding what the transformation
  leaves behind helps them manage the transformation
  itself).
  When using Suppress at Threshold 3 or 4, the
  Threshold is reduced by 1. Carrying evidence of what
  the pact can produce makes accepting that it exists,
  and thereby managing it, marginally less effortful.
  The shedding is warm to the touch. Animals respond
  to it as they would respond to the animal whose
  pact produced it, with wariness, curiosity, or
  submission depending on species and circumstance.
  This is not subtle in environments with domestic
  animals present.
Acquisition: Self-generated and regularly replaced.
  A Shedding degrades over time, after approximately
  one month, the pact's resonance in the shed material
  fades. Practitioners collect fresh material after
  each significant transformation. A practitioner who
  hasn't fully shifted in a while will eventually
  exhaust their Shedding's efficacy.
  The degradation timeline creates an interesting
  dynamic: a Skinchanger who is actively suppressing
  their shift (trying to stay in human form indefinitely)
  will eventually run out of viable Shedding. Their Focus
  fades as their avoidance deepens.

Improvised Foci: Any significant physical token associated with the pact, a bound wolf tooth from the first full shift, a preserved claw, a photograph taken in full form, provides +1D to one Expression (chosen at scene start) without the Shedding's Suppress cost reduction. These don't degrade, but they also don't carry the living resonance of fresh material.

Access and Cross-Lineage Notes

Skinchanger practitioners: This tradition is specific to the pact. No other lineage has equivalent access. Practitioners who develop it to 3D+ are engaging with what the pact actually is at a level most Skinchangers deliberately avoid, not because it is dangerous, but because it requires accepting the animal side as something to understand rather than manage from a safe distance. The hidden world tends to notice Skinchangers who have made this commitment; they carry themselves differently.

Within the Compact of Lines (AX.GM.07.15), Pact-Shifting practitioners are not categorically distinguished from other Skinchangers, the Compact's governance structure does not track tradition development. But Pack Advocates who have developed the tradition tend to be assigned the cases that require understanding the pact's mechanical reality rather than just managing its social implications. Line Keepers with Pact-Shifting access find it useful for verifying claimed lineage affiliations in contested entry investigations, the pact leaves legible traces for practitioners who know how to read them.

The bane material question: Silver is this catalog's declared Skinchanger bane material (see AX.GM.06, Lineage: Skinchanger). Pact-Shifting does not interact with bane material directly, but a Skinchanger who sustains a silver wound while in the middle of a Controlled Form or Deep Aspect application should apply that damage before the Tradition roll resolves, as the disruption is immediate. Silver wounds' suspension of Regeneration/Minor recovery applies regardless of whether the Skinchanger is in a shifted form.

Full shift vs. Pact-Shifting: Pact-Shifting does not replace the Skinchanger's involuntary full shift; it exists alongside it. A Skinchanger who takes Pact-Shifting is gaining the tools to manage the shift more deliberately, not replacing the shift with something else. In situations of extreme stress where Suppress fails, the involuntary shift still occurs. The tradition gives the practitioner agency; it does not remove the pact's ability to insist.