What is Changeling?

Changeling: The Lost is a game of beautiful madness. It is the fifth supplement in the New World of Darkness line released by White Wolf. This game focuses on the themes of the pain of loss, human nature, and the quest to find one's way home. This is a mature game with strong tones of horror, and as such is strictly R18.

Imagine you are average person. You lived your life as anyone else, perhaps entirely ignorant of the supernatural horrors that lie beyond. Then, on one fateful day, because of a broken promise, because you looked somewhere you weren't supposed to, because you were exceptional, or even just on the whims of chance, you were kidnapped.

You were dragged though The Hedge, the barrier that separates us from the world of stories and nightmares. As you were taken deeper into the Hedge by your captor, the thorns tearing at your flesh and soul, you wondered if you will ever see your home again, or wake up from this horrible nightmare.

But you didn't find your way home. You found yourself in the realm of terrible creatures known as True Fae. There, you were made a slave. Perhaps you were forced to pull the chariot of your captor across burning sand, perhaps you were kept in a brothel to service others of all descriptions, or perhaps you served as a nightlight while a mother told her daughter endless tales that made you long for home. The time in this world wasn't kind to you. Your body changed to best accommodate whatever sick purpose your keeper had for you. Maybe you even began to believe this is all you really are, ever were and will be forever.

You, however, are one of the lucky ones. Days, years, or centuries later, by your own skill or luck, you managed to escape. Many changelings speak of a memory of their time before they were taken, an Earthly thing that draws them back home through the Hedge. Eventually, however, you find your way back home.

To rub salt into the wound, even after all your pain, you came back to Earth to find you weren't even missed. The hole that had been left by your disappearance has been filled by an almost perfect replica of you, or at least what you once were. To make matters worse, despite spending years captures, mere days may have passed on Earth, or vice-versa. You can try to get your life back, but you are now different. At least most people aren't able to see you for what you have become, just the mask that helps you blend in with everyone else.

You now find solidarity, or at least company, among those that have shared a similar fate to you. All who have been at some point taken. All the lucky ones who found their way home. All who have been canny enough, so far, not to be taken back.