I'm looking for input (mostly brainstorming) on a certain aspect of my current project, that being a setting that successfully conveys a sense of menace to the players.
THE GAME
This is a realistic fantasy game (tech. as per 1000-1300 A.D. Europe) in which the sense of menace is a very important part of what the game is about. The game is about ordinary people, about being alone in the dark, about being part of something larger than yourself, about the value of hopeless struggle, and about the inevitability of death. Small bastions of relative safety are carved out of a larger environment that is hostile and threatening (this is true on virtually every scale).
The way things are currently set up, there is much hidden knowledge that, if discovered by the PCs, will point to an image of the world that is quite frightening. I have a nice Cthulhu-esque metaphysics that effects things like the stars, deep and dark places, and the enemies of Man. However, this game is not intended to be like Call of Cthulhu, in which the cosmic horror is all it's about. Nevertheless, I want to get off on the right foot and not wait for hundreds of adventures to establish the desired feel.
THE GOAL
For the general populace, including starting player characters, a sense of being threatened should be present, though subtle. Like the threat of nuclear war in the '60s. Or maybe the fear some people seem to feel about the threat of terrorism.
Some subtle signs of the hostile world's effect on human culture should also be evident, kind of like how seeing fallout shelters today evokes the Cold War fear of nuclear holocaust.
The goal is to create a sort of deep-rooted, pervasive, relegated-to-the-background vibe, such that:
1 - it can be conveyed to players (perhaps imperfectly at first, and then with more fidelity as time goes on) in a few hours of play
2 - it can be "shown, not told", surfacing through play rather than relying on pre-game orientation talk
3 - it seems like a generalized thing, the nature of the world, not just a fact about such and such a bad-guy near here
4 - it's widely known
LIMITATIONS
5 - it can't overshadow everything else
6 - it can't break or severely distort recognizable human culture -- whatever it is that threatens people, it must make sense that society has not morphed into some extreme, weird form to combat it
THE THREAT
Most of the danger that threatens Men has a common source. However, I feel it is important that encounters with pieces of this Evil Threat not make the threat come off as:
* simple
* effable
* predictable
* contrived
To accomplish this, I intend to avoid recycling many specific types of encounters. Once something is seen too much, it becomes understood and familiar, and ceases to be effectively scary.
Observant, curious characters should be able to tie some Evil Threat phenomena together, possibly correlating physical characteristics or symbols (though obvious connections should be infrequent), or thematic elements (this kind of subtle connection can be more common).
So, a major part of my attempt to give my setting the desired feel will be coming up with a great variety of Scary Evil Things, and various ways in which they might be connected to each other.
HELP!
Any suggestions within the constraints of these goals and standards are welcome. Feel free to propose Scary Evil Things, brainstorm ways to flavor urban and rural communities, or comment on evoking frightened vulnerability in roleplaying, etc., etc. This gameworld is already fairly solid in my mind, and I'll elaborate as needed. My next post will provide some examples of my own attempts to tackle both the hostile environment and the Evil Threat.
Thanks,
-Dave
P.S. Potentially important metaphysical point that might curtail some brainstorms: the world isn't naturally human-averse, quite the opposite, the problem is that human-averse things have gotten into it.
There exist sizable chunks of untamed land, much of which is filled mundane threats: boars, bears, lions, wolves, etc. There are also areas where bandits or toll-charging thugs prey on the roads.
Then there's the danger of nighttime, especially on full moons, when sylvan creepies come out and fey weirdness kicks in: sprites, lycanthropes, sleep-walking, disorientation, hearing things.
Primarily, though, The Threat derives primarily from a source that is alien and fundamentally inimical to life, embodying entropy, dissolution, and destruction without creation. This Cthulhu-esque schema has manifested in the world in various ways:
HISTORY:
-Massive plagues of supernatural origins.
-When stars get too big and bright, destructive comets fall and create craters of evil.
-Mythology claims that the Gods had to re-create the world once already after Evil got in and wrecked it.
EVIL RACES:
-Frenzied Orcs who cover the Southern half of the continent and have nearly exterminated Man in the past.
-Aquatic shark-men who prey on Men at sea.
-Large arctic lizard-men who raid from the frozen north.
-Daemon-possessed werewolves in the remote Northwest working on some foul project.
-Maybe kobolds/goblins.
-A darkness-shrouded crater in the Northeast from which swarms of horrific daemon-creatures periodically emerge.
MONSTERS:
-Giant insects, mutant plants, oozes, abominations (including massive Grells), semi-corporeal nasties, maybe undead.
-Aboleths, sea serpents, maybe a kraken.
EVIL PLACES:
-A large, central forest Orcs once controlled, permanently cursed.
-Scattered patches of land that Orcs have desecrated, also cursed, gross, and dangerous to varying degrees.
-A spooky, fog-shrouded lake.
-A small, impoverished nation ruled by a ghoulish nobility.
ISOLATED ENCOUNTERS:
-Wander into strange place, leave normal reality for shifting, chaotic plane inhabited by nasties. Escape only by analogy-logic.
-Get your brain scanned by some malign entity.
-Get possessed by some malign entity.
-Go insane or get cursed from: entering a cave or haunted structure; following desirable thing into foreign place; dreams, daydreams; getting entranced by complex stimuli (art, music); staring into mirrors or water; mucking with mystic rituals. Curses should be known of, be a part of cultural folklore, and be frequent enough that PCs wandering through a dense population center for more than a couple days may hear of multiple incidents.
TYPES OF CONNECTIONS BETWEEN EVIL THINGS:
- recurrent symbols, in clothing, arms, or tattoos
- analogous ritual diagrams
- distinct smells
- breakdown/corruption of stuff nearby
Hey there Dave,
I got full of ideas when I read the first post... but the second lost me for good. Only due to the races! All else is cool and can be really worked out nicely:the feeling you want can be really compelling, the omens and portents all evoke a good horror game, the epoch suggested allows for some deep violence on the individual and widespread levels. It brought me images of movies like The Omen, Reign of Fire, 28 Days Latter,The Exorcist (The Beginning)... all applied to a Dark Ages setting. Can't tell you that I haven't had some inspiration in this same direction before.
Quote-the world isn't naturally human-averse, quite the opposite, the problem is that human-averse things have gotten into it.
The word "human" fits nicely in the general idea. Well, would it be too much of a stretch to suggested you to keep things Human based, and put the threats as immaterial and possessing regular people and animals? It would enhance the paranoia and put the feeling of dread closer to the average person. And it wouldn't by all means restrict your weirdness level! ;-]
Somehow useful?
Douglas.
Hiya,
I'll tell you my metric for questions like this. It is: what is the reward system of the game?
Does it involve character improvement? Does it involve losing characters? Does it involve interactions among the players? Does it involve consequences of dice rolls (or whatever)? And so on.
Whatever your answer is, compare it to the thematic or atmospheric issues that you described in your first post. Do they match? Do they reinforce one another?
If the answer is "no," then you've discovered how to address the questions you raised in the first post. I'm willing to bet that's the current answer, actually.
A lot of people get it backwards - they say, "if you get it from the start (meaning theme and atmosphere), then the reward system can be about character-advancement (as usual), and it'll all work anyway, because you got it, right?" Which does not work consistently; "it" will only work for people who are very close to the source material, and very close to the author.
Instead, try it the way I suggested.
Best, Ron
I agree with dsmvites, the races/monsters in the second post threw me from a really good crest in the first. You'll have an easier time creating an impending doom feeling in a world of just humans (or nearly just humans) as the sentient race. Why? Of course, your players will have an easier time relating to them (at least most of your players, I would hope). But adding whole races of orcs and werewolves removes some of the mysticism I think you're trying to attach to this Otherworld Doom. They are too jarring, while at the same time providing a "gray area" that I don't think you want.
Maybe if you replaced them with humans that have been changed somehow? Mostly in the mind, not physically (too much, small physical changes can be good). Physical changes usually are scary or startling, but a changed mind or warped culture is disturbing on a more subtle level. Replace your orcs with maddened savages (what drove them mad?). Replace your shark-men with pirates who refuse to set foot on land (why?). Replace your were-wolves with nomads who keep wolves and refuse to leave the cold lands (why?!).
Whichever way you take it, one thing that I find creepy is large displays of effort for no apparent reason. Like an old and defensible wall in a field (what was it built to defend against?). Or a good road that leads into the wilderness and stops. Those drawings that can only be seen from a plane are weird to me. Particularly in medieval times, you had to have a REALLY GOOD reason to break off working on the harvest to build a wall, and it usually involves a lot of people working together. This is linked to the fallout shelter you mentioned in your first post.
Also, keep the "otherness" impersonal. People want to feel special, like they mean something, and being destroyed by something that wishes them malice or harm is almost okay. Being destroyed by something that doesn't (or can't) acknowledge you, but is still sentient, is terrible. It invokes a sense of worthlessness and helplessness that eats at our very ideas of "self" and plays havoc with our egos.
I like the notion that people know the world was destroyed and rebuilt after everything went wrong sometime in the past. That gives players something to rally against.
In terms of actual monsters, I would recommend against species for the most part (you mentioned grell). I think monsters are more... monstrous when they are unique. It even helps in the meta-game: the players themselves never know quite what they're going up against, they only have whatever clues their characters have uncovered. It isn't too hard to make up some monster tables that would let you roll up a new monster pretty quickly. You could tie them in with your "encroaching doom" if you really just made the tables into "modifications" to add to existing people or animals.
Hope some of these ideas help!
You have some interesting ideas about how this cthulhu-like horrors is part of the setting. That is fine, but what I see as more important is how these 'horrors' affect the characters, and what choices the characters face when they are up against them.
In many dark fantasy games the 'unspeakable horrors' is mostly just something out there that the character don't have any emotional connection with. And when they meet the horror it is in physical combat, and then the dark fantasy game has turned into a kill-the-monster game.
try to think about how these 'scary evil thing' affect the characters (and the NPCs), and think about how you can enforce this in the system. This will then bring the horror much closer to the characters.
And by the way. I agree with Douglas and Catlin, if you really want monsters (other than humans), they should not be well described, but something mysterious that never can be fully understood.
- Anders
IMPORTANT NOTE ON "EVIL RACES"
Alas, my use of the term "evil races" brought with it all the wrong connotations.
You might be able to talk to it, reason with it, and most importantly, empathize with it. Right? We could just take a step back and view Men vs Orcs as Red vs Blue. Right?
Wrong.
Only humans are used for those "gray area" roles in this game. Anything non-human is intended to be 100% non-empathizable. They do not speak the same language or share the same goals (mostly) or thought processes as Men.
The Orcs are marked by a powerful daemon. They believe (correctly) that they are bound for afterlives of eternal torment, and that the only respite is granted for slaughtering tons of Humans. When they see you, they will try to kill you, or tie you up and ritually sacrifice you to the daemon. That's it.
Orcs are encroaching doom. They lack the organizational structures to sustain long, widespread military campaigns, but they outnumber Men and are individually quite powerful. They have come close to wiping out humanity twice in the last three centuries. A whole bloodline of Men, comprising 1/4 of the population, has been eradicated from the Southwest, their entire kingdom fallen to the Orcs. The walled major cities have existed for times in states of siege, with all the farmland around them burned and spoiled.
I have not found a satisfactory answer to the question, "What do Orcs do when they're not killing Men?" but I think their role is important enough that I'll keep working on it. Suffice to say, no Human will ever encounter an Orc family or Orc hunting/fishing/farming community.
My intent is that, while the Evil Threat itself is fundamentally alien to this world, it has long-term agents within this world, and those agents have forms and behaviors that allow them to survive here. I called these "evil races", but perhaps "monsters that eat and reproduce" would have been more appropriate. The lizard-men and shark-men are basically predators with interesting back-stories, never evincing more than animal intelligence individually.
Quote from: dsmvites on June 13, 2006, 08:19:56 AM
would it be too much of a stretch to suggested you to keep things Human based, and put the threats as immaterial and possessing regular people and animals? It would enhance the paranoia and put the feeling of dread closer to the average person.
Immaterial threats will definitely be featured, but they don't make for very good fights. Most of the time, in an no-PC-magic setting such as this, you pretty much try to survive to run away when you encounter an immaterial adversary. This is great, but needs to be supplemented with other types of encounters too.
As for fighting fellow human beings who are obviously being controlled by some malevolent power, I like it but don't think it can be over-used. Zombies lose their creepy factor real quick if you keep seeing them.
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
I agree with dsmvites, the races/monsters in the second post threw me from a really good crest in the first.
D'oh! Please, ignore them and return to your crest! Hopefully my "evil races" post successfully addressed this issue...
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
Maybe if you replaced them with humans that have been changed somehow? Mostly in the mind, not physically (too much, small physical changes can be good).
Altered Men fill an important niche, but it is as Victims of the Evil Threat, not agents of it. Men who can no longer live amongst society -- that might fall out as a product of some transformative curse or other. Men who are raving and live as savages is definitely a good component -- these are the people who have been driven insane by comprehending the horror of the Evil Threat.
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
Whichever way you take it, one thing that I find creepy is large displays of effort for no apparent reason.
Yeah, that seems like a good track to brainstorm on... Evidence that other Men had to perform some great labor to defend themselves against some hard-to-imagine (or at least scary-to-imagine) Thing...
Alas, I don't think defense against standard physical assault would add much beyond the fact that most of the prominent cities in the world are walled anyway to defend against Orcs, and most near-to-Orc farming areas including forts and garrisons.
Defending your town against something that comes out of the ground or comes down from the sky or creeps out of your mirrors or emerges from shadows would leave behind some interesting puzzles...
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
Or a good road that leads into the wilderness and stops.
This is perfect, as it is in the interests of the Evil Threat to erase not only Men themselves, but Men's knowledge of and control over any portions of the world.
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
Particularly in medieval times, you had to have a REALLY GOOD reason to break off working on the harvest to build a wall, and it usually involves a lot of people working together.
Instead of a wall, perhaps some sort of giant religious symbol intended to ward away some kind of threat, with the symbol evoking the threat or its opposite in some metaphorical fashion... or giant stores of wood and omnipresent torch sconces, for keeping the town lit through the night...
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
Also, keep the "otherness" impersonal. People want to feel special, like they mean something, and being destroyed by something that wishes them malice or harm is almost okay.
I am glad you brought this up. In this game, any individual person may not be a big deal, but Humanity
is special and
does mean something. The Evil Threat is
partly a mindless force of entropy, but it is
also composed largely of malign intelligences who view Humanity as their enemy.
The horror is not intended to come from being disregarded by mindless cosmic forces who happen to run you over on their way to work; it's intended to come from facing a superior foe who you may hold at bay for a while but will eventually come to drag you down into madness and destruction.
The feeling of human importance should be a large part of what bolsters people to persevere against impossible odds for as long as they can.
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
I like the notion that people know the world was destroyed and rebuilt after everything went wrong sometime in the past. That gives players something to rally against.
Aye. As is, players are confronted with this fact extremely infrequently, by stumbling across some construct of the Ancients, or by hearing some myth recited by a local shaman. That may be good enough, but I'm certainly open to suggestions...
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
In terms of actual monsters, I would recommend against species for the most part (you mentioned grell). I think monsters are more... monstrous when they are unique.
I completely agree. Mostly, I only intend to turn a Thing into a Several Of A Thing when it is intelligent and operates on a grander scale (e.g. trying to shred the barriers that keep the Evil Threat out, thus destroying all reality).
Quote from: Castlin on June 13, 2006, 01:34:07 PM
It isn't too hard to make up some monster tables that would let you roll up a new monster pretty quickly. You could tie them in with your "encroaching doom" if you really just made the tables into "modifications" to add to existing people or animals.
That sounds less labor-intensive than my plan of making a very long list of one-use monsters, so I like it. In fact, I already have some ideas for those modifications, which I will spell out in a subsequent "monster attributes" post.
Thanks for the input!
-Dave
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 13, 2006, 02:55:30 PM
In many dark fantasy games the 'unspeakable horrors' is mostly just something out there that the character don't have any emotional connection with. And when they meet the horror it is in physical combat, and then the dark fantasy game has turned into a kill-the-monster game.
Very true. I am trying to walk a fine line, in which the horror element of the game is effective, without forcing players to play "a horror game". This setting is intended for adventurers, with motives similar to many who play "kill-the-monster" games: wealth, cool toys, thrills, knowledge, discovery, satisfaction of curiosity.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 13, 2006, 02:55:30 PM
try to think about how these 'scary evil thing' affect the characters (and the NPCs)
In some cases, I think "that was disgusting and hard to kill" is perfectly sufficient, provided the disgust is genuine. The task of creating the emotional connection you refer to is shared amongst many things in the world, with physical monsters a rather simple and confined part of that. Encounters with physical monsters over extended play should help convey the general nature of the Evil Threat as something that corrupts, destroys without creating, and is hostile to both its environment and particularly Humanity.
As for individual encounters which really develop a horrific feel, I think you are quite right with this statement:
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 13, 2006, 02:55:30 PM
they should not be well described, but something mysterious that never can be fully understood.
At the moment, I am thinking of these not as physical monsters, but as incorporeal intelligences. See my upcoming "monster attributes" post.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 13, 2006, 02:55:30 PM
think about how you can enforce this in the system. This will then bring the horror much closer to the characters.
Hmm. So, suppose you are a sword-wielding adventurer, and you wander down a dark path, and the GM confronts you with some oozing abomination. He describes something with malformed appendages, visible digestive organs, and randomly scattered eyeballs. It screams and slithers toward you, leaving a trail of rotting vegetation and mucous in its wake. Is this experience made any more effective by some particular mechanic? Such as rolls to avoid puking, screaming, fainting, running, being paralyzed with fear? Taking temporary damage to a Composure or Sanity stat?
I would guess that it would only be really effective if some sort of permanent loss was incurred, and I'm not sure if I want PCs to hemorrhage possessions and attributes every time they see a monster...
Pardon me if my responses sound negative; I'm actually rather on the same page with your perspective, just trying to trouble-shoot here.
-Dave
"MONSTER" ATTRIBUTES
Any brainstorm help in generating setting-appropriate creatures for encounters would be appreciated. Also, feel free to critique my brainstorms below.
Note: the mutants are intended to be unique, not recurring; the same probably goes for the alien, and maybe the incorporeal as well.
Incorporeal
These creatures provide excellent opportunities to point toward the alienness of the Evil Threat. Their capabilities should be heavy on events that never happen in the real world, and disdain physics and spacetime where possible.
Appearance brainstorms:
- invisible
- black shape of fluctuating dimensions
- black humanoid shape
- pinpoint of light
- illusion that suits its purpose (often human?)
Capabilities brainstorms:
- Pass Through Solids/Liquids
- Teleport
- Be In Multiple Places At Once
- Enter Your Mind
- Cause Insanity
- Drain Vitality (aging?)
- In general: mental powers good, touch attacks bad (is it incorporeal or not?!)
Alien Physical Creature
Stuff clearly not evolved by nature for survival. Another good opportunity to portray the alienness of the Evil Threat.
Appearance brainstorms:
- internal organs on outside
- secretions
- useless protrusions
- incompletely-formed limbs
- incompletely-formed sensory organs
- oddly located sensory organs
- multiple mouths
- crawling with bugs
- dropping body parts as it moves
- semi-liquid
- amorphous
- sulphurous smell
- rotting meat smell
- moaning
- gibbering
Capabilities brainstorms:
- engulf you
- absorb you/turn you into more of it
- corrosive/rotting touch
- make you flee/vomit/scream/faint/freeze
- spit corrosives
Mutated Physical Creature
Start from a bear, wolf, lion, boar, python, crocodile, etc. The more lavish your disgusting mutations the better -- it is necessary to get to the point where PCs will assume a mental state different than the original creature. This assumption will then be borne out when the thing attacks you with no regard for its own survival.
Physical modification brainstorms:
- skeleton & internal organs visible through rotted-away skin
- secretions
- useless protrusions
- extra limbs (fully-formed or otherwise)
- extra sensory organs (fully-formed or otherwise)
- extra mouth(s)
- crawling with bugs
- dropping body parts as it moves
- sulphurous smell
- rotting meat smell
Capabilities brainstorms:
- corrosive/rotting touch
- make you flee/vomit/scream/faint/freeze
- spit corrosives
- particularly deadly teeth/claws
Mutated Inanimate Object
The quest to make plants, fungus, etc. scary and not silly...
Physical modification brainstorms:
- change in color
- faint glow
- looks dead
- smell rotten
Capabilities brainstorms:
- rapid growth to snare or engulf you
- emit spores that kill you
- emit spores that make you hallucinate
- strangle you with vines
Quote
Hmm. So, suppose you are a sword-wielding adventurer, and you wander down a dark path, and the GM confronts you with some oozing abomination. He describes something with malformed appendages, visible digestive organs, and randomly scattered eyeballs. It screams and slithers toward you, leaving a trail of rotting vegetation and mucous in its wake. Is this experience made any more effective by some particular mechanic? Such as rolls to avoid puking, screaming, fainting, running, being paralyzed with fear? Taking temporary damage to a Composure or Sanity stat?
I would guess that it would only be really effective if some sort of permanent loss was incurred, and I'm not sure if I want PCs to hemorrhage possessions and attributes every time they see a monster...
Pardon me if my responses sound negative; I'm actually rather on the same page with your perspective, just trying to trouble-shoot here.
Well I guess we agree most of the way, it is just the question about the mechanic. I should properly have been a little more concrete, so I will try to give an example here.
Ok, here is the point: Horror outside the character is very hard to get to work, because it all depend on how good the GM is to describe the monster (or the horror scene), and many players like to play cool characters that do not react on these horrors. What is much more interesting is when the horror is inside the character; if the really scary thing is the choices the character have to make to overcome the monster.
The insanity-type mechanic you describe could work if it is done right, but it was not what I was thinking about. My idea was a mechanic that will give the character a bonus against these horrors, if he jeopardise his humanity or if he jeopardise the people he have relations to or his sanity or other thing that mean something to him.
This could be done by saying that to effective battle these monsters you have to use there own power against them. So when the character is up against a enemy too powerful for him he can choose to invoke some 'demonic' power. But to do this he have to scarify something; for instance:
* He compromises his humanity by gaining power through a blood ritual where he have to scarify a baby.
* He can 'scarify' his relation to his wife to get power. Which means that sometimes in the future his wife will be the victim of some 'demonic' influence.
* He can renounce his fate to get power, but the gods will properly punish him for this.
And it is possible to make mechanics for these things.
Well, this is just an example I could think of right now, it could properly be done more interesting, but I hope you get the idea.
- Anders
Quote from: Ron Edwards on June 13, 2006, 10:19:21 AM
what is the reward system of the game?
It's funny, most of what I hope to achieve when I play in settings like this has nothing to do with the system. The first things that come to mind when I hear "rewards" are "knowledge" and "cool experiences", followed by things like "becoming famous" and "acquiring wealth and allies". These things, to me, are rewards in themselves, without needing to confer any future advantages on any sorts of tests. (Does this mean I'm mostly a Narrativist at heart?)
The prerequisite for all these rewards is curiosity, the adventuring mentality wherein spooky or mysterious things should be investigated. Beyond that, behaviors that tend to earn these rewards are careful thought, cautiousness, clever problem-solving and tactics. The punishment for charging in fearlessly is usually death.
At the moment, the system involves a kind of advancement in between modeling reality (skills improve slowly with practice) and giving fantasy gamers what they've come to like (skills improve quickly by virtue of succeeding in game goals). It's not entirely concrete yet, and supposing I choose in the direction of just modeling reality, then I'm not sure if there truly is a rewards system at all. Players simply keep track of what their characters earn within the game world, and pursue whatever interests them in-game: wealth, cool trinkets, better armor, etc.
I suspect I may be thinking too narrowly about "rewards system" as a concept...?
Quote from: Ron Edwards on June 13, 2006, 10:19:21 AM
Whatever your answer is, compare it to the thematic or atmospheric issues that you described in your first post. Do they match? Do they reinforce one another?
Well, the attempt to model reality reinforces the thematic concern with "ordinary people", and the lack of hand-outs reinforces a certain level of environmental unfriendliness.
Characters begin weak enough to identify with other normal people, and with a mundane past which also contributes to this. Hopefully this helps them see themselves as part of a society and a world. It is important that no matter how much they advance they not become a class apart, because that generally leads to the feeling that one is a badass and is in control, which is at odds with the appropriate impression. Thus, the degree of advancement is modeled on reality: you get better at the things you practice, and this happens slowly.
The form of advancement is not pre-determined; characters get points that they can spend at their discretion. This is intended to contribute to a define-and-motivate-yourself mindset which meshes well with the game's themes (value of struggle, being alone).
The fact that if you are curious but not cautious you will probably die reinforces the dangerous world theme.
So, to answer your questions:
Do they match? Well, they are at least compatible and complementary.
Do they reinforce one another? I think so, but perhaps not as directly or powerfully as they could.
Quote from: Ron Edwards on June 13, 2006, 10:19:21 AM
A lot of people get it backwards - they say, "if you get it from the start (meaning theme and atmosphere), then the reward system can be about character-advancement (as usual), and it'll all work anyway, because you got it, right?"
I completely agree that a reliance on players "getting it" from the start is to be avoided. My intention has been for "getting it" to come about naturally as a result of continuing to wander around in the setting. The system's job at the moment is mostly to allow that to happen, by facilitating immersion in the setting through mechanics that are as realistic as possible while still being fast and fun.
As for using a mechanical system of rewards/punishments to, by its own merits, make players "get" themes of ordinary people alone in the dark engaged in hopeless struggle... I honestly wouldn't know where to start.
If anyone feels up to generating an example, just to point me in directions I may not have considered yet, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks,
-Dave
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 13, 2006, 06:18:14 PM
Ok, here is the point: Horror outside the character is very hard to get to work, because it all depend on how good the GM is to describe the monster (or the horror scene), and many players like to play cool characters that do not react on these horrors.
You're absolutely right, but I would like to try anyway. Mechanics that would help out the GM are welcome; thus, my own attempted brainstorm churned out some compulsory fear ("you run away from it!") and some emotional damage ("your Sanity score drops!").
The Horror is intentionally outside the character. The all-devouring evil of the cosmos hates you and your species and it's coming to get you.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 13, 2006, 06:18:14 PM
My idea was a mechanic that will give the character a bonus against these horrors, if he jeopardise his humanity or if he jeopardise the people he have relations to or his sanity or other thing that mean something to him.
Hmm. Interesting. If there is some specific way these horrors can be survived, or killed, which is different from battling normal creatures... then there could be stats measuring a PC's ability to do that... and these stats could be modified by experiences... perhaps sometimes intentionally so... and perhaps sometimes that act would be foul in itself...
This is all good food for thought.
However, I do not think it's possible or desirable to try to institute a policy that every encounter with Evil must entail a dramatic moral quandary and damning choice. That sounds more like a story arc than an encounter type to me.
I like where this idea is going. It reminds me of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, with the more obnoxious Tolkienisms removed. You might want to check out the WFRP core book for ideas on how to convey that kind of paranoid flavor through art and prose passages (or just to get an idea of what's been done already.) Personally, during my experiences playing WFRP, I wanted a more down-and-dirty horror story when everyone else wanted a more traditional dungeon-crawl, so I'm really looking forward to your finished product!
I think you'll get more effect by showing your players reasons for their characters to be xenophobic, rather than telling them how to roleplay. Let their characters be open-minded and "modernist" if they want, just make sure that those characters are the first to be betrayed by "misunderstood" NPCs, stricken with plagues and hexes, and eaten by awful Lovecraftian horrors that they should have been shunning instead of buying a Coke and keeping company.
Also, modern paranoia has a different flavor than medieval paranoia. In the game itself, I'd avoid references to modern things like terrorism and nuclear scares in favor of witch-hunts, plague-years, and prophets of doom. The timelessness of fear will likely come through by itself.
Hy there Dave,
I read your (many) posts and came to some questions:
a) There seems to be a discrepancy between the mood first suggested and your developed idea. At first you conjured us visions of paranoia and pervasive fear and you used term like the nuclear scare and cold war. You also added up a notion that mankind was special in the setting and the heroes would face (besides regular challenges for survival) an Otherworldly threat. Then monster races appeared in the posts and when you developed your ideas we ended up seeing a gibbering aberration as opponents. Thus, the question: how do you want to terrify your characters? With gross violations of natural order or subtle fear of an unspeakable evil that may be among them?
If the answer is the first, it seems like you really liked the Crab clan in Legend of the 5 Rings. Otherwise, you got back to those subtle feelings you brought forth with modern fear comparisons.
b) I read you description of orks and kept thinking: "why do they NEED to be orks?". There was no impediment whatsoever to the possibility of 'orks' meaning savage human tribes perverted by Otherworld evil. When I told you about immaterial foes my intent was not DnD related ("Goooosssh a ghost... [and I dont have a weapon +1]"), but instead something otherworldly bound to act in this plane through possession. These beings could pop up in your neighbor's family or may have taken over a whole nation (that tore itself apart). In the end it all comes down to question A above.
c) Finally, despite your answers above there is still a possible addition to the brainstorm. I got myself thinking in "What do they gain with it?" and translated to "Why the hell are they going to be heroes?". Of course, to save their hides. But, what if: some castes had a purpose and a role preventing this otherworld taint to spread? Something like nobility with laying of hands, sworn to protect their people from ______ (insert evil threat here); or clergy with prophecies granted by _______ (whoever rebuilt the world after some Great Big Mess) bound to guide people on this new beginning. They could even advance (not in ranks or levels, but in Essence) whenever they upheld their purpose.
Well... just adding to the brainstorm.
Douglas.
ops...
ps: if you really intend to keep the setting in the directions you lately upheld could me, Castlin, and Anders Larsen develop a pure human paralel setting?! The idea seems to good not to be worked!
;-] Just kidding!
Cheers
Douglas.
Quote from: billvolk on June 13, 2006, 09:33:05 PM
I like where this idea is going. It reminds me of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay
It should. My co-designer is a huge WFRP fan.
Quote from: billvolk on June 13, 2006, 09:33:05 PM
I think you'll get more effect by showing your players reasons for their characters to be xenophobic, rather than telling them how to roleplay. Let their characters be open-minded and "modernist" if they want, just make sure that those characters are the first to be betrayed by "misunderstood" NPCs, stricken with plagues and hexes, and eaten by awful Lovecraftian horrors that they should have been shunning instead of buying a Coke and keeping company.
I have no intention of telling players how to play. Agents of the Evil Threat are simply impossible to get along with; being open-minded is really only something you can do philosophically, after you've killed it or run away from it.
Your suggestion about sketchy NPCs is interesting -- I do intend to have corrupt humans as the occasional threat, but I don't think it'd be appropriate to instill great distrust of all strangers. With such a hostile environment, most humans tend to be pro-human.
Quote from: billvolk on June 13, 2006, 09:33:05 PM
Also, modern paranoia has a different flavor than medieval paranoia. In the game itself, I'd avoid references to modern things like terrorism and nuclear scares in favor of witch-hunts, plague-years, and prophets of doom.
Definitely. In fact, I intend to work on instances of all three of those to drop into world history.
Thanks,
-Dave
QuoteIt is important that no matter how much they advance they not become a class apart, because that generally leads to the feeling that one is a badass and is in control
Well one mechanical way to emphasize this would be to focus slightly more on food than most games I've played do. Food is very close to most people's hearts, and it was pretty much what medieval society worried about. I mean, you don't have to get all Dark Sun on the players, but a little more attention to what they're eating and where it came from (and what happens if they don't) would keep them feeling human and attached to all those busy hands that make their bread. Kind of a weird thing to focus on, I know, but when your enemies eat light and brains and dreams, your muffin seems all the more humane,
I'm also a little confused as to the ultimate goal now. I understand there's this impending horror, but is it intended to be the ominous, just-out-of-vision, pervasive doom, or slimy tentacled gooey monsters? Either is fine, but they both seem to be showing up, and I think you'd have a hard time reconciling them. The physical nature of the second will probably disrupt the abstract nature of the first.
QuoteYour suggestion about sketchy NPCs is interesting -- I do intend to have corrupt humans as the occasional threat, but I don't think it'd be appropriate to instill great distrust of all strangers. With such a hostile environment, most humans tend to be pro-human.
That's what makes corrupted humans so much more troublesome. It is also very much within the medieval mindset to not trust strangers! In game terms, though, I see what you mean; it can be a pain if your characters decide they have to run an interrogation/exorcism on everybody who asks them for help "just to be sure". If you made most of the tainted humans clearly "outsiders" or very visibly different (not necessarily physically, their behaviour could just be alien), it might help.
In terms of the flavor of doom (he he doom flavors), your players would probably have an easier time emphasizing with "modern" doom (nuclear war, terrorism) than "medieval" doom (comets, witch-hunts). If you could find a way to wrap those old ideas in modern feeling, I think that would be very effective.
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:26:39 AM
a) There seems to be a discrepancy between the mood first suggested and your developed idea. At first you conjured us visions of paranoia and pervasive fear and you used term like the nuclear scare and cold war. You also added up a notion that mankind was special in the setting and the heroes would face (besides regular challenges for survival) an Otherworldly threat.
Aye. However, I also stated that I wanted this mood to be relegated to the background, leaving human society in a recognizable state. So, some degree of subtlety is required.
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:26:39 AM
Then monster races appeared in the posts and when you developed your ideas we ended up seeing a gibbering aberration as opponents. Thus, the question: how do you want to terrify your characters? With gross violations of natural order or subtle fear of an unspeakable evil that may be among them?
The Cold War feel I was referring to was
not intended to be "my neighbor might be a Commie!" It was intended to be "I might get nuked!" The threat of getting nuked wasn't imminent, it wasn't clear, but people worried about it because they had an Enemy with the capability to strike from a distance with incredible destructive force.
Quote from: Castlin on June 14, 2006, 12:25:06 PM
I'm also a little confused as to the ultimate goal now. I understand there's this impending horror, but is it intended to be the ominous, just-out-of-vision, pervasive doom, or slimy tentacled gooey monsters? Either is fine, but they both seem to be showing up, and I think you'd have a hard time reconciling them. The physical nature of the second will probably disrupt the abstract nature of the first.
The mood is not intended to be created by one encounter with a gibbering aberration. Many farmers will never see a gibbering aberration in their whole lives. The Evil Threat should have many ways in which it makes its presence felt to Men. There should be variety, because relying solely on Orcs, or Wraiths, or Mutant Fungi, or prophecies, or historical anecdotes would get old. When it comes to characters crawling into strange places with swords at the ready, one type of thing they might encounter is a gross violation of the natural order, which hints at the fundamentally alien nature of the Evil Threat.
The subtle feeling is standing in a small village looking into the dark woods and knowing that gibbering abominations are out there.
If these answers seem unsatisfactory, please tell me how, keeping in mind my goals stated in the first post. This seems to be an important topic.
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:26:39 AM
b) I read you description of orks and kept thinking: "why do they NEED to be orks?". There was no impediment whatsoever to the possibility of 'orks' meaning savage human tribes perverted by Otherworld evil.
Well, in reality they
are a race descended from humans who were perverted by Otherworld evil, but I didn't mention it because most players will never find that out.
I dislike using the term "Orc" because of reactions like yours, but when I gave my players a weird name ("Svarinskepna") and the basics (man-sized, ugly, primitive, numerous, thoroughly hostile), they said, "Ah, Orcs." Later in the process, I will certainly revisit the idea of renaming them.
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:26:39 AM
When I told you about immaterial foes my intent was not DnD related ("Goooosssh a ghost... [and I dont have a weapon +1]"), but instead something otherworldly bound to act in this plane through possession.
Daemonic possession will indeed be one of the varieties of Evil -- it's on one of the lists in my second post, along with curses, another type of non-material Evil action. It seems like perhaps I should highlight these in the material I present.
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:26:39 AM
"Why the hell are they going to be heroes?" Of course, to save their hides.
The assumption thus far has been that all players will play characters who are curious, and willing to encounter some danger in the name of excitement, discovery and possibly personal gain.
You give me an interesting idea, however, in which the game begins with players
forced into action by some scenario, and then must go on adventures to retrieve something of personal importance, or remove curses from themselves, etc.... This would establish some level of "hostile world" right off the bat... Sounds like one individual campaign, though, not something that could be a regular setting feature...
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:26:39 AM
But, what if: some castes had a purpose and a role preventing this otherworld taint to spread? Something like nobility with laying of hands, sworn to protect their people from ______ (insert evil threat here); or clergy with prophecies granted by _______ (whoever rebuilt the world after some Great Big Mess) bound to guide people on this new beginning. They could even advance (not in ranks or levels, but in Essence) whenever they upheld their purpose.
Great idea. I actually have a player doing just that, though he's an extremist member of an underground cult, not some noble caste. But establishing a greater role for Those Who Look To Fight Evil definitely has possibilities... as long as whatever organizations do this still don't know much about the Evil Threat, and are thus incapable of demystifying it.
Quote from: Castlin on June 14, 2006, 12:25:06 PM
Well one mechanical way to emphasize this would be to focus slightly more on food than most games I've played do.
I love this idea, but don't see any way to implement it beyond:
a) discussing meals a bit more thoroughly when I GM
b) continuing to make PCs pay for everything, including food -- this has resulted in the party helping out a farmer in his fields to repay him for dinner and lodgings when they were broke
Quote from: Castlin on June 14, 2006, 12:25:06 PM
when your enemies eat light and brains and dreams, your muffin seems all the more humane,
Excellent. I will consider "eats light / brains / dreams" added to my monster capabilities brainstorm list.
Quote from: Castlin on June 14, 2006, 12:25:06 PM
If you made most of the tainted humans clearly "outsiders" or very visibly different (not necessarily physically, their behaviour could just be alien), it might help.
The victims of the Evil Threat will indeed be encountered. Emaciated, wide-eyed, violent, twitchy, incoherent -- this is what happens when you drink water from Orc-desecrated areas. Curse and plague victims will also be seen from time to time.
Quote from: Castlin on June 14, 2006, 12:25:06 PM
your players would probably have an easier time emphasizing with "modern" doom (nuclear war, terrorism) than "medieval" doom (comets, witch-hunts). If you could find a way to wrap those old ideas in modern feeling, I think that would be very effective.
Modern
feeling? I think that's pretty much up to the specific description, right?
Thanks,
-Dave
Quote from: dsmvites on June 14, 2006, 08:32:18 AM
if you really intend to keep the setting in the directions you lately upheld could me, Castlin, and Anders Larsen develop a pure human paralel setting?! The idea seems to good not to be worked!
The idea
is good, for a game that's more focused on the horror element and less interested in traditional fantasy adventuring. I'm trying to walk a fine line and have both. In my game, there are certain obstacles that the players are not intended to humanize, nor really have any reason at all to empathize with. These obstacles take the forms of oozing monsters, bodiless daemons, Orcs, shark-men, etc.
Obstacles where some ambiguity is part of the point will be humans. There are certainly humans in the world who consciously or unconsciously serve the Evil Threat, and many more who are victims of it. There is an entire nation ruled by servants of servants of a particularly nasty Evil Threat. However, there is a reason why this nation is remote and isolated -- the
general concept of Humanity is intended to retain a position of prominence and "rightness" in the world.
The game is absolutely an anthropocentric setting and endeavor, not a single-minded investigation into horror. Human beings are fundamental to the history, nature, existence and purpose of the physical universe. If the Evil Threat destroys humanity, it will destroy all physical reality as well. This is not intended to be known to PCs as fact, but there are various myths and ritual practices that hint at it.
I am not proposing to "keep Humanity pure" entirely, or to make it so "all Humans are good"; I am, however, drawing a stark division between the Human race and the Evil Threat.
I'd personally be more scared by degenerate, savage, tainted humans than by non-human Orcs, myself: look at the Reavers in
Firefly/
Serenity, or the islanders in the Peter Jackson version of
King Kong, for some really upsetting models. It's always more upsetting to recognize some glimmer of humanity in the enemy you have no choice but to kill -- especially if you think, "maybe one day that could be
me."
As a further step, you could tie this in with
either or both of two very different mechanics:
1) If you're really desperate, you can use Evil's own methods to defeat it, increasing your power but ultimately turning yourself into that which you fight (Anders Larsen's idea, and akin to Ron Edwards'
Sorcerer)
2) If Evil defeats you, and you survive, you begin to come under its sway -- you are increasingly cowed, morally broken, until finally you become a sniveling minion of those you once fought. (This works well with your idea of "facing a superior foe who you may hold at bay for a while but will eventually come to drag you down into madness and destruction.")
Now, think how
radically different your setting depending on which mechanics your system uses:
1 but not 2: "Fight not with monsters, lest yet become a monster" becomes the theme of the game -- someone has to defeat Evil so that humanity can survive, but the heroes must constantly struggle to use
as little dark power as possible in the process.
2 but not 1: "Better dead than Red" becomes the theme -- heroes are encouraged to do their utmost to defeat evil, and to risk everything, because if you win, there's no downside, and if you lose, well, that's still a moral victory as long as you die trying, because at least you died as a human being.
1 and 2 together: Now the whole game becomes an awful balancing act. If you defeat evil by evil means, you become evil, and menace everything you once defended; but if you are defeated by evil, then you're enslaved and warped into something evil, along with everyone you love and fight for.
The specifics of this aren't the issue, really. What I want you to think about is how
huge a difference the mechanics can make to the whole feel of the game, and how crucial it is that your mechanics support the mood of the setting.
Quote from: David Berg on June 13, 2006, 06:29:53 PM
Quote from: Ron Edwards on June 13, 2006, 10:19:21 AM
what is the reward system of the game?
It's funny, most of what I hope to achieve when I play in settings like this has nothing to do with the system. The first things that come to mind when I hear "rewards" are "knowledge" and "cool experiences", followed by things like "becoming famous" and "acquiring wealth and allies". These things, to me, are rewards in themselves, without needing to confer any future advantages on any sorts of tests. (Does this mean I'm mostly a Narrativist at heart?)
The prerequisite for all these rewards is curiosity, the adventuring mentality wherein spooky or mysterious things should be investigated. Beyond that, behaviors that tend to earn these rewards are careful thought, cautiousness, clever problem-solving and tactics. The punishment for charging in fearlessly is usually death.
At the moment, the system involves a kind of advancement in between modeling reality (skills improve slowly with practice) and giving fantasy gamers what they've come to like (skills improve quickly by virtue of succeeding in game goals). It's not entirely concrete yet, and supposing I choose in the direction of just modeling reality, then I'm not sure if there truly is a rewards system at all. Players simply keep track of what their characters earn within the game world, and pursue whatever interests them in-game: wealth, cool trinkets, better armor, etc.
I suspect I may be thinking too narrowly about "rewards system" as a concept...?
Let me do my best to explain the Ron Edwards school of thinking about "rewards systems," because you're right that you're not quite getting his meaning, and it is
absolutely crucial.
The rewards that matter are the ones for players, not for characters.Now, we're all trained to think of those two being locked together: if good stuff happens to my character -- s/he gets stronger, faster, richer, more powerful -- that's a reward for me, the real person playing. Conversely, if bad stuff happens to my character, that's a punishment for me, the real person playing -- in the extreme case, my character dies and I no longer have any ability to act in the game.
But, wait a sec, if we really had our characters' best interests at heart, we'd have them stay safe at home and be investment bankers or something, not have them go into dark places with nasty beasties. And if "bad stuff for my character" is always a punishment for the player, why is it so much fun when our characters are placed in terrible peril, get jilted by their lovers, or come face-to-face with terrible, powerful villains, and so little fun when our characters just walk over easy opposition and get everything they want without a struggle?
Any game has a reward system -- if only the purely informal and social reward system where you do or say something and I respond with, "Cool!" What's more,
every game's reward system boils down to that moment where I say "cool!" and you feel good about it.
Now, maybe there's some game-mechanical "cue" (to use Vincent Baker's term) that inspired me to say "cool." In traditional games, this would be things like your character making a difficult skill check because you've been spending XPs to raise that ability, for example, or your character levelling up. In a lot of indie games, this could be you spending some kind of "story point" you earned to introduce a new plot complication or NPC, totally independent of your character doing anything; or it could be you deciding your character gets
hurt in a particularly impressive way (see "Fallout" in Vincent Baker's
Dogs in the Vineyard), e.g. "now my character carries the scar of your sword forever" or "okay, now my guy has 'Afraid of the Dark' at 2d6."
But! If you stack up amazing in-game stats for your character, and have tons of whatever kind of points,
and I don't ever say 'cool!', then
there is no reward.
This is a chronic, chronic problem of games that try to apply the traditional D&D/GURPS/White Wolf model to anything besides "let's win the fight at the least possible risk to ourselves." If your game-text is all about one thing -- seeking out and confronting inhuman horror, for example -- but your mechanical rewards are all about another thing -- e.g. the more fights you win, the better you fight next time; or, the more you stay at home and train, the better you get -- then you have a fatal disconnect. The key is to figure out what kind of behavior you want from the
players -- the players, the players, the players; forget the characters for a minute, they're not real anyway, they're just instruments of the players' imaginations. Then make your mechanics
reward that kind of behavior and
nothing else.
This is a tremendously personal choice, but I can make some suggestions based on what you've already said:
- A "realistic" skill system that makes characters more proficient the more they practice
when not adventuring is a game-killer: It encourages everyone to stay home, instead of going out and getting in trouble.
- A "realistic" money system that makes characters pay for everything, and forces players to concentrate on how much they spend and how much they earn, won't work for you: It encourages everyone to focus on money, not adventure and horror.
- A traditional "XP" system that makes characters better fighters the more fights they win, as in D&D, is a mediocre fit for what you want: It encourages getting into trouble, but never more trouble than you can currently handle -- if you have an overwhelming foe, the logical response is to go kill off some wimps first, so you can get strong enough to take on the big guy.
- A "lose to win" system, as in
FATE ("Aspects"), Tony Lower-Basch's
Capes, or Miller's
With Great Power..., where being defeated this time gives you some kind of points that you can use to buy victory next time, and where buying victory tends to expend your points and leave you vulnerable to defeat again, might be a very good fit: It nicely replicates the whole "we lose, we lose again, we lose again, we finally win!" dynamic of many heroic stories. It can even be "realistic" if you justify it in terms of, "dang, you had to run screaming from the monster that time, but next time you'll be prepared for its horrific appearance," or "hey, you lost that fight, but in the process you think you spotted the monster's crucial weakness -- you'll be ready for it next time!" (Viz. every second episode of
Buffy the Vampire Slayer).
- A "fallout" system, as in
Dogs in the Vineyard, where your character can gain new traits and abilities
from being defeated or harmed, might be a very good match, too: "Okay, I barely escaped with my life that time, so now I have the trait 'I fear demons' at level 10 -- next time I'm in a fight with a demon, I can harness my fear to fight harder and win!"
(I'd advise checking out my post here - http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=18387.msg194369#msg194369 - and the entire surrounding discussion).
Quote from: David Berg on June 13, 2006, 07:11:51 PMHowever, I do not think it's possible or desirable to try to institute a policy that every encounter with Evil must entail a dramatic moral quandary and damning choice. That sounds more like a story arc than an encounter type to me.
Dave,
Having geeked out with ya in person at State Street Diner and read over this thread as it has evolved, I think the best thing you can do at this point, as a game designer, is show up to Dexcon and do your damnedest to get into games of Burning Wheel, Dogs in the Vineyard and I dunno, I've got to look over the line-up.
I'd think the best thing you can do for your game right now is play some other games that acheve some of the goals you are talking about here in a way that you aren't used to.
Games and game books that are worth taking a look at in particular in that they are fantasy and gritty:
Sorcerer and its sourcebook, Sorcerer & Sword: if just for S&S's overview of sword and sorcery literature and kickers and bangs in Sorcerer.
Conspiracy of Shadows: For the conpsiracy creation and how it draws the players, not just the characters but the players, into this twisted web of deceit and lies.
Burning Wheel: Beliefs, again for how to draw in no the characters but the players.
Trollbabe: for its simplicity and dice mechanics and how they create story.
Judd's research suggestions just reminded me that I am not really prepared to get heavily into systems and theory talk regarding this game. My original goal for this thread was specifically to develop the setting. Let's return to that.
(Of course, anyone who proposes a gameworld element is certainly welcome to propose a mechanism that accompanies that element if they have one in mind.)
As I don't wish to discourage anyone who is enjoying non-setting discussions here (nor seem ungrateful to those offering help in such areas! I do appreciate it), I have created a new thread (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20113.0) and linked some relevant posts from this thread.
So: monsters (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20099.msg210260#msg210260)/geography/history (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20099.msg210157#msg210157)/culture (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20099.msg210156#msg210156), anyone?
Gotcha on separating out reward systems as a separate issue -- that makes sense. Big caveat, though: If the mechanics, and especially the reward system, do not line up with the setting you invent, then actual play will not take place in your setting*: It'll drift into something that sorta looks like your setting but doesn't have any of the cool stuff you envisioned. (Apparently this happens to D&D and, especially, World of Darkness players all the time: "Where'd the epic battle between good and evil/angst-ridden intrigue go? We're just gettin' missions and killin' stuff.")
As for setting specifically, besides my earlier suggestion of using insane/degenerate humans for your "horde" bad-guys instead of "Orcs" (there are some good Conan the Barbarian stories that do this, besides the Firefly and King Kong models I mentioned earlier), I like the idea of having all the other "monsters" be unique. I'd suggest some kind of Creepy Details Table with random generation for quick beasties, or (more complex) a point-buy Build Your Own Abomination system for GMs to use. I would definitely not have any of these villains have their own culture, society, or system of values -- that way it shouldn't be possible for anyone to say, "oh, well, from their point of view, they're really the good guys."
Conversely, I'd make your humans, and their history, culture, religion, geography, etc., all as close to historical Europe (or rather, to the popular idea of historical Europe) as you can manage. These guys provide your players' point of view: If they're alien and hard to understand, then (a) your players will be struggling to feel sympathy with their own characters and the people they're supposed to protect, and (b) the monsters won't stand out as much. The bog-standard "generic fantasy setting" has a lot to recommend it, at least for people who've played D&D, but, better yet is the "generic fairy tale kingdom." Read a lot of fairy tales (Grimm's, etc.) and watch a lot of fantasy or medieval movies (Lord of the Rings, Kingdom of Heaven), and model your society on that. That way, your players can quickly slip into character, because everything is recognizable: "Okay, we've got castles, villages, kings, knights, priests, and peasants, let's go" (even if the priests worship the Sun-God instead of Jesus, or if some of the knights are warrior-women... I'm doing that in my own The Shadow of Yesterday game). It's very clear and comfortable who "we" are -- which makes "them," your savages and monsters, all the more horrifically alien by contrast.
* That is, as long as other people are playing the game with only the rules to go by: If you, personally, are present, especially as a GM, you can override this phenomenon.
Sydney-
We're definitely on the same page about a lot of this stuff.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
If the mechanics, and especially the reward system, do not line up with the setting you invent, then actual play will not take place in your setting
Right. For example, if the rewards system is entirely about social accomplishments, characters will have no desire to wander into the dark, murky corners of the world and encounter my Evil phenomena.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
using insane/degenerate humans for your "horde" bad-guys instead of "Orcs"
"They used to be us" and "that could be us if we're not careful" are great,
but only if a sense is retained that "they are
not us, we can't
possibly be friends with them or like them or feel sorry for them." Adversaries you can feel sorry for will be Humans.
At the moment, my plan is to make signs that Orcs were once Human extremely few and far between, requiring a large amount of experience and deduction to see...
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
I like the idea of having all the other "monsters" be unique.
Earthly abominations caused by the invading power of the Evil Threat
will all be unique. As for bodiless daemons or super-powerful creatures close to the origins of the Evil Threat itself, I intend for those to exist in perhaps a few types. 5 Balrogs, 3 Grells, a dozen or so Wraith-type-things...
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
I'd suggest some kind of Creepy Details Table with random generation for quick beasties, or (more complex) a point-buy Build Your Own Abomination system for GMs to use.
Already in progress. See post 9 in this thread (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20099.msg210260#msg210260).
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
I would definitely not have any of these villains have their own culture, society, or system of values -- that way it shouldn't be possible for anyone to say, "oh, well, from their point of view, they're really the good guys."
Indeed. The shark-men and lizard-men are basically intended to be animals with beyond-animal capabilities. The Orcs toe the line -- their existence certainly
implies that they probably have a culture, but I've been hoping to get around this by making sure humans never see any evidence of it. No human enters Orc lands and returns alive; the only Orcs encountered are war parties. I hope this is sufficient...
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
Conversely, I'd make your humans, and their history, culture, religion, geography, etc., all as close to historical Europe (or rather, to the popular idea of historical Europe) as you can manage.
That is indeed what I'm attempting. The major Human empire consists of Romans loosely ruling (in heavy assimilation) three cultures that resemble medieval England, Germany and Scandinavia. There's also a small region based on Romania, and a larger nation based loosely on Tolkein's Rohan crossed with Turks.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 06:39:41 PM
Read a lot of fairy tales (Grimm's, etc.) and watch a lot of fantasy or medieval movies (Lord of the Rings, Kingdom of Heaven), and model your society on that. That way, your players can quickly slip into character
Actual historical research has taken the place of this; hopefully, what I lose in immediate familiarity I make up in satisfying realism.
Yeah, that definitely sounds like the right track to me. Only two quibbles, really:
Quote from: David Berg on June 14, 2006, 08:00:39 PMAt the moment, my plan is to make signs that Orcs were once Human extremely few and far between, requiring a large amount of experience and deduction to see...
But if you make it too hard, most people playing your game will
never figure it out. Yeah, the GM may have a plan to spill it "eventually," but we all know how many RPG campaigns break up before you ever get to "eventually," leaving the players to ask, "what was the big climax supposed to be, anyway?"
Forge games have taught me that delayed gratification and keeping secrets are
bad. To paraphrase Vincent Baker's instructions for the GM in
Dogs in the Vineyard, the NPCs have secrets they want to keep, not you the real person GM'ing; the GM has secrets he wants to
reveal, so s/he can show off the situation in all its gruesome glory. Vincent even recommends that when an NPC is lying to the player characters, the GM should make it
obvious the guy is lying -- even say, "yup, he's lying!" if the players aren't sure. The trick (again, from Vincent) is that knowing the secret shouldn't make the solution easier for the players: Instead, everything they find out should make the situation more complicated and the potential solutions more problematic.
I'd recommend that you make it damned obvious that the Orcs were human once -- and equally obvious that if you try to negotiate or to show them mercy for a second, they'll eat you alive -- and then totally
not obvious what happened to them, why, or what can be done to fix it, if anything at all.
QuoteActual historical research has taken the place of this [i.e. fairy tales & films]; hopefully, what I lose in immediate familiarity I make up in satisfying realism.
You're probably good to go, but I would recommend taking a look at some of the Conan stories (the real ones by Howard, not the later stories written by other people): Howard was a big Lovecraft fan, thought of himself as a "weird fiction" writer who just happened to be adding a pseudo-medieval setting, referred explicitly to "old ones" in his work, and invented some truly cool demons, ape-men, fallen civilizations, and degenerate savages that are well worth imitating.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 02:13:59 PM
2) If Evil defeats you, and you survive, you begin to come under its sway -- you are increasingly cowed, morally broken, until finally you become a sniveling minion of those you once fought.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 02:13:59 PM
"Better dead than Red" becomes the theme -- heroes are encouraged to do their utmost to defeat evil, and to risk everything, because if you win, there's no downside, and if you lose, well, that's still a moral victory as long as you die trying, because at least you died as a human being.
I sense some potential here... Some enemies should have the ability to inflict a fate that is (at least eventually) worse than death on PCs... and at least in some cases, this can only happen when the PC is at the enemy's mercy (e.g. having lost a fight with it)...
More Monster Capabilities brainstorms:
- implant eggs (hatch in x amount of time if not somehow removed, then young proceed to eat you from the inside)
- trigger mutation (variable in both speed of growth and in ultimate degree)
- make you permanently afraid (of similar creatures? all spawn of Evil Threat? everything?)
- distort your mind (infect with alien/chaotic/human-hostile traits?)
Nice. Some additional ideas:
- enslave you
- enthrall you
- make you love the monster
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 08:16:16 PM
I'd recommend that you make it damned obvious that the Orcs were human once -- and equally obvious that if you try to negotiate or to show them mercy for a second, they'll eat you alive -- and then totally not obvious what happened to them, why, or what can be done to fix it, if anything at all.
You're right, having the best of both worlds probably deserves a more thorough shot than I've taken at it thus far.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 08:16:16 PM
Howard was a big Lovecraft fan, thought of himself as a "weird fiction" writer who just happened to be adding a pseudo-medieval setting, referred explicitly to "old ones" in his work, and invented some truly cool demons, ape-men, fallen civilizations, and degenerate savages that are well worth imitating.
Sounds perfect. Thanks for the tip!
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 14, 2006, 02:13:59 PM
Let me do my best to explain the Ron Edwards school of thinking about "rewards systems," because you're right that you're not quite getting his meaning, and it is absolutely crucial.
The rewards that matter are the ones for players, not for characters.
Sydney-
I found what you had to say on this topic extremely interesting, and I have started a new thread (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20115.0) to follow up on the ideas you described.
David - It's late and I'm a newb so this post may fall flat.
When I think about what it might have been like to live in a dark ages Europe, I think there was always a 'fear of the uknown'. What people didn't understand, they feared, and most likely destroyed.
This is how myths and religions were started, long before science explained certain things. (I'm not supporting or denouncing Creationism or Evolution, that's not the discussion here.) Magnetism was magic. Thunder was Thor crafting in the sky. The world was flat and dinosaur bones were dragons.
A question: What is the Evil Threat's purpose? Maybe I missed it in the posts. Is it trying to hide something? Prevent mankind from discovering something? To prevent mankind from growing spiritually, socially, economically, etc. Is the Evil Threat mankind's first mistake? First nightmare? Is it simply trying to keep mankind in the dark, ignorant and in fear? Does it feed off of that fear?
Here's another little idea before I log-off: Maybe give the player's very little information on what lies beyond their borders. Historically speaking, people didn't roam far from home. They hear rumors, but can't verify it without seeing for themselves.
Watch the movie The 13th Warrior for a good visualization of this concept.
I have been thinking about how to make horrors outside the character work. Even though I have never GMed a horror game, I will typically have elements of horror in my games, so I will draw on these experiences.
A monster taken from a monster section, from whatever rpg that is used, is never scary, because the players know what it is, and you can only get this horror feeling, if the player don't know what it is (horror is about what you don't know). It may work the first time, but there can only be so many monsters in the book, so at some point you have to reuse a monster. At most you can make the player fear for there characters life, but that is really not the horror feeling.
A list of element that the GM can put together to form a unique monster will work better (I guess it is what you are going for), but even here there can be a problem. If you show this monster too directly too early, you will risk degrading it to just another weird monster; and the horror feeling is gone. So the trick is the process of how to reveal the monster.
On thing that is interesting to work with is how the monster affect its surroundings. Maybe it will make people go insane, maybe it will cause weird mutations in animals (They grow human arms, or begin to sound like crying children). Maybe strange phenomenas happens like tree begin to eat each other or water turn to blood. All these things can happen without anyone have seen the monster yet.
Another interesting thing is if there is some strange reason for why the monster has appeared. Maybe it is something that happen once a year, on the same day that some evil wizard died. Maybe the monster have a mission - something it tries to accomplice. Maybe it is drawn to certain emotion, like jealousy or hate.
For some reason patterns in chaos can be scary. It is much more interesting if the monster leave behind a recognisable pattern, than if it just leave chaos.
In general, it is better to think about what a monster do, that think about what it is.
- Anders
Quote from: Carl Bussler on June 14, 2006, 11:03:16 PM
When I think about what it might have been like to live in a dark ages Europe, I think there was always a 'fear of the uknown'. What people didn't understand, they feared, and most likely destroyed.
Quote from: Carl Bussler on June 14, 2006, 11:03:16 PM
Here's another little idea before I log-off: Maybe give the player's very little information on what lies beyond their borders. Historically speaking, people didn't roam far from home. They hear rumors, but can't verify it without seeing for themselves.
Good call, expanding the domain of "the unknown" is a good way to ratchet up the fear level.
(I am beginning to realize that allowing my players to create characters who are well-traveled and from all different parts of the world is demystifying it somewhat... same for providing them with a useful map.)
Right now, known vs. unknown is (I think) divided between lands humans live on and lands they don't. But most of the land they don't live on is just forest, and forest, while capable of housing all manner of monsters, doesn't really evoke "fear of the unknown" as a general rule. The Orc lands to the south are unknown, but no one wants to go there anyway; same for the Dimwood, a central forest formerly occupied by Orcs before a human military effort mostly exterminated them. It'd be nice if I could find a way to drive home "fear of the unknown" when players
aren't deliberately wandering into danger...
Maybe something happens at night that somehow effects even folks in the middle of heavily-settled lands...
Quote from: Carl Bussler on June 14, 2006, 11:03:16 PM
This is how myths and religions were started, long before science explained certain things.
Indeed. Lendrhald inhabitants understandings of the world are based largely on myths. The world is flat, the Western Sea goes on forever, the stars are daemon ships, etc. Thus far it's provided good intro flavor, but hasn't affected play at all.
Quote from: Carl Bussler on June 14, 2006, 11:03:16 PM
A question: What is the Evil Threat's purpose?
To destroy all physical reality and erase this obnoxious bubble of Human life and meaning.
Individual agents of the Evil Threat may have more worldly perspectives, and enjoy things like Human suffering and fear and insanity. Mostly, though, their thoughts are alien and reflect the Evil Threat's purpose as accurately as possible.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 15, 2006, 04:49:06 PM
A list of element that the GM can put together to form a unique monster will work better (I guess it is what you are going for), but even here there can be a problem. If you show this monster too directly too early, you will risk degrading it to just another weird monster; and the horror feeling is gone.
My intent is to make a long-as-possible list of creepy-as-possible elements (I hope to get more feedback on that!*), but you are probably right about this.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 15, 2006, 04:49:06 PM
So the trick is the process of how to reveal the monster.
In addition to the separate physical signs you mention below, it might be cool to have some other way in which the monster is revealed only partially...
Striking from darkness, or from somewhere where you can't see it, for instance... Sight should be the last sense to apprehend a monster whenever possible. I wonder if any particular properties of a physical monster could lend themselves to achieving this... it's black, it's invisible, it's the color of the forest, it has chameleon powers, it's very small, it moves faster than the eye can follow...
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 15, 2006, 04:49:06 PM
On thing that is interesting to work with is how the monster affect its surroundings. Maybe it will make people go insane, maybe it will cause weird mutations in animals (They grow human arms, or begin to sound like crying children). Maybe strange phenomenas happens like tree begin to eat each other or water turn to blood. All these things can happen without anyone have seen the monster yet.
I need to start yet another brainstorm list: Creepy Signs That Something Is Amiss!
I already have a certain effect planned. It's caused by Orc ritual desecration of a holy site. It involves the site itself getting nasty (fog, bog, smells, monsters) and also infecting any creature who eats or drinks there with a specific curse. The curse causes inability to eat and fills the victim with violent energy, causing emaciated lunatics of all species. Running into such a creature is a sign of a Nasty Site, as are harsh birdcalls, swarming insects and snakes, black water, faint odors of decay, and unnatural silence.
Orc groves, freakish daemon-monsters, and maybe certain types of mutants, should have various signs that indicate them. Probably there should be partial overlap, but some signs reserved for one type of Evil only.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 15, 2006, 04:49:06 PM
Another interesting thing is if there is some strange reason for why the monster has appeared. Maybe it is something that happen once a year, on the same day that some evil wizard died. Maybe the monster have a mission - something it tries to accomplice. Maybe it is drawn to certain emotion, like jealousy or hate.
I'd think that attaching some sort of reason or motivation to the monster's behavior would make it
less horrific, not more. Unless the motive itself was particularly horrifying...
In any given situation/adventure, I could see using any of the ideas you mentioned. I don't see any reason to make any of them widespread characteristics of monsters in general, though...
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 15, 2006, 04:49:06 PM
For some reason patterns in chaos can be scary. It is much more interesting if the monster leave behind a recognisable pattern, than if it just leave chaos.
More interesting? Sure. Scarier? It would depend:
If the pattern is mundane or benign, probably not. Chaos will likely be creepier.
If the pattern is creepy but unthreatening, maybe, maybe not. Chaos could be creepier. Depends on specifics.
If the pattern is threatening (it'll be back! it's getting more powerful! it's getting more aggressive!) then we definitely have something.
Quote from: Anders Larsen on June 15, 2006, 04:49:06 PM
In general, it is better to think about what a monster do, that think about what it is.
Agreed. The "capabilities" parts of the brainstorm lists will help with that. But I like your idea of also working on some behavior patterns, especially those that would convey an evolving threat. (Alas, I am too tired to generate great ideas at the moment.)
*anyone interested, see posts 9, 26, and 27 in this thread for what we've got thus far
Quote from: David Berg on June 16, 2006, 03:30:15 AMRight now, known vs. unknown is (I think) divided between lands humans live on and lands they don't. But most of the land they don't live on is just forest, and forest, while capable of housing all manner of monsters, doesn't really evoke "fear of the unknown" as a general rule....
Dude: You gotta read some fairy tales, right now.
Little Red Riding Hood.
Hansel and Grettle.
Snow White. In the medieval consciousness these stories convey, human civilization consists of tiny, fragile islands -- villages and towns -- isolated from each other by a sea of forest: dark, chaotic, hostile. As long as you stay in the village, you're safe (probably). As long as you stay in the cultivated fields, you're safe (probably), as long as you get back before nightfall. But as soon as you walk more than a few hours in any direction from your home -- maybe a few minutes, if you live on the margins; lots of fairy-tale characters are woodcutters' children -- then you are cut off, alone, in an alien environment where you cannot see more than a few dozen yards in any direction, where man-eating wolves and witches lurk, and where no one can hear you scream. You're on your own.
"Don't go into the woods!" Look at movies like
The Village or
Blair Witch. The fear still resonates today.
Of course the woods can house "all manner of monsters." But most of the time, they should be appallingly
empty. Maybe a bird sings, somewhere (only to cut off abruptly just before things get really bad). Maybe a creature scurries away, just at the edge of your peripheral vision. Maybe there's a long, strange cry in the distance -- what the hell was that? A crow? An animal? A person? Don't ask, just keep going, going, maybe we can get through the woods and into the next village before nightfall...
And when the monsters do show, don't think D&D: There should be no "routine monsters." A single wolf should be
scary -- a serious threat to the player-characters. And threats can be more than physical injury, or even insanity: One of the deepest horrors is that of being put in a situation where the only way to survive is to do something
wrong -- let the monster feast upon the wounded while you take the opportunity to run away, or promise the fairy queen your firstborn child if she'll only let you go.
To go even deeper: I don't think you get "horror" simply by scaring people. The quality of nightmare -- of a waking nightmare -- comes from something else: from the erosion of the boundary between our internal world and the external world, between what we fear and what we experience, between what we imagine and what exists. Little children stumble into horror all the time: If I dream about pirates in the house, how do I know they aren't really there? If I get angry at my friend and wish she would die, and then she falls down and twists her ankle, how do I know that I didn't make that happen? Adults, over time, learn a bit more about cause and effect, and realize that before something in your head can become something in the real world, you have to do something to make it happen. Horror occurs when what you fear (or desire...) manifests in external reality without any apparent cause,
just because you thought about it.
The scariest answer to "Oh my God -- what was
that?" is always "
What do you think?"
It seems you need your game to create suspense. Poke around for books and web pages focusing on techniques for writing horror. Other useful subjects are film treatments of horror. What makes a movie or book scary? If you want your game to be about dread and horror, your design should help make that happen. Don't just leave it to the GM and players.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 16, 2006, 10:55:40 AM
In the medieval consciousness these stories convey, human civilization consists of tiny, fragile islands -- villages and towns -- isolated from each other by a sea of forest: dark, chaotic, hostile. . . .
This is exactly the sort of feel I'm attempting to achieve. My comment about what forests evoke "as a general rule" was regarding the players, who (in my experience) will require lots of stuff to actually
happen in forests before they become leery of them. So, that's the question: what should happen?
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 16, 2006, 10:55:40 AM
Of course the woods can house "all manner of monsters." But most of the time, they should be appallingly empty.
With my players, this would only work
after it was demonstrated to them that being in an appallingly empty forest is
actually bad news. Cut-off birdcalls, strange cries, and scurrying, will not do it in and of themselves. I think these are all good suggestions, but only after forest-fear has been driven home by some near-death, near-insanity, near-capture or near-losing-prized-possessions experiences.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 16, 2006, 10:55:40 AM
And when the monsters do show, don't think D&D: There should be no "routine monsters."
Agreed.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 16, 2006, 10:55:40 AM
A single wolf should be scary -- a serious threat to the player-characters.
Agreed that there's no point in throwing easily-defeatable opponents at the players and hoping them to be deeply terrified.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 16, 2006, 10:55:40 AM
One of the deepest horrors is that of being put in a situation where the only way to survive is to do something wrong -- let the monster feast upon the wounded while you take the opportunity to run away, or promise the fairy queen your firstborn child if she'll only let you go.
The only way I can see of encouraging this to happen is to invent opponents who are:
1) capable of putting characters completely at their mercy
2) disposed to let characters live given certain conditions
This could work for:
1) an impossible-to-beat monster whose disposition is to retreat from a fight if it can drag an easy meal away with it (possible capabilities: Grab, Stun, Poison, Inflict Crippling Wound, Swallow Whole, run away fast, tough to hurt or kill, massively damaging attacks)
2) a large throng of bandits who outnumber the characters and want to embarrass or torture them3) monsters with mental powers who want to inflict psychological damage ("I have your mind, Human! Now knife your comrade, or I'll devour it!") (possible capabilities: Project Thoughts/Images/Sensations, Cause Fear, Cause Insanity, Drain Intelligence, Erase Mind)
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 16, 2006, 10:55:40 AM
The quality of nightmare -- of a waking nightmare -- comes from something else: from the erosion of the boundary between our internal world and the external world . . . The scariest answer to "Oh my God -- what was that?" is always "What do you think?"
Granting the PCs unknown or uncontrollable abilities to do bad stuff is a great idea. Some ways this could happen:
1) lasting alterations to the characters1a) Now that you've emerged from the Ghoul's tomb, you can curse people. It seems to have something to do with directing a negative emotion their way. Or perhaps fearing for their safety. You're not sure. You can't consciously do it or avoid doing it.
1b) When bad things happen in your dreams, you wake up and find they (or something analogous to them) have happened in real life.
2) monsters with mental powers 2a) It makes you hallucinate, ranging from subtle and odd to intense and horrific.
2b) It looks like what you're most afraid of. Its attacks correspond to the fates you're most afraid of. It acts in the ways that frighten you most.
2c) It attacks your dreams. If it hurts you in dreams, you will wake to find no physical marks, but be hurt anyway.
3) places with the same effects as the aforementioned monster powersI suspect I haven't
nearly mined your suggestions for all they're worth...
Those are all good ones. It's also very potent (look at how many stories do this) to have the monster go "let's make a deal" -- just this once, it'll help you out, or let the girl go, but you have to do this one little thing. And it's also very potent for the monster's goal to be to enslave the heroes -- not kill them, not brainwash them, not mind-control them, but put them in a situation so bad that they agree to submit to it forever.
Hi, newbie poster here though I've been reading Forgeish stuff for a while.
From the tone of what the OP has been telling us, I get the feeling that he is naturally inclined towards the 'keeping secrets' methodology of GMing. In an individual game, for some GMs and groups this works, for others not; that's not what I'm going to address here. What I am going to say is that trying to keep 'metaplot'ish secrets from the players, as a matter of Game Line Policy -- like the true nature of Orcs discussed above -- is simply not going to work. Period, full stop. The players will know the metaplot 'secrets'. There are any number of reasons for that, some innocent, some not -- they may be GMing a game themselves, they may have already played one campaign in this world, they may have read the rulebook because it was interesting before they could persuade the rest of the group to play -- but to you, the designer, the motives and reasons aren't important. What's important is that it's not going to work beyond your personal playtest group, and even then firewalling from version 2.2 characters the secrets that haven't changed since 1.4 is going to be hard.
Therefore, you can't make the creepiness and horror of the setting derive from secrets, or at least, not from secrets that are spelled out in the setting description of your RPG.
If you want to make some of the horror derive from the fact that the characters don't know what's going on, I think you have a relatively small set of options::
1) Have a set of mysteries which you don't provide the answers for. Exalted is an example of a game with a very, very detailed setting which nevertheless leaves some canonical mysteries explicitly unanswered. The only problem with this is that the player involvement with the secrets not in this category is still infected -- e.g., players in an Exalted Solars or Dragon-blooded game are usually well aware of the existence and nature of the Sidereals, even though their characters supposedly do not (at least, as a rule).
1a) Expand the set of mysteries and provide some sets of possible answers to them, without constraining a GMs choice in an individual campaign.
2) Make your description of the setting more sketchy, and provide tools for expanding on it. Makes lots of work on the GM, though, and depends on that 'one person's creativity'.
3) Make tools for the players themselves to create mysteries, and leave the answers unknown at the start to all, including the players creating them. Not all mysteries need to be handled this way, of course, some can be determined ahead of time by either category 1 or 2, but this greatly expands the possible scope of the unknown available to you. I also think you can look at a lot of media for inspiration -- mysteries develop along with TV shows but (usually, anyway) the writers do a pretty good job weaving it all together at the end. Does anyone believe that the writers of Alias knew exactly what was in Rambaldi's prophecies until the very end? Or that the writers of Lost even now know the true nature of the Others? Or that the writers of Battlestar Galactica know whether No.6 really is in Baltar's head or not? I don't. And yet there are clues scattered. Make tools for the creation of the mysteries, the accumulation of clues, and the decision of mysteries -- whether revealed to the characters or not -- and I think the level of fear of the unknown will go up.
Quote from: David Berg on June 16, 2006, 03:30:15 AMLendrhald inhabitants understandings of the world are based largely on myths. The world is flat, the Western Sea goes on forever, the stars are daemon ships, etc. Thus far it's provided good intro flavor, but hasn't affected play at all.
You have great material to mine here to answer the question "what do the players DO?" Make all those myths REAL. Make that the way the world really works. The stars
really are daemon ships, the Western Sea really is endless (or maybe it drops into eternal night at some far, terrible boundary where giant serpents swim, and the Siren Queens live in a golden castle whose halls are littered with the bones of men).
Next, put those myths right into play, as the things characters are expected to encounter. This is a grim fairy tale, of sorts, and thus what the players do is create grim fairy tales in play, by wandering into the dark forest and encountering realities that don't make sense. A daemon ship comes down -- a falling star -- and maybe it lies at the center of horrible things creeping into the village at night...and...oh my god...what are they doing to the children they abducted?!
And even when and if the characters beat back this invasion of daemons and triumph, all those stars -- all those stars! -- could come down...at any time...
But the trick is to abandon modern, scientific, materialist views of the world and make the myths real. The gods really do live up on that mountain there, and they really do require blood sacrifices, and thunder really is the gods fighting the daemons in the sky. Etc. So what do the players do? They stumble into the middle of all of this.
Just a suggestion, hope you find it helpful.
Quote from: Adam Dray on June 16, 2006, 01:11:27 PM
It seems you need your game to create suspense. Poke around for books and web pages focusing on techniques for writing horror. Other useful subjects are film treatments of horror. What makes a movie or book scary? If you want your game to be about dread and horror, your design should help make that happen. Don't just leave it to the GM and players.
Quote from: Threlicus on June 18, 2006, 10:35:04 PM
Hi, newbie poster here though I've been reading Forgeish stuff for a while.
From the tone of what the OP has been telling us, I get the feeling that he is naturally inclined towards the 'keeping secrets' methodology of GMing. In an individual game, for some GMs and groups this works, for others not; that's not what I'm going to address here. What I am going to say is that trying to keep 'metaplot'ish secrets from the players, as a matter of Game Line Policy -- like the true nature of Orcs discussed above -- is simply not going to work. Period, full stop. The players will know the metaplot 'secrets'. There are any number of reasons for that, some innocent, some not -- they may be GMing a game themselves, they may have already played one campaign in this world, they may have read the rulebook because it was interesting before they could persuade the rest of the group to play -- but to you, the designer, the motives and reasons aren't important. What's important is that it's not going to work beyond your personal playtest group, and even then firewalling from version 2.2 characters the secrets that haven't changed since 1.4 is going to be hard.
Therefore, you can't make the creepiness and horror of the setting derive from secrets, or at least, not from secrets that are spelled out in the setting description of your RPG.
If you want to make some of the horror derive from the fact that the characters don't know what's going on, I think you have a relatively small set of options::
1) Have a set of mysteries which you don't provide the answers for. Exalted is an example of a game with a very, very detailed setting which nevertheless leaves some canonical mysteries explicitly unanswered. The only problem with this is that the player involvement with the secrets not in this category is still infected -- e.g., players in an Exalted Solars or Dragon-blooded game are usually well aware of the existence and nature of the Sidereals, even though their characters supposedly do not (at least, as a rule).
1a) Expand the set of mysteries and provide some sets of possible answers to them, without constraining a GMs choice in an individual campaign.
2) Make your description of the setting more sketchy, and provide tools for expanding on it. Makes lots of work on the GM, though, and depends on that 'one person's creativity'.
3) Make tools for the players themselves to create mysteries, and leave the answers unknown at the start to all, including the players creating them. Not all mysteries need to be handled this way, of course, some can be determined ahead of time by either category 1 or 2, but this greatly expands the possible scope of the unknown available to you. I also think you can look at a lot of media for inspiration -- mysteries develop along with TV shows but (usually, anyway) the writers do a pretty good job weaving it all together at the end. Does anyone believe that the writers of Alias knew exactly what was in Rambaldi's prophecies until the very end? Or that the writers of Lost even now know the true nature of the Others? Or that the writers of Battlestar Galactica know whether No.6 really is in Baltar's head or not? I don't. And yet there are clues scattered. Make tools for the creation of the mysteries, the accumulation of clues, and the decision of mysteries -- whether revealed to the characters or not -- and I think the level of fear of the unknown will go up.
Clicked the "Post" button by accident on that last one, sorry...
Quote from: Adam Dray on June 16, 2006, 01:11:27 PM
Poke around for books and web pages focusing on techniques for writing horror.
Good call. I'm already using some such techniques, but having a better grasp of a broader palette would be good.
Quote from: Threlicus on June 18, 2006, 10:35:04 PM
The players will know the metaplot 'secrets'.
Maybe, maybe not. I think that's a "publication and sales" design issue, not a "setting content" design issue, so I don't want to get into that here. But I think the most important point here is:
Quote from: Threlicus on June 18, 2006, 10:35:04 PM
you can't make the creepiness and horror of the setting derive from secrets, or at least, not from secrets that are spelled out in the setting description of your RPG.
Agreed. "The unknown is good at being creepy" was a reference to things like monster encounters, not meta-plot secrets. The meta-plot secrets aren't there to contribute to any initial or short-term impression, and the correct initial and short-term impressions must be achievable without them.
Quote from: Threlicus on June 18, 2006, 10:35:04 PM
1) Have a set of mysteries which you don't provide the answers for.
There are several mysteries in the world (a giant, collapsed tower built by unknown means; an island only visible in the full light of the second moon; an abandoned Orc ziggurat on the border of human territory from which chanting can be heard on solstices), but I don't have a ton of them per area, and not all of them are creepy.
More are always welcome. That's part of what this thread is for, brainstorming such things. Any more specific ideas? The players will frequently be:
a) passing through small villages
b) on roads between small villages
c) in the world's largest cities
d) poking their heads into the forest when something catches their attention
So, types of creepy mysteries appropriate to those settings would be particularly useful.
Quote from: Threlicus on June 18, 2006, 10:35:04 PM
1a) Expand the set of mysteries and provide some sets of possible answers to them, without constraining a GMs choice in an individual campaign.
2) Make your description of the setting more sketchy, and provide tools for expanding on it.
3) Make tools for the players themselves to create mysteries, and leave the answers unknown at the start to all, including the players creating them.
Good idea. However, a "design your own mystery" game is not inherently creepy.
So, for now, let's focus on the kinds of mysteries to use. Perhaps we can generate a list of elements like I've been doing for monster capabilities and appearances. With that in place, designing a system to enable GMs (and/or players? probably not) to generate new mysteries shouldn't be hard.
Quote from: Threlicus on June 18, 2006, 10:35:04 PM
Make tools for the creation of the mysteries, the accumulation of clues, and the decision of mysteries -- whether revealed to the characters or not
All good ideas. Let's get some elements out there, and I'll come back to these.
Quote from: greyorm on June 19, 2006, 12:08:51 AM
You have great material to mine here to answer the question "what do the players DO?" Make all those myths REAL. Make that the way the world really works.
Already done. :)
It should be noted, though, that I have chosen to keep a certain level of complexity here. The true nature of the cosmos is not perfectly described by the mythology of any one culture; rather, various cultures' myths include bits and pieces of the Truth, and various individuals believe these myths to different degrees.
Quote from: greyorm on June 19, 2006, 12:08:51 AM
A daemon ship comes down -- a falling star -- and maybe it lies at the center of horrible things creeping into the village at night...and...oh my god...what are they doing to the children they abducted?!
I already have plans for falling stars, but the more general category of "bad things coming out of the sky" could probably stand some embellishment. The night sky is kind of like the ocean and the bowels of the earth: you don't really know what might be lurking up there. Maybe something the Sun God's power keeps at bay during daytime.
Abducting children is a good starting point too. Maybe as a lure to get adults to wander into someplace they otherwise wouldn't? Maybe to infect the children with a disease and return them? What about children makes them easier or better suited for abduction?
Quote from: greyorm on June 19, 2006, 12:08:51 AM
Next, put those myths right into play, as the things characters are expected to encounter.
Quote from: greyorm on June 19, 2006, 12:08:51 AM
So what do the players do? They stumble into the middle of all of this.
One complicating factor is that I want human beings and human culture to feel familiar and real. Thus, if the PCs had the same experiences as everyone else, they would be in the middle of some daemonic struggle etc. only very infrequently. So, why do the PCs have different experiences than regular folks? To date, my answers have been:
1) because the PCs are more risk-taking and thrill-seeking than regular folks (I've been operating under the assumption that the players are curious and the characters will go poke at anything supernatural-seeming.)
2) because given an undefined inch of the world, the GM is more likely to put something interesting there if the PCs are entering it
I am getting the sense that many posters here believe this list ought to be supplemented in some way, perhaps via:
3) a Character Creation process that demands change and encourages exploration
4) a suggestion that GMs start games with some dramatic event (possibly related to larger cosmic forces and plots)
Other ideas are welcome...
Unknown Armies (not an Indie game! Oh no! Unclean! Unclean!) has a really great approach to this issue: Every character is defined as having a "trigger event" -- some utterly shattering experience where they stumbled across the supernatural reality underlying our everyday world, and after which they can never rest easy with "normal" again. The characters aren't living in a world where the supernatural is obvious and all over the place; but they're not seeking it out because they're adrenaline junkies, either: They seek it out because some deep, personal need in them has been awakened.
There are some great examples in the rulebook: a cave-diver (someone who takes SCUBA gear down into underground lakes and swims around... very dangerous) who came across a sunken temple, unimaginably ancient; an abused kid, taken in by an older woman who ran a sort of informal shelter, who saw the woman get shot in the head by a child-beating dad and keep on fighting him until all the kids were safe; a gay college student who had a one-night stand with a tremendously charismatic stranger with chains running through his flesh and wants to find him again; a paramedic at 9/11 who found the head of a mannequin in the ruins, took it home, and discovered it started talking to him; a girl who discovers her parents aren't really her parents and that her name is an anagram of a cult leader's....
The really brilliant thing in Unknown Armies is that the "trigger event" is made up as part of character creation: The player comes up with it, not the GM (although the GM has input), and it's already happened. So instead of the player making up a "normal" person and the the GM guessing at what might make an interesting "welcome to the world of adventure" kick-off, the player makes up something that he (or she) finds interesting and the character's already in motion when the game starts.
Quote from: David Berg on June 19, 2006, 03:10:13 PM
Agreed. "The unknown is good at being creepy" was a reference to things like monster encounters, not meta-plot secrets. The meta-plot secrets aren't there to contribute to any initial or short-term impression, and the correct initial and short-term impressions must be achievable without them.
As a player, I would find it cool if there *were* big-picture things that were meaningfully unknown. This is a tall order to combine with a detailed setting, I agree, but no harm in thinking about how to try to do it. And to me, because I stand by my contention that "the players will know the metaplot secrets", that means things that are NOT spelled out by your setting. Since you clearly have a strong vision for the setting, to me that means giving tools so that individual GMs and groups can create and answer mysteries while staying within the style and mood of what you present.
Quote from: David Berg on June 19, 2006, 03:10:13 PM
There are several mysteries in the world (a giant, collapsed tower built by unknown means; an island only visible in the full light of the second moon; an abandoned Orc ziggurat on the border of human territory from which chanting can be heard on solstices), but I don't have a ton of them per area, and not all of them are creepy.
See, this is emblematic of how you're approaching the problem -- please, give me more lists of weird things to stick in the setting. What I'm saying is, don't give lists, give examples, and then when the GM (or a player!) creates a cottage, abandoned but obviously only recently so, in a border area thought uninhabited -- that mystery and the details created to go along with it will properly fit. It also allows mysteries to be dynamic without having a 'metaplot timeline', something that old World of Darkness games ought to make you wary of.
Quote from: David Berg on June 19, 2006, 03:10:13 PM
Good idea. However, a "design your own mystery" game is not inherently creepy. So, for now, let's focus on the kinds of mysteries to use. Perhaps we can generate a list of elements like I've been doing for monster capabilities and appearances. With that in place, designing a system to enable GMs (and/or players? probably not) to generate new mysteries shouldn't be hard.
(I'm being a bit non-responsive below, ignoring your request for lists of elements, because I honestly don't think it's all that useful, and because it sounds to me like you already have plenty of good examples created to throw at your future game-buyers. I'm going to talk a bit about the generation system, which I *do* think will be hard to get right, and will actually prove to be the crucial part of the system. Please bear with me.)
Why probably not the players? As long as their contributions fit with the tone and style of the game, I don't see why they can't be welcomed. Oh, actually I do see one argument -- giving the players power over the setting can detract from a particular feeling of powerlessness that may contribute to horror -- but I'm not fully convinced by it. I suspect that allowing the players to add mysteries should be fine, as long as you make things much harder to resolve and answer than to create. So if the players create an underground bunker which they stumble upon while being hunted by flying abominations, fine, let them escape the threat in exchange for the mystery. Resolving the mystery as to why this bunker is here will be at least as interesting as fighting the flying things. This could tie nicely into those 'Expediency Points' discussed in another thread...
Capes -- a completely GMless game -- has a mechanism which you might take a look at in this regard. As long as a conflict is on the table and not resolved mechanically, it is *not allowed* that any player may make a narration which would resolve the conflict (i.e., to make either outcome impossible). This is the Not Yet rule, and in Capes applies only within a scene (because that is the duration of a conflict). For your purposes, I'm proposing that you might want a kind of longer-term Not Yet rule for mysteries -- until the characters have accumulated a certain level of knowledge about a particular mystery, no one is allowed to actually resolve the 'true' answer. it also comes with a corollary -- once a Conflict is mechanically resolved, it *must* be narratively resolved. Something similar to that corollary can help with what I think RPG.net called 'pixelbitching' -- GMs who require players to figure out their one preconceived idea of 'the solution' in order to make progress -- which I find can be a particular problem in games involving mysteries.
Anyway, My feeling is that, as long as everyone is on the same page *stylistically*, allowing player contributions will only add to the richness of the environment. And, as long as you make world consistency be an important priority by which such contributions are judged, you don't necessarily lose any of your Sim values in the process.
I've snipped a bunch more that suggest to me that, hey, you already have answers for a bunch of (most? all?) the mysteries that you present in your setting. I'd like to encourage you to try to give up the feeling of ownership that you obviously have of the setting, scale back the level of detail that you present, and present some of your answers as possibilities and choices of alternatives, rather than truths. Not only will that address the player knowledge issue, that will also allow GMs and groups who don't like some piece of your setting (and there *will* be some, if not all except you, who do) to tweak things to their liking without breaking the integrity of the whole.
Quote from: David Berg on June 19, 2006, 03:10:13 PM
One complicating factor is that I want human beings and human culture to feel familiar and real. Thus, if the PCs had the same experiences as everyone else, they would be in the middle of some daemonic struggle etc. only very infrequently. So, why do the PCs have different experiences than regular folks? To date, my answers have been:
1) because the PCs are more risk-taking and thrill-seeking than regular folks (I've been operating under the assumption that the players are curious and the characters will go poke at anything supernatural-seeming.)
2) because given an undefined inch of the world, the GM is more likely to put something interesting there if the PCs are entering it
I am getting the sense that many posters here believe this list ought to be supplemented in some way, perhaps via:
3) a Character Creation process that demands change and encourages exploration
4) a suggestion that GMs start games with some dramatic event (possibly related to larger cosmic forces and plots)
My feeling is a very meta one -- these are the characters that, for whatever reason, we players have chosen to tell stories about. That means they will turn out to have been different from the average -- even if they didn't seem so at first -- because the really average ones are boring and turn out to lead average lives that we don't tell stories about. Some people think that this attitude breaks Sim, but frankly I don't see how you can avoid playing Shopkeepers and Storefronts if you insist that the PCs be truly average people. So even if I think of things from the most diehard Simulationist POV I can, I don't have a problem with a certain level of improbable events occuring -- it just turns out that we were telling the stories about people to whom these improbable events occurred. It is only when the level of improbability gets to where it's highly unlikely that *anyone* could have such a series of improbability that it breaks my Sim. IMHO, anyway. So I don't have a problem with this.
Quote from: Sydney Freedberg on June 19, 2006, 03:24:21 PM
The really brilliant thing in Unknown Armies is that the "trigger event" is made up as part of character creation: The player comes up with it, not the GM (although the GM has input), and it's already happened. So instead of the player making up a "normal" person and the the GM guessing at what might make an interesting "welcome to the world of adventure" kick-off, the player makes up something that he (or she) finds interesting and the character's already in motion when the game starts.
My co-creator is familiar with
Unknown Armies, I'll ask him about this.
We were thinking that characters should start off more or less like everyone else, to encourage identification with Humanity and "regular people". It's important to our thematic structure that PCs not feel a class apart. If we can come up with a way to do that
and to give PCs personal reasons to plumb ickyness at every opportunity then I'm all for it...
Quote from: Threlicus on June 19, 2006, 04:31:38 PM
As a player, I would find it cool if there *were* big-picture things that were meaningfully unknown.
I have plenty of big-picture things that are unknown... but
meaningfully unknown? Perhaps not. There's not currently a lot of incentive to investigate the origins of the Orcs, the shape of the world, the fate of the Ancients, the nature of the force in the Crater, etc. Partly, I think things that are large-scale in space or time are inherently
difficult for a handful of guys on horses to really solve. But making them try anyway, and giving them enough clues so that it isn't totally frustrating: I'm totally down with that.
In my current game, an unknown (weird-acting werewolves many miles away)
became meaningful (something destroyed an Imperial ship, we must blame someone!) and the adventure was born. But I also like the idea of longstanding mysteries, which people in this world might wonder about for their whole lives. Umm... I think my brainstorm batteries are running low right now.
Quote from: Threlicus on June 19, 2006, 04:31:38 PM
See, this is emblematic of how you're approaching the problem -- please, give me more lists of weird things to stick in the setting.
Yep. That is how I'm approaching the problem in this thread. It should be noted, though, that that also includes "please, give me more lists of elements and processes to help GMs create weird things to stick in the setting."
Quote from: Threlicus on June 19, 2006, 04:31:38 PM
I'm going to talk a bit about the generation system, which I *do* think will be hard to get right, and will actually prove to be the crucial part of the system.
No problem, if that's the part that interests you, go for it. Try to work with what I'm giving you, though. I can't really respond to any of your specific ideas (e.g. "characters create a bunker") because they hinge on me changing my philosophy to your philosophy first. Discussion of why my philosophy is what it is can be found here (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20115.0). I will respond to some of your more general arguments there.
Thanks,
-Dave
Okay, I lied. Sorry Threlicus, I couldn't find any place to address your suggestions. I've already got 3 threads going:
- setting material
- types of rewards systems that could work in my game (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20115.0)
- specific rewards systems that could work in my game
I don't want to start a 4th, "types of content-generation systems that could work in my game." I liked your idea of finding some way to ensure that world-consistency was a priority in generation, but the best way I can think of to do that is by providing world-consistent elements to use in that process. (Brainstorm lists! Brainstorm lists!)
Turning the generation system into a rewards system probably wouldn't work in my game (pending discussions in the middle thread above, linked for your convenience*), and just leaving it in the hands of GMs/players without providing any elements probably amounts to a "Feel free to make stuff up but try to make sure it fits!" note.
*To anyone checking out that thread, please read replies 15 & 16 and then scan prior arguments before responding. It's really hard to discuss a lot of this stuff without people being clear on the details of my current position.
just wading in with 2 cents.
someone psoted that medaevil peopke (and superstitious people in general) fear the unknown. the more unknown there is, the more fearful they are. This sounds right to me. and when something bad happens and they cant work out why, they invent bad things, because 'better the devil you know...'
But in your world, the bad things are real I suppose. This makes them known, which makes them less fearful. so how do you have known bad things and at the same time have the unknown? I think you hit the nail on the head before - you might know 'what', but you dont know 'how' or 'why'. how do the bad things make bad stuff happen, and more importantly, why do they do it. So I think that although you are trying to write a setting, maybe you shouldnt set motivations of the bad things in stone. If you leave that to the players, then you are giving them soemthing to do in your setting besides defend themselves against attack. Youre making it investagatory. There is scope there for a number of motivations for players other than pure defence.
have you played 'Paranoia' recently? I have fond memories of this game. Your character could be killed at any time, but of course you had 6 other clones. how fun was that game? the constant threat you talk about was there, because the players were always in a perpetual state of confusion, being knocked from pillar to post and doing stuff under orders and threat of death, but without understanding the whys and wherefores.
Quote from: David Berg on June 19, 2006, 05:03:45 PM
We were thinking that characters should start off more or less like everyone else, to encourage identification with Humanity and "regular people". It's important to our thematic structure that PCs not feel a class apart. If we can come up with a way to do that and to give PCs personal reasons to plumb ickyness at every opportunity then I'm all for it...
I think you may struggle with this. "Regular people", when presented with ickyness, would try to do anything to
avoid plumbing it. If you want players to create characters that
want to plumb ickyness at every opportunity, then those characters
aren't going to be regular people.Personally, I think the Unknown Armies way is a winner here. They are everyday, humdrum people until
something happened. And now that has happened, they are everyday, humdrum people who are driven - by this something - to go headlong into ickyness.
Quote from: David Berg on June 19, 2006, 03:10:13 PMOne complicating factor is that I want human beings and human culture to feel familiar and real. Thus, if the PCs had the same experiences as everyone else, they would be in the middle of some daemonic struggle etc. only very infrequently. So, why do the PCs have different experiences than regular folks? To date, my answers have been:
1) because the PCs are more risk-taking and thrill-seeking than regular folks (I've been operating under the assumption that the players are curious and the characters will go poke at anything supernatural-seeming.)
2) because given an undefined inch of the world, the GM is more likely to put something interesting there if the PCs are entering it
I am getting the sense that many posters here believe this list ought to be supplemented in some way, perhaps via:
3) a Character Creation process that demands change and encourages exploration
4) a suggestion that GMs start games with some dramatic event (possibly related to larger cosmic forces and plots)
Other ideas are welcome...
David,
I'm going to do an about-face here and retract my statements about using the mythology and putting the characters into the center of that. If you want your game to be about subtle fear of the unknown, about cold-war style paranoia, then...I don't know, throwing the characters into the stuff I mentioned constantly will make the game more about fantastic realities than it will make it about your original vision for play.
Stories about weird phenomena rely on the fact that the characters only encounter it in snips and glimpses, behind the efforts of daily life, to be effective as "weird" and create fear responses to it. Subtlety rather than blatancy.
The reason everyone was afraid of nuclear war wasn't because it had happened and we knew what it would be like, but because it never did, and yet...it could. All too easily. That's what was terrifying about it. The possibility, the real concrete possibility, rather than the reality.
Let me know if I'm off-track.
Man... Plenty of takers for theory discussion, but no one wants to add to my brainstorm lists...
I'll happily continue to clarify my positions (see below), but let me reiterate that
my hope for this thread is to get specific suggestions for stuff in the world. If anyone wants to put forward their opinions on a general strategy, I'd greatly appreciate it if you'd accompany those opinions with some usable examples.
Quote from: stefoid on June 27, 2006, 03:49:08 AM
But in your world, the bad things are real I suppose. This makes them known, which makes them less fearful.
Well, once you're hitting a monster with your sword, yeah, you know what that monster looks like. Please note, however, that because most monsters (and other types of Evil encounters) will be unique (thematic similarities over physical ones), knowledge of one does not confer knowledge of all.
Quote from: stefoid on June 27, 2006, 03:49:08 AM
I think you hit the nail on the head before - you might know 'what', but you dont know 'how' or 'why'. how do the bad things make bad stuff happen, and more importantly, why do they do it.
Right. Make the players feel threatened without understanding why or exactly how -- any suggestions of ways this could be pulled off?
Quote from: stefoid on June 27, 2006, 03:49:08 AM
So I think that although you are trying to write a setting, maybe you shouldnt set motivations of the bad things in stone. If you leave that to the players, then you are giving them soemthing to do in your setting besides defend themselves against attack.
The Evil Threat does have some defining characteristics (alien to this reality) and goals (destroy this reality and humanity). So, for now, assume that a given Evil Thing has motivations that are known to the GM but not the players. Giving players control over that sort of thing is part of the larger "players creating setting" topic in another thread.
Quote from: stefoid on June 27, 2006, 03:49:08 AM
Youre making it investagatory. There is scope there for a number of motivations for players other than pure defence.
I think being threatened by Evil is probably the best incentive to investigate it... though obviously some types of threats (regular abductions) lend themselves more to that than others (random attack by crazed abomination that fights til death). But I'm certainly open to other incentives as well...
Quote from: Warren on June 27, 2006, 05:47:51 AM
"Regular people", when presented with ickyness, would try to do anything to avoid plumbing it. If you want players to create characters that want to plumb ickyness at every opportunity, then those characters aren't going to be regular people.
It's a potential issue, certainly, but I don't think it's an automatic problem. I like to climb fences, as I think the fun is worth the risk, while many other people think that's a terrible trade-off. This doesn't mean I have no connection to or identification with those people in any general sense; it just means that in certain situations they'll think I'm crazy and I'll think they're wimpy.
It would be nice, of course, if characters had the sense that there was something to be gained by plumbing ickyness beyond just thrills and useless knowledge. Just some little extra incentive, more on the practical side. "If I learn about where monsters come from, I can get money / jobs / influence / allies" etc....
Quote from: Warren on June 27, 2006, 05:47:51 AM
Personally, I think the Unknown Armies way is a winner here. They are everyday, humdrum people until something happened. And now that has happened, they are everyday, humdrum people who are driven - by this something - to go headlong into ickyness.
I still like this idea, and encourage people to think about specific ways to apply it to creating characters for my game.
What happened, such that the characters now
have some different motivations from regular people, but are
not totally alienated from them?
Quote from: greyorm on June 27, 2006, 05:51:34 AM
The reason everyone was afraid of nuclear war wasn't because it had happened and we knew what it would be like, but because it never did, and yet...it could. All too easily. That's what was terrifying about it. The possibility, the real concrete possibility, rather than the reality.
And there were reminders that it could happen. Missile tests, remote armed conflicts, diplomatic breakdown, subtle and overt threats. The news media brought all this home to the American people, and Lendrhald has no news media, so the process will have to be very different. Mythology, cultural tradition, slowly-spreading word of mouth. Processes that demonstrate the subtle but deeply-affecting knowledge that Bad Stuff Is Out There and May Come To Get You. Such processes are one world feature I've been hoping for input on.
Quote from: greyorm on June 27, 2006, 05:51:34 AM
Let me know if I'm off-track.
The cold war parallel works better as a very general comparison than it does for any specifics... but I think you're on the right track.
I think the horribleness of the enemy is going to give rapidly diminishing returns. Theres more mileage in despair.
Make civilisation dependent on some MacGuffin that holds back the Dark.
Then show the characters that their corner of civilisation has only 6 months (or weeks, or years etc.) supply of MacGuffins left.
Hey David,
I really like the idea of this setting, which is why I keep coming back and checking on it. I think you may want to check out Earthdawn (http://www.earthdawn.com"), origionally by FASA, now with an edition by RedBrick in New Zeland (earthdawn.com link), and another by Living Room Games in the US. You could look up Earthdawn in wikipedia for a good overview of the setting. Much more fantasy than you may want with elves/orks/windlings (little faerie type people), etc. But one of the best aspects of the game is that it's set in a post apocalytic "re-emergence" from hundreds of years of underground hiding while "things" (Barsaivians call them Horrors) ravaged the surface during a surge in the magic level of reality. Many Kaers (hidden cities) were sumarily cracked open like freshly cooked clams, to various icky ends. One of the main premises in the setting is that Horrors "Mark" their victims, most of the Marks establish a form of telepathic communication, domination, feeding on feelings, etc. One of the recognizable side effects of being Horror Marked is that you will fail to create works of art. Any creative endevour is twisted by the Horror, consciously or unconsciously. There-fore, every Name-Giver in the land is taught at a young age at least one creative skill ("Artisan Skill"), and it has become a common ritual, that you must perform your Artisan Skill before they'll let you past the gates of any city/town. This is a great example of the "McGuffin" mentioned in the last post. And there's always the paranoia of "what if I can't see the corruption in this person's art"? The text give an example of a character accusing a fencing master of being "Marked" and the court demands an Artisan Test on the spot. He performs a massively complicated sword dance, twirling and cutting, exquisite foot work, masterfull handling of the blade, etc. Once finished, the lord looks to the accusing character, as everyone in the hall was really impressed at the Master's skill. The character (A Swordmaster Adept) non-chalantly replies, "While that may have fooled the court, and even some of my fellow Swordsmasters, and while excelling technically, you did not fool me. Each of the techniques and cuts you used would not have led to a clean death. Your opponents would have slowly, and with excruciating pain, bled to death. Some of them may have taken _days_ to die."
Earthdawn also has some really good Horror powers that you could add variations of to some of your BrainStorm Lists.
Namaste,
Joshua
So after reading though this thread I think I'm ready to add what may be inconsequential but may add some flavor to the setting. Recently I've been doing some research on the Black Death, a most notorious plague in our history and I'll come back to this in a minute, but keep it in mind.
First starvation, one thing that stuck from me early on was magic seems to be only though pacts with dark forces and some (most?) dark things in this land have the ability to or work towards defiling the land. When another poster brought up the value of food I thought the idea was great and fit the setting perfectly. When encountering such a creature whose very presence spoils the land if the characters are far from home starvation is quite possible even if they survive the encounter. No matter how great a warrior you may be without food or water you will die.
Now back to plagues and other fun things. As I was reading though various commentaries on the Black Death one thing that was mentioned was loss of faith in the church as they could do nothing to help the dying. This can mean a few things in game terms. First, there hasn't been much talk about government, they are unified and man tends to group in large walled cities. It's been mentioned that legends and myth are to be prevalent but the subject of religion has not been broached. What are the power structures in the realm, how do they protect themselves from the threat of evil? Have they too become tainted to grow their power before the inevitable fall? How do the commoners see the structures of power with a threat that at best can be only kept at bay for a time? What are the views of the political rulers towards the evil beyond the walls and who supports them? Have people become disillusioned with them as they continue to fail and if so who can they turn to? The moral of troops cannot be good when they know facing this evil can lead to fates far worse than death.
Ok there's what I have to add, but I like to say I like this concept.
As I have read through this thread, a lot of people have spoken about tension but IMHO, not a lot about letdown. I use this term to refer to the normal moments in the PC life. I see a couple of related issues...
1. How does the player know what is normal? I ask this because if there is too much horror, I would be wondering why the PC isn't living under a rock and being extremely xenophobic. My association with this would be a desire to isolate themselves from contant with the outside world. This tendency would counteract curiosity to some degree. I guess this would relate to the technique of making a safe haven only to destroy it later.
2. Does the player needs to know what safety is? i.e. do you need sessions where mundane things are done in order to balance out the extraordinary? In other words, I see some people (not necessarily anyone here) so worried about the horror that they end up making the horror "normal." The game world can't be too horrifying, otherwise (again this is just me) there is a sense of "why aren't these people either wiped out or prepared for "horror encounters."
In other words, don't let the pursuit of horror destroy the verisimilitude of the rest of the game.
My 2 cents,
Sean
Quote from: sean2099 on June 27, 2006, 10:52:14 PM
In other words, don't let the pursuit of horror destroy the verisimilitude of the rest of the game.
At various points in this thread, I have chimed in to remind people that the intent is for the feeling of Threat to be a persistent
background phenomenon that
doesn't much distort everyday life. Thus, whenever the PCs aren't actively seeking ickyness (or being sought by it), "normal" actions and interactions in a medieval setting should occur. Nice to know you're on board with this intent.
QuoteMan... Plenty of takers for theory discussion, but no one wants to add to my brainstorm lists...
I'll happily continue to clarify my positions (see below), but let me reiterate that my hope for this thread is to get specific suggestions for stuff in the world. If anyone wants to put forward their opinions on a general strategy, I'd greatly appreciate it if you'd accompany those opinions with some usable examples.
QuoteI think you hit the nail on the head before - you might know 'what', but you dont know 'how' or 'why'. how do the bad things make bad stuff happen, and more importantly, why do they do it.
Right. Make the players feel threatened without understanding why or exactly how -- any suggestions of ways this could be pulled off?
well, as for the 'how', I was thinking of stuff like the milk going bad for no reason. obviously caused by nasty evil things. how did they do it? why? Thats the kind of medevil mindset. In your setting, things are probably a little more upscaled. you want something a little more threatening than curdled milk. but the principle is the same.
option a) characters wake up to a commotion and find a monster in the cow shed, eating cows. a fight ensues, they kill it and go back to bed.
option b) characters wake up in the morning and find the village is encircled by neatly seperated cow halves (length wise).
the second option is more what I was thinking.
Quote
QuoteSo I think that although you are trying to write a setting, maybe you shouldnt set motivations of the bad things in stone. If you leave that to the players, then you are giving them soemthing to do in your setting besides defend themselves against attack.
The Evil Threat does have some defining characteristics (alien to this reality) and goals (destroy this reality and humanity). So, for now, assume that a given Evil Thing has motivations that are known to the GM but not the players. Giving players control over that sort of thing is part of the larger "players creating setting" topic in another thread.
err yeah, bad language on my part. Im thinking the GM is a player, but you the setting writer are not. So you the setting writer dont carve in stone exactly what the motivations of the Evil Thing are, and how it might accomplish them. You just give a few examples of the types of things that might happen in your game (supporting the background dread thing) and encourage the GM to come up with more of his own, and the motivations behind them. I mean, you can say the Evil Thing wants to destroy humanity and this reality. OK, but obviously its going to take a long time and its grand scheme involves many, many complicated sub schemes performed over a long time, otherwise why hasnt it just succeeded already. So any scenario in thi sgame is going to involve just a few of those little subplots in the grand scheme, and those subplots are not defined by you the setting creator.
Quote from: NN on June 27, 2006, 07:13:55 PM
I think the horribleness of the enemy is going to give rapidly diminishing returns. Theres more mileage in despair.
Agreed, facing weird atrocities over and over, even if they vary a good bit, will get old. In many circumstances, the impact of Evil Forces should be felt only indirectly.
Despair I like as an element of human culture, but overcoming that despair in order to fight on is also key. Not sure how best to present these...
Quote from: NN on June 27, 2006, 07:13:55 PM
Make civilisation dependent on some MacGuffin that holds back the Dark.
Then show the characters that their corner of civilisation has only 6 months (or weeks, or years etc.) supply of MacGuffins left.
I like this. I wouldn't want to have a large population clearly aware of such a thing, as that society would become pretty extreme pretty quickly. But there are still plenty of options:
1) small, isolated settlement that knows Evil will soon destroy it (of course, they'd have to also be incapable of convincing other humans to come help them)
2) small, isolated settlement that fears Evil may eventually destroy it, but doesn't know the specifics -- specifics the PCs may unearth, discovering the End Is Near
2a) same, but settlement oblivious -- PCs led to truth while pursuing something that initially seemed relatively unthreatening
3) larger area of human civilization full of disparate takes on the Evil Threat, with relatively few people in any state resembling panic -- PCs discover evidence that MacGuffins will run out in a few weeks / months / years
The cosmology I have set up actually
does say that all reality will be destroyed if certain things occur, including the failure of Humans to perform certain seasonal rituals. But no one (or almost no one) in the world is supposed to know for sure how this works, so I envision the PCs only gradually piecing together a vague idea of it over extended play. (Must be a reason why no one knows; don't want to snap PC perspective from grounded to cosmic too early or too quickly.)
Quote from: Certified on June 27, 2006, 09:08:20 PM
some (most?) dark things in this land have the ability to or work towards defiling the land. When another poster brought up the value of food I thought the idea was great and fit the setting perfectly. When encountering such a creature whose very presence spoils the land if the characters are far from home starvation is quite possible even if they survive the encounter. No matter how great a warrior you may be without food or water you will die.
This is an excellent idea that I can see working in a number of ways:
1) monster lays siege to a town without ever physically attacking anyone or even revealing its presence, working instead by making all the farmers' crops die
2) large area spoiled by corruption, PCs must make it through quickly before running out of food
3) smaller spoiled area, but time-consuming to leave (climb up? climb down? navigate magical confusion? maze?)
4) monster that tracks PCs, spoiling the land around them, hoping to eventually starve them
On the subject of complex methods of assaulting travelers, a monster with the ability to erase roads / trails would also be cool.
Quote from: Certified on June 27, 2006, 09:08:20 PM
It's been mentioned that legends and myth are to be prevalent but the subject of religion has not been broached.
Religion is another tool I hope to use to convey the desired tone. Thus far, the only efforts I've made on religions have been to:
1) drop disparate pieces of the true nature of the world (including Evil) into disparate faiths
2) make general beliefs in keeping with the cultural influences I've used (the Viking-esque men of the Northwest have some elements of Norse mythology in their religion)
3) state that varying degrees of religious adherence exists, with both complete zealots and complete atheists in the extreme minority
Quote from: Certified on June 27, 2006, 09:08:20 PM
What are the power structures in the realm, how do they protect themselves from the threat of evil?
The Empire defends various borders against various static sources of Evil (Orcs in the South, pit daemons in the Northwest, etc.). The independent nation of Palatine shares a fluctuating border with the Orcs, with constant fighting. As for protection versus unknown or transient threats, I've had no thoughts to date on governments' possible recourses...
Quote from: Certified on June 27, 2006, 09:08:20 PM
Have they too become tainted to grow their power before the inevitable fall? How do the commoners see the structures of power with a threat that at best can be only kept at bay for a time? What are the views of the political rulers towards the evil beyond the walls and who supports them? Have people become disillusioned with them as they continue to fail and if so who can they turn to? The moral of troops cannot be good when they know facing this evil can lead to fates far worse than death.
Most people
don't envision their community or society being wiped out in the near future. But for those who do (see responses to NN's "despair" idea above), yeah, ruler-commoner tensions would be a cool direction to explore.
In general, morale should be both bad (look what we're facing!) and well-fortified (we
must fight on, for the continued survival of Mankind!).
The impact of "ability to protect people from Orcs" has already been heavily factored into the story of who came to power when on a large scale. Perhaps some smaller-scale examples should be added too, of commoners who outright revolted against their rulers due to some Evil (non-Orc?) problem... Evil driving or influencing human communities to destroy themselves is good stuff... such a thing would serve as an example for brave stalwarts to say, "Have courage, stick together, don't be like Community X!"
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 27, 2006, 09:01:39 PM
I think you may want to check out Earthdawn (http://www.earthdawn.com"), originally by FASA, now with an edition by RedBrick in New Zeland (earthdawn.com link), and another by Living Room Games in the US.
Is all the cool stuff you mentioned in the FASA edition of Earthdawn? A friend of mine has it. I looked through it long ago, and don't remember
any of this (though that could just be a reflection on my memory)...
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 27, 2006, 09:01:39 PM
one of the best aspects of the game is that it's set in a post apocalytic "re-emergence" from hundreds of years of underground hiding while "things" (Barsaivians call them Horrors) ravaged the surface during a surge in the magic level of reality. Many Kaers (hidden cities) were sumarily cracked open like freshly cooked clams, to various icky ends.
A history of humans and human societies meeting awful fates at the hands of Evil is a must.
World mythology already includes a First Age, which was great until Evil got in and broke it, forcing the world to be re-created for the Second Age, which is the era that current humans understand and identify with.
The history of the Second Age is largely concerned with humans alternately spreading and being beaten back by Orcs, with an overall pattern of Orc progress and human defeat. The whole Southeastern Kingdom has fallen to the Orcs, and some good stories should definitely be tied into that -- frightened humans huddling in hidden cities in the mountains is already one piece.
Beyond what I've already created, though, I think I see the potential for a lot more good stuff in this direction, using distinct eras, memorable fates of significant populations, and scourges other than Orcs.
Brainstorm:
1) periods of having to protect yourself vs Evil in extreme ways
1a) nighttime deadly unless you're surrounded by light (shadow daemons?)
1b) outdoors deadly unless you're covered with cool mud (monster with infravision?)
1c) poisoned air - purify breaths with charmed masks
1d) poisoned water - purify with holy vessel
2) some period when a major city was abandoned because some powerful Evil took up residence there
3) non-farming societies (hunter-gatherers/fishermen?) who were forced to be nomadic, because some Evil followed them, catching up whenever they settled in a spot
4) non-farming societies (hunter-gatherers/fishermen?) who were forced to live in awful conditions (swamps? underground? desert? coastal caves? barren mountain peaks?) as a form of hiding from Evil (flying monsters? burrowing monsters?)
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 27, 2006, 09:01:39 PM
One of the main premises in the setting is that Horrors "Mark" their victims, most of the Marks establish a form of telepathic communication, domination, feeding on feelings, etc. One of the recognizable side effects of being Horror Marked is that you will fail to create works of art. Any creative endevour is twisted by the Horror, consciously or unconsciously.
Yeah, it's been discussed that perhaps fighting an Evil Thing (winning? losing? regardless?) should affect you in some subtle way. Wandering into the wrong place or looking at the wrong object may also curse you.
What manifestations (testable or not) of being tainted by Evilness could be fun?
1) can't create works of beauty
2) can't perform holy rituals
3) blessed items burn you
4) sunlight and/or moonlight hurts your eyes and/or skin
5) choke on particularly pure water or air
6) have no shadow / reflection
7) can't perceive works of beauty (singing is garbled noise, perfume reeks, paintings are chaotic nonsense, etc.)
8) certain sigils appears on certain body parts
9) anything in continuous contact with you for X time begins to rot / melt / corrode
10) animals run from you
11) those with sensitivity to Evil can see darkness / mark / sigil that is above / around / covering you
12) various other signs that tell you more clearly that something is wrong (inability to keep down food, awful smell, can't sleep, etc.)
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 27, 2006, 09:01:39 PM
There-fore, every Name-Giver in the land is taught at a young age at least one creative skill ("Artisan Skill"), and it has become a common ritual, that you must perform your Artisan Skill before they'll let you past the gates of any city/town.
The idea that some places test you for some forms of taintedness is cool. Maybe:
1) a town that's had too many cursed people enter and somehow endanger the people there, and has devised some mostly-accurate way of identifying a certain curse / all curses / any contact with Evil
2) a town that's simply superstitious and administers "witches float"-type tests (superstition lent weight by myths / history / knowledge of town #1 above)
QuoteIs all the cool stuff you mentioned in the FASA edition of Earthdawn? A friend of mine has it. I looked through it long ago, and don't remember any of this (though that could just be a reflection on my memory)...
Hey David!
If your friend has just the basic book, then there's some pretty good stuff at the end near the creatures/Horrors section. I'll dip into the RedBrick Compilation that I just got (two over 500 page books with just about all the important setting stuff, and a smoothed out rules set).
QuoteFoolish Name-givers! Knowledge is a powerful tool in this age of magic. Knowledge of the Horrors, however, invites their touch upon your mind and heart. The wise Name-giver will remember this and be wary.
• Vasdenjas, Great Dragon, Master of Secrets •
As Names are important to the magical nature of reality in the setting, reading the Name of a Horror in a book may open a channel to possible taint.
Here's a breakdown of some of the cool horror powers:
- Animate Dead: Your basic trap the fleeing soul back into the body, and manipulate it to the Horror's ends. Many Horrors allow the trapped soul to retain almost total consciousness, just to get a buzz off the despair the soul feels at having to obey it's every whim. This can lead to situation such as an undead told, "Do not allow any living thing other than me to pass this gate." At this point, characters may in fact end up talking to the undead as it stands stoicly in front of them, learning back-story, etc, until one of them crosses the line of the door, when suddenly the face of the withered corpse collapses in despair, whispers "I'm sorry" and begins to thrash the characters.
- Corrupt Reality: "Typical effects of Corrupt Reality include the everpresent "eye" images associated with Aazhvat Many-Eyes, as well as the fouling of food and drink, the creation of eerie sounds or changes in temperature, the transformation of mundane objects into slime-covered monstrosities, and the induced rapid decay
of inanimate objects." - Damage Shift: Allows the Horror to transfer the damage it just took from one attack on-to anyone within touch or sight distance (range varies by horror). Icky thing in the system is that this doesn't take an action. May be used once or multiple times per round (again, caries by Horror).
- Disrupt Magic: The ability to pick apart the astal patterns of spell/enchantments/powers.
- Dream Shape: Ability to enter and control victims dreams. Can be used to plant false information, induce desired mental states/emotions, or just plain torture.
- Forge Horror Construct: twist a living or dead being into a monstrocity that will follow it's masters bidding.
- Karma Boost: Allows the horror to offer marked characters bits of it's own power to use. Each bit of power accepted allows for a change of further corruption into a Horro Construct. This usually translates into a whole lot of bonus dice available for the character to use on various things.
- Skin Shift: One of the nastier attack powers, this rips the victims skin away from the muscles and ligaments, and rotates in around his/her body. This could leave the mouth somewhere on the side of the head for example. Lots of nasty dice penalties apply to the victim in addition to damage.
- Though Worm: A type of mental domination, the Horror, once it has succeded in planting a thought worm, has the option to offer suggestions to the character. Failing to act on these suggestion allows the Horror a ranged damage test (1,000 mile radius). Acceptance of the suggestion earns the character (pc or npc) Legend Points (basically experience points). If they deny the suggenstion, in addition to damage, the next suggestion carries a greater reward of Legend Points.
- Many horrors also cast spells, usually of the Nethermantic school.
These are listed as generic Horror powers, common to many types of horrors. Named or Unique horrors may get unique powers that related to their niche in the game.
For example, the Named Horror Fla Tra Lys, a Named Bloatform, has this description:
This slow, globular-shaped Horror has six short, thick tentacles. When it moves, bulky masses shift and rotate beneath its scabby hide. A shimmering haze rises from it, and it emits a cool, sterile smell like rubbing alcohol. Unlike other bloatforms, Fla Tra Lys cannot float. Survivors of Fla Tra Lys's attacks named the Horror "the Eater of Music" for its horrible effect on music. The Horror uses a unique magical effect to turn music played in its vicinity into wretched, grating noises. Apparently the Horror delights in the disquiet this causes and often manifests where music is being played.
And is known for offering artistic suggestions to victims, which if acted upon create weird, unsettling, and horrifying peices of art. It also rewards those it acts as muse to by hinting at locations of legendery treasure.
Joshua-
Thanks for taking the time to type all these powers up. Some of them (Dream Shape, some of Corrupt Reality) are already on my lists (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=20099.msg210260#msg210260), but many others I think I can adapt and add.
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
[li]Animate Dead: Your basic trap the fleeing soul back into the body[/li]
[li]Forge Horror Construct: twist a living or dead being into a monstrocity that will follow it's masters bidding.[/li]
[li]Thought Worm: A type of mental domination[/li]
[li]Karma Boost: Allows the horror to offer marked characters bits of it's own power to use.[/li]
I like this, as well as various other forms of "leave humans in a horrible state for some purpose" (most of these effects could be instant or gradual):
- rigging corpses to explode
- twisting the body into something the monster controls while the mind is unaltered and powerless
- trapping consciousness in a dead body that slowly rots
- mental control over actions
- implanted suggestions that take effect when somehow triggered (known or unknown)
- "marking" people, with ability to affect them in subtler ways over distance, including:
- tempting them with offers of power
- punishing them with pain if they resist commands
Various ways to accomplish these:
- coat person in something they can't entirely remove
- inject egg / organ / goo / poison / seed / thorn / worm into person
- prolonged visual contact
- prolonged physical contact
- burn mark into person
- pheromones / gas
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
the creation of eerie sounds or changes in temperature
the transformation of mundane objects into slime-covered monstrosities
I'll add these to my other "corrupt reality" effects...
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
This slow, globular-shaped Horror has six short, thick tentacles.
When it moves, bulky masses shift and rotate beneath its scabby hide.
A shimmering haze rises from it
it emits a cool, sterile smell like rubbing alcohol.
...and these to my "monster appearance" elements.
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
[li]Damage Shift: Allows the Horror to transfer the damage it just took from one attack on-to anyone within touch or sight distance[/li]
Described thus, this is too metagamey for my taste, but I bet there's an in-game way to achieve the same results: Every time a PC strikes the monster with any hand-held weapon, the monster automatically delivers some attack via this touch connection. It could be:
- some mystical version of an electric shock (cold / heat / fear / energy drain)
- an unavoidably fast physical response.
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
[li]Skin Shift: One of the nastier attack powers, this rips the victims skin away from the muscles and ligaments, and rotates in around his/her body.[/li]
This is a potentially cool version of the "mutilate characters" monster capability... I'll have to think about which kinds of effects will be effectively horrifying and which will seem nonsensical and contrived...
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
[li]Disrupt Magic: The ability to pick apart the astal patterns of spell/enchantments/powers.[/li]
Spells/powers may not come up, but enchantments definitely.
Quote from: Telarus, KSC on June 28, 2006, 04:06:22 PM
The Horror uses a unique magical effect to turn music played in its vicinity into wretched, grating noises. Apparently the Horror delights in the disquiet this causes and often manifests where music is being played.
Hmm... The idea of monsters who appear where their powers can best be used is interesting:
- corrupted bits of the world might generate monsters in response to certain stimuli
- certain bodiless daemons might choose to take on physical forms when they find a situation to their liking
Destroying human knowledge or culture (e.g. music) nicely expresses the nature of the Evil Threat as long as this a) occurs incidentally (monsters going on raids to wipe out flutes is dumb) or b) occurs for an actual reason that benefits the monster (allows it to escape from the world or destroy the world, or at least brings it closer).
Are you still looking to identify an Evil Threat, or do you have one in mind already? The reason I ask is that I would expect ane vil intended to be thematic would need to be consistent and identifiable, have some sort of underlying logic that can be recognised. Hodge-podge evil isn't very scary IMO, things need to have a sense of coherency to feel really dangerous I think.
I also wnated to suggest soemthing else, which is that you express some of the deapsir mechanically or grapically. I once proposed a visual display of the characters soul, so the player could watch it descend and know that the character would go to hell when it died. I think if you want players to keep something in mind, it has to appear before them in some form. Call of Cthulhu is famous for its sense of attritional helplessness, although I did not enjoy this personally.
Quote from: contracycle on June 30, 2006, 06:24:54 AM
Are you still looking to identify an Evil Threat, or do you have one in mind already? The reason I ask is that I would expect an evil intended to be thematic would need to be consistent and identifiable, have some sort of underlying logic that can be recognised.
Right. Recognition is not intended to be easy or definitive, but experience should show a general pattern.
The Evil Threat is fundamentally alien and inimical to humanity, life, and our reality. It is toxic, destroying without creating, melting stuff into formless sludge. It comes from a state of perpetual flux of physical laws, and can sometimes produce similar localized effects within our reality. It has no goals or desires other than those that contribute toward the destruction of humanity and the world (or, in the cases of highly intelligent individual daemons, escape from the world).
Quote from: contracycle on June 30, 2006, 06:24:54 AM
I also wnated to suggest soemthing else, which is that you express some of the deapsir mechanically or grapically.
If I can do that without being too heavy-handed, without making it the single dominant thematic concern of the game, without coercing players to play stuff they ain't feelin', then it might be cool. Something that formally keeps track of the characters' reactions to evil as already played might be best.
"Despair" probably isn't even the right word to describe what the characters ought to take away from interacting with the world; I kind of expect they'll more
encounter despair than be seriously burdened with it themselves. Despair isn't much fun to play for more than a session or so. Learning too much about Evil and where it comes from should drive them insane... learning lesser amounts might scar them in lesser ways...
You have DECRIBED the Evil Threat, but you have not told me if you already have one in mind. ASre yoiu asking us to comie up with an Evil Threat, or to expand upon yours? If the latter, we will need to know what it is.
Quote from: contracycle on July 03, 2006, 03:59:07 AM
You have DECRIBED the Evil Threat, but you have not told me if you already have one in mind.
Uh... the one I have in mind is the one I've described. If you want a name for it, call it Pandemonium, Chaos, or Cthulhu. I've found it most constructive to refer to it by its role, "Evil Threat".
Quote from: contracycle on July 03, 2006, 03:59:07 AM
ASre yoiu asking us to comie up with an Evil Threat, or to expand upon yours? If the latter, we will need to know what it is.
It
is what it
does.
I'm not really asking for people to expand upon the Evil Threat specifically. I'm asking for people to expand upon the things in the world that will contribute to the desired aesthetic. My second post describes some general areas for development that I feel might contribute to this.
Have you read P. C. Hodgell's novels, Godstalk, Dark of the Moon, and Seeker's Mask? The ultimate enemy in those is, conceptually, the same as yours: a being of primal chaos that attacks creation by corrupting the essences of things. Dark of the Moon, specifically, focuses on servants of the enemy, called "changers", whose bodies have become plastic, to the point where they can impersonate almost anybody (though they need to drink blood from their victims.) And in land under the enemy's influence, corpses that haven't been cremated reanimate to hunt the living.
Quote from: Michael Brazier on July 04, 2006, 01:08:49 AM
servants of the enemy, called "changers", whose bodies have become plastic, to the point where they can impersonate almost anybody (though they need to drink blood from their victims.)
I like the ominous and unnerving element to an enemy adept at infiltration. Unfortunately, I don't like the idea of people not trusting their neighbors (cuz they might actually be Evil Doppelgangers!). It's probably best if the in-game popular conception of such things includes a certain niche (powerful people?) which removes most of the populace from suspicion but nevertheless leaves the shapechangers considerable influence. Maybe history includes a few memorable incidents of key officials or landowners being replaced by shapechangers, and then using their power for horrible ends...
Quote from: Michael Brazier on July 04, 2006, 01:08:49 AM
And in land under the enemy's influence, corpses that haven't been cremated reanimate to hunt the living.
Burial practices designed specifically to stop such things would be a perfect addition to human culture. Something memorable and interesting, without seeming wacky or silly (cremation obviously make sense, but players have seen that and may assume there's nothing more to know about it). Maybe a burial where the body is restrained in some fashion that is mostly ornamental but also effective? Chains running around the waist (plus maybe a decorative "buckle") and behind some sort of heavy bier that's interred with the dead? There are probably some practical issues with that, I'll think more on this...
P.S. No, I haven't read anything by Hodgell.
Interesting though it is, this thread has now reached the point where enough information has been posed and exchanged. If anyone wants to spawn daughter threads (preferably in Actual Play), that would be fine.
Best, Ron
Quote from: Ron Edwards on July 06, 2006, 12:02:54 PM
this thread has now reached the point where enough information has been posed and exchanged. If anyone wants to spawn daughter threads (preferably in Actual Play), that would be fine.
I'm going to take some time, go through all the feedback in this thread, work on some lists, and eventually create some threads focused on more specific elements of "hostile fantasy setting." I'm not sure how long this will take me. In the meantime, anyone who wants to respond to my ideas and aims as expressed in this thread, feel free to PM me.
Thanks,
-David
I should have been more clear. This thread is now closed.
Best, Ron