Black Rock City

[violet]

I'm running Dogs soon! This is my first town, so I thought I'd drop it here and see whatall everyone thinks.

I need to flesh out a few more NPCs (one other NPC, a Faithful prostitute who wants the Dogs to please get her husband to stop working in the oil pits; it's such dangerous work, and she can provide for them both). I also think Brother Cavill might need to be inflated a little (three-dimensional-like), but I'm not too worried about that, since I think I'll be playing him a fairish bit.

BLACK ROCK CITY

Black Rock City used to just be the dusty town of Black Rock, a little trading stop for farmers and those heading west. That is, until some enterprising folks from back east showed up, strangely interested in the worthless, greasy black rocks covering the hills around the town. They started hiring and bringing in silver miners--some Faithful, some not--and digging for oil. With those miners have come families, stores, jobs, and prosperity.

SOMETHING'S WRONG

As far back as anyone (at least, any white settler) can remember, the people of Black Rock have had a symbiotic relationship with the mountain folk, with lots of healthy trade. More and more mountain folk have been moving to the town, though, and cracks between the mountain folk and Faithful are starting to appear. The Steward and his daughter are happy to minister to them and see the flock grow, but they're considerably in the minority; the white settlers are unhappy about the mountain folk competing for work and diluting the Faith with their presence, and the mountain folk are increasingly unhappy with the way they've been treated; some of them resent their dependence on the town. There has been violence in the town--mostly white townsfolk defending their town against mountain folk. Nobody has been killed yet, but it's just a matter of time.

On top of it all, the oil mines are proving increasingly dangerous. Two workers were killed last week--a Faithful and a non-Faithful, both white. Of course, everyone blames everyone else for those accidents, which doesn't help much.

PRIDE

What started as a small operation with a couple of bore holes has been stretching further and further into mountain folk territory. Pollution from the oil mines has been driving animals further away, making hunting harder, and making some of the mountain folk sick. The drill owners (some Faithful, some not) see it as their right to conquer the land and take what they need. The rest of the townsfolk like the prosperity the mines have brought to Black Rock, and thus more or less agree.

INJUSTICE

The mountain folk have become more and more reliant on trade with the town -- more are picking up and moving there every month.  With more hands to go around, even the relatively steady stream of labor needed by the mines can't keep everyone in work. Some of the white settlers--including the Steward's brother--aren't happy about this, and they're pressuring other townsfolk and the Steward to kick the mountain folk out. Thus, the mountain folk in town are finding it harder and harder to get work, stores won't sell to them (or sell at exorbitant prices), and the mountain folk who've come to depend on the town's trade are finding the townsfolk hostile and unwilling to deal with them. The mountain folk aren't taking this lying down -- there have been a few mountain folk raids on caravans that haven't killed anyone (yet).  There have also been an increasing number of accidents on the oil rigs, most recently drowning two rig workers, a mountain folk man and a white man, both Faithful. The white settlers, of course, blame the mountain folk for sabotage.

SINS

Violence - White townsfolk have attacked mountain folk living in town, though nobody's been killed so far. White townspeople dressed as mountain folk attack and burn a caravan on its way into town, killing several people.

Greed + Lust - Opportunistically, the mayor sets up a brothel, getting increasingly desperate mountain folk women to take positions as prostitutes.

DEMONIC ATTACKS

The demons have been sitting in the ground, waiting. Now released, They're poisoning the earth and streams, making it harder for the mountain folk to hunt, and making them sick.

They've whispered in the ear of the Steward's brother and his followers. They've told them the faith is being diluted by the mountain folk. They've told them they need to protect it. They've told them how.

They've been planting desperation in the hearts of the mountain folk women and having them turn to prostitution. In time, desperation will turn to anger, and prostitution to violent resistance.

They have held back the oil until just the right moment to drown the workers. In time, they will release fire.

FALSE DOCTRINE

MOUNTAIN FOLK ARE LESS THAN THE WHITE SETTLERS; CONVERTED MOUNTAIN FOLK ARE NOT TRUE FAITHFUL.

CORRUPT WORSHIP

The Steward's brother, with the mayor's blessing, starts organizing alternative services for the white townsfolk--Faithful and non-Faithful both, so long as they're white. They're convincing them that the mountain folk are destroying their faith and their town.

FALSE PRIESTHOOD

The Steward's brother has been led astray. He is organizing a schism. And he has support.

SORCERY

The demons are leading the Steward's brother, showing him the most potent ways to gain power through a racial war.

HATE AND MURDER

Caravan drivers and families are killed by (ostensibly) a mountain folk attack; the townsfolk are calling for justice, by which they probably mean blood.

WHAT DO THE TOWNSPEOPLE WANT FROM THE DOGS?

STEWARD JACOB (THOMAS) wants the Dogs to bolster his authority, help him regain control of the town, and help him convert the Mountain Folk. He thinks that if they were more integrated with the Faith, these problems wouldn't be happening.

He thinks his brother, BROTHER CAVILL, is bitter and unhappy since    he lost his job as a horse hand and had to take up mining. STEWARD    JACOB has tried talking to him, but CAVILL thinks he's too    soft. Maybe if the Dogs talked to him...?

He also wants the dogs to gently steer his daughter towards    becoming a Dog. He thinks that she is kind, compassionate, and    pious, but he fears that she may be too drawn towards the mountain    folk.

SISTER KAITLIN (THOMAS) is the Steward's daughter. She wants the Dogs to help her father's efforts at reconciling the whites and the mountain folk. She also wants the Dogs to help her marry a mountain folk man she's fallen in love with, either by convincing her father it's right (despite his relative open-mindedness, she's afraid to approach him herself--with good reason), or by marrying them outright.

Her husband is SIERRA IMA's brother, SINEA ALAM. She'd also like    help converting him to the Faith, since he has thus far resisted.

BROTHER CAVILL (THOMAS) is the Steward's brother, and is himself a miner. He wants the Dogs to kick out Steward Jacob (his brother), kick out the mountain folk, and install him as Steward. Failing that, he would accept just kicking the mountain folk out.

SIERRA IMALAI is a mountain folk prostitute. She's recently converted, and she wants the Dogs to reassure her that what she's doing is right, because she has to do it to survive.

BROTHER SAMUEL is the Mayor. He wants the Dogs to turn a blind eye to his brothel and leave the (highly profitable) oil drilling operations alone. He's cautiously supportive of BROTHER CAVILL--the mountain folk are mostly poor and, he reasons, lazy, and they don't contribute much to the town. Still, he doesn't want a racial war, and he doesn't want his brothel to run dry.

DEAN MATTEWSON is an Oil Man. He doesn't care what the Dogs do so long as his drills keep on drilling. He will kill to keep them going.

THE DEMONS want the Dogs to let the drilling continue, and to let the tensions between the white settlers and the mountain folk escalate until there's a racial war; this can happen whether or not BROTHER CAVILL is leading it.

WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF THE DOGS NEVER CAME

BROTHER CAVILL will gain more and more adherents, and the violence in town will continue to escalate. At some point, Steward Jacob will learn of the alternate prayer services, but at that point, he'll be powerless to do anything. At some point, a flashpoint will occur, some fragment of violence that sets off a complete schism of Black Rock from the Faith, and unleashes a genocidal war.