[PTA] PTA/Changeling combo, and use of magic in PTA

[Standback]

I've just come across White Wolf's "Changeling: The Lost," and I was completely blown away. I love the basic concept: the players play ordinary people who were kidnapped by fairies, enslaved and tortured, and when they finally escape, they discover they can't fit in back in the home they were taken from - they're seperated by a gulf of years, and often they've been supplanted by a fae changeling who now knows their life and family better than they do.

This concept just seems to me so rich in potential, such a springboard with so many different possibilities and variations, that I'm more excited about C:TL than I've been about a roleplaying game in many a year. The thing is, I'm wondering if I might be able to adapt Changeling into a PTA game - since PTA seems to me much better-suited to the dramatic, character-oriented games I'm imagining than the White Wolf World of Darkness system.

Now, nothing's stopping me from just presenting that core concept I like so much, finding players who are interested, and taking it from there. That's almost certainly what I'm going to try. Still, I was wondering if anybody else has done anything similar before - adapting an existing game (and I think adapting a game might be a big difference than adapting a TV show or a book, for example) to PTA. I'd be interested in advice, or just anecdotes of what was tried and how it worked out. My biggest concern is how much information a game system has - PTA is geared toward minimal pre-established information, and I'm wondering how playing around with that guideline might work out. With Changeling, for example, I certainly don't have to have the same Fae Courts, the Hedge between our world and Faerie, the different types of changelings, etc., that the original system does... but would having them, or some of them, in the background add to the game, or detract?

A second question I've been mulling over for a while, but the Changeling business has brought it to the fore. I've been wondering how well PTA and magic work together. There have been a lot of approaches to working magic into different roleplaying games (Changeling's, I'll add, has a neat twist to it ); most of them tend to involve long, long lists of what types of magic and effects are available, how, and to whom. Now, in general, I'd expect a PTA magic-user to work just like every other skill or edge works - you give a general description (as an edge, or as part of the character concept) - say "Illusion Crafter" "Hermetic Demonologist," "New-Age Witch," etc., and it's up to the player to invent and describe magic-use that fits that description. I'm wondering, though, if that might not always be enough. Magic seems much less restricted to me than most other descriptions and edges - you can always invent a spell that does whatever suits this specific situation, and PTA lacks the background material to rule what might be feasible and what won't be. If someone's allowed to come up with the perfect spell for every occasion, won't that start feeling artificial very quickly, even if the New-Age Witch does do it with crystals and incense? On the less extreme, munchkined-out edge of the scale - as a player, I think I'd be very hesitant to introduce new effects I haven't done before. "Am I allowed to?" I'd wonder. "Is this too much? Am I cheating? Am I holding myself in?" I wouldn't know what my own character was capable of doing, at least not until I'd played enough to establish his style and use of magic.

I'd be happy to hear about experiences of how magic has been used in PTA games, successfully or otherwise...


Thanks

[chance.thirteen]

You could "use" The Lost to define the characters, especially what magic should be easy or hard for them. Since you wouldn't be using their dramatic resolution mechanisms, you would be free to allow more or less budget to build a character. Then you just use it for guidelines to how to describe the scenes, be in trivial about the limits of a Contract, or deciding how hard a time someone has overcoming some challenge on a narrative level.

PS, I would love to see someone play The Lost with Don't Rest Your Head

[Alan]

Hi Standback,

...the players play ordinary people who were kidnapped by fairies, enslaved and tortured, and when they finally escape, they discover they can't fit in back in the home they were taken from - they're seperated by a gulf of years, and often they've been supplanted by a fae changeling who now knows their life and family better than they do.

If I were to run this, I would simply use the PTA rules as written with no adjustments. This concept suggests many possible protagonists and great Issues. Beyond the sentence quoted above, I would let background get developed by the group during the pitch session, the pilot, and the series. You might offer the book around for inspiration but don't treat anything as canon unless someone (including the Producer) brings it into play.

Magic works great in PTA. Your group can decide in the pitch session who gets to use magic and how big the effects can be and the cost of those effects -- all in broad, descriptive terms. To create a magic-using protagonist, the player just says "My  protagonist is a hedge wizard (or whatever)" and now he or she gets to describe the character using hedge magic in play. No edges or connections are required. Scope of the magic is defined by the description the group came up with earlier and whether the magic actually produces any effect on the story is mediated by the regular conflict mechanic.

Easy. Try it.