This is what I'm gunna play with my freinds

[TempvsMortis]

I'll be sure to get you a transcript or something afterward. I thought of some awesome stuff and my friends have never heard of Shock:, so we're gunna start out with this setting, maybe do a fresh one later.

Issue: Disparity (Not just in class, but in civilization. Think 1st world vs 3rd world, only amplify the magnitude ^N, because what is science fiction good for if not extremity?)

Shock: Immortality (The people at the top of the civilizational ladder live forever)

Issue: Societal Rot (Despite all of their technology and social services, the people at the top are a slowly decaying civilization, like all empires, and are rotting from the inside)

Paraxes: Intelligence / Common Sense ----------- Subversion / Aggression

(Aggression doesn't just mean violence, it also means being assertive and straight forward, as opposed to being sneaky and sly.)

Minutiae:
-There are two levels of civilization: the Sky-Dwellers and the Earth-Dwellers
-The Earth-Dwellers live in a post-apocalyptic Mad Max-like dark ages, ruled by marauding gangs and warlords
-The Sky-Dwellers live in a series of giant floating city-states, and avoid coming down at all cost, and barely even visit each-other
-The Sky-Cities are not self sufficient, so they must periodically send down ships to harvest plants, animals, and minerals for their cities, though they never leave their ships.
-The Sky-Dwellers are stagnant, and though they have space-tech they never leave Earth because they have no desire to expand or explore (think "The City and the Stars" by Arthur C. Clarke if you've read it)
-Immortality requires regular gene therapy treatments
-The Sky-Dwellers haven't just outlawed murder, they've outlawed death, so not only is the death-penalty gone but you aren't allowed to deny a citizen his immortality treatments
-(This is the big one) Due to a lax social environment, opaque bureaucracy, and most of all the unknown and/or ignored side-effects of the immortality treatments, the Sky-Dwellers are all going completely insane (hence Societal Rot)
-Sky-Dwellers are in denial about their growing insanity
-In the law of all Sky-Dweller city-states, there is no legal state of insanity, so no-one can be denied their rights of attorney because of it (or their positions in power)

I own Disparity, that way my character can address Societal Rot. I already know who he is, so it'll be awesome. As for minutiae, this may seem like a lot, but it's not. There's nothing about legal code there, or anything much about Earth-Dweller society or relations between Sky-Cities, plus I don't know what my friends will play as, so it'll be interesting.

My Protag is named Troy Parsonyan, resident of the Sky-Dweller City-State of Argon (I thought making the Sky-Dwellers feel a little Greek would be nice).

Intelligence---------------------------Subversion-------
-------| 4 |-------------------------------------| 5 |------------
Common Sense--------------------Aggression------

Story Goal: Change Society

Antagonist: The System

Features: Sane, Influential, Refuses Immortality Treatment

Links: Government Friend, Insane Wife

You see what's happened here? He's famous in part because he chooses mortality, but he chooses it because he's seen what it's done to his wife, who he can't even live with any more because it's so bad. Of course he's tried to force her off of it, but she refuses, and because their is no legal state "Insanity" or whatnot in their system he can't seize legal powers and deny it to her. Thus, he must show everyone how their system is broken and the Immortality is saving their flesh but destroying their minds, so that he can save his wife and hopefully return her to normal. Unfortunately, the systems in societies rarely like change, and this is one operated by near-lunatics, so it's not a pleasant task, though it's helped by having friends in high places.

My inspiration for this was a distortion of, "In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is King."
My dad always says, "In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is in an Asylum."

[Ben Lehman]

Hey, man.

You really, really, really ought to strongly consider playing by the rules, and coming up with shocks and issues as a group.

In my experience, frontloading shocks and issues like this results in flat, boring, formulaic play.

yrs--
--Ben

[TempvsMortis]

I was gunna end up suggesting these things anyway. The problem is it's been a few days so these things have had time to stew over in my head whether I like it or not, but of course once I think of them I couldn't imagine *not* thinking of them. Besides, I'm totally open to changing stuff if they want, though the minutiae I put up there are pretty key just to my Protag. They have to exist or his story isn't possible. Also I told my friend about the issues and shocks I thought of, and he said they were really awesome, so we'll see.

[Mickey]

Sorry to be following you around like a bad smell Tempvs xP

I'm not familiar with shock, but that back story sounds nice. The part about the insane wife sounds juicy!

[Ben Lehman]

I was gunna end up suggesting these things anyway. The problem is it's been a few days so these things have had time to stew over in my head whether I like it or not, but of course once I think of them I couldn't imagine *not* thinking of them. Besides, I'm totally open to changing stuff if they want, though the minutiae I put up there are pretty key just to my Protag. They have to exist or his story isn't possible. Also I told my friend about the issues and shocks I thought of, and he said they were really awesome, so we'll see.

Dude, but ... come up with your protag as part of a group, after you've come up with shocks and issues together, right?

Shock: works best with no prep. I realize that this is wildly different from what you might expect, but doing solo preparation alone (our shocks and issues are gonna be this! I'm gonna play this character!) is breaking the rules of the game as much as saying "Rocks fall, everyone dies" is breaking the rules of D&D.

Now, you might be like "fuck the rules! they're keeping me down." But ... I strongly suggest you give it a go, by the rules, your first time. After that, maybe give it a go with all this preparation and compare the difference.

yrs--
--Ben

[TempvsMortis]

Mrp... Yeah, I guess. Durnit! This is so awesome though! If it were really stupid I would just chuck it, but it's not! I can already see a million different awesome endings for my Antag, and I know there are a million I can't imagine! Blarg, why is life so cruel?