[Paladin] The Paladin Enlightened: Setting, Characters, Code

[Joshua Tompkins]

We (Myself, James Nostack, and Zubon-do, whose name unfortunately escapes me) had our second prep session of Paladin last night.  For those following along at home, this is a continuation of threads over in Actual Play and here in the Anvilwerks forum.  I'm going to try to summarize what we eventually came up with last night, but there were (by far) too many cool ideas to mention them all here.  As James put it, we were blessed with "an avalance of coolness" last night.  If you're interested, the raw transcripts are here (112k PDF version here), or, if you're lucky enough to be using Mac OS X, the styled Colloquy transcripts are here.

Some of this is going to be repeated from other threads, but hopefully any interested newcomers will be able to jump into the game after reading this stuff, without having to dig into hours of IRC transcripts or jump between multiple threads.

Okay, here we go, in order of appearance:

Setting

In brief, the game is set in an alternate history version of Enlightenment Europe, probably somewhere in France (Paris, most likely, since that's where the group's nominal headquarters is).  The basic timeframe is very late 18th century (1780-1790), but as this is an alternate history, playing around with the timeline is not only acceptable, it's expected.  What we're going for here is a backdrop of revolution (the American revolution is going on, and the French one looms ever closer), so when you think of the setting, think stress, because there's going to be a lot of it, politically, socially, and culturally.

We've been throwing a few Gnostic concepts around a lot in setting prep.  If you're finding yourself a little rusty when it comes to Applied Gnostiscm, here's a quick rundown:

The Gnostic universe is essentially dualistic - there is an entity of absolute Good, called the True God, or the Unknown Maker, and an entity of absolute Evil, called Jaldabaoth (literally "Son of Chaos"), also known as the Half-Maker or (most commonly) as the Demiurge.

The idea here is that there is an omnipotent Being, an infinite potentiality, called the True God, and this being is served by a very large group of powerful demi-gods or spirits called Aeons.  All of these beings live in a place called the Pleroma, a realm where the infinite potentialities or possibilities of the divine works fully.  In otherwords, this is a place full of power that can be used to do just about anything.  This power is usually represented by Light (or related things, like sparks, etc).

The Demiurge is the offspring of Sophia, Aeon of Wisdom.  Unaware of his own lineage, the Demiurge used (perverted, really) the power of the Pleroma in the creation of the Material universe.  The problem is that the Demiurge is only partially divine, and so he fucked it up:  the universe is full of suffering, natural disasters, and death.  Still, the Demiurge thinks it's pretty cool and has set himself up as its God-Ruler.

As an aside, it's worth noting here that this is essentially a reverse of the Judeo-Christian view of things.  The Christian God is the Gnostic Demiurge, unaware of His own shortcomings and generally making a mess of things, while the True God is essentially the Christian Devil (Sophia, Aeon of Wisdom - and by extension, the True God - is represented in a Gnostic art as a serpent).

Followers of the Gnostic religion are different from the common folk in that they are possessed of Gnosis, secret knowledge of the true nature of the universe, and of what creation could have been.  

For the purposes of the game, Gnosis is represented as a spell, or ritual, or word of power that allows the user to channel the power of the True God (the "Light of the Pleroma") to gain knowledge, to subtly alter reality (think low-grade Mage:  The Ascension magic, if you're familiar with that game) to their own advantage, be massively charismatic, and, just so these things don't get too mundane, to gain a remarkable proficiency in the martial arts (possibly kung-fu/eastern martial arts, but also fencing, etc).

Our Paladins come from a resurgent group of Gnostic philosophers within the Order of the Freemasons.  As a group, the Freemasons are occupied with the gathering and protection of the Gnosis (but only rarely with the use of same), mostly from our primary arch-rivals (you guessed it), the Roman Catholic Church.

Yes, the Church is pretty much evil, occupied as they are in the worship and service of the Demiurge.  In our universe, the Church never had a Counter-Reformation, thanks largely to a group within the Church called the Hylic Order of St. Jerome, a group of Dark Paladins.

These guys are bad news, and really freaking creepy.  They burn out their own eyes as part of their ritual of initiation (to better emulate the Demiurge, who is blind as well as crazy).  They can see through an effect of Dark Animus, and their eye sockets leak black fluid (a phyiscal manifestation of their Dark Animus, the polar opposite of the purifying light of the Pleroma) in the presence of Light Animus.  They can use their Dark Animus to greatly increase their strength, speed, etc (pretty much all of the Kewl Powerz that the good Paladins don't have access to), and also have a sort of limited, local future-vision, making them extremely dangerous.

Our (that is, the player's) Paladins nominally belong to a splinter group within the Freemasons who are tired of simply gathering Gnosis and want to actually use it to bring about the Great Change, a destruction and recreation of the universe in its true form, free of the taint of the Demiurge.

Characters

Thus far, we have three characters (or at least, character concepts):

* A Freemason archivist/librarian, frustrated with the stagnation within the Order and worried by the changes in the wind,

* An exiled Scottish laird (a minor noble), trained in Alchemy in Paris, who is utterly blind to the portents of the coming revolution, and

* A wiley street urchin, now in a Paris prison, who knows much more then he's telling.

No actual character creation yet, but some great concepts, sure to produce some entertaining play.

The Code

We have the very beginnings of a code, left over from a previous thread:

Unbreakable Laws:

You shall protect the Gnosis, keeping it secret from the Minions and Corruption of Jaldabaoth, the Demi-urge, even unto the cost of your own life.

Major Laws:

There are those throughout the world of the Demi-urge who have been freed from the lie that is the Creation of the Half-Maker, those in whom the spark that is the Light of the Pleroma has been given form. These you shall protect, even unto the cost of your own life.

You shall suffer no minion of Jaldabaoth, the Demi-urge, the Half-Maker, Son of Chaos, to live.

Minor Laws:

You shall work always to bring the Light of the True God to the varied peoples of the Earth.

You shall resist the corruption of the Demi-urge in all of it's forms.

You shall own no property, save that which is given unto you in the pursuit of Gnosis and in the effort to protect it.

What we don't know is if this Code is capable of generating enough action and tension in the game to make using it worthwhile.  Any thoughts you guys have on the subject would be welcome (there is a parallel thread on this subject here).  We could really use some help from more experienced Paladin players here.

We also managed to come up with some ideas for the actual, on-going campaign.  Here's a few, with some expansion for folks who weren't there last night:

* The fabric of the Demiurge's universe is starting to fray, and the Pleroma's light is starting to leak through.  The Masonic paladins are keen to find these "caches" of power and harness them.

* The Rosetta Stone is present in Paris, and contains coded directions to the location of the Nag Hammadi texts, a cache of Gnostic literature rich in Gnosis.  There is also the possibility of clues in the Stone or in the texts which lead to a massive cache of Pleromic energy, possibilty even enough to initiate the Great Change.

* The Perpetuum Mobile - several prototypes of which are in the possession of the archivist in his secret Paris lab.

* A secret Paris hide-out across the street from the archbishop's palace.  The cache Arcanum, right under the nose of the Church and State, and the nominal headquarters of our group.

There was surely more, but you'll have to dig into the transcripts to find out. ;)

Anyway, that's the game as it stands now.  We're still looking for ideas, players, and a GM, but this looks more and more to be a really fun game.  Any interested parties are welcome to toss arond a few ideas here, and to participate or lurk in our IRC sessions (they're on Monday nights, 9pm EST, in #paladin and #paladin_ooc on the magicstar IRC server).

[James_Nostack]

Sophie Farouche
Concept: teenage urchin paladin

Sophie is a cutpurse, rapscallion, and ne'er-do-well from the bad part of Paris.  She somehow gained knowledge of the Order's secret headquarters, but was caught by the gendarmes and held in the Bastille.  The Order dispatched a paladin to interrogate, and if necessary eliminate, this nuisance, but instead Sophie became inducted into the Illuminated Order, though this has been disputed by the old guard on the basis of her sex and social class.

Flesh Attributes
Active: Guttersnipe 3
Reactive: Unflappable 3
Social: Youngster 3

Light Attributes
Active: Defiant
Reactive: ?
Social: Class Solidarity

Dark Attributes
Active: Vengeful
Reactive: Opportunistic
Social: Class Prejudice

Animus Values
Light 3
Dark 3
She has no firm commitments to either side yet.

Other Abilities
1. Arms: knife-fighting
2. Hmm.
3. Double hmm.

[Joshua Tompkins]

Aidan George Murray-Stuart

Aidan George Murray-Stuart, Marquis of Atholl, is the younger son of Lord George Murray, commander of the armies of Charles Edward Stuart (Bonnie Prince Charlie, the 'Young Pretender'), and brother of John Murray, 3rd Duke of Atholl.

Driven into exile following the Jacobite defeat in the '45 Rising, Aidan has lived throughout the Continent, most recently settling in Paris, where he has connections with the retinue of the Charles, the Prince In Exile.  Trained in alchemy by Charles' philosophers and fenching by the prince's guard, he has found that he fits in well with the young Parisian nobility.  Unfortunately he has become rather too comfortable, and has let his (relatively minor) nobility go to his head.

Aidan was recruited into the Masonic Order by his tutor, and has taken to Gnostiscm rather like a fish to water, especially since he found that several of his friends from Court are also members.

Flesh Attributes:

Active: Nobility 4, Reactive: Speed 2, Social: Pity 3

Light Attributes:

Active: Integrity 2, Reactive: Faith 1, Social: Affability 3

Dark Attributes:

Active: Rage 1, Reactive: Aloofness 1, Social: Arrogance 1

Skills:

Diplomacy, Alchemy, Arms

Light Animus: 5
Dark Animus: 1

Aidan's weapon of the Faith is a titanium rapier & fencing dagger, forged by the Order's weaponsmiths upon initiation.

[Zubon-do]

Gascogne Sergent was the spoiled son of a wealthy scholar, at one point in his life.  He inherited his father's library when the man died suddenly, and spent his idle youth building it to Alexandrian completeness.  He discovered the Order while studying Hermeneutics in a Venetian archive, and soon became their chief librarian.

No one can recall Gascogne ever passing through the rites or properly being confirmed, but he does appear in the appropriate ledgers and certainly knows all of the passwords.  Young initiates are often left with the puzzle of how the application for degrees on file seems to only have one set of handwriting.

Gascogne has a vast facility for languages, and it is said that his walking staff's markings are an Ogham transliteration of his entire catalogue, as spoken aloud in Aramaic.  He appears to putter a lot, as old men do when they work on long finnicky projects.

Flesh: Stubborn, Crotchety, Linguistics
Light: Knowledge, Cleverness, Teacher
Dark: ?, Secrecy, Arrogance

(Still working on the rest)