[Stealing Heaven]- a game of occult initiation and human limitations

[Bailywolf]

Modern occult games are one of my favorite types of design.  I loves 'em. 

Anyhow, here's another.

I'm re-reading Barker's Great and Secret Show (and recalling other Barker novels and stories I've enjoyed the hell out of), and I just read Powers' Declare (and recalling other Powers novels I've enjoyed the hell out of).  I got to thinking about the occult, about initiations, about synchronicity, about potential occult power VS actualized power, about the human capacity for violence and the dread of the supernatural, and about initiations, changes in essential nature.  About overcoming essential human limitations which are on their flipside essential human qualities.  About cheating your way to enlightenment- about Stealing Heaven.

Limits:

I only have pseudo-code for the game mechanics so far, but my basic design goals is to within a fairly narrative framework, try and sim some elements of human psychology you don't often see in game designs- basically, how empathy acts as a limiter on human capacity for violence, sanity on human capacity to accept the supernatural, and Peace as a limiter on the scope of ambition.  The flipside, lower empathy makes it harder to relate to people, sanity makes it harder to deal with reality, and peace makes it harder to take satisfaction in your accomplishments. 

Mechanically, Empathy acts to limit violence- with situations lowering natural resistance to doing harm to another human (escalation, disassociation, dehumanization, mod-mentality...).  Empathy acts as a max on social interaction with other people.

Mechanically, Sanity acts to limit magic- with situations lowering natural dread of the supernatural (familiarity, mythology, beauty...).  Sanity acts as a max on perception and many basic practical functions. 

Mechanically, Peace acts to limit ambition- with situations lowering natural tendency towards stasis and satisfaction (motivation mostly...).  Peace acts as a max on plotting, scheming, and the formulation of Designs by which to further your occult agenda.


A rough pseudo-system to illustrate what I mean.

You meet a man who claims to have a translation of a pre-Columbian tablet detailing a clue to the Great Work- and a key element in one of your Designs.  However, he stalls and stonewalls, trying to get more money for the thing.  You decide to apply some violence to the situation, wanting immediate results- and engage in a physical assault.  Right off, the situation has to be analyzed to a certain extent.  What are you going for here?  You want to hurt him a little, and scare him a lot.  You aren't trying to maim him, and you aren't really trying to kill him.  You just want to sucker-punch him to incapacitate him, and slam him back against the fly-specked wall. 

Your Empathy is 4 (out of 10)- you've done and seen quite a lot of violence in your time. 

The Escalation for the scene starts at 0- you are initiating the violence, and if it continues for additional clashes, Escalation will increase... also, using weapons or being especially abusive will bump the Escalation up. 

You are alone, so there is no modification either way for witnesses or cohorts. 

The smuggler isn't especially inhuman- he's just a wormy little guy- so you don't get any kind of modifier, unless you actively degrade and dehumanize him first (or you witness something that does the same), so this produces a +2 modifier. 

You aren't trying from a cold start to maim or kill, so it is somewhat easier to engage in violence, producing a -1 modifier. 

In the first clash, your Hesitation (the total of Empathy and situational mods) is 5.  This represents your hesitation and reluctance to inflict injury on this guy.  Lower Hesitation means things can leap to deadly combat quickly- and if one party has lower Hesitation than the other, then they have a major advantage when it comes to dishing out the pain. 

With whatever resolution scheme I end up with, this 5 acts as a cap on the amount of harm you can do- it represents a 'holding back' as basic human instinct kicks in and stays your hand somewhat... limiting the amount and severity of the damage you can bring yourself to inflict.  You may be capable of inflicting more based on your skills and abilities, but this limits how much and how fast you can do it (as Hesitation works as a negative modifier to order-of-action-resolution). 

It would work the same when doing magic- Sanity (which is the basis for a derived circumstantial total analogous to Hesitation which is called Dread) caps the mechanical outcome, even if your skill with the occult might allow you greater power. 


Magic:

Magic works in the setting.  The Uninitiated work with ritual and metaphor and mostly bullshit.  Their magic- if it works at all- manifests as synchronous benefits or boons.  Nothing overtly supernatural, but results which would allow a magician to cheat at life, to gain advantage over others, and generally do better.  Magic isn't an especially nice pursuit.

Initiates, however, have undergone a transformative occult rite of passage- often a formal initiation into some hidden Mystery tradition or order, but not always... spontaneous Initiates are not unknown, and some devise their own initiation.  Initiates are, in some ways, not really human anymore.  They are halfway between blindness and vision- the proverbial one-eyed men in the land of the blind.  They can see enough of the true nature of reality to almost painfully hunger for more, for clearer sight, for more awareness, for purer power.  However, they are still bound to human concerns, and some limitations... sanity, empathy, and peace all drag them back.  Crazies make some of the most powerful Initiates, but they are disorganized, and their insights slip through their fingers.  Losing all your humanity denies you perspective on what you seek to acquire- the Great Work.  The purification of the self.  Enlightenment.  What the hell ever.  What you're trying to do is steal grace, to pick the locks on the pearly gates and enter Paradise with your Human loves and hates and hungers in tact, so you can really appreciate the hell out of it.  You're a big cosmic bastard, when you get right down to it.

And sometimes, Heaven fights back.

Initiates have their Tricks though- their powers in the moment... spells, potencies, investments of occult potential.  Initiation also makes you very very very hard to kill in some subtle ways.  You can bleed, you can hurt, you can wish to die, but baring some special circumstances, you need not concern yourself with such mundane things as death.  Which isn't to say you don't hunger- your body still sweats and hungers and lusts.  You are still flesh- and that's part of what you hope to preserve when you complete your Work, and finally see clear to whatever lies beyond.

Will you achieve enlightenment and find you don't have enough humanity left to give a shit about it?

Will you be destroyed in its pursuit?

Or will you steal into Heaven as a thief in the night, and walk the golden streets with muddy sneakers?


Basic system considerations...

I'm not sure.  I don't know if I want a simple roll/add, a dice pool, a single die over/under blackjack kind of thing... just not sure yet.  I need to play with some different schemes and see which best works to the 'limitations' thing best.


-Ben

 

[simon_hibbs]

I don't realy see how character are suposed to progress spiritualy in a mechanical sens (if that even makes sense), and what that 'progression' amounts to. Also I would have said that initiation makes you more human, not less because it makes you a more complete spiritual being.

Also the way you've described Empathy (including in the example) people with more empathy can do more damage, but are also better at social skills. Something wrong here.

Simon Hibbs

[Bailywolf]

I don't realy see how character are suposed to progress spiritualy in a mechanical sens (if that even makes sense), and what that 'progression' amounts to. Also I would have said that initiation makes you more human, not less because it makes you a more complete spiritual being.

Also the way you've described Empathy (including in the example) people with more empathy can do more damage, but are also better at social skills. Something wrong here.

Simon Hibbs

The example isn't super-clear because I don't have the mechanical vectors worked out- basically, Empathy would cap damage in inverse proportion... which is to say, the lower your Empathy, the higher your base damage- with circumstances allowing this to increase to murderous levels.

I could reverse it, rather than describe 'Empathy' as a stat, I could change it to 'malice' and as it increased, so would your base potential for harm (but it would act as a penalty to your socilization).  Sorry about the confusion.

Initiation is something of a glass-half-full.  It depends on how you look at it, but given the general stance of the game (the the title), its about being a cosmic bastard.  Who wants to spend their lives in meditation, spiritual persuits, and self-denial in order to acheive enlightenment?  Screw that noise- I'm taking it.  I'm ripping reality's nuts off with my teeth, and making the universe my bitch.  I'm stealing heaven from the hands of the worthy.  I'm a bad man.

-B

[Graham W]

Ben,

This sounds very interesting. I'm not sure quite where you want feedback, so can I throw some random ideas and questions at you?

Firstly, your Empathy / Damage thing, where having more empathy stops you doing damage, reminds me of Shock (in which, as I remember, attributes are defined as a sliding scale between two opposites). Could you do something similar? Have a scale with "Caring" at one end and "Psychopathic" at the other?

Secondly, I'd like to see some sort of feedback in the mechanics, so that if you try to do damage, your Empathy is likely to drop. (For example, for every six you roll, you do more damage but your empathy drops permanently. That sort of thing.)

Thirdly, as a character loses humanity, would you like it to become easier for the character to lose even more humanity (in a slippery slope sort of way) or harder (making it difficult for characters to be either totally inhuman or totally saintly)?

Graham

[Anders Larsen]

You have some interesting ideas here. A game that is inspired by Clive Barker can not go wrong.

But I would really like to know what the character actually do in this game. You are talking about scheming, plotting and the formulating of Design (what is this?), but it is a little vague.

And in what situations does Empathy, Sanity and Peace change value? What should the players do to change them?

- Anders

[TroyLovesRPG]

Hello,

The conflict within the character is interesting. That you have a sliding scale will make it easy for the players to understand the conflict. I see that it may be possible to be powerful enough in your game to have everything, but on the verge of collapse. There are two points that stand out for me:

1) The immediate inverse in the attributes doesn't strike me as realistic. Most people seem to have low values in either end of the scale.

2) The attributes don't quite show opposites in an obvious way.

Here's something that may work for you. Keep the attributes of Empathy, Sanity and Peace. Place two abstract descriptors and two stats on each end of the scale.

           Empathy
Friendly          Hateful
Insight            Aggression
            Sanity
Reasonable     Deluded
Perception       Mysticism
            Peace
Calm               Egotistical
Serenity          Trickery

The character has 10 points to place in each area. Example: 8 points could go to Insight and 2 points to Aggression. The character is mostly friendly but does have a temper under certain circumstances. With 4 in Perception and 6 in Mysticism, the character's life is steeped in magic and this clouds his reasoning. Having 1 in Serenity and 9 in Trickery has this character constantly scheming to get ahead.

As a character develops power, the three areas can have more than 10 points, possibly having 6 in Perception and 8 in Mysticism. The character gains power when performing great deeds. A character of that power could be a formidable sorcerer. Having more than 10 points can create an imbalance that may unsettle the character.

Time for bed.

Troy

[Bailywolf]

Thanks everyone- here are some thoughts and refinements...

Designs
Basically formalized scheming intended to further an Initiate's occult goals- plots, plans, and dirty deals.  Designs are the main route to more occult power- and the eventual possibility of victory conditions... of storming paradise.  Shorter term, they let Initiates via for power and control of the occult underworld of weirdos, psychics, ritualists, cultists, crazies, and the shadowy agents of the Power Eliets- politicians, the military, big biz. 

Limits
I like the idea of a sliding scale between two poles... for the limit scores, but I can't really think how to make use of it... I think I can get the same utility with a cleaner design using a single score which implies its oposite by adding to some actions and penalizing others.  'Malice' forming the basis for your capacity to do harm and take the initiative.  'Insanity' for working magic.  Ambition for fomenting schemes and manipulation.  Malice would penalize positive socilization, Insanity would penalize mundane perceptions, Ambition would penalize... hmm...  its a tough one...

Divide 10 points at start, increase or decrease based on experience and choice. 

The idea is that the morality is front-loaded rather than back-end.  You don't make a Humanity check when you kick someone into an undustrial sausage press and watch them ground into hot dogs... rather you are unable to take it that far without some serious provocations.  Its about the question "what would it take for you to kill a man?"  If your Malice is really high, it wouldn't take a hell of a lot.  If your Malice is low, it would take a great deal.

To really leverage this, it needs to dovetail with some kind of scene/conflict structure in which these provacations to greater and greater violence/magic/ambition can be tracked.

One simple way to work it mechanically might be a basic roll-and-add scheme, with the Limits  acting as max totals or the base limit stats subtracting from the oposite kind of roll... but roll/add might not be indie enough ;)

Thanks for keeping me thinking... more as it comes to me.

-B

[Anders Larsen]

Designs
Basically formalized scheming intended to further an Initiate's occult goals- plots, plans, and dirty deals.  Designs are the main route to more occult power- and the eventual possibility of victory conditions... of storming paradise.  Shorter term, they let Initiates via for power and control of the occult underworld of weirdos, psychics, ritualists, cultists, crazies, and the shadowy agents of the Power Eliets- politicians, the military, big biz.

This began to make me think. I do not know is this fit to your game, but here it is anyway.

All event in the world could have some occult significant. Mostly this is not noticed, because these events is normally very random of nature, so they cancel out each other. The Initiated will try to direct these events with magic, political power, or by influencing them directly (physically). When the Initiated have aligned a certain number of these event, something big will happen, that can be used as an entry to paradise.

It may not be obvious what event that need to be directed, to create the right occult condition, but the Initiated will know it intuitively. He may suddenly 'know' that he have to kill his boss to set the right events in motion, and it is then a problem, if he is not able to do it. Then things may fall apart.

When all event is align correctly, it should properly be the players job to tell what happen.

- Anders

[Bailywolf]

Designs
Basically formalized scheming intended to further an Initiate's occult goals- plots, plans, and dirty deals.  Designs are the main route to more occult power- and the eventual possibility of victory conditions... of storming paradise.  Shorter term, they let Initiates via for power and control of the occult underworld of weirdos, psychics, ritualists, cultists, crazies, and the shadowy agents of the Power Eliets- politicians, the military, big biz.

This began to make me think. I do not know is this fit to your game, but here it is anyway.

All event in the world could have some occult significant. Mostly this is not noticed, because these events is normally very random of nature, so they cancel out each other. The Initiated will try to direct these events with magic, political power, or by influencing them directly (physically). When the Initiated have aligned a certain number of these event, something big will happen, that can be used as an entry to paradise.

It may not be obvious what event that need to be directed, to create the right occult condition, but the Initiated will know it intuitively. He may suddenly 'know' that he have to kill his boss to set the right events in motion, and it is then a problem, if he is not able to do it. Then things may fall apart.

When all event is align correctly, it should properly be the players job to tell what happen.

- Anders

YES!  You nailed it- plucking thoughts right from my brain.

The idea is, to the Initiated, EVERYTHING has occult significance- they can work the kind of synchronous manipulations uninitiated magicians ritually (and unreliably) produce with a thought and act of will- part of the reason Initiates are so hard to out-and-out kill, is a circumstances conspire to make it impossible... the bullet glances off their skull rather than shattering it... they are thrown clear of the wreck... they roll with your brick-cracking Meth fueled punches.  A magician could do the same thing- but not without hours of ritual, symbolism, and sweat- all attempting to create a 'seed crystal' of circumstances which will ripple out into the world, creating the desired result.

An Initiate just does it.

Designs are like a magician's rituals, but on a grand scheme- rather than sacred spaces or personal shinres, you use political campaigns or professional Baseball.  Rather than sanctified daggers and candles, you use actors in the next Hollywood summer noise-fest and bags of pure cocain.  Its like doing a magical ritual on a massive scale- with the stakes dramatically higher.  You have to be a bit of a bastard to do this kind of thing.

-B

[Spooky Fanboy]

The idea is, to the Initiated, EVERYTHING has occult significance- they can work the kind of synchronous manipulations uninitiated magicians ritually (and unreliably) produce with a thought and act of will- part of the reason Initiates are so hard to out-and-out kill, is a circumstances conspire to make it impossible... the bullet glances off their skull rather than shattering it... they are thrown clear of the wreck... they roll with your brick-cracking Meth fueled punches.  A magician could do the same thing- but not without hours of ritual, symbolism, and sweat- all attempting to create a 'seed crystal' of circumstances which will ripple out into the world, creating the desired result.

An Initiate just does it.

Designs are like a magician's rituals, but on a grand scheme- rather than sacred spaces or personal shinres, you use political campaigns or professional Baseball.  Rather than sanctified daggers and candles, you use actors in the next Hollywood summer noise-fest and bags of pure cocain.  Its like doing a magical ritual on a massive scale- with the stakes dramatically higher.  You have to be a bit of a bastard to do this kind of thing.

-B

Ah, so magic in this setting is subtle-but-powerful stuff: no fireballs, but the poor shit you target will die when his house burns down around him. Is that what you're going for? And presumably, the question isn't so much whether you succeed, but what that success cost you, correct? Will there be a fallout mechanic to reflect this?

Your Designs gives me an impression of a Reality Shaping battle between the Fair Folk of Exalted mated with Unknown Armies. "I'll use my Cocaine-Fueled Hollywood Action-Fest Involving Islamic Fundamentalist Vampires With Tom Wait's 'You're Innocent When You Dream' In The Soundtrack to counteract your Democratic Party Uprising Fueled By Wiretapping and Lobbying  Scandals, thus insuring the War in Iraq continues and my connections in government rise in power. This will insure that I get first access to ancient records involving The Great Work in that region! Mwuahahahahahaaa!" Is that what you're going for? I'm curious: how will players/GMs be able to judge how effective Designs are when they go against each other? Or will that default to a roll against/of Empathy, Sanity, or Peace? I would lobby for a mix of certain memes/tropes giving definite bonuses, and flourishes giving extra bonuses, mixed with an attribute roll based on the Initiate's raw power and Sanity/lack thereof.

[Bailywolf]

Pretty much nailed it... I was kicking around how you might extrapolate a magical ritual into a Design...

Say you do semi classical Western ritual magic, then get Initiated.  You have a Sacred Space- say the Movie Industry.  You have a ritual blade- a movie producer you are manipulating.  You have a wand- a director.  You have a Cup- a photogenic movie star.  You have sacrements- lots of cocain to put into the Cup.  You have an Alter- the movie studio.  You have an Auspicious Time- the summe blockbuster release schedule.  You have the Ritual- the making of the film itself.  And you have the Outcome- changing the collective consciousness of the United States in a meaningful way. 

Each Element of the Design requires specifc action to acquire and place, then you have to make sure the Design plays out when it becomes active.

Its a lot of work- but Initiates don't just work with powerful synchronisity- they also have their tricks.  Specific unnatural powers- investments of occult potential.  Crazy Charlie Manson Eyes that let you use your Malice as a bonus to persuasion and intimidation rather than a penalty.  The ability to conjure unnatrual allies to aid you, and grant you the advantage of numbers, letting you overcome your limits easier.  Looping time.  Folding space like origami.  Seeing sins.  Breathing death onto your enemy's faces.  Commanding the flesh.  Wounding the spirit. 

Each Initiate trades something of flexibility for these tricks, but they are potent things, and vital when furthering a Design.

-B

[Anders Larsen]

Say you do semi classical Western ritual magic, then get Initiated.  You have a Sacred Space- say the Movie Industry.  You have a ritual blade- a movie producer you are manipulating.  You have a wand- a director.  You have a Cup- a photogenic movie star.  You have sacrements- lots of cocain to put into the Cup.  You have an Alter- the movie studio.  You have an Auspicious Time- the summe blockbuster release schedule.  You have the Ritual- the making of the film itself.  And you have the Outcome- changing the collective consciousness of the United States in a meaningful way.

I am curious how you are going to make rules that handle this. Is the Cup, Wand, Sword etc. something that is defined in the rules, and then it have to be decided what real world object/people they are associated with. But who or what decides this?  And then it is possible to work with these real world object, as if they where magical tool. But what decide what you should do, for them to have an effect? How many event (and how big) should an Initiated make happen, before the gate to paradise will open?

I am thinking of some kind of scale of transcending. Every time the Initiated make some meaningful event happen, he will transcend on step up the scale, and when he reach the top, he have reached the gates. Of course the higher you are the longer there is to fall down.

I know it may be a little to early to ask for rules. But I am actually quite interest in these kind of ideas, but I have never really thought they could work in a game.

- Anders

[Bailywolf]

It's intresting you ask about that- I was just toying with the formalized Design concepts... each element has a function within the desing, and I need to decide how I want to do it... to pick an occult system from the RW and expand it to larger scope, or to make it more general... 'the insturment' and 'the catalyst' and 'the weapon' and 'the motivator'...

Also, Levels of Initiation.

A new Initiate can percieve (and thus manipulate) the occult currents only in a local way- within his immediate circle of perception and influence.  Within his own community.  As he gains new levels of Initiation, his Tricks become more profound, and he can percieve the occult currents on a larger and larger scale... eventually being able to formulate a Global design- for similar stakes.

Lower ranked Initiates often find themselves working in cabals- to expand their 'range' and to counter the Designs of more advanced solo Initiates.  This is the basic excuse for a player ground... the alternative is more of a player VS player battle.

Mechanics... I'm torn between trying for something functional and simple (d10+mods VS diff or opposed roll) or something funky (die ladder of d4-d20 w/ multiple dice in a pool of different types... limits determine die type, ability determines number of dice...).

-B 

[Danny_K]

It sounds to me like the two core mechanics you're thinking about are:
1)The character stats/task resolution system, where the basic concept seems to be that you can have supernatural effectiveness OR be a normal person who's good at doing normal things, but not both. 

Unknown Armies and Kult are both games with magic systems built around this idea.

2) Designs -- how you make them, how you counter them.  This is definitely the more interesting of the two concepts for me -- I'm a big Kenneth Hite fan, so the ability to create and control weird conspiracies and occult axes of power is intriguing.  I think you could make a very interesting game just based around this idea and mechanic: the PC's have enough mojo to make some Designs and to detect the Designs of others that encroach on them and their turf. 

The PC's then automatically have something to do and a reason to do it: they want to develop and defend their own Designs, and keep other magicians from messing them or their neighborhood up by incorporating them into a different, alien Design. 

I've never seen a game that does this well, so I'd love you to write one.  :)  I also would encourage you to let everything else be driven by the Design mechanic you come up with.  It seems more interesting to me to have a generalized kind of Design magic which, in a given game, could look like battling neighborhood Voudouns, or Satanic cult members, or UFO contactees.  In other words, I've already seen a zillion different types of magic systems in RPGs, but I've rarely seen a good magic toolkit. 

[Anders Larsen]

It's intresting you ask about that- I was just toying with the formalized Design concepts... each element has a function within the desing, and I need to decide how I want to do it... to pick an occult system from the RW and expand it to larger scope, or to make it more general... 'the insturment' and 'the catalyst' and 'the weapon' and 'the motivator'...

I don't know if you know anything about real world magic, so I may not be telling you anything new here. But is you don't know about this, it may be useful for your game. So here is how a real world ritual is (or can be) done:

The ritual area consist of a circle on the floor wherein you have the alter and the four magical tools: Cup (water), Sword (air), Wand (fire), Disc (sometime called pentacle) (earth). The room should be decorated with symbols that is related to the energy you want to use.

The procedure is:

1) Doing the banishing ritual to clear the area of any bad influence (this part may not be so interesting in a rpg).

2) Call forth the energy of the four elements to empower the area.

3) Now the magician begin to call on the energy that is specific needed for this ritual. This is typecally planetary energy: If the ritual is about romance, Venus is used. If it is about finance, Mercury is used. Is it is about power, Jupiter is used etc.. It can also be energy from different "pagan" gods and entities.

4) The magician channel the energy into an object that represent (symbolic) what he want with the ritual. It can be a piece if paper with symbols on, or it can be a clay figure, or something else. (in the game this should properly not be an object).

5) At the end it is necessary to dispel all the unwanted energy. This is done by going through the banishing ritual once more.

Real world magic work in a way that is only notable for the magician. If you make a ritual with the intention of getting more money, it may come about with a salary rise, or a friend suddenly remember that he owns you money. But here the magician should be careful, because it may happen that his parents get killed in a car crash, and he inhered the money.

A magician typically asks the tarot card, if something bad will come out of the ritual.

... Hope you can use this.

- Anders