I've been writing, re-writing and then re-re-writing my concepts for Void over the last while. Essentially , I am trying to make a logical series of events for this energy/entity and tie it into the background story so that it all meshes.

At the moment, this is so far the most logical sequence . It is in very basic point form.

What is Void?

-Ancient entity, which feeds on lifeforce and dream energy.

Is it Evil?

-Void is neither evil, nor good. It exists for a single purpose: to feed. In that respect it will go to ANY length to ensure that it can still feed.
This certainly gives it evil leanings, but only at a very base, survival oriented level.

When did it come?

-During the Autumn of Ashes, when mortal society was all but obliterated.

What happened then?

-It cast the people into an eternal sleep, devouring the essence of their dreams, from where they became a part of itself.

-Eventually, the power of dreams filled Void with astounding power. It used this power to create the Spires. They act as a focus for it, each Spire representing a different Strata of the Fabric(Dream World).

-Then Void placed its essence into the Spires, where it could feed more efficiently by drawing directly from the Fabric instead of from the mortals minds.

-The creation of the Spires had unexpected side effects. The focus they provided caused the energy Void had collected to manifest into Reality. This reshaped the face of the world, creating new life-forms and continents and also birthed the first of the Chimera.

-The Chimera tainted the Spires, for Void would not allow the mortals to awaken and share its food source with the Chimera. In so doing they lay ruin down on Void. It became impossible for Void to control its release of power, and it was drained.

-The unexpected expulsion of all its power forced Void into hibernation, ending the Aeon Slumber and awakening the mortals. The Chimera, free from the influence of Void, are now able to feed on their insecurities and fears and begin to multiply.

-Void still manifests things into reality…but it can only do so through other beings while it sleeps. These manifestations become Dreamers. They are the dream heroes of Void, who are made to strike back against its hated enemy, the Chimera, so that Void can again have the power it so sorely desires.

Does this seem logical, and workable, based on what I ahve thus far shared on the forums? At this point, any suggestions are more than welcome. To answer preliminary questions, Void is an energy form with sentience. It thinks in entirely alien ways, and is purely selfish. It cares ONLY to feed, and to protect its food at all costs. All lifeforms on the world are little more than this to it. It cares little for struggles, wars and strife. In fact, it gets more nourishment from bad dreams than good because the bad dreams are infectious and easily influenced from real events. However, it also knows that the Chimera feed off such negative emotions, which only serves to furhter their evil ends.
    Thus, Void may be more inclined to inspire goodness in order to counter the machinations of its black-souled enemy.

    I have toyed with the idea of Void as an evil entity as well, although I dont see the use or point of this if Dreamers are not inherently evil, and if the Chimera are the pure embodiment of all our worst horrors and fears. Plus, having Void as a neutral being that can go either way ties it very much to the nature of Dreams as well as the Sway mechanic.

Does this seem logical, and workable {?}

* * * *

    I have toyed with the idea of Void as an evil entity as well, although I dont see the use or point of this if Dreamers are not inherently evil, and if the Chimera are the pure embodiment of all our worst horrors and fears. Plus, having Void as a neutral being that can go either way ties it very much to the nature of Dreams as well as the Sway mechanic.

Is void is affected by what it feeds on?  If the dreamers dreams became part of void and it became filled iwth incredible power maybe it is filled with incredible confusion as well?  Void may in fact be so large it has forgotten what it is.  ?

The description does seem logical and unique.  I think there may be some question as to whether void acts of it's own intent, or acts only based on it's needs.  If it acts on it's needs and nothing else then it is truly moralless. But if it has intent and put things into action then it does make decision and bear the responsibility of that decision.

Curiosity, but you have established that the Void is an ancient entity, so why did it come at the Autumn of Ashes? That is, why not earlier, during the Spring of Ashes or later during the Winter of Ashes (as it were)? Do you envision that there was something unique about the world at that point, which essentially called out across time and space to the Void? If there was something unique that brought it at that time, then might not it vaguely desire (as much as it is capable of desire) to have the world return to a time similar to the Autumn of ashes?

On a different topic, if the Void was able to feed of the fabric of reality directly, why did it need to keep humanity asleep? How you have phrased things seems to imply that the Chimera wanted to wake humanity, does this make them vaguely good (in the same sense that the Void can be said to be "evil")? That would add an interesting element, if the players were to take the role of Dreamers created to bring back one of the worst times of human history.

Such aside, you have what appears to be a very tight background concept. Certainly one that, if I found browsing at a bookstore, I'd take a second look.

~just a thought.

Arcadian:

Yes, Void is affected by what it feeds on, to a degree. Because of all the chaos and fear in the poeoples dreams during the Aeon Slumber, which it did not anticipate, the INITIAL idea i had was that Void went  little nutty and manifested things for that reason...but I wasnt fond of that. Instead, Void feeds, and takes a bit of that thought process into itself...be it a little bit of good, evil, or neutral dream essence.

One thing to note. I intend to keep the game very much meta-plot lite. In this, I mean that I do not intend to have anyone really know that Void even exists. No mortal has even the slightest idea, and Dreamers may only have basic suspicions with no evidence to substantiate the claims. Thus, a lot of questions regarding Void can go quite happily unanswered, left to GM fiat.
On that note, I can leave the decision on whether or not Void acts based on needs or intent to the playing groups.

J.Tolson:

Void came during the Autumn of Ashes, because it was at that time in history that things were darkest. There was so much angusih and suffering at the time that all of the energy released at death, paired with the countless terrible nightmares, shone like a beacon to Void across the vastness of space.
The most alluring aspect was the very existence of dreams. It had never before fed on sentients, and this was a new thing to it. Dreams were a renewable food source. It would never need to move around again, and so it stayed .

The mortals were cast into a slumber from which they could not awaken, nor age and die.

The Nightmares only sought to awaken the mortals so that they coudl terrorize them. That is why they exist. Without the mortals walking around they had no purpose, and could only devour their sleeping bodies, and where the fun in tearing apart someone who is in a magick-liek coma? Void would not allow the mortals to awaken while it fed. This frustrated the Chimera, and they did something about it, sabotaging Void and screwing up its day, so to speak.

And as for the Dreamers sturgglign against their knowledge to bring about another dark age....that Is going to be implied to some degree. It is not necessarily the case, as this will vary from play group to play group. However, depending on what side of things wins out in the end (ie: Positive or Negative sway) that could very much be a real possibility.

I'm working on my own fantasy game and I am avoiding putting any strong moral judgments about good and evil into the rules or setting. I want my players to determine what is good and evil through their actions during play.

Chris,

Let me see if I have this strait.

Once upon the time there was Void.  Void existed only to feed, knowing neither good nor evil, right nor wrong, joy nor suffering.

Void fed upon the dreams of mortals.  As it fed upon them it changed.  It become a reflection of their humanity.  It embodied both good and evil, right and wrong, joy and suffering.  But the dreams it fed upon were coming from an age of great strife and suffering.  As a result the negative side was far stronger then the positive.

But above all it still desired to feed.  With its new power it built the spires which connected human dreams to the very fabric of reality, allowing it to drain existence itself.  But this had a side effect.  Part of the Void desired evil and darkness.  When it connected with the fabric of reality the dark part of Void tore itself from the rest of Void and gave itself form as the Chimera.

This loss of self weakened Void.  The Chimera took much of its power when they left and continued to siphon power from the Void.  Worse then that, the love and positive aspects were without balance.  With the last of its power, Void expelled that which was good from itself.  This created the Dreamers.

Void is now a shattered thing, connected to the very fabric of reality but unable to act on its own.  Through it the Chimera and Dreamers, the living embodiment of the mortal dreams the Void once consumed, do battle.  This war further weakens Void, keeping it and its endless hunger trapped in a death like slumber, possibly for  all time.

Is this what you were going for?  After reading your description I was unsure why the Chimera come into reality in the first place.

Best,
      Bill

thats pretty much it exactly, Bill :)

Hi!
  Are Chimera and Nightmares the same thing?
  Did you intend for this to be an oedipal tale? Chimera are clearly the offspring of the void. They spring from the void's efforts and feed from the same source. And they seem to be striving to kill their father and take its place.
  It seems like the battle is uneven. The void does stuff pretty much randomly or at least in an undirected fashion. The Dreamers are supposed to support the void, but don't know it exists and have the right or ability to go either way. The Chimera exists to thwart the void and feed off of mortals and knows what is going on. And the Nightmares if they are different exist to terrify mortals and direct the energy to a negative sway. And I know there are Dreamers who convert to avatars or some sort of Angels/Devils. I guess Sparks exist as mortals to stand up for them, but they still don't know what is going on.
  So it seems to me that there are no forces fighting for the void that know what is going on and no one fighting to save humanity from all this bad mojo.
  It seems like you are really focusing on the dystopia of this world. But that makes the fruitless labors of the goody-two shoes all the more dystopic. Maybe add Emmisarries, the official voice of the void, whose jobs are rendered unnecesary as the void is unconscious and unable to communicate. And maybe the Awakened a mortal who realizes the peril humanity is in and maybe can even tap into the power that is making this all happen. Maybe that is the idea behind sparks, but that doesn't come through...
  Even if these two new ideas are NPCs only, you could still obscure the answer and leave it up to the GM or whatever to decide what is really going on. But you can add depth, direction and potential for all three sides of this conflict.

Chris,

Woot!  Got it right.

This means some very intresting things.  First, the Void's fate is beautifully ironic.  Due to its own 'crime' it is now powerless and help less.  Good stuff.  :)

I like how Chimera and Dreamers are of the Void but do not actually care about the Void.  Again, that kind of cool.

The Void is a parasite.  Killing it would disempower the Chimera and Dreamers, ending the war and returning humanity to a state of relative peace.  This could result in some interesting conflict for Dreamers.

You don't need the Chimera to taint the spires.  This is an act of good, even if their motivations were bad.  Also, if the Spires are tainted, doesn't this by definition make the Dreamers themselves tainted?  After all, they draw power from the Void and thus from the spires as well.

Instead of having the Chimera somehow corrupt the spires you can simply say that...
A:  Mortals awakened because the Void did not need to feed off them any more (he has access to the very fabric of reality)
B:  When the Void lost the part of itself that became the Chimera it no longer had the power to keep mortals asleep
C:  Since the Chimera was basically 'Good' for a while it could have let them go because it was the right thing to do.  This would have happened when it was unbalanced, after the Chimera but before it unleashed the Dreamers.

Best,
       Bill

dindenver :

Some very interesting points, and I myself had noticed that as well. Which is why I made the post to start with :) The comments have helped push the ideas into a more cohesive direction. The way it stands now is pretty much as Bill posted in his "do i get it" synopsis.

The reason no one knows the Void is there, is because it arrived and put everyone into a sleep that lasted thousands of years. When they awoke, Void was powerless and unable to truly interact with reality.

And yes, Chimera are the nightmares. Three types of Chimera exist: Fears, Nightmares and Terrors. (ie: Bad, Badder, Baddest.)

As for the oedipus thing....under the new direction things are going the Chimera are not so much the offspring of void, so much as a "WOOPSIE". Voids own screwing around with reality ended up ripping a piece of its ol' body and tainting it with the darkness that filled it. This left only the other two possible "sides" of it..neutral and good. Neutral is boring and Void at its core, so i dont even bother touching on that. we already know all it wants is to feed. The GOOD side of it, realising what it had unleashed on the world through its stupid experiment , cast its pure energy into the world and birthed the dreamers (and not on purpose, per se. it just wanted that positive energy to harm the Chimera. But when Void slipped into its own eternal slumber, it imagined the dreamers....and so there they are)

as for the "other people" who know whats going on....thats why we have prophets, shamans, etc etc. The people of the world know a great evil lurks. They are very much aware of the Chimera...they dont know what they truly ARE, only that they are demons from hell and seek to destroy them all. Which is , in essence, mostly the truth. The spires are a mystery to them. They have always been there, and so they assume that they were a part of the ancient and forgotten past.

However, there is certainly room for added depth in regard to the three types...Mortals, I would say, with the inclusion of bills idea, would pretty much be done. Everything fits quite well for them.

Dreamers are essentially done as well. they have a great inner conflict, and a bluddy dangerous outer conflict as well. There are a few bugs to iron out here, but not too shabby.

Sparks need the most loving at the moment, and these will likely undergo the greatest changes in the long haul. They are both the newest class ive added, as well as the most strange. Dreamers are strange too, but on a much different level.