(Long time reader, first time poster, yada yada yada)

I've begun brainstorming a game that I'm currently referring to as Flash In The Pan. It takes place in a modern, half-real world based more on the recurring imagery of rock music than any sort of published fiction. In it, the PCs play (metaphorically) faceless Archetypes that are defined only by a collection of lines from songs - the goal being more related to exploring recurring themes in such music than to the telling of concrete stories of specific people. Conflict resolution would be based on the relevance of those lines to the PC's current situation.

Firstly, is this even doable?
Secondly, would there be any kind of appeal for such a game?
Finally, would such a collection of lyrics (and, of course, the actions of the PC's) add enough individuality to the characters to make them worth differentiating?

Any other ideas or comments would also, of course, be appreciated.

Hello Chris, and welcome!

First, of course it's doable.
Second, what do you care? If you are jazzed about the idea, that's all the enthusiasm you need. Seriously.
Finally, hell yes. Think about the song, "Yummy Yummy Yummy" by Ohio Express. Then think about the song "Killing In The Name" by Rage Against The Machine. (A fist fight between two characters with these lyrics would be pretty ugly.)

So yeah, absolutely go for it. The concept is intriguing, and I'm interested in seeing what you can do with it. Come up with some mechanics and get back to us, 'k?

Oh, and your title is cool.

Sounds interesting to me. Might be a good vehicle to tell short stories that involve different characters/set-ups but revolve around thematically consistent ideas. Sort of Raymond Carver or Flannery O'Connor or something...

Not sure what this could turn into, but I would like to think it could be a way of freeing stories from the tyranny of 'my character' and 'the party' who re-occur week in, week out. I tried to do something with soundtracks as themes in Casefile: ZODIAC, but ultimately stuck with the old 'player character' as a stable formula element. It would be great to see the idea be expressed more fully.

>>>>Think about the song, "Yummy Yummy Yummy" by Ohio Express.

I'd rather not.

Scobie

Seems doable to me. I've had a similar concept that I'll never do anything with: characters defined by a specific CD. Five players. You put the CDs in a CD changer, hit random play, and use the music playing at any given time for task resolution. "Hm, that action fits the song's mood..."

This concept reminds me of the Aqua Teen Hunger Force where Carl had a magic belt with "all the powers of seventies supergroup Foreigner!" If you recited a bit of Foreigner lyric a related effect would occur to an intended target. "You're cool as ice!" "You've got double vision!"

Players would probably have to be well-versed (ha!) in their chosen songs but it would be tons of fun :)

Greetings and Welcome Chris,

I must say first off, I love this concept. A lyrical based character creation (and I presume mechanic) lends itself wonderfully to quick, yet deep and personal character concepts.

I, personally, would like to see alot more on this setting and system. If you want suggestions or help, let me know. I'd love to assist in such an original idea!

scobie wrote: Not sure what this could turn into, but I would like to think it could be a way of freeing stories from the tyranny of 'my character' and 'the party' who re-occur week in, week out. I tried to do something with soundtracks as themes in Casefile: ZODIAC, but ultimately stuck with the old 'player character' as a stable formula element. It would be great to see the idea be expressed more fully.

gobi wrote: Seems doable to me. I've had a similar concept that I'll never do anything with: characters defined by a specific CD. Five players. You put the CDs in a CD changer, hit random play, and use the music playing at any given time for task resolution. "Hm, that action fits the song's mood..."

Chris Capps wrote: Most actions require no roll, but when you do roll, just roll a single d6. If the task directly relates to one of your lyrics, success is rolling 4 or under. If the task is only marginally related to one of your lyrics, success is rolling 3 or under. if the task has nothing to do with one of your lyrics, success is 2 or under.

Any ideas? Comments?

That's a really good point - the rules will have to be very specific about what is and isn't "directly related"..

So, maybe:

4 for using your actual lyric to perform an action
3 for when your lyric relates to the action
2 when your lyric has no relation to the action

+1 to all that when the GM decides the song playing relates to the action?

That might be too player-skewed, though..

Are you choosing whole songs, or lyrics? In other words, is the character a mix tape, or a single song that's a medley?

I'd be more tempted to have the latter. In that case, you could ensure that each /line/ of a song (any song!) is listed individually on the character sheet, you have less information flying about, and it's the LINE that's important, rather than a whole bunch of songs. Character advancement, such that it'd exist, could be through adding additional song lyrics.

Then, characters roll one die base. They add one for each lyric they can justify including in the situation. More lyrics, the better. Then they roll. Whee!

GM characters can be like this too, without much fuss.

Lxndr wrote: I'd be more tempted to have the latter. In that case, you could ensure that each /line/ of a song (any song!) is listed individually on the character sheet, you have less information flying about, and it's the LINE that's important, rather than a whole bunch of songs. Character advancement, such that it'd exist, could be through adding additional song lyrics.

Lxndr wrote: Are you choosing whole songs, or lyrics? In other words, is the character a mix tape, or a single song that's a medley?

I'd be more tempted to have the latter. In that case, you could ensure that each /line/ of a song (any song!) is listed individually on the character sheet, you have less information flying about, and it's the LINE that's important, rather than a whole bunch of songs. Character advancement, such that it'd exist, could be through adding additional song lyrics.

gobi wrote:
Shameless, yet marginally relevant plug: Check out the Gears & Spears thread if you want to see a type of lyric/poem character creation currently in development. It's epic mythology rather than pop song lyrics, but the basic concept is the same.

Chris Capps wrote: Yeah, that was the idea - having entire songs would get too vague, I think. With individual lyrics, you'd have a very specific idea about what your character is. i just didnt thing of the medley analogy.

That's a wonderful idea for character advancement. Over time, the character wouldn't get more powerful, he'd just become better defined.

Chris Capps wrote: Actually, Gears & Spears was partly the inspiration for my idea to have the characters be sets of lyrics - it's a brilliant game concept and i can't wait until I have the oppurtunity to try and convince my group to play it, and for them to tell me that they don't get it.

Thinking about it more, there isn't a direct need for character advancement in Flash In The Pan. In rock music, there certainly isn't any. There's change, but very rarely growth - and when there is some sort of redemtion, its always very final.

Instead, maybe players could just be given the option to replace one lyric with another one, or (ooh!) have a growing pool of lyrics that they can assign to their character at the beginning of every gaming session, but they can only assign a fixed number of them.

This could be hinged on dramatic relevance, too.

Say a character is playing an archetypal Martyr with no control over their destiny. They might (drawing lyric examples from Bright Eyes, since i have the lyric book in front of me) have the lyric "My actions are orchestrated from above," that could be used in situations where they don't have control. During a session, the character goes through a traumatic experience in which they suddenly are forced to contol things themselves. The lyric "There is only you, and what you make the truth" could be added to their pool, and when appropriate for the character, used in lieu of the other one.

Okay, now THAT sounds cool.

They have more lyrics they CAN use, but they're still only able to use a certain limited # during any session (barring some sort of mechanical "track change").

I like. :)

Ok, so I finally have the mechanic for Flash In The Pan. Until now, it's just seemed like any other RPG, with lyrics instead of Traits, but I finally realized how I can really bring the idea of exploring Archetypes into fruition.

Each player will create an archetype, that will carry on from session to session, which will have a master list of lyrics. These are general archetypes, with no personality, name, or emotion.

Example:

The Martyr

1. "Fall in love to fail, to boost your CD sales."
2. "My actions are orchestrated from above."
3. "You should know that I won't let you die."
4. "Cut that little child inside of me, and such a part of you."
5. "Won't you hold me now? I will not bend, I will not break."

Sounds pretty danged cool. I'd buy the game for something like this.

But I think even "the Martyr" is too much of a name for the archetype/template. The exploration of the character's theme through the adding of lyrics can take on many forms, not all of them necessarily easily labelled (or WANTING to be labeled). Heck, take 2,3, and 5 of your initial list, and you've created not so much a martyr as a holy warrior, or at least it could be interpreted that way.

Another possible idea (perhaps just as an optional rule): switch the archetypes around. Players MUST play a different archetype (or collection of lyrics) each session, and must go through the whole list before they go back to the first one again. At the end of each session, the player CURRENTLY using the archetype gets to add a new lyric to it. But someone else will use the archetype in the next session (the order in which they get to choose is decided by die roll, I guess). Thus each archetype eventually is molded through the combined efforts of all the players, and is not the property of any one player.

You could even, to run even farther into the "probably just optional rules" area, have more archetypes available than players... thus allowing for a different cast of archetypes for each session.

Either way, I like the whole "archetypes, not characters" method. :)

Just caught up with this thread. Wanted to chime in and say that I've long been interested in games that combine pop music with roleplaying. I think you're on to something with the archetype exploration. For your game though, I'm not sure if I like the idea of playing a different character each session (not that it couldn't work). But why not specify that characters are inherently multi-faceted. In other words, players could create different personalities for different situations. These of course would be linked to your different lyric choices.

I couple of years ago I came up with a game that used randomly played songs as the basis for scene framing. You might be interested. I called the game Theme Music, but it's far from playable.