Hello All,

My Sorcerer ideas are a dime a dozen and I generally don't post them here unless I think I might actually get a chance to develop them. Well this latest one has kind of seized me by the throat and won't let go. I've even put together a very specific list of players I want for this game. One of whom has never played an RPG before. So, once I get this one sheet nailed down I'm going to send it to them and see if we can coordinate schedules.

The Asylum

Sorcerers are the institutionally insane commited to The Asylum.

Humanity is accepting reality and rejecting your own delusions, fantasies, self-deceptions and lies. This includes helping others do the same.

Demons are products of the Sorcerer's insanity. An imaginary friend, a photograph of a repressed memory, an object of fixation or desire, an animal valued as a lover, a second or third personality, and so on.

Sorcery is based on retreating into a fantasy world where the sorcerer's delusions are "real." Here, new demons are formed and old demons are banished. Note "Banishing" a demon does not necessarily mean that the patient is cured but rather that the affliction no longer has a reallity hold. A schizophrenic who banishes the demon who whispers to him in his cell doesn't mean he no longer hears voices but rather that the voices have been successfully rejected as unreal.

The above is the core of the one-sheet but I want to elaborate on the last element. When I was thinking about this "fantasy" world inside the patient's head I hit upon an idea that I owe to Ron's river concept in his current game. What if this world of delusion was actually shared by the sorcerers, a kind of dream state constructed from the dellusions of the insane. I started there but then took it a few steps further.

This dream world of delusions can be visited via The Otherworld rules from Sorcerer & Sword. Thus without necessarily trying to contact a specfic demon one can just volluntarily retreat into one's fantasies. It also provides an interesting consequence for Zero Humanity. The way I see it if a Sorcerer hits Zero Humanity they are forced into this world of delusions and can not get out. But the player may continue to play the character in this false reality with the hopes of returning. What the conditions are for returning I'm not sure but I'm assuming it would require the significant conquring of a demon or perhaps powerful acts on the part of the other PCs. Needless to say when the character returns from being "away" horrible things may have been done to his real self in the meantime.

Supporting cast would of course consist of the doctors, nurses and orderlies of the institution, other patients and their families, and the PC's own families. I imagine a great deal of real-world conflicts arrising from the interactions of these crucial NPCs.

The point I'm stuck on is when and where to set this game. I'm probably going to have to do some research into the history of Asylums. For example, I know at one point homosexuals and single women were locked up and at some point horrible treatment like shock therepy and lobotemies were used but I don't necessarily know if the former actually overlapped with the latter.

One option I had considered was setting the game No When. That is, The Asylum represents a mixture of our fears and worries about the worst elements of psychiactric history regardless of whether those elements ever co-existed. I'm kind of thinking about Tim Burton's portrayal of Gotham City. Clearly, all the modern technologies and amenities are available but the people dress and talk like it's 1945. My fear would be that if I made reality itself too surreal then the contrast between the Humanity sapping falseness of the dellusion world wouldn't stand in high enough contrast.

Thoughts?

Sources:

Video Games: Sanitarium
Movies: One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, Session 9, Paperhouse and Brazil (the latter two being demonstrations of the fantasy world).
Comic Books: Batman stories featuring Arkham Asylum.

Jesse

One option I had considered was setting the game No When. That is, The Asylum represents a mixture of our fears and worries about the worst elements of psychiactric history regardless of whether those elements ever co-existed. I'm kind of thinking about Tim Burton's portrayal of Gotham City. Clearly, all the modern technologies and amenities are available but the people dress and talk like it's 1945. My fear would be that if I made reality itself too surreal then the contrast between the Humanity sapping falseness of the dellusion world wouldn't stand in high enough contrast.

As far as timeframe, given that you cite Brazil as a source, I'd make it set "Somewhere in the Twentieth Century".

Are you intentionally making the question of reality ambiguous (a functional option, IMO), or are you saying that Demons have an objective in-game reality? Or that they're objectively unreal? I can't tell from what you have.

Mike

Hi Jesse,

One thing that I'd need or be interested in, as a potential player, is where's the potential for heroism as a sorcerer? Note, as a sorcerer.

That may or may not be an issue for a one-sheet, but it's at least a concern for that first get-together for character creation or discussion. My character must have wanted something terribly in order to Bind his or her demon, by whatever definition or customization of "demon" or Humanity. That something should be interesting, or mean something, in real-life human terms.

Otherwise, the sorcerers are merely nuts and the "only way to win," to borrow from Mike Holmes and Wargames, "is not to play."

Now, in my necromancy game, that wasn't specified at all. I think that in a true modern-world game (as opposed to a "Hidden World" setting a la White Wolf), this issue takes care of itself very nicely. The very act of creating a modern-world character usually brings up engaging issues.

But as soon as the setting becomes more fanciful or, as you're considering here, overtly symbolic, then the question of why your sorcerer is worth anything (as opposed to being merely nuts) does arise.

David Cronenberg's films provide a good example of this problem. It's why I like The Brood far better than, say, The Fly, eXistenZ, or Dead Ringers. In the latter movies, the characters embody the setting's and situation's theme; they don't judge or act upon the Premise but merely experience it.

Best,
Ron

Hello,

Mike,

The demons are "real" in the usual Sorcerer context. They are not just pure metaphore but actual beings. It's the inverse of Lovecraft. Lovecraft: Demons are real, because you know about it you're insane. Me: Because you are insane, the demons are real.

Ron,

BINGO! Exactly the problem I've been strugling with. For a VERY VERY long time I've kind of had this idea stuck in the back of my head. "I want to set a game in an asylum where the PCs are insane. Feels like a Sorcerer game. What's Humanity? More importantly what do the PCs DO!" And I totally understand what you mean by AS SORCERERS.

Here's where the turning piont in my head was. Originaly I was doing the overly simplistic, "It's an Asylum therefore Humanity must be Sanity" but that doesn't make a lot of sense since we've already agreed that the PCs are insane. That's like saying your Humanity starts at or bellow zero and there's no where really to go but down.

That's why I changed the humanity definition to reflect self-deception. Self-deception is the key. It's possible for someone who is SANE to still be self-decieving. Sorcerer's have bought into the self-deception wholely for the purposes of protecting them from some aspect of reality. That does NOT rob them of the ability to recognize that someone else is falling into a pit of self-deception and harming themselves.

Example: Let's say one of the nurses at the asylum has an abusive boyfriend who is prone to bothering her at work whenever he has some kind of emotional fit. But she continues to justify it, rationalize it, make excuses for it.

What do the Sorcerers around her do? Help her wake up to the reality of the basterd? Push her further into her delusions? To what point? To the point where she herself gains a demon that "shelters" her from the abuses of her boyfriend?

This is also backed up by having the delusional Otherworld (by the way this is very very much Not-Here as previously discussed, not a "Hidden World" in the White Wolf sense) be shared and be the consequence of going to Zero Humanity. That leaves open the doors for the OTHER Sorcerers to go in and "rescue" someone who is trapped there. Again by bringing them OUT of their self-deceptions and lies.

I have a feeling that Perception will be one of the most powerful abilities in this setting.

Make sense?

Jesse

So they can be heroes by helping each other give up Sorcery? How does Sorcery help in this case? Even if it does, are we done once everyone is out?

What is it in the real world that the Sorcerers want? It can't be getting out, or then all they'd have to do is, again, quit.

That's the point of my Wargames quote. The game can't be all about a fight to drop Sorcery, or it's too simple.

Sorcerers are defined as having some drive that causes them to use Sorcery in the first place as a problem solver. So the answer has to be related in this version of the game to that thing that put them in the asylum in the first place. That is, if they were on the stock market and lost everything, then they had to decieve themselves into becoming actually able to make money with a demon. Or somesuch. In which case, the character's kicker could revolve around regaining his riches with his ability.

There are probably other ways to go. Make us up a sample character with a Kicker, and I think it'll all become clear.

Anyhow, the other big problem I see is that if I had a demon, and didn't want to be locked up in an asylum, I would leave. Why do the characters stay?

Also, we all have fantasies, lies to ourselves and self-delusions. It's precisely the belief in these things that are insanity, or at least psychoses. So I'm not seeing your definition of humanity as different from what most people think of as insanity. For example, a person may tell themselves that they're the coolest person in the world; probably happens to many people all the time. The fact that they don't believe it is the difference between these people and a megalomaniac. A schitzophrenic person who no longer listens to the voices in their head is no longer schitzophrenic. Neurotic, maybe, but not psychotic. You're aware of the difference, right?

Is that humanity? Not letting your neurosis become psychosis? That would indicate only the most destructive of neuroses, as lesser neuroses don't require hospitalization all that often. Phobias, for instance, even when strong, are usually something that sufferers can function with. It's only when a neurotic goes from understanding that his fear of spiders being around every corner and can kill him is irrational, to actually believing this, that the patient becomes incapable of functioning (in fact some psychotics can actually function in society).

Um, extreme compulsive behaviors would count, I suppose, as suitable neuroses. For example, eating disorders can become so bad that a person needs to be hospitalized to prevent damage to their health. Severe depression, certainly. That sort of thing.

Is this what you're thinking?

Mike

Let me see if I can phrase all of this another way.

In terms of the Outcomes listed in Sorcerer's Soul you and Ron are kind of asking me what the "Outlaw Prevails" outcome would look like.

And you know, I hate that outcome. I'm not sure why, but I just do. It seems kind of boring to me. I think it's because it doesn't feel definitive to me at all. In terms of a TV show the "Outlaw Prevails" outcome feels like the outcome every episode would have to have just to keep the show going. But once the TV show was canceled then one of the other THREE outcomes must result as part of the series finale.

I will think about this some more because you're completely right. I THOUGHT I had worked through it but maybe I haven't.

By the way, another source for this setting is the recent film Identity.

Jesse

If you only play three sessions, then Outlaw prevails is just the one of four possible outcomes. Yes, in a long-term game, this would seem contrived. But in a Sorcerer game it seems just fine. Almost pulled one off last game, in fact that was my goal. But another player managed to snatch my victory away at the last second, and my character ended up...in the assylum!

:-)

Anyhow, it's not so much what that outome would look like as why the Sorcerer would even be trying? What is so important that the Sorcerer has to embrace insanity to get it? And how does being in the assylum make that possible?

Mike

The concept of intelligently embracing insanity intereasts me alot, as well as adding alot of elements that an "insane PCs" game tends to lack(Protaganism being the most prominent).

I'm thinking in sort of a "The Maxx" vibe, you could have the nature of the PCs insanity hold important clues to traumas in the PCS life. Perhaps there could be two kinds of insanity, one which is constructed to avoid their problems like as a psychological fugue, which impedes understanding themselves, and the other one harshly confronts it, the Demons with their clear, focused and yet twisted symboligy to internal truths. The violent nature of confronting insanity is what threatens to destroy your Humanity, which could be defined as any number of things.

I think Kickers should be handled espicially different. Characters are assumed to be in desperate, horrible situations. Kickers should be about what has a chance to bring them out of it, even if they tempt complete destruction of the self.

Hey Jesse,

Have you read One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?

Sirogit's post prompted me to mix that plus The Maxx in my head, and the emergent hybrid scares me.

Best,
Ron

Hello All,

Sorry, for the delay in response, I've been out of town all weekend.

To answer Ron's question, erm, no, I haven't READ One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. I have, (a) seen the movie (a LONG time ago) and (b) (much more recently) performed in a stage production of a play based on the novel. So, if either were good adaptations I'm at least familiar with the basic story, if not the original presentation.

I'm not familiar at all with "The Maxx" although after a bit of research I see that it was a comic book and an MTV show. From the description it seems a bit more overt, at least in the real world than I'm going for.

However, when I read sirogit's post I said, "Ah here's someone who gets it." And then realized I could quite rearticulate what I'd just read. This is the line that had me nodding up and down: "Perhaps there could be two kinds of insanity, one which is constructed to avoid their problems like as a psychological fugue, which impedes understanding themselves, and the other one harshly confronts it, the Demons with their clear, focused and yet twisted symboligy to internal truths."

Although, I don't really see those as two different forms of insanity. I could perhaps see how they were two sides of the same coin.

After thinking about all of this I suddenly realized that I'm working from a very very specific definition of insanity and I've totally failed to articulate that. Sirogit's definition made me realize that because that definition rings very true to me.

First, I'm not very familiar with insanity, all its causes and its treatments. To some extent I understand that a lot of mental illnesses are thrust upon people and are an unwanted handicap. That's NOT the kind of insanity I'm talking about. Instead, I'm talking about the kind of insanity that is willfully constructed as a defense mechanism against past trauma. I would imagine that flashback sequences for the purposes of earning bonus dice, especially for Sorcery would be EXTREMELY important and frequent.

If we put aside a specific Humanity definition and you asked me flat out whom do the Sorcerer's actions impact, for better or for worse, I would say the "normal" people, the staff, non-sorcerous patients, family members. Yes, just like One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, which is why I listed it among my original sources.

So between Sirogit's posts, Ron's post and this post, I can't tell if we're on the same page or not.

Jesse

Hi Jesse,

It reads to me as if you're getting closer to articulating what you want in the one-sheet.

About Cuckoo's Nest: Both the play and the movie are excellent adaptations, but one thing they "lose" from the novel (for very understandable reasons) is the shifting back and forth among the Chief's perceptions of reality. The book is told entirely from the Chief's point of view. The prose in the book is often extremely bizarre and horrific, as he sometimes sees things naturalistically and sometimes through the filter of hallucinatory insight. One might even say demonic or mystic insight; at one point, he literally sees through the walls and floors to eavesdrop on a conference meeting, and the book is completely unconcerned with whether he's "really" doing this or merely imagining the events he sees. The same applies to events like a dead inmate being slung up on a meat hook by his ankle, then torn open to spew forth a shower of rust and broken mechanical parts.

I recommend it highly; it's a riveting read and not at all hampered by knowing how the story turns out.

Therefore the novel has a lot in common with The Maxx, in which the principal characters shift back and forth in their perceptions between reality, flashback, and a fairly simplistic fantasy-world. The important thing about The Maxx, though, is how horrible the "real" story is - it concerns a lot of trauma about rape, family-abandonment issues, a fairly scary husband-wife relationship, and more. Jesse, you really ought to rent the six-issue MTV version, which is simplified from the comics series but very, very intense.

Best,
Ron

Actually, it's really kind of a shame I haven't read Cuckoo's Nest because one of my many quirks is that when I see something that's based on something else I HAVE to read the source material. I, of course, can't always keep up. When I was in the play I bought a copy of the novel but never got a chance to read it. I will bump it to the top of my "To Read" list again.

As for "The Maxx" I did a little more digging and found a much better description of it than the one I found before. That indeed sounds very interesting. I will have to track it down, either the comic book or the MTV series.

(Side Note: This is the issue I have with comic books as a story telling medium. It's nigh impossible to track down past story arcs or issues for reseach purposes unless they are reprinted as compilations. Is there a great comics archive somewhere?)

Jesse

One thing that pops into my head is K-Pax. Yes, most people see it as a fairly lighthearted story. However, consider the nature of Prot's reality, and compare it to the horrific nature of Robert Porter's experiences. The allure of the delusional world (I'm an alien from another world, gifted with miraculous powers) is self-evident when contrasted with the alternative (I work a dead-end job and my family was just brutally murdered).

The only problem is that it leaves you in neutral, as it were. The only way to move on and accomplish anything is to reject the delusions and accept reality for what it is: stark and unmerciful, but ultimately necessary. Prot also presents a nifty paradox: the act of helping others to return to the 'real world' reinforces his own delusional reality.

-- Ben

Hi Ben,

Prot also presents a nifty paradox: the act of helping others to return to the 'real world' reinforces his own delusional reality.

Yes! Yes! Yes!

You may be insane but that doesn't necessarily mean you're the most dysfunctional person around! In fact your insanity may place you in the unique position of percieving, judging and rectifying those dysfunctions around you.

I THINK this is what I've been trying to get at from the begining.

I just found out that the first of a planned series of compiled reprints for "The Maxx" was just printed last month. I will have to track this down.

Jesse

Hi Jesse and All,

I finally got a chance to read through this thread carefully. Forgive me if you've all gotten to this point already, but I thought I'd try to make an idea that only seems to be floating around here explicit:

These are people who go to the "other side" of insanity and bring back something for people who are sane in the real world. This is a typical "mythic pattern," if you will (found in both Joseph Campbell and Tolkien's essay "On Fairie Tales" if anyone wants more info (and for those of you who don't like Campbell much, let it slide, cause it's not key here). It's also key in the heroquests of HeroQuest.

The idea is that the hero from this world goes to the world of myth and magic and returns with something for people to use. He's suffered the dangers of Fairie or Myth, grows for it, and comes back with something the real world needs -- a something that could only be found in the realm of myth.

It seems to me that the Sorcerers of the Asylum have found a real, honest to god connection to the world of myth, perhaps even just like HeroQuestors. But with two unique hitches: 1) They're living in the twentieth century, where the world of magic is viewed as, by definition, a pathological problem, 2) they can't quite actually leave the world of Myth behind.

Number two is very important. Whether it's Jack in Jack in the Beanstalk or a Hoertling returning to his village, these folks have a real world to return to. They leave the world of magic, an extraordinary place that they percieve as *alien* behind.

The Sorcerers in the Asylum have more than one foot in Fairie, it seems to me, and suffer for it.

Because they know how desperately the world needs the cures from Fairie / Myth / Other Place, and will take dangerous risks to stay there. This is the heroic element Ron asked about (and others have discussed earlier).

Going with sirogit's comments that the Kicker involves the chance to get out of this pecular job (permanment myth walker), there's a horrible challenge before the Sorcerer: "Should I?" After all, if there's only three dozen or so of these sorcerers in the world of Asylum attending to this stuff, what happens if *I* stop? But what would it be like to be like all the people I've been helping?

Imagine HQ, where you're trapped in the world of Myth and you can't get back to the place where all your Key Words mean something....

Anywhoo, that's how I see it. Give the Sorcerer's real world connections with people who depend (unwittingly or not) upon their forays into the realm of Dreams and it seems to me you're ready to rock.

Christopher

Hello Christopher,

It had been kind of in the back of my mind but I'm glad you spelled it out. It means the concept is coming across. Everytime I've talked about this delusional otherworld I've kind of had this little mental coda in my mind say, "kind of Mythic, really." But I never seem to say it out loud.

You even draw parallels between HeroQuest and my idea and I think that's very interesting. I recently purchased HeroQuest (I'm about 50% of the way through it) and so far it isn't really doing anything for me. This concept of an otherworld constructed from the delusions of the insane and that somehow the things from this otherworld might actually be usefull, indeed NEEDED here, excites me to no end. And I think it has to do with the fact that I really can believe in such a place on the real-but-not-real paradox level of the infamous "Not Here." I can believe it and it freaks me out, the hallmark of a good Sorcerer setup.

"The Sorcerers in the Asylum have more than one foot in Fairie, it seems to me, and suffer for it."

"Imagine HQ, where you're trapped in the world of Myth and you can't get back to the place where all your Key Words mean something...."

"Give the Sorcerer's real world connections with people who depend (unwittingly or not) upon their forays into the realm of Dreams and it seems to me you're ready to rock."

These three statements in particular are spot on.

Jesse

Hi Jesse,

Well, getting some statements spot on is particularly exciting since I might get a chance to play in this game.

A new topic. I'm really intrigued with the idea that each Sorcerer's delusional otherworld are somehow connected and interact with each other. At first I though, "No way," because each Sorcerer's fucked-up-ness would be pretty unique. But then I thought of the mythic realm from Moore's Promethea, the place where all dreams reside. I suddenly saw a playing area where the players and GM bring in a LOT of color (Little Red Ridinghood (maybe carrying an Uzi now), Zeus, Gollum and the Holy Grail, as well as a little boy's room where the shadows really do house monsters all can find a home here.)

Or not.

Where were you thinking of going with this?

Christopher

This just sounds like my imagination. Where's the insanity? Or....

Hmm..

Mike

Well, I think that's a good question Mike.

I think (though I might be wrong, I believe I have yet to wrap my head around Sorcerer), is that the demon's Needs and Desires will insure that the Sorcerer has a really hard time with Reality: isolation, destructive behavior, addictions to mind altering substances.

The image I keep getting is an old Irish Fisherman who sits every day by a tavern staring out at... What? We don't know. He's a visionary of sorts, who offers up beautiful poetry on occassion, keeping the town's spirit level in a time of destitution...

But he's a drunkard, a violent man on occassion, who can't seem to stay home and show his wife his love, and his children have all disowned him. ("Poet" is great for the public, but something else when you have to live in the same house with him.)

The thing is, he's more *comfortable* in Fairie than in the real world. But longs for a place in the real world. But his Fairie Princess Muse will leave him if he doesn't pay propper homage and remain most loyal above all to her...

Christopher

I've given some thought to that as well. I hesitate to make the world of dellusions a COMPLETELY shared surreal mixing bowl of elements. I think your kneejerk reaction that this otherworld is highly personalized is the correct one. But I also like the idea of Sorcerer's being able to visit each other's dellusions and having SOME kind of impact there.

In fact, it might actually be worth investigating some rules tweaks. In Sorcerer & Sword it takes a Contact roll to journey to The Otherworld. I wanted to keep this preserved. Perhaps it requires some variation on Summoning to enter or allow someone to enter your "domain" of the otherworld. I very much like to think of Sorcerers as both Master and Prisoners of their own dellusions. Perhaps you can shape other's "realities" with a Will vs. Will roll of some kind.

As for color I imagine the full range from horrifically nightmarish to freakishly "normal" and the interactions between being quite striking and surreal.

Example: PC A is a shell-shocked war vetran who's dellusional world consists of a blackend WWII battlefield. PC B is a man with with gender-identity issues and his dellusional world consists of a uber-sterotypical 1950s suburban white-picket fence home where PC B is actually a model Martha Stewart housewife.

The interactions between these dellusions might look something like this: PC B opens his/her front door to see a WWII wasteland while grass and roses can still be seen from the windows. PC A sees a picturesq suburan home in the distance illuminated by a single ray of sunlight that breaks through the otherwise bleak and continuous clouds. Wherever PC B walks in the WWII landscape flowers and grass sprout at his/her feet and everything in PC B's house bleeds or burns whenever PC A touches it.

The problem is I don't know if this compartmentalized but connected concept of the otherworld supports the Mythic concept you so well articulated and was niggling at the back of my mind. Perhaps it pushes things back too much towards the "Sorcerers helping Sorcerers not be Sorcerers" problem. When it comes to my personal aesthetic sensibilities I've allways been about sharp contrasts and smooth shading over muddy and fluid lines and mixtures.

Jesse

Whoa! I just had an idea. Up above I wrote about Sorcerer's affecting each other's dellusional domains via Will rolls. Now, I still see this otherworld being the "home" of and "owned" by the demons. But what if Sorcerers don't "need" demons here, so to speak. What if, while in the otherworld, Sorcerer's can weild power directly via Will rolls or better yet Lore rolls. (i.e. substitue Lore for Power in the Demon Abilities description) but to weild that same power in the REAL world the Sorcerers have got to bring the Demons back with them.

I think this would certainly support my vision of insanity as dysfunctional self-defense mechanism rather than pure mental handicap.

Jesse

Have you seen Psychosis? Perhaps the otherworld is like the ship in Psychosis - it's a single unified place, but everyone's PERCEPTIONS of it are fundamentally different, to the point where they wouldn't recognize it as the same place by trying to describe it to one another (and they may not realize that they're interacting with one another INSIDE the space, they'll just recognize that an "other" is there).

So at the SAME TIME PC1 would see the WWII battlefield, PC2 would see the picket fences. Any challenges would manifest themselves dually to both parties, and each party would recognize the other differently (and likely even filter dialogue and edit it to taste).

Just a thought.

Hi Jesse,

I've been thinking about your "self-defense" mechanism for a couple of days. I think you're close, but let me offer this.

If a Sorcerer gets is at an advantage in Delusional Land, fine. It's an advantage. So, working magic is easier there. But there's really no "defense" invovled.

What I propose is this: An actual, life threatening penalty of some kind for being in the real world. Something along the lines of (but this is just an under-baked example): the Sorcerer loses a point of Will for every day he's away from Delusional Land. Whether or not the penalty kicked in before or after the Sorcerer had summoned his first demon is up to you. (In one case, learning Sorcerry was means to stay alive, as the Sorcerer's will was draining from the pain of the world. In the other, the Sorcerer ended up with a kind of alergy to reality after going toward the world of delusion to escape the mundane pain of the world. From your previous posts it sounds as if you'd set it up so the PC was dying, and found Sorcery to survive.)

Since going to Delusional Land requires Sorcery, then Our Guy is in trouble every time he takes action in order to Survive.

Now, the getting stuff from the other-world to help others is vital, as it answers Ron's questions of Heroic. But a Sorcery built on I-do-this-to-save-myself-and-others doesn't seem to be broken to me. Though it does seem a bit squishy. What I see happening is two very different styles of play: the broken-real-world-moments of pain and misery, where life is just sandpaper on the skin; and the empowered, I am a hero, master of my own domain, I know exactly what I'm doing and belong here kind of moments when in Delusional Land.

When I see it that way, it seems less squishy than really, really sad. Because Our Guy, while in Delusional Land, really is healthy and at his best. He's just got no way to transfer that to actual life because life is actually killing him.

How's that?

Christopher

That's very interesting although I'm not sure about attaching an actual on-going mechanic to the condition. I was thinking about self-defense as being a focus point for the origin story of the sorcerer and as a codifier for the relationship between demon and sorcerer.

Here are some more thoughts.

1) I think the Humanity definition needs to be revised. "Rejecting delusion" isn't right after all we've discussed. Now, it's a lot more like "acknowledging and strengthening empathic ties in the real world."

2) I also think I should construct a sample Sorcerer. This will go a long way towards explaining what I mean by "self-defense." With regards to this I give you:

Sorcerer: Lilly Savine
Appearance: A pleasent 10 year old girl with pigtails.

Telltale: Cries tears of blood.
Price: Childish (-1 to social interactions with adults)

Stamina: 2 Youthfull
Will: 4 Loving
Lore: 4 Solitary Adept
Cover: 4 School Girl
Humanity: 4

Demon: Billy
Type: Inconspicuous
Appearance: Billy is invisible but can manifest as a young boy a few years younger than Lilly. He will only do this when Lilly is alone.
Telltale: Casts a shadow even when invisible.

Desire: Mischief
Need: To be talked about to adults.

Stamina: 3
Will: 6
Lore: 5
Power: 6
Abilities: Armor (Billy), Link, Armor(Lilly), Daze(Billy), Confuse(Billy)

Notes: The Armor-Link-Armor combination allows the overly protective "siblings" to suffer damage in place of the other. Such that any abuse directed at Lilly is taken by Billy and vice versa. Daze and Confuse are used by Billy to protect Lilly from uncomfortable conversations.

Origin: When Lilly was just three years old her mother got pregnant. For nine months Lilly got very excited about having a little brother. Sadly, the child was still born. Lilly was crushed emotionally. So much so, that she "invented" (i.e. Summoned) an imaginary brother named Billy. Her and Billy play together all the time. At first her parents thought it was just a phase but over the last seven years Lilly has insisted more and more that Billy is real and begun to play with him more and more to the exculsion of other children. Finally, her parents decided there was nothing they could do and commited her to the asylum.

Kicker: During her stay Lilly has befriend a nurse named Laura. Laura has taken on a mother-away-from-home role for Lilly. But during her last visit Laura seemed distant and affraid. When Lilly asked her what was wrong Laura said that she was being transfered to the "violence wing" and that a new nurse would be replacing her here in the "children's wing."

Her Otherworld: Lilly's otherworld is a large eerily empty amusment park where she and Billy play together alone.

3) Perhaps it's time to bring the other players in on this. I have a lot of material with which to revise the one sheet and some good questions for players to think about. I should start seeing if I can start co-ordinating schedules to get together to answer some of these questions and create characters.

However, in this thread I still would like a little feedback on the revised Humanity definition above as well as the sample character I provided.

Jesse

Hi Jesse,

The revised Humanity definition works fine for me - it's actually the default definition for Sorcerer, with special reference to your localized sorcery definition. Sometimes the basics are indeed best.

I like the character, although the Kicker seems a little murky. That's a GM note-to-self, though, not a criticism I'd offer toward a player.

And finally, the set of ideas you've presented are definitely due for player input. I'd venture to say that any more prep on your part before getting them involved would be counter-productive.

Best,
Ron

What Ron said... But one quick question?

Could you give an example of Lilly's heroic angle? That's what got us going down the path of a lot of this thread. Is that an issue anymore? (I think it still needs to be.... But I may be projecting the game *I'd* run.)

Christopher

No, the heroic angle is still an issue, especially in so far as it is synonimous with proactivity in the progtagonists.

Ron's right in that the Kicker is a little murky. But writing sample kickers for a game I plan to GM is always very hard for me because it's very easy for me to fall into the playing-before-we-play trap. So, I just stopped the Kicker at the first point of significant change to Lilly's situation but I could go on and add lots of details.

The way I see it, Lilly is very much a loving child (see Will descriptor) and wants desperately to be part of a functional family and she's not above constructing one if she has to. First she's created the demon brother out of nothing but her own imagination. Then, when her real mother abandons her she sets up this nurse as a mother figure in her absence. But I know all of this mostly because I created her and I don't know how much of this I'd infer as a GM if all I saw was what was written above.

What I DO see is that there's this important figure Laura who's being taken away from Lilly and replaced by an unknown figure. So I see two possibilities.

1) Laura is the important NPC to the player. I could see a billion ways to threaten Laura and have Lilly sorcerously intervene. It's alluded to in the Kicker that Laura is unhappy about her transfer. Why? Maybe there's a doctor whose sexual advances were rejected by Laura and he's punishing her by having her transfered to the less desirable more dangerous job.

To go the weird route maybe there's some freakass dangerous sorcerer over in the violence wing who develops a thing for his new nurse.

The point is the question becomes what's this sweet little 10 year old girl going to do to save her pseudo-mother figure? The restrictions of the setting, the potential interactions of the dellusional otherworld all provide for interesting creative tools for tackling that problem.

2) Laura isn't the important NPC, she's just gone, and it's the unknown NPC whose important in the player's mind. In this case I'd make the new NPC either out-and-out hostile (kind of boring) or rather genuingly caring but totally missing the boat (more interesting). Basically I'd make this nurse some kind of threat (directly or indirectly) to Lilly and the other children in the children's ward.

I can imagine Billy playing a big role in this. Imagine this new nurse really wants to live up to her predecessor's reputation. So, she tries to get Lilly to open up and communicate with her. But Billy intervenes trying to "protect" his "sister" and uses lots of Daze and Confuse. The poor nurse walks away the impression that Lilly is just too difficult to communicate with.

Because I can spot both possiblities I'd probably plan for both and inter-relate them somehow. Add in the PCs other Kickers and The Asylum rapidly becomes populated with a nightmarish pile of conflicts and unhappy people.

Is that clear?

Jesse

Hi Jesse,

I got it. But now, it's time to go to the players. Past time.

Best,
Ron

Ron mentioned once that I injected a needed dose of reference into the Forge. So here I am doing my job =P

Games:
Sanitarium (you mentioned this already)
Blackstone Chronicles (an absolutely appalling game based on a series of novellas that were also pretty good, all about horrible asylum hijinks. And I do mean horrible)
Phantasmagoria 2 (an oldie but a goodie)

Movies:
Dark City
What Dreams May Come
(I could go on for a while here, but I won't)

Books:
Mythago Wood (Robert Holdstock, first book of two or three, about a Not-Here where all myths exist in every variation, by the power of our belief in them and reality is very psychoreceptively fluid)
Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever (a hero who slips in and out of a fantasy world... but rejects it as a delusion and adamantly refuses the role of hero that it's people offer him, with rather tragic results)

And this has nothing to do with the premise, but someone mentioned Little Red Riding Hood with an uzi- that would be Baby Bonnie Hood from the Night Warriors (aka DarkStalkers here in the States) series of games/anime. She's a short blonde bounty hunter who dresses in a red hooded frock and carries a picnic basket... full of automatic weapons and high explosives. Quite amusing.

And last but by no means least, you've mentioned the Maxx several times. Avoid if you can the lousy MTV Oddities version and pick up the comic. If you can't find the entire run (you need the entire run to make sense of any of it) or can't find it at all, and you live in the Chicagoland area, I have the whole series and would be willing to loan them on the stipulation that you are very careful with them.

Beddie bye time for me.

peace out, game on!

Oh yeah, the other movies I was trying to think of are the Cell and Paperhouse.