So I've been pondering a whole bunch of things from both the recent threads about myth and through-framing, along with this concept I'm trying to enact called Humble Mythologies.

The game concept is to simulate the feel of mythic stories and/or "magical realism" (the literary genre) in a modern, urban contest. The players should enjoy uncovering the simple, unexplainable magics in everyday life, as well as bits and pieces of the greater mystery. I'm not sure if what I'm developing will do that, but it's certainly interesting in and of itself. So I'm looking mainly for advice that will either stear this project towards my original goals or move it more in the direction it's headed now (whatever that is).

Here goes.


NARRATIVE GUIDELINES

1. You cannot use any proper nouns, ever. Characters and things and animals and places and books don't have names. They are simply given generic tags to describe them. The man. A grocery store. A small dog. The fast food chain. This supposedly will makes things more iconic and work towards developing a "shared symbolic language" (to quote Neel).

2. No heavy description of anything. The man isn't tall, with black hair, and blue eyes. You can't see the signs of age on his face. The sky isn't lit up in an explosion of color. None of that. Nobody cares what things look like. Whether they are beautiful or ugly or scary or whatever. What's important is what they do. Storyteller's don't spend time describing the handsome prince. All we need to know is that he's handsome and he's a prince. That's enough.

3. Characters cannot introspectively question the nature of the world: why nobody ever admires the colors of a sunset, why nothing has a proper name, etc. This is all taken for granted. They can, of course, wonder why no one loves them, or how they're going to survive after they loose their job. But no questioning the tenants of the game's aesthetic. Also, nobody believes in magic and nobody ever will, even though the evidence for it may be all around them.

4. There is no possibility of violence. Characters can get very angry. They can jump up and down, shake their fists in the air, scream at each other, but cannot try to physically harm each other. Weapons do not exist. No guns, no swords, no batons. Knives are used for cutting things, not people. Hammers are used to hit nails. This is the natural ways of things.

5. Whenever any player accidentally (or intentionally) breaks one of the Narrative Guidelines, the game universe performs something called a "Correction." This means that either, A) the scene ends, and later on, can be redone or ignored completely, or B) something horrible/dangerous/exciting/wonderful occurs that completely distracts the character's attention from the slip-up, which is then completely forgotten and/or ignored. Players can call Corrections on each other when someone messes up, but it's generally bad form to let the same person play "Rules-Lawyer" and narrate most of the Corrections, even if they called it first. So no person can narrate two Corrections in a row.

6. The only time you can break any of the Narrative Guidelines with no consequences is during an occurance of magic (either of the Humble or True varieties). While magic is occuring, things and people can discover their names, colors and sounds are experienced with great clarity and wonder, people can ponder the nature of their limited existence, and, yes, can even try to harm one another. However, once the magic is over, all is left is a slight memory of what occured, nothing more. The magic does not carry over to the memory, so people remember the events without the magic. Note that, when a Correction is called, players also have the choice of invoking some kind of magic, and incorperating their mistake into the mystery of the moment (thought see the guidelines below).


MAGIC

Magic comes in two varieties:

1. Humble Magic: This is anything that a normal human being could accomplish, given the right tools and equipment, and less than 5 minutes time. You couldn't use Humble Magic to fly to Russia, but you could use it to fall safely from a very high building, to light your cigarette without matches or a lighter, to use a pay phone for free, to lift a very heavy object, to unlock a locked door, to play a gorgeous melody without any instrument, etc. Humble Magic is likely to occur several times in a given game session, but can only occur once in a given scene. Humble Magic is also enacted relative to a specific character.

2. True Magic is not exactly earth-shattering, but it does shake up the lives of whoever experiences it. True Magic is anything that would be impossible for a human to accomplish (or might be, but would take years and years of work). Having an office building appear out of nowhere, writing a song so beautiful that it makes everyone who hears it cry, watching your friend get turned to stone, looking through a crack in the ground into hell itself, etc. True Magic can only occur once a session, and sometimes doesn't happen at all. True Magic is enacted independently of any character, and multiple players can together assume narrative control over it, if they like, though one must be the final arbitrator of what occurs.


CHARACTERS

Since they have no names, characters are described in other ways.

1. Their Element. The six suggested elements for a standard urban myth game are listed below, with their associated meanings. Every character is assigned one at creation:

a. Epistles -- communication (phones, newspapers, letters, beepers, billboards, ads, couriers, etc.)
b. Candles -- illumination & heat (traffic lights, heaters, neon signs, lighters, firetrucks, trashcan fires, etc.)
c. Winds -- transportation (buses, subway, bicycles, elevators, taxis, ships, trucks, etc.)
d. Rooks -- buildings (parking lots, coffee shops, gas stations, offices, stairs, fire escapes, manholes, etc.)
e. Coins -- commerce (money, valuables, suits, armored cars, shopping, groceries, fast food, etc.)
f. Beasts -- living things (pigeons, strays, people, instincts, emotions, biological needs, parks, etc.)

2. Their Approach. This describes how their approach their element. The suggested list of approaches is:

w. Page -- servant, a caretaker who protects and pampers their element
x. Knight -- warrior, an activist who fights on behalf of their element
y. Queen -- master, an artist who manipulates and shapes their element
z. King -- embodiment, a leader who is their element, setting an example

Thought there may seem to be an implied heirarchy, no approach is "better" than any other. It's simply a matter of taste and personal preference. An approach is also selected at character creation, giving the character a designation such as "the Queen of Rooks" or "the Page of Candles" for example. No two characters are allowed to have the same element and the same approach, which leaves 24 possibilities for main characters (unless someone dies, leaves the sphere of the game, or is replaced).

3. Characters are not owned by individual players, but by the entire group. However, it is often best to allow the same player to portray the character most of the time, for consistancy sake (and enjoyment of watching someone develop a role). Still, the same player cannot talk to themselves very easily, so it is recommended that players switch off characters from time to time, especially in scenes where two of a single player's characters are going to be interacting heavily.

4. Characters enact Humble Magic through the context of their Element. The Page of Beasts could summon a horde of pidgeons to cover his escape, for example, but he could not cause a nearby neon sign to erupt with light, blinding his persuers (though the Page of Candles could do such a thing).


SCENE FRAMING

"Humble Mythologies" is about aggressive, consensus-driven through-framing. Because of this, I'm probably going to have to build some kind of structure to support consensus-building, but lets ignore that for now and focus on what I want to have happen.

1. Someone calls for a scene. This can be as simple as saying "I want a scene."

2. They describe what they want to have happen in the scene, with other players providing suggestions. Together, the group through-frames the scene, covering the beginning, significant events, and a prediction or two about the end. They decide what characters have to be involved. And then they enact the scene.

3. If they want, they can create a new character for the scene, providing them with an Element and Approach. They can also choose to have existing characters appear in the scene too, though a specific character cannot appear in two scenes in a row.

4. Not all roles in a scene have to be played by established characters. "Extras" are temporary roles that players assume to play the uninteresting, unchanging masses of the game world. Extras can be cast during the through-framing or improvized on the spot, with someone jumping into the role of a butcher or taxi driver, the minute it's obvious that one is needed. The job of an Extra is to do what's needed and then get out of the way. They should not try to hog the spotlight from the characters, but support them as best they can (which often means shutting up or leaving). Extras that reappear in later scenes are good candidates for becoming actual characters in the story.

5. Anyone can call for a scene to end by tapping twice on the table. This is basically a sign of impatience, or one that suggest that the main purpose of the scene has already been accomplished. Players involved in the scene can answer back by tapping twice on the table, indicating agreement and the end of the scene, or by continuing, if they think the scene deserves to go on a bit longer. A lot of tapping, however, should be taken as a sign that the other players want to play too :)

6. Magical effects cannot be through-framed. The fact that magic will happen, and when it will happen, can be decided before play begins, but the effect itself cannot be determined or described. You could say, "And then, the Page will escape from his persuers with a little Humble Magic," but that's about it. The fun is in having the color suddenly explode into the setting, replacing all the uniform grey.

7. Occurances of True Magic have to be assigned to a scene and player during through-framing, since only one happens in a given game. However, the player can always decide not to have it occur. It's kind of a permission deal. At the through-framing point of a scene, the players can choose to give someone permission to enact True Magic in that scene, but they can't decide where or how or if it really happens. Permission does not carry over to future scenes. True Magic can happen at any point in the session. Early on, it can drive play for the rest of the game, or, near the end, it can provide a climax or reward. Player groups should experiment with using True Magic in various ways, for various narrative purposes.

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And that's what I've got so far. Pretty freeform, at this point, but I think the through-framing and tight narrative guidelines will hold everything together, though I haven't gotten the chance to playtest it yet (soon, I hope). I really think this kind of system would really work well for the group of players I have (all female, many first-time or casual gamers), where traditional number-crunching, action-oriented systems would not.

The setting still doesn't have any sort of OOMPH to it, though. No general purpose or cause to uphold. That's what I think I might be missing. Suggestions from anyone on that? I can see people having the "That's great, but what do I DO?" problem.

Thanks in advance.

The system is a little free-form? Maybe more then a little :) but I think it has a great deal of promise.

As for the setting I think maybe your title, Humble Mythologies, can provide a clue. Perhaps these people seek out the after-glow of True Magic, wanting to experience what others have done. Peraps when True MAgic occurs, it creates a point in Time that is constant ie you do it in the present but it now exists in the past AND the future.

Perhaps like moths the Characters are drawn to this flmae in a need to experience it, even if there is some danger. So in a sense they re-live a "Myth" and also with their own Tru eMagic crete new ones as they go.

The "Kill something" persona in me would normally suggest have some sort of cataclysmic Antogonist or Dark Conspiracy. I think though that you might consider a Poor Man's Highlander: people born with this gift but instead of hunting each other they gain acknowledgement from creating and reliving these moments.

"The Kurrigan is the most powerful, he has relived Babe Ruth calling his shot..."

Hope thi shelps

Sean

Perhaps you could encourage participation with a reward system that leads to being able to use True Magic? Get a penny after each scene you participate in? maybe it costs 1 penny to use Humble Magic and 5 pennies for True magic? I realize this is the gamist in me, but what if there is conflict about a scene?

I love the genre of urban fantasy and its relative magic realism. (I must confess this
sounds nothing like anything I've read by Charles de Lint or Gabriel Garcia Marquez, tho'.)

I would be worried about how a game this freeform could be game-mastered whether by an
official game-master or group consensus. "You see the man." "I already see him." "No, I
mean the other man." "Ah." "The man sees the man, then the man yells at the man." "Uhm,
which man yells at which man?" "The other man yells at the man." "Yeah . . no which man
is the other man?" "The man you saw first!" "Oh, so First Man yells at Second Man!" "Exactly!"
"Correction! Correction! You named them First Man and Second Man!" "Ah, damn . . . "

No offense, but it seems to me that the namelessness will be asking for trouble.

I also wonder how players can wonder about the magic of it all when they are required to
take it all for granted or risk correction by the universe.

Doctor Xero

ADGBoss wrote: The system is a little free-form? Maybe more then a little :)

Perhaps these people seek out the after-glow of True Magic, wanting to experience what others have done. Peraps when True MAgic occurs, it creates a point in Time that is constant ie you do it in the present but it now exists in the past AND the future.

The "Kill something" persona in me would normally suggest have some sort of cataclysmic Antogonist or Dark Conspiracy.

Umberhulk wrote: Perhaps you could encourage participation with a reward system that leads to being able to use True Magic? Get a penny after each scene you participate in? maybe it costs 1 penny to use Humble Magic and 5 pennies for True magic? I realize this is the gamist in me, but what if there is conflict about a scene?

Doctor Xero wrote: I would be worried about how a game this freeform could be game-mastered whether by an official game-master or group consensus.

No offense, but it seems to me that the namelessness will be asking for trouble.

I also wonder how players can wonder about the magic of it all when they are required to take it all for granted or risk correction by the universe.

Jonathan Walton wrote:
"Here's an excerpt from a writer called J. Robert Lennon (who I just found
online), edited just slightly to show what I mean:
'Dad's dead," said my brother, as if it were my fault. He was five years
my elder, and once tried to make me drink a bottle of aftershave I had
stolen from him. He was fifteen at the time, and I was ten, and he only
stopped when he realized that I would vomit the aftershave and
everything else onto his bedroom carpet. The last word he'd spoken to
me, during our last phone conversation a couple of years ago, was fine,
followed by the silence of an abrupt hang-up. Now, with the telephone
receiver in one hand and a backgammon dice cup in the other, I might
have welcomed a nice, clean disconnection. Instead the silence was
filled with my brother's breathing.'
No proper nouns in that passage, and no colorful descriptions. Plain language,
but it describes the relationship between the two brothers pretty effectively."

I would call the remembrance about aftershave fairly colorful. It simply adds color
by way of an anecdote rather than an adjective, which is really a minor difference.

This works fine if there are no more than two individuals in the entire scene (not two PCs
but two characters whether PC or NPC). If the narrator were describing a scene
involving three brothers, and referred to each of the three brothers as only "my brother"
with no further detail (as required by your game), this passage would have been far
more difficult to understand. If the narrator kept differentiating the brothers with tags
such "my brother who almost made me drink aftershave lotion" and "my brother
who loves cats", the narrator is again adding that forbidden further detail and beginning
to coin nicknames to name the brothers: Aftershave Brother, Cat Brother, etc.

For that matter, referring to the man as Dad is really a naming, since most children
use Dad or its variants as replacements for the first names of their fathers. (That's
why in written English we capitalize Dad when used as a proper noun surrogate.)
The same holds true for identifying the man as elder brother.

I mean no offense, but I'm concerned this particular game element would prove unplayable
unless players begin using out-of-play cheats such as OOC comments ("My PC is
referring to Jim's PC not Raul's PC and not Jenna's PC when he says "the man"
this time) or pointing ("My PC turns to the man [points at Jim] and asks him about
the man [points at Raul] who knows the man [points at Jenna]").

I suspect I'm not getting why you want to avoid all proper names and adjectives
and descriptors for this game. Perhaps an example of play involving four or more
players would help?

Jonathan Walton wrote:
"Just because people don't have names, it doesn't mean you can't refer to them in
other ways."

I'd have to disagree. Once you have decided to use a term to refer always to a
specific person, regardless of whether it's Bill, J. Crew Guy, Tall Man, or First
First Man My PC Speaks to This Scene, you've created a name. Otherwise, nicknames
and pet names and other surrogate references would not exist.

Doctor Xero

I guess you could go with a show of hands voting for conflicts, or "Onesies, Twosies" to figure out who determines story in conflict.

Or your vote counts like a shareholder. You could get a penny for being out of a scene, but if you don't like what's going on in a scene then you can bid your way into the scene and take over the story telling for a particular character. The characters would change hands a lot more that way.

Another idea is to pass the characters around and have each player write down a different word on each character sheet that could be used in a scene by a player narrating that character to gain a penny.

This lets people benefit from being in or out of a scene.

Xero, in your last post, it sounds like you're trying to be the Rules-Lawyer from Hell, sticking much more strictly to my guidelines than I would. The point is not to make things impossible. The point is to make non-magical play less colorful than the occasional magical moments, and to make the characters iconic by not giving them names. You know how in Aesop's fables where animals are simply called Wolf, Raven, Horse, etc? That's kinda what I'm imagining here, except with people: father, brother, the garbage man, the lawyer, etc.

If those are considered names to you, then, fine, they're names. But it feels like you're intentionally twisting my words to show problems in the game that aren't really there. At least, I haven't become convinced that those problems exist, just from reading your comments.

Umberhulk wrote: Or your vote counts like a shareholder. You could get a penny for being out of a scene, but if you don't like what's going on in a scene then you can bid your way into the scene...

I think the distinction you are approaching with your description rule is that you cannot describe, in normal narration, external properties of things: their colours, their shapes, their names.

However, you are allowed to describe internal characteristics, as they are related to you: why you care about them, what you do with them, where you first encountered them, etc.

The point being, of course, that the world only exists as a part of you, until magic makes it a thing real in itself.

Jonathan Walton wrote Sat Jan 31, 2004 4:45 pm:
"Xero, in your last post, it sounds like you're trying to be the Rules-Lawyer from Hell,
sticking much more strictly to my guidelines than I would. . . . But it feels like you're
intentionally twisting my words to show problems in the game that aren't really there."

Not my intention. Your initial emphasis and subsequent response seemed so definitive
that I was concerned how it might be misunderstood by your player audience; I was trying
to demonstrate for you the problems with its wording, little more.

"You know how in Aesop's fables where animals are simply called Wolf, Raven, Horse,
etc? That's kinda what I'm imagining here, except with people: father, brother, the garbage man, the lawyer, etc."

I've also noticed that when a fable involves two or more of the same creature, they
are further differentiated: Big Frog and Little Frog, the Old Wolf and the Young Wolf,
Mother Ox and The Brown Ox, etc.

"At least, I haven't become convinced that those problems exist, just from reading your comments."

<shrug> At this point, that's your choice -- I think further discussion on this point would
be counterproductive.

I would still like to see an example of play involving several players, ideally two of them
playing characters of the same type (each a Man, each a Girl, whatever), to have a
better sense of what you're striving for.

Doctor Xero

Nice start, let's see what it inspires... Some random thoughts, without editorialising.

First of all, premise (theme, possibly): you need one, and it quite clearly is the contrast between the iconic world and the magic one. Just finish the system and tell the players to make of the world constraint what they will. You hardly need anything else, assuming the rules are evocative enough (which they are). The iconic world you describe does a wonderful job of simulating in an unique way the main theme of urban fantasy, the wonder of magic. Instead of agonizing with how to describe or implement magic (like numerous games do), you just make the normal world lesser than normal, achieving the same effect of wonder maybe better than most games do with their complex and evocative magic rules. This is achievement enough, as most urban fantastists do /nothing else/ in their stories. It's all just preparation for the magic moment. It's an added bonus that most take the tack of "the world of magic is symbolic", while you take the complete reverse of tacking the mundate with symbolism and giving magic the reality. A very liberal premise, if I may say so.

About characters and their description: assume that all people of the world are of an element. These people are elemental Servitors, who are unavare of magic, but mold their lives according to the symbolism of their element. There can be many servitors in the story, obviously.

About elements: consider making the list of elements freeform, so that there is one element per player, plus the players may add one element in consensus later in the story. This way you leave the support structure with more freedom, which is a good thing: If the players want to explore the relationship of Snake people and Stone people, it can be done straightforwardly without interpreting Snake and Stone through your elements. Also, assume that all things as well as people are elementally aspected.

About nouns: what you seem to be looking for, as esteemed Shreyas already noted, is the difference between the internal and external. If it's not a problem for Plato, it's not for us either. Consider however formalising the following:
1)Every thing has to be referred to by one noun.
2)If there is two things with overlapping referrents, add a different adjective to both.
Alternatively, don't sweat it. This is absolutely the whole and only point of the game, but if someone doesn't get it without higher linguistics, what can you do?

Residue: to accentuate the search for magic, make it possible for major magic to effect a Naming in addition to it's normal effects: this means either attaching a name to a thing or adding an extra adjective to it's description or awaking one person to the existence of something more. Otherwise magic should indeed be only temporary.

About resource management: not necessary or desirable. What you need is conflict resolution between players, not limits on directorial power. Use this one of mine, if you prefer:
Usually a player decides what his character /tries/ to do. He can either decide the success and repercussions himself, or ask another player of his choise for an opinion. If someone however disagrees with the player's judgement when he decides on his own, the complete opposite to the player's decision happens. If the player asked another player, two players are needed to reverse the decision (of which one can be the original player, if he doesn't like the decision). I don't say that this is right for you, but I say that it's deeper and more nuanced than you think.

More about theme and conflict: obviously all characters are unified by a dissatisfaction and awareness of something more. This is a common theme of urban fantasy, which is an offshoot of romanticism. In character creation then, you could emphasize these aspects by demanding an answer to the Question of Dissatisfaction and the Question of Awareness; what the character dreams about, and what hinted him of magic, respectively. A character without dissatisfaction may only be a Page (or servitor), while a character needs Awareness to be a Queen or a King.

About the elements and freedom: there is a possibility of constructing an additional philosophical question here, if one is so inclined. The existense of both Elements and Approaches implies an ordered universe. The goal of the characters is to break free. Question: are the elements, on a symbolic or acknowledged (by characters) level, the shackles or the means of liberation? Is humble magic perhaps a bone offered by the Uncaring, while the true magic shortly breaks the prison? Or are the elements paths that lead to greater understanding of the Maya, peaking in true magic? Note that I don't mean that any of these rules aspects would need to be presented to the characters of the game world, I'm speaking solely about the thematic level the players assumedly operate in. Some pondering on the premise follows.

Approaches: assume that there is a possibility for a character to change approach and even element through change in life. Assume that the approaches are indeed ordered into a hierarchy, with the numerous Servitors on the bottom and the titles on top. This hierarchy isn't an absolute truth; the players are assumed to answer the question about it's significance and validity through play. There is demands on the character depending on the approach, and a character becomes servitor when he is removed from an approach for some reason.
Approach -- must be
Servitor -- living by the element
Page -- living greatly by the element
Knight -- dissatisfied with something
Queen -- dissatisfied, aware of the existence of magic
King -- dissatisfied, aware and hold no other title

Elements: Assume that a character can adopt different elements, and hold a servitor status or title in them all. This is also purely symbolic; the idea is to use the symbolic relations and character "development" to spark the story. Page of an element being subservient socially to his queen, losing his status in the element and gaining a new one in another and so on, all changes that either reflect or spark the story.

Magician: Assume that a character can be disassociated from all elements and live. Such a character would be called Magician (still one per story, assuming we hold to that limit), and would conseivably symbolize freedom and breaking the limits. Therefore a character has to be both dissatisfied and aware of magic to be the Magician.

Change: Assume, that change in approach or elements of a person or thing come about through the actions of the characters. Approach would change when the character's understanding and harmony with the given element changes, or when another character ousts the character from his title (in which case he becomes a servitor) by outperforming him. Losing an elemental status altogether or gaining a new one follows always from great change in the life of the character. There is still the limit of Dissatisfaction and Awareness on the character's approach.

Numbers: Assume that there can be more than one holder of a given Approach in the story. I'm assuming here that statists are given implicit titles also when appropriate, so this moves the title system a little more to the direction of symbolic simulation from straight player character creation. These limits are as follows:
Servitor -- There can be an unlimited amount.
Page -- Every page must have a master of higher title, and these cannot be the same person or thing. 'None' is a master.
Knight -- Every knight must have something to fight for, and these cannot be the same person or thing. 'Nothing' is a thing.
Queen -- Every queen must have a domain, and these cannot overlap.
King -- There can be only one.
Magician -- Superrare, but unlimited.
The masters of the pages, causes of the knights and the domains of the queens must all be of higher title and the same element, metaphorically or concretely.

Magic: Note that humble magic is elementally accented, while true magic is not. Note that I don't comment on whether this is a difference between the magics, indicating different sources, or if it's unity between the elements and the true world. This is a question for the players.

With these systems in place, there are symbolic tools for answering the earlier question about freedom and structure. By the changes in the caste system and the role of the Magician the thematic questions of freedom and structure can be manipulated as well as those already in place. Note that the Magician has no natural connection to an element and therefore does humble magic without elemental connection, making it strange and unknown even to characters aware of magic.

Point: the baroque titles and elements hold no mechanical significance at all, operating wholly on the symbolic plane. What is the importance of my character losing his crown in the element of Buildings, if it has no rules significance? This is either an astoundingly half-assed way of building a dud of a game, or a strong symbolic system of interpreting and inspiring game events.

Titles: Apart from the previous topics, consider demanding that elements be always either of a paradigm or apart. Elements apart from each other cannot have the same names for the approaches, while elements of a paradigm must have the same names for them. Therefore a given element might have several names for an Approach, if it shares paradigm with elements apart from each other. This is more symbolic fucking with the heads of the players, and has no other meaning than establishing the relations of the different elements towards each other.

Rules of manipulation: The big design question is, can the game be constructed towards this vision? If it can, what is needed is a metasystem for forced manipulation of the system of elements and approaches. There'd be then three interlocking systems: the extremely minimalistic system of inworld conflict, mostly handled through the scene framing; the rules of narration, controlling the grayness of the world and use of magic; the metasystem for forcing changes in the titles of characters and acknowledging changes happening through play. If implemented, the idea of the game is clear: the changes in the lives of the characters are followed by changes in the title system, and changes in the title system are followed by changes in the lives of the characters. There is some connection between the titles and finding true magic, but what it is is defined by the players through playing.

So much great stuff to respond to...

Shreyas Sampat wrote: The point being, of course, that the world only exists as a part of you, until magic makes it a thing real in itself.

Doctor Xero wrote: Your initial emphasis and subsequent response seemed so definitive that I was concerned how it might be misunderstood by your player audience; I was trying to demonstrate for you the problems with its wording, little more.

Eero Tuovinen wrote: First of all, premise (theme, possibly): you need one, and it quite clearly is the contrast between the iconic world and the magic one. Just finish the system and tell the players to make of the world constraint what they will.

Assume that all people of the world are of an element. These people are elemental Servitors, who are unavare of magic, but mold their lives according to the symbolism of their element.

Consider making the list of elements freeform, so that there is one element per player, plus the players may add one element in consensus later in the story. ...Also, assume that all things as well as people are elementally aspected.

About resource management: not necessary or desirable. What you need is conflict resolution between players, not limits on directorial power.

Assume that a character can adopt different elements, and hold a servitor status or title in them all. This is also purely symbolic; the idea is to use the symbolic relations and character "development" to spark the story.

Magician: Assume that a character can be disassociated from all elements and live. Such a character would be called Magician (still one per story, assuming we hold to that limit), and would conseivably symbolize freedom and breaking the limits.

Jonathan Walton wrote:
Cool, then. Sorry I misread your intent. Your point about the "Big Frog & Little Frog" is well taken too. I don't think a single adjective would be enough to really spoil the aesthetic, so I might end up suggesting something like that. After all, if you have any two individuals, you can certainly call one them "the Taller Man" and "the Other," or do something similar. Then again, I'd still like to avoid language based on physical descriptions, because it de-generalizes everything and breaks the illusion that all the players are imagining the same thing.

Eero Tuovinen wrote: First of all, premise (theme, possibly): you need one, and it quite clearly is the contrast between the iconic world and the magic one. Just finish the system and tell the players to make of the world constraint what they will.

This is what I was originally thinking, but I guess I'm worried that players will have trouble knowing how to develop conflict (which, I think, drives most narrative), especially typical American players who aren't likely to have done much freeform roleplaying. Then again, I just may need to ditch the idea of writing the game for typical American roleplayers and focus on a different audience.

I still feel that some sort of relationship map, or a way of determing inter-character relationships would do a lot to drive play. The hierarchy you mention later does something pretty similar, since it's also creating relationships (hierarchical ones of power). But let me talk about that in a minute...

Hmm, I like the politics of this concept (everyone has an Element, so nobody's special), but it doesn't seem to gel with the narrative structure, where the PCs are obviously much more significant than the average joe.

Then again, your apprach would emphasize the fact that everyone has a story to tell, everyone is a potential lead character. I'll have to ponder this a bit. Maybe what distinguishes the PCs is not that they have an Element, but that they can draw on their Element to perform Humble Magic, something that anyone could potentially do. That way too, an Extra would automatically shift into a PC the moment they first performed Humble Magic. Definitely has potential...

Consider making the list of elements freeform, so that there is one element per player, plus the players may add one element in consensus later in the story. ...Also, assume that all things as well as people are elementally aspected.

This is something that I had considered earlier, but I was thinking more along the lines of giving a different Element to each character, but that was too much riffing on Nobilis and In Nomine for me. Your way, actually, sounds like it would work much better. So the players would decide what Elements form the basis of their mythology. If the group has any trouble reaching consensus on the Elements, it would be easy enough to let each player pick one, but still encourage them all to maintain PCs of Elements other than the one they chose.

On the issue of things having Elements: I think animals definitely should (though having a dog of the Snake Element would be rather weird/cool), but maybe only magic objects should have Elements. Other objects are basically tools and, as such, are basically an extension of their character and should be considered the same Element. Unless you're thinking of having a Snake-PC who drives a Water-car or something? I'm not sure what that would mean, except in moments of magic where the Elements became more apparent.

Your "residue" concept is cool. I thought about allowing True Magic to permanently give people names, and this seems to be the kind of thing you're talking about. But maybe only True Magic should leave a permanent residue. Humble Magic might have one, but the residue would fade with time, completely disappearing after a couple of days. I can imagine a neat story where the PCs cluster around the remants of some Humble Magic, entralled by it, but then have to watch it fade away before their eyes.

About resource management: not necessary or desirable. What you need is conflict resolution between players, not limits on directorial power.

Maybe. I don't know. Don't both of these address the same issue, ultimately? They decide who gets to determine what happens. I agree that resource management isn't quite the right system for this game, though. It's a little bit too... formal, I guess.

Still, since we're planning on heavily framing most of the scenes, I don't think the conflicts are really going to be what happens during a particular scene. The conflicts are going to come when the scene gets framed, when the group tries to decide what should happen. That's when I was imagining the resource might come in handy, to do Universalis-style bidding. But there's other potential ways of resolving those difficulties, I guess. Your system sounds neat, but it seems more appropriate to deciding issues as they happen in a narrative, rather than helping the group come to consensus before the scene even begins.

As for premise: the philosophical issues you mentioned are great, and just the kind of thing I intended. Since the existence of Humble & True Magic is never going to be explained in the game (and isn't something the characters are even consistently aware of), I imagine the players will be thinking about it a great deal, even if the PCs aren't.

Assume that a character can adopt different elements, and hold a servitor status or title in them all. This is also purely symbolic; the idea is to use the symbolic relations and character "development" to spark the story.

Ha! I think you definitely have something there: an Element-driven relationship map and maybe even a Karma-based resolution mechanic. Here's an example, off the top of my head:

What do you think? Characters can then take different tactics to try to get what they want, manuvering around to play on their strengths. Does this take too much attention off the magic, since it's now a story about power struggles? I feel like the characters' main goal should be to seek out the magic moments in the world, not try to get ahead at their jobs. But maybe this kind of thing might still work. Any suggestions?

Magician: Assume that a character can be disassociated from all elements and live. Such a character would be called Magician (still one per story, assuming we hold to that limit), and would conseivably symbolize freedom and breaking the limits.

Hmm... A very interesting proposal, but I'm not totally convinced by it. If there was a character who was completely aware of magic (in a way that most other characters weren't) wouldn't they tend to become the center of attention, since they'd almost be an avatar of the players (who, like the Magician, also are aware of magic)? The Magician would get to break all the awareness rules, would get to ponder the nature of things, etc.

Perhaps if there were restrictions on when and how the Magician could appear in the narrative, it might work. If there was only one Magician, and s/he could only appear in one scene per session, the character might serve to re-emphasize the nature of magic, drawing attention to it, while still not drawing all the attention on themselves. Part of the continuing plot would then be figuring out what the hell the Magician is up to. After all, what do you do in a world where you can see all the magic? Perhaps the players would begin to suspect that the Magician himself is the source of True Magic, being, as he is, apart from the structure of Elements.

Also, it begs the question: If the Magician character is removed from the game in any way, can another character break free of the Elements and become the Magician? All in all, a very interesting idea, but I'll have to think about it a bit before deciding whether and how to implement it.

Eero Tuovinen wrote: There is two levels to the game, the symbolic and the concrete. These have been already constructed, with the elements and titles being the symbolic part. The point is, there is no formal connection between them at all except the magic. This is either very elegant, or extremely crazy.

I personally have a vague feeling that this is on some level a complete symbology. In theory it could however be expanded, to give the players more tools. You'll just risk making in unmanageable and incomplete (in the sense that the system inspires questions that it has no tools to answer). Opinions?

Always posit that the two levels, the symbolic, and the concrete, are interrelated, but don't give any absolute rules. The result should be that the players start to build the story towards the symbols: a change in the title of a character inspires a cataclysmic turn in the plot, or a character, who has the title of Page of Ice (to master whatshisname), naturally is deferential to his master. Or not, as the rules don't say that the relationship should mean this.

Now, give a system of rules for the players to manipulate the title system. Some way for them to give elemental affinities and titles to things and people. Also posit that the elements and titles change through the play, and put in a formal phase after all scenes, where these changes are recorded if they happen. Give the phase a friction, so the symbols aren't too easy to change.

Servitor -- living by the element
Page -- living greatly by the element
Knight -- dissatisfied with something
Queen -- dissatisfied, aware of the existence of something more
King -- dissatisfied, aware and hold no other title

I'd write more, maybe an outline for the system of symbol manipulation, but time presses.

Jonathan Walton wrote:

Always posit that the two levels, the symbolic, and the concrete, are interrelated, but don't give any absolute rules. The result should be that the players start to build the story towards the symbols: a change in the title of a character inspires a cataclysmic turn in the plot, or a character, who has the title of Page of Ice (to master whatshisname), naturally is deferential to his master. Or not, as the rules don't say that the relationship should mean this.

I think this is the major thing that makes the game unique. It's like taking an entire cosmology and turning into something that's as abstract as a traditional "alignment" system. The Page of Ice doesn't know he's "the Page of Ice" any more than a Paladin knows he's "Lawful Good" or whatever. It just serves as a motivation for play decisions.

Now, give a system of rules for the players to manipulate the title system. Some way for them to give elemental affinities and titles to things and people. Also posit that the elements and titles change through the play, and put in a formal phase after all scenes, where these changes are recorded if they happen. Give the phase a friction, so the symbols aren't too easy to change.

Give me a couple days to ponder a few options here, and I'll get back to you. If we're going to avoid the Gamist tendency to quantify levels of rank and have characters cause each other the gain or lose levels, I think we're going to need something subtle and frickin' brilliant. After all, we need to ensure a few things:

1. Players have no reason to try to make their characters all Kings or whatever. Maybe if characters increase in rank too much, they change so much that they need to be played by another player?

2. That a Player doesn't feel any less effective if they're characters have lower ranks. After all, if the story is really ABOUT the Page, what does it matter if the Page isn't a King? Being a King should be pretty boring in many ways, because you stand alone and don't have the freedom of those on the bottom.

3. In general, I think it's going to convince players that being at a given level in the heirachy doesn't really make a character "better" or "worse" than another; it just makes them "different." How to make this clear, when the ranks don't directly effect play, is hard.

4. Moving up/down in rank and changing Elements should be a big deal, but it should also happen really easily, if that's what the narrative suggests.

Servitor -- living by the element
Page -- living greatly by the element
Knight -- dissatisfied with something
Queen -- dissatisfied, aware of the existence of something more
King -- dissatisfied, aware and hold no other title

Can you explain more what you mean by both "living by the element" means? For instance, what would "living by Snakes" or "living greatly by Ice" mean? And is dissatisfaction similar to that kind of general "wrongness" that Morpheus describes in the Matrix ("You've always felt that there was something... dissatisfying with the world...")?

I'd write more, maybe an outline for the system of symbol manipulation, but time presses.

Eero, if you write any more, you're not going to leave much for me to design ;)

Eero Tuovinen wrote:
Indeed, fricking brilliant is what's needed, I won't forgive you if you go for anything suboptimal on such a nice game idea.

From world to symbols when exploring the story, and from symbols to world when creating one, shall be the law.

Did you understand what I meant about the amounts of the different titles?

Thus we could have the Ice Queen of Marlsboro (don't ask why), her Ice Knight of Marlsboro (meaning the knight's cause is the queen, or Marlsboro, depending on preference) and a couple of Pages for those two, all aspected to Ice.

So the rules system used should enable players to:
a) resolve disagreements about framing,
b) enable players to proactively change elemental associations of characters and introduce assosiations for things,
c) evaluate and record changes in elemental assosiations that happen due to what happens in the game and
d) maybe do some slight manipulation of the representation of the world, like adding and changing adjectives to things, as a kind of a symbol manipulation.

Anyway, consider playing cards for the mechanics.

I myself would maybe explore the possibilities of tying the different functions to parts of the story
(scenes, climaxes, intermissions, sessions, prologues, epilogues, flashbacks, stories, acts, books, chapters, tie-ins, the animated series, action figures, preparation sequences, revelations, turns of the plot, introducing characters, removing characters, beginnings and endings)
to get that literary, stylistic feel.

Maybe embed the whole to some regimented cultural tradition, like ballet or opera buffo, to get some inspiration and color to the mechanics.

Hey, just tell me if I'm too pushy. You can think of it as admiration of the concept. I don't post too much, partly because of time, but partly because not everything draws me to.

Jonathan Walton wrote:
Something just struck me when reading your last post. If each member of high-ranked royalty needs something to be King/Queen of, and things don't have names... Perhaps you can only become a King/Queen once you have a named thing to be ruler of. That is, you have to wait for True Magic to name something, then, you can declare yourself ruler of it. Part of what makes royalty aware of magic, then, is that their dominion is over something that magic has named.

Makes me wonder if we could work out similar narrative requirements for each rank, which would make advancement rare, but possible. Maybe we need some in-game thing to provoke dissatisfaction?

Another potentially-brilliant thought that just struck me: what if the requirements for changing rank or element is that you have to make the other players think that the change needs to happen, without mentioning it yourself. So, you have to make your character act a certain way, such that it causes someone else to say: "Y'know, I really think the Tall Man should be Snake-element, not Ice-element. He's been really distrustworthy lately."

The system would have to be a little more complicated that that, more involved than just one player saying that they thought a change was needed (to keep change from being constant), but what do you think of that as a basis for change? It would certainly make it happen somewhat consistently, but then also occur just unexpectedly every now and then, promoting plot.

Imagine a system that might work something like this:

1. At the end of each scene, every player takes out a card and writes down any symbol changes that they think need to take place as a result of the events of the scene. You can't, however, request symbol changes for your own characters.

What if there were cards with different types of scenes on them, which were then somehow drawn or arranged in a particular order, partially by choice and partially by chance. After all, there's no reason that the story couldn't start with a conclusion or intermission. Maybe there would be other cards for adding or removing players, or ones that limited the number or type of characters that could be in a particular scene.

Maybe embed the whole to some regimented cultural tradition, like ballet or opera buffo, to get some inspiration and color to the mechanics.

Opera buffo is very, very cool. But you run into another symbolic language there, which I don't think would necessarily gel well with the Elements and Approaches that we've defined already. Maybe we could steal their narrative structures, though. I'm going to think more about how exactly the scene framing connects with the rest of what we've got so far, but I wanted to divulge what my mind was already churning on.

You know... Another thing just struck me: it's going to be impossible to have artwork for this game, assuming it gets to that point. Everything will have to ride on the words, the graphic design, and maybe some non-representational artwork to convey mood and color. But anything representational goes against the game's narrative guidelines, because it would describe the external properties of things.

I got to thinking while washing dishes about the nature and reasons of the narrative limitations placed on the players of Humble Mythologies. Here's what I came up with:

The four limitations, as presented by Mr Walton, are the following:
1. You cannot use any proper nouns, ever.
2. No heavy description of anything.
3. Characters cannot introspectively question the nature of the world.
4. There is no possibility of violence.

Now, it's quite clear that the first and second limitations are a part of the same principle, that of making the world simple. This is the central aesthetic of the game, let's not mess with it. The third is likewise necessary for deep thematic reasons; it'd be strange if the characters would question their world, but the game would lose it's meaning without such questioning: therefore we prohibit such introspection, and thus draw the player's attention to it.

The fourth is the clausule I'm interested in. Why no violence? There's two reasons: firstly, this removes a central element of usual games, and thus opens the possibilities for unusual play. Pretty basic, and should be a part of many other games. The second reason is thematic, as I understand it: by removing a valuable part of the world, we make it the lesser for it. As I noted earlier, the game gives us shocking possibilities in working with the wonder of magic, by magic the baseline reality lesser than our own, and thus giving room for the magic to live in.

From this second reason I came to the conclusion that there actually is no reason for the violence limitation to be the only one; indeed, it should only be a suggestion, a good example of such a limit. In this way the game would gain in thematic tools, in the same way it gains by letting the players choose the elements in the symbology.

If the players could choose the way their world is limited (similar to MLwM with it's "more than human" and "less than human"), they could more effectively control the themes. Imagine that instead of "no violence" there'd be "no love" or "no dreams" or even "no plumbing". The limitations would focus the play, especially as exactly the lacking consepts would be the ones that magic would allow.

This could be conceivably done the same way as with elements, with there being as many consepts lacking in the world as there are players, with one added later through consensus. This'd work with smaller parts, but the kinds of violence would then be too large. Perhaps the players simply decide freeform the number and type of lacks in the world of their story.

The limits on narration, therefore, would contract to following:
1. The world is vague and archetypal in nature.
2. Characters cannot introspectively question the nature of the world.
4. The world lacks something valuable to human condition.

Jonathan, I think Eero just figured out how to make that Invisible Cities game you've been longing after.

Eero, that's brilliant.

Shreyas Sampat wrote: Eero, that's brilliant.

First off I would like to get the pre-posting requisites out of the way:
Obviously no one would comment if they werent truly and seriously impressed with the game idea.
And I am.
It looks to me like it has a startling amount of possibility.

Also, I am late.
With both of those in mind, I really only have one issue that I would like to see clarifyed by brighter, and more directly involved minds than my own:

The role of Approaches.


When I first began reading the thread, it was the character design system and its trappings that really excited me. As the thread progressed, something changed subtly - it may be that this is for the best, or the intended result, or that I am simply misreading, but it seems that Approaches have become a hierarchy as opposed to what they began as.

The problem that I see with arranging the Approaches as a system of ranks is that it must, as a necessity, cheapen each rank but the topmost.
When the Approaches are only a road to king-ship, how can Any page possibly be a Good page? They would all become mercenaries, posers, just scrambling for power.

Rather it was my understanding that to be a Page was to want to be a page, because it was not a recognized thing. If one lived in accordance with protecting and nurturing one's element, then one was a page. There was nowhere to go, because to be a Knight carried no more power, or prestiege, only a different way of looking at things.


As an example, take The Grass Cutter.
The Grass Cutter is a young man who cuts grass. He happens to be the Knight of Brambles (association: plants, thorns,growing things..etc).
The Grass Cutter might, in the course of a roleplay, chase hoodlums from his golf course, combat animals attempting to destroy it, or hack apart unruly plants. Because that is how he serves his element, by fighting for it.
The Grass Cutter works with the Mechanic, who happens to be the Queen of Gears (mechanical apparatus, oil, metal..). The Grass Cutter is also the Page of Gears. This is not to say that the Queen holds more power than the Grass Cutter, it is to say that the Grass Cutter cares for his machines, he keeps them in good repair, he cleans and checks them; and that is all. And that is all he Wants to do with them.
The Queen, the Mechanic, builds new machines, controls and manipulates them, works a will through the element.

I can see how they (the Approaches) seem to dictate a hierarchy, but I suppose my point is that it seems as though there would be a distinct lack of motivation to climb that hierarchy, unless something Drastically changed in the character itself.

So I suppose the ambition could still exist, but to make it inborn just doesnt quite jive with how I originally viewed the approaches.

Once again, this could be a personal complaint, or wholly misrepresentative, but hey - I wanted it to be on the table.

Jux wrote:
The role of Approaches.

Concerns allayed by a rereading bearing those facts in mind.

I bow to the point of freedom.
Well done, and thanks.

Thanks for the comments, Jux. I think all 3 of us on are the same page here. The heirarchy between ranks is simply an implied one. Some characters (and players) will feel drawn to climb the heirarchy and some will not. To each their own. The idea is for the symbolic world to provide motivation for the "real" one. The implied heirarchy is one way this can happen, but there are plenty of others too.

Eero Tuovinen wrote: By the by, Jonathan, how is the game coming along? I want to play it in May, when I get rid of the current projects...