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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

QuoteOne 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.

Or here's an alternate spin on it to consider.

The reality is horrible.  The question that the PCs need to face is if they want to help others within this dark reality (i.e. choosing to face the darkness) or escape to a fantasyland of power alone.  In this way, the dehumanization of a No When setting becomes a bonus, not a problem.  (Besides, it makes me think of Dark City, which has a similar setting.)

Seth Ben-Ezra
Great Wolf

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,

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

Wow, that's exactly like The Maxx. It also strikes me as the key to The Outlaw Prevails for this particular setting, and it also dovetails with my thoughts on The Incredible Hulk TV show, as discussed in the recent Urge thread. Banner continually gives up his chances for happiness and community, because becoming the Hulk is the key to securing those very things for other people.

Best,
Ron