Barf Forth Apocalyptica
powered by the apocalypse => Monsterhearts => Topic started by: mcdaldno on July 27, 2010, 02:37:18 AM
-
So, I scrapped the Style+Type way of generating characters. Everyone picks their skin (Mortal, Vampire, Witch, etc) and that's that.
Skins have: descriptors, stats, special moves, a sex move, and a darkest self.
While you select your descriptors, stats & moves (just like in AW), each skin has exactly one sex move and one darkest self.
Here's what the Darkest Self is - it's a dark and awful thing that you can become. Not just a monstrous teenager, but a true monster. The worst possible fate for your kind.
While you are your Darkest Self, you are locked into a set of instincts and impulses. To do otherwise is Acting Under Fire.
There's an escape clause: something that gets you back into normal mode. Maybe it's hurting a loved one, sacrificing strings, isolating yourself, going too far, confronting your past, etc, etc. Something that brings you face-to-face with what you want least.
For example, when a Werewolf is its Darkest Self, maybe it can only interact with others if it Seizes By Force or Threatens (Goes Aggro). Like all Darkest Selves, you can Act Under Fire to try to momentarily bypass this rule. To escape your Darkest Self, you must isolate yourself until the sun rises once again.
Here's why I thought of this, and why I merged style+class:
The Mortal's sex move is to trigger their partner's Darkest Self. OMG, right?!
Questions:
1. Does this sound fun?
2. Is this too prescriptive?
3. Does this emulate the whole "you thought I was a monster before, but now I'm a REAL monster!" plot point that seems to rear its head in this genre?
4. What are some possible Darkest Selves for different Skins?
-
I'll answer 4 with a very rough brainstorm.
Werewolf - As mentioned in my OP.
Mortal - You cannot disagree with, question or halt a monster. To do so requires that you Act Under Fire. To escape your Darkest Self, you must confess the darkness to other mortals, and seek their sanctuary.
Vampire - Whenever you are intimate with someone, physically or emotionally, they suffer 1 Harm, because you do something horrific to them. Protecting them from you requires that you Act Under Fire. To escape your Darkest Self, you must put your life in another's hands.
-
OMG that's the stuff.
-Vincent
-
Really nice. I think you nailed the werewolf, and that vampire sounds pretty awesome too.
Maybe a ghost type character's darkest self is a lone observer who can watch anything unfold, but can't interfere or make their wishes known.
What if a mutant's darkest self is a cyclone of power that can only destroy things.
How about a character whose darkest self can only manipulate: like the skinner, who keeps giving people hold that makes them want to do stuff for you, but completely removes the possibility of authentica intimacy?
-
Ghost: At your darkest self, you are completely invisible and completely mute. To be noticed requires that you must Act Under Fire. To escape your darkest self, you must revisit something painful from your past.
-
I want the opposite for ghosts! I want a ghost to become able only to express and re-express its past trauma. Able only to lash out, and always lashing out at something that's not even happening anymore.
He's a kid who died under sordid and traumatic circumstances, right? It was the 20s and his girlfriend's father forced her to marry a richer, older man, so he hanged himself, for instance, something like that? Now whenever you get close to him, he becomes able only to relive that experience, casting you in whichever role makes most sense to his trapped psyche and lashing out at you accordingly.
I love it when ghosts lash out, is why. It's scary, ghosts can do some scary shit.
-Vincent
-
That sounds awesome Vincent (and gives me some food for thought for my hack as well) but in your view, how would this version of the ghost escape his darkest self? By realizing that the world has changed?
-
Hm. I think the opposite, maybe? They need to resolve that stuff, come to some conclusion they weren't able to in life.
Or, well, that's what they need in order to disappear forever and go onto their final rest, which is not the same as being a boyfriend. What do they need in order to go back to being a boyfriend? Reassurance?
-Vincent
-
I want the opposite for ghosts! I want a ghost to become able only to express and re-express its past trauma. Able only to lash out, and always lashing out at something that's not even happening anymore.
[...]
-Vincent
Yeah, this is hot hot hot. But...
The reason I went the invisible+mute avenue is because then ghosts are all about non-existence, and isolation, and being not there.
I worry that making their Darkest Self all about being trapped in a rage... well, it makes them very similar to a Werewolf or a Mutant. I mean, it theoretically does, because nothing's locked in yet. But you see my concern, right?
What about if the Ghost has the invisible+mute Darkest Self, but has a move like:
Haunted
When you begin play, note the circumstances of your death, including up to two people responsible for that death. During play, you can get caught up in the past, and cast someone into one of those two roles, superimposing all your fears and hatreds onto them. When you do, carry +1forward when you carry out your vengeance upon them.
-
Oh! Cool, yeah. I'm for it.
-Vincent
-
The Witch Darkest Self is: playful cruelty. Humiliating people because it's funny. Controlling people because you can. Playing with memories, setting up no-win situations, just because it's entertaining to watch the victim twitch. To get out of it, pass on an opportunity to do this sort of thing when it would actually get you a tangible benefit (in addition to amusement).
The Fae Darkest Self is: You slip closer to your "faerie" self. Even a casual commitment bites like a formal oath if you try to break it. You develop odd compulsions and common things can harm you. It's tough to understand why mortals get so riled up over some things. To escape it, take a scene reaffirming your connection to mortals and roll+(some stat representing mortality) . On a 10, you're good. On a 7-9, you escape your Darkest Self at the cost of 1-harm. On a miss, you take the harm but it doesn't help.
These are just first drafts, but I had the ideas.
-
I'm licking the screen.
mwaaruhyuumuyah
-
Hey Neon Fox,
Thanks! These are both good directions to meander in.
I'm concerned that the Witch can escape her Darkest Self too easily. It's not a Darkest Self if you can undo it whenever you want to - it's just a bad mood. So... needs teeth.
With the Fae, I like it! "Even a casual commitment bites like a formal oath if you try to break it." I want to take that farther, and make it more severe.
Fae Darkest Self: Everything you say is a promise. Everything you hear is a promise. If a promise is broken, justice must be wrought in blood. To let a promise slide counts as Acting Under Fire. To escape your Darkest Self, [?]
-
Comment that may or may not be relevant: the darkest selves feel kind of like more restrictive Keys from tSoY.
-
Comment that may or may not be relevant: the darkest selves feel kind of like more restrictive Keys from tSoY.
Hm.
That's interesting. When I was reading Neon Fox's post, I immediately thought that they were too Key-like, but brimming with awesome otherwise.
Darkest Selves give you no experience. You don't get to them on purpose - though you do smile a secret smile when someone else shoves you into your Darkest Self.
Darkest Selves are about dealing with new situations and consequences, sure, but they're also about permission. You were trying to balance monster and fragile teenager before. Darkest Self says, "Fuck it. You're a monster, now. Full blown. You are terrible and hideous. Play it to the hilt."
It gives you a reset button, but it's a reset button that should *hurt*
-
Yeah, maybe it was just Neon Fox's examples that made me think Keys.
I was wondering if maybe you would want to give some kind of reward for indulging your darkest self longer rather than immediately trying to hit the reset button. Or are you just going to try to make all the reset buttons painful enough that it won't be an issue?
-
fnord,
I want your Darkest Self to fuck shit up for you. I want it to be a losing proposition, that you can't help but love in a perverse way, because you're at the helm of your own self-destruction.
So, the only reward for being your Darkest Self should be that your inhibitions are probably swept away. You can just give in to the monster.
The only reward for escaping your Darkest Self should be that you've escaped it.
Also, though, some Skins get more powerful as their Darkest Self, in this trade-off-y way.
-
Cool. I suppose if, as a player, you really fucking hate a playbook's darker self, you shouldn't have picked that playbook to begin with. You've got to take one with a darker self that you can revel in a bit, right?
(oh, and you can call me brian, if you want.)
-
Joe - just as a matter of curiousity, how familiar are you with White Wolf stuff?
-
Joe - just as a matter of curiousity, how familiar are you with White Wolf stuff?
I've run Vampire: the Masquerade. I've started and abandoned a Vampire: the Masquerade hack that stole mechanics from Covenant.
I can pitch all the major product lines to you, including Mummy and Hunter.
That's more or less it.
If you are wondering if I know that I'm deep into White Wolf territory, yes. I know. If you have other thoughts: put 'em out there!
-
Joe - just as a matter of curiousity, how familiar are you with White Wolf stuff?
I've run Vampire: the Masquerade. I've started and abandoned a Vampire: the Masquerade hack that stole mechanics from Covenant.
I can pitch all the major product lines to you, including Mummy and Hunter.
That's more or less it.
If you are wondering if I know that I'm deep into White Wolf territory, yes. I know. If you have other thoughts: put 'em out there!
I'm mostly just curious. I think that amidst all the angsty crap there are some real gems in the White Wolf catalog, both oWoD and nWoD and you should steal, pillage and hijack whatever you like. *grin*
-
I feel very strongly that the only way out of your Darkest Self must involve another person with whom you have a pre-existing relationship. You have to do something to someone specific, or someone has to do something specific to you. Isolation and running away might happen AFTER that triggered event, but it can't be the whole thing.
Werewolves (and possibly Vampires) escape their Darkest Self by harming a loved one; Ghosts escape their Darkest Self by somebody realizing they are there (and calling their name or somehow acknowledging their triggering event); Fae escape their Darkest Self by being forgiven by somebody they've wronged (something they themselves are incapable of doing); Mortals escape their Darkest Self by standing up to a Monster (going aggro, basically)...
Anyways, something like that. I just feel like the genre demands that it is your relationship with other people that ultimately lets you regain your grip on yourself. Not your personal willpower, not random circumstance -- other people.
-
I feel very strongly that the only way out of your Darkest Self must involve another person with whom you have a pre-existing relationship. You have to do something to someone specific, or someone has to do something specific to you. Isolation and running away might happen AFTER that triggered event, but it can't be the whole thing.
I think there's a lot of merit to this idea. I'm fighting with it in my head, at the moment, because it's a different direction than I was headed...
But I think that if I give it some time, and experiment with it, I'll come to accept that you're right.
So: give me some time!
-
So, I'm doing a lot of catching up here, and might be reacting to non-state-of-the-art skin design, but I had a thought about the Mortal's Darkest Self. I can see how the 'go along with the monster' feeds the genre, but reading through the principles about acceptance and what not, isn't this a golden opportunity to both highlight a 'dark side' of humanity as well as play up what it is the monsters fear from the mortals making everything so delightfully angsty?
What I mean is, maybe the mortal's darkest self should be some sort of raging intolerance for monsterdom. Like reporting their monster boyfriend to the church/cops/parents or refusing to see them because they want to be normal or something. I don't have many mechanical-ish ideas here, unfortunately.
-
Intolerance and judgement, sure, that's pretty dark. And also innately human, I think.
-
Intolerance and judgement, sure, that's pretty dark. And also innately human, I think.
Truth.
You and Jeff are right about the Mortal's Darkest Self.
Oh, btw, have I already mentioned the Mortal's Sex Move?
When you have sex with someone, trigger their Darkest Self.
-
This might just be my own insanity speaking, but... would it be cool for the mortal to get some kind of benefit out of having sex with a monster? Maybe getting to mark experience?
-
Yep, you mentioned the mortal's sex move before, and it's hot hotness.
-
This might just be my own insanity speaking, but... would it be cool for the mortal to get some kind of benefit out of having sex with a monster? Maybe getting to mark experience?
I think that they do get a benefit. It's just a totally fucked up and creepy one. Let's walk through it, and you can tell me whether this works for you or not:
Lilly is a Mortal. She's terrified of the hypnotic world she's been exploring, but she also has an agenda going in the back of her mind. She sleeps with Tobias, a Ghost. They drift off, and when she wakes back up, Tobias is gone. Cue emo mope scene.
Except, Tobias isn't gone. His player is like, "Tobias is in the room, wanting desperately to communicate with you. But he can't - he's his Darkest Self. He lifts the love letter he wrote you, off the desk, and sends it falling through the air, towards you."
And now Lilly's player has something awesome in her hands. A victim that needs her help. And sure, she could acknowledge Tobias, and console him, and talk him back into existence (which I think is the new way you resolve a ghost's DS).
But... what is the Mortal good at? What are they poised to take advantage of? Being a victim. Lilly's lover just became the most terrible version of himself possible.
Lilly's just escalated their relationship, went deeper into her victimhood, and gave Tobias a strong motivation to stick around - that only she will understand why he became this way.
All Lilly has to do is balance that line between feeling hurt and being helpful, and she can milk this situation with Tobias for all it's worth.