Want a Creative Thrillride to the Edge of Creation? An Epic Modern Myth

Started by Modern Fairy Tale, April 04, 2012, 04:38:15 PM

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Modern Fairy Tale

I am interested in running a very uniquely styled storyline.  If you find this kind of nontratitional rpg situation appealing, let me know.  Some of us like to explore the icecream flavors beyond strawberry, vanilla, and chocalate.  Are you more a butterscotch or a rocky rode kind of person?

I want to begin a group game of losely related or interelated plots all sharing the same world.  Now you no doubt want to ask... what kind of world is this?  I guess the closest I can equate it to is kind of a Harry Desden-like world... but with more UMPHHHH.  Perhaps a closer example would be Hellboy or the X-Men... but instead of mutation they are talking about magical gifts and phenomena.  Magic, myth, and mysticism is the prime method of power on this world... no superscience, no mutations, etc.  Kind of like the Golden Age comic books, Captain Marvel and Wonder Woman, but in a darker and more modern world haunted by horrors out of Lovecraft's own fevered nightmares.

The Mosaic World of Parable and Shade

Imagine a world of supernatural beings.  There are modern day sorcerers, werewolves, other stranger things out there.  They exist as part of a shadow world virtually unseen by man.  Magic is hard to notice... unless ones life is in immediate jeprody.  Some have the Sight.  Most do not.  These beings are part of a greater war like an epic scale chess match of good versus evil for the very fate of creation.  Each character plays a part.  Some stand with the light... helping to keep the axis mundi... the world pillar intact and thus keep Creation in place.  Some, especially the Exiled Tribe, my werewolves, really dont give a damn.  They could ride a flaming world into the ground as long as they are covering themselves in glory by participating in the Great Hunt.  Then there is the Demogorgon... a terrible tentacled lord of darkness who was displaced from the universe in the majesty of creation and seeks to bring down its demise to reclaim its natural right as the ruler of the very ritualistic center of the universe.

So, imagine Fae and Magi and Exiled, all powerful beings existing apart from our world... in sort of a shade existence.  Imagine as they struggle against each other and thier enviroment, what can end up happening.  The Magi utilize thier Divine Spark as well as the Radiance... the final embers of Creation... to do anything, almost within thier selected spheres of interest and with thier agreed upon style.  Fae exist as fusions of nature and a near a plethera of near humanoid races.  For example, the elves of this world... the Sidhe... are cat like.  Some have tails and furry ears, some are just beautiful, androgenous beings with large pointy ears.  They have claws, which some have sworn never to use in battle, but are still great for climbing.  Their balance and general athleticism is vastly superior to humanity... and they can wield creative energies which bring the Wyld into our world.  The Exiled, my werewolves, flawlessly shape themselves as the situation requires... favoring about three forms.  These forms can very from huge primative dire wolves to perfect fusions of wolf and man with muzzle, hindlegs, prehensile claws, and the barrel chest of a man, some chose larger versions of this, some more willowy and lanky versions.  They break themselves down into different breeds like the Anubii or the Barghest.

What if you want to play a genie... on this world the Xian are an enlightened, elemental being from both Chinese and Arabian lore.  What if you want some scifi action, seems there are some Greys in an underwater base who have been here a very long time.  Perhaps a crafty, goblin-like Kobold is interesting, or one of thier geneticly varried race all the way up to beserking trolls and simplistic giants.  What if you want to play a vampire... I cant help you there... I hate vampires.  On my world, vampires arent beautiful sparkly people who long to find someone to share thier gift of immortality with... they are either the reptilian degenerated spawn of dragons, did you know Dracula means 'son of the Dragon', or are a vicious, inhuman, walking plaugue upon like the original Transyvanian version... seeking only to bathe in the blood of every man, woman, and child... perferably in the reverse of that order... around them for miles.

The Nitty Gritty

Now, if you are hooked, Ill pitch the mechanics.  I want to use the old Marvel Super Hero system.  Now dont knock it, its a good system.  The Intensities, the interactions of different success levels, all the already published work out there for free to download and look through and utilize... for FREEEEE... and you have virtually probably hundreds of examples all throughout Marvel history and plenty of fandom creations all over the web.  It is easy to use from the Judges point of view.  For example... you come across a superstong, really big demon with Incredible Strength.  He picks up a sign post and swings it at you.  You can say the signpost... being made of metal might have at most Excellent hardness... so though he swings at you, only some of the forces actually hits you if he does hit you.  Exactlly Excellent damage... not the Incredible he was swinging with.  Now imagine being able to scale anything... fire, acid, wind strength, running speed, vehicle control, mental strength, resource cost, material strength, magical intensity... the same way.  You see what Im saying, everything becomes levels of intensity which modify each other with a single percentile roll.  Elegant and with Feats... very flexible.  You can adapt virtally any power or spell from anywhere into a Marvel Superheroes power pretty easily.  Now remember, though we are using the Marvel RPG system, we are not using thier world.  We will be using mine.

Some Story Ideas

Ive pitched this a few times, wanting people to tell me thier ideas, but I never got much reply.  So this time I am going to suggest some of the ideas I see in my world, when I close my eyes and enter it.  This is a world based on a belief that most of myth and legend is true... usually about fifty percent true or something... with a grand theme all across Western Civilization of staving off a horrible unmaking of Creation by a greater... devil-like being common in most world religions dating back to perhaps Set or Apophis in anchient Egypt or Tiamat in... Babylonian or Sumerian... forgot which.  But that consuming, inhuman, insane evil wishing to eat everything around it.  So, on such an epic scale, what could possibly happen.

The daughter of a powerful Fae king has an almost Thor-like exile from her kingdome.  She is in the middle of exacting justice on some briggands called the destoryer and the ravager... a giant and a centaur.  She destroys the destoryer... then restrains and begins 'ravaging the ravager' teasing him as she tied him down and forced affection from him which he was hating since he had no control.  Then she is called to court... she knows this is happening because a ring of mushrooms begins growing around her.  Letting him free, she yells at him.  "Remember.  I will find you, you mangy centaur.  I will make you mine."  About half of that is spoken in the presence of the royal court as she is teleported into her fathers presence.  The nobles ooohhh and aaahhh, but our princess doesnt feel the need to explain, she just walks up and addresses her father.  Well, shes been haughty and arrogant, she has the Passion of a Fae... but as a noble, must ultimately surrender to Serenity or risk her birthrights.  She a bitch, so shes cast out to earth.  Shes cared for by a kind Magi, she learns about the Earth, our problems.  Makes friends, etc.  Might meet a guy, someone she didnt expect to interest her, a seeming mere commoner, but he surprises her.  She changes... comes back, has to protect her father from some wars breaking out at home... protects her father and earns redemption... having balanced her power and Passions with Serenity.

Okay, another.

What if a totally evil Necromancer were to go around just animating things or casting evils and releasing them, trying to cause so much suffering and arcane exposure as to lower the dimentional boundaries, allowing him to conjure his master to this realm.  He finds a troubled young woman, and takes sexual advantage of her (later, when she is of age, when the story is taking place) and makes her his apprentise.  I imagine her as some kind of innocent.  Imagine a child who alone had the immunity to some remote disease.  Imaging living and scrounging for years... until he comes across her at a very young age, maybe eight, and begins training her.  Now she is starting to have power, but he gets sick sometimes.  I picture her as psychologically kind of child-like and innocent, though she has some tinges of madness and will cast spells to make skeletons dance for her own maniacal laughter.  Inevitably, he is going to use her up, use her as a partner, with the lure of power, but in the end he will sacrifice her to open the final gate... or something.  Maybe she gets a lucid moment or two, after witnessing a death similar to her mothers perhaps, and turns on him.

Now, image who would be sent to apprehend such a terribly infections evil.  Not some mere humans, who cant even see the Necromancer, when he is using his power... making him as elusive as a ghost except by Magi, maybe a few of thier allies.  Imagine being a few of them, trying to find him.  Now, imagine having problems when they come across a biker gang of Exiled looking to cover themselves in glory by finding every undead Mockeries and killing them in bloody righteous fury almost like enthusiactic, compeditive, spiritual skeet shooting through the outskirts of town.  They even race against the Magi, not wanting to share the kills with them... not carring about the Necromancer... as far as they are concerned he is fluffing thier standing in the Great Hunt.  They might even heft him some ale with a mug made from the brainpan of one of his demonspawn.  So, how can the Magi and thier allies convince the Exiled to help them out?  Perhaps brain and diplomacy can rule out over just arcane jousting with super fast and strong and regenerating forces of the Wyld.  All of this leading to a showdown with perhaps all three forces... or a surpise army.  A disgruntled funeral worker has been dumping bodies for years.  Imagine the resivore of power that could be?  Maybe the Magi and the Exiled and anyone else they can get to help will be needed to deal with this threat.  Oh, fun fact, the Necromancer has a henchwoman he is... of course, sexuallly active with.  Shes an assassin who sports the Naughty Nurse, look.  (Calls herself the Angle of Mercy.  So... think Haleyquin mixed with that nurse outfit worn by Daryl Hanna in the first Kill Bill.)

Do you need more ideas?  Does any of this stir excitement or creativity on your part?  Let me know.  I can keep spouting out story after story but... come on.  Let me save some for myself.  Could you play a powerful being with extreme strength or martial skill or who can call upon the elements or formulate rituals reaching across the very boundaries of the realms for power?  Would you rather play a less powerful ally or hedge mage or something?  Would you like to play a mundame one of those In The Know or maybe an innocent which stumbles into this world.  Do you see a place for youself in this world?  I hope so.

Respond here or PM me if you want.  I have two people who are discussing characters right now.  A couple more cannot hurt.  If you want to join us, let me know.
She again rubbed a match on the wall, and the light shone round her; in the brightness stood her old grandmother, clear and shining, yet mild and loving in her appearance. "Grandmother," cried the little one, "O take me with you; I know you will go away when the match burns out; you will vanish like the warm stove, the roast goose, and the large, glorious Christmas-tree." And she made haste to light the whole bundle of matches, for she wished to keep her grandmother there. And the matches glowed with a light that was brighter than the noon-day, and her grandmother had never appeared so large or so beautiful. She took the little girl in her arms, and they both flew upwards in brightness and joy far above the earth, where there was neither cold nor hunger nor pain, for they were with God. 
Hans Christian Anderson in The Little Match Girl