Kevin's Watch

Sorry I had to move your posts, guys. Organizational stuff.

Fist, check the rule change on 'human faith.'

So, I have a few thoughts to share so far:

1) Damn you to Hell for getting creative juices flowing RIGHT when I'm buried in non-Watch stuff and can't give my full attention. (Which really means I give my full attention, but take food from my family's mouth in the process.)

2) I'm really liking the savage feel of taking a totem approach instead of a 'civilized' pantheon style approach. Some of the imagery I have for the totemic version of Nyx's avatar are... interesting. Let's hope DeviantArt has something that meets my standards.

3) The "athiest test" is kind of concerning. It flatly rules out clearly miraculous acts. No "kraken rising from the bay to destroy the city" moments. So, of course, players with a heightened sense of subtlety can probably spin some yarn about how it was really a tsunami that wiped out the city, or how the army that saved us from the barbarian horde just happened to be wandering by. But maybe not all the players are as good at that type of play. And really, I think that athiesm is only really a recent phenomanon, having come about once people's "understanding" of science allowed them to think of non-divine reasons for things.

I haven't fit this into the new rules yet, but keep in mind I did say 'the mortal realm.' There will be two others (at least).

Other realms?

<drool/>

I was just thinking of how some effects might happen in several ways. So... it may be that Nyx turns her warriors into sable panthers who move through the jungle like mist. But some athiest who talks about it later will say that they were simply very stealthy people.

Maybe it really WAS a kraken that swam towards the city, rose up out of the harbor, and destroyed all life. Any athiests who saw this would have died partway through an existential crisis, but athiests who came upon the scene later would say that it was simply a ginormous wave that flattened everything. And evidence (especially in an age before forensics) wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

But I don't like the idea of not having the option to do amazing, fantastic things with our power. I do like the idea of keeping those fantastic things under the radar somehow, but I'm not sure how we'd go about creating game mechanics to enforce that.

There's just a whole different feel to "your people are more stealthy" than "your people actually become shadows" but sceptics don't believe it.

Is there any relationship between what happened in the first game and this one? (Are the events of 1.0 in the past?)

No, this game is entirely unrelated.

I was hoping to have some fun with how Chime's ideals all got twisted up by mortals. Feuding secret societies would've been fun too!

Sheesh... This is gonna be tough. Lots of domains I wouldn't know how to use now. Or wouldn't know how to tell the people about without telling them. Quite the challenge!

Good thing there are no domains.

Blah blah blah...

Having a conversation with a player over email/text messages, I realize the concept of playing without domains may be a bit difficult. So, I thought I'd offer a few thoughts on the subject.

One thing that Xar has said publicly, I believe, is that players rely too much on their domains, or barring that, on their mortal followers. A domain is an effective tool, but it's just that. Just because you're the God of Hammers doesn't mean you want to use one to cut down a tree, and it's a rather pathetic god that needs his high priest to do it for him. If you're a god, just use your divine power to saw it down (awesomely). Zeus may have been the god of lightning, but when you read the myths, he didn't really use lightning all that much (spending most of his time raping/seducing people or turning people or himself into various things).

My idea is to get away from that line of thinking and, at the same time, to give players a more immediate connection to the world. Instead of playing more classical gods of various domains, players will be more like tutelary deities. Imagine them being somewhere between an ancestor/spirit figure and a monotheistic god.

Now, some players might be inclined to pick something like a river for their totem and to use their DSP for various 'watery' actions. That's OK to a certain extent, but I wouldn't let it limit you. If a follower showed up on your banks dying of hunger, you could use your DSP to allow them to gain all the sustenance they need from water, but it would probably be a better idea to create a new berry-bearing plant that grows along your bank.

Your actions may be limited by your DSP, the rules of the game, and, to a lesser extent, what works best for your character. Other than that, though, the sky's the limit, the only real barrier being your imagination.

With the 'atheist test' it gets a bit trickier. I think it will help to go back to what mythology is all about -- explaining those things that are beyond current mortal understanding. Our ancestors didn't know why the rivers flooded every year, what those dots of light in the night sky were, or why a certain plant or insect may take over an entire crop in a season or two. Their knowledge of climatology, astronomy, and evolution were woefully inadequate. But their ability to tell stories wasn't. They were as grand, meaningful, and powerful as the things they explained. And this is the power we're really using in these games -- the vast power of nature in all its forms combined with the power of the human imagination.

You could be the Goddess of Things That Get Stuck in Drawers (well, not in this game), but tell the story right and you can dominate the game. It'd be a hard sell, but...

Some advice for starting out, since the world is young, I'd suggest starting out with mostly teleological myths. Help build up the world and explain how things came to be. Once you have a lot of things to work with and a handle on how to do things, the rest should come easily.

Do we *have* to pick a totem?

I ask because I have no clue what totem I would take. I was thinking I might have to just start and see what comes up. I really like the idea of no domains - I find it very liberating. But, totem? I don't know.

*edit*

Nevermind. I think I have a totem in mind.

Thanks, Syl. I'm getting a better feel for things. And I'm very much liking it!!

caamora wrote:I have no clue what totem I would take.

... says the person quoting a Cherokee story about wolves fighting, in her .sig.

caamora wrote:
I have no clue what totem I would take.

... says the person quoting a Cherokee story about wolves fighting, in her .sig.

I wrote that I didn't know what totem to take, not that I didn't know what a totem is.

Sounds like you should take... um... I don't know... the wolf?

Just a thought.

hehehehehe. Funny you should say that......

So what's the setting? A city again? Meaning, if they're tribal, maybe the city will have several sections, one for each tribe/clan?