Eerie Gaming IV, Continued: The Eerie Dungeon

My previous post on a fae-touched OD&D variant described the mundane world and how adventurers wind up in fairy-land. This post describes fairy-land and how to escape it.

Whether you enter fairy-land in the wilderness or through a fae-touched door, you are considered to be on Dungeon Level 1 of a mythic underworld, only moreso.

• Fantastic creatures (ignore logic or ecology;)
• Traps of all sorts, which magically reset themselves;
• Doors open for monsters by themselves;
• Stairs (and chutes or shafts) allow you to change levels, even if "Dungeon Level Two" turns out to be a mountain range or seacoast;
  
• Monsters, even humans, see in the dark;
• Adventurers, even charmed or befriended monsters, do not.

Secret doors can be anywhere. If there is something that could serve as a switch or trigger, such as a torch holder or a loose stone, you can search for a secret door; on success, a door opens when the trigger is activated. On a 1 in 6, the region behind the door is a randomly-selected dungeon or outdoor geomorph or the equivalent; otherwise, it leads where the map would logically indicate it should (solid stone becomes a temporary tunnel to the nearest room.) In either case, if you pass through the door without fixing it so that it can't close, it closes ... and there is a 1 in 6 chance it disappears.

Even on the deepest levels of a fairy-land dungeon, it is possible to open a door and step into a sparkling forest or moonlit desert. Time and space have little meaning here. Failure to map travel means a 1 in 6 chance of being lost (I prefer using my 2d6 risk mechanic for this, but a single d6 is fine, too.)

Getting lost in fairy-land means that the landscape changes; you push your way through some bushes and find an ice-field, and the forest behind you has disappeared. The same effect occurs in an underground setting. The best way to handle either is to have some geomorphs handy; when the party gets lost, choose a geomorph randomly and select which direction the party enters from.

A lost party can attempt to find its way back to a familiar area. The players describe where they are trying to go and what they are doing to find their way back (for example, if they are in a desert and they are trying to get back to a cavern they were in earlier, they might say they are looking for a rocky outcropping.) Roll 2d6 and pick the higher die result, then triple it; if the Wisdom of the leader/guide is higher than the die result, the party is one stage closer to getting back to where they wish to be. The GM judges how many attempts are necessary to get back based on broad degrees of difference between where the party is now and where it needs to go.

Example 1: Party is in a desert looking for caves in general. Their guide looks for a rocky outcropping. First success means the outcropping is found; they can then search for a cave entrance and get back underground.

Example 2: Party is in a desert looking for a specific cave. First, they need to get back underground, as in Example 1. Then, they wander through the tunnels, making a second 2d6 roll to get to that specific cave.

Example 3: Party is in a desert looking for a specific clearing in a forest. The guide looks for an oasis; success finds the oasis. Pushing through some dense brush at the oasis allows another 2d6 roll to find woods; searching through the woods is worth a third roll to find the clearing.

A good plan to find their way back grants the guide a +1 to Wisdom.

The players can exploit this feature of fairy-land to get from one known area to an unconnected area: head into a maze or wilderness area without mapping to get lost, then search for the second.

Getting out of fairy-land counts as finding your way back after being lost. First, if you are technically on Dungeon Level Two or lower, you must get back to Level One, one level at a time. Then, you must find your way to an area of fairy-land that resembles the place you came in; once there, roll 2d6, pick the highest, and double it; if your character level is higher than the result, you escape fairy-land; otherwise, you must wander away and return to try again.

Time in fairy-land doesn't flow the way it does in the mundane world. When you return, take the deepest level you reached in fairy-land and roll that many d6s (up to 8 dice.) Find the highest result and multiply that number by the base time unit, determined by how many dice there are with that result:

• 1 die: minutes
• 2 dice: hours
• 3 dice: days
• 4 dice: weeks
• 5 dice: months
• 6 dice: years
• 7 dice: centuries

Then, make a save vs. death; if failed, your character ages the same amount.

Characters earn extra experience for traveling through fairy-land. Multiply the deepest dungeon level reached by a number based on the amount of time you experienced in fairy-land (as opposed to the real time rolled for above.)

• Turns: x10
• hours: x100
• days: x1000

Monetary treasure from fairy-land is good, too, but there's a chance it will turn to leaves, stones, or other worthless items. Roll a number of d6s equal to your hit dice and find the lowest result, then triple it; if your Wisdom is higher, the treasure is real; otherwise, the glamour fades after a number of hours equal to the die result.

Eerie Gaming IV: Dungeons & Eerieness

So far, I've posted a couple adaptations of JAGS Wonderland to InSpectres. Time for something completely different: OD&D.

Traditional fairy-stories and fairy-lore are a perfect fit for the surreal tale. There's a whole land out there, somewhere, that's not on any map, with invisible entrances in hills or at the bottom of lakes that are only open sometimes. Follow an enchanting melody or a spectacularly unusual beast into the deep woods and you are likely to be "fairy-led", stumbling into this unnatural realm.

In this D&D variant, all monsters other than ordinary animals and humans come from fairy-land. Elves, dwarves, and halflings do, too; despite the differences in appearance and ability, all three are considered one group, "Fae", and are considered the same species as humans, just fae-touched. Any half- or full-fae offspring, regardless of specific parentage, has a random chance of being one of the three. Player character fae are called "changelings" and grow up in human society, possibly with no memories of fairy-land.

Magic only works as described when in fairy-land. Otherwise, spells only take effect by coincidental events: roll 1d6 per spell level for the number of days the effect is delayed.

Example 1: Read Languages allows a character to decipher codes or inscriptions in a foreign language after 2d6 days of study.

Example 2: a Fireball spell will cause a victim to burn himself 3d6 days after the spell is cast.

The delay roll is interpreted as hours instead of days if the caster performs a mundane action that would produce a similar effect.

Example 3: Casting Read Languages and then studying books on a foreign culture would allow deciphering a text in a language from that culture after 2d6 hours.

Example 4: A Cure Light Wounds cast while preparing an herbal poultice and praying continually can restore hit points after 1d6 hours.

Clerical turning is an exception. The undead are considered part of the otherworld, and it is the task of priests to keep the otherworld at bay. In fact, a cleric can attempt to turn or dispel fae creatures and phenomenon as if it were undead of the same number of hit dice. Treat minor phenomena as skeletons.

Caves, ruins, and mundane dungeons are not treated as "Dungeon Level 1," but as wilderness, stocked with vermin, wild beasts, and outlaws. Unless occupied by humans, the only traps in such places are pits and deadfalls. However, sometimes people wander into fairy-land, or are taken. It's never certain: roll dice for PCs in the following situations:

• reading a magical inscription or scroll: 1d6
• traveling by twilight: 1d6
• visiting a spot known as "fae-touched": 1d6
• seeing something "fae-touched" (aside from changelings): 2d6
• being "fairy-led" or following someone who is: 3d6
• seeing or using magic: 4d6

If the situation fits more than one of the above, use the highest value and add 1d6. If the total is more than current hit points, the affected PC catches a glimpse of fairy-land, which could mean seeing a door or cave that wasn't there before, hearing eerie music, seeing an unnatural beast or other phenomenon. If the character enters a fae-touched portal or follows eerie beasts, music, or visions, they are "fairy-led", which could affect their companions should they attempt to follow.

There will be more in an upcoming post.

Millennium The RPG

Along the lines of "Lost the RPG", here's an adaptation of another TV series with Terry O'Quinn in a major role: Millennium, the series about a group that appears at first to merely be consulting on serial murder cases, but turns out to be an ancient conspiracy obsessed with a coming apocalypse. Again, use either JAGS Wonderland or port it to InSpectres (or some other system.) If you are using InSpectres, you should probably use the "multiple franchises" rule I described before. If using JAGS or another build-points game, you buy a relationship or other link to a group.

Characters start in a law enforcement franchise of some kind, with no dice/points invested in the Millennium Group. They can be either uninfected or have low Unsanity. However, they usually have some minor talent similar to magic: they can catch glimpses of things on lower chessboards, or get warnings from a "guardian angel". This is what interests Millennium in the characters and triggers contact.

Characters investigate mysteries -- crimes, usually, and often violent ones -- on Chessboard 0. At first, they use their gift (and, eventually, physical resources of Millennium) for insight into horrific but otherwise mundane Chessboard 0 events. Millennium seems like just an ordinary group with extraordinary resources and a belief that the world is really getting worse, so someone needs to stop things from getting worse.

Many of the mysteries being investigated are being influenced by reflections on Chessboard 0 of things from a far deeper level. After solving several mysteries, the characters will begin to encounter these beings directly, always mistaking them for ordinary serial killers or corrupt officials (The Judge, Lucy Butler, Mabius, and other instruments of the demon Legion.) These beings can perform limited breeches of natural law and thus will usually lead to infection or trigger episodes, sending characters down to Chessboard 1.

However, in addition to individual mysteries, there's a big meta-mystery, the Conspiracy. The real explanation of what Millennium is up to. This is tracked with a separate Conspiracy score that starts at 0 points (or dice, in InSpectres terms.) Although mundane mysteries and even mundane conspiracies can be solved on Chessboard 0, the big Conspiracy can only be solved by having episodes. Investigating Millennium on Chessboard 0 results in inexplicable discoveries; investigating on a lower chessboard earns points/dice to add to the Conspiracy score. When it reaches a GM-determined level (usually 10,) the Conspiracy is mostly solved.

Episodes are limited to Chessboard 1 until the Conspiracy rating rises. In general, characters can descend one chessboard deeper every time the Conspiracy rating doubles. The deeper the episode, the shorter it lasts; Millennium focuses mainly on the effects of the deeper levels on Chessboard 0.

Once Conspiracy reaches 1, characters will notice that fully-made Millennium members have more control over episodes than most infected. They all have at least Advanced levels of Mastery, up to full Master level for characters like The Old Man. They also have access to "magic" based on shadow control, generally expressed as prophetic knowledge, clairvoyance, or seeming control over coincidence and probability (witness the "accident" that kills Frank Black's friend from The Trust, or Lara Mean's obsession with rolling dice when she becomes a full member.)

As Conspiracy rises, characters will become aware of factions within Millennium (Owls versus Roosters, for example,) schisms (The Family,) and rivals (Odessa.) The game will change from simple criminal investigation to a war over the future of mankind.

Lost: the RPG

I and a couple other people have said on several occasions that JAGS Wonderland can be used to recreate a number of novels,.movies, and television shows featuring a multilayered reality that causes the main characters to question their sanity or understanding. For example, the TV series Lost. Here's how you could run a Lost game using either JAGS Wonderland or InSpectres.

Whip up some characters involved in a plane crash. Each player details one character, but there are several other survivors who can be left faceless/nameless or given just a one-line description, to be expanded as needed or turned into replacements for retired or deceased PCs. None of the initial PCs is infected, but they may have had borderline experiences in their past.

Unlike the rest of the world, any stress on the island could cause infection, as long as it occurs when a character is isolated. Once infected, characters can have episodes even when in someone else's presence, and this can potentially infect others.

Forces or beings on a deep chessboard are present on the island. For the most part, their actions manifest as coincidences on chessboard 0. Thinking too hard about these coincidences can potentially lead to Unsanity.

Some regions of the island have even weirder manifestations of the actions of these deep forces and creatures. The Smoke Monster would be one example; it only rarely appears, and then only in the Dark Territory. Richard would be another deep-chessboard inhabitant, although his chessboard 0 appearance seems almost normal.

The island is also inhabited by infected people -- the Others. These people are aware of at least the first and second chessboard and exploit it to move unseen, speak a previously unknown language, find unexpected resources, or learn information about castaways. In game terms, they are "normal" people who have Mastery and one or two "magic" talents.

If using InSpectres, confessionals would be a great way to handle flashbacks and flashforwards.

It seems best to disregard most of the "facts" of Lost and instead, make up mysteries as needed, and improvise answers (that always lead to new mysteries.)

Blog Carnival: Carnival of Souls The RPG

I decided to try joining the Blog Carnival for the first time. The topic is "festivals and carnivals". Since I've been writing about InSpectres recently, the only game I ever ran at a convention, and since I've also been writing about surrealism and "eerie gaming", I thought I'd combine the three ideas into "Carnival of Souls The RPG".

Carnival of Souls is a semi-obscure horror movie from the '60s. It looks and feels a lot like a Twilight Zone episode: the sole survivor of a fatal car crash tries to forget about it and get on with her life, but weird things begin to happen to her... This game starts with the same basic concept: the characters have all been involved in a catastrophic accident and escaped.

The base rules are the UnSpeakable variant of InSpectres. Disregard the "UnSpeakable Skills" (they're too Lovecraftian.) Keep Sanity. Each character has one talent, something they care deeply about, either their job ("church organist") or a hobby ("mystery novels") or activity ("chatting up strangers".)

Start with a Pit of 10-20 dice. In addition to the Pit, there's another pool of dice that starts out empty, called The Carnival. Every time a character loses Sanity, add one die to The Carnival. A high 1 roll for physically dangerous actions means death, but only if the character's Sanity is lower than the Carnival dice. Otherwise, the character nearly dies, but miraculously survives; the unsettling nature of their escape from death requires a Sanity roll against Dark Despair.

There is also a real abandoned carnival or amusement park at the outskirts of town. It, too, is unsettling, and requires Sanity rolls: 1 die for first daytime and nighttime encounters, half Sanity dice for actually entering the carnival, further rolls for unsettling events that occur there. Any time the character walks, runs, or drives anywhere, roll at least 1 Sanity die. If they lose a point of Sanity, they somehow wind up at the abandoned carnival.

Any time a character uses their talent (plays the organ, for the church organist,) they are in danger of entering an eerie trance. Roll a Sanity die; the character is entranced on a 1; they will behave oddly or even sinisterly while ignoring their surroundings. Any PC who witnesses an entranced character must also roll for Sanity.

If a player needs an extra die to roll for an action, they can use one Carnival die. However, any high 1 or 2 result when using a Carnival die means that The Man shows up. He is a mysterious, sinister-looking figure who cannot be seen except by the PCs. His appearance always requires a Sanity roll against Dark Despair, at the very least. He will not communicate or interact directly with the characters the first time he appears, just stare. He becomes more direct each time he appears; if he appears when there are at least 3 Carnival dice remaining, from now on he will pursue PCs when he appears. The first time he appears at the abandoned carnival, he will begin to openly communicate. A roll of 6 on any action will cause him to disappear.

When a character loses all Sanity, the Man appears again. From that point on, he can be temporarily evaded like any other pursuer, but he will mysteriously catch up any time a 1 or 2 is rolled on an action. Remember, rolling a 1 on a dangerous action at this point will mean death.

The PCs are supposed to be dead, of course, but something is keeping them in the world of the living unnaturally. For one, their dead bodies weren't recovered. There may also be something they need to finish. The exact task is left open, to be investigated like a mystery. Every roll of 6 while investigating the mystery earns one Mystery point. Once 10 points are earned, any characters who are still sane get a second chance on life, while those who have lost all Sanity vanish; their dead bodies are then found, and their spirits join The Carnival.

Eerie Gaming III: Unsanity

In the previous post on using InSpectres to play JAGS Wonderland, I described what happens when Stress is higher than Unsanity, but I didn't describe how Unsanity increases from its starting level (0 for ordinary people, 1 for those already infected.) That's because there are several options, each with a different feel.

The simplest is: Unsanity equals the highest Stress level the character has ever had. If a character gains 3 Stress, Unsanity becomes 3 as well. If the character heals the stress, then gains 2 Stress, Unsanity is still 3. If the character then gains 2 more Stress without being healed, Stress and Unsanity are now both 4. This is pretty simple, but very hard on characters. Pretty much everyone would wind up infected if the universe worked that way.

Option 2: if Stress increases while being exposed to unreal or fantastic elements or events, Unsanity goes up by 1 point (and Sanity therefore goes down by 1 point.) Once infected, any kind of stress can trigger an Episode, but only the five triggering events previously listed can cause an increase in Unsanity. With this option, only the mentally ill and hallucinogenic drug users are likely to become spontaneously infected, with occultists coming in second. Other people become infected when exposed to those already having Episodes.

Option 3: players choose when to become more infected by buying off high levels of Stress with Sanity, perhaps at a 5:1 ratio. This has the benefit of giving players more control, but risks having no one becoming infected unless the GM rides the characters hard, hitting them with high stress rolls. The GM can also lure characters to the dark side by having a lot of NPCs with Wonderland-inspired abilities; in order to defeat the NPCs, the players may have to give in to Unsanity.

Eerie Gaming II: Using InSpectres

In my previous Eerie Gaming post, I talked about how great JAGS Wonderland is, but mentioned I wouldn't run it with JAGS. These days, I prefer games that I can make quick rulings on without consulting rulebooks. So what would I use? I have a couple ideas. Here's one I've suggested before: InSpectres. I originally posted my ideas for running Wonderland in InSpectres on Story Games, but I can't find a link to my post and I think you'd need to log in to read it, anyways; this post will cover the basics of how I'd do it.

Characters: either build 'em with 9 dice as in standard Inspectres or with just one skill as in the UnSpeakable variant for a grittier feel. There are two additional skills, Sanity and Unsanity. Split 10 points between them; if Sanity is 10, the character is uninfected. Cool is renamed to Mastery.

Franchises: standard rules, but keep the starting dice small; instead of representing the franchise's total resources, the dice represent how much the characters can get from that franchise without giving anything in return. Also, it's possible to have multiple franchises or join new franchises during play; these can be support groups, rebel networks, investigative groups, or government agencies.

Plot Points: you do not earn mission dice, you earn plot points; one point on a skill roll of 5, two points on a 6. You can spend plot points to renew Cool/Mastery, invest in a franchise, or make a Wonderland advantage permanent ("bring something back", get a beneficial mutation, etc.)

Stress: if you accrue more stress than your Sanity score, you have an Episode. If your stress drops below your Unsanity, the Episode "thins out" and will end soon, the next time you roll a 5 or 6 while performing an ordinary action. In addition to the common forms of stress, make stress rolls for triggering events as well:

• watching or reading surreal or fantastic media, daydreaming: 1 die
• witnessing or interacting with someone having an Episode: 2 dice
• letting curiosity about the unexplained draw you in: 3 dice
• major mind-altering effects, like taking drugs: 4 dice
• witnessing the impossible: 5 dice

Episodes: if Stress is more than Unsanity, a character can only end an Episode by spending Cool/Mastery to roll dice (5 or 6 ends the Episode, 4 reduces Stress by one level.) A character can also force an Episode by spending Mastery to roll dice.

Dissociation: your reflection is another character with no dice to roll. To affect dissociation, use the aiding/teamwork rules to lend a die result to your reflection. If you are only rolling 1 die, you can opt to describe what you are trying to do in Wonderland, roll the die, and then take the automatic 1 in Wonderland, using the die result instead to describe what your reflection does in the real world. If you have more than one die to roll, you can use one result for your Wonderland action and one for your reflection's action. The standard InSpectres die results correlate to the Wonderland Dissociation levels:

• 1-2: Total GM control = Complete Dissociation. The GM describes what the reflection does.
• 3: Partial GM control = Major Dissociation. The GM describes what the reflection does, but the player can suggest a minor effect of the Wonderland events on the real world.
• 4: Partial player control = Moderate Dissociation. The player can describe a limited effect of Wonderland on the real world.
• 5: Player control = Minor Dissociation. The player's action succeeds in the real world, too, but without any impossible effects.
• 6: Total player control = Complete Association. The impossible happens.

There will be more on this later, as well as ideas for adapting JAGS Wonderland in other ways.

Eerie Gaming

I have supposed a Human being to be capable of various psychical states,
with varying degrees of consciousness, as follows:

 a. the ordinary state, with no consciousness
    of the presence of Fairies;

 b. the eerie state, in which, while conscious
    of actual surroundings, he is also conscious
    of the presence of Fairies;

 c. a form of trance, in which, while unconscious
    of actual surroundings, and apparently asleep,
    he (i.e. his immaterial essence) migrates to
    other scenes, in the actual world, or in
    Fairyland, and is conscious of the presence
    of Fairies. 

Lewis Carroll, preface to Sylvie and Bruno Concluded

A post on Society of the Torch, Pole, and Rope reminded me that I wanted to do a couple posts about surreal gaming, as opposed to fantasy, horror or occult gaming, and in particular about the setting and concept of JAGS Wonderland. It's a big topic, because it's one that interests me greatly, so it can't all be done in one post. This post will be an introduction.

I've long been interested not just in surrealism but in what I call "surreal tales", for lack of a better term. That is, fantasy, horror, adventure, or character studies that don't just use surreal elements as a literary or dramatic technique, but are themselves about characters who experience surreal perceptions. The defining feature of a surreal tale for me is that the affected characters doubt their sanity or the reality of their experiences, or have their sanity or veracity called into question. some or even most of the events in the story are left ambiguous as to whether they happened at all. The surreal tale is thus about madness, perception, and the nature of reality.

My favorite example from TV is the old "Twilight Zone". If you watch several episodes of the original series in a row, you'll notice that in practically every episode, there's a question of whether the events are a dream or a sign of insanity. There are a few exceptions that are straight-forward science fiction, but even in some of these, like the famous "It's a Good Life" (where Bill Mumy wishes people into the cornfield,) reality itself is plastic. The canonical examples of the surreal tale in literature, on the other hand, are Lewis Carroll's Alice stories and his less-well-known Sylvie and Bruno stories. In addition, there are a huge number of ghost stories that aren't so much about horror as they are about an impossible glimpse into a lost life; for example, "The Demoiselle d'Ys" by Robert W. Chambers.

RPGs have occasionally touched upon dreams and madness, but early examples were frequently just dreams as super powers/magic. The Call of Cthulhu's Dreamlands supplement is perhaps first game to focus on dual realities with uncertain connections; another would be Mage: The Ascension, with its periods of Unquiet. My own attempts to capture a little of this began in 2002, with my first draft of The Court of 9 Chambers, in which surrealist painters studying numerology develop the ability to enter a dreamworld in a waking trance and begin fighting each other with artistic motifs in order to reach some Ultimate Secret. I tried a couple other games that played with false reality, such as the drug-crazed hippie game Head Spaces and the B-Movie universe game Out of Frame. I've seen some other people design reality-twisting games, like Dev Purkayastha's Colorless Green Ideas Sleep Furiously and Andrew Kenrick's Lost Days of Memories and Madness.

The most intriguing surreal tale RPG I've seen so far is JAGS Wonderland. I'm not at all interested in the JAGS system itself -- it's basically just another point-buy system reminiscent of GURPS or Hero. However, JAGS Wonderland is brilliant, because the game is not about horror or fantasy or adventure with just a touch of post-modernism or dreamlike details; it's about people afflicted with the usually involuntary ability to slip into another reality, but they (or their doubles) continue to act in the real world in a visibly insane manner. It's about the differences between what the characters perceive and what is "actually" happening, and what the characters are going to do about it. Will they learn to control it? Can they? Will they try to avoid it? Will they let it control them? And why is it all happening?

JAGS Wonderland's inspiration, of course, is Lewis Carroll, perhaps even that quote above from Sylvie and Bruno. There's also elements from Neil Gaiman's Mirrormask and Neverwhen, films by the Brothers Quay and Jan Svankmeyer, Japanese horror films like Ringu, and probably a lot of other sources. And, I'm finding, the premise can be adapted to cover a number of other settings, which is something I want to touch on in a future article.

For now, I just encourage those of you who have never heard of JAGS Wonderland to download it and check it out.