Let's talk about Roll Playing Part 2

Let's set a tone for the rest of the week. With Annalow as a game setting, it would become it's own game (sort of), so I will borrow the four questions of Game Making from John Wick. Those questions are:

What is your game about?

Why is your game about that?

What encourages your players to be about your game?

Why is it fun?

Woof. I have my work cut out for me.

What is your game about?

If we go by Amythra, the basis of the game is one of discovery, but through exploration and philosophy. No RPG I can think of covers Philosophy as a foundational game mechanic, so I'll try that one, and why not? (note: this is a temporary foundation until we can find something less vague) There's RPGs about Comedy, Drama, Adventure, Action, but where's the genre's Six-Degrees of Separation? Where's the Our Town? The introspective battle one alignments? Actually, these are as easy to find as Dungeons and Dragons, with their alignment system. Just ask a Planeswalker about the difference between devils and daemons.

Still, exploration of philosophy isn't D&D's approach, rather that's more about a player's rise to power and their use there of. I may need the help of a philosophy professor to truly grasp the meaning of this game premise, but we'll keep it as a base for now. I know Annalow is NOT about rise of power, even tho there's an obvious power struggle between the Ixxar and the Mumes over the city as well two factions of the Borc up north are waring.

The Mume and the Ixxar are an interesting struggle that makes sense. The Ixxar are vastly intelligent and are, in their minds, trying to right a wrong. The Mumes keep them at stalemate, having the creativity to continually innovate. The Ixxar seek the old way, one's with logic and reason while the Mumes radically grasp for the new and the expressive, making champion emotion and sensation. Similarly, in the north, the Union of Borc Nations that dominate the northern Hemisphere fight against the Borc Cross Militia who struggle to free their people, breaking them back into a city-state society. One big government versus individual governments. This sounds like a battle of philosophy to me. (Edit: Ideals, really)

As always, we may need to work on it, but let's keep Exploration and Philosophy as a foundation for now. This may change in the future as we discover Annalow's premise.

(Blank Map stolen from colorofinsanity.deviantart.com)

Mume Rules

For the Active Exploits Take Two Game.

Linky

Here are the starting abilities and aspects for Mume Race.

Fitness: 0

Awareness: 0

Creativity: 2

Reasoning: 0

Mental Magic: -1

Luck: 4

Discipline: 4

Spread 4 points among the above stats. You start with 4 Novice Skills, 3 Proficient, and 1 Expert skill.

Mumes are the stand in for Humans, but are not humans themselves. There is some variation to their look, but most have dark skin, bright eyes of any color (even strange colors like purple, gold, or pink), and dark blond to white hair. The Mumes in Jerrow and Annalow are used to tropical atmosphere, so tend to dress very lightly, choosing thin fabric or nothing. Traveling Mumes that have seen the world dress more practically.

Because of Annalow, Mash'ta tends to view Mumes with hesitant curiosity. The city was taken by force, it allows slavery, and it's citizens are rather promiscuous. So the default view of Mumes are that they are sex-crazed tyrannical slavers. Mumes rarely fit this image, usually being caught up in their own thoughts about fashion, style, or art. Mumes obsess over culture, you see.

Remember that only female mumes (womume) who are affiliated with the Church of the Living Goddess are trained to use Mental Magic, but all mumes have some small capacity. Because of how closely they guard it, however, the Mental Magic ability may not increase unless trained by the church. They are called "Heart Mage" as official name or "Sensate" in unofficial circles.

All magic requires physical contact to work. Here's a list of what Mental Magic is capable of and the difficulty for each act.

Diff- Effect

0/1- Sense of general emotions and sensations

2- Detailed readings of the target's thoughts

4- Limited Control over emotions and sensation of the target.

6- Control over Specific thoughts, but the effects do not last longer than 3 days

8- Permanent control over specific thoughts and emotions of the target.

A tricky note about all magic: There is no action without an equal and opposite reaction and that remains true of magic. There will be debates over what is lost from the heart mage when a target's mind is changed, or worse, what is added. An example is if a heart-mage wants to ease the pain of another, they would take the pain onto themselves. I foresee much argument in the future.

[Note: Crap, I forgot yesterday. Spent the day with my wife and it slipped my mind. 10 Days off left.]