Random Ideas, brought about by sleep deprivation

Xathan · April 21, 2006, 12:03:46 AM

Here are setting ideas that have come to me after being awake for almost 2 full days. All of them seem to have potential to me right now, though they might seem stupid after a full nightÃ¢,¬,,¢s sleep. Feedback would be appreciated. (oh, and for those of you who are following Datrik, more will be coming for it this or next week. :) )

1)   The world is a giant creature. It would still be spherical, and creatures on the surface would notice little difference. However, great organic pores that go deeper and deeper into it form the creatureÃ¢,¬,,¢s respiratory and circulatory system. The creature is sentient, but no more aware of the creatures that live on and in it than any other organism is aware of the bacteria that live on and in them.

2)   Where there is an underdark in most settings is an unimaginably vast complex that was built by a long dead race. These creatures would be comparable to LovecraftÃ¢,¬,,¢s Elder Ones, and still influence the world above. Meanwhile, great engines of ancient power rest beneath the surface. This setting would focus a great deal on humanoid raceÃ¢,¬,,¢s place in the cosmos.

3)   Speaking of the cosmos, the next one would focus on a solar system that features several gas giants orbiting a single star. The people would live on the moons of these gas giants, allowing for interplanetary adventure in a smaller area. Psionics would be dominant in this setting.

4)   Perhaps something more down to Earth? Or how about down under earth? Make the world flat, connect both sides by an underdark, and then you have a setting that is a coin. Trade routes though the underdark would be common, as each side would have resources the other doesnÃ¢,¬,,¢t have access to.

5)   Another idea: The apocalypse happens. Celestials and Fiends fight over the world. It ends. Now the Celestials, Fiends, and Mortals must pick up the pieces of a broken world.

6)   A setting scattered across the void of space, where the humanoid races must stand on guard against entities of cosmic power and scope, much like HP LovecraftÃ¢,¬,,¢s creations, only actually spreading the humanoid races across the galaxy.

Like I said, settings brought on by a lack of sleep. I want to post them to see what you all think, and IÃ¢,¬,,¢ll tell you what I think when IÃ¢,¬,,¢m able to do so. :P

Numinous · April 21, 2006, 12:15:00 AM

ooh, shiny! I like the coin world, and the apocalypse, but the question is how to really make them work...

However, I must break this to you, the giant creature idea seems rather gimmicky, and not very cool in the long-term.

Captain Obvious · April 21, 2006, 12:34:02 AM

I like threads like this. Go you.

1) I agree with Nat. this seems way to gimicky for a CS. it could work cool as an adventrue locale (maybe they find a "demiplane")

2)I was actually planning out something like this, but the world was a huge machine designed to act at a prison for a seleeping god. as you got lower into the underdark, the caves slowly turned into floors and machinery, with some kind of monstrous custodians.

3)This kind of setting has so much potential but has to be done right (i don't know what right i though). would you use spaceships (i.e. spelljammer type), or use portals, or do the characters have to use psionic powers to teleport world to world?

4)this could be cool, but how would it work in the middle? does gravity go to zero there? does it all of a sudden switch from up to down?

5)This one is just plain awesome. Post apocaliptic, but fantasy-style, not sci-fi. I would tottally wan to make something like this. (Maybe i will...hmm...)

6)Kinda confused about this one. Either i don't understand, or else it doesn't seem to have any distinct element to it. (then again, i do only know one scentence about the setting...)

Xathan · April 21, 2006, 12:50:00 AM

Quoteooh, shiny! I like the coin world, and the apocalypse, but the question is how to really make them work...

I like threads like this. Go you.[/quote]

QuoteHowever, I must break this to you, the giant creature idea seems rather gimmicky, and not very cool in the long-term.

Gimicky is the right word for it, though I'm working on how to make living dungeons, which would be made by powerful wizards or something along those lines: again, lack of sleep, so ideas aren't the best.

Quote2)I was actually planning out something like this, but the world was a huge machine designed to act at a prison for a seleeping god. as you got lower into the underdark, the caves slowly turned into floors and machinery, with some kind of monstrous custodians.

3)This kind of setting has so much potential but has to be done right (i don't know what right i though). would you use spaceships (i.e. spelljammer type), or use portals, or do the characters have to use psionic powers to teleport world to world?[/quote]4)this could be cool, but how would it work in the middle? does gravity go to zero there? does it all of a sudden switch from up to down?[/quote]5)This one is just plain awesome. Post apocaliptic, but fantasy-style, not sci-fi. I would tottally wan to make something like this. (Maybe i will...hmm...)[/quote]6)Kinda confused about this one. Either i don't understand, or else it doesn't seem to have any distinct element to it. (then again, i do only know one scentence about the setting...)
[/quote]

It isnÃ¢,¬,,¢t much yet. Basically, itÃ¢,¬,,¢s DnD in space, with Lovecraftian creatures thrown into the mix. (If you havenÃ¢,¬,,¢t read HP Lovecraft, this setting wonÃ¢,¬,,¢t make sense until I post full write ups) I will develop this setting later, though I might just make this pure sci-fi and take out all fantasy elements altogether: in which case, I wonÃ¢,¬,,¢t post it over here.

Captain Obvious · April 21, 2006, 12:56:16 AM

Well, i you do plan on making that post-apocalyptic setting here, then we could just both work on it. that way, i'm not taking your idea really.

QuoteIf you havenÃ¢,¬,,¢t read HP Lovecraft, this setting wonÃ¢,¬,,¢t make sense until I post full write ups

i haven't actually read any lovecraft (i've been meaning to for a while though), but i have read several things in the style of, based on or about lovecraftian stuff, so i sort of understand.

Velox · April 21, 2006, 01:49:26 AM

1) I haven't seen it too often, personally, so I won't cry gimmick. They did this in "Rifts: Wormwood", and they did it well. The world was a giant symbiotic organism that needed people to feed it good vibes and people needed it to stay alive. Demons invade, so the world reacts like a body reacts to an alien organism. Symbiotic organisms were spawned by the planet to be used against the demons, and the demons could corrupt localized areas of the planet to make evil parasites. Yeah, it was cool. That idea can be cool.

2) Old ones are cool. Intelligent design is cool. Do you like comic books? Do you like Mike Mignola? You should check out "BPRD: Hollow Earth".

3) Meh... my opinion depends on how people get from one planet to the other. Portals (like Stargate) between worlds? That's cool. Random rips in space? That's kinda cool. Primitive space-faring technology? That can be cool, depending on how it's done (but I'm not sure how to do it). Magical schooners that soar into the void (possibly encountering unicorns out there, or maybe a Led Zeppelin cover band), not so cool. I'm not down with that. Psionics are cool, too. Especially in extremely low-magic games. Games where they have to fight with magic for practitioners makes them both mundane. It becomes more like choosing a preferred shape of Peep rather than deciding what path of power to take; they both basically taste the same.

4) Yeah... I never really saw the appeal in "weird world shape". I'd rather take a round world like we have and play around with the crazy stuff that can happen there. Politics and human nature are usually enough for me to toy with; I don't need to do crazy stuff like "the world is a ring" or "the world is concave and filled with semi-solid gas" to have fun. But I'm kind of a boring fantasy player. Lemme know when your gonna run a "weird world shape" game, I'll give it a try.

5) I'm all about the apocolypse. Fallout fo' life, sucka. Angels and demons can conjure up deep emotions in people, too, making for vibrant games.

6) So how'd they get there? Why's everybody all scattered? The gods play a game of 52 pickup? And just how do meager mortals, stranded no less, expect to combat complacent and omnipotent alien intellegence?

And like I said see a doctor, dude. Insomnia is no joke.

You have a campaign setting don't you? I forgot it existed. It was some neat little dealie with earth-smiting meteors and new kinds of magic and moon-bound elves and junk, right? Yeah, I'll be reviewing, commenting, critiquing, and generally poking and prodding that soon.

Captain Obvious · April 21, 2006, 09:09:47 AM

Was thinking some more about that apocalyptic world. (the more i think about it, the more i love the concept. if you or we don't make one, ill make a start on it in a little while).

So, i imagine the huge final battle between heaven and hell as was prophesised, yadda yadda yadda, the whole usual. except, this time the humans got fed up being stuck in the middle of it, an decided to fight back. to this end, they developed psionics to be a new weapon against the forces of angels and demons. This caused an unexpected wrinkle in the great plan. Neither heaven nor hell had any experience fighting againstthis and so all three faction were thrown into dissaray. Viewing this as the "final battle" though, neither side would give in even though they were cripple, and the humans couldn't pull out of the war either since the battleground was their home. The war finally ground to a halt, but not until all three factions were weakened almost beyond recovery. Then, amongst the ashes of the world they destroyed, they struggled to rebuild.

The way i imagine this world, is that the only core races used to be humans (keep it simple, and closer to what an armageddon on our world back then might have been like), but after the war all the factions split appart and now are forced to co-exist for the most part. This has led to many other PC races being created (i.e. different variants half-feinds and half-celestials based on the different races. the abbility to use monster classes to play a full-blood. maybe various types of tainted (go mutants) humans. perhaps there are fey that weathered the apocalypse hidding in their home dimension, but now with all the other forces weakened, they are starting to make a play for power).

As for classes, i envision many similar ones, but psionics are quite prevalent for the humans. arcane spellcaseter still exist (sorcerors might be even more common now, especially for the half breeds). clerics get split up into those who still follow the demonic of angelic factions (who knows why. faith is hard to rationalize), and those who got fed up with outsider forces and have turned their faith inwards and now revere the unquenchable nature of the human spirt (their domains coud each represent an element of humans, rather than an aspect of the world around them).

Since demons and celestials are so common, i would think that heaven and hell (faerie too probably) should be actual tangible locales in the world (probably heaven would be cities in the clouds, hell would exist under the world {you have to travel through the underdark to get there}, and faerie could use the folkloric route of access where there are gates hidden all over the place {you just have to know where they are}. this way they are removed from the battle ground, but travel is still not too difficult).

More to come later. (I really like this concept. the CS is just writting itself so far)
:angel: :muffy:

Xathan · April 21, 2006, 10:54:29 AM

Quote from: Velox1211) I haven't seen it too often, personally, so I won't cry gimmick. They did this in "Rifts: Wormwood", and they did it well. The world was a giant symbiotic organism that needed people to feed it good vibes and people needed it to stay alive. Demons invade, so the world reacts like a body reacts to an alien organism. Symbiotic organisms were spawned by the planet to be used against the demons, and the demons could corrupt localized areas of the planet to make evil parasites. Yeah, it was cool. That idea can be cool.

2) Old ones are cool. Intelligent design is cool. Do you like comic books? Do you like Mike Mignola? You should check out "BPRD: Hollow Earth".[/quote]3) Meh... my opinion depends on how people get from one planet to the other. Portals (like Stargate) between worlds? That's cool. Random rips in space? That's kinda cool. Primitive space-faring technology? That can be cool, depending on how it's done (but I'm not sure how to do it). Magical schooners that soar into the void (possibly encountering unicorns out there, or maybe a Led Zeppelin cover band), not so cool. I'm not down with that. Psionics are cool, too. Especially in extremely low-magic games. Games where they have to fight with magic for practitioners makes them both mundane. It becomes more like choosing a preferred shape of Peep rather than deciding what path of power to take; they both basically taste the same.[/quote]4) Yeah... I never really saw the appeal in "weird world shape". I'd rather take a round world like we have and play around with the crazy stuff that can happen there. Politics and human nature are usually enough for me to toy with; I don't need to do crazy stuff like "the world is a ring" or "the world is concave and filled with semi-solid gas" to have fun. But I'm kind of a boring fantasy player. Lemme know when your gonna run a "weird world shape" game, I'll give it a try.[/quote]5) I'm all about the apocolypse. Fallout fo' life, sucka. Angels and demons can conjure up deep emotions in people, too, making for vibrant games.[/quote]6) So how'd they get there? Why's everybody all scattered? The gods play a game of 52 pickup? And just how do meager mortals, stranded no less, expect to combat complacent and omnipotent alien intellegence?[/quote]And like I said see a doctor, dude. Insomnia is no joke.[/quote]

QuoteYou have a campaign setting don't you? I forgot it existed. It was some neat little dealie with earth-smiting meteors and new kinds of magic and moon-bound elves and junk, right? Yeah, I'll be reviewing, commenting, critiquing, and generally poking and prodding that soon.

:shy: yeah, Datrik still exists. With me and settings, things tend to fade to the background until I have a sudden brainstorm or people ask questions, at which point I dive back in.

Xathan · April 21, 2006, 10:54:51 AM

QuoteWas thinking some more about that apocalyptic world. (the more i think about it, the more i love the concept. if you or we don't make one, ill make a start on it in a little while).

So, i imagine the huge final battle between heaven and hell as was prophesised, yadda yadda yadda, the whole usual. except, this time the humans got fed up being stuck in the middle of it, an decided to fight back. to this end, they developed psionics to be a new weapon against the forces of angels and demons. This caused an unexpected wrinkle in the great plan. Neither heaven nor hell had any experience fighting againstthis and so all three faction were thrown into dissaray. Viewing this as the "final battle" though, neither side would give in even though they were cripple, and the humans couldn't pull out of the war either since the battleground was their home. The war finally ground to a halt, but not until all three factions were weakened almost beyond recovery. Then, amongst the ashes of the world they destroyed, they struggled to rebuild.[/quote]The way i imagine this world, is that the only core races used to be humans (keep it simple, and closer to what an armageddon on our world back then might have been like), but after the war all the factions split appart and now are forced to co-exist for the most part. This has led to many other PC races being created (i.e. different variants half-feinds and half-celestials based on the different races. the abbility to use monster classes to play a full-blood. maybe various types of tainted (go mutants) humans. perhaps there are fey that weathered the apocalypse hidding in their home dimension, but now with all the other forces weakened, they are starting to make a play for power).[/quote]As for classes, i envision many similar ones, but psionics are quite prevalent for the humans. arcane spellcaseter still exist (sorcerors might be even more common now, especially for the half breeds). clerics get split up into those who still follow the demonic of angelic factions (who knows why. faith is hard to rationalize), and those who got fed up with outsider forces and have turned their faith inwards and now revere the unquenchable nature of the human spirt (their domains coud each represent an element of humans, rather than an aspect of the world around them).[/quote]Since demons and celestials are so common, i would think that heaven and hell (faerie too probably) should be actual tangible locales in the world (probably heaven would be cities in the clouds, hell would exist under the world {you have to travel through the underdark to get there}, and faerie could use the folkloric route of access where there are gates hidden all over the place {you just have to know where they are}. this way they are removed from the battle ground, but travel is still not too difficult).[/quote]More to come later. (I really like this concept. the CS is just writting itself so far)
:angel: :muffy:
[/quote]

I like it too, and I agree (mind stealing thief :P) before you post more, IM me or PM me: we need to talk about how we want to handle posting, since we are both obviously going to make it, and we shouldnÃ¢,¬,,¢t step on each otherÃ¢,¬,,¢s toes too much if we donÃ¢,¬,,¢t end up working together.

:angel: :demon:

Xathan · April 21, 2006, 12:30:09 PM

I've moved the Apocalypse setting into two seperate threads, one for posting one for review. I'm not trying to cut you out, Supa: this is what I have so far. If you want to work with me, I'm open to discussion on the subject, and we can change things on what I posted. I just wanted to get it out their so I can get it moving.

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Random Ideas, brought about by sleep deprivation

Xathan

Numinous

Captain Obvious

Xathan

Captain Obvious

Velox

Captain Obvious

Xathan

Xathan

Xathan