Our Terrible Purpose: Discussion and Critique

[TheMeanestGuest]

Hey CBG! I'm sure many of you may have seen my narrative forum game, Our Terrible Purpose. But what you might not know is that it isn't only a game! That's right, it's a setting too. Two in one - I know I'm impressed. So anyways, I'm essentially just interested in hearing what people think about it in general. Tell me what you like, tell me what you hate. Maybe my writing annoys you. Maybe you think the names I make up are stupid. Maybe you really really like maneating zirrafs and you think I should add more! Now is your chance to tell me. I would like Our Terrible Purpose to continue improving as I go forward, and I think seeing and considering the thoughts of my esteemed colleagues in setting design is likely a good way to go about doing just that! Also a shoutout to Steerpike and Salacious Angel for producing some inspiring content over the years.

Known Potential Issues:
- Organization; it can be hard to sift through.
- Obfuscation; yeah I'm pretty guilty.

I would also be more than happy to answer as many questions as you'd care to field. Feel free to discuss all aspects of OTP and its gamification. Over to you.

[Weave]

TMG, I've only ever gotten the time to glance over some of what you've written before, but dear god can you write. It's very poetic, almost reminiscent of SA, but with a bit more context and grounded in something I can generally understand most of the time-ish.

I realize you asked about your setting, and I'll get to that - I just needed to say that first. I'll give it the old hard read now.

[TheMeanestGuest]

Thanks Weave! I appreciate the compliment. If there's any poetry to it I assure you it's only incidental, that's just the way it falls out of my head. Can't take too much credit.

I'm definitely interested to hear what you have to say about it once you've given it a look over. And don't feel that you have to read all of it - unless you want to, of course.

[Steerpike]

There's totally a poetry to it:

"That dim and distant star was kindled to life, bright and blazing in its newborn glory."

"A supernal wood grew up about that city, and it was the apotheosis of all woods, sublime in its natural beauty and tranquility, and filled with creatures wonderful and rare."

"He took up the pallid body of Heosë - her wrists slashed, golden blood still dripping, and he left that place."

"He slept that night beneath a mountain, and he dreamed of a time before hunger."

"But beneath this melancholy pith is a seed of implacable rage and a fury aroused to anger is a horrific sight to behold - grey skin flushing a cascade of burnt colours, multifarious claws and fangs poised to rend and tear."

It has sort of King James rhythms, and definitely something of the Silmarillion to it, including the density of its references. To quote a spy in the House of Hands, who might be speaking of the setting: "There are numerous strange workings and phenomena here, many incomprehensible to my limited understanding."

[Rose-of-Vellum]

Agreed. Both on its poetry and on its praiseworthiness.

[TheMeanestGuest]

It has sort of King James rhythms, and definitely something of the Silmarillion to it, including the density of its references. To quote a spy in the House of Hands, who might be speaking of the setting: "There are numerous strange workings and phenomena here, many incomprehensible to my limited understanding."

The Silmarillion has had some fairly significant influences on Our Terrible Purpose - it was probably my favourite book growing up. So I'm glad that some of its qualities are reflected. Sometimes I do wonder if the density and the style are overbearing. Or if the partial incomprehensibility is ever frustrating - I've tried to make to make it feel appropriate and.. core to the experience, kind of. It's my hope that this allows the reader to add to or alter the narrative on their own. Part of this is presenting different perspectives. Has it been successful though? I'm not sure! That's why this thread is here, I suppose. And thanks, Rose!

[Rhamnousia]

Like I really don't want to detract from the amazing poetry of your writing, but is there any way you could make a "tl;dr" primer or overview of sorts, like the one that Steerpike has for the major cities at the beginning of CE? This is a setting I'd love to get into, but the writing is incredibly dense and some sort of reference would make the difference between me enjoying it as a piece of fiction and me understanding it completely enough to engage with it as a game.

But so I'm not only complaining, I definitely agree with the assessment that it's very King James. A lot of your word choices, especially the names and your use of -im to make things plural, give the setting an almost biblical sort of character, if that makes any sense.

[TheMeanestGuest]

That is something I can probably do, Superbright! Maybe a little challenging for me to decide what precisely to put in it, but it is definitely a good idea.

I'll look into that this weekend if I have the time.

[ChiefDesigner]

Hey all!

I'm the Karkeron player in this game; I post as Secretariat elsewhere, hence the namespace collisions.

One thing that I have been tossing around in my head is a Lets Play: Our Terrible Purpose. 

In-game, it makes some amount of sense; Karkeron has always been kind of run by Politburo committee, and while the worldviews of other states are very different, I can at least get into some of the details of the Roziery worldview, discuss some of the internals of the setting in plain language.

This would all go into the final set of orders that we submit to TMG, obviously.


Would there be any interest in that?

[Rose-of-Vellum]

Definitely.

[TheMeanestGuest]

I mentioned this, of course, but I am quite interested to see how you present things from the PoV of the Rozierey, Chief!

[ChiefDesigner]

Putting up my orders for public view, in hopes that it will be enlightening to others!

~

The Surgeon has, in her library, a dozen dozen tomes.  Some are illuminated by hand; these are, generally, the newest, and detail all manner of creatures anomic.  

The oldest, contrariwise, is unrivalled in its understanding of human physiology.  Its flexible, transparent pages detail, layer by layer, the human body, male and female.  She is told by the Polysophic's librarians that it is reproduced by machine, a craft that has only been regained in recent days.

Every work in her library teaches the same lesson about life -- grow, or perish.


Our Terrible Purpose Orders, Karkeron, Turn 4

[ic=Stat Block]Karkeron - Secretariat
- The Iron City of the Rozierey, risen up amidst the sweating jungles of Rem through sheer force of will -

Leadership: The Cabal of Karkeron
Edifices: The Fortress Karkeron, Its Belching Factories, the Iron Road, Old Blackwater Ports
Attitudes: the Rozier's Legacy, Hot Metal Progress, Baelnish Dignity
Assets: the Steel-Hat Army, Rennish Stone Giants, Karkerian Steeds, the Thought Engine
and Heroes: One-Eyed Goearn the Trolmund, Black Orkris – sire of Steeds, the Sergeant, the Surgeon, the Adjutant, the Crone[/ic]


[ooc=Conquest]
Karkeron is pressed on two sides -- in the east, by zirraf-by-the-waters; and to the south, by the alliance between Grist and Pardes/zirraf-of-exultations.  The strategic problem we need to solve, then, is how to thread that needle -- how to, with a minimum of resource expenditure, hold off two while dealing with the third.

The two zirrafs are strong, and growing stronger; if they're allowed to grow, by consuming more territory and more humans, the more bloated they become and the harder it will be to defeat them.  Conversely, if they can be contained, they stagnate.

The order of events, thus, is:

• Stall zirraf-by-the-waters at the crossings of the Alph.  He hasn't ventured into Dis yet, which is a good sign; so long as we can hold the crossings to the north, we're in good shape.
  Ideally, with the help of Rhomes, a contingent of Rennish Stone Giants can drive back the centaurs of Chirew in the south, and prevent us from getting outflanked to the south.
  
  


• Karkerian steeds were born to run.  They are exceptionally well-suited to the terrain of the Kunotara Plain -- they can outrun any human infantry on foot for the duration of an engagement, they can ride in, pick apart slaver columns bound for Pardes, and ride off with captives bound to horses; they can outmaneuver and outflank anything of the dog soldiers allied to that zirraf.
  
  This isn't a halting offensive on foot -- this is a modern campaign, that will be fought with Hot Metal Progress and won with cartridges, cassava, and canister shot.  If we can start flipping dog soldier tribes, we might be able to get enough local manpower to defend fixed points; if so, we can string the Iron Road out into the Kunotara Plain, and our logistics becomes immeasurably easier.
  
  
• Karkerian steeds can also establish regular contact with the other Roziery at Ath.  An iron road with an Athican terminus is probably not happening, as much as we would like it to -- too easy to pull up, They're embattled and vulnerable too, pressed between a bunch of major players; so long as we can maintain regular communication with them, we can bring them under our influence and protection... whatever that means.  Mostly it means trying to prop up the College..
  
  
• 
  While we've tied down Pardes to his north, we can start figuring out to do what to do with Grist.  They may or may not attack Rugh before they get to us -- if they do, they will probably have to deal with Amasque, but we can't count on that.
  
  This means that we get to see how well naval artillery stands up to a squadron of zirrafs.  "Exciting!"
  
  The produce of our belching factories will let us build, at our old Blackwater ports, a fleet of blackships plated in iron; with sloped sides and spinning barrels to repel boarders, and gun turrets to take aim at Grist's zirrafim, our aim is to conduct some gunboat diplomacy.
  
  The values of Gordis King -- deceit and treachery, a trade in slaves -- stand in firm opposition to the Baelnish dignity of the Signors and Signoras of Grist.  We want to appeal to the better natures of these Signors and Signoras -- that it is wrong to trade in the flesh of their fellows, and that Gordis would sell them into slavery if he thought it would further his aims.  The goal is to remove Gordis from power, second-best is to neutralize him as a threat -- if he offers us a deal, only take it if we believe that it will further our position, to the point of putting Steel-Hats on Grist's street corners if we have to.
  

If we can achieve these three goals -- stall the two zirrafs, start to weaken one, and neutralize Grist -- we take a couple slow steps forward.  If not... well, we've still got Fortress Karkeron untagged, and Black Orkrist and Goearn in reserver...
[/ooc]

[ooc=Comprehension]
There are three major unsolved questions we can address:  

• Bissel, the city under the Blackwater;
• Dis, and the Sorceror's war machines stored there;
• and the Alphar in Karkeron, and a comprehension of their anomic knowledge (cayanics?);

There are other major plot hooks that we've investigated, that will have to sit fallow for now -- we don't have the tags, or, frankly, the reach to conduct salvage operations at the Field of Sermet, or really figure out what's going on in Guringweg.  (We're already pretty overstretched as it is.)

• Bissel may or may not contain people!  The Sorcerer did a bad job of it by just drowning it under the water and walking away; it was neither thorough nor organized (par for the course, really.)  The Adjutant has full command over the sailors and ships of the Blackwater Ports -- those that aren't currently being used to bring Grist to heel -- to put together a mission of sailors, divers and salvors, to investigate the location of Bissel and if possible make contact with its residents.
  
  If nobody lives there, explore and salvage the city for anything that might profitably be put to use against our major existential threats.
  
  
  
• When he pulled down the tower of Dis, Rhomes didn't really bother with the basements.  This is another source of resources -- the Sorcerer maintained a fleet of helicopters flying machines and armored cars behemoths, (probably) anomically powered and better than anything we can expect to field in the next fifteen years.  Even a few of these, deployed judiciously as a mobile reserve, might be able to help us hold the crossings of the Alph and maintain a high loss exchange ratio.  (Though we're going to need one that's super high if we're going to get out of this...)
  
  The Sergeant -- or, if he is available and can extract safely from Tarnidine, our captain of adventurers -- has the skill, nerve, and access codes to get a team Dis, and get out in a night and a day.  The curse on Dis is strong enough to repel a zirraf; we had better take it pretty damn seriously.
  
  Still, though, this is the Rozier's Legacy -- the things left in Dis are our patrimony, after all.
  
  First priority is to get plans or drawings of war machines or automata soldiers that we might be able to retool our factories to produce; failing that, if we can get engineering samples we can take them apart and try and rebuild them that way.
  
  
  
• Finally, once we have located the Alphar in the city (thanks to Murh), we have the Crone's wisdom and the Thought Engine's raw analytical ability in order to make heads or tails of their magic -- gain some understanding of how they use magic in terms that are comprehensible to the Roziery, so that we might be able to weaponize it or otherwise put it to use.
  

[/ooc]

[TheMeanestGuest]

Ah-hah. I was looking for these! If anyone is still considering joining and still has unasked question regarding how to approach playing, well, this is actually a very good example set of orders!

They can be shorter, they can be longer; however you feel best conveys your intentions. You could even write me a poem of orders if you really wanted to.