Kazyan
2014-02-13, 09:48 AM
I've been turning over an old idea in my head, previously used for a now-aborted novel. I tried to port it to D&D 3.5, but considering that it would be great to explore story, themes, and supernatural interactions, it's looking like White Wolf's World of Darkness setting is a vastly better place to put this. This thread is a check to see if the concept would work, what I need to do if it's worth pursuing, and to discuss the story and mechanical elements necessary to make it, well, World of Darkness. If it's a go, it goes on the top of my pile of homebrew projects, which is saying less than it sounds like it is.
It is rare that a person is ever truly alone in what they do. When someone succeeds, they fundamentally rely on gifts from the outside world or from each other. Sometimes this help is very abstract or removed—marathoners couldn’t do what they do without the producers of health food—but sometimes it’s direct, like a rich son living on his parent’s inheritance, or someone winning a lottery funded by an entire state. Though humanity loves to think that they succeed on their own merits, compassion and gratefulness are what make them accepted by others. If one doesn’t appreciate gifts, they’ll become more begrudging, or there will be less of them. People who reciprocate are valued and given attention, and those who don’t are ignored.
Or so idealism would like to think. A sad truth is that so many sacrifices from the world at large go unsung, gifts are criticized for not being big enough, and the most intensely suffering people are demonized for suggesting that a bit of help would be nice. Injustice and ungratefulness rule the world even as their opposites are so fundamentally necessary in civilization.
Once can expand this principle not just to humans, but to their environment—supernatural or otherwise. Humans require the sacrifices of nature to develop technology and keep society running, and yet few people care about rampant pollution to any meaningful degree. As such, nature’s bounty is slipping as species go extinct and food sources become less and less fit for the human body.
Synine: The Sacrifice is about a silent guardian race of humanity, those who take only what they need and reciprocate the gifts humanity gives them. These supernatural beings, like vampires and the Inspired, are the synines. Their life depends on a cycle of sacrifice from nature to synine and back—they draw their life force from water, and Water expects this gift to be used for sacrifices in turn. Though it is their mission to protect humanity when it cannot do so on its own, they will always find their sacrifices belittled, ignored, gone unnoticed, or even criticized for not being “good enough”.
Synines may begin their life cycle with the utmost altruism, but as they are worn down by ungratefulness and the toll of their sacrifices, they come to stop caring. In the end, they must choose between two dark fates. If they lose the will to sacrifice, nature will no longer do so in kind, and their bodies will slowly crumble. If they hold on to their altruism, humanity will take and take until they have nothing left of themselves to give, perhaps without so much as a “thank you”.
But in the end, it is their goal to make a world of darkness more reciprocating for all, and the torment they so undergo will finally make the world a better place someday.
Maybe.
Theme: Sacrifice and Ungratefulness
Go ahead and give to others, but don't expect anyone to care.
From the first time someone is transformed into a synine, they are torn between doing what they must and the doubt that literally crumbles them from the inside. They have little choice but to give, and hope in vain that they will receive enough in return to keep giving. Sacrifice is needed for Water’s approval to stay alive, even as deprivation slowly snuffs out their Eudaimonia until they are begging for death. A synine protects and gives to a world that may never give back, but if they decide for one moment to let their convictions down, some of their permission to live slips away permanently.
Synines are powerful entities that look and seem human enough, empowered by the gifts of Water. Some can leap great distances, speak into others’ minds, step between cities, move the world by force or even bend the threats of existence around them. All to ensure and assure themselves, for the sake of those who need their sacrifices. They might find solace in what they can do, but it never lasts. Always driven to give up more, partly because it’s the right thing to do and partly because they cannot afford not to, a synine faces a decision that make a vampire’s troubles with morality look easy. Synines face hard choices, and the question isn’t which choice will keep them from dying in the end—that’s unavoidable. It’s a question of, when they get there, whether they’ll deserve their death...and whether the alternative is worse.
Synine: The Sacrifice would detail how to play an entirely new superantural creature, a synine, and the associated supernatural abilities you get to play with. Plus the usual stuff about WoD antagonists and how to make the setting awful--calibrated to deal with ungratefulness as a theme.
Synines are powered by Water with a capital W; they can absorb purified water to heal themselves and possibly regain willpower. It's the only way for them to heal. But since they're basically thralls to Water's will, they've got to do their job of babysitting humanity, it's harder for them to heal if they're not doing that.
A synine would have Sacrifice, Favor, and Eudaimonia scores.
Sacrifice represents their degree of altruism, belief that humanity is fundamentally good, and ability to heal with the generosity of Water. With very high Sacrifice, a synine won't even bother hiding what they are, for being so trusting. But as it drops, they'll get cynical, become less willing to make themselves miserable for people, start to think they're justified in taking what they deserve from the "system", and give up on the idea that they need to sacrifice for others--and by the time they truly become ungrateful, they are doomed. A high Sacrifice means that they can heal up with small amounts of water, low Sacrifice means that they'll need ever more vast quantities, and when they reach zero, water refuses to heal their body at all. Then, ordinary bodily decay from dying cells/minor bruises/etc will rapidly accumulate until death.
Favor is their "supernatural advantage" score; this is the one that makes you level up. Fresh new Synines are more like humans than agents of Water's reciprocating ideals. Synines that gain power and commune with large bodies of water can incur more Favor from Water. Every synine would be basically capable of raising 5-dot abilities to 10 dots, no matter their age and experience, if Water didn't keep them on such a tight leash--it restrains the new synines that are not proven to be able to sacrifice. They have to fight tooth and nail for Water to grant them the special privileges of Favor.
Eudaimonia represents a synine's overall well-being, both mentally and physically. If their health deteriorates or their mind starts to break down, Eudaimonia will decay as well. If a synine gives their services to humanity, they're fine so long as there's enough reciprocation, but this being World of Darkness, they're going to lose out. A synine working 80 hours a week at charity centers will probably lose out on Eudaimonia due to mental health issues, for example, and it'll keep going down and down until they've got nothing left to give, which ruins them. Very high Eudaimonia means that a synine is doing awesome, thanks for asking!, low Eudaimonia means they're a wreck, and Eudaimonia 1 means they're dying of deprivation or depression; it's too late to save them at Eudaimonia 0. Determining and changing this score is a bit complicated in this rough-draft idea. You'll have a base score determined by Wellness scores--Id, Ego, and Superego; add them up and subtract 5. Superego would always be equal to five minus your number of derangements. Ego would have a set of up to five dots representing health habits, and when one of them is seriously threatened, the synine has to make a Resolve roll or abandon it. Id would be equal to your Resources or current Health, whichever is lower. For the purposes of recalculating Eudaimonia based on health, only do so at the end a of a scene; don't worry about every scratch and shove if your Eudaimonia is really low.
The degeneration mechanic is as normal and tied to Sacrifice. When a synine does something out of line with the ideal of sacrifice and protection, they have to make a degeneration roll with a number of dice corresponding to the act's severity. If they fail, they drop a Sacrifice dot and then make a Sacrifice roll to avoid getting a related derangement; if they get the derangement anyway, it goes away if they regain the sacrifice dot which caused it. A high Sacrifice score is beneficial because it's your maximum dice pool when doing something unrelated to what Water wants out of you. When you reach 0, you have no way to heal damage, but you don't automatically lose your character...technically. Synines regularly take bashing damage just from the mundanities everyday life; you just don't notice if you have enough Sacrifice and stay hydrated.
Then there are the fun powers to make the World of Darkness palatable along the way. These are still up for concepting, but I pretty much covered my ideas above. Water breathing plus excellent swimming, deflecting projectiles (up to and including bullets if you can get past the metal damage--see below), supernatural parkour with lots of jumping, telepathy, teleporting through doorways, creating waves of force, and being miraculously unharmed by accidents/not-so-accidents. Specific kinds of synines would have unique abilities, such as the Zasi having power over cold. Synines can also convert mortals into one of their own, but I'm not sure how they would do this yet--still thinking up all the details, here.
Oh, and one massive weakness, because every supernatural has one. Synines cannot stand Water’s opposition of Metal; it dessicates their bodies immediately at a touch. Damage dealt in this way is usually lethal, and the more obscure a form of metal gets, the more damage it can do; the number of points of damage are measured by the metal's Malison. Particularly "unnatural" metals (that's loosely what Malison is) deal aggravated damage. Synines take less damage as their Favor increases.
Each synine will have a Phase as their X-splat, which is the equivalent of a vampire's clan or a genius's catalyst. A Landau (steam) is capable of limited flight and other “incorporeal” things but is more vulnerable to Metal, a Zasi (ice) interacts favorably with the cold but cannot swim or breathe water, a Ladisai (freshwater) can actually control ordinary water but are more vulnerable to Metal, a Cathrom (saltwater) doesn’t need to heal as often and is able to do so from very dirty water—even though their healing is stunted—and a Deuterys (heavy water) can partially overcome their problem with Metal at the price of being psychologically stunted with chronic confusion.
I don’t know what to do with the Y-splats, the equivalent of a genius's foundation or a vampire's covenant, and will probably be developed when I get a better idea of the antagonist agents of Metal.
Synines with Favor 3 or more can undergo a Conflux (their Z-splat, which is...basically a prestige class), in which they mediate a bond between Water and some other usually-liquid material, sacrificing aspects of their body as a symbol of the alliance. It is Water’s ideal that this fosters more reciprocation, and the synine does get cool toys out of the deal; it’s just that the synine takes a drawback. Water will not let them have nice things without an associated sacrifice.
Kufabarafu (Blood): A synine that tries to Conflux with Blood just about dies on the spot, but shamble along in a half-alive state from there forward. They gain some benefits and drawback typical of vampires.
Tyrathian (Oil): A Tyrathian has an intuitive understanding of the role of oils in machines, and even the more benign oils like cooking oil—but not pretroleum; that’s something else entirely. They can use complex machines proficiently and perform tasks which oils are vital to. But their skin becomes blotchy and discolored, their hair becomes slick and skeevy, and their Appearance degrades overall.
Davacoth (Petroleum): A Davacoth gains the ability to mold plastics on a whim and power gas-driven machines with their own health. At the same time, they deal with chronic, wracking coughs and the loss of Stamina.
Kanthi (Alcohol): A kanthi can alter states of consciousness—their own, or others. Sounds great, except that when they conflux, their psyche is mutilated. Imagine someone who fights their addiction for years and fails; that’s about what they go through all at once. Their Willpower score itself is unharmed, but they can no longer gain Willpower by resting.
As usual, you can't combine templates. Synines won't experience a First Change, Awaken as a mage, have a Breakthrough, or turn into a Changeling. Their corpses don't become Prometheans and they will never Blossom. A synine who tries to convert a supernatural might succeed on a Genius/Mage/Princess, but it will strip the other template and result in Bad Things happening to the victim; other supernaturals are immune. A vampire that Embraces a synine might kind of succeed--if the synine had Favor 3 or higher, they come back to life as a Kufabarafu with three new derangements.
So does this seem like an idea worth pursuing? If so, what do I need to keep in mind? Based on Genius: The Transgression and Princess: The Hopeful, fanbooks seem pretty doable.
It is rare that a person is ever truly alone in what they do. When someone succeeds, they fundamentally rely on gifts from the outside world or from each other. Sometimes this help is very abstract or removed—marathoners couldn’t do what they do without the producers of health food—but sometimes it’s direct, like a rich son living on his parent’s inheritance, or someone winning a lottery funded by an entire state. Though humanity loves to think that they succeed on their own merits, compassion and gratefulness are what make them accepted by others. If one doesn’t appreciate gifts, they’ll become more begrudging, or there will be less of them. People who reciprocate are valued and given attention, and those who don’t are ignored.
Or so idealism would like to think. A sad truth is that so many sacrifices from the world at large go unsung, gifts are criticized for not being big enough, and the most intensely suffering people are demonized for suggesting that a bit of help would be nice. Injustice and ungratefulness rule the world even as their opposites are so fundamentally necessary in civilization.
Once can expand this principle not just to humans, but to their environment—supernatural or otherwise. Humans require the sacrifices of nature to develop technology and keep society running, and yet few people care about rampant pollution to any meaningful degree. As such, nature’s bounty is slipping as species go extinct and food sources become less and less fit for the human body.
Synine: The Sacrifice is about a silent guardian race of humanity, those who take only what they need and reciprocate the gifts humanity gives them. These supernatural beings, like vampires and the Inspired, are the synines. Their life depends on a cycle of sacrifice from nature to synine and back—they draw their life force from water, and Water expects this gift to be used for sacrifices in turn. Though it is their mission to protect humanity when it cannot do so on its own, they will always find their sacrifices belittled, ignored, gone unnoticed, or even criticized for not being “good enough”.
Synines may begin their life cycle with the utmost altruism, but as they are worn down by ungratefulness and the toll of their sacrifices, they come to stop caring. In the end, they must choose between two dark fates. If they lose the will to sacrifice, nature will no longer do so in kind, and their bodies will slowly crumble. If they hold on to their altruism, humanity will take and take until they have nothing left of themselves to give, perhaps without so much as a “thank you”.
But in the end, it is their goal to make a world of darkness more reciprocating for all, and the torment they so undergo will finally make the world a better place someday.
Maybe.
Theme: Sacrifice and Ungratefulness
Go ahead and give to others, but don't expect anyone to care.
From the first time someone is transformed into a synine, they are torn between doing what they must and the doubt that literally crumbles them from the inside. They have little choice but to give, and hope in vain that they will receive enough in return to keep giving. Sacrifice is needed for Water’s approval to stay alive, even as deprivation slowly snuffs out their Eudaimonia until they are begging for death. A synine protects and gives to a world that may never give back, but if they decide for one moment to let their convictions down, some of their permission to live slips away permanently.
Synines are powerful entities that look and seem human enough, empowered by the gifts of Water. Some can leap great distances, speak into others’ minds, step between cities, move the world by force or even bend the threats of existence around them. All to ensure and assure themselves, for the sake of those who need their sacrifices. They might find solace in what they can do, but it never lasts. Always driven to give up more, partly because it’s the right thing to do and partly because they cannot afford not to, a synine faces a decision that make a vampire’s troubles with morality look easy. Synines face hard choices, and the question isn’t which choice will keep them from dying in the end—that’s unavoidable. It’s a question of, when they get there, whether they’ll deserve their death...and whether the alternative is worse.
Synine: The Sacrifice would detail how to play an entirely new superantural creature, a synine, and the associated supernatural abilities you get to play with. Plus the usual stuff about WoD antagonists and how to make the setting awful--calibrated to deal with ungratefulness as a theme.
Synines are powered by Water with a capital W; they can absorb purified water to heal themselves and possibly regain willpower. It's the only way for them to heal. But since they're basically thralls to Water's will, they've got to do their job of babysitting humanity, it's harder for them to heal if they're not doing that.
A synine would have Sacrifice, Favor, and Eudaimonia scores.
Sacrifice represents their degree of altruism, belief that humanity is fundamentally good, and ability to heal with the generosity of Water. With very high Sacrifice, a synine won't even bother hiding what they are, for being so trusting. But as it drops, they'll get cynical, become less willing to make themselves miserable for people, start to think they're justified in taking what they deserve from the "system", and give up on the idea that they need to sacrifice for others--and by the time they truly become ungrateful, they are doomed. A high Sacrifice means that they can heal up with small amounts of water, low Sacrifice means that they'll need ever more vast quantities, and when they reach zero, water refuses to heal their body at all. Then, ordinary bodily decay from dying cells/minor bruises/etc will rapidly accumulate until death.
Favor is their "supernatural advantage" score; this is the one that makes you level up. Fresh new Synines are more like humans than agents of Water's reciprocating ideals. Synines that gain power and commune with large bodies of water can incur more Favor from Water. Every synine would be basically capable of raising 5-dot abilities to 10 dots, no matter their age and experience, if Water didn't keep them on such a tight leash--it restrains the new synines that are not proven to be able to sacrifice. They have to fight tooth and nail for Water to grant them the special privileges of Favor.
Eudaimonia represents a synine's overall well-being, both mentally and physically. If their health deteriorates or their mind starts to break down, Eudaimonia will decay as well. If a synine gives their services to humanity, they're fine so long as there's enough reciprocation, but this being World of Darkness, they're going to lose out. A synine working 80 hours a week at charity centers will probably lose out on Eudaimonia due to mental health issues, for example, and it'll keep going down and down until they've got nothing left to give, which ruins them. Very high Eudaimonia means that a synine is doing awesome, thanks for asking!, low Eudaimonia means they're a wreck, and Eudaimonia 1 means they're dying of deprivation or depression; it's too late to save them at Eudaimonia 0. Determining and changing this score is a bit complicated in this rough-draft idea. You'll have a base score determined by Wellness scores--Id, Ego, and Superego; add them up and subtract 5. Superego would always be equal to five minus your number of derangements. Ego would have a set of up to five dots representing health habits, and when one of them is seriously threatened, the synine has to make a Resolve roll or abandon it. Id would be equal to your Resources or current Health, whichever is lower. For the purposes of recalculating Eudaimonia based on health, only do so at the end a of a scene; don't worry about every scratch and shove if your Eudaimonia is really low.
The degeneration mechanic is as normal and tied to Sacrifice. When a synine does something out of line with the ideal of sacrifice and protection, they have to make a degeneration roll with a number of dice corresponding to the act's severity. If they fail, they drop a Sacrifice dot and then make a Sacrifice roll to avoid getting a related derangement; if they get the derangement anyway, it goes away if they regain the sacrifice dot which caused it. A high Sacrifice score is beneficial because it's your maximum dice pool when doing something unrelated to what Water wants out of you. When you reach 0, you have no way to heal damage, but you don't automatically lose your character...technically. Synines regularly take bashing damage just from the mundanities everyday life; you just don't notice if you have enough Sacrifice and stay hydrated.
Then there are the fun powers to make the World of Darkness palatable along the way. These are still up for concepting, but I pretty much covered my ideas above. Water breathing plus excellent swimming, deflecting projectiles (up to and including bullets if you can get past the metal damage--see below), supernatural parkour with lots of jumping, telepathy, teleporting through doorways, creating waves of force, and being miraculously unharmed by accidents/not-so-accidents. Specific kinds of synines would have unique abilities, such as the Zasi having power over cold. Synines can also convert mortals into one of their own, but I'm not sure how they would do this yet--still thinking up all the details, here.
Oh, and one massive weakness, because every supernatural has one. Synines cannot stand Water’s opposition of Metal; it dessicates their bodies immediately at a touch. Damage dealt in this way is usually lethal, and the more obscure a form of metal gets, the more damage it can do; the number of points of damage are measured by the metal's Malison. Particularly "unnatural" metals (that's loosely what Malison is) deal aggravated damage. Synines take less damage as their Favor increases.
Each synine will have a Phase as their X-splat, which is the equivalent of a vampire's clan or a genius's catalyst. A Landau (steam) is capable of limited flight and other “incorporeal” things but is more vulnerable to Metal, a Zasi (ice) interacts favorably with the cold but cannot swim or breathe water, a Ladisai (freshwater) can actually control ordinary water but are more vulnerable to Metal, a Cathrom (saltwater) doesn’t need to heal as often and is able to do so from very dirty water—even though their healing is stunted—and a Deuterys (heavy water) can partially overcome their problem with Metal at the price of being psychologically stunted with chronic confusion.
I don’t know what to do with the Y-splats, the equivalent of a genius's foundation or a vampire's covenant, and will probably be developed when I get a better idea of the antagonist agents of Metal.
Synines with Favor 3 or more can undergo a Conflux (their Z-splat, which is...basically a prestige class), in which they mediate a bond between Water and some other usually-liquid material, sacrificing aspects of their body as a symbol of the alliance. It is Water’s ideal that this fosters more reciprocation, and the synine does get cool toys out of the deal; it’s just that the synine takes a drawback. Water will not let them have nice things without an associated sacrifice.
Kufabarafu (Blood): A synine that tries to Conflux with Blood just about dies on the spot, but shamble along in a half-alive state from there forward. They gain some benefits and drawback typical of vampires.
Tyrathian (Oil): A Tyrathian has an intuitive understanding of the role of oils in machines, and even the more benign oils like cooking oil—but not pretroleum; that’s something else entirely. They can use complex machines proficiently and perform tasks which oils are vital to. But their skin becomes blotchy and discolored, their hair becomes slick and skeevy, and their Appearance degrades overall.
Davacoth (Petroleum): A Davacoth gains the ability to mold plastics on a whim and power gas-driven machines with their own health. At the same time, they deal with chronic, wracking coughs and the loss of Stamina.
Kanthi (Alcohol): A kanthi can alter states of consciousness—their own, or others. Sounds great, except that when they conflux, their psyche is mutilated. Imagine someone who fights their addiction for years and fails; that’s about what they go through all at once. Their Willpower score itself is unharmed, but they can no longer gain Willpower by resting.
As usual, you can't combine templates. Synines won't experience a First Change, Awaken as a mage, have a Breakthrough, or turn into a Changeling. Their corpses don't become Prometheans and they will never Blossom. A synine who tries to convert a supernatural might succeed on a Genius/Mage/Princess, but it will strip the other template and result in Bad Things happening to the victim; other supernaturals are immune. A vampire that Embraces a synine might kind of succeed--if the synine had Favor 3 or higher, they come back to life as a Kufabarafu with three new derangements.
So does this seem like an idea worth pursuing? If so, what do I need to keep in mind? Based on Genius: The Transgression and Princess: The Hopeful, fanbooks seem pretty doable.