| From: | Jeremy DeVore jmortir@*****.net |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Early Brainstorming: My Campaign Again |
| Date: | Tue, 23 Feb 1999 00:16:44 -0600 |
First, the whole Living Dead thing is going to start full force. Hell, the
characters start the whole thing for the most part. So it will have to be an
important part at least in the beginning. Later on after they let the evil
genie out of the bottle, the Living Dead go into the background. I want
something similar to the beginning of Dawn of the Dead, where people are
trying to get on with their lives as normal as they can (you know going to
work and the such) while they try to adapt to the epidemic (such as shutting
down Public Housing and outlawing Private Residences). This would mean that
the characters would be performing Runs as the world begins to fall apart
(all of a sudden sections (RTG's) of the Matrix totally disappear...). This
will eventually lead the characters into an escape plan, where they will try
to escape Earth altogether.
Now let's try to explain the Epidemic shall we? The probe brought an energy
force back with it that emanates from the physical form of the probe. This
energy is the cause of everything. It is mysterious, and it does things that
are known to be impossible.
It's a leech. This energy grabs hold of something and warps it. When it came
down to Earth it slowly leeched itself into the Astral Space around it.
Altering it beyond recognition. Where once it was the by product of life and
creativity, it now brings about the living dead and negative emotions.
Astral Space (where infected) has become the epidemic, everything else that
happens is just a side effect... Whoa that little thought changes a lot and
makes things much more interesting.
This new Astral Space acts as a leech itself. When it comes into contact
with normal Astral it begins to transform it. Think of how heat conducts in
metal. Think of the cold metal as normal Astral and the heat as the Infected
Astral. Slowly, the cold is going to be changed into the hot (ok I know that
is not scientifically accurate but for my explanation it works). Now this
Infected Astral is totally repelled by living beings, it cannot force it's
way into them. In the beginning of my story, the Corp that has the probe in
it's possession will use a concentrated form of Fat Bacteria (FAB) to
conceal it from Astral Intruders. This security measure will contain the
Infected Astral to the lab the probe is being held in. Now when the
characters steal parts of the probe and have them out there in the general
public, things are going to go down hill fast. Not only does this Infected
Astral leech onto normal Astral, but for some strange reason (as if any of
this can be explained reasonably by anyone) this Infected Astral latches
itself onto Inanimate objects. Normal Astral is created and generated by
life, and this new Astral maintains itself by holding onto dead or inanimate
things.
This is something I might need some help with. I do not know how Astral
Space reacts when a person dies. So I am winging it here and I hope I make
sense. When a person dies in this Infected Astral the Astral leeches itself
to the body the way it does with inanimate things. As a side effect of the
tainted Astral entering a recently deceased body, it rises and attempts to
carry out it's most basic of functions (namely eat!).
But there are other ways of Infecting yourself. The Infected Astral itself
cannot enter a living being. You have to remember that this Infected Astral
binds itself to dead matter. The blood or saliva of the Living Dead carries
the Astral Taint with it. And if these materials enter the body of a living
being, the taint has a foothold and will eventually corrupt the Astral of
the living being. Resulting in death and the reanimation as a Living Dead
Zombie. That's bad enough, but if food has had a chance of being infected
(people will again have to learn to eat fresh meat and vegetables) and is
consumed the same will happen. Water is strangely exempt from the
contamination...
One of the sickest ways of becoming Infected has to be what happens to
mages. They channel this Twisted Astral through their bodies as they become
links to physical world. The magic works the same, because the mage's body
filters out the corrupted crud out of it. And the fact that the mage is
living and does not have an infected piece of physical matter within them
(you know the saliva of the Living Dead) means that the Infected Astral
cannot just take them. But the more Astral they channel into the physical
world through spells will eventually cause the Infection to take hold. Their
body will naturally regenerate their Aura, but if they pull in too much
Infected crap they're worm food. I think a good rule would be to keep track
of the Force Rating of every spell they cast,and if they go over their
Safety Threshold (which would equal their Magic Attribute multiplied by 6 (I
think that is a safe number, but we will be starting from the beginning so
if I need to lower it I will as the Epidemic runs wild)) they become
Infected as surely as if they were bitten. Every time a character gets a
restful sleep (there will be modifiers because with the dead running rampant
who is going to always get a good night's sleep) erase their Essence from
the Force running total (for example you have a mage who has cast spells
during the day that has equaled up to 35, one point away from becoming a
Zombie, he catches some sleep in a military compound, so when he wakes up he
has his Essence Rating (in this case a 6) subtracted from the Force total,
so now his total is 29, he can cast 7 Force of spells before he becomes a
meat Popsicle.) And mages will feel the taint build up in them so they all
know how much they can take before they "turn", so let the players keep
track of the totals. As you can see mages will begin to conserve what magic
they cast.
I haven't decided how others that are tied to Astral Space will be altered
by this Infected Astral. Can you imagine what would happen to the Dual
Natured out there?
I think I have gotten enough out for this one email. I hope I don't
overwhelm ya'll with this. I am sure I will get some response to this. More
to come later. Because I still haven't touched base on the Space Travel
stuff...
Later
J
http://www.prysm.net/~jmortir/AWINS
ICQ# 27381095
"Tis a nobler thing I... Aw screw it! Bye..."
