Could /tg/ help refine a campaign premise?
There are two realities, each as real as one another: our Earth in the year 202X, and a sprawling panoply of fantastical planes full of magical creatures and impossible vistas.
Here is the twist: the sentient creatures of both realities share souls, subconscious minds, and fates.
One rich businessman in Earth might share an essence with an archangel in a golden fortress in the fantasy planes, while another rich businessman in Earth could share an essence with an elven beggar in the fantasy planes.
One docile puppy in Earth could have a common essence with a ferocious demon-drake in the fantasy planes, while another docile puppy in Earth could have the essence of a cute and cuddly faerie dog in the fantasy realms.
When one becomes sad, the other is likely to become sad too. When one has their day brightened by a good Samaritan, the other takes heart too. When one prospers, so does the other.
When a new sentient creature is born in one, the other reality creates another as well. When one dies... the other is marked for death as well. (They share overall population numbers for sapient entities and for non-sapients.)
Geographical areas have their fates linked too. Just as there are thousands of counties, provinces, and prefectures in Earth, so too are thousands of fantasy planes. Famine and devastation in one spells misfortune in the other. Peace and prosperity in one reciprocates the same in the other.
The PCs are "single-minded," one of the select few who have mysteriously awakened to this duality... but have only one conscious mind to spare. Their conscious mind can tap into the knowledge, memory, and skills of both personas. They can shift their consciousness between realities, placing the other on (reasonably competent) autopilot.
They can also discern who and where any given sentient creature's counterpart is.
The PCs are all from the same city, which is in turn linked to the same fantasy plane.
(Continued.)
The PCs go on adventures that let them instigate changes in one reality to ripple over to the other.
Maybe in the fantasy realm, a raging great wyrm red dragon is terrorizing the countryside in a fit of grief. This is too strong for the PCs to overcome in the fantasy world, so they find a way to get close to the dragon and discern the dragon's identity in Earth as a high school girl angry and depressed over a breakup. They can help that girl overcome her negative emotions, and the dragon in the fantasy world calms down.
Or perhaps in Earth, the PCs want to help a mutual friend get through a rough financial patch. Pooling together money in Earth simply will not be enough, so they discern their friend's identity in the fantasy realm as an elven king whose kingdom is also suffering from an economic crisis because a legendary thief looted the treasury. (A student in Earth and a king in the fantasy realms obviously have very different levels of wealth, but both can suffer financial misfortune relative to their "baseline.") The PCs can track down the legendary thief, bring back the riches, and watch as both the king and their friend in Earth have their finances restored.
There are a few problems I see here though:
1. It is going to get very complicated if both worlds are equally real, and what happens in one reciprocates in the other. Would this not mean that nothing anyone does ever matters, because everything is simply a chain reaction of ripples and reciprocations guided by each reality's fate? Even adventures and interactions with/against other "single-minded" would logically be completely irrelevant in the grand scheme due to both realities' essences echoing against one another.
2. How could there possibly be long-lived (if not immortal) sapient creatures in the fantasy realm if none of Earth's sapient creatures can live past ~122 years? That would also cap the effective lifespans of sapient creatures in the fantasy planes to ~122 years.
3. What is the incentive to alternate between both lives, instead of sticking to one (probably the more exciting and magical fantasy life) and leaving the other on autopilot for everything? What is the incentive to care about both equally as much? Should PCs have a limit to their consciousness-shifting that makes living out both lives mandatory over the course of a few days?
One solution to #3 I can think of myself is that the PCs do not shift their consciousness from one reality to another at-will. It is not under their control.
Instead, the Earth-reality "runs" for 24 hours before going into a timeless stasis for another 24 hours. During that time, the fantasy-reality "runs" for 24 hours before going into a stasis for 24 hours, which is when Earth starts to "run" again.
The PCs, then, would experience life as alternating between these two realities every 24 hours, like so: Monday in Earth -> Monday in fantasy -> Tuesday in Earth -> Tuesday in fantasy -> Wedesday in Earth -> Wednesday in fantasy, and so on.
Would this be a more ideal setup?
>>44059186
Time fuckery, even simple ones, don't work too well in tabletop games. At least I've never had an experience where they worked well. Besides, willfully letting the players shift between worlds helps out with your agency problem.
As far as problem 1 goes, that's an age old philosophical issue that is mostly ignored in RPGs. The players and the characters they play are special. The players assume they have agency and this assumption is reinforced by the GM showing them the consequences of their actions. By having the players solve problems in one world and showing them the effects of that in the other, you're showing that they have far more agency than your average denizen of either world.
As far as 2 goes, implementing reincarnation might be a useful hack. You said that when one dies the other is "marked for death." This can mean almost anything. It might be that debilitating sickness is common for "immortal" beings when their Earthly counterpart dies, or they start to feel like something is missing in their life and become unfocused or whatever. A drastic physical or psychological shift would satisfy me as a player. Alternatively, if you ixnay immortal races you could perfectly sync up deaths. How different would dragons be if they only lived for 80 years? Could be fun.
Cool setting concept though. I'd play in it.
>>44059536
Forgot about 3. It could be something as simple as making sure each PC has a person or place or something in each world they value deeply.
What is being on "autopilot" like anyway? Is it something like that Click movie or are they more or less themselves? Maybe it's dangerous because their auto-selves aren't as cognizant of danger as they are when they're in control.
>>44059536
>>44059580
For #1, the issue is the very fact that nothing *anybody*, even the PCs and other "single-minded," does is meaningless.
Logically, if the fate of one follows the other, then they should reinforce each other in a vicious cycle, right?
The PCs' home county/province in Earth becomes prosperous and happy. Then the counterpart fantasy plane becomes prosperous and happy... which in turn makes the Earth county/province prosperous and happy. It would take something major to break this vicious cycle.
Would it be better if the two worlds did not affect each other by default, but the PCs were super-special fate-bound people who could *make* one world affect the other?
For #2, having all long-lived or immortal creatures suddenly go out of commission at age 70-122 would be very suspicious, because then they would never actually be long-lived or immortal even in the fantasy planes.
At the same time, assigning roughly human lifespans to angels, demons, dragons, and the like seems very "un-fantasy," and practically makes them just humans with fancy appearances and powers. The fantasy realms may as well be full of fantastical humans at that rate.
For #3, it makes sense that everybody has something they care about in both worlds, but it is not out of the question for a PC to care only about one world. "My life on Earth is with a boring family and a boring school, so I do not care for it at all" does not seem especially outlandish, yet it makes for a poor PC in this kind of campaign.
I suppose autopilot would have the PC act "normally," without tapping into the knowledge, memories, or skills of their counterpart. They are slightly less competent in all regards, but still enough to get by in life.
If being on autopilot means being in danger, then that means that every PC is *always in danger*, which does not seem quite right. This is also difficult for the group to adjudicate, because it means that at all times, each PC has a counterpart taking action.
>>44059034
>Would this not mean that nothing anyone does ever matters
>>44059867
> the issue is the very fact that nothing *anybody* ... does is meaningless
Well, which is it?
>Logically, if the fate of one follows the other, then they should reinforce each other in a vicious cycle, right?
If you want it to, yes. Or you can just say that fortune isn't recursive across the planes, or that only changes arising from inside that plane can be carried over to the next one or some other rule you think of.
>having all long-lived or immortal creatures suddenly go out of commission
Not necessarily out of commission, maybe something like they lose their passion for life. Human beings on the regular peak in high school and it's all downhill from there. Maybe their elven counterpart got killed at an early age.
It really depends on what being marked for death means.
Given your thoughts on the autopilot, the shifting day cycles is probably easier to run.
>>44060430
>Well, which is it?
I meant to say that everything everybody does is meaningless because, logically, both realities should reciprocate the fate of the other into a vicious cycle.
How could this be addressed?
>Not necessarily out of commission, maybe something like they lose their passion for life.
>Maybe their elven counterpart got killed at an early age.
Would people not find it suspicious that *every* long-lived to immortal creature either gets killed or loses their zest for life near the age of a hundred?
Could there perhaps be a system wherein a long-lived or immortal creature is "tethered" to a human on Earth for as long as that human lives, and when that human dies, the long-lived/immortal creature becomes "tethered" to a newborn human? Would that be too complicated?
>>44060596
>How could this be addressed?
Two kinds of changes in fortune: Internal and External. Internal changes are those that happen to units in the same plane. These create External changes in the other plane. External changes do not create further External changes.
>Could there perhaps be a system wherein a long-lived or immortal creature is "tethered" to a human on Earth for as long as that human lives, and when that human dies, the long-lived/immortal creature becomes "tethered" to a newborn human? Would that be too complicated?
Probably not. Begs the question of why some creatures get retethered though.
>>44060734
>Two kinds of changes in fortune: Internal and External.
Even in our real world, success leads to further success, and misfortune leads to further misfortune.
In this setting, if someone receives an External upswing in fortune, it is likely that they will capitalize on that and create Internal upswings in fortune for themselves as well... which will rebound onto the other reality and reinforce the vicious cycle.
This is why I am thinking that the "essence/fate rebounding" should be something that only PCs can instigate. Otherwise, the two worlds do not influence each other very much.
This would make the PCs very special, because they (and anyone else like them) are the only ones who can cause one world to actually affect the other.
Could one solution to the "no long-lived/immortal creatures in the fantasy world" be that for the past thousands of years, angels, dragons, demons, and faeries have indeed had lifespans roughly similar to humans, but in recent years, some have mysteriously begun to throw off all aging, and some mortals have even researched methods of eternal life through undeath?
Meanwhile, in the real world in the year 202X or 203X, medical treatments to halt or reverse aging have entered the mass market for the rich.
Which one devised the immortality first, who can say?
