Void Shifters

[Kesteven]

This is an RP setting I've now tried on 2 other forums, and perhaps against my better judgement I'm wanting to give another chance.

It's a time-travel occult mystery fantasy action-adventure, and if that got your interest you might want to look at the previous threads:
Dissolute Productions
RPGateway

For more information, quick overviews of aspects of the setting, and a character creation guide, see the wiki.

Summary:
The story takes place in a world of magic, manipulated from behind the scenes by shadowy deities who seek ultimate power. Complicating this further, an unknown event in the future has shattered the path of time, dividing the world into millennial eras between which travel is possible, and who knows how many alternate timelines abound as the deities use their magic to further derange the timestream.
The characters come into this game of 6-dimensional blind chess knowing very little. They might wield magical powers or they might not, but either way, in order to extricate themselves from the clutches of their overlords and forge their own destiny they'll have to uncover the secrets of their world and outwit the gods themselves.

The overall style is intended to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek; the setting allows for a wide range of characters of mundane or preposterous origins, and humour, action and serious character development all have equal priority as far as I'm concerned. Overpowered characters are allowed if I think there's good enough justification. People can involve themselves as much or as little as they like with the more complicated aspects of the setting - time-travel can be the basis for convoluted and intelligent plots or just an excuse to shoot knights with a laser pistol.

The last 2 games were mastered to some extent, but I'm thinking here it might work better freeform. Would anyone be interested?

[vitamin_kitten]

This interests me a bit, and I feel there was a relevant question I wanted to ask, but my coworker spiked the coffee with shots of extra caffeine, so my brain is a bit of a mess right now.

[Kesteven]

Heh, that might explain why this interests you.

[vitamin_kitten]

No, I'm genuinely interested in it. XD I like the concept of travelling between times and dimensions. I think the question I wanted to ask was about the specifics of the plot- if there was one, or if you were basically just creating more of a world for characters to interact in.

[Kesteven]

Okay, plot... well, the overall plot is rather vague but revolves around uncovering the mystery of the event in the future, and the nature of the demonic forces. As more was revealed, the characters would have to make decisions about how to respond, ultimately culminating in a quest to either exploit the sinister web or destroy it, or perhaps achieve some other goal in that theme. That would be fairly far into the game though and I don't realistically expect anyone to reach the 'end'.

The first game was extremely plot-heavy as I was doing most of the writing and basically making an interactive story with players making decisions or solving puzzles at key points, trying to base as much as I could around the material other people were providing in the form of character background and player decisions. Like I said though those were mastered quite heavily, if we're going a more freeform route then I'd probably leave a lot more of the decisions about where to take things to the players, but I'd be mostly playing it by ear. I'd like for there to be some kind of narrative progression though and if I thought the story was stagnating I'd probably take efforts to inject some excitement.

[vitamin_kitten]

Hmm, well, if other people get interested in it, I might join. :3

[Sorrel]

I can see this going pretty well...I like the time travel idea, and it makes room for a lot of unique characters and a whole lot of imagination. Consider me interested.

Also, I think that maybe having detailed character sheets would work well for this, just to keep track of who's who and where they came from. I looked at your past threads, and didn't so much like the first one, it was hard to understand with such weird flow...and lack of character description (maybe I was missing something?) But the RPGateway one was interesting, I really liked the wiki thing for the characters. I've never seen that done before.

[Kesteven]

It can be a bit excessive, but wikis are a really good way to keep track of data. I sometimes use wiki-like systems like WOAS to keep track of my personal creative writing when things get convoluted, since I like to develop rich backgrounds, and browsing through is a good way to get ideas for what to do next. I think it works even better for cooperative projects like RP where everyone can develop their own corners.

The Dissolute Productions game might seem a little odd to people here because the format was like a tabletop game, with a lot of OOC banter and the DM (me) doing most of the work as far as storytelling goes, the players just providing actions and speech and solving puzzles, like a computer game, except I'm the computer.
Since people here are all 'advanced' roleplayers though, anything done here would be in more or less the same freestyle format as everything else, it's just a question of how much people think they could get out of the setting. I think it has a lot of potential, but I suppose I would. I see it as something of a license to run wild, which this forum seems especially (and regrettably, for me at least) lacking in.

[Digital Muse]

If this gets going, count me in. It has tons of potential of wildly varying characters to interact.

[Dio the Awesome]

HEY! I was waiting for this, then I missed. After I post here, I'm checking for an OOC thread. I want to use my old character, because, he was so cool, but he never got developed due to a lack of people committed to the RP.

[Kesteven]

Great, I liked that character. Well, if we can get everyone in this thread together that's three or four people plus me, which I reckon is enough to start the sign-ups for real. I'll get started adjusting the rules and writing an OOC post.

[Digital Muse]

I'm definitely still in!

[Kesteven]

OK, the OOC thread is up. It still may not go anywhere, but we'll see.

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