Instinct

[Riverstyx777]

Hey, all. If you stumbled your way to this OOC, good for you! This is where you post any of your questions or concerns for the role play.

Also, I would like to note that Nyu is indeed my co-GM.

[Kilgannon]

Hello, guys if your reading this I'd like to welcome you to the Roleplay! To those who are filling in the main chars: Your parents will die. Now, we want this to actually effect your char like it would someone who has never lost a loved one. Mental strain, depression, insomnia, ect. Also, River and I require that every character gets a teensy bit of the infected virus in them, Via a small scratch. No bites, that's too much viral stuff. Other than that, we have nothing to let you guys know currently. Have fun!

[Riverstyx777]

After discussing this role play in depth with my friend, Eastep, I finally figured out what was missing for you guys.

This role play is going to be based on the characters themselves. It is going to be a "social experiment" of sorts. The whole survival aspect is actually an underlying motive. The main thing is that these characters are all "normal" people, regular citizens that have no combat training whatsoever, nor any experiences of loss on this magnitude. Basically, these characters are people that are used to boring suburban life, where nothing exciting ever happens.

What does this all mean to you? Well, it means that your posts are mainly going to be based on the thoughts and feelings of your characters, not so much as their actions. Although, actions are important as well.

Please remember, if you have any questions, feel free to PM myself or Nyu, or just post them in here.

[Tartha]

Hey River; Nice to meet you Nyu.
I don't know how free the posting in the OOC Thread is, so I'm just gonna post here... if you want me to delete it, let me know.

*I was thinking about the mental strain on the characters and thought that I'd add some tidbits that people may find helpful, or interesting.


If you've never played a game based around the mental degradation of a character, I have some very rough guidelines that were developed for a Tabletop game (Unknown Armies). They might make you think of something you hadn't thought of before, or they may just be food for thought. Feel free to ignore them.

"So, this is what going crazy feel like..."

Imagine that every person has 5 "meters" that gauge their sanity:
* Violence - Represents your character's reaction to violent acts
* Unnatural - Represents your character's reaction to the unnatural/supernatural
* Helplessness - Represents your character's reaction in helpless situations
* Isolation - Represents your character's reaction in periods of isolation/loneliness
* Self - Represents your character's ability to deal with issues relating to identity

As your character grows and experiences the world they will be tested in each of these areas (well, maybe not all of them, but if you're an RP Character chances are you'll touch on most them). Each meter is shaped like so:

Hardened / Meter Name / Failed
□ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ □ / Violence / □ □ □ □ □


The more a character is hardened in a meter, the less that type of stress effects that character. The more failed you are in a meter the more your character's everyday life is effected by this stresser, and the poorer they react when confronted with it.
For all intensive purposes you can have as many Hardened in a disorder as is possible. As a character becomes more and more Hardened, they are less and less effected by what that meter represents and become more and more okay with whatever that is: basically they are slowly turning into a psychopath.
A character can only gain 5 Failed in a meter (no more). When a character reaches 5 Failed in a Meter they gain a permanent disorder (like Obsessive Compulsive Disorder--a Helplessness Meter Disorder), and when confronted with that stresser they are incapable of rational action--resorting immediately to their Flight/Freeze/Fight response.
It's important to remember that the difference between each notch/level of the meter is rather large.


Examples:
(I should mention that, in this system, when you are confronted with a stresser--no matter what level it is--you can only gain 1 Failed notch at a time.)
So, the way it works (in a nutshell) is that if you are hardened above the level of the stress-check you're not gonna freak out when confronted with the stress. However, if you're not hardened to above the stresser, you have a chance of going crazy (failing a check: gaining a failed notch) or getting hardened (gaining a hardened notch). Having failed notches does not effect this basic formula (Hardened > Stress = No Check; Hardened < Stress = Check). There is no reason why a person can't have both failed and hardened notches in a meter.

Sample Stress Checks
Violence
1 Be attacked with a weapon--shot at or slashed.
2 Witness an act of torture.
3 Get shot at random. Be tortured briefly.
4 Kill someone in a fight.
5 Be present at a massive battle, with hundreds of deaths on both sides.
6 Perform an act of torture.
7 Deliberately kill a helpless target.
8 Get tortured for an hour or longer.
9 Witness a brutal mass execution.
10 Watch as someone you love is tortured to death.
Unnatural
1 Experience a preternaturally strong deja vu.
2 See a creature or machine that cannot logically exist.
3 Realize that a vision you had of the future has come true.
4 See convincing proof that 2+2 does not equal 4.
5 Be successfully attacked with magick.
6 See someone you know killed by magick, without any visible or "rational" cause.
7 Have a conversation with a loved one whom you know is dead.
8 See an animal with human features.
9 See the dead rise.
10 Realize that the reason you and your husband of ten hears have never had children is that he's not really a human being.
Helplessness
1 Unintentionally humiliate yourself in public.
2 Get fired from your job you love.
3 Fail at something when it's imperative that you succeed.
4 Get dumped into a pit of maggots.
5 Spend a month in jail.
6 Watch a videotape of your spouse committing adultery.
7 Be placed in a situation where you have to either saw off one of your limbs or die.
8 Watch someone you love die.
9 Watch someone you love die because you tried to save them and failed.
10 Be possessed, yet conscious, as your body commits unspeakable acts against your will.
Isolation
1 Spend a day without seeing anyone you know.
2 Spend five hours in a sensory-deprivation tank.
3 Spend three days without talking to another human being.
4 Be institutionalized by someone you love and trust.
5 Spend a week in solitary confinement.
6 See someone you thought you knew intimately behaving in a fashion completely contrary to her normal behavior.
7 Spend a month in a country where no one speaks your language and where you can't make yourself understood no matter how hard you try.
8 Be deeply, painfully, and violently betrayed by someone you love.
9 Be treated like a stranger by your closest friends.
10 Spend a month in a sensory-deprivation tank.
Self
1 Break a minor promise.
2 Be confronted with proof that your self-image is incorrect.
3 Secretly gratify an urge that is unacceptable to your upbringing and background.
4 Lie to conceal some aspect of your personality from a close friend or loved one who trusts you implicitly.
5 Decide not to act on an impulse steaming from your personal sacred ideals because it's "too dangerous."
6 Deliberately deceive someone you love in a way that is certain to cause them terrible pain if they find out.
7 Discover that you have inadvertently committed an act of cannibalism.
8 Deliberately act completely contrary to your personal sacred ideals.
9 Kill someone you love.
10 Deliberately destroy everything you've risked your life to support.

Failed Notches
Violence
1 At this level, you're superficially fine. Perhaps you're a little edgy whenever a knife in the room happens to be pointing your direction.
2 You are very aware of violence, both as it exists and as it is depicted. It strikes you as somewhat odd that so many people don't realize that movie violence is very different from real violence.
3 You get alert or uneasy every time you see blood, even badly faked blood in a horror flick or when someone cuts a rare steak. Sometimes you have nightmares about violence you've witnessed.
5 You instinctively take a defensive posture whenever there's a loud noise or raised voice nearby. Your nightmares are frequent, and you have a hard time looking at anyone without imagining (if briefly) what you would do at that moment if they attacked you.
Unnatural
1 At this level it's pretty hard to tell. Perhaps you become a little superstitious--reading your horoscope daily, watching for "lucky" numbers, avoiding cracks in the sidewalk, etc.
2 You have a few nightmares, and you are suspicious of and/or fascinated by occult and religious books, places, paraphernalia, and people.
3 You frequently feel like you're being watched, even when there's no one around. Sometimes it seems like you hear voices in "white noise"--sounds like the wind in the trees, the sloshing of a washing machine, or noises of traffic.
4 The nightmares are frequent, and often you don't know you're dreaming until you jerk awake. Sometimes you feel like there's someone--or something--watching you and you can almost see it out of the corner of your eye. When you whip your head around, there's nothing there.
Helplessness
1 At this level you're fairly normal. Perhaps you're a little finicky or meticulous, trying to eliminate the possibility of something going wrong.
2 You have a tendency to get unreasonably nervous and pessimistic when small things go wrong. You may be irritated if a bus is just a few minutes late, or if your computer freezes up.
3 You have an intense dislike for surprises, even good ones. They remind you of the essentially unpredictable nature of reality, and that scares and annoys you.
4 You find it very difficult to trust anything. Your friends, your own abilities, even your memories could be false, waiting to betray you. You have a tendency towards obsessive-compulsive behaviors such as checking the door to your house two or three (or more) times every time you leave to make absolutely certain it's locked. You attempt to be prepared for every eventuality.
Isolation
1 You can interact in society and get through your everyday lief with no real problems. You're maybe a little shy with people at first, but you feel a kind of gratitude whenever a new acquaintance doesn't reject you.
2 You're a bit nervous around new people, eager to make a good impression. This could be expressed as shyness or through "chatterbox" behaviors.
3 If you sleep alone, you sometimes suffer from insomnia. Perhaps you don't like silence when you're by yourself, and always keep a television on or a radio playing. Sometimes, when you're not paying attention, you talk to yourself or think out loud.
4 Sometimes when you're isolated (either all by yourself or surrounded by strangers) you have panic attacks--a sense of intangible, impending doom. Your skin flushes, your breath becomes rapid and labored, you sweat. Simply put, you show the signs of being in mortal danger, when there is no danger around.
Self
1 You don't have any real kinks yet, but every now and again you feel a sense of dissociation, an eerie moment when you feel alienated from your own character and motivations.
2 The "who am I?" moments come more frequently. You tend to become introspective whenever someone mentions "truth" or "lies" or "promises."
3 Half the time your words and actions feel oddly forced, fake, or rehearsed to you--as if, rather than yourself, you were an actor playing the role of you.
4 You frequently feel like you're watching your every action from the outside. you have little or no sense of will or volition: it's as if you're a passive observer, along for the ride while your body goes through he motions.

Hardened Notches
Violence
1-3 Superficially, you're much like everyone else.
4-5 Your attitude towards violence shows on your face when the subject comes up in conversation, unless you work to keep it hidden. It might be intensity, or nervousness, or just a grim silence, depending on how you cope.
6-7 Violence is a common feature of your mental landscape. Unlike less-hardened people, you show little reaction at all when it is discussed or depicted in fiction.
8-9 Your callousness shows in your every word and expression unless you make a continuous effort to suppress it. Again, the exact tone is up to you: it could be bitter and harsh, feverish and vehement, or icy cold.
10 It's not hard for people to realize that the deepest horrors of torture and brutality have become commonplace to you, unless you work very, very hard to keep it hidden--which means you come off as tense and guarded all the time. The death of others, or yourself, has no intrinsic significance. You might prefer to stay alive, but it's only a matter of personal taste. Life, in the abstract, doesn't mean anything.
Unnatural
1-3 There's little to distinguish you from the average person, except perhaps a tendency to snort derisively when someone mentions their "intuitions."
4-5 You tend to listen very closely and intently when someone discusses the paranormal or supernatural, trying to figure out if they know something or if they're just talking trash.
6-7 You now know and accept that there are vast, incomprehensible forces governing the universe. It strikes you as odd when people act as if they're in control of their lives: you know better.
8-9 Things that average people consider "meaningless coincidences" strike you as deeply, intensely funny, because you see the connections that they do not. you may develop a reputation for laughing inappropriately.
10 You are no longer surprised by violation of ordinary logic. Everything is "normal" to you--talking foliage, spontaneous combustion, and stigmata are as ordinary and reasonable as cars, dogs, and rain.
Helplessness
1-3 You don't have any major behavior or attitude shifts yet, just minor things. You tend to be pessimistic and fatalistic, perhaps.
4-6 Your fatalism has increased. When things go wrong in a big, bad way, or when trouble comes from a completely unexpected or unlikely source, you handle it with a remarkable lack of affect.
7-9 You have a boundless faith in the ability of chaos to screw you over. You can easily believe that even the most suspicious of mishaps is simple random chance.
("So my brake cable snapped and my gas pedal got stuck down to the floor. What makes you think someone tinkered with my car? Shit happens.")
10 The distinction between "intentional" and "accidental" is pretty much lost on you. Maybe you believe that everything is completely predestined, or maybe you believe that everything in the world happens due to chance. The one thing you find hard to swallow is the idea that we are the captions of our fates.
Isolation
1-3 There are no really obvious signs of your experiences. Perhaps you're a little standoffish or curt.
4-5 You can be unthinkingly rude, breaking in during the middle of a conversation before someone's done speaking, scratching yourself in an indelicate fashion, or telling the truth when it isn't diplomatic to do so.
6-7 You lack patience with people who don't immediately understand what you're trying to tell them. Your natural inclination is to repeat the same explanations (which are obvious to you) over and over, or just give up.
8-9 Unless you're concentrating, you lack dialogue skills. You don't like when people interrupt but you frequently interrupt others. You also don't see the point of a lot of social conventions such as clothing, grooming, etc. You might still shave every day, but it all seems a little silly.
10 At some level, you no only don't care what people think about you: you can't understand how anyone could care. You are very aware that people are inherently alone, that we can never really understand anyone or communicate anything but the most rudimentary ideas and feelings. You know everyone is an island, in the final analysis. Especially you.
Self
1-3 there are few external signs of your interior struggle: people may sometimes find you to ba little brittle or "phony" -seeming.
4-5 Even when you're telling the truth, people often think you're lying, unless you make a particular effort to act "natural."
6-7 You've lost a sense of connection to those who were previously close to you. You can predict the actions of your friends, relatives, or lovers, but you no longer know exactly what you feel about them.
8-9 Half the time, you only know you're telling the truth if you take a minute to think about it. Truth and lies aren't nearly as important as they used to be--back before you quit lying to yourself...
10 Life has been pared down to the essentials for you: you no longer have opinions about music, food, or fashion. YOu've lost the ability to enjoy or dislike thinbgs, because there's so little "you" there to interact.



The system is a bit brutal, but it gives an interesting example of what horror/insanity can look like in a very unforgiving world.
Obviously, this system is one used with dice, and so it doesn't translate in that way to the current game, but I thought it might be interesting to see.


Unknown Armies:
Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unknown_Armies
Site: http://ua.johntynes.com/

I've been in a game like this before: everyone chose a time in history, created a character, and then were moved to the present. The idea was that a huge portion of the world's population was moved to the future, suddenly, and all to the same location. The U.S. Government decided to build a facility for these "time travelers" to live in that would bring them up-to-date, and help them cope with the time-shift. Every RP session was a group therapy session for a group of 8 people who found themselves in this interesting environment. The GM played our therapist. Anyhow, it was good fun. We ret-conned the Unknown Armies system for dealing with "stress" (rather than going insane--which tends to happen very quickly in Unknown Armies).

... well this post got huge and out-of-control. ^_^'

[Lovely VonSchultz]

Do you still need a Hazel?

[Riverstyx777]

Hello, folks... If anybody keeping up to date with this role play is still around, this message is for you. I only need two more main characters to start this role play: Hazel Mishele Clymer and Dahlia Anne Beckett. Also; I need all the people that have reserved character roles for this role play to kindly post the bios in the next few days. I know I haven't even posted my character, but I've been trying to get you guys active.

[Lovely VonSchultz]

I suppose I will post a bio for Hazel this evening. -thumbs up- Right-o.

[Tartha]

I was curious as to the state of this, here, Role Play.

[rachelrm_7]

*Stumbles in* Hello, River. Long time, no see.
I'll work on my character bio. I have the basics, but there's little to no plot.
Be back shortly.!