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Trinity Universe: Tabula Rasa OOC

ProfPotts

By ProfPotts,
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ProfPotts

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Okay - new game-concept:

The Player Characters are all tabulae rasae, 'blank slates'. They don't know who they are, what their histories are, or even what they are capable of. The game starts from this point - with the characters newly 'awakened'.

Characters:

Characters will all be fit, healthy, humans in their prime (they appear to be somewhere between their late teens & early thirties). They can be of any human racial type (Black, White, Asian, Indian, Arabic, etc.) & either male or female.

The characters will all start nude & hairless (no body or head hair - although they do have eyebrows & eyelashes). None have any physical defects, & none have any unnatural markings (i.e. no scars, tattoos, or similar marks). The introduction post will hopefully explain this a bit...

Characters have no memories - no names or histories. This isn't to imply that they're gibbering zombies though - they have the usual amount of adult human knowledge as to their environments, just not specifics (i.e. they know how to walk, talk, eat, etc. & will recognise, say, a gun as 'a gun' & know what it does). The characters all speak, read, & write English - this may not turn out to be their native language, but that's one of the many things they'll discover along the way.

When they are first introduced characters will be newly emerged from a medical-style 'life support' type tube in a room of a thousand such tubes. Tubes will be numbered 000 to 999: feel free to pick any unassigned tube number! Again the introduction post will hopefully explain this a bit better.

Character Generation:

Players will need to assign their Attribute dots (a 7/5/3 spread), & note any Qualities for Attributes at 4 or 5.

No Attribute can be taken at 1.

At this stage players can also spend Bonus Points on additional Attributes &/or Willpower, or save their Bonus Points for later.

Willpower starts at 5, & characters get 20 Bonus Points each. Those Bonus Points are all they'll get for the rest of their (extended) chargen, so players will need to think about what they may want for their character in the future.

Players all get a 'pool' of 23 Ability dots. These are not assigned at the start of the game - the character doesn't yet know what he or she can do. What happens is that every time a situation requiring a new ability crops up, the players need to assign zero-to-three Ability dots from their pool to that Ability, then spend any Bonus Points they want to on additional dots in that Ability & any specialities.

Example: The characters find a gun for the first time. As Storyteller I post that everyone now needs to assign their character's Firearms Ability rating. One player decides not to assign any dots at all - his character looks at the gun thinking 'It's a gun - but I don't think I've ever fired one before'. A different player assigns 3 Ability dots to Firearms & spends an additional 4 Bonus Points to bring his Firearms score up to 5 - his character picks up the gun & goes through a quick & efficient field-strip & check of the weapon, thinking 'This seems natural - like an extension of my body. This must be a clue to who I really am!'.

Once assigned, Ability dots & Bonus Points are fixed - they cannot be chopped & changed about. You also can't go back & assign more dots to a score you've already defined - so, for example, unless you spend Bonus Points on Attributes at the start of play, you'll never get to spend Bonus Points on Attributes. In essence the character generation process is just being extended across the course of play.

Backgrounds are, obviously, a mystery to the characters - the main goal of the game will be, initially at least, to discover who they really are.

As for Psi & Modes - the characters don't know if they are psychic or not at the start of the game.

Additionally this is going to be, at least to begin with, an open game. Anyone who wants to play will be able to jump in (at least until the action moves beyond the starting environment) with a newly awakened tabula rasa. Because of the unusal method of character generation, players should not send any character details to me (they shouldn't really have any character details anyway ::wink ), but instead post their character information here: Attributes + Qualities, Willpower, Bonus Points spent & remaining; & - when it starts to happen - update that entry with Abilities + specialities, Ability dots remaining to be assigned, & any other relevant information.

Character will also start with a Nature - although players don't have to decide on that right away - they can leave the character without a Nature (& without the benefits of having a Nature - i.e. regaining Willpower) until they feel the character has started to display one. Some players may assign (& post) their character's Nature right away, others may choose not to for a while.

Although this may all seem weird, it should actually be easier than usual to play - just think of the very basics of the character, then jump in.

Game themes are, naturally, self-discovery & exploration.

Feel free to ask questions &, once I've posted the introduction, feel free to post character statistics here, & jump right into the game.

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ProfPotts Elite

ProfPotts

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Just a thought, but for people who have a different native language can they go ahead and purchase it?

The reason I ask is because people who have a different native tonge (and haden't talked to anyone else yet) would talk in that tongue then 'discover' they could talk in english.

You're overthinking things really... That same sort of argument could be used to fill in all the character's Ability dots, which kinda' defeats the point of the game.

Just presume that all the characters talk & think in English until a situation crops up where they might need to use other languages.

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phoenix Elite

phoenix

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[Okay - everyone update their character sheet post by assigning zero-to-three dots from their Ability dot pool to Engineering, & zero-to-three dots from their Ability dot pool to Medicine; then spending as many or few Bonus Points as they want on extra dots &/or specialities (no more than three per Ability) for each of those two Abilities]

Done.

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ProfPotts Elite

ProfPotts

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Hmmm... Okay - that didn't quite work as planned...

If people could assign dots to the Abilies I ask about it'd be great. If you choose to assign zero dots, that too needs to be noted on the character sheet - a record so that we know that your character has no dots in that Ability. You shouldn't really be assigning dots to Abilities I haven't asked for either - I'm aiming for a 'progressive self discovery' thing here, rather than pre-defining everything the characters can do.

Not sure how else to explain this... ::unsure

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phoenix Elite

phoenix

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You shouldn't really be assigning dots to Abilities I haven't asked for either - I'm aiming for a 'progressive self discovery' thing here, rather than pre-defining everything the characters can do.

Sorry about that Prof - I thought Science might be related and thought I'd throw it in; I wasn't planning on having it all suddenly come flooding back just because someone showed her something vaguely related.

I'll edit that out now.

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ezekiel Veteran

ezekiel

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Think it's just Ayre who hasn't got any actions waiting at the moment - although that doesn't stop other people putting up additional posts if they want to...

Cool, another question though...should I be assigning points to awareness as well? My character is the one doing the sneaking, awareness doesn't really apply to him right now..

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ProfPotts Elite

ProfPotts

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My character is the one doing the sneaking, awareness doesn't really apply to him right now..

How do you know that?.. ::unsure Think there's nothing else around to spot?.. Ah, the innocent die so young... ::devil

Edit: sorry - that means, 'yes' you should assign dots to Awareness too. ::wink

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  • 4 weeks later...
ezekiel Veteran

ezekiel

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Note, if 999 can't pull the grating back (I'm assuming it'd be easier than lifting it out but I may be wrong) he'll just leave it and try to follow whatever's under the floor to someplace hopefully more hospitable...a wardrobe closet would be a godsend for example. ::wink ::biggrin

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