Soul Search 2018

[Marchwarden]

Curious how you all would interpret this:

 

After the gruesome defeat I posted about a while back, the Champions 2018 players were wondering if the GM missed a trick. After all, at least two of the 2018 Crowns of Krim can sense living souls, so they should have been able to tell that Eternia wasn't really dead, despite being dismembered. We were wrong. In the Great Godawful Smackdown Rematch Fight, the villains threw out a few taunts ("Toy of Teleios", "Soulless spawn of science", that sort of thing), which seemed to confirm some of Eternia's worst fears. Her doubts about her own "humanity" are reflected in her Psych Lims, and she started to suffer a sort of collapse. That was the first time in any Champions combat that I ever had to make a PRE Attack against my own team's brick in order to provide emotional support. Well, she snapped out of it in time to save me from Temblor, and the Champions eventually prevailed. Nonetheless, Eternia's pretty devastated. On the upside, Heartseeker pointed out that all the Crowns once had souls and lost them, so why should it be impossible for someone born without a soul to earn one?

 

So, that's our new subplot: the quest to get our teammate a soul. I have two questions: first, how do you think this will work mechanically? Transform specifically says that it can't turn unliving into living things - but Eternia isn't inanimate like an armchair, or even like Mechanon. I'm thinking either a Spiritual Transform, or else a Summon (summoning a nascent soul into her body, that is), or else GM-dictated plot device (when conditions X, Y and Z are satified, it will just happen).

 

Secondly, where in the CU ought we to look for help? Witchcraft is Archmage in 2018, and not always easy to contact: I suspect she'll tell us something helpful but necessarily cryptic. There are also the religious institutions that exist in the real world as well. Finally, we confiscated some tomes and paraphernalia from the Crowns, which seems to involve soul-related ritual magic. I'm more than a little uncomfortable about seeking help from that quarter, though...

[Enforcer84]

Are you playing in MC? If so, maybe Blackburn's Books survives to the 2018 and she can be of help.

[Lord Liaden]

The methods that you suggest for Eternia to acquire a soul all seem reasonable. If she has any Disadvantages associated with her soulless state, you might let her save up enough Experience to buy them off (perhaps partly acquired on a quest to earn a soul), then let her experience a "radiation accident" to buy them all off at once.

 

As a source of occult lore in the Champions Universe, your first choice would probably be the Trismegistus Council, which barring some disaster should still be functioning in 2018. Witchcraft had a strong connection to them early in her career, so if you know her she can probably point you to where to contact them. Next best bet would be one of the benevolent mystics of Vibora Bay, Florida, including Robert Caliburn, the sorceror Dr. Ka, and the voodoo practitioners Brother Thunder and Sister Rain.

 

There are also several prominent heroic sorcerors around Champions Earth who could still be active in 2018, including Dweomer of Ireland, Rhiannon of Wales, the Gypsy clairvoyant and mystic Zamara in Europe, Russia's Gyeroy Vedun ("Hero Wizard"), Rashindar of India, and Japan's Akumashibaru ("Devil-Binder").

 

All of these are mentioned in Champions Universe.

[Ranxerox]

At the wisk of sounding corny, I think she sould aquire the soul of a herioc NPC who is dying but for one reason or another needs to stay on this side of the veil of tears. Magic can play a role, but basically it should just be the special effect of a "radiation accident".

 

I don't think something like creation of a soul is something that could be done with a buyable power. Once you define it with character points, it is only a matter of ti,me before a player finds someway to co-opt the power and abuse it.

[Wyrm Ouroboros]

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

If she has any Disadvantages associated with her soulless state, you might let her save up enough Experience to buy them off (perhaps partly acquired on a quest to earn a soul), then let her experience a "radiation accident" to buy them all off at once.

 

Agree/disagree. I agree that there is a massive potential for a 'radiation accident'; I don't know the particulars of Eternia (is she a robot? Clone? What??) but unless she's transforming 'states of matter', i.e. robot-with-computer to flesh-and-brain, she shouldn't be changing powers. Her 'soulless state' Disadvantages should instead be replaced by new ones, and preferably very severe ones; children feel everything more passionately. A quirk might become a moderate PsychLim, a 'poderate' may become a 'strong', a 'strong' may become 'total'. Me, I'd switch them around instead of let her just buy them off.

 

IMO, Eternia's 'quest to get ... a soul' should be a matter of very, very good roleplaying; remember, this is the superheroic equivalent to Pinocchio's quest to be 'a real boy'. It isn't a matter of a power, a dying hero (Whose Soul Is It Anyway?), or something 'technical'; it shouldn't even be a clinical matter of 'do X, Y, and Z, and something wondrous will happen!!' You, the GM, should decide what sort of experiences/passions/hopes/dreams Eternia should experience or believe in order to 'gain a soul'. It might be interesting if she had to 'find religion'; after all, faith is just about the only 'proof' we have of the soul, mystic relics notwithstanding. (See Steven Brust's 'Issola' for an interesting diatribe on what 'the soul' is.)

 

Once you believe the character is ready, take the player aside and inform her. Remind her that as a 'new soul' she is, or should be, full of innocence and wonder, child-like in many things. Doesn't mean she's stupid, just means that all that pre-programmed cynicism should be wiped out of the database...

[Marchwarden]

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

The methods that you suggest for Eternia to acquire a soul all seem reasonable. If she has any Disadvantages associated with her soulless state, you might let her save up enough Experience to buy them off (perhaps partly acquired on a quest to earn a soul), then let her experience a "radiation accident" to buy them all off at once.

 

Actually, the player and GM worked out a rather novel way of handling the Psych Lims. The player, who has some knowledge of the subject, pointed out that, in RL, survivors of abusive environments don't so much "buy off" their Psych Lims so much as replace them with a different set. So, like Firewing, she has two opposed Psych Lims, her "Victim Complex" (self-doubting, self-hating, instinctually submissive and passive) and her "Survivor Complex" (fiercely independent, assertive, jealous of her dignity and integrity, highly responsible). Right now, "Victim" is Strong, while "Survivor" is Moderate, which means that she will regress more often than not if left to her own devices - this is why it is important for her friends to be there for her at crucial moments.

 

The idea is that, through time and role-play, the GM will permit zero-sum Disad exchanges, with "Victim"/"Survivor" going from Strong/Moderate to Moderate/Strong and eventually to nonexistant/Total. Personally, I thought it a fairly original and reasonably accurate way to depict the recovery process. I'm guessing that acquiring a soul would certainly constitute a major milestone, and would prompt the first shift.

 

BTW, the situation behind Eternia's personal problems lies in her origin. It began when Teleios decided that it was too inefficient to keep making fresh batches of test subjects. He'd just made several breakthroughs in the area of cellular regeneration, and became enthused by the prospect of a reuseable subject; imagine performing a test, vivisecting the subject and analyzing the results, thendebriefing the subject and preparing a second round of tests - what possibilities! And since the Perfect Man is as much an artist as a scientist, he reasoned that, since they'd be spending so much time together, the subject ought not to be too unpleasant to look at. COM 30 was adequate by Teleios' standards. Thus was Eternia created in a vat. She spent approximately four years in Teleios' lab, 'helping' him. She actually acquired quite a suite of Science Skills, albeit from a somewhat macabre perspective.

 

Then came the day when Teleios agreed to furnish VIPER with a cheap, mass-produced, temporary STR-boosting serum which they could issue to their agents in bulk quantities. He had the formula mostly complete, but, before setting the purity and dosage, he wanted to study the effects on human tissue of sudden and drastic strength increase. So, he ordered Eternia to strap herself into the Cellular Invigorator and began increasing her strength to different levels at different rates, pausing periodically to take samples from muscles, bones and ligaments and record his data. That's what he was doing when the base alarms started blaring.

 

To make a long story slightly less so, a swirling melee between Champions, Genetic Praetorians, escaped clone-monsters and UNTIL agents swept through the base and into the lab. A minion got Knocked Back, hard, against the Invigorator's control panel. In the heat of combat, nobody noticed thet the controls were now jammed at MAX INCR, and the counter kept going up. When it hit 90, Eternia tore herself out of her restraints, just in time to see her 'master' laid low by an arrow. In that instant, a crack opened in her tiny world of subservience and suffering. When the heroes motioned for her to escape with them...she followed them.

 

So there she is: as strong as Grond, able to heal nearly any injury nearly instantly, inured to pain, as lovely as a goddess...but also woefully naive and burdened with the ultimate case of childhood abuse syndrome. Some abuse survivors experience alienation from humanity - she has genuinely legitimate doubts as to whether or not she's human. In a fairly low-angst group of heroes, she's the token trauma case, but she manages to come across as sympathetic and heart-rending rather than whiny or histrionic. We'd do anything to help her.

[Marchwarden]

Originally posted by Wyrm Ouroboros

IMO, Eternia's 'quest to get ... a soul' should be a matter of very, very good roleplaying; remember, this is the superheroic equivalent to Pinocchio's quest to be 'a real boy'. It isn't a matter of a power, a dying hero (Whose Soul Is It Anyway?), or something 'technical'; it shouldn't even be a clinical matter of 'do X, Y, and Z, and something wondrous will happen!!' You, the GM, should decide what sort of experiences/passions/hopes/dreams Eternia should experience or believe in order to 'gain a soul'. It might be interesting if she had to 'find religion'; after all, faith is just about the only 'proof' we have of the soul, mystic relics notwithstanding.

 

Your reply hit the board just as I was composing the last one, so you have her origin there...

 

Just to clarify, I'm a player in C-2018, not the GM. My first question, therefore, was posed mainly for curiosity's sake; I'm sure the GM has something worked out, but I wanted to know how the worthy denizens of these boards would handle it (some of the most entertaining debates on this board stem from "How would you do this?" type questions).

 

I realize the XYZ statement seemed flippant; I was trying to say "if the following set of conditions are met...", and yes, those conditions could easily include dramatic requirements acted out through roleplay as well as plot elements achieved through puzzle-solving or beating up bad guys. In fact, I strongly suspect that combat will have almost nothing to do with this particular subplot; it would suit this particular GM's sense of dramatic irony if the party's (by far) strongest and toughest member could only achieve her most cherished personal goals through means other than fighting.

[ZootSoot]

Re: Soul Search 2018

 

Originally posted by Marchwarden

Curious how you all would interpret this:

 

After the gruesome defeat I posted about a while back, the Champions 2018 players were wondering if the GM missed a trick. After all, at least two of the 2018 Crowns of Krim can sense living souls, so they should have been able to tell that Eternia wasn't really dead, despite being dismembered. We were wrong. In the Great Godawful Smackdown Rematch Fight, the villains threw out a few taunts ("Toy of Teleios", "Soulless spawn of science", that sort of thing), which seemed to confirm some of Eternia's worst fears. Her doubts about her own "humanity" are reflected in her Psych Lims, and she started to suffer a sort of collapse. That was the first time in any Champions combat that I ever had to make a PRE Attack against my own team's brick in order to provide emotional support. Well, she snapped out of it in time to save me from Temblor, and the Champions eventually prevailed. Nonetheless, Eternia's pretty devastated. On the upside, Heartseeker pointed out that all the Crowns once had souls and lost them, so why should it be impossible for someone born without a soul to earn one?

 

So, that's our new subplot: the quest to get our teammate a soul. I have two questions: first, how do you think this will work mechanically? Transform specifically says that it can't turn unliving into living things - but Eternia isn't inanimate like an armchair, or even like Mechanon. I'm thinking either a Spiritual Transform, or else a Summon (summoning a nascent soul into her body, that is), or else GM-dictated plot device (when conditions X, Y and Z are satified, it will just happen).

 

Secondly, where in the CU ought we to look for help? Witchcraft is Archmage in 2018, and not always easy to contact: I suspect she'll tell us something helpful but necessarily cryptic. There are also the religious institutions that exist in the real world as well. Finally, we confiscated some tomes and paraphernalia from the Crowns, which seems to involve soul-related ritual magic. I'm more than a little uncomfortable about seeking help from that quarter, though...

 

Well, drawing n my own experience as Talisman exzterminator in the present (story in greatest champions moments thread around here) you need to find a soul without a body which is willing to bond with her. I would say look into the victims of the Crowns and try to make contact on the astral plane. Pure plot device.