my setting (in progress)

[ZombiePope]

I wasn't sure where to put this, as it seems to be Dark Champions with aspects of Fantasy and Star Hero. I put it here, tho, cuz its in the future. My influences come from pretty much any cyberpunk (its NOT cyberpunk, though), Necromunda, Fray, and many other sources I can't remember. off the bat.

 

Imagine a city, it could be almost any city on Earth. It builds upon itself, layer upon layer, glittering multi-kilometer skyscrapers doing their damnest to breach the heavens. Technological wonders of every sort develop, and billionaires are almost commonplace. Below, however, are dark spaces, forgotten by these urbane souls, smothered and shadowed by the city above, where people live, kill each other, and die, usually violently. Wondrous devices sometimes filter down, but generally available technology is little changed from the late 20th century. Humanity has reached the stars, but what's that matter to a person who's never seen the sky in his life?

 

Just to complicate things, the Numinus Boom (don't ask me what that is) has restored Earth's almost-dormant magic. The upper escheleons can utilize arcane knowledge and artifice as well as technology. Devils tempt humans, high or low, so they may use their souls in the afterlife for food, soldiers, or other such unpleasent things. Demons, spawn of humanity's collective Id, ravage and eat everything they can. While the forces of Hell (Devils) turn their attention to pretty much everyone, the Abyss (demons) finds it easier to manifest in the darkness and corruption of the Undercity, slowly working its way up to consume Humanity in death and horror, at the behest of their masters, the unimaginable Abominations. (remember season 7 of Buffy? "from beneath you it devours") Yet these wretched, foul offspring of fiends are often passed off as mutants or helldust hallucinations.

 

The world is bleak, but far from hopeless. The Sons of the Presence, whose faith descends from the Abrahamic religions, bring the Word to these endless streets, tunnels, and sewers. They have several ministries, each of which focuses on a certain divine aspect of the Supreme, and since the Numinus Boom, can use divine magics relating to their ministry. these ministries include, but are not limited to:

 

-the Ministry of the Shepard (who focus on protecting, and bringing the word to, the poor and defenseless)

 

-the Ministry of Shadow (they help people decide the right thing to do in a world so blurred with shades of gray. Seems to attract ex-thieves, so they may posess stealth and other thievish skills, in addition to shadow magics )

 

-the Light (who focus on healing, peace, and hope)

 

-the Word (Who spread the word via any channel, and posess the gifts of influencing people. They too often, however, manipulate human affairs, as they are after all master puppeteers. They are also masters of memetic engineering)

 

-The Rock (who preach steadfastness and courage)

 

-Hellfire (ever listened to a Hellfire preacher? you got the idea. They warn of the immediate and eternal consequences of sin, and help sinners perform acts of contrition. they see fire as a purifying influence)

 

-Living Water (who focus on healing, and feeding, clothing, and generally helping the poor)

 

-Bringers of Final Respite- Care for the faithful and repentant who are near death, and help those who are dying find a peaceful afterlife. They can tell what afterlife a person is destined for (taking into account the person's actions and thoughts up to that time, they can change), just as Death himself is said to be able to do. They wield powers of death, but in the service of God.

 

 

Religious type characters (clerics and paladins) are just as likely to be good, evil or selfish, but as long as they can justify to themselves they are doing God's work, they do not lose their powers. There are other faiths which can grant abilities, like the Enlightened Brothers (Buddhism), and the Church of the Horned God (satanism, not to offend anyone who might actually worship a horned god), but I havent worked them out yet.

 

I've even found a system for simulating the corrupting, dangerous influence of really, really evil objects, places, and creatures have on people (kind of like evil radiation poisoning) which I can easily adapt to Hero, called Taint (probably will rename it for my game, though, cuz they'll have no end of laughs at that). One who spends too much time around stuff that emits Taint will experience degenrative effects (like Chaos from Warhammer,or the effects of the One Ring on Smeagol, as much as I hate LotR), even taking physical damage and dying, to rise as some nasty undead. They can, however, embrace a path that derives power from this Taint and gain great physical or mystical prowess, at the expense of their sanity (think the Reavers, or the lunatic cultists from any number of Lovecraft stories). places and objects of great sanctification, like springs (in the undercity? pfft, not likely), a holy symbol carven of white oak and sanctified by a Shepard, a sheet of vellum from a year-old lamb, or a staff of lightning struck oak can all help to absorb one's taint. Some beings, like angels, the Slayer, or demons/devils (who are, after, all, incarnate evil) are immune to taint.

 

This, as I stated, is NOT cyberpunk. The world is crappy and filled with rotten people, moral ambiguity is everywhere, and Evil is eternal, but there are good people who can do great things, and fight evil without (usually) resorting to evil themselves. One can truly Be a Hero.

 

Not TL;DR, I hope? it's far from completely worked out.

[Publius]

Re: my setting (in progress)

 

Sounds very cool. I like the blending of concepts into a unique combination. Very few ideas are totally new, and those that are can be too difficult to wrap our heads around, but the way we put things together -- as I think you have done here -- makes them unique and fresh.

 

Question 1: are all cities like this or just the larger ones/one?

 

Question 2A: how are the resources brought into the city? Food and water and power specifically.

 

Question 2B: What kind of population are we talking? Take a look at some of the arcology literature, you can really pack folks into a single building constructed like this, imagine the city. Linking this to Question 1, maybe the population is being jammed into that space because it has to, survivors from the Earth's dwindling biosphere thus allowing/forcing a fantastic variety of cultures in the same space.

 

Question 3: Other infrastructure points. How is transportation handled in the city? Communications? information technology? Any one of these could be an amazing source of uniqueness to your setting.

 

Example: say communications are all but shut down by the cacophany of radiowave saturation (or a byproduct of some kind, say your Numi-whatever), hard-lines are the only way to communicate over distance, that means messengers and old telephones are the order of the day. The messengers may form a guild of sorts, with very strict policies toward those who have harmed messengers, making the Guild Messengers sacrosanct in the upper reaches which are so dependent on them and opening the door to 'rogues' who do that sort of work outside of the Messenger Guild and at great peril from both messengers and outsiders.

 

Question/Suggestion: Are there different names used for different parts of the "city" (see below)? Example: The Above, the Below, the Betwixt (middle, closer to the upper levels), the Between (middle), the Shade (lower middle). And the Depths (below Below).

 

Suggestion: replace the word "city". This is as to a city that a city is as to a few shacks clustered together off of a foot path in the middle of BFE. Arcology, sounds like a bit more...

 

I love the basics of this, it has a great feel. May I steal it ruthlessly? I mean that.

[ZombiePope]

Re: my setting (in progress)

 

I imagine there are other cities like this, and vast wastelands of ruined biosphere full of motorcycle savages. However, I don't think I'll be concerning myself much with stuff outside, cuz the city is so freakin huge. as for arcologies... I'll have to look.

 

I took my inspiration from the Hive Cities of Necromunda, huge spire-shaped cities where pretty much everything is built on top of everything for milleninia. At the top there's the Spire, where the royal class and other rich types live, then the region beneath where middle class lives, then the Underhive, where gangs fight their endless wars in the abandoned urban sectors, then finally the some region beneath that gathers all the trickle-down nastiness, where few dare go due to the horrible abominations and corruption.

 

If this is greater than a city... what would I call it? GLad you like it, though, take it and adapt it however you like. I'll post more info as I work it out.