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Old 11-24-2014, 02:55 AM   #28
Christopher R. Rice
 
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Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Portsmouth, VA, USA
Default Re: Cosmology and game mechanics for Dream Worlds

Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
You said this is an interesting topic. So I thought some more about what happens from dream wounds and deaths. Taking a look at Planescape Torment, of all places, I think I settled on this idea:
Places in the dreamworld have RW-hazard classes. One's personal dream bubble is normally harmless (death results in waking up at -1FP as from Nightmares), as are some other 'sanctuary' places.
Other places have a RW-hazard rating, ranging from slightly above zero, up to 1. This is the fraction of real HP that will be lost upon taking damage in the dreamworld. Failing a Death Check in the dreamworld means that damage is recalculated, with succeeded-in-dreams death checks being successful automatically in the real world, but in case if the damage was so big that it bleeds over into the real world demanding a new death check above and beyond those already successful ones, the new checks are to be rolled normally.
Finally, some places are marked as non-returning. That means that dying in dreams there will not take you back to the waking world - your dream-self has to be carried by someone else, while your real-world body is borderline-comatose.

Oh, and I think that I should let the PC immediately choose whether to be pulled back into the real world or not at the moment of failing a consciousness check. Opting to stay in means more risk, but also an opportunity to regain consciousness in the dreamworld; opting to wake up is a safety cord, with all that entails.
Okay, that is pretty interesting. Hmmm. Cool. Might steal that for my own campaign.

Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
Thinking more on this: I do like the navigation benefit. I'm still unsure how I want to scale time between the real and dream world, and how much time I want to be occupied by travel along strands of the dreamweb between nodes, or the ratio of time spent in nodes and between nodes.
Just make the scaling random every time you go to sleep, say roll 1d: 1-2, time moves slower there; 3, no change; 4, reroll now and then roll again every hour; 5-6, time moves faster there. After that roll 2d-2 and compare the roll to the penalty on the SSR table and read "Yards" as the multiplier or divisor for time. So if you roll a 2 and then 4, time in the dream world passing at one-tenth the time in the real world.

Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
Thinking more on this:
I vaguely recall scenes of defending fortresses in Changeling . . . somewhere.
What this means is that while it's nice to have some places (e.g. ancient libraries) stretch out to accommodate infinite crowds, it's also nice to have some types of dream estate be quite limited.
Meh. That seems straight up the GM ally - it's whatever he says it is or deems. Trying to apply strict rules to dreams is like trying to apply physics to action move - just don't.

Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
Having doorsteps of some nodes actually blockable/defensible, but not others, seems like an opportunity for some adventurous moments. Such as spirits asking riddles to let people pass or whatever, which people can nonetheless get around using longer roads (but don't want to). It sort of takes the best of both worlds - the gateway network and the free hyperspace method.
I've done that before, it's entirely workable.


Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
My players are going to such a cave. So my plan to present them with such a doorway in a crampy room of an inn elsewhere is being overriden. (Frankly, for a while I thought the party will stop looking into that cave, so it will be saved up for later.)
Cool.

Quote:
Originally Posted by vicky_molokh View Post
Oh, and now I can start making up the geography. I'm thinking of only letting PCs open up new nodes gradually. Not sure how to justify this in-game. I don't want a flat check penalty per node travelled beyond the first. I want some sort of access-granting process, like finding passwords but more metaphorical, and something so that I could delay the process at will, while thinking up the places that exist in the dreamweb.
That should help shake things loose in your head and help you decide what is what a bit more.
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