11-10-2014, 10:00 AM | #1 |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
What are some plausible tricks you can use to disguise that a setting is descended from our own world? This can be something that you want to achieve in, for example, a lost and fallen space colony, a post apocalyptic setting or a post banestorm setting. Above all I think it's proper nouns that need to be obscured to avoid an obvious signal that this isn't, say, an unassociated fantasy world.
|
11-10-2014, 11:03 AM | #2 |
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Republic of Texas; FOS
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
The key, as you pointed out, is to file off all the serial numbers. All proper names for places, people, cultures, religions, and languages need to be changed.
People speak 'Basic' or 'Common', worship gods with unfamiliar names, go to the city NOT called London2.. The fact that the people act like modern or historic humans is unremarkable in most settings; Authors and settlngs-makers usually draw on what the know and switch it up a bit. Players are used to seeing familiar-if-out-of-place elements from actual Earth in their sci-fi and fantasy, even when the settings are supposed to be completely original. If you plan to have a 'reveal' later in the campaign, be sure to have an explanation of why everything was lost... "It's been a really long time" or "all the adults died leaving only children to carry on" or "the Dictator and His Evil Police State burned all the books and killed everyone speaking the old names" might work in this trope. Just come up with an idea you like to explain it, Players often enjoy finding the "why"...
__________________
Our decades-old & rarely updated CarWars blog & Hotwheel conversion tutorial: North Texas Autoduel Association |
11-10-2014, 11:06 AM | #3 |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
It depends how much science the PCs can apply. For example, if the people in the setting were interfertile with Earth humans, I'd require a great deal of evidence before changing my opinion that we had common ancestry.
|
11-10-2014, 11:14 AM | #4 | |||
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
There's an implicit assumption here that is incorrect. The characters will be natives and will be staying within their own context. It's disguising it from the players that is necessary. Players won't immediately jump to a connection with us instead of a subcreation if there aren't proper nouns littering the place that are obvious descendants of modern things. Last edited by Sindri; 11-10-2014 at 11:18 AM. |
|||
11-10-2014, 11:53 AM | #5 | |
Join Date: Jun 2013
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
Quote:
|
|
11-10-2014, 11:59 AM | #6 | |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
Quote:
|
|
11-10-2014, 12:31 PM | #7 | |
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Houston
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
Quote:
Mess with the Geography. There have been enough Apocalypses done in movies and TV to make this trivially easy depending on your particular flavor of apocalypse. In a short lived Thundar campaign, I flooded the great plains and let California fall in the ocean all the way to Sierra Nevada which made the US look very different. Disguising the History: One of my favorite tricks comes from By The Waters of Babylon where they simply fracture the names. Praying to the God Ashing (a bust of George Washington) for example. Also, those that remember suffer from the sensationalism and myth of being passed down. It's all about how you sell it.... The Suns Arrows, GodFinger, Hell from Beneath could all describe a nuclear assault. The Ghost that Withered Them - Weaponized HIV/AIDS The Ghost that Boiled Up their Soul - Mouth Frothing weaponized Rabies or Epilepsy The Ghost that wringged the blood from their breath - Typhus/Consumption Disguising the Humans: This one is a bit trickier, Disguising THAT they are humans is tough. Disguising that they are Humans from earth isnt really that difficult at all once you sever them from Earth Culture and History. That said, a few mutations arent forbidden for a sufficiently fantastic world. Restructure their DNA along different evolutionary lines (See Genesis : Star Trek TNG S07E19). As everything (in theory) comes from the same primordial ooze, feel free to go nuts and swap stuff around. Tails. Fangs. Fur. Wings. Venom. Leafs. Scales. Bark. Pollen. Carapaces. Finally, just evolving or Devolving humans can make them look quite different. (The Sixth Finger - Outer Limits S01E05) and can endow them with all sorts of kewl powerz and limitations. You're the GM. You know your group so you probably have a good idea of where their Belief suspenders get tight, but remember the further out and more bizzare you get, the easier it is to hide that human ancestry. Nymdok My father is a priest; I am the son of a priest. I have been in the Dead Places near us... |
|
11-10-2014, 12:33 PM | #8 | |
Join Date: Jun 2013
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
Quote:
Naturally, you don't have to explain any of this to your players. You just make the modified religions and say "Hey, here's the religions of the setting." Throw in some standard - and not-so-standard - fantasy religions while you're at it and the players will probably just think "Oh, the GM must have based the Knights of Trinity on Christianity, and the Holy Struggle on Islam," not "ZOMG we must be on Earth 'cause those are obviously Christians and Muslims!" |
|
11-10-2014, 12:56 PM | #9 | |||
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
|
|||
11-10-2014, 02:42 PM | #10 |
Join Date: Jun 2013
|
Re: Obscuring a Setting's Descent from Earth
So you get rid of the oral tradition. As it turns out, various bioengineered plagues wiped out the bulk of humanity, and the various bioweapons (dragons and the like, naturally) remaining from the wars killed all the others. Well, except for the ones in cold sleep, but most of those units suffered serious glitches - the vast majority woke up with some brand of amnesia, and the only ones who didn't either died without passing on what they remembered or were atheists who were rather happy to see religion having died out.
|
Tags |
brainstorm, cartography, gods, player knowledge, religions |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|