Can we talk about the Mnoren?

[DrewAstolfi67]

Will the Mnoren feature in the updated version?

They reminded me of the Lords in Phillip Jose Farmer and I was fascinated by them. My friends and I never used them in a game, in part b/c our characters never got all that powerful, and perhaps also b/c Steve Jackson advised against it in the rule book.

But we speculated about them a lot, and always assumed there were all these high-level agendas happening under the surface...did anyone ever do anything with them?

[The Wyzard]

Playable Mnoren or Bust.

[I could actually write up a pitch for that campaign in less than half an hour if I wanted to.]

[Shadekeep]

Originally Posted by DrewAstolfi67

They reminded me of the Lords in Phillip Jose Farmer and I was fascinated by them. My friends and I never used them in a game, in part b/c our characters never got all that powerful, and perhaps also b/c Steve Jackson advised against it in the rule book.

I find the Mnoren reminiscent of the Amberites from Roger Zelazny's Amber novels. They move between worlds like Amberites, though they don't seem to have quite the same level of world-shaping abilities. The Mnoren are a great mechanism for justifying why any number of otherwise anomalous things might be found on Cidri. They existed in my campaign, but as rumour and legend, with the players never encountering anyone with first-hand experience with them.

[kentreuber]

Hawaii has the menehune, who were supposed to have built all sorts of amazing things before the arrival of the Polynesians.

[ColinK]

I don't remember ever bringing an actual Mnoren into any game I managed.

We did occasionally pick up "stuff" associated with Mnoren activities, like the odd rocket propelled grenade launcher in SECURITY STATION.

Honest, the goblin dropped it, or we never would have noticed....

[Chris Rice]

I had a City in my campaign world which was run by mysterious rulers who may have been Mnoren. The players never found out the truth.

[David Bofinger]

I had a city in my campaign which was notionally ruled by a reclusive Mnoren. At least that's what the guy who claimed to be his prime minister said. He might have been telling the truth or lying, there was no way to know.

Playing a Mnoren strikes me as absolutely bizarre but probably not bizarre enough to be fun.

• You have two attributes: the will to continue existing (WX) and the respect of other Mnoren (RE).
• You have to find things to do which are sufficiently diverting to make your WX rise: boring events make your WX fall. You may also have talents, which help you to gain extra WX from particular kinds of situation. If your WX falls to zero you give up on life, which is like dying for normal characters except you get to make one grand gesture (like handing a human your sceptre and flying into the sunset).
• If you ruin other Mnoren's fun your RE drops and other Mnoren will decide you are boring and not invite you to their social occasions which makes it harder to gain WX. If your RE drops to zero several other Mnoren get together and kill you.
• You can literally do anything you like to anyone who isn't a Mnoren any time and they can't hurt you under any circumstance. You can also e.g. shape planets into donuts, unless someone else owns the planet and objects. You can't do anything to other Mnoren (writing rules for it would be horrible) but if you argue with another Mnoren about something you might be able to get them to give in using your RE. Or drive them to suicide.
• A battle between a Mnoren and a non-Mnoren might consist of the Mnoren either trying to drive away the ennui long enough to exterminate the non-Mnoren, or the non-Mnoren trying to drive the Mnoren into suicidal depression.

[DrewAstolfi67]

Originally Posted by kentreuber

Hawaii has the menehune, who were supposed to have built all sorts of amazing things before the arrival of the Polynesians.

Good thought! I lived in Hawai'i for years and visited some Menehune sites (like the Menehune ditch). The stonework is clearly different from other native Hawaiian sites. Here's a link to this fascinating site:

http://on-walkabout.net/2014/04/21/o...itch-on-kauai/

[tbeard1999]

Yeah, let's start with pronunciation.

MEN-OR-EN?

NOREN?

MUN-OR-EN?

Or something else?

[Shroomofinsanity]

I am getting the stuff together to run a campaign in which the mnoren each run various nations as their "patron gods." My idea is that one of the mnoren gets very bored and starts taking down his neighbors and the players will get to eventually try and convince this rogue mnoren to cut it out.

They wont know at first about the mnoren and will only find out when their patron of their country gets worried about his holding and starts sending any adventurers of note to try and solve the problem.