Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[lawastooshort]

Here's a solution to the whole "You're dead now, suggestion game over" thing.

You play as a zombie who can constantly resurrect. However, the problem is if you die, you lose everything since your stuff has been looted, and if you die enough times there is the potential that you will start losing limbs and need to recover them.

Or the resurrected zombie of the original character. I like the Quest for Limbs idea though. That could be a suggestion game in itself: You Are a Zombie Head.

[Fniff]

Hell, you might not even need to find your own limbs if you die. You could just rip and replace from your enemies once you kill them. Hell, that could grant different bonuses! Imagine how the PC would look by the end of the suggestion game!

[lawastooshort]

You'd probably have to start small: things you could trap and tear off with your zombie teeth.

[Fniff]

I'm trying to come up with sanity effects for a game. Does anyone else have any ideas? Here's how sanity would work in my game.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

You have ten sanity points. You begin at full sanity. Sanity isn't a true representation of sanity. By normal psychological standards, you may be absolutely crazy. Sanity is merely a representation of you sticking to what you consider to be your standards and your vision of what reality is.

You lose sanity by seeing things and doing things that screw up your worldview. If you believe in the ultimate good of mankind, you'll have to roll against losing sanity at the sight of a genocide. If you will not harm children, you'll have to roll against losing sanity if you accidentally kill a kid.

Here's how the rolls work out.

1-2: "Oh God. What have I done?" You will never, ever forget this. Every time you close your eyes, you will see it. Lose five sanity points.
3-6: "I didn't do this. Didn't I...?" You are beginning to seriously doubt that you are the good guy in this situation. Lose three sanity points.
7-9: "I'm not a bad guy, but I just did something really really bad." You start getting cognitive dissonance from what you just did. Lose one sanity point.
10-15: "This isn't my fault." You were freaked out by that, but you keep yourself together. No change.
16-18: "It was an accident. An accident on their part." You've convinced yourself that you simply could not prevent it. Gain one sanity point.
19-20: "I was in the right. I did my best, but that wasn't enough. They brought this on themselves." You've convinced yourself that it was simply bad luck and you chose the best path open to you. Gain two sanity points.

As your sanity lowers, more and more effects are unlocked. I will roll for these effects at appropriate times, E.G places/situations that remind you of the event where you lost sanity. These will remain until you gain more sanity or until you leave the situation/place that's making you nervous.

Current effects:
Sanity 8-9:
Tremors: Your hand is shaking and it won't stop. -1 to rolls requiring accuracy or a steady hand.
Anxiety: You are feeling very anxious. -1 to doing anything to or nearby the object/location that's making you remember.
Depression: You are feeling down in the dumps. -1 to social rolls.

[kj1225]

I think that at about half sanity they see things out the corner of their eye, or the get bad feelings about things. At really low sanity they start seeing things like death and violence start hearing whispers of the dead asking them why they didn't help and begin sobbing. Or you can read creepypasta for more thing that people are likely to do when they experience things that make them feel guilt.

[Fniff]

I was thinking of that (With actual PTSD syndromes, like seeing dead bodies everywhere), but I'd like a few sanity effects that have effects on gameplay like the tremors effect.

[kj1225]

Well I think that all of those would have an effect on game play. Let's use the seeing thing on the edge of your vision you would have a much harder time focusing on what your doing. So maybe a minus one to focus related tasks. Hearing things would make it harder to interact with people so a minus one on top of the depression debuff.

[Fniff]

Okay, so hallucinations... What would be good for the higher levels, though? They're harder cos they kinda have to be subtle.

[Nerjin]

Have lower sanity levels result in the player getting less accurate information.

Basically the more their sanity degrades the more room you [the GM] have to outright lie to them about stuff.

Not sure how it would work exactly but might be interesting. It'd also make sanity a much higher priority to keep around as with lower rolls players can just avoid that sorta thing but if your sanity is low it makes them question what is and isn't real.

[monk12]

Have lower sanity levels result in the player getting less accurate information.

Basically the more their sanity degrades the more room you [the GM] have to outright lie to them about stuff.

Not sure how it would work exactly but might be interesting. It'd also make sanity a much higher priority to keep around as with lower rolls players can just avoid that sorta thing but if your sanity is low it makes them question what is and isn't real.

This would be my preferred method of handling sanity. Insanity comes in so many flavors, why restrict yourself to just a handful of symptoms?

I will note that information-related insanity is trickier if you have multiple players, since they can fact-check with one another. Unless sanity levels are hidden...

[Fniff]

I had an idea where at sanity one, there's a chance you get one of three really, really bad effects. Suicidal, Catatonia, Psychosis.

Suicidal is self explanatory. You roll. If you fail it, your character tries to kill themselves by any means possible. Catatonia means your character slips int catatonia, meaning you're essentially dead because your character has locked themselves off from reality. Psychosis means that your character experiences a massive nervous breakdown. After that, he becomes an actual GM-controlled enemy, as his entire personality is overwhelmed by madness.

Basically, sanity one is really, really bad.

[Nerjin]

I had an idea where at sanity one, there's a chance you get one of three really, really bad effects. Suicidal, Catatonia, Psychosis.

Suicidal is self explanatory. You roll. If you fail it, your character tries to kill themselves by any means possible. Catatonia means your character slips int catatonia, meaning you're essentially dead because your character has locked themselves off from reality. Psychosis means that your character experiences a massive nervous breakdown. After that, he becomes an actual GM-controlled enemy, as his entire personality is overwhelmed by madness.

Basically, sanity one is really, really bad.

I personally don't like those methods as they're essentially a death roll. Taking control from a player should only happen at death. What if someone you're playing with simply shoots a kid because they hate playing with you? Your sanity slips to one and you're out. You had no chance to prevent it.

If your character is alive you should have a chance at avoiding this bit that actually in your control.

[Xantalos]

So wait, what if the pc is a cynic convinced that the world is bad? Every act of kindness would reduce his SAN.

[Nerjin]

So wait, what if the pc is a cynic convinced that the world is bad? Every act of kindness would reduce his SAN.

Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes,Yes, Yes, YES, YES,YES! A THOUSAND TIMES YES!

[kj1225]

Whatever the case this sounds fun and I'd like to play it!