In continuing my theme of failing to learn from the mistakes of others, I would like to present...Not Enough Gods.
At the Start, there Wasn't.
There was no Time. No Space. No Reality. Even Nothing did not yet exist, for there can't be an Absence without first a Presence.
So, at the very Start, there simply was...Not.
It was from this crystal-perfect non-existence that Being came to Be. It was the Only - there existed no others. Without Time, the period the Only spent contemplating this new Existence was both instantaneous and infinite. It was after this contemplation that the Only decided to destroy itself - and so it created Time, so that there might be a beginning and an end. It created Space, so that there might be finite. Lastly, it created three others to follow, and the Only became instead the Antecedent.
With its three children now joined and a vast blank canvas laid before them, the Antecedent bid them to themselves create. Create, and the Antecedent would observe. Though they were mere creations and the power they held was not even a fraction of what the Antecedent possessed, these three were still the First True Gods, and all of Existence would be theirs to craft.
And thus ends the Zeroth Age - the Age of Being.
If you've made it through all that, then welcome to
Not Enough Gods! This is yet another God Game, inspired primarily by Sensei's old
Too Many Gods game. Following much in the same vein as that game,
Not Enough Gods follows the process of creating a universe and building a world with a rich, interesting history. Players will create, destroy, fight, and fuck their way through the Ages until the end of the game, at which point I'll either hand out awards to players or swear off running forum games altogether.
The game starts in the First Age, having just completed the Zeroth Age in which the the
Antecedent (aka me, the GM) and the
First True Gods (aka the first three players to sign up) were created. From here on we will progress through four more Ages (about 5 to 8 turns each) until the end of the game. If something is missing or broken at the end of an Age (like if mortals aren't created, or time keeps segfaulting and freezing) then the
Antecedent will create/repair it so things may progress smoothly. I will announce when we are on the last turn of each Age so players have time to finish up their actions.
The AgesZeroth Age: The Age of BeingThe Zeroth Age, in which the game is created.
The first three players sign up and a waiting list is compiled for people who will join later.
Actions in this Age might include:
Signing up.
Giving your God a name.
The First Age, in which more Gods are created and the cosmos are formed.
Here players may go about having awesome God SexTM and creating more Gods (there aren't enough Gods, after all), as well as creating all the stuff that will fill up the universe.
Actions this Age might include:
Making new Gods (either by yourself, or with another player - this action may be done both here and every following Age).
Create different planes of existence (if you do this, please make your plane interesting!)
Creating the Stars.
Creating the Sun.
Make Seasons (doesn't even have to be the traditional four seasons).
Creating planets (no life yet, sadly)
Olympus, Seats of Power, and other places for the Gods to live (just because you create a house for all the other players to live doesn't mean they'll stay there)
Cosmic-sized creations, constellations, other Big Things.
Creating servants - Angels, Guardians, things like that.
Making Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, the Soul-Volcano, or anywhere else you might wanna stash a mortal's soul after they die.
Hard actions might include:
Modifying an existing Fundamental Law.
Laying the ground-work for the underlying forces behind....say, Magic or Souls.
Cosmic-sized life (the turtle upon which the world lives, giving life to and animating constellations, etc).
Imposing limits on what others might do (all planets must be flat, all planes exist bordering one another, etc)
The Second Age, in which the universe is made ready for intelligent life.
It's here we start getting into the exciting stuff - making the universe ready for mortals to inhabit. After all, without worship, what's the point of being a God?
Actions this Age might include:
Giving yourself Form - if you do not do this during this Age, you will be Formless for the rest of the game and weaker than the other Gods.
Putting atmospheres on planets.
Making general flora and fauna to inhabit worlds and planes.
Making and shaping oceans, mountains, and other planet-sized terrains.
Burying dinosaur bones to fool the mortals later.
Other minor tweaks to make realms more inhabitable for mortals.
Fight! You cannot kill each other, but your physical forms can tear mountains asunder, your spells can boil oceans, and you can wound other Gods and make them lose turns (Usually between 1 and 3).
Hard actions might include:
Affecting cosmic bodies, like in the previous Age.
Creating specific species of plants and animals.
Creating primordial intelligent life early - the first fumbling, crude worshipers to inhabit all of reality.
Define how a specific strain Magic works based on what was defined in the First Age (there can be competing strains of magic).
Megalithic, powerful structures (city-sized temples, a space elevator, etc)
Stealing Dominions from another God (this Age and all following Ages).
The Third Age, in which Mortals walk the Earth.
Time to create the meatbags! Intelligent life may now be created, as well as the supernatural.
Actions this Age might include:
Creating the first sustainable mortals (Elves, Dwarves, Humans, Smurfs, etc).
Forming these mortals into worshipers.
Smiting these mortals for worshiping someone else.
Bang these mortals to create Demi-Gods (i.e. bring new players into the game).
Give Fire to the Mortals (or teach them something like sailing, magic, forging, etc).
Create Magical Beasts (uncommon species of powerful creatures).
Create Legendary Creatures (singular, more powerful creatures).
Create specific species of plants and animals.
Hard actions might include:
Large, regional effects like in the Age of Earth, including creating or changing entire regions.
Create multiple mythical beasts at once, EG dragons of several colors.
Issuing Commandments (they're young and don't really understand things well yet).
Exterminating a race of Mortals (they're resilient, but it can be done).
Creating Legendary Artifacts (things on a small scale are still hard to do without over-blowing it, but it's possible now).
Permanently Killing Another God.
The Fourth Age, in which the Gods begin to fade.
Your powers grow weaker and weaker, and now they are but a glimmer of what they once were. This is your last chance before you fade into memory altogether.
Actions this Age might include:
Issue religious Commandments to a mortal race,
Command your followers to go war with heathens or followers of other Gods
Command your followers to create temples, roads, ships, or other great works of architecture
Create a magical artifact, like Excalibur or the Hand of Vecna.
Create a Hero: A half-god, half-mortal NPC. They might materialize into existence from your own mind, or be born the, erm, normal way. Either, way they can change the world by slaying mythical beasts and doing great deeds, but they might not obey you.
Bless or curse mortals.
Cause natural disasters, cosmic events like eclipses, or other miracles, which affect a specific city or region.
Fight and kill one another, and possibly even consume the essence of your brothers and sisters to last another turn or two.
Hard actions might include:
Actions from the Age of Myth.
Creating a Demi-God through hot God-on-Mortal loving.
Creating or spreading religions to multiple parts of the world at once.
Bless or curse entire regions.
Cause natural disasters or other miracles which affect the entire world.
Modify intelligent races.
The Fifth Age, in which the world continues to turn, even without the Gods above.
The Gods are now but a superstition, but they had many lasting effects. This Age is an epilogue of what happens afterwards and how the world turns out once you're no longer there to guide it.
Actions this Age might include:
Cheering on a mortal or faction as they go on about their business.
Booing as another species of mortals pogroms the race you created.
Hard actions include:
Inducing schizophrenia in a mortal to make them believe they are the next Messiah.
Appearing as burnt toast or as a water stain.
The RulesJOININGYou only need to post the name you will have in-game, and your first action. Make sure your action includes a full description of what you intend to do, but keep it concise and readable for my sake, please.
If there are no available slots, simply post your intent to join and you will be added to the waiting list. As new slots are created, players will be pulled from the waiting list at random and dropped into the game as the children of other Gods.
CREATING OTHER GODSGods like creating other Gods, as it turns out.
A player may spend an action to create an offspring. This offspring will be a God in their own right, and will start with either a new aspect declared by their parent, or a random aspect pulled from one of the parents dominions.
A player may either create their offspring by themselves (perhaps they sprung from the player's mind as a headache, or they are an elevated mortal, or the player crafted them from their own essence) or with another willing player. Note that only one player needs to spend their action to create offspring, and the other only needs to give their consent. In this case the offspring will start with an aspect from each parent. If both players spend their turn creating an offspring, then the new God will start with an additional aspect declared by the new player (who will be pulled from the wait list at random).
ROLLINGEvery action will result in a 2d4 dice roll. The higher your result, the better you accomplish your action. A number that's too low might fail do anything, only complete part of your action, or have unintended consequences. This is not to be rules-heavy or strategic game, so whatever I think sounds like a good story is a big factor in the outcome. If you are opposed by another god, then you will each get a roll, and the one with the higher result will succeed. Depending on the circumstances (particularly fighting), success might be more dramatic if there is a big difference between your results. Whenever you roll, your highest bonus from a domain that is relevant will be added. For example, if you have a +1 bonus in the Water domain, this might apply to creating a river or extinguishing a volcano, but not creating a volcano. If you have a +2 bonus in the Fire domain and a +1 in the War domain, and you fight another god, you could say that you use fire magic to get a +2, but you cannot add them for a +3.
Difficult, overly-complex, or meme actions will receive either a -1 or -2 to the result. Easy actions
might receive +1. Note that the Dice Roll Results chart below is a
guideline for how I'll judge your result and is by no means set in stone.
DICE ROLLS:0: The only way you can reach zero is if you did something stupidly hard with no experience and rolled snake-eyes. You will be punished accordingly.
1: You did something difficult with no experience and rolled bad. Your action blows up in your face, or goes counter to what you wanted.
2: You rolled as low as you can go and your action didn't work. Just because you're a God doesn't mean you're infallible - you must have overlooked something...
3: You rolled the bare minimum!
Something happens, though probably not what you wanted. You gain experience in the Domain, at least.
4: Low Success. It's not perfect, and may need some refinement, but you managed to get out what you wanted and it's...passable.
5: Normal Success. Your action succeeds about as expected.
6: Your action is clever and deft, weaving reality to your desires.
7: Your action has paid off perfectly. Your action goes exactly as you want it to - better, even!
8: Rolling a natural 8 means you gain double advancement in a Domain. Your action might get a bit of flair depending on how well it fits.
9: You are a God. The world is your playground. If it makes sense, your action performs beyond how you wanted it to.
DOMAIN BONUSESWhen you perform an action, it contributes to your mastery over a Domain. You may suggest what Domain your action contributes to in your post, or you may leave it open-ended for GM interpretation.
The more you take actions that pertain to a certain domain, the higher your bonus will be. Actions must be successful to count. Common examples of domains are elements (Fire, Water, Earth, Air), moral concepts (Good, Evil, Law, Chaos), abilities or skills (Strength, Magic, War, Trickery), emotions (Love, Fear, Bravery) or more specific concepts (Nature, Life, Death, Work). Really it could be all sorts of things. Each action you take can only improve one domain. Below is a list of how many actions it takes to gain power in a domain:
+1: 2 Actions, But when you gain progress in your first domain, it counts as 2 actions and becomes +1 immediately.
+2: 4 Actions
+4: 7 Actions - Major Domain threshold.
+5: 10 Actions
Every Domain you have is a "Minor" Domain until you achieve +3, in which case it becomes a "Major" Domain and you receive an additional +2 bonus. Players may have
at most two Major Domains. Achieving a Major Domain means the Domain now belongs to you - you are now the
God of XYZ. This also means that no other God may hold it as a Major Domain and may not receive beyond a +2 while you hold it.
FIGHTINGAfter the
Age of Cosmos, Gods may engage in combat with one another. Such disputes are violent and destructive and tend to result in a lot of collateral damage, but the rewards can be lucrative. Similar to standard Opposed Actions, players roll and add their bonuses to the result. High total wins. The loser may lose control of a Domain (to be gained by the winner), or they might need to spend a turn or two resting to recover. Players may even be knocked out of the game for an entire Age, or even permanently - particularly if multiple Gods gang up on them. Be warned, though - excessive violence may draw the ire of the
Antecedent.
TURNSThe game will update when I feel like it. I plan to update at least once a week, and at most once per day. You may have only 24 hours from when a turn is posted to post your action! I will make a post declaring that action submissions are closed before I begin writing the turn. This means you might miss some turns- don't worry, it's not the end of the world. With a large number of players, I cannot wait to be certain everyone has posted. In extreme cases, like if you've missed three turns over more than a week, I might offer your place in the game to someone else.
Once a sufficiently large number of players have entered into the game, I may declare that the last person to post their action receives a
-1 for that turn.
FIRST TURN BEGINS IMMEDIATELY:It is the Age of the Cosmos. You have no body, but you have a mind. The world is empty and still, but you know there is space around you. The minds of others shine like beacons of light. For a moment the void is filled brilliantly and a voice other than your own can be heard in your thoughts: "Go now and create the world that you will. When I return I hope to see something beautiful." Then, you are left alone.
The universe is now your sandbox. Declare your name, and your first action. If your action fits the guidelines of "normal" for The Age of the Cosmos, and it does not conflict with the action of another player, it will succeed without rolling.
Behavior RulesBe original!
There's nothing wrong with being inspired by other myths and legends, or even other games. That being said, do not copy-paste your God or action from another source. At the very least, give your own spin on the subject.
Salt.
Please keep the salt to manageable levels. Games like this can be quite draining to run, and constantly fighting with the players is a sure-fire way to kill any enthusiasm to write. My goal is to keep things going smoothly; if you object to a ruling, you may politely submit one - and ONLY one - appeal to have the decision overturned. I will consider the appeal fully, but typically these appeals will be rejected unless I made some sort of game-breaking mistake.
Player Interaction
Be polite to one another. If you have a disagreement with another player you can't solve in two or three replies, please take it to PM's.
Why did you stop updating this game?
I either got bored or salt levels got too high. It's a lot of writing, man.
I noticed a large portion of this was copy-pasted from Sensei's game.
Lol yeah.
I have a question not answered by the Master Post, and I read it like, three times.
In that case, post your question in the thread and I'll answer it eventually if someone else doesn't answer it before me.
Author
Topic: Not Enough Gods - Age 1, Turn 3 (Read 9618 times)