Character creation. Okay.
Let’s break it down.
(missing break it down gif because all the ones I found were depressing)
We need to make this as simple and elegant as possible.
So the easiest thing is to ask the player to choose something to be a god of. It can be an element (Fire, water, etc), an aspect of culture (Music, art), nature itself (The sky, forests), an industry (Farming, Engineering) etc.
The trick here is, as elegantly as possible, allow for as much diversity as we can. Because for Greek gods Aphrodite is the goddess of love, but among Hindu faith Shiva is the god of destruction in a way that brings in new innovation and improvement. Then there is Odin, god of the gallows, magic and sacrifice. So it isn’t enough to just say someone is a god of something, how do they represent that which they have domain of?
So let’s say these are our twelve things someone could be god of.
- Fire
- Water
- Earth
- Air
- Passion
- Death
- Life
- Knowledge
- War
- Nature
- Deceit
- Truth
If we were giving a list of things for players to be gods, they could be attached as keywords to each of the 48 options we have to generate (four a month) for things to keep.
Thus we can add two keywords to an option so multiple players can make a bid for it and it benefits them, even in secret.
The problem with this method is, it isn’t really a secret who is voting for what. It would all be out in the open who would benefit and a lot of deception in the meta would be lost.
Or we go simpler.
First of all, we ask a player What are you a god off? This can be a single word, a concept, an element, or an industry?
Second, How do you represent what you are god of? What does being that god mean to you?
Whenever an option comes up during a month, before all other actions, each player tells the GM what they’re going to vote for and how it ties in to the answers to the two questions at character creation. after all, Poseidon was god of horses and the sea.
Yeah, I don’t get that one either.
As it stands right now, I can’t think of anything I can create at this point for character creation that influences the final outcome.
BUT, here’s a thought. Remember all those actions in the first phase?
- Preserve an option for next month
- Generate more tokens to vote
- Stop someone’s vote
- The top two voted options are saved instead of just the top
- Something that aids your odds to survive at the end
- Eliminate an option before the vote
I want to modify the odds of survival one
- Add a choice to your own identity
Yeah. What if players can add choices of what to preserve to their identity during the game?
It won’t make it to the new world, but it will be part of that god’s identity and let’s make it that gods can sacrifice those aspects of their identity to survive longer in the final round. Even more! They can use those new identifiers as arguments for why later choices apply to them.
So say we get a Poseidon that says he wants horses, and later down the line, Sports becomes something he votes to preserve because chariot races.
Now that might work.
So here’s the question: Do we do keywords, or allow players to have free reign?