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Anonymous
in character/universe explanations for corruption, insanity, and simular things 2017-07-11 06:21:20 Post No. 54262894
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in character/universe explanations for corruption, insanity, and simular things 2017-07-11 06:21:20 Post No. 54262894
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in character/universe explanations for corruption, insanity, and simular things
Anonymous
2017-07-11 06:21:20
Post No. 54262894
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This is a thread for talking about, working on, and exchanging explanations and understandings for things that are an important part of settings and game mechanics, but for which we don’t always have a solid grasp of the in universe workings of and would be hard pressed to give a detailed or solid explanation of in character.
Examples include things like knowledge of the real nature of the universe, or the insignificance of humanity in said universe causing derangement in lovecraftian systems. We know this is a thing, we know what it does to people, and if the system we are using has rules to abstract this phenomena out and chart its progression, then we know how those rules work.
The same is true for exposure to alien or chaotic things in Warhammer 40k RPGs. Though at least with chaos and the warp specifically there are analogues to exposure to radiation, toxic and mind altering chemicals, and mutagens that make it easier to get a grasp on.
One thing that seems to be less common to have are ideas about how and why certain knowledges that aren’t magic can warp minds and turn them terrible, or straight up kill them, whether they want this to happen or not. A lot of the time this isn’t a problem because:
A.) As players are not often in the situation of playing characters who have some more nuanced level of understanding of these forces and how they work, or think that they do.
B.) Even if the character we are playing does possess such an understanding, or believed understanding, it is not often in most games that we are called upon to play our characters explaining this understanding to another character, nor are we often put into situations where the nuances of our character’s understanding of these forces would cause them to behave any differently than the vast majority of characters who don’t have such an understanding.
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>>54262894
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But when we do want or need to come up with such an understanding, belief, or explanation (actual or merely believed to be so) for why and how looking at the shoggoth makes you crazy, or why learning the secrets of xenotech leads to madness, it can be difficult.
So please, share explanations have you encountered or come up with for why a bit of knowledge can be more dangerous than you would think, and any times you’ve played a game where that has become relevant or important.
I myself am having am currently having a problem related to the latter and would appreciate any advice or assistance you could give.
The setting is 40k and the game is rogue trader.We aren’t using the fantasy flight system, however the elements of insanity and corruption are still there and abstracted out in the Frankenstein system we are using.
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>>54262918
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We are currently in the lower levels of an arch-heretek’s fortress built into a moon in a system that we are investigating because it belongs to the rogue trader’s dynasty but was erased from star charts by someone.(This campaign has been going on for over a year and a half now so in the interest of saving time and space I’m not going to go further into why we are where we are.)
My character, an eldar contacted into the service of the rogue trader, killed a pair of prisoners(2 deeply faithful magos who our enemy had captured and handed over to the Arch-heretek who then fitted with mind control devices and forced to operate necron devices for him, while the heretek’s dangerously charismatic boss manipulated the faith of these two men into a miraculous will to resist him that delayed the onset of madness from what they were being made to do, so long as they remained in that condition of resisting active enslavement)because he figured out that they had been too damaged by the experiences and forbidden knowledge they had been exposed to stay stable. In other words they looked saveable, unless you could see minds and souls with the clarity of an eldar, and had seen humans fall enough times to know where this was going.
In crunch terms you could say their insanity scores were maxed out but none of it had resolved yet, but would begin to.
Our explorator is an idealistic and insatiably curious magos biologis with a deep sympathy for the enslaved (servitors are not the same thing because they are just automatons that happen to include people parts, or so the belief goes). The explorator also believes in the power of human will. The idea that non-chaotic, non-demonic, knowledge and expereinces can corrupt someone to the point that they can become a threat whether they want to or not is alien to her.
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>>54262930
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This combination of tremendous technical skill and knowledge with dangerous levels of naivety, curiosity, and idealism is completely in keeping with the character's backstory and experiences. (And, yes, if you are wondering, it has also been biting the character in the ass in terms making decisions and embarking on projects that have made enemies and lead to a declining sanity score. So if that kind of character triggers you please keep it to yourself so as not to distract from the subject of what I’m asking for help with. )
So
Do you have any advice on how to have my character do the following?:
>1.) Explain to this magos that knowledge that doesn't come from deamons, the warp, or evil tomes, can indeed corrupt someone, and that situations can push a person to the point that they become dangerous, even if it is completely against their will to do so.
>2.) Explain that this situation was indeed irrefutably such a situation and therefore killing these magos who wanted nothing more than to know the emperor/ommnisiah forgave them for something that they were not at fault for and had no choice in, was the correct action and spared them from a fate worse than death.
>3.) In the Process, avoid revealing information that would warp the mind of the magos, or any other human who heard it, and won't turn the party against my character.
In other words.
My character knows, understands, and can explain something that I, the player, Don’t understand. Namely how forbidden or alien knowledge can corrupt humans. So I am asking for ways to understand and approach this subject, and ideas on how to explain it in a way a someone scientifically minded can understand and accept, so that I can play my character right.
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