madness

Oct. 18th, 2004 03:06 pm
morsla: (Default)
[personal profile] morsla
It's almost over. I'm making a little progress - enough to see, now - but time is moving far faster than I'd like it to. This time last week, I organised a spur-of-the-moment dinner thingamajig. Right now, I'm considering hiding from all life until I finish writing.

The Thesisaurus is a large and unwieldy beast, and it's coming together in fragmented pieces. Much like excavating dinosaur bones, I keep coming across small pieces of work done throughout the year - I know they have something to do with the project, but I'm not sure where they fit in. Will I wire together the skeleton only to add in limbs that never existed? Guess I'll only know after the fact, when some smartass turns up in twenty years to say "Well, I disagree with all the previous work conducted in this field - and here's my proof."

In other news, [livejournal.com profile] bishi_wannabe has started me thinking about stories of the Fae... two games ended on the weekend, and in a few weeks I'll be free enough to try filling the void that's crying out for new stories. Plus, I've been listening to lots of Talvin Singh, and thinking about madness in great detail ;) And I do like a setting that can stretch characters and players to breaking point...

A few of you have heard me raving about the Exalted: Fae book that's arriving by the end of the year... a setting where the fae are most certainly not all cheerful pooka and pretty pink fairies. The Raksha have dreamed themselves a physical form, and waded into creation trailing all the ravages of the Wyld in their wake.

The world is mutable, and the characters immortal. Close to the Imperial Mountain, creation is anchored firmly - but towards the fringes, the edges, the world is unravelling. Out in the madness, the Raksha rule - twisting their surroundings as they desire, to provide a beauty that appeals to their jaded tastes. Love and loss, grief and joy are as vivid as colour and sound - and woven with gossamer, they may be as solid as stone. Yet, infinite control over the changing tides of the Wyld is not enough. Stronger than chaos stands virtue, and on virtue the Wyld Host may feed.

Not all are ravening devourers, ravaging the solid lands until they pale and bleach of life. Many are artists, devising grand works spanning centuries and continents. They are utterly alien in their outlook, and the solid lands of creation are as a wound in the Wyld that will not heal. Into this world, a rare few travel - abandoning their palaces in Rakshastan to seek their destiny in creation.

I plan to run a game - a series of one-shots set in the Bordermarches, where the Wyld is surging into creation. To shamelessly borrow an idea from RPGnet, I'll be running a series of stories within a story - each session forming one tale, like the Arabian Nights. The characters are Raksha who have bound themselves to creation - not nearly so stagnant as the mortals within it, but they will likely never return to the true wyld. They have fixed some elements of their nature - abstract concepts, images, motifs - and these are as constant as the "personality" within.

The stories will be set around the world, and the appearence of the protagonists will change - but their abilities will not. In each Dream, a new story will be told, in a new location - from the coral atolls and endless ocean of the far West, to the glassy sand and burning sky of the South, to the frozen glaciers and howling winds of the farthest North. I'm planning four sessions to start with (Water, Fire, Wood and Air), but I can add extra one-shots when the idea takes me.

More details will have to wait until the book is released (mercifully, after I hand the thesis in) but that's my basic framework at the moment...

Talvin Singh - Soni

on his back he laid with his eyes to the sky
with his pain released from his earthly ties
from his children, cries, from the fear
and the cold in the world of lies

her tears came fast and her words came slow
life mirrorred by the tragic flow

in her pain she wept from day to day
in the haze of her love she would never obey
to put on her coat
she began to stray

in the pain of the sun and the heat of midday,

the blood ink in red, on the paper she penned
to the one she would never see, and then
with her veil pulled tight she crossed the bridge,
again, over the river of tears of what might been

like a distant dewah, on a lotus leaf
drowned as she was in the body of grief

and in the blood red dust the flame grew higher,
unbound by the rage of the funneral pyre
she uttered no breath, nor tear nor sigh
as the cresent moon rose into the sky.

Date: 2004-10-18 05:11 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lycaonia.livejournal.com
I hear ya about the thesis, boy do I hear ya.

Each section clamours for attention but theres only so much of me that can go around, only so much!

Hiding sounds good, but then I get all lonesome with the thoughts of singapore and I come out of my shell again.

Heres to drinking till we start seeing things once its all over!

Date: 2004-10-18 05:16 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] morsla.livejournal.com
...but I'm already seeing things...

Date: 2004-10-18 05:28 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lycaonia.livejournal.com
I knew the water was spiked!!!! Why else would anyone be insane enough to do an honours thesis???

Date: 2004-10-18 05:27 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] virtual-munkee.livejournal.com
wish i could play cool fae games again. the inner roleplayer in me (and yes, there is one, even if i am a painfully boring roleplayer) wants to do fun things like this fae stuff!

dammit. i havent FOUND any roleplayers like u dudes here in adelaide yet...

go for gold with ur thesis babe, sounds like u should get at least what i did!!!! i am surprised u havent started drinking heavily on fri evenings, like i did round this time 2 years ago...

n i am sure u remember me climbing the stairs to get to bed on THOSE nites...

Date: 2004-10-18 10:43 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] morsla.livejournal.com
Those would be the many "I never want to drink again" nights, then... ;)

Half the time, I'm still working Friday nights as I've slept in and started work at midday. Much unwinding happened over the weekend, though - coincidentally, I've drunk more in the past week than I have in several months...

For Stuff To Do (not necessarily roleplaying though..) in Adelaide, try the Heroic Cinema website ( http://www.heroic-cinema.com ). Mark's added a few sections lately, and there are a couple of Adelaide people contributing to the reviews and what's on sections. I think you've already met the main SA reviewer over noodles, as she used to live in Melbourne (and went to many a chinatown night). HK cinema is always a good spot to find interesting groups of people :)

Date: 2004-10-19 12:28 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] virtual-munkee.livejournal.com
yeah for sure, i missed the anime weekend when mark was over, i suck! anyways...

yeah i am slowly getting on top of work/money, i need to see more movies and stop partying so much. films kick ass, and i miss seeing em!

Date: 2004-10-18 05:27 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kashiichan.livejournal.com
You have the most beautiful way with words, honey. I can't wait to meet you.

Date: 2004-10-18 10:44 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] morsla.livejournal.com
Well, I don't know when I'm likely to get to Brisbane - but if you ever end up in Melbourne, say hi :)

Date: 2004-10-19 11:26 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kashiichan.livejournal.com
I shall be in Melbourne in December-January. I shall be hanging out with Simon at some point, so I should get to meet you then. If I'm lucky and not cursed by the Fail-Everything pixie.

Date: 2004-10-18 05:30 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] bishi-wannabe.livejournal.com
328 pages.

MUran sigs.

Morsla game.

ROCK!

Date: 2004-10-18 06:08 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] morsla.livejournal.com
How many hours 'til this book hits the shelves? :)

I feel like trying something a little different... I'll probably expand the character creation stuff to let people take most of what they want up front, and then I probably won't be mechanically progressing the characters in play with XP. The stories aren't set up to be sequential, and keeping the protagonists with the same abilities each time should let people play around more with the mutable parts of the game - what form they would dream for themselves in a new realm, and how best to use their arts.

Date: 2004-10-18 06:16 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] bishi-wannabe.livejournal.com
That's totally appropriate for the Raksha - while the Exalt's wuxia "I invent a technique to defeat you!" thing is cool and fun, the Raksha are somewhat apart from that element of the setting, much like the Gods and Demons, who don't have progression rules per se.

Date: 2004-10-18 06:10 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] miss-rynn.livejournal.com
Write yout thesis! WRITE IT!


... sorry, just felt I had to be the voice of common-sense for a moment...

Date: 2004-10-18 06:34 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] morsla.livejournal.com
...am waiting for clarification on a spreadsheet equation at the moment, you see :) It's broken my mind, so I've inflicted it on my supervisor.

Don't worry - I'm only writing large amounts of waffle in my lunchbreaks (3pm is lunch for me).

Date: 2004-10-18 07:23 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] morsla.livejournal.com
Update: Supervisor's brain broken too. Looks like this might be another late night.

Date: 2004-10-18 08:23 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] harkon.livejournal.com
Don't you win when you get their brain to melt?

Date: 2004-10-18 08:54 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] punk-rock-nerd.livejournal.com
Kashiichan is one of my friends who I've told about you. For some reason she wants to meet all my friends *shrugs*

Ah well, another roleplaying chick is always a good thing

Date: 2004-10-19 09:50 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lisbourne.livejournal.com
*skips* I'm another friend-of-Simon, and I told him I wouldn't mind meeting his friends either, 'specially if Cari gets to...

*looks at [Unknown site tag]* 'Ello. I'm Suzie. I don't roleplay, but I do enjoy laughing at Simon when he gets attacked by his housemate's kitten.

wanna be friends, then?

Date: 2004-10-19 11:30 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] kashiichan.livejournal.com
I warn you, I haven't roleplayed in a while because all the DM/GM's up here are either crap or working all the time, so I may be a bit rusty. Don't worry though, I learn fast. ;)
I want to meet all of Simon's friends so that I can scare them with my craziness and memories of some of the conversaions.
Here are some good examples.

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