This post is going to discuss some plot points in BioShock Infinite. There will be spoilers, and while I will try to avoid major plot reveals, you should bear in mind that there may be some; if you can't abide 'em, then now's the time to stop reading.
On with the show!
One of the main political groups Booker discovers in Columbia is the Vox Populi, a rag-tag bunch of rebels in desperate need of guns. He agrees to help them, in exchange for a favor, an act that causes his companion Elizabeth some concern. Is helping the Vox Populi the right thing to do? Will they be just like the heroes of Les Miserables - a rather melancholy end for them, of course, but death in a good cause can only be heroic - and make things better for the people?
Which goes to show that French literature, no matter how masterful, can't be trusted when it comes to describing revolutions. As a general rule, successful revolts tend to go something like this:
A: These many, then, shall die; their names are prick'd.
O: Your brother, too, must die; consent you, Lepidus?
L: I do consent ...
O: Prick him down, Antony.
L: Upon condition Publius shall not live,
Who is your sister's son, Mark Antony.
A: He shall not live; look, with a spot I damn him.
But, Lepidus, go you to Caesar's house;
Fetch the will hither, and we shall determine
How to cut off some charge in legacies.
L: What, shall I find you here?
O: Or in the Capitol.
exit L
A: This is a slight, unmeritable man,
Meet to be sent on errands; is it fit,
The three-fold world divided, he should stand,
One of the three to share it?
This is what a successful revolt looks like, and has looked like ever since man first started building cities. An unsuccessful revolt looks something like this:
D: Shall no man else be touched, but only Caesar?
C: Decius, well urged: I think it is not meet,
Mark Antony, so well beloved of Caesar,
Should outlive Caesar: we shall find of him
A shrewd contriver; and, you know, his means,
If he improve them, may well stretch so far
As to annoy us all; which to prevent,
Let Antony and Caesar fall together.
B: Our course will seem too bloody, Caius Cassius,
To cut the head off and then hack the limbs,
Like wrath in death and envy afterwards;
For Antony is but a limb of Caesar:
Let us be sacrificers, but not butchers, Caius.
It is a pattern that repeats itself, time and again. When Richard of Gloucester finally has the throne of England in his grasp, after hard and bloody campaigning, his first act is to silence his brother's Woodeville relations, who are accused - whether accurately or not is impossible to say - of plotting against Richard's life. Shortly afterward, Richard's brother's children go conveniently missing, and the fate of the princes in the Tower has never been conclusively proved. Not long after that, Richard himself ends up dead at Bosworth field, only to have his bones excavated under a car park, of all things. The socialists who followed Marx and Lenin, and overthrew the Tsar, did so out of the highest motives; "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is a noble sentiment, but soon snuffed out. Come the mid-1920s, many of those who follow Marxist ideals are under suspicion, in exile, or dead; when Stalin consolidates his power, the age of assassination and condemnation begins. "The French give a man rum before they lead him out to the guillotine," said Mikhail Koltsov, Stalin's man in Spain during the Civil War, "In these days we give him champagne." Koltsov was a man with few illusions; he too died, a victim of Stalin's bloodlust.
A rebellion that succeeds does so because it consolidates power quickly and decisively. Time and again, that has meant killing off your political enemies as quickly as possible. Even the United States, much more fortunate in this regard, has its Whiskey Rebellion, and victory for Washington and the rebels meant disaster for the Loyalists, tens of thousands of whom emigrated. But that is a rare example of a revolution that consolidates itself without excess bloodshed. Regrettably many rebel leaders more closely resemble Pol Pot than Washington and, as the CIA has sometimes learned to its cost, the rebels you support today may be your enemy tomorrow.
Even so, it is rare, in a modern fictional context, for rebels to be portrayed in a bad light. Instead it is almost axiomatic that the rebels are the good guys, and - particularly in a video game - if you join the rebels, you must be fighting on the side of the angels. It is very, very uncommon for that not to be the case, and even on the occasions when the rebels turn out to have feet of clay, they still get something like a noble exit. After all, the rebellion isn't to be blamed for the actions of a few bad apples, and if you can only kill the right people at the right time, justice will assuredly prevail. In BioShock context, the Vox Populi soon reveal themselves as being less heroic than the protagonists of Les Miserables, which is altogether a more realistic view of revolutions than video games normally give.
In an RPG context, particularly as relates to Trail of Cthulhu, what does this mean?
To begin with, the protagonists in your campaign may well believe - as Elizabeth initially believes, and as many intellectuals of the 1930s rationalize it - that revolution is the necessary first step that will lead to a utopia. There are any number of political revolts kicking off, or threatening to kick off, in the decade, many of them inspired by events in Russia. Spain's Civil War is the classic, the one that inspired Orwell first to fight, and later to create his seminal work of revolutionary fiction. Across Europe there are groups dedicated to the cause of working class revolution. Central and Southern America are still smouldering after a tumultuous nineteenth century, Ghandi is fasting and avoiding assassination in India, nationalism is bubbling away in Africa, while in America Roosevelt is dealing with unprecedented poverty by making an unprecedented move to the political Left. Everyone believes revolution is coming, and that the people they most dislike are "a bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes." If you believe that revolution is a bad thing, then clearly you must be a member of the bourgeoisie, and therefore thoroughly deserve what's coming to you.
Next comes disillusion. As Orwell demonstrates, there is nothing more likely to induce a violent dislike of revolution than seeing one close up. There will be the pricking of lists, the poisonous umbrellas, torture, unjust imprisonment, and betrayal both of people and of the revolutionary ideal. Your former comrades quickly become your worst enemies; indeed, they have to, even if they would prefer otherwise, since to defend you means being denounced in turn. Or perhaps they have internalized the party message to such a degree that to think otherwise is beyond them.
"It would be impossible for me," wrote Orwell, "for instance, to debate the rights and wrongs of the Barcelona fighting with a Communist Party member, because no Communist - that is to say, no 'good' Communist - could admit that I have given a truthful account of the facts. If he followed his party line dutifully he would have to declare that I am lying or, at best, that I am hopelessly misled and that anyone who glanced at the Daily Worker headlines a thousand miles from the scene of events knows more of what was happening in Barcelona than I do."
Fictions work best when they mirror reality. For that reason, the Vox Populi - and the revolt in general - in BioShock Infinite's Columbia will probably have a much greater effect on the video game playing audience than the hundred other rebellions their avatars may have joined in the past. In your RPG campaign, I would recommend you strive for something similar. In Trail, this could be reflected in something as simple as a Drive, Pillar of Sanity or Source of Stability. Perhaps this character genuinely believes in the worker's revolution, or their best friend and mentor is a champion of the downtrodden. Or, if the Keeper wants to go further, perhaps the game could be set in the context of an existing revolution, like Spain. Even in a less tumultuous setting, like Bookhounds of London, there's scope for revolutionary doings; the owner of a bookstore can easily be distributing political propaganda on the side, or attending meetings of a very dubious nature. No doubt the police, or the domestic intelligence services, would like a quiet word.
The key thing to bear in mind is, in fiction, rebellions give players something to fight for. That's why video games use them so often; they're an excellent context for the ongoing action. But those games ignore the wider context of rebellion at their peril. "You just complicate the narrative," Booker is told, and that ought also to be true of your players. The revolution is by no means an unmixed blessing, and the protagonists may soon discover that what they thought they were fighting for is less substantial than, say, a castle in the clouds.
Sunday, 21 April 2013
BioShock Infinite Review (ish)
As my next post is going to reference Irrational Games' BioShock Infinite, it occurred to me that I ought to post a brief explanation of the game, before I get down to brass tacks. Consider this a kind of review of the Xbox 360 edition, which I will keep as spoiler-lite as possible. I also ought to state at the start that, while I do post news articles and features for the Escapist, this mini-review is in no way associated with the Escapist.
Now, on with the show.
The year is 1912. You play as Booker De Witt, down-at-heels private inquiry agent, assigned one simple task: capture a girl named Elizabeth, and bring her back to your shadowy masters in New York. Except Elizabeth is held captive in Columbia, a floating city high above the clouds, ruled over by a self-proclaimed prophet and messiah figure, Comstock. Comstock relies on a combination of religion and mad science to keep his city afloat and his flock obedient; along the way you'll be mastering at least some of that mad science in order to achieve your objective. These Vigors, which allow you to hurl fireballs, electrocute enemies, blast them with water cannons or savage them with bloodthirsty crows, among many other powers, are your main means of keeping the enemy at bay. Lord knows you need 'em; the human opponents are reasonable at Medium difficulty, at least until end game when they start getting tough, but the mechanical Founders, Frankenstein monster-esque Handymen, Vigor-using crow fanatics and firemen all do their best to pound you flat.
The plot and setting are the two main draws here. Ken Levine's team have created something really special, in Columbia; unlike many another fictional world, you'll come to believe in this twisted utopia in the sky. There's such incredible intention to detail here, much of which has a deeper meaning that you'll only come to appreciate late game, as the plot threads start winding together. Characterization is also vital. This is one of the few first-person titles that gives the protagonist a voice, a decision which makes perfect sense, and Elizabeth - your target - is one of the best designed heroines in video game fiction. Her personality and abilities are both engaging and extremely useful. Expect to see plenty of Elizabeth and Booker cosplayers at conventions over the next few years! Special mention must be made of your two not-quite-allies, the Lutece twins, who you'll come to love and hate in equal measure. Again, perfect cosplay material for the right couple!
Game play is pretty standard shooter stuff, and if you played the original BioShock you'll already have a good idea what to expect from Vigors. You'll feel like a superhuman, blasting your way through the ordinary enemies, but don't get too cocky, or the Handyman will punish you! There's a great variety of powers here, and I strongly recommend experimentation. In my first play through, I concentrated exclusively on the powers you get early on - Possession, Murder of Crows, and Devil's Kiss - and while I enjoyed them, on my second game I deliberately concentrated on all the others. I soon found that, contrary to my initial assessment, the other Vigors - Charge and Undertow being my two favorites - are incredibly powerful, and well worth playing around with.
This is particularly so if you concentrate on getting the best kind of equipment. New to BioShock Infinite is Gear, special shirts, pants, boots and hats that give you extra boosts in combat. If you concentrate on a combat build that suits your style, you'll soon discover massive benefits. Take Charge, for example, a Vigor that allows you to run straight at the enemy, dealing massive damage. On it's own, it's pretty sweet, and perfect for taking down the heavy hitters. Combine that with gear that benefits a close-combat style, and you'll be clearing the room in no time. Towards the end, each Charge was smacking my main target, stunning all the others, making them vulnerable to damage for 5 seconds, and had a 40% chance of Possessing one of them, free of charge. Perfect for a donnybrook, particularly if you're facing off against half a dozen enemies or more.
Mind you, you do have to enjoy a donnybrook. There isn't a non-lethal way of dealing with foes, and the melee finishers in particular have set off some people's gore alarm. I didn't find that a problem, but then I enjoyed the original BioShock, which had exactly the same kind of play.
I'm told there have been issues with the Xbox 360 version of the game. I can't speak to that, as I never encountered any of them, and by now some or all may have been fixed. It's worth checking before you buy.
I should point out that this title features very linear game play. That should come as no surprise to veterans of the original BioShock, since linear game play was integral to the focus of the plot in that title, and also in this. However if you're looking for plenty of side quests and options, you may come away from this disappointed. Though there are some side quests, there aren't many, and - unlike a Dishonored-style sandbox - there's only one way to get from A to B, most of the time. You may also get a little sick of Press X To [fill in the blank]. However this title, like the previous, was put together with that style of play in mind ... and I really can't say more than that without giving away massive plot spoilers. You'll just have to trust me when I say that it works very well indeed.
Bottom line: if you like shooters, and enjoy an immersive game world with a cleverly designed plot, this is the title for you. If you're allergic to linear game play, and would prefer a non-lethal way of dealing with your enemies, best avoid. Expect to see this on Game of the Year lists, come December!
Now, on with the show.
The year is 1912. You play as Booker De Witt, down-at-heels private inquiry agent, assigned one simple task: capture a girl named Elizabeth, and bring her back to your shadowy masters in New York. Except Elizabeth is held captive in Columbia, a floating city high above the clouds, ruled over by a self-proclaimed prophet and messiah figure, Comstock. Comstock relies on a combination of religion and mad science to keep his city afloat and his flock obedient; along the way you'll be mastering at least some of that mad science in order to achieve your objective. These Vigors, which allow you to hurl fireballs, electrocute enemies, blast them with water cannons or savage them with bloodthirsty crows, among many other powers, are your main means of keeping the enemy at bay. Lord knows you need 'em; the human opponents are reasonable at Medium difficulty, at least until end game when they start getting tough, but the mechanical Founders, Frankenstein monster-esque Handymen, Vigor-using crow fanatics and firemen all do their best to pound you flat.
The plot and setting are the two main draws here. Ken Levine's team have created something really special, in Columbia; unlike many another fictional world, you'll come to believe in this twisted utopia in the sky. There's such incredible intention to detail here, much of which has a deeper meaning that you'll only come to appreciate late game, as the plot threads start winding together. Characterization is also vital. This is one of the few first-person titles that gives the protagonist a voice, a decision which makes perfect sense, and Elizabeth - your target - is one of the best designed heroines in video game fiction. Her personality and abilities are both engaging and extremely useful. Expect to see plenty of Elizabeth and Booker cosplayers at conventions over the next few years! Special mention must be made of your two not-quite-allies, the Lutece twins, who you'll come to love and hate in equal measure. Again, perfect cosplay material for the right couple!
Game play is pretty standard shooter stuff, and if you played the original BioShock you'll already have a good idea what to expect from Vigors. You'll feel like a superhuman, blasting your way through the ordinary enemies, but don't get too cocky, or the Handyman will punish you! There's a great variety of powers here, and I strongly recommend experimentation. In my first play through, I concentrated exclusively on the powers you get early on - Possession, Murder of Crows, and Devil's Kiss - and while I enjoyed them, on my second game I deliberately concentrated on all the others. I soon found that, contrary to my initial assessment, the other Vigors - Charge and Undertow being my two favorites - are incredibly powerful, and well worth playing around with.
This is particularly so if you concentrate on getting the best kind of equipment. New to BioShock Infinite is Gear, special shirts, pants, boots and hats that give you extra boosts in combat. If you concentrate on a combat build that suits your style, you'll soon discover massive benefits. Take Charge, for example, a Vigor that allows you to run straight at the enemy, dealing massive damage. On it's own, it's pretty sweet, and perfect for taking down the heavy hitters. Combine that with gear that benefits a close-combat style, and you'll be clearing the room in no time. Towards the end, each Charge was smacking my main target, stunning all the others, making them vulnerable to damage for 5 seconds, and had a 40% chance of Possessing one of them, free of charge. Perfect for a donnybrook, particularly if you're facing off against half a dozen enemies or more.
Mind you, you do have to enjoy a donnybrook. There isn't a non-lethal way of dealing with foes, and the melee finishers in particular have set off some people's gore alarm. I didn't find that a problem, but then I enjoyed the original BioShock, which had exactly the same kind of play.
I'm told there have been issues with the Xbox 360 version of the game. I can't speak to that, as I never encountered any of them, and by now some or all may have been fixed. It's worth checking before you buy.
I should point out that this title features very linear game play. That should come as no surprise to veterans of the original BioShock, since linear game play was integral to the focus of the plot in that title, and also in this. However if you're looking for plenty of side quests and options, you may come away from this disappointed. Though there are some side quests, there aren't many, and - unlike a Dishonored-style sandbox - there's only one way to get from A to B, most of the time. You may also get a little sick of Press X To [fill in the blank]. However this title, like the previous, was put together with that style of play in mind ... and I really can't say more than that without giving away massive plot spoilers. You'll just have to trust me when I say that it works very well indeed.
Bottom line: if you like shooters, and enjoy an immersive game world with a cleverly designed plot, this is the title for you. If you're allergic to linear game play, and would prefer a non-lethal way of dealing with your enemies, best avoid. Expect to see this on Game of the Year lists, come December!
Wednesday, 17 April 2013
Bookshelf: I, Phone
In this post, I'm going to be talking about a book I picked up at Eastercon: I, Phone, by David Wake. I have the paperback edition, but this is also available in eBook form via Kindle and Smashwords.The setting is the not-so-distant future, in which smart phones are considerably smarter, and more self-aware, than their owners. It kicks off with the hero of the piece, Jeeves, rated at 157 IQ or 2.5 Rossum, whichever you'd rather, recording and reporting on the murder of his owner, Alice Wooster, via his Black Box app. Except, as it turns out, she doesn't die; her attacker does, and when his bullet-riddled corpse is discovered with Alice the only logical suspect, Jeeves, good net-citizen that he is, promptly alerts the authorities. Thus begins the first of what will prove to be many escape attempts, as Alice and Jeeves do their damndest to get out of the clutches of the law, and the mysterious group who also seems to want them both dead. Incidentally, if anyone was wondering whether the naming of Jeeves and Wooster was a coincidence, I think you can stop wondering.
The plot thickens when Jeeves discovers that the mysterious group after Alice's blood happens to have something to do with the latest virtual reality technology, intended to upgrade everyone's VR goggles so that they have something pleasant to look at when they walk through London. Gone are the homeless and urban decay, replaced by pretty much whatever the user fancies. This narrative device also allows Jeeves some freedom of movement, since - as a creature of the internet - he can download himself into the virtual reality, becoming essentially independent of his physical constraints. This becomes very useful later in the plot, when Jeeves' physical form is captured by the mysterious agency, and he's forced to become a kind of techno-ghost, haunting his way through a virtual cityscape. His avatar might change from Cary Grant to a less homosexual Stephen Fry, according to the whims of his owner Alice, but Jeeves remains Jeeves throughout; the sensible one, the planner, the thinker, whose ultimate goal is to keep his owner out of harm's way. Even though, as his ethics programming dictates, he's the one who sometimes puts her in harm's way to begin with.
Consider this:
"EEVES! JEEVES! JEE"
"Hello, Alice, it's still early," I say. "There is rain due later in the afternoon. Your appointments today are -"
"Jeeves, shut up!"
"Sorry, Miss."
"Why did you remove your battery?"
"I didn't. I can't."
"What?"
"I don't have any arms."
I appear to be writing a contemporaneous natural language log, but the only App I have that would do that is the Black Box App, which is only activated in an emergency. I wonder why.
Alice is looking around the flat, desperately. I wonder why.
"Alice," I ask. "What's the matter?"
"There's a dead body in my bedroom."
"Pardon?"
She cradles me in her arms and carries me to the bedroom before thrusting me out as if she wants to take a photograph. Alice isn't wearing any clothes, so perhaps we've reached that inevitable day when she's run out of fresh laundry. The room is a mess. I already have a note to sort out the maid service, along with adjusting her exercise avatar, so maybe I ought to increase its level of urgency. That's strange, I only have two notes on file, which seems a very small number. However, rather than worry about that now, I focus on what Alice is trying to show me. True enough, there's a dead body in the bed. It's male, tall, looking up. He has a third eye in his forehead as if a camera lens has been inserted. He's been shot. I search around for his identity and emergency protocol, but there's no phone within wi-fi range. I'm at a loss.
Wake's strengths are in little moments like these, that capture the essence of the scene and also the characters in it. There are some brilliant scenes to be enjoyed here; my personal favorite came when Jeeves discovers a little colony of desperate souls, people who lost their smart phones and who now have no idea what to do with themselves. They sit, lost and alone, in cafes, trying to fiddle with invisible touch screens, playing games that nobody but them can see.
Where he sometimes falls short is the larger narrative. From the moment Jeeves becomes a virtual ghost, everything gets a bit muddy, and towards the end I couldn't help but think that the only reason Jeeves abandoned his casing was because Wake couldn't think how else to carry the plot along. A protagonist who can't move under his own power isn't much good to a writer. There's enough technobabble to carry the concept, but I began to wonder whether the concept was strictly necessary.
That, and Alice is underwritten. Jeeves' devotion to her may be programmed in, but the reader's devotion isn't, and after a time it becomes increasingly difficult to see why Jeeves is so attached to her. It doesn't help that she all but vanishes for significant portions of the plot, thus depriving her of spotlight time that might have made her more interesting.
Those two caveats aside, I thoroughly enjoyed I, Phone. Science fiction isn't a genre I read much any more, and novels like this make me wonder why I don't, when there's stuff as good as this out there. It captures the best thing about fiction: it makes the world we live in suddenly seem magical, without using any ingredients other than the ones we're already familiar with. I first read this in a rush while Eastercon was still ongoing, and that should tell you something; that, at a time when there were a thousand and one other things to do, I couldn't put it down. It's rare when a book does that, and for that reason I'd recommend I, Phone to anyone with an interest in science fiction, smart phones, or the modern world. It's grand stuff!
The plot thickens when Jeeves discovers that the mysterious group after Alice's blood happens to have something to do with the latest virtual reality technology, intended to upgrade everyone's VR goggles so that they have something pleasant to look at when they walk through London. Gone are the homeless and urban decay, replaced by pretty much whatever the user fancies. This narrative device also allows Jeeves some freedom of movement, since - as a creature of the internet - he can download himself into the virtual reality, becoming essentially independent of his physical constraints. This becomes very useful later in the plot, when Jeeves' physical form is captured by the mysterious agency, and he's forced to become a kind of techno-ghost, haunting his way through a virtual cityscape. His avatar might change from Cary Grant to a less homosexual Stephen Fry, according to the whims of his owner Alice, but Jeeves remains Jeeves throughout; the sensible one, the planner, the thinker, whose ultimate goal is to keep his owner out of harm's way. Even though, as his ethics programming dictates, he's the one who sometimes puts her in harm's way to begin with.
Consider this:
"EEVES! JEEVES! JEE"
"Hello, Alice, it's still early," I say. "There is rain due later in the afternoon. Your appointments today are -"
"Jeeves, shut up!"
"Sorry, Miss."
"Why did you remove your battery?"
"I didn't. I can't."
"What?"
"I don't have any arms."
I appear to be writing a contemporaneous natural language log, but the only App I have that would do that is the Black Box App, which is only activated in an emergency. I wonder why.
Alice is looking around the flat, desperately. I wonder why.
"Alice," I ask. "What's the matter?"
"There's a dead body in my bedroom."
"Pardon?"
She cradles me in her arms and carries me to the bedroom before thrusting me out as if she wants to take a photograph. Alice isn't wearing any clothes, so perhaps we've reached that inevitable day when she's run out of fresh laundry. The room is a mess. I already have a note to sort out the maid service, along with adjusting her exercise avatar, so maybe I ought to increase its level of urgency. That's strange, I only have two notes on file, which seems a very small number. However, rather than worry about that now, I focus on what Alice is trying to show me. True enough, there's a dead body in the bed. It's male, tall, looking up. He has a third eye in his forehead as if a camera lens has been inserted. He's been shot. I search around for his identity and emergency protocol, but there's no phone within wi-fi range. I'm at a loss.
Wake's strengths are in little moments like these, that capture the essence of the scene and also the characters in it. There are some brilliant scenes to be enjoyed here; my personal favorite came when Jeeves discovers a little colony of desperate souls, people who lost their smart phones and who now have no idea what to do with themselves. They sit, lost and alone, in cafes, trying to fiddle with invisible touch screens, playing games that nobody but them can see.
Where he sometimes falls short is the larger narrative. From the moment Jeeves becomes a virtual ghost, everything gets a bit muddy, and towards the end I couldn't help but think that the only reason Jeeves abandoned his casing was because Wake couldn't think how else to carry the plot along. A protagonist who can't move under his own power isn't much good to a writer. There's enough technobabble to carry the concept, but I began to wonder whether the concept was strictly necessary.
That, and Alice is underwritten. Jeeves' devotion to her may be programmed in, but the reader's devotion isn't, and after a time it becomes increasingly difficult to see why Jeeves is so attached to her. It doesn't help that she all but vanishes for significant portions of the plot, thus depriving her of spotlight time that might have made her more interesting.
Those two caveats aside, I thoroughly enjoyed I, Phone. Science fiction isn't a genre I read much any more, and novels like this make me wonder why I don't, when there's stuff as good as this out there. It captures the best thing about fiction: it makes the world we live in suddenly seem magical, without using any ingredients other than the ones we're already familiar with. I first read this in a rush while Eastercon was still ongoing, and that should tell you something; that, at a time when there were a thousand and one other things to do, I couldn't put it down. It's rare when a book does that, and for that reason I'd recommend I, Phone to anyone with an interest in science fiction, smart phones, or the modern world. It's grand stuff!
Friday, 12 April 2013
Things That Must Be Done
Whew!
The last two weeks have been a lot of fun. I went to the UK for a couple weeks, and was lucky enough to spend some time with Simon Rogers and the Pelgrane folks, before heading off to Eastercon. Eastercon, for those who don't know it, is a fantasy and science fiction event that takes place every year at Easter, hence the name, and its writer's track is phenomenal. I have to go back next year. I don't think I've seen that many fiction creators in one place before. I now have plenty of material for a few reviews, which I'll be posting shortly.
One quick digression on the subject of reviews: one author whose works I picked up there and have since read is Janine Ashbless, whose work includes mainly erotic fiction. I won't be reviewing her stuff, not because I didn't enjoy it or because of the subject matter, but because she's been a friend of mine for years, and I don't think I could fairly review a mate. That said, I can recommend whoever I want, and I definitely recommend her novel Heart Of Flame, particularly to those who like their Arabian Nights fantasy colored with a little Lovecraftian horror, by way of Robert E. Howard. The plot is straightforward enough: a beautiful princess has been captured by a djinn, and its up to our hero Rafiq, and his sorceress companion Taqla, to get her back. But first they need to find the answer to a simple riddle ... I wish I'd also had the foresight to pick up Named And Shamed, as Janine held a reading of it on the last day, and it sounds really interesting. The setting is alternate history present, with our heroine having to tread carefully around the scheming Good Folk. Tansy stole a poem that the old people really, really want back; but she hasn't got it any more. A man's life is at stake, and now Tansy has to decide how far she's prepared to go to return the fair folk's prize. Given that this is the sort of fiction that features BDSM as well as debauched dryads, "how far" is a phrase laden with meaning ...
Now, digression over. One thing Eastercon taught me is the necessity of getting things done. My writing's been doing really well, recently; I've had plenty of articles in the Escapist, and my Pelgrane work is going great guns. I have several pieces in with them right now, some of which should see the light of day before the end of the year. One of these has the working title Storm Of Steel, an anthology - print this time, not .pdf - which will include several of the Great War scenarios, an expanded rule set, and other good things. In fact, I talked with the YSDC folks about that while I was in Bradford, and there's an interview due out at Yog-Sothoth very soon, which - if you're a patron there - you'll be able to listen to. I'll also be re-starting my Bookshelf segment at YSDC, on a monthly basis.
So I have every reason to be pleased with how things are going, but it's not enough. I keep telling myself that I ought to work on something larger, and each time I try to get started, there's something that delays it. If I'm truthful, "delay" is - at least in part - a stand-in word for "procrastinate". There's no excuse for it, really, try as I might to find one. I've met plenty of authors in the past few weeks, and while all of them were excellent people, none of them did anything that I couldn't do myself. I need to get started, and the best time for that is now.
The working title is Witchfinder General. It's alternate history, set in 1980s America. There are eight months left in the year; time to get this show on the road, and if I haven't broken the back of this particular project before Christmas, I'll know the reason why. It won't be because other things got in the way. It will be because I let them get in the way.
There are some things that must be done, and this is one of them.
The last two weeks have been a lot of fun. I went to the UK for a couple weeks, and was lucky enough to spend some time with Simon Rogers and the Pelgrane folks, before heading off to Eastercon. Eastercon, for those who don't know it, is a fantasy and science fiction event that takes place every year at Easter, hence the name, and its writer's track is phenomenal. I have to go back next year. I don't think I've seen that many fiction creators in one place before. I now have plenty of material for a few reviews, which I'll be posting shortly.
One quick digression on the subject of reviews: one author whose works I picked up there and have since read is Janine Ashbless, whose work includes mainly erotic fiction. I won't be reviewing her stuff, not because I didn't enjoy it or because of the subject matter, but because she's been a friend of mine for years, and I don't think I could fairly review a mate. That said, I can recommend whoever I want, and I definitely recommend her novel Heart Of Flame, particularly to those who like their Arabian Nights fantasy colored with a little Lovecraftian horror, by way of Robert E. Howard. The plot is straightforward enough: a beautiful princess has been captured by a djinn, and its up to our hero Rafiq, and his sorceress companion Taqla, to get her back. But first they need to find the answer to a simple riddle ... I wish I'd also had the foresight to pick up Named And Shamed, as Janine held a reading of it on the last day, and it sounds really interesting. The setting is alternate history present, with our heroine having to tread carefully around the scheming Good Folk. Tansy stole a poem that the old people really, really want back; but she hasn't got it any more. A man's life is at stake, and now Tansy has to decide how far she's prepared to go to return the fair folk's prize. Given that this is the sort of fiction that features BDSM as well as debauched dryads, "how far" is a phrase laden with meaning ...
Now, digression over. One thing Eastercon taught me is the necessity of getting things done. My writing's been doing really well, recently; I've had plenty of articles in the Escapist, and my Pelgrane work is going great guns. I have several pieces in with them right now, some of which should see the light of day before the end of the year. One of these has the working title Storm Of Steel, an anthology - print this time, not .pdf - which will include several of the Great War scenarios, an expanded rule set, and other good things. In fact, I talked with the YSDC folks about that while I was in Bradford, and there's an interview due out at Yog-Sothoth very soon, which - if you're a patron there - you'll be able to listen to. I'll also be re-starting my Bookshelf segment at YSDC, on a monthly basis.
So I have every reason to be pleased with how things are going, but it's not enough. I keep telling myself that I ought to work on something larger, and each time I try to get started, there's something that delays it. If I'm truthful, "delay" is - at least in part - a stand-in word for "procrastinate". There's no excuse for it, really, try as I might to find one. I've met plenty of authors in the past few weeks, and while all of them were excellent people, none of them did anything that I couldn't do myself. I need to get started, and the best time for that is now.
The working title is Witchfinder General. It's alternate history, set in 1980s America. There are eight months left in the year; time to get this show on the road, and if I haven't broken the back of this particular project before Christmas, I'll know the reason why. It won't be because other things got in the way. It will be because I let them get in the way.
There are some things that must be done, and this is one of them.
Sunday, 24 March 2013
Enquiring Minds
I've been reading a lot of Mutant City Blues recently. It's a fun RPG setting; I particularly like the concept of the Quade Diagram, in which various kinds of mutation can be linked to other kinds, creating a chain by which certain powers can be deduced, and weaknesses too, based on the observed powers of the mutant in question. Fun stuff!
If I'm disappointed at all - and I'm not even sure that disappointed is the right word - it's that, for a game in which crimes are solved, relatively little emphasis is placed on the crime scene. I suppose you could argue that this is the difference between, say, an Agatha Christie novel and a CSI scenario. The television series CSI, particularly in its more recent incarnations, sacrifices detail to tell a story, whereas a crime drama in its classic incarnation is all about the detail. The very first Hercule Poirot novel, for example, turns entirely on a point about a document that may, or may not, exist. The reader is able to deduce whether or not it exists and, as a consequence, what happened, next, by paying attention to details, chief among which is the discovery of the crime scene. Christie even goes so far as to draw a map of the house in which the scene takes place, so her readers can follow along and make their own deductions.
CSI follows a completely different path. Television is a visual medium; the viewer isn't supposed to supply intelligent input. Certainly the viewer isn't supposed to work out whodunit. The whole point of a crime story as presented in this light is to entertain, for an hour or so, and then present a result that the viewer finds satisfactory. Or at least that the network finds satisfactory, which is why so many follow the CSI path and so few the Wire. But that's a story for another day.
If you will write, then you must read. Write what you know is the popular credo, but as so few people know the intricacies of murder it follows that, if you are to write crime, you need to read a hell of a lot. All manner of odd, forgotten authors become grist to your mill, which is why I have a copy of Burt Rapp's Homicide Investigation: A Practical Handbook. I'm not about to pretend that Rapp is an unsung genius. Apart from anything else, he's as dated as hell; that book was written back in the 1980s, when DNA analysis - never mind the computerized databases that are meat and drink to CSI - was very much in its infancy. Which, incidentally, makes books like Rapp's invaluable to anyone writing a story set before DNA and the current television cop; ie. anything set before 1989. Many of us can only imagine what that world was like; Rapp knew. But that's by the way.
There's a section on canvassing for information that I want to cover here, and Rapp's text is as follows:
Canvassing isn't a casual task to assign to anyone who happens to be available. Canvassing requires dedication, intelligence, motivation, and skill in dealing with people. The officers assigned to canvassing should have a clear idea of the information they should try to elicit. Basic information is as follows:
It all seems so simple, when laid out as Rapp has it, in order. If you want to know what happened, then you ask who was there, you ask what they saw or heard, and you ask if there was anyone else on site who might have heard or seen anything. Hardly the stuff of revelation.
Or consider something from a different source:
Similarly, an Edinburgh surgeon in 1880 diagnosed a patient as a recently discharged sergeant from a regiment posted to Barbados; the man was respectful but forgetfully kept his hat on, as in the Army, he was Scottish with an air of authority, and he had elephantiasis, which you get in Barbados but not in the Highlands. Elementary, my dear Joseph Bell (1837-1911). [The Alarming History of Medicine, Richard Gordon]
Investigation is, above all, the art of paying attention. In RPG terms, it starts in the very first scene, and does not stop until the scenario is over. Players should never take the information as presented entirely for granted; there is always something there to discover. Equally they should never neglect the basics. Who was there? What did they see, or hear? What is present at the scene, and what might account for it being there? Tunnel vision never does anyone any good, and to wed yourself to a theory of the crime without sufficient evidence is to invite disaster. It isn't all about progressing from scene to scene; sometimes it's about making sure you're on the right path, before making that deductive leap that transplants a Scot to the isle of the Bearded Ones. Just one or two questions can prevent a great deal of useless, even counter-productive effort.
But perhaps most importantly, have a clear idea of the information you're trying to get. In many ways, it's like an exam; understand the question, and then attempt to answer it. That way you have a better chance of getting the right answer down on paper ... or at least, having the satisfaction of knowing that you understood, just before the horrific minions of Cthulhu come knocking on your door.
If I'm disappointed at all - and I'm not even sure that disappointed is the right word - it's that, for a game in which crimes are solved, relatively little emphasis is placed on the crime scene. I suppose you could argue that this is the difference between, say, an Agatha Christie novel and a CSI scenario. The television series CSI, particularly in its more recent incarnations, sacrifices detail to tell a story, whereas a crime drama in its classic incarnation is all about the detail. The very first Hercule Poirot novel, for example, turns entirely on a point about a document that may, or may not, exist. The reader is able to deduce whether or not it exists and, as a consequence, what happened, next, by paying attention to details, chief among which is the discovery of the crime scene. Christie even goes so far as to draw a map of the house in which the scene takes place, so her readers can follow along and make their own deductions.
CSI follows a completely different path. Television is a visual medium; the viewer isn't supposed to supply intelligent input. Certainly the viewer isn't supposed to work out whodunit. The whole point of a crime story as presented in this light is to entertain, for an hour or so, and then present a result that the viewer finds satisfactory. Or at least that the network finds satisfactory, which is why so many follow the CSI path and so few the Wire. But that's a story for another day.
If you will write, then you must read. Write what you know is the popular credo, but as so few people know the intricacies of murder it follows that, if you are to write crime, you need to read a hell of a lot. All manner of odd, forgotten authors become grist to your mill, which is why I have a copy of Burt Rapp's Homicide Investigation: A Practical Handbook. I'm not about to pretend that Rapp is an unsung genius. Apart from anything else, he's as dated as hell; that book was written back in the 1980s, when DNA analysis - never mind the computerized databases that are meat and drink to CSI - was very much in its infancy. Which, incidentally, makes books like Rapp's invaluable to anyone writing a story set before DNA and the current television cop; ie. anything set before 1989. Many of us can only imagine what that world was like; Rapp knew. But that's by the way.
There's a section on canvassing for information that I want to cover here, and Rapp's text is as follows:
Canvassing isn't a casual task to assign to anyone who happens to be available. Canvassing requires dedication, intelligence, motivation, and skill in dealing with people. The officers assigned to canvassing should have a clear idea of the information they should try to elicit. Basic information is as follows:
- Name
- Address
- Telephone number
- Work address and telephone
- was person present during the crime?
- did the person see or hear anything?
- does the person know either the victim or the suspect?
- names of any others at this address
- names of any visitors during the period of the crime
- convenient time for another interview, if necessary
- witness' travel plans, for the foreseeable future
It all seems so simple, when laid out as Rapp has it, in order. If you want to know what happened, then you ask who was there, you ask what they saw or heard, and you ask if there was anyone else on site who might have heard or seen anything. Hardly the stuff of revelation.
Or consider something from a different source:
Similarly, an Edinburgh surgeon in 1880 diagnosed a patient as a recently discharged sergeant from a regiment posted to Barbados; the man was respectful but forgetfully kept his hat on, as in the Army, he was Scottish with an air of authority, and he had elephantiasis, which you get in Barbados but not in the Highlands. Elementary, my dear Joseph Bell (1837-1911). [The Alarming History of Medicine, Richard Gordon]
Investigation is, above all, the art of paying attention. In RPG terms, it starts in the very first scene, and does not stop until the scenario is over. Players should never take the information as presented entirely for granted; there is always something there to discover. Equally they should never neglect the basics. Who was there? What did they see, or hear? What is present at the scene, and what might account for it being there? Tunnel vision never does anyone any good, and to wed yourself to a theory of the crime without sufficient evidence is to invite disaster. It isn't all about progressing from scene to scene; sometimes it's about making sure you're on the right path, before making that deductive leap that transplants a Scot to the isle of the Bearded Ones. Just one or two questions can prevent a great deal of useless, even counter-productive effort.
But perhaps most importantly, have a clear idea of the information you're trying to get. In many ways, it's like an exam; understand the question, and then attempt to answer it. That way you have a better chance of getting the right answer down on paper ... or at least, having the satisfaction of knowing that you understood, just before the horrific minions of Cthulhu come knocking on your door.
Tuesday, 26 February 2013
Dusting Off Price
I've been reading Pelgrane Press' Night's Black Agents, trying to digest its ideas and see whether or not it will work for me. I think it might. However this may be because, in the first few pages, it references one of my favorite authors: Anthony Price.
Night's Black Agents, for those who don't know it, is an RPG horror setting that presumes vampires exist, and are at the heart of a gigantic, possibly world-spanning conspiracy. You know this because, until recently, you were working for them; but, having discovered your masters' true identity, you're now more of a liability than an asset. Vampires hate loose ends, so if you want to keep on breathing, you need to do something decisive, and fast. It's a spy game at its heart, with you as the spy, betrayed by your former masters, and now on the run.
Spy games are exactly the sort of thing Anthony Price was fond of. Price, a former journalist, turned to novel writing in the early 1970s and, over time, put together nineteen intricately crafted stories. His two favorite characters were David Audley, a former tanker in World War Two who gets recruited for Intelligence work in the aftermath of the war, and Colonel Butler, also a soldier, who is recruited at much the same time by the same person, and who eventually rises to head of the Intelligence branch that Audley works for. Most of Price's work was set in the 1970s and 80s, with occasional glimpses back into the war years. I say was because, although I've no proof one way or the other, it's long been my assumption that Price is dead. Certainly he hasn't published anything for over two decades, though I see that, according to Existential Ennui, he was still with us in 2011.
The Night's Black Agents connection comes early in the Modes section when, in talking about the Dust option, Hite says: "To instead recreate the gritty, low-fi espionage world of Anthony Price or Charles McCarry ... you can de-power the game into Dust mode," and he goes on to give advice as to how this may be done. "In Dust mode," Hite continues, "the vampires and their agents will be far more challenging and powerful in open combat. Design, and encourage your players to design, operations that avoid shootouts unless the team has overwhelming positional advantage, or some surprising ace in the hole."
If there's one thing Price is especially known for, it's the cerebral nature of his plots. At one point you may be convinced beyond all hope of reason that the supposed villains - they might be KGB, they might be agents of another foreign power - are secretly after the gold of Troy, or a list of names from an old Napoleonic warship, or hidden treasure from the English Civil War, only to discover that the truth of the matter is something altogether different. In his Other Paths To Glory, much depends on the fate of a regiment that went missing, almost to a man, on the Somme in 1916; yet it's not until the final chapters that the reader discovers why these soldiers' deaths were - are - so important in 1974.
Double and triple agents are commonplace. One of the enduring tropes of Price's works is Debreczen, the alleged school for spies in East Germany, whose sole purpose was to create people for very deep cover operations. They weren't supposed to deliver secrets; their role was to exist, and keep on existing for as long as possible, rising in the ranks of whichever organization they had penetrated. Imagine an Intelligence agency, a corporation, a political organization where the leadership wasn't merely corrupted, but had been - from the very beginning - working for the Other Side. Audley and his fellow spies were never entirely sure whether Debreczen had even existed; merely the threat that something like it might exist kept them awake nights. Because once you introduce that sort of thing into the mix, anything's possible; the people you report to, work for, vote for, might not be who you always believed them to be.
I can see that kind of setting working very well in a Night's Black Agents game. The whole idea of double and triple crosses, agents who might have been working for the enemy all along, ought to be meat and drink to a Vampire Spies game. If anyone's wondering what a Price setting might be like, I offer the following guidelines:
1. Live by the sword, die by the sword. Very few agents in Price's world get far on guts and guns. In the early chapters of October Men, Italian agent Villari is set up as the perfect bravo, swaggering, assured, lethal. Yet when the bullets fly, it is not he but his more bookish and cowardly partner, Boselli, who emerges triumphant; even if it is, at least in part, by complete accident. Those who get into gunfights often die young, in Price's world.
2. Nobody is who they seem to be. The Brigadier in The Hour of the Donkey is anything but, the dentist in Our Man in Camelot is no dentist, and Paul Mitchell, reluctant hero of Other Paths to Glory is no soldier, but that's all right, as his partner Nikki MacMahon isn't really from the French Ministry of Tourism. When in doubt, always assume someone's lying about their true identity. It saves time.
3. Everybody's lying about their intentions, as well as their identity. In The Labyrinth Makers, Price's best known novel, the prevailing assumption throughout the book is that the Russian top brass who wants to visit England is doing so because he thinks that, as a result of a recent discovery, the true location of the gold of Troy, lost during the War when Germany fell, is about to be discovered. Then we're led to believe he's after something else, only to discover that what he was after might not have been the important thing at all. Or perhaps it really was Trojan gold ... But the smoke and mirrors is integral to the plot; it's not like a Bond novel, where the true identity of, say, Auric Goldfinger is known pretty much from the opening pages, and the point of the narrative is to discover how he intends to burgle Fort Knox. Goldfinger has many faults, but concealing his intentions isn't one of them. He wouldn't last long in Price's world.
4. The stakes are both unbelievably high, and potentially meaningless, all at the same time. In one novel, which I shall not name, the entire scheme - which has already claimed several lives and is about to claim many more by the climactic moments - is undone by damp and wet. Another hinges, in its final moments, on ancient grenades. Perhaps we're finally about to find out what happened at Debreczen, or perhaps we're about to find out that Debreczen never existed in the first place. The illusion of Trojan gold, in the first novel, is repeated again and again; fantastic treasures, that somehow turn into worthless lead.
5. Relationships are key. Most of these novels take place before widespread computerization, and the reader's left with the impression that Price himself didn't think much of technology. For his agents, it's all about who you know, the expert you can turn to for that much-needed clue. The trading of favours comes up again and again, in Price's world. Even knowing your enemy puts you one step ahead; October Men opens up with an Italian spymaster recognizing, in a few fleeting seconds, an old foe at a busy airport terminal, and in more than one story David Audley's knowledge of that preeminent Russian archaeologist and spy, Panin, saves the day.
At any rate, that ought to be enough to get the Director thinking. I shall need to read Night's Black Agents a few more times to see if it really is for me, but early results are promising!
Night's Black Agents, for those who don't know it, is an RPG horror setting that presumes vampires exist, and are at the heart of a gigantic, possibly world-spanning conspiracy. You know this because, until recently, you were working for them; but, having discovered your masters' true identity, you're now more of a liability than an asset. Vampires hate loose ends, so if you want to keep on breathing, you need to do something decisive, and fast. It's a spy game at its heart, with you as the spy, betrayed by your former masters, and now on the run.
Spy games are exactly the sort of thing Anthony Price was fond of. Price, a former journalist, turned to novel writing in the early 1970s and, over time, put together nineteen intricately crafted stories. His two favorite characters were David Audley, a former tanker in World War Two who gets recruited for Intelligence work in the aftermath of the war, and Colonel Butler, also a soldier, who is recruited at much the same time by the same person, and who eventually rises to head of the Intelligence branch that Audley works for. Most of Price's work was set in the 1970s and 80s, with occasional glimpses back into the war years. I say was because, although I've no proof one way or the other, it's long been my assumption that Price is dead. Certainly he hasn't published anything for over two decades, though I see that, according to Existential Ennui, he was still with us in 2011.
The Night's Black Agents connection comes early in the Modes section when, in talking about the Dust option, Hite says: "To instead recreate the gritty, low-fi espionage world of Anthony Price or Charles McCarry ... you can de-power the game into Dust mode," and he goes on to give advice as to how this may be done. "In Dust mode," Hite continues, "the vampires and their agents will be far more challenging and powerful in open combat. Design, and encourage your players to design, operations that avoid shootouts unless the team has overwhelming positional advantage, or some surprising ace in the hole."
If there's one thing Price is especially known for, it's the cerebral nature of his plots. At one point you may be convinced beyond all hope of reason that the supposed villains - they might be KGB, they might be agents of another foreign power - are secretly after the gold of Troy, or a list of names from an old Napoleonic warship, or hidden treasure from the English Civil War, only to discover that the truth of the matter is something altogether different. In his Other Paths To Glory, much depends on the fate of a regiment that went missing, almost to a man, on the Somme in 1916; yet it's not until the final chapters that the reader discovers why these soldiers' deaths were - are - so important in 1974.
Double and triple agents are commonplace. One of the enduring tropes of Price's works is Debreczen, the alleged school for spies in East Germany, whose sole purpose was to create people for very deep cover operations. They weren't supposed to deliver secrets; their role was to exist, and keep on existing for as long as possible, rising in the ranks of whichever organization they had penetrated. Imagine an Intelligence agency, a corporation, a political organization where the leadership wasn't merely corrupted, but had been - from the very beginning - working for the Other Side. Audley and his fellow spies were never entirely sure whether Debreczen had even existed; merely the threat that something like it might exist kept them awake nights. Because once you introduce that sort of thing into the mix, anything's possible; the people you report to, work for, vote for, might not be who you always believed them to be.
I can see that kind of setting working very well in a Night's Black Agents game. The whole idea of double and triple crosses, agents who might have been working for the enemy all along, ought to be meat and drink to a Vampire Spies game. If anyone's wondering what a Price setting might be like, I offer the following guidelines:
1. Live by the sword, die by the sword. Very few agents in Price's world get far on guts and guns. In the early chapters of October Men, Italian agent Villari is set up as the perfect bravo, swaggering, assured, lethal. Yet when the bullets fly, it is not he but his more bookish and cowardly partner, Boselli, who emerges triumphant; even if it is, at least in part, by complete accident. Those who get into gunfights often die young, in Price's world.
2. Nobody is who they seem to be. The Brigadier in The Hour of the Donkey is anything but, the dentist in Our Man in Camelot is no dentist, and Paul Mitchell, reluctant hero of Other Paths to Glory is no soldier, but that's all right, as his partner Nikki MacMahon isn't really from the French Ministry of Tourism. When in doubt, always assume someone's lying about their true identity. It saves time.
3. Everybody's lying about their intentions, as well as their identity. In The Labyrinth Makers, Price's best known novel, the prevailing assumption throughout the book is that the Russian top brass who wants to visit England is doing so because he thinks that, as a result of a recent discovery, the true location of the gold of Troy, lost during the War when Germany fell, is about to be discovered. Then we're led to believe he's after something else, only to discover that what he was after might not have been the important thing at all. Or perhaps it really was Trojan gold ... But the smoke and mirrors is integral to the plot; it's not like a Bond novel, where the true identity of, say, Auric Goldfinger is known pretty much from the opening pages, and the point of the narrative is to discover how he intends to burgle Fort Knox. Goldfinger has many faults, but concealing his intentions isn't one of them. He wouldn't last long in Price's world.
4. The stakes are both unbelievably high, and potentially meaningless, all at the same time. In one novel, which I shall not name, the entire scheme - which has already claimed several lives and is about to claim many more by the climactic moments - is undone by damp and wet. Another hinges, in its final moments, on ancient grenades. Perhaps we're finally about to find out what happened at Debreczen, or perhaps we're about to find out that Debreczen never existed in the first place. The illusion of Trojan gold, in the first novel, is repeated again and again; fantastic treasures, that somehow turn into worthless lead.
5. Relationships are key. Most of these novels take place before widespread computerization, and the reader's left with the impression that Price himself didn't think much of technology. For his agents, it's all about who you know, the expert you can turn to for that much-needed clue. The trading of favours comes up again and again, in Price's world. Even knowing your enemy puts you one step ahead; October Men opens up with an Italian spymaster recognizing, in a few fleeting seconds, an old foe at a busy airport terminal, and in more than one story David Audley's knowledge of that preeminent Russian archaeologist and spy, Panin, saves the day.
At any rate, that ought to be enough to get the Director thinking. I shall need to read Night's Black Agents a few more times to see if it really is for me, but early results are promising!
Sunday, 3 February 2013
The Value of Knowledge
I've talked about books within the context of a Trail of Cthulhu campaign once or twice before, arguing for the concept of fake Mythos, and describing a potential Mythos tome. This time I want to talk about books that aren't Mythos related at all, yet still have their uses in a horror setting.
There are many possible Mythos tomes out there. The main Trail book mentions seventeen, but even a little research will uncover dozens more, many of them invented by scenario writers specifically for a particular campaign or one-shot. This is undoubtedly useful, yet - particularly in the early stages of a campaign - I'd warn against resorting immediately to Mythos tomes.
When I discussed the first story arc I mentioned that it should be almost entirely about the setting, and the characters' role in that setting. If it is Arabesque, then everything the protagonists encounter should reinforce Arabesque tropes and ideas, and so on. Naturally this means that, in general terms, the kind of horror the protagonists will be coming up against is low-key. Something to whet the appetite, not something capable of crushing the life out of the protagonists.
What this means in terms of Mythos tomes is that, realistically speaking, there probably oughtn't to be any; at least, not in the first arc. At most, perhaps there are rumors, or one or two fakes floating around; but anything that dangerous probably oughtn't to be on offer, at least not until the very end of the arc.But if there are no Mythos tomes, then what kind of tomes are there? After all, the protagonists run a bookshop; they can hardly be expected to ignore books.
My response is that there are books, and plenty of them; ordinary, honest books, like the Thousand and One Nights (I'm having a lot of fun with that in my own campaign), which don't in themselves have Mythos knowledge, but can be used as part of an ongoing plot. In some cases borrowing from the plot can be useful; imagine a book scout, sniffing for valuables, who happens to re-enact the voyages of Sindbad the Sailor in the process. Or perhaps a regular customer to the shop, who begins to take on attributes common to Ali Baba, complete with meddling rich brother and a hidden treasure. In that setting, the books could become a kind of divining tool, not unlike the way the bible is used in M.R. James' The Ash Tree. What is troubling our dear friend, and why is that book mysteriously open to that very page in which Ali Baba discovers his dead brother, killed by the Forty Thieves?
But this kind of indirection may not suit every campaign. There are more direct methods. The Dust-Things described in the Bookhounds can be very useful, in that they take on attributes of the books they mimic. Imagine what a collection of, say, R.L. Stevenson's works might become, with one or two of those hidden away in its leaves. Would the bookstore become the haunt of pirates? Or would the Dust Things lead the protagonists on to discover the New Arabian Nights, and the Suicide Club that still exists, hidden somewhere in London?
There is one other alternative, and that is to have a mundane book become magical. There are plenty of precedents for this; black magicians often wrote their copies of the Grand Grimoire out in longhand, on the presumption that their personal energies, poured into the creation of the book, made the item magical. There's potential for almost anything to become an occult text, under the right circumstances.
And with that, let me tell you about the Books of Knowledge.
Printed by the Grolier Society in London, this Children's Encyclopedia was intended to teach - and mould - young minds, and included such topics as nature, science, famous books, golden deeds, poetry, and - most important, this - Things to Make and Do. I happen to have a 1911 collection of these inherited from my great-grandfather, which is how I know about them; I used to read them when my grandmother looked after my brother and me. Physically, the collection is a set of sixteen thick hardback volumes, mostly black-and-white with the occasional color plate. The stories are intended to be edifying, though often in a gruesome sort of way; I'm looking at The Story of Little Red Shoes as I type this, which ends with headstrong Karen pleading with a headsman to cut off her perpetually dancing feet rather than her head; her eventual reward is to be taken up to Heaven by an angel. And all this, mark you, for the crime of wearing pretty red dancing shoes on a Sunday. One line in particular strikes me as being strong meat for young minds: She told the headsman what she had done, and persuaded him to cut off her feet, and away they danced in the red shoes across the moor. Now there's the stuff of nightmares! But I digress.
I want to talk about Model Town.
It is a very troublesome thing to build a real town, the opening paragraph reads, and it costs a great sum of money. There is the land to buy, streets to make, sewers to lay, architects, builders, clerks, foremen, and workmen to pay. Then inspectors and surveyors come to see that the work is being done as they like. So that not many people have ever built a whole town alone. We will try to do so ...
It goes on to describe how you, with your inquiring young mind, sharp knife - but what boy or girl is without a knife? - pencil, glue, and a quantity of cardboard, can construct wonders. It starts with a model of Shakespeare's birthplace, but it doesn't stop there. There's the Fire Station, a Farm, the Chapel and its Parsonage, Shops, Villas, the Church, and, of course, the Gasworks.
It is some time since we made any new buildings to add to Modeltown, the last section reads. The last building we made was the Gasworks. We could go in indefinitely ... If we have made all the buildings, or even a considerable number of them, we ought to have become rather expert at the work of cardboard modelling. But, after all, we have only followed instructions and plans. There is, however, a much higher ability than this. There is the ability to think things out for ourselves, and invent ...
In game terms, the Books of Knowledge in themselves are non-magical; perhaps poring over them will net the reader 1 temporary pool point History, Art History, or similar. But there is one very special collection, previously owned by Henry Worthing, and poring over that will earn the reader 1 dedicated pool point Craft (model buildings), and 1 point Occult, Magic, or Megapolisomancy, reader's choice.
Henry Worthing, born 1901 in India, where his father was a colonial administrator, was a happy child, but wild in his habits. The Books, bought for him by his doting mother, were the only things to truly capture his imagination, and he spent hours and days working on his Model Town, which he patterned on what he imagined London to be like. Then he was sent Home shortly before the War started, to live with his aunt and uncle in the real London. He soon discovered that all was not as he had imagined; his relatives grudged him his keep, often told him that he was only there on sufferance, and was a wicked child, for any number of reasons. His parents' deaths soon afterward only compounded his sorrows; though there was a little money, his aunt and uncle kept most of it for themselves. Meanwhile Henry stayed up in the attic, working day and night on his Model Town. Now he had the actual London streets and buildings to work with and, piece by piece, he put together something extraordinary.
Then, one night, Henry vanished, never to be seen again. It was claimed at the time that his relatives, worried that their bilking of his inheritance was about to be uncovered, got rid of the boy, but a thorough investigation came to nothing. The Books - and Henry's Town - were soon got rid of, presumably destroyed.
Yet, claim some Megapolisomancers, Henry's London proved remarkably difficult to truly kill. Some of his models have turned up in the most unlikely of places, and are prized by those who use the bricks and soul of London in their magic. But the books are the real prize, and more than one practitioner has spent many hours picking through obscure bookstores, hoping against hope that they'll stumble across one of the precious volumes with Henry's hand-written notes in the margins.
As to where Henry himself ended up, practitioners of the Art theorize that Henry managed, one night, to vanish into a London of his own devising, becoming one with the city he loved so much. Perhaps his aunt and uncle could shed some light on what really happened, but his uncle is - supposedly - dead, and his aunt now lives far out in the countryside.
It's said she has a horror of cities.
There are many possible Mythos tomes out there. The main Trail book mentions seventeen, but even a little research will uncover dozens more, many of them invented by scenario writers specifically for a particular campaign or one-shot. This is undoubtedly useful, yet - particularly in the early stages of a campaign - I'd warn against resorting immediately to Mythos tomes.
When I discussed the first story arc I mentioned that it should be almost entirely about the setting, and the characters' role in that setting. If it is Arabesque, then everything the protagonists encounter should reinforce Arabesque tropes and ideas, and so on. Naturally this means that, in general terms, the kind of horror the protagonists will be coming up against is low-key. Something to whet the appetite, not something capable of crushing the life out of the protagonists.
What this means in terms of Mythos tomes is that, realistically speaking, there probably oughtn't to be any; at least, not in the first arc. At most, perhaps there are rumors, or one or two fakes floating around; but anything that dangerous probably oughtn't to be on offer, at least not until the very end of the arc.But if there are no Mythos tomes, then what kind of tomes are there? After all, the protagonists run a bookshop; they can hardly be expected to ignore books.
My response is that there are books, and plenty of them; ordinary, honest books, like the Thousand and One Nights (I'm having a lot of fun with that in my own campaign), which don't in themselves have Mythos knowledge, but can be used as part of an ongoing plot. In some cases borrowing from the plot can be useful; imagine a book scout, sniffing for valuables, who happens to re-enact the voyages of Sindbad the Sailor in the process. Or perhaps a regular customer to the shop, who begins to take on attributes common to Ali Baba, complete with meddling rich brother and a hidden treasure. In that setting, the books could become a kind of divining tool, not unlike the way the bible is used in M.R. James' The Ash Tree. What is troubling our dear friend, and why is that book mysteriously open to that very page in which Ali Baba discovers his dead brother, killed by the Forty Thieves?
But this kind of indirection may not suit every campaign. There are more direct methods. The Dust-Things described in the Bookhounds can be very useful, in that they take on attributes of the books they mimic. Imagine what a collection of, say, R.L. Stevenson's works might become, with one or two of those hidden away in its leaves. Would the bookstore become the haunt of pirates? Or would the Dust Things lead the protagonists on to discover the New Arabian Nights, and the Suicide Club that still exists, hidden somewhere in London?
There is one other alternative, and that is to have a mundane book become magical. There are plenty of precedents for this; black magicians often wrote their copies of the Grand Grimoire out in longhand, on the presumption that their personal energies, poured into the creation of the book, made the item magical. There's potential for almost anything to become an occult text, under the right circumstances.
And with that, let me tell you about the Books of Knowledge.
Printed by the Grolier Society in London, this Children's Encyclopedia was intended to teach - and mould - young minds, and included such topics as nature, science, famous books, golden deeds, poetry, and - most important, this - Things to Make and Do. I happen to have a 1911 collection of these inherited from my great-grandfather, which is how I know about them; I used to read them when my grandmother looked after my brother and me. Physically, the collection is a set of sixteen thick hardback volumes, mostly black-and-white with the occasional color plate. The stories are intended to be edifying, though often in a gruesome sort of way; I'm looking at The Story of Little Red Shoes as I type this, which ends with headstrong Karen pleading with a headsman to cut off her perpetually dancing feet rather than her head; her eventual reward is to be taken up to Heaven by an angel. And all this, mark you, for the crime of wearing pretty red dancing shoes on a Sunday. One line in particular strikes me as being strong meat for young minds: She told the headsman what she had done, and persuaded him to cut off her feet, and away they danced in the red shoes across the moor. Now there's the stuff of nightmares! But I digress.
I want to talk about Model Town.
It is a very troublesome thing to build a real town, the opening paragraph reads, and it costs a great sum of money. There is the land to buy, streets to make, sewers to lay, architects, builders, clerks, foremen, and workmen to pay. Then inspectors and surveyors come to see that the work is being done as they like. So that not many people have ever built a whole town alone. We will try to do so ...
It goes on to describe how you, with your inquiring young mind, sharp knife - but what boy or girl is without a knife? - pencil, glue, and a quantity of cardboard, can construct wonders. It starts with a model of Shakespeare's birthplace, but it doesn't stop there. There's the Fire Station, a Farm, the Chapel and its Parsonage, Shops, Villas, the Church, and, of course, the Gasworks.
It is some time since we made any new buildings to add to Modeltown, the last section reads. The last building we made was the Gasworks. We could go in indefinitely ... If we have made all the buildings, or even a considerable number of them, we ought to have become rather expert at the work of cardboard modelling. But, after all, we have only followed instructions and plans. There is, however, a much higher ability than this. There is the ability to think things out for ourselves, and invent ...
In game terms, the Books of Knowledge in themselves are non-magical; perhaps poring over them will net the reader 1 temporary pool point History, Art History, or similar. But there is one very special collection, previously owned by Henry Worthing, and poring over that will earn the reader 1 dedicated pool point Craft (model buildings), and 1 point Occult, Magic, or Megapolisomancy, reader's choice.
Henry Worthing, born 1901 in India, where his father was a colonial administrator, was a happy child, but wild in his habits. The Books, bought for him by his doting mother, were the only things to truly capture his imagination, and he spent hours and days working on his Model Town, which he patterned on what he imagined London to be like. Then he was sent Home shortly before the War started, to live with his aunt and uncle in the real London. He soon discovered that all was not as he had imagined; his relatives grudged him his keep, often told him that he was only there on sufferance, and was a wicked child, for any number of reasons. His parents' deaths soon afterward only compounded his sorrows; though there was a little money, his aunt and uncle kept most of it for themselves. Meanwhile Henry stayed up in the attic, working day and night on his Model Town. Now he had the actual London streets and buildings to work with and, piece by piece, he put together something extraordinary.
Then, one night, Henry vanished, never to be seen again. It was claimed at the time that his relatives, worried that their bilking of his inheritance was about to be uncovered, got rid of the boy, but a thorough investigation came to nothing. The Books - and Henry's Town - were soon got rid of, presumably destroyed.
Yet, claim some Megapolisomancers, Henry's London proved remarkably difficult to truly kill. Some of his models have turned up in the most unlikely of places, and are prized by those who use the bricks and soul of London in their magic. But the books are the real prize, and more than one practitioner has spent many hours picking through obscure bookstores, hoping against hope that they'll stumble across one of the precious volumes with Henry's hand-written notes in the margins.
As to where Henry himself ended up, practitioners of the Art theorize that Henry managed, one night, to vanish into a London of his own devising, becoming one with the city he loved so much. Perhaps his aunt and uncle could shed some light on what really happened, but his uncle is - supposedly - dead, and his aunt now lives far out in the countryside.
It's said she has a horror of cities.
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