Pre-SLNES II: Descendants of Aadora

(working title)

Hello again. Yeah - I was going to do a steampunk NES, but decided eh. I'll just do another fantasy NES. So this will be a fantasy NES.

However, it is a bit different. This NES is primarily story-driven. Actions should be done through stories, however brief or lengthy you wish. The NES is quite visual (in terms of relying on the map) because of the concept. However, I do not want the map to be the backbone, even though it is a vital reference point. Stories should be the meat of this experiment.

This is a preNES, so it is for discussion and perhaps for you to post some initial thoughts on what you might want to play as.

So what will this NES be about, exactly?

This NES will take place on "The Land". The Land was given to the descendants (you) of Aadora, the Entity of Sea and Space. This all-powerful being, not male or female nor god or goddess, created a plane of existence and cemented it with the seas.

As players...

You will play as a descendant of Aadora, which means you are basically an all-powerful god or goddess. This should not be a generic god or goddess of something (i.e. - I don't really want "God of Water" or "Goddess of Love"). No. Rather, the descendants of Aadora are complicated beings who have personality traits that interact with the Land. You might play this NES as an evil god, which means you will probably specialize in destruction and chaos. What the little people on the surface of the Land consider you as is not up to you, though. They might perceive you as something completely different than what you intend.

I'm getting ahead of myself, though. The first stage of this NES will be Geomancing. I have a map made (I will be using the full map of Ethereal from my previous NES). However, this map is completely blank aside from oceans and major lakes/waterways, which Aadora has proclaimed to be her dominion (though coasts and coves are the dominion of the gods). I have placed numbers randomly on the map, a total of 37. They are broad, and not in any kind of borders, because things will be pretty free-flow here and not too board-gamey.

Concepts

The first stage of this NES will be to form terrain within the world. This is pretty self-explanatory. Oh, you want a forest in "Territory 1", so be it - but maybe someone wanted some mountains in "Territory 2", so they merge a bit and the map begins to form in that way. I haven't hammered out details on gameplay yet, but I imagine that players can only geomance terrain adjacent to terrain that has already been geomanced. This will encourage interaction between the deities and create interesting situations.

Once terrain has been suitably crafted by all of you (and I might even allow you to change what other players have already made - but haven't decided yet), life forms will begin to come into the world. So basically, you will be describing ecosystems for the terrain chunk you designed. Like I said, I'll be linking adjacent terrains and telling you what the average temperatures are of territories and then you can start to craft life forms from that. They will just be animals and other creatures. Remember, this is a fantasy game, and not a realistic experiment in the creation of a biologically-accurate ecosystem.

Once that stage has finished, humans will start to arise. Only humans. But their personalities will differ depending on what deity has dominion over where they settle, and what is going on there. You can feel free to torment or help these humans as much as you want. Civilizations will arise. And we'll continue from there.

Gameplay

First of all: No orders. None at all. Everything in this NES will be completely transparent and available to all players. Updates will essentially be the map for the first few turns. I am taking time from my life to start this NES, and I honestly don't have time for the kind of updates I achieved in SLNES I. So, the updates will be purely visual, and then perhaps a list of important notes. It is up to you, as the player, to describe what is going on in this world. I am here to host the game, create the world as you describe it, and moderate any conflicts. The most significant part of my presence will be telling you what temperatures are and linking territories so that you can design life and later civilizations from that information.

This is not a board-game NES, though the visual element is important for obvious reasons. Despite that, stories of all kinds are required, because to do anything you must post in-character about it. This can be one line, or an epic tale.

When it comes to forming terrain: The first person to post about forming a territory will basically start everything off. Then you must alter territories adjacent to ones that players have already posted about. As I said before, I might allow players to screw with other player territories.

Players will only be able to change 1 territory per update in the beginning. This will cause you to focus on your little piece of the world. Everything you describe may not work out. If you want too many features in your little piece, it may become too chaotic and fail and blow up in your face.

Oh, and you can name whatever features as you wish. If a feature, such as a mountain range, runs from one territory into another (like I said, there are no borders - so it is very free-form): It is really first-come, first-serve. Names of features will eventually become your dominion, rather than generic territory numbers. We'll evolve with the world!

Aadora

Aadora will breathe life into everything you make and "it" (not a he or she) is basically allowing you to do what you are doing. I am thinking that Aadora might throw some strange things into the world every now and then to make things interesting.

Religion

Having been a religion major in addition to the visual thing, I want not only physical terrain/life to develop, but also ideas. Perhaps your deity has a specific idea of time and space that he/she wishes to impose upon the world.

Deity Profiles

If you want to play, here is a template for what a deity profile will look like:

Name of Deity (player)
Personality:
Ideology:
Other Info:

It's that simple for now. Remember you are all brothers and sisters.

Oh yeah, and here is that map with those terrain numbers:

Name of Deity: The King of the South (SouthernKing)
Personality: Peaceful to all Southerners, hatred against the Northerners
Ideology: I will support the southern half of the land. The people/sentinent beings of the south deserve to rule the land. I will give them anything necessary for Southern domination.
Other Info: Likes fried chicken and Mello Yello, if anyone wants to give them to me.

I'll have to look it over and decide, but after the death of the previous NES on my turn of entry I am a bit skeptical.

Amon Savag (Amon Savag)
Personality:Aggressive
Ideology:Militarist
Other Info: The followers of the Great Amon are a very fragmented group. Constantly battling one another to gain the favor of their god. When Amon chooses from among these warring clans a champion and bestows upon him certain favors, it is behind him that the others who worship him rally to bring devastation upon others.

To be continued. pre-NESes are dumb, so just copy and paste this when you start your NES, you dumby.

Sorry, Luckymoose. But that NES was way too much for me to handle at this time. I hope you understand.

Also I should note that territories can be as vague or descriptive as possible. I will allow territory areas to have many different types of terrains.

An ambitious plan Starlife. I've never seen a pure story GodNES before. Hopefully this will not die young as many GodNESes do. I already know what I'm going to be but it might take a while to write it down.

If I might offer some constructive criticism, I would suggest that you clearly delineate what is within the power of our gods and what is beyond them to prevent confusion and accusations of meta-gaming. Can we create life for example? How far? Microbes or 50-foot long dragons? What about sapient life? Can we create it or can we modify humans into what we want them to be? I realise this is a story NES and much will be decided as we go along but GodNESes tend to die due to player confusion over sort of level of powers they possess and sometimes a lack of will from the mod to help straighten matters out, which I know will not be a problem with you.

I look forward to playing and will see if I can think of anything else to suggest.

Vertinari118 said:

An ambitious plan Starlife. I've never seen a pure story GodNES before. Hopefully this will not die young as many GodNESes do. I already know what I'm going to be but it might take a while to write it down.

If I might offer some constructive criticism, I would suggest that you clearly delineate what is within the power of our gods and what is beyond them to prevent confusion and accusations of meta-gaming. Can we create life for example? How far? Microbes or 50-foot long dragons? What about sapient life? Can we create it or can we modify humans into what we want them to be? I realise this is a story NES and much will be decided as we go along but GodNESes tend to die due to player confusion over sort of level of powers they possess and sometimes a lack of will from the mod to help straighten matters out, which I know will not be a problem with you.

I look forward to playing and will see if I can think of anything else to suggest.

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Hello Verti, it is nice to see you.

I mentioned in the OP that I would have certain phases of gameplay. The first phase is purely terrain creation. The second phase is animals/life. And the third phase is humans and civilizations.

I am not familiar with GodNES, but I will say that I am being rather open-ended with this game. That is not to say I will encourage or condone meta-gaming. But it is a game in which players are in the role of deities. In the long run, it will be me who makes the notes per update on what is going on. If a god creates a 50-foot dragon during the "animals" phase, that is fine with me. That dragon will meld into the overall ecosystem of its region, and perhaps spread to other regions. However, other creatures designed by other deities will respond to the presence of this dragon, even without the guidance of players. And that dragon very well could backfire on the god who created it.

It is really a game of creation, and then witnessing what your creations do. You can interfere with them, but sometimes it will be too late. Imagine a mad scientist creating frankenstein.

Phase I, or the Geomancing Phase will be purely about changing terrain and creating that aspect of the Land. That doesn't mean geomancing will end during phase II or III necessarily, but I have to post an Update indicating that geomancing may occur and which territories it may occur in. It won't be this free-for-all unmoderated god mess.

Phase II, or the Creatures Phase, will be about creating animals and innovative plants or whatever else that you feel is necessary for the terrain you have morphed.

Phase III, or the Civilizations Phase, will be about humanity. Yes you can interfere with them. You can destroy cities, or help them. You are a deity, after all.

What would be the advantage of creating a 50-foot dragon, though? You imply that by doing such a thing, someone would be power-gaming. But what will that dragon do for them? They can create it, but they can't control it. It isn't like a "unit" or anything. There is nothing like that. Deities will have no direct control over anything. They can simply interfere with it or interfere with a village or interfere with a volcano. That is all. Controlling is not really possible, though. So the outcomes of your actions are really up in the air, and the story is focused around pure creativity.

Just as I mentioned before, you might want to appear a certain way to the civilization arising in your territory. But those people might view you as something completely different. They might ignore you completely. Or they might worship you endlessly. But you can't actually control them. You can't say they are moving from Point A to Point B. You can say that you are flooding their farmlands, or that you are burning the forest. You can be as destructive, or as benevolent, as you wish.

Ororot (erez87)
Personality: An emotionless ruthlessly logical being. Has interested in nothing but it's own pure wishes. Cold and uneasy to deal with.
Ideology: Logical and emotionless thought.
Other Info: Ororot is nothing but a pure thought. It has no emotions and has no interest in others unless they are in his way. As part of his being he is also a god of a special crystal that constantly spreads out and grows, forming a landscape covered by crystal. Barren lands fit to nothing. His essence spreads out of gigantic crystal beacons from which the crystal landscape grows.

Put a grand crystal obelisk-like beacon in 21 and begin spreading out crystal to create the land of crystal. Allow other players to make geographic formation on 21, but have the crystal constantly grow and cover anything grown in deep crystal.

erez87 said:

Ororot (erez87)
Personality: An emotionless ruthlessly logical being. Has interested in nothing but it's own pure wishes. Cold and uneasy to deal with.
Ideology: Logical and emotionless thought.
Other Info: Ororot is nothing but a pure thought. It has no emotions and has no interest in others unless they are in his way. As part of his being he is also a god of a special crystal that constantly spreads out and grows, forming a landscape covered by crystal. Barren lands fit to nothing. His essence spreads out of gigantic crystal beacons from which the crystal landscape grows.

Put a grand crystal obelisk-like beacon in 21 and begin spreading out crystal to create the land of crystal. Allow other players to make geographic formation on 21, but have the crystal constantly grow and cover anything grown in deep crystal.

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This is PreNES. We aren't playing yet. But I like your profile.

Name: Ch@0s
Personality: Magnanimous. Random.
Ideology: Randomness
Other Info: Doot de doo, the world's such a fun place to be in. See, look, grass is green, sky is blue, the water's blue, that fish's blue, that bird's blue... Oh hmm. Maybe that is too boring. Oh I know, I'll paint the sky pink! And that tree's too boring, so I'll turn it so that it bears fruits of lobsters and fishes and bananas. And banana is too boring on it's own so I'll change it again to a type of fish. And that bird needs to be pink and wearing a dress too.

I'll turn that river into a river of cheese...NO! I'll turn that moon into cheese and have bunnies live on it.

Oh the seas will boil with magma and have... Magmafishes? Magmadogs? Magma something live in it. I'll change the whole world!

Oh, and... Shoop da woop.

As usual, Seon - simultaneous interest and laughter.

I'm so very tempted... It's just me and storyneses...

thomas.berubeg said:

I'm so very tempted... It's just me and storyneses...

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Can be as brief or lengthy as you want.

Okay cool. Most GodNESes are a battle for supremacy and thus knowing what you can and can't do is rather important. If its more of a Spore-style game, that concern is more or less irrelevant.

Oh, what the hell.

Name: Woololo
Personality: Irresponsible, anything for pleasure, Party animal, generous
Ideology: Life is boring unless there is a party going on. and, even then, the party can always be made funner by the addition of... Well... the party can ALWAYS GET BETTER
Other Info: Soon

Edited my post. Also, we need to have an actual name for the continent we are on, just my thought.

SouthernKing said:

Edited my post. Also, we need to have an actual name for the continent we are on, just my thought.

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Will do.

I think I'm going to go ahead and get some real rules and the main thread up. Even if there are only 5-10 players, we can begin shaping the world right away.

Name: Kthulo
Personality: Insane
Ideology: He would help a little village by making the land able to grow more crops, at a faster rate. He then would precede a year later to cause the volcano near the village to erupt, killing the ones he helped before.
Other Info: Soon

This does look interesting. I may have to join...we'll see.