Degrees of Darkness
Degrees of Darkness
After Session One of our Coriolis Mercy of the Icons campaign, I am now into double figures when it comes to Darkness Points. So what? And what are Darkness Points anyway (also known as DP)?
So in Coriolis the GM “earns” DP as the players push their rolls by praying to the Icons, there are other ways, but this is primarily how the GM gets them. The GM then uses this meta currency to mess with the players; triggering events, powering NPC special abilities, jamming their guns, etc.
In many circles, it is seen as a broken mechanic, as the GM quickly builds up a very large pool of DP.
So it got me thinking, let’s track more than just the points, let’s figure out which Icon the players prayed to and which player prayed and were their prayers answered?
From session one (and it is easy in a VTT to extract this) I now have those stats, The Dancer is ahead, having been prayed to three times and our Data Djinn, Ariel is also ahead having both prayed the most and failed the most! All set out in a nice little heatmap, that allows the players to ruminate and puzzle as this grows. GMs, paranoia is your friend!
So how am I going to use this? I honestly don’t know, but as a GM, I’m less interested in messing with the players and more interested in how the Icons influence the setting, the players, their nemesis, and their benefactor. I think this could lead to some interesting diversions in the story path.
Take The Dancer, the Icon of Inspiration and Perseverance. But there is a darker reference, to The Beast, could this be the true nature of mankind? Does The Beast start to manifest itself as The Dancer is invoked, does it become angry and seek out who calls it (as the players pray to this icon) and who calls it unnecessarily (as rerolls fail)? Perhaps the Players don’t encounter this at the start of the campaign, but later on when their ship crash lands on a remote jungle planet.
