Mist & Shadow, to me, is very inspiring. With all the intrigue, conspiracy, secrecy, and conflict between and within the factions, there is a ton of design opportunities that can be made. Overall, the game gives me a feel of an MMO that is currently being developed called The Secret World (The Secret World is set in the modern world, where players are a part of one of three rival factions who understand that urban legends, myths, and other fantastical things about the world are actually true.). Also, I feel that this being set in WWI gives the game a lot more depth and also a new twist on games that can be considered similar. Not only would there be faction differences between the League and the Consortium, but also there can be ties to historical alliances and nations which allow for even more conflicts even among the two factions the game is based around. There are layers upon layers of conflicts that can be weaved into the setting.
Genre
Theme
The Oracle of Munich - "The end is coming for us, Dear Friends, and we shall fight to the last to grasp our slipping sand."
For millennia, the beings of mystery, myth, and legend had orchestrated events of mankind to their liking. As earth crept towards what would later be called the Great War, the Oracle of Munich had foretold that the end of their control was coming soon as mankind was becoming more aware, more knowledgeable, and more capable of choosing his own fate. So it was that the League of Mists was formed to try to remake the world and to stave off the end of the Old Times. Man's stumble towards Awareness was not just a simple progression and evolution of his collective knowledge. Instead it had recently been developing faster and faster due to new discoveries by a loose organization of scientists, politicians, church leaders, and soldiers known as the Shadow Consortium. A few years ago, members of what eventually became the Shadow Consortium had discovered the League of Mists and had pieced together their intent to destroy the world and rebuild it as they desired. With so many agents of the League of Mists spread throughout the world's governments, the Shadow Consortium's only choice was to fight a hidden war that would determine the future of the world and the fate of mankind.
In Mist & Shadow, the truth is almost never what appears on the outside but is instead several layers deep within intrigue, subterfuge, and obfuscation. While magic and the supernatural is still outside the conventional knowledge of mankind, members of the Shadow Consortium work day and night to unlock the power of the unknown in combination with technology. The League of Mists pushes the gears of war forward as millions of men, women, and children die in a conflict that will remake the world. How it will end for sure is yet to be seen for even the Oracle of Munich now admits that the circumstances of her prophecy have changed.
While Mist & Shadow is marked as a fantasy setting, it also has strong historical elements as well as some horror influences.
Background
League of Mists
While the League of Mists has only existed for about thirty years, its members and their ancestors have been influencing and controlling mankind from behind the scenes for millennia. When the Oracle of Munich made her prophecy about the end of the Old Times, word spread quickly throughout the Satyr Court, the wizard guilds, and the rest of the loose community of supernatural and fantastic beings hidden throughout the world. Leaders of the existing organizations and other powerful beings came together to form the League of Mists in order to create a plan by which they could stop the Awareness of Man and recreate a new world in a form that would continue their power.
The plan that they created involved using their combined influence to create diplomatic conditions by which the world's strongest powers would be plunged into war. Their agents crafted the Franco-Russian alliance to bring France and Russia together in mutual defense. At the same time, members of the League of Mists worked behind the scenes in Germany and Austria-Hungary to craft the agreements that would create the Central Powers. When Germany's Count Alfred von Schlieffen drew up his plan to invade France by way of Belgium in violation of the treaties protecting Belgium's neutrality, he guaranteed the entry of Great Britain into the war when the League of Mists put the final stages of their plan to trigger war in motion.
Shadow Consortium
In 1911, a group of Italian geologists looking for oil deposits in Libya during the Italo-Turkish War discovered an ancient ruin that had been uncovered by blowing sands during a recent sandstorm. They called to the platoon of soldiers that had been protecting them to help open the entrance to what seemed to be a small structure in order to discover its secrets. When they were finally able to gain entrance, they discovered a library of histories in every written form of the last three thousand years. While the histories did not cover every event of those years, it seemed to be written in exactly the same writing and form whether it was on papyrus or newer paper technology. In other words, it was all written by a single individual. When the scientists returned with the documents to Italy to share them with historians, they were able to translate the documents to learn that they were autobiographical logs of the activities of a creature calling itself Sehetepibre. Sehetepibre had been working on behalf of other powerful masters to manipulate and control human events as far back as ancient Egypt, and he had been in contact with other beings such as faeries, dragons, and wizards in order to share resources and collaborate on projects to direct the course of mankind.
With the Sehetepibre Chronicles shared secretly and covertly with only the most trusted colleagues around the world, many significant thought leaders were convinced that everything in the world was not as it seemed. When a demon-looking creature was caught spying on a meeting of the early members of the Shadow Consortium as they discussed the significance of the documents, they knew that the truth was not what human society believed about itself. The problem with going public with their newfound knowledge was that the supernaturals would work to destroy it and discredit the Shadow Consortium's members. They instead decided their best strategy would be to fight secretly against them to limit their influence and expand their knowledge of what they had discovered was the League of Mists. Their struggle was accelerated when Shadow Consortium agents discovered that Germany intended to follow the Schlieffen Plan in its quest to prevent an imagined encirclement by the other powers. The Schlieffen Plan guaranteed that war would come to all of Europe and would result in millions of human deaths.
The Current Situation
While the Shadow Consortium attempted to keep Germany from invading Belgium and France, the League of Mists arranged the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo. The Shadow Consortium is now forced into more obvious action to try to bring an end to the war quickly and to destroy the web of influence that the League of Mists has built. The scientists of the Shadow Consortium have been working day and night to research artifacts and other items recovered from captured and killed members of the League of Mists. Both factions race to recover lost knowledge and locations abandoned by members of the League of Mists in the past.
Antagonists & Conflict
The first conflict for PCs to struggle with is that there is no black and white. There are members of the League of Mists who manipulate mankind for their personal power and benefit, and there are other members of the League of Mists who have protected mankind against disease or famine. There are members of the Shadow Consortium who hunt down and violently kill all supernatural creatures they can find, and there are other members who simply want to shield mankind from the League's influence. The League of Mists is definitely on the darker gray end of the spectrum since their overall goal is to destroy the world as it is in order to create a new world which they can better control. You could also argue that they are on the darker side of gray for their manipulation of mankind. The Shadow Consortium is more on the lighter side of gray, but they are also not unwilling to use the Great War to their advantage if it means they can break the manipulation and control of mankind. For example, if the destruction of a village that is under the influence of a powerful spirit is the only way to end that spirit's influence, there are members of the Consortium that will advocate that solution - with other members vocally opposing it.
Conflict with the other faction
The PCs would be working on behalf of their faction in order to gain an advantage over the other faction. They may also be attempting to infiltrate or gather information about the other faction in order to further the goals of their own faction.
Conflict with their own faction
Since both factions are gray to some extent, the PCs might discover a member of their own faction that is going about the faction's goals in a way that they do not support. They must then decide how they will react and what they will do to stop that other member.
Special Features
Magic
While magic is very prevalent within the League of Mists, the Shadow Consortium has some of its members working to unlock its secrets to mundane mankind. A single cabal of wizards defected from the League of Mists in disagreement with how the war was proceeding, and they had managed to transfer a significant amount of knowledge and skill before they were killed by assassins sent by the League of Mists.
There are many supernatural creatures within the League of Mists, and they include creatures of myth and legend as well as creatures that have never been seen or imagined. Some of these other creatures are intelligent, but many have been created recently to be the mindless servants of the League's members.
A secret organization within the Catholic Church that is part of the Shadow Consortium has been able to take relics recovered from the League of Mists and unlock hidden power. This hidden power manifests itself as miracles in the hands of the devout but can also consume the unfaithful in flame when used improperly.
Technology
The League of Mists sees technology as a tool by which mankind can more quickly bring about his own demise, but the Shadow Consortium has been combining the magic they have uncovered with new technology that draws on that magic. While most of these combinations have been to enhance the technologies of mankind, some have been used to create brand new weapons, devices, and machines.
PC Role
In Mist & Shadow, the PCs will typically be in one of three primary roles: an agent of the League of Mists, an agent of the Shadow Consortium, or an individual outside of either group.
Agents of the League of Mists
In this role, the PCs could be working to stop the efforts of the Shadow Consortium. They could be also be sent to check on other members of the League of Mists. On occasion, agents of the League of Mists might be sent to try to find supernatural beings that have not yet been recruited into the League.
Agents of the Shadow Consortium
Members of the Shadow Consortium could be working on rooting out agents of the League of Mists that have worked their way into governments and militaries. They might also raid League of Mists safehouses in search of useful artifacts to advance the capabilities of the Shadow Consortium or prevent the League of Mists from using them. On occasion, they might also be sent to kill particularly powerful members of the league.
Independents
Humans and supernaturals alike might become aware of the League of Mists and the Shadow Consortium but choose not to join either one of them. They might be interested in building their own wealth and power, or they could simply be intrigued by the events behind the scenes. Their activities would likely work against one or both of the factions, and they could potentially be part of smaller groups that have decided to stay independent or neutral.
History
- Member for
- 2 years 25 weeks
Setting Concept Score
While I do enjoy the historical bent this brings, the concept of magic fading as Man brings reason and science to the world has been done many times. The resistance against such is also not a very exciting or original topic for me, though every iteration of it does bring some new views and somewhat interesting characters to it. I think the quality of the concept's writing is excellent and shows a good grasp of the historical period, though I don't find the actual subject of the theme to be very inspiring or original.
I think Mage, Vampire, Shadowrun, Wraith (edit: and Hellboy - thx for the reminder Matt!) and a variety of other settings have taken this theme up, and while I do enjoy the kind of historical fun one can have with WW I and the relevant time periods, I just don't feel any truly innovative settings or incredible inspiration from this variation.
This is basically an amalgamation of Nothing New in the West and Harry Dresden. And I think that two large organisations are too few. Several dozen small organisations, loges and circles would be more interesting because the setting would then become richer in its aspects.
After a few afterthoughts, I must say that I am steadily less convinced of this setting's qualities. There is much overlapping with the usual suspects of mystery games - namely the world of darkness and Cthulhu and just taking the by now stereotypic conflict of supernatural parties into a different era which is not even that different if one takes Call of Cthulhu into account is not enough to make this too innovative either.
This setting reminds me of WoD and the Sombalonist in places, but with a heavier emphasis on factions and influence in the regular human sector. One factor that I find especialy intriquing is the blending of Tech and Magic, which I think could be a very catchy concept if rules for it were designed well. How crunchy is this setting though (combat heavy to RP heavy?)? All in all, I think this is a very solid system that has generic elements that make it more aplicable to a broader audience while having unique elements to draw people in. I do suggest that rules be specialy tailored to a great extent or out right created to take full advantage of the various aspects of this setting if chosen.
Edit: Looking back on it, I like this setting more and more each time I read it. Also, since as Mike suggested it can blend RPing and Combat together well (and range from being very leathal like CoC, to more or less the leathality of OWoD), I have to say I think this would be a great setting for our first project.
I like the feeling of possibility from this pitch.
I'm getting a positive 'Hellboy' vibe from this, so that's where I'm jumping off imaginatively in trying to think of what kinds of characters and NPCs might inhabit the world, and the mix of real-world dirty military grit with fantastic pockets of dark fairy tale wonder. I dig it.
One reason that my Inspiring rating is not a little higher is because that with all the emphasis on shades of gray and not knowing all the angles - well, I still don't think I fully understand all the forces at work. Of course, perhaps that is the intent. But for designers and GMs, we'd need to pin down some more concrete/explicit relationship webs (even if such webs are temporary, or only partially true), otherwise development will be difficult. Also, I don't know much about WWI, so that would require some education for me before I'd be able to generate content.
Also, I think the title could be adjusted. 'Mist and Shadow' certainly conveys the themes of deception, intrigue, and whatnot, but doesn't give any hint at all about the key ideas of "World War I" and "fantasy creatures" or whatnot. Maybe add a subtitle? Or shift the mistyness and shadowyness to the subtitle... The title should at least give some hint about the core concepts. I'll leave it up to the creator.
After doing the background research on World War 1, I became even more convinced that World War 1 is ripe for an RPG treatment. Mix together espionage and spy-thriller potential with fantasy, and I am really excited about writing for this setting.
I really like this. Conspiracy Theories are a fun past time, the first world war and the time around it is a personal favorite of mine, and the lack of moral absolutes is pretty much a prerequisite for a setting's quality. It reminds me somewhat of the Shadow War in Gurps: Voodoo, but in a good way.
Actually, you had me at "the Satyr Court"; everything afterwards was just bonus.
Comments
Sub-faction - The Sleeper Wakes
This is a rough idea for what a sub-faction might look like. This example is a sub-faction of the Shadow Consortium:
H. G. Wells did not just use a creative imagination and a sharp mind to write his works as in 1912 he was approached by members of the Shadow Consortium to help them understand the artifacts they had recovered. While he was no occultist, he was a science fiction author who could perhaps connect the dots for them to unlock the power of the artifacts that had been found by the Shadow Consortium. Wells was one of the strongest proponents of trying to prevent the Great War, but the effort to prevent the war ultimately failed.
Once the war started, Wells consistently argued that Man must not be used in the battle against the League of Mists. After all, Man was an unwitting servant of the League's members. To organize against more violent and militaristic elements of the Shadow Consortium, Wells started the Sleeper Wakes group to lobby against open warfare with the League of Mists and to instead support fighting the League directly without involving the entirety of human society. He believed that mankind was about to evolve beyond Personages where it would no longer have to rely upon men and women who were as much pretending to be important and powerful as they were actually important and powerful. All men and women had the potential to be great, and he believed that when the League of Mists was defeated all men and women could seize that opportunity.
How crunchy is this setting (combat heavy to RP heavy?)?
In terms of combat vs. RP, I think that the system could support either direction alone or both directions at the same time.
One thing that is not set in my mind yet is whether a classic fantasy system focused around acquiring wealth and power (aka d20) or a newer system that is more focused around plot and action (like Savage Worlds or Fate) would be better.
In a D&D sense, PCs could be interested in advancing their own wealth and power, gaining experience from defeating foes or overcoming obstacles. Sure, they might be heroes, but wealth and power are things that all D&D PCs gain over time because those are fundamental aspects of the system.
In a Savage Worlds or Fate sense, game sessions could be focused around action in a pulp fiction style like Indiana Jones or Hellboy. In those systems, the PCs are heroes by their actions and perhaps stunts that they manage to pull off against the antagonists or to disarm a ticking bomb.
While I could decide one of these right here and now, I think the choice could be more decided by what system is chosen should Mist & Shadow be the winning concept. If the Swarm wants to develop a D&D-style game, then D20 would be better. If the Swarm wants to develop a more action-adventure or pulp style game, then Savage Worlds or Fate would be better.
In all these systems, there are a lot of opportunities to add our own mechanics to give the system a feel specific to our setting. As examples, with D20, there are feats, spells, magic items, technology, creatures and more. For Savage Worlds, there are Edges, Hindrances, creatures, equipment and other things that we can use to make the system feel right. Some of this is debate for the next stage, but I wanted to put these things out there.
Rules
If the game is set in one of the bloodiest wars of history, known for great number of people died pretty pointlessly for a few meters of muddy ground, I think it is pretty mandatory that a rule system for a game set in this era is highly lethal, to reflect the reality of trench warfare and the thousands of deaths and injured. Something simple yet deadly would be the best choice, I guess.
Responses to reviews
Re: Title
I think a better title is warranted. One idea I had was "Mist & Shadow: The Great War for Mankind" or something similar.
Re: Shades of gray
Yes, the factions are shades of gray, but I do think that the the Shadow Consortium is more towards the lighter side and the League of Mists is closer to the dark side. For the lighter side, think about the US in WW2 and the internment of Japanese Americans. For the darker side, think perhaps of Mussolini and making the trains run on time. ;) My apologies for using WW2 references, but more people know those than WW1 references...for now.
Re: World of Darkness
There are definitely parallels here, but I do not see a one-to-one type relationship. In the WoD, the different supernaturals tend to keep to their own - vampires with vampires, werewolves with werewolves, etc. You could certainly do a WoD chronicle that captures the Mist & Shadow idea, but it would be quite a strong break from the standard WoD plot points and themes.
World War I
While listening to Pulp Gamer today, they mentioned that there is a real lack of World War I games out there. I absolutely agree which is why I chose World War I as the backdrop and historical time period for Mist & Shadow. World War I has a lot of the features of traditional fantasy settings in that there are noble families that rule most of the countries. When you add in that World War I was the end of many of them, you have some significant potential for conflicts beyond what actually happened in history. It really is ripe for an alternative history/fantasy treatment.
WW I
There is one uestion I have: How much focus do you want to put on the historical accuracy? It is right that there isn't much gaming material on the first world war (I think there is a CoC sourcebook / adventure on it, but I am not sure if this is true or just a campaign from someone I heard about) but I think that the effect of taking the era as a background is somewhat lost if it turns out to be a mostly fantasy game with a few occassional name droppings.
I have studied history (and am going to teach it in school) so I have at least basic knowledge on the topic (I wrote a term paper once about Tirpitz and the German Fleet) so from the research side, I can give my input on those things.
Historical accuracy
In my mind, the history is the same up until the war breaks out. Once the war starts, the Shadow Consortium realizes they are going to have to be more active. They are still not openly trying to broadcast to humanity that they are under the control of hidden masters, but they are having to take more actions to try to keep the League of Mists from being succesful.
In the end, I think we would end up with our own version of the Great War, but it would have "real world" history as a foundation. To give you an idea, I recently read "The Guns of August" and am currently reading HG Wells "War and the Future" for research to give the setting a historical feel but not necessarily to be 100% accurate.
review by mikeb
Did you just review your own setting?
I mean not that I disagree with it, I like this setting and all, but that seems a bit odd to me.
Yes
Yes, and in the last message out to everyone, I encouraged concept authors to post a review of the favorite of their own concepts.
While the originality and writing quality are pretty subjective in one's own assessment of one's own concept (why I just picked scores of 3 for those), the inspiring part is important because it indicates a level of commitment to work on developing the setting. While I like my other concept After the Flood, it doesn't really inspire me to do a lot of effort writing if it were to win. However Mist & Shadow has me really jazzed to develop, and I wanted to capture that by ranking up the Inspiring category for it. There's also an aspect of the site that keeps from completely gaming the system - a setting doesn't get an aggregate score until a minimum number of reviews is reached.
Again, I highly encourage concept authors to choose their favorite of their own setting concepts and post a review.
That's understandable
I can agree with your argumentation and it's very understandable that you are thrilled about this one - I found it pretty cool myself.
The problem that I see is, though, that it is too easy to give the full 5.0 points to your own setting to toss off the vote, and those writers who are more honest about their settings's strengths and weaknesses - like yourself- are going to be disadvantaged by this.
And I think you underestimated your own writing skills with this.