Role-Playing With Style.
Introducing the Dark Fantastic
by Chris | Jun 23 2008
The dancers kick and sway, their hands tracing elegant lines of invisible poetry through the smoke. Julie Samedi spins another song, her pale fingers keeping the dancers shuffling to her rhythm. On top of her box, Noir transcends the crowd, her taut muscles rolling under vinyl as she twirls. From her vantage, she can see Louis holding court for a gaggle of fans, raised on the schlock horror films he called home for years, and his niece Emalice, sitting at the bar, talking to Dennis, the bartender. Colt Bastien’s leaning into the DJ booth now, giving Julie a copy of his latest single while his retinue waits adoringly.
Around them, creatures skulk unnoticed by the humans, hidden and hunting. Vampires stalk their prey on the dance floor, changelings trade favors and other arcane things in the corner, their fae features hidden from the common eye. But these chosen, each of them marked by the journey they have taken, can see it all. They can feel the thrumming current of magic pulsing under the music, and they can bend it to their will.
This is Avalon.
This is the Dark Fantastic.
We just started a new Mage: the Awakening campaign, set in a slightly customized version of the World of Darkness. The content is almost entirely the same, it’s just a different style. The same film shot by a different director. I’ll be posting the setting as we go, and a look at how the game develops as we go, though I’ll be holding some things back until they don’t affect my players anymore, since Eloy, Kat and Frank are all in the game and read the site. :P
This is the text I gave my players:
The World of Darkness
In many ways, the World of Darkness is our world. People hope and dream and work in much the same manner as they do in reality. But this is our world seen the twisted lens of a stylish madman. The volume is turned up. Yes, people like us exist, but they are faded things compared to the elegant and vibrant and terrible and deadly things that stalk the alleys and nightclubs of the city.
Differences of the Dark Fantastic
The Dark Fantastic plays up the supernatural aspects of the World of Darkness to an even greater extent. Vampires, Mages, Werewolves, Changelings and other things coexist in overcrowded cities with mortals who remain largely ignorant of their existence. The various breeds continue to slip by unnoticed even while competing with each other for territory and power, hiding among the mortals that unknowingly provide them with sustenance or support.
New Randstad
The Dark Fantastic is set in the fictional city of New Randstad, in the northeastern United States. New Randstad is loosely based on an amalgam of New York City and Prague.
The real Randstad is a conurban metropolis made up of four cities: Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam and Utrecht, the four largest cities in the Netherlands. Like Randstad and New York City, New Randstad is made up of a number of boroughs that were once independent cities of their own.
Randstad means, literally, Edge City. Once placed on the very edge of civilization, New Randstad has grown and adapted to being on the cutting edge. It has gained a reputation as a cultural center, thanks to the thriving theater district and the varied museums and libraries, as well as a place of learning, thanks to the New Randstad University. The city council prides itself on the city’s place in the world.
But the original meaning of the name still resonates for the supernatural breeds who call the city home. New Randstad is the location of a nexus, called a Verge by mages. Once per month, the Verge pulses, and the skin between the worlds becomes thin. This is both attractive and dangerous to the shadow breeds that inhabit the city.
The Concord
Each shadow breed has its own “governing” body, to adjudicate between its people. The vampires have their prince, the changelings their courts… but the potential for inter-breed conflict is too high, and the consequences of a breech of the breeds’ codes of secrecy are too harsh. The Concord is a council of representatives from each breed, intended to allow for peaceful coexistence between the various communities hiding beneath the human radar.
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“I come here often. I close the shop and just walk here. My niece often comes with me. When my wife, Madeline, was still with us, she would come with me. Maddy would always talk about how the Avalon was like a big studio sound stage. She won an Oscar, you know, for Best Art Direction. She was a very talented lady.”
(Takes a sip of his single malt scotch)
“I got my start back in the early ‘70s doing soap operas. Even today, I can tell you that that was some of the hardest work I’ve ever done as an actor. The schedule was grueling and when it came time to renew my contract I let the writers write me out. I moved on to minor roles in various movies most of which are imminently forgettable. Still, I was working and having a good time.”
“I met Madeline at the wrap party for “Teenage Vampires From Outer Space” down in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She was down there on vacation from New Randstad. It may not have been exactly love at first sight but it was certainly love by the third date. I asked her to marry me and she said yes.”
(Takes another sip of his scotch)
“Our life in Hollywood was filled with work and friends. She sure had the talent. As for me, well, I knew from the start of my acting career that I would never be in the same league as Jack Nicholson or Tom Hanks. I made it a point to accept roles that I liked. I’ve done a number of “B Movies” in my time. Some,like Teenage Vampires from Outer Space, were schlocky fun...but others like “Dark Streets” showed, I think, that just because a film has a low budget doesn’t mean that it has to have low quality...and yes, most of the time I was typecast as the Villain...there were a few years where it seemed like I wore a German army uniform so much that I felt like I could’ve qualified for a pension from the Wehrmacht.
Unfortunately, Hollywood became more and more corporatized. No matter what you were working on it always seemed as if some damned suit was right there at your elbow. Maddy and I had both had enough so we sold the house and moved back here to New Randstad.”
“We opened our shop which we called “The Cabinet of Curiosities”. Within a year, I was offered a television gig as the host of a horror movie show. That’s right, I was Gaston LeGhoul, owner of “Mansion of Movie Madness”. Every Saturday afternoon between 2 and 4 I would hold court while showing a seemingly never ending parade of turkeys. Fortunately, I was able to slip in some good stuff. I believe that I was the first one to introduce Guillermo del Toro to this media market. I showed his “Chronos”. A terrific move. My show ran for four years. The ratings started to sag and I felt that it was better to go out on a high note so I claimed that due to personal reasons that I was putting the show to bed.”
(Finishes his scotch and sets the glass down gently on the table)
“We were busy with the shop. Maddy was planning on teaching a course in set design at New Randstad University. She even got me interested in teaching a course on the history of horror movies. Business was booming. It was a magic time...Then she died.”
“She collapsed one afternoon at the shop. I called the paramedics but it was too late. She died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. The doctors said it was a cardiac aneurism. All the magic went out of my world.”
“That was little over a year ago. Now though, I feel something changing. The magic seems to be coming back. It’s a different magic to be sure...but it is still magic.”