The Moreau Bug

At any time I am working on one to three blog post to go up here. I tend to bite off more than I can chew, so usually only one in three get through enough drafts that I post them. 

This morning, I woke up just wanting to do some setting design from scratch. I am sure this will come as a surprise to no one, but I love Word Mill Publishing's Mythic GME 2nd edition. One of its delightful features is a collection of tables covering all kinds of specialized topics. I also love the RPG Fate Core, and I haven't played it in ages, so I will use these two tools to make the game.

Starting with a blank index card and the Mythic GME app (available for Android devices and Kindle tablets), which has the same collection of tables as the Mythic GME 2nd Edition, I started creating word pairs until I had enough that my imagination took over. Take a look at what came up, and I will tell you how I used them to create the quick setting for a Fate Core game.

Adventure Tone: Modern/Hard
Magic Item: Danger/Average
Spell Effects: Pain/ Attack
Description: Mechanical/Soft
Location: Frightening/Helpful
Characters: Animal/Bold
Action: Change/Illness

You can see by the choices I made in picking out tables, I had some idea of what I wanted. Primarily I wanted a world that was Adventurous and Magical.  Everything else just rounded out those details.

Now we start with the Mad Libs. 

The first thing that caught my eye was the first thing I randomly selected: Modern/Hard. So I decided the setting is essentially just the Earth we all live in everyday, but set on hard mode. That reminded me a bit of the old World of Darkness games, as they were made in the 90s, so I tucked that insight away just in case it would be useful later. 

What we have is a world is a lot like our own, but people have it a bit rougher. There is a stress not found in the real world that makes it harder. That dragged my eyes all the way down to the bottom: Change/Illness. That tells me there is some sort of illness in this world, which can change people, and that this is constantly at the back of everyone's mind. 

Looking at the Characters results I see Animal and Bold suggested that the illness has something to do with animals and is probably spread by biting, much like rabies. Paring that with Change/Illness we start to get a clearer picture. Spell Effects being Pain and Attack finished the picture. 

There is a magical illness that causes people to, quite painfully, take on animal aspects. It is passed on by the bite by someone already carrying the illness. I immediately thought of one of my favorite books, The Isle of Dr Moreau, and though the process was quite different in the book, the name of the game was right there: The Moreau Bug. 

Still, the list isn't used up. Description gave me Mechanical and Soft, which reinforced my idea that most people depend on a lot of technology in their lives, that probably leaves the no need to "toughen up".  So most people have cars, cell phones, computers, Fit Bits, tablets, and everything in their house is mass produced. 

Glancing back up to Magic Item Description, Dangerous/Average, I think this falls into an either/or category. Objects of power and wonder exist, but tend to a danger even to experts. But, object made by magical craftsmen can be picked up at high end department stores, and no one thinks much about it. 

Magic casters are as rare as microchip designers, but magical items are as common as microchips. There is probably a touch of magic in the process of making all high end goods, even if it is just to make clothing resistant to tears and dirt or a common glamor on your, very expensive, electric toothbrush that really does cause you smile to gleam. Truly powerful magic items, like clips with endless rounds of bullets, or miracle cures used by specialist, exact a cost on the user, which most wouldn't find worth it. The very rich can afford to pay someone to take those chances. The very poor maybe desperate enough to try it themselves, but most people stay well away from powerful magic items.

The last couplet on our list is Locations: Frightening and Helpful. From this I extracted the last thing I needed for the game. Those who contract the Moreau Bug and can't treat it or hide it are forced out to the edge of society. (I believe this is where we will find our protagonist).

In these wilderness camps and urban slums, they either lose control and degenerate, or they form communities that, while ruled with tooth and claw, are still useful. It is somewhere to fit in, if you are afflicted, and somewhere to recruit if you are willing to take the chance. (Maybe there is a touch of Shadowrun in the flavor of this game as well.)

Ok, that setting looks good, but we haven't yet cracked open the Fate Core rule book. 

Looks like this maybe a two or three part article. 

If you read this far thanks for that.

W.D.