A lot of anime has that kind of dreamworld quality. Kino No Tabi, Angel's Egg, the end episodes of Texhnolyze... I'd like to play in a scenario like that, but it requires a very good GM.

>>1724358
And very good players!

Paprika is another anime with thank kind of reality-warping effect. It might be interesting to have the real world and a 'mind-scape' world that the players can slip in and out of.
Policemen come to arrest you? Slip into the mind-scape and attack the copper's sense of conviction (which may have a weird and powerful form).

>>1724390

There is No Spoon is a simple system for playing Matrix games that seems like it could be adapted for playing games in a dreamscape setting. Take a look at it, OP.

>>1724390
Then there comes the involentary slip, or going in without realising until too late - such as knocking on the apartment of a contact only to have it opened by a 7-foot-tall stuffed hippo...

Plot twist: everyone is fucking dead and have been since the campaign began. The reality they're in currently is a Gehenna like purgatory in which they must reach enlightenment in order to leave. It constantly shifts from realistic and familiar to dreamlike or nightmarish. But you can't leave it unless you fullfil some kind of quest that enables you to reach Nirvana.

>>1724404
I had a look at it a while ago, thanks. It's a good suggestion. Possibly Nobilis too, although I'm not very familiar with the rules.

>>1724419
Maybe they don't even have to be dead, the world searching for paradice before they die and their memories drift apart. Imagine if it became a comercial process, like in Grim Fandango..? What would people do to achieve enlightenment if it could be brought or stolen?

>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzRqIswQbUE

I love the guns in that video! Perhaps you could have different colour blob-bullets with the opposite colour in the colour wheel acting as defence against it.
Guy shooting red at you, you'll be fine if you're waring a green cloak.

>>1724493
Outlaw-star style? Awesome.

This setting needs to be investigated further.

>>1724419
Gantz.

I'd prefer a Blame setting, really. The dual realities of digital and 'base' mixing in odd ways was very cool.

Somehing tells me this has been done before. I've never played a campaign like that, but such a setting probably exists (no, it's not Planescape).

Sounds like a bitch to GM but potentially epic if done right.

>>1724619
Old Changeling?

>>1724619
Surrealism is a long standing mode or genre in Art, Liturature, Film and Music. I can even name a few Video Games.
Wouldn't surprise me if its appeared for P&P.

I like the idea of warping the world through perception or bending it by will-power to certain aims, I suppose the majority of conflicts would be trying to out-imagine your opponents.

Matrix on acid. Count me in.

>>1724667

Same. So, the PC's are all thrown into this dreamworld without understanding who, what or why they are?

I'd like to think the entirety of this game could be done on propositions. The player says what he wants to happen in a given situation: 'I'd like an escape route from the bad-guys!" And the GM supplies that but not in a way that you'd expect, or adding in further complications, characters or puzzles.
Perhaps you'd have a single stat that, if high, let you get what you described with minimum fuss, but if low would cause all sorts of problems if it happened at all!

>>1724688

You need a "mental" stat that represents how your understanding of the dream world lets you manipulate it, and a "physical" stat to withstand threats, such as monsters, surroundings and other enemies.

>>1724680
Perhaps some of the players where born in the dream-land? Or have had years of contact?

Hmm.. it'd be interesting to explore the idea that entering the dream world is either unremarkable in the real world (like going on a buisiness trip, a police investigation, or holiday), or outsiders are commonplace in the dreamworld and the inhabitance don't make any big deal out of it - you're just a foreign tourist who doesn't speak the language of surreality very well.

>>1724688
You'd have break that stat up or it would literally be the only stat that matters.

If someone can run an SA game well I'll declare them best GM of the world.

>>1724703

If you're born in dreamland you'd be more susceptible to its mindwarping effects, but you'd have more understanding of the "rules" of the environment, however random or malleable they would be. How to simulate that?

>>1724692
The Phenomenal, the world of emperical substance, reality
The Nomenal, the world of the Mind, the meta-physical

>>1724706
The GM might put more weight on your suggestions in scenes in the mind-scape, whereas the reality-born Police Officer PC you're guiding towards his suspect would have more wieght in the physical world.
Perhaps the GM might allow you to interact with objects and people that, to another player, might appear innanimate or illogical. Wereas in the real world (how real is it?) being able to manifext yourself physically might be an isssue - a ghost-like presence?

Of course outsiders slowly go mad.

>>1724714

Or simply have their memories stolen away to be sold to the highest bidder.

ITT, there is no spoon.

>>1724711

So the PC's would either be Phenomenal-born humans that for some reason are drawn to interact with Noumena (due to madness, paranormal events, drug experiences, emotional trauma, etc) or Noumena that take it upon themselves to guide and help humans agains the tyrannical Powers that rule the dream? I like.

I like the idea of the mind-world not being all bad or madness-enducing. Just like here, it's filled with both tranquility and disturbance, great beauty and gritty secrets; grim darkness is only powerful when contested by light and peace.

>>1724721

Memories! Memories! Get your juicy memories here! Happy, sad, angry, sexy, we have all the memories your Mnemotube can handle! And for all you Soul Eaters, we have a few delicious ripe human souls! Hey hands off that one mister, no sampling allowed. Bid on them like everyone else. Intellects! Fresh intellects here!

>>1724725
Depends, it could be very much part of the real world and how things operate. I like the eariler idea of the real-world police having to chase criminals through surreal landscapes, interviewing suspects who are sapient stuffed-toys or Día de los Muertos skulls.

Perhaps people do get thrown inescapably into the void, but I like the idea of two worlds existing side by side and spilling over into one another; it's one thing to have a squid marching-band march down your corridor but another to have Coalition Forces attempting to secure Hearts and Minds in the turbulant City of Dreams, with M16s and M3 Bradleys

>>1724725
>the tyrannical Powers that rule the dream
Inverse Gnosticism? I like.

>>1724734
The idea usually goes that the other world isn't bad or malevolent but simply not a place where we mundanes are supposed to be and therefore harmful to us. Like going into outer space or deep underwater, we simply weren't made to go there.
Of course our own world isn't fit for the other beings too. I can imagine that it's too stagnant for them and they'll gradually become slow, apathic and eventually go in a coma.

>>1724705
excuse me but wtf?

>>1724751
>Coalition Forces attempting to secure Hearts and Minds in the turbulant City of Dreams, with M16s and M3 Bradleys

Good god that's awesome!

"Americanos! Americanos! Come come! Buy a dream or two of your homes!"

>>1724752
>>the tyrannical Powers that rule the dream
>Inverse Gnosticism? I like.
Isn't that... well, Gnosticism? God's a stupid child who foolishly made the confines of the physical?

The Demiurge? Creator of Matter?

Perhaps there would be a Creator of Mind? Neither of which are God, just an imperfect creator.

>>1724762
Hmmm?

>>1724767
But it's the dream world that's ruled by a tyrannical child instead of the physical world.

>>1724781
Ah, I see what you mean now. Inverse. Gotcha

I like it.

>>1724775

The creator of Matter and the creator of Mind aren't on the best of terms with each other. Each wants to rule the other, but their constant fighting brings no clear victory. Ripples of that fighting are felt by all who possess both Mind and Matter.

>>1724705
SA?

>>1724781
I'd think there'd be no outright de facto ruler of the dream world, who rules simply because of his nature. Indeed, politics, in a world where thoughts and ideals have form would be even more of a factor in the running of things.

Parliment of Dreams.

>>1724779

>>1724785
The physical world might have a change of seasons, the mental a change of emotions.

>>1724751
what about dream-world police chasing one of their own through Chicargo?

>>1724793
Ant tits?

>>1724813

Something like >>1724806
would be a nice dreamworld cop. They'd try to disguise themselves as material humans though, or just possess some mundanes.

>>1724786
Spirited Away. Not Something Awful. No one wants a Something Awful campaign.

>Parliment of Dreams.
Oh man. Instead of passing a normal law they could pass a law of nature or even logic.
>All in favor of abolishing Time, raise your hand. All opposed, raise your hand. Motion passed.

>>1724822
Forgot my attention whore.

>>1724822
"All those who wish to abolish hands, raise your hand." And thus democracy died in the dream-scape.

>>1724821
Would be awesome, playing as a mind creature in the physical world, on a mission, getting attacked for being freeky. Just as bad as being a normal human going into the mind.

Well, I'm the OP and, if I were to run this and invent some rules, would anyone be interested? Matrix meets Paprika cum Spirited Away via Kaiba

An example charsheet for this game.

>>1724841

I'm in. I'm so fucking in.

>>1724841

Until they started voting with their feet.

>>1724845
Hmm.. the game could use cards instead of dice. In fact, it could use both and maybe even straws (drawing the short one) and swap and change for different resolutions.

Rolling Dice, of different sizes.
Picking Cards, both normal and tarrot.
Drawing Straws
Flipping Coins

Magic Eight ball?

Any other ideas for gettting clandestine results?

>>1724868
So, a shitty result would mean I'm at the GM's mercy but a great roll/draw would allow me to narrate the scene?

>>1724868

Tarot cards would be a good way to generate characters.

>>1724841
TINS is perfect for this. Why invent a system?

>>1724875
Draw as many as you like and the entire group works together to define their meaning for your character.

I like the idea of the rules being as loose as concievably possible. Hard mechanics and number-cruching doesn't suit this game, rather it should be about the group discussing what would be cool and what would work to tell a story.
Hell, doesn't even need a turn structure for combat - just an impartical GM to make sure everyone has the same amount of time in the scene.

>>1724889
Because it's part of the fun?

TINS?

>>1724898

There Is No Spoon.

http://www.steved.org/rp_rules_tins.html

>>1724903
Ah yes, I remember it.

>>1724872
Well, you could have a system like Panty Explosion: You have a Rival and a Best Friend, and on a fail the Rival Narrates, and on a success the Friend Narrates.

Also, I like the idea of tarot based characters. Perhaps each card means something, and the players draw a hand, and use that to create their characters?

Sort of like, a sentence. You draw The Fool, The World, The Herophant, and the Empress, and that's what you're stats are. Someone else can figure out what each card does, and what I'm talking about. The cards could be based around numbers depending on how they're drawn (First card is Str, second Con, etcetera) or they could be card based, and abstract. Or, perhaps the cards are just drawn, and there's no stats, and it's something like "My card beats your card, this is how"?

>>1724841

That'd rule something hardcore.

just wondering, would the Gods of Ancient Man (The Egyptian, Norse, Roman (Greek) pantheons, Central american gods, etc.) exist as "physical" entities in the Mindscape? I'd assume they would, but in a diminished form, as they still exist in the human consciousness in a roundabout way. Fictional characters, too. Kraken and Mer-people in the oceans, Knights running around the countryside attacking windmills, all that jazz.

I could see some cool things happening if that was the case.

>>1724916
Interesting. Well, Tarot cards have specific meanings but perhaps what you draw can be interpreted in the group.

I like the rival/friend idea. I was thinking of using a deck of playing cards, red suits are positive and black a negative: getting high red is something wonderful and high black is terrible - low black is mild misfortune, while low red is happy chance.

As cards are drawn the deck gets smaller and smaller until by the end of the session it becomes easy to gusss what the likely results are going to be and judge whether you want to engage in conflicts.
If you're attempting something you're good at you might pick two or, if masterful, three cards and choose what you want.

>>1724926
I suppose all that exists in the human subconscious exists in a phyical formic way in the Surreality - so common motifs, such as religious characters and icongraphy, would be an every-day experience.

>>1724947
ooh, that is a nice idea. Does everyone in the party use the same deck, or does everyone ave a different one?

And, I should point out that the tarot in it's original form was a card game, and has suits and numbers (Four of swords, Ten of swords, Ace of swords). Perhaps splitting a deck into it's components would yeild better results (Diamonds for defense, Spades for attack, Heart for healing, and Clubs for... something?)

The Minor Arcana might be in keeping with the sort of theme of obscurity and phenomenon

>>1724947
Perhaps, upon taking a second or third card, instead of disgarding the ones you don't use you pass them on to other PCs or NPCs, possibly forcing them to take them in the case of enemies.

>>1725007
Well, considering all the ways there are in the world to get random results it could be quite possible to use a different way for each type of action - divination with an 8-ball anyone?

I think Abarat would be a pretty good example. It's just, well bizarre, magical and fantastic. Someday i'l run a game there.

But, i think these kind of games need bizarre game mechanics too. "Weather the cuckoo likes" -supplement for Over the edge has system where conflicts are solved via random words and then making poems out of them. It's worth buying.

>>1725007
In character creation you could draw from the Major Acarana two cards - one creates a possitive aspect for that character and the other a negative one. You can draw as many sets of two as you like - each positive trait balanced by a negative one.

>>1725033
ha ha! awesome!

Rhyme-off: who ever can't think of a sentence that rhymes with the one last spoken looses.

>>1725039

Not only Positive and Negative, also Material and Dream aspects would be covered. A Material-born character would have the Positive aspect card be the Material one. Vice versa for a Dream-born.

>>1725033
Poems? That's interesting. How does it work?

>>1725047
Is this open to anyone, or whoever the DM chooses?

>>1725047
Woah, that'd make for a really freeky meta-game feeling. Like playing MGS2..

Imagine, in the real world you just use dice for resolution, something we're all familiar with: in the dream-scape it could be anything! Interpreting Tarot, playing Blackjack against squid, rolling knuckes, rhyming-games, guessing which ball is under the cup!

James Jesus Arthur J. Christos, this would be a mighty game! Hell, duelling demons over a game of snakes and ladders!!

>>1724947
>>1724875
>>1724868
>>1724892

I remember trying to create a Persona-RP where characters are represented by a tarot card but it ended up being really complex then it should be.

>>1725060
I like the idea of a changing, fluid mode of play. I guess it would be open any time the GM wanted it to be - I could imagine getting the players to narrate a fight, the success of their attacks only based on how well the rhyme with the last speaker!

When and If the GM tells them what kind of verbal rules apply and do not at any given time is up to his own sense of bastardry.

>>1725072

But the Dreamborn roll regular dice in the dreamworld. Whereas in the real world they resolve situations with random stuff like rhyming or cards.

>>1725090
well, the problem with that is if your players are a bunch of tards

>>1725090
Exactly - and where the two worlds spill into one another perhaps their would be bizzare cross-overs such as the importance of the role not being the number shown but how the dice landed.

>>1725106
So, if a roll landed -where- you wanted it, it would be just like you planned it?

>>1725105

If your players are a bunch of tards you have a problem irrespective of the system.

So - would the dream-scape, the surreality, be a fantastical place populated by both the good and bad alike but one that is largely fixed and static: a place that could essentially be mapped and, however bizzare, could be traversed accordingly like Oz or the Spirited Away world?

Or would it be a enternally shifting place of mutating existance where nothing stays the same for more than a few minutes before undergoing a transition of some kind, like Wonderland and the dream-world of Paprika?

Or perhaps both, some stable places that are wildly exotic but reasonable in terms of space and causality and other expanses of twisting and shifting reality.

>>1725157

Both, I reckon. There are a few metropolises and the like, but most of the Dreamscape is fluid and wierd.

>>1725119
Well... saying that might... pissed them (off?)...

Fuck you, guy...

>>1725072
>>1725090
>>1725106
Wow.

Let players challenge dream beings and then play out the challenge. They can challenge a djin to a rhyming contest and bet their memories against a magic treasure. Or play a game of chance with a demon who has their friends captured. If they win they go free. If they lose the demon gets their soul. That kind of thing.

>>1725118
Essentially, or the number of dice within an inch of another is how successful an action would be.

>>1725157
Hey... I wouldn't mind helping out with the feel of the Dreamscape...

I've been thinking for a long time about making some surreal world like Wonderland or Neverland. Its been brewing in my mind since reading King of Bandit's Jing

>>1725192
Good to see you think outside of the box Mr.'oh-let's-use-TINS'. ;p

>>1725192 But if they lose the devil gets their soul.

The OP's idea sounds a lot like the Middlemarches and the Deep Wyld from Exalted.

>>1725198
Jing has just the right kind of feel I want. Welcome aboard.

>>1725205
That song is now running through my head...

Try JAGS Wonderland.

It's very much like what you're talking about, OP.

>>1725238
which song?

Achive! ACHRIVE!

>>1725387

That movie was so depressing. :(

>>1725233
In an hour I'll be home, and with my scanner and such. What "countries" does the place need?

I was thinking something like Abarat's islands of the clock, only with a few holidays thrown in. Stuff like that. Having islands based on Nightmares instead of dreams would be interesting. Sort of like The Nothing from Neverending Story.

Plus, while the Dreamscape might be Heffalumps and Woozles all hearts and dreams, the Nightmarescape would be things like blackness and ooze and horrid Cthulu-esque things.

>>1725401

I can see several poles. But to start with, don't divide it into Dream and Nightmare, since anyone who's ever dreamt knows that one can change into the other pretty quickly.

There's the Fairytale lands, where archetypes battle, fairies fly and monsters lurk. The Mundane, which represents the dream version of base reality, only somehow you always seem to find yourself naked at work and your boss is a fish. The Dirty, all writhing flesh and fantasies from the innocent to the perverse. The Thinkscape, where concepts come to life and philosophies wrestle each other.

>>1725401
I feel it would be wrong to say, 'here is peace of the munchkin village and here the grim darkness of the black forest!' - what the surreality is, in my mind, is the reflection of human consciousness given physical shape. As we all well know no thought can be truely pure, no concept untarnished by another - the surreality is peopled by dreams and ideas, and mapped by mood and view; there shouldn't be an island of nightmares and a city of sweet-dreams but metropolises where big-bad-wolves and talking lillies live side-by-side.

Perhaps it should be like holding a mirror over the earth instead of sky and where humans gather their reflections above them are the where the surreality becomes dense - filled with conflicting personalities, steritypes, icons and forms. Essentially cities on earth mirror cities in the Surreality, except in the dream their a milloin, million times more complex.

Where humans are more sparce there's more space for their ideas to float and roam and be individual. These are the wilderness of the Surreality, changing, shifting places filled with storms of emotion and desire and the humans who effect them move and live.

We could move this to the suptg rooms?

Why does the OP scare the living shit out of me?

Getting a bit of a Disgaea feel to the politics here - sure, everyone's a monster but we have to band together to from a constitutional government regardless.

Vote! Or I'll eat you!

Just throwing things out here, OP, or anyone else, stop me if I'm on to something, stop me if I'm not, and stop me if you can see a tangent forming and have something to add. But whatever you do, don't stop me now.

Canton of Orthodoxy
Chess pieces
"Watch"dogs. Newfags wont get this.
cards
mirrors
islands
time
riddles
wordplay, puns
recursion
childishness
children's fears

>>1725508
It's a surrrealist masterwork - that's what its meant to do.

So, the real and the surreal are inextricably connected?
Do all normal humans know this and it's now a part of life? Just a select few? No one but the players and some unfortunate mental patients?

Has the Surreality existed from the beginning of human consciousness or did it take shape after some dream-weaving technological wonder come onto the mass-market?

>>1725627
...I miss that book...

>>1725651
I can't even remember if I finished that book. All I can remember is that I liked Tock.

>>1725627
watsdis? Themes or locations?

>>1725651

Fucking book took me 7 years to finish. It's just one of those books you put down, fully intending to read, and you always get sidetracked 15 pages from the ending.

Along this same vein, OP, check out "Flatland"-- it's crazy.

>>1725678
both. I'm thinking the center island should be the Canton of Orthodoxy, trying to impose some semblance of law in such a world. And then there should be places that are spread out from that island, based around other things, like the Alice in Wonderland Card Soldiers and Chessmen, and Peter Pan's "Kids vs Pirates; 'I forget about them when I kill them'". And a little bit of King of Bandit's surreal gimmick towns, like Zaza and it's Masque Corrida, and the Eternal City of Reviva, as well as the town were love was forbidden.

This is the "This is from an Exalted Sourcebook" thread that no one noticed.

>>1725715
I really want a diverse multiculturalism to throw off attempts at classification: if the PCs can say 'ah, we're in the land of chess-pieces' things become familliar and comprehendable - breaking the sense of the surreal and displacing, and also limiting what the GM can pull from the hat.

Sure, I'd have armies of Cards and Chess pieces - but no kingdom of childresn toys. Rather they'd just be another ethnic group, as it were, in an ever-expanding internationalist phycho-opera.

Anko, try city-states rather than islands or sprawling nations - it's a good way of grouping ideas and themes into a single form but without pinning down any particuallar place and thus making it bland.

This thread is full of delicious win.

I hope to fucking GOD someone is archiving this.

>>1725817
Ah, I wasn't so much thinking "Land of Chess pieces" as I was, "Checkerboard Wasteland", where packs of wild "watch"dogs come out at night. Has anyone else in this thread read "The Looking Glass Wars"? I haven't read Seeing Redd yet, but that's another thing that should be inspiring to this.

Also, should this get finished anytime soon, my idea of mapping out this world has given me an idea of a character to play: A cartographer, in a world where cities and continents often change places, and travel is sometimes instantaneous and unnerving.

>Anko
uh... actually, I'm Edward, that's just a joke left over from yesterday's Sailor Moon thread.

>>1725817
If I was going to draw a map - I'd get a piece of paper, draw a grid and then tear, stain, stitch, crumple and smudge the page until it was filled with incomprehensible marks and visceral wounds.
I would then get the tokens and counters from all the board games I own, sweets, paperclips, dust, lint, shrunken apple-cores, twigs and dead flies and strew them across the landscape. These are the towns and cities.
Suspend on fishing-wire a series of marbles, a porcelain disc and a light-bulb and these are the heavens.

Take a picture, and voilà! A map of the surreality.

>>1725888
>uh... actually, I'm Edward, that's just a joke left over from yesterday's Sailor Moon thread.

I refuse to feel awkward about that. How was I meant to know? Eh?

>>1725846
Make it happen.

Get some small boxes, put something inside (a die, a playing card, a piece of cut glass) and give it to each player at the start of the game. Whent they want to they can open it - what these things do I guess is up to you...

>>1725888

The Cartographer is a nice NPC to include in this setting. He could instruct bewildered PC's on where to go, and provide quests and ideas. This setting needs a lot of quirky NPC's, like Sigil.

>>1725638

The Dream and Reality interact in odd ways. Those born of the Real enter the Dream to get something they want or desperately need, through hidden channels, dreaming techniques, drugs or magic books. The Dreamborn, on the other hand, leave their realm to escape, possess or otherwise control mundane creatures, or to track down fugitives. The "official" position of the two realms is that they do not interact, and the border is carefully policed, most citizens kept unaware. But there are ways to cross the border anyway.

>>1725950

>>1725953
No good comes from the joining of the two, but 'spillages' are common, especially through wardrobes for some reason...
Political trends tend to sweep certain city-states but many are held together through the combination of bustling open-market and self-consuming bureaucracy alone; law-enforcement being a cross between 'might-makes-right' and hired hitmen. But then again there are people who would claim themselves kings and republics who would oppose them; war is common, but armies might wander for years without ever meeting one another.
Humans make prized diplomats, politicians and generals – usually having enough sense of self to be persuasive in any situation and, if they can make sense of what they see, enough analytical nouce to give them the edge over many of the Dream’s semi-conscious beings. Conversely humans are a great source of memories, emotions and form and it’s been known for pirate groups to abduct unfortunates for these ends.

You know what? I'm just amazed that none of you have bothered to mention Jodorowsky in any of this. The Technopriests fits so spookily well with this that it shouldn't be passed up. Holy Mountain, too.

>>1726060
explain more.

Bump for awesome idea, and art.

>>1726296
My PC.

Has this tread been archived yet!?

Here's a thought: currency. Not everything craves the paper and pennies of mortal lucre - some want precious metals and stones but other denizens of the Dream may want even stranger. As a rule, insect-types (from walking-hives to bug-head) trade in sweet things and the phantoms desire only human fear. Pebbles, feathers and shards of glass; quiet songs, apples cores and egg shells - all things that have different worths for different folks.

tl;dr: the only game in the world where one quite literally sing for one's supper.

>>1726354
So, I'd have to pass a singing proficiency test to get fed?

>>1726354
How about seemingly brilliant, but ultimately politically incorrect ideas? Like a dance club for the blind.

>>1726363
Nah - I'd actually make you sing a song and award you on how much you entertained the group as a whole.

sigh,,,

Thanks for the ideas guys.

I'll go write up a rule book.

I guess there will have to be an offline and on-line version.

Archived?

Hey, OP, I am developing a system that is meant for a setting very much like the one you are describing. There was also a thread about a "dream warrior" game earlier this week.

Crazy how everyone has sort of jumped onto the same idea at once, huh?

We call it The World, a place made of the dreams and hallucinations of special people, each time you enter one of our many realms you are bond to the rules of that realm, and the only way to travel to another realm is by fullfilling some sort of task, it can be anything, sailing , wearing a ruby made special item, defeating an evil empire,falling down from a building...

>>1724352
Look up this game. I can't seem to find a good review right now, but it's kinda like what you're talking about. Also it uses dominos in place of dice.

>>1726870

sauce?

>>1725475
There should also be dream places that have no counterpart in the mundane world.

What about travel? How can normal people get around? They probably shouldn't be able to get very far without help.

>>1726870
>>1726906

Stop undermining me! Damn you all!

...damn, Noumenal looks kind of funky though. We had similar ideas for resolving actions without dice above.. maybe I could pilfer dominos too..

>>1727225
I was thinking traversing the Dreaming should be a confusing and unnerving task, and that the landscape itself should be fluid.

Think of it as moving at the speed of plot, only more like moving -to- the speed of plot. You're always were you need to be, and if you aren't, you are. A few steps and somehow you're across the map. There are Landmarks, but they're more like feelings.

>>1727262

Conversely, you move the plot along by narrating clearly where you need to be and how to get there. Dramatic chase scenes or travels over spectacularly beautiful landscapes happen as you tell them. But you always have enemies, and they will weave the plot against you, delaying you, pitting you against hazards, beasts and pursuers.

Noumenon review:
http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/12/12877.phtml

>>1724352

OP, this is a delicious idea.

ITT: Why /tg/ is still pretty fucking awesome.

The first few lines into the OP's post instantly made me think of the Planes of Chaos in D&D/ Forgotten Realms with the Githzerai and Githyanki. Whole cities exist due to the sole fact that the inhabitants believe in them. Warriors wield swords brought into existence and with a shape and edge reflecting the strength of the wielder's willpower. Beyond these bubbles of belief is a void of chaos and nothingness. Look into it a bit for ideas.

>>1727225
Very much so - I think I'd like to keep, while I'm writing this in the summer, the whys and wherefores as ambiguous as possible; I'll include explanations philosophical and psychological theory (because, hey, what else is a Philosophy Major for?), such as Solipsism and 'folie à plusieurs', but leave what causes and governs the Surreal World and its populations a mystery to be created and uncovered by individual player groups.

I plan to emphasise the use of the imagination in all things - if there seems to be a conceivable way of travelling it should be discussed within a group and implemented accordingly. I'd imagine every citadel has some form of transportation, from motor cars to floating slugs, from opaque bubbles to tiny crawl-space worm-holes; I definitely want to have rules that allow for player-creation of cities and dreamscapes, should they want it.

Furthermore, one last thing, I'd want to emphasise the characters and citizens of the surreal world - the fact that they shouldn't be treated as merely furnishings but as autonomous persons with motives and desires; however alien they might be: men with the faces of wolves, tiny floating screws - each should be recognised as an individual entity that can be dealt with and nothing is truly faceless.

>>1727280
Not just enemies, the things living on the path too and the Dreamscape itself. And maybe some dream beings make a killing by offering (relatively) safe travel to mundanes?

What if distances aren't based on geographic locations but on concepts? For example: it's easy to travel from dream-LA to dream-Shanghai because they're both large cities but moving from dream-LA to a dream-village nearby takes a long time. And traveling to a place where they speak the same language as where you are now doesn't take as long either.

>>1727424
You, sir, have earned some kind of namefag name.

>>1727431
Perhaps it should be, because this is the game of Perceptions, a distance equal to however long the PCs feel it should be.
Or even more clandestinely - lay out all the cards in a deck face-down and have the PCs play a memeory-game. That's how long the trip takes.

>>1727424
>but leave what causes and governs the Surreal World and its populations a mystery to be created and uncovered by individual player groups.
Good point. I also don't think there should be any metaplot. At most give the GM some locations and characters and let him come up with stories.

>tiny floating screws
How *do* you deal with tiny floating screws?

>>1727501
Have a chat. See what they want... possibly screwdrivers...

uhh>>1727540

wuts dat?

>>1727793
Comsonaught Ghost.

Transport can be anything imaginable, eh?

Indeed.

>each should be recognised as an individual entity that can be dealt with and nothing is truly faceless.

"Umm.. we need the forest to move.. please?"

>>1728008
Macbeth?

Last night I was reading "The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath", where carts are pulled by an alien creature too remarkable to describe. I figured that it might look like a giant Puppeteer without the necks (if you like Niven), or perhaps instead like an enlarged Houndeye (if you like Half-Life).

>>1728008
"And what will you do in return, Human?"

>>1728105
"I will reveal to you the place of the Secret Feast."

archive archive archive!

>>1728099
But both of those are really easy to describe!

>>1728183
I guess so. Bulky body, three legs.

Wonderful idea thread is wonderful!

Any music, film or anime inspirations?

Image limit reached.
Conclusion?

>>1728348
I'm honestly surprised nobody mentioned the comic Sandman, whose protagonist is the ruler of the world of dreams and ideas. Aside from that, read the thread again, people have cited plenty of stories that take place in ideaspace.

>>1728440
It was so obvious I thought I woundn't even bother. Also partically why I've been trying to steer away from the world being called 'the Dream.'

>>1725307
No it isn't. JAGS is basicaly a needlesly complicated GURPS wannabe.

>>1726125

Sorry about the late reply, I had to tend to the not-nerdy things in my life.

Jodorowsky's "The Technopriests" is a comic about a boy who wanted to make video games. Wait wait wait. It's the future, see, and the only group in the universe that makes video games is the Techno-Technos, a religious group which the boy slowly ascends to ruling over, in order to create a beautiful, peaceful universe. The comic is full of dreamy imagery, and a wild blend of of new age mysticisms and philosophies. The glimpses of the video games we see the kid create, for example, are trippy dreamscapes that are meant to self-actualize the player to Nirvana.

"Holy Mountain" was funded by John Lennon, for what it's worth. It's the story of a group of ne'er-do-wells who systematically shed their old selves in order to become the rulers of the world. Lots of bizarre, bizarre visuals, overripe with symbolism.

I mean like nothing you've ever seen before. Every minute I watched it I was slack-jawed in a state of WTF.

I figure Jodorowsky would be good, simply because his work is so surreal and fascinating. A lot of it runs on dream logic, so I'm sure it'd help if the GM checked it out.

>>1728490
And when something is needlessly complicated in comparison to GURPS, you know you're in trouble.

>>1728440
I figured it was like >>1728463 said. I mean, I mentioned "The Dreaming", and I've been thinking SANDMAN whenever I read the thread. I guess I just forgot to say it?

>>1728659
I like GURPS and I still lol'd. Am I a bad person?

>>1728610
Watching some of the Holy Mountain on youtube... seems to me that one can have too much symbol and allegory.

"From the hill you can see the city is very far away."
"No it isn't."
"What?"
"Here, Tom, stand over there." *holds up a piece a string and stretches it so that its ends appear to touch Tom and the city*
"See? This string show that the city can't be more then a foot away from us!"
"What kind of logic is tha-"
Then suddenly they were right next to the city.

Which by the way is made from giant mushrooms and are full of blue Communist. And the roads are sleeping dragons made of books.

>>1729063
Makes me think of a scene from Noein.

"Hey look, we're getting closer!"
"Are we?"
"Yeah, it's only a few miles!"
"You just keep believing that."
*CAUSALITY ERROR LOL*
"See?"

HOW DOES I CAN ARCHIVE? TELL ME NOW!

"We need an escape route, fast!"

Alright, I take my knife and cut this apple in half. I take the two halves and place them together making a whole. We both leap into the hole and escape.

>>1729333
I.. whut? Woah! My mind, it is being blown!!

SPRING YOU FUCK UP! YOU BETTER BE BLOODY WRITING THIS!!!

>>1729333
I take this apple.

Now the surface of the apple represents the physical curvature of spacetime and what we're doing is like burrowing a hole through the middle, like a worm, to get from point A to point B. Of course it's not really a hole, per se, but an extra-dimensio
*LOGIC!*
...and we're here!

>>1729346
yeah yeah, I'm doin' it. Keep your knickers on.

http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html
Archived - it's the third from the bottom. Although more has been posted since. Vote for it!

>>1729419
What's with the recent shitty postings? Is the archive full of trolls?

>>1729425
yup

Bumping this thread as a paragon of how Awesome /tg/ can be.

bump!