Hey, new to the community, but an avid lover of this game. Though I haven’t played this game yet (farm life), I spend a lot of time thinking about it.
I watched howl’s moving castle a few times recently, and I was thinking about the idea of a wizard who can lose control of themselves and become a monster from overuse of their magic.
I was thinking for a class move based on this, tied to a fatigue mechanic a la Awful Good Games’ wizard from A Sundered World.
Say there is a sentience or humanity or sanity or whatever stat, either tied to constitution or set at an arbitrary number, that decreases each time the wizard’s fatigue matches their current HP.
When your fatigue equals your current hp, (maybe you lose 1 sentience no matter what and) roll +nothing/CON/CHA/WIS/INT (unsure which). On a 10+ you maintain control for now, but you cannot use your magic until you rest for an hour or so. On a 7-9 (maybe you lose 1 sentience only on 9 or lower and)choose 1:
you maintain some control but become an arcane monster until you can rest, lose 2 sentience instead of 1
you lose conciousness and deal your damage to 1/2/3 nearby creatures (enemy or ally) of the GM’s choosing
sentience can only be reset though some archaic means, i guess, maybe through dying? transferring the corruption to your surroundings? storing in a place of power? human sacrifices? standard ritual? idk, haven’t gotten that far yet, but wondering what y’all think.
What about a “Death” move as per Grim World or a variant on Last Breath?
Just to keep it simple.
I could see this Move idea as a part of a type of Wizard Playbook. You have a Humanity<--->Monster bar. on the Cast a Spell- 7-9: add the option to move your indicator towards Monster. Some type of spells, very powerful Monster spells could give you a mark on this automatically. And a “Purge Magic” Move that could bring you toward Humanity side. But say you have 5 ticks: -1, 0, +1, +2, +3: with that as the bonus to casting Monster type of spells. -1 would be fully human or full humanity. I think that it fits more as a type of magic user. With custom playbooks you can do many types of Moves. I think that it is better to encapsulate it into a Class feature.
Also, put a cool narrative “mechanic” to regain Humanity, not some “dull” spell. Something like “when the mage has time to spend far from dangers, with his friend around, then roll/regain…” or “when the mage has some precious moment of intimacy with a special friend, then roll/regain…”
I’m not really a fan of adding a new resource to track. What about doing something like Darkest Self from Monsterhearts?
Darkest Self is a little script the player follows that encourages them to play their character like a horrible monstrous asshole. It gets triggered from the 7-9 results of certain moves or the GM can trigger it as a Hard Move. A character stays in their Darkest Self until some indicated condition is met.
I would write this as a separate move that modifies the Wizard’s Cast a Spell Move. Something like this:
—–
Arcane Monster
Using your magic too often can cause you to lose control of yourself, transforming you into an arcane monster. Add this to the list of 7-9 options to Cast a Spell:
– You retain control of yourself but manifest one of your Arcane Monster features (maybe have a list of features the player has to pick from somewhere.)
Additionally, the GM adds “Transform into an Arcane Monster” to their list of GM Moves for you only.
—–
I second the idea of adding the option to decrease your Sentience to the 7-9 choices
Welcome to the community first of all! Good to know there are other country folk who like this game! I like the adding an option to Cast a Spell. Maybe it replaces the lose the spell option since the monstrous side of you is too covetous of magical power to allow any spells to slip away from it? That could be the reason it has to show itself more and more in order to keep your magic from escaping. Just an idea.
I think that’s a very fitting replacement Scott Selvidge.
This concept might make a neat Compendium Class. Something like:
When you compromise your humanity to achieve some greater goal, you may take this move when you next level up:
The Monster Within. When you take this move, choose another move that you can perform which gives you a choice of problems to select from on a 7-9 result (such as Cast a Spell, Volley or certain types of Defy Danger). Add the following to that move’s 7-9 options: (whatever implementation of the above you decide on)
Chris Stone-Bush Maybe not a new bar or mechanic but some condition tags on it to indicate the monstrous nature and the change. Sort of like Weakened (-1 Str bonus)
i’ve never read monsterhearts, but i like your idea, making it overmechanical prolly doesnt help. i also like the idea of using friendship or intimacy as a way to combat the corruption. i appreciate y’alls feedback, i will tinker.