Bad Futures...?

[TigerEmperor]

While pondering some ideas on what I should do for the Lore Incarnate slot for a Praetorian character I made recently, primarily to ensure I remained thematically appropriate to his background and basic character concepts, I got thinking: what would a bad future related to this character look like?

 

Mind you, I do not mean the character meeting a bad end; I mean bad happening because of the character.

 

As an example, the character I was thinking about would be Mind-Dagger, the Praetorian counterpart of my other character Mind-Knife. Like his counterpart, he's the great-great-great-grandnephew of Gerhardt Eisenstadt, the man would be become Lord Nemesis. Like his counterpart, highly intelligent, considerable psychic potential and ability, got a Ph.D. in criminal psych, and joined the Praetorian Police Department. He acted as an interrogator and created criminal profiles, while also acting as a liaison to Powers Division. While he was at work one day, the Resistance came and killed all his family, including his kid sister. He hunted down the Resistance cell responsible and left them a psychically lobotomized mess for the PPD to pick up, then left the PPD to fully join Powers Division. He has no sympathy for any Resistance member, no matter who, how, or why.

 

It was suggested that, due to the Well wanting to correct an imbalance or to be amused, or both, he ended up with Nemesis Lore pets as well, and that got me thinking. Regardless of Incarnate level abilities and stories, one of the bad futures as a result of Mind-Dagger becoming involved with Primal Earth and how he would act under specific situations [such as the people of Primal Earth not improving, even in the face of an external or planet-driven threat, but in fact socially degrading and letting more tragedies like his family's occur with increasing frequency] would look...

 

Frankly, starkly like Praetoria but with some changes. Such as a brass-and-steam steampunk aesthetic, more people in the defense and policing forces, very strict [maybe even mechanical] rules and codes for specific areas of life and behavior, seers networked a bit like Arachnos's in that they reinforce each others' holds on themselves and earnestly believing before said hold that "Imperator Eisenstadt's will be done." Or even taking corrective action, such as interfering with peoples' thoughts at even the basest level to prevent them from acting on those thoughts [not necessarily stopping the thinking but preventing them from doing it and 'painting' the thought in a repulsive light]. Curfews and emphasis on the learning of morality and ethics, especially why it was important to be a specific way and how and why a situation came to be from different ethical standpoints but skewed. And some bright spots that underline but don't deny the bad, such as the Ekaterina Eisenstadt School of Humane Arts, built for his lost sister who loved painting and dancing and playing with the family dog. And few would want to step out of line for fear of hearing the lockstep of well-made leather and steam marching towards their door, if they hear anything before the arrest. "In the Imperator's name." and "For Master Eisenstadt!" being common invocations.

 

As such, what would some of the bad futures for your characters look like? Would they be decidedly dystopian, a la when you fight Lord Recluse? Or would they seem a little too utopic to be okay, like Praetoria? Somewhere in between? What happened and what makes this future world that way? And would the character believe that such a future may even be necessary?

Edited October 26 by TigerEmperor
Slight adjustment to clarify that the situation occurred more generally, not because Incarnate, and to emphasize the thread topic

[chase]

Although I tie my characters to CoH Lore in various ways, I tend to ignore anything incarnate-level or that aspect of the future direction the game held.   I just have no interest in such cosmic power levels so it's unlikely that any of my characters would be solely responsible for a substantially-different future timeline.

I certainly have at their own power leve "what if'" moments where their decisions have an impact, just not at a global level.   Tabby will have her "superman 2" moment- her opportunity to break her transformation and be who she really wants to be with every fiber of her being, but doing so will release an evil that will almost certainly end lives- not the world... not millions, but will result in deaths.   There's certainly stories that can be told- what if she doesn't realize the cost when she's faced with the decision? Who's affected and how do the survivors' lives change because of it...

Chase Arcanum is the closest I have to a "knowing (well... learning...) cosmic secrets" character as I've ever bothered to make- something of a lite Sorcerer Supreme, but when faced with hints of a possible convergence of realities, I never imagined he'd have any chance to impact something so massive, but might instead focus on weaving threads of reality among those most important to him allowing them to find each other and perhaps hold some ghost of memories from a reality that was no-longer.   In his lore, his strict scientific mind left him limited to kinetic or illusion spells where he could imagine scientific truths like the conservation of energy still held sway, but if the convergence occurred, his effort to exert some control over it would drive him to madness and, in doing so, unlock his full and most dangerous potential.  
 

 

[Oginth]

Like chase, I typically ignored Incarnate and cosmic storyline, but I did have a bad-ending in mind for one of my characters long before she even reached 50 (lung cancer).

 

As I recently returned to CoH, and started creating more characters, I have considered one of the new ones be the instrument of an old one's death.

 

Even though I treated most of them as comic book characters, so they don't really die forever, but I have this evil character, he's destined to be killed by a hero one day, because his backstory is inspired by a comic book character who got killed by a hero.

Edited October 24 by Oginth

[TigerEmperor]

On 10/23/2024 at 10:23 AM, chase said:

Although I tie my characters to CoH Lore in various ways, I tend to ignore anything incarnate-level or that aspect of the future direction the game held.   I just have no interest in such cosmic power levels so it's unlikely that any of my characters would be solely responsible for a substantially-different future timeline.

I certainly have at their own power leve "what if'" moments where their decisions have an impact, just not at a global level.   Tabby will have her "superman 2" moment- her opportunity to break her transformation and be who she really wants to be with every fiber of her being, but doing so will release an evil that will almost certainly end lives- not the world... not millions, but will result in deaths.   There's certainly stories that can be told- what if she doesn't realize the cost when she's faced with the decision? Who's affected and how do the survivors' lives change because of it...

Chase Arcanum is the closest I have to a "knowing (well... learning...) cosmic secrets" character as I've ever bothered to make- something of a lite Sorcerer Supreme, but when faced with hints of a possible convergence of realities, I never imagined he'd have any chance to impact something so massive, but might instead focus on weaving threads of reality among those most important to him allowing them to find each other and perhaps hold some ghost of memories from a reality that was no-longer.   In his lore, his strict scientific mind left him limited to kinetic or illusion spells where he could imagine scientific truths like the conservation of energy still held sway, but if the convergence occurred, his effort to exert some control over it would drive him to madness and, in doing so, unlock his full and most dangerous potential.  
 

 

 

Yeah, it doesn't have to be cosmic or high level bad to be a bad future. Such as if Tabby's returning to normal releases an evil that not only ends lives but ends up specifically ending the lives of people she knows. And having that evil in the world, even if it isn't free for long because of Paragon and the Isles being rife with heroes, villains, etc., having ended any life at all because of her wish, would definitely be what I'm on about. Question then becomes less of a "Does she feel bad?" and more of a "What would she do about it?" question at that point but that's a discussion for another day.

 

And even without going to the higher levels of power that Incarnates and similar beings inhabit [though Sorcerer Supremes and Harry Dresdens can have similar impacts despite not necessarily being pound for pound statistically as capable], yeah, someone driven mad and able to access their fullest capability? No mental or moral fetters? Bad future for everyone incoming, kids. Even when they don't become Kefka or Sephiroth.

 

On 10/24/2024 at 7:33 AM, Oginth said:

Like chase, I typically ignored Incarnate and cosmic storyline, but I did have a bad-ending in mind for one of my characters long before she even reached 50 (lung cancer).

 

As I recently returned to CoH, and started creating more characters, I have considered one of the new ones be the instrument of an old one's death.

 

Even though I treated most of them as comic book characters, so they don't really die forever, but I have this evil character, he's destined to be killed by a hero one day, because his backstory is inspired by a comic book character who got killed by a hero.

 

Not quite what I was meaning but still pretty rough for the characters.

[chase]

On 10/26/2024 at 7:17 AM, TigerEmperor said:

...

Yeah, it doesn't have to be cosmic or high level bad to be a bad future. Such as if Tabby's returning to normal releases an evil that not only ends lives but ends up specifically ending the lives of people she knows. And having that evil in the world, even if it isn't free for long because of Paragon and the Isles being rife with heroes, villains, etc., having ended any life at all because of her wish, would definitely be what I'm on about. Question then becomes less of a "Does she feel bad?" and more of a "What would she do about it?" question at that point but that's a discussion for another day...

 

What would she do about it?  Well, probably her two biggest motivators are her desire to be human again and her overly-developed sense of obligation / "unhealthy sense of guilt".   The guilt is what ultimately leads her to accept her fate and thwart the big baddie.     To have this path described above to be chosen, I see two possibilities: 

• She's unaware of the cost of her transformation back to human until afterward, and her guilt drives her to fix it.
• She's aware of the cost, but the sense of guilt isn't there.   maybe a friend-therapist did too good of a job in the "You don't owe the world a thing" message.   Has to be a friend-therapist, she can't afford to pay one.

Keeping with the theme of dark futures:

An Uchecked Sense of Guilt.
- I've always tried to emphasize her mind as her greatest asset, (also the source of her greatest problems) and she'd still have that, so I COULD see her actively working with the midnighters to find the threat's weakness and confine/destroy it.   I imagine the knowledge that she caused death and pain to so many would put her guilt into overdrive.   Although her magical affinity left with her transformation back she could still be a researcher and supporter. 

It starts with skipping sleep and meals to pursue any hero's research as if lives depended on it- ("I didn't realize the cost of my own problem and this could cost lives too and I can't let others die and... and... IJustNeedToGetThisDoneOK?" ).  Sure, some people would grow concerned but... dammit, she IS good at what she does and there's always another crisis.  Surely someone's making sure she doesn't go too far.   Rather than enjoying her human form, she'd be loathe to look in a mirror- her human appearance constantly reminds her of the cost that others paid for that luxury.  She'd grow dangerously thin and sunken-eyed from self-neglect, her skin deathly pale from lack of sun.  Her pulled back hair, tied into a minimum-effort tail always seemed just a day past-due for a washing when it was visible at all.  An oversized black hoodie with the hood raked as far over her features as possible was her wardrobe of choice. 

As Tabby, she rarely let people get close so there will be few people that feel close enough to intervene.  Heck, to an outside observer, this self-neglect hovers just on the cusp of calling for an intervention but never crosses it.   They might think differently if they saw beneath the hoodie.  As Tabby she'd sometimes resort to self-inflicted cuts for "blood magic" since her more rapid healing made such scrapes minor, but now in her human form that practice has manifest as an increasingly dangerous cutting disorder.  Low iron probably explains a lot of her pallor... and maybe that hand tremor's not from a borderline Tantrum Energy Drink overdose after all...

No, Nobody sees that.   Most don't even know she was once the quirky catgirl that hated to be called Tabby.   Fewer even know her name's Tabitha-  she's just the midnighter archives' go-to ghoul girl you want when you need research done with the speed and dedication you'd expect if someone's life was at risk.  You're just not expecting the life that's really on the line.

 

============

 

Or A Guilt-Free Life

"The world doesn't owe you a think.  You didn't volunteer to be the ward that would seal away some great evil, you shouldn't be expected to just perpetually stay on that job for life.   Save yourself and move on"   

That message was eventually driven into Tabitha long enough for her to believe it, so when she changed back and things went awry, she just embraced those words even tighter.   Even when her friend who offered those assuring words, Marzaana, died in the aftermath, she believed them.   Sure, she missed good old insane Mary Zane terribly, but she didn't feel RESPONSIBLE for it.  She didn't owe the world- or anyone- anything.

Now, after it all was over- after fighting so hard just to be NORMAL again- she'd begun to realize just how damn boring "normal" was.  Yeah, just being able to take a semester of college without interruption was nice, but mundane jobs are just SO MUNDANE.   As Tabby she could step into the aether and step out wherever she wanted.  She could manifest bolts of arcane energy, cause things to hover, heck, she could WILL HERSELF UNSEEABLE.    She absolutely did NOT MISS being a human-cat monstrosity- the real life manifestation of a furry's fantasy pinup SHOULD be gone for good- but the magic-- the power-  That should have still been hers.    She shouldn't have needed to give that up with her transformation back.  She shouldn't need to pay a price.   The world had no right to take it back.  That was part of her.  That was who she was.

And it would be hers again.    Every possible discipline, every tome she could find, every quasi-mystical lead was tried and tested.  She could learn the material and execute the actions flawlessly, but she cast no ripple in the aether-- no eddy in the mana permeating through the world- it was as if anything that should be magical in her essence was taken from her.

No.   Stolen.    

She would just have to steal it back. 

She knew the rituals, she just needed the tools- secured away in the midnighter archives-- it'd be a short borrow, nobody would miss them.   It would be wrong to take the power of someone doing good, of course, but her research have given her the forbidden names of many things- dark and evil and absolutely undeserving of the power they held. 

She would summon one of them, imprison it, sever its power, and take it for her own.  

This second disaster would be far worse than the first, but we'll never know if Tabitha's mantra would leave her feeling absolved of guilt for it.   She won't survive it.

Edited October 28 by chase

[TigerEmperor]

On 10/28/2024 at 2:54 PM, chase said:

 

What would she do about it?  Well, probably her two biggest motivators are her desire to be human again and her overly-developed sense of obligation / "unhealthy sense of guilt".   The guilt is what ultimately leads her to accept her fate and thwart the big baddie.     To have this path described above to be chosen, I see two possibilities: 

• She's unaware of the cost of her transformation back to human until afterward, and her guilt drives her to fix it.
• She's aware of the cost, but the sense of guilt isn't there.   maybe a friend-therapist did too good of a job in the "You don't owe the world a thing" message.   Has to be a friend-therapist, she can't afford to pay one.

Keeping with the theme of dark futures:

An Uchecked Sense of Guilt.
- I've always tried to emphasize her mind as her greatest asset, (also the source of her greatest problems) and she'd still have that, so I COULD see her actively working with the midnighters to find the threat's weakness and confine/destroy it.   I imagine the knowledge that she caused death and pain to so many would put her guilt into overdrive.   Although her magical affinity left with her transformation back she could still be a researcher and supporter. 

It starts with skipping sleep and meals to pursue any hero's research as if lives depended on it- ("I didn't realize the cost of my own problem and this could cost lives too and I can't let others die and... and... IJustNeedToGetThisDoneOK?" ).  Sure, some people would grow concerned but... dammit, she IS good at what she does and there's always another crisis.  Surely someone's making sure she doesn't go too far.   Rather than enjoying her human form, she'd be loathe to look in a mirror- her human appearance constantly reminds her of the cost that others paid for that luxury.  She'd grow dangerously thin and sunken-eyed from self-neglect, her skin deathly pale from lack of sun.  Her pulled back hair, tied into a minimum-effort tail always seemed just a day past-due for a washing when it was visible at all.  An oversized black hoodie with the hood raked as far over her features as possible was her wardrobe of choice. 

As Tabby, she rarely let people get close so there will be few people that feel close enough to intervene.  Heck, to an outside observer, this self-neglect hovers just on the cusp of calling for an intervention but never crosses it.   They might think differently if they saw beneath the hoodie.  As Tabby she'd sometimes resort to self-inflicted cuts for "blood magic" since her more rapid healing made such scrapes minor, but now in her human form that practice has manifest as an increasingly dangerous cutting disorder.  Low iron probably explains a lot of her pallor... and maybe that hand tremor's not from a borderline Tantrum Energy Drink overdose after all...

No, Nobody sees that.   Most don't even know she was once the quirky catgirl that hated to be called Tabby.   Fewer even know her name's Tabitha-  she's just the midnighter archives' go-to ghoul girl you want when you need research done with the speed and dedication you'd expect if someone's life was at risk.  You're just not expecting the life that's really on the line.

 

============

 

Or A Guilt-Free Life

"The world doesn't owe you a think.  You didn't volunteer to be the ward that would seal away some great evil, you shouldn't be expected to just perpetually stay on that job for life.   Save yourself and move on"   

That message was eventually driven into Tabitha long enough for her to believe it, so when she changed back and things went awry, she just embraced those words even tighter.   Even when her friend who offered those assuring words, Marzaana, died in the aftermath, she believed them.   Sure, she missed good old insane Mary Zane terribly, but she didn't feel RESPONSIBLE for it.  She didn't owe the world- or anyone- anything.

Now, after it all was over- after fighting so hard just to be NORMAL again- she'd begun to realize just how damn boring "normal" was.  Yeah, just being able to take a semester of college without interruption was nice, but mundane jobs are just SO MUNDANE.   As Tabby she could step into the aether and step out wherever she wanted.  She could manifest bolts of arcane energy, cause things to hover, heck, she could WILL HERSELF UNSEEABLE.    She absolutely did NOT MISS being a human-cat monstrosity- the real life manifestation of a furry's fantasy pinup SHOULD be gone for good- but the magic-- the power-  That should have still been hers.    She shouldn't have needed to give that up with her transformation back.  She shouldn't need to pay a price.   The world had no right to take it back.  That was part of her.  That was who she was.

And it would be hers again.    Every possible discipline, every tome she could find, every quasi-mystical lead was tried and tested.  She could learn the material and execute the actions flawlessly, but she cast no ripple in the aether-- no eddy in the mana permeating through the world- it was as if anything that should be magical in her essence was taken from her.

No.   Stolen.    

She would just have to steal it back. 

She knew the rituals, she just needed the tools- secured away in the midnighter archives-- it'd be a short borrow, nobody would miss them.   It would be wrong to take the power of someone doing good, of course, but her research have given her the forbidden names of many things- dark and evil and absolutely undeserving of the power they held. 

She would summon one of them, imprison it, sever its power, and take it for her own.  

This second disaster would be far worse than the first, but we'll never know if Tabitha's mantra would leave her feeling absolved of guilt for it.   She won't survive it.

 

Definitely bad futures, yeah. Especially since she doesn't perceive it to be bad, necessarily, but also makes it at least subtly bad for everyone else since they'd either be taking advantage of her obsessive obligation/guilt-driven efforts or hit by the ramifications of her attempting to take the power.

 

But the Dichotomy of Tabby does wonderfully illustrate why we need to walk a fine road with emotions like guilt and shame, especially for what we can't control ourselves, and underline one of the major points I may have inadvertently been driving at: it may not seem bad to you, especially at the time, but to others...? Yeah, that's where it becomes problematic. Even more so when you think you have good intentions or tell yourself you'd be able to do good if you had the power/position.

 

I know that one of my initial characters might make the "Imperator Eisenstadt" future look tame in that he'd be more overtly "The world is under my boot heel, but I have good reasons for what I do.", but it wouldn't change the fact that he would be grinding humanity's face into the dirt because of his perception of their behavior and if they deserve it for letting specific issues continue to be extant. And because of the continued looking at him suspiciously just because he'd gotten himself possessed the one time [and admittedly into some really terrible stuff but again, if he was literally unable to control his own body, not his fault]. How long can you hold someone to account for something when they weren't to blame? How much can you make them prove that they're a changed person? And will it ever be enough? Or are you going to make them going to go over the edge and do evil things of their own will solely because you can't trust them?