I'm thinking on treading a bit of water with this story element.   Basically you are half human and half something else that's utterly hated(demon, fallen angel, werewolf, undead).

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The general way that the world interacts with you is pretty much hating you.   Humans hate you because "your kind" pretty much have a tendancy to go bat-like-insane,  being half of a species that's a predator to your other half tends to do that to a person.   Your other half will tend to not like you as well:  you're either tasty(demon / undead), a mistake that should be removed(fallen angel), or just aren't like them at all(full wolf elemental / undead).   Nothing that a player can do can change how the world views them, period.   achieving stability/acceptance is hiding your other half.

So this means that you'll end up spending a lot of your time hiding your other half, spending it in the underworld of society(not testing for said conditions, and if found easier to escape), and evading "hunters".   Remember there is also no acceptance to people who have been "found" even amoung the criminal organizations.

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then again It might just be better off being a small sandbox single player game.

So any views on this.   I haven't put much thought in it but figured it'd be something to toss out there.

Originally posted by paulscott

I'm thinking on treading a bit of water with this story element.   Basically you are half human and half something else that's utterly hated(demon, fallen angel, werewolf, undead).

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The general way that the world interacts with you is pretty much hating you.   Humans hate you because "your kind" pretty much have a tendancy to go bat-like-insane,  being half of a species that's a predator to your other half tends to do that to a person.   Your other half will tend to not like you as well:  you're either tasty(demon / undead), a mistake that should be removed(fallen angel), or just aren't like them at all(full wolf elemental / undead).   Nothing that a player can do can change how the world views them, period.   achieving stability/acceptance is hiding your other half.

So this means that you'll end up spending a lot of your time hiding your other half, spending it in the underworld of society(not testing for said conditions, and if found easier to escape), and evading "hunters".   Remember there is also no acceptance to people who have been "found" even amoung the criminal organizations.

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then again It might just be better off being a small sandbox single player game.

So any views on this.   I haven't put much thought in it but figured it'd be something to toss out there.

Sounds very single player to me.

If there were an MMORPG amount of these half-breeds, you figure they'd just start their own alliance and not even have to deal with the other races.

Well when you get to territory control like mechanics it actually makes a bit of sense.   Under "other" circumstances normal kingdoms would come in and claim everything.   But then again that does remove the "story" elements to some extent or another.

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You could also tone down the "hate" a little bit to be somewhat tolerable.   Kind of like how you were treated in morrowind or similar.

It has the makings of a good story. You provide a backdrop that is interesting, easily understood, and creates the kind of friction needed for plot twists and the like.

Potentially, you could have it so that 'your kind' hate 'each other' which would prevent alliances etc. You could use your game to explore the past, how you got the way you are etc. Perhaps a path forward where finding your place in the world turns into demanding one, attempting to dominate being 'superior' due to being able to tap into 'the best of both worlds' while struggling with the 'worst of both' as well.

Plenty of places to take your concept. Interesting for sure. Good luck!

If the half-breeds rely on the true bloods for something, they'll probably still stick around in their oppressed societies. Whether that service is a lie (such as protection, a placebo drug, religion, etc.) or not (actual services that are only found in certain cities) probably determines a lot about the story, but not much else.

Players don't tend to fear the same things NPCs do. All the important context flies out the window when you introduce a player into a new setting, you know.

If the hate for a player's race is too great, it becomes an unnecessary obstacle that players will naturally try to avoid if possible. If every player is discriminated against, it's not so much discrimination as it is a societal norm or "part of the game."

If you want to boil a player's blood, injustice is the perfect way to do it. If all they encounter is injustice, however, it stops meaning anything.

Originally posted by Plasuma!!!

If you want to boil a player's blood, injustice is the perfect way to do it. If all they encounter is injustice, however, it stops meaning anything.

By this do you mean, say, as a werewolf, perhaps, when you are found out, places that you once went are now slamming the doors in your face now that they know you are a werewolf, but perhaps one or two other half-breed NPCs will allow you to hide out for the night, or something?

The idea being that, on occaision, something unjust should happen for emotional effect, which in turn can make the player either fight against it or accept it meekly and turn elsewhere for companionship and other such things someone would want in real life...?

Well the genral story elemtent is that you can live a reletivly "normal" life, with a few extra needs(feeding on emotions(demon), the dead, some soul dieing(half angel), or just need some extra "thrills"(feral elemental) ).    If you can hide your other half almost no one will reconize you for what you are.

As a matter of fact the only person that would probably be able to reconize you with a lot work and warning(if paying attention) would be a hunter of some kind.    Unless of course you make a mistake that even a normal person would reconize.

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still somewhat stuck on it probably needing to be a single player game to properly fit mechanics like the "hunters" in without some weird "mechanics rigging" about that would be needed for an MMO.

Ah, okay, I missed that point when I read over the thread. I may need new glasses.

If that's the case, is there no way to reverse the effect? I imagine players could vacate the area and change their identity for a fresh start... but I think it would be a bad idea to bar a player from vital resources because they all happen to be in the one town he revealed himself to.

Then again, does a "revealing" always have to be so terrible...? One could become a freakish hero in battle if they worked to save people from a siege or something.

Here's to hoping we don't get any games with "save the city from utter destruction and become a hero to remove your pariah status" as a common instanced quest. Ugh... equal content distribution is such a pain, it takes so much out of the world.

Oh hi I've been feeding on your anger/despair/dyeing family members souls/dead bodies/terrorizing the woods  for the past 15 years.    But I've just saved your lifes so it's good now right?

Humans are a herding "animal"  when there's a predator in your midsts no matter what the conditions you're going to get rid of them anyway possible.     You probably won't even see a criminal organization that wants to work with known half breeds.    That said news doesn't necesarily travel fast, and there aren't very good "sure" identification systems.

Oh, so players absolutely must exist at the detriment to the rest world? That's... interesting...

I guess if you're damned to be a social pariah, you don't have many options, then.

There's always the option Repulsion suggests, where the freaks get together and form their own societies. Just instead of farms with cows, they're full of humans instead.

Well it's not like you're eating your "other dietary needs" everyday.   But once or twice a game month along with normal human needs sounds about right.

Enough so that you "must" be viewed as a predator by others.   Not enough so that you don't "have" to view yourself as a predator and makes your "human" needs stronger than your "other" needs.    This is also infrequent enough that "farming" doesn't make sense,  and freequent enough that you probably wouldn't want to live outside the fringes of society.

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meh treating this post like someone with ADD.

Originally posted by paulscott

meh treating this post like someone with ADD.

I think I may have ADD, actually. I can't hold a coherent thought for more than a few...

Wait, what?

.

Originally posted by biofellis

This is a tough delivery.

You've got a core mechanic that is essentially an unresolvable emotional dynamic. This makes for very tough game design. Further, you get to lead the player along the path of 'realization', and I honestly don't know where that path's supposed to go- but there should be a destination or players are going to sense it. Further, that destination should resonate with the player after the experiences you put them through as well. After the choices you force them to make.

You have after all leveraged all the odds against them, and taken all easy options off the table.

The player wants to play this, why?

I'm not sure an unresolvable emotional dynamic can be called a mechanic. It's an element of a linear story, but it's not something you can repeat ad infinitum without diminishing returns.

When push comes to shove, imposed meanings lose meaning. If the NPCs are your food and you need them to survive, who cares about them? They're NPCs, you need them and the game imposes this. It's the same sort of issue about sailors lost at sea who eat the cabin-boy to survive. Emotion takes a backseat to instinct in survival situations, and it happens very quickly with gamers (just look at EVE Online).

I think you could do a lot with this social system. You're a danger to society, and you know it, so how well can you hide it? That, sir, is a challenge! Players are always up for challenges so long as they are not impossible or too easy.

As for this system with AI? I would see it as an espionage / stealth mechanic, if nothing else. The player is forced into the position of a predator in the game, and it would be a terrible shame not to capitalize on that setting with some good ol' fashioned hunting games. Some targets may be harder than others. Maybe you want to spread fear and start witch hunts in your name. Perhaps spark legends and become infamous, even.

It's really just a dark setting masked over some pretty simple designs. If you could imagine City of Heroes or City of Villains with players organized in Perez Park, terrorizing the citizens of the Atlas district, that's what it would be in terms of an MMO. "Help, xXNo5FeratUXx is here!! He's eating people!!!!" NPC's pleas for help are just a signal for players to start having fun.

It's like Rampage World Tour from a different angle. There's so much you can do with it.

Four words: Star Wars Galaxies Jedi

You pretty much describe World of Darkness. 

Try Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines. It's a CRPG based on WOD and has all the elements you've been discussing.

After reading this, I want to watch Claymore again.

If it sort of followed that idea, the hunters would be very similar to the hunted.  The main difference would be the balance between their powers and their control (both would be required for attacks and abilities to work).  Depending on the side you are on, during combat 1 of those pools would regenerate (the other would be a finite resource).

I'll stop here, because I don't think this is quite what you're looking for.

Originally posted by Devour

Four words: Star Wars Galaxies Jedi

Not quite the same thing.

Jedi don't feed off of people in the Star Wars canon lore. They're irrationally good and call themselves protectors of good / justice. Sith are the opposite. They're irrationally evil and happen to want to exploit all that is good and just.

In Star Wars Galaxies, the Jedi didn't need to feed off anyone. They were hunted because that's what lore says you do in Star Wars.

We're talking about predators that absolutely must feed on other people. They have to do it for reasons beyond their control.

I should have joined to convo earlier, I got some questions, and hopefully good things to say.

First I would like to cover the "hiding it" aspect. What do you really have in mind here? Something like; the player does w/e content there is besides others that would be looking to kill him under certain circumstances? I would have to question how divided the players would be into the roles; whether there is just those who hunt and those being hunted (though hidden), or some other roles to sparse out them out (other castes of some sort). When you look at it like 100% of the roles aim at hunting the "monsters", or what-have-ya, and hidden amongst them are the very people they hunt - you eventually run into some kind of issue regarding general mistrust in guild structure, as well as those being found out having a permanent KoS from those that can communicate it. I don't know how to deal with the latter besides allowing players to change their identities repeatedly, as necessary.

Next I would like to ask in what ways you would employ a "revealing action". Obviously there are maintenance-like tasks that you must do to keep "sane" or something, like feeding or losing it when near certain phenomena, and that is a good mainstay - but I would like to cover more overt things. Like if you start visibly looking the part if you neglect the tasks you need to do, or some "in a pinch" skills will reveal your identity should you use them (DA blood magic, w/e). You would figure the tradeoff for the the role is power for identity (in a sense), so there would have to be something to make regular players *afraid of you*. I would suggest the obvious OPing of 1v1 balance that I vouch for in certain circumstances such as this, it adds to the "act" of seeming like every other human when abroad (even in typical combat), and by revealing god-like powers - you become the target.

Then there are issues of how to handle PvP in general; is it FFA, or some kind of factioned deal?

Depending on which you go with, and any kind can work, you have to figure out how to deal with "investigation by murder"... and what I mean is blatantly killing people on the chance they might be a monster and get some kind of reward from it. In an FFA scheme you might have to make it so visibility and player-actions tie into proccing a free kill on the monster-role, but not so much if the PvP is more moderated, as in a factional sense where the same side can't attack their own - even if they know he's a monster - but then that can lead to some implementable "investigation" play where others can do research on the player, figure what kind of monster he is, then do a mission-line for materials that can "pull him out of the shell" in public - giving reason to kill on the spot. Plenty of things to do there.

As for the point of territory acquisition, that was the last thing on my mind when proposed the point of "blending into society" in the OP. Having an overt war as your half-monster self suggests putting your name on the global KoS and spending too much time defending positions in the map to infiltrate the human towns to spy, or whatever. I think it's possible, but then the setting swaps from a mystery-basis (as society is one, but finding the monsters within is the deal), to more full-on fantasy (where the monsters are the bad-guys and have an army to face). There is a middleground, but it still has the overhanging sense that things are bigger than the monsters infiltrating society, and there is less mystery as to why they hide amongst us. I personally like the basis of it being more like the WoD campaign settings, with a covert war going on, but that's my personal tastes - probably because that style hasn't been touched on much yet, while "zombies vs vampires" is on DVD for the 50th time. 

As for whether this idea is best suited to single-player or MMO-style, really, you can do either. If you really like the setting you come up with, pen both, couldn't hurt.

When players fight each other I'd love to see a mechanic where they can "fight carefully" both giving up and similar before there's a risk.   One player losing purposfully to make it obvious that the other player is a half breed of somesort.   Or both players going full out where if witnessed they will be caught and hunted.

If both players fight carefully it'd just be something like a simple bar fight or similar.   The police might show up,  civilians might split you apart,  or one of you walk off feigning injury.   No penalties or similar.

If the defender fights to reveal their attacker a few things happens.   Basically the defender fights some but if they can sucessfully make it obvious that the enemy is "more than human",  they trigger some chaos where the attacker is the focus of it.  

If both escalate to their other half then both are revealed and some nifty chaos ensues

Basically when players fight each other in a civilized are they can just brawl,  the defender could work at "revealing" their attacker rather than damaging them,  or you can have a nice full out screw the town fest.

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I also like Plasuma's description where the players aren't "evil"  they're just a bane to the human populas.  Basically a melting pot of very conflicted emotions,  rather than something you can just put on the "scale of judgment".

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WoD would be a similar goal "theme line" in some cases

though I will say that I really hate the D&D version of the drow.   When I need to work with dark elfs in a story line I will write the ones that the players see are the ones that some how managed to make it to the surface after being exiled,  exile being a fate worse than death due to the bleak nature of the "under dark".   

Originally posted by paulscott

though I will say that I really hate the D&D version of the drow.   When I need to work with dark elfs in a story line I will write the ones that the players see are the ones that some how managed to make it to the surface after being exiled,  exile being a fate worse than death due to the bleak nature of the "under dark".   

Personally, I am so over the Tokienesque/D&D incarnations of these races that it was a hard decision to buy Dragon Age. I admit I like what they did with dwarven backhistory, but nothing else wowed me in the least bit. Elves are one of my biggest fantasy peeves in general, and while I never read it; Discworld took Elves in a direction that was interesting.

I feel these tired ideas have hit a wall for me personally, and as a writer I refuse to do anything resembling an elf outside of a cereal box. If I ever do decide to jump on the train, it will be a Campaign setting for D&D to end the madness... but looking back; even Shadowrun is kind of lame for it's use of tired concepts (worked back then though).