Page 198 - World of Darkness

ees at work, members of a gang, friends camping or simply Initial Encounters
unrelated commuters on a train. They all get insights into
the unreal together. The advantage of working with a Once you know the nature of a character’s passing
group is that you coordinate the characters from the be- contact with the supernatural, you need to decide how
ginning, regardless of what form their immersion into the that contact unfolds from the character’s perspective. You
supernatural takes. may decide that a vampire repeatedly preys upon the
Alternatively, you can introduce each character to character’s daughter, but how does the parent recognize
the unknown individually. Each character and player gets that something is wrong?
a first story on his or her own, with characters meeting Initial encounters with the unknown should start out
later, perhaps before or after each truly grasps what the small, as discussed previously. These are characters’ first
supernatural is. This approach means more work on your forays into the hidden world, and you don’t want to over-
part, ushering each character into the otherworldly by a whelm their senses and minds with the blinding truth.
separate approach, but the results can be very satisfying, They should get hints and suggestions that something more
giving each character his own feel for and take on what is at work than meets the eye. From there, a personal com-
reality might truly be. pulsion to act drives them toward an inkling of under-
The following are various premises for supernatural standing.
forces that could interfere in characters’ lives. One can The following ideas are clues about something sinis-
afflict all players’ characters, or each character can face ter going on. Alone, these observations might be over-
his own terrifying dilemma. looked or dismissed, but if they accumulate they suggest
• A loved one is repeatedly fed upon by a vampire, something truly wrong. Nothing inherently supernatural
becoming enthralled with his/her abuser. The victim is is implied just yet, but further investigation might suggest
not consciously aware of the feeding, but unconsciously it.
seeks out the creature and submits. The victim could be a • A loved one repeatedly turns off or doesn’t answer
character’s girl- or boyfriend, spouse or child. phones. He leaves his cell phone behind at certain times.
• A friend or loved one has the inherent makeup or The household or business phone rings and the person at
fate to become an otherworldly being, but doesn’t know the other end hangs up or a strange, somehow foreign caller
it. All he knows is that something is wrong with him. He asks for the subject.
doesn’t sleep well at night. Bad things happen to people • A friend keeps strange hours, coming and going at
around him. He claims to hear voices. Others tend to avoid any time of day or night with forced or half-hearted ex-
him, whether instinctively or by intent. Sympathetic char- planations.
acters feel compelled to help, assuming they can bring • Neighborhood pets go missing.
themselves to be near him at all. • Important meetings and plans are missed.
• Beings play cat and mouse with a character, per- • A co-worker avoids the character and apparently
haps for fun or to test him to see if he has the right stuff to most others.
become one of them. Bizarre mishaps occur around but • If the character himself is the subject of strange
never directly to him. He suffers painful losses, yet may events or weird changes, others avoid him. He seems to
find a certain pleasure or liberty in them. For example, rub them the wrong way or makes them uncomfortable
his spouse may have a fatal accident, yet he finds a strange without explanation.
relief in her passing. He can finally “be himself.” • Instances of random crime increase, suggesting that
• A character’s life coincidentally intrudes upon the they’re not so random. A loved one is arrested more than
activity of the supernatural and he witnesses only a glim- once, or break-ins or thefts occur at home or work.
mer of what’s really going on. A boss might be enthralled
by or be the pawn of a monster. The character’s home Exploration
might be in the neighborhood of a being’s lair. He wit- Having put together enough pieces of the puzzle to
nesses the creature’s depredations, which are hidden, but recognize that something strange is going on with a friend
not always well enough. Or a ghost haunts the character’s or family member, the character explores further. Rather
apartment building. than simply recognize that odd events occur as before, he
• A character runs afoul of a creature’s agent and in- now goes in search of them, trying to understand what’s
terrupts its schemes. The being then targets the character really going on. The fine point here is that he gets only
for revenge or as a replacement for its agent. A cop might hints of anything unusual, never a direct view of any crea-
arrest a monster’s proxy. A good Samaritan might save a tures of the night. Most likely, he witnesses the results of
woman victimized by “criminals” when she was actually their activities.
intended as food for the master. The character wins an • It seems that pets have gone missing in a several-
auction for an antique that’s also sought by another bid- block area. Indeed, the character notices that very few
der. The opponent is the pawn of a ghost seeking to re- birds are around.
store its scattered collection from life, and now the ghost • The boss, co-worker or friend hasn’t been home
wants that last piece. very much lately. His family has noticed and is concerned,

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PRELIMINARY STORY