There Are No Heroes
There Are No Heroes is set in the modern United States with a distinctive alteration outside of reality - the limited presence of that which exists outside nature; the supernatural. Though not always subtle, the supernatural is an element that is as mystifying and poorly understood as it is in regular lore, yet here it has influence and presence. Despite this, it is not acknowledged or readily known, even by those involved directly in it as few and far between as they are; most people simply regard it as myth, folklore, urban legend and fantasy. Deviating only slightly from truth, the once bright future of the world is dimmer, darker and duller than ever before; the world having fallen as a whole into another great depression.
Your common man will go about his life paying no attention or regard to this element of reality, as he's unlikely to ever see it - experience it. At the end of the day he will still be concerned about his bills, his next promotion, and if his wife is cheating on him with his neighbor; never once stopping to care about anything outside of the norm.
But not everyone has such minor concerns.
For a few unfortunate persons their lives can never be the same as anyone else's no matter how hard it is they try. They work in the same conditions as anyone else, striving to get by, but they're scarred from some element they can't explain but simply know. They won't - they can't - attribute these incidents solely to madness and they won't simply let go as they know there is more to life than spending ten hours of their life commuting and working within the confines of four small walls at a desk, day in and day out. They are the caliber who spend sleepless nights trying to put these thoughts away, either be it in a bottle of alcohol or a bottle of pills... but nothing they do will ever convince them otherwise.
However, there are some of these people who are more than just people now; they are something else altogether - or always had been and never realized it.
They are cursed (or gifted) with powers that aren't meant to be, things that cannot exist or defy existence, and nothing can ever be the same for them. Most, if one can call such limited a population of unusual persons, fall prey to what their true nature is or has become, as people are vulnerable and prone to failure, but most of all, corruptible. When given power over their fellow man most use it to further their lives than to better that of others. Imagine, for a moment the ability to influence one's opinion with mere thought - to sway even the staunchest of opponents and weaken their resolve. Or muse on the nature of eliminating the greatest of rivals on a dark night when they travel by themselves, leaving with slicked claws or fangs.
In There Are No Heroes some characters are redeemed terrors of unnature; individuals who fell prey to some aspect of their power, only to return as better aspects of themselves, or at least shadows there of. Others are the unfortunate souls who have come to know more than they ever should. Regardless of their origin all these things comes at a terrible cost... one doesn't simply forget, or excuse, their evil deeds done - they need repay, with the rest of their existence, wrong with right. However, this does not mean they need take the high road, and in fact, one should not; the high road, while morally superior, is often prone to failure.
Plot
Each character opens with their backstory played out, defining who they were and what they are, what they did and what they do now. In this they are essentially sharing their backstory and explaining who their character is in game before moving on to the current plot. While other characters do not immediately know this information (unless of course they too were present), it's present for the other players to better comprehend the character in their current time frame - an explanation of sorts to understand the angle a character and writer is approaching from before the actual plot itself initiates.
Each character's current place opens with them trying to live out their life and undoubtedly facing difficulty in adapting to the norm as something outside of it or from traumatic experiences with those same powers; failing miserably to grapple with and hold on to their humanity. It is here that as the game master once all characters have posted that the plot itself will be revealed; what I will say is that each character will be brought together by fate - a mechanic explained later.
The plot itself will contend with opposing that which is evil, both man and things of unnature - the antiheroes (the characters) need do their best to not only go undetected and try to live out their lives subtly, but also to prevent others from doing great harm to those who cannot defend themselves. The threats will vary wildly from scenario to scenario, but most are only human. Every character is battling their own inner demons no less, meaning no one is truly innocent, but some are far greater shadows of what a person should be than others are.
- All characters provide an opening backstory to give a feeling for what made them who they are now; an account of their brush with the occult or its consumption of their normal life.
- All characters try to live their lives with some semblance of normalcy and conformity.
- All characters are either formerly normal people with abnormal abilities or normal people who have encountered the abnormal formerly.
- All characters are antiheroes who are attempting to redeem themselves and undo errors or mistakes of their past, be them mortal or unnaturally born.
- Most characters should be flawed or scarred psychologically from their experiences in the past and develop credible coping mechanisms.
Characters
Players have two base options for characters, both of which are very, very broad strokes; human and the inhuman. Humanity has the advantage of, while not strong, fast, resilient, or superbly intellectual, that they can live out their life and operate with normalcy - things which the unnatural cannot. Inhumans however, are much more varied, as the touch of the supernatural renders a human inhuman; by this virtue, in game mechanics, a human being with actual psychic talent or practiced wizardry is placed into this category, just as a zoanthrope is, despite both being largely able to live out normal human lives whereas a vampire simply cannot.
Most importantly to character creation is "fate", or in the more abstract sense "Fate Points". Each character before creation has three points of fate, or effectively the ability to do or be the impossible within a few limits; this abstract concept represents a twist of fate, or mere chance essentially. In order to play a human touched by unnature one must expend a single use of fate at character creation, representing that they survived, endured, or encountered an event that was entirely fate and or chance - something that should not have happened - and that it either cursed or gifted them in some way, as fitting of their opinion.
A valid use of a "Fate Point" is to make a regular human character into a psychic with a few basic abilities. For example, while a psychic can't explicitly read minds, they could sense emotion and glean a bit of it from thought in a form of telepathy, or could be able to levitate small objects through a version of telekinesis, or even gain knowledge of a person by handling an object through psychometry. They could not, however, outright ignite people with pyrokinesis or possess someone with a form of astral projection.
Thus one must expend a point to create an unnatural character and must expend another point for additional expanded abilities, such as having multiple abilities. Some unnatural creatures inherently have multiple abilities, but come with drawbacks; a human with lycanthropy is playable with but a single expenditure of fate because although the actual alternate form is exceptionally powerful, it is difficult to control, is vulnerable to silver, is compelled to manifest on full moons or under extreme duress, and otherwise can be readily exploited by others. If the individual wanted to control their lycanthropy and have true mastery and understanding of it, they'd need expend two fate and only receive that benefit; they could not, however, expend another point of fate and make silver cease to harm them, or fail to transform under a full moon, as these are universal qualities of which no exception for their type exists.
Fate, otherwise, is used to preform acts of extreme heroism or otherwise defy the possible. One could, with fate, survive a mortal wound - a human survive a point blank shot to the head, dealt by their captor. Though they would be comatose for weeks at a minimum, they would survive and remain a character. One could not, with fate, as a human stop an oncoming bus through strength alone; the vehicle would instead careen, haphazardly, out of the way when it should have killed them. Treat fate uses like this as a "second chance" and specify usage of them through something like double parenthesis at the start of the post, saying "I'm spending a twist of fate." or something similar. Fate is not always so kind however, with said bus just as likely to end up in peril now with no one at fault but the character in question.
Moving on from the concept of "fate", characters should be readily attempting to manage normalcy versus their abnormalcy (or dealings with it); they still have lives to attend to, needs to fill, and things expected of them. The further they drift away from their previous normal world, the more distinct the corruption becomes as they are left, largely by themselves, to themselves. Characters should not revel in their monstrous power (if they have it) - it's frightening, terrifying and mind bending - but they can easily understand and comprehend it to the point that they can utilize it as a tool, and more importantly, a means to survive.
- Minimum age of characters is 18.
- Characters may be human (with the option of having minor experience toward the inhuman) or inhuman (with former humanity).
- Characters all begin play with 3 Fate Points.
- Characters must spend 1 Fate Point to become supernatural being and an additional 1 Fate Point to refine their abilities or remove a weakness that is not universal.
- Characters should not revel in their abilities or experience with the inhuman; it has damaged, or even more often, destroyed their life.
- Characters may not combine different inhuman qualities.
Humanity
A character need not be an unnatural creature bearing some terrible burden or curse - in fact, they should not be - and may instead be a normal mortal with the sole stipulation that they are aware of the supernatural, for better and worse. Humans have the advantage of having no relative drawbacks in any scenario, but at the same time having no particular strengths. For example, a human can go undetected by a psychic who can innately sense things of unnature, but that same human hasn't nearly the athletic ability of even the most mundane of vampires.
Most humans can survive day to day with minimal concern about the supernatural affecting their lives and those who are aware of it often specifically choose to fight against it, using their research and versatility to survive, or contrarily withdraw and become recluse - living in fear of that which could not possibly be. However, most glaringly dangerous, is the fact that some creatures - namely vampires or zoanthropes - can bestow their curse upon humans. This threat is very real to human characters in There Are No Heroes, and thus they should carefully consider expending fate points to - just by chance - avoid a heavy burden to bear. Alternatively, humans do have the option to awaken other powers through immense involvement in the unnatural, most easily through wizardry, but often at the cost of their sanity for doing so.
Inhumanity
One of the most notable elements of There Are No Heroes is that characters have the option to begin, or later become, inhuman. Because of this quality, a sense of balance needs be established. If you wish to play an unlisted human character turned inhuman, please message me with your idea. Creatures which are not valid options, such as zombies, demons, ghosts, etc, are barred as they are inherently not human or cannot even attempt to continue their humanity.
Character Sheet
Below is the generalized character sheet, which while expansive and long, should cover almost any area that a character sheet need to.
