All we do for Gold
It has well been known for sometime that no one goes to the town of Fortunes End. There was a time when people making the pilgrimage was quite common, posters would appear all across the country asking for assistance with a matter and promising your weight in gold if you could help. Naturally there were few who could resist such an offer, even as news spread of people never returning there was still an abundance of adventurers and desperate people willing to roll those dice. But people learn, slowly perhaps but they do learn, and eventually there were few around who were willing to visit Fortunes End, and if there were any they were quickly dissuaded by others who knew better. But as less people made their way to the town, more and more posters would appear, all with the same plea and offer. No one was sure where the posters came from, they seemed to appear over night, and those that tried to catch the culprits hanging them swore on their lives that one second there were no posters then they blinked and the town was covered. People burned them for fuel, stuffed them into mattresses and coats for warmth, some towns would even use the backs of the posters to print newspapers. Despite the abundance of reminders of the Fortune’s End and it’s offer, the missing people and the strange never ending deluge of posters kept people heavily invested in never visiting.
Of course, desperate times make desperate people.
The world faced an economic collapse that effected every person at every level of society. No one came out unscathed, even the rich who always seemed to prevail in such times. Perhaps it was the usual foolishness of people that brought this about, perhaps Fortunes End was reaching out beyond it’s borders. The exact cause hardly mattered, when the dust settled, many people were left in dire circumstance. Homes and fortunes were lost, food was scarce, what little was available would cost most people a months worth of wages to purchase, and the only people who were managing to stay afloat in these dire times were the grave diggers.
It was in these times a few desperate people came to the conclusion that the unknown horrors of the town couldn’t be much worse than the horror story they lived everyday. With little to loose, and the promise of enough gold to start over, people from all over picked up one of the endlessly spawning posters and followed the directions to Fortune’s End.
This is a weird west (Weird Western) style RPG, however this is only a general style and does not stick closely to the Americanization that often comes with western style media. For those unfamiliar with weird west, it is a style that mixes the tropes/setting/visuals of western style stories with that of horror/fantasy/sci-fi. The entirety of the first campaign will take place exclusively in the fictional town of Fortune’s End, and I have deliberately not specified the country this town supposedly exists in so feel free to have your character’s origin be from where you want, however the time period of the characters and the knowledge/tools they would have access to is from as late as 1885.
There is a mystery element to this RP, which will likely require deductive/inductive reasoning, and will often require a great deal of sleuthing/snooping/speaking. Not many things will, or should, be straight forward and I encourage asking lots of questions both in game and out of game.
For those of you who aren’t super into mystery elements there will be plenty of ways to contribute/ interact with the story that will still push the plot along and answer questions. Not everyone needs to be an aspiring detective to participate.
This is a collaborative story, however I will be acting as a pseudo game-master. Mostly to keep things on track and ensure we’re all moving in the same direction, enforce some of the rules, to keep track of the mystery, and to act as a sort of administrator for things. But please do not take that as meaning you need to clear everything with me, so long as you don’t go off the rails in an unfitting direction you’re free to expand the story/setting/mystery/characters in any direction you like.
Special Rules:
Fate Points:
When you using an exclusive character you must stick to the character sheet and any limitations you (or another person if you are collaborating) has made for that character. However, everyone starts the RP with three fate points that can be spent at anytime, for any reason, that allows that character to, for a moment, go beyond what they should be normally capable of. This could be anything from making an impossible shot with your gun, to convincing someone to share information with you even though you are notoriously bad at that sort of thing. Bare in mind that you must still present a plausible scenario for what you are doing. Fate Points don’t let you fire a gun with no bullets and can’t help you convince someone to tell you about the secrets of the town if they wouldn’t plausibly know the answers.
These are meant to help and also give everyone the ability to create cool and memorable moments. Please don’t abuse these.
Points are refunded when and if we complete an arc.
Character Control:
Every player gets one main character, and one secondary character that they exclusively control and have the ability to make changes to. Even I don’t have the ability to seize control or permanently change these characters. If anyone wants to make use of your characters they must ask permission from you. Even for minor things it is better to ask the controlling character.
As I am the one running the story I get more exclusive characters than any of you but not too many or else I’ll be in a never ending storm of collaborations.
Any character that is not exclusive is free game for anyone to control and change, provided what you do doesn’t contradict already established character traits.
Character Dibs:
There is a maximum of 27 characters to be added to the town of Fortune’s End not counting the main characters, and a secondary town of sorts with room for more (though with greater restrictions). So there is plenty of space for everyone to add characters to the story.
If you ever have an idea for a character, but you’re in a place in the story where it doesn’t make sense to add them in. You can call dibs by name dropping that character in any of your posts. Once you’ve done that you can add the character to either the Exclusive Characters or the Free Characters depending on if you want exclusive control over them or not. You don’t need to fill out the whole character sheet at that time you just need to make a post with their name. You can’t call dibs on a character you haven’t named, and again, please don’t abuse this. It’s meant to make sure everyone can move the story in the direction they want. Once you do a post where the character is introduce properly, if you haven’t already, you must then go and fill out the character sheet.
Character Creation:
Everyone starts the story having just arrived in Fortune's End and made their way to the Saloon where they will be staying. The character you start with is your main character, and this character must be visibly human. They might have secrets hiding beneath their skin, but from just a visual perspective they look normal. They made their way to Fortune's End for their own personal reasons, but they knew the town had something odd about it before they set off on their journey. This main character is the first of two "exclusive" characters you can make. Your secondary character can be another person arriving in Fortune's End, a monster-person from Fortune's End itself, or someone from Fortune Found. You don't need to make your secondary character right away, but your Main Character, the one you start the story with, must have a fully filled out character sheet before anything can start.
Any exclusive characters must have a fully filled out character sheet (see “Characters” tab). You do not need to fill out the entire character sheet for free characters, and I would encourage not fully filling those sheets out just so others can add to them. When you want to add to an existing character just message the player who originally made them with your addition. If you’re adding an addition for another player, be sure to note who requested the addition at the end of what ever you put in.
There are 27 available character slots in the town of Fortune’s End and you are free to do what ever you want with them so long as they adhere to the followings three rules.
1) They are visibly a monster of some kind. You are not going to mistake anyone from Fortune’s End for a regular person.
2) They can’t leave the town.
3) No one character has the full story and knows precisely whats going on. Everyone has smalls bits of information that must come together.
There is also a secondary town of sorts called Fortune Found. This “town” has more room for characters, and can be a good source of your secondary character if you don’t want your other exclusive character to be a monster. You must keep the following in mind for these characters.
1) They have been trapped for a long time and they are trapped because they couldn’t figure things out. So they know even less than the “people” of Fortune’s End.
2) Many of them won’t enter Fortune’s End without an extremely good reason. At this point in their lives the promise of gold, or anything they don’t need to survive or thrive, is not a good reason. Currently the only ones willing to enter are a man named Quill, and an unnamed group who takes resources from the town during the day.
3) They are all loyal to each other. Hurting or pissing off one will earn the ire of all and make dealing with them in the future even harder.
Post Length:
I personally care more about post frequency than post length. If you’re too busy or aren’t up to writing, a quick paragraph to check in with your character will go a long way. I’d rather have a lot of short posts then a few long posts separated by months of inactivity. If you haven’t posted in over a month, your character will be removed in some fashion.
If you decide part way through this isn’t for you, please have the courtesy to shoot me a message so I can open the game back up and invite people in who want to play or try things out. Don’t just disappear and leave things in limbo for weeks or months while people wonder if you’re ever coming back.
Your main character is someone who is not from Fortune's End but someone who went there for one reason or another. This is the only real hard restriction for your main character. Your secondary exclusive character is less restricted.
There are six available slots for players, first come first serve.
I already have my First Post up if you'd like an idea of what to expect.
And that is everything! Feel free to message me if you have any questions or would like to join!
