Eidolon: Conspiracy Theory
Mario's is a small diner in downtown Buffalo, New York. The furnishings make up for their cheapness with gaudy red and white coloring; even if the chrome fittings could do with a polish they still shine in the dawn sunlight. The hour is early, and the restaurant is almost empty, but the smell of cooking grease and strong coffee hang heavy in the air as the staff prepare for the coming breakfast rush. A waitress behind the counter watches the few patrons for empty coffee cups, while they in turn tend to their meals with various levels of lethargy. Viewed without context, the scene could be set in any of a hundred thousand diners throughout the country.
Each of our heroes finds themselves in this place, at this time. Yet it is not quite right to call them heroes, for at this moment they are common, ordinary people, much like the diner itself. They are picking at their eggs, sipping their coffees, preparing for work or bed as their circumstances may be, as they presumably have many times before.
Suddenly the door flies open, apparently of its own accord. It hits a rack of classifieds, which are sent scattering. Objects on the bar and tables start exploding, following a path down the lobby. Salt shakers and ketchup bottles send fragments of glass flying everywhere. Near the end of the bar, a plastic display case full of pie tumbles off its perch, and a waiter standing stunned in the back of house entryway is pushed over by an invisible force.
From the kitchen can be heard the sounds of falling pots and pans, as if a wild animal were wreaking havoc, but for a few moments the dining room is quiet. A patron might have enough time to catch their breath and check themselves for cuts. They might even have enough time to look out the front windows and see a man in a cheap suit standing on the sidewalk out front, with a look of concentration on his face.
Then the diner erupts into flame, killing everyone inside.
-----
You wake up with a start. The plastic of the barstool creaks below you; you are sitting at a black plywood bar in what seems to be a dance club of some kind. With the house lights up, the whole place looks cheap and dirty. Overflowing trash cans stand near the walls, bits of lank streamers hang from the exposed rafters, and sticky spots on the bar and floor where drinks were spilled the night before have yet to be wiped up.
A slightly-built man stands behind the bar, grabbing the edge with both hands. He looks to be pushing fifty; his over-tanned skin makes it hard to tell one way or the other, and contrasts sharply with his ice-blue eyes. He's wearing a tassled black leather vest with nothing underneath, and a pair of tight leather pants the same color. His mouth is open in a toothy grin, and his teeth are the same gaudy gold of the massive lightbulb-studded sign above the liquor, which reads "EDEN". In front of you on the bar is a card--different in size and shape from a normal playing card--which has been placed face down. As you look back and forth, you see that the other barstools are occupied by other people from the diner you were just in; like you, they seem to be unharmed, and they also have cards placed in front of them.
"Well, hello." The man's voice is deep, melodic, and ripe with the affected charm of a used car salesman. "I've been expecting you." He gestures widely, with both hands, to the cards sitting in front of you. "You're all dead. But, if you're interested, I may have a deal to offer you."
General Notes
The system we will be using is Eidolon: Become Your Best Self, inspired by Jojo's Bizarre Adventure and Persona. I'm planning to run with 3-5 players.
I'll be providing the character sheets and cheat sheets publicly for reference. I'd like to recommend that you purchase the full rules from itch.io to support the creators, but if you can't do that for whatever reason and want to join, PM me and I can get you a copy.
The setting is present day USA; the world is like real life unless otherwise stated. Per the blurb, we'll be starting in New York state, but I expect travel to be a significant part of the campaign.
As far as content goes, swearing, sexual references, violence, etc are all fine, but I'd like any sexual content past first base to fade to black. (Naturally, this is in addition to whatever lines the players have; if there's something you just don't want brought up or even mentioned in the game, let me know, whether that's particularly graphic violence, mentions of suicide, spiders, etc.)
Content warnings for the story as planned include police brutality, conspiracy thought, and general violence and mayhem, including in crowded areas.
For full disclosure, this is my first time DMing this system, as well as my first time DMing play-by-post. Please don't hesitate to tell me if there's something I'm doing which isn't working for you so we can talk it out!
Character Creation
- Your character should be an ordinary person, who has not previously had contact with the Undertow or anything else explicitly supernatural (unless you want to play the Veteran and we discuss it, see below)
- I'm interested in seeing complex characters--people who don't see themselves as heroes, people who are in it just to save their own skin, people who can't live up to their own ideals, all great. What I don't particularly want to see are out-and-out villains--characters who harm others just for the hell of it.
- As far as playbooks go:
- The Wildcard is off limits for this game
- If you want to run the Veteran, Beast, or Inhuman, check in with me first so we can discuss your concept
- I'd prefer if each person had a different playbook, but I won't make it an absolute requirement so long as their powers don't end up being too similar
- I'm going to start this just a little railroad-y, with a pre-planned encounter; until that's done, don't feel like you need to worry about ties. That said, if you want to discuss among yourselves and do some ahead of then, that's fine with me.
- If you want to come to me with a completed character sheet, that's great; if you'd rather draw up a rough character idea and talk it over first, that's great too!
How I Run Things
- I'm definitely interested in this being a more collaborative experience. Eidolon 2E includes several explicit mechanisms for allowing the players to wrest control of the game world away from the GM, and I think in general games are more interesting when the players aren't afraid to confidently say things that make sense about the world. I'd rather you do something and we maybe have to backtrack on it than I would everyone waiting on me for everything. I've found that some of the best plot moments in games I've run have come from ideas tossed off by the players.
- This is in the rulebook, but it bears repeating because my priorities are the same. Rule 1 is: do everything you can to ensure that everyone at the table is having a good time. Rule 2 is: Always play in service of telling a good, interesting, exciting story. Nothing should get in the way of Rule 1, and only Rule 1 should get in the way of Rule 2. If at any point you aren't having fun, please let me know immediately so we can work out how to move forward. By the same token, if you have an idea for something you think would make a good story and want to talk it out with me or with the group as a whole, don't hesitate to bring it up!
- I've GM'd TTRPGS and done PBP RP before, but never both at the same time, and I've never done PBP in a GM/player format. To some degree, I'll be looking to the rest of you for cues on how best to handle things like time limits for posting, etc, so please be patient with me. That said, I'll do my best to practice basic courtesy, e.g. letting y'all know when I'll be absent, and I ask that you do the same.
Links
Playbooks
Cheat Sheet
