The Basics

[zoelogical42]

 

 

Welcome to Sburb! Grab a towel, don't panic, and get ready for the destruction of everything you knew and emergence of a brand new universe.

The conceit of Homestuck is simple at its core and complicated in output: your home planet is being destroyed by meteors and its destruction is inevitable, but you and your friends are the ones chosen to make a new universe and start the world over again. It's an invitation to personal development, teamwork, and evolution. lbr should be pretty fun all things considered

Anyways: the Basics.

Your goal is to escape Earth with your friends to Sburb and create a new universe that you can enter as the Ultimate Reward. There is a basic outline of events. However, Skaia will respond to events as if they had already occurred with the assumption of their always occurring. This means that a void session was always going to be a void session; therefore, events are already occurring in response. This is, essentially, a way to justify any bullshit you want to throw at your fellow players; but remember, everyone has to work to solve their problems together.

A Perfectly Generic Outline

On Earth:

• Arrival of First Sburb Discs (staggered out two by two throughout the first day.)
• Client/Server Setup
• Kernelsprite Prototyping
• Sburb Entry for Player 1
• Player 1 explores planet while Player 2 builds their house up to the next level; then Player 3 becomes the server and Player 2 becomes the client, et cetera, until the circle of stupidity is complete.

In the Incipisphere: 

• The Space player finds and incubates the Genesis Frog.
• The first player completes the ectobiology quest.
• All other quests are optional but productive.

Potential Quests:

• Consort Quests: the consorts of your planet are always in need of things to be done.
• Ectobiology Quest: given to the first player to enter Sburb, they must ensure the existence of themselves and their fellow players.
• Echeladder Quest: how many rungs can you scale?
• Godtier Quest: can you face your own death in order to become a god?
• Planet Quest: the denizen of your planet has issued a challenge. can you fulfill it?
• Aspect Quest: can you master your aspect? or will it master you?
• Class Quest: is it who you are, or what you do?
• Exile Commands: you feel a peculiar urge to do something, but it wasn't from you.
• Fulfilled Aesthetic: how many things can you prototype that fit your aesthetic? 

Potential Conflicts:

• Prospitian/Derse Intrigue
• Angel/Horrorterror Corruption

Endgame

• Endgame starts when the Black King wins on the Battlefield and enacts the Reckoning, when meteors start falling from the Veil and hitting your homeplanet.
• Players must unite to defeat the threat that emerges from the Battlefield before they can enter the new universe they've created.

-

Gameplay is modeled off of the Vast & Starlit system. Taking turns, each player sets up a scene: describes the location, says who's there and explains what's happening. They pick two-three heroes for the scene. Everyone not playing one of the focused heroes can play a background character or their own hero. The scene is then an active part of the story.

When you attempt something Dangerous, Difficult, or Both, any other player may call it out as such.

• For non-focus characters, if the thing attempted is Dangerous, a third player will tell you how you got hurt or endangered by doing it. If the thing attempted is Difficult, the third player will tell you what is needed before it can be done. If it is Both, the third player will tell you how you failed and endangered everyone.
• For focus characters, the scene ends on a cliffhanger. It then becomes the starting point of their character's next scene. Then you may take the Difficult, Dangerous or Both challenge but only from hearing from other players what the consequences of each will be.

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Prototyping Items

One of the hallmarks of Homestuck is the bizarre and nifty items its characters can prototype. The Vast & Starlit alien tech concept fits this very nicely. In order to prototype objects, you must start with one of three steps, and have one or more players complete the other two.

• describe the underlying principles the tech is based on: science, bullshittium, tropes, et cetera.
• describe the aesthetics of the technology: what were the contributing items? what does this item look like? broad is fine.
• describe the functions of the technology: what does it do?

When you make the prototyped tech part of your personal gear, have the other players ask you 3 to 5 questions about it. At least one of the questions must be from this list.

• how is it unique?
• how is it quirky or temperamental?
• what does it need to work?

Classpecting

[zoelogical42]

a brief summary of classpect theory for this game. 
 

 

Aspect Theory

• Space: is. Creation, movement, nurture. Home of the Genesis Frog. Has the ability to teleport, telekinesis. Falls back and moves forward as needed.
• Time: is not. Destruction, temporality. Home of the Scratch Construct, the restart button. Has the power to loop, change timelines, but has to keep everything consistent.
• Light: is. Information, luck. Ability to recognize the best way to get to what you want.
• Void: is not. Nothingness, obsfucation of knowledge. Portals, emptiness, fluidity.
• Blood: is. Relationships, connections. Affinity, affection, unity to achieve goals. Loads of empathy and insight into how people work. Community is essential to function.
• Breath: is not. Freedom, wind, resilience and accommodation. Open-mindedness.
• Life: is. Vitality and survival. the ability to heal, to absorb and move on. A life player can bring each of their teammates back from death once aside from kissing unless cancelled out by class.
• Doom: is not. Mass destruction, impending death. Negative outcomes. judgment/law. Fate. understanding of system rules and structure.
• Rage: is. Negative emotions, fury, sanity/madness. Losing control. Frustration at the way things are.
• Hope: is not. The power of belief to change things. If you believe in it hard enough, it’ll come true.
• Heart: is. Essence of being; emotions, intuition, motivation. Being whatever you are to the most of what you are. Potential access to selves across timelines, or fragmentations and permutations of self.
• Mind: is not. Thoughts, decisions, choices, reasoning, decision-making. Mildly psychic. Free will.

Aspect Abilities

Space

Herotier:

• Nurturer of the Frog: you are the caretaker of the Genesis Frog.
• Make Space: you move aside or step forward as needed.
• Find a Way: you can always find a way. 20% chance of teleportation (no actions).
• Keeper of the Forge: the forge to incubate the Genesis Frog is located somewhere on your planet

Godtier:

• Nurturer of the Frog: you are the caretaker of the Genesis Frog.
• Make Space: you move aside or step forward as needed.
• Find a Way: no travel actions, 100% teleportation.
• Resize: One side makes you larger; the other makes you small. Ability to shrink/enlarge items/persons.

Time

Herotier:

• Don’t Cross the Streams: you have an instinctive sense of the timestream and how it should function. Responsibility to keep a record of the timeline.
• Timetravel: you can make a time loop anytime you want. Essentially: endless actions.
• Take a Nap: while timetravelling, every five actions you have to take a break.
• Keeper of the Scratch Construct: if the session needs to be restarted, the method is located on your planet.

Godtier:

• Don’t Cross the Streams: you have an instinctive sense of the timestream and how it should function. Responsibility to keep a record of the timeline.
• Timetravel: Can now contact doomed timelines.
• Take a Nap: while timetravelling, every eight actions you have to take a break.
• Watched Clock Never Boils: you have a perpetual interior timeclock.

Light

Herotier:

• Get Lucky: do you feel lucky, kid? +1 on all rolls.
• Well Informed: there’s information everywhere if you know how to look.
• Readjust: you have a sense of which way is best. Can reroll 2 actions per time period, and use the highest score on each reroll.
• On a Roll: you can roll to divine the best path. if over 8, they get an additional +2 to their next 10 rolls.

Godtier:

• Get Lucky: do you feel lucky, punk? +2 on all rolls.
• Well Informed: there’s information everywhere if you know how to look.
• Readjust: you have a sense of which way is best. Can reroll 4 actions per time period, and use the highest score on each reroll.
• On a Roll: you can roll to divine the best path. if over 6, they get an additional +3 to their next 10 rolls.

Void

Herotier:

• Like a Ghost: it’s like if the sky were starless.
• Don’t Know Nothing: sometimes the right answer is hiding right where you weren’t looking. gets ignorance challenges instead of information challenges.
• Game the System: 40% chance for a failure to count as a success.

Godtier:

• Like a Ghost: it’s like if the sky were starless. Ability to phase; no ability to touch items while phased. No interruptions during travel while phased.
• Don’t Know Nothing: sometimes the right answer is hiding right where you weren’t looking.
• Game the System: 60% chance for a failure to count as a success.
• Appearify: the ability to pull platonic ideals out of nothingness with a difficulty modifier based on how well they can conceptualize the object. (suggestion: Paint challenge?)

Blood

Herotier:

• Bleeding Heart: you wear your heart on your sleeve.
• Social Cohesion: you’re in tune with the rhythm of group dynamics.
• Antibody Motion: you can recognize when someone is not themselves. roll to heal corruption (horrorterror or angel). 30% chance of success.
• Inner Sociologist: you’ve made a study of your talents.

Godtier:

• Bleeding Heart: you wear your heart on your sleeve.
• Social Cohesion: you’re in tune with the rhythm of group dynamics. +4 to group building challenges. +
• Antibody Motion: you can recognize when someone is not themselves. roll to heal corruption (horrorterror or angel). 60% chance of success.
• Equalizing Stasis: keeping the group going requires fluidity. Can equalize health between their own and another player’s.

Breath

Herotier:

• Resilience: even after everything, it’s still you.
• Bringer of Change: a new wind for a new day.
• Equilibrium: you follow the path of least resistance. +1 against any challenge that uses one of your three highest stats.
• Like a Leaf on the Wind: watch how I fly.

Godtier:

• Resilience: even after everything, it’s still you.
• Bringer of Change: a new wind for a new day.
• Freebird: find your own way. Roll for a third option to open up.
• The Windy Thing: power of wind as attack/dispersion.

Heart

Herotier:

• Be Yourself: you can’t be anyone else.
• Kaleidoscopic Permutation: as many selves as there are mirrors. Ability to interact with fragments and splinters of self.
• A Mirror Clear: can absorb others’ emotions for what they are.
• True Colors: Can see the essences of things - what a thing “truly” is.

Godtier:

• Be Yourself: you can’t be anyone else.
• Kaleidoscopic Permutation: as many selves as there are mirrors. Ability to communicate through fragments of self.
• A Mirror Darkly: gains ability to communicate with alternate timeline selves internally.
• Soulswipe: can pull out the essence of a thing from the thing. Creates something like a soul that can be broken or altered by a Heart player.

Mind

Herotier:

• Like a Shrink: you have perspective on your actions and those of other people.
• Get the Job Done: you have what it takes.
• Karma Consequence: a decision leads to a path. Reroll 3 actions in a row, and then choose either one set or the other.
• Thought at Play: thought is a game. +2 and +2 for two special interests, determined at onset of game.

Godtier:

• Like a Shrink: you have perspective on your actions and those of other people.
• Get the Job Done: you have what it takes.
• Karma Chameleon: a decision leads to a path. Reroll 6 actions in a row, and then choose either one set or the other.
• Thought at Play: thought is a game. +4 and +4 for two special interests, determined at onset of game.

Rage

Herotier:

• Warrior Spirit: you have it inside you.
• Berserker: you cannot be tamed during this state. +2 against influence challenges. + 2 on any roll for 5 rolls. Can be activated only during a dangerous + difficult endeavour. Can only do negative/harmful actions during this state.
• An Injustice: one thing you cannot stand. Alternate activation for berserker state.
• Toxic: Can destabilize others’ sanity; in exchange, loses sanity.

Godtier:

• Warrior Spirit: you have it inside you.
• Berserker: you cannot be tamed during this state. + 4 on any roll for 10 rolls. Can be activated only during a dangerous + difficult endeavour. Can only do negative/harmful actions during this state.
• Judgment: the choice of mercy. Can do 2 positive actions during berserker.
• Joy of War: you are laughing as you go.

Hope

Herotier:

• There Once Was a Story: and you believed it to be true.
• Hope Bubble: you cannot be stopped during this state. + 2 against influence challenges. + 2 on any roll for 5 rolls. Can be activated only during a dangerous + difficult endeavour. Can only do positive/healing actions during this state.
• Eureka!: a point of inspiration. Alternative activation for Hope Bubble.
• Gadzooks!: sharing hope with your friends. Can bolster others’ sanity at the price of their own.

Godtier:

• There Once Was a Story: and you believed it to be true.
• Hope Bubble: you cannot be stopped during this state. + 4 on any roll for 10 rolls. Can be activated only during a dangerous + difficult endeavour.
• Excalibur’s Slice: hope has sharp edges, too. You can do two negative actions during Hope Bubble.
• A Thing With Feathers: that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all.

Doom

Herotier:

• Damocles’ Sword: you can dodge if you know it’s there.
• Shuttle of Fate: can you truly change your fate? Ability to reroll 2 actions per time period.
• Domesday Book: you’ve heard about stories like these before.
• Isaac’s Burden: a destined sacrifice. When disaster comes, you can sacrifice something in order to preserve something else.

Godtier:

• Damocles’ Sword: you can dodge if you know it’s there.
• Shuttle of Fate: can you truly change your fate? Ability to reroll 4 actions per time period.
• Achilles’ Heelies: navigate by failure. Roll to divine the best path. If under 6, your failure brings survival.
• Zombie Lawn: if at  health, can trigger a zombie state until healed above 2.

Life

Herotier:

• Verve: existence is a joy. You get a boost from living.
• Excalibur’s Scabbard: you chose the scabbard instead of the sword. Temporary invulnerability.
• Heal UP: it was just sitting there, asking to be used. Receives 2 healing items per time period.
• The Way Things Are: you live in what is.

Godtier:

• Verve: existence is a joy. You get a boost from living.
• Excalibur’s Scabbard: you chose the scabbard instead of the sword. Temporary invulnerability.
• Heal UP: it was just sitting there, asking to be used. Receives 4 healing items per time period.
• Orpheus’ Lament: what Orpheus could not, you do. 1 extra heal from death per person unless cancelled out by class.

 

Class Theory

• Heir: passive. attains through gifts and happenstance. Goes after what they want, but also is purposefully redirected.
• Page: active. attains through work. Is given very little guidance or help and starts off with very little ability, but self-directedly becomes the most powerful piece in the game.
• Rogue: passive. takes for others. Greatest strength is through connections with other people and how it motivates them. They take, but give as often as they take. Their main symbol is fluidity. 
• Thief: active. takes. Greatest strength is through connection with self. If their self-understanding is not thorough enough, they can wreck the whole game. They need to figure out what they need and go after it. They can store their aspect.
• Sylph: passive. influences. Self-contained. Enough in and of themselves, they hold communion and healing with their aspect. Their influence, when they exert it, can be sometimes overbearing. But when they act, they make the necessary decision.
• Witch: active. influences. Outwardly-contained. They tend towards active manipulation, usually of personal boundaries and their own power, in order to achieve their ends.
• Seer: passive. understands. Looks in order to direct others, generally the mastermind/navigator figure. 
• Mage: active. understands. Looks in order to direct self and study. Veers more to comprehension than sight. 
• Knight: passive. serves. Is given quests and fulfills them. If you want something done, give it to a knight.
• Maid: active. serves. Cleans her situation up, generally directly serving a higher power. If you want a problem solved, give it to a maid.
• Bard: passive. ends. Focuses on the way the story is told. Is directed primarily by their aspect.
• Prince: active. ends. Comes in last minute to kiss the prince/ss and kill the dragon. Directs and commands their aspect.

Class Experiences

 

Heir: one who passively attains

Herotier:

• Heir’s Gift: you have an inheritance. wherever you go, there’s a chance of receiving something you need. 
• Heir’s Fall: it’s easy to take things for granted.

Godtier:

• Heir’s Domain: you have become your aspect.
• Heir’s Ear: you’ve learned how to listen.

Page: one who actively attains

Herotier:

• Page’s Start: every book has a starting page.
• Page’s Frustration: it takes so long to get anywhere from the first page.

Godtier:

• Page’s Success: you’ve worked your way to mastery of your aspect.
• Page’s Lesson: what you’ve learned, you can pass on.

Rogue: one who passively displaces

Herotier:

• Rogue’s Mission: rob from the rich and give to the poor.
• Rogue’s Equality: equalize your environment.

Godtier:

• Rogue’s Home: you’ve found one.
• Rogue’s Heist: no one does it better.

Thief: one who actively displaces

Herotier:

• Thief’s Mark: take from anyone and give to yourself.
• Thief’s Equality: equalize your environment.

Godtier:

• Thief’s Honor: you have a code so you don’t have regrets.
• Thief’s Guild: you have your people; everyone does.

Knight: one who passively serves

Herotier:

• Knight’s Quest: you know what you’re doing.
• Knight’s Armor: it’s like a tank.

Godtier:

• Knight’s Table: you’ve found your crew.
• Knight’s Ambition: you know what you don’t need.

Maid: one who actively serves

Herotier:

• Maid’s Duty: it seems that there’s always a mess to clean up.
• Maid’s Mop: fortunately you’re good at cleaning up.

Godtier:

• Maid’s Business: now who runs things around here?
• Maid’s Insight: nobody knows better than the person who sees it all.

Seer: one who passively guides

Herotier:

• Seer’s Mirror: there is a way out.
• Seer’s Labyrinth: one hall more crowded than the next.

Godtier:

• Seer’s Philosophy: you’ve come to terms with your experiences.
• Seer’s Chair: you can boss people around whenever you want.

Mage: one who actively guides

Herotier:

• Mage’s Spell: you can change things. But are you doing more harm than good?
• Mage’s Book: whatever it is, it’s certain to have happened before.

Godtier:

• Mage’s Feat: things are beginning to happen.
• Mage’s Generosity: you’ve discovered how to make this work.

Sylph: one who passively influences

Herotier:

• Sylph’s Haven: you have a place where you feel completely in control and at home.
• Sylph’s Haunt: you worry about things that are out of your control.

Godtier:

• Sylph’s Harmony: you carry your home inside of you.
• Sylph’s Humility: not so much a submission as an assertion.

Witch: one who actively influences

Herotier:

• Witch’s Tower: things are going to change.
• Witch’s Casting: maybe it’ll help; maybe it won’t.

Godtier:

• Witch’s Enchantment: it’s the right thing to do.
• Witch’s Charm: all’s well as ends well.

Bard: one who passively ends

Herotier:

• Bard’s Mead: there’s always some set aside for you.
• Bard’s Regale: you have a true gift with words.

Godtier:

• Bard’s Egress: you know how to exit a story.
• Bard’s Epic: you know how to end a story.

Prince: one who actively ends

Herotier:

• Prince’s Desire: there must be something that you want.
• Prince’s Gambit: your strategy will never fail.

Godtier:

• Prince’s Reign: you’ve stumbled, but you’ve learned.
• Prince’s Debt: you always pay in full.

Character Capacity

[zoelogical42]

Note: This is kind of a work in progress and one of the things that needs to be playtested.

Basics
Starting Health Vial: 20
Starting Cache Limit: 10
Echeladder Rung: 0

(For every echeladder rung, health vial and cache limit are increased by ten.)

Starting Stats
Grit(strength/perseverance): 1-5
Vim(resistance/sanity): 1-5
Nimbility(agility/speed): 1-5

Amiamosity(connection making): 1-3
Charismagic(magic and perspicacity): 1-3
Discernment(intelligence and observation): 1-3

IDEALLY amiamosity would serve as the measure of how well your character makes relationships; it is not a measure of whether those relationships are good or bad. Charismagic serves as a marker of your character's connection to their aspect and their awareness of it. Discernment serves as a marker of your character's general knowledge and awareness of the world around them. Grit would then be a measure of your character's strength and ability to keep going. Vim is a measure of their resistance to getting hurt and their sanity levels. Nimbility is a measure of their agility and speed. 

Quests and Conflicts

[zoelogical42]

Ideas for quests! This post is explicitly open to suggestions.


Consort Quests:

Planetary Quest: this only requires three things. It must be tied to the aesthetic of your planet, it must be inflicted by your denizen, and it must be something solvable only by use of your classpect.

Ectobiology Quest

This quest is given only to the first character to enter Sburb. They are responsible for paradoxifying their fellow players and ensuring that everybody exists.

Exile Commands

• ever felt the strange desire to shake your bootie like an aardvark and squat on your desk? you can thank an exile for that, probably.
• sometimes these are useful and sometimes these are...entirely not....
• if you hear a strange voice in your head telling you to "kiss the girl" you are entirely within reason to invoke an abjure

Aspect Quests:

• Space: find the Genesis Frog and make the new universe; learn when to fall back and when to assert yourself

• Time: keep everyone from dying; accept what you cannot change

• Blood: keep your community functioning and sane

• Light: find the best direction

• Hope: believe in something

• Breath: find freedom

• Rage: use your anger

• Doom: accept necessary sacrifices

• Heart: be in tune with your own emotions

• Mind: make the right choices

• Life: grow

• Void: accept inner emptiness

 

Class Quests

• Heir: attain inheritance of aspect

• Page: work to attain aspect

• Rogue: displace with aspect for others

• Thief: displace aspect for self

• Knight: serve with aspect for others

• Maid: serve with aspect for self

• Seer: understand with aspect

• Mage: understand through aspect

• Sylph: influence aspect

• Witch: influence with aspect

• Bard: end with aspect

• Prince: end through aspect

Angel Corruption

• this is most easily recognizable by the appearance of lumintense, a state in which the character begins to glow, refuses to compromise, and gets rather stabby.
• there should be a rather Angel of the Lord aesthetic going on.

Horrorterror Corruption

• this is most easily recognizable by the appearance of grimdark, a state in which the character begins to gray, compromises endlessly, and gets reckless.
• there should be a Lovecraftian aesthetic going on.

Prospitian Intrigue

• help the Parcelmistress deliver her packages!
• look in the clouds for the future
• the knowledge of imminent failure

Dersian Intrigue

• Jack Noir and his entire wildcard deal.
• The Black Queen's vanity.
• the Authority Regulators.
• the Warweary Villein, who starts a revolution.
• the Horrorterrors watching.

Suggested Denizens

[zoelogical42]

All bolded denizens are canon denizens! 

Male	Female	Nonbinary
Typheus (breath)	Aditi (creativity/breath)	Aster (escape/breath)
Vritri (dragon/blood)	Hestia (home/hearth/blood)	Agni (fire/connection/blood)
Sia (perception/light)	Cetus (ocean/light)	Ushas (dawn/defence/light)
Janus (doors/void)	Nix (night/stealing/void)	Shesha (when all is gone what remains/void)
Geb (space/earth)	Echidna (scratches/space)	Herne (hunter/space)
Hephaestus (weapons/time)	Urvashi (time/elusiveness)	Morrigan (war/time)
Asclepius (medicine/life)	Hemera (day/life)	Bat (two faces/life)
Fenrir (doom)	Likho (misfortune;doom)	Shait (fate/doom)
Prometheus(courage/mind)	Dike (justice/mind)	Vor (awareness/mind)
Baldr(innocence/heart)	Mnemosyne (memory/heart)	Blodeuwedd (fake/heart)
Herakles (rage/destruction)	Morrigan (rage/war cry)	Rudra (wrath/animals)
Elpis (hope)	Inanna (doom/hope)	Bennu (rebirth/hope)
Yaldabaoth (strongest warrior)	Nike (victory/warrior)	Thor (thunder god)
Abraxas (weakest warrior)	Olwen (white footprint/weak warrior)	Loki (trickster god)

Resource Summary Post

[zoelogical42]

• The Basics
• Classpecting
• Denizens
• Dreamstuck Writing Basics
• Quests and Conflicts

Game One

[zoelogical42]

So okay! We have most of the things necessary to start, so let's start! Part of this game is going to be just figuring out how everything works and what needs to be adjusted for better game play, so any suggestions, input and feedback would be very much appreciated. I'll keep this post open until we have enough people to start or we have twelve players, either or. When we get enough people involved, I'll randomize the classpects and other information and send them back to you, and then set up a Get to Know Each Other's Characters post.

To submit your application, please fill out the following form in one of the comments below!

Player Name:
Player Pronouns:
Player Age:
Class Preferences (3):
Aspect Preferences (3):
Character Race Preference: 
Prospit or Derse Preference:
Discord or Slack Preference: 
Anything Else: