Whispersmith
From PlotBunnies
This idea is for a Collectible Card Game, rather than a story. I could envision it as a film, too, but mostof what I've written is about the game rules, rather than the setting. Angel
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[edit] World
(My new idea for today is an evolution of this one, involving a time machine and some other stuff. But I figured I should share this first. This was originally an idea for a collectible card game (as a deliberate contrast to all the battle-oriented), but I have no idea how to arrange either art or printing for such a thing. So I'll just post the story bits; if anyone has an idea how this could actually be made, let me know and I'll go into more detail on the game mechanics)
There is a secret group controlling all the world's governments. That much isn't open to debate; ask any conspiracy theorist. They all know it, though most of them couldn't tell you how they know, and none of them can agree on who is doing the controlling. They'll talk about shadowy consortia of businessmen and oil tycoons. Or freemasons, ruling from the shadows for generations. Of secret codes, and societies like the Skullmen grooming potential rulers for the future.
They are wrong. There's no group here, no conspiracy. The people in control aren't well known, that's almost the only thing they have in common. They know of each other, but they don't plot or conspire. For the most part, they see each other as competitors. Centuries ago, their predecessors set out some rules of engagement, so that their secret war remains civil and doesn't damage the very resources they're competing for. That document used the term Shadow Walkers to refer to people who know about the game they play in the shadows of world politics; but in more recent times, the people who rule the world have come to call themselves a different name: Whispersmiths.
From the Whispersmith's point of view, the 'big picture' is like an amazingly complex game of chess. The main fields of play are politics, economics, academia and the media. Their "board" has many pieces on it; representing either ostensibly powerful individuals, groups united by some common ideology (who can be expected to act as a unit), and occasionally corporations or government departments. Some smiths actually have computerised or physical game boards, with icons or pawns to represent the pieces. Some of these cooperate to keep their boards as close as possible to the real world. This isn't really an alliance, though, just a group who get some mutual benefit by pooling the most basic levels of intelligence. It would be most irritating, they say, to find an important piece overtaken by something you didn't even know was on the board.
As we approach the end of the 20th century, the largest group of mapmakers ("The Chess Club", who themselves have 35 members) have recently released a summary of the current state of play to anyone who would find it interesting. According to their figures, there are 659 Whispersmiths operating, and the game board contains ninety thousand playing pieces, of which maybe four thousand are anything more influential than pawns. The rest of the world's population are simply not worth considering.
The tools of control, for the Whispersmiths, aren't weapons, or money, or anything else the conspiracy theorists might suggest. They fight with Whispers, what mundane people might call rumours. The skill of whispering was discovered and named more than a thousand years ago, but was kept secret among the first smiths. It certainly contains some aspects of the later disciplines known as hypnosis and NLP, but isn't quite the same as either. A true whisper is a rumour which seems to have a life of its own, even able to pass subliminally from one person to another without being expliciltly stated. Some whispers are constructive, and give birth to scientific discoveries, while others may be harmful, and destroy a piece's sense of self.
A political piece isn't valuable simply for his power, or an economic piece for his control. A piece's value is determined by how many people listen to what he might say, the different social groups he moves in. While an amateur smith might try to manipulate the actions of a politician through a whisper about him, this is an obvious move and can easily be countered. The experienced smith will use a dozen different rumours to emotionally empower or destroy a hundred pawns or groups in different parts of a city, in order to influence an election and ensure that the mayoral candidate who shares their politics takes the seat. (It seems that someone pushed against their own basic nature becomes unpredictable, so its easier to find someone who already agrees with the policy you want, and then craft whispers to force a hundred of their rivals' supporters into a depressive fugue such that they can't vote)
[edit] Sample Whispersmith: Denise Carlin
Denise is a dancer at a small club in Chicago. She currently has channels - reliable chains of pawns who will carry a whisper for her - connecting her to the chief of police, city councillors in six different US cities, and a couple of powerful men in the Chinese triads. Like most smiths, she doesn't care for having too many pieces in play in the same geographic area.
She owns a small apartment, which money for her day job can easily pay for. She also gets some state benefits, due to a minor disability which is 'conveniently' in a higher regulatory classification if you're also left handed. She doesn't use her power to accumulate personal wealth; she has no desire to be in the public eye at all. But she has no problem influencing the council to ensure that the parks around her home are always kept free of litter and crime; and that the public amenities in her area are kept at a higher priority than they would otherwise be.
She also has enough chains of influence that she has control over a number of resources - though actually using these for any overt action would probably cost her the relevant pieces. Her resources at present include: 1) A small Libyan terrorist cell, under the control of a delusional individual who believes he is getting messages from his god through coded messages in the newspapers.
2) A nuclear device in a bunker in Iran (which she can influence enough to move it around through different secret military departments, but probably not actually deploy without sacrificing many of her pieces in a risky blackmail plot)
3) 30% of the production of fuel oil and gas from North Sea drilling rigs. She can direct to a great degree the contracts and prices which are agreed for her fuel, but actually obtaining it (or selling it) is probably not feasible.
[edit] Game Rules
I think I mentioned this one the other day ... look back through my previous posts for an idea of the setting. Basically, the cards are (mostly) normal people, except for the elite 'Whispersmiths', who control world politics by spreading magically-charged rumours.
Most of the cards in this game represent people. A person has a number of interests, as well as some statistics. At the start of the game, each player chooses one person (their 'Smith') to represent them, and places them at the far left of their playing area. The game is played using a 'web' of social connections. The object of the game is either to ostracise the other player's Whispersmith (make it so that less than one fifth of the cards in play is connected to them), or to make them drop out (any person card can be removed from the table by giving them more 'black whispers' (malicious rumours) than their confidence stat).
The game is played using counters that represent 'whispers'. These can be white or black, though some cards may introduce other colours.
During your turn, each Person gets to perform one action. This can either be moving whispers off them, generating a new (white) whisper, or moving along the table.
Spreading Whispers: A person's Influence stat determines how far they can throw a whisper. Influence 1 means they can move each whisper that's on them to any connected Person. Influence 2 means they can move a whisper to a Person who is connected to one of their immediate connections. Influence 3 means they can pass it to a connection's connection's connection, and so on. Black whispers can be kept 'wrapped up in' (on top of the counter for) a white whisper that acts as a carrier. They are moved together, but you can choose to move only the black one if you wish. A black whisper on its own is a malicious rumour destroying the credibility of the person it is on - they can't move it unless they also sacrifice a number of white whispers equal to their Influence.
Generating Whispers: A Person who doesn't move any whispers can instead generate a single white whisper, either on themself or on any person they're directly connected to. The exception to this is each player's Smith, who can instead choose to either generate and throw a white whisper (up to the distance indicated by their influence, as normal), or generate a black whisper and a white carrier on themself.
Dropping Out: If the black whispers on a person (not including any with a white carrier) equal their confidence, they can't perform a normal action. They are so disillusioned by the bad things everyone is saying about them that they can't socialise any more. If you wish, the player who controls a Dropping Out person can choose to remove them from the game, and discard any whispers that are on them. If they gain one more black whisper (so the number exceeds their Confidence), they are immediately removed from the game.
Dealing With It: A Smith can recognise black whispers, and knows how to deal with them. When your opponent gets black whispers onto your Smith, you can deal with them by moving the counters onto your draw pile. Dealing with the negative effects (both social and internal) takes time away from your planning though; each card on your draw pile reduces your maximum hand size by 1 (It starts at 5), though you can then remove these tokens from the game by skipping your draw phase when you could normally draw a card.
Person Cards: A Person may have some effect which they can do instead of their normal actions, or which can be activated by spending Whispers. You can only spend whispers that are on a Person; you cannot spend a black whisper or its carrier.
Whisper Cards: These are put into play from your hand instead of a token when you could normally generate a white whisper, but have some other effect on the Person they are currently on.
World Affairs cards: These change the state of play, and usually last for a set number of turns. When their duration expires (usually at the start of the owner's turn, before they draw), they go straight back into your hand.
Drawing Cards: You can draw or discard any number of cards at the start of your turn, bringing the number of cards in your hand to 5.
Moving People: This game could work either with a kind of playing mat, or just arranging your cards in an approximate grid. In either case, there is an area in the middle of the table called the 'front line'. If you put a Person on the front line, then People on your opponent's front line can be connected to them. If playing without a mat, you can't spread your cards out too far. You need to be able to touch two Person cards with the same hand to make them connected. You can place a new Person anywhere they are connected to a Person already in play, or anywhere on the front line. You can move a Person (instead of having them generate or throw whispers) as long as they are still adjacent to at least one Person they're already connected to, and their total number of connections doesn't decrease by more than 1. If you move a Person on or off the front line without breaking any connections, they may still throw whispers in the same turn.
Connected?: Two Person cards are considered connected if they are adjacent to each other on the table (horizontally or vertically), and have at least one interest in common.
Anyway ... I got to dash now. Please tell me what you think of my mechanics, and whether you'd consider playing either of my games. And it you know anyone else who might be interested, then please feel free to reshare.
[edit] Progress
Wow ... it looks like I might actually be able to make a trading card game, if I can put some artwork together. Printing will work out expensive, but I think I could just about afford it.
That doesn't leave me enough money to commission any artwork, though. I can probably do graphics (card layout and backs), but not actual pictures. On the other hand, I'm looking at a social game, so most of the cards will be people. Are there enough people in my circles who'd offer a photo to a game like this? I don't know ... but I think its worth a shot.
The theme of the game is 'whispers'. The story is built around a secret group of people who manipulate the ostensibly powerful people (politicians, the rich, media tycoons) using networks of ordinary people to spread magical, mind-controlling rumours. So the game's basic "statistics" are 'confidence' (2-5), 'sociability' (1-3) and a list of circles: social groups that each person is a member of. So ... if you're interested in helping me with this project, all it takes is a photo, name, and (real or fictitious) a couple of details.
I'm now trying to work out which game would be easiest to find artwork for. At the moment, I thing Whispersmith is probably my best shot, though if I can get an artist on board Bonsai! might be a better option.
For most 'Person' cards, some kind of action shot would work best. A person participating in one of his hobbies, or somehow representing the type of person he/she is. So a person leaning on his hockey stick, or a guy at a desk surrounded by Gundam figures would be great. I'd like to avoid having just a lot of "mug shots", but a picture that gives some impression who the character^ is, or what is important to them (like many profile pictures on here) is perfect.
Footnote ^ - The "Person" on a Person card could be a real person, or entirely fictional, or somewhere in between. Its up to you whether the character shares the same name/circles/stats as the real person in the photo.
