Author Topic: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs  (Read 23177 times)

Offline Simon Hogwood

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #30 on: April 24, 2008, 02:39:23 AM »
If you lived there at one point, there's no reason why you couldn't.

Heck, I'm considering putting together settings for Scotland and Cleveland, and I've never been to either.  ;)
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Offline JohnPatrickMCP

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #31 on: April 26, 2008, 11:10:45 PM »
Hey all,

It was mentioned earlier in this post but I am already starting to put together some material for Detroit as a setting.  In the words of Michael Bay "No city does urban decay like Detroit".  Plus there are a fair amount of local urban legends and spooky places.  Lets face it no matter how much they try to slap a pretty face on it detroit is still a place you don't really want to be alone after dark.  In the dresden files universe I see Detroit as what Chicago would be like without people like Harry and company keeping evil in check.  After the start of the war most of the Red Court vampires from Chicago relocated to Detroit and turned the city into a vampire stronghold.  A few brave, stupid, or powerful members of the council still live in the city trying to keep an eye on the vamps and hold back thier takeover of the city.  Meanwhile a secret society of mortals live and fight on the fine line between our world and the world of the supernatural.  Plus it has haunted cemetaries, indian burial grounds, a demonic herald of chaos and those are just some of the supernatural threats lets not forget dirty cops, crooked politicians, organized crime and gang violence.  Detroit's got it all.

Offline brenatevi

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #32 on: May 02, 2008, 10:02:32 AM »
How about Jerusalem?  Now there's a city with lots and lots of history, having been sacked and occupied many, many times.  It is also one of the most important cities to three major religions.  I also think it would be a great starting point for magical archaeological expeditions (finding buried ancient cities where old gods sleeps.)

Offline Lanodantheon

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #33 on: May 02, 2008, 04:34:04 PM »
Jerusalem... I can't even begin to wonder. This is one of those places where you have a great potential to piss off your friends if you're not all on the same page. How a GM treats this city would communicate a lot about the GM. It's all dependent on exactly what they did to explain it. It could reflect a dim view of humanity or a hope that that situation could turn out alright someday. IT all depends.


I think it could go one of 3 general ways:
 
The first way Dresden Files Jerusalem could go would be that the magical world is in chaos there, with the magical world barely able to keep up. You think a suicide bomber is a b***h, try his his ghost. That, and the psychic energy from all of the fear, hate and anger around the whole region would only spur the other magical force in the region, Faith. I'd be surprised if the Temple of Solomon didn't disintegrate any vampire or other ghoulie that set foot in it. Not to mention, Fundamentalists are scary enough, now think about Fundamentalist Wizards with Thaumaturgy....

This route of it as a hotspot could go further in one way with the Angels of the region are still crusading in a part of the Nevernever reflective of Dante's Divine Comedy, Hellgate London, Diablo and Little Nicky...j/k. But, it could also be a hotspot if it was interpreted as a city abandoned by the magical world and by the gods, but that is just one possible interpretation.

The second way Jerusalem could go is a common technique in the Dresden Files, Playing against type. Jerusalem is a center of politics in our world, in the Magical one, "Meh..."  It could be a magically dead zone because of all the Faith magic combined with all of the emotions. That route would be a downer though.

The third way is actually logical.  Jerusalem actually would probably be a better candidate for a Magical Casablanca/Berlin than a podunk town since the political sturggles could hide anything in it. Jerusalem as Accorded Neutral Ground would be fun because of the reasons you play a city like that, it's factioned. A main reason it could be accorded neutral territory is because there's so much magic in it. If you wanted to take it further, have magic banned within city limits under penalty of death because drawing from it is like having infinite supply of uranium bullets that explode. When something magical does go down in Magical Jerusalem, it's big.

I personally wouldn't run a game here (Not my kind of place and I don't know my way around) but if I did visit ingame, mine would be a mixture of all of these places.

That being said, I wonder about 2 other cities: Vactian City and Mecca...
www.obsidianportal.com/campaigns/the-emerald-city  (Nov 2012 Campaign of The Month)

fate-accelerated-star-wars-the-infinite-empire.obsidianportal.com/
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Offline Torvaldr

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #34 on: May 05, 2008, 05:17:05 AM »
Well, no one else brought it up so I will. Staying in the US base it in San Francisco, lots of different communities there to borrow mythology from rather than staying with any one culture. Can you say Dresden meets Big Trouble in Little China? It's all in the reflexes...........  ;D
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Offline skakid

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #35 on: May 05, 2008, 12:58:22 PM »
That, and the psychic energy from all of the fear, hate and anger around the whole region would only spur the other magical force in the region, Faith. I'd be surprised if the Temple of Solomon didn't disintegrate any vampire or other ghoulie that set foot in it.

I'd be inclined to think that the whole city would do that.  Maybe the faith based magic just flows like a fountain from the combination of religions that view the entire city as holy ground.  Interesting thoughts on the city. 

Offline janus1612

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #36 on: May 05, 2008, 10:47:01 PM »
I'm busy writing a campaign for England and I have less problem with the things I can put in than things I should leave out.

Arthurian legends, Roman gods, Celtic, Norse and Saxon mythology, Eastern European legends (thanks to the influx of immigrants... thank you European Union), Chinese mythology (thanks to chinese immigrants who have been coming here for decades), stuff from anywhere the British Empire stretched the list goes on... and on... and on...

And this is without even looking at figuring out new cool and interesting stuff of my own, or looking into the two world wars or crusades, or inquisition, or running a spin on what Jim has already picked up on.

You see my problem here.

Wardens in Britain would be horrendously busy people.
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Offline Rel Fexive

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #37 on: May 06, 2008, 07:39:09 PM »
I'm busy writing a campaign for England and I have less problem with the things I can put in than things I should leave out.

Arthurian legends, Roman gods, Celtic, Norse and Saxon mythology, Eastern European legends (thanks to the influx of immigrants... thank you European Union), Chinese mythology (thanks to chinese immigrants who have been coming here for decades), stuff from anywhere the British Empire stretched the list goes on... and on... and on...

And this is without even looking at figuring out new cool and interesting stuff of my own, or looking into the two world wars or crusades, or inquisition, or running a spin on what Jim has already picked up on.

You see my problem here.

Wardens in Britain would be horrendously busy people.

I'd be interested in seeing the end results of that my own self.
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Offline JohnPatrickMCP

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #38 on: May 09, 2008, 07:41:56 PM »
Wardens in Britain would be horrendously busy people.

For bouns points you could work in lovecraftian ichy things.

Offline janus1612

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #39 on: May 10, 2008, 09:33:51 AM »
For bouns points you could work in lovecraftian ichy things.

Great Cthulu you say... *smirks and cracks knuckles*

(Funny story, one of the players in an old table top Call of Cthulu game had a massive intimidate score and wanted to meet the great Cthulu to see if the line 'Nice tentacles you've got there sir, wouldn't like to see 'em get <sniff> broken!' would work. I didn't stick around to see the results. As I'm sure you can tell we were taking our role playing very seriously back then.)

As to seeing results, well the system adaption is working pretty well. Only problem I'm finding is working out a system for magical drain, ie getting worn out from casting magic, but I'll figure something out.

If you wanna stop by to read up on what is going on the board is here:

http://murpg.proboards19.com/index.cgi

I'll be calling the topic Semiautomagic (it's such a cool title I just gotta), but it's not set up yet as we're still doing character gen.
« Last Edit: May 10, 2008, 11:31:53 AM by janus1612 »
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Offline janus1612

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #40 on: May 10, 2008, 11:31:08 AM »
Actually all this talk of Cthulu has just given me an idea so I thank you. Of course my players might not, but I am very grateful.  ;D
Meddle not in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

Offline TangXiao

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #41 on: May 16, 2008, 05:13:11 AM »
Something Wiki made me think about tonight...should there be some sort of relationship between the politics of "sister cities"?  I mean, these kinds of pairings don't always make sense anyway -- seriously, what is the common thread connecting Belfast, Nashville, and Hefei, China?  Could it be that there's some sort of supernatural relation between the locations?

Offline TheMouse

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Re: Alternate Locations for Dresden RPGs
« Reply #42 on: July 14, 2008, 04:32:02 PM »
I'd probably run my first game in Amherst MA. Sure, it's not a big city, but it's got lots of people (several universities do that), a good variety of people, and some interesting locales. The campus of UMass alone offers a lot of possibilities. The dorms are a good Red or White court hunting ground. I can see a group like the Alphas springing up. What if the campus Christian group actually has some faith miracle workers? Etc.

Besides, it's just another way to continue the local tradition of running WoD games on campus. (: