Manifest: New Beginning.

Fresh Start, again.

I had initially started a blog on this very same site with the intent of posting daily on the progress of a project. That project's goal was to create a role playing game based on the sci-fi television serials and comic books of '60s. Primary inspiration would be from Star Trek, Buck Rodgers, Flash Gordon, Lost in Space, with additional influence from tangential sources such as John Carter of Mars, Johnny Quest, and Asimov.

One of my mistakes with my previous blog was preoccupation with quality. I wanted the blog to be an entertaining read for anyone visiting. That will no longer be a goal. This blog will exist solely as a sketchbook for my own ideas related to this project. My goals will be:

1. Write Every Day.
2. Begin to build a narrative and mechanical framework for a game that will be brought together in coherent form at a later date.

With that in mind. Two things have been occupying my thoughts in regards to this game. The first is the idea of alchemy as a unifying theme that could connect the mechanical attributes of the game into the narrative. In the game, there is an organization known as The Swanscove Society. The members range from wealthy dilettantes to esoterics. Alchemy as a foundation for some of this organizations' beliefs and rituals could cross over into the mechanical aspects of the game. As an example, a founding Swanscove Society member could have written a book regarded by modern society members as a priceless treatise on alchemical themes. Excerpts from this book on the topic of the seven alchemical planets could be used as a discussion of the player characters' basic attritubes. A short term goal will be to read up on historical alchemists and their beliefs and especially their symbols.

A second train of thought concerns an alien race in the game. Of the different species of player characters (Human, Hale, Mechanoid, and Kord) the Kord are the only alien species that will be available. An effort will be made to make them truly alien in both form and philosophy. In the narrative of the game, the Kord will play a role similar to the Vulcans in Star Trek. They will be present during the first steps of humanity into the greater galactic community. Similar to Vulcans, they will have a divergent philosophy but remain steadfast allies. Unlike Vulcans, however, the Kord society and philosophy will not be an ideal to which humans might strive, but one that is difficult to comprehend.

The basis of this divergent philosophy will be in the relationship Kord have with death. They will believe that death is not a result of the body's weakness, but because of a weakness in resolve. Kord bodies will be able to recover from grotesque injuries short of being completely obliterated. Those Kord who die and leave behind remains are thought to have chosen death, a choice that is considered betrayal of the living. This relationship with death is expanded upon by what I hope will be a deep mythology. That mythology starts with my developing two characters (central to the primary narrative of the game book.) One is the king of his peoples, an ancient and wise creature that has his arm severed in a storied battle with the Kord's long time enemy. This king represents a languishing and fading people, a society grown stagnant and in decline. His arm, unlike most Kord injuries, refused to regenerate. The missing arm, severed in battle, was thought obliterated. However, it has been discovered and more, the arm has regenerated a new body, a new persona. This Kord could be considered king, as well, and his body and mind are full of energy and new hope representing a divergent and idyllic new future for his people.

The Kord also have an alien relationship with their technology. Their society has been fundamentally changed and its people adapted to cryogenic sleep as a solution to interstellar travel. They have also developed 'hyperwave' transmission, a method for sending information at the speed of light. Their hyperwave communication networks interface with slumbering Kord to produce a virtual dreamland, something that has become interwoven with their species' mythology.

I will be writing about these two topics at length in the coming entries. However, I will not be bound by that statement and will feel free to write on any topic that occurs to me on that day.