Dungeons

[powersthatbe]

Liminal Space | Dreamspace DUNGEONS At unpredictable intervals, mysterious doors - almost always doors, but sometimes some other signifier of a trapped person - appear in Liminal Space. Travelers who have been around for a while can identify them as Dungeon portals, behind which someone is in need of rescue; the shape of the door itself can tell you a good deal about who’s behind it, and so can Travelers with a knack for finding portals around Liminal Space. Dungeons most often appear between Jaunts, but sometimes one opens up during a Jaunt, at which point only Investigators on that Jaunt can access the portal. It takes at least two people to exit a dungeon portal, and there’s no guarantee you’ll find the trapped person, so only a total lunatic goes in alone. It used to be that dungeon portals wouldn’t accept more than four people, full stop, but lately that’s shifted; the biggest rescues have included a dozen or more people, but three to eight is more usual. What’s inside will vary. Usually, confusing, labyrinthine spaces, surreal monsters, nightmares drawn from the psyche of the trapped traveler, and time distortions, so that multiple versions of the same event can happen simultaneously. The Network is usually functional inside dungeons, at least for rescuers, though sometimes it isn’t, and it doesn’t always stay consistent within the same dungeon. Liminal skills don’t work unless you have the skill to overcome the block on your access. And at the end, if you’re lucky, the trapped person is waiting for you. If you’re not lucky, your work is just beginning… From an OOC perspective, dungeons have evolved from ‘solely a de-idling mechanic’ into another means for characters to go through canon updates, switch from canon to an AU or back, or to address some much-needed character growth. IDLE RECLAIMS When the player of an idled character asks to return them to the game, a mod grants them permission to set up a stand-alone dungeon rescue post. The number of participants in any given dungeon rescue can be as low as two and and high as the player running it feels like they can handle; please consult the player if you’d like to join in on the dungeon. (Out of character, smaller groups usually manage to get further in threads, so we still recommend capping at four.) Some dungeons include a ‘meanwhile, back at the portal…’ thread where any number of onlookers, gawkers, and concerned friends can wait for the party’s return. Idled characters are returned to the game only when their dungeon reaches the required comment count to un-idle (30 comments from them, or an NPC journal under the player’s aegis). Players looking to un-idle an unmarked character should make note of this fact when they contact the mods, so that an appropriate Conversation Space thread can be arranged. (Sorry, guys, but nobody except Baby Rose gets to avoid being marked in Phase Three.) CANON UPDATING Not all dungeons are for reclaiming idled characters; sometimes players organize them to canon-update their character, using the dungeon to move through the ‘new’ events. Please contact the mods before setting up a canon-update dungeon to apprise them of the new canon point. It is not unknown for dungeoned characters to leave a canon-update dungeon with some new skills from their home world, or for rescuers to learn a few new tricks in the dungeon themselves. Again, please consult the mods for approval before offering skills to dungeon-goers. These skills take up a Skill AC slot like any other, and can often count as taught skills for rescuers. AU MERGING Dungeons can also be used to move a character from their original, pure-canon universe into an AU continuity, or from the AU back to the original canon material. Additionally, while players are more than welcome to use the Heart Game mechanic in place of a dungeon for any purpose, given the ‘changes in the game change the character’ nature of Heart Games, they’re particularly ideal for AU merges. As with canon updating, please contact the mods for approval. SHADOWS Shadows are half-real spaces that can appear in Liminal Space, centered around the obscure portions of a single character’s psyche. By entering them, with or without friends, a character can grapple with some portion of themselves - a future self, an alternate self, a repressed memory - and absorb it. Shadows require mod permission to set up, and are one method of canon updating, gaining AU memories, or dealing with in-character trauma that needs to be resolved. If you’d prefer to use this general mechanic over a dungeon for an update/merge but would rather not use a Shadow, please contact the mods; we’d be happy to help you sort out an alternative. Shadows may, at the dungeon runner’s discretion, also make an appearance within a dungeon, usually presenting the crux of the trapped character’s issues before a full rescue can be staged. In addition to being a cathartic way to address character development, this is currently the easiest mechanic available in-game for interested players to take a Persona as a skill for their character. As usual, please contact the mods for skill permission; if you need help fleshing out a Persona, the game’s cast is generally happy to help.