telocim
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Posts: 6
Joined: Fri 20 Mar 2015, 16:18

Ark - Day 0 to present

Thu 26 Mar 2015, 19:31

While thinking of a brief history the Ark it occurred to me:

1) the elder cared for and raised hundreds of young children
2) these children would need to be educated
3) the society of the Ark would have defined rules, roles, and mores

These observations are important (to me) in order to give the players a framework to interact with NPCs in the Ark. Each is addressed below for my campaign.

1) the Elder identified young leaders (future Bosses) and tasked them with assisting him in organizing/supervising daily tasks: food distribution, waste removal, etc. The young bosses wouldn't always supervise the same groups and no 'factions' would be established, but loose affiliations would develop among groups. Eventually, a routine develops freeing the Elder to focus on other tasks such as...

2) educating the children. The Elder used a combination of live and recorded lectures to teach the children. I'm picturing 10 classrooms full of children sitting cross-legged, staring up at a battery powered netbook LCD monitor secured on the shoulders of a lab coat wearing mannequin. The screen is filled with the Elder's head lecturing on a variety of subjects. Children eagerly taking turns at the hand-crank battery charger whenever the low battery light flickers on. Live lectures are reserved for the smartest children and whenever Ark ethics are taught...

3) various systems of punishments and rewards are incorporated to teach right and wrong behaviors. The most important of which is to not to harm your Ark brothers and sisters. Using your mutant powers to seriously harm an Ark brother or sister is forbidden and the punishment is exile. Physical altercations are punished much less harshly but murdering an Ark member would also result in exile. (with no Ark supplies)

This is the state of affairs in my setting when players begin the game and have defined NPC friends and enemies.

To those of you who are more familiar with the setting: do you see anything that conflicts with the setting as defined in the book?
 
Nilo
Posts: 159
Joined: Thu 14 Apr 2011, 11:55

Re: Ark - Day 0 to present

Fri 19 Jun 2015, 10:52

This gives me really nice images. :)

I don´t think it conflicts with the setting. In our game the Elder has been absent for some time, probably due to depression caused by loneliness, grief and doubt. So the children has since long time ago been forced to educate themselves "Lord of the Flies"-style. Some of them remembers the Elder and his teachings and tries to communicate with him, but most of the mutants just try to survive.

Now that we have played a couple of sessions the culture and knowledge has return to the Ark, I imagine that some of the Mutants now recalls the teachings of the Elder. I think it was a nice "journey" to start the Ark as a place for savages and through play see them getting more and more civilized.

Maybe your Ark should start with a little higher values in culture and technologi?
 
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Tomas
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Joined: Fri 08 Apr 2011, 11:31

Re: Ark - Day 0 to present

Fri 19 Jun 2015, 12:36

Yup, I see no reason this wouldn't work. :)
Fria Ligan
 
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SCalvin
Posts: 189
Joined: Tue 03 Feb 2015, 19:06

Re: Ark - Day 0 to present

Mon 21 Dec 2015, 14:07

That is something for each group to define. We think of ours as a schoolyard, barely (and now never) overseen by a teacher. The bosses have all grown into their positions. Violence is a bit more common, nothing but a simple revenge code protects people. The Ark is more defined by what it lacks than what it has.

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