On the shoulders of giants: a new multiple choices LP!

[Curufinwe]

Now I've been a member for a few weeks, I had the time to abuse old playground threads a bit. I've been particularly entertained by multiple choice LPs, especially the ones by the Barbarian, and most of all by his Codexian Saga.

Before coming here, I never really considered the possibility of reading and/or playing in this kind of nerdish environment, but the little writer inside me thought it might be time to start something of my own, for my/your enjoyment.

So, what I'll bring you and hope you will appreciate, is a multiple choice LP regarding the long span of human civilization.

I'll be the god/overseer of this game. I'll present scenarios, give a few choice (three for each scenario for now, we'll see later depending on how it goes), wait for a majority vote, write consequences that will flow in the next scenario.

The starting point is... well, prehistoric crap. Our budding human civilization is based on planet Earth, we start... somewhere, we know nothing, we have nothing, we're not even cavemen. Just naked Homo Sapiens.

Our starting civilization will be very flavorless, a blank slate to be written upon with very open outcomes. In the future, depending on how the society evolves, I will most likely limit the choices depending on what we've become (for example, don't expect a warlike theocracy meeting another group to have the option 'Trade', at least in the beginning).

The flavor text and fluff will be written normally, while choices will be bolded for ease of spotting.

Anyway, without further ado, the first scenario!

(Disclaimer: English is not my native language, so please forgive the occasional weird turn of phrase or downright fuckup)

LIST OF UPDATES

ACT 1: Days of Innocence

I: In the jungle...
II: The great grasslands
III: Lots of zebras here!
IV: And then there was fire...
V: The migration starts.
VI: The council of elders.
VII: The first murderer.
VIII: Paleocapitalism? No thanks!
IX: On rivers and their proprieties.
X: The free-will experiment.
XI: The black stone.
XII: Sheepishly.
XIII: We are not alone in the universe!
XIV: The refugee's tale.
XV: The dawn of warfare.
XVI: Tribal militia.
XVII: On bears and wolves.
XVIII: Our bear companions.
XIX: The lonely mountain.
XX: The free-will experiment, part II.
XXI: Of orange roots and medicinal herbs.
XXII: At the cave's mouth.
XXIII: Spelunking.
XXIV: The red cave.
XXV: Riders from the south.
XXVI: The Seer's warnings.
XXVII: The Fiery Mountain.

XXVIII: Escape.
XXIX: On the lake's shores.
XXX: A schism?
XXXI: The Wielder of Fire.

ACT 2: The Wielder reigns supreme.

XXXII: A meeting of boats.
XXXIII: Beasts.
XXXIV: Planning for battle.
XXXV: Deploying.
XXXVI: The battle, at last!
XXXVII: While the Wielder sleeps...
XXXVIII: Monsters in the mists.
XXXIX: A peaceful year.
XL: Weapon research.
XLI: The red blade.
XLII: Planning for the expedition.
XLIII: The Wielder gives a warning.
XLIV: The lifeless lands.
XLV: Fire elementals?
XLVI: The Wielder strikes back.
XLVII: The council's last stand.

ACT 3: A New Start

I: First choice.
II: Food shortages and monsters.
III: Site of a massacre.
IV: A dark, dark labyrinth.
V: An amicable conversation.
VI: A journal from the past.

INTERLUDES AND COMMENTARIES

Interlude 1: Pre-Update X
Interlude 2: Pre-Update XX


HERE BE MAPS

Update VIII
Update XX Map: The east.
Update XXX: North of the Fiery Mountain.





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Since time immemorial (our fathers' childhood) our group has lived in a forest. Wet, inhospitable, even hostile. Big animals hunt us and eat us, while we scrape a living by eating carcass and a few plants that more often than not are barely edible.
Sunlight burns us, rain makes us sick, the nights are long and scary, filled with unseen dangers.
Yet we survive, hunched under the trees, scavenging what we can, having children, burying the elder. And always we are driven to better our condition, but we can't. We know nothing. We see nothing.

One day, a young boy got lost in the forest. For a long time he doesn't come back, until we abandon all hope to find him. Finally he returns, alive, excited, and speaks of things he's seen, ranging farther than anyone has in living memory.

He speaks of a wall of rock with a dark hole in it. He speaks of the end of the forest, with the open sky and sun staring down at him, grass extending in every direction. He pleads for us all to follow him, to abandon this merciless forest.
An old wizened man, toothless and barely alive, says 'We have always lived here. Let's not follow the fancy stories of this young fool. We have everything we need here'.
An old woman, tired, holding her sick son, intervenes: 'We need to find shelter. The sun burns us and the rain makes us sick. We need to explore that hole in the rock.'
Finally the burliest man in the group speaks up: 'I want to see the open grass. If we can see further, the monsters won't take us by surprise anymore, and we can fight back with our clubs and fists'

So, choose!

A: Stay right where we are. The forest is the evil we know, who knows what lurks in the cave or in the grassland.
B: Head to the cave. We need shelter from monsters and elements.
C: Boldly abandon our native forest and head for the grasslands. New environment, new life, new chances!


Final note: I will keep this up for roughly 24 hours, with an update tomorrow evening, unless there's no vote at all.

Please don't leave this with no vote at all :p

 

[Lindblum]

1: You are just making this up as you go? or is there a Book?

2: It would be much more clearer and safer ,since English is not your native language to present the choices in Bold with A,B,C to make it easier to count.

A: Stay
B: Explore
C: Look at grass to not be ambushed by monsters? (what difference does this make compared to B?)

 

[Curufinwe]

1: Bit of both. I have a whole slew of things planned and an hidden 'score' system on various attributes, but I've always been a great one for improvisation as well.

2: I hear and obey (and you're right, the outcome of choices is much clearer in my head than in what I write). Edited the post.

 

[desocupado]

Let's explore the hole, like the old woman suggests.

:lyricsuitedisapproves:

 

[Tigranes]

B seems reasonable. We can use it as a springboard to head into the open lands subsequently, if we can.

 

[Jack]

C - The cave might seem safe, but if another tribe or an animal would attack we would be trapped and who knows what beasts could lurk its depths. To try our luck in the open steppe seems like a better option. We might even get rid of some deadweight in the process.

 

[Kz3r0]

B: Head to the cave. We need shelter from monsters and elements.

 

[Esquilax]

C - The cave might seem safe, but if another tribe or an animal would attack we would be trapped and who knows what beasts could lurk its depths. To try our luck in the open steppe seems like a better option. We might even get rid of some deadweight in the process.

Agreed. Clearly our lives are difficult in the forest, and the cave seems as much of a trap as it does a shelter. Trying our luck on the steppes, with its fertile grassland, seems to be our best bet. If human beings managed to survive a trip across the Bering Strait to settle the Americas, they'll survive this far easier. Also, ADVENTURE!!!1!!1

C: Boldly abandon our native forest and head for the grasslands. New environment, new life, new chances!

 

[Stygian Lurker]

C: Boldly abandon our native forest and head for the grasslands. New environment, new life, new chances!

 

[CappenVarra]

C: where no Neanderthal ubermensch has gone before!

 

[Monty]

B Get in the hole...

 

[Vernydar]

C
Our young men yearn for a new, better place and for a better life. Our wives and children are malnourished here. Our elders get sick and die because of the rain, and we are hunted by monsters. To stay in the forest is to die a slow death, either by the fangs of monsters or by hunger, cold and illness.
The dark hole offer us some protection, and shelter from rain and sun. But who knows what kind of monsters inhabit that place. And also, when we leave the hole, we still are within the deep, wet forest. The food is scarce and when we gather it, we are at the mercy of animals and creatures we cannot kill. This place is cursed by evil spirits and the bones of our fathers rot in the wet soil.

We must leave this accursed place if we want to live a better life. The open grass is new to us, and we might find more food. It will also be easier to avoid the animals that hunt us here. There is no shelter, but we can travel and maybe find a new place where food and shelter are plentiful.

The voyage will be dangerous, and some of us might die, especially the elders. But what do we have to lose? Even if some of us die, the survivors and their children will have a better life. My yet unborn son or daughter might be able to live a life without fearing rain, sun, monster and illness. I say we depart now.

 

[Lindblum]

C
has seen fit to grant us the chance and courage, to explore the minefield that he has created.

 

[oscar]

Deciding between B and C.

B might see us become more of a sedentary, agricultural people.
C could see us as more nomadic types.

C. The strongest and best genes will survive the journey.

 

[Curufinwe]

Wow. Thanks for all the votes, didn't expect to get as many as 11 with the first update.
Anyway, the tally gives a clear victory to the grasslands option, with 7 votes, trumping the cave with 4 and the 'stay where we are' option at a grand 0. Yes, I admit that one pretty much sucked. :p

Very well, the choice is made, update time, to flow into the next choice.

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After hours of arguing the young and healthy manage to shout down the objections made by the old and prudent.
The old woman says, shaking her head sadly: 'This will be the end of us'.

She was right.

She and her sickly son didn't live past the first winter. Many others followed them in the first hard years in the open.

We moved, finding a place so different to what we knew that simple survival was at first a challenge. The sun burned brighter than ever, the nights, although not as dark as what we remembered, scared us with the immensity of the sky and the blinking lights watching down on us. The open air of winter got so cold men and women froze to death. We met and soon learned to avoid great predators, hunting in packs.
We were forced to move out of the way of immense herds of black and white animals, or hulking horned beasts, grazing the grass and leaving nothing in their wake.
We had to taste again the plants and roots we would eat, to avoid the ones that would make us sick. We kept eating carcass, gorging on the leftovers of the great predators.

Still not all was bleak. Moons and years rose and waned, only the strongest and smartest of the tribe were left. Survivors all, masters of scavenging, braver and bolder each passing season. We noticed the immense herds were the center of this system, the great predators following in their wake. But we were too few, too weak to dare to follow and leave our scant sources of water behind.

Finally a great debate rose in the tribe.

Some, the daring, the healthiest, said: 'We observed how the predators hunt for many years now. We know their ways, we should adopt them. We should start hunting the grazing beasts ourselves, to provide us with better food'.
Others, who observed most carefully the grazing beasts, said: 'The animals who eat grass are peaceful spirits. They never hurt us, they never attacked us. We should try to learn their ways and capture some, to keep in thrall of our tribe.'
Finally, the elders of the tribe rose up: 'You both are right, and yet wrong. All those animals share in the spirit of the land. We should raise altars and worship them, to ask in return the boon of their vitality, of their vigor, of their cleverness. It would be sacrilege to defile them by hunting or exploiting them.'


Thus, the second choice is born. Do we:

A. Learn to hunt the beast who eat grass, to dress in their pelts and partake of their meat?
B. Do we try to capture and enslave those beasts, to exploit their great strength?
C. Do we build altars to the animal spirits in order to harness their abilities?

As before, 24 hours, majority vote wins. Get voting!

 

[Kz3r0]

B.

 

[SCO]

Fast forward that shit.

B, bare horse nomads in no time.

 

[Stygian Lurker]

A. Learn to hunt the beast who eat grass, to dress in their pelts and partake of their meat.

 

[Monty]

B seems the best route to advancement and food security.

Once again the elders give rubbish advice, time to send them to a retirement cave or something.

 

[Jack]

B - I would have preferred to tame the great predators so that we may hunt as one and wield their fearsome strength against other tribes but I guess the plant eaters will have to do for now. It will give the weaker members of the tribe something to do and provide us with food that we do not have to wriggle out of nature's hands so that we may focus our efforts on more important matters.

To focus our efforts on hunting sure is tempting but it makes us too dependent on the dice rolls of fate, if our prey would decide to travel we would have to travel with it and we would be dead meat if the predators became more efficient in hunting them. By taming them we take control of things ourselves and don't have to compete with the other predators.

 

[oscar]

B, or else we risk becoming permanently stuck as African or Native American types. We need cattle and horses!

 

[Vernydar]

B

A very young warrior steps up to voice his opinions:

"I was born here, but my father told me of the accursed forest before he died. I believe leaving that place to come here was good, but I also think we must change again to live a better life.

The elder speaks of building altars to the animals so that they will lend us their strength. This is well and good, but what shall we eat then if we don't eat those animals? I say his suggestion is foolish.

Some of us want to hunt the grazing beasts, like the predators do. This is good, and tempting, and it would give us food immediately. But it is also dangerous, because the predators might attack us, and because we are few. And if the grazing beasts move, we will have to follow them. No, no, I do not believe this is a good choice.

I say we try to capture and enslave those peaceful, grazing beasts. If we do, we will have food, even if we have to move, because we can bring them with us. Even if the year is bad and water does not fall from the sky, we will not have to worry that the beasts do not come here where we are. And when we kill the beasts for food, we can skin them and use their pelts to dress.
Also, the beasts are strong. Maybe we can use them for something more as well. At the least, we can have them carry heavy things on their backs, instead of carrying them ourselves.

 

[kazgar]

Shame earth was mentioned in first post, therefore i'm guessing everyone is assuming there's no chance for animal spirits to do anything. I'm going to vote C but I looks like its futile in this case.

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

Bah, what are we - baboons, scurrying for safety of the known history set by our betters? We aren't playing Civ here.


C! Let's make our own mistakes and die bravely!

 

[Esquilax]

I don't like B on account of it being so meta-gamey: it's easy to say that domesticating animals is the way to go with 8,000 years of hindsight. But our people are in the moment, and they can only act with the best knowledge they have at hand. A or C are far better options than B is. You guys are thinking in terms of costs and benefits as if this is some RTS or something. What about our spiritual and cultural development (i.e. C) or the development of martial skills so that we can raise our sons to be strong warriors with great morale? That will do more for our people's well-being and is a lot more true to our current situation instead of relying so much on meta-gaming.

Besides, a nomadic lifestyle (for the moment at least) is not as much of a death knell as you guys think at the moment. Sure, sedentary is probably the way to go down the road, but the Mongols managed to lay waste to the mightiest empires in the world on horseback. If we need technology/know-how down the road, we can just take it too.

Anywho, I pick C, because others have picked it as well. I can see us developing culturally and being more of a peaceful people if this continues. I also see the benefit for A, but sadly nobody else picked it.

C. Build altars to the animal spirits in order to harness their abilities