World Building (Broken Lands)

Well I call the Source home but outside our gates there are communities out there. Nothing like the great markets or whatever but people doing things. Living, dying, growing. I think it must be made of remnants of a Golden age RV park as most of the homes around the source are on wheels or tow able. 
 
What markets are you referring to? I thought you picked 'it's the only reliable source of clean water around' instead of 'a large market has sprung up around the source'?
 
Tzer said:
Wernicke is more of a nomad than anything else. I doubt he has a permanent residence at this time. If he does, it's a rarely used shack in one of the more populated holds out there.
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Okay. Seeing as you know the other characters, consider them allies, and see them all the time, what brings you back to them constantly?
 
Well, he has a history with all the other PCs but it isn't necessarily a positive one. Unless it's something you're making a ruling on, the book just says they have to be acquaintances- otherwise there wouldn't be Hx options that set them at negative Hx if they are the best of friends who go to each other for everything.


"Who found you bleeding and left you for dead? Take Hx-2 with them." Doesn't sound like allies to me.


But like his intro post in session 1 says there are certain people in the wasteland that he respects and is more inclined to listen to or deal with, or just suit his purposes better by being alive. People always need killing, and no one is better at it than Wernicke.
 
Crackvault's a settlement out east aways of the Source. Big trading partner, though their prices keep going up. They're squatting on top of an old world bunker, a place that was meant to keep people safe through whatever end came, which means they've got quite a stock of medicine and bullets - though they claim they know how to make more. Water ran out a long time ago, though, so they trade for it from the Source.


Thing is, sooner or later they have to run out of goods to trade. They're gonna get desperate. 
 
Tzer said:
Well, he has a history with all the other PCs but it isn't necessarily a positive one. Unless it's something you're making a ruling on, the book just says they have to be acquaintances- otherwise there wouldn't be Hx options that set them at negative Hx if they are the best of friends who go to each other for everything.


"Who found you bleeding and left you for dead? Take Hx-2 with them." Doesn't sound like allies to me.
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Actually, the direct quote from the book:


"Your characters don’t have to be friends, but they do have to know each other and see each other all the time. They should be allies. They might become enemies in play, but they shouldn’t start out enemies."


I'm willing to work in most anything, but it's important that the characters have strong ties so they're in the game together a bunch. Negative starting Hx is a thing for sure, but it's more of a "I grudgingly work with them despite our past" sort of situation. It's important we nail down what brings him back to these people. What ties him to this group or each of these people individually?
 
If Crackvault tries anything they'll get embargo'd again. Almost went raider the last time but we made a deal. Did Hound sort that out or was it someone else? We really do rely on Hound and his band rather hard. The source is understaffed and underpopulated for at least ten more years. The elders need to die off and the youngest need to repopulate. We aren't letting in Bright and his kin to the blood pool though. I'd rather have a dirty hard riding biker in the Hall than those bewitched souls. 
 
He probably associates with the others due to steady work. I offered to have Wernicke be the physical sheriff for the source on sight and was told no. He would work with the biker gang when a job requires more than one person, even if that one person is the baddest ass. Hound can use the mobility of his bikes to skirmish and make gangs overextend for Wernicke to mop up. Bright I could see trading for protection from prosecution by some group of people or gang. One loud-moth bigot gets gutshot and dropped in a ditch and suddenly no one wants to fuck with the cult any more. It could be for barter, but more likely for information and just a safe place to lay down his head every once in a while.


Really, the motivation for Wernicke is profit. I see ways for him to get exchanges he feels are valuable with at least two characters, and the third by association.
 
Oh, we aren't averse to having Wernicke patrol the exterior, we can even give him an RV to home in nearby. He's free to come and go as he pleases, we'd like him on retainer though. Keeping our friends close and all that! 
 
He's inclined to keep the place from going to hell because he, like everyone else, needs clean water. If he's there, he'd likely help out. But being on retainer and being expected to help sounds like having a boss, which is something neither he nor I would permit. Like I said before, he's no one's employee. 
 
Getting water isn't the problem. If he can't just get water from the source, he'll get it from the people who take caravans to and from the source, likely at gun point. He prizes his independence, and is prideful. He will work with people, not for them. People can pay him to do things on an individual basis but he will not be beholden to them or reliant upon them. He isn't at anyone's beck and call. 
 
Getting water will be a problem if you decide to steal it. 


Embargo on everyone until the bandit raiding caravans is dead. From the Flamingo to the Tomb, down to Crackvault not a drop of water will flow. 


Please rethink your action, we merely ask for aid and offer water for your guns under dire circumstances, we will not be threatened. A man can live unbeholden to man but none can live without servitude to their body. 
 
Yeah, they can't bully him into doing anything. Embargoing everyone is more likely to initiate a hostile takeover of the source than to get him killed. It's not like there's an army there- the only thing stopping anyone with a gun from taking over is the idea they've perpetuated about being the only people able to actually get the water out. And Wernicke does not care about dooming the entire region to dying of thirst if the only other alternative is to be a slave or die.  He also wouldn't be the -only- bandit robbing caravans even under the best of circumstances. There are other raiders out there, and they have to get water somehow. And that's if he couldn't just launch a direct assault on the source and kill everyone on his own. He would rather cut off the water supply to the entire region than be subservient to someone else. 


He will not work for Arsenic or be at her beck and call, end of story. The fact that I have to debate my character's independence shows how asinine that playbook is. It forces everyone into either being the waterbearer's bitch or being hostile right out of the gate, and by pulling the 'we're the only people who can operate it' card (which is completely made up and not a part of the playbook at all) you've limited the options for hostility so as to have a stranglehold over the entire game. I refuse to play into it. I will not be part of the story 'Arsenic, her source, and all the other narratively irrelevant human garbage around it'. I'm withdrawing from the game. Hopefully the rest of you have fun. 


EDIT: I'm editing this because I can no longer post since I resigned my membership. My character is not averse to cooperation. You're not offering cooperation, you're demanding servitude. It thrusts itself into the center of everything. I don't want my character's entire story and motivation to be trying to work his way into the vaunted bloodline of the source. The game is all about you. I'm not calling your work irrelevant human garbage, you misread. I'm saying that everyone else becomes narratively irrelevant secondary characters because of the level of importance that playbook demands, and apparently the most I can hope for to make a compelling game is to ingratiate myself to the main character to become a part of their family. I refuse to be subservient to another player because I didn't pick the playbook that controls the entire setting. It's fundamentally broken. Arsenic is the most powerful person in the entire damn game from day one. Not once have I refused cooperation with anyone. But you demand that I make your character the center of my character's life, and I have no interest in doing so. I didn't sign up for that. I WAS ready to change and give it a try. I was ready to totally modify my entire character to work WITH your character, but you refused me. You demand he be subservient or be nothing at all. 


EDIT2: I am not trying to be hostile or mean to you. I'm extremely annoyed that this is not the game that I wanted to play from the outset. I picked the Gunlugger entirely because of their independence. I should have just left the game much earlier or expressed the fact that I had no interest in playing in a game totally centered around one person and place. My opinion is not universal- if other people think that being satellites around the source would make for a fun a compelling game, I hope everyone has a great time. But I don't want to be anyone's vassal. Do you not see how your playbook demands that it becomes the center of attention? I just have no interest in that kind of game. 
 
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A region with a time honored, fair trading, water flowing Source. Armed with the debt's of gangs, communities of caravans, those weak and dying that are given water for nothing in return seek to bring hostility against us instead of offing a Rouge with no qualms about robbing, killing, and murdering them because he enjoys being a wild dog instead of offering fair due for service rendered? The region would not be doomed, as his head would be brought within a day or he vanishes and dies of thirst in three. It seems to me that the Gunlugger was determined to be hostile from the beginning and his intentions have been shown to be ill. If I was in the position of Wernicke, I'd say 'shit, this bitch is sweet tasting poison but maybe I can find some sugar to make it go down easy.' Work my way in, figure out some way to get Arsenic in my hands, find a common history and make some sort of exciting tense plot while external factors mount against us! Maybe even work your way into the bloodline of the Source? 


I daresay it seems a character that operates on such a level of refusal of cooperation, open negativity, and general dissatisfaction won't be missed in the long run. Though as much I do enjoy hearing my work and ideas being called irrelevant human garbage, If it bothered the other plays to the same level that it seems to bother you, I'd gladly change my entire playbook and all the information built around it. But for some reason I find that you'd be hard pressed to change a single facet of your creation. I hope you and your Wernicke have a grand time. 
 
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