Nothing says that a character has to be an air-breathing humanoid, of course - or even in the same range of size. But it's quite understandable that most characters are. It's what we as players are used to and can relate to. All the same, there's room for exploration. What would it be like to play a state or a city or a neighbourhood? (There has been a Modulari character along these lines, and at least one living-building character.) Or a microbe?
Obviously, one of the biggest questions is how the character interacts with the rest of the muck's characters - and one answer is probably through "avatar" characters (see Archetypes). It might also be cool to try playing out a single character or group of characters as they interact with a city environment, for example - or to see how two sentient city-states interact with one another.
- What do you suppose happens when cities make love? --Sandstorrm
On the micro-scale, it's already been suggested that some Chitins are actually tiny symbiotes controlling a much bigger body. With a bit of coding (and, of course, some willing players), it might be possible to have a character that "possesses" others...
- Kaisho-Kaiju, the Monster Club, and her human-scale avatar Kai-Kai. She hasn't been sighted lately and never opened for business as far as I know, but it was a cool concept - cybered-up mind-shot macro, hollowed out into a living building. I believe her player's more of a macro than a xeno. People seriously interested that particular kind of 'scale' as a factor in a character may have migrated to Bandari rather than PB.
- Some heavy-shifters are nano-collectives, which has a certain level of scale. Nobody's played this up yet, though; the intelligence is usually seen as emerging from the nanochine's clustering. Any nano-clusters willing to do a scene where a few dozen nanochines split off?
- There have been, in the past, half-joking threats of a scene between Puzzlebox and Twin, with hints of flirtation before (she) came to live within {her}. That's a scale difference but like all good power relationships on PB it might be switchy; Twin's multi-galaxy mass, PB varies depending who you talk to.
- Also, I find myself thinking of Earth in Swanwick's Vacuum Flowers - a whole-planet Plural. There's a more mystick riff on that in his Stations of the Tides, as well. Scale in a different way.
- Just some precedents/inspirations that come to mind. -Twin
Concepts