Prison Plot September 2009
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11-13; Prison Break
Guilty until proven innocent!
That's the way the Deities roll and they've decided to play hardball. Problems with the justice system? Issues with the police force? Fought the law and the law won? Whether you plead innocent or guilty, the Deities are taking matters into their own hands as judge, jury, and executioner.
Who qualifies? Characters who have committed an act that can be considered a crime in their world or in the City. We aren't talking about taking candy from a baby or stealing a pack of cigarettes. We're talking gun hold ups, assaults, kidnappings, tortures, and of course murders. Characters going into the prison should genuinely be guilty of a crime or feel guilty over an act that falls within a grayish area, such as committing murder as an act of revenge. Incidentally crimes that were thought out but never carried out qualify too and how badly a character wanted to tie down another and beat them senseless with a crowbar is at your discretion as a player, ie. we are letting you define the word pre-meditated. In general we are trusting players to flex their own creative muscle while managing to stay within the guidelines of the plot. One character's crime may not seem like a crime to another guilty character, but both may still find themselves in the prison anyway. Such is the advantage of the Deities having connections to so many homeworlds.
10; Thursday You may have your character literally dragged from their home in the middle of the night by the Deities' very own Gestapo Unit. It's up to you if the gestapo decide to reveal why they are taking your character away or not. You may also play out fights with the gestapo and have your character escape their clutches. Take note they are not easy targets. Characters who escape arrest should bear medium damage, either physically in wounds or emotionally in fear. The gestapo element is optional. If you prefer to participate in this plot without the gestapo unit then read on!
11; Friday Whether they were taken in by the gestapo or not, all characters involved in this plot will wake up in one of the cells at Prison Island. It's the prison most citizens recognize but with additional levels, and those levels extend deeply into the earth. No one knows how far underground it goes, only that there are many cells for guilty guilty guilty citizens. And tough security measures to boot.
Cruel and unusual punishment. You heard right. Prisons are in theory correctional or reform facilities. It's too bad the Deities have a bizarre idea of what qualifies as treatment. This is where you as a player can get even more creative. You are free to have your character simply rot all alone in their cell or you may play out punishments and involve NPC guards if necessary. We ask that the punishment fit the crime somehow, for example: A character guilty of letting another drown may receive some form of water torture. The punishment can be psychological too, such as making a character think they're covered in rats when there are no rats. Someone guilty of a crime when they were under the influence of alcohol may find that they are given food in the prison but nothing to drink whatsoever. The prison will have NPC guards with equipment and security measures suitable for the characters in confinement, like swords for the medieval sorts and tasers for the modern sorts...or you can mix it up and have swords on your cybercriminal and tasers on your bandit. Use your imagination!
Parole...but more likely escape. The only way to get paroled within three days is to have your character finally acknowledge the severity of what they did and pledge repentance in some form. There will be no repercussions if characters don't follow through but the intent must be genuine. The Parole Board (appointed by Mouse, appointed by Sabine, appointed by Laszlo, appointed by Rumblelina, appointed by Bertol) will just know if your character is telling the truth or not. The other option is escape. Yes your characters can break out of prison. As with the gestapo, escape from prison must be difficult and will come with damage, either physical or emotional or both! You are free to use your imagination when it comes to security measures in your character's cell or part of the prison. The prison's extended underground levels seem endless so there should be a lot of space for players to have characters work out their own escapes without stepping on other players' toes. Of course you can have characters meet up to escape together. Exits include characters working their way up from the subterranean levels to the standard above ground levels of the prison, or they can find hidden doorways that will take them into the City's Underground. These doors would shut then "seal away" behind them so they can't be used to go back into the prison, for example: He ducks into what appears to be a broom closet to hide from the guards, only to find himself in a corner of the Underground and the doorway nothing more than a brick wall. In either case, escape should not be easy for any character but the difficulty presented can fit the character making the escape, ie. a wall of diamond cutting lasers for James Bond or a pit of rusty spikes for the Prince of Persia. Players can combine elements however they see fit for characters making escapes in pairs or groups.
13; Sunday If characters aren't paroled or haven't escaped by Sunday, there is one last way out of prison. It's probably the one way no character wants to use. At the end of the day, exactly at 11:59pm (that's 23:59 for the militants), the Deities will be blowing up the prison. It will take only 1 minute for the entire complex to be destroyed entirely. The lake in which the upper portion of the prison sits will be left intact. What remains of the prison, burnt out structures and what not, will be submerged to the bottom of the lake. By morning on Monday, September 14, the remaining wreckage will be nothing more than an underwater maze, as if it had been at the bottom of the lake for years. From here on, characters may explore the prison underwater as if it were a shipwreck. It will be dangerous of course, considering what it used to be! As for characters still in the prison when it's destroyed, they will have been killed and thus made City Dead. There are no event exemptions for this plot. Characters killed in the explosion may awaken as City Dead wherever you wish. This also applies to characters killed while trying to escape.
There will be rumors circulating throughout the prison system and the City itself that the Deities are planning to destroy the prison and you may assume your character has heard this rumor if no character actively communicates with them about the rumor.
Other stuff! Yes this means network communication is completely valid between prisoners and between prisoners and characters outside of the prison. Network Devices are the only guaranteed luxury granted to prisoners.
Characters who wish to break into the prison to save another character will only be able to enter the prison by committing a crime. Again, petty theft will not qualify, however setting fire to someone's house will. Thought crimes against the Deities will not work and no the Deities don't care how contradictory that may be to their system. With this in mind, yes characters may enter the prison after the 11th but again there will be rumors circulating that getting out of the prison before the end of the 13th is a Good Idea.
As mentioned in this post, after the plot there will be no Deity Sanctioned prison system. We hope players find something to do with this plot and of course you are free to have characters ignore the noise coming from Prison Island during the weekend if you choose not to participate. If you have any other questions don't hesitate to ask!
11-13; Prison Break
Guilty until proven innocent!
That's the way the Deities roll and they've decided to play hardball. Problems with the justice system? Issues with the police force? Fought the law and the law won? Whether you plead innocent or guilty, the Deities are taking matters into their own hands as judge, jury, and executioner.
Who qualifies? Characters who have committed an act that can be considered a crime in their world or in the City. We aren't talking about taking candy from a baby or stealing a pack of cigarettes. We're talking gun hold ups, assaults, kidnappings, tortures, and of course murders. Characters going into the prison should genuinely be guilty of a crime or feel guilty over an act that falls within a grayish area, such as committing murder as an act of revenge. Incidentally crimes that were thought out but never carried out qualify too and how badly a character wanted to tie down another and beat them senseless with a crowbar is at your discretion as a player, ie. we are letting you define the word pre-meditated. In general we are trusting players to flex their own creative muscle while managing to stay within the guidelines of the plot. One character's crime may not seem like a crime to another guilty character, but both may still find themselves in the prison anyway. Such is the advantage of the Deities having connections to so many homeworlds.
10; Thursday You may have your character literally dragged from their home in the middle of the night by the Deities' very own Gestapo Unit. It's up to you if the gestapo decide to reveal why they are taking your character away or not. You may also play out fights with the gestapo and have your character escape their clutches. Take note they are not easy targets. Characters who escape arrest should bear medium damage, either physically in wounds or emotionally in fear. The gestapo element is optional. If you prefer to participate in this plot without the gestapo unit then read on!
11; Friday Whether they were taken in by the gestapo or not, all characters involved in this plot will wake up in one of the cells at Prison Island. It's the prison most citizens recognize but with additional levels, and those levels extend deeply into the earth. No one knows how far underground it goes, only that there are many cells for guilty guilty guilty citizens. And tough security measures to boot.
Cruel and unusual punishment. You heard right. Prisons are in theory correctional or reform facilities. It's too bad the Deities have a bizarre idea of what qualifies as treatment. This is where you as a player can get even more creative. You are free to have your character simply rot all alone in their cell or you may play out punishments and involve NPC guards if necessary. We ask that the punishment fit the crime somehow, for example: A character guilty of letting another drown may receive some form of water torture. The punishment can be psychological too, such as making a character think they're covered in rats when there are no rats. Someone guilty of a crime when they were under the influence of alcohol may find that they are given food in the prison but nothing to drink whatsoever. The prison will have NPC guards with equipment and security measures suitable for the characters in confinement, like swords for the medieval sorts and tasers for the modern sorts...or you can mix it up and have swords on your cybercriminal and tasers on your bandit. Use your imagination!
Parole...but more likely escape. The only way to get paroled within three days is to have your character finally acknowledge the severity of what they did and pledge repentance in some form. There will be no repercussions if characters don't follow through but the intent must be genuine. The Parole Board (appointed by Mouse, appointed by Sabine, appointed by Laszlo, appointed by Rumblelina, appointed by Bertol) will just know if your character is telling the truth or not. The other option is escape. Yes your characters can break out of prison. As with the gestapo, escape from prison must be difficult and will come with damage, either physical or emotional or both! You are free to use your imagination when it comes to security measures in your character's cell or part of the prison. The prison's extended underground levels seem endless so there should be a lot of space for players to have characters work out their own escapes without stepping on other players' toes. Of course you can have characters meet up to escape together. Exits include characters working their way up from the subterranean levels to the standard above ground levels of the prison, or they can find hidden doorways that will take them into the City's Underground. These doors would shut then "seal away" behind them so they can't be used to go back into the prison, for example: He ducks into what appears to be a broom closet to hide from the guards, only to find himself in a corner of the Underground and the doorway nothing more than a brick wall. In either case, escape should not be easy for any character but the difficulty presented can fit the character making the escape, ie. a wall of diamond cutting lasers for James Bond or a pit of rusty spikes for the Prince of Persia. Players can combine elements however they see fit for characters making escapes in pairs or groups.
13; Sunday If characters aren't paroled or haven't escaped by Sunday, there is one last way out of prison. It's probably the one way no character wants to use. At the end of the day, exactly at 11:59pm (that's 23:59 for the militants), the Deities will be blowing up the prison. It will take only 1 minute for the entire complex to be destroyed entirely. The lake in which the upper portion of the prison sits will be left intact. What remains of the prison, burnt out structures and what not, will be submerged to the bottom of the lake. By morning on Monday, September 14, the remaining wreckage will be nothing more than an underwater maze, as if it had been at the bottom of the lake for years. From here on, characters may explore the prison underwater as if it were a shipwreck. It will be dangerous of course, considering what it used to be! As for characters still in the prison when it's destroyed, they will have been killed and thus made City Dead. There are no event exemptions for this plot. Characters killed in the explosion may awaken as City Dead wherever you wish. This also applies to characters killed while trying to escape.
There will be rumors circulating throughout the prison system and the City itself that the Deities are planning to destroy the prison and you may assume your character has heard this rumor if no character actively communicates with them about the rumor.
Other stuff! Yes this means network communication is completely valid between prisoners and between prisoners and characters outside of the prison. Network Devices are the only guaranteed luxury granted to prisoners.
Characters who wish to break into the prison to save another character will only be able to enter the prison by committing a crime. Again, petty theft will not qualify, however setting fire to someone's house will. Thought crimes against the Deities will not work and no the Deities don't care how contradictory that may be to their system. With this in mind, yes characters may enter the prison after the 11th but again there will be rumors circulating that getting out of the prison before the end of the 13th is a Good Idea.
As mentioned in this post, after the plot there will be no Deity Sanctioned prison system. We hope players find something to do with this plot and of course you are free to have characters ignore the noise coming from Prison Island during the weekend if you choose not to participate. If you have any other questions don't hesitate to ask!