Dear friends:
I have a question about playing the Innocent. Part of that playbook is finding out what your character’s older self did that turned them into a villain. How is that supposed to work in the game — does the player decide on that, or the MC, or both together? I feel uncomfortable writing up this NPC myself and so does the MC.
Both. Play to find out!
One of my players is playing the innocent and we’ve developed the story exclusively during gameplay. He has told me when he was crossing out things that reflected situations he thought happened to his older self and when info that I provided about his future self’s past seemed, to him, to contribute to his darkness. In this way we’ve weaved the story together. Anything he’s told me he crossed out I’ve created some fiction around, and I’ve periodically given him info from various sources about things that have happened in the intervening years and he has decided when that information was a pivotal event. I’ve made sure to check in with him in between games to see if he, the player, is liking what we’ve been developing. The only problem he has now is how swiftly he’s approaching the possibility of becoming an NPC. He hasn’t decided if he wants to just go for it and create a new character or if he wants to switch playbooks to shift his story and possibly change the dynamic with his future self. The nice thing, though, is that marking the steps on the road to becoming his future self is entirely in his hands, so if he wants to simply delay the inevitable it is possible for him to do so.
I have to say I have loved having an Innocent in my game. It has added a whole extra layer of storytelling to our game.
When dealing with time travel stories, you need to answer the question of whether or not time is fixed – the future is what already happened later – or if it can be changed. If it can be changed, the Innocent’s future self can change as she guides her younger self toward better life choices (or go suddenly darker after a bad day). The thing that turned her into a villain can be a moving target, leading to some soul searching discussions of whether there even is a path to avoid going bad. Give hope, take it away, lather, rinse, repeat.
The innocent playbook lays out a sort of narrative arc. I think it’s fair to say that the playbook does not assume time is fixed (because the steps in Your Future Self are phrased generically. You knew elder you fought some silver age hero back in the day, you fight a modern age hero now, you have taken a step.) Indeed, if you can say time is fixed, there is no dramatic question to be answered (and no player choice). But the question it does pose is will you walk the same path? Are you destined to become the same person, or do your new choices and experience make make you a different person? How time really works might be unknown, or it may be known that timelines have “inertia” that tend to prevent changes in the timeline.
Work it out collaboratively, the way both player and GM can reveal details about the Protégé’s Mentor or the Outsider’s home (or the Doomed’s Doom, or the Legacy’s family, or the people who changed the Bull…)
we’ve got an innocent in our game. Our PC came up with the basic concept, and the details of how things work have emerged in play. I made some decisions as facilitator such as the time delay on the younger self choosing to do something and the older knowing/remembering it happening, but for the most part it’s been very organic. We do check in to ensure we all agree it makes sense though