Twist my Plot. Please!

[WanderingMonster]

So I revealed part of my plot last weekend. Boiled down: most souls are like a grain of sand falling in a pool. Some souls are like boulders. These "boulder souls" create ripples throughout the multiverse. In this cosmology, the Material incarnation is the boulder, and all other planar expressions are the various ripples. I devised a plot where the players' echo-selves would plot against them. The Key Idea I needed them to know was that the Material self had to die in order for the planar selves to enter the Material plane.

As an introduction to that idea and a bit of foreshadowing, I created an NPC who was being plotted against by her evil planar echoes, and being defended by one of the good-echoes. The PCs found the Material NPC's dead body (killed by a henchmonster of an evil-echo). I had them directly witness the death of the the good-echo at the hands of said evil-echo. It was bloody and dramatic and one player remarked, "Wow. Sort of like Highlander?" To which another responded, "God, I hope not."

Here's the problem: It was planned to be sort of like Highlander! I didn't start off with that premise, but after I devised the plot, I thought to myself, I just ripped off Highlander without intending it. But I carried on anyway. I planned that killing each echo would somehow empower the Last Self Standing. Now I'm in a bind. I don't want to give them what they expect, especially when it seems that they really don't like the idea. I know that they expect me to twist it somehow, otherwise they wouldn't have brazenly condemned the idea to my face. Trouble is, I wasn't planning a twist.

How can I make this different than, "There can be only one." Specifically, I want a general reason for an echo-soul to want to kill the others without The Quickening. Any ideas?

 

[Bendris Noulg]

Ever see The One? Similar premise, completely different take (kinda Highlander meets Sliders).

You could have it that these echoes exist in a limited reality. FREX: A Chaotic Evil echo would exist in a "ripple" where only pain, fear, hate, anger, and rage are represented in the living experience. However, these echoes are different from the other inhabitants of this plane because they are haunted by the "full reality" experience of their mortal twins; in their "dreams", the see the lives of the PCs and envy them, their lives, their "full experience"... They strive to be "human" (or your PC race of choice) and will do whatever it takes to achieve it.

Considering this, a Good-aligned echo could conceivably find alternate means of achieving the same goal, like causing a "switch" of sorts between the PC and itself.

 

[iceifur]

Make it, "there can be only TWO!"

You know, pull a "Legend" kind of thing, like when Tim Curry says something like, "There is no light without the Dark."

Give'em a cliche, just don't give'em the cliche they expect.

And, if that fails, praise them for their obviously advanced mental prowess in seeing through your devious plots. Candy helps, too.

-B-

 

[random user]

I'm actually a little fuzzy on what's going on. So if this doesn't work, I apologize.

Hrm how about this. There are declared "good" echoes and declared "bad" echoes. When you kill an echo, it is automatically reborn -- but it is reborn as an innocent echo. Though circumstance or indirect manipulation (all mature echo's feel physical pain at being on the same plane and excruitiating, like 10% of their max hp each round, pain if within 1000 miles as the neutral echo) echo's can try to persuade the echo to turn "good" or "evil." If all the echos at one point in time are all of one alignment and/or neutral, umm... well I'm out of ideas, but like they gain power or something.

But maybe someone can take it from there?

 

[Hand of Evil]

Take the echo and think song, each 'death' is a cord, when the song becomes strong and loud something will break. This could be a seal or a wall, or such.

 

[Wasgo]

How can I make this different than, "There can be only one." Specifically, I want a general reason for an echo-soul to want to kill the others without The Quickening. Any ideas?

When the material plane soul dies, it goes to a new plane, awaiting reincarnation. Apon being reincarnated, all the echoes die.The only way this won't happen is if one echo becomes strong enough to be more 'real' than the orginal. In which case it can ascend to the plane (which only allows entries of full souls), and replace the original. Evil echoes fight for their own survival, good echoes believe in a greater purpose.

 

[Wraith Form]

Yeah, I agree....go with candy.

 

[Eccles]

I've got a couple of options for you.

First, make it all about the odds. When copy Prime dies, there might be 200 echoes waiting to take over. The more echoes you can butcher off, the higher the chance of your being the replacement.

Bendris Noulg's ripples is a much better idea, though. Combine it with a touch of "Quickening", and more than a little 7 deadly sins, and you have the makings of a glorious planar adventure, as (for instance) the echo of the Prime's pride kills (and takes over) gluttony, hatred, paranoia, etc, becoming more powerful, and more of a 'whole' than before. Making each emotion a pocket dimension would be the root for a wonderful romp.

Finally, the biggy. Immortality. If the echoes can replace the Prime when the prime is killed, and there are a finite number of echoes, what happens if you kill off every other echo, and then kill the Prime? You have no soul replacements, and therefore (as nature abhors a vacuum) cannot die.

If I were writing this, it would all hinge on some villain somewhere plugging up a nebulous 'Font of Souls' or something, meaning that new echoes (or souls) weren't created every time an existing one was killed...

 

[diaglo]

positive and negative energy...

as much as the echoes try to avoid one another they are actually attracted...

the good/positive echoes try to perserve or protect the others...

while the bad/negative echoes try to kill or dominate the others...

this is the reaction of both forces to the pull they are having towards the other...

as much as they struggle to achieve their goal. the more they are required to interact with the opposite goal.

eventually...only they merge... ying/yang... etc...

 

[am181d]

You've already established one important twist. There are sides: good and evil. So it's not a matter of "there can be only one" so much as "only one side can prevail." Maybe one person has one good echo and one bad echo. Maybe another has one good echo and thirty thousand bad echoes. The exact amounts might have something to do with the "real person." The really good either have more good echoes or more bad echoes. The more important the person in the material plane, the more echoes they have overall.

Maybe the evil echoes of the PC's actually have a legion of lesser echoes working for them. An army of twisted, less powerful (but still dangerous) versions of the PC's.