Alora Fane

Some thoughts regarding designing this project, Dreamons, around six areas that follow the same formula, with some ideas for each one that still need a lot more refining!

I feel like I have more clarity about my direction than before! I spent this week trying to work through some remaining fog.

(I wrote this 95% of this on Friday... but I'm finally getting around to finishing and posting it on Sunday! Pfff!)

This directly follows on from ∞ a post I wrote on Monday ∞, in which I talked about how this project could now be called Dreamons, and it could involve being a member of the 'Oneironauts' and travelling into people's dreams to save them from inner demons that are holding them back.

I was excited to do some actual making stuff, like revising mechanics or making story events and characters... but (these days at least) I can't really just dive in without doing some fairly thorough planning first. It takes time, but should save time in the long run.

I've been aiming to avoid a complex narrative, and I intend to stick with that, but I need there to be some compelling reason for things to be happening. I've been trying to come up with something that would hopefully be appealing to play, but straightforward to make; I want to find a path that's not fraught with the damn constant revisions and indecisiveness that's made everything take so long with both this and Atonal Dreams.

So: formulas! Or formulae. While 'formulaic' is pretty much always used as a criticism, formulae are common in media, as they're appealing to both creators and consumers. I've seen a bunch of YouTubers who create Pokemon-related content posting a lot about their invented 'regions', which each have familiar elements like eight gyms, an Elite Four, 'early route birds', and the like, just with some variation to make them (technically if not especially) original. That's an example of a formula.

(Memody: Sindrel Song's design also followed a repeating formula.)

What I have in mind for this is that there are six psychepelagos to explore, based on the elements - as described in Monday's post - and each follows the exact same pattern, just with different variables slotted in.

I'll describe here an idea for that pattern, though I'm still in the middle of brainstorming, so it's all still very much in flux:

From the hub, you'd approach one of six sleeping people; I think I will allow the player to tackle them in any order, with minimal statistical growth for the player character between them for balancing reasons. Somehow, you'd enter their psychepelago (I haven't yet decided on the lore mechanisms behind this).

Shortly after arriving, you'd encounter the Dreamer; that is, the sleeping person whose mind you'd entered. They'd talk about an Aspiration that they have - some goal or desire they'd want to reach or achieve - but they're held back by three negative beliefs. This encounter would play out like a combination of a conversation and a battle, where they'd say something and you'd be able to use one of your skills in response, instead of just selecting a text option. Some plot battles like these might be coded to use unique quips (the silly thing a character says when using a skill); I'll need to sort out exactly how that could work.

You'd convince - via the 'battle' - the Dreamer that you were there to help them. You'd travel together, and soon (as in, probably in the very next room) you'd reach something called the Aspire, which would be a pyramid - a spire - inside which the thing (or probably person) they're aspiring to reach can be found. It'd be locked, though, with a triforce-like icon (a triangle made of four smaller triangles) on it. (Though I wonder whether that icon effectively belongs to the Legend of Zelda even though, ∞ as the Triforce Wikipedia articles says ∞, it's been used throughout (especially Japanese) history and culture.)

[Thought while reviewing this before posting: maybe a three-petaled flower might be a better choice, then.]

You'd have to explore three smaller dungeons (in any order) which represent the three negative beliefs the Dreamer had previously mentioned.

Each of the smaller dungeons would have a different theme/concept behind it. It'd begin with a short bit of dialogue where the Dreamer would tell you why this is holding them back.

You'd then have to travel through the dungeon convincing people (or rather dreamons) in it. That is, winning battles. At the end would be a miniboss dreamon specifically related to the negative belief, who might have a special title like the guardian or something (though I've yet to decide on what this title would be). Converting this guardian (or whatever) would award you a triangle segment that'd then appear on the Aspire to show progress towards unlocking it.

With all three guardians convinced, you'd be able to enter the Aspire, which would be a single boss room where you'd face a boss dreamon representing the Dreamer's desire. You'd battle against them, but to make more use of the game's taming-over mechanics... well, two possibilities come to mind:

1. One is that someone, maybe a recurring villainous dreamon (who could go on to play some (penultimate) Final Boss kind of role later) would whisper something to the Dreamer, causing them to convert over to the 'dark side' alongside the boss. Then, the three previously-converted guardians would appear on your side, and together you'd convince the Dreamer that they were worthy after all. The idea being that you've transformed them from foes to friends, and they now give positive suggestions instead of negative ones like before.

2. Alternatively, the boss just summons the three guardians and you and the dreamer face all four at once. Could feel more challenging, but would be sort of undoing the player's previous achievements (taming the guardians).

Either way, after winning this battle, the Dreamer would have what they aspired to achieve, the dream would end, and they'd awaken and leave the hospital.

You'd begin the game with two skills: Attack (Discord/Gravitoom; basically "you are wrong") and Appeal (Harmony/Levitality; basically "I am right"). You'd learn a new single-element skill for completing each psychepelago (but could only equip six in total). The dreamer characters might earn new skills from the three guardians.

(Because elements are 'super effective' against themselves rather than another, acquiring a good Viscereal skill after the Viscereal area is complete might seem a bit unsatsifying, but since characters (or I suppose they're dreamons now) have three runes, it's not as if areas would have only single-rune opponents. Completing the Viscereal area, then, would allow you to more effectively convert Viscereal-runed dreamons in other psychepelagos. Makes sense, I think?)

I've spent a bit of time roughly sketching out some possible scenarios and characters for each of the six elements, though they're very vague and unfinished!

As a reminder, here are the six elements I'm using, and their associations; there are three pairs of opposites:

Viscereal is about the physical, straightforward, familiar, bodily desires, etc
Abstral, its opposite, is about change, potential, strangeness, ideas, creativity

Discord is about strife, conflict, dominance
Harmony is about peace, cooperation, submission

Gravitoom is about sorrow, seriousness, death, decay
Levitality is about joy, silliness, life, growth

Oh, also, a lore note: I've yet to decide on exact details about the six Alora Fane barbari races since some brainstorming last December where I revised them quite a bit but it wasn't well-received, but I know at least that this game will likely use exclusively members of the Bold race, who are essentially typical humans. In the original ideas for the Alora Fane races, I imagined different skin colours as representing separate races (tan for Bold, pale for Meek, black for Mhandisi), but I've now decided that there are three subraces of Bold with different skin colours, called either the Snowfolk, Sandfolk, and Soilfolk, or maybe Snowskins, Sandskins, and Soilskins, corresponding to pale, tan, and dark skins respectively.

Does anything about that register as racist to any of you? I imagine most of you are more attuned to such things than I am. I like that there are four four-letter words beginning with S that describe different colours of ground, and I don't think I've come across slurs involving any of those before, but I've been surprised before by what people have considered (potentially) offensive.

There are several reasons I bothered coming up with named subraces at all:

- One was because I don't like injecting real-world diversity into settings where it makes no sense (eg Asian hobbits), but since it's fantasy, the setting can be changed to allow for such things in a way that does fit.

- Another is for the race choice at character creation; asking if you're one of these pre-named subraces feels less weird to me than asking whether you're white, brown, or black.

- A third reason is that as there are six dreamer characters, and six possible race/sex combos, having one for each feels elegant to me.

ANYWAY. Six sketched-out character concepts! Each has a name beginning with the same letter as the element they're representing (and which are exactly six letters long), and I've given each a single-word descriptor for their Aspire which encapsulates their specific motivation and goal.

All are incomplete and vague - some moreso than others - so I'll need to do more brainstorming, and I'm very open to thoughts and suggestions (if I've even described my ideas well enough to be made sense of...). Some might change completely from what I present here:

Viscereal - The Aspire of Desire

Virgil (from virgin), a fairly ordinary Sandskin male, wants to find love (and sex). But:

He believes he's too ugly, and so he ventures into a gym/resort place full of pretty people (Babes and Hunks) and convinces them he belongs there? May end with him facing a dreamon that looks like his childhood bully, who put the idea in his head.

He believes he's too unsuccessful, so he must convince his colleagues at FarmCo. (a silly combination of farm and corporate tropes) that he deserves the Employee of the Year award. At the end, he faces a dreamon based on his boss.

He believes he's not normal, and has to attend a family gathering, where he has to show his many relatives that he's a standard member of society. The boss is a dreamon based on his mother or father.

Finally, inside the Aspire, he meets the girl, perhaps called 'Her' (either a specific girl he fancies or a representation of women in general), and has to convince her to his side (with the guardians on either side, as described earlier).

Abstral - The Aspire of Change

Alorea (from Alora (Fane) + lore), a Snowskin female, hopes to influence the world with her art. But:

She worries she's not original enough, and... must stand out among her peers at her art school and impress her teacher, or something?

She believes she's too different, and her art won't resonate with anyone, so she ventures into some psychedelic realm full of aliens who don't speak English, and manages to appeal to (that is, convince via battle) them, culminating in appealing to their leader... or something.

She's uninspired, and ventures to a realm of embodied ideas that she has to convince to come to her.

Finally, inside the Aspire, she... hmm. Despite being very Abstral myself (or to the extreme end of the Openness trait, which Abstral is based on), I've been finding this one especially tricky to know what to do with. I need to do more brainstorming.

Discord - The Aspire of Dominance (alt: Power)

Daiana (alternative 6-letter spelling of the regal Diana), a Soilskin female, wants to be strong, independent, on top and in charge. But:

She worries she's not strong enough, and must beat everyone else in some (debate-based?) arena/coliseum.

She believes she's not independent enough, and must... escape a dungeon or prison or something? Unclear.

She's not safe, and has to calm/defeat predators in a forest or something.

Finally, inside the Aspire, she... faces the Chief of her tribe of Blight Wolves, who she takes over from? Similarities to Collie. Again, vague, unclear, needs a lot of refining.

Harmony - The Aspire of Belonging

Hayven (from haven, heaven), a Snowskin male, wants a group he can call his own, so he decides to start his own religion! But:

He's not assertive enough, so he has to go around a village convincing people his religion is true (the original idea for Belief Battles/Frayth, so I could reuse some concepts from that for this).

He's not at peace, and has to calm some fiery dreamons or something.

(Unsure of a third!)

Finally, inside the Aspire, he... hmm. Again, very unclear here. I like the idea of reusing the forming-a-religion concept, though how that could tie to a specific anthropomorphised goal isn't obvious to me.

Gravitoom - The Aspire of Death

Gisele (alternative spelling of the ∞ eponymous protagonist of a ballet about ghosts ∞), a Sandskin female, is... depressed and wants to die?? But:

She's anxious, and must buy something mundane from a shop, but her social anxiety makes every encounter feel like some terrible battle...?

She's depressed, and... trapped in a dark cave or something?

Death is inevitable, and... undead in a crypt?

Finally, inside the Aspire, she... faces the Grim Reaper, but makes peace with the darkness instead and changes her mind? Or something?? Gravitoom is basically the domain of all suffering and mental illness, so this one's particularly tricky to know what to do with. Maybe something related to suicide is very unwise though (yes, 'maybe'), so I'll need to consider different ideas here.

Levitality - The Aspire of Glory

Lucian (means light; alt: Lucius), a Soilskin male, wants to be famous. But:

He's worried that he's not funny, so he has to go around a comedy club making people laugh.

He's worried he lacks charisma, so he has to work as a door-to-door salesman convincing people to buy some product.

He's worried he's not noticed, so he has to convince strangers on the street to check out his content (whatever that might be)... or something.

Finally, inside the Aspire, he... faces some celebrity he's looked up to since he was a child, or something?

Coming up with ideas is tricky because the basic gameplay - convincing others to join you via social skills - isn't as deeply ingrained in my mind as the idea of physically fighting things to reach a solution. So for a lot of them, I've had an idea, but can't easily imagine how it'd translate into convincing. I imagine it's something that'd become easier to conceptualise with practice. (You'd think after working with this general idea of side-swapping for years now, it'd be second nature to me, but apparently not.)

I've also been wondering whether having three sub-areas for each psychepelago would be overdoing it, and whether it'd be wiser to just base each psychepelago around a single idea (eg the Harmony one would be based around convincing people to your religion and nothing else)... but then would the boss battle just be a 2 v 1? Would they have some random minions with them? Doesn't feel as satisfying. And if I were to go with that instead, would the final boss of the area be a dreamon who's been holding the dreamer back, or the object of their desires, or a combination of both??

Anyway, brainstorming is a process, and I'm clearly in the middle of that with these ideas. Maybe you find seeing the process interesting, though, or can contribute ideas that could influence things in a direction you might like.

I actually only spent a couple of days - if that - brainstorming these ideas, hence their sketchiness. I spent longer composing a musical Main Theme I could use for the game and derive other themes from, and I'm really quite happy with what I came up with after endless tweaking! Maybe I'll post it on my Patreon soon (once I stop making tiny changes every time I come back to it).