I've always enjoyed a bit of genre mixing and the thought occured to me this AM that taking the Count of Monte Cristo and reimagining it as a campaign in the EP Universe could be really entertaining (to me :-)). Obviously it wouldn't be completely compatible since CoMC deals primarily with Dantes' singular quest for vengeance etc. But many of the themes and various plot points could be injected into a roleplaying campaign. Though the end result would undoubtedly bear little first-glance resemblance to Dumas' tale, enough nodds of the cap could be made that a comparison would be clear.
The hyperelite of the inner system would be a great reskinning of the nobility in CoMC. Mysterious strangers and exotic companions are easy enough to muster up. Player characters could easily take a similar role in the tale to Albert de Mocerf (classic rp themes of testing their allegiences and being douped by powerful NPC's). The Fall of Earth could provide a good amount of similarity to the Hundred Days (where Napoleon regained control of France from Louis XVIII) and provide great campaign background for the kind of betrayal and scandal that could provide fuel enough to have a person thought to have perished in the fall come back from the outer system to seek their revenge, using the PC's as a tool.
Other similarities to the events or themes of CoMC could easily be found I'm sure
Random I know...I'll be exploring this concept further for my own needs, but I thought I'd toss my musings up here to see if anyone had anything interesting to add.
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[Campaign Ideas] Count of Monte Cristo
Sun, 2011-09-11 14:05
#1
Herbo
[Campaign Ideas] Count of Monte Cristo
Mon, 2011-09-12 06:43
#2
Arenamontanus
Re: [Campaign Ideas] Count of Monte Cristo
Nice coincidence, I was recently thinking about classic novels that could make a good backbone for an EP adventure, and the CoMC came up. Still not 100% certain of how to use it, mainly because I haven't *read* it, but it sounds like a perfect source.
Destroying powerful people in EP is hard, since they cannot be killed. Hence they must be ruined - financially, reputationally, and psychologically. It also makes a proper revenge quest far more epic.
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Mon, 2011-09-12 11:49
#3
Herbo
Re: [Campaign Ideas] Count of Monte Cristo
This is one of the reasons that CoMC popped up for me since a good deal of the revenge leveled against the various characters in Dumas' book trends toward financial, reputation and psychological destruction (Danglars, Fernand & Villefort respectively).
With all the wrinkles and complications present in EP, it makes some of the more nebulous things like vast wealth (ie. mysteriously high rep, hyper-elite style cred, etc) more interesting than "a giant cave full of gold and gems."
I was also thinking about more iconic things within CoMC like the Chateau D'if and that poses a bit more of a problem since a big scary prison-fortress floating offshore from Marseille doesn't really transfer well even if you were to toss it into space and bury it in an asteroid. I'd imagine a VR prison would be more apropriate, but somehow that doesn't really "do it" for me. Aside from maybe the Jovian Republic are there any good examples of "old school" prisons in the system?
Mon, 2011-09-12 12:13
#4
Arenamontanus
Re: [Campaign Ideas] Count of Monte Cristo
Maybe the Count is actually supported by a major secret power, perhaps a Promethean or other free super-AGI. The secret learned in prison gives access to this support, providing the rep and credit.
The Axelrod Prison at the start of Rajaniemi's "The Quantum Thief" is a very cool VR prison. Ongoing game theoretical battles and scenarios intended to promote a nice ethical outlook as the prisoner's "reform" by recognizing reciprocal altruism in the iterated prisoner's dilemma.
I can also imagine dreary prison servers placed on Luna, filled to capacity with uploaded prisoners transmitted during the Fall from Earth prison servers.
Or why not send off prisoners as "colonists" to a gulag on Mars or Mercury... I mean work training camp, of course. It would be like indenture, but to a government body. Which then gets sold off to a hypercorp during the Fall.
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Sat, 2011-09-17 19:13
#5
King Shere
Re: [Campaign Ideas] Count of Monte Cristo
Another option is that the former "count" was among those exciled into scumbarges.
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