|
|
|
|
|
To some, memory is an everlasting curse, etched in the mind in long, indelible strokes, the signature of all history soaked through waking thought. Each memory radiant, a bright flame to which the eyes cannot close. The ages pass and the despair of existing throughout them accumulates. We are engulfed in a blaze of unending thoughts. We burn in this purgatory, knowing that there is precious little we have not seen, or felt, or known. We are not omniscient, but we know too much. It is we who understand the harsh truth that there is nothing new under the sun. And if there was, we would destroy it out of fear. Gods are not understood, but we are characterize by the power and knowledge we hold. Mortals, with their brief flickering lives, are dazzled by the immortal’s splendor. They dress us up in the majesty of legends, preserving our images, words and deeds. Few of them understand what it is like to be a god, to be crushed under the enormity of what you are. They don’t understand that eventually we flee into the cool solitude of our own minds to escape memory’s raging fire. Like humans, we can diminish. Unlike them, we cannot pass into a truly new incarnation. We are what we are and must remain what we are forever. Death comes very rarely to us. Even if our physical body perishes, there is always the legends which speak our names and call us back again to this corporeal earth. Humans are possessed by the spirit of our ancient, most terrible enemy. Through them, the Beast holds our souls prisoner by knowing us---truly knowing us. Only by relinquishing our old name for the new one can we take power away from the Beast. We work toward this goal so that we can, in the final war, act freely against the it. Otherwise, the Beast will take control of us and force us to suicide ourselves within it’s bottomless jaws. The Beast came to this Earth sixty-five million years ago. A radiant, bejeweled giant of profound beauty and power, it tumbled from the sky, exiled from a universe beyond our own. It shattered against the living soul of the earth into countless crystal shards. These shards, still possessing the life and fragmented consciousness of the Beast, immediately sought to bring themselves back together into a single whole creature. To accomplish this, they became parasites, borrowing into the bodies of living animals. Influencing the creatures, the shards were able to move from place to place, to commune with one another. Because the earth itself was alive in those days, the rocks and trees held the same life-force as living beings. Some of them were infested by the shards too. Animals, plants, stone, fire and water became immortal creatures with shards beating at their hearts. The presence of the shards inside them made these creatures immune, yet slaves, to time. So they continued to live, to gain memory and terrible intelligence. That was our beginning---the rape of our bodies by alien parasites bent on merging themselves back into the Beast, sacrificing us in this cause. So the father swallows his children. Through the ages we have fought against this assimilation. We defeated the dread avatars spawned by the Beast one by one. Many of us fell to the enemy’s evil seduction and are lost. Others have survived to the modern day. We are known by many forms to human kind. We are the vampires who suck his blood, the Lycanthropes which devour his flesh. We are angels which comfort him, demons that seduce him, spirits which haunt him. We are only gods because man made us so. Sadly, he does no realize that the Beast inside him will one day be his doom and that one day human kind must look to us a saviors. We nearly destroyed the Beast once, but it’s consciousness fled into the unconscious, dreaming minds of mankind. In these dreams it built an empire of shadow, hunger and fear. It’s minions, the Nightmares, seek escape from this lair to further the dark purposes of their master in the waking world. Among the so-called civilized world of mankind, we prepare for the final war when, it is prophesied, the Beast rise from it’s dream prison and be reborn. If this happens, this world and many worlds beyond it are doomed to be devoured. Memories of the war haunt us. Premonitions of the great slaughter ahead horrify us. Our battles have been so terrible that they wasted whole planets beyond Earth. Our fortunes have risen and fallen. Once Mankind’s masters, we now live in his shadow because the Beast inside him has given him power over us. Some of us have transcended into a new form of life, one which is immune to the power of Beast and man. These creatures bar the way to salvation for the rest of us unless we can prove ourselves worthy. Those who prove themselves worthy join the ranks of the Transcended and are perhaps the only hope for the future of the rest of us. The burden of memory is a great one. Even with our desire for freedom, many of us are sickened by the long ages. We give in to despair. We enter our own minds, becoming statues which daydream of ages past when there was some joy in living. Others among us take their own lives and wander the deep Blue Air, the ethereal ocean through which spirits endlessly swim. Still others use supernatural arts to place themselves into self-imposed amnesia, exiling themselves to live among human beings, burying their memories and powers to experience life anew. The seduction of a new, fresh life is powerful to those who have lost joy in their ancient, cheerless existence. Some in our society do not look kindly on those rogue immortals who shirk their responsibility in favor or this amnesia. Many call it cowardly. Others, however, understand how close to the Beast these rogues must live as mortals, entering the world of dreams each night, defenseless. How brave they are to become so vulnerable where the Beast prowls. Those are the ones we seek now, to bring them back into our fold and discover what they have learned about our terrible enemy. They are learning secrets we could never discover, and so they are the heroes of the battles to come. They are another hope for our doomed kind. They are you.
Immortal is a role-play game, a game of make-believe, of theatrical performance. Each player is a primary character in the constantly unraveling story created by their leader, the narrator. While the players star in the continuing saga, acting out their character’s responses, the narrator creates the stimuli, assuming the roles of supporting characters and generally moderating the game so that all participants experience a sense of realism from the story. It’s the job of the narrator to invent the setting the player’s character "lives" in. He’s the judge who sometimes uses dice to determine the outcome of situations which demand absolute impartiality, such as determining how a character fares in a combat situation. The tale of an Immortal game is a game of adventure. The characters find themselves involved in a supernatural war which not only spans the planet earth, it’s spirit realm and world of dreams, but also worlds in the galaxies beyond. It is, in essence, a juxtaposition of dark fairy tale and science fiction which can, from time to time, intrude on the fantasy worlds of the ancient past Role-play games have mechanics, the rolling of dice to determine how successful a character is in performing stressful actions, such as fighting or attempting to use skills (such as driving, for example) while under duress. Immortal uses a ten-side dice system based on the various physical and mental attributes possessed by each character. The system is streamlined and as simple as possible for quick resolution of conflict. For those who are only interested in involving themselves in Immortal’s story, mechanics are often sacrificed as unnecessary complications. We heartily support this stance. As always, the story comes first. Game mechanics, if they do not serve the story, should be eliminated.
The setting and rules of Immortal can be found in a series of books, available at many comic, book and hobby stores. Click on any title on the list below for a detailed description of the book. Immortal The Invisible War Pilot Pack Dream Stroke Lost Trinty Shapeshifter’s Manual Serenades: The First Book Of Powers Dracul Sourcebook Art Of War
The character is the center of all Immortal tales. As a player, you create a character and through acting, bring him or her to life. This persona lives in the Immortal universe, struggling against members of his own kind and finding, with increasing sadness, that his life among humans is a mere charade. The character is caught between exile from the human world he understands and being consumed in the politics and battles of the immortal world alien to him. The road of the Immortal character is one of self-discovery and self-preservation against heavy odds.
The Narrator sets the stage for the characters to perform on. He invents the locale where the characters live, the distant places they will travel to, and the various foes they will encounter. He is the mastermind of political intrigue by supporting characters and the evil might of the minions of the Beast, the enemy of all immortal kind. He is also the inventor of ordinary, mortal supporting characters---the grocer, a character’s human relative or the transitory cab driver that cuts the character off on his way to an important event. The narrator is all other characters that the players have not already invented. Narrators construct stories. They are like the writers of a movie while the players are it’s stars. He arbitrates all conflicts and through his verbal description, moves the characters through their adventure.
This is the official web page of the Immortal role-play game, created by Ran Ackels and published by Precedence Publishing. Click here if you wish to go to the Precedence home page to discover more about our company and it’s products. This page is divided into four main parts. We invite you to explore each section, whether you are new to the game or a veteran of the Invisible War. 1. Player’s Resources: This link supplies services to the player of Immortal, including tips on character creation, links to other player’s web sites, a character sheet that can be downloaded, optional rules and errata. 2. Narrator’s Resources: Provides useful information on the Immortal setting, it’s groups and characters. Includes plot ideas and other data, including a lexicon of Immortal terms. 3. Immortal Society: Provides membership information on our world-wide player’s association known as Club Eternity and rules for live-action Immortal games. It also has information on the various nations of immortals. Other available products relating to IMMORTAL, such as t-shirts, art prints, mugs, mousepads, dice and other fun stuff is also included. 4. Gallery: A collection of digital art from the Immortal RPG by Ran Ackels. |
|
