[WB] The 'Hub' World

THE HUB WORLD (concept created and written by Mr Master)

INITIAL PREMISES

Okay, so, when I was thinking of some kind of environment that would be equally accessible to any sort of RP world you want to envision, I had the concept that these worlds are literally different worlds. That's how you justify demons, sci-fi, magical realms, vampires, furries, what have you; they each come from a dimension or world where those things happen.

So, to crossover maximally, you need to have a space that's connected in some way to all these worlds. That automatically means you can't have the requirement for magic or technology to manage the transition, because not every RP world has magic, nor high technology.

There's a variety of crossing-world techniques in literature, but it's not just going from place to place that was intriguing, as much as the idea of a neutral ground, a no-man's land, which would allow the denizens of different worlds to meet and interact, without having to commit to them being on someone's home territory. This is also why I didn't want it to be a specific world, per se, but a limited territory would be all that would be necessary: a kind of inter-dimensional Casablanca, a Free City of Denver (to you Shadowrun players out there), etc., and so forth.

Now, in "The Magician's Nephew," C. S. Lewis wrote of a kind of grove outside of time and worlds, where you could enter other worlds by going into other "pools" of what appeared to be water but didn't get you wet. This was fine, but I didn't think something pastoral would be what we wanted. I mean, most of the RPs deal with drama, sometimes corruption, certainly action of various sorts. That seems more like it would be urban, like cities tend to breed greater moral darkness and a wider variety of dysfunction and criminality/activity. So then I wanted there to be something like a city, although you'd want to have some sort of nod to the wilderness, too.

So far, we have a limited no-being's-land that has the form of an urban environment. But what sort of city? The idea of varying time periods, varying technologies, meant it had to have some kind of timeless quality. Something that could be relatable to just about any character, and just about any technology frame. I wanted something that readers and characters alike could instantly recognize, and yet would be timeless. Best I could come up with was something like the ancient Babylonian cities, which seemed both a touch exotic and a bit primitive, but also very adaptable to general RP purposes.

There would have to be details, but the imagery was already coming together. The whole concept of the place was a point of transition between worlds and dimensions, and it's about passages, doorways, alleys, arches, tunnels, ways from one place to another. The thematic unity of the place was important, as well: it should be perpetually twilight there, as that's the point between day and night and day again, it's neither one but rather a transition between the two. Overcast and foggy, but never rainy, both because it's easier to explain the sourceless twilight that way and obscure distance details, but also because it's another transitional feature.

Then I had to think of how you got here. Again, there's a variety of ways. Kids got to Narnia in a variety of ways, His Dark Materials, the two Pandora's Star books, etc. I wanted to have the opportunity to introduce as wide a variety of RP environments as possible, which meant I wanted to discourage requiring specific methods. I wanted it so literally anyone could stumble into the place.

Which brought up the Pandora's Star books. One of the major plot threads involves characters skipping between worlds simply by hiking, and eventually they find themselves elsewhere. There's somewhat more to it, but that's essentially the observable transition. I liked that, because it was a) easy to describe, yet still mysterious, b) universally applicable without special preparation or tools, c) as metaphoric and thematic as anything else. It could be done accidentally, and yet one could learn the knack and do it at will, and bring people with you. It seemed like it was the best candidate idea I'd run across yet.

So that's the initial concepts. Everything else was working on the mysteriousness, universal application, and interesting hooks.

This is a draft of what came out of those thoughts. This is only a draft, presented here for review so you can see what came out of those premises in my head. I want to encourage reaction and discussion in this thread, as this is a starting point for some of these concepts. What initial premise should stay, what should be changed, what other ideas or ways to solve particular problems can be enabled? This is a high-level environment mechanics issue, and simpler is better, as is wider application. I think I've come up with some simple and widely-applicable answers to most of the issues I've thought of, but I'm happy to consider other issues and other answers; I'm not perfect, but I like to think I can world-build a little bit after all these years practicing.

WORLD OF TWILIGHT, WORLD OF SHADOW

There is a place that is no-place.

If transitions have a location, if the point between here and there has a definition and dimension, then there's a place that represents the place between everywhere. There's a place that's not any one place, but is every place, or rather, you can get there from here. Where from here? Everywhere.

In form, it is ancient and timeless, a city of incredible age, but with energy, being both vital as a living metropolis and dusty as an architectural reconstruction. It resembles, to modern Earth eyes, an ancient Mesopotamian city, with most buildings constructed of mud brick, mud plaster, and wood, with narrow winding passages instead of conventional streets, and mostly squat, low-ceilinged buildings with open doorways and windows and ceiling gaps.









The most notable aspect of the city is that it appears to have no clear edges, no ends. There is no territory to explore beyond it, because it is not on a world, it is transition given form, it is a space in between, and because of that, if one enters it and crosses it, one goes to the next place. Which brings up how one even arrives in the World of In-Between in the first place.

ARRIVALS AND DEPARTURES

In the Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, Douglas Adams describes the art of learning to fly as you throw yourself at the ground and... miss. How does one miss the ground? Well, that's the question, isn't it?

Similarly, one gets to the Shadow City by being in between one place and another, and simply not completing the passage. Most often this happens when one is lost, distracted, in a hurry. One makes a turn, or passes under an arch, or ducks through a loop of wood or stone or steel, and if the frame of mind is right, if the stars are aligned, or whatever else needs to be in place, then one finds oneself either in the Space In-Between, or on the way there, at least. The arrival can be sudden, like turning a corner or exiting an elevator or going through a doorway, and you look around to find yourself there, or gradual, such as going through alleys or through woods, and the surroundings get more and more unfamiliar until they open up and you're there. The transitions are rarely detectable.

Leaving is very similar, but much more intentional. This is why one can never find the edges of the city; one strikes out for the edge, and the transition happens at some point before one gets there. Technically, the transition can happen at any point, if the conditions are right. In a place where everything is a transition, it's hard to make a distinction of a "right" place for a transition to resolve. The trick, of course, is ending up where you want to go. While travel to the Space In Between doesn't need to be directed, there's usually a need for some kind of intention when leaving, because otherwise, the results can be... random.

However, there are those who have developed the knack, mastered the trick of intentionally getting lost, slipping away from reality on purpose. The theory is that once you've recognized the odd sort of distraction you need to have, you might be able to reproduce it at will. And if anyone is following you, they can be brought along, if they also don't know where they are going. It won't work with a large group; only about three or four people at a time can make the shift. Any more than that, and there are too many viewpoints anchoring everybody to one place.

Practitioners of this cannot really describe what it is, or what it feels like. It's something they figure out, something they can reproduce, but it's an experiential thing, an art, not a science, as much metaphorical as actual. The actual time of twilight is the best, as things always seem strange in the half-light. Familiarity with the surroundings works against moving to the Twilight City, but familiarity with a destination in moving away from there is crucial. What's the gimmick? The best way it's been described is you aim yourself at a destination and... miss.

THE SPACE IN-BETWEEN, UP CLOSE

As far as can be determined, the city has always existed, just as it is, and always will exist. People come to the city from all times, all places, as it exists as a basic truth of reality, rather than a specific point in time and space. If anything, it is outside of time, and that's why it seems so literally eternal. In fact, its existence outside of time might somehow explain why reality acts so strange while one is there.

What the normal universe considers physical laws don't always apply here. The more advanced a tool or piece of equipment, the less likely it is to operate properly. And even simple things operate strangely. Fire, for example: it burns weakly, barely shedding light and heat. But for what little it does shed, it doesn't consume fuel. Torches never burn out, though they shed only a candle's illumination. Compasses spin uselessly, or simply point to the nearest ferrous metal. People get hungry and thirsty and sleepy, but not on the schedules they would expect, and not always at the same rate as normal.

Firearms don't fire well, sometimes the powder doesn't ignite. Powered weapons don't operate, or do so fitfully and at lesser power. Non-weapon machines do slightly better, but they're still unreliable. Weapons tend to have the most immediate and instant needs, the explosive action, the sudden release, and those are what fails the most, or simply doesn't operate as it should. It's as if there's a dampening effect that shuts things down. The times nuclear weapons have been detonated in the city, for example, the destruction was barely more than a few dozen meters wide, with no lingering radiation.

No, technology is unreliable in the In-Between places. The best options are muscle and smarts, maybe augmented by some simple tools, steel and wood and stone. It seems primitive to many, normal to others, but if you need to do something in this twilight nether-world between spaces, that's the best way to go about it.

And people do things here, all the time. If only a tiny fraction of beings at any one time know the secret of how to travel here, spread out across the universe and throughout the timestream, that's still an awful lot of transients. Some stay, for a time or for their lives, however long or short. Aging is tricky here, but generally slower (though that means little if one has realized the means to exit in a different time as well as a different place in the "real" world). And they generally do something to pass the time, whether that's smuggling, trading, spying, guiding, or keeping an inn. Human ingenuity at making a profit (however one defines "profit") knows few bounds, and the shadow-realm itself is a resource many have figured out how to utilize to their own ends.

And it's not just humans, either. Near humans, human variants, animal people, and creatures stranger even than that find their ways through this space. They bring goods to trade, grudges to pursue, and stories to tell (when the language can be translated). Many think more like humans than one would expect. Many have thoughts that are utterly incomprehensible to the human mind. But most everybody somehow manages to co-exist, whether it's because they don't stay long, or they welcome the exploration. Those few that can't co-exist either are forcibly moved out (pursuit by an angry mob that has had enough of your antics frequently ends up provoking some kind of transition) or don't survive the visit.

Nowhere has it been said that the City of Twilight is safe.

It's not hard to set up residence; one just finds a building that's currently unoccupied and occupies it. Decorations, modifications, equipment - it lingers for a while. If you make changes to a building, they'll stay as long as you do. Abandoned places eventually either become unable to be located or they go back to the way they were before; ether way, the alterations disappear, and the City reverts to its primal, original form. All things are transient, except the City itself.

Walking the narrow, pre-historic-feeling paths of the city can be surreal and dreamlike. The ever-present overcast glow of the sky simply points out the fact that you can't see more than a hundred feet because of the fog; not that there's a hundred feet of straightaway to see, most days. Little things skitter past, and hulking shapes cross through side streets ahead, and you know all of them may be sentient beings because animals don't recognize the metaphorical existence of transitions like higher intelligences do, and can't cross over independently. A swarm of robed Bedouins, or something similar, passes by, nodding as one to a jump-suited spacewoman that lounges in a nearby doorway, who nods back as she gazes speculatively at you, her intentions unreadable. The sound of running water echoes distantly, and closer, the muffled sound of laughter, and someone playing jazz on a tinkly piano and what sounds like it could be a theramin. A pteranodon screech sounds overhead, one of a dozen weird and unexplainable noises you've heard since you arrived, and nobody else seems to pay any attention. Just another ... night? day? stretch of time? ... in the In-Between.

EXPLORING THE CITY - THE PERILS OF NAVIGATION

In a place that is the embodiment of passages, of changing, it seems almost natural that much of it is in flux. There have been no successful maps of the city ever made, as the specific routes from one place to another seem to change as soon as they are out of anyone's sight. The only way to navigate within the city is by landmarks, as there are a few major landmarks that never change, and people can always find their way to a place in the city based on where it's supposed to be in relation to the landmarks.

The four major landmarks are the Mountain, the Castle, and the Sea, and the River that connects the three. Lesser landmarks are the seven Bridges that cross the River at various points. The Mountain and the Castle can always be seen above the fog, glimmering in the dawn/dusk, dim and distinctive shapes rising above the otherwise cloudy and indistinct mass of the city around them. The Sea has never been seen, just heard as distant waves beyond the widening at the mouth of the River. And the River, well, the River impedes travel from one part of the city to the other, but it can be another point of transition, based on the fact that cities and rivers go together throughout history.

In turn, then:

The Mountain

The Mountain is the only real variation in terrain greater than a gentle hill, and it also represents the only real terminus of buildings in the entire city. It's a steep forested slope, with a distant snow cap and a trickling brook that widens to a stream and widens further still to the head of the River, without a visible source of new water adding to the flow. Anyone who's been lost in the woods, or scrabbling down a rock-face, and turned around and found themselves somewhere unexpected may have stumbled through here at some point. This is where those who come through transitions in the wilderness end up. Moving up onto the lower slopes of the Mountain is also the only way to ford the water to the other side of the River without using a Bridge, but it's risky, because a transition could occur at any point when one is out of sight of the buildings, and that's most of the hike.

One can climb the Mountain, but inevitably one ends up on a real mountain before one gets too far. Mind you, sunrises and night skies around mountains are generally spectacular, so if one is seeking natural beauty, it's rewarding, but if one is trying to explore the City's unique dimension, it really doesn't help.

There are a few cave mouths dotting the slopes; those provide as much opportunity from transition as the rock face does, and usually even more quickly than average.

The Castle

The Castle is the most impressive structure in the entire city. It's not actually a castle, but is more like a weird alien pyramid. It straddles the River like a gigantic bridge, faced with stone and metal whose colors cannot be entirely determined in the dimness. The buildings leading up to it on both sides of the River are taller than anywhere in the city, faced with smoother plaster, or shiny stone. If one squints a little, it can look like a modern city, and in fact, those neighborhoods are often the point of transitions to and from the more upscale neighborhoods; one finds obsidian and smoothed plaster at one glance, gets distracted by nearly tripping over something, and looks up to find glass, steel, and poured concrete.

The strange architecture of the Castle has not been explained; it resembles, but not exactly, ancient buildings on literally millions of worlds, but the details are apparently unique. Wide gates admit anyone who cares to enter, and the passages and hallways and broad chambers are open to all, just as the rest of the City, though the higher one goes in the Castle structure, the narrower the passages get. A higher vantage point doesn't reveal much more about the city, as the borders are cloaked in fog, and no one's vision can see more distant details than the Mountain. And there is a limit to how high one can go; the tallest central spires are closed off from the public, the only detectable entrance being the High Gates, and those are not only closed but guarded, as well, as will be described shortly.

As this is the largest and most impressive building in the City, it has attracted more than its share of egotistical visitors seeking to claim it as their own. But taking up residence there as one would in any other building is discouraged, somehow; many have tried, but most end up feeling unnerved, unwanted, and realize it's not as self-aggrandizing as they had thought. Those that are truly stubborn, who put up with the nightmares and feelings of dread and paranoia end up turning around and finding themselves faced with the Castle's guardians.





The guards of the Castle and the High Gate therein, the only known true natives of the Transitional Dimension, are not beings as anyone has been able to define them. They appear to be oddly-proportioned, just-slightly-alien suits of armor, each one unique in greater or lesser degree from all the others. Some are simple to the point of being an abstraction of armor, others are as ornate as any Renaissance noble's personal ceremonial garb. Whether there are hundreds of them hidden somewhere, or only a few that change appearance as frequently as the City changes its street plan, it's true that no two of them look alike, and not one has been seen more than once.

Two always stand, immobile and impervious to anything, at each side of the High Gates, tall spears in hand. When someone outstays their welcome in the Castle, two or three of them show up to evict him or her or it. A very few times in the known history of the City, as many as five have left the Castle to shut down particularly bad episodes of violence, destroying indiscriminately until the problem went away. And they are well suited for that duty, because nothing appears to be able to damage them, nothing can hold them for very long, and while they can be avoided and dodged, they possess an unstoppable strength that cannot be resisted indefinitely. One of the recorded uses of nuclear weaponry within the City involved these armored guardians, and while the buildings around the bomb were obliterated, the warriors themselves simply picked themselves up and proceeded on their mission, unimpaired. When they are seen in motion, it's always bad news for someone. In this dimension, they the ultimate authority. What cannot be explained is why they exert that authority so rarely, and only in extreme circumstances.

All known detection methods, human or alien, technological, mystic, psychic, or biological, can determine nothing about them. They are not living creatures, not machines, not magical, not elemental. Their armor cannot be analyzed, they make no noise, and don't seem to communicate in any detectable way. In human language, someone once nicknamed them Janissaries, and it somehow stuck. They are the only known representatives of whatever it is that keeps the City in existence, and they don't communicate anything with those who visit.

And whatever else it is that resides here, whatever it is that gives the Janissaries their orders, has to be behind the High Gates. That golden portal, inscribed with ancient designs that have defied identification and translation for all the time they have been in existence, stay closed to all. Some have claimed to have seen the Gates open, but they have either been lying or have been tricked in some fashion. Supplicants come to ask the presumed masters of the dimension for favors, to make demands, to plea for guidance or assistance. They speak to the closed gates, under the impassive gaze of the Janissaries, and when they're done, there is no answer, and they must leave. Sometimes, luck befalls them, more often it doesn't. But no one could really say whether or not it's an answer to their pleas; statistically, there's no proven advantage to "asking the Gates," as local slang would have it. But still, asking the Gates is better than having no hope at all.

The Sea

The Sea has never been seen, but downstream from the Castle, one can hear the sound of waves lapping an unseen shore. The River widens to where one cannot see the other side in the mist, and those either walking or sailing on the River toward the sound of the Sea inevitably make a transition before they actually reach them. On occasion, a vessel of some sort will come sailing into the River from an unguessable sea, and may stay a while, but it has been nearly unheard of for the same vessel to make the unexpected voyage twice.

The River

The River is just that; a river, flowing from the Mountain to the Sea. Its channel is narrow in some places, making the waters fast, and broad in others, making the current lazy, but it always flows steadily and cleanly. It passes under seven Bridges and the Castle (which acts as an eighth Bridge, but is too massive, and the passage across too indirect, to really count as a true bridge) in its path, and then empties into the Sea, as described above.

Of the Bridges, all are high enough to allow what few ships are on the water passage, but there is much more water traffic downstream from the Castle than upstream. The flow of the water under the Castle is frequently through small channels and passages, almost caves or lava tubes, with only a couple of relatively narrow tunnels allowing surface traffic through.

The Bridges

Each Bridge has its own character and style.

The Wooden Bridge is closest to the Mountain, and is a primitive wood-and-pilling bridge crossing the river at its relative narrowest point within the city itself. The apex of the Wooden Bridge is a covered bridge structure straight out of the tale of the Headless Horseman.

The Stone Bridge is fieldstone and slab, and always seems to be crumbling, though it has appeared that way for time immemorial, and has never quite collapsed.

The Market Bridge has stalls and stands for vendors selling wares, and they do, constantly. Some call it the Noisy Bridge from all the salespeople trying to get passerby to purchase their wares. This broad bridge, and the buildings and squares on either end, comprise the major market area of the City, whatever passes for the main bazaar of the place.

The Magic Bridge (also called the Rainbow Bridge, or the Viking Bridge by some humans) is a flattish arch that seems to need no supports or pilings, stretching simply from one bank to the other. It is no more than a few inches thick, yet appears impenetrable and impervious to anything. It also glows very faintly, and upon examination, displays distinct color bands, of the ROYGBIV variety.

Between the Magic Bridge and the Grand Bridge sits the Castle.

The Grand Bridge (sometimes called the Gothic Bridge) is a large stone span with three uprights, all decorated or overdecorated with carvings, gargoyles, alien bas-reliefs, and other baroque accouterments. Outside of the Castle, it is the most decorated "native" structure in the City, and it can be extremely creepy.

The Steel Bridge is the longest of the bridges, and it seems to be the most modern in design, made of rusty (but never rusted through) metal and stone. It's a suspension bridge, with three tall spires from which chains descend to support the actual span of the bridge.

The Port Bridge is the bridge closest to the Sea, and it is the longest and most solidly built, short of the Castle itself. It has moorings at water level, docks and simple cranes and winches build into the structure of the bridge so that the few ships that find their way here can moor and load and unload cargo. A sailing vessel lost at sea is the only way more than a handful of people can arrive at one time, and unfortunately no guide has managed to reliably gimmick a transition for a whole boat at once.

THE TEMPLE OF THE BLUE MOON (concept created by BlackWingAngel, written by darkangel76)

The Temple of the Blue Moon is located deep in the heart of the hub world, standing solitary on a small island in a vast lake while enshrouded by a thick fog. Since the hub world is difficult to define geographically as well as difficult to navigate for most, the temple is nearly impossible to find. Rumors say that those who seek to visit the temple will fail. That it’s those who truly need the council of those who reside there, those of the Azure Council and their Enforcers, who will find them when the time is indeed appropriate. And more than likely it is those of the Council who will find the seekers as opposed to the other way around.

The members of the Azure Council mainly keep to themselves, overseeing the actions of those who pass through their timeless world. But their vision does not end with the world in which they reside. They can also see into the worlds connecting to their own as they are the true natives of the timeless world in which everything branches off from. Despite their passivity, they will seek out those who go against ‘The Unwritten Will of the Azure Council’, as it has come to be known - a guideline that must be adhered to. When those whom they watch suddenly stray, they are reminded by the Azure Council and in some very rare instances will even feel the wrath of justice.

Fortunately, the Azure Council enjoys just watching how everyone interacts with each other, how they travel and handle various situations, preferring to let them work out their differences if possible should they arise. And fortunately they’ve found that instances requiring their intervention and/or wrath to be few and far between. Passive, neutral, they keep watch and guard their ‘Unwritten Will’, their goal to keep everyone safe, to make sure their ‘Unwritten Will’ is followed.

Members of the Azure Council –
High Priests & Priestesses Admin & sub-Admin

The Council’s Enforcers who sometimes intervene on the Council’s behalf –
Cleric Global Mods
Acolyte Sectional Mods (See these people FIRST.)