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One of the issues brought up in both recent talks and at the WN Discord Stage thing was a lack of Esoteric and Occult themes. In response, those running it said that they are interested in it, but have yet to come up with how they exactly intend to execute it. This is what this suggestion is for.
Why should HL2RP contain esoteric and occult themes?
(This section is technically the suggestion itself. Everything after is just how to add it.
When something is Esoteric, it means that it is only meant to be seen by, or only understood by, very few people. It is personal. When others see it, they can make no sense of it. When another sees it, they can understand it, but may find it difficult to explain to others without being seen as too far beyond them in the best case, or downright crazy or just lying in the worst case.
The occult refers to that which is supernatural, mystical, and magical. This goes hand in hand with something that is "esoteric," as it is often these things that are only understood by very few, if at all.
These both together are major themes in the Half Life series. There are many, many points that display these themes in full force. The Combine. The Nihilanth. The Gman. Vortigaunts in general. Advisors. Xen. The general mystery of it all. Ravenholm. These are just naming big name bits from the game. The Vault is literally an anomalous mind fuck. If you read a description of it on the SCP website, you'd think it was an anomaly being contained by the SCP foundation. The same applies to everything else I have listed.
So it comes as a surprise that we have very little of these things in our server. The Esoteric and Occult are major themes in Half Life. Without them, this is just "Occupation" Roleplay, not true Half Life.
But let's not ignore the obvious implications here. Xen is a borderworld. A gateway between many different dimensions. The Resonance Cascade saw the worlds of Xen and Earth literally merging together. One cannot say that quite a number of anomalies and otherwise unexplainable things have arrived on Earth. This effectively opens up the possibilities to nearly anything. You could legit bring the entirety of the SCP foundation's anomalies into the world of HL2RP, and they'd be able to be written off as "They got to Xen somehow from another dimension, and then ended up on Earth in the Resonance Cascade." But of course, we don't want to go that far, because if not executed correctly, you are going to have a lot of silly and weird things happening. This leads to the next segment.
This is the end of the actual suggestion. The rest is just details and how to properly implement it. Stop reading here if you are a lazy fuck.
The core philosophies of running esoteric and occult themes in HL2RP.
(This section and everything after is how it should be implemented, preferably.)
The best way to add these themes is by establishing 3 core tenets to their implementation. What things do we need to keep in mind when introducing these themes into the server?
1. The supernatural and anomalous must be introduced at the lowest, most discreet level.
The esoteric and occult immediately lose their charm when literally everybody knows everything about it. This applies both on an OOC and IC. An event involving "ghost spewing out of the sewers and into the streets" like a Ghostbusters knock off is silly and uinspired, even if it could be called occult and supernatural. Why? Because it loses that sense of exclusiveness. If everyone knows about it, it feels much less mysterious and creepy because now you can turn to the person to your right and talk about it as if it were your mailman delivering mail to your neighbor.
To properly introduce the occult, it must be made esoteric. It should be introduced as natural as possible, and if not, hinted at to the majority in a very vague manner.
Instead of having 15+ people on the street witnessing some horrid entity shifting in and out of reality, have one person, or a small group witness it in the sewers, or in a very dark corner of the slums. Keep it as mysterious, vague, and confusing as possible within reason. This is how to do a natural introduction. It's not broadcasted out to the server, but only to a few chosen people. Now this can keep happening, and multiple people can see it, but they should still not know what it is. It is up to them, and the rumors that will spread, that will create the overarching narrative of something really terrifying and inhuman is in the sewers. Don't go down there.
While it shouldn't be done often, you can have occult events that effect the entire server. When this is done, and it should be done rarely, they need to be very vague and hard to explain. It doesn't have to be brief, but it should be if the risk of overstaying its welcome is there.
Yes, this also applies OOC. If the person who makes one of these events proceeds to go into the Discord and let everybody know about "Le cool epic anomaly in teh sewers", than the mystery is lost, and the event loses its charm. Metagame or not, they will know what they are dealing with.
2. The supernatural and anomalous must be presented in a manner that fits the context of the world it exists in.
This is less about what the anomaly can do, and more about how it fits into the world. This is a tough line to balance on, but is required for it to be at its best. On one hand, it is an anomaly. It isn't meant to BE in the world, hence why it is an anomaly. On the other hand, if the anomaly is the alien circus clown who shows up in the sewers and turns you into a vampire with an evil laugh, then nobody is going to take it seriously. Sure, it is anomalous, but it doesn't fit into the world itself.
I find the best way to look at this is via the perspective of whoever will view it. It needs to fit into the world, but it shouldn't fit into what a character will understand.
The two types of bad supernatural/anomalous events.
- Immersion Breaking. Gooblart the evil clown from outer space that makes you eat infected cotton candy to turn you into an evil clown might not be understood by a character, but it doesn't fit into the world of Half Life, and comes off as cheesy and immersion breaking. In short, it's ridiculous.
- Cliche/Generic. A haunting ghost that stalks a character could arguably fit into the world of Half Life if you want to extend Half Life to also include the world that existed before the Resonance Cascade, but everyone knows what a ghost is, and what a ghost can do. This is where "OOC" level interpretation comes in. If an entity is a transparent ghost of a former friend of theres that floats through walls, you've lost the ability to make something that the character doesn't understand. (IMPORTANT: This doesn't mean you can't take a generic or cliche concept, and turn it into something unique, or even well executed. Even cliche and generic concepts can be done very well, but this is often harder to do.)
3. The supernatural and anomalous must be reserved and unique so that it may not be over done.
This is as important as the first two. It doesn't matter how good an anomaly is designed, how well it fits into the world, or how mysterious and other worldly it is- if it is done over and over again, or too many anomalies are done at once, you will lose your mystery factor. This comes from the common idea that: If something is experienced too many times, the person experiencing it will eventually grow bored of it.
If MegaShart46 finds their character walking down a hall of their apartment complex that they've never seen before despite living there for years and knowing every nook and cranny, that first moment is very off putting, confusing, new, and potentially frightening. Even a second or third time can be an "Oh shit it's happening again" moment- but the fifth time? The 10th time? It begins to lose its touch, and MegaShart46 will just be wanting it to end when they realize that it's yet ANOTHER "weird hallway" event.
However, it doesn't just apply to the same type of occurance. If you throw way too many things at one person, you are ruining the overall exposure and atmosphere of their roleplay. If MegaShart46 can't walk outside without seeing a person disappear behind a tree or some Eldritch horror whispering into his mind, then we'll have someone complaining on the forums about how they are in some weird freaky other world instead of the dystopian city they joined, and all those events will quickly lose their appeal.
In general, these anomalies as one offs should only occur every once in a while, and to different people. One or two events per day, presented to one or two people, AT MOST. Or one event for one small group. Think about how well that event will be explained to other characters, and other members in OOC since that will happen inevitably. Even then, this "once per day" should only be done in short bursts. If it needs to be dialed back to once or twice every few days, if not once a week, than it should be done so. As for server wide anomalous events, they should be heavily reviewed by others before done, and should only happen once a month at most.
How to actually execute this.
Honestly, to be realistic, only a certain number of people are going to be able to write/execute events like these that are done truly well. Writing normal events that work in the known and defined is one thing because you can easily convey them due to having familiarity with it. Having someone try to write the abstract and that which is even harder to convey is next level because you are working with topics that are very unique and hard to understand. This goes all the way from the use of unique writing to describe sensory details that have never been known, all the way up to trying to portray the atmosphere and instill a feeling in the reader. The goal with these events is not to just describe something happening, but to make the reader feel an intended emotion such as fear, confusion, or mystery when they experience it.
Firstly, I think these events should only be handled by select people in the staff team (or whoever will generate events like these). They don't need an official label or anything, there just needs to be an understanding that you shouldn't be going around making events like these unless you have been given permission by a Senior Admin or a CM to do so (on a constant basis). There should not be more than 2 or 3 active staff members doing these on a constant basis. This is to keep communication more solid between them, and to prevent staff from accidentally oversaturating the server with these events because you have 10 admins making weird events.
Second, and tying to the first, the first members to take this responsibility should be confident in their ability to make these events. They need to show that they understand what has been explained here, and know how to run events and facilitate roleplay. This is a part of event making that shouldn't have to take on the responsibility of running potentially bad events with the excuse of "Well the admin who wrote is new to it so give them a break." Essentially, experienced event writers only.
Finally, any event writers who want to do this after the first writers have been chosen should observe those who do them to understand what is expected, allowed to work with them so as to see how the potential writer views it, and then allowed to write them under supervision to see how they handle it. If they show that they can do it, they should be allowed on board so long as the members tasked with this can effectively communicate with a new member on board.
In the end, if every staff member can be made capable of doing this, and proper organization is done to keep it in play, than that is the goal that should be aimed for.
A good way of running this in actual execution is to keep tabs on characters through the in-game staff menu's involving characters. Note what experiences they have seen so as to not hit the same person twice and over expose them. Furthermore, note in a discord channel or some other manner when the last time an esoteric event was ran. This way, members in charge of this aren't just running event after event.
Overall, this section is the most adjustable. So long as the core philosophies detailed in the last section are met, than the way it's done works.
Conclusion
Thanks for reading. Leave any questions or concerns below. Fuck off.
Why should HL2RP contain esoteric and occult themes?
(This section is technically the suggestion itself. Everything after is just how to add it.
When something is Esoteric, it means that it is only meant to be seen by, or only understood by, very few people. It is personal. When others see it, they can make no sense of it. When another sees it, they can understand it, but may find it difficult to explain to others without being seen as too far beyond them in the best case, or downright crazy or just lying in the worst case.
The occult refers to that which is supernatural, mystical, and magical. This goes hand in hand with something that is "esoteric," as it is often these things that are only understood by very few, if at all.
These both together are major themes in the Half Life series. There are many, many points that display these themes in full force. The Combine. The Nihilanth. The Gman. Vortigaunts in general. Advisors. Xen. The general mystery of it all. Ravenholm. These are just naming big name bits from the game. The Vault is literally an anomalous mind fuck. If you read a description of it on the SCP website, you'd think it was an anomaly being contained by the SCP foundation. The same applies to everything else I have listed.
So it comes as a surprise that we have very little of these things in our server. The Esoteric and Occult are major themes in Half Life. Without them, this is just "Occupation" Roleplay, not true Half Life.
But let's not ignore the obvious implications here. Xen is a borderworld. A gateway between many different dimensions. The Resonance Cascade saw the worlds of Xen and Earth literally merging together. One cannot say that quite a number of anomalies and otherwise unexplainable things have arrived on Earth. This effectively opens up the possibilities to nearly anything. You could legit bring the entirety of the SCP foundation's anomalies into the world of HL2RP, and they'd be able to be written off as "They got to Xen somehow from another dimension, and then ended up on Earth in the Resonance Cascade." But of course, we don't want to go that far, because if not executed correctly, you are going to have a lot of silly and weird things happening. This leads to the next segment.
This is the end of the actual suggestion. The rest is just details and how to properly implement it. Stop reading here if you are a lazy fuck.
The core philosophies of running esoteric and occult themes in HL2RP.
(This section and everything after is how it should be implemented, preferably.)
The best way to add these themes is by establishing 3 core tenets to their implementation. What things do we need to keep in mind when introducing these themes into the server?
1. The supernatural and anomalous must be introduced at the lowest, most discreet level.
The esoteric and occult immediately lose their charm when literally everybody knows everything about it. This applies both on an OOC and IC. An event involving "ghost spewing out of the sewers and into the streets" like a Ghostbusters knock off is silly and uinspired, even if it could be called occult and supernatural. Why? Because it loses that sense of exclusiveness. If everyone knows about it, it feels much less mysterious and creepy because now you can turn to the person to your right and talk about it as if it were your mailman delivering mail to your neighbor.
To properly introduce the occult, it must be made esoteric. It should be introduced as natural as possible, and if not, hinted at to the majority in a very vague manner.
Instead of having 15+ people on the street witnessing some horrid entity shifting in and out of reality, have one person, or a small group witness it in the sewers, or in a very dark corner of the slums. Keep it as mysterious, vague, and confusing as possible within reason. This is how to do a natural introduction. It's not broadcasted out to the server, but only to a few chosen people. Now this can keep happening, and multiple people can see it, but they should still not know what it is. It is up to them, and the rumors that will spread, that will create the overarching narrative of something really terrifying and inhuman is in the sewers. Don't go down there.
While it shouldn't be done often, you can have occult events that effect the entire server. When this is done, and it should be done rarely, they need to be very vague and hard to explain. It doesn't have to be brief, but it should be if the risk of overstaying its welcome is there.
Yes, this also applies OOC. If the person who makes one of these events proceeds to go into the Discord and let everybody know about "Le cool epic anomaly in teh sewers", than the mystery is lost, and the event loses its charm. Metagame or not, they will know what they are dealing with.
2. The supernatural and anomalous must be presented in a manner that fits the context of the world it exists in.
This is less about what the anomaly can do, and more about how it fits into the world. This is a tough line to balance on, but is required for it to be at its best. On one hand, it is an anomaly. It isn't meant to BE in the world, hence why it is an anomaly. On the other hand, if the anomaly is the alien circus clown who shows up in the sewers and turns you into a vampire with an evil laugh, then nobody is going to take it seriously. Sure, it is anomalous, but it doesn't fit into the world itself.
I find the best way to look at this is via the perspective of whoever will view it. It needs to fit into the world, but it shouldn't fit into what a character will understand.
The two types of bad supernatural/anomalous events.
- Immersion Breaking. Gooblart the evil clown from outer space that makes you eat infected cotton candy to turn you into an evil clown might not be understood by a character, but it doesn't fit into the world of Half Life, and comes off as cheesy and immersion breaking. In short, it's ridiculous.
- Cliche/Generic. A haunting ghost that stalks a character could arguably fit into the world of Half Life if you want to extend Half Life to also include the world that existed before the Resonance Cascade, but everyone knows what a ghost is, and what a ghost can do. This is where "OOC" level interpretation comes in. If an entity is a transparent ghost of a former friend of theres that floats through walls, you've lost the ability to make something that the character doesn't understand. (IMPORTANT: This doesn't mean you can't take a generic or cliche concept, and turn it into something unique, or even well executed. Even cliche and generic concepts can be done very well, but this is often harder to do.)
3. The supernatural and anomalous must be reserved and unique so that it may not be over done.
This is as important as the first two. It doesn't matter how good an anomaly is designed, how well it fits into the world, or how mysterious and other worldly it is- if it is done over and over again, or too many anomalies are done at once, you will lose your mystery factor. This comes from the common idea that: If something is experienced too many times, the person experiencing it will eventually grow bored of it.
If MegaShart46 finds their character walking down a hall of their apartment complex that they've never seen before despite living there for years and knowing every nook and cranny, that first moment is very off putting, confusing, new, and potentially frightening. Even a second or third time can be an "Oh shit it's happening again" moment- but the fifth time? The 10th time? It begins to lose its touch, and MegaShart46 will just be wanting it to end when they realize that it's yet ANOTHER "weird hallway" event.
However, it doesn't just apply to the same type of occurance. If you throw way too many things at one person, you are ruining the overall exposure and atmosphere of their roleplay. If MegaShart46 can't walk outside without seeing a person disappear behind a tree or some Eldritch horror whispering into his mind, then we'll have someone complaining on the forums about how they are in some weird freaky other world instead of the dystopian city they joined, and all those events will quickly lose their appeal.
In general, these anomalies as one offs should only occur every once in a while, and to different people. One or two events per day, presented to one or two people, AT MOST. Or one event for one small group. Think about how well that event will be explained to other characters, and other members in OOC since that will happen inevitably. Even then, this "once per day" should only be done in short bursts. If it needs to be dialed back to once or twice every few days, if not once a week, than it should be done so. As for server wide anomalous events, they should be heavily reviewed by others before done, and should only happen once a month at most.
How to actually execute this.
Honestly, to be realistic, only a certain number of people are going to be able to write/execute events like these that are done truly well. Writing normal events that work in the known and defined is one thing because you can easily convey them due to having familiarity with it. Having someone try to write the abstract and that which is even harder to convey is next level because you are working with topics that are very unique and hard to understand. This goes all the way from the use of unique writing to describe sensory details that have never been known, all the way up to trying to portray the atmosphere and instill a feeling in the reader. The goal with these events is not to just describe something happening, but to make the reader feel an intended emotion such as fear, confusion, or mystery when they experience it.
Firstly, I think these events should only be handled by select people in the staff team (or whoever will generate events like these). They don't need an official label or anything, there just needs to be an understanding that you shouldn't be going around making events like these unless you have been given permission by a Senior Admin or a CM to do so (on a constant basis). There should not be more than 2 or 3 active staff members doing these on a constant basis. This is to keep communication more solid between them, and to prevent staff from accidentally oversaturating the server with these events because you have 10 admins making weird events.
Second, and tying to the first, the first members to take this responsibility should be confident in their ability to make these events. They need to show that they understand what has been explained here, and know how to run events and facilitate roleplay. This is a part of event making that shouldn't have to take on the responsibility of running potentially bad events with the excuse of "Well the admin who wrote is new to it so give them a break." Essentially, experienced event writers only.
Finally, any event writers who want to do this after the first writers have been chosen should observe those who do them to understand what is expected, allowed to work with them so as to see how the potential writer views it, and then allowed to write them under supervision to see how they handle it. If they show that they can do it, they should be allowed on board so long as the members tasked with this can effectively communicate with a new member on board.
In the end, if every staff member can be made capable of doing this, and proper organization is done to keep it in play, than that is the goal that should be aimed for.
A good way of running this in actual execution is to keep tabs on characters through the in-game staff menu's involving characters. Note what experiences they have seen so as to not hit the same person twice and over expose them. Furthermore, note in a discord channel or some other manner when the last time an esoteric event was ran. This way, members in charge of this aren't just running event after event.
Overall, this section is the most adjustable. So long as the core philosophies detailed in the last section are met, than the way it's done works.
Conclusion
Thanks for reading. Leave any questions or concerns below. Fuck off.
anyway
