Fall of SchreckNet | Player Application

This is a game about Vampires grappling with a system at its breaking point. Hubris has overtaken the founders of this seemingly perfect internet oasis. The security vulnerabilities in SchreckNet were never going to be able to be ignored forever. Now, it all comes crumbling down.

Themes

• The Apocalypse is coming, and it's not Gehenna. Your one safe haven is crashing down. Outside, in the real world? You're a shriveled corpse. On here? You're untouchable. Or so you thought. That's all falling apart, now. How will you cope with this loss?
• Vampires are entropic; immortality is an unending slide towards decay. Bad things will happen and continue to happen. Someday, you will botch another feeding. You'll kill your niece. You'll break the Masquerade. This is just the start. How will you continue to survive?
• SchreckNet is the closest thing you have to family. You can't afford to lose it. But you will. What does it mean to say goodbye to your family? Is your family your greatest ally or worst enemy? 

What You'll Do

You'll explore your character's relationship with their online peers as the fabric of SchreckNet threatens to buckle under the weight of internal and external pressures. You'll intentionally reach out to other characters and grapple with the emotional stakes of losing a shared love. You'll play three sessions of LARP; this will be done through an IRC client. You'll install a filter to make your computer look like a CRT. You'll put on your biggest hoodie. You'll turn off the lights. You'll immerse yourself in a tactile experience where everything in the IRC is in-character. Think: ARG. You'll decide how a democratic online community responds to intrusions. You'll build relationships with your fellow users, investigate suspicious activity, and try to stave off the inevitable.

Why is this called a LARP, then?

While it is similar to other text-based forms of roleplaying, like text RP, this LARP is attempting something slightly different. It's live action in that there's not really an OOC separation. Everything in the chat is IC, the interfacing with the computer is IC. You're sort of LARPing in your home in this way. You're embodying a character sitting at a computer on Schreknet, rather than writing a character from a third person perspective. You aren't typing for your character, your character is typing through you.

Game Mechanics

There is only one real "game mechanic" in this game; more details will be shared if your application is accepted. Everything to do with the game is done through the IRC interface. Treat every IRC command as an in-character action. There are no character sheets or secret powers. The initial channel is a jumping off point, and you should feel free to create side conversations and private messages within the IRC client with other users, all in-character.

Safety Mechanics

1. OOC check-in. This game is meant to be highly immersive, so OOC chatter is not permitted in the main chat room space. However, in private messages with other users, you may use block text ((like this)) to signify you are talking out of character. You can use this to quickly check in with another user, ask if the topic of conversation is too intense, ask them to pull back, etc.

2. Blocking and disconnecting. You are free to block any user in this game and refuse private messages from them within the IRC client - you are not required to engage with any specific members of this game. You may also disconnect from the IRC chat at any time and step away from the game if it is too intense.

3. Reporting. If someone does something that's clearly not within the scope of this game (violating the content rules, harassing you, trolling, spamming, etc.), shoot me an email with screenshots and I'll happily assist.

This game is not a hand-held, theme-park experience. Instead, it is a collaborative game where player agency and plot is centered. "Yes, and" and is the name of the game. For example, a character may say that they worked with your character on a contract. “Yes, and-ing” would be if that character agrees that this contract did happen and adding that it resulted in your character losing a lot of money. However, players are under no obligation to say yes. I encourage creative ways of responding to plots that are not entirely in agreement with using responses such as “yes but,” “yes with,” “no and,” “no but,” and “no with.”

This is not official canon for the World of Darkness.

SchreckNet is a computer network created and maintained by Clan Nosferatu, one of the sub-types of Vampires in the World of Darkness. Clan Nosferatu are hideous monsters who have had their bodies disfigured by the Embrace - the process by which one becomes a Vampire. These Kindred (Vampires) have always lurked in the shadows, but when the Internet came to be, the Nosferatu saw the opportunity to create a new shadow to hide inside of. 

This secret internet was created by Gerard Rafin, also known as "Uncle Smelly". It is a space where secrets and information are shared, plans are outlined, and schemes are established. Power bases are built on SchreckNet. Membership is not limited to Camarilla-aligned Nosferatu; all Clans of any Sect could theoretically access SchreckNet, though Clan Nosferatu, and to a smaller portion Clan Malkavian, are its masters.

SchreckNet was breached by a hacker known as "Hurricane" in the 1990s. Instead of retaliating, the Nosferatu instead allowed "Hurricane" to enter their community. This was the first domino that signalled the coming downfall of SchreckNet.

The turn of the century saw the creation of SchreckNet 2.0 - for our purposes, this signals the start of its presence as a psuedo-IRC chat client. Access was gatekept by an Auspex puzzle until their membership was approved by one other user. This was the point where SchreckNet shifted from a anarchic frontier into a direct democracy. Users can only be banned from the service via majority vote and old or compromised access links have to be manually scrubbed from existence.

Oh, and IRC chat? Here's a primary source about IRC. Check out those acronyms and slang! Here's some Vampire specific slang:

ACSL: Age, Clan, Sect, Location

BUL: Bite You Later

ROFLOLCB: Rolling on the floor, laughing out loud, crying blood

*vv*: Emoticon (vampire fangs)

RTT: Read The Traditions

Fangsona: Partially ironic referance to a Vampire's online presence

Bags: Blood bags, mortals

Licks: One of many ways to refer to Kindred

Get creative! Maybe make your own ASCII?

--------------------------------
< don't scare off the juicebags! >
--------------------------------

        ^__^
          (oo)_______
           (__)             )/
                    ||----w |
                    ||       ||

Vampire: The Masquerade is a political horror game. While we will absolutely do our best to ensure all players feel comfortable and safe, there are some dark themes and uncomfortable content which we are going to intentionally explore in this game; I am calling these the innate themes. 

You are able to opt out of engaging with any characters you want, but there is no way to sanitize the environment to ensure you do not encounter dark subject matter.

If you do not feel comfortable with these innate themes, that is okay - you should decide how you will respond to them. That might mean not playing this game - that's okay! This game isn't for everyone! That might mean having a plan on how to remove yourself from the game if it gets uncomfortable. At the very least, I recommend having an aftercare plan after each session, and I recommend attending the optional de-roleing Discord server after the game is concluded to release the pressure valve.

What content is innate:

This game will be uncomfortable. You are not playing a power fantasy. You are playing out the once-powerful. Your character will not get everything they want. Being uncomfortable is okay! We'll have a curated aftercare space once all three sessions are complete, too. It will be safe.

There will be power imbalances. Other characters will be stronger than yours. While there will be little ways to exercise that power in this game, you should be comfortable "yes-and"ing other players' power, status, and reputation.

There will be political subterfuge. Backstabbing, lying, and more are tactics which your character has at their disposal. Kindness is a weapon.

You are also playing Vampires, so there will be mention of stalking, feeding without consent, unwanted pleasure from feeding, and unwanted desire. However, feeding will not be acted out during LARP sessions because we're solely online.

Isolation is a major theme of this game. You are alone in your room playing a character whose main source of community is through a disintegrating online chatroom. Your lovers, friends, rivals, colleagues, and peers are all here. And there might come a point where you're sitting there, staring at your computer screen, and they're all gone. Sitting in those emotions and immersing yourself in them is part of this game. This might result in some bleed! Consider if that's okay with you.

This is not an exhaustive list. Any themes mentioned in the V5 rulebook are solidly within this game's scope.

What content will not be featured:

There won't be any kind of explicit sexual violence, violence against children or animals, or severe drug or alcohol abuse. There will not be any graphic depictions of feeding. Real-life bigotry towards facets such as race, sex, and ability are off the table, though fictional bigotry towards Clan or mortal/undead status are allowed.

Suicide is strictly off the table. Doom, depression, nihilism, and grappling with mortality are okay, but your character should want to persevere after SchreckNet. Do not create a character who is hopeless. Do not traumatize your fellow players.

Do not create alternate alises to contact blocked players. Because I can't guarantee whether or not someone has blocked you due to an OOC or IC reason, please don't try to reach out to someone that has blocked you.

At the end of the day: we, the players, are not monsters. We're here to enjoy a temporary, fictional experience that might challenge us in ways that are fun. If you find that experience to be unpleasant, reach out! This game might not be for you, or we might be able to collaborate on ways to make it more enjoyable.

If someone pushes your limits as a player in a way that is inappropriate to this game, please reach out to me.

I will directly reference the VtM Rulebook - please read the text screenshotted below. Alt text is available.

If you've read this far and this all sounds reasonable to you, remember this word: Vitae. Yeah, I'm doing the stupid "put the secret word in the end of the form" thing. Sue me. This section's important.