Hello Talents,
Huge thanks to Danielle Lauzon and Travis Legge for doing the Q&A yesterday! And thanks to everyone who joined via the Onyx Path Twitch channel or watched the simulcast live on our Crowdfunding page. It's pretty cool new functionality that BackerKit is just starting to sort out, and we were pretty happy to help be a test case for them.
If you missed it,
the video replay is now available on YouTube <here>
Upcoming Stream
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This page will also have a simulcast of an Actual Play running this Saturday from 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM Easter Time. You'll be able to see the
Trinity Continuum Player's Guide rules in action in this three-part adventure series, and we'll have the first two episodes running live on our page for the next two Saturdays.
I know it's just been a few days since we gained access to Chapter 2 from the manuscript, but I'm eager to see what's next. I LOVED the stuff in Chapter 2, from the investigation rules and conspiracy discussion to the chase / pursuit rules, and I'm eager to see what other awesomeness the team has come up with.
Something that Danielle touched on a bunch during the Q&A was the idea of Dimensional Travel, so let's get a sneak peek from Chapter 3 today to tide us over until we receive the full manuscript on Tuesday.
Alternate Dimensions
For millennia, humanity has told stories of fairyland and other realms that were similar to their home, but also different in strange and often baffling ways, and that these realms were sometimes only a footstep way. However, no one seems to have understood what at least some of these stories and a few of these realms actually were, until Aether-fueled genius Nicola Tesla began experimenting with devices to sense and even open the way to alternate dimensions. Due to the lack of Aether, no one can duplicate his experiments, but his ideas about the structure of reality are still as useful today as when he wrote them.
Tesla proved that the multiverse is real, but that it is also quite complex. Instead of either a single timeline, or a multiverse where every single decision or event creates a new parallel world, most events are simply too small to create a new timeline. Whether or not someone has a burger or a plate of steamed bao for lunch does not matter to more than a tiny handful of people and has no effect on the structure of the timeline. In contrast, big events, like the assassination of a major political figure, the start or end of a war, or any similar event that affects an entire nation or is as important or large scale usually create at least two alternate dimensions, one where the event happened, and one where it didn’t.
However, it’s also the case that new alternate dimensions have been coming into existence since the formation of the universe, many billions of years ago. As a result, dimension travelers categorize parallel worlds into two types, close tangents and far tangents. Close tangents are alternate dimensions which have some clear connection to the world the characters come from. This can include everything from a world where Adolf Hitler died in World War I and the European front of World War II never happened, to one where an unusual degree of cooperation between US intelligence agencies managed to prevent the September 11 attacks on New York City and Washington DC, or even where aliens invaded Earth in the 2010s.
In contrast, far tangents are alternate dimensions which lack any obvious connection to the characters’ world. A truly vast array of options are available, from worlds where mammals never evolved and the dominant species are intelligent dinosaurs or even sentient trilobites, to worlds which superficially conform to a known era but where the inhabitants are anything from intelligent gorillas to winged bird people, to one where humans exist, but where blood-drinking vampires or conquering aliens have ruled over humanity for the past 500 years.
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How To Travel Between Dimensions
Anyone can travel between dimensions, and some people do it by accident, as they unknowingly walk through an open dimensional weak point — which most dimension travelers call flux gates — and suddenly find themselves in a parallel universe. Fortunately, this is quite rare, since most of these weak points are no larger than a home doorway, and unless someone walks precisely through it, they never know it’s there at all. Also, walking through it from the side or even walking so that part of the subject’s body passes through it does not permit the person to pass through the flux gate.
However, Talents have a much easier time traveling between dimensions than un-Inspired individuals, because their ability to perform subconscious probability manipulation draws its power from the structure of the multiverse. While particular Gifts (p. XX) make dimension traveling far easier and more reliable, every Talent can see any flux gate that is within short range and in their line of sight. Most Talents report that these flux gates look like oval shimmers in the air.
In addition, Talents are necessary to use flux gates. A flux gate is normally just a shimmering oval that only Talents can see, but is nothing more than a weird distortion in the air until it become active. Activating a gate is simple and often happens accidentally: If any Talent has spent at least one point of Inspiration within long range of a flux gate, then the flux gate activates and remains open for the next full scene. An active flux gate appears to glow faintly to any Talent in its line of sight, and anyone can walk through it and emerge in another dimension. As a result, some flux gates in cities open multiple times a day, while one in a remote rural area may only open once every few years.
Most flux gates are relatively small, and nothing larger than Size Scale 1 can move through them, but some flux gates are large enough to permit Size Scale 2 or Size Scale 3 objects to pass through. These larger flux gates occasionally allow cars, or on a handful of occasions, even large passenger planes to slip between dimensions, leading to baffling news stories of a few people, or even an entire plane load, vanishing from one world without a trace or suddenly appearing in another, simply because a Talent on the plane spent Inspiration at exactly the wrong (or perhaps right) time. In some cases, these people appear in a world where versions of them already exist, while in others they never existed at all.
Walking, flying, or driving through an active flux gate is exceedingly simple, as long as the person passes through the flux gate without touching its edges, which is simple if they can see it and quite rare if they cannot. Also, radio and other electromagnetic signals cannot pass through flux gates. Finally, flux gates always lead from a location in one dimension to the exact same location in another dimension.
Dimensional flux gates can appear anywhere but are relatively common at the site of world-changing events, in large part because such events create new alternate dimensions due to the tension between the world where the event happened and the one where it did not. In addition, flux gates also spontaneously form in locations where for some reason the surroundings in both dimensions are identical or nearly so. Finally, the natural or deliberately created flux events that can lead to someone becoming Inspired are the most common source of dimensional flux gates, and also the most diverse source of them. Other locations that generate dimensional weak points only create a single flux gate to a single alternate dimension that is in some way related to the event. Flux events can create flux gates leading to any alternate dimension, from exceedingly similar worlds that diverged from the dimension that characters were in only a few months previously to exceptionally alien alternate dimensions that diverged more than a billion years ago. Usually, flux gates created by flux events are the only method of gaining access to drastically different alternate dimensions that diverged anywhere from several thousand to several billion years ago. In addition, other sources of flux gates typically only create a single gate, while a single flux event can create as many as half a dozen, or on rare occasions, even more gates to different dimensions. Finally, while no one understands the reason, flux gates are most likely to appear in areas that are rarely crowded or busy.
Regardless of what causes a flux gate, in most cases they only persist for a few decades, but traces of them remain for many centuries, and a Talent with the right Gift can open them. Also, dimensional flux gates are stabilized and strengthened when people travel through them, either accidentally or on purpose. As a result, flux gates located either somewhere that people regularly stumble through them by accident, or which one or more Talents regularly use to travel between dimensions, can persist indefinitely.
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The Difficulty of Dimension Traveling
Some Talents wonder why so few un-Inspired individuals either know about flux gates and alternate dimensions or have accidentally traveled there, since anyone can stumble through a flux gate when they are active. There are several factors that make accidental dimension traveling particularly difficult. The first is that even in the middle of a city, flux gates are closed far more than they are open, because there are only so many Talents and they only spend Inspiration so often.
In addition, touching the edge of the flux gate prevents the person doing so from traveling through it. Even if the person just has a finger or a few strands of hairbrush against the edge of the flux gate, they cannot pass, and if the person was partway through the flux gate when a portion of their body touched its edge, the gate instantly ejects them, typically causing the person to stumble a bit. In addition, traveling through a flux gate requires the traveler walk through the gate within a few degrees of perpendicular to it. Walking through a flux gate at too acute an angle prevents the person from passing through it, and instead the person merely walks through the seemingly empty space. Avoiding both of these issues is exceedingly simple for anyone who can see the flux gate, but quite difficult for anyone who cannot. In addition, while no one understands why this is, more than half of all known flux gates appear on or only a few centimeters from a wall or other surface, which could be anything from a wide tree trunk, to a cliff face, to the wall of a building. Since few people willingly walk into walls, only someone who knows a flux gate is there is ever likely to find it.
There is also a small amount of resistance to passing through a flux gate. Anyone who is running, walking forcefully and at a brisk pace, or riding on a vehicle will instantly pass through it with only a slight jolt, but someone who is merely walking along at a normal speed is likely to stumble as if they tripped on a crack in the pavement, and in such cases, they almost always end up not passing through the gate. Finally, flux gates decay far more rapidly if people regularly pass through the edges of the gate. While many flux gates persist for several decades if people avoid them or only pass entirely through them, one in a crowded area where hundreds or thousands of people regularly traverse its edges may only remain open for less than a week. As a result, unInspired individuals regularly pass through flux gates, but in very small numbers. In addition, many only get partway through the flux gate and instantly pull back as they feel themselves beginning to fall through or catch a glimpse of something impossible-seeming on the other side.
Risks of Dimension Traveling
Walking through a flux gate to another dimension is never perfectly safe and can be exceptionally dangerous. When traveling to close tangents, characters could step into the middle of a battlefield or into the intensely radioactive ruins of a recent nuclear war; they could unknowingly walk onto a busy freeway filled with high-speed traffic; or, if they are exceptionally unlucky, into an operating factory filled with dangerous and unfamiliar machinery or some similarly instantly deadly situation. Visiting far tangents can be even riskier, since what is dry land in the character’s world could be anything from an ocean to a lake of molten lava. Also, if the dimensions diverged long enough ago, even the air might not be breathable. As a result, even just sticking your head through to take a look can risk radiation exposure, a poisonous atmosphere, or similar problems.
Because of these risks, one common tactic is to send an object through first. Technically adept dimension travelers have come up with devices ranging from drones to motorized toy cars outfitted with a range of items and programmed to drive in particular patterns, as well as similar vehicles controlled by long, flexible wires. Such payloads typically include a Geiger counter or some unexposed film to check for radiation levels, and maybe a small video camera or cellphone to record what is visible on the other side. However, the most important part of any such operation is simply whether the probe returns or not and what condition it’s in. Such probes prevent unsuspecting travelers from suddenly stepping into a lava lake, a deep ocean, a radioactive hellscape, or the middle of a battlefield. Also, if the video shows any inhabitants, the characters at least have a chance of visiting the dimension in roughly appropriate, or at least not drastically inappropriate, clothes.
Of course, problems can still arise, like the case of Joseph Aquila, a Talent who first arrived in a new dimension in a nudist colony. Since there had been significant linguistic drift between this dimension and his own, he thought that nudity was commonplace across the planet. Aquila was very surprised when he found a second flux gate to this world and arrived naked, in the middle of a large city, where everyone else was fully clothed. Talents with the Dimensional Awareness Gift (p. XX) have a significant advantage, because they can tell by looking at a flux gate if it leads to a close or a far tangent, which — while not eliminating all risk — at least means that the character knows if there’s a danger of walking into an ocean or an unbreathable atmosphere.
Close Tangents
When most people think of alternate dimensions, they think of close tangents: worlds that shared the same history as the characters’ home dimension until one or more events within the last several centuries went very differently. These are worlds where (for example) World War I took a different course, and as a result, Hitler never came to power, and Germany was never under the control of the Nazi Party; or worlds where the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 did not resolve peacefully, and instead was the trigger for a limited nuclear war.
Close tangents are often visibly different from the characters’ home dimension, but sometimes in subtle ways, and there are many similarities. Languages are normally unchanged except for differences in slang, and local technology might be somewhat higher or lower, unless there was some drastic event like aliens sharing their technology or a nuclear war or plague that killed tens or even hundreds of millions. In the case of such dire events, human technology could either incorporate advanced alien knowledge or might have fallen back to an early industrial level, or perhaps even further.
When visitors study the history of a close tangent, they usually discover that this dimension diverged from their own due to a single impressive event, but because that event went differently in the two dimensions, further changes occurred over time. As a result, the longer ago two dimensions separate, the more different from one another they become.
Understanding a Close Tangent
While not essential, when visiting a close tangent, many characters find it useful to try to understand how this dimension is different from their own. In some cases, the answer is glaringly obvious, such as when characters visit a post-nuclear hellscape or a world engulfed in a massive war. However, most close tangents have more subtle differences. Doing this is procedural play focused on information gathering. However, characters can only accomplish this task if they can speak, and ideally read, the local language. While observation can provide hints, without the ability to communicate with local residents or read local sources, the characters are left with nothing more than guesswork. Acquiring this information also depends upon the characters finding a source for it. A well-equipped public or university library typically will contain everything the characters need to learn the basics of how this variant is different. Depending upon the differences, understanding them almost always requires a Humanities roll and may also require Science or Technology rolls. A particularly easy to use library can provide between +1 and +3 Enhancement to this roll.
Talking to someone, particularly a historian, can also swiftly provide the answers the characters are interested in, but asking questions like “Why does the sky glow green at night” or “When were those flying cars invented” often comes across as very strange, because almost everyone on this tangent learns this information as a child. That said, if the characters can convince an amateur or professional historian that they are not delusional or otherwise seriously mentally impaired, they can obtain their answers swiftly and easily. Both of the above options typically require several hours of effort.
Other methods, like reading newspapers and casual observation can also work, but are far slower, often taking a week or more and imposing increased Difficulty or various Complications on the roll, depending on exactly what the characters are doing. Finally, unless the tangent the characters are visiting split off within the past two decades, their mobile phones won’t work, but if the tangent has the internet and public terminals in universities, libraries, or other locations, then an hour or two of internet research should provide the characters with a wealth of information about this alternate world.
Types of Close Tangents
Close tangents are a category that includes everything from worlds that at first glance appear completely identical to the characters’ home dimension to worlds which are instantly recognizable to being drastically different.
Hell Worlds
These are worlds where something went drastically wrong. Maybe aliens invaded and brutally conquered the planet, perhaps the Yellowstone super volcano erupted and plunged the entire world into a civilization-ending ice age, maybe a huge asteroid impact or a massive nuclear war devastated the world, or a deadly bioweapon escaped from a lab, killing 99 out of every 100 people. Regardless of the reason, a single catastrophic event devastated, or possibly even ended human civilization, and left those who survived struggling to continue to do so. Some dimension travelers visit hell worlds to help the survivors rebuild, while a few impressively callous travelers eagerly visit worlds devastated by plagues and similar catastrophic events that killed most of the population but left the built environment largely intact, allowing them to loot valuables from museums and the decaying houses of the dead ultra-wealthy with little possibility of anyone attempting to stop them.
War Worlds
A close relative of the hell worlds are worlds where much of the planet is engulfed in a world war. Because widespread use of nuclear weapons soon transforms a dimension into a hell world, on these dimensions the inhabitants may use tactical nuclear weapons on battlefields but have not destroyed more than a few cities with atomic fire. Every nation may not be at war, but the scale of war in these variants is at least as large as World War II and may be considerably larger. Also, if things go poorly, and a nuclear or biological war starts, a war world can very easily become a hell world.
Most characters avoid war worlds once they have identified one, but some go to attempt to help out one side or simply provide aid to civilians. In addition, depending upon when the war started and other details, some of these worlds have military technology that’s better or more advanced than anything in their own dimension. The downside of such attempts is the characters will be attempting to steal cutting edge weapons from a military, in the middle of a war, which is impressively illegal and unsafe.
Strange Worlds
This is a catchall category where a single event transformed the world in unusual and unexpected ways. These worlds include ones where non-hostile aliens arrived to either trade with humanity or offer humanity a place in their interstellar confederation, as well as worlds where a singular invention revolutionized civilization. Maybe someone invented inexpensive teleportation, and now anyone can get in a teleportation booth in Chicago, slip a $20 into the payment slot, and step out an instant later in Tokyo or Mumbai. Alternately, maybe someone developed a drug that transforms most of the human species into psiads or create psions from latents almost a century early (see
Trinity Continuum: Æon and
The Æon Æxpansion). It’s even possible that someone managed to duplicate the Hammersmith Event from
Trinity Continuum: Adventure!, and the present day is now filled with Daredevils, Mesmerists, Stalwarts, and a host of visitors from lost worlds and other dimensions. The only commonality is that some event transformed the world in non-negative, weird, and often in quite positive ways.
This, of course, is just the start of the discussion on Alternate Dimensions, and you'll see much more, along with info on Far Tangents, Time Travel, Planetary Travel, the Microverse, and Underwater Adventuring included in the next Chapter. Again, backers will have access to the full draft version on Tuesday, and anyone who backs the project will be able to read the entire draft manuscript before any pledges are processed or payments collected.
Also, as Danielle and Travis mentioned, there's a TON of stuff in this book for Talents of any era and genre, and as we've seen with the chase rules and other bits from Chapter 2, there's a TON of material that is useful for your Trinity Continuum game regardless of what era you're playing in. So make sure to let your Æon, Aberrant, and Anima friends know that there are goodies in this book for them as well!
I'll be back tomorrow with another awesome fiction piece to help bring this world to live. In the meantime, stay Inspired and please remember to spread the word!
#TCPG
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