Game Chef 2013: Hollow Relm

Above is the Bitter Realm,ordered,uncluttered, constant, and crystalline. Below lies the Realm of Filth, hungry, dynamic, ugly, and incomprehensible. We live in the realm between. Neither one nor the other. Both realms are at war, we are the weapons they use. Our deaths are the tally they keep. All sickness, all death, all evil, is external to man. In the beginning Man was innocent and without sin. Somehow you must bring humanity back to that state.

In this game you play paper lanterns(need a better name, but one that still evokes that same fragility), the fragile human forms that wield a power called the light. The rest of humanity is lost in the dark or actively making the world darker. It is your task to push that darkness back and show them the truth.

Mechanics Thoughts: you have two pools of dice. A white pool and a black pool. when you take dice from one it affects your action. when you take dice from both it also affects your action. the pools must mean something. you can set aside dice before hand to have a greater effect, or you can trust to luck. normally you must have a roll higher than a target number yet also save a die that has a one on it(effect). the more dice with ones the greater the effect. you can spend an Illumination point to increase your pool, increase the number you can keep, or raise the numbers that count towards effect.

The pools are a finite supply of dice. You use them up as a conflict goes on. there needs to be a way to gain more dice mid conflict. it should be relatively easy, but also have a down side(and it should be pretty big). the same goes for Illumination. of course if you run out of Illumination then it becomes easier to fall to Shadow(don't know what this means yet).

You have a list of traits, you have your hollow traits and your light traits. your hollow traits are the stuff from before you knew what the world was really like. These are things like your name and your occupation and the like. Your light traits are traits you acquired after your enlightenment. these are traits that represent your understanding of the realms and how to manipulate your dual nature, basically these give you powers. In any given conflict you can normally use two traits, one hollow and one light. you can spend Illumination to increase the number of light traits you use, and you can gain shadow to use more hollow traits. the traits you use are the number of dice you can keep after a roll.

Bad guys:
The Worm: from the Realm of Filth, it eats people from the inside then lays its larvae inside. There they grow and devour each other until only one remains. this then grows and uses the human like a suit until it is ready to tear its way out and begin the cycle all over again. This is all psychic, you understand. most people can't see them. when they leave their host it just looks like a stroke or an aneurism, or something. The Worm is about self. It starts with hunger, wanting more. It moves to wanting what others have. And it becomes a belief in the primacy of self. The Worm spreads hubris and selfishness. It tears down empathy, sympathy, and charity. The Worm seek to make this realm the new Realm of Filth.

The Snowflake: It is order. It is purity. The Snowflake becomes apart of the victims unconscious. It is unique, and yet it is the same. it places those need within its host's minds. The need to belong, and the need for superficial individualism. The victims slowly are hollowed out by these needs. becoming more infatuated with trends and fitting in within a faction, clique, or group. This causes The Storm. When these Same Individuals attack another group. The victims of The Snowflake can no longer see people outside of their group as human beings. The snowflake is the birth of war, violence, and murder.