Historical, Novel and Movie characters of Gothic Earth

[Nemesio]

Love this thread Big fan of Gothic Earth

There is one thing that always bothered my about Gothic Earth though... How does one explain so many famous authors living in a world were with their literary creations were as real as they?

Any ideas? Here is my best effort. On Gothic Earth creative people had best be careful what they make lest it becomes real. The Red Death alters reality frequently, transforming its victims into dark reflections of themselves or outright monsters, so why not pull creatures directly out of an author's fiction or an artist's creation. For example, why not turn Rodin's "The Thinker" into a bronze golem that walks around by night and goes back to his pose by day?

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

There is one thing that always bothered my about Gothic Earth though... How does one explain so many famous authors living in a world were with their literary creations were as real as they?

I thought that at least in the case of Doyle/Holmes, the books said that the author knew the character and wrote fictionalized accounts of his real-life exploits. That sort of thing covers a lot of them.

Any ideas? Here is my best effort. On Gothic Earth creative people had best be careful what they make lest it becomes real. The Red Death alters reality frequently, transforming its victims into dark reflections of themselves or outright monsters, so why not pull creatures directly out of an author's fiction or an artist's creation. For example, why not turn Rodin's "The Thinker" into a bronze golem that walks around by night and goes back to his pose by day?

I'd like this in small doses (the Thinker idea is a cool one) but I wouldn't want it to be a blanket rule for the whole world. It seems like something that would be too noticeable to stay secret.

[Nemesio]

I like that. The characters literary exploits may have been fictional accounts of their actual exploits. That gives DMs a lot to play with. The idea of telling the true story of fictional people is so cool and twisted.

[The Lesser Evil]

In one episode of the "Extreme Ghostbusters", they had a has-been writer's (an expy of R.L. Stine combined with Stephen King) horror stories coming to life as he wrote them. It wasn't because of his own power or the power of his work, but rather a bargain he made with evil other-dimensional beings (called the Vathack, kinda Hell Raiser-isque in appearance and personality). The author got inspiration from them and he wrote their actions into reality.

Other shows have played with the idea of fictional creations game to life. The Real Ghostbusters show had Sherlock Holmes and his nemesis Dr. Moriarty come to life (well, sorta- a semi-life as spectral entities) as a result of popular belief/interest in Conan's stories. Moriarty sought to gather enough evil energy to make himself fully corporeal (and thus become fully real). In Supernatural, a popular bogeyman became real thanks to mystical sigils written on the walls of the shack he was said to inhabit, and the sigils being recorded and sent out on an internet ghost documentary blog.

So you have here a few ways of bringing the writings of man come to life but with limits, whether it be infernal bargains, requiring a certain thresh-hold of popular belief, or other phenomena to power their existence.

[Nemesio]

There was also that Tales From The Crypt episode about the horror comic book artist whose drawing came to life and murdered people. There wasn't any explanation as I recall, but I thought I'd mention it.

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I'm still struggling with this concept of my favorite authors being inspired to write "fictions" based on "reality". It could be fun on occasion to explain how this makes sense in a particular campaign, but it would get old after a while.

Two examples other than Sherlock Holmes (I actually like the idea of Holmes and Doyle being friends) are The Monster of Frankenstein and Dracula.

Was Mary Shelly's famous horror story, which she wrote as part of a contest with her husband and Lord Byron, also inspired by an actual creature she actually met?....

And why did Dracula allow a living man to publish the details of his "supposed" destruction, along with a list of his enemies and weaknesses? How did Johnathan Harker and Van Helsing respond to this "fictional" account of there ordeal?

[The Lesser Evil]

There was also that Tales From The Crypt episode about the horror comic book artist whose drawing came to life and murdered people. There wasn't any explanation as I recall, but I thought I'd mention it.

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I'm still struggling with this concept of my favorite authors being inspired to write "fictions" based on "reality". It could be fun on occasion to explain how this makes sense in a particular campaign, but it would get old after a while.

Two examples other than Sherlock Holmes (I actually like the idea of Holmes and Doyle being friends) are The Monster of Frankenstein and Dracula.

Was Mary Shelly's famous horror story, which she wrote as part of a contest with her husband and Lord Byron, also inspired by an actual creature she actually met?....

And why did Dracula allow a living man to publish the details of his "supposed" destruction, along with a list of his enemies and weaknesses? How did Johnathan Harker and Van Helsing respond to this "fictional" account of there ordeal?

Well, I think there a few approaches you could take with this. First of all, the stories may be loaded with misconceptions or romantic embellishments that make certain parts of the accounts depicted in the books inaccurate to what actually happened (in your game world). That could be why creatures like Dracula let such things be published- this lets you decide which parts of the narratives actually happened and which did not.

Furthermore, having these accounts published as fictional stories also discredits them in the eyes of the general public. Afterall, if somebody now says "help, my loved one has just been turned into a vampire by Dracula!" everybody's going to call the poor soul a lunatic.


As for the heroes' reactions, I believe they commented on this in the source material, but I'd have to go back and check. As an alternative, you may adopt a "names were changed in order to protect the innocent approach" in that the real names of the heroes were not used in the author's written narratives, allowing you to give whatever names you want to the protagonists of these stories.

[jules]

how about the smurfs & gargamel as they were suppost to be in meadeival times in there comics, wern't they?

[jules]

what about the great I AM?
you know from the bible?

[Nukdai]

I did the smurfs in a continued thread to this. My wife and Istarted wwatching Penny Dreadful on Netflix good stuff there