pointing at the moon

enforcing mechanics in-fiction

SillDA touch me like a rose...

my wonderfully intelligent artfriend Joy said something about Cottonmouth design that really elegantly articulates what I'd been sort of flailing at:

"there is only fiction, structured by the rule set. Every procedure points to the fiction, and fiction only... Procedures and mechanics enshrine and guide the inner eye to the fiction. Like they are hands pointing to the moon. If they fill too much you obscure what you are pointing at. But the size of a thing depends on its emotional 'potential'"

so, in the vein of stabbing and bleeding hearts, here's how you can bring a little Cottonmouth Tenor Girlhood to your dungeon games; changing the rules of the game to also be the rules of the world, and describing what happens if you don't follow them. Your decision to have +1 basic attack bonus or whatever is now made at the fiction level, rather than the game level. If you don't see why that's cool you are lost to me.

would that my chewed fingers were this gorgeous

you can have a better attack bonus than your class or level would allow for but...

• for each time you do, 50% chance one weapon or piece of armor wielded or worn affixes itself to your flesh, making it unsuitable for anything but combat
• any warrior, friend or foe, has a X/10 chance of challenging you to lethal combat, where X is the number of times you've broken the rule of attack bonus.
• after each battle, X/10 chance that a herd of white horses, on whose bodies your name is written one hundred thousand times and mouths full of all the teeth of everyone you've ever killed come to you, heralded by hot breath, and demand that you mount them and ride to the nearest settlement, putting every living soul there to the sword. X is equal to the number of times you've broken the rule of attack bonus.
  
  

  

  there is something about a bird eating your throatflesh ribbon that is so romantic

more hp than allowed but

• each day, roll an exploding d4; on a 3 or higher, that many of your excess hit-points detach themselves into a flashing, gurgling bio-electric sinew wife. she wishes to be wed to you with utmost haste and great expense and ceremony; if you will not satisfy her, she will choose someone who can. she binds herself to whoever she marries, granting double the hp that constitutes her being
• you are irresistibly delicious; X/10 chance for any carnivore to be overcome with hunger and attempt to devour you then and there where X is equal to your excess hp. X/20 that this happens for any omni/herbivores. Once they have eaten you, they will, after 1d20-X weeks, give birth to X mewling young, each one with your face.
• your flesh is incredibly fertile ground. When you walk on the earth, your speed is compromised as the roots of the plants around you try to bind you to the ground to raise their children in. When you sleep on the ground, you lose 1d4 HP per hour and the plants around you experience that many years worth of growth, all at once. When you die, roll 1d4 per Hit Point; this effect occurs in that many square miles from the site of your death. Anyone with significant knowledge of the earth and growing things will not be able to help themselves and will attempt to sacrifice you, making any number of excuses to themselves.
  
  

  

  no quip here i just think bahira motaz shaheen is awesome