Made in Abyss as a setting

Would it work?
For the uninformed, the manga/show is about a gigantic hole on a desolate island that is so deep that nobody ever reached the bottom yet, with all kinds of ancient artifacts hidden in it and primeval beasts dwelling below that has become a huge hub for adventurers to come to in search for riches.
A group of adventurers trying to climb down as far as they can would make for a pretty fun setting in my eyes. Could probably work really well as a 'hardcore' setting, too, where player death is rather common while always having an easy way to add new characters to the party.

Would ultimately probably just be a simple loot raid campaign, but I can still see the potential to have quite some fun with it.

Yes on the following conditions

>No forced child characters
>Make curse burden a legitimate obstacle to overcome.
>Make overcoming curse burdens the hardest part of character progression as you get to the 3rd layer and below
>Steal any artifact ideas you can from any setting, players are supposed to return them to the surface and purchase them legitimately otherwise they risk being disowned by the Organization (if they want to go that route let them though)

It has merits for a setting for sure.

...

Of course no forced child characters, especially not past a few hundred meters in.
The other points are pretty much how I'd imagine things would work. The curse effects and resisting them would probably be the hardest part to implement, but I suppose they'd fall under general vitality/constitution saves or just be based on your character level. For D&D as the system, making a curse save using your Proficiency bonus would probably best represent it.

I've been thinking about this as well and trying to figure out how too make it more "game" friendly.
I've been thinking that it might be more fun for the players to be one of the first cave raiders. So they can be the first to map out the abyss and if they want to, they can be a part of the growing city around the Abyss.
I was also thinking of placing Magi-style dungeons to break up the exploration and maybe place artifacts within them so the players wouldn't have to dig around randomly to find treasures.

Curse is reasonably easy because after a few levels it's just save or die then save and then a level deeper is just die.

The progression of the game should have a point where the players just can't go up anymore and have to survive long enough in order to complete their equivalent of a white whistle With all the horrific implications that implies

Woah that actually looks pretty awesome.

Can you explain the curse in more detail for those of us not in the know?

Basically, it's an effect of going deeper and deeper down into the abyss. Starts with rather mundane and small things like headaches and general sickness but proceeds to get worse and worse, eventually deforming and mutating your body and ultimately leads to death. It's the main problem preventing people from properly exploring the depths and the deadliest part of going down there, despite all the monsters.

They have a 'ranking' system in place denoted by the color of your whistle which shows how deep you can make it and how deep the guild lets you go, ranging from Red Whistles, basically apprentices and most often still kids, to White Whistles, which are raiders that can go down way, way further than most others could even hope to survive at, which are seen as legendary heroes in-universe.

Basically if you go vertically upwards a number of effects happen based on the level(which is graduated into about 7) that you're on

I can't remember them exactly but it's something like
1 is Nausea and Headaches
Then it goes up through mild internal bleeding to extreme bleeding and hemorrhaging through to complete loss of your senses, bleeding through every orifice to straight up death then it gets even worse from there

Most people simply ascend by toughing it out and hoping they don't bleed to death on the way up or are killed by a predator while incapacitated. There's a few people who can come back from the deeper levels(the series explains why eventually).

Note that's not vertically up between the levels, that's vertically up any appreciable distance at all. 1-2 seconds can trigger symptoms which can be fatal depending on the level.

We discussed this in a thread about two monts ago. It's just fetish fuel for lolicons, shotacons, furries and guro lovers.

But you can make anything work if you homebrew it so whatever, you damn furry.

Beneath that its an interesting setting.

>m-muh fetish fuel
just admit you just don't like it instead of making up some stupid made up reason, retard

Basically the abyss is filled with a layered forcefield that prevents it from being viewed directly from above, but still allows light to pass through.

These layers also produce adverse affects within humans and the concentration increases the further into the abyss you travel.

Ascending 10m vertically will begin to trigger effects and the side effects vary in severity the lower you go. Death is guarenteed if you ascend from the 6th layer unless you are either immune (no human is so far) or utilize a very specific property of curse burden that requires human sacrifices.

Pic related.

Creatures in the abyss are more or less immune to the side effects, and creatures in the lower regions can even read disturbances in the flow of forcefields to predict human movements and hunt them more effectively.

It is worth noting that for strains in the earlier levels you can simply become immune to them through increasing your physical constitution. Children are more suseptible to these than adults.

>They have a 'ranking' system
It is worth noting that the ranking system doesn't grade people for layer 3, That region seems to be the real barrier between the novices and the professionals. And it's not just being able to descend to these regions, but also survive the return trip.

Another property of the Abyss is a slight time dilation effect. The further down you go the greater the effect and living on the 5th layer for a few weeks is the same as a 3 months on the surface.

White Whistles are unique in that they tend to be less human thanks to employing various first class artifacts (basically the highest class any single human can wield, nations will employ artifacts higher than that for warfare purposes). Constant trips up and down the abyss to lower levels also warps the body in more subtle ways which also affects the mind. So insanity is going to be a problem for those who have long careers.

The 6 level hole in the ground with increasingly dangerous monsters and fantastical treasure combined with the resource management and expedition style make me think OD&D greyhawk or something like it.

While I probably wouldn't run it with OSR system I'd use something similarly light but non-narrativist ruleset.
Player stats and abilities are minor effects or specialisations. The focus would be using gear, tracking rations, stamina and wounds.
Really special abilities are granted through artefacts.

Experience is gained through discovering new creatures, place and artefacts as well as surviving close encounters with the denizens of the Abyss.

I dropped it when it turned out that the White whistles are literally made from people.
Not only from people but actually from your loved ones.

Stupid forced drama at its best.

I dunno, it doesn't feel as bad as most "grimderp" manga by now.

Although it's kinda impressive that someone managed to outdad Shou Tucker.

Correct me if I am wrong but didnt the curse only fucked you up if you try to go back to the surface?
Cant you pretty much descend as much as you want as long as you stay down there?

Yep. There is a site on the map called the 'Capital of the Unreturned'. Guess what that is?

I can't be the only one who thinks Bondrewd looks fucking cool.

His mask reminds me of Daft Punk.

Why is the one kid topless?

Why haven't they sent machines down there yet to try and dig it up?
Also, would wearing a suit prevent the curse from affecting you?

Because he's a robot they found in the Abyss with that outfit.

>Why haven't they sent machines down there yet to try and dig it up?
They don't have machines which can move autonomously like that.
>Also, would wearing a suit prevent the curse from affecting you?
No, it's magic. Bondrewd figured out how to use a cartridge system to prevent the curse from affecting him though, and becoming a fluffy bunny helps you avoid the curse as well.

Actually this raises a question. If Register is a machine, then how does the curse affect him? Wouldn't it just leave him be since he isn't technically 'human'?

>and becoming a fluffy bunny helps you avoid the curse as well.
what?

He's unaffected yes.

Best Dadâ„¢ did an experiment where he attempted to have two little girls ascend while shunting the curse effects of one onto the other. End result: one girl became a rabbit, the other became a horrifically twisted meat carpet who exists in perpetual pain, and sorta looks a bit like a rabbit if you squint.

Why rabbits? Fuck if I know.

>Best Dadâ„¢
sounds like a swell guy
what's his endgame?

That's a very nice-looking abyss.

Wouldn't the simplest approach be to establish permanent habitations at different depths and more or less bucket-brigade artifacts to the surface? In exchange for supplies, possibly?

I suppose nobody wants to live there...

Beating the curse of the abyss and being the best dad ever.

You could probably make Kingdom Death Monster work somehow. They're both really brutal and uncomfortably sexual.

This and Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles are two settings that I'd love to play in that would probably need a very specific system to really work in.

You can get out of dodge by being "blessed" by the abyss and becoming very fluffy, as long as you sacrifice someone who loves you.

Reg is completely immune and despite the memory gap, was able to both swim through the miniature ocean separating layers 6 and 5 (he doesn't need to breathe) and then climbs the rest of the way to the top. Dude is the real monster of the abyss.

A side effect of finding a way to successfully survive the six layers burden causes people to basically anthropomorphize. I don't know why it's rabbits but we're going with rabbits. He go from looking like to pic related. We never see his face but his arms and tail are now covered in fur and you can see some poking out from his pants as well.

They actually do do this. There are bases on the second and fifth level that we know of. The third layer is a series of sheer vertical drops so it's possible that there is no way to set up a safe place there. And the fourth layer is home to some of the most dangerous predators in the entire Abyss and the number of safe locations is equally probably very small. But there are a number of gondola systems that allow people to go up and down so they do have locations where they can set up shop.

Read the latest chapter. The curse of the 6th level turns you into the thing you most desire. Fluffiness comes from love but there are some fucked up shits down there.

I have. The love is specifically for being fluffy of course. I am wondering how you gain the desire to run over small creatures with your body though.

Essentially, loosing humanity makes you more resistant to the curse, and being "blessed" lets you see the things that cause the curse (and also let the deeper monsters predict your moves and hunt you) and mutual sacrifice is the key to survival.

Also, SCIENCE!

It was a shitty twist. I thought the MC being stillborn was a pretty cool one, though, so what do I know?

The white whistle backstory could easily be a hint at how most artifacts were made, especially with the latest chapter's shaping of the whistle.

I'm interested to see how it'll pan out, because it's very clearly nearing endgame. The quicker pacing of the manga pushes things along while still having plenty of drama, which I appreciate.

>being "blessed" lets you see the things that cause the curse

What are the 'things' that cause the Curse? Besides magic bullshit that is? Is it eldritch abominations?

>The other became a horrifically twisted meat carpet who exists in perpetual pain, and sorta looks a bit like a rabbit if you squint.

WHO was also functionally immortal.

It's treated more like a magnetic/gravity anomaly. They can see the flux of the veil that exists in each layer.

There's no "magic" per say in this setting. All the non-explained aspects are treated in a more scientific way by the actual Delvers.

Let me explain it better. The "curses" are more like status ailments that you suffer when you go deeper into the abyss.

This is caused by the abyss itself and it's shown to be something unique to the abyss.

It's heavily hinted that the abyss and its anomalies are related to the civilization that left all the treasures and knick-knacks that are scattered all over the abyss.

The animals in this setting look kind of weird and mutated, but they don't seem "eldritch" in nature.

The Delvers treat the discovery and cataloguing of the things in the abyss in a scientific way. They can create items similar to the simpler items they scavenge.

The curse of the 6th layer, is the one that either curses or blesses you when you go in. It's the point of no return in this world and if you go in and try to go back up, you will be transformed in some way or another.

To be clearer: the "curse" only happens when you try going up. You pass through a veil of consciousness-aware energy that, on the "underside," tears at you causing those negative effects.

The curse is pretty much Abyss-Decompression-Sickness. The energy field is like water. Conscious beings cause ripples in the water . Some creatures that have adapted to the abyss can perceive the energy field and it's ripples and can move freely through it for the most part.
What's worth noting is that the field also seems to defy the flow of time somewhat. Ripples can appear out of time and give away an action before it's made. So a creature that can see the ripples clearly can predict the movements of other creatures before they have been made.

My theory is that the Abyss is actually a portal to another dimension.

"Cartridges."

It's the most discreet way to say that you are killing orphans to turn yourself into a giant rabbit.

You're not even killing them. You're stuffing them, horrifically mutilated, in boxes, then huffing their suffering like glue

From the perspective of someone who just watched the episodes of the anime the idea of a town built up around an enormous unexplored labrynth with an economy based on adventurers sounds a lot like Etrian Odyssey.
From the spOilers I've seen it seems like it gets a lot more grimdark.

EO had an tabletop system made for it, I don't know how far along the translation is but you could probably crib some ideas from that.

>Make curse burden a legitimate obstacle to overcome
>implying it isn't
Status effects are serious when they hit at inopportune times. Even lesser curse effects like nausea and dizziness can be the difference to tip the scales when your life is already hanging by a thread.
Bondrewd even had the shakers that weaponized the hallucination curse and this is still all just the lesser effects, the haemorrhaging and worse can directly kill you.

>It is worth noting that for strains in the earlier levels you can simply become immune to them through increasing your physical constitution. Children are more suseptible to these than adults.
I don't think that's right. You can certainly get used to the effects but I'm pretty sure it still happens and may not actually get any less severe.
Also, it's not necessarily that children are "more susceptible" but that they're children so they're less able to handle the strain on their body like with illness or injury. It's probably the same for the elderly minus notable enhanced exceptions.

Except they don't actually use it for forced drama since it's all background and main character has one conveniently handed to them without sacrifice. If anything it's the opposite of forced drama and you're just a whining retard who has no idea what they're talking about.

I actually like it as giving meaning behind the use of whistles and their connection to the abyss.

>what's his endgame?
SCIENCE!

Reread the chapter.
The weirdos in the deep are different, they willingly abandoned their humanity somehow rather than ascending since it would fuck them up.

Dumping the explanation for unfamiliar anons.

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>(and also let the deeper monsters predict your moves and hunt you)
I'm not sure that was implied anywhere. The deeper monsters hunt based on how consciousness alters the flow the forcefield. That's for everyone with a consciousness and I don't recall it being stated that blessings or curses have any effect besides letting you see the forcefield too. There have been cases of manipulating the forcefield to trick people like with the bugs though.

>The animals in this setting look kind of weird and mutated, but they don't seem "eldritch" in nature.
The hippo monster from the survival training at the seeker camp also actually came from outside the abyss originally but have adapted to and been altered by the abyss.

Mine is that there's something horrible at the bottom and the forcefield and abyss exist to contain it.
There's also references to the 2,000 year cycle and recently there were implications that the curse effect is strengthening or spreading upwards with the whole birthday plotline with the youngest orphan.

Suffering is just a side effect! Love is actually much more desirable for the process but takes longer to cultivate and isn't necessary for lesser curses.

>EO had an tabletop system made for it
Translations died out years ago if the tumblr page associated with it is to be believed. From what was circulating around the Japanese TTG threads here the system was using a somewhat generic ruleset called SRS and was not given enough tailoring to make it feel unique. It was likened to giving a setting the D20 treatment without putting in more effort.

It's stated that the fields react to consciousness so that is why predators that can see it seem to predict the future. They can see your intentions before you act and you need to be able to divorce your thoughts from your actions to trick them.

>You can certainly get used to the effects
Yes, I phrased that poorly, it's more than possible to become used to some effects but they will always be present. It just happens that the first two layers only cause nausea which is vastly more tolerable than random bleeding and loss of senses. I'm still not sure how anyone not Nanachi actually leaves the 5th layer at any reasonable speed when you completely lose your senses and risk killing yourself just by moving. Not to mention there are still predators on the 5th layer, it's insane to think about what kind of monsters Black and White whistles are to do that on a constant basis.

>loli bunnygirl forceful penetration
Dammit user, at least spoiler that stuff.

Part of the premise is that Reg is immune. I don't know how people miss this shit.

If I remember there are some things that help you deal with the 5th layers curse like meyaa and going up as a group, doesnt aliviate it but it certainly makes it less horrid.

Now I have no fucking clue how they get up the 4th layer due to both its size and the fact that it makes you bleed from whatever openings your body has

Couldn't you time it with people already on the next floor? Even if your body is pretty fucked up it likely wouldn't be as bad if you could get a few people to help clear the path.

Do you mean descending? Ascent means to go up. Descent means to go down.

While I guess you could, only blacks and white whistles are going to be arround the 5th and 4th layer. While we dont know the amounts of whistles its not hard to assume there isnt that many blacks and we know of 5 whites, 3 of which are in layer 6 or below, one is sitting in 5, and the last one is all the way up near the top of layer 2

Ascent. Effects only trigger on the way up and the lower layers cause the more severe effects. See the explanation here

This is all surprisingly dark for something with such an innocent looking cover image. Guess I have something thread this weekend.

The most recent chapters get even stranger. I never realized how scary anal prolapse could be until now.

Can someone explain how turning into a bunny helps alleviate the curse?

stop speedreading

If you give the curse to someone who loves you, their love will do the opposite to you and "bless" you, turning you into a bunny. The main advantage is that you can see the forcefield that gives the curse to people, and find holes in it to go up without getting the curse.

You need to become not-human to avoid the curse.

how do you give yhe curse to someone

You use a special device that Bondrewd made. Either the elevator that he used on Nanachi and a bunch of other orphans, or the cartridge system built into the suits of him and the praying hands.

Yesssss.Guve me that miasma, senpai.

Crystal Chronicles is also much better-suited to typical RPG combat, resource management, etc.

Spiral Knights is also along the same lines.

There's also the shakers which are weaponised curse.

Other than the artstyle this seems kinda neat.

A shame I dont start reading a series until its 100% finished after Berserk and it's 900 year hiatuses.

Inhuman anatomy and extra senses go a long way to alleviating the effects of the curse.

Track a Humanity rating, that is directly responsible for resistance to the Curse. Constant experience and artifact use can permanently alter it, while certain mindsets, techniques, and travel methods can temporarily modify it.

Either don't track food at all, or pull out an entire system for diagnosing whether a foodstuff is safe and properly preparing them.

Curse-type monsters are immune to the burden, and have massive To Hit bonuses that are countered by Party Tactics.

While weapons and the environment can be used to perform Special Actions, Party Tactics are more mental abilities aimed at stunning or critting enemies or for movement bonuses. Being able to execute a Party Tactic alone is almost required for White Whistles(who drink TPKs like water).

I wonder what lies at the bottom of the Abyss. Judging by all of this, it'seems probably something very horrible.

i bet there is an egg, dont know why, but i got a feeling its an egg.

I'm for the "door to different dimension" theory and that it just leads to a mirrored version of itself on the other side.

Wanted to try and make some Crystal Chronicles rules using Ryuutama as its base a while ago, though I guess it would lend itself to just be used as a setting and plot hook for any RPG system.

What if... it leads to a nexus? When you get to the bottom you find out that its a core and you can see the exits of other abyss that also lead to the core and if you were to traverse them up you'd end up on another world/demension?

For a game, it might be best to just have a large monster at the bottom, or the forgotten ruins of an ancient civilization filled with artifacts just so there's a "reward" at the bottom for them. I don't know how players would respond to travelling through the horrors of the abyss only to find out there's more travelling to do (other than returning to the surface with their haul).

>returning to the surface
>from the very bottom
Yeah good luck with that.
Another abyss might ne a decent option if players want to keep going or return to the campaign again.

As a game though, it wouldn't be fun for the players to reach the bottom only to be met with certain death if they try to return. Why not give them a chance to become heroic and legendary while also giving the campaign a solid ending point?

What am I looking at? Looks like an anime rendition of the Great Wheel's Abyss?

Is that series even done?

I'd probably go for a middle ground. Make the bottom of the abyss a settlement of ancient white whistles that are all considered legendary and allow them to settle in the abyss as their new home. I agree that they should get a "happy ending" of some kind, but deciding to really go down all the way past 6th layer should still be an absolute decision.

Just from reading this thread, I can only see there being someone down there since the entire field seems to be set up to prevent people from leaving. Maybe there's two people due to the sacrificing of a loved one.

In a campaign I would probably give it a Dark Souls vibe: a desolate, empty place with an incredibly dangerous bastard sitting at it's center who went through just as much shit as the characters.
You can go for a rather sad end by having the players simply kill the guy and end this misery, or you go balls-to-the-wall awesome and have the players break the chains, the prisoner ascends and turns into a giant monster as he unravels the force field. Monsters flee the Abyss, the city is under seige and the end of the world is nigh.

yes, it can work. Think Undermountain crossed with Chtulu.

for heavens' sake, man

I say it's another abyss

just going the opposite way

also the abyss are mimics

>a hint at how most artifacts were made
I'll only buy that if the new white whistle is complete. If it needs a casing or something, then obviously the artifacts aren't just necroforged soulsteel.

>I'm not sure that was implied anywhere
I meant the forcefield that causes the curse is what the deeper monsters watch to predict your moves.

My current theory is that it is a field of the flowers, pure and fluffy and innocent. It's perfectly innocuous, and everyone who goes there lives happily ever after.

Then, there's an almost-black panel showing nothing but a field of bodies.

>a mirrored version of itself on the other side
Somehow extremely nightmarish. Like getting to the top of a mountain and seeing that there's another mountain up there.

another
deeper
hole