One of the main inspirations for the Palace Semi-Infinite is The Gardens of Ynn, and one of the things I love about Ynn is the ritual entrance. While I prefer to keep the exact relationship between the palace and reality nebulous, this is an option I'd consider for similar ritual entrances.
The Main Entrance
Anyone can get to the Palace with an invitation. A valid invitation must:
- be written in ink. Some frequent visitors even tattoo their invitations, although this is considered gauche.
- state the parties invited. The scope can be specific ("Jane Doe") or broad ("the bearer of this invitation") but must be somehow limited in number ("with a retinue of not more than seven") and time ("before the feast of St. Alouicious in the year 2003").
- be signed. An invitation will not work for the person who signs it, even as a plus one.
- be written (technically, only signed) inside the Palace.
Present your invitation to a guard or doorman at the entrance to any building and convince them to open the door for you. When you pass through, you will arrive in a random (but consistent) room of the Palace. (Some people claim that the guard must "announce" your arrival as part of the ritual, but this is in fact unnecessary and increasingly old-fashioned.)
The Servant's Entrance
- Find a coin on the ground that is not yours and which you did not see drop. It must be worth at least 12 of a smaller denomination of coin. Pick it up and keep it.
- Recite: "I, [insert name], gladly accept this payment for a week's honest work."
- Enter thru any unwatched door.
You are marked as a servant of the Palace for the next week. This means:
- a small bonus to remain unobserved by palace inhabitants (other than servants).
- a penalty to the reaction rolls of palace inhabitants.
- you are unable to sign invitations to the palace.
At the end of the week, you will be ejected from the palace (if you haven't escaped already), unless you secure more stable employment first.
I love this sort of arcane-yet-navigable system within the game world. People know it, they know how to work with it, but it remains strange and not fully understood. I would be excited to explore the Palace Semi-Infinite.
ReplyDeleteI do wonder: if an invitation must be limited to a certain time, why would people tattoo themselves with it? Could the time by cyclical, as in "On a Tuesday?"
The initial thought was "before the death of the bearer," but more generally I was never fully satisfied with the time limitation aspect of it. I left it in, but I suspect it would be too simple to circumvent to cause problems in practice.
ReplyDeleteI love how this expands the insidious shifted reality of the infinite palace. The Fae-like rules fit perfectly, glad you're still growing the game!
ReplyDelete