Story/Virtue/Anti-Virtue Interactive Tarot

This idea came to me as I considered the gypsy wagons that already traverse the overland map. I personally feel like if something like that were going to feature prominently in the game world, it should probably be as fleshed out as possible and integrated with the game systemically and not just thematically. Now, crystal balls already featured prominently in the Ultima series, and I imagine they will make an appearance this time around as well. That said, I think tarot would make an interesting concept to include in a game about making a journey of self discovery. Of course, that's just one facet, but small steps first.

Now, of course I could just end it there and say "tarot. put it in, k?", but that would just be too easy. I'm sure everyone would like to see Stephen design and create a nice card illustration set to see in game, could even turn it into a merchandising opportunity and sell physical decks with the Portalarium logo on the back (rotationally symmetrical please). Why can't we go a little further and have the entire deck redesigned based on stuff like story themes to-be-determined, the three principles, the otherwise forsaken virtues and anti-virtues, the principles of order/chaos/balance, etc.? To be clear, I'm proposing a new set of cards entirely rather than trying to shoe-horn those kinds of themes into the existing tarot card set as we know it. Could be used for the obvious fortune telling in-game, or could be used to play card games (as with existing tarot).

To take this concept to it's furthest open-ended conclusion possible, it'd be neat if players were able to freely manipulate the cards interactively as with UO's board game gumps and use that to play games or tell fortunes using whatever method the player wants, perhaps even collectively making up their own games or reading patterns that are tailored to the kind of cards we end up with and publishing the rules in in-game books (and websites, of course).

Well, what do you guys think?

 

Yea, I'd like tarot to feature somewhere in the game.

On the subject, I was thinking about if sleep were ever put in the game what players could do while sleeping. What about a dreaming mini-game involving tarot cards? Aside from the path you choose when creating your characters, you would also have to choose paths in your dreams, and this would possibly affect things like level progression, buffs for the following day, and so on.

Is that appealing at all, or too complicated?

 

Great ideas here.

Perhaps the gypsy wagon will "visit" you frequently, or you can seek it out and get a Tarot Card reading to see where you stand.

Making it a minigame during sleep, or even at certain events in the game, perhaps upon death or resurrection. How you choose or what your reading is could alter your death re rez experience. Granted, some folks will try to 'game' the system for optimal results regardless of what their true intentions i.e. virtues are.

 

Oh, oh. I wasn't expecting this thread to come back from the dead.

A dreaming mini-game that takes about 5-10 minutes would be neat. Doesn't have to be tarot based but that would still be wicked cool, provided it's optional. I guess the issue is getting bad luck with the game if it provides you buffs. I would be happy with a simple "reading" that just gives you a recap of where you are with the storyline, recent events, or your recent actions. It could be a neat way to give players a glimpse at what the game thinks of their actions, since I presume that the game won't really share what it thinks of you with you.

I was just interested in allowing players to have fun with it, just like the gump games in UO that let them pass the time with chess, etc., I didn't consider that it could be more deeply involved with the game's story than just having the cards and their relationships based on the setting. I like the fact that the whole concept leaves itself open to interpretation by the game's systems, it could be all of those things or none of those things suggested, and I imagine it would be easy to change too.

On the subject of dream mini-games, this could be just one of several...but I think it's strong enough to stand on its own.

 

This is good idea about tarot mini-game. One could be that after death gypsy would read your cards on what happens with your virtues (you have to play thru some instance) or you could choose to walk thru some random door matrix style and pay some gold/xp/(...) for it but skip mini-game.