Just a moment ago, a group chat reminded us of some funny little diagrams from a funny little game, shown above.
Wisher, Theurgist, & Fatalist & Weaver of Their Fates (or, WTF for short) is a little TTRPG creation by Jenna K. Moran.
Moran is a damn good designer for some wild-ass games. Generally, the two she's known most for are Nobilis (wherein you play incarnate concepts of reality trying to keep reality from unspooling. very The Sandman-ish) and Chuubo's Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine (wherein you play some very idyllic slice-of-life moments in the last town in existence). They're both really cool examinations of diceless mechanized narrative - playing character arcs in a way without randomization but definite pacing and resource management. Really cool stuff!
The other thing that's notable about these games, though, is that they're DENSE. They're also a bit abstract. This is something that got some fun poked at them.
Now, we don't know where WTF came from, but it feels like something that could have come out of that. A kind of... game-designer, tongue-in-cheek, almost self-deprecating kind of humor.
The game is about a small cohort of characters in a reality that is, very definitely, not real. You are cognizant you are people of fiction in a world of fiction, where truth is a lot of malleables and unknowns. The point of the game is, ultimately, to try confronting or undoing that. (Well, maybe. The game is a lot of winks at the camera.) This is done through a quest for something called the Jewel of All Desiring, which will allow you to wish reality into the right shape.
These characters are, unshockingly, the people in the title of the game.
- The Wisher is just... well, a good person. They'll be the one wishing for the new world, unshockingly. They're good people, the kind you can trust to wish for a new world in a way that will actually turn out for the best.
- The Theurgist is a bit more abstract. They're meant to shape The Wisher into the right kind of person* to be able to make a wish to begin with. They're sort of the ones who know (and sometimes define) the rules by which reality works.
- The Fatalist keeps knowledge of the world. The things that are out there, the actual shape of the things that lie before them. They're the substance to the function of the Theurgist and the meaning of the Wisher. They're also the material that the new world will be made out of, unfashioned and rebuilt, the most fundamental knowledge of a world becoming the fundament itself.
- The Weaver is the GM role, sort of. You are there for contrast and challenge, of course. But you're also a player, in a way. What you do is opposed by the players - as you may expect of the role - but it's opposed not only in a situational way but in a way that crosses into the structure of the game itself.
The game itself gets abstract as it goes on. There's rules, sure. There's explanations of the game, sure. There's worldbuilding, sure. And we have no doubts it's ultimately playable.
The joy, though, is in the writing. Moran has a gift for rules and prose, and it shines through here. But beyond that...
The game itself is sort of a celebration of narrative, creation, truth, and embodiment of characters and stories. It doesn't put as much as a in or out of character divide as many things do, it doesn't fully close the magic circle in a way a game would normally cause you to expect.
You argue over the nature of reality. You can challenge, undo, rewrite the rules. The Theurgist can even so disprove the Weaver's guidance and use of the rules that they can depose them and take over the game because they're more right about it.
The part that lives with us to this day is how it guides you to make abilities for your characters. There's three parts to a given aspect you carry: mechanical support, truth, and valence.
- Mechanical Support is how much it matters in the general function and challenge of the game. Without this, there's little function where you're challenge. With it, you can overcome even vaguely related things. If you're wielding a frying pan as someone with a strong mechanical cooking skill, you have an I Win button that could topple gods.
- Truth is... well, how true it is. The difference between calling yourself the best cook you know out of personal confidence and there being no factor in the narrative or universe that will ever out-chef you once you're aware of them.
- Valence is our favorite of these, and feels unlike things we've seen elsewhere. It's how much this aspect of you matters. If your cooking has a weak valence, it'll probably just enter the narrative to make sure you're rested and comfortable after cooking a campside meal. A strong valence bends the tide of fate around it; the smell of your beef stew could draw opposing generals together to end a centuries-long conflict.
Now, we're not seeing everything here. (And we're for sure not covering all of the book.) We're people of poor memory and not the greatest insight. This is far from a detailed or perfect coverage of the book. That said...
It's a fun look at truth, narrative, and the life of unreal characters. If you're interested in stories, mechanics, or TTRPG characters, it's worth checking out. It's not too long, and - importantly! - totally free, here on Jenna Moran's site: https://afarandasunlessland.files.wordpress.com/2018/09/wtf.pdf
