#prometheans

So, Promethean: The Created, huh? God, what a fascinating game. One that really merges some very compelling themes with an already intriguing setting, and then gives you all kinds of fun character options to play around with. Also one that no one really knows about…

For those not up to speed, Promethean is a game about beings— Prometheans— created by humans to be human, or close to it, for one reason or another. Some people who create Prometheans do so by stitching together corpses and animating them just like Frankenstein, others create golems and other constructs, and some Prometheans don’t seem to have a creator other than the whims of the Divine Fire, which is the force that animates all of the Created.

Here’s the thing: Creating human life through magic is actually pretty tricky, and so the resulting Prometheans are invariably off, somehow. It’s a little different for each Promethean, some of them are just really disturbing and creepy in their movements and occasionally mannerisms, others are uncannily graceful, and some are just kinda vaguely alien. It doesn’t even just come down to most humans having an irrational fear and hatred of Prometheans (which is called Disquiet), nature itself seems to recoil from the Divine Fire— the weather twists and the air and water is tainted, until the area becomes a Wasteland.

So the goal of the game is simple: Find out how to become human, in a process called the New Dawn, so your Promethean player character can transcend their limits.

And god, what to say about this game! It’s about interrogating what it is to be human, or perhaps more accurately a person, and how “trying to be a person” is both inherently kind of silly— you’re already a person!— and also kind of the only thing any of us can ever do.

Prometheans complete their journeys through understanding the ways humans act, sure, but they only get there by finding the human that’s already in them. And yet, at the same time, they really are transforming— physically, mentally, and spiritually. To be human is to change, to grow, to wither, really.

This is a game about asking player characters some of the hardest questions— What does it mean to live? What is the purpose of being? What would you sacrifice to find out? Is it worth pursuing at all, anyway?— and then just letting them go on a metaphysical road trip where they struggle to answer them, making mistakes all the while, and maybe learning that being able to ask the questions at all is what matters.

I don’t know, I just wish more people knew about Promethean! It’s a painful game to play, really, what with every character being a rootless wanderer instinctually hated by most humans, so I understand why it’s a hard sell.

Prometheans are my favourite because i can put them Anywhere. they're an interdimensional species known for travelling all spaces they can reach. they're pacifist and refuse to fight unless absolutely necessary

their skin and hair is made of a nigh impenetrable metal that they can shift, allowing them to be (almost) indestructible shapeshifters. their only known weaknesses are blades of the same material they are, and diamond.

they can learn any language within a manner of days, due to their traveller nature, however their own language is entirely non-verbal.

“Our duty as soldiers is to protect humanity...