A strange idea

[Joe Iglesias]

I wrote this up about a month ago as a GURPS Voodoo idea; I think it could
profitably be used in a UA game in some fashion...

Joe
---
"I could be bounded in a nut shell and count myself a king of infinite
space, were it not that I have bad dreams."
Howling lunacy here: http://members.xoom.com/McGuffins/

---------- Forwarded message ----------

I was rereading old Suppressed Transmissions and the most Illuminated
things popped into my head; one's a big subplot for the PBEM, but this one
I *can* share. Try this one next time you feel like pulling out the old
book...

First, let's ditch the G:V background and just go with the general ideas
presented-- Voudonistas united against a similarly secret, magic-using
society.

Instead of the Hermetic Lodge, let's pit Voodoo against Islam, as both
religions have a long mystic tradition and are big in black communities.
This also gives us a Christians-vs-Muslims subtext if we want it, as
most real-world Voodoos also consider themselves good Catholics (insert
digression on the loa being worshipped as the saints here).

Now, to narrow down a setting, let's go the Tim Powers route and occultate
something commonplace, something you wouldn't think is magically
significant.  Let's say rap. 

So now we have a setup where the soul of the black community in the US
(home of the world's most violent rappers; rpgs need fight scenes, of
course) is being fought over by the mystic Muslim community and the
less-wealthy Voodoos.  The best way to create pliable citizens is to raise
them that way, so clearly rappers are molding their fans by rhyme to the
aims of the Nation of Islam (which is pretty batty to start with, as its
official theology involves flying saucers and eugenics-- I'm serious), the
obvious culprit, as many many prominent black celebs are turning to Islam
in general and Farrakhan's church in particular.

In this wacky world, the rivalry between East Coast and West Coast MCs was
instigated by the Voodoos, to create a civil war in the Muslim rappers'
power structure (attach mythic baggage to Tupac and the Notorious BIG as
appropriate), creating a power vacuum  which new, loa-backed rappers
would then fill (as has been borne out by the bankruptcy and dissolution
of Death Row Records and New Orleans-based No Limit Productions surging 
from obscurity to become the #1 rap label, and even recruiting DRR's top
act Snoop Doggy Dogg[who used to have NoI bodyguards]).

An interesting campaign might be to have a PC group of young up-and-coming
rappers being courted to the Big Leagues by representatives of the two
factions' record labels, and graducally cluing in to the fact that All Is
Not As It Seems, as loa sent by Master P (Master Petro?) confront them in 
their dreams and the Wu-Tang Clan (which is interesting semiotically in
itself-- are they trying to ritually harvest the power of of the huge
Asian rap fanbase by sympathy in names [even going so far as to rename
Staten Island "Shaolin"]?) command the fae (who are, judging by the
similarities in behavior and mythography, closely related to the djinni of
Islamic lore) to counter his gambit.   And who does the mysterious Dr
Octagon, who claims to have come from outer space with a message for
Earth, serve?

I think I need some sleep.