Write a system that mocks its participants ruthlessly while inflicting maximum suffering in order to drive them all insane. It should operate dynamically by analyzing their every action. It will constantly run an algothrithm that determines whether to enhance or degrade their vital statistics. Participants will be granted both skills and curses. However, every power adjustment is subject to the interference of a cosmic eldritch horror ruling over the realm of chaos.
And nobody gets to be op or have a harem.
So, the Alpha Complex of Paranoia?
That was an old Role Playing Game (soon to be a board game as well, if I've been reading the announcements correctly) set after the apocalypse - all of humanity now lives in underground shelters called "Alpha Complex" - and yeah, one of the big conflicts (until they dumped this in the
third fourth edition) was that each Alpha Complex believed it was the "one and only" and violently sought to make sure there were no others. The society is run by The Computer (The Computer is your Friend. Trust No One. Keep your Laser Handy) and the High Programmers, and, in addition to rival Complexes, the whole system is under threat from mutants and the members of various secret societies.
Player characters were required to be "Troubleshooters" - people who track down members of secret societies, mutants, spies from other complexes and internal traitors (i.e. "trouble") and deal with it (i.e. "shoot" it). To simplify their task, each Troubleshooter has six clones, though only one can be "active" at a time.
The problems are:
1. Every PC belongs to a secret society.
2. Every PC is a mutant.
3. The Computer was never all that stable to begin with, and rival High Programmers have spent generations making it worse...
Making The Computer give each PC a System in a setting like this would be a difficult thing to pull off well, but someone who is adept at dark comedy could probably make something of pure genius from it. Especially since The Computer would definitely give and rescind arbitrary upgrades, and grant skills that make no sense to anyone but it, just "because" pretty much at random...
In my story the system is made by the combination of magic and divinity. Magic is chaos and unlimited potential to change reality. Literally, anything can be done with enough magic, but since it is chaos, you can't control it, at least not with more of an equal power, which is divinity. Divinity is characterized by order and authority, the power to command reality. By mixing the two, you have the divinity control the magic but at the cost of the magic being limited, like only being able to do one thing. The more divinity you obtain, the more magic you can have which makes that ability stronger. In essence, divinity functions like experience points or a soft level cap. This system can create something that appears to have classes and skills depending on the function of the magic framework that is the skill or class.
