Hastur as an Anti-Archetype. Part of an Unknown Armies/Call of Cthulhu crossover.
Destruction. Creation. Entropy. Entelechy. When you understand the cycle of universes, all are one. In the beginning will be the word, and the King In Yellow will speak it.
Hastur is the Archetype of Archetypes yet to be created. The King in Yellow, its Godwalker, wears a mask that is no mask, yet it cannot become a face until Carcosa, the universe to come, is called into being. In the infinite probabilities from which the next universe will be created, Hastur is a parasite, swimming within the egg of the next universe and feeding upon its yolk. Carcosa is entropic inasmuch as it is necessary to destroy this universe to make way for the next one. It creates entropy in this universe to stabilise its own coming-to-be. For a description of the current state of Carcosa, see John Tynes’ article, >http://www.tccorp.com/pagan/pp_tuo1.html#Hali> The Road to Hali .
If you somehow arrive in Carcosa, Non-Great Old One Avatar rolls (including Nyarlathotep) have a 10% penalty while in residence, and Great Old Ones rolls a 20% penalty, except for Hastur itself.
Hastur is sometimes in co-operation and sometimes in conflict with the other Great Old Ones depending upon whether their actions hasten or slow its coming.
Channels:
1-50% When I close your minds, Carcosa increases to a maximum.
Convince those around you (permanently if your Avatar roll beats their Mind score and they fail a (roll/10) rank Self check) of the merit (artistic or otherwise) of nihilism, the emptiness of all existing traditions, laws, social structures, art and culture, etc, and the need to sweep it all away and replace it with something new.
51-70%: As Carcosa approaches, your energy approaches zero.
With a successful roll, those in your vicinity are prevented from making use of Obsession or Passion bonuses (flip-flopping, etc). The universe-to-be doesn’t care how much you want something to happen. A critical or matched success on the Avater: Hastur roll suppresses magic (and Avatar manifestations) completely. This sudden inability to exercise willpower may trigger Madness Meter checks in those whose identity is bound up with their willworking or Avatarhood.
71-90% If a system is in equilibrium with Carcosa, it is Carcosa.
By re-enacting a scene not yet come to pass, from the universe-to-be, (most commonly from the play The King In Yellow), the Avatar can transport him/herself and anyone or thing s/he is carrying to Carcosa. Sometimes, someone makes it back.
91-98%: Carcosa, once created, cannot be destroyed.
The Avatar must find a way of expressing the spirit of Hastur in a way that has never been done before (in a new form of art, a new type of artefact, etc). By doing so the Avatar can link an area or item on earth permanently with Carcosa. Once an Avatar has done this, repeating their actions becomes a Major ritual to travel to Carcosa (one way). (Why Major? Because most people only do this once in their life…)
The Avatar also gains the ability to invest a permanent First Channel effect in a sigil known as The Yellow Sign, which has the same effect on those who perceive it as the Avatar’s own use of the first channel would.
Godwalker: The King in Yellow.
The King in Yellow’s powers are not well defined, but it is known that he/it can invest Yellow Signs with permanent first or second channel effects.
I can’t sleep.
I like the idea that the process of continual rebirth has a mechanism in Hastur. That is, if the Invisible Clergy can sort of be seen as at least partly a representation of the collective subconscious, then there might be “outside archetypes”, not just emptied shells from previous incarnations, but other facets of the universe mind-body. The Comte is self-preservation, not so much of a universe’s iteration but of the cycle that could be interrupted if things go wrong in the fabric of things. And Hastur is sort of a combination of Freud’s Sex and Death urges (in the vaguest way with some misinterpretation). The need to reproduce at the cost of self-death.
And now I’m think that archetypes, while active during the run of the universe that made them, become little more than molds for the new universe to be pored into. Molds which flake or break off when the new universe is done being born. And the reason Carcosa is so terrifying and chaotic is that it’s little more than the pure potential-stuff that universal incarnations are made out of and until it’s pored into the mold made by the 333 archetypes, it’s all madness and the color of oncoming energy too near to be white anymore.
Also, it needs taboos and behaviors.
Also, as cool as creating a ritual is, the third and fourth channels do effectively the same thing (get you to Carcosa) I would recommend replacing the third channel with the ability to cast someone into Carcosa, and make the fourth channel some kind of horrible bodily transformation, a la the Chosen of Hastur.
The King in Yellow can also administer The Unspeakable Oath, by which an Avatar pledges his eternal loyalty to Hastur and the King. Taking The Unspeakable Oath grants an automatic +10% (up to 98%) in one’s Avatar: Hastur rating. However, if one who has taken the Oath ever critically fails an Avatar roll, they are punished by being transformed into a Byakhee, a hideous flying creature bound to obey the commands of the King and of any Avatar of Hastur who performs a Significant ritual of summoning and makes an Avatar roll. Byakhee are often used by cults of Hastur to send their enemies to Carcosa.
In addition, the Oathbound have pledged loyalty to the King and so cannot challenge him directly for the Godwalkerhood; Ambitious Oathbound must manipulate others into removing the current King instead.
Taboo: Conservatism is forbidden. This is not the sloppy use of the term as “republican supporter”, but in the Burkean sense of supporting and maintaining existing social (and other) institutions. Creation, construction, corruption and destruction are good. Maintenance and upholding of tradition are bad.
Avatars in History: Jayavarman VII, emperor of Angkor; Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, french architect; the last king of Denpasar, Bali; Ambrose Bierce?
Masks: The King in Yellow; The Phantom of the Opera; Svengali; “John” from The Yellow Wallpaper; Harlequin;
Notes: I would like the first channel to have a similar “hardening” effect as the Demagogue for the purposes of nihilistic actions, but I don’t have the book with the Demagogue in it atm.
The difference between the third and fourth channel is that the third lets a person transport themselves (and those they hold) to Carcosa, but the fourth creates a permanent gate, through which anyone, including hapless members of the public, can pass, as well as creating a ritual that lets other non-Avatars transport themselves.
As far as channels go, I’m not sure I like the last two just because they don’t really feel like emphasized traits of the core archetype. If he was more tied to travel or banishment, it would work better, but something more connected to the exchange of status-quo for alien or anti-maintenance.
The 2nd channel works, though. There’s the argument that since magick tears against the universe and thus hastened entropy (vs. avatar powers which just harness the flow), it doesn’t make sense to suppress it, but I think since the focus is on will, not what the will is applied to, it works just fine. As a GM, I might even house-rule that someone spending excessive time in the presence of a 2nd channel avatar would have increasing difficulty applying their willpower to anything particularly to maintain things and that the channel’s magic-blocking effect works on adepts and avatars, but not always on random magic phenomena (like Special Orders or the effects around some types of artefacts, depending on the symbolic meaning tied up with it).
Completely off-topic but when are you doing Azatoth?
I’m not. Azathoth isn’t a dead Archetype, it’s a dead Godhead. Totally beyond humanity. IMHO. Nothing stopping you from doing it, of course 🙂
Heh, I think I’m lacking in the imagination and inspiration department compared to coming up with the awesome stuff you have.
Though what about doing Ygolonac? How interesting and freaky would it be to lose your head and grow a gaping maw of razor teeth where your privates used to be?
I agree that the latter two channels seem both redundant and disjoint from the concept
Perhaps there’s some connecion with Anonymancy. The play “the King in Yellow” seems to describe the fundamental structure of a raid: the well-known stranger, the ruler with no domain, the man with no face, arrives at a party in a land without geography (Carcosa, the Internet, whatever it is, changes the second you look away), and reveals that it’s all a sham, which completely spoils the mood. Various people try to argue, with little success; as unpleasant as it may be to stay, nobody manages to gather the will to leave.