Running Slay the Princess games as my D&D Characters
Try to make as close a choice to what you PC would make as possible with the available choices
No oblivion. Too many of my characters I feel would make this choice. It's certainly interesting but kind of defeats the exercise (The Stranger is okay but no waiting in chapter 2)
No "good" ending. That's no fun.
No "waiting". aka Shifty closing your game. This just slows things down
Ella continued (Cycle 1)(Cycle 2)(cycle 3)(Cycle 4 Part 1)(Cycle 4 Part 2)(Cycle 5)
Finale! (CW: blood, violence, horror, spoilers)
Ella approaches the mirror one final time.
And meets the Narrator. Maybe he'll continue to be cagy, maybe he'll finally give her some answers.
So you're the Narrator. I was wondering if I'd ever get to see you.
Are you part of me? Or are you something else?
Versions of you, You've said that before. So I really was meeting different yous?
The People out there beyond the walls of the construct... Do THEY know about this? Do they know what you want me to do to them?
I'm sorry I don't want to destroy you. Will it help if I look away or stop asking questions?
I wasn't supposed to see this was I?
If you want me to slay Her, I need to know what She actually is.
Why would you want me to destroy the concept of transformation?
If I destroy Her, how is that existence any better than death? Or even different from death at all? Honestly, it feels worse (It's true Ella almost did pass into her state of continual bliss, but she just wasn't ready to give in just yet. She wanted to see if she could find another way out. A couple more decades or so of stagnation and she knows she would have hated it. Death is hard, terrifying. But stagnation is worse. The world needs change.)
So there is still capacity for change? Children can still grow up? But how old can one get. Will they just keep getting older and never die? Ella's not sure she understands how it is supposed to work.
10. And what is my true identity?
The Narrator tells Ella that she is in fact a God. Maybe she will have more control over what happens to people then. A world with no death and suffering does sound nice. And if she was made for this purpose, Then she should fulfill it.
11. Rest easy. I'm going to destroy Her.
This is the entity Ella has been talking to all along. This is the entity she was sent to destroy.
Do you know about the Echo? Did you hear our conversation?
Can there not be meaning even without death?
3. If I let you out, an entire world ends for good. I can't do that.
You act as though the world can't exist without you, but I've existed without you.
Submitting to you was a mistake. I would have destroyed you if I knew what you were.
It was meaningless. Neither of us could ever truly win.
But without redemption there can be no sin
If you hadn't snatched that body away, we would have killed each other. We were self-destructive.
As the clash abates Ella states her intentions!
I was told there was enough of you in me to preserve meaning in existence. I'm going to trust that's true [Slay the Princess]
Just then the Voice of the Hero returns to Ella and offers to help her.
Ella has a task to complete. She takes the blade and enters the basement.
That's never worked out for Ella before, but things are different this time. She might as well do the Princess the courtesy.
Are you... the same as you are out there?
Oh... so maybe this princess really is separate from the entity outside. Just another innocent victim in all of this... but again, that is one life verses billions...
2. I don't think I ever really wanted to slay you. But I don't like what your existence means for the world.
A strange idea. Ella isn't sure. The looping made her exhausted. But sitting here, it seems so far behind her. Could she really do this forever? She has some questions first.
Would resetting it do anything to help THEM? The people out there? If you continue to exist, don't they continue to die and suffer?
We're going to find ourselves back here eventually.
If we're talking about this right now, how do we know we haven't done this before?
How do you know that things won't end worse? What if when I make my way back here I'm different and I hurt you? What if I let you bring about the end of everything?
We'd have to decide to do this every single time. Forever. Eventually something is going to be different. What if we change our minds?
As the Princess says that. Ella realizes that she's never made a choice for herself. Not really. She's always done what she's felt is the righteous thing. She was happy to do it. But still... no one ever asked what she wanted. What does she want? Does she even know?
7. I don't want to forget you
8. This isn't fair. I want to be here with you. I don't want to be alone again.
9. I take it all back. I don't want this, and I don't want to kill you. Is it too late to go back to being a god?
10. Okay. Then let's do it. I believe in us. [Agree to her plan]
Cycle 1: The Razor (The Arms Race/Mutually Assured Destruction)
Cycle 5: The Wraith (Via slain Nightmare)
Ending: Make way to The Shifting Mound's heart and return to the beginning again
Final thoughts on Ella's run: I don't have much to say, except I think now as this project is going on longer and longer I'm starting to maybe make decisions a little more meta because I don't want to repeat the same things as previous run. To the point where I'm contradicting myself. I think the stories I weave are still interesting, but I don't know if I'm loosing the heart of the project. I don't know if people are disappointed in me because of that.
The ending of Ella's run is a good example of all of this. Because I think the way I had been constructing the ending and how Ella had been acting all along, I think she would have slayed heart princess right away. But I still wanted to talk to her. I hadn't decided to repeat the cycle necessarily at that point but I wanted to see how I felt. I do think it was an interesting new perspective on Ella's character to have her realize that she's never really been able to do what she wants, but I still don't know if she would have made the choice to repeat. At least not the Ella I used to play. I suppose the experiences they have in these cycles could change them.
