To Horatio and Arthur
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IamLEAM1983
- Site Admin
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- Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:54 am
- Location: Quebec, Canada
To Horatio and Arthur
What's your take on McKamey Manor?
-
IamLEAM1983
- Site Admin
- Posts: 3709
- Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:54 am
- Location: Quebec, Canada
As Horatio and Arthur
Arthur:
"I've worked a few haunts in my time; so has Alana. The key to an unforgettable experience is to offer a sense of pathos and catharsis. It's not too dissimilar from Grand Guignol; where the goal is to shock and delight in equal, deliciously ghoulish measures. In the best of cases, what you really want isn't the initial scream of mortals seeing you pop out of nowhere after Shadow-walking, but rather the laugh of release that follows. The threat you offer has to seem real enough in the exact instant it's occuring, only to fade away to pantomime seconds later.
The best way to achieve this is through inhabiting a role for the evening, through the act of draping yourself in a constructed fiction. Arthur Holden the undead theatre rat wouldn't hurt a fly, obviously, but Jeremiah Haverghast the disgraced railroad baron with a sordid, Bluebeard-worthy past of lost wives and dark dealings diverse; he would hurt the attendees aplenty - if only the Great Arcane Seals weren't about to exorcise him and his menagerie at the act's end, of course. Then you keep the exit visible at all times and turn an exxagerated chase into your actually guiding an exhausted participant out of the experience. One safeword is all I need to drop the act, scoop you up and Shadow-walk you to a prearranged locale that'll offer you safety, peace and quiet until you can be discharged for the next group to step in. I do this knowing that the yearly haunt always has three paramedics and one Mage with a few notches in Curative magic amongst the costumed volunteers. Consent is obtained and slavisly adhered to, and everyone is mostly out to make sure you have a good bit of graven seasonal fun. In the eighteen years I've led the local Railroad Murder House haunt, we've never seen more than three sprained ankles."
Arthur draws himself up, turning noticeably colder.
"What this pathetic fool of a man calls a show, I call a masturbatory exercise in self-congratulatory sadism. No research, no setting, no lore, no motivation, no pathos - nothing except pain for its own useless sake. I even checked with Archie and Nereus to see if the act might actually be some particularly moronic Void Weaver ploy - but no, no such luck there. I'm known for giving mortals a fair shake, but this is a feckless and worthless speck of mortal meat with the ambitions of a common maggot."
Horatio:
"You call him a maggot, Arthur dear - how charming! Having once been mobile, you see, I have more of a hands-on experience with these venues - as a very, very difficult customer of sorts, essentially. Your mind breaks the way mine has and friends extricate a demon out of your gray matter during a global possession event and, well - that changes things, somewhat.
Previously, I would've honored the fear and thrills as part of the artifice, the necessary items in our holy sacrament with Lady Cybele, Mother of Madness - but now? Now, my friends, I see these as being sacred. Fear teaches us so much, and some cheapen its lessons for self-aggrandizement?! Oh, no, no, no,no - that will simply not do, you see! Fear without a message is hollow, and fear without the means to conquer it is nothing except misery and pain - and you all know how I feel about those..."
Horatio crushes the bag of popcorn he'd been pretending to eat out of in one hand, momentarily freezing his features in an expression of white-hot rage. His features then eerily soften. He chuckles menacingly.
"I paid a visit to the Manor, shortly before the incursions. Played my part well, sounded nice and mundane over the phone and my serendipitously busted webcam. I offered the proprietor a ticket to my own venue, to be cashed in on the same night..."
He dramatically swoons. "The fear, my friends - the delicious, genuine, mind-opening fear seeping out of Mister McKamey was... intoxicating. In the end, he tasted of retribution well-deserved and of soiled undies, heh. Killing him would've been antithetical to our cause, but scaring him made a wonderful point.
Fear and delight, my friends - fear and delight, indeed! Also hope, joy, renewed clarity, that tart rush of cortisol in the bloodstream - and a ton of bad calories. If your haunt is missing in one of these aspects, it isn't any haunt Horatio Ignatius Grimley will ever caution."
"I've worked a few haunts in my time; so has Alana. The key to an unforgettable experience is to offer a sense of pathos and catharsis. It's not too dissimilar from Grand Guignol; where the goal is to shock and delight in equal, deliciously ghoulish measures. In the best of cases, what you really want isn't the initial scream of mortals seeing you pop out of nowhere after Shadow-walking, but rather the laugh of release that follows. The threat you offer has to seem real enough in the exact instant it's occuring, only to fade away to pantomime seconds later.
The best way to achieve this is through inhabiting a role for the evening, through the act of draping yourself in a constructed fiction. Arthur Holden the undead theatre rat wouldn't hurt a fly, obviously, but Jeremiah Haverghast the disgraced railroad baron with a sordid, Bluebeard-worthy past of lost wives and dark dealings diverse; he would hurt the attendees aplenty - if only the Great Arcane Seals weren't about to exorcise him and his menagerie at the act's end, of course. Then you keep the exit visible at all times and turn an exxagerated chase into your actually guiding an exhausted participant out of the experience. One safeword is all I need to drop the act, scoop you up and Shadow-walk you to a prearranged locale that'll offer you safety, peace and quiet until you can be discharged for the next group to step in. I do this knowing that the yearly haunt always has three paramedics and one Mage with a few notches in Curative magic amongst the costumed volunteers. Consent is obtained and slavisly adhered to, and everyone is mostly out to make sure you have a good bit of graven seasonal fun. In the eighteen years I've led the local Railroad Murder House haunt, we've never seen more than three sprained ankles."
Arthur draws himself up, turning noticeably colder.
"What this pathetic fool of a man calls a show, I call a masturbatory exercise in self-congratulatory sadism. No research, no setting, no lore, no motivation, no pathos - nothing except pain for its own useless sake. I even checked with Archie and Nereus to see if the act might actually be some particularly moronic Void Weaver ploy - but no, no such luck there. I'm known for giving mortals a fair shake, but this is a feckless and worthless speck of mortal meat with the ambitions of a common maggot."
Horatio:
"You call him a maggot, Arthur dear - how charming! Having once been mobile, you see, I have more of a hands-on experience with these venues - as a very, very difficult customer of sorts, essentially. Your mind breaks the way mine has and friends extricate a demon out of your gray matter during a global possession event and, well - that changes things, somewhat.
Previously, I would've honored the fear and thrills as part of the artifice, the necessary items in our holy sacrament with Lady Cybele, Mother of Madness - but now? Now, my friends, I see these as being sacred. Fear teaches us so much, and some cheapen its lessons for self-aggrandizement?! Oh, no, no, no,no - that will simply not do, you see! Fear without a message is hollow, and fear without the means to conquer it is nothing except misery and pain - and you all know how I feel about those..."
Horatio crushes the bag of popcorn he'd been pretending to eat out of in one hand, momentarily freezing his features in an expression of white-hot rage. His features then eerily soften. He chuckles menacingly.
"I paid a visit to the Manor, shortly before the incursions. Played my part well, sounded nice and mundane over the phone and my serendipitously busted webcam. I offered the proprietor a ticket to my own venue, to be cashed in on the same night..."
He dramatically swoons. "The fear, my friends - the delicious, genuine, mind-opening fear seeping out of Mister McKamey was... intoxicating. In the end, he tasted of retribution well-deserved and of soiled undies, heh. Killing him would've been antithetical to our cause, but scaring him made a wonderful point.
Fear and delight, my friends - fear and delight, indeed! Also hope, joy, renewed clarity, that tart rush of cortisol in the bloodstream - and a ton of bad calories. If your haunt is missing in one of these aspects, it isn't any haunt Horatio Ignatius Grimley will ever caution."