Missing Persons:
Creating Your Setting
According to the FBI, in 2013 close to 63,000 people went
missing in the U.S. alone. That means that, by U.S. population
at the time, one in every 500 or so people went missing
that year. That number is not likely to decrease, especially
in the Chronicles of Darkness, where monsters are real and
breathing down our necks – when they bother to breathe,
anyway. Also, that number only accounts for reported missing
persons, when, in fact, plenty of people go missing and have
no one who notices or cares enough to report it. Do you know
500 people? In your school, your extended social group and
family? Your town? Your neighborhood?
Using the Missing Persons system, you’re going to build
your setting up around a missing persons case that happens
in your characters’ lives, or at least in their area. Someone is
gone and you, as a group, are going to examine your characters
and their setting by the light of police flashlights, to a
soundtrack of probing questions.
The missing person does not need to be the focus, or even
an important factor, in your story. So if you’ve already got
an idea of the stories you want to create in your Chronicles
of Darkness game, don’t dismiss using the missing person to
build your setting. He can be a major mystery to unravel, or
a tragic statistic that is of note only because you’re thinking
about it, and then gone and forgotten as soon as the real
story takes off. Your missing person may be a major player
or a background element, depending on how the story goes.
It’s important for you to stay flexible about this, of course, as
players may naturally chase any mystery put in front of them.
If you expect it’s just a background element, tell them so, or
else end it quickly and sadly, or quickly and mysteriously,
depending on the tone of your Chronicles of Darkness game.
What You’ll Need: In order to create a missing person
to get your chronicle started you’ll need players, character
sheets, and basic ideas for the kinds of characters most of
your players want to play. You’ll also need a big sheet of paper
everyone can write on. You’ll be making a sort of map on
this paper. A whiteboard also works. If you don’t have either
of these, a pile of notecards will do, which you can write on
and arrange. As the Storyteller, you’re also going to need to
determine the scope of your game. Is it focused entirely in
one high school that all the characters attend? Is it a whole
urban sprawl? Or is it just one small, rural community and
the truck stop at the edge of town? Determining the rough
scale of your chronicle will help your players sketch out this
map. Visual representations of that scale are also helpful;
for example, a city map or the blueprints of an apartment
complex. A list of names, covering a diverse range of genders,
ethnicities, and ages can be helpful as well, so that no one
gets stuck on naming Storyteller characters. Random pictures
of people for inspiration can also be useful tools.
How You Do It: While the players are creating their
characters, ask them the questions about the missing person
below. Each player will have to answer most of the questions,
and add to the map that you’re creating together. This map
will provide places, Storyteller characters, and relationships
to start your chronicle out holistically, so everyone needs to
participate. The less the players have predetermined about
their character, the better this will work, unless the player is
already aware of how Missing Person works, and are eager
to get involved. You don’t have to answer these questions in
any particular order, either. Jump around from step to step
and player to player as it feels natural and organic. Just make
sure everyone has most of the questions answered by the time
you’re done so that the map is fleshed out, and everyone has
hooks into the world in which your chronicle is set.
The Missing Person
Someone is missing. Who is it? In order for there to be
a person missing, you need to determine who the person is
and at least some of the circumstances surrounding their
disappearance. A name is a good place to start or, if you
can, a character picture or portrait helps the players start to
string ideas together. Is she young or old? Is he rich or poor?
Does it make sense they’re gone; are they the sort who runs
off from time to time, or is their disappearance entirely out
of the ordinary? Can anyone account for any part of it? Is
there a stack of clues and witnesses to sort through, or is this
missing person only barely noticed, a statistic, more than a
person gone from their community?
Putting it on Paper
After the Storyteller puts a name, and maybe an image,
of the missing person on the table, players can start to help
define that person. Jot down about a sentence per player as
they discuss the details of the disappearance. Try to keep all
statements open ended, leaving room for conflicting evidence
and the ambiguity of reality. “She’s really popular” is better
than “everyone likes her.” Popularity can represent a lot
of different traits and reactions, whereas determining how
exactly people feel about her is limiting. “Police found a lot
of blood at the crime scene” is better than “the fact that her
blood was everywhere points to homicide” because again,
it’s vague. If you can, avoid passive statements, too. If you’re
about to put down a sentence that starts with “there is” or
“there are,” try to reword it. Having people or things doing
something is a lot punchier than having things be done to
someone, and so, using the example above, “police found a
lot of blood” is better than “there was a lot of blood.”
Talk the players through disagreements or conflicting
statements. Conflicting ideas can actually contribute to
verisimilitude. If you think about anyone real in your life,
does everyone in your life share that opinion? For every
“funny guy” in your life, there are bound to be people who
don’t get the jokes or aren’t amused by the behavior, and so
it’s as easy to put down “hilarious” for the missing person
as it is to put down “not very funny.” This is where direct
and punchy statements really help. “The ladies think he’s a
riot” says a lot more than “some people find him amusing,”
and leaves room for “he doesn’t have many friends” without
one canceling out the other. Instead, they paint a stronger,
clearer picture of the sort of guy he is based only on how
those two seemingly-contradictory ideas bounce off each
other. Of course, as with all other steps in the Missing Person
chronicle starter, you and your players don’t have to sit down
and fill out each statement about the missing person right
now. They can come back and add their own thoughts as the
map develops. Just leave some blank space for new statements
as they develop.
Try to avoid using more than one statement from
each player. You don’t want to write out a huge biography
of the missing person; you simply want a framework
to connect to and some tantalizing ideas to build from.
What the Questions Really Answer
Why a disappearance and not a murder? A missing
person leaves more questions in the mind than a dead
body. After all, a body tells you “this person is dead,
their story is at an end.” With a missing person, though,
ambiguity of mood and tone means you can do a lot
more with it as a story. A missing person is a story
with, potentially, no ending. The story might act as a
background element: sad, hopeless, and flavoring the
rest of your chronicle. Conversely, it might be a tense
emergency as the missing person is sick, needs medication,
is a child, or any other ticking time bomb about
to go off at any moment.
Crime Scenes
From where is she missing? Where did you see him
last, and when? What spaces did you share with the
missing person? Did you and the missing person go to
the same coffee shop every Sunday at the same time
for the last three months, and it’s only now that he’s
missing that you’ve even noticed how frequently you saw
one another? Did you see her last in your apartment,
as she threw on her jacket and told you to never call
her again? Where did you both go, but never actually
crossed paths? The missing person lived in the same
reality as your characters, whether in their town, block,
or school. Whatever the scope of your chronicle, this
missing person lived within it just as your characters
do, and you’re better off anchoring all the characters
in real, shared spaces.
Putting it on Paper
At some point while you’re building your chronicle
map, each player should put down a location that will
matter to the story. Start out with the idea that these
locations are all tied to the missing person, but they
must also each somehow tie to the player characters.
This might be a place the missing person was terrified
of, and your character needs to go daily, for example,
or a place where you used to live together.
These locations should also act as go-to locations
when setting a scene or shaking up the storyline.
Any one of these locations can be a great place for
the Storyteller to trigger more action or sow seeds for
character-driven plot as well. Sometimes simply starting
a scene by saying, “Meanwhile, in the graveyard, something
is stirring, something unnamed and forgotten,”
can get things going. These set-piece locations should
have a name, a one-sentence description, and a sentence
describing both how the player character relates to
them and how the missing person once did. To strengthen
the mood of any specific location, instead of a descriptive
sentence, players might suggest a musical motif that would fit
just as well. This is an excellent technique to anchor a place
in the players’ minds, especially if you play the song quietly
any time a scene starts in the location.
What the Questions Really Answer
Characters standing around in empty, white rooms in
generic buildings, on stock streets in general towns can end
up feeling dry and distant. If you focus in and dress the set
with memories, moods, themes, and especially details, it
becomes real and vital and can inform the story in ways you
may not have expected. Vivid settings can help the Storyteller
hang on to their passion for the chronicle and prevent the
Storyteller from getting burned out. When players are debating
whether or not they should take that Dramatic Failure, or
how their Condition should manifest in this scene, having a
good sense of the mood and details can inspire and encourage
them. A rooftop is not the same thing as the grubby,
rust-covered rooftop of an aging theater. The latter tells the
player that things can fall apart, the structure may not hold,
and hell, yes you should consider having your character fall
off of something when she fails.
Implication
How do you know the missing person? Was he a good
friend, or a lover? Was she a child or dependent? Is this
disappearance keenly felt, or is the character somehow unaware
of what is disconnected and broken in their web of
relationships? Is the character knowingly responsible for the
disappearance, or the catalyst for it? Is she the cause without
knowing it? They might have been complete strangers, but
because of the rule of seven degrees of separation, no life
within your chronicle exists without touching others. This
chronicle starter reflects the connections we see and don’t
see, so while characters may not realize their direct ties to the
missing person, the players should be aware of them.
Putting it on Paper
On your map, as spokes radiating outward, possibly from
the locations described in the Crime Scene step, write each
character’s name down. On the spoke, write a sentence describing
either the direct relationship between the character
and the missing person, or the effect their disappearance has
on the character’s life, even if it’s on a level understood by
the players and Storyteller, but not the character. If a player
would like her character be implicated in the disappearance,
that’s great, but try to keep this very open ended. Consider
that “I’m pretty sure I killed her, but the body went missing
so I kept quiet” is much more interesting and useful than “I
killed her and hid the body.” Leave the mystery of the disappearance
in, even in the case of direct involvement. Whenever
possible, attach opinions and biases to these statements so
they can stay ambiguous. “I think I made her run away,” or
“Everyone blames me for what happened to him” are useful
because they leave room for the player to explore how right
or wrong those opinions are. They also suggest elements of
personality for their characters, as well as how the outside
world observes the character. The ways in which the outside
world views the disappearance will be handled more thoroughly
in a later section.
What the Questions Really Answer
This may end up being the step that is the most difficult
for some players, as they are asked to open their character
up to a communal worldbuilding step that not every player
is used to. Encourage them gently, but remember that not
everyone has to contribute to every single step. It’s one thing
to decide as a group, “Hey, this person exists and is gone,
“but it takes it to the next level to say, “This person is gone,
and my character is somehow tied to this potential tragedy.”
You are asking that player to be accountable, in some way,
regarding what happens to characters that are outside the
players’ control. After all, a player can’t spend Experiences
to raise the combat stats of their character’s girlfriend, so
getting attached means the player might be stung should
something happen to her. That’s why it’s important that this
step is optional, and not a hard requirement.
If a player wants to get involved but doesn’t want their
character directly involved with the missing person, that’s
okay. It’s worthwhile to take a step back and look at the social
ecology of the characters. Maybe she wouldn’t deal with a
missing drug dealer, because she’s on the straight and narrow,
but is the fact that it’s a drug dealer who’s gone missing a
relief to or a burden on her beloved brother, a drug addict?
Community
Who cares about the disappearance? Who doesn’t care
about the disappearance? Are there posters everywhere,
candlelight vigils? Has the media gotten involved, putting
the missing person’s face up on TV screens all over the city?
If the missing person has family, what are they doing about
the disappearance, and what are they telling people about
the person who has vanished? A family and community that
says “Oh, well, no one is surprised he’s gone,” assigns a tone
of indifference to the local population that the characters
may end up taking advantage of, or become victims to. A
close-knit community can be a community that knows each
other’s secrets and keeps them, or one that spreads them
around. A disenfranchised community that minds its own
business won’t be there when someone calls out for help. If
a character shouts “Help, fire,” who will respond?
Putting it on Paper
This step can and should happen sporadically over the
course of the rest of the chronicle mapping. Draw spokes
out from the missing person’s name, and draw clouds, like
thought bubbles in a comic. In these, with no specific attribution,
write some rumors surrounding both the person and
the disappearance. These thought bubbles reflect popular
opinion and local myth surrounding the events. They should
be specific, but don’t need to be anchored to specific characters.
“Everyone knows he was kind of a drunk” is acceptable.
“The family couldn’t give two shits about her” is great, too.
Don’t worry yet about what the police or other real authorities
are doing about the situation; that’s a later step. In this
situation, you’re just putting down things “everyone knows”
without closely examining who constitutes “everyone.” These
rumors don’t have to be true, though they may or may not
have a grain of truth to them, and the ones that are true
may be the strangest of the bunch, depending on the story
of your chronicle. Even as you’re considering the opinions
of the characters directly connected to the missing person,
consider the outsider view rather than what the characters
may actually be experiencing. So, if one of the player characters
is implicated by a rumor, position the statement from
outside of the character. Weaker language like “he seemed”
or “maybe she” is perfectly acceptable here. Try to keep them
short for the sake of space, but if you need to invent a quick
urban legend about the rumor, just put a title down and put
it on a note off to the side, or something similar.
What the Questions Really Answer
In a real, living community, be it tightly knit or loose and
isolationist, everyone has opinions about the things they see
around them. Perhaps they keep these thoughts entirely to
themselves, share them only with close family, or mumble
them to anyone who will listen. No matter how open or
private they keep their thoughts about their environment
and neighbors, many people couch these opinions in rumor
and attribute the beliefs to “everyone” to avoid personal accountability.
When a person hears rumors from the unknown
“everyone,” they are most likely to only forward the rumors
that align with their own existing beliefs. Thus, rumors are
transformed, adjusted, and refined to fit the communal
zeitgeist of the neighborhood population. Of course, as in a
game of whisper-down-the-lane, or telephone, some strange
ideas can sneak into popular opinion, making it hard to tell
the difference between random hiccups in the chain of ideas
and the truly strange Chronicles of Darkness truths.
Authorities
Do the police care? What questions do they ask you
about the missing person? What don’t they bother asking?
Who has the real power and influence here when it comes
to looking into this disappearance? If the police aren’t yet
involved, why? Is the case federal for some reason? Have the
feds chased the local cops away from sensitive matters and
taken the whole thing entirely out of the hands of those who
live with and around the missing person? Is it a matter of a
local authority, like the staff of a university or principal of
a powerful private school, keeping things hushed up until
they’ve managed damage control? Is this chronicle set in a
prison, with a warden hiding not just this disappearance,
but many like it?
Putting it on Paper
As a group, decide what the major authority is in this situation.
You could put down two if you like, perhaps a powerful
criminal syndicate that works in opposition to legal authorities,
each with their own influence on the situation. Adding more
than that gets complicated, and it’s generally better to let any
complexity grow organically within the course of the game than
to try to frontload the chronicle with several competing powers.
This chronicle starter is about a missing person, after all, and not
a turf war. A turf war may also be happening, but keep it simple.
Next, allow each player to draw a line from the central
authority or authorities on which the group has agreed to
various people or locations on the map. On the lines, write
out dates and facts that depict the authorities’ actions without
saying much about their motivations for these actions. These
details should be grounded in the setting’s reality.
For Example:
Location: Armed police investigators were seen investigating
the abandoned chicken processing plant a week after
the disappearance.
Person of Interest: No one from the police has asked
the missing person’s ex-husband any questions about his
disappearance.
Player Character: Members of the local crime family
cornered the character and asked her some leading questions
about the missing person, then left in a hurry.
Location: Neither the cops nor the gang will go to this
place for different reasons, so its truths remain unknown
to them.
What the Questions Really Answer
In some ways, this step helps outline what the characters
will and won’t be able to get away with as they go through
the chronicle. Defining the in-game authorities and, more
importantly, suggesting how they operate and what they care
about, will guide the Storyteller and the players as to where
they should focus the hands of justice. (Legal or illegal, most
authorities have their own codes of justice.) This step helps
to avoid questions like “Why did the cops get to this area so
quickly when I fired a gun, but when I called 911 last week,
the line was disconnected?” This is because it forces everyone
at the table to consider what motivates the powers that be.
People of Interest
Who else knew the missing person? Who were her friends,
acquaintances, and family? What about his enemies and
those who meant him harm? These witnesses, suspects, and
community figures touched the life of the missing person,
but also have connections to the player characters. Are their
bonds to the missing person strong and their relationships to
the player characters weak? Are they the only real connection
between the player characters and the missing person? How
do they relate to the locations important to the chronicle, to
figures of authority, and to the rumor mill as it grinds along?
Putting it on Paper
This step can also happen at any point; as soon as the
players need someone concrete around whom to anchor a
place or idea, create a person of interest. These can be lovers,
siblings, or even the old ladies who watch everything the
characters do from a window across the street.
Each player should volunteer at least one person of
interest while creating this chronicle starter. Write down
the person of interest’s name on the map, and put a square
around it. Consider this character’s relationship to the rest of
the information on the map. Draw a line from the person of
interest to any player character other than the initial player’s
own. On that line, the player of the second character should
write down a one-sentence description of their relationship
to the person of interest. The player who volunteered
the person of interest should also draw a line between the
person of interest and the missing person. She can write a
statement of their relationship as it appears to the outside
world, perhaps related to her character, perhaps not. As a
final step, she should draw a dotted line from the person of
interest to either a location, a rumor, an authority, or even
another person of interest, symbolizing another connection.
There’s no need for a description here; the dotted line is just
an implied connection that everyone can play off of later.
What the Questions Answer
People of interest are not the entire population of your
chronicle, obviously, but as they spring up, they become
representatives of the population. As they are written, they
may start off as stereotypes. Build out from that, adding
depth and focus. Once the chronicle map is completed, a
Storyteller can and should make simple character sheets for
the people of interest. At least make sure to make note of
their names, whatever is written about them on the map,
and give them each at least one strong Aspiration just as you
would a player character.
Media and Inspiration
Just in case you need a little inspiration, or perhaps want
to send along some ideas of what a missing persons case is
like to your players, here’s some media that handles not just
a death or missing person, but also the lives of the people
around that person who is, otherwise, gone. Missing Person,
as a chronicle starter, focuses on the vacuum a gone or dead
person leaves in the lives of those around them, and these
pieces of media reflect that idea in a few different ways.
Consider the variety of tones you can bring to this chronicle
starter with the ideas below.
Stand by Me, movie, or “The Body”, short story by
Stephen King. The Body, as well as the movie that was based
on it, are both prime examples of using a missing persons
case as a jumping-off point for a much deeper narrative. In
the story, a group of boys travel into the wilderness outside
their small town in search of a “dead kid” of whom they’d
heard rumors among the other local children. It’s a powerful
slice-of-life story about boys, who are on the cusp of being
young men, dealing with their demons. The titular body is
important, yes, but as a catalyst for growth rather than as its
own event in the boys’ lives.
Twin Peaks, TV. If your characters are likely to actually
investigate the missing persons case, Twin Peaks is an interesting
twist on the classic, more technical, police procedural.
It focuses much more on the lives of the people around the
dead girl, and examines what people thought of her as a
person, versus who she actually was. It’s a strange story, too,
one not outside of the realms of possibility for a Chronicles
of Darkness game.
Pretty Little Liars, TV. This modern teen drama, centered
on a missing persons case, exemplifies the idea that a
relatively small town can be absolutely bursting with secrets.
Though the series’ primary mystery is “What happened to
Alison DiLaurentis?” a multitude of revelations, romantic
entanglements, and plot twists occur throughout the series,
casting suspicion on seemingly every character at some point
or another.
The Killing (U.S. or Dutch version), TV. Like Twin Peaks,
this show centers on a criminal investigation, but the lives of
the investigators and the people involved are very intimate
and intense. The pacing is slow, as one case takes up the entire
length of the series, so it matches the pacing of a tabletop
game a bit better than a typical one-and-done episode of a
standard police procedural.
Creating Your Setting
According to the FBI, in 2013 close to 63,000 people went
missing in the U.S. alone. That means that, by U.S. population
at the time, one in every 500 or so people went missing
that year. That number is not likely to decrease, especially
in the Chronicles of Darkness, where monsters are real and
breathing down our necks – when they bother to breathe,
anyway. Also, that number only accounts for reported missing
persons, when, in fact, plenty of people go missing and have
no one who notices or cares enough to report it. Do you know
500 people? In your school, your extended social group and
family? Your town? Your neighborhood?
Using the Missing Persons system, you’re going to build
your setting up around a missing persons case that happens
in your characters’ lives, or at least in their area. Someone is
gone and you, as a group, are going to examine your characters
and their setting by the light of police flashlights, to a
soundtrack of probing questions.
The missing person does not need to be the focus, or even
an important factor, in your story. So if you’ve already got
an idea of the stories you want to create in your Chronicles
of Darkness game, don’t dismiss using the missing person to
build your setting. He can be a major mystery to unravel, or
a tragic statistic that is of note only because you’re thinking
about it, and then gone and forgotten as soon as the real
story takes off. Your missing person may be a major player
or a background element, depending on how the story goes.
It’s important for you to stay flexible about this, of course, as
players may naturally chase any mystery put in front of them.
If you expect it’s just a background element, tell them so, or
else end it quickly and sadly, or quickly and mysteriously,
depending on the tone of your Chronicles of Darkness game.
What You’ll Need: In order to create a missing person
to get your chronicle started you’ll need players, character
sheets, and basic ideas for the kinds of characters most of
your players want to play. You’ll also need a big sheet of paper
everyone can write on. You’ll be making a sort of map on
this paper. A whiteboard also works. If you don’t have either
of these, a pile of notecards will do, which you can write on
and arrange. As the Storyteller, you’re also going to need to
determine the scope of your game. Is it focused entirely in
one high school that all the characters attend? Is it a whole
urban sprawl? Or is it just one small, rural community and
the truck stop at the edge of town? Determining the rough
scale of your chronicle will help your players sketch out this
map. Visual representations of that scale are also helpful;
for example, a city map or the blueprints of an apartment
complex. A list of names, covering a diverse range of genders,
ethnicities, and ages can be helpful as well, so that no one
gets stuck on naming Storyteller characters. Random pictures
of people for inspiration can also be useful tools.
How You Do It: While the players are creating their
characters, ask them the questions about the missing person
below. Each player will have to answer most of the questions,
and add to the map that you’re creating together. This map
will provide places, Storyteller characters, and relationships
to start your chronicle out holistically, so everyone needs to
participate. The less the players have predetermined about
their character, the better this will work, unless the player is
already aware of how Missing Person works, and are eager
to get involved. You don’t have to answer these questions in
any particular order, either. Jump around from step to step
and player to player as it feels natural and organic. Just make
sure everyone has most of the questions answered by the time
you’re done so that the map is fleshed out, and everyone has
hooks into the world in which your chronicle is set.
The Missing Person
Someone is missing. Who is it? In order for there to be
a person missing, you need to determine who the person is
and at least some of the circumstances surrounding their
disappearance. A name is a good place to start or, if you
can, a character picture or portrait helps the players start to
string ideas together. Is she young or old? Is he rich or poor?
Does it make sense they’re gone; are they the sort who runs
off from time to time, or is their disappearance entirely out
of the ordinary? Can anyone account for any part of it? Is
there a stack of clues and witnesses to sort through, or is this
missing person only barely noticed, a statistic, more than a
person gone from their community?
Putting it on Paper
After the Storyteller puts a name, and maybe an image,
of the missing person on the table, players can start to help
define that person. Jot down about a sentence per player as
they discuss the details of the disappearance. Try to keep all
statements open ended, leaving room for conflicting evidence
and the ambiguity of reality. “She’s really popular” is better
than “everyone likes her.” Popularity can represent a lot
of different traits and reactions, whereas determining how
exactly people feel about her is limiting. “Police found a lot
of blood at the crime scene” is better than “the fact that her
blood was everywhere points to homicide” because again,
it’s vague. If you can, avoid passive statements, too. If you’re
about to put down a sentence that starts with “there is” or
“there are,” try to reword it. Having people or things doing
something is a lot punchier than having things be done to
someone, and so, using the example above, “police found a
lot of blood” is better than “there was a lot of blood.”
Talk the players through disagreements or conflicting
statements. Conflicting ideas can actually contribute to
verisimilitude. If you think about anyone real in your life,
does everyone in your life share that opinion? For every
“funny guy” in your life, there are bound to be people who
don’t get the jokes or aren’t amused by the behavior, and so
it’s as easy to put down “hilarious” for the missing person
as it is to put down “not very funny.” This is where direct
and punchy statements really help. “The ladies think he’s a
riot” says a lot more than “some people find him amusing,”
and leaves room for “he doesn’t have many friends” without
one canceling out the other. Instead, they paint a stronger,
clearer picture of the sort of guy he is based only on how
those two seemingly-contradictory ideas bounce off each
other. Of course, as with all other steps in the Missing Person
chronicle starter, you and your players don’t have to sit down
and fill out each statement about the missing person right
now. They can come back and add their own thoughts as the
map develops. Just leave some blank space for new statements
as they develop.
Try to avoid using more than one statement from
each player. You don’t want to write out a huge biography
of the missing person; you simply want a framework
to connect to and some tantalizing ideas to build from.
What the Questions Really Answer
Why a disappearance and not a murder? A missing
person leaves more questions in the mind than a dead
body. After all, a body tells you “this person is dead,
their story is at an end.” With a missing person, though,
ambiguity of mood and tone means you can do a lot
more with it as a story. A missing person is a story
with, potentially, no ending. The story might act as a
background element: sad, hopeless, and flavoring the
rest of your chronicle. Conversely, it might be a tense
emergency as the missing person is sick, needs medication,
is a child, or any other ticking time bomb about
to go off at any moment.
Crime Scenes
From where is she missing? Where did you see him
last, and when? What spaces did you share with the
missing person? Did you and the missing person go to
the same coffee shop every Sunday at the same time
for the last three months, and it’s only now that he’s
missing that you’ve even noticed how frequently you saw
one another? Did you see her last in your apartment,
as she threw on her jacket and told you to never call
her again? Where did you both go, but never actually
crossed paths? The missing person lived in the same
reality as your characters, whether in their town, block,
or school. Whatever the scope of your chronicle, this
missing person lived within it just as your characters
do, and you’re better off anchoring all the characters
in real, shared spaces.
Putting it on Paper
At some point while you’re building your chronicle
map, each player should put down a location that will
matter to the story. Start out with the idea that these
locations are all tied to the missing person, but they
must also each somehow tie to the player characters.
This might be a place the missing person was terrified
of, and your character needs to go daily, for example,
or a place where you used to live together.
These locations should also act as go-to locations
when setting a scene or shaking up the storyline.
Any one of these locations can be a great place for
the Storyteller to trigger more action or sow seeds for
character-driven plot as well. Sometimes simply starting
a scene by saying, “Meanwhile, in the graveyard, something
is stirring, something unnamed and forgotten,”
can get things going. These set-piece locations should
have a name, a one-sentence description, and a sentence
describing both how the player character relates to
them and how the missing person once did. To strengthen
the mood of any specific location, instead of a descriptive
sentence, players might suggest a musical motif that would fit
just as well. This is an excellent technique to anchor a place
in the players’ minds, especially if you play the song quietly
any time a scene starts in the location.
What the Questions Really Answer
Characters standing around in empty, white rooms in
generic buildings, on stock streets in general towns can end
up feeling dry and distant. If you focus in and dress the set
with memories, moods, themes, and especially details, it
becomes real and vital and can inform the story in ways you
may not have expected. Vivid settings can help the Storyteller
hang on to their passion for the chronicle and prevent the
Storyteller from getting burned out. When players are debating
whether or not they should take that Dramatic Failure, or
how their Condition should manifest in this scene, having a
good sense of the mood and details can inspire and encourage
them. A rooftop is not the same thing as the grubby,
rust-covered rooftop of an aging theater. The latter tells the
player that things can fall apart, the structure may not hold,
and hell, yes you should consider having your character fall
off of something when she fails.
Implication
How do you know the missing person? Was he a good
friend, or a lover? Was she a child or dependent? Is this
disappearance keenly felt, or is the character somehow unaware
of what is disconnected and broken in their web of
relationships? Is the character knowingly responsible for the
disappearance, or the catalyst for it? Is she the cause without
knowing it? They might have been complete strangers, but
because of the rule of seven degrees of separation, no life
within your chronicle exists without touching others. This
chronicle starter reflects the connections we see and don’t
see, so while characters may not realize their direct ties to the
missing person, the players should be aware of them.
Putting it on Paper
On your map, as spokes radiating outward, possibly from
the locations described in the Crime Scene step, write each
character’s name down. On the spoke, write a sentence describing
either the direct relationship between the character
and the missing person, or the effect their disappearance has
on the character’s life, even if it’s on a level understood by
the players and Storyteller, but not the character. If a player
would like her character be implicated in the disappearance,
that’s great, but try to keep this very open ended. Consider
that “I’m pretty sure I killed her, but the body went missing
so I kept quiet” is much more interesting and useful than “I
killed her and hid the body.” Leave the mystery of the disappearance
in, even in the case of direct involvement. Whenever
possible, attach opinions and biases to these statements so
they can stay ambiguous. “I think I made her run away,” or
“Everyone blames me for what happened to him” are useful
because they leave room for the player to explore how right
or wrong those opinions are. They also suggest elements of
personality for their characters, as well as how the outside
world observes the character. The ways in which the outside
world views the disappearance will be handled more thoroughly
in a later section.
What the Questions Really Answer
This may end up being the step that is the most difficult
for some players, as they are asked to open their character
up to a communal worldbuilding step that not every player
is used to. Encourage them gently, but remember that not
everyone has to contribute to every single step. It’s one thing
to decide as a group, “Hey, this person exists and is gone,
“but it takes it to the next level to say, “This person is gone,
and my character is somehow tied to this potential tragedy.”
You are asking that player to be accountable, in some way,
regarding what happens to characters that are outside the
players’ control. After all, a player can’t spend Experiences
to raise the combat stats of their character’s girlfriend, so
getting attached means the player might be stung should
something happen to her. That’s why it’s important that this
step is optional, and not a hard requirement.
If a player wants to get involved but doesn’t want their
character directly involved with the missing person, that’s
okay. It’s worthwhile to take a step back and look at the social
ecology of the characters. Maybe she wouldn’t deal with a
missing drug dealer, because she’s on the straight and narrow,
but is the fact that it’s a drug dealer who’s gone missing a
relief to or a burden on her beloved brother, a drug addict?
Community
Who cares about the disappearance? Who doesn’t care
about the disappearance? Are there posters everywhere,
candlelight vigils? Has the media gotten involved, putting
the missing person’s face up on TV screens all over the city?
If the missing person has family, what are they doing about
the disappearance, and what are they telling people about
the person who has vanished? A family and community that
says “Oh, well, no one is surprised he’s gone,” assigns a tone
of indifference to the local population that the characters
may end up taking advantage of, or become victims to. A
close-knit community can be a community that knows each
other’s secrets and keeps them, or one that spreads them
around. A disenfranchised community that minds its own
business won’t be there when someone calls out for help. If
a character shouts “Help, fire,” who will respond?
Putting it on Paper
This step can and should happen sporadically over the
course of the rest of the chronicle mapping. Draw spokes
out from the missing person’s name, and draw clouds, like
thought bubbles in a comic. In these, with no specific attribution,
write some rumors surrounding both the person and
the disappearance. These thought bubbles reflect popular
opinion and local myth surrounding the events. They should
be specific, but don’t need to be anchored to specific characters.
“Everyone knows he was kind of a drunk” is acceptable.
“The family couldn’t give two shits about her” is great, too.
Don’t worry yet about what the police or other real authorities
are doing about the situation; that’s a later step. In this
situation, you’re just putting down things “everyone knows”
without closely examining who constitutes “everyone.” These
rumors don’t have to be true, though they may or may not
have a grain of truth to them, and the ones that are true
may be the strangest of the bunch, depending on the story
of your chronicle. Even as you’re considering the opinions
of the characters directly connected to the missing person,
consider the outsider view rather than what the characters
may actually be experiencing. So, if one of the player characters
is implicated by a rumor, position the statement from
outside of the character. Weaker language like “he seemed”
or “maybe she” is perfectly acceptable here. Try to keep them
short for the sake of space, but if you need to invent a quick
urban legend about the rumor, just put a title down and put
it on a note off to the side, or something similar.
What the Questions Really Answer
In a real, living community, be it tightly knit or loose and
isolationist, everyone has opinions about the things they see
around them. Perhaps they keep these thoughts entirely to
themselves, share them only with close family, or mumble
them to anyone who will listen. No matter how open or
private they keep their thoughts about their environment
and neighbors, many people couch these opinions in rumor
and attribute the beliefs to “everyone” to avoid personal accountability.
When a person hears rumors from the unknown
“everyone,” they are most likely to only forward the rumors
that align with their own existing beliefs. Thus, rumors are
transformed, adjusted, and refined to fit the communal
zeitgeist of the neighborhood population. Of course, as in a
game of whisper-down-the-lane, or telephone, some strange
ideas can sneak into popular opinion, making it hard to tell
the difference between random hiccups in the chain of ideas
and the truly strange Chronicles of Darkness truths.
Authorities
Do the police care? What questions do they ask you
about the missing person? What don’t they bother asking?
Who has the real power and influence here when it comes
to looking into this disappearance? If the police aren’t yet
involved, why? Is the case federal for some reason? Have the
feds chased the local cops away from sensitive matters and
taken the whole thing entirely out of the hands of those who
live with and around the missing person? Is it a matter of a
local authority, like the staff of a university or principal of
a powerful private school, keeping things hushed up until
they’ve managed damage control? Is this chronicle set in a
prison, with a warden hiding not just this disappearance,
but many like it?
Putting it on Paper
As a group, decide what the major authority is in this situation.
You could put down two if you like, perhaps a powerful
criminal syndicate that works in opposition to legal authorities,
each with their own influence on the situation. Adding more
than that gets complicated, and it’s generally better to let any
complexity grow organically within the course of the game than
to try to frontload the chronicle with several competing powers.
This chronicle starter is about a missing person, after all, and not
a turf war. A turf war may also be happening, but keep it simple.
Next, allow each player to draw a line from the central
authority or authorities on which the group has agreed to
various people or locations on the map. On the lines, write
out dates and facts that depict the authorities’ actions without
saying much about their motivations for these actions. These
details should be grounded in the setting’s reality.
For Example:
Location: Armed police investigators were seen investigating
the abandoned chicken processing plant a week after
the disappearance.
Person of Interest: No one from the police has asked
the missing person’s ex-husband any questions about his
disappearance.
Player Character: Members of the local crime family
cornered the character and asked her some leading questions
about the missing person, then left in a hurry.
Location: Neither the cops nor the gang will go to this
place for different reasons, so its truths remain unknown
to them.
What the Questions Really Answer
In some ways, this step helps outline what the characters
will and won’t be able to get away with as they go through
the chronicle. Defining the in-game authorities and, more
importantly, suggesting how they operate and what they care
about, will guide the Storyteller and the players as to where
they should focus the hands of justice. (Legal or illegal, most
authorities have their own codes of justice.) This step helps
to avoid questions like “Why did the cops get to this area so
quickly when I fired a gun, but when I called 911 last week,
the line was disconnected?” This is because it forces everyone
at the table to consider what motivates the powers that be.
People of Interest
Who else knew the missing person? Who were her friends,
acquaintances, and family? What about his enemies and
those who meant him harm? These witnesses, suspects, and
community figures touched the life of the missing person,
but also have connections to the player characters. Are their
bonds to the missing person strong and their relationships to
the player characters weak? Are they the only real connection
between the player characters and the missing person? How
do they relate to the locations important to the chronicle, to
figures of authority, and to the rumor mill as it grinds along?
Putting it on Paper
This step can also happen at any point; as soon as the
players need someone concrete around whom to anchor a
place or idea, create a person of interest. These can be lovers,
siblings, or even the old ladies who watch everything the
characters do from a window across the street.
Each player should volunteer at least one person of
interest while creating this chronicle starter. Write down
the person of interest’s name on the map, and put a square
around it. Consider this character’s relationship to the rest of
the information on the map. Draw a line from the person of
interest to any player character other than the initial player’s
own. On that line, the player of the second character should
write down a one-sentence description of their relationship
to the person of interest. The player who volunteered
the person of interest should also draw a line between the
person of interest and the missing person. She can write a
statement of their relationship as it appears to the outside
world, perhaps related to her character, perhaps not. As a
final step, she should draw a dotted line from the person of
interest to either a location, a rumor, an authority, or even
another person of interest, symbolizing another connection.
There’s no need for a description here; the dotted line is just
an implied connection that everyone can play off of later.
What the Questions Answer
People of interest are not the entire population of your
chronicle, obviously, but as they spring up, they become
representatives of the population. As they are written, they
may start off as stereotypes. Build out from that, adding
depth and focus. Once the chronicle map is completed, a
Storyteller can and should make simple character sheets for
the people of interest. At least make sure to make note of
their names, whatever is written about them on the map,
and give them each at least one strong Aspiration just as you
would a player character.
Media and Inspiration
Just in case you need a little inspiration, or perhaps want
to send along some ideas of what a missing persons case is
like to your players, here’s some media that handles not just
a death or missing person, but also the lives of the people
around that person who is, otherwise, gone. Missing Person,
as a chronicle starter, focuses on the vacuum a gone or dead
person leaves in the lives of those around them, and these
pieces of media reflect that idea in a few different ways.
Consider the variety of tones you can bring to this chronicle
starter with the ideas below.
Stand by Me, movie, or “The Body”, short story by
Stephen King. The Body, as well as the movie that was based
on it, are both prime examples of using a missing persons
case as a jumping-off point for a much deeper narrative. In
the story, a group of boys travel into the wilderness outside
their small town in search of a “dead kid” of whom they’d
heard rumors among the other local children. It’s a powerful
slice-of-life story about boys, who are on the cusp of being
young men, dealing with their demons. The titular body is
important, yes, but as a catalyst for growth rather than as its
own event in the boys’ lives.
Twin Peaks, TV. If your characters are likely to actually
investigate the missing persons case, Twin Peaks is an interesting
twist on the classic, more technical, police procedural.
It focuses much more on the lives of the people around the
dead girl, and examines what people thought of her as a
person, versus who she actually was. It’s a strange story, too,
one not outside of the realms of possibility for a Chronicles
of Darkness game.
Pretty Little Liars, TV. This modern teen drama, centered
on a missing persons case, exemplifies the idea that a
relatively small town can be absolutely bursting with secrets.
Though the series’ primary mystery is “What happened to
Alison DiLaurentis?” a multitude of revelations, romantic
entanglements, and plot twists occur throughout the series,
casting suspicion on seemingly every character at some point
or another.
The Killing (U.S. or Dutch version), TV. Like Twin Peaks,
this show centers on a criminal investigation, but the lives of
the investigators and the people involved are very intimate
and intense. The pacing is slow, as one case takes up the entire
length of the series, so it matches the pacing of a tabletop
game a bit better than a typical one-and-done episode of a
standard police procedural.
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