how to Sense8?

[Contagion]

So I'm finally biting the bullet and building my own game, and ive been pulling from a lot of places me and my players really like.

My setting is quite large, there are 7 different universes that exist concurrently and can be visit as easily as buying a bus ticket. Getting a team with members who could be from each of these different universes was a struggle until I remembered we'd all seen Sense8 and loved it. So i was thinking, maybe make the party a cluster. But i'm not sure how to game rules that?

mainly, How would sharing work? can the players pick, is it random and they have to roll a dice, or should i pause the situation and ask, "who thinks they can help? and the first person to answer is the one who shares. how often can this happen? should i treat it like warlock spells or wild shape?

Also, in the beginning it was harder than it was at the end, so should I make the cluster like it's its own character and track XP for it so when it levels up the party gains access to different things like longer sharing times or more sharing opportunities?

this is the first time i'm building a setting from the ground up and not taking over for another DM or running a pre-made adventure. I know the idea is a little but out there, but the concept of connection is important to the setting so i feel like adding sensate's fits in a way. any help would be appreciated, thank you.

[Bjarkmundur]

I am ALL over this one! Loved the series and love the idea! Are you sure about his though? I mean, are you just mulling it over and asking preliminary questions or have you fully decided clusters are a thing in your world(s) and intend for the players to be one of them?

[Contagion]

I really like the concept, and it would fix some of the general problems with the setting being so large. plus it also helps with some logistical things because my players cant all play on the same day sometimes. But i didn't want to invest so much time into it if it's not viable and since i've never made my own campaign I dont quite know how the mechanics would work for it, ao i was looking for opinions. I didnt want to get too attached to if the idea cant pan out.

[Bjarkmundur]

Alright, the abilities of Homo Sensoriums can be divided into three.

Psychic Link
This ability grows from a single sensory input all the way to being able to share thoughts and emotions.




Visiting

When the psychic link is strong enough they gain the ability to visit. At first this happens instinctively when a sensate is in danger.

Sharing
This allows one sensate to take control of another in order to used the shared abilities of the cluster.

And then there's of course there are the memories of the cluster's parent.

I'm guessing we just go from the least powerful to the most powerful as your PCs gain levels? I don't know how useful visiting is going to be, but shared senses and being able to psychicly swap positions with an ally (swapping mental stats and associated features).

Are all your players familiar with the series? It's actually probably better if they aren't, but knowing who has seen it and who hasn't tells us how true to the source we have to be, just so we don't make anyone frustrated.

You probably have to have a very specific description of which of each of the players abilities are shared when Sharing. A wizard's spellcasting feature is obviously shared, but is a sorcerer's?

Im thinking something along the lines of

- Telepathic Link (1st level?)
- Shared Senses (3rd level?)
- Mind Swap (this is the main feature)
- A recharge-able feature that works like a divination spell, or advantage on an intelligence ability check, representing the information gained from a parent. Consider simply writing this into the story or have it a shared resource for the entire group.

Balance doesn't really matter since all your players get the same features, which makes this entire thing so much easier.

So when all of this is said and done, what you'll end up with is the equivalent of a radio earpiece, the ability to swap positions with an ally in combat on your turn until the end of your turn, and some way to gain additional information. It's definitely not going to break your campaign, but it might take a couple of encounters for your players to get the hang of the swap mechanic.

Maybe to make it easier we simply divide the Sharing ability over a couple of levels, adding the 'Shared' tag to various stats, abilities and features each level. Just so your players can get the hang of it. That way it can also be a much bigger feature than if you had to give it out all at once. The cool part about this is that it feels like it's a part of a whole thing. Being able to share messages at first, then images and sound, then something like using a reaction to have a spell or effect that targets wisdom, intelligence or charisma affect you instead, then go into full body-swapping on your turn, then into the ability to do it off turn to cast things like shield and other reaction effects. Danger Sense is also a cool feature to be able to share. The ability to use effects that target Self target an ally is going to be so much fun ^^

[Ogre Mage]

As an easy but gross simplification, I would say the cluster is under the effect of a permanent Rary's Telepathic Bond.

[Contagion]

Okay awesome! I'll see if I can get like a rough draft of something using these suggestions and how it would fit in my setting, and then share it here for more feedback. thank you