Icons
I'm trying to sell this to my kids. (Who are both over 20 but I'll try to get them to sit down for a couple of hours and indulge their old possibly-soon-to-be-senile father.)
- Santa Claus is a corporate commercial stooge. The Spirit of Christmas is a totally different thing.
- Just to make it more racially insensitive and as a nod to my family's Dutch heritage, Svarte Piet will be his right-hand man.
- For reasons of climate change, Santa's workshop has been moved from the North Pole to China.
- The twelve signs of the zodiac, the twelve labours of Herakles...we have the twelve days of Christmas. There are twelve rituals that have to be carried out, and then the New Year will lose its power, the Old Year will retain control, and it will be Commercial Christmas forever!
Our heroes have themselves, a tiny bit of magic from the baby New Year (once January 1st comes around), and the assistance of the Krampus, who in my version is really the Grinch, regardless of what the actual legends say.
I'm figuring that we start on January 2, the tenth day of Christmas. I might shift this around a bit, with the whole thing coming to a climax on December 31 instead and the first couple of rituals being done undetected before Christmas. Haven't decided yet.
We start in medias res and have what seem like innocent children latch onto a hero (possibly at a shopping mall appearance) and they. Will. Not. Let. Go. Binding and cumulative Stunning, I think.
Department store Santas, the minions (mind-controlled through the costume) by Evil Santa.
From there, we have the Person Who Explains, who delivers the narrative dump. (Have to play by ear whether the kids want the PWE to just drop the narrative Yule log and or be part of it.)
It's possible that everything will be explained by the Krampus, who might well be attacked in true comic book fashion because he looks like a bad guy.
From there, we try to stop the second-last ritual. Probably it'll be something to do with eleven pipers piping, which makes me think of Azathoth and the demon pipers around him. Things will be stacked against them, but if they win, hey, great. Not gonna force it to go to another scene...
And then we'll deal with Aaron, the twelfth drummer, who is also the Little Drummer Boy.
I know, it's vague, but I have to get buy-in from them first.
Notes to NPCs
Not character writeups, no.
Santa Claus
Well, he can mind-control anyone in a Santa suit. He probably has control over Coca-Cola in some way (because of the rumours that red and white are Santa's colours because they're Coke's colours). The canonical Santa can get into buildings, which is probably alternate form (fluid) for oozing down the chimney or whatever else there is. Time Control, with Duplication and Teleport as the main effects.
Flying Reindeer
Either a gadget of Santa or actual foes, depending on what I need. If a foe, they can do damage with head-butting (Slash damage from the antlers) or kicking. Have to do something gross with Rudolph's nose....perhaps it penetrates all obscurity, which is why it has been cut off and mounted on the end of a flashlight (which can also do bashing damage). Rudolph appears but with a mechanical muzzle...kind of a reindeer version of the James Bond villain Jaws.
Svarte Piet
Shunned by modern society, equipped with coal, what else can he do but throw in with Santa?
I'm a little unclear on his actual abilities, but let's say he can transform anything that you don't possess into coal. So to protect something, you have to claim it.
Old Year
(I could get really bitter and cynical here, but I'm going to try to avoid that.)
Old man with a scythe is the imagery. The old year is death, is going to death? Will get the new year's health — for him/it this is a straight immortality tale, so maybe he's avoiding the skeleton with the scythe. I just re-watched the JLU episode "This Little Piggy" so maybe there's some Charon imagery I can work in?
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