Stories of Autumn

 

If a spring story shows a rise, and a summer story shows a time of strength, then an autumn story explores a downfall. A downfall may be a slow drawn out affair, or it may be fairly abrupt and dramatic. The only thing clear about an autumn story is that the glory days of spring and summer have passed, and now it's the time for the inevitable decline before something fresh can take over.

In the various games I've been exposed to, I've found the idea of autumn stories best represented in assorted "story games" rather than traditional tabletop forms or OSR products. The traditional and OSR games might have autumnal settings, with dying empires and crumbling decadence, but the stories in them still strive to be heroic. Story games have a tendency to be more atmospheric and less competitive, and therefore more capable of telling stories that are both introspective and atmospheric. This is often a complaint launched at this genre of game, suggesting that they afren't good because they don't "provide the same experience at the table that I'm after", but the experience being sought is quite often the competitive heroism that work better in traditional games (note that this isn't always the case, and I'll touch on some traditional games that do awesome Autumn stories later)... spring is a time when power grows, summer is a time when it stabilises and strengthens, autumn isn't about those things. It's about dealing with fallout, reflecting on what could have worked better, and reliving the glory days, perhaps denying that the glory days are over, perhaps hastening a decline to get back to the growth of spring.

Traditionally, spring stories are comedy with a positive outlook at the conclusion, autumn stories are tragedy with an end that is more melancholy. Perhaps the strongest archetype I can think of with this in mind is Shakespeare's play "MacBeth". 

 

Power has been gained, a kingdom has been stable, but now there is instability as a result of ambition and hubris. There is an attempt to subvert the natural cycles, and things go off the rails before the rightful order of things is re-established at the end.

The three games I can instantly think of that tell good autumnal stories have the ideas of a cycle baked into their DNA. Traditional games like Pendragon and proto-"Story Games" like Ars Magica and Mage: the Ascension. Ars Magica and Mage both have long term side effects from exposing yourself to too much magic (or exposing yourself to magic too often), and this may come in the form of physical, mental or spiritual degradation that needs to be deal with properly before some of its effects can be minimised. Pendragon does it by deliberately telling multi-generational stories (Ars Magica does this too), where a character grows, gains power, but the power fades away and the scars of attaining that power remain... eventually it becomes untenable to continue playing the character, and hopefully they have an heir to continue the campaign. Characters fade into the background, they become mentors to a new generation, but that doesn't particularly mean that their stories are over. (Being products of their time, the focus often remains on the spring and summer stories, because these are more dynamic and "action packed").  

Autumn Stories

Perhaps the biggest autumn story in recent years had "Winter is Coming" as its catchphrase. Individually, there were plenty of autumnal personal stories within the narrative, with characters at the height of their power desperately trying to cling to it and making mistakes that they try to hide (often unsuccessfully). We watch people receive their comeuppance,either being shamed, mutilated, banished, or killed. All this happens in the context of a world that is gradually crumbling around them all as menaces encroach. I never got around to reading the books, but the television series started as a slow burn, dragging out the downfall, with a few dramatic moments to keep interest, and things accelerated downward, until a rushed finale. I stopped watching around season 6, and I don't think I missed a whole heap.     

Another autumn story that I really like is the movie "Kate". Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays an assassin who has the results of some complicated hits come back to haunt her during the last 24 hours of her life. She's dying, but this is an opportunity for her to tie up loose ends. It almost works as an inter-generational story, like Pendragon, where the daughter of one of her previous targets becomes a pseudo-apprentice to her. While looking for the picture to go here, there was a suggestion that there might be a sequel movie, but it's one of those stories that doesn't make sense for a follow-up. She dies at the end, the assassinations continue with someone else, the cycle of crime and murder continues. But this is a pretty self contained story...

 

In a similar vein is one of my all time favourite films..."Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai"

 

On a more sci-fi note, and one of the narratives that inspired this series of posts is the TV series "Foundation". In this series, the genetic empire of humanity has been around for millennia, and has been overseen by a sequence of cloned emperors (one young, "Dawn", who learns the ropes of leadership.  one older, "Day", who is the figurehead leader of the empire. The eldest, "Dusk", has retured from the active role as figurehead of the empire and engages in personal pursuits). The whole point of the cloned Emperors tells the story of an empire that is desperately trying to fend off its autumnal decline. The wider story is about the Foundation and the mathematical prediction that the empire IS going to fall, and there will be a period of darkness (winter) before a new age is reborn. The foundation itself goes through the cycle of ages, and in the first two seasons sees a spring, summer, autumn and winter before a second foundation is established. The cycles of the galaxy turn slowly, the cycles of the organisations within the galaxy turn more quickly, the lifespans of people within those organisations turn faster still. The "constants" are individuals who have withdrawn from the cycle of reality...such as the genetic dynasty, a "digital" version of Hari Seldon removing himself into the 4-dimensional hypercubic space of the foundation's library, the physical Harry Seldon and Gaal Dornick spending most of their time in cryosleep, constantly jumping forward through the timestream, or Demerzel's robtic immortality. But each of these options of preventing the decline of autumn comes with its issues. The march of times moves ever forward, and those who resist it find the repercussions of their choice come back to haunt them. 

Vampire: the Masquerade does this type of story well also, but gradually has the characters forced to confront an ever-growing beast that threatens to consume their soul with each passing night. It ends up become a story about how they resist that growing darkness, and whether their power in the mortal world helps against the turning of immortality. Again, this is a proto-"Story Game", where experimentation with narrative forms and incorporating the story drivers with the mechanical effects was in development.   

In Warhammer 40k, the faction that most reflects the stories of Autumn would be the Aeldari. These creatures formerly known as "Space Elves" were once a great starfaring civilisation with an empire that had lasted for dozens of millennia (and perhaps longer), but in their hubris and pride, they fell. A dark god awoke in the ashes of their ruins, and the survuvors of the civilisation work to maimtain relevance against younger cultures trying to establish themselves. The Aeldari are effectively immortal, and have some of the most advanced technology available, however they have incredibly low fertility and the race is fighting an ongoing war of attrition that has decimated them over the years. They know their time is over, but now is the time to make sure anyone who might come to replace them as the dominant power in the galaxy is worthy.