In every timeline where monsters have been around for a while (which is most of them, given the 4-dimensional nature of the rifts), there are those who practice the ancient, secret art of Monster Hunting. Once you know their ways, it isn't too hard to track them down and seek their aid, gather information, or just hang out.

The Hunters are usually ordinary humans, armed with knowledge of their enemy, and ancient techniques and tools to help fight them. They're usually loosely-organized in militias, or even smaller units. They generally have little regard for any government-level organizations with the same mission, as in most timelines, said organizations are usually at odds with them and with innocents, always favoring the "greater good". Hunters focus on the little guy--they fight for those who can't fight for themselves.

There are some who hunt for money, or other resources. Not always well-liked, but there's usually a reason they can command a fee. These are more often lone wolves, rarely more than a small party, and often armed with more than mere knowledge and tools, but perhaps a tinge of the dark power they are trained to combat. Still, sometimes the Hunters need some extra oomph, and they've been known to place open contracts to lure in these super-hunters, usually funded by communal collection. The PCs likely fit the bill just fine; up to them to decide how they prefer to be compensated.

On a meta level, I'll probably have a few recurring Hunter characters, who aren't Jumpers, and won't remember you across Jumps, but will have a fairly consistent personality and skill set that makes them useful or endearing. There could be some interesting roleplaying possibilities there.

Inevitably, you'll encounter NPCs who you'd rather not see devoured by horrible monsters or by your own personal Universe-eating black hole. And you'll probably want to try to save them by bringing them with you.

This sounds like a very interesting prompt for roleplaying possibilities. I think it should be difficult--impossible at first, but a goal you could work toward, maybe have some partial success. And even if you find a reliable means, there are limitations, ranging from the obvious (you can't bring 4 billion people in Hyacinth's garage), to the more esoteric (a given person can only have one existence per timeline; you all jump into your own bodies upon arrival, but mystically keep your memories; your refugees would have no such luck, and effectively be annihilated). Transcending those limitations sounds like an interesting long-term hook.

This also gets to one of the other major themes I want to explore: The Struggle.

You're not the only Jumpers. That was clear for each of you when you met the first other. There must be more like you, kindred spirits in this uncaring storm.

Yes, there are. A few are indeed like you, with similar goals, and a similar struggle, desparate for companionship and aid. Perhaps you'll find them.

And then there are the ones who Jump like you--or even unlike you, maybe with greater control, deliberate precision. And they aren't looking for companionship. Some are exploiting their power. Others using it to aid the Protocol or its equivalent. Some might even be touched by the darkness beyond, and seem to be helping it along.

Is that what awaits you if you Jump one too many times?

I can see some very interesting cross-dimensional battles in the late game. Monsters are one thing, but even they can't Jump into and out of reality at will (well, not all of them).

The struggle is real.

Really, I'm not quite sure what to call it. Ennui? Despair? Not quite right. It's the emotion for which you can only say to someone: "man, that's...rough".

You're jumping from Universe to Universe. Everyone you meet, save for a few kindred spirits, is just so much dust. They'll either be eaten by monsters or sucked into a black hole. And yet...they won't. 99 times out of 100, they're waiting for you in the next Jump, right as rain. Apart from whatever minor differences there are in this reality (all restaurants are Taco Bell), these people seem no worse for the wear, save that they don't remember meeting you. Is that so wrong? Is knowing the PCs the secret to true happiness?

It's a roller coaster of emotion, but like all roller coasters, it inevitably takes you down. Nothing you do matters, no one you save will exist long enough to be thankful for it.

And that's powerful. I want to play with that. I'm a sick fuck, but...it just sounds fascinating.

Obviously, it's very dangerous. It could lead to a very negative energy in the game, but that isn't what I want. I want it to light a fire. I want the PCs to hit bottom and rebound, vowing to find a way to fight back, to make their sacrifice count. They'll want to learn the rules, then bend them until they break. They'll want to find the architect of their cruel fate and make him eat his own ass. They want to shove these Monsters back into the abyss that spawned them, and find the guy who invented all this and balefire him out of existence.

And they'll need distractions along the way; they'll need something to help them cope, to get through this Jump, and the next, until they find a better way. They'll need humor, and companionship, and maybe even faith in...something.

In the end, they're not fighting for gold, or levels, or even a nation or a whole world. They're fighting for their right to exist. They're fighting for meaning to their actions. They're fighting for the very existence of agency.

They are ascending to heaven to steal fire from the sun. They are eating the apple. Their struggle...is Man versus God.

Here's a rule: extra-dimensional spaces are not part of a specific timeline.

Hyacinth has a Garage of Holding. It's a perk of working for Paradox. She keeps her Trans Am in there when she isn't driving it, along with some other useful supplies. She's had some time to play with it, experiment a little, and see how it works.

The garage door can't close if there's anyone inside it. She surmises that if you could somehow force the door closed with someone inside, something very bad might happen to that person. Obviously, she hasn't attempted this. She's tried it on animals, though: the door closes just fine with a goldfish, and also with dogs. She locked a cat in there once, but it somehow got out, despite the door dematerializing out of existence after shutting.

She's probably had a chance to try to rescue somebody--or at least a cute animal or two--during a Jump. Let's say she has, just to set the stage. She befriended a stray dog in one Universe, and couldn't bear to destroy him, so she locked him the garage before destroying the Universe. When she Jumped, she excused herself from her company meeting on workplace etiquette (Sexism in the workplace: why Women should stop harassing Men and the other two genders), and absconded to the parking garage to see if the dog made it. On opening, the dog had vanished.

Ever the scientist, she tried again (this weird new Universe was doomed anyway), this time ransacking a pet store. Most of the fish survived the jump intact, as well as most birds and insects. She locked four cats in there, and brought back 5: 3 of the original 4, and 2 she'd never seen. None of the dogs made it, and neither did the magpie or--weirdly enough--the ants. However, operating on the assumption that she didn't know how much time passed inside the garage during a Jump (she chastised herself for not starting with that test), she left plenty of food, water, and litter for the animals. All of the bowls were intact, and only a bit of the food had been nibbled at (so not much time, then).

Inanimate objects make the transition just fine. She hasn't found anything yet that doesn't cross over.

This has been useful in the past to gather resources for future excursions--cash, illegal weapons from apocalyptic (or just weird) Universes, and the occasional dimensional gadget that hadn't actually been invented in her original timeline.

And, it so happens that there is no rule that she has to die or destroy the Universe promptly after each Jump. She spent a few years in some of the Jumps, mostly researching, or trying to retrace the steps of her vision quest to learn more about the Nightmare Shard. And in one particularly lucky run, neither Paradox nor Monster nor her own quasi-suicidal tendencies caught up to her for a long time.

And she lived to the ripe old age of 62.

She has much to say of that timeline. It was delightlyful magic-free. She barely heard of anything that might have been Monster or Paradox related. At one point, she straight-up broke into Paradox HQ, only to find it entirely staffed with non-insiders, with nothing nefarious to be found. After decades of research taught her little, and after so many years since she had a real fight, she began to wonder if maybe this was it. Maybe she was given a life of her own. Maybe she would Jump at the end, maybe not. Maybe this was her final reward, a release from the cycle, if only for her. And after all those years...she couldn't say no. She was so tired.

So she got on with her life. She had enough resources to get by, and her devices could fix the occasional slot machine or lottery ticket easily enough. She retired early, and just lived a life, mostly alone, connecting more easily with horses and dogs than with people, who she'd long ago lost the ability to truly connect with (was that before or after the Jumps began?).

She lived well, until the last years. Until the Last War. She thought about offing herself during it--hell, all the way back in 2016, when the election started it all--but it was so strange, so unreal (in contrast to the rest of this timeline), that she felt compelled to watch it unfold, to see if it had any grand significance. Admittedly, watching Donald Trump unfold into a world-devouring tentacle monster wasn't exactly how she pictured this world ending, but it sure was satisfying to blow a hole in his carapace and shatter that fucking Nightmare Shard right in his asshole.

Before the war got too intense, she of course had the good sense to pack a few things away for a rainy day, including some pretty snazzy weaponry (which she's saving for aforementioned rainy day), an iPhone 15 (with charger, of course), and a laptop with a downloaded copy of Wikipedia on it. Because that's what you do. And chargers. Lots of chargers. And USB cables. And spare batteries...oh wait.