033: Octopus Slipper

ENTRY 033: Octopus Slipper

In their efforts to combat the psychological trauma and mitigate the integration experience associated with resleeving, the psychosurgeons of Glitch have begun experimenting with artificial experience narratives to ease the transition between sleeves, or from physical morph to infomorph. Essentially immersive roleplaying games with psychosurgical analytical tools and scenarios embedded in them, the transhuman player slowly becomes adapted to their new existence by scenarios that run the gamut from leveling up and changing class to ritual initiation and spiritual reincarnation to birth and puberty analogues.

The original suite of resleeving therapy psychosurgery programs were pirated by enterprising hackers and eventually found their market as a breed of petal most commonly known as Octopus Slipper, a bluish-pink artificial orchid with eight slipper-shaped pouch-like petals surrounding a coiled pseudo-stamen that smells like cinnamon and old papyrus. Aside from being mildly addictive roleplaying scenarios, users of Octopus Slipper are still subject to the subtle psychosurgical therapy routines embedded in the petal code.

Both petal and psychosurgery can help transhumans transition to new sleeves easier—or cause alienation as the user’s self-image shifts out of synch with their current morph. Users may end up feeling like an octopus-morph trapped in the body of an Olympian, unable to recognize the body they inhabit as their own, and attempt self-harm or retreat into the fantasies of Octopus Slipper to escape the prison of their own morph.

Resleeving Therapy Psychsurgery Mechanics

Resleeving Therapy follows the usual Psychosurgery rules from Eclipse Phase, pp.229-32)

Timeframe: 1 week per +10 (max. 3 weeks/+30)

PM: +0

SV: 1 per +10

Resleeving therapy is design to acclimate transhumans planning to resleeve to their new bodies by using specialized roleplaying software to experience a narrative transition and familiarize the character with the new form. A successful Psychosurgery Test provides a +10 bonus to Integration and Alienation Tests for the character’s next resleeving.

Resleeving therapy is aimed at acclimating the character to a specific type of morph; the bonus does not apply if they choose to resleeve into a body of a markedly different type.

Octopus Slipper Mechanics

Type	Application	Duration	Addiction Modifier	Addiction Type	Cost
Nano	O	4 hours	-1	Mental	Low

Each dose of Octopus Slipper provides a cumulative +1 bonus (max +30) to Integration and Alienation Tests (Eclipse Phase, pp.271-2). However, if the user does not resleeve within (20 – cumulative bonus) days of taking the dose, they must make an Alienation Test (Eclipse Phase, p.272) as if they had resleeved into their current form, with a -30 penalty.

Octopus Slipper acclimates the character to a specific type of morph; the bonus to the Integration and Alienation Tests counts as a penalty if they choose to resleeve into a body of a markedly different type.

Sweets

• Hardcore (spend 16+ hours a day on Octopus Slipper): The user unlocks additional transformation options. They may effectively choose which morph the bonus from Octopus Slipper applies to.
• Extra Levels (random once addicted to Octopus Slipper): The maximum bonus the user may accumulate from Octopus Slipper increases by +10.
• Coupon (character gets +30 bonus and successfully resleeves into the appropriate morph): Character stumbles receives a coupon code for free psychosurgery sessions, redeemable at the original resleeving therapy clinic on Glitch, in exchange for answering a brief questionnaire.