History GoMadFromTheRevelation / TabletopGames

* ''TabletopGame/{{Toon}}'': Since Toons are, by their very nature, already nutty, exposure to Things Toons Were Not Meant to Know instead drives them '''sane'''. This can lead to dire fates such as becoming a public accountant or taking up stamp collecting.

** ''Lankhmar: The New Adventures of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser''. Sheelba of the Eyeless Face says that any mortal viewing her true form would be driven mad. Likewise, it is said that anyone who views Ningauble will go insane.

** ''Lankhmar: The New Adventures of Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser''. Sheelba of the Eyeless Face says that any mortal viewing her true form would be driven mad. Likewise, it is said that anyone who views Ningauble will go insane.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'': A mage named Nethys got a look at the fundamental secrets of reality, and the experience 1) [[DeityOfHumanOrigin ascended him to godhood]] and 2) snapped his mind [[DualityMotif clean in half]]. He's now the god of magic -- ''all'' magic, regardless of scale or purpose, and blesses every kind of magical research, from "creating a new spell to feed a nation in a famine" to "hey, I bet if I combine these concepts I can rain horrible death from the sky".

* In the ''TabletopGame/AllFleshMustBeEaten'' supplement ''Pulp Zombies'', Zaxxor in the "Zombies Inc." Deadworld discovered, quite by accident, a way to reanimate the dead as intelligent zombies (the exact degree of intelligence depending on how long they were dead before the process). The realization that this blew a hole through ''everything'' he had ever believed about the afterlife shattered his psyche, and the only way he found to cope was through turning to megalomania and crime. The end result is the campaign's BigBad.

** The ''TabletopGame/CallOfCthulhu'' adventure "City Beneath the Sands" actually turns this trope ''against'' the EldritchAbomination. [[spoiler: If the heroes fail to prevent the bad guys from linking their sleeping god-alien's mind with the collective subconscious of human dreamers everywhere, it's the ''god'' that goes mad, overwhelmed by contact with millions of human psyches (which are just as disturbing to it as vice versa). Sleepers worldwide just mainline nightmares for a night.]]

** The ''TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}}'' campaign setting had tons of things that could drive a character insane, or at least prompt a Madness Check. Like direct mind-to-mind contact with a fiend. More common are Horror Checks (which cause lasting mental trauma, but usually not insanity) and Fear Checks (which simply cause the victim to panic.)

** The Arcanis world-setting, along with the Living Arcanis campaign, featured Larissa. She started as the goddess of Fate, Prophecy, and all that jazz but one day she looked too far into the future and, well, went mad from the revelation. Now she's the goddess of sensuality, lust, and ladies (and men) of the evening. Apparently she's convinced that the fate she saw will come to pass and that she needs to get in as much pleasure now before it all goes kablooey.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer}}'' and ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''

-->'''Inquisitor Czevak:''' Ask not the Eldar a question for they will give you three answers, all of which are true and terrifying to know.
** And then, because ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'' takes everything up to eleven, we have Kairos Fateweaver. Kairos was a freaking ''daemon'' whose god, Tzeentch, threw him into the Well of Eternity, a pool of infinite knowledge. Kairos came back with full knowledge of the past, present, and future, as well as two heads which are both insane. At any time one of them lies and the other tells the truth. Let's be absolutely clear: the premier avatar of the Warhammer 40,000 universe's god of knowledge and fate ''went insane when it found out the truth about the universe'', every other aspect of the god that's tried it ''did not survive'', and the god himself is ''too scared to look''. [[CrapsackWorld Crapsack universe]] doesn't begin to describe this place.

* The Black Spiral Dancers from ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse'' get their name because every last one of them walked the Black Spiral Labyrinth, an equally metaphorical and literal path that brought them face-to-face with the Wyrm (the cosmic embodiment of suffering and hatred). The Black Spiral Labyrinth is a nightmarish spiritual realm within the mind of the Wyrm, with nine circles that test and torment visitors. The experience breaks the minds of all but the most strong-willed like a twig. Many Black Spiral Dancers take their deed name after whatever pathetic growls or mewling noises come out of their mouth upon "revelation."
** Similarly, the Weaver, originally a cosmic embodiment of order and purpose, went insane and became an all-consuming force for stasis. In one version of the story, the Weaver tried to define the Wyld (a cosmic embodiment of primal chaos) and got the biggest "DOES NOT COMPUTE" in history. In another version, the Weaver experienced an existential crisis after the Wyld kept changing its creations and the Wyrm kept destroying them, driving it insane.

** Over in the TabletopGame/{{New World of Darkness}}, the Bale Hounds of ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheForsaken'' are said to have completely gone off their collective nut on finding the site of Father Wolf's murder.

** And then, because ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'' takes everything UpToEleven, we have Kairos Fateweaver. Kairos was a freaking ''daemon'' whose god, Tzeentch, threw him into the Well of Eternity, a pool of infinite knowledge. Kairos came back with full knowledge of the past, present, and future, as well as two heads which are both insane. At any time one of them lies and the other tells the truth. Let's be absolutely clear: the premier avatar of the Warhammer 40,000 universe's god of knowledge and fate ''went insane when it found out the truth about the universe'', every other aspect of the god that's tried it ''did not survive'', and the god himself is ''too scared to look''. [[CrapsackWorld Crapsack universe]] doesn't begin to describe this place.

* This is a common consequence of trucking with the Abyss in ''TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening''. The things that live in there include such friendly fellows as the Nemesis Continuum, a set of Abyssal ''scientific proofs'' that burn themselves into your cerebral cortex and force you to derive more and more of them - and as you prove they exist, they begin to alter the physical laws of the world. (For example, you might "prove" that gravity follows Aristolian and not Newtonian laws - and suddenly objects start falling at different speeds.) Or take the Abyssal Assistant, a nifty tool that lets you invent things that aren't physically possible - too bad it makes you ''addicted'' to building them, and the more you build, the worse your health (and the health of the surrounding neighborhood) gets. If you're lucky, ''only'' your mind will be shot to pieces by the time the Guardians of the Veil arrive to clean up the mess...

* In ''TabletopGame/TheOthers2015'', a corruption story is played with the Dark Past cards labeled 1 through 7. 1 is the best, labeled "Clear Conscience", however it is the only one that doesn't harm the character. 2 is "Slightly Troubled", and your character is damaged due to something that is bothering their mind. 3 is "The Guilty One" and causes the apocalypse track to raise when revealed. 4 is "Former Hell Club" and the player remembers their past and takes either 3 wounds or 3 corruption. 5 is "Psychopathy Trigger" and the player goes nuts, damaging themselves and all nearby players for two wounds. 6 is "Suicide Pact" and kills the player at the end of the round. Finally, 7 is "the Tainted One" and your character is forcibly taken control of by The Sin. All of these cards are activated by using corruption or being too corrupted by the enemy.

* ''TabletopGame/UnknownArmies''

* In ''TabletopGame/TheOthers''a corruption story is played with the Dark Past cards labeled 1 through 7. 1 is the best, labeled "Clear Conscience", however it is the only one that doesn't harm the character. 2 is "Slightly Troubled", and your character is damaged due to something that is bothering their mind. 3 is "The Guilty One" and causes the apocalypse track to raise when revealed. 4 is "Former Hell Club" and the player remembers their past and takes either 3 wounds or 3 corruption. 5 is "Psychopathy Trigger" and the player goes nuts, damaging themselves and all nearby players for two wounds. 6 is "Suicide Pact" and kills the player at the end of the round. Finally, 7 is "the Tainted One" and your character is forcibly taken control of by The Sin. All of these cards are activated by using corruption or being too corrupted by the enemy.

** You are a normal guy who realizes that humanity is just the playthings of vampires, werewolves, fairies, zombies, etc, and always has been since the dawn of time. The voices in your head telling you this is the truth doesn't exactly help.

* ''TabletopGame/MageTheAscension''. One could say that Awakening to the realization that all reality is controlled by the belief of people, that your beliefs can change it more than others, and that humanity has become an apathetic race unwilling to realize the wonderment of the world is simply the start of a long, torturous road to death or complete insanity. Some Mages make the (subconscious) decision to reject any reality but their own, wrapping themselves in a bubble of delusion, and unable to see anything outside it, eventually being ejected from the fabric of the world itself. Some Mages become brainwashed into reinforcing the frozen reality as it is (i.e. science) forming a contradiction in themselves against their dynamic nature. Then there's the Nephandi, the depths of depravity who would sell humanity out to [[EldritchAbomination Demons]] just [[DealWithTheDevil for power]]. Since, by being a mage, you change reality with your beliefs just by existing, you're constantly violating general reality, you're always a little off even if you can avoid those three disastrous paths above.

** A more mundane (and comedic) example is with the orks. When a Waaagh leaves a planet the spores left behind will produce feral orks who have no access or concept of technology; if a tribe of feral orks is shown technology more complex than a basic steam engine or catapult they will completely lose their minds becoming 'madboyz'.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'': A mage named Nethys got a look at the fundamental secrets of reality, and the experience 1) [[DeityOfHumanOrigin ascended him to godhood]] and 2) snapped his mind [[DualityMotif clean in half]]. He's now the god of magic -- ''all'' magic, regardless of scale or purpose, and blesses every kind of magical research, from "creating a new spell to feed a nation in a famine" to "hey, I bet if I combine these concepts I can rain horrible death from the sky".
** Something like this also happened to the god Zon-Kuthon. Once a god of art and beauty named Dou-Bral, he felt jealous of his twin sister Shelyn being AlwaysSomeoneBetter, and left to explore the cosmos for inspiration. He encountered [[EldritchAbomination something]] that warped his mind, and returned as Zon-Kuthon, the twisted god of pain and darkness.
* The Black Spiral Dancers from ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse'' get their name because every last one of them walked the Black Spiral Labyrinth, an equally metaphorical and literal path that brought them face-to-face with the Wyrm (the cosmic embodiment of suffering and hatred). The Black Spiral Labyrinth is a nightmarish spiritual realm within the mind of the Wyrm, with nine circles that test and torment visitors. The experience breaks the minds of all but the most strong-willed like a twig. Many Black Spiral Dancers take their deed name after whatever pathetic growls or mewling noises come out of their mouth upon "revelation."
** Similarly, the Weaver, originally a cosmic embodiment of order and purpose, went insane and became an all-consuming force for stasis. In one version of the story, the Weaver tried to define the Wyld (a cosmic embodiment of primal chaos) and got the biggest "DOES NOT COMPUTE" in history. In another version, the Weaver experienced an existential crisis after the Wyld kept changing its creations and the Wyrm kept destroying them, driving it insane.
** The Wyrm itself was originally a general [[DarkIsNotEvil elegant destroyer]] [[BalanceBetweenGoodAndEvil to keep pattern from overwhelming order]] and provide fresh unordered energy for the Wyld, before the Weaver tied it up. The central Wyrm went mad from the impossibility of essentially imprisoning a fireball with string, and what few pieces escaped went crazy from realizing what had happened to the world without them.
** Over in the TabletopGame/{{New World of Darkness}}, the Bale Hounds of ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheForsaken'' are said to have completely gone off their collective nut on finding the site of Father Wolf's murder.
* In ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'', this is the schtick of the insane seers of Clan Malkavian, and is also a popular trait amongst the utterly inhuman Tzimisce.
* Fan game ''TabletopGame/GeniusTheTransgression'' has the [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder Genius condition]] being somewhat contagious- exposure to mad science can turn an ordinary human into a [[TheIgor Beholden]], or even cause a Breakthrough to becoming a full fledged [[MadScientist Genius]]. This isn't generally encouraged as [[PerpetualPoverty there's enough fighting over resources]] as it is.
* ''TabletopGame/MageTheAscension''. One could say that Awakening to the realization that all reality is controlled by the belief of people, that your beliefs can change it more than others, and that humanity has become an apathetic race unwilling to realize the wonderment of the world is simply the start of a long, torturous road to death or complete insanity. Some Mages make the (subconscious) decision to reject any reality but their own, wrapping themselves in a bubble of delusion, and unable to see anything outside it, eventually being ejected from the fabric of the world itself. Some Mages become brainwashed into reinforcing the frozen reality as it is (i.e. science) forming a contradiction in themselves against their dynamic nature. Then there's the Nephandi, the depths of depravity who would sell humanity out to [[EldritchAbomination Demons]] just [[DealWithTheDevil for power]]. Since, by being a mage, you change reality with your beliefs just by existing, you're constantly violating general reality, you're always a little off even if you can avoid those three disastrous paths above.

* ''TabletopGame/CallOfCthulhu''
** This game can (appropriately enough) be basically considered the TropeCodifier at least as far as role-playing games are concerned. Practically everything even mildly disturbing to a character's worldview has a chance of nibbling away at his or her sanity score, and full exposure to the horrors of the Mythos can cause him or her to snap (temporarily or permanently) rather quickly; thus, part of the challenge of playing is puzzling out a solution to the problems and pitfalls posed by the scenario without learning ''too much'' in the bargain. One edition of the rulebook even joked about it: "The only game where the big prize for finishing an adventure is a moldy old book which, when read, causes your face to melt off."
** ''TabletopGame/CthulhuTech'', on the other hand, plays with this. Reading arcane texts, for example, can slowly drive you over the brink, as you'd expect exposure to the Necronomicon would. So does exposure to god-like aliens or their avatars or anything else that every natural law is struggling against. Realizing that the [[BodyHorror Doahanoids]] you [[ShootTheDog vaporized with a charge cannon]] ''weren't'' isn't good for your grip on reality, either. However, since the JapaneseMediaTropes the game adds to the Mythos call for a certain level of idealism, society at large is entirely aware of these effects, and [[ThereAreNoTherapists There Are Therapists]] to reduce or eliminate the dementia characters gain.
** The ''TabletopGame/CallOfCthulhu'' adventure "City Beneath the Sands" actually turns this trope ''against'' the EldritchAbomination. [[spoiler: If the heroes fail to prevent the bad guys from linking their sleeping god-alien's mind with the collective subconscious of human dreamers everywhere, it's the ''god'' that goes mad, overwhelmed by contact with millions of human psyches (which are just as disturbing to it as vice versa). Sleepers worldwide just mainline nightmares for a night.]]
** 7th Edition has an optional rule called "Mythos Hardening" that downplays this: If you ever manage to survive having more points in Mythos Lore than your current sanity, you'll only lose half as much sanity points from all sources from then on, even if you become more sane later.

* ''TabletopGame/UnknownArmies''
** The Madness Meters have many varieties of ways to show how a multitude of stressful experiences, among them anything dealing with the supernatural, can either harden you into a sociopath or drive you insane.\\\
The Unnatural Madness Meter is meant to represent the psychological strain of seeing something that doesn't conform to your worldview, not the inability to comprehend or accept what you've seen. One of the themes in the game is that magic and the supernatural may be weird and freaky, even to those that are clued in, but it is also part of the world and is not beyond understanding. Even {{Reality Warper}}s aren't an offense to that natural order of things, but the ones that dictate and sometimes change the natural order as needed. The {{Muggles}} also aren't as helpless as with most [[TheMasquerade Masquerades]] [[spoiler: and are in fact the ultimate source of magical power due to a symbolic variant of ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve.]]
* ''[[TabletopGame/VictorianaRPG Victoriana]]'' demonologists have a spell that can expose the recipient to all the beauty of Entropy in two seconds. The recipient invariably goes mad (at least temporarily).
* ''TabletopGame/{{Nobilis}}'' has a variant in Dementia Animus. If you are a mortal who succumbs to this as a result of witnessing miracles, you don't go mad; you go sane in such a way that you can see Mythic Reality, in which everything has a spirit and there's a guy holding up the sky. Of course, to everyone else who ''cannot'' see the spirit of your toaster, you appear totally bonkers and will usually come to a bad end. Fortunately, at least in third edition, you can receive succor, and forget what you have seen, by meeting Surolam, the dog-headed god of ordinary things.
* This is what Insight and Madness stunt dice represent in the LovecraftLite ''TabletopGame/{{Fiasco}}'' playset [[http://bullypulpitgames.com/fiasco-playset-special-unaussprechlichen-klutzen/ Unausspreclichen Klutzen]]. When you get the Madness die, you go mad. When you get the Insight die, you go mad...but, you know, in a happy way.
* In ''TabletopGame/TheOthers''a corruption story is played with the Dark Past cards labeled 1 through 7. 1 is the best, labeled "Clear Conscience", however it is the only one that doesn't harm the character. 2 is "Slightly Troubled", and your character is damaged due to something that is bothering their mind. 3 is "The Guilty One" and causes the apocalypse track to raise when revealed. 4 is "Former Hell Club" and the player remembers their past and takes either 3 wounds or 3 corruption. 5 is "Psychopathy Trigger" and the player goes nuts, damaging themselves and all nearby players for two wounds. 6 is "Suicide Pact" and kills the player at the end of the round. Finally, 7 is "the Tainted One" and your character is forcibly taken control of by The Sin. All of these cards are activated by using corruption or being too corrupted by the enemy.

** Many people who encounter the daemons of Chaos, especially the daemons of Tzeentch and Nurgle. (It's the smell, really...)