The GM Guide to Handling NPC Time Travel in RPs
Don't.
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Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
The most famous example of this is the "grandfather clause", and often includes the concept of a time machine: John's grandfather builds a time machine for the first time at C, which John steals and travels down to B, where his grandfather is a young boy having sired no offspring. John kills the boy either deliberately or accidentally, and finds himself with a time machine that will not be invented, and himself never being born, and therefore unable to go back in time to kill his grandfather.
The illustration postulates that with every alteration of the earlier timeline, a new universe is created. This supposedly eliminates paradox, by allowing a violating spanner free reign to change anything he pleases and enter a fresh universe more tailored to his likes.
Both the foregoing examples - and many other arguments - presume the actions of a single sentient group or individual spanner acting only upon unwitting levellers and inanimate objects. This is not the state of spacetime, of course. See also Appendix A, Fallacies and Follies.
This illustration shows the common belief that time travel would impact the universe in much the same way. Every action, however paradoxical, would recycle back into the fabric of reality through some (usually ill-defined) natural means, like a stream washing dumped poisons away.
But causality is not a renewable resource. Some narcissists hope - even expect - that the universe will either get along around their desires, or some thing will stop them from playing with the universe, and no serious harm done. "Events will conspire against you."
Events don't conspire, people do. What's more, events can't conspire and people can . This is sentient force. The price of this freedom of time is responsibility for it, and this responsibility is backed up by the fear of one's very existence. In this regard, time travel is never a game. See also Appendix A.
The light gray lines inside the white timeline arrow represent a spanner living in level time. The dark gray lines are merely aids to visualize the direction and destination of individual spans, and are not to scale by any means.
At any point marked D, the spanner may be entering to stop an incident of frag, (as shown in Illustration D1). It is this ceaseless sequence of applied sentient force that keeps spacetime solid and on track. The thrust of the expanding universe, rushing away from the Big Bang, is why there is time.
1. Without breaking through the paper, make a very light scoring with a drafting knife from A to B, increasing pressure slightly as you go along.
2. Now from B to C, making the cut through the paper.
3. At C begins what is called the As/As Not, the point beyond which natural paradoxes do not heal, but collapse the universe instead. Cut this branching area cleanly.
4. Now tear (not cut) the page up to the line at D. Fold at D, and curl the peninsula of paper so that it lifts.
Explanation
An instance of paradox begins (A) and either reverts to a non-paradox state without effect at (B) or it increases effect until (C). At C comes the As/AsNot, the beginning of collapse and the tearing of causality.
A spanner who has created a paradox has the main responsibility to fix it in his Yet, even if that paradox caused him no frag. (Note that fragging the narcissist who has created a deliberate paradox is usually fixing not creating the paradox!)
5. Never let the bit of paper be torn out of the book; it's a good exercise.
Sphere of Annihilation
time travel is best when either seriously and meticulously overthought, or given barely any thought at all