groundrules | applications

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applications

applications

APPLICATIONS

Eastbound is primarily an invite-only game — each existing player can currently invite up to one person per month, or get in touch about further invites. Existing players can hold two characters in game. A third character can be applied, if players can prove they have met activity requirements for two consecutive months with their existing two characters and have stayed engaged with the game. If you don't have an invite, somehow stumbled upon this neck of the woods, and you’d like to stay, drop the mod journal a line — we'll try to figure it out.

As of Oct. 1, cast/game caps are off. Please note, as of Dec. 1, Eastbound only has 3-4 months of gameplay left.

WHAT CHARACTERS CAN BE APPLIED?

YES: canon and original characters, if they have a solid and consistent personality and background. Characters brought in after they've died are a-okay. For characters taken from a time point just as they're in the process of dying, please read below on meeting medical requirements.

NO (at this time): real people, original characters set in a canon environment, characters from canons or canon instalments that have been released for less than one month, characters with imported development from other games (CRAU), alternate universe, or gender-swapped versions of canon characters.

Children or characters with very specific medical/magical/environment needs: appable, but please make a note of how your character will ICly meet their requirements and stay alive. Likewise, if you are applying for a character taken just as they're dying, provide a suggestion for how they can be kept alive on arrival (this might be easier in some app cycles than others). You can bend the world a little to make miracles happen (ex: a substitute for the medication your character needs to survive can be found for a high price at certain apothecaries, etc.)

Characters that were dropped or swept by activity checks: yes, but they’ll come back without their previous memories, if they are applied in by a different player.

APPLICATION FORM & INSTRUCTIONS

EXISTING / RETURNING PLAYERS

NEW PLAYERS

PLAYER NAME: 
CONTACT:
REFERRED BY: Who invited you, please? c:

CHARACTER: 
CANON:
CANON POINT:

BACKGROUND: written or linked history both fine. Bullet points also a-okay. If no information is available in English, please write this out in short.

ABILITIES | POWERS: Include any relevant power restrictions, so you don’t break our playground.

PERSONALITY: make sure this ties back to the character’s time point and background.

SAMPLE: one or more samples to showcase the nuances of your character’s personality. Submit at least one prose sample of five comments or more. You can link memes, PSL or other game threads, provided they took place within the last 12 months. You can also write a single prose sample in the game or character canon setting, if you think you can cover good introspective ground that way, or a top level with enough variety to show how the character engages in various scenarios. 
 
INVENTORY: No world-breaking items. For living or magical beings, or anything colossal (think... Gundams...) please let's talk beforehand!

SUITABILITY: Eastbound is a plot-heavy game that typically features sleuthing, action and the undead. How is your character likely to deal with all that (and the game bear)?

NOTES: Are there any particular accommodations your character will need? How do you propose to handle that?

APPLICATIONS CLOSED

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Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Sound Hellblazer retcon, did not expect that. Happy to have him. Just a few things:

— Regarding his powers — that all sounds great, especially with opt-ins. You don't have to nerf demon summons too much as long as they're not game-breaking. They come with the territory, let the man live.

— Now, since he does have experience with necromancy, be aware that he'll count as death-sensitive for us. You'll see in some write-ups that characters with that characteristic sometimes experience plot developments in a slightly different way (ex: the undead are drawn to them more, or they're more easily enthralled by the death lieges, or whatever the death issue du jour is).

— In Arc IV: Serthica, characters are mod-assigned a base location between citadel halves Eidris and Minaras and a false identity. They can still discreetly infiltrate the other citadel half, and this is mostly just to figure out where he's based most of the time. Which do you prefer for him, Eidris or Minaras?

Good to know about the demon summoning since it's, like you said, his thing. I'll still ask for mod permission beforehand, though, since it's technically ~boundaries between worlds~ stuff, or would you prefer I not? Likewise, would upping the count to say two per arc be okay?

Necromancy is more of a rarity for him, so it's something I always intended to treat with care. Good to know about the added layer of risk; thank you.

Minaras please and thank you!

Look, if it's just the equivalent of, "John summons a little extra brawn for this here fight," don't bother. If it's big (large scale, or giving a deep advantage over mystery reveals), get in touch.

Your acceptance notes in shortly.

Got it. Thanks for the patience and quick response dude o/

Let's go with Minaras!

Thank you for your application!

ADMIN

When you have a second, have a last read through the game rules and comment to the TAKEN LIST.

Join

eastbound,

lostcompass,

westwhere. Feel free to make an OOC intro post on

lostcompass, if you want, or wait for the intro & CR meme due up on 16 October!

All game updates are posted on

lostcompass, but you can also follow

eastbound. You’ll get a private message with an invite to the informal game discord server, once you comment to the Taken List.

If you’re not already served on that front, we have some custom codes to help you set up a character inbox or permissions post. Both are entirely optional, and feel free to customise at will!

Your character is exempted from activity requirements this month.

We are now in Arc IV: Sethica, and our latest game-wide event was The Unwinding. Your character can reach out to NPCs for investigations at any time. You can also handwave they’ve been brought up to date with the Arc Story So Far by party member NPC Karsa, if you so choose.

NOTES

Your character receives one of the shiny new Arc IV pocket watch translators and communicators, allowing written, video and audio interaction. It contains an inevitable clock portion, whose beat seems to get louder as time ticks towards 6:00 and 18:00. A sharp, tinny alarm rings at these times.

Lila is formally assigned to Minaras, where she is a sad trombone, piano and other musical instruments tuner: to your great joy and enthusiasm, you have the excuse to access many a (rich) establishment, listen to the banging of rambunctious children, and fix all musical wrongs.

Lila pre-assigned network username is pretty-pretty butterfly.

INTRO

Lila joins the party at the end of the the U n w i n d i n g event. She wakes with everyone else in the Mouse House orphanage run by Ma’am Mariol, while the group negotiates its safe return overground.

The Merchant contacts her and Master John Constantine with a brief assignment, facilitated by miniature transportation beacons that deliver them to the lighthouse of Ellethia — a now barren island overcome by plush vegetation that spawns fresh each morning and wilts at night. Nothing truly dies here. Formerly an academic and learning institute, the lighthouse was the first site assailed by the undead — and the tower’s interiors show numerous scars of scratches, tearing and debris. Ghosts live everywhere.

The party has previously visited here to uncover the dark past of Ellethia, leaving it a… slightly safer space in wake of their travel. Lila and John are tasked to find and retrieve one or more of the white uniforms worn by the previous workers of the institutes. The garments seem to be absent.

While inspecting the remains, Lila will run into the locked chamber of the Sleepers, where an engraving urges visitors to make a wish as their price of entry. Unknown to John and Lila, these wishes always come true, but take a turn for misfortune.

Per our discussion, if Lila makes a wish along the lines of wanting her pregnancy or child to be safe, the door will allow both John and she to enter, and you can find several torn, but recognisable white uniforms inside. Both John and Lila can grab a few, if they so wish.

The Merchant will want them to ask the group if the ‘man in white’ observed during the U n w i n d i n g was wearing one such uniform. Lila and John can ascertain the answer is yes. You can put that in an OOC note, if you decide to make a network post about it, so other players know that’s the man-in-white’s regalia — confirming the Merchant’s suspicion that the stranger is a survivor of the institute of Ellethia.

If you decide to take the post route, feel free to do that at any point over the next 10 days.

Again, to make things exceptionally convenient, assume travel to and from the lighthouse is done via transporter beacon and takes a strategic few seconds each way. Magic, man. Who needs diesel.

If you fine folks want to talk amongst yourselves about anything regarding this (or just have questions!), feel free to throw them here.

Thank you for your application!

ADMIN

When you have a second, have a last read through the game rules and comment to the TAKEN LIST.

Join

eastbound,

lostcompass,

westwhere. Feel free to make an OOC intro post on

lostcompass, if you want, or wait for the intro & CR meme due up on 16 October!

All game updates are posted on

lostcompass, but you can also follow

eastbound. You’ll get a private message with an invite to the informal game discord server, once you comment to the Taken List.

If you’re not already served on that front, we have some custom codes to help you set up a character inbox or permissions post. Both are entirely optional, and feel free to customise at will!

Your character is exempted from activity requirements this month.

NOTES

John is formally assigned to Minaras, where he is a public conduct disciplinarian: if someone spits on the road or curses or exhibits the wretchedness of their bared ankle, it is your job, nay duty, to preach until they've been set on their righteous, community and virtue-loving path.

…yes, John can hold on to any cigarettes, opiates and other trinkets he confiscates in the name of public decency.

John’s pre-assigned network username is wooden dice.

INTRO

John joins the party at the end of the the U n w i n d i n g event. He wakes with everyone else in the Mouse House orphanage run by Ma’am Mariol, while the group negotiates its safe return overground.

The Merchant contacts him and Lila Pitts with a brief assignment, facilitated by miniature transportation beacons that deliver them to the lighthouse of Ellethia — a now barren island overcome by plush vegetation that spawns fresh each morning and wilts at night. Nothing truly dies here. Formerly an academic and learning institute, the lighthouse was the first site assailed by the undead — and the tower’s interiors show numerous scars of scratches, tearing and debris. Ghosts live everywhere.

The party has previously visited here to uncover the dark past of Ellethia, leaving it a… slightly safer space in wake of their travel. Lila and John are tasked to find and retrieve one or more of the white uniforms worn by the previous workers of the institutes. The garments seem to be absent.

While inspecting the remains, Lila will run into the locked chamber of the Sleepers, where an engraving urges visitors to make a wish as their price of entry. Unknown to John and Lila, these wishes always come true, but take a turn for misfortune.

Lila is set to make a wish, which will allow both John and she to enter. You can drop a line if you also want John to make a wish, just recall the aforementioned warning. You can find several torn, but recognisable white uniforms inside. Both John and Lila can grab a few, if they so wish.

The Merchant will want them to ask the group if the ‘man in white’ observed during the U n w i n d i n g was wearing one such uniform. Lila and John can ascertain the answer is yes. You can put that in an OOC note, if you decide to make a network post about it, so other players know this is the man-in-white’s regalia — confirming the Merchant’s suspicion that the stranger is a survivor of the institute of Ellethia.

If you decide to take the post route, feel free to do that at any point over the next 10 days.

Again, to make things exceptionally convenient, assume travel to and from the lighthouse is done via transporter beacon and takes a strategic few seconds each way. Magic, man. Who needs diesel.

If you fine folks want to talk amongst yourselves about anything regarding this (or just have questions!), feel free to throw them here.

So, since we've got Vi in this round, and you've chosen different citadel alignments — would you like a common intro?

Full disclosure: I'm asking the Vi player the same thing, and I'd need both of you to agree to the common intro to make it happen.

We've now had a Caitlyn in this round — since you've chosen different citadel alignments, would you like a common intro?

As a heads up: I'm asking the Caitlyn player the same thing. Both of you would need to agree to a common intro for it to happen.

By common intro, you mean like they're linked? That's totally cool with me, if it can work with the different alignments!

Yeah, the intro'd be in the Mouse House, where everyone is recovering from the Unwinding — I figured common intro, since different alignments means fewer chances for Vi and Caitlyn to hang out at first.

Got it! Sounds good to me.

A common intro sounds great!

PLAYER NAME: Tessa
CONTACT: pm
HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE GAME?: TDM (linked below in samples)

CHARACTER: Wanda Maximoff
CANON: MCU
CANON POINT: post-Multiverse of Madness

BACKGROUND: Wanda ❝Scarlet Witch❞ Maximoff — Marvel wiki link.

ABILITIES | POWERS:
I've proposed nerfs within here, but, of course, mods can modify those further as needed.

PSIONICS ➝ Wanda is able to move (including levitate and otherwise manipulate) a number of objects with her mind. She can pull things apart, and use this force to create a type of energy shield to protect herself and/or others. She can also send red energy blasts from her hands — this red energy also allows her to fly, levitate others, and perform actions such as filtering poison gas out of air or containing/causing explosions. She is also powerful enough to manipulate an infinity stone.

Wanda can read minds (thoughts/dreams), and mentally communicate with people. She can do this at a level that is shown to be a pretty narrow focus. Wanda can influence people mentally. She can put people in a trance-like state where she makes them see what she wants them to — things like their deepest fears, for example (though what they're afraid of isn't decided by her) — and trap them within that state while they interact with their hallucinations as if they're real. She experiences that along with them, though the victim is unaware of her being with them. With this, she can also influence the memories, actions, and thoughts of people, their emotions, senses, and feel their general aura. This ability also allows her to induce feelings of pain, or sleep, etc. She can also temporarily paralyze people with this.

CHAOS MAGIC ➝ Wanda has a form of chaos magic. Her magic is ill-defined in canon, so for game purposes, I am limiting it to the following spells with the following limitations:
✦ Teleportation— Wanda's teleportation associated with this will only allow her to teleport herself and up to two others a short distance.
✦ Cast spells to heal herself and others— however, if they die from their injuries, she cannot under any circumstances bring them back to life; she can only heal them as long as they're alive.
✦ Casting spells to transform one thing into another— She can handle anything that's up to the size of a human, so with this she can't do something like turn a large tree into a house or vice versa for example, but she COULD turn a coin into a sheet of paper for example.
✦ Conjuring liquid substances/solid substances/decor out of what seems like thin air— The limitations to this being that she cannot conjure living human beings under any circumstances, and can conjure any non-edible solid materials up to the size of a large car for usual playing purposes. Anything bigger than that would be impossible for usual gameplay and is therefore subject on my end OOCly to special plotting and mod permission. She can conjure up to five of each individual object (per month).
✦ Protection spells— These spells can protect a person or location from most magical or non-magical threats for up to one day before the spell wears off and she would have to recast the spell, unless she only makes the spell good for a lesser amount of time; if the threat were particularly large in scale -- like, a loooot of heavy weapons or just against magical forces more trained than hers, her spell would break under the pressure.
✦ Clairtangency— When she physically touches an object or person, this contact causes her to pick up a small amount of information from it (anything about the object or person; this can be history of an object or person, feelings/emotions of a person at the current time, or about a past event, et cetera). This won't happen every single time she touches something/someone, and no information will be obtained in threads unless discussed with all players involved about what she would find out beforehand, since I'm obviously not interested in using this to godmod/infomod. Same stipulations apply when it comes to finding out game metaplot info; mods will be chatted with first. Also, if your character is a robot/android/undead/etc, I will default to assuming, as with her telepathy, that she can't read their emotions or feelings, unless you'd prefer otherwise.
✦ Runes— She uses runes to do things like protect a room and make her magic the only usable one in it for a time.
✦ Astral projection— While she won't be able to travel to any actual other realms (i.e.: the afterlife, et cetera) in game, she will be able to use this more like she uses her teleportation ability. Except it's just teleportation for her astral self, not her physical self. She can only stay astral-ly projected for up to 30 minutes at a time without risk to her physical self; any longer and she'll be at risk of any number of things -- like her physical body being possessed, passing out, headaches, so on.

OTHER WEAKNESSES/POWER LIMITATIONS ➝ Even with her abilities, Wanda is still a regular human underneath that and can be killed by anything that would kill a regular human. Wanda's powers will not work on anyone who is immune to mental infiltration, or has any other kind of mental block skill that would not allow her to read their thoughts or otherwise mentally manipulate them. Any kind of sonic wave blasts sent at her will disrupt her focus enough to get her powers to be rendered temporarily unusable; shock fields of electricity will also block her powers. In games, I also play her powers to be something that doesn't work over network communications. As in, if she's communicating with someone via video/audio/text, she cannot use her telepathy on them during those mediums of interaction. Her telepathy is also null and void against any creature that does not have a living mind (i.e.: robots/androids would fall under this category, as would undead creatures like vampires).

PERSONALITY:

Wanda, a caring, perceptive individual lost her parents at the age of ten when the family’s apartment building was bombed (this tragedy planted a seed of vengeance in her; more on that later), but has been determined to turn the tragedy of growing up in the war zone into something meaningful. She and her twin Pietro were always front and centre in protests and riots against Western (USA, et al) powers at hand that were occupying and destabilizing Sokovia before hidden Hydra scientists approached them and promised the twins power. Not simply accepting their fates, Wanda and Pietro rebelled against it, supported each other and developed their co-dependent relationship. They balance each other out - Pietro convinced Wanda to participate in Strucker's experiments from the word ‘go’ and Wanda had to talk Pietro into not releasing Tony in Age of Ultron when they both held resentment for his Western weapons business.

Once she loses Pietro in the battle against Ultron, she presses on with her resilience by leaving Sokovia and joining the Avengers in New York. Seeing that SHIELD was not exactly the monster she had believed it to be, since they did show up to save her people, she gives them this chance -- despite her feeling guilt for her part in Ultron and what it did to Novi Grad and her brother. Wanda feels a need to prove both to herself and the world that she can be better than before. She grows stronger. Even in at the fight at the airport in Civil War, she knows more than anyone else what will happen to the ones that stay behind to try to press against Tony and his team -- what kind of place Ross will put them in, but she doesn't hesitate because she knows stopping Tony is more important.

After being tossed in the Raft, she's lost almost everything. Sokovia, her brother, her second home with the Avengers. The Avengers were her chance to find a new purpose and belonging, and she still looks for it now. Her instinct for kindness and protectiveness means that anyone who shows that to her will find her returning it to them. She can have trust issues, but she isn't so cold that she will be ice to everyone nice. Her anger and doubt can be her weaknesses, because if someone she loves is hurt, she will go fight hard at whatever or whoever wronged them, and she can get massive blinders and not see straight. Until a trusted friend comes along and talks her out of it. And despite her dark history, Wanda has found some light in dry sarcasm. She will tease her friends and family, lightly, in a blink and you might miss it, way. It keeps her going.

Moving mostly past her issues with the Avengers when she joined the team, and her issues with SHIELD, shifted her perception of how she can be a hero in this new age. She still hates Tony, but she can work with him. Even with Clint "retiring", she still has a soft spot for the Avenger who is like a father figure for her now, since his life is because Pietro gave up his. To close friends of her friends, she treats as close — when T'Challa went for Bucky, she protected Bucky, since he's Steve's friend — and she trusts Steve.

Wanda is still learning how to deal with failure and her powers. Her kindness means she wants to save everyone, but sometimes, as Steve says to her, that isn't always possible. Saving as many people as possible has to be good enough, even if it sucks that some people die. She wants her power to be enough, but it's not, and she can blame herself quickly for that. She expects so much of herself after gaining this power. However, once Wanda's made up her mind, she acts decisively and good fucking luck taking her out of it. She knows and is terrified of how destructive her powers can be, and how easily she can be made into a living weapon, which she tries hard not to be. Her confidence in knowing she has all of this power, and that constant fear in her own mind that she's going to mess up and kill people, eats away at her in an inner battle. Sometimes she ruminates in the guilt which motivates her to do better and be better, and also tells her to stand back and don't get involved lest people die.

Despite this, her vengeful nature comes back into play should people she cares about be in harm's way. Mostly, she takes actions which incapacitate (not harm) the threats to them, but if her loved one's lives are on the line? She's going for the kill. (Example A: In Infinity War, she threw shredded Proxima Midnight for almost killing Natasha.) When Wanda does have to kill, she surprisingly doesn't seem to show regret for that because she knew it had to be done, since it is a last resort for her.

After manipulating reality and holding a town hostage for a few weeks, Wanda is yet again isolating herself and trying to learn about her new chaos magic abilities. While also trying to figure out how to get back her children that she gave birth to in her fake reality, then had to erase. Grief is an understatement, but she's also motivated in a way she's never been motivated before.

That motivation plus the Darkhold's corruption leads her to send demons and monsters to hunt a young teen, America Chavez, a multiverse hopper, across the multiverse. Wanda believes America 's powers will allow Wanda to see her children again - the catch being that taking America's powers for such a purpose means killing America. Wanda sees this as a reasonable trade (curtesy of the Darkhold) and doesn't mind the action.

This pits her against Stephen Strange and the other sorcerers of Kamar-Taj.

Eventually, through her series of multiverse travels and fighting former allies, she breaks free from the Darkhold long enough to realize that it and killing America isn't the answer. She destroyed every universes darkhold by collapsing it's temple, with her inside. Her fate is TBD, but anyone who's read Children's Crusade in the comics probably knows what's coming.

SAMPLE: tdm | inbox from another game | top level from another game

INVENTORY: This outfit and if possible the Darkhold. I won't have her do anything game-breaky with the Darkhold, and any major use of it will be mod-approved for a plot well beforehand.

NOTES: She shouldn't need any particular accommodations, or anything unusual like that.

IF ACCEPTED, WOULD YOU WANT A PLOT-LIGHT OR PLOT-HEAVY CUSTOM INTRO? Either!

PLAYER NAME: Lia
CONTACT: cosmology#1563 on Discord
HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE GAME?: Test drive

CHARACTER: Yelena Belova
CANON: Marvel Cinematic Universe
CANON POINT: Following the Hawkeye finale

BACKGROUND: MCU Wiki

ABILITIES | POWERS: Yelena is a trained killer with a range of associated skills including marksmanship, hand-to-hand combat, and espionage.

PERSONALITY: For most of her life, Yelena Belova was chemically subjugated to kill for the Red Room. She describes this kind of brainwashing as different from psychological conditioning: "I'm talking about chemically altering brain functions... You're fully conscious but you don't know which part is you. I'm still not sure." She has years worth of traumatic experiences and destructive actions to unpack, and learning to trust is an uphill climb. In fact, she can't fully trust her own self, as she is still untangling the part of her that was brainwashed from the rest of her psyche. Even her early memories are a mess to navigate: she was happiest when she lived with her parents and sister in Ohio, six years old and oblivious to the truth that all four of them were spies sent to steal secrets from S.H.I.E.L.D. In a terrible twist of fate, those stolen secrets helped to develop the chemical agent used to control Yelena for the next 21 years. Such ironies are familiar to Yelena and influence her cynical outlook.

NATASHA: I was trying to actually do something good. To make up for all the pain and suffering that we caused. Trying to be more than just a trained killer.
YELENA: Well, then you were fooling yourself because pain and suffering is every day, and we are both still a trained killer.

Yelena is very direct: she doesn't sugarcoat her words, nor does she soothe herself with pretty lies. She accepts being a killer despite her lack of choice in the matter. Although she feels remorse for the lives she has ended, she doesn't fool herself that she can do anything to make up for her past. Instead, she takes each day at a time as she comes to terms with having free will and how to use it.

The Red Room was the sort of place that could burn the humanity out of someone. Remarkably, Yelena retains a strong sentimentality and even the capacity to be vulnerable in front of others. She expresses feeling betrayed by her "fake" family when they try to cheapen what was, for Yelena, a very meaningful and defining experience. She admits remorse over killing the widow that freed her. The strength of her emotions is so dependable that villains use it against her: Yelena's grief over her sister's death allowed her to be manipulated into an attempted revenge killing.

Yelena masks any fears or anxieties behind her sense of humor. In near-death situations, she jokes about whether or not the given scenario would be a cool way to die. After Natasha deals a low blow, saying Yelena is not her "real sister," Yelena responds by mocking Natasha's fighting style.

Since regaining her freedom, Yelena has developed her own version of a moral compass. It doesn't keep her from killing if the situation calls for it (see: revenge) but she does exhibit care for others. Even as she goes after the man she believes responsible for her sister's death, Yelena takes measures to keep others out of harm's way. She dedicates herself to freeing the remaining widows under chemical mind control and helping them adjust to new lives. Yelena would never think of herself as a hero, but she does believe that people are defined by what they do. The evidence suggests that part of her does want to be good, or at minimum, to do good.

SAMPLE: Test drive top level | Tag in | Tag in (Note: I'm hoping at least one of these will be up to five comments by the time apps close but if need be I will happily write another sample.)

INVENTORY: One black tactical suit, three hidden knives, a pair of Widow's Bite wrist tasers, and a handgun.

NOTES: N/A

IF ACCEPTED, WOULD YOU WANT A PLOT-LIGHT OR PLOT-HEAVY CUSTOM INTRO? I'm good with either!

PLAYER NAME: Molly
CONTACT:

marvelousmith
HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE GAME?: got a few threads going on in the TDM!

CHARACTER: Vrtra (“Varshahn”)
CANON: Final Fantasy XIV
CANON POINT: 6.2, just before walking back through the portal to the Source

BACKGROUND: First, a note on names: “Varshahn” is the name of his current simulacrum body, while “Vrtra” is his true name as a dragon. The game typically calls him Varshahn when he is on-screen in his simulacrum body, and Vrtra when he is on-screen as a dragon. He answers to both and states that he does not mind people more-or-less choosing which they want to call him.

Here is his wiki link, which has not yet been updated for the latest patch, 6.2. To complete his background, here's a brief summary of the patch:

Preparations for crossing into the Void are completed, and Y'shtola, Estinien and the Warrior of Light (i.e. the player character) meet up in Thavnair to get down to business. Vrtra arrives as Varshahn, but before they leave he is gifted a sort of “upgraded” adult body that can better fight and use magic. The four of them travel through the gate and fight their way through a ruined, haunted castle (the Fell Court of Troia). They discover that voidsent can regenerate after death, and that they are ruled over by the strongest among them, currently Golbez and the Four Archfiends. They befriend a half-voidsent woman whom they name “Zero” and, with her assistance, defeat one of the Archfiends, Scarmiglione. Zero knows how to essentially crystallize her fellow voidsent, preventing them from regenerating and thus killing them for real; she begrudgingly agrees to continue helping the team so long as they let her feed off of their aether. (Y'shtola volunteers her aether first, but later Varshahn offers his instead.) The Warrior manages to see into Scarmiglione's memories and sees that Golbez has captured Azdaja and is keeping her alive in stasis for unknown but doubtlessly evil reasons.

After some investigation, and while gaining further insight into the lives and culture of the voidsent, they are confronted by the second Archfiend, Barbariccia, who taunts them with knowledge of Azdaja's whereabouts if they can defeat her in battle. They do, but the Warrior is unable to get anything from her memories (and uh they killed her instead of questioning her, which wasn't the best move but whatever), and Zero is exhausted from the battle, forcing them to retreat. They step back through the portal to their home world with Zero in tow, and the patch ends with the Warrior and Varshahn showing her around Radz-at-Han and resting up for their next foray.

ABILITIES | POWERS: dragons in FFXIV are extremely powerful creatures, able to breathe fire and send out magical/sonic blasts, sustain themselves only on aether (magical energy), pop their eyes in and out of their skulls (and let others borrow them!), and so on. Most of these powers do not seem to translate to the Varshahn body, however.

Here is what we have seen him do as Varshahn:
- sense other dragons (including those “touched” by dragons such as Estinien) and possibly get a sense of other's powers or magics
- fight using sword and shield, or a lance
- use protective and destructive magics (i.e., he can tank or dps) including shielding others around him

Here are things that his dragon-self can do, with notes:
- sing/call to other dragons, which is “borne on the aether” (cannot be done by the simulacrum). It is somewhat implied that dragonsong has other magical properties, but these are not clearly defined. If there is ever an opportunity for Vrtra to sing in-game, I would probably play it as just “music that is incredibly moving and resonant within one's soul”.
- auto-translate their own language via telepathy (possibly can be done by the simulacrum?)
- breath fire/sonic blasts (won't be possible in-game)
- fly, including in outer space (nope)
- natural protection against corrupting magic/influences (presumably not relevant in-game)
- control lesser “scalekin” like crocodiles, pteranodons, etc. (presumably cannot be done by the simulacrum)

And finally, as a simulacrum rather than a real person, Varshahn presumably does not need to eat/drink/sleep and so forth, and can be “deactivated” by taking the eye out and putting it back in the dragon's skull. Vrtra is technically capable of moving and observing from both bodies at once, though in-game his dragon form will be miniaturized and confined to a pendant.

PERSONALITY: Vrtra's main personality points are devotion, self-sacrifice, and insecurity. He views all of Thavnair as his children, and has secretly guided and watched over them for generations. His love for them is strong enough to stop him from answering his brother's centuries-long call for blood after the brutal murder of his sister; he describes himself as hiding away and desperately hoping that the war does not come to his shores and disrupt his people's peace. Even when the Final Days come to Thavnair and warp its citizens beyond recognition, corrupting their aether and turning them into violent monstrosities, Vrtra hesitates to hurt them and mourns their loss deeply (“O capricious and cruel fate – they are undeserving of such condemnation...”). His love for his sister, too, has defined him for years; he spent centuries looking for a way to reach her after she became trapped in the void, and even after nominally giving up on the search, he quietly harbors hope that she is still alive. His normally calm demeanor gives way to concern and even frustration and anger when it is clear that she's still in danger during the events of patch 6.2.

While he protects and cares for Thavnair specifically, he also loves all of Eitherys and views it as his father did – the “last bastion of hope” in a universe filled with despair. In order to help save the lives of its people, he donates his own scales to research into protective wards. This results in a large, bloody wound across his side when the player first meets him; it is unknown exactly how many scales he's taken off of himself, or for how long he's been doing it, but it's obviously caused a great deal of pain and damage. He dismisses this as “a mere annoyance compared to the dreadful suffering inflicted upon this land and its people”. In terms of slightly less literal self-sacrifice, he's hidden himself away for most of his life in order to uphold peace and stability for his people, living confined in the mountain palace of Radz-at-Han and almost exclusively interacting with others through his living dolls. His only real companions have been the royal family, to which he gives all the credit of leadership to – even after he steps up and becomes the satrap officially, he speaks of the last satrap, Ahewann, with great respect and fondness, clearly seeing him as just as much of a leader as he himself is.

His arc in Endwalker is one of overcoming his insecurities and fear of rejection by his people. He describes himself (in detail) as just as frightening as the monsters created by the Final Days, and agonizes over the decision to reveal himself to his people, only relenting once Ahewann dies and Thavnair is left leaderless (and Estinien gives him a nice pep talk). As Varshahn, he introduces his dragon self to his people by asking them to remember that he means them no harm, despite his appearance; after the crisis of the Final Days is averted, he continues to use Varshahn as well as his real body to communicate with his people. His dragon model is also often posed as crouching low to the ground, unlike some of the other dragons we have seen previously, as though he is trying to make himself smaller or less intimidating.

Since he wanders around masquerading as a cute kid, he also appears to have a fanciful side; he plays the part of Varshahn well and is even noted to have joined the children of Radz-at-Han in their daily games. Even after he reveals himself and the true nature of “Varshahn”, the people of Thavnair continue to treat him in an affectionate manner, referring to him as their “little brother”, which he seems to enjoy and even encourage.

SAMPLE: The chiming of the clock is still reverberating inside of Varshahn’s horns as he blocks a knife-wielding mannequin’s attack. He has, unfortunately, been trapped in the dollhouse for over an hour by now, so this is not his first little “hunting session”. At least that has given him the knowledge that the partygoers will stop attacking soon - he just needs to hold out against their assault for a few minutes.

He’d tried reasoning with them at first, hoping for a non-violent solution, but his words had fallen on deaf ears. Assuming they had ears. The reward for his pacifism was a few knife-wounds to the simulacrum body. (His true form is still safely inside of the strange pendant he’d been given before boarding the train a couple of Unwindings ago.) The magic that ties his two bodies together allows him to feel the pain of the simulacrum, but he’s experienced with his double-life enough to be able to focus his attention away from it; and the body itself works just fine even with damage. This much damage, anyway. It won’t do to have a part cut off. He’d be trapped inside the pendant with no means of carrying himself away then, and to be frank he’d feel guilty for ruining his alchemists’ hard work on the vessel.

The chiming is finally fading as he wrests the knife out of the mannequin’s hands and turns the blade against it, a doll fighting another doll, as though they were the playthings of a precocious unseen child. Vrtra isn’t entirely sure that such a description is inaccurate; he’s been told something about forces summoning them all here against their wills, the need to escape via beacons to the east…it’s been a lot to take in, even without the murderous mannequins. He hopes, as his adversary finally stills in a heap on the floor, that he gets more answers soon. An ancient being such as he knows how to be patient, yes, but his incomplete mission back home grates on him; he has to get back to the others, back to taking care of Zero and to finding his sister…

Clanking footsteps pull him out of his worries over friends and family. There are more mannequins after him. He dashes down the corridor to find a more defensive spot, wishing he had his sword and shield instead of the admittedly snazzy clothes that Varshahn had been inexplicably put in.

He finds a room with what looks like a sturdy door and decides to barricade himself inside. Only to find that he is not alone - the occupant isn’t a mannequin or faceless robot, so he assumes that they’re a fellow victim of the Unwinding.

Then he notices the blood and wounds his new companion is trying to hide, and his heart aches. Yes, this is definitely another victim.

“Do not fear,” he says softly to them. “We shall survive this together. If they come for us, stay behind me, and I will protect you.”

It would really be nice to have his sword and shield.

INVENTORY: he'll be living pretty much entirely in his simulacrum body for the duration of the game. The simulacrum comes with clothing as well as a sword and shield, and he is also carrying a protective talisman made partially from his own scale. The talisman protects its bearer from the influence of hypnotizing demi-gods known as primals, as well as from corruption by the Void.

In addition, he will have a locket which holds his miniaturized dragon form, as discussed with the mods.

NOTES: see above with regards to his dragon body!

IF ACCEPTED, WOULD YOU WANT A PLOT-LIGHT OR PLOT-HEAVY CUSTOM INTRO? Plot-light intro since things will be exciting enough for him just...existing as a living doll carrying his miniature real self in a Pokeball, lol.

Thank you for your application!

ADMIN

When you have a second, have a last read through the game rules and comment to the TAKEN LIST.

Join

eastbound,

lostcompass,

westwhere. Feel free to make an OOC intro post on

lostcompass, if you want, or wait for the intro & CR meme due up on 16 October!

All game updates are posted on

lostcompass, but you can also follow

eastbound. You’ll get a private message with an invite to the informal game discord server, once you comment to the Taken List.

If you’re not already served on that front, we have some custom codes to help you set up a character inbox or permissions post. Both are entirely optional, and feel free to customise at will!

Your character is exempted from activity requirements this month.

NOTES

Vi is formally assigned to Eidris, where she is a dragon veterinarian: to everyone’s relief, dragons are immensely resilient, you’re mostly called in to examine and treat their sniffles with the same two-three pre-prescribed sniffles. Enjoy adorable dragons nipping your ankles.

Vi’s pre-assigned network username is magic wand.

INTRO

Vi joins the party at the end of the the U n w i n d i n g event. She wakes with everyone else in the Mouse House orphanage run by Ma’am Mariol, while the group negotiates its safe return overground.

Since Vi and Caitlyn are likely to remain birds of a feather, staying together, they can both experience the vast hospitality of the Mouse House. In exchange, Ma’am Mariol only asks the duo to run the occasional errand — picking up groceries, walking the children to the doctor’s or schooling, etcetera.

While on one such (milk, it’s always milk!) commission, Caitlyn and Vi might catch a glimpse of a few drunk men roughhousing in a small, dark alley. Their conflict progresses from name-calling to light punches to a proper brawl, until one drops a small wooden box (think: 20x20cm ) marked for the delicate use of the incense diffusers strewn across the Mouse House.

If Caitlyn and Vi retrieve the box when the men have gone and open it, they will find half of the contents comprise leaves, roots and flowers of foxglove, wisteria, passion flower and valerian — a not impotent blend of sedatives and plants that can lead to memory loss. Some of these herbs have already been ground in a small sack, prepared for use in the diffusers.

The box bears the insignia of one of the Minaras governmental medical facilities found overground.

Thank you for your application!

ADMIN

When you have a second, have a last read through the game rules and comment to the TAKEN LIST.

Join

eastbound,

lostcompass,

westwhere. Feel free to make an OOC intro post on

lostcompass, if you want, or wait for the intro & CR meme due up on 16 October!

All game updates are posted on

lostcompass, but you can also follow

eastbound. You’ll get a private message with an invite to the informal game discord server, once you comment to the Taken List.

If you’re not already served on that front, we have some custom codes to help you set up a character inbox or permissions post. Both are entirely optional, and feel free to customise at will!

Your character is exempted from activity requirements this month.

NOTES

Caitlyn is formally assigned to Minaras, where she is a droid ad model: never mind the brain, it’s all about your pretty face and making delinquent droids look like every household’s must-have dream. You have to stay manicured, groomed and delightfully dressed at all times. Comes with lace-laden wardrobe.

Caitlyn’s pre-assigned network username is hopscotch.

INTRO

Caitlyn joins the party at the end of the the U n w i n d i n g event. She wakes with everyone else in the Mouse House orphanage run by Ma’am Mariol, while the group negotiates its safe return overground.

Since Vi and Caitlyn are likely to remain birds of a feather, staying together, they can both experience the vast hospitality of the Mouse House. In exchange, Ma’am Mariol only asks the duo to run the occasional errand — picking up groceries, walking the children to the doctor’s or schooling, etcetera.

While on one such (milk, it’s always milk!) commission, Caitlyn and Vi might catch a glimpse of a few drunk men roughhousing in a small, dark alley. Their conflict progresses from name-calling to light punches to a proper brawl, until one drops a small wooden box (think: 20x20cm ) marked for the delicate use of the incense diffusers strewn across the Mouse House.

If Caitlyn and Vi retrieve the box when the men have gone and open it, they will find half of the contents comprise leaves, roots and flowers of foxglove, wisteria, passion flower and valerian — a not impotent blend of sedatives and plants that can lead to memory loss. Some of these herbs have already been ground in a small sack, prepared for use in the diffusers.

The box bears the insignia of one of the Minaras governmental medical facilities found overground.

Heya — this all looks fine, although we may have to fiddle with or nerf the effect of the tracking rune from time to time. We might also need to grow Alec two ounces of self-worth :c. His smartphone can work while it's got juice, but will sadly not be catching a network.

While in Arc IV: Serthica, characters are mod-assigned an allegiance between citadel halves Eidris and Minaras under false identities. Characters can still traverse the other citadel half, as long as they're discreet about it. Which do you prefer for him, Eidris or Minaras?

PLAYER NAME: Sam
CONTACT:

verities
HOW DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE GAME?: ruxi ofc

CHARACTER: Lucyna Kushinada
CANON: Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
CANON POINT: end of s01e08 - shortly after getting her brain fried trying to take out an enemy netrunner

BACKGROUND:

| LUCY WIKIA
| CYBERPUNK: EDGERUNNERS WIKI
| CYBERPUNK: EDGERUNNERS EPISODE WIKI

ABILITIES | POWERS:

At her core, Lucy is an average human of average strength, agility, etc. She does physical exercise, as well, to keep up her body stamina and strength, but does not appear to have any augmentations to her natural physical strength and speed.

CYBERWARE > Like most citizens of Night City, Lucy has a number of cyberware augmentations to her body to enhance or gift her skills she wouldn't have naturally. Please note, so far she does not appear to have a heavy number of physical enhancements, but these sorts of augmentations can be more subtle. Until creators confirm otherwise, I am only listing augmentations she blatantly seems to have. If creators say otherwise, I will reach out to mod before implementing. Her current cyberware enhancements include:

CYBEROPTICS :: Lucy has cybernetic eyes that allow her to read displays from her neuroimplants as if in front of her, scope her eyesight in to view things from long distances, comes with anti-dazzle protection to protect her vision from harsh sunlight and flares without the use of sunglasses, establishes a targeting display when using her weaponry, has low-lite function to give her clearer vision in the dark, and has image enhancement capabilities to keep her vision clear and defined.

CYBERDECK :: Lucy's neural system is integrated with an unknown but highly advanced cyberdeck system. This system allows Lucy to read out information about technology around her, hack systems/other people, jack into systems from a distance, and more. Her advanced deck allows her to do these things with quicker speed and efficiency than most other hackers like her. Cyberdecks also allow users to connect with their phones to take calls/text messages using their own neural connections.

MONOWIRE :: In both of Lucy's arms is installed a monowire. A monowire is a long range, string of energy that can be wielded almost like a whip. It is thin and strong enough to slice limbs off with ease. It relies on battery charge to sustain the wire, and needs to be 'holstered' back in her arms to recharge.

INTERFACE PLUGINS :: These are ports located on the body that allow the user to 'jack in' directly to a network system and interface in the cyberspace for more direct hacking and netrunning. Lucy has a small interface port that allows her to jack into lighter technology pieces (computers, atms, etc.), but Lucy also has a larger port in the back of the base of her skull that she keeps covered with a cosmetic piece. This allows her to lie in tubs of ice and use stronger connections to enter cyberspace more fully and interact on a more direct level.

COSMETIC CYBERWARE :: Lucy also has some cosmetic cyberware pieces to enhance her body as she personally sees fit.

NETRUNNER > A lot of edgerunners and mercs have cyberdecks that allow for basic to low-level hacking skills. Lucy is what is known as a netrunner, in that she's trained specially to hack, create viruses, and more when it comes to software technology. Her cyberware is corporate/military-level advanced, and her skills rival any other known netrunner.

SKILLED COMBATANT > Having been raised by a corpo to be a netrunner, Lucy's physical skills were also not neglected due to corpos being strongly tied with militaries as well. Additionally, stronger physical prowess gave netrunners more stamina to withstand longer times in cyberspace and face down the daemon viruses within. As such, Lucy is skilled with hand to hand combat, melee weapons, and small arm weapons like pistols.

PERSONALITY:

Lucy is a dreamer in a city that crushes dreams.

Raised in a corporate (corpo) environment, Lucy was taken from her family before she could even remember them. This was due to Lucy having the physical markers of a strong netrunner, and then showing an aptitude for the technique once taken in by Arasaka. Lucy was raised along with twelve others to believe they were special. That she was special, and thus her unique talents would lead her to well-placed career within Arasaka, sent out into the world to share her gifts with the corporation that gave her her best chance at a good life. It wasn't until her training was complete in her early teens that reality crushed her. Lucy and the others were not freed, but instead hooked into cyberspace for hours/days on end and made to datamin the cyber frontier post cyberspace cataclysm. This life was physically grueling and mentally scarring, and Lucy watched one by one as her brethren died before her eyes.

The flaw in Arasaka's logic, however, was instilling in Lucy that she was special. The best. Which meant that those who held her captive were weaker. Lucy and her remaining brethren used this logic to embolden themselves to stage an escape using their hacking abilities to release their technological bindings and fry the brains of their captors. However, it is strongly implied that Lucy was the only one to have made it out alive in the end with guns shooting at her from behind.

With this upbringing, Lucy set out to make her own path. Lucy used her training at Arasaka to strengthen herself, mask herself in cities, and become an edgerunner (another word for cyberpunk outlaw/mercenary). Her logic was that cities were so big and loud, hiding right under the eyes of the corpos in all that noise would cover her trail. An effective strategy that helped her live into her early twenties.

During this time of survival, Lucy learned to become a mysterious woman that revealed little to others. However, she did see the need for survival in numbers and joined a edgerunner group as a member of their team. This helped her both earn money to survive and round out her weaknesses with members that excelled where she lacked. Kiwi, the woman that brought her into the group, told Lucy not to trust anyone, though Lucy would say she didn't need that lesson after what Arasaka did to her.

Truthfully, however, even Arasaka hadn't been able to kill the good spirit that still resided within Lucy.

Lucy's outward behaviors displayed that of a woman who was indifferent to the world around her at worst or amused by it's trivalities at best. She can come off pragmatic in her logic, but reckless in her treatment of others. Almost as if everything is a game in her mind, keeping others guessing at her next moves.

In reality, Lucy is a dreamer still at heart. She carries with her the ideal of moving to the moon, far away from where corpos can reach her so she can be free to live her life as she pleases. This sort of thinking is rare in Night City, as few believe they can obtain a better life of any kind so don't dare to dream of it.

However, it's not only Lucy's dreamer-like mentality that Arasaka failed to snuff out. Despite having plentiful reasons to distrust others after the abuse at the hands of corpos and Kiwi's warning to only look out for herself, Lucy cares deeply for those around her. Especially those in her crew. She hates seeing what society ruled by corpos does to others, though often she feels at a loss on what she can do to help. But with those closest to her, she does try to help however she can. She wants to protect them the way she didn't protect her brethren, and to also protect the innocence that she had destroyed herself. Lucy finds herself to be cynical and too far gone for the world, despite being someone who still cares about others more than most. This particularly shows when Kiwi, the one who warned her, ends up being the one to outright betray Lucy. Showing that Lucy let her guard down and trusted someone close to her when she shouldn't have.

Lucy likes to act like she's jaded, but in reality she's still the dreamer Arasaka raised her to be. All she wants is a better future for herself, but also those that are victims of the harsh realities of life.

SAMPLE:

LOG + NETWORK TDM

INVENTORY:

+ Clothes on her back
+ Cyberware implants
+ Unity pistol

NOTES: I don't know if Lucy's implants would continue working as-is or if they'd need to be like magic compatible? They run deep in her neural and physical systems, however, so they do need to maintain functionality, but it's heavily implied that cyberware operate using the physical body to maintain their power levels as people with cyberware never have to recharge anywhere and too much cyberware can lead to cyberpsychosis from messing with the bodys system and brain too much.

IF ACCEPTED, WOULD YOU WANT A PLOT-LIGHT OR PLOT-HEAVY CUSTOM INTRO? N/A since she came in on the Unwinding event!

Heya — thank you for the above!

Would you happen to have any samples from the past 12 months (or would you be okay to write something, whatever works easiest) showing how she handles anger/sadness or the vengeful nature your rightfully mention in her personality section? Asking because unfortunately Wanda's emotions are very closely linked to her powers, and that combination has proven to be — for want of better words — explosive in the MCU canon, from time to time. So seeing how you handle that aspect of her in play is more relevant in her case than in that of other characters, purely because of the magnitude of her (pretty awesome) abilities.

If you could get back with that within the next 48h, that would be absolutely fantastic.

Heya — this reads great, but your suspicion was correct, it would be great to have a few more samples. Apologies to ask, as you've been tagging on your end.

If it makes this hopefully quicker and easier for you, happy for you to respond ICly (as a short writing sample) or OOCly (as a summary) to the following scenario —

Suppose Yelena were in blissful Serthica, minding her own business, infiltrating a haunted tower, as one does. (The doppelganger of) her 'sister' Natasha appears, pretends initial fondness to see her, then ruthlessly takes advantage and stabs her. How does Yelena react?

Just a few lines would be great, if this works for you within the next 48 hours!

[ OOC NOTE: I went with the IC writing sample, I hope this works! ]

As Natasha's blade carves into her, Yelena hears Melina's voice in her head, telling her that pain can only make her stronger. She has lived by that advice: it enabled her to survive the Red Room, and it will help her survive this too.

(Later, when she is stitching up her own wound, she will remember that Natasha was the last person to patch her up. It will all flood back then: the initial shock of seeing her sister, her unbridled joy and relief, and then her rage from being betrayed. No knife can cut as deep as having her sister's memory used against her.

But she must save that for the recovery; right now, she needs to live past this encounter.)

Yelena screams— a raw, primal sound that speaks to something far deeper than physical pain— as she pulls the knife out. She can't see past her anger, but that's fine. Anger is useful. Anger is exactly what will power her through this.

She climbs furiously to her feat to face Natasha's doppelganger, brandishing the knife covered in her own blood as she blinks past the tears in her eyes. "Get out of my sister's face or I will cut it off!"

...and on that peaceful, serene and anger management controlled-note: happy to have her. Thank you so much for taking the time to write this additional bit!

In Arc IV, characters are mod-assigned to either Eidris or Minaras. They'll still be able to access the other citadel half, provided they infiltrate discreetly. The choice is mostly to give them an assigned 'home base' for the Arc's duration. Which would you rather for her, Eidris or Minaras?

Let's go with Minaras. Thank you!

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

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Wanda Maximoff | Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)

yelena belova | marvel cinematic universe

Vrtra (Varshahn) | Final Fantasy XIV

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lucyna kushinada < cyberpunk: edgerunners >

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