Tantavelist

Looking at him following a few RPed things involving his powers, I begin to suspect that my main character Nightschild might be too powerful- in the mental picture I have of him anyway. I GM a lot of pen-and-paper games and have this instinctive aversion to overpowered characters, but it's dawning on me that I may need to tone down how much raw power he has- despite the fact that he's got not idea how to access it, which makes it an easy retrofit RP-wise. With him hardly having touched it so far, most people won't notice IC or OOC anyway.

I blame the fact that I've not read many comic books but watch a lot of anime. Superpowered god-characters are the rule not the exception there, and I may need to move the power level of what I consider a "reasonable" character down a bit.

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Nick said that it was the most unpleasant time he had spent in the company of a lawyer.

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I'm pretty certain it was "The LEAST unpleasant time spent in the company of a Lawyer", but go with what you recall...

People seem to be going with the "Science" suggestion that Coile made, which is good, but not for me. I said earlier that I wanted something more than a flimsy excuse for why a group of very different Heroes suddenly decided to form a supergroup together, and although they are well written, that's really all Coile's suggestions are (excepting the Natural one).

None of them addresses the central problem of WHY these people all decide to join. The people are all given their powers by the same event, so they all spontaneously decide to stay together and fight crime with their new abilities? As far as I'm concerned that's on the same level as the "Advanturers meet in a bar and a stranger approaches them with a job" cliche. Coile's suggestions would all make great backgrounds for individual characters, but they don't hold up as group concepts IMO.

There seems to be a growing number interested though, so you should have the numbers to make it work without me being involved. Have fun anyway, those who do go with it.

Nightschild ran into a crisis at Pocket D last night, as the situation with Lady Patriot's doppelganger, Fallen Patriot, took a deadly turn.

Nick and Roselin Thorne had talked with Sarah about a double of her that had been seen about Paragon City and the Rogue Isles. Sarah2, who Nick and Rose had also met, had recently caused trouble for Sarah by robbing a bank in Paragon City, which wasn't a good thing given that she's a member of The Militia. The two had both complained of strange fainting spells, and seemed to recall events that had happened to the other one.

Roselin had discovered that Sarah2 was working with Feyth, an individual that seems to have a grudge against Sarah, and who was responsibloe for Sarah2 robbing the bank. Deciding it would be a good thing to separate them, Rose paid for a hotel room for Sarah2 and offered to support her, thus removing the need for her to work for Feyth.

It seems that Feyth has found out about this, and wasn't pleased. She tracked down Sarah2 and stabbed her, leaving her to slowly bleed to death. In Pocket D, Sarah suddenly started bleeding heavily out of a wound that appeared on her side.

Desperately trying to stop the bleeding, Roselin found that her healing powers weren't working- the wound re-formed as fast as she healed it. Nick guessed that it was Sarah2 who'd been hurt, and that they would both need healing for anything to work. He used his own magic in an improvised ritual (something he'd avoided doing since the Fuchsia affair) to draw life-force from Rose and send it into Sarah, then down whatever link connected them to Sarah2.

The ritual was a success, and both girls were healed. A few side effects were noted- Nick's powers come from his Succubus mother, and he'd been drawing the life-force from a woman who lusts after Sarah. Consequently, both Sarahs were in a rather "excitable" state after the transfer, but their lives were saved.

Nick immediately left for the Rogue Isles to find Sarah2. She was alive anhd well, and Feyth was nowhere to be seen.

OK, that should have read "Not only would the Hero ATs not fit as well as Villainous ones like Stalkers and Masterminds". But I'm sure people get the idea with a little thought.

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Hi,
i would be very interested in doind something like this if you would let me join you.
+ I prefer the Shadow Clan idea, But i would prefer to play on heroes

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I like the Shadow Clan idea best out of my suggestions also. But I really wouldn't like playing it on heroes- not only would the ATs (especially Masterminds and Stalkers) not fit as well, but my whole idea was to make a villain group that isn't evil- just mercenary. My own preferences run to the Villainous side rather than Heroic, but I'll play either to expand my RP horizons.

Here are a couple of ideas for a new RP group:-


The Armour Brigade:-

A member of an elite unit from an alternate universe is stranded in the CoX world by some dimensional incident. His Powered Armour suit has nanotech-based self-repair, so despite the heavy damage he took in his arrival, his suit is slowly regaining its functions. Freedom Corps enlists his aid in exchange for looking into ways to send him home, and part of this aid consists of them getting samples of his suit nanites.

Using these, researchers are able to create basic frames for Powered Armour suits. These are not especially powerful by themselves, lacking the original’s more advanced functions, but they do have an advanced and adaptive system for powering and controlling machinery. These suits thus make perfect platforms for integrating other “superscience” devices of unique origin. Each suit will have different powers, depending on what experimental/alien tech is integrated into the suit.

I have a character concept I made then abandoned at 4th level that would be the perfect candidate for the dimensional traveller with the original suit. The downside to this idea would be that we’d have to power level to 20 and get a second costume slot before the characters could mingle with other Rpers outside our Powered Armour.


The Shadow Clan:-

A Concept for Villain RP, which there just isn’t enough of.

The characters are all members of a Ninja clan. Centuries ago, they served a Daimyo in feudal Japan, until their Lord was killed and his family wiped out in a conflict with a Chinese warlord allied with the Tsoo. Left leaderless and adrift, they turned to mercenary work to support themselves, but never forgot their old lord or their duty of revenge. Recently having left Japan for the Rogue Isles following difficulties with the Japanese government, the Clan has begun making a niche for itself, whilst working to underminet he Tsoo at every opportunity.

The clan would be over a hundred strong, with most members simply being represented by a mastermind’s pets. The actual Toons would be the elite members of the clan. Stalkers or Brutes would be the Ninja fighters, Masterminds leaders of the lower ranked members, and Dominators/Corruptors would be sorcerors working to support the other types.


I can come up with others if people don't like either of these- just give a suggestion. However, as I see it, the whole point of this is to have a group where the characters are all created around a common theme and background. Just having a random collection of characters thrown together in a group with a one-line idea like "We all met in the tutorial"- not a very strong concept.

I certainly can't force anyone to adopt any system like this, but if everyone is creating heroes on their own and having people of different origins and background put in a group for the sake of it, then we might as well just join an existing RP group. Count me in if we have a core concept for the characters- but count me out if it's just a case of "we all met up when a new team was formed and never encountered each other before that."

Time to throw a few concept ideas around and see which one gets the most interest, I think. I've one or two right now that I'll write up and post here when I have the time.

Tuesdays would not be possible for me, but I'm willing to commit to wednesdays if there are enough people interested. Villains are my preference, but I'll lower myself to playing a hero if it turns out this idea is popular. I currently have only one RP character, so plenty of time and slots available.

GMT zone also here.

A busy evening for Nightschild at Pocket D this wednesday. He turned up to find Lady Patriot, Vigilante Storm and Lady Cobra at the bar already. They briefly talked about Sarah's (Lady Partiot) bodyfriend Shadow Flysh and how he seemed to be away so much, then as if by magic the man himself appeared, apologising to Sarah for his extended absences recently. Sarah showed off her new costume, complete with transformation belt for instant change from civilian attire, and Roselin Thorne arrived in time to add her own comments on Sarah's new cape.

Whilst Rachel (Vigilante Storm) moved to the far end of the bar to put the moves on a tall, handsome stranger, Nick asked Flysh about what it was that he did. Revealing that he worked for an extra-dimensional group that Nick, after hearing his description, dubbed the "Paradox Police", Flysh and Nick had a discussion about parallel universes, time travel and paradox. Sarah complained that her head was hurting early on in this, and settled for a less mentally taxing discussion about fashion with the other girls.

Royal Flush turned up in time to be introduced to the other heroes (and Roselin) present. Flysh left as she arrived, but the others were able to chat with Nicole briefly before leaving.

Left together at the bar, Nick asked Nicole if she was feeling better after her recent difficulties. She said she was as well as could be expected, and was eventually drawn into telling him the full story of the accident that had given her both her powers and her problems.

This discussion was cut short by the arrival of Zeyna. The three talked for a while about business, and Zeyna was given the short version of Nicole's story. She was sympathetic it, given her own past, but also turned out to have a phobia of rats- so Nicole's increasing mention of them had her rather jumpy.

Eventually they all called it a night, and Nick and Zeyna retired to a more private location. Zeyna confronted Nick about what she felt was his growing tendency for killing- she'd heard about him killing a member of the Freakshow who'd been bragging that he'd slept with Zeyna. Nick admitted that he'd let his anger get the better of him there, and that he probably shouldn't have gone as far as killing. He refused to feel guilty about it though, or about any of the killing he'd done on his jobs. The argument didn't end in any bitterness, though, and Zeyna still spent the night with him.

At Pocket D over the weekend, Nightschild found himself chatting with Royal Flush again. He found her in the company of Mischievous, who introduced herself as Savannah. Nicole was talking about the problem with her powers the other night, and explaining how she had been given something that was keeping it under control, although this meant she wasn't allowed to drink, along with a few other interesting side effects (she made occasional comments about the invisible rats).

Whilst discussing this situation, Savannah mentioned that she was a Psychiatrist with psychic powers who specialised working with Superheroes. Perhaps she could help Nicole control her powers, or at least help her with any synptoms, mental or otherwise, that she was suffering from. Nick wasn't to enthusiastic about her helping, having had some bad experiences with shrinks during his time in Longbow custody, but Nicole seemed willing to give it a try. It being Nicole's head, Nick let her accept Savannah's help.

Savannah took Nicole to a relatively quiet corner of the club and had them kneel down facing each other, with their heads touching. After some time like this, Savannah declared she was done and Nicole said that she did feel better- at any rate, she could no longer hear the rats.

The two women and Nick talked for a little longer. Savannah looked somewhat distressed, and tried to pass it off as a side effect of the mind-link. Being pressed further, she admitted that she was having some problems in her relationship with her fiancee, and that the mind-link simply made it harder to suppress her feelings about anything. Nicole and Nick listened to her describe what was going on- he had put their wedding back several times, stopped letting her mind-link with him, and she'd been seeing her friend around him an awful lot lately- and told her that it did sound as if her fears might be justified.

Nick suggested that she phone him and say she wasn't going to be home tonight due to work, then turn up in a few hours anyway. She dithered about this, not really wanting to risk having her fears confirmed, but when asked what she'd advise to a patient who was in this situation, she finally made the call. Nicole had let slip that she was short of a place to stay, due to a bad run of luck at cards, so she and Savannah decided to find a motel together, as Savannah might not feel very welcome at home tonight. Savannah said she would also be able to help if Nicole took another turn for the worse, and Nicole said she'd make sure Savannah at least drove past her house to see if her friend's car was parked there. Everyone drank up and left shortly after this.

Nightschild arrived in Pocket D to find that Zeyna was present, talking to Royal Flush (who seemed surprised to learn that this was the girlfriend Nick had been talking to her about the other night). Zeyna asked to talk with him in private, which he agreed to do.


Zeyna told him that the video clip he had of her and a Freak was of a Freak feeling her up and trying to have sex whilst she was passed out, and that if the video had lasted a minute longer it would have shown her waking up and blasting him. She also said that she had kissed and been groped by some Freaks at the parties as part of trying to fit into the gang, but she had never gone all the way. She said that she really did love him and couldn't stand the thought of them not being together. He didn't like the thought of her even doing what she had with someone else, but after his own indescrections he didn't feel he had room to complain. They ended up kissing and making up, then Zeyna left to attend to business- promising to return and do more than just kiss.


As he waited, he wandered back into the bar to find a number of people there. He had a brief conversation with Nicole (Royal Flush) about the morality of gambling and the what in general it was like to work for their respective sides. Seeing a group of heroes in the corner, Nick recognised Coile and suggested that Nicole could use a few contacts on her own side of the fence. The two wnadered over.


The conversation was mostly about Andre's wedding, unsurprising as it was only two days away. Nicole introduced herself to Andre, Nene, Love Angel and Star Crusader. After a little banter about stag nights and married men cuddling women other than their wives, Nick got into a heated debate with the blue-faced alien about ethics, which left Nick feeling increasingly annoyed by what he saw as his opponent's tendency to shift the topic onto subjects that could be preached about.


As people were slowly getting ready to leave, Nicole started to shiver and act strangely. She seemed to rapidly become paranoid and delusional, but managed to blurt out some comments about blowing up a hospital wing which suggested that this was somehow connected to her powers and had happened before. As Andre and Nick tried to calm her enough to help her, she curled up on the floor and finally passed out. Andre rushed her to the Galaxy City hospital, leaving Nick to meet Zeyna in a slightly less upbeat mood than he had anticipated.

Over the last few days, Nightschild has been trying to get drunk in spite of his half-demon metabolism that makes him highly resistant if not completely immune to alchohol. He's been sitting around Pocket D drinking heavily, but there's been no familiar faces about much. A few strangers have chatted to him about his problems with Zeyna, and both Chiaroscuro and Royal Flush seemed to advise that perhaps he should just move on and find a girl that was right for him.

Fuchsia and the Bonding

During her first extended abscence, Nick began working with a vampire named Fuchsia in his missions on the Isles. He had encoutered her briefly in Pocket D, and now they began working together he found that not only did they make an effective team, but she was charming and attractive- but he had feeling for Zeyna and pushed this into the back of his mind, settling for simply occasionally flirting with her.

This situation was changed when he once again experimented with his magic, which he has no formal training in the use of and uses purely based on his inherited demonic instincts. A ritual where Fuchsia would drink his blood to gain more power to face a particularly tough enemy they had been hired to take down turned out to be far more then he had thought. Unknowingly, he had created something similar to the bond a Master Vampire uses to bind a lesser vampire as a Thrall. Fuchsia found herself increasingly drawn to him, and craved his blood more and more. Finally, she went into a frenzy and began to feed off him too deeply, and he responded instinctively by draining the life-energy from her to keep himself alive. The loop thus formed sent them into a state of bliss, and when he recovered enough to think he found that not only had they fed on each other but they'd had sex at some point also.

Wracked with guilt over what had happened, he nevertheless managed to find the courage to confess things to Zeyna at their next meeting. After much tears and heartache, Nick managed to persuade her to stay together with him. The problem with the bond was not going away, though, and he began searching the libraries at Castla Balthory for a solution.

As this was happening, Fuchsia was showing signs of increasing interest in Nick, but through their shared bond she could see how he felt about Zeyna, and so actually tried to help them resolve things- whatever her feelings, she could see that Nick would never choose her over Zeyna.

Breaking the Bond

The bond situation suddenly became far more serious when Fuchsia's "Family", the Dread Pack, learned of the bond. Their interpretation of things was that Nick had deliberately enslaved Fuchsia, and that anything Fuchsia said in his support was simply the bond talking. They told Nick that if he had one week to make some visible progress in breaking the bond, or they would start to consider plan B- killing him and hoping that Fuchsia would survive his death.

With this turn of evens, Nick had no choice but to inform the rest of the Court of the Blood Countess of what he had done. The Countess herself was less than amused, but decided that breaking the bond was the easier way to solve things. When it was discovered that Fuchsia had actually found herself unable to feed upon anyone but Nick and had begun to decay, a ruitual was immediately performed with members of the Dread Pack observing. The bond was declared broken, and Fuchsia was taken home by the Pack, leaving Nick to face a dressing-down from the Countess.

The bond was not broken, however, as Nick's half-demon ancestry and immense if uncontrolled magical reserves had allowed it to remain, in a much weakened form. Within a week of the ritual, both realised that the bond was still present. When they met to discuss it, she also told him she was having trouble feeding and starting to fail again. For whatever reason, they would have to perform the ritual where they both fed on each other on a regular basis or she would begin to decay again. Nick managed to perform it and stop short of full sex in the process, but the feeling in created meant that he would certainly slip again if it was done often enough.

He told Zeyna everything, and this was the last straw- she wasn't able to accept him repeatedly sleeping with Fuchsia and broke up. He was sitting in a bar trying to out-drink his demonic constitution when Fuchsia, feeling wheat he did through the bond, found him and tried to comfort him. The comfort turned into her trying to seduce him, and when she said that he hadn't given up the bond because he didn't really want to get rid of her, he lost his temper. He lashed out at Fuchsia with his power, and instinctively managed to tear the bond out- very nearly killing her in the process. It wasn't that he hadn't wanted to get rid of her, but that he hadn't wanted to hurt Fuchsia in the process.

Current Status

With the bond gone, Nick managed to sort-of patch things up with Zeyna. They were still on shaky grounds, but they were together again. The next crisis soon struck, though, as Nick overheard some Freaks talking about "That Blue **** with the Wings" and how she was sleeping her way to the top of the Freakshow. Torturing and killing them in a rage whilst trying to make them take what they said back, he was given a cellphone with a 30-second clip taken by another Freak at a party that seems to prove that they are, in fact, telling the truth- Zeyna is infiltrating the Freakshow on her back.



Looking at this, I realise that there is almost certainly a great deal I'm missing out of all this. The players of Zeyna and Fuchsia are free to fill in the gaps if they want, or people can just ask. I'm also seeing why people do nightly updates to ongoing RPs, and wishing I'd been doing that all through the above plot threads.

Seeing Coile's mammoth recap post there has finally convinced me to post a recap of what's been happening with Nightschild, since the RP has been pretty good and seems to otherwise be going completely unrecorded.

Following his arrival in the Rogue Islands two months ago, the teenaged half-demon Nightschild (dubbed "Nick" at Pocket D, a name which has stuck) has been having a very busy and confusing time. He's spent less than three years on Earth, and most of that was in the Zig following his unfortunate first encounter with Longbow. He's been slowly making a reputation as a mercanary in the Byzantine politics of the Isles, and has become a member of the Court of the Blood Countess, in the sevice of the notorious Elizabeth Balthory.

Zeyna

He started coming to Pocket D in his spare time, and made the acquiantance of a number of superpowered individuals, most notably the Winged and blue-skinned lightening throwing heroine Zeyna. After some weeks of friendly banter and increasing flirting, Zeyna gave in to Nick's advances and slept with him. She was surprised to say the least to find that it was his first time, and even more surprised that he was able to persuade her to continue sleeping with him against her better judgement. Unfortunately, Zeyna was on parole, having been arrested for crimes committed during her youthful association with the Freakshow and granted early release on condition she make amends by working with Freedom Corps. Her parole officer, Tyler Marks, is a psychic who monitors his charges' minds to ensure that they really have changed their ways. Needless to say he was less than thrilled to learn of her relationship with an underaged supervillain. He told her how he felt in no uncertain terms, but strangely seemed to take no further action.

Nick and Zeyna continued seeing each other, and both were beginning to feel it was more than just physical attraction, even if neither was willing to say so at this point. But complications were arising from both sides of the relationship.

Tyler and the Freakshow

Zeyna was informed by Tyler that she was to be sent undercover for an extended period of time. She was to renew her old ties with the Freakshow, and establish herself in a position of influence there. She was reluctant at first, but was finally swayed the offer to let her finally have revenge on her Ex, Danny, who had kept her in an abusive relationship during her teenage years and was now a high-ranking member of the Freakshow himself. This meant, of course, that the amount of time she could spend with Nick was going to be greatly reduced.

During their last night together before she went into deep cover, Zeyna suddenly felt herself losing control of her powers during an intimate moment. She'd had problems with this in the past whenever she felt a particularly intense emotion, but this had supposedly been solved by psychic blocks the Freedom Corps had placed in her mind. Fortunately Nick's own powers saved him from any ill effects, but looking at the situation and its convenient timing, they were faced with the obvious conclusion that Tyler had removed the blocks in the hope that exactly this would happen and Nick would be killed. Zeyna managed to convince Nick not to go to Paragon City and kill Tyler until she could ask him what had really happened, then left him for her undercover assignment.

My own character Nightschild is based around the idea that he isn't evil, he just sees no difference between the Heroes and Villains other than the Heroes having a better PR team. He was given a very rough deal by Longbow early on in his career, and that led him to working for Arachnos, not any choices on his part.

I've started meeting quite a few Villain RPers recently, and the problems people raise about Villain RP makes the assumption that the people involved are all completely evil and selfish. This might be the case for some, but not for all. The types I hnag around with seem more like Mercenaries than Villains- they don't want to torture or kill people for fun, it just doesn't bother them if they have to do it as part of a job. Arachnos pays better and places fewer restrictions on its operatives.

And as Pistol said- in Comic Books (and other things as well), there are all sorts of situations where people supposedly on different sides end up being something other than enemies. Even if they ARE enemies- look at how much great dialogue there is between Lex Luthor and Superman at times. Enemies like that could be just as much fun to RP as friends or lovers for the people involved.

I suddenly have this image of a bunch of shady, semi-reforemed types sitting in a room every week with the Parole officer... Potentially a very interesting RP addition for the heroes.

If people like the alts idea- and it seems that people do- then we could use this thread, or start another, to have people put their "wanted" ads- say who you'd like to have a walk-on part in an existing RP, and then people can reply to take the job. It seems to have worked with the Parole Officer, so why not with other things?

I have many empty character slots, and would be more than willing to take up such a role. My main is a villain, and so has limited RP opportunities.

Oh, and with regards to the actual character of the Parole Officer- the one in the RP is currently suspected of doing Bad Things, so it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say he was guilty, got fired (or at least suspended), and was assigned to a new Parole Officer. If not, the paralysed thing will take some creative working around (but not impossible). Of course, it's Sis_Kin requesting the character, so she should have final say.

Global Name: @Tantavalist
Server: Union

RP Characters:
Nightschild (Villain)

Type of RP: Any, especially RP that goes beyond chatting in Pocket D.

Can be Contacted: In game or via board

Sis_Kin's proposal was something the two of us had discussed regarding the situation. The idea of the ""Off-Screen" character being played by someone was one that I got from another game. An RPer there had the idea of having other people in the RP circle use empty character slots to create "bit-part" characters. As an example, one character had reported having disagreements with his family, especially his mother. So another player created the mother as an alt, and every once in a while would turn up to make life awkward. So, essentially, these characters would take the role that NPCs play in tabletop RPGs.

In the case of the Parole Officer given here, it wouldn't be a full-time RP. It would be perfectly realistic to just schedule a weekly meeting of an hour or so, where Zeyna reports to him. And, of course, if any other heros have similarly shady pasts, the part could be expanded by having them report to the same Parole Officer.

This can, of course, be taken much further. How many RPers are going to fill all twelves character slots? Take the time to create minor characters to enhance RP with them!

I'll be interested in hearing people's thoughts on this, both the situation in question and the concept of minor characters in general.