Please do not Take these Organs
| Please do not [T]ake these Organs by JamesLeng |
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Act 1 Act 2 Discussion ] |
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You all met in a tavern in some no-name logging town out on the frontier. Scruffy prospectors, scheming merchants, disgraced minor nobles, and deranged veterans from thousands of miles away converged on rumors of a ruined fortress from the Old Empire and the priceless treasures within. Seemed like a great way to get rich, make a name for yourself, or at least keep busy while avoiding the big cities for whatever reason.
You assembled a team, planned an expedition, set out for one of the better-known cavern entrances... then things started to go wrong. Currently you're deep underground, separated from the rest of the expedition and known paths to the surface by a sliding-wall trap, and the way forward is blocked by some ridiculous chess puzzle. Engraving on steel plaque, on a low stone pedestal covered in smudged-out chalk notes, reads
"Life is a dirge of shadow and light
A terrible chore ‘ere blessed sleep
Resting in peace of eternal night
A knightly prize for those who would leap
Into the fray knowing their right
A foolish whim whose meaning is deep
Fraught with the force of clerical might
A bound to the left and so we shall reap
Yet stay the true course in blooded sight
A castle falls east in a weatherworn heap
Then comes freedom to victors of peril-fraught fight
And journey continues with prize one can keep.
Seek the prize within the eightfold field.
Orcus watches and cheers the struggle.”
In other words, an old school dice-based dungeon crawl. Rebooted!
Act 2 Character Roster:
Active Characters
Maru Red
Tiefling Townie
Specialization: Skald
High/Low Ambitions: Fame, glory, and the perks that come with it / Craving for pipeweed
Phobia: Being forgotten from this world/dying without becoming famous
Mutation: Filed down horns protruding from her forehead
Vulnerability: Much like a reptile, gets sluggish in the cold, and will become comatose if she is in extreme cold for extended periods of time
Ability: She can summon forth a two-handed, spectral ax, fueled by blood, which sings a battle dirge to inspire her allies and intimidate her foes
Bio: Maru was conceived via rape, and was largely unwanted and resented by her mother. Her mother had demonic blood in her ancestry, and Maru inherited these traits. After running away from home, a group of towns people from a nearby village found her, and filed her horns down in an attempt to purge the demonic influence from her body. Not long after a group of "orc" bandits raided the town, and ended up taking her in and nursing her back to health. She joined them, and some time later was put on trial for the murder of her father, of which she was proudly guilty. She escaped the custody of local law enforcement, albeit on her own, and made her way out to the frontier to get a clean start and make a new name for herself. She entered the ruins hoping for gold glory and inspiration for a epic to be told through the ages, but after being cut off from the main expedition force, a rare voice of reason tells her that perhaps a hot meal, soft bed and cheap wench would be preferable to starving to death in a crumbling fortress. And so, she now attempts to get un-lost, and hopes that the others can figure out the riddle behind this puzzle because she is stumped.
Description: Maru Red is a young dark skinned woman with a thick cockney accent, and a shaved head which has begun re-growing its thickly curled strands, to a small degree, since they started their expedition. ~5'8, probably 160lbs or so, with a build more accurately described as scrappy and wirey, rather than bulky or muscular. She has as much of a beer pouch and she can build up, but regular bar fights exercise tends to keep the weight off despite her best efforts. Her nose has obviously been broken more than once, and the multitude of white-ish scars running across her face, and the entirety of her body really, show either a lack of regulars for her own well being, or an intimate home life with a loving briar patch. Possibly both. She could probably drink the rest of the party combined under the table, although she might not remember doing it, and she has a tendency for crudeness rivaled only by her seeming lack of an inside voice. She tends to be quick to action, with few regrets. Everyone makes mistakes and she can't predict the future, so why worry over something she, or anyone else for that matter, screwed up on. Buy everyone a round of drinks, or maybe a really expensive round of drinks if you fucked up big time, and move on. Mistakes are inevitable, but regrets are a choice, and when she's the most famous name since the days of the empire, she doesn't want to have anything weighing down on her creative process and inspiring deeds.
In short, she's a raucous girl with an appetite for grog and action, driven by the dream that some day, her name alone will inspire countless imitators, epic tales, and have the tavern girls fighting over who gets to help warm her bed in the cold winter nights.
Inventory:
Left hip - Lead bullets & sling
Right hip - clean cloth, hooked needles, & thread
Left shoulder - feathers, penknife, lots of parchment & ink (for mapping)
Right shoulder - Pipeweed
Chest/neck - Lantern
Top of head - Blanket, wrapped to conceal horns
Somewhere uncomfortable - Coin purse
Player: Santova
Hore Wutashi
Gnoll-Human Hybrid Hedge Witch
Specialization: Outsider Shaman
High/Low Ambitions: Go 'Home' / Murder. Bloodshed, dismemberment, and death get her going like nothing else, provided she can see it coming and isn't exclusively on the receiving end.
Phobia: Fear of the unknown, mostly anything that can kill her without showing itself.
Mutation: Canine Features. Ears. Tail. And yes, Gnoll *censored*
Vulnerability: Potential complications from damage to the cybernetics
Ability: Plasma pistol integrated into a cybernetic arm
Bio: Twenty years ago, a magic experiment performed by the chieftain of a generic gnoll tribe accidentally latched onto a quantum portal energy signature from another world. As you can guess, one of the staff from the lab was sucked in and fell into the arms of a really lucky gnoll. She wasn't even one of the scientists, just an intern from the biology department! But then, all the actual scientists that went through the portal fell in less fortunate places and died in a matter of seconds. So after five rapes, a few medical miracles, and one really loud childbirth later, Hore was born into a tribe of rapists with a deity-figure as a mother and showered with all the attention of a classic chosen one. She learned much about mathematics, biology, natural sciences, and basic quantum mechanics from whatever her mother could still retain.
Then her mother died in a freak accident when she was ten. Perforated by falling bull horns. Go figure.
After fighting her way out of her own paranoid psychopathic tribe, Hore wants to know more about her mother's world and if she could have a place there. Barring that, like any among her tribe she has a lust for murder and rape matched only by her desire to create a working system for endless murder and rape.
Description: Hore has furred paws for hands and feet, but started out with ten fingers and ten toes (she lost two fingers on her left hand from a plasma pistol misfire), with fingers that feel human with claws instead of nails, but the palms of her hands and feet have animal pads. As per her mutations, she has an additional two wolf-like ears, her tail is long, thin, and bushy but she keeps it close for fear that it will get wrecked, and the last part is doggy-like. Still, she has distinct curves and a modest bust for her large frame, though her arms are slightly muscular, but generally she focuses on speed and agility rather than her innate bruthe strength. Her hair has the texture of fur but goes down to her shoulders, and is mostly brown with red streaks here and there, which she trims further than the rest to keep a constant "blood speckled" look. Hore is also covered in light scars, which she considers her 'fur coat' as they contrast against her fair skin, a trait that she is not proud of. One thing to note is that most of her cybernetics are centered around the left arm and breast, causing them to heal the scars around her but take on a faint, almost undetectable glow of various LED lights centered around a green aura coming from where her heart should be which represents the power core. Her actual heart is on the right, moved by the cybernetic augmenations over the course of fifteen years by the nanomachines in her bloodstream.
Note that these nanomachines are incredibly basic and produced by an artificial organ conjoined with her liver, they cannot self-replicate and due to programming restrictions they must take orders from the main processor, then flow throughout the entire bloodstream until they find the right organ or cyberware, and then they either place nutrients for the organs to self-recover or work on fixing the cyberware and then they self-destruct into their basic components for the bloodstream to collect and recycle. This was because these nanos were meant for civilian use in experiments and tests and if something went horribly wrong then their first protocol is to shut down or self-destruct and let the grown-ups do their work. Hore's cyber would have been done in a mere three months and with less health complications if she was born in her mother's own world with all the fancy augmentation auto-docs, but safety precautions are necessary to prevent the nanomachines from fritzing during a weatherstorm and eating the host alive. So when Hore takes serious damage the nanomachines don't repair her body like in The Expanse, they just shut down and the nanomachine factory builds more from the junk materials in her liver.
Inventory:
Left hip - Knives
Right hip - Lantern
Left shoulder - Axe
Right shoulder - Spear
Chest/neck - Leather Armor
Top of head - Jug of Water
Somewhere Uncomfortable - Tools for Lockpicking and Field Surgery
Player: kome
Decaro Vos
Eel-man Soldier
Specialization: Grappling
High/Low Ambitions: Protecting the weak / Bedding other sentient species
Phobia: Any dry and excessively dusty environment, thorny plants, mummified corpses, scorpions, and powdered silver (or silvery metals, but not, for example, liquid mercury, silver coins, or iron filings), or apparent unnaturally-accelerated erosion of stone
Mutation: Big eye on chest, which can detect and size people up based on their auras.
Vulnerability: Dehydration
Ability: Flesh Blessing - can touch a creature to cause a horrible mutation
Bio: Vos was born of noble parents, the fourteenth hatchling in his clutch. He was raised steadfast in the teachings of his deity, and one day decided to leave his village to spread these teachings and give aid to the many other people of the world. During his travels he heard tale of a dungeon full of secrets and possibly evil, so he joined forces with a band of attractive people to investigate. Vos is now lost and a little bit scared, but he knows his faith will protect him. He was never much for poetry and does not know how to play chess, so instead he attempts to force his way through whatever door/obstacle is in his path.
Description: Vos is your typical knight in not-so-shining armor, except he's an eel man. He wears an old beat up chain shirt with his cloak over the top, crusader style, and a long loin cloth covering his lower bits (pants are difficult because of his thick tail) and a set of worn boots. The large eye on his chest has a cloudy, spotty pupil and peeks out through a hole in his shirt. It tends to dart around when he is in the presence of multiple people and stare unblinking when he's alone with somebody. He has dark grayish rubbery skin. His neck tends to slightly expand and contract when he breathes. He has a pair of lidless eel eyes on his head and a row of small pointy teeth. In his throat is a set of pharyngeal jaws that allow for pronunciation fairly similar to a human tongue, though the sounds he makes are never quite human.
Inventory:
Left hip - Spear
Right hip - Jug of Water
Left shoulder - Lantern
Right shoulder - Blanket
Chest/neck - Chain Armor
Top of Head - Plate armor
Somewhere uncomfortable - Block of Soap
Player: strngy
Davina
Human Rich Bastard
Specialization: Fencer
High/Low Ambitions: Legacy (explained / elaborated on in character bio) / Ladies. Doesn't help with establishing a family legacy, but hey, dad had mistresses too.
Phobia: Spoor of those bodiless hounds which lurk in the corners of time, such as deep yet bloodless wounds in otherwise normal flesh, stringy blue caustic-alkali slime, locked-room murder mysteries, sharp corners on convex architectural elements (especially when filled in with something more smooth and round which has cracked or been left incomplete), and ill-conceived efforts to directly observe the distant past.
Mutation: Appears normal when calm, but becomes blurry, and thus harder to sense or strike, when in the grips of passion, including most combat situations. 'Clipping' through solid walls or out of manacles is possible, but usually involves heroic exertion and a risk of injury. Berzerk rage, paralyzing grief, blind panic, etc. result in total intangibility for the duration of the insanity, which may be a lifesaver or a debilitating inconvenience depending on context. Clothing and other equipment comes along with, if it's touching and she honestly thinks it's rightfully hers. Also, odd dietary requirements and downright bizarre (though consistent) distortions of smell and taste, ever since a childhood incident that shifted some birthmarks around and made her left-handed.
Vulnerability: Bags of Holding, portals, and other technological exceptions to Euclidean geometry are treated as if wrapped in razorwire, though she'll need something far more exotic than heavy gloves for safe handling, and banishing or warding effects never treat her as 'one of the locals.'
Ability: Teleport anywhere within line-of-sight, including through windows, and even around corners with the aid of an appropriately-angled reflective surface, but no more than a few hundred yards per hop. Requires a fine sword with which to cut a hole in the air (or at least some edge sharp enough to cut paper, but the very thought of using any tool lesser than her ancestral sword feels gross and wrong on an instinctive level) and the tunnel stays open for a minute or so, allowing partners or pursuers to follow unless they're considerably larger than her. If her feet are glued to the floor or she's broken her spine or something, she might be able to open a hole and then fail to propel herself through it, but can't reliably do that on purpose. If she wants to open a tunnel while staying in place, or for that matter, teleport several times in rapid succession, there should be some surface solid enough for her to kick off of as part of changing direction.
Seriously Expensive Thing: Ancestral sword, appropriate to style.
Bio: The daughter of a noble house (or at least a rich and successful one with a good history), Davina benefits from an upbringing where she had everything that was needed to prepare her to face the world. She was the heir to and recipients of these advantages as part of her legacy. A legacy that no longer exists, as her house has fallen.
She's now on a quest to restore that legacy. Nothing so trite as taking back her exact family holding- this isn't about a right to rule or a territory. As far as she's concerned, she's a link in a chain, and she will not be the point where it breaks. Before she dies, Davina wants a reestablished power base or holdings to see that the next generation of her family gets at least as good a shot as she did.
Inventory:
Left hip: coin purse
Right Hip: Aforementioned sword
Chest: Breast plate
Right shoulder: Knives (throwing, worn openly)
Left Shoulder: Dried fruit
Top of head: Hygiene Kit, including soap, small scissors, and a razor, disguised as a fancy hat
Hidden somewhere uncomfortable: signet ring, needle, and other weaponized jewelry hidden in plain sight
Player: mageykun
Eric Grimwald
Human Rich Bastard
Specialization: Commanding others.
High/Low Ambitions: To become a lich and rule a mighty kingdom. / To find a suitable bride.
Phobia: Monophobia - Fear of being Alone/Without companion.
Mutation: Jaw is slightly deformed which greatly altered his diet. This leads to difficulty chewing solid food, combined with willingness and ability to eat stuff that's badly rotten, and resistance to poison in general.
Vulnerability: Conventional healing magic causes problems for Eric. Agonizingly painful, sometimes makes the wound worse instead of better. Alchemical potions work fine, though.
Ability: Eric is able to reanimate and command undead creatures of a lesser intelligence to follow basic commands. If Eric becomes incapacitated, any creature under his command shall be free to act as they please.
Seriously Expensive Thing: A magic quiver that can transmute any dry bones found lying around into more crossbow bolts.
Inventory:
Left hip - Dried Bread
Right hip - Crossbow Arrows - 20
Left shoulder - Crossbow
Right shoulder - Boiled Leather Armor
Chest/neck - Jug of Water
Top of head - Plate Armoured Cap.
Somewhere uncomfortable - Coin Purse
Player: GB
Yisheng Ji
Half-Avian Hedge Witch
Specialization: Healing / Medicine
High/Low Ambitions: Become immortal and eternally youthful / Make money
Phobia: Being crushed to death
Mutation: Feathers growing from arms, legs, and back that passively help regulate body temperature in non-extreme conditions, and ward off damp, but are obviously somewhat disturbing to look at
Vulnerability: Consuming birdflesh makes him incredibly sick
Ability: Frictionless, lightweight movement - He can treat non-solid surfaces as if they were perfectly solid and rigid, and move as if he were near-weightless. For example, walking across the surface of freshly-fallen snow without leaving any trace of his presence, walking across water without causing it to ripple, jumping into long (albeit quite slow) glides like 90s/00s wire fu movies, and slow-falling in the same fashion.
Bio: An ancient, divine spirit beast came down from a celestial realm on business, taking human form when it arrived. (Specifically, its true form was a celestial rooster.) However, before it returned home, it encountered and was infatuated by a village maiden who happened to pass by, and inevitably seduced her. Yisheng Ji was the product of that pairing, although his father left before he was born, likely to never return. Due to this unusual heritage, he enjoys some measure of divine power, not granted by an external source. As he gets more experienced, he'll naturally unlock more and more of that bottomless divine potential. (aka standard level progression) He was apprenticed to, and eventually became a local doctor when he grew up. However, he felt his quiet life was too stagnant to allow him to truly grow, so he set off on his own to master both his medical skills and innate power, hoping to eventually cheat death and the passage of time itself.
Inventory:
Left hip: Brass Balm
Right hip: Jug of wine
Left shoulder: Clean cloth, hooked needles, & thread
Right shoulder: Tools for field surgery
Chest/neck: Blanket
Top of head: Dragonweed
Concealed: Greekfire
Player: Tunic
Maria Agate
Human Hedge Witch
Specialization: Purifying Light (Basically the use of magical light to burn and kill enemies)
High/Low Ambitions: The destruction of Great Evil / The destruction of those she sees as "impure"
Phobia: The taste of blood
Mutation: A tongue that can split in half, turning into two fully ambulatory tentacles.
Vulnerability: Magical darkness causes her to suffer symptoms similar to sunburn.
Ability: Knots which hold the soul as well as the body. Tie someone to a chair and prevent them from lying, bind a door and ghosts can't walk through it, sufficiently elaborate macrame and some demon can't escape until improbable conditions (of her choosing) are met, that sort of thing. Self-bondage to reinforce self-control, too.
Bio: Maria is a descendant of the Agate line, a series of holy men most known for their unparalleled command of what they identify as the "Purging Light", light powerful enough to burn and even kill those caught in it. She grew up learning the techniques, and when she came of age she set out to do battle with evil. She considers purity very important, though she finds temptations lie stronger than she'd expected...
Description: Rather pretty, though hardened by her time spent adventuring. Due to her usual close proximity to intense light, she has a slight tan. She wears her blonde hair short, and has blue eyes. She is tall and thin, though with much more muscle than her brother. Normally rather buxom, she binds her chest with ropes in order to keep her self control in even the most taxing of situations. Usually clad in simple clothing that allows her to move her limbs easily.
Inventory:
Left Hip: Dried Bread
Neck/Chest:Jade Amulet
Left Shoulder Iron Statuette of Saint Agate, a distant ancestor made a Saint for his singlehanded defeat of a Demon Lord.
Right Hip: Jug of Water
Right Shoulder: Dragon weed
Head: Platemail
Somewhere Uncomfortable: Rope
Player: The Archivist
Daniel Agate
Human Hedge Witch
Specialization: Purification, removal of negative status effects and minor healing
High/Low Ambitions: To do good / Men, men, men. A sufficiently attractive man can easily distract Daniel, and he finds it difficult to resist their advances.
Phobia: Large, feral dogs
Mutation: Square pupils, with greatly enhanced depth perception and low-light vision
Vulnerability: Magical darkness causes him to suffer symptoms similar to sunburn.
Ability: An aura of light centered around himself that can be expanded and contracted at will. Causes mild burns and can occasionally be accidentally triggered by unwanted touches. At max power he's standing in a golden bonfire which might be visible miles away on a clear night, but it never provides useful illumination outside the actual radius of effect. As a side benefit, so long as the aura is extended beyond his skin (and thus visible) he doesn't have to worry about penalties to balance, climbing, grappling, etc. for slippery surfaces, nor diseases and poisons that work by breath or skin contact. It acts like a forcefield, pushing nasty sludge out of the way. Very handy in a plague environment. Corrosives could still be an issue, or anything ingested, or pressed right into an open wound.
Bio: Maria's younger brother, Daniel was the "black sheep" of his family. Rather than his family's abilities of Purging Light, Daniel was born capable of the art of Purification, being capable of "burning away" curses and illness, along with minor wounds. Combined with his homosexuality, he proved unpopular in his traditional family. The day he turned of age, his loving sister Maria brought him along as a travelling companion, determined to treat him better than the rest of her family had.
Description: Somehow manages to be even prettier than his sister, fresh-faced and youthful in appearance. Unlike his sister, he remains rather fair-skinned. His hair is blonde and slightly longer than that of his sister, and his eyes are a bright green rather than the blue of his sister's. He's as tall as Maria, though rather than her thin, somewhat angular appearance he manages to seem more lithe and soft, with a distinctly feminine way of holding himself. He keeps a spare set of candles strapped to his inner thigh at all times. His outfit is a robe meant to shame Purifiers such as himself, slightly too small for his body.
Inventory:
Left Shoulder: Brass Balm
Right Shoulder: Brass Balm
Uncomfortable Place: Candles, strapped to his inner thigh and easily mistaken for a concealed erection. The wicks tickle from time to time.
Neck/Chest: Bronze Statuette of Saint Agate
Left Hip: Cloth, Needles, Thread
Right Hip: Knives
Head: Jade Amulet
Player: The Archivist
Djan Seriv
Elf (Orc) Soldier
Specialization: Slinger
High/Low Ambitions: Secure a quiet, peaceful life for as many people as he reasonably can / Revenge on those who caused his desertion
Phobia: Swans, as they were depicted in the insignia of the noble who commanded his army
Mutation: Mostly vestigal second set of jaws in throat
Vulnerability: Aversion and nausea when gold is present in sufficient quantity to smell (which has the side benefit that he's supernaturally able to "smell" gold at all, which shouldn't be physically possible given it's extremely low room-temperature vapor pressure and lack of chemical reactivity), then painful blisters and eventual bleeding sores from skin contact.
Ability: Bei Fong-style metalbending: Anything a smith could do with proper tools, he can do with his bare hands, usually faster and easier since he avoids the inefficiency of swinging a hammer around. Making useful items requires a roll against the relevant craft skill, since he still needs to understand what he's trying to do. It's easy to temporarily rubberize, say, some iron bars he wants to slip between and then leave seemingly undisturbed, but permanently reshaping stuff requires energy, which has to come from either his own body (fatigue), or oxidation of the item he's shaping. Accordingly, it's harder to work on anything corrosion-resistant, or in an oxygen-poor environment, or with an item he want to keep pristine and rust-free, but those problems don't stack. Twisting a sword into rusty scrap is just about the easiest thing in the world... provided he can grab it and concentrate for a second, which the sword's wielder might not cooperate with. Gold, platinum, moonsilver, pure lead (pewter and mundane silver are fine), and maybe a few other rarities or exotic alloys don't respond at all, no matter how hard he pushes. Along with, of course, anything nonmetallic, or not in contact with his skin. It's possible to reshape a large item far away by extending a thin wire over to connect to it, but anything more than he could plausibly lift with one hand (whether because of total mass or bad leverage) requires going very slowly, and even then is imprecise, like clenching a pool cue between his teeth and trying to write legibly with a half-dead ballpoint pen taped to the opposite end.
Bio: Djan Seriv had the fortune to be born in a relatively quiet, rural region, so even if he was born fairly ugly for an elf he didn't attract much notice working on his family's farm. He grew strong chasing after sheep, lugging crops, and plowing fields, and when his next stroke of misfortune hit as a war flared up, he was soon drafted into the local lord's army. When he was young and afraid, a fervent anger at the nobility, the enemy, and the world burnt within him, making him an effective soldier. As the years beat him down, he became too weary to sustain his hatred and with little more than what he carried, finally decided to desert his army when the war dragged without any sign of ceasing. He doubts his old allies have much time or energy to spare tracking down one deserter, but just to be sure he's gone all the way to these ancient ruins to shake off pursuers and get something that could let him live a quiet life at last. He doesn't have much and earning his status as a veteran soldier has left him less handsome than ever, but he's tough and determined.
Description: Djan Seriv is a large, bulky elf ugly enough to easily qualify as an orc. He has no style, he has no grace, this adventurer has a funny face. Djan was born with a somewhat asymmetrical facial structure, and his years of fighting weren't kind enough to give him the sort of scars people think are attractive on anime characters. His nose has been broken at least once and healed poorly, while another scar pulls a lip up to display several damaged teeth. He dresses in plain, drab clothing remarkable only because of a damaged patch on one lapel where it looks like part of the fabric was torn off and patched again.
Inventory:
Left hip - Lead bullets & sling
Right hip - manacles
Left shoulder - Spear
Right shoulder - Wooden shield
Chest/neck - Jade amulet shaped like a clenched fist
Top of head - Dried meat in a small basket
Somewhere uncomfortable - Plate armor
Player: DanZapman
Geoffrey Vargas
Human Rich Bastard
Specialization: Escapology and evasion
High/Low Ambitions: Maintain just barely enough professionalism as a mercenary to avoid being fired, then retire and collect a pension / Eat fruity pies
Mutation: A nasty-looking, vaguely-ominous sigil etched into the back of his shoulder, which needs to be re-bandaged on a regular basis (at least every day or two) or it starts to fester, and getting hit there hurts more than it otherwise might. Paying close attention to aches can provide early warning of inclement weather, magical traps, or other bad news. The brand also makes monsters prefer him, when given a choice of targets.
Seriously Expensive Thing: An enchanted belt which provides enhanced strength and/or speed, but only during moments of heroic desperation
Bio: A former Royal Guardsman and professional coward.
Inventory:
Left hip - Dagger
Right hip - Enchanted belt
Left shoulder - Spear
Right shoulder - single plate pauldron
Chest/neck - plate-mail
Top of head - Strong skullcap helmet (well maintained)
Somewhere uncomfortable - Nothing?
Player: Riotmode
Rhea
Half-goblinoid Hedge Witch
Specialization: Empathic Fire
High/Low Ambitions:Baking! Specifically. She can cook other things, but she's interested in making fancy deserts, mostly. / Fascination with the sun
Phobia: Unnatural / magical darkness. Anything that light fails to illuminate the way it should. Possibly sufficiently aberrant distortions of light as well.
Mutation: Her emotions made manifest in flame. (small orbiting flames)
Vulnerability: Super drowning powers. Being put in an environment where it's impossible for her to create flame is unhealthy, as it's a spiritual extension of herself.
Ability: Fire bending / empathic communication with flame (and sufficiently flame-like magics).
Bio:A native of the depths, rather than an adventurer who delved too deep. Before the Church of Orcus moved in and allied with them, local goblinoids primarily revered certain sites of geothermal activity. In one such case, the relevant local divinity lay with one of those remaining faithful geyser-worshippers, with the intention of creating a political pawn.
Of course, politics being what they are, these plans never really came to fruition. Rhea's background left her as something of a priestess, a duty she was always reasonable content to fulfill (and she honors her mother still), but her real passion was always backing. Something that she really couldn't explore to the fullest back home. There weren't exactly the right supplies, and the local culinary traditions ran in a different direction. So with her mother's (confused, but tolerant) blessing, she's off to see the surface and master her culinary field of choice in a more favorable environment.
(I'm thinking heritage means she would come across as really tall for a goblinoid, but pretty short for humans. Somewhat odd looking to both, as a human might find her nowhere near ugly enough to be a golbin, and vice versa).
Inventory:
top of head: Cinnamon Incense (useful, burns, played a role in certain religious rituals, plus it's a spice you could cook with)
left shoulder: Cookware (limited set of pots and pans)
right shoulder: Greekfire
chest/neck: Bronze statuette (representation of her fire-divinity mother)
left hip: Knives (of a type more suited for cooking or gathering than combat)
right hip: jug of oil (can be used for cooking, rituals, negotiating material)
hidden somewhere uncomfortable: tools for lockpicking and field surgery (trivial sterilization, and can probably be used for tweaking fine details on dessert preparation)
Player: mageykun
Casualties
None yet!
Not so Disposable Minions
Lt. Dan: Undead Elvinoid and Eric's First in command. This creature's name is in reference to the character of Lieutenant Dan from the 1994 movie Forrest Gump.
2nd Lt. Dangle Undead Elvinoid and Eric's Second in command. This creature's name is in reference to the character of Lieutenant Dangle from the television series Reno 911!
Pvt. Dip: Undead Elvinoid under Eric's command. Name originally coined by player Santova.
Pvt. Dodge: Undead Elvinoid under Eric's command. Name originally coined by player Santova.
Pvt. Delilah: Undead Elvinoid under Eric's command. Name originally coined by player Santova.
Pvt. Bob/DECEASED: Undead Elvinoid under Eric's command. Name originally coined by player Santova. Torn apart by an Empty Sweeper whilst leading the party through the underground in Session 2, Thread 1.
Act 1 (Pre-Reboot) Character Roster:
Active Characters
Marijke
Hedge Witch
Specialization: Suggestion / Mental influences
High/Low Ambitions: Greed / Wealth
Vulnerability: Allergy to shellfish
Spells:
* "Free Samples" allow for these spells to be cast once per person per day, independent of prepared spell slots. Minor (4 slots): staunch bleeding, resume bleeding, sense poison, gum-fire, whisper-web, bestow fool's luck, green milk curse, footsore curse, experimental miscellany First circle (4 slots): spit fire, least true healing*, least true spite, bestow shadow armor, bite-the-pinecone curse, friendship curse*, first servant invocation (specify type), appraise, rhyme of mending, lightning lecture atemi Second circle (3 slots): demand gift, spit spiders, tesserflecked, penalty clause, least astral courier
Ability: Gemstone Familiar
Player: mageykun
"Sir" Garaile
Soldier
Specialization: Single combat
High/Low Ambitions: Renown / Collecting trophies
Mutation: Unusually-jointed
Player: Tunic
Nico Nashville
Townie
Specialization: Bluff / Acting
High/Low Ambitions: Occult secrets / Costuming
Phobia: Memory loss
Parasite: Babel worm (distracting universal translation)
Vulnerability: Unusually receptive to magic
Innate Power: Uncannily adept method actor, can convince observers of blatant untruths and take on aspects or abilities of his persona; believes it while acting.
Player: CalimariGod
Than
Soldier
Specialization: Sharpshooter
High/Low Ambitions: Purification of insane undead / Verifying hostiles are indeed dead
Phobia: Being cornered
Mutation: Heterochromia (blue eye can tell if someone is lying, but not the truth itself; red eye can see enemy vitals)
Vulnerability: Violent deaths within 5 yards will momentarily leave her incapacitated or paralyzed
Innate Power: Wields a trick weapon spirit bow that can be summoned and desummoned at will
Dimitry "the White Snake" Nicola
Townie
Specialization: Stealth, assassination, thievery
High/Low Ambitions: Reversion of numerous changes to his biology, so he can live comfortably / Fetish for bring mind controlled
Phobia: Arachnids / being labelled as an outcast, being shunned
Mutation: Cursed, black, soulless-looking and reptillian-like eyes which are really sensitive to light, but adjust easier and see further in the dark. Deathly pale skin. Female physical traits
Vulnerability: Affected by many alteration spells. Vibrant to Detect Magic, appears more appetizing to magic-absorbing/eating creatures, less likely to gain positive effects from further alteration spells
Innate Power: Sociopathic. Remains calm and keeps a clear head in stressful situations, and is unfettered morally
Letkra
Rich Bastard
Specialization: Spear-dancing
High/Low Ambitions: Find a way to return to her home dimension / Large impalement, self or otherwise
Phobia: Being trapped in a ward or summoning diagram (Psychologically incapable of freeing herself from perceived restraints in a deliberate fashion)
Mutation: Is a golem-construct composed of semi-homogenous inorganic material, with freely detachable limbs and head; automatic self-repair is slower than human healing
Vulnerability: Requires a pint of oil every 6-8 hours of activity, rather than food and water
Innate Power: Generates an adjustable force field around herself, which can act passively as a small shield or actively as a large barrier
Player: Mitsukara
Riv
Hedge Witch
Specialization: Alchemy / Artificing
High/Low Ambitions: Eternal life / Pursuit of knowledge
Phobia: Fear of own mortality
Mutation: Four arms
Vulnerability: Partially mummified: weakness to both fire and water, but resistant to physical damage; unusual blood clots at one-tenth speed, but also bleeds out at one-tenth speed
Innate Power: Tinkering (Rapid prototyping of mad science gadgets)
Player: Santova
Ravenous Llyr
Soldier
Specialization: Tracking / Hunting
High/Low Ambitions: Finding true love / Eating freshly-killed raw meat
Phobia: Completely inorganic creatures, such as metal golems
Mutation: Superpowered digestive system: can't be harmed by anything ingested, and consuming meat in particular triggers a temporary surge of rapid bodily regeneration based on how much was eaten
Vulnerability: Highly gullible, with little-to-no understanding of social subtleties; easily tricked by even simple deception
Innate Power: Were-shark, shifting reflexively based on context: full human on dry land, shark in deep/salty water, grotesque shark-faced biped in shallow/fresh water, heavy rain, on a beach, or when coated in blood; strenuous and itchy to use the 'wrong' form
Player: Tunic
Stone
Hedge Witch
Specialization: Spirits
High/Low Ambitions: Break his family's curse / Tuning out the spirits through drug use
Phobia: Drowning / Deep water
Mutation: Left leg up to just above hip is made of stone
Vulnerability: Tendency to be possessed, even by spirits that wouldn't normally be able to
Innate Power: Context-sensitive postcognition: spirits of ancestors can be called upon to recite a target's spiritual condition and history
Player: Santova
Casualties
Sgt. Nick
Soldier
Specialization: Intuition
High/Low Ambitions: Redemption / Fascinated by ghosts
Phobia: Disease and rotting corpses
Fate: Left for dead in diseased pool with a corpse in it
Yeven Surgis
Rich Bastard
Specialization: Demons
High/Low Ambitions: Revenge / Groom themselves frequently, and be impeccable
Phobia: Claustrophobia
Mutation: Blind, but with 10-meter Blindsight
Vulnerability: Spells affect her as if she were a demon; symbols of holy faith or purity are injurious
Innate Power: Lesser gravity control
Player: Bad transetor
Fate: MIA; wandered off into labyrinthine caves
