Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Lyinginbedmon 06-04-07, 09:47 AM	I'm gearing up to write a series of stories featuring a ship known as the Simbelminos (Jannic for "Starlight"), which travels through space (It has some adult elements, you have been warned). I realise that sounds very Sci-Fi, but the rules the universe are based on, as well as much of the races and other info, are either D&D homebrew or D&D itself. The whole campaign world has been nicknamed "D&D Future" for lack of a better name. The Simbelminos is a "Galactic Caravel", and as such needs 9 crewmen to function. It's a hodge-podge of technology from various races, and includes 4 disintegrate weapons, two solar sails, an ion drive, and FTL & scanning technology. On to the crew then: Race: Human Homeworld: Cannis, Alastia Age: 24, born 24/08/4073 Height: 5’ 6” Weight: 137 lb Occupation: Prelate aboard SCS Simbelminos Enora is the prelate or priestess aboard the Simbelminos, and one of only two humans aboard. She is one of the less pleasant members, heavily drinking at virtually all times (Which is countered by her inhuman tolerance for alcohol), using her religious artefacts for purposes unintended in their creation, such as using her bible as a footrest, and rejecting any mention of miracles or divine intervention as foolish wishful thinking. There is a reasoning behind this however, as she does not subscribe to most common religions, but instead to human deism, which states that only things defined by human reasoning rather than prophetic books and fanatics can in any way be considered “divine”. The bible in her quarters is a copy of the 39th century edition of the Zakian bible, so with Zakia being a fairly prevalent religion she felt it best to keep a copy around should she ever run into a certain group of priests again. She is something of a sore thumb on the ship, as she suffers from space sickness (Not associated with space adaptation syndrome, closer to motion sickness) quite commonly, and spends much of her time during travel in her quarters consuming alcohol to take her mind off of the circumstances. She makes a point to be the first person to touch solid ground whenever the ship docks or lands, though the symptoms typically ameliorate after a few days. The space sickness leaves her tired and nauseous during trips, and there’s an in-joke among the crew that in the event of an emergency in take-off, the bathroom is the holiest place to be, because Enora will be found blessing the toilet. Given this sickness, and her resulting dislike of space travel, one might wonder exactly how she came to be aboard the Simbelminos at all. The simple answer is that she arrived by accident. The ship landed on Cannis during a large festival meant to honour the Faldean gods where she made the mistake of preaching her own beliefs to a tavern full of clergymen. Fleeing quickly (And carrying a forty year-old bottle of scotch belonging to the innkeeper), Enora accidentally made her way to the shipyard, where she hid from the passing brutes in a collection of care packages meant for Proteus. The packages were transported Enora included to the Simbelminos for transport, and Inzaul has simply neglected to send her off the ship since her discovery. Whilst she loathes space travel because of her illness, she does her best to make keeping her around worthwhile. Enora’s personality is somewhat dual depending on the amount of alcohol she consumes. When sober she is kind and menial and is typically considered to be a typical humble farmer’s wife-type personality. Whilst she is sober she works very hard but immediately takes a dislike towards Mattesith and Kartinbar. However, whilst drunk or approaching inebriation she greatly enjoys their company but does very little work that does not directly impact upon her own status. Whilst drunk, her symptoms also subside temporarily and her other ailments are also suppressed. Enora shares a large friendship with Maeter, and the two are ‘drinking buddies’ in most beverage-serving situations. Maeter’s nigh-incapacity to become inebriated leaves her in the position of ensuring that Enora does not get into trouble, whilst Enora enjoys tempting fate by pushing Maeter’s alcohol limits. Away from their drinking contests, Enora goes to Maeter for Jannic massage sessions whenever her symptoms start degrading to the point that she becomes heavily embarrassed amongst the other crewmembers. Her friendship with Maeter sometimes forces her to make decisions she would not make otherwise, such as to avoid her family (A familial guild specialising in stolen spacecraft parts) in order to safeguard the ship, and every so often her emotions are conflicted when the nature of her illness and the content of Maeter’s massage sessions force her to consider her own sexuality. Race: Elf Homeworld: Septim, Lloigor Age: 170, born 14/11/3927 Height: 5’ 4” Weight: 135 lb Occupation: Security chief aboard SCS Simbelminos Eth’erranara or “F” as she is more commonly known, is plainly an Elf to the eyes of anyone that sees her. However, her history affords a paradox, as unlike the calm and calculating Elves F behaves like a race closer to a Human or Orc or even a Dwarf than an Elf. She enjoys drinking (Though not to the extent of Enora, as her Elven physiology gifts her a weak tolerance for alcohol), regularly engages in contact sports like wrestling and boxing, and is much more unpredictable than even the most chaotic Elf. She owes this to her upbringing, as all the good clichés go, at the hands of adoptive parents. She was born to a pairing of male Elf and female Half-Elf ¼-Human ¼-Orc in 3927, but her military couple parents were soon executed after their capture by Illithid forces on Septim. The specific torture methods utilised on them forced her dying mother into labour and her last gasps of life were used to birth F (Which is why Septim is listed as her homeworld instead of Einderseod-2). She bears a number of small scars on her arms, legs, and back from cuts and scrapes she received during the process and in the day afterwards. An Elven patrol arrived on the planet the next day and found the orphaned F amongst the bodies of her parents. She was rescued and given to foster parent after foster parent through the Commonwealth, but none could effectively manage her or deal with her fairly gruesome origins. Eventually, she was sent to a Dwarven monastery on Einderseod-2 where the stubbornness of her guardians ensured that she stayed put. Consequently, she grew up around aggressive, heavy drinking, and extremely merry Dwarven monks who schooled her in combat and took her as far away from her Elven origins as could possibly be imagined. Because the rescue patrol named her, her name is of Elven origins, but the Dwarfs that cared for her shortened it to simply “F” for convenience. Compared to her guardians, F was very slight and scrawny in build, which necessitated that the fighting style she was taught be slightly altered, resulting in her unique combat method, called “Heavy Pebble” by her guardians. The style largely involves the use of accurately applied force and carefully managed momentum whilst combining the Dwarven talents of heavy-handed fighting. After leaving the monastery, her gambling debts dragged her quickly into the world of organised crime, where she eventually joined a group of bandits that held the Simbelminos hostage for its cargo. Inzaul and Pehrell, then the only crewmembers, convinced her to reconsider her position and she tricked the others and left them on a disabled galley, becoming the chief of security for the Simbelminos. F has a persistent dislike of Illithids, having been reminded about her parents’ deaths from an early age by nightmarish dreams of the day alone with them. She is gradually warming up to Mattesith, but still begrudges Inzaul’s decision to have him as the ship surgeon, and normally refuses any anaesthetic treatment during medical care by him, choosing instead to bear the pain and keep a cautious eye on him. She spends a lot of her free time in the primary cargo hold perfecting a technique she has been developing since age 29, which she calls “Squid Popper”. The basis of which is to produce a resonant imperfection in the cardiovascular system, eventually causing the heart of the victim to explode. She intends to eventually use it on the Illithids that killed her parents. F enjoys gambling, especially the ancient card game of Three Dragon Ante, but suffers bad luck and has gambling debts on a great many planets. She often suggests avoiding planets on which she has debts, and when she arrives on when anyway she typically stays on the ship. Whilst it is often said that F is the eldest member of the crew, she always points out that Inzaul is actually older than her by several decades (In actuality, it is closer to a couple millennia, but he forbids her to tell anyone this as a matter of personal preference) Race: Janni Homeworld: Jannah, Sendfri Age: 38, born [43][04][3005] Height: 5’ 7” Weight: 156 lb Occupation: Captain of SCS Simbelminos Inzaul was born on Jannah in the Sendfri galaxy, 200 light years away from the homeworld of the Einderseod races, on the equivalent date 17th June 1499. His named means “Go Far” in Jannic, in recognition of his childhood obsession with distance. He majored in computer engineering and theoretical physics. His first profession was as night guard in Northern Catacomb 23Y, where he met his future wife Kri’lin, who was working as the nurse’s assistant and later went on to join the Investigative Service. They later had a daughter, Temain, who went on to become a chart-topping pop singer, especially known for her #1 single Sulin Mut Imtel, a mixture of traditional Jannic funerary dirges. The family had one pet, a Tundran Nosorog named Temmy (Slang for the short version of “Temac”, meaning “Big”, the first thing Temain said when she saw him). Being fairly wealthy, and having placed an excessive amount of time into the project, Inzaul was the first choice for pilot in the initial tests of the Simbel faster-than-light drive. He is a member of the Janni race, the last of the Janni race in fact, due largely to their annihilation at the hands of the Sovices at the instigation of their reign. By this time, Inzaul was already dead, having had his molecules splattered across the interior of the experimental faster-than-light spacecraft, the Simbel, on Jannic date [30][06][3046]. You may then ask, how could he be alive and kicking now? The answer is in a collision of two situations. The first involves the Lost War on the planet of Einderseod, 200 light years from Jannah. The final and most enduring memory of this war was the Mizu Omi Barrier that encircled a large island chain on the surface of the planet, effectively a persistent fluctuation in time. It was into the ocean in a section of this barrier that the Simbel crash landed, the technology of the drive having killed the pilot and made it impossible to steer. At the test site, the large explosion resulting from the test ensured that all assumed Inzaul had died along with the ship and the drive. The second involves the arrival of the Black Pearl longship in the Mizu Omi island chain beyond the barrier. In the interim between his crash and their arrival, Inzaul’s ship had been discovered by a villainous group known as BroShaCho and he had been revived using resurrection magic and taken hostage, presumed mad due to his inability to speak Common at the time. The crew of the Pearl found him on 6th January 1955 stashed and gagged in a cave on one of the islands and retrieved him. What would happen next would change the course of his life and the fate of time itself. Due to reasons presently unknown, Inzaul was retrieved from the Pearl during their return trip through the barrier by a trio of Protoforged and a Centon known as Atoun, utilising a Sovice-made Nanogate connected to 21 individual Temporal Nodes. After his departure with them from the Pearl that day, virtually nothing is known until his reappearance in the Einderseod year 4094 as new owner and Captain of Simbelminos (Named in Jannic, meaning “Starlight”) as Inzaul Nostkriasti, having adopted a second name for social convenience and to mask his race. The universe now is a far cry from the one he lived and died in, and Inzaul is almost constantly irked by how out of date he seems and how complicated some of the world is. He spends a lot of time in the ship’s office, keeping track of expenses and paperwork, so a lot of it is cluttered and seemingly disorganised, though Inzaul could find a single sheet of paper from years ago in just a few seconds if needed. There is a small drawer in the desk that he keeps locked perpetually, though Pehrell knows there was a time when it was unlocked. However, he is very empathic, and is usually one of the first to suggest standing up for those in dire need and one of the first to comfort someone in distress. He deplores all religion, preferring the hard facts of science to the mystical realities and characters of theism. He keeps Enora around as a reminder that things are bigger than he is, allowing him to keep his perspective. He enjoys the peace and quiet when the rest of the crew is asleep and spends much of this time starting into empty space, contemplating a time more “ordinary”. Emotionally, Inzaul is a very tired person. Were it not for Legion of the Dragon and his apparent importance in stopping their machinations, he would quite gladly welcome the serenity of the grave, but knows there are people now that need him around more than he doesn’t want to be. As the last of the Janni, he knows his demise would mean extinction, and it is one of his primary driving forces that such a thing not happen, because he believes the memory of the Janni keeps the Sovices humble. Inzaul’s predicament leaves him with a sizeable list of annoyances, not the least of which is magic. The Janni evolved as a species and as a people without magic, and all of their technology has a zero basis on it. However, the vast majority of races in the universe did evolve with magic, allowing them to get into space in a much more primitive state. He acknowledges that magic is a useful and powerful force, but sees it as making other races spoiled compared to his own that had to do everything “the hard way” sans magic. Inzaul’s registration of the ship inside the Commonwealth is purely out of convenience. He would never willingly be a part of any organisation that would have the genocidal monsters that are the Sovices as founding members. As a result of the loss of his family, homeworld, and indeed, life, at their hands, Inzaul suffers from a distinct aggression towards virtually anything Sovice-made, especially anything based on Jannic technology. Evident of this is his treatment of Maeter, the sole member of the Sovice contingent on the Simbelminos, there by Commonwealth law. Race: Killoren Homeworld: Kin, Taeilmas Age: 47, born 26/03/4049 (Immortal) Height: 5’ 9” Weight: 127 lb Occupation: Deckhand aboard SCS Simbelminos Kartinbar was one of the first people brought aboard the Simbelminos by Inzaul, and handles the general day-to-day activities that keep it clean and tidy. He is very philosophical, and rarely a conversation goes by without him inserting some kind of many-layered metaphor. He especially enjoys pondering the meanings of existentialism, especially given it’s imprint upon his own existence. As a Killoren, Kartinbar sprang into existence spontaneously from microorganisms on Kin. As such, he has no concept of familial ties or bonds, but he greatly values the lives of those around him as part of his philosophy. Most popularly, he manifests the hunter aspect of Killoren, and usually spends the morning meditation required beside Prodis. As a Killoren, he is also effectively immortal, and some of his life goals extend long after other crewmembers can even conceive, such as his goal to unify a singular philosophical theory by the 19th Einderseod millennium. Because of his racial ties to nature, Kartinbar believes much more in nature than he ever does in actual scientific theory, but also adds his beliefs to magic as well due to their source of the living soul. His motto is “A tree stands in a grassy valley. Naturally, the tree has been there for quite some time, but one can’t believe it will always be so. We can no more say why the tree has been there as why the tree might be there still tomorrow” (As is common with Kartinbar, verbosity is prevalent). He doesn’t like the microscopic analysis of things that are “just there” in nature, life for him is much easier if you just know that something happens and go with it rather than analyse why it happened. However, he doesn’t believe that because something is “just there” it should be taken as such, he believes that taking something as “just there” is surrendering to fate. As such, he has clear disdain for the other crewmembers’ faith in the machinery that runs the ship, and in dire straits will usually be found in his bunk watering his plants, which entangle much of the aft section of the ship. This is a constant source of contention between Molly and himself, who adores the machinery and would love to see Kartinbar’s plants removed from the more delicate systems, especially the environmental controls whose moisture swiftly attracts the Taeilman foliage. Because he favours the aspect of the hunter, Kartinbar specialises in stealth-based combat, and is sometimes jokingly referred to as the “Hippy Ninja” amongst the crew. He is nearly impossible to find when he wants to hide, and the crew have been known to peer over their shoulders spontaneously to check if he is around watching them from some secret hiding place. At rest, Kartinbar enjoys the variety of life. He waters his plants, reads exotic literature, and does his best to mimic the speech of others. He doesn’t want to be an exact duplicate of anyone, but his innate ties to the natural world ensure that his curiosity with other creatures is never satiated. He has an odd taste for history, as his own race though undeniably ancient has no recorded history of its own. He keeps a very detailed journal, filled with a different perspective on events depending on the aspect he manifests in a given day. This has, on occasion, been mistaken for latent multiple personality disorder, but Inzaul assures doubters that he wouldn’t have hired Kartinbar if he were insane. In addition to his duties as deckhand, Kartinbar also serves as the ship’s moral counsellor, although issues usually take several hours to resolve as those involved decode Kartinbar’s cryptic psychological statements. Race: Sovice human solid-form android Homeworld: Jannah, Sendfri Age: 9, created [42][08][5603] Height: 5’ 4” Weight: 140 lb Occupation: Diplomat aboard SCS Simbelminos By law, as established during the first few years of its existence, every ship allied with the Commonwealth must have at least one Sovice agent aboard as part of the crew, in order to advise on usage of the Omnigate system and other technical issues. For the Simbelminos, this agent was Maeter Aetsebansiro, who operates as the ship’s diplomat, though she rarely is allowed to pursue this profession. She still tries to fulfil her position however, and assists the rest of the crew in their endeavours whenever this isn’t possible for one reason or another. Her quarters are kept in the lower cargo hold separate from all others, and Inzaul treats her coldly and with contempt for her entire being. However, Maeter endures this as part of her duties, and regardless of her captain’s desires of her presence she does her share of work around the ship as best as she can. Maeter is extremely logical, rational, and calculating and conducts every matter with a strict sense of professionalism. This leaves her as a somewhat stiff social figure, and she has a tendency to alienate others with her naïve sense of social norms. She smokes out of habit, though the tar damages her internal systems, but she does it to help her seem more normal to others. Every 8000 fully-burnt cigarettes forces her to seek maintenance before her systems start malfunctioning and she visually starts suffering from what could be compared to lung cancer. Out of concern for the living creatures around her, she smokes a special “fake” brand of cigarettes which give off smoke with no chemicals harmful to organisms but which is full of nanotechnology components, similar to the poison released by Amel units, allowing Sovice creatures to track anything contaminated by it. Maeter spends much of her time in the cargo hold in her quarters, examining new data or expanding upon her social image. As part of the 800 series of solid-form androids, Maeter possesses a number of technological advances over earlier models, which serve to make her appear more realistic. She is capable of producing children, can utilise blood to sustain damaged systems, and has reactions to computer viruses that mirror biological illnesses. She is also one of the few models to be equipped with a sex drive, though her personality lends her to suppressing this drive completely. Secretly however, Maeter is deeply affected by Inzaul’s contempt and will do virtually anything to prove herself to him. Because of her near-constant access to the ship systems, she knows a lot about Inzaul’s family, and she has attempted to incorporate a number of physical and behavioural traits into herself from his wife and daughter to make her seem more likeable to him, though this usually has the opposite effect of making him see her as more abhorrent than normal. Despite her demeanour, she doesn’t like the rigid command structure of the Sovices, and has difficulty with the programming of blindly following their orders. She does have a family, despite what others may assume of the Sovices. Her family are all 800 models, a ten-person family unit with numeric designations between 870 and 879. She therefore has a mother and father, two brothers and a sister, an aunt and uncle, and a grandmother and father. In the family unit, she is considered to be the youngest daughter of the mother and father. She doesn’t enjoy visiting her family, because each of them, as an “older” unit, has authority over her, and her siblings can be quite demanding whilst her mother has a tendency to be intimately graphic. Angstrom Aetsebanfithe Uncle Angstrom Aetsebanfri Brother Angstrom Aetsebannein Grandfather Angstrom Aetsebanseban Father Angstrom Aetsebantu Brother Maeter Aetsebanaet Grandmother Maeter Aetsebansichs Mother Maeter Aetsebansiro Little Sister Maeter Aetsebanthor Aunt Maeter Aetsebanwan Sister Race: Illithid Homeworld: Icthultu, Byatis Age: 143, born 14/11/3954 Height: 5’ 5” Weight: 148 lb Occupation: Surgeon aboard SCS Simbelminos Mattesith was a Commander in the Illithid Empire for 60 years, and was known for his exquisite taste in brains. He was present at the Battle of Hans Fall in 4026 as part of the coalition, and ultimately enjoyed in the delights of the other ambassadors, cementing the Illithids as they are now: Caged within their home galaxy. Mattesith escaped the encapsulation of the Illithid Empire with two of his Lieutenants, Neqoig and Icrx. They arrived on the uninhabited planet of Ictipik in Uttaus. They cannibalised their ship (A Nautilus-class) and constructed a sizeable stronghold beneath the rocky plains of the planet. As the years went by, they gathered creatures from ships and planets, sifting through the planes to garner a force of voidmind creatures to serve as their footsoldiers and attendants. With no Elder Brain to guide them, the trio enjoyed a distinct freedom that at first was a troublesome feeling, but eventually grew to be quite comforting. They no longer worried about retribution for any taboo experiments they undertook, and created a system or command akin to a democracy more than anything else. This harmony of horrors was not to last however. After 4 years the trio were discovered by an Armada ship searching for the answer to the missing creatures in the region. During the attack, many of the voidmind creatures were killed, as was Icrx, who was reduced to a pile of ash while trying to erase the computer hard drives. Mattesith escaped the compound, but was betrayed by Argus who shifted onto another plane with the surviving voidmind creatures instead of covering Icrx. Mattesith eluded capture for a week before the Armada ship left. With the all clear having been given, traffic resumed through the region, but Mattesith was in no position to begin rebuilding again, lacking the two other Illithids necessary for the creation of voidmind creatures. He lived for the next couple of days, feeding off of the brains of fallen Armada soldiers left behind in the frenzy of combat. The brains were partially rotten but were sufficient to feed him temporarily. Four days after the ship left, the SCS Jersey was transporting convicted criminals to the main depo in Semtek, when a riot broke out aboard the ship and caused significant damage to the circulation systems. As a result, it was forced to make an emergency landing on Ictipik for repairs. During the stay, Mattesith was discovered and taken captive. The ship's prelate, Damon Cohen, evangelist of Heironeous, managed to divulge from Mattesith the knowledge of his tactical genius. After a decidedly lengthy discussion, it was decided a better move to force Mattesith to conform to the Commonwealth's ethics and morals than to kill him outright. Project Sable Seraph was founded as the ship spent an extended period on Ictipik. Over the course of four months, Mattesith was repeatedly tortured and compelled to change his ways to those of Heironeous for the good of all. He was drugged, burned, beaten, and assaulted mentally, every lie of conversion yielding him only a brief reprieve as they validated the claim. Until eventually, he just gave in. Damon was overjoyed, and the torture sessions finally ceased. But Mattesith was smarter than that, and knew his life, as an evil being or a good being, have been cruelly infringed upon, and wanted vengeance and freedom repaid to him. Following his apparent conversion, he worked alongside Damon in preaching to the prisoners during journeys (His name was given to the ambassadors of the Sendfri Commonwealth, but the information was lost in the wake of relocation to new headquarters) and serving as a light medic. He lived inside the same room in which he was tortured, and began utilising talents still existent from his prior days to engineer his escape. In the month immediately prior to the escape, Mattesith displayed an increasing inability to function with civil behaviour. Damon confronted him about this disfunction while the Jersey was parked in a dock in Alastia. After a heated conversation, Mattesith pointed out that for all the time that Damon had spent in the room, he had never once simply looked upwards to the ceiling. Confused, Damon did so, and immediately caught sight of the psionic seal of a charm person spell seared into the materials. Startled by the revelation, Damon fell victim to the seal, and was enthusiastically compelled to follow Mattesith as he shifted the pair off the ship and onto an unknown plane. Damon would reappear 2 months later in Sendfri, dishevelled and addicted to Baccaran, but Mattesith escaped completely. The time apparently spent with Mattesith is a topic Damon continues to refuse to speak of, though he has since returned to his work in spite of the addiction. The “new” mentality afforded him a distinct outsider perspective to his race and culture, and he was repulsed by the content. Consequently, he has never eaten a brain since, though the urge will always be with him. He takes daily medication to suppress the instinct however, and avoids hospitals and clinics, and devours the brains of vermin or locks himself away when the urge is too great. Populated areas are loath to accept him in virtually any respect, usually more so when he attempts to be useful or kind (Which is seen as part of some unknown scheme). He also emphasises more on the “human” side of him than his Illithid heritage, a human having been utilised to birth him. Because of his history, Mattesith is an extremely competent surgeon, and his digestive enzymes (Normally used to pierce skulls) are an invaluable tool for removing tumours and other lumps, and he has been known to use them for cosmetic surgery on more than one occasion. However, despite his reputation as an excellent surgeon, his reputation as being an Illithid or “Mind Flayer” keeps many from his door in fear that he will devour their brains while they lie under anaesthetic. Because he had never met a Mind Flayer before, and had no knowledge of the Illithid Empire battles against the Commonwealths, Inzaul hired him as the ship surgeon of the Simbelminos without any reservation. F posed a significant argument against his employment but was overruled by the captain. F still has a distinct lack of confidence in Mattesith, and insists on refusing anaesthetic to keep her brains intact during operations. As an Illithid, and regardless of his urges to eat brains, Mattesith is in constant need of certain hormones, enzymes, and most importantly psychic energy, his food is made especially by Prodis, who takes great pains to ensure a constant supply of useable materials and forming them into a delectable meal. As such, they share a rapport on culinary subjects, and Prodis is acutely aware of Mattesith’s desire to atone for his crimes in his previous life. Kartinbar sees him as an ideal, an embodiment of the existential belief that existence supersedes purpose, and so is constantly intrigued by Mattesith’s medicated suppression of his original self. He also helps Mattesith when herbal remedies and treatments are necessary, as an aficionado on nature itself. As an ex-Commander, Mattesith is also distinctly aware of a number of Illithid shortcuts and secret passages, so has a professional connection with Pehrell in navigation through some regions. In what little free time he allots himself, Mattesith prefers to continue his research into a non-brain related source of the vital nutritional requirements of Mind Flayer anatomy. Presently, he is researching the source of the psychic energies, which will aid in producing a medicinal solution. Alternatively, he reads medical journals and detective novels, which he borrows, from Pehrell. Race: Human Homeworld: Einderseod-2, Sendfri Age: 22, born 29/04/4075 Height: 5’ 2” Weight: 99 lb Occupation: Shipwright aboard SCS Simbelminos Molly is the engineer and shipwright for the Simbelminos, the fourth person to become a crewmember. She is an amazing mechanical prodigy, but suffers from a number of ailments symptomatic of autism. She dislikes being touched, finding it painful, and occasionally finds the touch of fabric on her skin painful as well. Involuntary head motions or spontaneous touch on the back of her head easily frightens her. When anxious, her speech becomes extremely rushed, covering every possible facet of the topic, and is easily distracted onto other subjects. As a result, she doesn’t spend much time with the other crewmembers, but adores Maeter and the ship itself, idolising Maeter’s embodiment of technology. As a pay-off for her negative symptoms, she is intuitively aware of anything that goes wrong with machines and easily fixes even the biggest of malfunctions. Her small frame allows her access to parts of the ship that most are completely unaware of, and she is usually the person who repairs Maeter when her smoking habit starts to damage her functions, and persistently berates her for carrying out self-destructive habits such as the smoking. As a child, Molly’s autistic traits made her unmanageable for her parents, who deposited her into an institution on Jannah, where her mechanical intuitiveness was sparked. When she was 15 she escaped from the institution with help from an S-Janni nurse whose reproductive system she repaired, allowing her to have children with her husband (Though to Molly she was simply a broken machine in need of repairs). The nurse received an inherited fighter ship from her mother who died in combat, and used it to help Molly escape. To date there is a warrant out for Molly’s retrieval, and the partially constructed rocket she built at the institute for her escape is on display in the gallery there for visitors. Molly is easily one of the most sexually active of the crew, under wraps, and is a closet lesbian (Which she dislikes speaking of because it is an improper use of carefully designed evolution). Because her father and mother abandoned her, F and Prodis have become surrogates for her, and she does her best to please them. Inzaul takes great pains to keep Molly safe, because she reminds him of his daughter, and the crew in general do their best to help her due to her status as the least combat able of the crew. Despite her typical antisocial habit, she knows more about what cheers people up than they themselves often do, and when called to the task can incite an extreme amount of hope on the ship. This sometimes worries crewmen like Prodis, who gets concerned that she has access to information she shouldn’t. Molly’s biggest dream is to become fully mechanical and shed her biological body, much like Maeter. This is because as a machine she can be reprogrammed to remove all of her psychological ailments and would have much greater capacity in virtually any task. Once mechanical, she hopes to open a travelling machine shop to repair any devices that should happen by. Inzaul continually assures her that, whilst he can’t make her mechanical, she’s welcome to use the Simbelminos as the jumping point for her shop. Molly’s surrogacy for F makes her feel uncomfortable when Molly seeks her approval as she would a mother, but she does her best to ensure that Molly is indulged because she wants to see her well. Likewise, Prodis does his best to be a good father figure, which sometimes leads to him playing the “bad guy” by chastising her for her libido and handing out punishments. Secretly, he treats her like the daughter he’ll likely never have, because making Molly happy ensures that everyone aboard is happy. Race: Centon Homeworld: Unus, Proteus Age: 34, born ~18~Junius~4083~ Height: 6‘ 5“ Weight: 145 lb Occupation: Cook aboard SCS Simbelminos Prodis is a male Centon (Though through appearance it is difficult to distinguish the two Centon genders). He has an excellent talent for cooking, and his cakes are well renowned aboard the Simbelminos. Unlike most Centons, Prodis prefers to use his legs when possible, instead of flying as the rest of his race. This means that his legs are far more muscular than others, which are normally atrophied to the point that a Centon normally cannot walk at all. He has no known family members, and was born under the general cover story of some unknown captured enemy via the Ritual of Fruition, though like most newer Centons he was actually born naturally conceived through a Centon child by the Infernii faction. When he was 19, he joined the Temple of Dei and gradually worked his way up the military ranks until he achieved the prestigious rank of Warrior of Dei. Up to this date, his name was recognised as Prodis, not long after this it would change to Proditor. Prodis lead a group of soldiers into a raid of an Infernii cell, housing some 300 children being used as both new Centons and breeding. Prodis had been a loyal follower of Centon law and the will of holy scripture laid down by the priests of Dei, but upon seeing everything that lay within the cell something inside of him changed. Instead of giving the order to kill every Centon in the cell, Prodis instead turned against his team. Over the course of 5 hours, he then proceeded to kill every member of his team and every member of every team sent to reinforce them, a sum total of 300 deaths. As a result, he was branded a mass murderer, traitor (Hence, Proditor), and he quickly made his escape from Unus via a stolen Marsus fighter ship, slipping past the Faldean barricade around the galaxy. From here, he kept his original name, and lived in secret drifting through many galaxies. He sold the fighter ship to continue his wanderings not long after his escape, and despite his race’s lack of need for nutritional intakes he took up cookery as a hobby and became remarkably adept very quickly. He used this talent to provide himself with income wherever he went. Eventually, he was working at a tavern in Alastia when Inzaul happened upon the establishment and ordered one of Prodis’ cakes. Enamoured by the taste provided by one without any sense akin, Inzaul immediately offered the secretive Prodis a place on the Simbelminos. Despite his Jainist beliefs, he is quite happy to use whatever materials are present to prepare food for others. Prodis gave up the teachings of Dei when he betrayed the Temple, and has since turned to Jainism as his new religion, so he spends a considerable amount of his free time meditating. However, he does not believe he will ever reach moksha, as he is sometimes drawn back into his old life by defeating multiple opponents with almost supernatural deaths, usually in defence of others. Paradoxically, the holy symbol he keeps in his bunk is the Jain symbol for Ahimsa. Despite whatever questions this may raise about him, Prodis refuses to give any clear answer as to the origin of his abilities or why the Centon Theocracy despises him so much. Regardless, his darkest secret is not that he defended the only people actively trying to save his race from extinction and killed many to do it, but that he actually enjoyed killing them. Race: Illumian Homeworld: Litur, Amdira Age: 39, born 350/412 #3597 Height: 5‘ 6“ Weight: 138 lb Occupation: Helmsman aboard SCS Simbelminos When someone walks onto the bridge of the Simbelminos, the first thing they usually notice is that much of the room is taken up by stacks of books covering virtually any conceivable topic from engineering to navigation to romantic fiction to mythology. These belong to the ship’s helmsman, Pehrell Stormdelver, who has an almost insatiable love of reading. He is a kind and polite gentleman, who follows every conceivable rule of etiquette, including those of other cultures and those that haven’t been in general usage since the early 3000s (The vast majority of which he discovers in his reading). Emotionally, Pehrell is very insecure, and bases his social interactions on situations and circumstances in his novels, which can make him seem a tad absurd, but he does warm up to new people quickly. As a child, Pehrell was part of the Stormdelver Illumian cabal. This was a quill cabal, and was largely eradicated 18 years ago, leaving Pehrell orphaned from any family or friends. He and his younger sister Kerrea were the only known survivors, and his pay on the Simbelminos largely goes to supporting her through college. Whilst the attackers that destroyed the cabal were Githyanki, the specific location of the cabal and the items unretrieved from the ruins suggest that they were informed of the cabal stronghold’s contents. Consequently, Pehrell has suspected an informant was working with the Githyanki for some time, and many of the books around his station on the bridge were retrieved from the ruins. As the ship’s helmsman, it is Pehrell’s task to plot courses, estimate travel times, operate evasive manoeuvres, and generally remain in charge of the physical motions of the ship. He also serves as the translator in many encounters, because his extreme literacy allows him knowledge of an inordinate number of languages and social practices, whilst otherwise only Maeter (With her internal language processor) and Inzaul (With his universal translator) could understand most races. However, despite his gentlemanly manner, Pehrell is incredibly foul-mouthed when angry, spouting rants and curses that would make a drunken Orc mafia don blush. Understandably, he does his best to avoid such situations, and usually storms off before his anger takes this complete effect. In situations, he prefers to sit quietly and analyse the circumstances, attempting to command full mastery of every possibility, as is the case with most Illumians. This often makes him slow to react in crisis situations, forcing others to persistently remind him, which has lead to a number of harsh words in firefights. Pehrell has a secret infatuation with Maeter, as he admires her logical mind and prowess at mathematics. Because of Inzaul’s dislike of her, this can lead to arguments between the two friends, and Maeter has trouble reciprocating Pehrell’s feelings for her due to her social difficulties. However, despite the issues of the infatuation, Pehrell’s Illumian nature ensures that regardless of consequence he persists in making advances to get close to her, though very little literature has been written regarding his particular situation.Okay, feel free to comment, I'd like to have them all sorted out and fixed before I start writing anything in detail.
Lyinginbedmon 06-04-07, 05:47 PM	Questions? Comments? Lunatic ramblings?
Lyinginbedmon 06-05-07, 04:31 AM	I don't need a detailed insight into all 9 of them, just one would be alright! I'm beginning to think something's up, I've made 3 different threads over the past month and not one has had any replies...
Harrow Blade 06-05-07, 08:03 AM	I don't need a detailed insight into all 9 of them, just one would be alright! I'm beginning to think something's up, I've made 3 different threads over the past month and not one has had any replies... I am impressed by the quantity of work that you have put into your characters but to many I would think it appears daunting to have to read through so much writing that appears in what looks like one big chunk. Don't take this as an attack on you I am just trying to be constructive and help you get some of the feed back that you are looking for. i have skimmed through some of your post and think that you have some great ideas. if you are writing a story then I would suggest that a forum designed for like minded people would be of more gain to yourself. Believe in your ideas and take a gamble on yourself. your characters are more than a single dimension and appear to have drive which many people come here looking for to equip thier own characters with. Other than that i am not sure what else i can offer. I hope you find success in your endevour. Harrow Blade
Lyinginbedmon 06-05-07, 11:33 AM	Okay, I've split up the paragraphs some more into more manageable chunks, I originally wrote those in a Word document and unfortunately it seems the Tabs don't transfer
Lyinginbedmon 06-06-07, 07:22 AM	Anyone have any thoughts or comments on these fellows? Let me know if I messed up some apparent-rulings or if something doesn't make sense, heck let me know who your favourite is! :D
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-07-07, 01:48 AM	Alright I'm at work and have only read the first 3. As a result you only get :clap: :clap: :clap: so far. More will likely be forthcoming.
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-10-07, 03:29 AM	Alrighty having finished off reading these through I will offer another :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:. True that's two more than characters in existance total but you deserve 3(?) extra:D. Questions? Comments? Gonna have to list Pherrell as my favorite. :teach:Looks like its time for the editor hat. I hope I don't come off overly critical since I really do like what I've seen thus far.:teach: Enora Choor The idea of a priestess of Diesm is a bit strange. I'm gonna have to hold off on this one till I've seen her in action. I dunno about the drunkard bit either but it can make for some interesting scenes. I usually prefer a character who drinks heavily or not at all over one who does so constantly. Lastly the space sickness could use a little better defenition if its not like motion sickness what is it like? Eth'erranara “F” Maluath I tend to lean away from characters who are raised outside their own environment but in a natural one for someone else. I feel like it tends to create a "Dwarf in an Elf Suit" effect. I do like the history with Illithid though. Her piracy days and gambling debts can result in some great hooks as well. I'm not sure how much the rest of the crew should trust her and would put in a little more suspicion until she can prove herself after her method of introduction. Inzaul Nostkriasti An interesting choice for species; I'm not quite sure how it will work out in the story but will be waiting anxiously to find out. As for what happened to the rest of his world and how hee was ressurrected it could use some clarification (though thanks to PMs I know its part of the story and can't really call you to heavily on it.) He could use a little more on his personality though. How he feels about his status as Last of the Mohicans errr Janni and about the loss of his family in particular. I think his existance would have been quite lonely up until quite recently with the (seemingly) recent additions to the crew. His entire universe has changed so how he reacts to the new authorities is another good question. There is a little here but I would like to see it expanded on more. Kartinbar Kartinbar is an interesting set of contradictions wrapped up in a character who could easily turn out deeply fulfilling to read of or horribly mangled with constantly inconsistent attitudes and actions. He favors nature over science but science is the laws of nature examined in excrutiating detail. He favors many layered metaphors and philosphical debate but manifest the aspect of the hunter and moves stealthily about the ship. A difficult to understand counseler can at times be the best option of all but certain crew members can be counted on not to appreciate this... fortunately you seem to have spotted this already on your own. All in all if it were not for my trepidation over how easily this character can be miss-written he would have pulled into the #1 slot for favourite character. Maeter Aetsebansiro Well lets start with the obvious. I have no idea what a Sovis is or what a solid-form android is like. Not a bad thing neccessarilly but it makes this one a little tougher to comment on. From what I've seen I like her though. She seems to be trying very hard to fit in. Especially fun since her place should be pre-defined to a far greater degree; were it not for the unusual nature of the ship and crew. Relations are a little strange but fairly appropriately more defined by the others' reactions to her than hers to them. All in all seems fairly well rounded though she may need to find a secondary position since diplomat clearly isn't working out for her. Mattesith :nonono:First let me point out once again this is oppinnion only. Next, sorry but no :clap: here. Its not that he's badly written but he 2 cliches over my limit. First, I may have been ruined by Starship Andromeda but I hate a "turned good" member of race of purely evil creatures whose very life cycle makes them the enemy of all that is good and pure. Yeah reverse ethics can do it but why? I mean I've seen it done once or twice before and even well but when you do it to an Illithid it just doesn't cut it for me. And the method doesn't even really matter. It could be religion, or a traumatic experience, or even eating a bad brain... I just don't like such iconic evils "turning good." As for looking for an alternate food source.... its not really evil really if its nature... just ask Kartinbar. He may need alternates because of the life he was forced into but does he really feel he should have too? Is he that completely changed? Why not just go through the efforts to change his physical body then? Not all is lost though! I have a suggestion you may hate or love, use or toss, at your descretion:bow:. The Illithid life cycle begins when an Illithid spawn burrows into the brain of a human eating it and taking its place. The young creature then grows to fill the skull cavity extending its tentacles and so on. What if, upon taking its new body, a young Illithid imprinted somehow the life of the human whose body it was taking. The tactical knowledge of a general (the bodies former owner) was his and he used it to climb the ranks of the MindFlayer military. Later in life this imprinted memory could have been awakened once again somehow and now he is a joining of the cruel Illithid and the former human host. With the host winning out most of the time he may well seek a means of removing his parasititic brain and replacing it with a new human or even prostetic one which will let him change (back) into a more fully human form. Mollinda “Molly” Sev Another case of a lot of potential. Problem lies in the nature of the mental disorder. I don't think autistic traits tie in well with the nature of the social hub. Its not that autistics can't so much as that, as I understand it, they won't. If I understand the condition correctly, they tend to be detached and often seem aloof to those who are unaware of their condition. Not exactly the type to be heavily influencing the mood of the whole ship. The person you described should like machines because they have clear cut and well defined rules. She knows what will happen if she does this and what will happen if she does that. She should need a sense of order that she would be sabotaging herself with some of the other actions you have described.... in particular being so heavily sexually active. I would give her the drive but not so much the willingness to act on it. Make the others sensitive to her moods if you really want to push that aspect but don't try to have her cheering up or playing at ombudsman and smoothing over difficulties between other members of the crew. Prodis Centon? I have a feeling I'm missing out on a lot in this character but that I would enjoy it if I did catch all the references. The religions are meaningless to me as is the race. I'd like a little (actually a lot) more background so I can give a better idea. Still I like what I've seen and the general sense I get is of a well written story. Stormdelver, Pehrell :king: Simple story. Straightforward reactions to events of the past. Respectable personality with reasonable history. I like this guy. Something about him just clicks for me. He seems like the touchstone for this crew. A reliable individual who is knowledgeable and sociable. He may well be the best character available in many situations to smooth over the less fortunate relations amongst the various crew members. I like his care for his sister and see him as perhaps the most stable member of the crew. Lunatic ramblings? :help: :gel: :help: Existentialism teaches that nothing can ever be known with certainty. One can never be 100% sure of anything up to and including, this statement, that you are reading this statement, and that existentialism exists. As such it teaches, also, that most logic is illogical. After all, standard logic consist of drawing conclussions based off of known truths. No truths can be known with certainty however. On the other hand circular logic (logic which runs on a looping series of if/then statements) is logical since it never requires us to accept any givens. It is useless however since without a given none of it is meaningful. :drool: :looloo:
Lyinginbedmon 06-10-07, 07:48 AM	Enora Choor The idea of a priestess of Diesm is a bit strange. I'm gonna have to hold off on this one till I've seen her in action. I dunno about the drunkard bit either but it can make for some interesting scenes. I usually prefer a character who drinks heavily or not at all over one who does so constantly. Lastly the space sickness could use a little better defenition if its not like motion sickness what is it like? Hmm...I think a comparison is in order. Consider Ryoko (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryoko_Hakubi) & Ayeka (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayeka_Masaki_Jurai), when Enora is sober she's like Ayeka, a doting housewife kind of woman, but when she's drunk she's more like Ryoko, rambunctious and merry and generally more accepting of anyone. Think of her as someone you met when they were drunk, got to like them, then learned what they were like sober. You'd think of them more as their drunk mentality than their sober mentality, two seemingly individual personalities. Eth'erranara “F” Maluath I tend to lean away from characters who are raised outside their own environment but in a natural one for someone else. I feel like it tends to create a "Dwarf in an Elf Suit" effect. I do like the history with Illithid though. Her piracy days and gambling debts can result in some great hooks as well. I'm not sure how much the rest of the crew should trust her and would put in a little more suspicion until she can prove herself after her method of introduction. Mostly she's a trusted member, after all she has a fairly good deal with Inzaul for duties and salary on the ship, and betrayed her previous employers to join up. Of course, a better deal could arise that might challenge her loyalty, but that's a plot hook for a later date. Inzaul Nostkriasti An interesting choice for species; I'm not quite sure how it will work out in the story but will be waiting anxiously to find out. As for what happened to the rest of his world and how hee was ressurrected it could use some clarification (though thanks to PMs I know its part of the story and can't really call you to heavily on it.) He could use a little more on his personality though. How he feels about his status as Last of the Mohicans errr Janni and about the loss of his family in particular. I think his existance would have been quite lonely up until quite recently with the (seemingly) recent additions to the crew. His entire universe has changed so how he reacts to the new authorities is another good question. There is a little here but I would like to see it expanded on more. I expanded his personality and extrapolated how someone in his position might feel given his history, hopefully it gives a deeper insight into him. Kartinbar Kartinbar is an interesting set of contradictions wrapped up in a character who could easily turn out deeply fulfilling to read of or horribly mangled with constantly inconsistent attitudes and actions. He favors nature over science but science is the laws of nature examined in excrutiating detail. He favors many layered metaphors and philosphical debate but manifest the aspect of the hunter and moves stealthily about the ship. A difficult to understand counseler can at times be the best option of all but certain crew members can be counted on not to appreciate this... fortunately you seem to have spotted this already on your own. All in all if it were not for my trepidation over how easily this character can be miss-written he would have pulled into the #1 slot for favourite character. I clarified his psychology, see the opening post for more info. I also clarified "nature" and "science" from his perspective, and intermingled it into a working model of existentialism. Maeter Aetsebansiro Well lets start with the obvious. I have no idea what a Sovis is or what a solid-form android is like. Not a bad thing neccessarilly but it makes this one a little tougher to comment on. From what I've seen I like her though. She seems to be trying very hard to fit in. Especially fun since her place should be pre-defined to a far greater degree; were it not for the unusual nature of the ship and crew. Relations are a little strange but fairly appropriately more defined by the others' reactions to her than hers to them. All in all seems fairly well rounded though she may need to find a secondary position since diplomat clearly isn't working out for her. The Sovices are a machine race composed of nanotechnological blocks that come together to form various forms. Amel units are very small flying repair units that can inject nanotechnological components from the blocks that allow other Sovices to see the victim about 300 miles away. A solid-form android is pretty much a copy or approximation of a living creature, they are designed to be as indistinguishable as possible and were designed and created as liasons to other races. The very first SFA was named Meter Tu, after the Sovices' creator Maeter (Male units are named for Meter's creator & mother, Angstrom). The "a" in Maeter was added from a glitch and was kept for Maeters 231 onwards. Mattesith :nonono:First let me point out once again this is oppinnion only. Next, sorry but no :clap: here. Its not that he's badly written but he 2 cliches over my limit. First, I may have been ruined by Starship Andromeda but I hate a "turned good" member of race of purely evil creatures whose very life cycle makes them the enemy of all that is good and pure. Yeah reverse ethics can do it but why? I mean I've seen it done once or twice before and even well but when you do it to an Illithid it just doesn't cut it for me. And the method doesn't even really matter. It could be religion, or a traumatic experience, or even eating a bad brain... I just don't like such iconic evils "turning good." As for looking for an alternate food source.... its not really evil really if its nature... just ask Kartinbar. He may need alternates because of the life he was forced into but does he really feel he should have too? Is he that completely changed? Why not just go through the efforts to change his physical body then? Not all is lost though! I have a suggestion you may hate or love, use or toss, at your descretion:bow:. The Illithid life cycle begins when an Illithid spawn burrows into the brain of a human eating it and taking its place. The young creature then grows to fill the skull cavity extending its tentacles and so on. What if, upon taking its new body, a young Illithid imprinted somehow the life of the human whose body it was taking. The tactical knowledge of a general (the bodies former owner) was his and he used it to climb the ranks of the MindFlayer military. Later in life this imprinted memory could have been awakened once again somehow and now he is a joining of the cruel Illithid and the former human host. With the host winning out most of the time he may well seek a means of removing his parasititic brain and replacing it with a new human or even prostetic one which will let him change (back) into a more fully human form. I think you probably have been cliched over by Andromeda, what with the Nietzschieans and the Magog priest. It's a cliche but I've tried to do Mattesith as best I could. I needed a character that could function as a surgeon on the ship, and I figured what better than someone who used to eat them. The cliche came in when I had to insert them into the crew... Still, a good-aligned Mind Flayer is better than a good-aligned Drow with scimitars :D Mollinda “Molly” Sev Another case of a lot of potential. Problem lies in the nature of the mental disorder. I don't think autistic traits tie in well with the nature of the social hub. Its not that autistics can't so much as that, as I understand it, they won't. If I understand the condition correctly, they tend to be detached and often seem aloof to those who are unaware of their condition. Not exactly the type to be heavily influencing the mood of the whole ship. The person you described should like machines because they have clear cut and well defined rules. She knows what will happen if she does this and what will happen if she does that. She should need a sense of order that she would be sabotaging herself with some of the other actions you have described.... in particular being so heavily sexually active. I would give her the drive but not so much the willingness to act on it. Make the others sensitive to her moods if you really want to push that aspect but don't try to have her cheering up or playing at ombudsman and smoothing over difficulties between other members of the crew. I've made her particularly antisocial I realise, but neuroatypicals (Like myself, I have Asperger's Syndrome) can be full of contradictions. I myself am a very compulsive tidier, but my bedroom is persistently untidy. It's really more the compulsion than the syndrome, Molly gets into a pattern and sticks to it, so she's pretty sexually active but at the same time she's extremely routed in her machine nature. We're also pretty empathic too, because we essentially "sense" how others are feeling without visual cues (Which sometimes makes us slip up), so Molly ensures that everyone is happy to the best of her ability but it can of course go awry every now and then Prodis Centon? I have a feeling I'm missing out on a lot in this character but that I would enjoy it if I did catch all the references. The religions are meaningless to me as is the race. I'd like a little (actually a lot) more background so I can give a better idea. Still I like what I've seen and the general sense I get is of a well written story. The Centons were an originally humanoid race that fell into worship of a dead god, Dei, and genetically engineered themselves into a new race of elemental beings of positive & negative energy, which they can spit out in beams and fly around from. As a result of their flight, most Centons can't walk because their legs atrophy. Because + & - energy isn't native to the material world, they have to retreat to one of the energy planes for 6 hours every day, or else effectively be tired from lack of sleep. When they shift, they're in stasis on the plane, and when they shift back they return to the exact same relative point in space. However, this transformation left the adults sterile because the fetuses can't withstand the energy, so only the children can have...well...children. The Infernii are an underground group in Centon society that use this fact to continue the species, but naturally the rest think of them as abominations. Prodis was influenced by two distinct sources. The first was Star Wars, notably the Jedi. The Milis Dei are basically spiritiual warriors, and utilise a lightsaber-esque weapon that attaches to the wrists in a gauntlet. The name means "Soldier of God" in Latin, which the Centon language is based on. The second was Sheppard Derrial Book of Firefly fame, a priestly character with a past shrouded in so much mystery that most of the acting cast don't know it. I wanted something like Book but I didn't want to be caught in copyright or called out on the similarities that already exist between Starlight & Firefly. As a result, Prodis evolved. He's a spiritualist and largely pacifistic fighter who is devoted to meditation and cooking. Of course, like most mystery characters, what lies beneath is more tangled than the simplistic outer facade... Stormdelver, Pehrell :king: Simple story. Straightforward reactions to events of the past. Respectable personality with reasonable history. I like this guy. Something about him just clicks for me. He seems like the touchstone for this crew. A reliable individual who is knowledgeable and sociable. He may well be the best character available in many situations to smooth over the less fortunate relations amongst the various crew members. I like his care for his sister and see him as perhaps the most stable member of the crew. I'm glad you like him, I kept thinking he was a little too "blah" compared to the others, but I guess it's good to have someone a little more storybook than everyone else, and who better than the bookworm? :cool:
Lyinginbedmon 06-10-07, 08:15 AM	Hmm, I think I should note the order of arrival on the ship: Inzaul naturally came first, 4094 when it was purchased Kartinbar was next, he joined in 4094 but took a leave of 2 months to see his homeworld Pehrell joined in 4094 F joined early in 4095 during Kartinbar's absence The ship joined the Commonwealth in 4095, so Maeter arrived here Molly was picked up in 4096 Prodis also joined not long after Molly in 4096 Enora snuck onboard in the first days of 4097 The newest crewmember, Mattesith joined a couple of months ago in 4097
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-10-07, 11:46 PM	:w00t: My advise was taken as intended. It was understood my comments were inteded to be constructive. I think I may be happily working on this thread more in the future.:P Hmm...I think a comparison is in order. Consider Ryoko (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryoko_Hakubi) & Ayeka (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayeka_Masaki_Jurai), when Enora is sober she's like Ayeka, a doting housewife kind of woman, but when she's drunk she's more like Ryoko, rambunctious and merry and generally more accepting of anyone. Think of her as someone you met when they were drunk, got to like them, then learned what they were like sober. You'd think of them more as their drunk mentality than their sober mentality, two seemingly individual personalities. Hmmm. From what I see it could work out very nicely... especially when I put her in context of the rest of the crew. Still, as I said before, she's a little out of my realm of experience so its a little tough for me to make judgement calls as to how well she will work out. Mostly she's a trusted member, after all she has a fairly good deal with Inzaul for duties and salary on the ship, and betrayed her previous employers to join up. Of course, a better deal could arise that might challenge her loyalty, but that's a plot hook for a later date. All I'm saying is her reason for being there is more or less mercenary. That's not one that tends to breed trust quickly and yet you seem to have listed not just one or two but the whole crew as trusting her. I would think at the very least Maeter with her connections to the predominating government would be suspicious of a former space pirate. She may well be trustworthy but its hard to imagine everyone being able to see that. I expanded his personality and extrapolated how someone in his position might feel given his history, hopefully it gives a deeper insight into him. Much more actually. He has a lot stronger of a concept in my head now as to the sort of captain I'm reading about. I clarified his psychology, see the opening post for more info. I also clarified "nature" and "science" from his perspective, and intermingled it into a working model of existentialism. A little clearer but I would point out that I liked the contradictions and am in no way suggesting you change them. I just need to see the writing itself and the character in action before I make a call as to whether or not its a great one or a flop. He's a tough guy to write and you are taking on a challenge. You do seem to be capable of living up to said challenge based on what I've ready so far though. The Sovices are a machine race composed of nanotechnological blocks that come together to form various forms. Amel units are very small flying repair units that can inject nanotechnological components from the blocks that allow other Sovices to see the victim about 300 miles away. A solid-form android is pretty much a copy or approximation of a living creature, they are designed to be as indistinguishable as possible and were designed and created as liasons to other races. The very first SFA was named Meter Tu, after the Sovices' creator Maeter (Male units are named for Meter's creator & mother, Angstrom). The "a" in Maeter was added from a glitch and was kept for Maeters 231 onwards. Thank you. I think you probably have been cliched over by Andromeda, what with the Nietzschieans and the Magog priest. It's a cliche but I've tried to do Mattesith as best I could. I needed a character that could function as a surgeon on the ship, and I figured what better than someone who used to eat them. The cliche came in when I had to insert them into the crew... Well there are a lot of options for surgeons but you seem set on an Illithed. Your right about my being cliched over so I grant you the benefit of the doubt. Still, no comment on the alternate route to getting one? I really don't like reverse ethics unless there is a very good reason for the person doing it. Still, a good-aligned Mind Flayer is better than a good-aligned Drow with scimitars :D :rolleyes:What isn't?:rolleyes: p.s. Drizzt is a great character its the knockoffs that are horrible. I've made her particularly antisocial I realise, but neuroatypicals (Like myself, I have Asperger's Syndrome) can be full of contradictions. I myself am a very compulsive tidier, but my bedroom is persistently untidy. It's really more the compulsion than the syndrome, Molly gets into a pattern and sticks to it, so she's pretty sexually active but at the same time she's extremely routed in her machine nature. We're also pretty empathic too, because we essentially "sense" how others are feeling without visual cues (Which sometimes makes us slip up), so Molly ensures that everyone is happy to the best of her ability but it can of course go awry every now and then Sounds a little like myself and maybe I'm imposing that onto her. I can be pretty empathic as well but I tend a little more towards the disconnection with the world described by more autistic sources. I understand people better than I really should but have no real connections to cause me to interact with them. I would point out a new option therefore. I, personally, have a great deal of difficulty in social situations. I am not, by any definition of the term, outgoing in real life. In fact of the matter I am capable of turning others away so I don't have to deal with them without ever interacting with them in the first place. No rudeness, no avoidance, just making it so they don't notice or approach me. I am not nearly so bad now as once I was though. If you want her to be a little more realistic (from my biased viewpoint) have her do what I did. Have her teach herself to interact with others. In particular I would add a little more on her time in the Institution. Why did she escape if she had access to enough equipement to build an escape rocket? Does she have some larger goal that couldn't be accomplished there (it seems to me becoming fully prostetic could have been for a tech genius of her level)? As for where I am coming from... I spent years in Special Education dealing with small classrooms full of individuals I was far more intelligent than. I did so well my teachers were forced to place me in standard classes so my education wasn't hampered by their efforts to help me integrate socially and even in one case I taught another Special Ed student who was behind his class by a grade while I was ahead of mine by one. During that time I learned, though, how to react to others around me. I now, quite intentionally, look at my social place and am capable of forcing myself into roles I am comfortable taking on. I can look for a place for myself, find it, and use it to work with others around me. I'm relating her more to myself and you to yourself so this makes for a good portion of the conflict in the way I am viewing her as to how you are. The Centons were an originally humanoid race that fell into worship of a dead god, Dei, and genetically engineered themselves into a new race of elemental beings of positive & negative energy, which they can spit out in beams and fly around from. As a result of their flight, most Centons can't walk because their legs atrophy. Because + & - energy isn't native to the material world, they have to retreat to one of the energy planes for 6 hours every day, or else effectively be tired from lack of sleep. When they shift, they're in stasis on the plane, and when they shift back they return to the exact same relative point in space. However, this transformation left the adults sterile because the fetuses can't withstand the energy, so only the children can have...well...children. The Infernii are an underground group in Centon society that use this fact to continue the species, but naturally the rest think of them as abominations. Prodis was influenced by two distinct sources. The first was Star Wars, notably the Jedi. The Milis Dei are basically spiritiual warriors, and utilise a lightsaber-esque weapon that attaches to the wrists in a gauntlet. The name means "Soldier of God" in Latin, which the Centon language is based on. The second was Sheppard Derrial Book of Firefly fame, a priestly character with a past shrouded in so much mystery that most of the acting cast don't know it. I wanted something like Book but I didn't want to be caught in copyright or called out on the similarities that already exist between Starlight & Firefly. As a result, Prodis evolved. He's a spiritualist and largely pacifistic fighter who is devoted to meditation and cooking. Of course, like most mystery characters, what lies beneath is more tangled than the simplistic outer facade... Ah. Well. I was right. There is a lot to this one and he deffinetly looks interesting.
warwinner 06-11-07, 12:29 AM	Mattesith is an interesting concept, but seems very shallow/crude for a concept that has the most creative potential.you only seem to be emphasizing his atonement and medication.Shouldn't you be adding more depth/personality to him.Or do you have something in mind you forgot to put into writing ?
Lyinginbedmon 06-11-07, 09:24 AM	Mattesith is an interesting concept, but seems very shallow/crude for a concept that has the most creative potential.you only seem to be emphasizing his atonement and medication.Shouldn't you be adding more depth/personality to him.Or do you have something in mind you forgot to put into writing ? The main concept with Mattesith is self-contemplation and prejudice, he's trying to be something other than the general "mind flayer" reputation. I'll admit I'm having trouble rounding him out however, he's a bit of a "pac man" personality right now. Let's see. He spent a very long time as an Illithid, eating brains, inflicting tortures, etc. and eventually came to be a pretty important Commander. He escaped encapsulation over a hundred years ago and tried rebuilding his empire. He gets caught, and then suddenly his entire life is so horrible he could easily have gone insane. So, depression would be a big issue for him, as well as self-harming I can imagine. He's looking at a lot of psychoses, mostly trauma-influenced. The hardest thing for him is to keep himself from hurting any more people. He might become suicidal. This gives me the look of someone trying to attone for their past life, and who is on a lot of medication to manage his inherent and acquired mental illnesses. However, I welcome input from anyone else
Lyinginbedmon 06-12-07, 05:17 PM	Any new thoughts?
llaunay 06-14-07, 04:28 AM	Sweet jesus that took me 49minets to read. I need to take a walk or a shower or something.... ...good god!
Lyinginbedmon 06-14-07, 11:30 AM	Should I consider that a good review? :P
laughinggranny 06-14-07, 06:13 PM	Should I consider that a good review? :P Well he did read the whole thing. I confess, I've read the responses first, they intrigued me enough to spend the time reading the rest. )
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-15-07, 01:46 AM	Been thinking on Mattesith. I think my biggest problem on him is the question of why anyone would bother switching him over to good. I mean the people who found him weren't exactly paladins of redemption right? In fact it was a prison ship. Did they even really have the capability to do something like this. Why would they rather than just killing off a member of the most evil and reviled species around. The best I see here is that they decided to use an illegal, untested rehabilitation technique against him. Presumably they had this onboard because the criminals they were shipping were the worst cases in the universe. He may even have been caught trying to gather potential allies here. With his psionic capabilities he probably had little difficulty with maintaining alliances with the worst space-pirates, and syndicate leaders. His knowledge from his days as a general would have been a valuable trading asset when dealing with them as well. I think a little more on his attempts to restore the Mind Flayer Empire and his actions leading up to it; as well as a little on the reasons why he was transformed so, would help him out a great deal.
Lyinginbedmon 06-15-07, 08:46 AM	Okay, I've elaborated considerably on his transformation, including the reasoning and what happened between it and his initial escape.
laughinggranny 06-15-07, 12:06 PM	I really like the tenuous balance the demeanor of the crew towards each other it has a lot of plot twists and turns waiting to be exploited. I think it's good to have one stable individual even if he's somewhat quirky. Since the spiritual advisor is neck deep in her own problems (pardon the pun) the helmsman is a decent choice.
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-15-07, 11:51 PM	I really like the new details on his attempts to rebuild his empire though I'm still not quite at 100% on the reasoning behind a helm of opposite alignment. Still with the new improvements he's reached a quite respectable level that is helping me bypass the cliches of andromeda.
laughinggranny 06-16-07, 10:35 AM	I see the helm as their way to give him some type of revulsion for what he's done. Its only a punishment if he has a distaste for his old feeding habits. By turning him good it forces a different perspective upon him.
Lyinginbedmon 06-16-07, 10:53 AM	They could kill him, and it would be over in an instant. But truly, that's only a relief for them. To actually punish him, they have to let him live, but they have to make him live a life he doesn't want to live...
Lyinginbedmon 06-16-07, 09:00 PM	What better way to punish someone than to make their entire long-term memory into a torture?
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-17-07, 12:08 AM	You see, that just it. You're not punishing Angelus by giving him a soul you're creating Angel. Mattesith Ship's Surgeon is being punished for things done by Mattesith Illithid General. This is why this punishment never worked as a set-up for me. Instead of making a bad person suffer for his crimes you are effectively creating a good one who will suffer in their stead. Now on the other hand if Mattesith had some knowledge (read Illithid General) or skill (surgical) which was desperately needed then I could understand the need to create a good being with that knowledge/skill and to heck with the fact that doing so would cause undue suffering.
Lyinginbedmon 06-17-07, 08:47 AM	Angel was created because of the suffering from his past as Angelus. Having the soul gave him all the humanity he had in life, so he was back from being the evil tainted vampire he was and into the human who essentially became a one-man Auschwitz in the past. The horror of the past creates the good for the future. The same effectively happens for Mattesith. He becomes a good person to atone for his crimes as the general. The difference here being that he was evil from birth and that his mind just got repolarised rather than his soul plonked in.
warwinner 06-17-07, 09:16 AM	I second terjon's illegal testing thing on mattesith.A mere helm of opposite alignment doesn't seem to have that "punch".Maybe they damaged his psychic and physical and moral functions by some outlawed/prohibited tests that he is now a mere shadow of his powerful illithid self.Living on medication and hoping to find something that'll bring a semblance of his original illithid powers back.Maybe deep within he is tired of being treated like some piece of trash instead of being feared/respected like a true illithid
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-18-07, 12:11 AM	Angel was created because of the suffering from his past as Angelus. Having the soul gave him all the humanity he had in life, so he was back from being the evil tainted vampire he was and into the human who essentially became a one-man Auschwitz in the past. The horror of the past creates the good for the future. The same effectively happens for Mattesith. He becomes a good person to atone for his crimes as the general. The difference here being that he was evil from birth and that his mind just got repolarised rather than his soul plonked in. My point is that Angel and Angelus, as with Mattesith General and Surgeon, are effectively 2 different characters. The one being punished, in both cases, is not the one that committed the crimes.
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-18-07, 12:33 AM	I think warwinner has got what I'm going for. Either leave the general in and give him a reason to pretend to be good (significantly weakening his mental powers with crippling experimentation is good) or create the surgeon. If you create the surgeon as a seperate being from the general, the way you do with a helm of opposite alignment, you need to have a reason why someone would want to have a good Illithid around. Punishing a bad one doesn't count because you get rid of the bad one when you create the good.
Lyinginbedmon 06-18-07, 07:18 PM	Okay then, a bit of a rewrite is in order then. As a General, Mattesith clearly is a valuable person to keep around on your side, but as an Illithid he's hardly trustworthy and there's more than a little racial tension to overcome. But of course, there's more than one way to change alignments. You can use Helm of Opposite Alignment, which might not get you the one you want. You can use the tried and true method of making them the alignment you want, the hard way, but this can take time and might end up shifting the wrong person's alignment (Namely: Yours). And then there's the cliche method: Divine intervention. Specifically the class ability of the Evangelist: Convert the Unfaithful, this is effective but has the downside of giving them the option of staying the alignment. So how do we tempt them? We can always check out what alignment someone is with magic, detect evil/good/chaos/law etc. are on hand with even the earliest of spellcasters, though they might get a headache from trying. So naturally saying you've converted isn't going to get you off the hook unless it's real. So, they take Mattesith captive. The ship's priest should qualify for Evangelist I'd reckon given the clientele, and should be capable of crippling his Will save to get him batting for the other team. After/prior/during this process, the crew tortures him. Now we're in the realm of unsanctioned process. He's converted, makes the choice, and if he still detects as evil, he gets racked, he gets burned, until eventually he has little option but to convert. What then? Obviously he needs to get out somehow, and I doubt they'd let their prized little project off so easily. Mattesith, good-aligned or not, is going to want off the ship and into freedom, be it the proverbial frying pan or otherwise. I get the image of a badly beatend mind flayer strapped to an equally beaten chair, hands and legs bound, his tentacles tied in some cruel knot. A priest with a holy book in one hand and a symbol in another standing over him, and a freshly glowing psionic seal on the ceiling above...
laughinggranny 06-18-07, 09:07 PM	Out side of D&D I've seen 2 ways something similar happen. In Hitchhikers guide, theirs that perspective gun, that when the target is shot the targeted individual sees things from the point of view of the shooter. Second in the Highlander series, when one of the evil guys takes the head of a very good monk, his perspective changed and he became a priest or something to try and atone for all the bad deeds that he had done before. I don't know if the idea's would work for you but theres a couple more possibilitys.
Lyinginbedmon 06-19-07, 11:08 AM	I'd like to stay close to D&D canon, since the world that the stories will be based in is based on D&D (More specifically, my D&D Future campaign setting)
Lyinginbedmon 06-20-07, 06:04 PM	Any thoughts on the new premise?
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-21-07, 12:56 AM	Actually I think you have something going on with the evangelist but there's a point you may have missed. If the evangelist was of a good diety then there is no way he tolerates the torture neccessary for our Illithid friends' mental abilities to be crippled. So lets make the evangelist a preacher of LAW. Now our crippled Illithid general has been beaten down, mentally assaulted and preached to that redemption lies in acceptance of the law. He was never an opponent of the law in his life before and eventually he wholeheartedly accepts the lawful nuetral vision of the priest. He spends a time travelling with the prison ship and its crew helping to convert the unlawful and as he does he sees the universe in a new light. For the first time he has accepted a view of all sentient beings as equals (as they are before the law). As he travels he comes to disagree with the priest though. He has become a proponent of the the spirit of the law where the priest is law as written (naturally switching over to lawful good). He believes, due in part to his experience as an Illithid general and in part from his new role as a surgeon, that the law must be written well and adjusted by circumstance. When he is called upon to secretely operate on a ranking official in the new order (i forgot what you named the predominate organization in this setting) he uses the opportunity to find Inzual. After he finishes his surgical duties he uses the law as written and his massive intellect to his advantage and escapes the bonds the priest has placed upon him with a little known loophole and joins up with this new crew.
Lyinginbedmon 06-21-07, 06:10 AM	Actually I think you have something going on with the evangelist but there's a point you may have missed. If the evangelist was of a good diety then there is no way he tolerates the torture neccessary for our Illithid friends' mental abilities to be crippled. Looking through a list of deities, Heironeous seems to be the one most likely to be on a prison ship, and even seems to allow for the torture of evil beings (Wrath, Inquisition, and War domains) as well as being Lawful Good. Heironeous Alignment: LG Domains: Good, Law, War, Glory, Inquisition, Nobility, Courage, Sin-Pride, Sin-Wrath, Destiny
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-21-07, 11:46 PM	Didn't know if you were using the list out of PHB or a custom one. I was think more a cleric of LAW as a concept but H works quite nicely since he can have LN clerics.
Lyinginbedmon 06-22-07, 08:08 PM	It's a bit of both, there's the usual PHB deities, plus deities from Deities & Demigods, plus some custom deities for the alien races in the universe (Such as the dead-god of the Centons, Dei)
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-22-07, 11:48 PM	Doesn't that make a cleric of diesm even a little bit stranger then?
Lyinginbedmon 06-23-07, 03:31 AM	Not at all, Deism falls under the "alien races" category, as does Prodis' Jainism
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-23-07, 04:12 AM	Let me know if I'm focusing on too small of an area here or maybe being too literal but... There is a reasoning behind this however, as she does not subscribe to most common religions, but instead to human deism, which states that only things defined by human reasoning rather than prophetic books and fanatics can in any way be considered “divine”.
Lyinginbedmon 06-23-07, 04:19 AM	You're being too literal, Enora is essentially a cleric of ideals rather than deities
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-23-07, 06:03 AM	OK. Gotcha. It's just that I usually don't allow clerics of ideals in a world where gods play an active role (and I tend to view granting spellcasting as an active role). That being the case Heironious or the ideal of Law (think Judge Dread) would work quite nicely for this kind of conversion.
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-23-07, 06:07 AM	Perhaps in your world humans have advanced so much along scientific lines that they tend far more heavily towards clerics of idealogy than to reliance upon gods? An idea to consider but not one to take out of hand without considering its ramification on human relations with other races.
Lyinginbedmon 06-23-07, 05:54 PM	Okay, here's a redux of Mattesith's conversion: -------------------------- The SCS Jersey was transporting convicted criminals to the main depo in Semtek, when a riot broke out aboard the ship and caused significant damage to the circulation systems. As a result, it was forced to make an emergency landing on Ictipik for repairs. During the stay, Mattesith was discovered and taken captive. The ship's prelate, Damon Cohen, evangelist of Heironeous, managed to divulge from Mattesith the knowledge of his tactical genius. After a decidedly lengthy discussion, it was decided a better move to force Mattesith to conform to the Commonwealth's ethics and morals than to kill him outright. Project Sable Seraph was founded as the ship spent an extended period on Ictipik. Over the course of four months, Mattesith was repeatedly tortured and compelled to change his ways to those of Heironeous for the good of all. He was drugged, burned, beaten, and assaulted mentally, every lie of conversion yielding him only a brief reprieve as they validated the claim. Until eventually, he just gave in. Damon was overjoyed, and the torture sessions finally ceased. But Mattesith was smarter than that, and knew his life, as an evil being or a good being, have been cruelly infringed upon, and wanted vengeance and freedom repaid to him. Following his apparent conversion, he worked alongside Damon in preaching to the prisoners during journeys (His name was given to the ambassadors of the Sendfri Commonwealth, but the information was lost in the wake of relocation to new headquarters) and serving as a light medic. He lived inside the same room in which he was tortured, and began utilising talents still existent from his prior days to engineer his escape. In the month immediately prior to the escape, Mattesith displayed an increasing inability to function with civil behaviour. Damon confronted him about this disfunction while the Jersey was parked in a dock in Alastia. After a heated conversation, Mattesith pointed out that for all the time that Damon had spent in the room, he had never once simply looked upwards to the ceiling. Confused, Damon did so, and immediately caught sight of the psionic seal of a charm person spell seared into the materials. Startled by the revelation, Damon fell victim to the seal, and was enthusiastically compelled to follow Mattesith as he shifted the pair off the ship and onto an unknown plane. Damon would reappear 2 months later in Sendfri, dishevelled and addicted to Baccaran, but Mattesith escaped completely. The time apparently spent with Mattesith is a topic Damon continues to refuse to speak of, though he has since returned to his work in spite of the addiction. --------------------------
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-23-07, 11:30 PM	:dancin: B E A Utiful. Much better now.
Lyinginbedmon 06-24-07, 08:13 AM	Okay, I've updated the first post, awaiting the overall ratings for the Crew 2.0 :)
Lyinginbedmon 06-27-07, 01:16 PM	A quick note, I've written enough skeletal storyline to have these characters run for up to 7 books. In addition, Prodis' Jainist beliefs are from a real religion, Jainism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jainism), which I selected for the devout and peaceful traditions of its followers, and the usage of their most common symbol (The swastika) by the genocidal Nazis lends itself nicely to Prodis' own history.
Terjon of the Blue Rose 06-28-07, 12:33 AM	Gotta say I like what I've seen so far. So what are the titles and when can I expect them to be published in the US.:D
Lyinginbedmon 06-28-07, 02:57 AM	The titles are Starlight, Wellspring, Puzzle Box, Origin, Supply, Fusion, and Telos. They probably won't be published for a few years when I actually manage to finish writing them and get them through the publishing phase
Lyinginbedmon 06-28-07, 01:53 PM	Inzaul Nostkriasti An interesting choice for species; I'm not quite sure how it will work out in the story but will be waiting anxiously to find out. As for what happened to the rest of his world and how hee was ressurrected it could use some clarification (though thanks to PMs I know its part of the story and can't really call you to heavily on it.) You know, I hadn't noticed this until know, amazingly, but there seems to be the wrong impression on Inzaul's race. He's not actually Genie Janni, but Janni. It's a homebrewed humanoid race that created the Sovices, listed in my signature, or right here (http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=10971727&postcount=1). Wouldn't do too well for him to go about acting like something out of Aladdin now would it :P
Lyinginbedmon 06-29-07, 06:50 PM	Well, I guess I'll open up a can of worms here and prop up the builds for everyone. Because the entire setting is D&D mechanic-driven, the builds are important because it gives me a clear definition of what they can and cannot do (Which is, I think, a good property because it means they can't just "force jump out of the way" or "teleport to safety", they have their limits and everyone knows it) Enora - Cleric/Contemplative/Entropomancer F - Monk/Fighter/Swashbuckler Inzaul - Expert/Exemplar/Bloodhound Kartinbar - Scout/Rogue/Ninja/Avenging Executioner Maeter - Wu Jen/Master of Masks Mattesith - Adept/Combat Medic Molly - Expert/Sorcerer/Maester/Effigy Master (Mistress?) Pehrell - Archivist/Expert/Exemplar Prodis - Monk/Rogue/Milis Dei* Enora does her best to embody her deist principles, this includes null existence F is all about the close-quarters combat, and her talents serve her well in both melee and ranged combat Inzaul is a scientist at heart, but don't be around when you stir his ire, because he will find you. This will be shown in great detail in Book 3 (If you've seen it, think Doctor Who in The Family of Blood (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Family_of_Blood)) Kartinbar is all about sneaking up on you and scaring the living freaking daylights out of you...assuming you have any left I don't think it's any mystery as to the specialisation of Maeter's Wu Jen levels, but her diplomatic role shines through with her Master of Masks role, though her "masks" might be a little less obvious than normal Mattesith is a healer, not a fighter, and he does it well enough to make sure you don't come back for a while, which keeps everyone happy it seems :D Molly's specialty is machines, through and through, she can heal the worst damage to the ship and is a canny hand at fixing anything pretty bad on Maeter too Pehrell gets to read his books to his heart's content and gets benefits for doing so, on top of being a highly competent pilot *A Centon-oriented version of Champion of Corellon Larethian. Think "Jedi" but better and without the force tricks. Not unlike Rich Burlew, I'm leaving the levels out, because whilst it's good to have limits, it's a bad to publish them. Every Jack and Jill Villain everywhere would spot the weaknesses! :P As you can see, half of them start out as your typical NPC classes, and it wouldn't be too impossible for people to slip them into their own campaigns ;)
Lyinginbedmon 07-14-07, 09:35 PM	Well, as a present for everyone's help here, I offer up the prologue (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=886276) to Book 1 - Starlight. Note that as the book evolves this may be subject to change between posting and actual publication (Assuming I can get it published at all). Thanks for all your help in piecing together the crew, I very much appreciate it :)