Menaces and Mysteries: A Fallen London RP (recruitment thread)

IFS

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A knock at the door of your lodgings wakes you, the hurried messenger presses the smudged envelope into your hands and leaves without a word. Curious, you open it and read the letter inside by the flickering gaslight.
Dear Sir/Madam/Other,

You are invited to join the Department of Menace Eradication's latest effort to keep the peace in our fair city, to do battle with or investigate the horrors of the Neath! You are receiving this letter due to recognition of your knowledge/prowess/connections (or possibly by mistake), as we at the department believe these qualities would make you an excellent addition to this latest effort.

We look forward to seeing you at our headquarters on Watchmaker hill where we can discuss the particulars of this arrangement. I can assure you that you will be duly compensated for your efforts, though truly the glory of battle and discovery against the monsters of the Neath is payment in itself!

Sincerely,
Sir Byron Marshall, Dept. of Menace Eradication
An interesting if perhaps overenthusiastic proposition, maybe you ought to check it out? Perhaps the money entices you, or the thrill of monster hunting, maybe you seek refuge among the constables from those who pursue you, or maybe to alleviate the suspicions of the constables themselves by working among them. Perhaps you seek to unravel the myriad secrets of the Neath, or maybe you are simply bored. Whatever your reason all that is certain is that strange and marvelous adventures await you!

Greetings fellow escapists! I've been RPing on the escapist for some time now, and as Fallen London has one of my favorite settings in any game I've wanted to run an RP in it for some time now. I want to make this RP quite open to players though so you don't need to have played the game to apply, I am more than happy to answer whatever questions you might have, and will link to both the game and the wiki below if you want to search for answers yourself.

Fallen London: once capital of the British Empire, now home of the Bazaar. Deep. Dark. Expensive. Marvellous. Here you can find everything from immortality, to unnervingly good mushroom wine.

The Bazaar stole London three decades ago. Of course only anarchists and revolutionaries say "stole" any more. Everyone who matters has grown to know and love the status quo. It's quiet down here. All those jewels and mushrooms and all that black water. What could be better?


The year is 1891, 30 years since the Fall, when London was claimed (stolen some say) by the Echo Bazaar and sank into the Neath, a strange massive cavern beneath the Earth. Londoners are nothing if not adaptable however, and have grown accustomed to the oddities of their new residence. Among the adaptations employed was the foundation of the Department of Menace Eradication, an organization dedicated to controlling and fighting the monsters, horrors, and particularly menacing deviants unique to the Neath.

Since the Fall many things have changed, the strange Masters of the Bazaar, each controlling the trade of a different set of products, have enforced their rules. The papers and streets have different names now, and the Neath's own strange denizens have taken up residence, including devils, clay men, and stranger creatures still. And finally there are matters of such things like death, which in most cases is merely an inconvenience in the Neath though such things as old age, illness, or being hacked to pieces can still put you down permanently. This has given rise to a peculiar overlap of funeral homes and sanatoriums, as well as the quiet revision of certain passages in the bibles of the city's churches. In any case, once you die and return to life down here, you'll never be permitted to return to the surface...unless you're one of the few who find a way to immortality.

Speaking of immortality all commodities are sold on the Bazaar, from secrets, souls (though you're supposed to have a license to trade in those), and mushroom wine to prisoner's honey (a drug that transports the user physically into dreams) to stranger wares still. Oh and speaking of secrets the Bazaar and the Neath have many, far too many to fit into a single spoiler here, but hopefully this gives you enough to make your characters. If not I am more than happy to answer questions about the setting and its myriad mysteries either here or via PM.

[link]http://fallenlondon.wikia.com/wiki/Sidebar_Snippets[/link] (link to the wiki, specifically a page full of delicious flavor text)

[link]http://fallenlondon.storynexus.com/[/link] (link to the game itself)

[link]http://www.failbettergames.com/?post_type=comic[/link] (The game's creators also produced a great little comic, 7 pages long, set in Fallen London which is worth a look)

This will be a character driven RP following a fairly simple episodic plot, akin to how a lot of TV shows structure their plots. Essentially there will be a number of short story arcs/plots with a long running mystery/plot in the background that steadily builds up. I hope to give you all plenty of room to play your characters and look forward to running this RP.

As in the game death, insanity, and imprisonment are all possibilities, though for human characters (this includes Tomb Colonists) they are all temporary states and indeed there may be ways to benefit from putting yourself in one. For nonhuman characters they remain temporary with the exception of death, which is quite permanent.

The standard rules of RPing apply here of course, no godmodding, try to keep your posts at a decent length, and above all else have fun!

Name:

Race/species:

Sex: (if applicable)

Appearance: What does your character look like?

Personality: How does your character act and feel on matters?

Skills: (please choose one or two of the four main skills as your character's best skills, as well as list the specifics of what they know how to do)

Equipment: (weapons, tools, other odds and ends that you carry with you)

Bio/background: (Where are you from and what did you do before this? Whatever the case may be list it here, although you don't have to list every detail some would be nice.)

Motive/Goal: (Optional, but it would be nice to have a hook for me to use when writing stuff to accommodate this character)

Watchful: Observation, Intelligence, Deduction. Watchful characters are more likely to figure things out and will notice details that others might miss, generally useful for an intelligent or knowledgeable character. I will include details in posts describing things that watchful characters notice (in spoilers to distinguish them from other details) as well as allow them to better engage in things related to science, investigation, and so on.

Shadowy: Stealth, Subtlety, Cunning. Shadowy characters are stealthy and clever, a good skill for thieves, spies, and other such characters. This skill is helpful with picking pockets and locks, sneaking, climbing, and free running.

Dangerous: Strength, Ferocity, Soldiering. Dangerous characters are tough and strong, good for athletic characters as well as violent ones. This skill helps with a variety of tasks, from intimidation, to combat, to physically demanding tasks.

Persuasive: Wit, Charm, Plausibility. Persuasive characters are just that, this skill also represents artistic talents and is useful for any character that wants to be able to charm their way out of, or into a situation. Persuasive characters will have an easier time, well, persuading other characters. In addition the skill helps with lying, public speaking, art of all sorts, and so on.

Choosing only one skill means you have much more prowess in that area than someone else who chose two skills, though obviously you lack the versatility having two skills grants. Even if you did not pick a skill you can still perform actions involving that skill, you just are not especially talented at it. Overall I would prefer people not metagame, and simply choose whatever skills fit their character best.

Human: You should be familiar with this one, though it comes in many varieties. The age of such a character might be important if they are an urchin child or elderly, but otherwise need not be listed. You might want to state how long they've been in the Neath, did they immigrate from the surface? Were they here when the city fell? Or were they born down here?

Tomb-Colonist: The bandaged gentlemen from the Quiet Cities across the Unterzee.Technically still human, tomb colonists are in a state of disrepair after dying too often or too harshly. They are covered in bandages to hide their scars and wounds. Their state does make them much tougher than most but also somewhat stiff, and generally tomb colonists are treated somewhat akin to lepers.

Clay Men: Looking something like golems, clay men hail from across the Unterzee, from the land of Polythreme where inanimate objects come alive, they are large, strong and obedient, as well as a bit simple. Generally they are used as manual labor, and suffer some discrimination, but a rare clay man can get an education and better himself. They speak in ALL CAPS. How they are created or born on Polythreme isn't known to many, nor is what causes the creation of Unfinished men instead of a regular clay man on occasion.

Unfinished men: Unfinished Men are Clay Men who lack something - sight, a voice, a hand, conscience, obedience. You can't really tell a crippled Clay Man from an Unfinished Man, except that ordinary Clay Men are never criminals. The distinction, unfortunately, often evades Constables and citizens alike. They have some mark or imperfection that identifies them as Unfinished, but other than that look the same. Clay men are often shipped from Polythreme to act as cheap manual labor in London, those in charge of this process try to screen out the Unfinished and prevent their crossing, though they are not always successful.

Rubbery Men: The Rubbery Men are the ones who resemble squids, a little. They trade deep amber for the tiny blind fish that they eat, and for human music. They seem sad, anxious and very polite. But they are terribly menacing. Faces like squid! Occasionally one is stoned to death in an episode of civic high spirits. Rubbery men cannot speak, at least not English, they make a sound like water over stones and wave their tentacles to communicate. They are strange and mysterious, so not much is known about them.

Rattus Faber: The rarer and cleverer of the city rats - the dangerous ones - employ their tiny hands to marvellous effect, making tools and clockwork of unparalleled precision. They use these chiefly to set cat-traps, but can sometimes be employed by humans. Formally, one of these exceptional rats is rattus faber. Informally, it is an ?L.B.?. Rattus Faber are intelligent rats, occasionally kept as pets and generally seen as a nuisance. You may have one as your character if you so choose, however as I would prefer everyone to only have one character to start if you want to have one as a pet someone else would have to have it as their character. Rats are not the only talkative animal, ravens, cats, bats and others also talk, but rats most commonly interact with humans of their own accord and are the only ones to make things.

Devils: Not a race you may choose for a character, Devils are a common sight in parts of Fallen London, trading in souls or brass. Their Embassy, the Brass Embassy, is located on Ladybones Road. In general they resemble yellow eyed, horned humans, no one knows everything about them, and their presence has had a remarkable effect on aspects of society.
It should be noted that death is a possible consequence in this rp, but it is a temporary state for human characters. Rubbery men, Clay men and rats all die permanently though. It should also be noted that Rubbery and clay men do not have distinct sexes and all seem to be male.

Please let me know if you have further questions about the rp, setting or your characters.

Text quoted from the game is in italics.
 

sage42

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Mar 20, 2009
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Consider me interested. A few questions first. How will we get in touch with each other? Skype, group, OCC, or just PM's here on the 'Scapist? Personally I think the group would be easier. I'm assuming Combat will be involved at least for dangerous Characters, so how will that come into play?

That's all for now and more questions may be forthcoming. Still you can expect a sheet up soonish.
 

IFS

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Mar 5, 2012
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sage42 said:
Consider me interested. A few questions first. How will we get in touch with each other? Skype, group, OCC, or just PM's here on the 'Scapist? Personally I think the group would be easier. I'm assuming Combat will be involved at least for dangerous Characters, so how will that come into play?

That's all for now and more questions may be forthcoming. Still you can expect a sheet up soonish.
I'll make a group here on the escapist as well as one through skype so that everyone can chat and ask questions in the RP. As for combat it'll work as it usually does in forum RPs, small stuff you can do whatever you want to in your posts (provided you don't godmod) bigger stuff will be more of a challenge though. I don't plan to use dice rolls at all for combat, though if PVP ends up happening I may end up involving them in some way.
 

TheDoctor455

Friendly Neighborhood Time Lord
Apr 1, 2009
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IFS said:
Snip

Please let me know if you have further questions about the rp, setting or your characters.
Hey... I had an idea for a character... but he basically needs to have all four skills to have the right feel.

The flip side of that is... he is VERY likely to end up as an antagonist. Mind if I PM you my idea?
 

IFS

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TheDoctor455 said:
IFS said:
Snip

Please let me know if you have further questions about the rp, setting or your characters.
Hey... I had an idea for a character... but he basically needs to have all four skills to have the right feel.

The flip side of that is... he is VERY likely to end up as an antagonist. Mind if I PM you my idea?
You can PM me the idea if you want, but its very unlikely that I'll allow a character with all four skills.
 

sage42

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Mar 20, 2009
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Name: Priscilla Glass

Race/species: Human

Sex: Female

Appearance: Priscilla has long dark hair to her shoulder's, often styled to frame her round face. She stands at 5'5" and tends to keep herself very fit, weighing at 128 lbs. She has bright green eyes. She often wears a simple blue dress that bestows a decent amount of modesty and can still show off her form with simple boots. She is in her early thirties.

Personality: Priscilla tends to value one thing above all others: Herself. Priscilla is looking out for number one in the Neath and anyway she can allow herself luxury. There is little Priscilla won't do if to benefits her in someway, whether it's pleasure, monetary gain, or people in her debt she'll do it. She cannot stand Urchins or Revolutionaries, seeing both as the quickest ways of wasting time and money. While she can and will be kind if she can there are often reasons behind her kindness, other times she can be utterly ruthless.

Skills: Persuasive and Watchful. Specifically Wit, Charm, Observation, and Intelligence. (to be elaborated on in the Bio)

Equipment: A tasseled walking cane and a Skyglass knife that she keeps in the top of her boot. She also has a small handbag, where she keeps a small amount of Echos (about 10), and pocket mirror, and a emergency makeup kit. As well as a small vial of Prisoners Honey

Bio/background: Priscilla was born in the Neath to a poor family. Raised on it's wonders and dangers and little else. What money they had her father spent on spirits; her mother on Laudanum and Honey. When she came of age she left her home and ventured to the Vielgardens. She fell in love with the poets and musicians. The books and songs. And for a time joined them. Honed her craft, sung in the Singing Mandrake, she was even able to convince a few regulars to allow her a room for a few days at a time. She learned much, how to move poeple to tears, how to make others laugh. Even how to convince others that her viewpoint was right and other were wrong.

Times grew hard however. She was forced to take more....unsavory jobs in other parts of the Neath to survive. She worked for a time in a brothel on Ladybones Road. Many of her clients didn't enjoy her witty remarks or her poetry when on the job, and so she learned to stay silent, and to watch. Many visited Ladybones Road during her stay. The wealthy, the influential, the beautiful. She wished more than anything to join their ranks, to be away from the squalor and the dirt only those like her experienced. So she began to use her charm again, this time to learn secrets. A few honeyed words here and few sweet nothings whispered there and soon she had secrets on many who visited her. They owed her now, if only to keep her quiet. And she collected, quickly.

She was able to extort enough from her 'clients' to earn her a apartment back in the Vielgardens. She used the many 'favors' she had gained to experience the the good life. Vintage wines, a fine dress, even the Prisoners Honey she had despised as a child. She loved it all. And now she had a taste of the good life. She wanted more. With her last 'favor' she had earned she asked to have a good word put in for her in high places so that she may get a foot hold to begin her ascent.

She received the letter a few weeks later.

Motive/Goal: Priscilla's Goal is short and simple, become a member of the High Society. The Greatest parties, the finest wines, the most expensive dresses. She wants it all. And she'll use anyone and anything as a stepping stone.
And finished.
 

DarkRawen

Awe-Inspiringly Awesome
Apr 20, 2010
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Heh, I'm not exactly surprised this one turned up. Here's my character:

Name: Thomas

Race/species: Human

Sex: Male

Appearance: In his early twenties, Thomas is an olive-skinned man with dark brown eyes and hair. He is tall, around 6'3", and is well-trained with some visible muscles, though he is even stronger than he looks, and can easily overpower most men. His nose is broken after a fight not long ago, and there are dark rings underneath his eyes from lack of sleep. He usually wears a dark brown suit vest, a pair of matching trousers, and a white shirt underneath. Often, his sleeves will have traces of blood on them, and while he is usually clean, he still smells of alcohol. He's surprisingly graceful, though.

Personality: Thomas is troublesome person. He's pessimistic and cynic, selfish and greedy. A slave to his past, Thomas carries a lot of rage inside of him, a violent sadist who lacks restraint, or rather, the will to restrain himself. One could certainly think of him as a hedonist, he does what he wants to do, hurting others because it brings him pleasure. He enjoys good food and drinks, luxury and, every now and then, good company. However,Thomas is never truly happy despite the fact that he might appear like that sometimes, if he's not beating people up to satisfy his endless anger, he's drinking away his past and his misdeed, and drowning his sadness. Often he does both, and if he hasn't drunk yet, he's soon will. Thomas suffers not only bad memories, however, he often is under the influence of nightmares, taking a toll on both his ability to sleep, and his sanity, causing him to become a paranoid wreck when it's really bad.

Even if Thomas is a pitiful man, there are some traits of his that aren't that bad, should he feel a reason to be loyal, he will be. He is also very protective of those he deems his friends, and of children, there is nothing in the world that enrages him more than people harming children. Thomas is said to be the protector of the urchins, if anyone messes with them, chances are, he will help them get revenge. As an Agent of a Player of the Great Game, he has also been told not to harm anyone among the group, and he won't... unless he is given sufficient reason to. He will certainly still threaten them. Thomas is not the smartest man around, but he does have a certain cunning, and his instincts are strong enough for him to know when he is outmatched, which means that a retreat from him might just be a temporary one.

Skills: His main skill is Dangerous, with Shadowy as a somewhat minor one. Thomas knows how to fight and he's strong, often opting for a fist-fight (What, he totally did not just equip a pair brass-knuckles), and if that's not viable, he'll go with shooting or stabbing you instead. He's nimble and agile as well, a good climber and good at tracking people, although he is not good at reasoning or drawing conclusions. He knows how to read and write, but due to having been 15 when he was disowned, he's not the best at it. Thomas also has a knack for planning out fights and heists, too bad he fails to use that information for more legal and intellectual purposes.

Equipment: Thomas carries around a pair of brass-knuckles, a ravenglass knife, a small bottle of poison, a similarly sized bottle of alcohol, a horse-head amulet, and ratwork derringer. If he's openly out to harm someone, he might carry a rifle instead of the derringer.

Bio/background: Thomas was born into a upper-class family, as the third son of a rather influential man. As a young child, he was mischievous, charming and curious, with the tendencies to ignore the rules set out for him to follow. However, that soon changed, as his father was a man who believed children best learned to respect their parents through fear, and did to Thomas as he had with Thomas' two older siblings, started punishing him physically. While the twins had been quick to succumb to the state of "respect", Thomas reacted differently, stubbornly resisting while slowly learning that violence was the only way to deal with something.

After more than ten years, he was unrecognizable, violent and cruel, finding enjoyment in harming others. When his father got fed up with paying so that he wouldn't go to prison, Thomas ended up disowned, and, right afterwards, he got into a fight and stabbed there. After returning from his temporary death and released, he started drinking heavily and beating people up so that he could take their money and buy more alcohol. He started suffering from morbid and maddening nightmares, and took up painting as a way to express what he saw, his art gaining a strange sort of following. Obviously, as he's not that much of a painter, it was a small, curious one. It was then a Player of the Great Game, the Poet, took an interest in him, not only because of his art, but because of his strength and ability to fight. The Poet became someone he could depend on and trust in, and he in return became one of their most loyal and trusted Agents.
As of now, it was not the influence of the Poet that caused Thomas to receive the invitation, but rather his skill with dealing with hostile beings, creatures and humans alike. While he was more than hesitant to going, the Poet requested it, hoping that they could learn something more about the department, and use it to increase their influence.

Motive/Goal: His motive is to gather information for the Poet, although Thomas will certainly forget that a couple of times during the RP in favor of more... violent deeds.

Feedback and all that is appreciated.
 

Quintley

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Jul 5, 2013
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I'm really interested in this - I'm not familiar with the setting so it'll take me a little while to get to grips with the lore and make a character but hopefully in the next couple of days I'll come up with something.
 

TheDoctor455

Friendly Neighborhood Time Lord
Apr 1, 2009
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Name: Tobias Tzariaz Kaizar is his current preferred name on legal forms. His original name has been lost... well... mostly. His original initials remain imprinted on the back of his neck, which he usually keeps covered up with something. Most people call him Mr. Ceesar, or Old Toby. If you're on mutually friendly terms with him, he doesn't mind the latter, but if you're not, you'd better call him the former, and pronounce it properly (as in, not what I just wrote there... hint: There are no soft c's in Latin)... he can be a bit testy about this.

Race/species: Unfinished

Sex: None. But resembles male.

Appearance: His manufactured physique is rather intimidating, he has a good deal of height... though he'd have a bit more if it weren't for the fact that he doesn't have a neck. His head is literally sitting on his shoulders, as such, he can't really turn his head at all. He's compensated for this by having a clockwork top hat that pops out mirrors on sticks that allow him to see whatever he needs to from whatever angle he needs to, just by pulling the right strings hanging out of it. On his chest, he's had a full tuxedo pattern carved into it, and for the most part, it has been painstakingly painted in to look like real clothing... and again, for the most part the effect is almost perfectly executed... except for the tie. There's just something wrong with it... maybe it doesn't quite have the ruffles in the right places, maybe its just in a shade of deep blue that just wouldn't be possible on real cloth, or maybe its the fact that shadows never seem to fall on it. Ever. Almost as if they were actively avoiding the tie. As for his face, well... he isn't that pretty to look at: broad flabby cheeks, even wider mouth with thin lips (and sharp ivory teeth behind them), tiny, beady, squinting eyes, and just, overall, giving the impression of being more fish than human... as if the artist (or whatever) behind this... thing couldn't decide what kind of clay man he or she had wanted to make. As for the telltale physical deformity of an Unfinished, he was originally missing his right forearm, but has since had it replaced with an oblong block of stainless steel, which serves both as a counterweight for the rest of his body (he used to cling to walls everywhere he went), and as a nice little club that no one can ever take from him.

Personality: He is devastatingly intelligent. If he'd been allowed to have a formal education, he might have become an ingenious inventor and artist, instead of an amateur that has largely had to do a lot of guesswork over the years... sometimes he gets lucky though. He can be quick to anger, but is generally slow to act on it, as he strives to keep in control of his temper. Once he loses said temper however, he's pretty much a lumbering, raving hulk, and little can be done to calm him down short of losing him long enough for him to calm down again (there's been some debate as to how long this is exactly, the most popular guesses being somewhere between an hour and a half, and two years; but the safe distance has generally been agreed to be... the surface). But, assuming you don't massively piss him off, he's very reasonable, and sometimes even friendly. And while he does smile a lot, its pretty obvious that he's faking it. Its not that he's incapable of emotion, as anyone who has been on the receiving end of his rages can attest (well, the survivors anyway), but rather, that he is incapable of certain emotions. Like happiness, or even being content or completely relaxed. In fact, due at least in part to the prejudices against the Clay Men and the Unfinished in particular, he's become a bit paranoid, and almost unable to forgive or forget any slight thrown against him, even if it was imagined. (not that he'll ever recognize it as imagined either) Some have called him charming... but that isn't quite accurate, he's more... convincing... that is, he's very good at getting people to agree with him, even if they vehemently disagree with him at first... or at the very least, he'll give them some food for thought. This is due to his intelligence, and years and years of practice in the art of articulation. He also has a fairly artistic bent to him, and while he has experimented in just about every medium out there, he's never mastered any of them, or even especially excelled in any of them either. Oh sure, he's produced some stunning works of art in the past, but... there's always something ever so slightly... off about them. Oh yeah, and the quickest way to piss him off is to give him orders. You can make suggestions, but don't try to boss him around.

Skills:

Watchful: he's very intelligent, and observant, but ignorant. That is, he can figure out how things work on his own, or at least come up with a very plausible explanation (even if said explanation turns out to be wrong), and can tinker competently, he just... doesn't have a good cohesive knowledge base to work off of... which can lead him to make all kinds of strange conclusions at times... especially when magic enters the picture. In conversation, his intellect lends him a certain degree of subtlety and an air of mystery, as he uses every trick in the book to try and trip up his verbal opponents.

Dangerous: He's big, he's heavy, and can be pretty nasty in a fight. He has about average strength, but again, his intellect and cleverness make him much more dangerous than his physical strength. Though over the years, he has learned how to get through a brawl in one piece.

Equipment: Aside from his clockwork top hat and steel block hand... he doesn't tend to carry much on him. Well, there's his favorite pocket watch, but it hasn't worked right ever since he passed through a "thunder-chamber" on an expedition he'd... survived and come out of fairly wealthy. Now... it doesn't really tell the time, but it doesn't seem to turn randomly either... though it does have a habit of going forward and back when it feels like it. It isn't serving as a compass, and in fact, if it is fulfilling a function at this point, its almost impossible to see what it is. Toby's current running theory is that his pocket watch has become sentient and is frantically trying to communicate.

Bio/background: He was born/made/whatever on the island of Polythreme. About two hundred years after being made (two hundred years where he mostly just tried normal, mundane ways of finding happiness, like finding love, fishing, and whatever else you can think of for a 'normal' life), some slavers found him and smuggled him to London to be the next item on their auction list. He fetched a decent price from a wealthy industrial contractor who gleefully abused his ownership of Tobias. After a few years of this, Tobias started to realize that there was something very wrong with his lot and life, and so, he escaped and sought to improve it. He broke his chains, and crippled his old owner for life in order to be free, and to make sure the old bastard never tried to reclaim him.

As for what he's done since then...

he's been a bouncer, a bodyguard, a painter, a sculptor, a writer, an inventor, an explorer...

and about five years ago, he took part in an incredibly dangerous expedition into paths so twisted and dark that even devils wouldn't dare to traverse. Paths so dangerous that the rest of the expedition never returned, and Tobias himself only barely returned from alive, with a small fortune in tow.

Motive/Goal: For most of his life, just like anyone, he toiled and struggled in the pursuit of happiness. But... he's never achieved it. He's gotten married a few times, he's adopted a street urchin or two, he's painted, he's carved, he's written some great, if profoundly, subtly flawed works of art... but he's never been happy. He knows he'll probably never fill the unnameable void in his life, but that hasn't stopped him from trying. Over the nearly two hundred years that he's been around, he hasn't managed to fulfill this goal... there's a lot of frustration and a lot of bitterness in his clay heart.

Let me know what you think.

EDIT:

Some improvements made... still a work in progress though.
 

IFS

New member
Mar 5, 2012
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DarkRawen said:
Heh, I'm not exactly surprised this one turned up. Here's my character:

snip

Feedback and all that is appreciated.
Looks good! I'm sure his more... direct approach will cause problems for him at some point in the RP but it should be interesting to see unfold.

Quintley said:
I'm really interested in this - I'm not familiar with the setting so it'll take me a little while to get to grips with the lore and make a character but hopefully in the next couple of days I'll come up with something.
Take your time and feel free to ask questions, given how slow the forums get around this season I think the recruitment thread will be open for at least a week, maybe more depending on how much interest it gets.
TheDoctor455 said:
snip

Let me know what you think.
First off I'm still very hesitant to consider a character with more than two major skills, so you should try to figure out how to lump some of those together. Keep in mind that just because its not a major skill that doesn't mean the character is necessarily bad at everything covered by that skill, and a character can be subtle without being shadowy.

The majority of the problems with the sheet come from the lore, some of which is my fault (and I will be adding to the Clay man entry in the OP to fix this). All clay and unfinished men come from Polythreme, a small Island/city across the Unterzee from London where inanimate objects come to life (even gaining sentience), though how exactly it is that Clay/Unfinished men are created/born not many know. Clay men are often shipped to London from there to be used as a source of cheap labor, those in charge of the shipping try to screen out Unfinished men but aren't always successful. They don't make body modifications/augmentations either like yours has done, the club hand prosthetic is fine but the rest is way too extreme.

One last note is that Lovecraft would only have been born last year in the setting, so while his work is an inspiration for the setting the references to his work will have to remain out of character.
 

TheDoctor455

Friendly Neighborhood Time Lord
Apr 1, 2009
12,257
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IFS said:
DarkRawen said:
Heh, I'm not exactly surprised this one turned up. Here's my character:

snip

Feedback and all that is appreciated.
Looks good! I'm sure his more... direct approach will cause problems for him at some point in the RP but it should be interesting to see unfold.

Quintley said:
I'm really interested in this - I'm not familiar with the setting so it'll take me a little while to get to grips with the lore and make a character but hopefully in the next couple of days I'll come up with something.
Take your time and feel free to ask questions, given how slow the forums get around this season I think the recruitment thread will be open for at least a week, maybe more depending on how much interest it gets.
TheDoctor455 said:
snip

Let me know what you think.
First off I'm still very hesitant to consider a character with more than two major skills, so you should try to figure out how to lump some of those together. Keep in mind that just because its not a major skill that doesn't mean the character is necessarily bad at everything covered by that skill, and a character can be subtle without being shadowy.

The majority of the problems with the sheet come from the lore, some of which is my fault (and I will be adding to the Clay man entry in the OP to fix this). All clay and unfinished men come from Polythreme, a small Island/city across the Unterzee from London where inanimate objects come to life (even gaining sentience), though how exactly it is that Clay/Unfinished men are created/born not many know. Clay men are often shipped to London from there to be used as a source of cheap labor, those in charge of the shipping try to screen out Unfinished men but aren't always successful. They don't make body modifications/augmentations either like yours has done, the club hand prosthetic is fine but the rest is way too extreme.

One last note is that Lovecraft would only have been born last year in the setting, so while his work is an inspiration for the setting the references to his work will have to remain out of character.
Oh. Fair enough.

Hmm...

the wings were never meant to be functional, they were always intended to be purely decorative... and in their current state, they wouldn't have any practical use whatsoever.

Also... was the clockwork top hot full of mirrors okay? Not sure if you saw that or not.

As for the lore... I'll go back and fix that... but his exact origins are kind of irrelevant anyway... he just doesn't really care.
 

IFS

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TheDoctor455 said:
Also... was the clockwork top hot full of mirrors okay? Not sure if you saw that or not.
I did see the hat and its fine, there are far stranger hats in the Neath.
 

IFS

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MortifiedPenguin said:
Can I be lazy and re-sub the sheet from the last Fallen London RP that died an untimely death?
Yeah sure, go right ahead.
 

MortifiedPenguin

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Jun 8, 2012
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Name: Dr. Elisa Cartwright, nee Huxtable

Race/species: Human

Sex: Female

Appearance:


Skills:

Watchful - To even be adequate doctor, one must know one's craft and be able to spot the symptoms of disease, sickness and injury. It wouldn?t do to misdiagnose a bout of dysentery caused by an uncooperative mushroom as stomach cramps, nor a choleric cough diagnosed as a cold. As to be expected she is also rather intelligent making observations and jotting them down in her notepad for further study.

Persuasive - The Doctor - Patient relationship is made or broken on bedside manner; Elisa must be able to keep her patients calm and composed, stress is bad for health after all and can at times worsen a patient's condition, even at times when a diagnosis is unfavourable Elisa manages to pull this off somehow. However, she likes to think it may be her quick wit, her friendliness with her patients but in reality it?s probably the fleeting nature of death in Fallen London.

Equipment: A doctor?s bag full of rattling equipment, an assortment of pens, a scruffy notebook with even scruffier handwriting inside, papers and journals of the medical persuasion, a few bottles of laudanum with the inscription ?only for medical use only? labeled onto the bottle and a few vials of F.F. Gebrandt's Tincture of Vigour for her patients . Even if it doesn?t rain in the Neath, it doesn?t mean other things might not be falling from the ceiling, at most times she keep an umbrella on her person, cradled in the handle of the doctor?s bag for easy carrying.

She also carries a handbag in which she keeps collection of makeup and lipsticks for the more social occasions she is called on, soirees, balls and the like.

Additionally because she is just returning to the Neath, she has a large yellow suitcase packed with an array of dresses, hats and boots - some more practical than others.

Personality: Forthright in an oddly charming way, Elisa always believes she knows what best and often, even though she knows she should, won?t bother with seeking a second opinion from her colleagues. However when push does come to shove she will, admittedly on the rare occasion she is unable to find out the answer herself from research texts or medical journals, putting her patients above her ego, begrudgingly ask for help.

Her forthrightness does often land her in trouble though, as she often lands herself in arguments she cannot win, no matter how erudite her arguments and retorts are and comes out worse for it. Finding herself the bugbear of scandalous rumours. It doesn?t help that these rumours might be seated in truth; Elisa?s habit of partaking, only on occasion mind you, in the hedonistic honey dreams or her little laudanum habit to keep nightmares at bay, so far she has managed to keep prying eyes away.

Bio/background: Arriving from on by tramp steamer and hoping that the scandal that had her exiled to the tomb colonies had died down, Ms Elisa Huxtable stepped onto the Neath, bringing about a curious sense of deja vu of when she first arrived on the Neath (by dirigible); fleeing a failed marriage and a ruined reputation, she had made it her prerogative to start over and the best place to do that was in the city that sank, or to put it more accurately taken: Fallen London

She promptly set up a small practise below her lodgings, a dingy, small attic room, beggars can?t be choosers and all that. However the not so choice location failed to bring in many prospective patients, even then, when death from any but disease is only temporary and those who do catch something particularly nasty are too impoverished to shill out for a cure. The only work she did get was stitching up wounds and setting bones, but not enough to make her business thrive.

Instead of mulling about and waiting for her business to go bust, she again took the prerogative, opening up her doors the vigilant constables who may require the services of a plucky young pathologist who needed the money to buy better a better, more choice place to practise.

Again the fact that the dead don?t stay dead, except in the most extreme cases, hindered her progress. Lamenting that the Neath might be the best place for those with the title of Doctor other than those of a medical persuasion she turned to the honey dens in Veilgarden. There she met with the bohemians and other witty types, none of them foolish enough to get an arm or a leg broken hunting some beast in Watchmaker?s Hill.

Rather than finding some rich toff that might invest in her practise she embroiled herself with the bohemians, socialites and even the stray revolutionary. Delighting in the bright colourful world of the honey dreams and the amicable bohemians she let herself forget about the real dream of having a practise and indulged in the false ones created by the honey.

But, the bohemians being bohemians and honey being honey, she couldn?t help but get into some sort of scandal. And scandal she did get into to, enough so to banish her to the tomb colonies.

Motive/Goal: To try and regain her respectable reputation and open up her own practise, one that garners the same respect as the Bethnic and Summerset Colleges.

Connections: The bohemians, society, the constables and the odd revolutionary.

And there you go.
 

sage42

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Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand my sheet is now finished. I can always fix things if a few things sound off. Also what about Quirks and the like?

I'd like to add I've been hooked on the game now.
 

IFS

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MortifiedPenguin said:
snip

And there you go.
Looks good, no new complaints from me.

sage42 said:
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand my sheet is now finished. I can always fix things if a few things sound off. Also what about Quirks and the like?

I'd like to add I've been hooked on the game now.
Also looks good, as for stuff like quirks that sort of thing would be worked into the characters personality.

Great to hear you like the game!
 

sage42

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IFS said:
*snip*

Also looks good, as for stuff like quirks that sort of thing would be worked into the characters personality.

*snip*
Sweet then I shall edit Priscilla's personality a bit because there's a quirk that should be there then.
 

SamtheDeathclaw

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IFS said:
...I would prefer everyone to only have one character to start...
*whistles innocently*

OT: Oh man, another Fallen London rp for me to brutally murder with untimely family illnesses and player disputes?
SIGN ME UP. (And sorry about that.)

Will probably just rehash Ptolemy, sans Rubbery. We'll see.
 

SamtheDeathclaw

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Name: Ptolemy (the Rat still optional)

Race/species: Rattus Faber

Sex: Male

Appearance: A rat, in brief. Brown fur, beady little eyes, so on and so forth. He is, perhaps, gaunter than one might expect, and definitely has a haunted quality about him.

Personality: Ptolemy is a kind-hearted little rat, to be sure. He genuinely likes people, and often indulges in dinner parties and salon visits and the like. In the last six months, his personality has shifted, however. He's more closed-off, with secrets in his noggin no reasonable person would want to know. He looks over his shoulder often. On good days, he's the same old rat. On bad days, well. It's best not to be near him if you look even slightly edible. Thankfuly, good days are becoming more and more common as the weeks pass.

Skills: Persuasion. Witty, charming, full of panache and completely irrepressibly friendly, Ptolemy has honed his ability to convince and befriend others to a razor point.

Equipment: Being a nonviolent person, he carries no weapons. Being a rat, he wears no clothing. He was fairly wealthy when he first started seeking the name, from his work with writers, poets, and whatnot.
Given the way hunts for the name typically go, however, Ptolemy's now pretty close to broke, and large swaths of his contacts are no longer on speaking terms with him.

Bio/background: Ptolemy is a library rat, and damned proud of it. He doesn't know how his mother got in, or why, but he was born, along with six brothers and sisters, in a hollow in a bookshelf. He was raised surrounded by all this ancient knowledge, and found it fascinating. The librarian, a kindly woman, took a shine to the young rat and taught him how to read and write, and to talk like a proper gentleman. So he was raised more by a human woman than by his own mother. He came across Ptolemy in an ancient history book, and decided to forsake his given name and take on his instead.
When he was of age, he set out to make a name for himself. He was a charming little thing, well-learned and witty, if somewhat naive. And he succeeded. He met several up-and-coming artists and poets in Veilgarden, and acted as something of an agent for them, working deals with the Magazine Formerly Known As The London Magazine, art houses, anything. After a while, he was doing well at this, and so he opened a proper firm for it.
That is, until a certain writer he was attempting to nurture into a proper author burst in one evening, raving and ranting about how damnably hungry he was.
Once he'd calmed down some- and eaten one of Ptolemy's visitor's pet weasels- he grabbed Ptolemy, and ran out into the street, and into a hiding place of sorts. There, he told Ptolemy one thing, a name: Mr. Eaten. He then ran off, leaving Ptolemy to trudge back to his offices the hard way.

Ptolemy never saw the lad again. Passersby hired to call at his home also disappeared. Letters were returned, stained with blood. And there was no mention of a Mr. Eaten anywhere. Ptolemy returned to the library of his birth, and rifled through the books there. Nothing. He paid a few orphans in the Flit to listen for anything about a Mr. Eaten. He asked cats his assistant caught. He once hired someone to ask the Starveling Cat. He never heard back from the poor lass, but they say bits of her were found all over the alleys.

Most worryingly, as Ptolemy delved further and further into his mad quest, he began to feel the same damnable hunger that his writer friend had complained of. He began to grow gaunt and bony, and started a diet of raw meat and anything he could shove in his gullet.

Eventually, his search "paid off", in the form of a single word reaching his ears through his many tendrils:
NORTH

A week later, a courier politely handed him a note from Mr. Iron. "You are pursuing a name. End your pursuit now."

He did. He fired the people he'd hired, and many of them were not heard from again. A gang of orphans, only few of whom he'd hired, simply disappeared. A prominent spy (figure that one out) he'd once talked to about joining Ptolemy's search (though the man turned down the contract) allegedly left for the surface. Eventually, the unlucky few Ptolemy had brought into his mad search for the Name died horrific dea- erm, disappeared. He was left alone with his knowledge of the Name, and tried to forget.

It's been three months since his last Name-related contact set sail across the Unterzee for Polytheme. The boat did not make the return trip. Now, the hunger is almost entirely gone, and he's in the midst of reviving his literary business, which had faltered as he focused on the Name. However, when he received the letter, he left that for assistants and clerks. A sabbatical fighting monsters, he decided, would be exactly what he needed to sweep the vestiges of the accursed Name out of his head.

Motive/Goal: Not much, now. He still harbors some desire to seek the Name, but given the (likely grisly) fates of his compatriots, he's decided to restrain himself and hope for the best.
If you'd prefer a character that didn't have anything to do with Mr. Eaten, I'll scrap it and do just a straight port of the original Ptolemy. Probably should have asked if it was okay to roll a Northridden character, huh?

Edit v1.1: Reduced number of folks he hired. Or, tried to. Not sure I caught everything.