Penumbra Cielo - Supernatural Ghoul-Hunting: OOC [FULL!]

[Tame]

In a world very similar to our own, and yet different in a lot of ways, all kinds of ghouls, monsters, ghosts and demons plague mankind.  Some are just fierce and dangerous animals, some are malevolent spirits, some are cursed humans dedicated to harming people to satisfy their endless blood lust.  On an isolated island, there exists an organisation known as Penumbra Cielo, devoted to protecting innocents from these creatures.  This organisation is mysterious to the extreme; it is funded by no particular government, but seems to hold sanction in every nation in the world.  Their headquarters are a stronghold which few have ever breached.  Their members are few, and are the only ones who know its secrets.  From their guild headquarters they send out their agents all over the world to neutralise the most dangerous threats, using their individual supernatural abilities to fight their enemies, who often have equally disturbing and great powers.


This role-play centres around this organisation and their missions to fight various strange monsters, and sometimes humans. Players take on the roles of the guild’s hunters – the frontline soldiers on such missions, while I, the Game Master, act as NPCs, including other members of the guild, ordinary people and enemies.  My aim is to create an RPG with the input of players that is both and fun, exciting and of a high standard of role-playing.


It opens with the entrance test for new recruits (you guys) which will give players a feel for the way the RP will be run, as well as for the world in which it is set, the way the guild is run, and the type of skills that the characters will need.  It will also give good opportunities for character-interaction, because this role-play should be as much about character development as anything.

Spoiler: About the World

Information about the guild and the world in which it is set will be revealed as the role-play goes on, but a certain amount of it must given here so that players have enough information to play properly.

As has been said, the world setting is much like our own; the geography is largely the same ie. the same countries and places.  However, levels of technology are very different.  No cars or planes exist, and the main means of transport are trains or horse.  There is no electricity, therefore no computers or televisions.  Gas is the primary source of energy.
On the other hand, medicine is greatly improved. Although there exists none of the machines used today in medicine, most illnesses and grave injuries can be cured/healed with various methods. The trouble is getting hold of these cures, which are still in short supply.  For sake of a better explanation, the setting could be said to be steampunk.

Spoiler: About the guild

The guild is known as “Penumbra Cieloâ€

 

[Yggdrassil]

User Name: Yggdrassil

Name: Lucian

Age: 21

Gender: Male

Nationality: American, from Maryland to be exact.

Appearance: Somewhat short 5"8' tall at the most, and that's with shoes. His hair reaches halfway down his neck and is a bright blond color, seemingly bleached but all natural. Usually wears a black shirt with an orange X across it that is normally hidden by an orange vest.

Personality: Shy amongst new people, but fairly excitted and overactive when with friends or people he trusts. His moods tend to shift quickly and unexpectedly, from happy to angray to sad and back. He absolutely hates anyone who comments on his height, sometimes even becoming violent. When he is calm, though, he is a hard worker and planner, and doesn't rush into things.

Likes: Poeple shorter than him, furry animals, friends and aquaintances

Dislikes: People taller than him, reptiles, people he has never met, losing

History: Lucian comes from a family of overachievers, and of them he is the 'loser'; the one who hasn't shown some sort of amazing talent. Both of his brothers became Hunters early in their lives and all three of his sisters went off to become successful in their own fields. No more than two years after they had started, both of Lucian's brothers were dead and he made up his mind to become a Hunter himself, to prove that he was better than his siblings before him.

Weapons/Abilities: He has unusually high upper and lower body strength, coming from a nearly obsessive compulsive need to exercise. He pefers heavy weapons, especially a special sword called a counter sword, where a heavy weight is centered in the part of the blade near the hilt, allowing the swings to draw in a close opponent if done right.

Other skills: He has mild experience in group leadership and is an excellent swimmer. He has a way with animals, and is phenominal at teaching pets tricks.

Post Sample: http://rmxp.org/forums/http://dev.rmxp. ... 54#p419654
Normally I never make such long posts, of course.  :smile:

 

[Tame]

Brilliant, I wasn't expecting anyone to join so soon.  Your application is all fine. Thanks very much applying!

APPROVED!

 

[Devon Jacobs]

User Name: Devon Jacobs
Name: Billy Kohagon
Age: 18
Gender: Male
Nationality: American California
Appearance: 5'9" Actual Drawn Pic

Spoiler

http://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll96/Noliander/maguma151.jpg[/img]

Personality: Dense, but loyal. Always puts friends first and wont back down when it comes to there safety. He seems very pitiful when confronted by friends and usually submits to there wants.

Likes: Food, Sailing, Sword training
Dislikes: Those that threaten peice (so dramatic)

History: Billy comes from a long line of sailors dating back 1000 years. His great grandfather tamed the great Leviathan. He is trained in swordsmanship and acrobatics making him very agile for his swift size. With the murder of his family at the battle of Talkim forest he woanders the world helping people.

Weapons: Kitana, Aqua-mini Anchor
Abilities: Safe Retreat, When outnumbered or losing Billy gains great speed of retreat and enhanced tactics o aid retreat.
Other skills: Mathematics: Very good at calculations and tactics, mildly knowlegdable about magic.

Strength: 5
Stamina: 3
Speed: 3
Strategy: 5

 

[Anonymous]

User Name: Wumpi (usually, not right now.)

Name: Aster Cicada

Age: 19

Gender: Female

Nationality: Supposedly born in France to parents of french and Italian ethnicity, raised in south Wales

Appearance: Aster is about 5"6 with olive skin, short brown hair and, despite genetic improbability, blue eyes. Her usual attire consists of a loose white shirt, white trousers and black cloth shoes. She has a very scrawny build but this is less obvious because of her preference for loose clothing.

Personality: Aster is, on the surface, very warm and friendly. She dislikes conflict and will do her utmost to avoid upsetting people, avoiding conversation topics that could spark argument. She likes to act cute to try to get through difficult situations and has trouble doing anything if not ordered to.

Until she is told to fight or combat is unavoidable.

When forced to defend herself, Aster is cold, calculating and ruthless. She is reluctant to kill without being given the order to be a superior but she is happy with pretty much anything else and has no problem with torture. Her being a medic primarily only makes her more dangerous, she knows how to hurt people best.

She switches between these two personas terrifyingly seamlessly, favouring the 'civilian' one. It should be noted that this is neither losing her temper nor is it true 'multiple personalities'. Aster just finds it convenient to act a lot differently as a civilian and enjoys the fact that switching mid-fight is an excellent scare tactic. She holds very little regard for her own life and following orders from a superior comes before anything else.

Likes: Aster is quite curious and loves to learn new things. She has a somewhat worrying love of things that explode. She collects stuffed animals less because she likes them and more because her mother told her to get a hobby and names them after illnesses. Her favourite is a spotty rabbit called Chickenpox

Dislikes: Aster is a fussy eater and  hates salt with a passion. If food comes with salt on she will wash it and eat it soggy rather than eat it with salt. As mentioned in personality, she dislikes conflict. She is a follower rather than a leader and hates having to make important decisions for herself.

History: Everything Aster has done in her life, she has done because she was told to and without complaint. Her parents raised her to be unquestioningly obedient and had decided her as a medic since birth. Other than a very busy schedule and her parents' rather unorthodox way of teaching her about death (having her healthy pet cat put down in front of her), she had nothing in the way of trauma in her life. She was pushed toward medicine by her parents but also made to take gymnastics and self-defence lessons and study several different languages. She has every intention of becoming a hunter for one reason: she was told to.

Weapons/Abilities: Aster is primarily a medic and as such is better suited for supporting allies than actually fighting. She favours using traps as a weapon and carries caltrops and a selection of blades (none of which she is actually trained to use as weapons in themselves) to use in her traps.  If forced to fight alone, though, she is quick and agile and her punches, while not much compared to the attacks of her teammates, aren't too lacking considering attacking isn't her specialty. On the other hand, she can't take a hit well. She has a surprisingly high pain threshold but suffers from quite brittle bones. Recently she has been taking an interest in poisons...

Other skills or anything of note: Her medical training would be the obvious one. She is skilled enough in surgery to perform simple operations on the field and failing that can patch allies up well enough that they survive the journey back to somewhere with better equipment. Recently she has started ignoring the 'medic' side of medicine and following a somewhat less benign path.

Post Sample: Hey Marcel

 

[Spoo]

User name: Akinari

Name: Damian Dreft

Age: 27

Gender: Male

Nationality: Belgian, mother is from The Czech Republic.  His hometown is Ostend.

Appearance:  6"2 with tanned skin and light brown hair that's on the long side.  He pretty much always is wearing a navy windbreaker over his other clothes.  He's not very muscular, but not really scrawny either.

Personality:  Very adventurous and outgoing, he likes to meet new people.  He has a good heart and will protect his loved ones at any time.  Oddly enough, though, he is very quiet and a good listener.

In a situation where he has to fight, Damian uses brains over brawn, which is a tried and true tactic for him.  He is very good at math and has very good memory.  He is a hemaphobiac, so he hates seeing blood. 

Likes:  Damian is a freelance photographer, and he likes to take pictures of famous people and monuments especially.   He enjoys traveling and meeting new people, as stated above, as well.  But out of all things good, Damian has an almost morbid obsession with eating tomatoes.  

Dislikes: Damian is arguably the worst philosopher ever born.   He takes far to much to heart and he hates the rhetorical questions.   He dislikes door to door salesmen and the other pests such as those.  His least favorite food is fish.

History:  Damian was adventurous from the moment he started crawling.  He ran away to the beaches and docks of Ostend many times in his childhood.  By the time he was 14, Damian had already decided that he was going to explore the world and become a famous photographer.  When he run away one night, it started raining and he was back in his bed asleep before anyone even knew he was gone.  For the next several years he worked odd jobs to save up enough money to be able to survive on his own when he did finally get out of Belgium.   When he turned 21, he said goodbye to his family  and set off.   In his travels he learned much about the many cultures and languages of Europe.  He became a hunter almost by accident after helping some other hunters out that were fighting a group of ghouls.

Weapons/Abilities:  Aside from his excellent memory, Damian is very sneaky and can find hidden objects very well.  He boasts a collection of revolvers and he uses them well.  While not a man of action, he can find a way to use his surroundings to win a fight. 

Other talents or anything else:  His tactfulness is the first thing that comes to mind.   He has a small amount of martial arts training he learned while in Asia, but it is most effective when incapacitating an enemy from behind.   He's gradually gotten better at marksmanship and close-range weaponry, but he is still one to use brains over brawn.

 

[Tame]

Wild Cubone, thanks for applying. ACCEPTED!

Akiniari, apart from telemarketers not existing in this RPG, lol, everything is fine. You pistols will only be able to flintlock ones for this RPG, just so you know. Thanks for applying, you're ACCEPTED!


Devon Jacobs, there are some things wrong with your character, and I can't let you join until they've been rectified. I've copied your profile, and highlighted the problems.


User Name: Devon Jacobs
Name: Billy Kohagon
Age: 18
Gender: Male
Nationality: American California
Appearance: 5'9" Actual Drawn Pic

Spoiler

http://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll96/Noliander/maguma151.jpg[/img]

Personality: Dense, but loyal. Always puts friends first and wont back down when it comes to there safety. He seems very pitiful when confronted by friends and usually submits to there wants.

Likes: Food, Sailing, Sword training
Dislikes: Those that threaten peice (so dramatic)

History: Billy comes from a long line of sailors dating back 1000 years. His great grandfather tamed the great Leviathan and thus gained the power to control water in all aspects. He is trained in swordsmanship and acrobatics making him very agile for his swift size. With the murder of his family at the battle of Talkim forest he woanders the world helping people.
I like the idea of his great grandfather taming the great Leviathan; its these kinds of monsters that you might be fighting against.  However, you cannot have supernatural powers yet.  Later on you will be able to gain them, and they can have some connection to controlling water, but none yet. At any rate, being able to control water in all aspects is too powerful...


Weapons: Kitana, Aqua-mini Anvil
What's an Aqua-mini Anvil?
Abilities: Control water/ summon creators from the Aqua Abyss (sometimes)
No supernatural powers!

Other skills: Mathematics: Very good at calculations and tactics, mildly knowlegdable about magic.
This part seems to be in variance to the part when you called him dense; I'm not clear how he can both dense and good at calculations and tactics.

If you want to discuss any part of this with me, please do, either here or via messages.

 

[Devon Jacobs]

Oops sorry its an Anchor not anvil, and all the magic and powers can be dropped. The water control included. And he is dense as in doesnt take hints. Sorry I didnt read the post thuroughly enough.

 

[Spoo]

Might I ask when we are going to start this ?

 

[Tame]

It's fine Devon, don't worry about it. Just edit your post so the changes are made.

Also, to both you and Akinari, please include a short post sample to demonstrate your RPG...ness. Sorry Akinari, I forgot to look for one in your application first time round.

I should be starting on Thursday; this thread will have been up for a week then.  apart from the four of you, I'll be accepting one more applicant.  If no one else joins by then, I'll still start.

EDIT: Cancel that last part, I'll be starting Wednesday. I can't do Thursday.

 

[The Cry of Fallen Angels]

Hope this RP won't die ;x It'd be the first I'd enter without dying after 2-4 pages.

User Name: The Cry of Fallen Angels

Name: Johanna Elise Wildeman, Jo for short.

Age: 24

Gender: Female

Nationality: African by birth, raised in the Netherlands

Appearance: Dark skin, small brown eyes, she’s a bit on the tall and buff side for a woman. Johanna usually has her lower half of her haircut tied into a tail, which pretty much means her dreads are ranging from her of her head till just a bit above her lower back. She tends to wear baggy trousers and a pair of sporting shoes. Jo has a modest taste in jewellery, being necklace with a small silver cross.

Personality: Jo’s much of an individualist, putting herself on the top of her priority list. Her no-nonsense attitude and capability to think and calculate quickly often make conversations with Jo very short. She talks rather passionately but hardly ever loses her cool, unless her patience is being tested, wasting “valuableâ€

 

[Tame]

Thanks for applying, everything's fine. You're in!

Right, now that everyone's applications are fine, I'll be starting this evening (Wednesday).  Hopefully the first post should make it clear how to start.

 

[Tame]

Double post!

Well, the first post's up, feel free to begin!  As to the emblem mentioned, here's a picture of it: http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y33/Re ... /28500.jpg[/img]

 

[Tame]

Akinari, perhaps I didn't make myself clear enough in my explanation of the RPG, so sorry about that, but all PCs are examinees; they are not yet fully-fledged hunters and are taking the test to become one now.  The examiners are all NPCS, played by moi.

 

[Spoo]

Well then, how might I fix this?  I really don't want to mess up the RP.

 

[Tame]

Not to worry about it. Just make the minor modifications to your profile needed to make it fit.  Then do the same for your post, and carry on as if it hadn't happened!


This is a small addition to the workings of the RPG that I decided not to put in the very first post because it might get too confusing, but it needs to be done, if done at all, before the RPG gets fully underway.

It's the addition of stats to the role-play.  They'll be simple, very easy to understand, and will merely serve as a guideline to show people's relative strength, there won't be any complicated system or anything.

There are four categories;
Strength: the character's physical strength
Stamina: how long the character can exert physical effort for
Speed: how fast the character can move
Strategy: how good the character is at thinking up  and analysing plans

Each category has a maximum of 8, and points will be awarded as the RPG goes on.
For now, you can each choose your own stats; start with 16, and distribute them as you wish across the four categories.  Each category must have a minimum of 3, and at the moment, none may have more than 7.

Then post at the bottom of you character form the finished form, like this:

Character A
Strength: 6
Stamina: 4
Speed: 3
Strategy: 3
Total: 16

 

[The Cry of Fallen Angels]

You might have wanted to mention that in the first post because the statistics system is a huge turn-off. I'm glad you don't want stuff to be unbalanced but I thought you were assigning the supernatural stuff to people and controlling the npc's. That combined with the profiles we made should be sufficient guidelines right?

 

[Tame]

You might have wanted to mention that in the first post because the statistics system is a huge turn-off. I'm glad you don't want stuff to be unbalanced but I thought you were assigning the supernatural stuff to people and controlling the npc's. That combined with the profiles we made should be sufficient guidelines right?

Would you mind telling me why its a turn-off? For curiosities sake. If it proves wholly unpopular, I'll scrap it. It was really just for fun more than anything else; it would give characters bragging rights and so on. "I'm faster than you, blah blah blah."

As far as guidelines, it would only really be used if it was needed to resolve a dispute that might arise, for example, if two characters fought and it was necessary who would have the upper hand in certain given circumstances.

Finally, the basics of the supernatural powers will be taught by a mumber of the guild to all the characters, once they have joined.  The individual and specific powers may be chosen by you individually, provided they're not overpowered. You will of course have the opportunity to talk over any of it with me to decide what they may have.

I hope this has cleared up some of it. As I say, the stats aren't greatly important, so I'll decide against them if the others have similar views to you on them

 

[Devon Jacobs]

I don't really have a problem with them, just concerned it will get a little confusing.

 

[The Cry of Fallen Angels]

You might have wanted to mention that in the first post because the statistics system is a huge turn-off. I'm glad you don't want stuff to be unbalanced but I thought you were assigning the supernatural stuff to people and controlling the npc's. That combined with the profiles we made should be sufficient guidelines right?

Would you mind telling me why its a turn-off? For curiosities sake. If it proves wholly unpopular, I'll scrap it. It was really just for fun more than anything else; it would give characters bragging rights and so on. "I'm faster than you, blah blah blah."

As far as guidelines, it would only really be used if it was needed to resolve a dispute that might arise, for example, if two characters fought and it was necessary who would have the upper hand in certain given circumstances.

Finally, the basics of the supernatural powers will be taught by a mumber of the guild to all the characters, once they have joined.  The individual and specific powers may be chosen by you individually, provided they're not overpowered. You will of course have the opportunity to talk over any of it with me to decide what they may have.

I hope this has cleared up some of it. As I say, the stats aren't greatly important, so I'll decide against them if the others have similar views to you on them

My problem with these is that I want the actions the characters take and can take not to be dependant of numbers. It's like car A has a higher top speed than car B, but car B can reach the finish within less time because it's driver is more skilled, or just luckier. Statistics don't make the world go round.