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emptynesters2017-04-04 08:54 am
onemind) wrote in emptynesters2017-04-04 08:54 am
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TEST DRIVE :003
TEST DRIVE :003
WELCOME to the test drive and thank you for your interest in Station 72! To allow players to experiment with game mechanics, flexibility and to account for the fact that our TDMs tend to span a number of months to make up for our low player turnover, we've put together a game-themes random scenario generator for you to play with. Mix and match prompts at will, pick your own broodmates, experiment with abilities and specializations, talk to each other and maybe make up some pre-established CR, and generally play around however you like.
This test drive is not game canon, so take this chance to go nuts! Current in game players are also welcome to make top levels here and aren't beholden to their in-game characterizations (so if it makes more sense to be a broodmates of a character test driving, feel free to do so for the sake of these threads).
For the full experience, we strongly encourage players to write up a short blurb about what their fellow characters might know about them either through shared time on the Station or through the Nest mental link. Handy links can be found at the bottom of this entry if you have any questions and APPLICATIONS are always open if you decide you'd like to jump into the game proper. If you're having trouble coming up with a symbiote ability for your character for use in either the TDM or for your application, we have an ability workshop post located HERE.
(Mix and match these prompts at will to create your own TDM scenario - there's no obligation to use something from every category. Feel free to make up anything that isn't covered in the prompt if it lends to your playing.)
THE PLACE
1. STATION 72 consists of massive, alien sprawl. While large sections of the Station might be mistaken for a Station manufactured for use by humanoid beings - the hangar is relatively standard other than its massive size, the Life Support deck with its series of living quarters seems normal enough (if you ignore the part where none of the rooms have doors on them), and there's even a Jai Alai court -, beyond the most well trod paths the Station quickly cedes to the utterly bizarre. Corridors twist and loop back in on themselves, great verandas overlook massive empty rooms, ramps because stairs which lead to dead ends. It's easy to get lost if you don't have a destination in mind. Strangely enough, if you do know where you want to be, the Station's twisting paths will eventually get you there as long as you keep your goal firmly in mind. Knowing that is another thing entirely.
2. THE MELTED WORLD was once beautiful. Then again, maybe it's always been a toughened old rock, but at some point the planet called Ojan was glassed in the throes of a brutal war. The planet's entire surface has become a twisted, mirror-like substance by whatever super hot biological weapon was poured into it. The material isn't actually that horrible, consuming black; it perfectly reflects the empty, quiet space that surrounds Ojan: a foreboding testament to a war long forgotten. But what lies below the surface of the desolated world?
3. THE SCEPTRE is a fabulous building structure suspended from an asteroid in orbit around a planet. The Sceptre pierces down through the atmosphere of the planet below and over the course of the asteroid's orbit, The Sceptre has an opportunity to pass through every habitat and climate the world below it has to offer. The Sceptre is sleek and beautiful (or it is? Maybe it's fallen into disrepair and only ghosts remain) and its massive windows look out onto a varied, verdant world (or do they? What state is the planet below in, exactly? Has it been so thoroughly paved over that the atmosphere is the only place left to build?).
4. PENTARA PRIME is the ancient, meandering capital of the lush garden world of Pentara. Unlike most cities, it is a large, verdant sprawl, made up eighteen clustered centers - groups of low, elegant stone buildings, strung together by winding roads populated with quietly humming pods moving people from spoke to spoke. The capital is built around leisure, not production and there are far more gardens and orchards than there are buildings. The sun is heavy and low, and the air is still and buzzes with the sounds of fat-bodied insects. It’s so still, so calm. It seems empty and there is something unsettling in the quiet. --Or is it? Maybe it's bustling with energy, just as vibrant and delightful as it seems on the surface.
5. CHORIUS is not quite a planet. Not anymore. Once long ago it was, but over time it has changed - been stripped clean of every valuable mineral, every scrap of rare metal, and eventually even of atmosphere. The core has cooled perceptibly and now even its rotation period has slowed dramatically. Now it is a made up of shaped carbon and steel that bridge over the stripped surface of the planet, pulsing with energies, shielded from the harshness of the sun by a webbed dome that keeps the electric scented air from escaping into the space around it. Here nothing is wasted. Everything - everyone - is recycled and reconstituted into new forms. Every one of the cities changes daily, reformatted to meet new goals and new needs. It is a dead world filled with the living. But whether it is thriving or dying is hard to say - and what the newest change will bring with it is even more difficult to guess.
6. SPACE, THE FINAL FRONTIER. There's a lot of it in every direction.
THE PEOPLE
1. THE OUTLANDERS consist of small bands of settlers and explorers who have quested out into the unknown, the remote, and the dessicated parts of this galaxy looking for either new opportunities or forgotten mysteries. They are mostly upright though only vaguely humanoid, remnants of a civilization driven from their own failing world, each group is bound only by their own codes and personal laws. They're traders and nomads, largely peaceful but wary of the harsh, dangerous environment and beings they've crossed paths with. Don't cross a deal with an Outlander - they'll make you regret it.
2. A VERITABLE MELTING POT, the beings of this metropolis are as vibrant and diverse as is imaginable. These are a people developed by a myriad of cultural influences, technological insights, overlapping interests and clashing societal norms shaken up and spit out into something that more or less works as long as there's a whole lot of bureaucracy to keep it in order. And boy is there a lot of that. Mind your p's and q's - someone might haul you in for questioning if you cause too much of an uproar.
3. A RUINED GHOST is all that remains of this ancient civilization. Once there were people here leading brilliant or lives, or quiet ones, but all that's left are their ruined structures, old half-functional consoles and signs of lives abruptly arrested. What destroyed these people is initially unclear, but their extinction appears to have been absolute. --Or was it?
4. THE COURT is elegant and beautiful and perfect. Every being is shrouded in delicate, gauzy fabrics layered so densely as to obscure their elongated squirming bodies from head to toe. Each step sounds like a bell ringing from the the small metal plates at the bottom of their soft slippers; every gloved finger glints with small golden threads. The queens sweep through their secret insect gardens and their royal technomancers walk the halls with the glitter of hologlyphs sparkling at their fingertips and in the wake of their sweeping robes.
5. THE GREAT MILITARY is larger even than it’s name suggests. Every member of their civilization plays some part in it, every person has a rank, every family an insignia. The structure is rigid and inflexible and all-encompassing, and it has made them into ferocious enemies. They have been at war for as long as they have been a people, and their battle will never end, because if it did, they would go with it. The harshness of their life is painted on the sharp planes of their grey faces, but there is an indomitability and a pride to them that is hidden by their stern, unchanging expressions.
6. SCUM ALWAYS LIVES at the edge of the universe. Beware the dark of the space and the seedier underbelly of cities or the shadows of forgotten planet - pirates make their living there and these are desperate times, friend.
THE OBJECTIVE
1. GET UP from where you've fallen. Or get up from the nesting deck pod where you've just woken up on the Station. Or get up to Level 672 where there's a ship waiting for you. Or get up from the knee you've taken before this alien queen. Get up.
2. THE RESCUE might be saving a city from a disaster engineered by an enemy force, playing bodyguard for a government official, or liberating a rare artifact from a crumbling structure.
3. IT'S A RACE AGAINST TIME to collect the relic you've been sent to retrieve from the collapsing ruin. Or to make your way free of the military blockade. Or to make your escape from a crumbling world.
4. THE MASQUERADE is all a cover - for an assassination. For a heist. For a political coup.
5. INFILTRATE you know what you need. And you know who has it. With a little help you’ll be able to break into the place no one is supposed to go. You could sneak in… or smash in. Or maybe just talk your way past every little problem.
6. COME ON AND SLAM and welcome to the jam. It’s a ritual or maybe it’s just a pastime, but whichever it is there are rules and there is a goal. There’s probably even points. If you’re lucky, you just might score one. Avoid the spiky pits? Or maybe the thrown fruit. Or perhaps just the other team...
6. EXPLORE and uncover the secrets this place have to offer. There’s a mystery here if you know where to find it. And all you have to do is look.
7. DON'T DIE is easy to say and hard to do when you're under the guns of an armada. Or when you're trying to outwit spies. Or when the ground is literally crumbling under your feet.
INSPIRATION
jesssseeeee // 1
[He throws his kukri far and, possibly stupidly, into the middle of the fray. At this point? He's already faced much worse odds than a variety pack of aliens.
Nyx disappears, reappears instantly dead ass in the middle of enemy territory, much to said enemy's surprise. A clean slice across a throat, and he's gone again, in what seems to be flash broken glass and fire. He briefly reforms again, just to stab two more enemies. Sure, it's probably smarter to get going, but wasn't his last direct order on the battlefield one he conveniently chose to ignore?
Better to thin out the crowd, to be the distraction.
The kukri lands not too far from Jesse, and with it comes Nyx, in a literal blaze as he reforms.]
Get moving, I can hold them off.
[Big Damn Hero, at it again, because he's really not the one who has to make it out anyway.]
Ayyyy Nyx ; u ; <3
What, and let you get all the glory? Like hell.
[Jesse's gaze shifts swiftly from Nyx to a big, mean lookin' guy, leveling his sights and taking the shot by reflex. If there was one thing Reyes had taught him, it was no man gets left behind. Not unless there's no other way out, and their options ain't that grim.
Maybe he wasn't quite so good at that all the time, too used to working alone after so many vigilante years beneath his belt, but right now? It counts.
It's a risk, but Deadeye would clear the way ahead of them pretty well.]
Cover me.
[Not quite a question, but a request nonetheless. If nothing else, he knows he can trust the guy; loyal to a fault, just like him. And practically suicidal. Probably why they'd both ended up on this mission together. No one else was fool enough to volunteer.
He takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, then opens them, time seeming to slow as he raises the pistol, then pulls the trigger.
Onetwothreefourfivesix bodies drop in the span of a second, leaving an open path between him and Nyx and their way out.]
Move, Ulric!
[Is all the warning he gives before he's taking a leaping roll, back on his feet and pounding down the hallway. He trusts Nyx to be at his side. Doesn't look behind him, the hiss of laser fire pelting past them. Whether it's Deadeye or the fight, adrenaline sings through his veins and Jesse feels unstoppable. Maybe they'll both make it out after all.]
Gonna need a good drink an' a smoke after this'n.
no subject
There's a metaphor in there somewhere, considering he had neither in his hands by the time the sun began to rise over the destruction of the city.
No warping, just pure speed now, as he starts to zip past now dead enemies and right next to his current comrade, one that's just as damned heroic as he is. Whatever it was that gave him renewed strength, he was glad for it. Likely the only thing keeping him alive.
The fissures cutting through his neck and cheek start to itch wildly. Fresh wounds did that, didn't they? He suspects they won't ever really heal. Higher powers gave him those scars. Higher powers weren't really the merciful type.]
I'll get you the drink myself if we can get out in the next five minutes. Grab on.
[He shoves the more delicate, artistic kukri into Jesse's hand. Its older brother remains firmly in a gloved hand.]
Hope you're not the queasy type.
[There's absolutely no apology there as he flings the kukri in an impressively long-range warp.]
no subject
[Nyx is fast, and it's a different kind of fast than he is, all magic poofing and he's not entirely sure how it all works, but Jesse's grateful for it, not wanting to leave anyone behind. And maybe it's the calm confidence the guy exudes that kind of reminds him of his old squadmates in Blackwatch, but he trusts Nyx, glancing down for a moment at the kukri in his hand.
By the time Jesse realizes what Nyx has done and he glances down at his hand, there's no chance to argue before he's gone. Even though he's not the queasy type, he stumbles at the end of the warp, giving a loud whoop even as his heart's pounding and his head's spinning as he remembers which way is up and glances around to see if Nyx is with him.]
Give a man a little warnin' next time...
[Jesse mumbles the words, glancing back at their hot pursuit, and speeding his run now that the world doesn't feel like it's doing loop-de-loops around him. That was a hell of a rush. The next, a little louder as he trots backwards and levels a few more shots. Not all of them hit this time, but they make a few of their pursuers have second thoughts about this whole thing.]
Move yer ass, amigo or we're both dead.
no subject
[Nyx, for his part, doesn't stumble, doesn't check himself. He just keeps going like he's done this his entire life. Truth is, he's only done it for about half of his life, maybe a little less. Apologies later, the one that'll go with the drink.]
Amigo.
[The word is strange and foreign to him and even when he's saying it he's butchering it about ten times worse than imaginable.]
We're almost there!
[And this time, it's actually true, not some hopeful trick of the eye. They're within sight of the extraction point.
Nyx just barely begins to run backwards when he throws a massive fireball. There's no aim to it, it's more of a protective barrier, a deterrent. There's no way he could hold an actual barrier right now.]
That's should hold them, let's go!
no subject
Gotta say, been a hell of a trip.
[The little shuttle is sitting and waiting, the hatch open and inviting and Jesse hops in and stumbles to lean against the far wall, the burning of his muscles finally something he can pay attention to, and his lungs are screaming for air but they're alive. He's still holding the kukri he realizes as he glances down at his hands, and then offers it back towards Nyx with a grin.]
That was a hell of a thing ya did with the fire. And these are handy, gotta say. Does toss a man's lunch around a bit more than I'm used to, though.
no subject
You get used to it, unless you're Libertus.
[Though he laughs, there's a certain... sting to it. The persistent reminders that no, home's really not an option anymore. It hadn't been since the fall, but now?
Like the stories, he's just a spirit trying to pass on, without a real way to find the end of the road. A man caught somewhere between life and death, closer to death really, and here he is, still doing the exact same thing he'd been doing for years...
No wonder there's no end for him. What does a person do when they were ready and willing to die, only to still be alive in some regard? Wasn't there something about unfinished business?
Nyx puts it out of his mind, for now.]
He'd never gotten used to it. Always got mad at me when I had to do it, but it got us out of trouble more than once. You're not a bad shot, yourself.
[He mimes a pistol, aiming it at Jesse.]
Can't say I've seen anyone that can shoot half as good as you.