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@ Um Lovely: Thanks, I'm happy you liked her. I'm also really glad you caught on to the beauty/eternal life issue, because you're exactly right—she does want to restore her youth permentantly but it has more to do with being healthy and strong forever again than beauty. For comparison there is actually a villain in the same story who is the opposite—she wants eternal beauty and that whole living forever thing is just a bonus.
- Anyway, about Wren Summers: I'm sure you've heard this a million times so I'll apologize in advance—-Wren reminds me of Magneto with a little dash of . Though in my opinion a badass female version of Magneto who is in some ways far more justified, and at the same time far more ugly about her goals. Her powers are definitely neat, ultimate armor that even tosses away the weakness of being too "stiff" by shifting into liquid form, amazing! What is more creepy about her is that she is so terrifyingly realistic—we don't have super-powered mutants/Transhumans, but we do have far too many marginalized groups and being pushed into bad conditions and constant prejudice will cause anyone to snap, and give rise to a radical and possibly murderous leader. Come to think of it, she also gives off vibes of Daisy Fitzroy as well as Magneto.
One thing I was a little confused about when I first read her profile and still am—-it seems that she wasn't on either side of the disastrous protest incident when it happened, so how did she get PTSD from something she wasn't even present for? I can understand outrage or going rogue because of it, but not that. Or is it some other incident that gave her the trauma?
edited 2nd Nov '14 10:11:23 AM by Swordofknowledge
Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace
The Darkness Grows
That's still great about Gweyna; unattractive female characters are usually worse about their appearance than the seductive ones.
About Wren: Ack! The PTSD was part of her older characterization; I'll delete it.
And yes, I have had her compared to Magneto before, but I personally based her on IDW's Megatron. They're all violent crusaders who go careening off the rails at some point, so it's an apt comparison and a compliment as a X-Men fan. Thanks .
You made me curious enough to look up IDW's Megatron and boy do you have a point. Never thought I'd get so engrossed in reading a Transformers character's history. Anyway! Now that I've re-posted Gweyna, I can submit these guys so it makes sense.
- Name: Gweyna's Empties
- Age: The males are 21 years old and the females are 25 years old.
- Appearance: They wear white leather uniforms with steel armor on the chest, knees and elbows along with thin black gloves and boots and narrow crimson scabbards for their swords. The males are pale-skinned and black haired while the females are blonde and slightly tanner. All of them are lean and muscular from relentless training. Their faces are uniformly blank and expressionless except for eye movement when registering their surroundings or incoming attacks.
- Personality: Put bluntly, the Empties don't have personalities or even thoughts. They are failures from the annual project to create a new King and Queen, during which Azelas destroys the minds of multiple children gathered by the Inner Circle and attempts to implant a new loyal personality to fill the void. As usual, all but two subjects were failures, resulting in the Empties. They are little more than human weapons without thoughts or feelings. Some seem to have slight remnants of their old selves, but only the smallest hints.
- Abilities: The Empties are in peak physical condition. They possess high speed, strength, agility and durability well beyond that of the average human. They wield long curved sabers and the weapon choice combined with their sword skill makes it nearly impossible to avoid being struck. They pose no resistance to Gweyna's mind control magic and she is able to organize them to attack with perfect coordination and single-minded precision. Because of the mind-control and their lack of a sense of self Empties do not feel pain and will continue fighting until they are utterly disabled.
- Weaknesses: They are utterly dependent on Gweyna's mental commands for everything, such as when to eat, drink or even move around. Without her, they would simply stand in one place staring at nothing and would eventually starve to death. Thus if she is preoccupied or incapacitated, any resistance from them stops as they stand and wait for orders.
- Goals: Kill anyone who ventures into the ruins of Sinestel beneath Ylati's capital Kes'trina, and guard Azelas's Mirror with their lives, letting no one but Gweyna touch it.
- Motivation: Gweyna's commands.
- Role in the Story: Elite Mooks the protagonists encounter during the assault on Kes'trina on the day of the ritual. A sobering view to Niccolo of what he could have become.
Backstory: Twenty four years before Clockwalkers the Inner Circle decided that King Bruno and his wife Francesca were in need of children. Thus they set about planning the characteristics and attributes the children would have and how they would impact the current climate of the country. Azelas informed them that the network of underground tunnels—the artificial Ley Lines that turned Ylati into a Place of Power for the ritual—were almost complete. The only hindrance was that the North was devoid of humans, Helios having taken it over and forced all of its human citizens out twenty-six years previously.
Humans and nuriel must be in all four Quadrants of Ylati for the spell to work. It was decided that two royal children would be created; a prince who could use diplomacy and charm to win over the elves and dwarves to help drive out the insurgents and a princess who would be a warrior to lead the people both in military might and boost morale for the common citizens. The names were then decided upon: Prince Niccolo and Princess Araceli.
As had been done repeatedly over the course of Ylati's seven thousand year history, the members of the Inner Circle set to work harvesting children of certain physical qualities from the lands under their control. The children taken were five or six years old and mostly street children abandoned by their parents or otherwise orphaned. Some were even sold to the agents of the Circle by underground traders practicing in illegal human slavery. Once gathered, in a secluded location within Kes'trina's borders, they were divided into two groups by gender. The boys were taught etiquette, politics, diplomacy and skills with small daggers. The girls were taught female etiquette, war strategy, motivational speaking and mastery of the sword.
At last the final test came when they were eight and nine respectively. They were herded into a room where Azelas tried to implant his desired personalities within their minds. As usual it ended in failure for most of them until one male and female received the "Niccolo" and "Araceli" personalities. The rest were regarded as spares and used as guardians of the secrets Kes'trina hosted beneath its surface.
- Relevant Tropes
- Absurdly Sharp Blade: The sabers wielded by the Empties are made of high-quality dwarven steel and honed to razor sharpness. During the party's battle with Gweyna, one of them stops Ernesto Rossini from firing his crossbow by hacking it with his sword. The blade is so sharp that it cleaves cleanly through the crossbow's iron and wood body without even slowing down.
- Annoying Arrows: Ernesto and Vanthi, two characters wielding a Automatic Crossbow and a bow and arrow respectively manage to hit several Empties, but they simply continue with the arrows and bolts sticking uselessly out of their bodies—-however, they are slowed down by shots and will die of blood-loss or if hit in a vital spot.
- Anti-Villain: Of the Woobie variety. They didn't want to fight the protagonists—in fact, they're not even conscious anymore. Many of them were children abandoned by parents who didn't want them or lost their families through cruel twists of fate and wound up on the streets without any relatives to take them in. Others were sold after being kidnapped from their families or just given away by overcrowded orphanages. Though confused at first, many of them grew to like the compound where they were housed with a stable food supply and the elderly elf with her staff of kind men and women who took care of them and promised them they would be of great use to the Kingdom someday...
- Attack! Attack! Attack!: The Empties engage the protagonists without hesitation and complete disregard for injury or even death while fighting. Being wounded only slows them down, and even this doesn't really produce the full hindrance that it would for a rational thinking human who has been injured in combat. Justified as they aren't rational thinking humans, and doubled by the fact that they are under the mind control of a witch who really doesn't care whether they live or die. They avert the usual mindless and chaotic charge that follows this trope and instead attack in tightly packed groups to outmaneuver and isolate their opponents from one another for an easier kill.
- Awful Truth: Who and what they are is this to Prince Niccolo—-and Gweyna enjoys every minute of seeing his reaction.
- Drasil: "Wh-Who are these people? More of the Vision?
- Niccolo: "No! Their clothes are all wrong; you know the Vision never wears a uniform. I've seen every branch of the martial service and I've never encountered anything like this..."
- Gweyna: "They are your brothers and sisters, my flawed princeling. But you don't remember your time in the facility, do you? More to the point, they're the unlucky boys and girls who couldn't become 'Araceli' or 'Niccolo'. But of course there are always uses for failures, especially if the bodies can be kept in good condition."
- Bare-Fisted Monk: In addition to swordplay, they are at least partially skilled in barehanded fighting. Drasil kicks the sword away from one of them, only for her to punch him in the throat and sweep his legs out from under him and then impale him through the shoulder with her recovered weapon.
- Beat the Curse Out of Him: Subverted mockingly by Gweyna once Niccolo finds out what they are. He immediately attempts an "I Know You Are in There Somewhere" Fight to his former fellow "trainees", by trying to tell them to recall their former lives but Gweyna shoots it down immediately by telling him there isn't anything to recall, since they are all technically in a vegetative state.
- Brains and Brawn: They act as the brawn shielding Squishy Wizard Gweyna's brains. Which is fitting, since they are powerfully fit men and women in their prime while Gweyna is a frail, elderly woman over a thousand years old.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: Able to move at near blurring speed, strong enough to send grown adults crashing to the ground with a single punch and leap higher than normally possible. All of the children from this particular "batch" seem to have this, though Araceli is the strongest in this regard. Niccolo, interestingly enough, seems to be the only one lacking it.
- Dull Eyes of Unhappiness: Their eyes, regardless of the color, are uniformly dull and dead looking—a clear indication that no one is at home.
- Empty Shell: The Mind Rape Azelas performed on them as children destroyed their sense of self and they were so far gone that it couldn't attach its desired personality to the ragged remains of their minds. The only reason they move, attack or even perform simple tasks like eating is because of the outside instructions Gweyna gives with her mind control magic. To put it in perspective, the magic she uses to control them was never intended to be used on sentient beings but on animals, and one had to have a firm grasp on it to control even one cow let alone a herd of livestock.
- Elite Mooks: They function as Gweyna and Azelas's personal protection squad, guarding the chamber where its Mirror is stored and viciously killing anything that nears the room. When Vincezno Attoria a member of the Inner Circle actually ventures down to the ruins to speak to Azelas, Gweyna mentions that he was fortunate he didn't wander anywhere near there, since it would have been irritating to explain the mess to his family and swear in his son—who had been training—as his replacement at such a critical stage.
- Feel No Pain: They don't react to pain like ordinary people do. Something that would force an average person to rear backwards in pain and give an opponent time to strike or escape just inflicts a wound and nothing more. They don't even cry out when hit, something the protagonists fighting them find extremely creepy.
- Fridge Horror: Out of several hundred boys and girls, only one boy and one girl accepted the personalities and became Niccolo and Araceli. While we know that the ones who failed to accept the personalities and were rendered mindless became the Empties, what did the Inner Circle do to the children who didn't even have their chance to fail or succeed? Best not thought about.
- Go Mad from the Revelation: The way Azelas destroyed the minds of the children when the time came for them to be implanted with false personalities. It projected its understanding of the Overworld it had been called from into their minds and their consciousnesses shattered under the weight of such knowledge. That allowed it to fill in their missing thoughts with what it wanted. Unfortunately this mostly drove the subjects into a vegetative state and few could withstand it to move on to stage two.
- Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: They do not wear helmets, providing their opponents with a good target in the form of their heads. However, the blank looks on their faces almost make one wish they were wearing coverings over their dead expressions.
- Hive Mind: Played with. They have no minds, conjoined or no. However they are under the mental control of Gweyna, who in this case acts as a sort of central will that gives each of them their commands in order to create a fighting team. Each one of them is just a unit in what is basically a fast-paced strategy game with living pieces.
- Human Sacrifice: In order for the Mirror to receive the nuriel Life Energy from the ritual, the artificial Ley Lines have to recognize it as human. So what does Gweyna do? She calls one of them over while the rest are fighting and slits his throat. More disturbing is how she controls the dying man to walk over to the Mirror and lean in front of it to get as much blood as possible on its frame and glass.
- Human Shield: Vanthi quickly figures out that the Empties are a Keystone Army and they will be pacified without their controller giving them orders. However when he aims to fire at Gweyna, she notices and has one of them intercept the arrow by leaping in front of her to take it in the chest.
- Lightning Bruiser: A large part of how they overwhelm the party is due to their speed; they are able to move in near-blurs and wound their opponents with a barrage of razor sharp steel before they can recover from the shock of each hit.
- Super-Soldier: Fast, strong, completely focused on the elimination of the enemy and does not even react to pain in a way that would cause them to hesitate.
- Tragic Monster
- Tyke-Bomb: Of the laser-guided sort. They were raised with the idea that they would make a difference to the Kingdom of Ylati by driving away the evil rebels and doing their best to ensure that humanity triumphed over its enemies and was able to progress into a new era. Araceli and Niccolo only learned the specifics once their new personalities had overwritten the old ones and there was no question of their loyalty.
- Uncanny Valley: Their blank, expressionless faces and the fluid and constantly shifting way that the Empties move is quite unnerving and when Gweyna first looses them, Ernesto first believes them to be an upgraded version of the murderous Butchers that they previously encountered. He later thinks that it is like fighting animated corpses, that is how silent deadly and positively lifeless they are.
- The Voiceless: They don't talk except for a few grunts—or gurgles—when mortally wounded.
- You Are Number 6: Gweyna refers to them by a letter and numbers when giving orders. She refers to the males by the letter N—for Niccolo—followed by their number. She does the same with the females, except with the letter A for Araceli. An example would be N-17 and A-28.
edited 6th Nov '14 7:21:26 PM by Swordofknowledge
Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace
These things really put it into perspective what kind of depraved freakshows are really running the show. They don't need over the top magic or stupefying displays. What they show is more than enough.
That old lady deserves to die.
- Name: Dalton Jamesfield / Lord Eclipse
- Age: 32
- Personality: Dalton is at first one of the goofiest villains to ever grace New Dawn's pages, being someone who bumbles everything from his own Dramatic Entry to his attempts to exploit elemental weaknesses. Dalton seems dorky, shy, and very uneasy about talking to women, almost seeming phobiac of the thought. He thinks of his immediate subordinates – who are essentially the Goldfish Poop Gang – as his “family”, and acts like a rather dimwitted father to them. While he is technically dull, its made clear he understands facts of the magical reality a lot more than he understands academic instruction. When Matthew meets Dalton, it is readily established that Dalton is also a Chivalrous Pervert, giving his underling “Red Lady” a lot of compliments on her dress and outright refusing to peek when they do their little Team Rocket style introduction. So why exactly is Dalton mentioned here? He's yet another Lord Eclipse. This one, however, became a part of the conspiracy largely because he was utterly frustrated and enraged that he was being mocked and unendingly fired simply because he was always viewed as ineffectual, stupid and perverse. With this kind of focus, Dalton reveals he has learned quite a lot from the older Eclipses, as well as his own old bosses. He shows utmost deadly precision as Lord Eclipse, fighting mercilessly and without anything resembling consideration for his foes' lives. He remains mostly quiet, even as he kills people – not even offering a pithy saying or such. Viewing notions like mercy as having landed him in the place he ended up in, he often displays cold-blooded pragmatism in regards to his mission.
- Abilities: Dalton at the start can simply adjust “Element Fields” that cause certain spells to become stronger within them. He's also a reasonably good pugilist, using steel gauntlets given the design, it could possibly be foreshadowing and steel boots. As Lord Eclipse, he basically takes Good Old Fisticuffs to a whole new level – he has killed people simply by slamming his fist once into their stomach. One hit from his Lord Eclipse Armor's Fist can even result in Your Head Asplode. He also displays the very rare trait of being talented in Combination Element, which lets him combine certain elements to make unique attacks – for example, Earth + Fire = sustained lava shot at the foe. He also keeps the Khronos powers passed along with the Lord Eclipse identity.
- Weaknesses: At the start, oh, where do I begin? As Lord Eclipse, he seems extra-weak for some reason to hits to Khronos.
- Goals: Become able to be taken seriously. As Lord Eclipse, he wants to create a world where everyone either becomes strong, powerful and aggressive, or dies.
- Motivation: He apparently suffered from a difficult familial situation. This, combined with being laughed at, mocked, and “blasted off” repeatedly, results in Dalton becoming Lord Eclipse.
- Role in the Story: Big Bad of Return of Lord Eclipse
- Backstory: Dalton comes from a rather coarse family, a mother who was constantly getting drunk to mourn the fact their father abandoned them to go ride around the country on his motorcycle. Dalton left this life to join Sharon Tate Roman's New World Order, which is where his troubles really began.
- Tropes:
- Anti-Villain: At the start, Dalton just isn't evil. Just utterly misguided. Much less so later.
- Badass Boast: he tries one early on, and it fails. Miserably. Matthew breaks up laughing at it.
- Later, however...
- Dalton: You have no mechanisms left with which to stand against me. I have slain your heroes, I have ground the entire state beneath my boot, and the world is soon to follow. You are without inspiration, and without hope. Surrender and I will make your entrance into the new world almost painless.
- Beware the Silly Ones
- Boisterous Weakling: At first, Dalton is very boisterous and loud, and thinks he's the strongest magic user in Sanfield.
- Collective Identity: Part and parcel of being Lord Eclipse.
- Dangerously Genre-Savvy: He definitely learned from past mistakes, and has a tendency to go right for murder blows, and prioritizes using a fighting style that very few people can stand against.
- Tellingly, he skips “who dares?” entirely and simply tries to blast a group of people to pieces when they challenge him.
- Break the Cutie: Broken hard during Book III, culminating in his wish to Blessed Tear for everything in his life to go back to normal failing because Matthew happened to win against the entity just then. Might also qualify as Start of Darkness.
- Card-Carrying Villain: At first. It lessens over time, as he becomes more jaded.
- The Combat Pragmatist: Does not hesitate to blast a whole bunch of people to shreds from behind, when it became clear they were gonna be easy targets.
- Dark and Troubled Past: The series main events qualify as his Dark and Troubled Past. A very tragic case of it in that the heroes mostly accidentally cause the sympathetic and good natured Dalton to turn to worse and worse evil to try to fix his life.
- Despair Event Horizon: Dalton crosses it when it becomes painfully clear to him that his magic and his fighting style are both inadequate, and that no matter how hard he tries, he won't be able to lay a finger either on Matthew or on the new monster in town. All this after a training arc for him, and a lot of effort. And things only got worse for him from there – his family was killed during the Ensemble Day Massacre, and Hector killed his older brother by accident. Its like the world keeps trying to push him further past this line.
- Determinator: Never gives up no matter how many curbstomps he gets. Though eventually, his despair event moments knock him so hard he gets back up in a way that settles him into a different kind of villain.
- Dramatic Unmasking: When the mask of Lord Eclipse, this one resembling a reflective, but multi-sectioned mask themed like some sort of blank, is removed, boy everyone gets a shock.
- The Dreaded: Even more than the usual Lord Eclipse, because he's been doing this on a more personal note than others have.
- Elemental Powers: he has them initially, but in a weird way – he can amplify the effects of certain magic, and weaken other types. Later, he learns how to combine elements to create very unique spells, including a translucent cube that can contract inward and atomize anything caught inside.
- Establishing Character Moment: We first meet Dalton as his group do their Team Rocket-esque intro, sealing the deal on what kind of villain he really is.
- As Lord Eclipse, however, its showing up in Post-Plague Earth and responding to someone asking him, “How are you, my big friend” with “Better now – though I suspect I am no friend of yours” - we do not see what exactly Dalton did to him, but it was enough to make Cole vomit, because he basically drained all the person's soul and internal mana.
- Evil All Along: Well, eviler all along than we thought. Who would've thought dorky old Dalton could pull off being one of the most chilling Lord Eclipses ever.
- Evil Gloating: When Rick demands to know if it was him that did all this, he starts listing his crimes, which resembles gloating, but is more Dalton essentially forcing Rick to think that because of his “weaknesses” all of these deaths happened.
- Flash Step: Dalton moves extremely fast on his feet after becoming a Lord Eclipse. Can combine with his fisticuffs to become multi-directional Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs.
- Foreshadowing: A lot of it early on. We see him ruminating about the story of a heavily armored king, he talks about Jason Druford, another Eclipse, glowingly, and has very rare, but very large temper “eruptions” on occasion.
- For the Evulz: Averted - he doesn't do any of this for sadism or kicks. Rather, he feels he has to do all of this, and that its "the only way forward." Whatever happened to Dalton to push him into this, its definitely very severe.
- From Bad to Worse: Just when Rick feels like he's hit the bottom of his luck in Havenland, surrounded by the forces of Lamanda on one hand and her treacherous lieutenant Gerford on the other, we see a couple robots hooking up a robot girl to a Tuning Fork, fulfilling its requirements, and over the drone of battle incoming we have; OPERATION COMPLETE - TRANSPORTATION FROM CHAOS ASGARD BEGINS. Followed by Lord Eclipse walking through the portal, six Cancer Beasts at his side.
- From Nobody to Nightmare: He says so at first. Proven true later.
- Giant Mook: Dalton is the one tasked by Sharon with creating her Giant Mook / King Mook called The Cancer Beast. Even though Dalton was comically ill whenever discussing the plan, he still went through with it – turning someone almost completely overtaken by cancer into a tremendous creature. However, being a less than horrid villain, he was still really messed up about it.
- Less so when he brings an ensemble of fifty Cancer Beasts with him during his tenure as Lord Eclipse.
- Goldfish Poop Gang: He leads this kind of group. Matthew stops taking them seriously ten minutes into the first encounter.
- Good Old Fisticuffs: His initial fighting style. And the one used when he becomes Lord Eclipse, to absolutely deadly effect.
- Harmless Villain: When we meet him, Dalton's a bumbling fool who cannot figure out how to make his own spells work.
- Hero Killer: In one future Time Line when Matthew was accidentally put into a “deep sleep” to avoid a plague, Dalton kills absolutely everyone else in the heroic cast. To avoid the plague himself, he then leaped through a Hazard Gate, and when he returns after the plague's gone, he makes his entrance by murdering the interim protagonist's best friends, slaughtering said interim's school to a man, and making a “statement” by skewering poor Rick's girlfriend on the flag pole.
- Horrifying the Horror: Lamanda is a pretty terrible person, and has terrifying beliefs. That said, Lord Eclipse is viewed by her as a monster she was told about "in stories of horror, dread and woe."
- Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: Oh, Dalton, some of the things you manage to get yourself into...
- It's Personal: He tries to provoke this reaction numerous times, purely because, now that he's basically a Blood Knight / The Philosopher, it only makes sense. The first time, he simply points at Rick's girlfriend and blasts a hole through her. The second time, he taunts Matthew with the knowledge if he'd just killed Dalton when he was “a great big joke” this would not be happening.
- Kick The Son Of A Bitch: Havenland was run by psychotic Straw Feminist types who make Katejina Loos look stable, who used mutagenic goo, needles and other such drugs to make what looks like a nation of beautiful women and pretty boys...except some of those pretty boys are in their forties and still look like that. Its insinuated that the Queen, Lamanda, abused her brother both physically and sexually, and that she advocates killing any men who stumble into "MY Utopia". Havenland gets razed to the ground, its enforcers and despots either slain or driven underground, and Lamanda is on the losing side of an Eviler than Thou with Lord Eclipse that ends with him blasting her into Solarion the Hateful Sun.
- Large Ham: Dalton is basically a big, hammy caricature of the classic supervillain who simply runs around provoking the hero with random actions.
- Legion of Doom Lord Eclipse's Total Eclipse Legion. They come in varying degrees of competence, class and seriousness. On the one hand, we have his Triage, the Cancer Beasts, and Malaffar the Greater, together with N'kaistrun, Malaffar's manipulative, shapeshifting and acid-creating brother. On the other end we have Hellbiter, a serial killer whose only visible part of his head is his mouth who...well, go figure, Lord Lastland - who really likes impaling people to trees to turn them into "Deadwood Sentinels", and The Cannibal, who not only enjoys eating people, but likes tricking others into eating people. It is inferred they're even a generational Eclipse Legion of Doom, some of them showing up earlier, seemingly unaffiliated.
- Malevolent Masked Man: Well of course!
- Mana Drain: The only way he's a threat early on is a device that lets him absorb Mana, but it breaks easily. This device is reinforced and added to his Lord Eclipse armor.
- Mind over Matter: Slightly, as Lord Eclipse, though he prefers using his Century Aging Blasts. He still uses this power to hold a lot of people in the air to address them.
- No-Nonsense Nemesis: He lets absolutely nothing sidetrack him, and the only times he was defeated was because of outside variables not present in the initial fight.
- Not-So-Harmless Villain: Embarking on this is his character's journey.
- Person of Mass Destruction: Sheesh.
- The Philosopher: Has a more philosophic take on the idea of a world of the strong and the Blood Knight ideology than other villains, or even other Lord Eclipses do.
- The Social Darwinist: Believes in, mostly, the same World of Strength the other Eclipses believe in.
- The Stoic: As Lord Eclipse hooboy. He sounds dead of tone and utterly emotionless most of the time.
- Tin Tyrant
- Took a Level in Badass: Dalton in Book III is slightly tougher than he usually is. Lord Eclipse Dalton is this to a whole 'nother level. Anyone who can kill Shane in one hit with a punch to the gut is definitely an extremely dangerous villain.
- You remember his old buddies, right? They get this treatment too, becoming the trio called Lunar, Solar and Haley. And they all now kick ridiculous amounts of ass.
- Villain Decay: While he's notably tougher in Book III, he is still more and more ridiculous over time. Then inverted - every minute Lord Eclipse is on screen, he becomes more dangerous, and more accounts of his activities are shown.
- Walking Spoiler: Oh you have no idea.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Dalton is adamant that Sharon has the right idea. His target of devotion later changes to Lord Eclipse, and he becomes convinced a strong world is the only world that should exist, otherwise there will be disparity, violence and cruelty without end because only SOME people are powerful.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Played with – it is You Have Outlived Your Usefulness As You Are Now. He notices that the guy who had been helping him get back into the world had cancer, and was doing everything basically as a screw you to the world because he was gonna die anyway. So Lord Eclipse basically turns him into a massive Cancer Beast, which seems to destroy the guy's mind.
edited 14th Nov '14 1:39:19 AM by NickTheSwing
I feel like I'm missing part of this story. Going off what you've got here, Dalton reminds me a little bit—not a lot, but a little bit—of ZZ Gundam's Glemmy Toto, being a seemingly affable, Laughably Evil antagonist who turns out to be the single worst person in the story.
The only advice I can really give you is to be careful how you pull this off. If you do it well—and provide enough foreshadowing that people can catch it on reread—you're going to have a plot twist for the ages. If you make it seem like an asspull—particularly if the Dalton persona is very popular—the fanbase is going to riot.
Anyway, first time posting in a while. Lately I've been working in nonfiction rather than fiction. I had some time tonight though, and I thought I'd do a post on another villain from Gangland, the story that Svetlana Rossokovsky and Cale Brownlow hail from. Ladies and gentlemen, Omar Asif.
Name: Omar Asif
Age: Early to mid forties
Personality: Omar is made of ice. He displays little surface emotion, and the deeper you try to pry beneath the surface, the more layers of frost you find. He's tightly controlled, exceptionally focused, and motivated only by profit. Nothing else matters to Omar—not his reputation, not human life, not his faith. Omar's a practicing Muslim, but he doesn't let the religion's teachings get in the way of cashing in. To Omar any ideology just holds you back. He'll work with anybody. He'll also backstab them all the second it appears convenient. About the only way to even break through that cold facade is to try and claim the moral high ground. Then, and only then, will you be exposed to the full weight of Omar's brutal world view—though even then, don't expect him to raise his voice.
Abilities: Omar's an Afghani narcoterrorist. Over the course of his career he's fought against, and allied with the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, various tribal groups, the coalition forces, and the Afghan government. He's got years of experience in insurgent warfare, and easy access to military grade equipment. Worse still, his men are all veterans (ranging from emotionally dead child soldiers like his nephew Mohammad to men of his own age), and he has contacts and allies throughout both the professional criminal underworld, and the ideological terrorist networks. He's also the best tactician and strategist of any of the seasonal antagonists, and plans everything out well in advance. When he and his fellows hit the streets in the USA, neither Mitchell Michaels' Anti-Gang Task Force, nor any of the local criminals in prepared to deal with him.
Weaknesses: If the USA isn't prepared to deal with Omar, he's not prepared to deal with the USA. He's new to the region, and as far as information on the local gang structure goes, he's reliant on what he's gleaned en route. When he arrives, he's expecting Nick Medici to be his biggest problem, and figures that taking him down is the path to success. He barely has any idea of who Svetlana Rossokovsky is, and knows nothing of her working relationship with Michaels. Ultimately this last thing is what sees his plans undone.
Goals: Omar is in town to push the local drug kingpins out of the way and set up a heroin distribution network that cuts out the middlemen and reports back to headquarters in Afghanistan. He aims to destroy the Medici family apparatus, and, once he realizes how much trouble they are going to be, kill Svetlana and cripple Michaels' unit. Then he's going to get on the first flight back to Kabul that he can find.
Motivations: Omar believes that his organization has been getting screwed in the heroin trade. They do all the work to grow the poppies and process the heroin, and run all the risks, protecting the poppies from the various warring factions in Afghanistan. Yet in the end, most of the profits are made my the middlemen and distributers in Europe and the US. He wants to change all that, and has convinced his superiors to back his play.
Role in the story: Omar's the Big Bad of Season 3, and from the first episode to the last completely dominates the season. He makes the city's endemic gang warfare far, far worse, introducing suicide bombings, urban guerrilla tactics, and religious extremism (Omar's no fundamentalist, but he's happy to exploit those who are) to a conflict that had already seen enough bloodshed for two or three similarly sized wars. His carefully orchestrated campaign of terror wrecks the Medici empire, results in the deaths of numerous gangland players, and forever alters the face of the city's criminal landscape. While he's killed off at the end of the season, he's the catalyst for a lot of change, including the fall of the Medici, Lana's ascendency to the top of the underworld, and a lot of shifts in the police department. Thanks to him, Mitchell and Lana, who've always stayed at arm's length before, are forced to cooperate, which sees Mitchell come under investigation from IA. His nephew, Mohammed, who survives him and is rescued by some of the main cast, goes on to be a recurring cast member in Season 4.
Backstory: Omar comes from Afghanistan, and that shady area of the underworld where commercial terrorism and political crime bleed together into one hideous mess. He doesn't remember a time when he wasn't fighting to stay alive, and he doesn't imagine a future where that will be any less true. He's been to war with every armed group in his homeland, or so it seems, and that's permanently marked how he sees the world. Having risen to a position of power at home, Omar's spent the last year or so traveling across Europe and Asia, eliminating regional criminals, and putting his own men in their place. When the season begins he's just arrived in the city, and is preparing for his first move against the Medici.
Relevant tropes: Arc Villain/Big Bad (of Season 3), Badass, Bald of Evil, Berserk Button (people believing that the mafia are somehow morally superior to "terrorists" like him), The Chessmaster, Child Soldier (was one and will gladly make use of them), The Cynic, Evil Uncle (to his traumatized nephew), Outside-Context Villain, Shell-Shocked Veteran, Soft-Spoken Sadist, The Stoic.
edited 19th Nov '14 3:37:08 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Serocco
He seems to be more of a businessman as opposed to a terrorist. He's a literal ice person who deals in drugs, and thinks his industry is getting shafted. He seems to be a bit more of an actual terrorist - using intimidating to get a point a cross.
In RWBY, every girl is Best Girl.
That a criticism, a congratulations, or just a comment?
Serocco
Congratulations. :p Most terrorists are really just generic punching bags in most media. He actually has a reason for it.
Here is an idea I have for a new character that I have yet to introduce - Scyrrhic, also slated to be from Eclipse.
- Appearance: Scyrrhic is an eleven foot skeletal creature adorned in a suit of armor made purely of bone. In addition to her bone-like talons, she has a pair of horns protruding backwards, similar to Saren Arterius. Curved blades stick from her elbows, a long row of serrated teeth are atop her face, and a visor-shaped eyehole comprise her skull-like head. Triangular plated armor cover each of her talons as well.
- Personality: Vaguely insect-like, Scyrrhic is known for frequently twitching and moving with jerking movements while idle. Clicking noises often emit from her teeth when they vibrate, and she is known to psyche her prey out by pretending not to see just before moving in for the kill. She is a cold and calculating predator, with the mindset of a Serial Killer, whose brutality rivals only that of the main character herself. Despite this, she very much retains her sentience - she thinks, feels, acts, and talks as if she were human. One of her more infamous personality traits is her vehement belief that the only purpose of a man is to fuck women, whether or not they result in kids (similar to actual bugs, more or less), although she isn't exactly capable of sex, so she compensates by morphing men into incubators for her spawn. Anyone Ossified by her, and used as her thralls, is "a kindness they do not deserve" in her view.
- Abilities: Morphing her body into various grotesque, bone-like appendages (like guns or swords or even artillery units), as well as bone manipulation of her enemies. Her triumphant capability, however, is Ossification, which transforms people into skeletal mutants like her, with all of their abilities now deformed into bone. One of her sub-abilities is to transform men into egg-like constructs that rapidly produce her spawn. Another of her abilities is to detach a piece of her body and let it evolve into an Elite Mook.
- She has four major "castes" for Ossification. The first is Combat, the second is Artillery (mostly for destruction), the third is Incubation (when she turns men into eggs that spit out her spawn), and the fourth is Mockery. For the fourth caste, let's say she meets a fat woman, or obese, or chubby, or any woman whom is larger than average around the waist area. Scyrrhic will pierce her belly button. The bone would replace her flesh, her head would crack and hang backwards, and the stomach would twist and turn into a face. "What a nice balloon," she would say. "Now what if I pop it?"
- Goal: To surpass and execute the main character, Alice Sitchri. Here is a speech I concocted that explains it best (it's the speech I came up with that finally gave me an idea of how to fit her into the story: "You are a monster of a category all in her own. An abyss without form, prowling the night in search of her prey. A devil beneath the mask; a presence none can truly explain, but all will surely feel. In my life, you were a myth. The tales would shift as often as the wind, and I never knew how to feel about you. As I am now, I've grown to admire you. We're all chasing your shadow. From the ground I once stood, to the grave I last fell, I only live, to see you die."
- Backstory: She Was Once a Man (or woman), who grew up living in constant paranoia over the monsters living in the world (ala vampires, werewolves, demons, whatever). One of the most frequent rumors she heard was about Alice Sitchri; Scyrrhic grew more and more obsessed with learning about the Succubus, culminating in her decision to willingly become a monster. Out of a deranged combination of admiration, envy, bitterness, and fear, Scyrrhic has dedicated her life towards surpassing her "idol" in Alice, no matter the cost.
edited 29th Nov '14 2:11:35 AM by Serocco
In RWBY, every girl is Best Girl.
Great blue orb of void.
I've noticed allot of insectlike monsters recently. Yours has more personality than the norm (or so I think.) I hope someone else does a critique of your villain as I am not the best person to do this. Anyway the design sounds cool.
Name: Styx II/ Ida Reza
Age: Two hundred at most (fairly young for a demon.) Physically she's in her early twenties.
Appearance: She's pale with a greyish undertone. She's got gray eyes of a weird shade. Her hairs messed up and dirty. Neck down she's covered in huge scars. Her face is quite pleasing to the eye (it not really hers.) She rarely changes her chlothes no matter how filthy they get.
Personality: She rarely holds anything resembling a normal conversation. Saying she has a problem controlling her temper is a severe understatement. She has killed people over a ham sandwich. Is extremely hot blooded has attacked her allies for petty reasons and rushed into battle with opponents who where far stronger and experienced. Ida rather than killing to live, lives to kill. If she selects a target (either acting on the Silencer's order or out of boredom) Ida first stalks the victim in order to inflict fear. Next she wounds them non fatally and lets them go. She has been known to pursue the unfortunate for months realishing in the terror she inflicts before finally killing them in a gruesome and unusual manner. The only person she was friends with was Lethe due to having the same sick interests it didn't last. She find sex and human relationships disgusting in general. She pretends it's for moral reasons but she really can't fathom why someone would allow themselves to be so vulnerable. She is pretty grossed out by her own libido. She fairly reckless, isn't so much not afraid of death as simply not value her life. The only thing that can barely keep Ida in liner is the faceless Archon. The Archon is simply so horrific even Ida reluctantly obeys it to avoid upsetting the abomination.
Abilities: Ida's body has a different composition than a humans. She's very heavy and dense for her size. ida's ridiculously strong (still weaker than Styx III) can kill with one punch. She's also very hard to injure.. Most bullets just bounce off her (higher calibers have done minor damage.) She's got some sort of magical ability to control iron. Ida usually uses it to stop herself from bleeding. She throws knives with enough force to shatter through walls, she can make them change direction in midair.
Weaknesses: She rarely uses her iron control stating that it makes fighting boring. She barely knows how to use her powers. She isn't the fastest and tires easily from running. Her endurance is high but she's not invulnerable. Given her psychotic personality she is now alone. Her tendancy to rush into battle with no forethought has nearly killed her multiple times. Her mind and soul degenarates if she isn't feed human souls regularly.
Goals: Not pissing of the Archon. Otherwise unleashing as much pain on the world as possible. She want absolute freedom from anyone and anything.
Motivation: She has a deep hate for humans claiming we're even worse than her. She doesn't like demons a whole lot better. Her main desire is to be feared. She also wishes to break free from the Archon.
Role in the story: Ida appears early on. She viciously attacks Svetla under the Archon's order. Svetla releasea her demon spore for the first out of her free will. The spore infested Svetla sends Ida running for her life. Rather than staying away from Svetla she becomes obsessed that there's something even more deranged than her and attempts to cause the spore to emerge permanently by ruining the girl's life. She's fallen out Lethe and the two have a bizzare rivalry. The Archon decides Ida's too much of a burden and cuts of her supply of souls. This result s in her degenerating into a feral demon.
Crappy Dali imitator and producer of generalized bad art http://kamilkovakaramelka.deviantart.com/
@Serocco
Well, that's a revolting character. Not in concept, but on the personal level. Her power set is interesting, and she's certainly going to earn the loathing of your audience very quickly. Where I think she needs some work is in motivation and backstory. It's all well and good for her to want to surpass Alice, but you may want to make it so that her reasons for wishing to do so go a little deeper and have a more personal tinge to them. As is I don't know how sustainable it'd be; in my experience, people deal better with long-running foes (and from what you've written it sounds like you intend for her to be a long-runner) when the connection is more personal (though of course you could have it start out as a mere interest and then become more personal over the course of the rivalry).
@Manicnightmarepixie
All I'm really getting from this character is that she hates everybody. Now, it's certainly possible to work with that, and even to do interesting things with it, but it doesn't offer a lot for me to talk about as a critic. The only thing that really stands out to me is her dislike of her own sexuality, which has potential, but I'm not clear from reading the post on what you intend to do with it.
Thought I'd give everybody a break from my usual gangsters, terrorists, and spree killers. Here's a villain from a shonen-esque fantasy concept I'm kicking around. It's set in a world not that dissimilar to our own, but where the key difference is that there are people out there who make contracts with words or concepts. Once the contract is made, you can do anything that's connected to said word, limited only by your imagination, and how powerful the concept is to start with. The guy listed here is the main villain of the story.
Name: Belial (or at least that's what he's calling himself)
Age: Could be anywhere from his mid-twenties to his mid-thirties.
Personality: Belial presents along the lines of Johan Liebert or Paptimus Scirocco—calm, suave, smooth-talking, and completely comfortable with his own evil. He's grandiose, has a flair for drama, and talks at length about being the personification of evil, all while trying to cultivate an air of both the mysterious, and the Affably Evil. He's well-spoken, clever, and would probably be an interesting guy to hang out with if he weren't engaged in trying to Take Over the World. In reality, of course, this is all a facade, and Belial's a screaming mess of personality disorders who doesn't want to face up to the pettiness of his own motivations. Belial would love to be doing what he's doing because he's just that intrinsically evil, and his contract has influenced his thinking to the point where there are times when he really does believe that. The truth is, he does what he does because he's a control freak whose self-esteem can't take being less than anybody else.
Abilities: Belial's word is "Hell", and when you've got a deal with a concept that large there's not much you can't do. Since he's not fond of direct physical combat, he tends to use it to trap people within their own minds, in a personal hell of their own subconscious' creation. Most of his victims can't snap out of this, and are reduced to screaming ruins, torturing themselves for days or weeks until their bodies finally give out. The only way out is to realize what's happening and that you are not, in point of fact, in Hell.
If push does come to shove, Belial's a powerhouse. While he has zero combat training, his contract makes it so he doesn't need it. He can throw hellfire, summon demons, and convert the entire battlefield into a hellscape in that does exactly what he wants it to. He can also grant himself the physical attributes of a demon or devil as they exist not only in religion, but in popular fiction. Worst of all, the idea of Hell is so universal, and such a part of the popular consciousness that it gives him an additional power boost that he frankly doesn't need.
Outside of his powerset, Belial's an expert manipulator. He's got a significant number of followers, all of whom he's stringing along, playing on their own goals and hopes while he tries to direct their energies towards achieving his own.
Weaknesses: Belial's goals are, objectively speaking, crazy. This means that, for all his manipulative ability, the recruits he has to draw on tend to be on the damaged side of things. He's running an army of thrill killers, suicidal nihilists, and uneasy allies whose goals do not reflect his own. The divisions within his organization are extreme, with almost every member pursuing their own agenda, and it takes most of his energies to hold it together, especially since for all his personal charisma, his Lack of Empathy is a handicap. He spends most of his time just keeping his people on task, which is one reason why he doesn't see a lot of field action himself.
As far as his powers go, Belial's ability to trap people in a personal Hell is at its most effective one on one. Put him up against a group and he just can't focus enough to build the illusion properly. It's also possible for him to make a mistake, as evidenced when he tries it on Shona, and grabs a hold of something that used to terrify her, but doesn't anymore. On the physical front, there is no obvious weakness; the best way to deal with Belial is to outnumber him and beat him down.
Goals: According to the 'verse's mythos, the reason why people have contracts in the first place is because the first recognizable human being forged a contract with the idea of God, and enabled his descendents to make their own deals. Belial wants to forge a new contract with God, but in order to do that, has to render the original contract invalid. He thinks that the way to do this is to murder everybody who currently has a contract, or who shows potential of developing one in the future. Then he'll knife himself, and use his dying moments to make a new deal. Whether this would actually work, or if he's just a delusional SOB, is up in the air.
Motivations: Belial's a pathological narcissist who cannot stand the fact that there are people out there who aren't bowing to him. He's a social dominator with an ingrained need to be the biggest dog in any room he walks into, and he's very aware of that fact. Since trying to get power through legitimate means didn't work out, this is his Plan B.
His own summation of why he does what he does: "You're all wrong you know. I don't think I deserve to rule the world. I just want to. And I have a talent for getting what I want."
Role in story: Belial's The Big Bad and the leader of the Unshriven Legion, an international collection of societal rejects who are out to eradicate their fellow contractors from the face of the Earth. He's the man behind the attack on Emary Rose
's school, which he had burned down for no other reason than the fact that there were a few weak contractors attending it. He's responsible for numerous other terrorist attacks, and in addition to the Unshriven Legion, he's also The Man Behind the Man to a number of Muggle Power style hate groups and political movements. Both the authorities and Emary's little vigilante group want Belial dead—which is okay by him, since their attempts at dealing with him usually give him more contractors to kill. For most of the story he remains in the background, orchestrating the Legion's actions without directly involving himself, and the first few times of the heroes do run into him, he's the archetype of the cool, unstoppable mastermind. It's not until the last part of the story that he takes a direct role, and not until the very end that his whole persona begins to unravel.
Backstory: Belial grew up in an upper class household, where he lacked for nothing—save the attention that he felt was rightfully his. His parents had ten kids, and he was right in the middle, which meant he tended to get lost in the shuffle. He made up for this by becoming the uncrowned king of his school, through a combination of charisma, bullying, and outright bribery. He headed up the student council, played on every team, and involved himself in every community outreach project. When he graduated he tried to launch a political career, but discovered the rules weren't quite the same. With television cameras scrutinizing his every move he couldn't conceal his self-absorption or corruption for long, and when he was caught trying to seduce a staffer's wife and giving payouts to local officials, his campaign collapsed. He went on a little soul-searching journey, forged his contract, and reinvented himself as the man he is now, going so far as to ditch his real name, and have his features surgically altered. Discover and bring up any of the above, and he will have a minor Freak Out.
Relevant tropes: A God Am I, Big Bad, Card-Carrying Villain, Control Freak, Demon Lords and Archdevils (he does a great impression), Despotism Justifies the Means, Diabolical Mastermind, Faux Affably Evil, Final Boss (he's the last physical threat of the series), Final Solution (to the contractors), Hell, It's All About Me, Manipulative Bastard, Narcissist, Take Over the World, Villainous Breakdown (when he's finally confronted with his real motivations and who he is)
edited 28th Nov '14 12:45:06 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Serocco
I've always had a thing for Skeletons in the Coat Closet, or any sorta villain that is bone-like without being a generic walking skeleton. Scyrrhic is my way of bringing that into a story, with the Arrancar, the Tyranids, and the Xenomorphs as inspirations. I had the name Scyrrhic floating around for a while, which I got from "Pyrrhic" (same pronunciation, just with an S), but I had Scyrrhic as male originally.
Only recently did I decide to have her as female, because I think having someone that grotesque as a woman is something of a premium. I never was able to figure out how to fit her into until I checked out Hellsing Ultimate's English version (they are fantastic at writing more poetic dialogue, which helps me along), and Luke's "We're all chasing your shadow" comment helped me along with her here.
So I figured to have her backstory as a human who was scared of urban legends in the same way someone was scared of The Slender Man. Somewhere along the line, she went from fear to envy and admiration of the monster that most fascinated her - Alice Sitchri, so she turns into Scyrrhic as a way to meet her. Any tweaks to the backstory/motives?
Making a contract with concepts sounds pretty damn OP, like if anyone wanted to make a contract with "Gravity," there goes the planet. So it's perhaps better for characters who have personality, emotional, and/or psychological issues that make it clear they don't have the mental fortitude for it. Which is where Belial goes, which I like. He resembles a lot of Johan, including the part where he's born a sociopath and the narcissism (although Belial has it more so). He sounds like what'd happen if you granted an upper-class Spoiled Brat more power, too. I think you should make the Mask of Sanity part a bit more subtle, at least at first, so it isn't jarring when he goes Not So Stoic.
edited 29th Nov '14 2:34:10 AM by Serocco
In RWBY, every girl is Best Girl.
Jolly Saint Nick
Belial certainly is a sociopath type, which I personally enjoy and I like using it in my own villains. He also has his genuine weaknesses which is great because he's not too powerful and there are indeed a lot of ways he can be stopped even though he's scary. Plus, his backstory seems done well and does seem to be realistic. I'm not sure how much I can say, and sorry if this is a poor critique. I just think he's well done.
—-
This is a character from my fanfic-in-progress. Enjoy!
Name: Lucian Ward
Age: In his 50's
Personality: Manipulative, Authoritative, Impatient, Power-Hungry, But can be civil when it suits his plans. Likes to keep secrets.
Abilities: He's the leader of an agency and they follow his every order, He is a very skilled manipulator, and he's also pretty tough in a fight.
Weaknesses: He's impatient, suffers from delusions of grandeur and his own policy of being civil when there's no reason to be cruel can work against him when the heroes can use his brief moments of kindness to their advantage. His followers believe what he is doing is for their benefit because he's promised things to them, and even when he does deliver with temporary Pet the Dog moments, he has no interest in actually helping anyone but himself and he is merely manipulating them- if they find out, he will have no power over anyone at all.
Goals: He wants to find some sort of hidden ancient Egyptian tomb that is not only very difficult to access, but is said to hide the treasures of a person who had godlike powers. He wishes to access those treasures and make himself into a god, for he believes himself to be descended from this man and is obsessed with controlling others.
Motivation: He wants to become a god (or at least gain godlike powers) because he not only believes to be a descendant of Darius, he believes he feels like his family was cheated out of something that was rightfully theirs- the position of Pharaoh. Lucian is determined to both seize power and make the world the way he wants it.
Role in the story: Lucian has his followers kidnap The Chosen One (Nina) and keeps her locked in a cell for months with little food and a lot of isolation, while forcing her into things such as lying to her friends so they don't worry while she's gone. During that time he works on finding the location of the tomb, spying on Nina and those close to her, and letting the isolation get to her as well. He then suddenly starts demanding she get better food, brings her grandmother in to give her some sort of comfort, and orders her to be taken care of better. When Nina's friends manage to eventually find her, he doesn't even kill them when he chases them away. It's his attempt to manipulate her into feeling some sort of Stockholm Syndrome, so when he needs her to dig up the tomb and access the treasures for him, he can have an easier time convincing her to do it. Lucian doesn't need her, however, he just knows that if she's The Chosen One, she could have a much easier time getting into the tomb than he'd have. If she doesn't do it, he'd just kill her and have his followers use brute force or sneaky tactics to break in instead. I haven't worked out everything else yet, as I'm only on chapter 5, but a lot of these ideas simply came to me in the middle of writing a scene with him.
Backstory: N/A
Relevant Tropes: The Sociopath (at least I think so, could be wrong), Manipulative Bastard, Bait the Dog, You Have Outlived Your Usefulness, A God Am I, Hidden Agenda Villain, Bad Boss, Surveillance as the Plot Demands, Neutral Evil, Complete Monster, Pragmatic Villain, Dangerously Genre-Savvy
I'll appreciate feedback on what his overall goal could be because I do need help there, and if you just think he's interesting and realistic.
edited 4th Dec '14 3:18:53 PM by Sibuna
Happy Holidays to everyone! Have a great end of the year, and an even better 2015- you all deserve it!
Typically we still critique the most recent post (or if you have nothing to say about that, a recent post. Doesn't have to be mine). More feedback is never a bad thing.
Jolly Saint Nick
True. I'll write one in when I have more time.
@Serocco
"Making a contract with concepts sounds pretty damn OP, like if anyone wanted to make a contract with "Gravity, " there goes the planet. So it's perhaps better for characters who have personality, emotional, and/or psychological issues that make it clear they don't have the mental fortitude for it."
Not quite sure what you mean by this. If I follow correctly you're saying that if I give a character a contract with a potentially world-destroying concept, I'd best make sure that said character isn't the type who would be willing to do that?
If so, don't worry. For one thing, getting a contract with a concept like "gravity" would be very difficult. The more powerful the contract, the harder it is to get it. For another, all contracts are limited by the contractor's imagination, and by the way that culture influences us to understand the concept in question. So if, for instance, somebody really did get a contract with "gravity" s/he would have to be aware that they could use it to destroy the world, which of course, many people aren't. The usual portrayal of gravity manipulators in fiction is that of somebody who can turn it off or increase it over a small area, and that will influence the thinking of anybody who manages to get said contract.
As far as Belial's mask of sanity (or perhaps more accurately, mask of calmness; he's not hiding his A God Am I motivations) goes, I intend to have him break down over the course of a fairly lengthy conversation, as the heroes reveal that they've managed to dig up the past he thought he'd buried, and ID him. His control gets shakier and shakier, until finally, his real name, and his motivations get thrown in his face, at which point he has his breakdown.
And yes, I approve of Scyrrhic being female. Take it from a guy who has written a female cyclops with a crush on my male lead, a female merc who was built like the backside of a barn, and a female demon lord who wasn't The Vamp, more female characters who are not traditionally attractive—or even attractive at all—are always welcome.
@Sibuna
I don't know which series this is meant to be a fanfic of, so I can't speak as to whether you've created a Villain Sue (at least within the context of that 'verse; I can still say if he's one in a general sense), or fits especially well with that world. I will simply critique him as a villain in general.
First off, you haven't really posted enough about him for me to get a grasp on his personality. You've listed a lot of terms, but they don't necessarily mean much. Your manipulative, power hungry, impatient SOB is not necessarily the same as my manipulative, power hungry, impatient SOB. In part it's that I don't know which parts of that description are dominant and which are secondary, and in part that even if I did know that, presentation is a big part of it. So I can't necessarily offer a critique of that.
The list of strengths has similar problems. However, your list of weaknesses is solid. Right away you've avoided making him too OP, which is important in all fiction, and even more important in fanfiction (where something that doesn't gel with the prefabricated world is going to get noticed). Good work there.
When you say he's descended from Darius, you mean the third Shāhanshāh of the original Persian Empire? Xerxes' father? Or are we talking a Darius from the world of the story you're inserting him into? If it's the former, you can ditch the pharaoh thing, if only because the Persian Shāhanshāhs were more powerful than the Egyptian pharaohs. They overran Egypt, and added that to their list of titles.
His motivation is fine, though your description of both it and his goals is rather vague. I assume that this story is still very much a work-in-progress. That said, his plan ain't bad, and I'd like to see this attempt at inducing Stockholm syndrome.
If this sounds overly negative, please don't be discouraged. It's quite possible that if you were to present me with more information, that many of my questions would be cleared up. One word of advice—you may want to storyboard this out. Not knowing where your story is going can be very problematic.
And now for another villain from the same story as Belial. I don't know if I'll ever actually write it, but I'm enjoying coming up with characters, and it's a rather nice change from Svetlana, Cale, Omar, and the other villains of Gangland. Though if anybody is desperate to hear more about that, let me know, and I'll gladly put more up.
Name: Unpronounceable to us. Belial slapped the nickname "Rex" on him, and it stuck for reasons that will become obvious.
Age: Physically? Somewhere in his thirties. Chronologically? A couple hundred thousand years.
Personality: Every sufficiently large villain collective needs a good old fashioned thug to do the heavy lifting. In the Unshriven Legion, that's Rex. He's straightforward, brutal, and has rarely met a problem that he couldn't just plow his way through. That said, Rex is far from stupid. His lack of sophistication has more to do with the time period he hails from, then an actual lack of IQ points, and while he's unlikely to come up with a complex plan on his own, he can certainly execute one if it's given to him. He's large in terms of both personality and physicality, and unlike Belial—or for that matter, most of the Legion leadership—he has a working sense of humour. That said, get him around people, and particularly large groups of people, and you can feel the anger simmering just under the surface.
Abilities: Rex's contract is with "Extinction" and everything that entails. For the most part, he fights as a summoner, throwing wave after wave of prehistoric creatures (though, despite his name, these never include a Tyrannosaurus) at his foes, which is usually enough. If pressed, however, he can take his game up a lot more notches, generating extinct viruses and bacteria (and any virus or bacteria that has caused an extinction), superheating the battlefield with volcanic activity, or crushing his adversaries beneath sheets of glacial ice. If the enemy gets too close, he can shape-shift into any of the prehistoric animals he summons, or channel said animals' power into his own form. His final screw you in the event that he's beaten is to call up a meteor, of the planet killing variety.
Outside of his contract, Rex is the only survivor of an era when if you wanted to eat meat, you had to kill it with your own bare hands (or a spear, but hey, he's not going to brag about that part). He may not know any martial arts, or understand most modern weapons, but he's been through more genuine life and death situations than anybody who isn't living in a warzone. He's also, as previously mentioned, more than smart enough to follow Belial's complex gameplan to the letter and, in the event of a screw up or unforseen circumstance, to innovate.
Weaknesses: While Rex's contract can be adapted for close combat, he's still at a disadvantage against somebody like Emary Rose or Ike Rail, whose entire contracts are built around personal combat. He may have more experience than both of them put together, but he's not going to rip through Emary's armour, or catch a hit from Ike's swords on his bare hands (or any mundane weapon he might be armed with). Against opponents like them, he has to keep his distance and let his summons or the rearranged geography do the fighting for him. Speaking of the latter, he's no more immune to volcanic gasses or meteor impacts than anybody else, so he has to very careful when using the moves from the more devastating end of his skillset.
As far as personal weaknesses go, Rex is a pawn, and he knows it. He's loyal to Belial because he doesn't have a choice, and is following Belial's plans, rather than his own. While he's a good improvisor, he won't be able to salvage a strategy that's fallen apart completely, and since Belial doesn't tell him everything, there are times when Rex isn't one hundred percent sure of their objectives, which throws things off even more.
Goals: Rex's goals are Belial's, at least on the surface. He's out to massacre all other contractors and potential contractors, and help Belial forge his new contract with God. See Motivations for why.
Motivations: Rex has his own agenda, and his own reasons for working for Belial. He wants his people back, and Belial's promised that once he's gained his new contract, he'll resurrect them. Rex isn't sure he believes Belial, but he's got nothing to lose and everything to gain, so he soldiers along and crosses his fingers. Besides, even if it doesn't work out in the end, he's still getting the chance to murder a lot of modern humans, and that's an alright consolation prize.
Role in story: Rex is the field leader of the Unshriven Legion, and initially appears to be The Big Bad. He's seen given orders to various Legion terror cells and death squads and makes an early appearance in which he gives Emary and her band, and then Ike and his squad, and then both teams together, an absolutely savage beating. He later dispatches a couple of Legion teams to take out a government training facility, and when they fail, leads another assault himself, killing the police commissioner (who was a fellow contractor and mentor figure to several of the heroes). It climaxes in a direct attack on the capital itself, during which Rex is finally killed by the powered-up heroes. It's at this point that the protagonists discover that he was neither The Big Bad nor The Dragon, but was rather The Brute in the Legion's command roster (though the reader would get several hints as to this beforehand).
Backstory: Rex is the last surviving member of this universe's equivalent of the Neanderthals, who were wiped out in a series of conflicts with modern humans. As the last members of his race died around him, Rex managed to make a contract with Extinction, hoping to use it to resurrect his friends and family, but could not, due to the horrible irony that as long as he is alive, the species isn't technically extinct. He ended up going on a rampage, which resulted in the deaths of thousands of humans, before he was cornered; with nowhere else to go, he triggered an Ice Age, freezing himself inside of a glacier. He was eventually found by Belial, during the latter's soul-searching trip around the world; Belial thawed him out, introduced him to the modern world, and recruited him into the Unshriven Legion with the promise that they would find a way to resurrect Rex's race.
Relevant tropes: The Berserker, The Brute, Contemporary Caveman, Disc-One Final Boss, Genius Bruiser, Hero Killer, Last of His Kind, Revenge, Summon Magic, Taking You with Me (when he's finally killed, his last act is to summon the meteor and try to take the human race with him), Wake-Up Call Boss.
edited 4th Dec '14 8:45:50 PM by AmbarSonofDeshar
Jolly Saint Nick
@Ambar- Thanks for the feedback!
Truth is, I have not spent much time on this guy to really develop a unique personality for him, which explains the problem you brought up. Not that that is a good thing, of course, but I did only start this a couple days ago, so there you go. Half of me is planning like crazy, the other half is kind of winging it. This goes for his strengths as well.
Alright, good to know. In my fanfic of this show, I did end up making a very OP villain with few weakness, so one of the things I'm going for here is to make this story more realistic, Villain-wise. Good to see I succeeded.
Darius is an OC I made up by searching for names, and liking this one so I decided to use it. So it's the latter, and the Pharaoh thing still applies. I'm writing for the House of Anubis fandom, which pretty much demands Egypt just from the title.
Thanks. Yes, the story is still definitely being worked on. I simply just got so excited with what I had of this guy so far that I wanted feedback right away, haha. Glad to hear you like his goals and motivations though, or at least what I have of them so far.
I probably should do a storyboard, you're right. I have a problem with planning too far ahead while still not knowing how the future scenes would actually fit or what to do with the part I'm writing now. But this was good feedback, thanks!
Happy Holidays to everyone! Have a great end of the year, and an even better 2015- you all deserve it!
Would suggest picking an actual Egyptian name for the guy who is buried in the Egyptian tomb then.
Jolly Saint Nick
I looked at a name generator specifically for Egyptian names and that one came up. I can get a new name of course, but I like this one.
Well it's not an ancient Egyptian name, at least as far as I know. It first arrives in Egypt by way of Persia.
Jolly Saint Nick
Good to know, I'll look into changing it
Serocco
EDIT: Oh, fuck, I forgot to comment on a new character. Lemme see...
One thing I like about Rex is that he's both The Berserker and a Genius Bruiser. He seems like the type that would be more of The Brute rather than a Disc-One Final Boss, and his backstory is actually pretty fucked up. It's almost like he's going on a suicide run so his species can rest at last.
Here's another character concept I have for Eclipse. Ambar already saw it earlier, and I'd like others to chime in.
Her name is Chloe Aeyslou, whom I based off General Esdeath from Akame Ga Kill
- Appearance: She wears a military uniform with Thigh High Boots, Rapunzel Hair, a Commissar Cap, and a minidress modified into a skirt. Chloe, as well as her henchwomen in general, is meant to be something of a parallel to the main character regarding appearances, since Siacade is Light Is Not Good to Alice's Dark Is Not Evil (and Dark Is Evil, since she's an Anti-Hero) structure.
- Personality: Since she's an expy of Esdeath, Chloe is a sadist who loves fighting, but her form of sadism is not predicated on harming people physically. Rather than physically harm anyone, however, she'd rather troll them or put them in really uncomfortable or dangerous positions for her amusement (and to see if they're capable enough to pull through), because "pain" isn't really her thing - it's much more amusing for her to see them Freak Out than squirm in pain (I've always felt Comedic Sociopathy is a form of sadism anyway, ala "Lemme seal you inside a cave and force you to break out the longer way :D"). She is a Social Darwinist, but what counts as "strength" often has less to do with battle or power and more to do with character, with will, with resolve. She holds disdain for plutocrats who inherited their wealth, because "that was never meant to be yours." If she witnesses, say, Police Brutality, she often finds the civilians disappointing whenever they get abused without a fight, and thinks the cops are cowardly or reactionary who "cheat" their way into "victories". As a Blood Knight, she's more subdued about it, and sees it as the equivalent to "an expressive dance" that reveals your character. In addition, she's domineering, and flexes her authority to get what she wants. She's something of a Chivalrous Pervert, however, in that while she very much enjoys having scantily clad men please her, she always sees that they're healthy, comfortable, and protected. She's very motherly, consoling her soldiers when they're in emotional pain, advising them like a guardian, helps them grow past any psychological or personal issues, and holds their lives in high regard. She's also something of a romantic, both in terms of being a Shipper on Deck and in terms of finding a guy of her own.
- Backstory: As a young girl, Chloe lived in a time of turmoil and lawlessness, when Siacade was reeling from a nearly dimension-destroying cataclysm around 2000 years ago. She lived in a retired Reaper father was repeatedly abused by his wife. Chloe was disgusted with his continued spinelessness, with his repeated backing away from his promises to challenge his wife. Eventually, Chloe killed her mother, after her father was killed by her mother, but she could not bring herself to mourn her father on account of him being so weak willed. Now on her own, and partly due to her father's weak will, Chloe would develop her Social Darwinist mindset, before becoming the Suzerain of the Seraphim.
- Abilities: Undrafted, but likely involving light-based powers due to her being a Reaper (who are angelic).
- Role in the story: She is the Suzerain of the Seraphim, an elite cadre of the strongest Reapers in the realm of Siacade. Partly based off the Sternritter from Bleach, the Seraphim are high-ranking military commanders, the most elite fighters of their species, and a Praetorian Guard for the Sovereign of Siacade who only work as a unit when called upon to assemble by the Sovereign. As Suzerain, Chloe Aeyslou is the supreme commander of all of Siacade, although many of her Seraphim as said to be at her level. Siacade is infamous for its imperialism, so she gets involved when a war breaks out between the Valkyries of Valhalla and the Reapers of Siacade. While you often hear how commanders inspire loyalty from their soldiers, Chloe is an example where her soldiers inspire loyalty from their commander; she often goes against her Social Darwinist mindset of hating the weak and never helping them if they prove too spineless in her view when it concerns her soldiers, because they are as close to family as she's had. Eventually, she's faced with a decision: stay loyal to the Sovereign and continue to fight as many enemies as you want, or save the Seraphim (who are her surrogate family). Choose between her Social Darwinism and battle-loving nature, or save her family.
- Goal: Live her life in a way different from both her abusive mother and her spineless father.
edited 23rd Apr '15 12:32:17 PM by Serocco
In RWBY, every girl is Best Girl.
You need to comment on a recent write-up before anybody can comment on yours.
Serocco
I have done so now.
In RWBY, every girl is Best Girl.
The Darkness Grows
@Serocco: Chloe is different. I like that she's a Chivalrous Pervert, strange as that sounds. It's a fairly unusual trope for a female character to have; one that isn't played for laughs at her expense that is. And I like that she does come back to caring for others. But much as I enjoy her caring for those she commands, I don't particularly see where her change came about. It isn't bad, it definitely makes for a good inner conflict, I just don't see it.
Name: Sound-Wave/ Lilith Alvarez
Age: 29
Personality: None to speak of. Lilith was an active Transhuman civil rights proponent, who believed that all people, regardless of their species, were equal. She could be a fiery debater if the right buttons were pushed, but most often she was an amicable young woman who saw the best in people. Her powers scared her at times.
Abilities: Sound-Wave is a trained assassin, with a single-minded drive toward its (her) goals. This combined with its her control over sound waves and ability to manipulate them in various ways including raising and lowering certain sound waves in a twenty-foot radius, makes her it a nearly unstoppable force.
Weaknesses: Sound-Wave has no weaknesses. Lilith's throat isn't as strong on the outside as it has to be on the inside and outside of her battle armor, she's just as vulnerable as anyone else. She's unstable, mentally speaking.
Role in the story: The Leader of a heroic Quirky Miniboss Squad that targets the villains. It She and the rest of the Agents offer the Five Bad Band some extra challenges.
Goals: Kill the Renascences' leaders. Kill Dr. Jacobs.
Motivation: It's what it was created to do. She can't get back at all of the people responsible for her transformation, but she'll settle for him.
Backstory: Sound-Wave, like its siblings, was created under the supervision of Dr. Jacobs four months after the Renascence proved themselves to be a credible threat.
[[Pretend there are spoiler tags here: Lilith was raised by her parents in various places around the country, but especially Detroit, MI. As a child, she developed two mutations separately, her father's wings and her mother's sound amplification, a thing nearly unheard of. Despite this, she was never anything special when she was young.
When she was nine, her father was attacked and his wings cut off. The police did next to nothing even though he could identify his attackers. After visiting her father in the hospital, Lilith decided she wanted to fight for the rights of Transhumans. In high school, she garnered a reputation as an insane crusader, going to protests and coming back covered in bruises and set in casts of various kinds. This trend carried over into her adulthood and she found herself often hospitalized.
She was invited to a protest on July 4th in her hometown, which she quickly accepted and gathered even more people to come along. When things turned ugly, she stood at the front lines. Then the first shot was fired and she rose above the crowd to project her voice without hurting anyone. She was shot eleven times for her trouble, six shots through her wings. She fell and cracked her head open on the pavement.
Upon waking up, she found herself in a government base, dosed up on painkillers and a team of government agents waiting for her. She was charged with the attempted murder of a peace officer and told her sentence could be life in prison or working for the government for twenty years. No other choices, no appeals, and if she tried to escape she would be killed. And to top it all off, her wings were gone. Delirious and traumatized, she considered letting them kill her, but in the end chose to work for them. She came to regret that choice.
Lilith was sent off to training to become a reserve soldier. Three years after that, Lilith was a competent soldier, if not an especially powerful one; it couldn't be risked. When she met the qualifications for the "Agents" project, Dr. Franklin Jacobs was called in. She was sent to him and his assistants, tied down, and forcibly mind wiped. If it had worked, only Sound-Wave would have been left, but a sliver of Lilith remained. And she wants revenge.]]
Relevant tropes:
- Ambiguous Gender: In story. No one except the handlers knows Sound-Wave's gender.
- Blood Knight: Sound-Wave enjoys its job.
- Body Horror: Lilith's wings were cut off of her back, even though it's implied that they could have been saved.
- Sound-Wave's mouth was restructured to open wider, via cutting some of the flesh off and resetting bones.
- Brainwashed and Crazy
- Determinator: Sound-Wave and the rest of the Agents for the Renascence and Lilith for Dr. Jacobs.
- The Dog Bites Back: Hard.
- Faux Affably Evil: Sound-Wave is quite polite to anyone not Renascence, but would kill them in a heartbeat.
- Implacable Man: Sound-Wave is programmed not to give up until its objective is met.
- "It" Is Dehumanizing: All of the Agents are called 'it'.
- The Knights Who Say "Squee!": Sound-Wave does the most dignified geeking out possible upon meeting the highly-decorated war hero Amelia Alvarez. Fitting, as Amelia is Lilith's mother. Lilith is less than thrilled: "No! I never wanted Mama to see me like this!"
- The Leader/The Face: Sound-Wave speaks for the Agents and receives their orders. Along with:
- Cold Sniper/Combat Medic Magus who acts as the second.
- Communications Officer Bio-Tech - The Smart One.
- Meltdown - The Big One.
- Demolition - Demolitions Expert
- And Rubber Man The Thin Man - The Sneaky One
- Make Me Wanna Shout: They can control sound. Lilith specialized in sonic screams that could decimate every window in a building, while Sound-Wave changes the amount of sound her target can hear, lowering everything beyond the human hearing range then up to hertz that make a airplane take-off sound quiet. They are immune to such frequency changes themselves; everything sounds the same to them.
- The Mole: Lilith masquerades as Sound-Wave sometimes and gives her handlers incorrect information about the Renascence.
- Mind Rape: One of the six worst cases in the entire story.
- Mom the Veteran: She was indeed. In this world, the Cold War... wasn't so cold and involved different parties. Those parties fought the old fashioned way in the 1980s and Amelia Alvarez was one of the best soldiers. Her rigidness in the chain of command led her to not investigate her husband's attack and put a huge strain on her and Lilith's relationship. She's also the reason Lilith wasn't left to die at the July Massacre. That backfired on her.
- One-Way Visor: Sound-Wave's armor comes with one. It only wears the visor in combat though.
- Revenge Before Reason: Lilith kills herself and dozens of other people to get at Dr. Jacobs.
- Powered Armor: A light version. It enhances her strength and durability by a bit.
- Psycho Supporter: Sound-Wave has a slavish devotion to Dr. Jacobs. Lilith does not share its feelings.
- Quirky Miniboss Squad: The Agents can be considered one.
- Senseless Sacrifice: Lilith kills herself in the facility the Agents were created in, but Dr. Jacobs escapes beforehand.
- Split Personality: When Lilith was erased, it didn't fully take, leaving both her and Sound-Wave inside their head. Lilith doesn't have much power initially, with Sound-Wave dismissing her as aftershocks of a mind wipe. By the time it figured out Lilith wasn't going away, she already had enough control to hide herself from a scan. She and it can wrench control away from the other, though the other will always have some influence.
- Taking You with Me: Lilith tries.
- Tragic Monster: Sound-Wave is only what it was created to be, no more, no less.
- War Is Glorious: Sound-Wave was programmed to think this, as it would only be useful (and allowed to live) while there was a war.
- Winged Humanoid: Like her father, Lilith had huge grey wings.
edited 6th Dec '14 11:40:41 PM by UmLovely
RISE
This one is a redo, but she's changed a bit since the last time.
Name: Wren Summers
Age: 30
Personality: Wren puts on a front of complete composure and hold it fairly well, though in reality she swings from controlled and brilliant to enraged and physically violent. Her pre-existing anger issues supply the latter, while her relatively underdeveloped intellect leads to the former. She does not do well with equality, ironically, in romantic relationships.
Abilities: She was trained by her military father and assassin mother in self-defense and later learned more offensive fighting techniques while working for the Detroit police. Her metal skin makes her nearly invulnerable and her ability to "read" the fighting style of her opponent only adds to her combat skills. While sane, Wren is a very good manipulator and liar.
Weaknesses: If someone distracts her or makes her angry beyond reason, she will be outmaneuvered. Sheer concussive force will also stop her, as it will cause her metal form to disappear; from there she can be stopped like anyone else.
Goals: Equality and superiority for all Transhumans in the United States if possible, and their own country made out of US land if not.
Motivation: After a lifetime of being looked down upon, Wren decided that something had to be done. When a protest went wrong, ending in eighty people dead and dozens more injured, Wren snapped, deciding that humans and Transhumans could never live peacefully together. She believes that war was inevitable and the only thing left is for her species to win.
Role in the story: The Big Bad
Backstory: Wren was the only child of a military infantryman and a former government assassin and raised in Detroit's Transhuman military housing. While she was heavily dissuaded from more intellectual things in school and at home (to prevent disappointment), she loved learning, reading most of all. Most people thought it was a phase. After graduating from high school and a stint as hired muscle, Wren applied to and was accepted into the DPD at 21. She did well enough, though she often protested the divide in treatment between human and Transhuman suspects. On July 4th, a peaceful protest for Transhuman rights set up near a courthouse. Due to the unique abilities of Transhumans and the fear of normal humans, the police were called in. Wren was not allowed to go, due to potential "sympathies". With miscommunication and distrust on both sides, a "fight" (really bloodbath) occurred; the general response being to hail the officers as heroes and paint the protesters as violent and unruly, though the damage was done to the DPD's reputation. When they only issued a half-hearted apology, citing that the protesters fought back (they did), Wren resigned. She disappeared for three years, leaving her parents and boyfriend no sign of where she went, and came back with an army, the Renascence.
Relevant Tropes:
edited 2nd Nov '14 4:24:09 PM by UmLovely
RISE