Prosperity For All: A Cold War Superpowers RPG Sign-Up

"In the representative democracy that we all live in, a certain amount of faith in our governors is understood. Bravery. Expertise. Compassion. We expect our governors to demonstrate the virtues we want to see in our country, and so we elect them. People of the United States, for the safety of the brave men on the front lines of the wars we fight every day, on every front, I ask... no, I implore you, please believe in the righteousness of what we are doing here in Merab, till such a time that declassifying the details of the Merab interdictions would not risk lives I have sworn to protect. Thank you." —United States President Nixon, in an address regarding questions around the carpet-bombing missions to Merab.

"Well, Sergei, as Premier there's nobody that can tell me what I can and can't say, so I'll just let you and your—how many? Fifteen million listeners? Fifteen million listeners and you on a little secret: The United States bombed Merab to hell and back and I want to send people in to defend innocent people and help fix up their capital city of Atarah especially. It's that simple. Thank you for having me on your show tonight."—Soviet Union Premier Alexei Kosygin, in a broadcast delivered on The Sergei Ilyatkin Radio Show 36 hours after Nixon's own address to the press.

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The country of Merab - located at the very edge of eastern Europe, tucked between Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Romania, and bordering the Soviet Union, this small nation has had its fair share of war in the 20th century, its lands seized and exchanged throughout the Great War and located right in the middle grounds of the Eastern Front during World War II. However, despite its unfortunate location at the heart of two World Wars, the global superpowers did not see much potential in the rural and mining industries of this third world country.

That is, until May 18th, 1970, when the Merab Mining Company, on the outskirts of Merab’s capital Atarah, struck the vein of a mineral more valuable than gold. Named Merabium after the country it was found in, this rare meteoric metal is a highly efficient electrical conductor while resistant to heat - making it exceedingly valuable in technologies for both civic and military use. Merab was already on the brink of self-destruction - standing on the dividing line between East and West, the nation had sympathizers for social and the United States both, with an ambivalent government attempting to maintain its neutrality. However the discovery of Merabium sparked the powderkeg of tensions already brewing in the country; over the span of a year, the country deteriorated, falling into all out civil war.

Seeing the potential in this metal found nowhere else on the planet, the United States and the Soviet Union backed pro-capitalist and pro-communist regimes, respectively, providing supplies to people sympathetic to their nations and their ideologies. Pro-union miners occupied the central mining operation for Merabium, holding it to supply communist allies; in response, on August 16th, 1973 the United States carpet-bombed the country on classified orders in order to potentially clear the way for US interests to set up shop and harvest the metal themselves. This went south quickly when one of the occupying miners caught in a blast simply stood back up, his wounds miraculously knitting back together. It seemed that the blasts from the bombs, most likely some agent in the explosives, had activated the Merabium’s true purpose.

You are in the city of Atarah, a city under siege, in the country of Merab. It’s November of 1973. A horrible gold rush has begun in Merab, especially in the ruined capital, Atarah. Claiming an “interdiction operation,” the United States and Union of Soviet Socialist Republics have invaded to wage a proxy war on “neutral” ground. Caught up in the midst are the many people empowered by the Merabium, people who might be able to make a change within the gnashing machineries of two empires. Let there be prosperity for all.

---

This is the current situation:

• Water still flows. It was easy enough to fix what few mains were busted by the bombs.
• Food is available at a cost (rarely money). The US, USSR, and a few NGOs supply food to the citizens if they provide intelligence, facilities, personnel, or expertise.
• Not many folks still have electricity. People with superpowers that generate it often have loads of mundanes under their thumb, benevolently or otherwise.
• Basically nobody still uses money. Trade in goods and services, especially superpowered services, is the new norm. Lots of businesses just have tabs running for locals that get conveniently misplaced or erased "by mistake." Local communities gotta help each other out in times like this.
• Atarah has an interdiction on it from both sides—no unauthorized information, material, or personnel are permitted to enter or leave the city at this time. The bulk of both superpowers' force is concentrated at the points of ingress they seized first.
• The USSR and US both have FOBs positioned further into the city which dispatch supplies, ranger teams, and intelligence agents. The US have taken the Atarah post office and the USSR has claimed the midsize Jerahmeel Park.
• Private companies, acting as civilian contractors with the military, are the superpowers’ real hands inside Atarah, using federal FOBs to base their own operations for their benefit, supposedly concurrent with their patrons' own goals.
• Local government in Atarah is a headless horseman. Civic services like hospitals, police, and firemen have managed to hold it together, but city hall was bombed early and both governing parties went into hiding or fled early into the interdiction.
• Private civilians have either signed on as volunteer auxiliaries/irregulars with any of the above powers, or have struck out on their own. A growing faction of civilians are attacking anyone from outside of town, driven to try to drive out the monsters that would claim their homes from them.

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So, welcome to Prosperity For All, a Cold War era Superpowers RP! This RP centers on the people caught inside Atarah, the capital of the fictional country of Merab. You can find a map of Merab in the grand scope here.◊ You can find a map of Atarah here◊. Neither of these maps are exhaustive or intended to be limited; please expand upon the world when necessary. My co-GM Taco and I wanted to lay down an agenda for the game as well before we got to the character sheet.

• Try to think with the space. We have a map of the city for a reason, and you should feel free to make scenes spill together if it would make sense.
  • A WORD ABOUT TRAVERSAL WHILE WE'RE AT IT. For characters to travel a decent distance, end a post with your character heading out to that location. They can still be pursued of course, but use the prose to signpost that your character is leaving, and then arrive at the start of your next post.
• Ancillary NPCs a player introduces for whatever reason that aren't directly opposed to that player's character are under their control.
• Try to give players in your character's scene a chance to each get a post in before you make another one.
• The tone we're looking for is a decently melodramatic and earnest game; think Metal Gear Solid. Be willing to make a character who'll monologue about political ideas and philosophies you're invested in. I say invested, and not supportive of, and that's important too.
• The world we're going for is a directed sandbox. Hooks will drop most days but you are encouraged to develop the world through your character's own drives.

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With that said, here’s the character sheet, looking forward to your characters! You can get the code to directly paste into your post at this pastebin.

• Name: Who were you born as and what do people call you by? How do you want to be known?
• Gender: How do you want to be seen?
• Age: How many years have you seen of this world?
• Appearance: How do you present yourself to others?
• Loyalties: Do you work for or with the US government or Soviet Union? Do you have ties to the people or PMCs here? Or are you loyal only to yourself?
• Ideology & Values: What is that you fight for? What is it that you believe in?
• Personality: How do you act with the people around you? More importantly, how do you see yourself inside?
• Biography: Where are you from? What have you seen?
• Abilities and Skills: What is it you can do, gained from the Merabium’s power or otherwise?
• Equipment: What tools and assets have helped you survive this war?
• Misc: Anything else to report?

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Citizens for Merabian Independence

• Hildegarde Dietrich (Lady Winter), played by Izshta
• Stela Sukova, played by emilyorthoclase
• Amadeus von Hertz (The Conductor), played by Starbound2

Good Samaritans

• Yves Dupont, played by Enirboreh
• Yael Nekov, played by Chariot

Independent Agents

• Ariel Golbeck (Gunsmith), played by Toukas
• Viktoriya Volkov (Logistics), played by nman

Aligned with US Interests

• Aleksander Krashinski (The Red Horseman), played by TailsDoll
• Ray Maxim, played by Taco

Aligned with Soviet Interests

• Wanda Dojinovac, played by wikkit
• Haliskander Jordovich (The Phantom Cosmonaut), played by Pentigan

Aligned with Klaus Kaiser's Interests

• Klaus Kaiser, played by HilarityEnsues

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The RP Proper!

The Discussion Thread!

Our Discord Channel!

Edited by Starbound2 on Nov 5th 2018 at 5:45:24 AM

• Name: Stela Sukova (born Stela Svobodova)

• Gender: Cis woman

• Appearance: A rather butch middle-aged woman, with shaggy but short dark hair, a stocky build, and cool gray eyes. She prefers to wear traditionally male clothes when not working as a nurse.

• Loyalties: Stela dislikes both the US and the USSR, seeing them as bullies who ultimately aren’t different from one another in any of the ways that matter. She’s loyal to her homeland of Merab first and foremost.

• Ideology & Values: Stela is, for the most part, pro-democracy, but she believes that a Merabian democracy is impossible until the US and USSR get the hell out. Furthermore, she’s not so idealistic as to think democracy will just happen: she’s focusing on keeping her loved ones alive and healthy, for the time being.

• Personality: Stela is forthright and blunt, with very little interest in sugarcoating anything. But she is far from cruel or vindictive; she just believes that hiding the truth will only cause more pain in the future. She dislikes virtually all authority figures on principle, though she usually won’t be openly hostile to them. Usually. She can be emotionally closed off, but it’s a conscious decision: her parents rejected her, her siblings stood by as she left, and her best friend died.

• Biography: Stela Svobodova was born in 1946, to an ethnically Czech family of miners, as the youngest of five children. She was bookish from a young age, and while she was expected to drop out of school to help support her family, she ultimately continued her studies while working.
  • In 1966, Stela told her parents of her intention to study medicine, something they very bluntly disapproved of. To get away from them, she wed lifelong friend Konstantin Suk in a marriage of convenience, despite being a lesbian; Konstantin was aware of this and fine with it. They moved to Atarah, where Stela got work as a nurse, and she and Konstantin became active in the local political scene. Konstantin died in 1968 during a riot, and Stela still hasn’t quite gotten over the death of her best friend.

• Abilities and Skills:

• Exposure to Merabium has given Stela the ability to shift her density to become intangible and light enough to float, or invulnerable and very heavy.

• Stela is a highly competent nurse, and is extremely knowledgeable about medicine and how to treat injuries and illnesses.

• Equipment: Stela has access to all the equipment at the hospital she works at.

Looks all good to me! Stela Sukova (emilyorthoclase) is accepted!

Now for my own character. Might look familiar to anyone who's played with me before.

• Name: Amadeus von Hertz, also known as The Conductor
• Gender: Male
• Age: 59
• Appearance: A thin, wiry man at 5'10", the Conductor is not especially tall, but his narrow build makes him seem as such. This is amplified by his tuxedo, a classically black suit with rather sharp blue lines running vertically down them. His skin is ghostly pale and his hair is equally white, which he wears in large curls like a judge's wig. Along with his tux, he wears a set of white gloves. Both tux and gloves are slightly tattered due to extensive use. His eyes are an airy blue.
• Loyalties: Amadeus's loyalties are strictly to his own people; the US, USSR, and PMCs have all made an unstable situation even worse and he wants all of them out of his country.
• Ideology & Values: Frankly Amadeus doesn't give a damn about the capitalism vs. communism dichotomy; his home continues to be messed around with by foreign powers and it won't be able to stand on its own again until people from the outside with their own selfish motives get forced out so that Merab's people can rebuild their nation on their own.
• Personality: Irritable. Arrogant. Misanthropic. If you had ever encountered Amadeus before he became empowered, you would consider him the most elitist, rude, and outright terrible person you ever had the misfortune of meeting. However after the events surrounding Merab's civil war and the bombing and subsequent occupation of Atarah, some small part of the orchestrator's conduct had changed. Although Amadeus, as dangerous insurgent and priority military target The Conductor!!!, maintains his prior pompous and bombastic personality, behind closed doors he's grown softer, quieter, more contemplative. Some might even perhaps say he's become more sheepish - it would be overstating it to say he's become considerate, but he is more considerate of the people who are a part of the city he still considers home.
• Biography: Performing as a conductor for the Atarah Grand Symphony Orchestra, with an interest in music from a young age, Amadeus was an upper class gentleman with high hopes for the future of Merab after World War II. Even with tensions rising between the East & West both in and around Atarah, Amadeus did all he could to bring the high arts to his often overlooked country - hopes elevated by the discovery of the miracle metal known as Merabium. Some days afterward the orchestra gifted him a beautiful baton composed of that rare mineral only found in their nation in spite of the growing warfare that surrounded him, Amadeus chose to live in blissful ignorance, holding performances month after month.
• That is until August 16th, 1973 - where armed pro-union miners occupied the Merabium operation, American B-52s began to drop bombs, sweeping the city from one end to the other in a rain of hellfire. The Dnieper Concert & Symphony Hall, performing a routine set for a small audience, was caught in the blast, its patrons and performers all caught beneath the rubble. As rescue workers came afterward and cleared the rubble, it seemed all had died - that was, until a burst of lightning suddenly shot forth and shattered the roof that had collapsed upon a singular Amadeus. Swiftly the nurses at St. Jeanne's Hospital rushed him to their emergency room where the seemingly frail man made a miraculous recovery.
• Seeing American soldiers roll in without a care for the atrocities they committed, with Russian troops following soon after, something changed within Amadeus's heart... Now, much of Atarah has been left without power for weeks on end... save for the western corner. The symphony Amadeus watched over was now gone, but his orchestrations to protect his people were only beginning.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Human Generator: Due to a strange accident or miracle, the Conductor's body gained the ability to store, move, and produce electrical energy. Not only does this give a potent (if chaotic) power to wield, it's also ill advised to simply get into fisticuffs with him without taking into account that shocking fact.
  • Captive Audience: The Conductor has the power to telepathically communicate with those around him, speaking directly into their minds. More often than not he uses this to announce his presence loudly with dramatic music and bombastic declarations, but he can also use this to secretly communicate with allies or others.
• Equipment:
  • Baton: The lightning in his body is a chaotic thing, incredibly difficult to control; however, his custom designed Merabium baton allows him to better focus and channel the electrical energy into tangible forms and shapes, creating swords, whips, fists and other such objects.
• Misc: N/A

• Name: Yves Dupont.
• Gender: Male.
• Age: 20.
• Appearance: Lanky chap, feminine features.◊ About 6'3 in height, and dresses in clothing even bigger than he is.
• Loyalties: If asked, Yves will quietly say that he's on the American's side. Or the opposite side if the person he is speaking to gives the impression they lie more with USSR loyalties. In truth, Yves is loyal to his home country and his home country alone—but France's flip-flopping isn't helping matters in the slightest. As such, Yves can be considered mostly open to either affairs—but he rarely delves into details out of fear of his own safety.
• Ideology & Values: Yves is truly no more a fighter than he is a generally vengeful person. The most he ever does in involvement with the war is acting protectively of those less fortunate in Atarah (which seems to comprise a pretty large amount in his opinion). His naïveté when it comes to combat culminates especially in the fact that he has never before seen a dead body—which is probably for the best, as even witnessing someone suffering an emotional breakdown is enough to sicken him with empathy.
• Personality: A quiet, meek young man with a heart unfortunately way too large to be exposed to such a situation. Yves is a good Samaritan through and through—the first to rush forward if someone is being oppressed or is otherwise in need and desperately try to make them happy again. His selflessness has affected his own health in the process, however—providing for others seems to be his own way of coping and avoiding having to think about the more horrific events going on just outside of his acknowledgement. Though somewhat naïve and prone to acting irrationally, Yves has the advantage of innocence and kindness in midst of bloody skirmishes—and the disadvantages of being somewhat cowardly and a complete noncombatant.
• Biography: Born in 1953 in the commune of Chauvigny, Yves was raised mostly isolated from the outside world in a small farm owned by his grandparents—his parents having moved away to Atarah shortly after his birth for a reason currently unknown to him. This abandonment clearly ate away at him the older he got, and as soon as was considered old enough to be taught to drive by them he packed his bags and left the farm in order to discover what truly happened. Yves arrived in Atarah about two months or so later—in April of 1971, in the height of Merabium's mining career. Since then, he has slowly eaked his way into its society; learning the local language and doing the odd job or two in hopes of being able to fully settle down and properly discover what had happened to his parents and why they had elected to leave him at such an early age. However, with the carpet-bombing event naught but two years later and the occupation of Atarah shortly after, Yves has found himself cut short in his quest and uncertain as to what to do. Confused and more than a little uneasy, Yves has simply elected to help in the ways that he can—by being as giving and peaceable as one can possibly be in this situation. Though this hasn't stopped a few incidents from occurring in his protectiveness of the common citizens—and thus he usually hides out in a small, ratty apartment in the corner of the city for a degree of safety.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Shattering: Either through a spike of fear or from intense concentration, Yves can explode into a shower of shards akin to glass in order to make a quick escape—done by an intense increase in vibrational energy that he charges up over time while idle. He may only shatter when his latent vibrational energy has reached its peak (across a period of about ten to twenty minutes at a time) and can also as an option transfer this into inanimate objects in order to shatter them in his place via contact with the thing (although he needs to get a proper 'feel' for the target object first—both physically and visually in order to find the right frequency). As this is seemingly limited only to inanimate objects, Yves hasn't found much practical use for it yet—though it does beg the question of shattered objects being possibly tied into his other power below.
  • Reconstitution: Obviously when he's shattered he is merely a pile of inanimate shards. But instead of reforming himself from what he has left behind, Yves can return to the realm of physicality via a (mostly) reflective enough mirror of decent size—though it has to specifically be one he has seen before and intensely studied from every angle. Furthermore, his physical form can be frozen in whatever state it has been shattered in—allowing him to live on in a mirror despite injury as long as it remains intact. Yves dislikes this aspect of his abilities, as everything outside of the mirror's field of vision and reflective capability is unrendered and nonexistent—plus the transition back into the real world is an uncomfortable one with a feeling he describes as "walking through a hundred spider's webs". Currently, the only link Yves has to a mirror is the one stored in his apartment for fast transportation, though judging by the space the link occupies in his mind he suspects he can only have two or three more links active at once before it starts to affect him detrimentally.
• Equipment:
  • First-Aid Kit: An item he is never without, and very insistent upon using for even the slightest debilitation in a person he comes across. He stores the thing in a small backpack—but the speed in which he can get it out makes it seem like he stores it ready in the sleeves of his sweater. He is by no means an expert in medicine, unfortunately, but he knows how to patch a simple wound. Not that his frantic pestering and overprotectiveness assures any 'patients' he has the pleasure of treating—and his nervous self-deprecation towards his skills doesn't contribute to his bedside manner for that matter as well.
  • Pocket Knife: Yves may be fearful of injuries, and dreadful at inflicting them, but he is no fool. He is reluctantly accepting of the fact that he needs at least something to protect himself with, and so carries around a simple pocket knife under the excuse that it's a useful tool to have in general. Which it is—but if the sight alone can give enough pause to his enemies for him to shatter, then he considers himself better off with it than without it. Even though its presence is a haunting thing on his mind.
• Misc: N/A

Edited by Enirboreh on Nov 2nd 2018 at 8:07:31 AM

bork

Hi all, local co-GM here. I'm not going to be doing much, I'm basically just a player who can pitch in the DM gruntwork Starbound might not always be able to swing. That said, here's my own character.

• Name: Ray Maxim
• Gender: M
• Age: 26
• Appearance: Ray's a shorter guy, about 5'4 with a very sharp, angular, narrow face, like a knife. He keeps his hair in a short shaggy mass, fairly plain. He dresses formally and plain, not with really any equipment or anything fancy. Sort of suspicious in how he dresses like an exactly average civvie.
• Loyalties: Ray is an Asset Security Consultant working for The Nobel Concern. He assaults journalists, dumps bodies, and protects employees. The Nobel Concern is a holding company focused primarily on "actuarial analysis and targeted importation of desired goods." They collect intelligence on powderkegs around the globe, run analysis and calculations on potential markets to be found there, eliminate competition, and then import exactly what they've calculated they can gouge people on, fronted through mazes of shell companies.
• Ideology & Values: Ray believes the world's one where you only get what you fight for, tooth and nail. The world doesn't have room for great achievements along with differences of opinion. You want to change the world, you do it on top of everyone that tried to stop you. On land you carpet-bombed.
• Personality: Ray is extremely casual and conversational in the blase way that you only achieve from constant effort. When he gets distracted or caught off guard (not particularly hard), his really simple act immediately shifts to a more inflammatory and aggressive angle. He might not genuinely believe in his employers specifically, he is just there for a paycheck, but he doesn't have the patience for much else. He thinks people should fix their own problems, which is what he's doing now, making cash for a nice retirement for a country that will forever owe him. He thinks that actions only have consequences through their victims taking action—therefore, punching someone in the dark is basically a victimless crime. Leave no traces you can be followed with and you're basically fine.
• Biography: Ray is a military brat born in the fifties who never saw much reason to make friends if he was going to just move around all the time, so he got exactly the isolated upbringing you'd expect. He figured from what his parents told him the US were the good guys, and more importantly the strongest guys. He graduated with high marks on account of that same isolation, and got a business degree over at SUNY. What he got immediately good at was security consultancy; his weird freakass upbringing made him really comfortable in "consistently" unsteady environments, and really sensitive to when things were being kept from him. He eventually filtered his way through the corporate asskicker/deskjock industry until he signed on with The Nobel Concern, a tech conglomerate and an NGO working on behalf of the US government's interests abroad—holdings, acquisitions, and fixers. Ray gained his powers almost minutes after touching down in Merab: a local radical charged him from a hiding place in a Nobel Concern office and got him in the chest with a shiv made of Merabium. He thought he was going to die, said no thanks instead, turned into a huge wolf monster, ate that guy's face, and then shifted back to human. Surrounded only by Nobel Concern employees, and in possession of his senses once more, Ray realized he was an extremely deniable asset. He already had the mission he came here for: pave the way for the Nobel Concern. Now he had some powerful means of acquiring it.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Werewolf. Ray can turn into a huge strong six and a half foot wolf-man, more wolf than man—kind of a Jon Talbain look, but more of a dark gray than a blue color. He can lift about 500 pounds, his claws and teeth are sharp as modern steel, his senses are even sharper, and he heals quick while he's transformed.
  • Ray does have a legit business degree and good grades. He knows how to work with money, and contracts, and spreadsheets, and other boring business stuff.
  • Ray knows how to fight. Trained in a variety of martial arts sourced from The Nobel Concern's security training program, Ray mostly focuses on sharp, heavy strikes designed to maximize pain and let a target fight back (in order to make lawsuits harder to argue, see).
• Equipment:
  • Special notarized documents from The Nobel Concern. Ray is fully authorized to make pretty big promises on Nobel's behalf and has documentation to back it up.
  • A Gun. Ray packs a small revolver when he doesn't think he can reliably transform.
  • A bike. It might not look cool, but with gas at a premium and the streets all fucked up a solidly built red bike is what you need.
  • Ray is one of only a few people working for The Nobel Concern, and they have a single-room office built into a side room in the US's FOB. Has a cot with blankets behind a curtain, a closet, a desk with pens and paper, a mailbox, and filing cabinets.

@Enirboreh: I've had a history of players wanting their characters to have powerful abilities restrained only by their own moral limitations, and I've always been wary of such due to players not always keeping to that. I bring this up specifically because of "His distaste for violence means he hasn't attempted this on a human being, but his destructive abilities more than indicate he has the potential to do so" sets off those same flags in me. Since you mentioned inanimate objects being the primary recipient of his transfer of powers, perhaps stick with that - human beings are far from inanimate, after all. I'll let you change it how you like, but the potential for disruption and full "shattering" of a human being, regardless of the character's distaste for it, means I cannot accept Yves as is.

Gotcha. I'll make it limited specifically to objects then. That'll also make the ability itself a little more strange.

Edit: Done. Also added mention of a bit of Fridge Logic that's been plaguing me.

Edited by Enirboreh on Nov 2nd 2018 at 8:09:20 AM

bork

And with those changes, I can say yes to Yves! Yves Dupont (Enirboreh) is accepted!

Edited by Starbound2 on Nov 2nd 2018 at 1:17:40 AM

• Name: Yael Nekov
• Gender: Gender nonconforming cis male.
• Appearance: A short, lightskinned black male with long red hair that he keeps pulled back in a ponytail. He often wears contacts over his brown eyes. Due to his love of cute things he often wears women's clothing. This is one example of something he'd wear.
• Loyalties: Yael's loyalty is to the people of Merab. In particular, his loyalty is primarily to his friends and family. This primarily manifests as loyalty to the local high school and college.
• Ideology & Values: Yael doesn't care for politics and favors doing what's right above all else. As such he advocates for teaching others to be better people and protecting the rights of others. As such his primary goal is to ensure the local schools don't fall into the wrong hands. In his mind, that means both sides of this proxy war.
• Personality: Yael is a sensitive young man who cares about the needs of others. This tends to manifest in the form of mediating arguments between people and standing up for those who need it. While he puts on an air of confidence and often spouts arrogant things to make himself seem important, the truth is that he has a low self esteem. The only thing he takes pride in is his interest in cute things and even then with the war going on he has had to put that aside, though it does shine through in his choice of clothing style.
• Biography: Born in 1950, Yael has had a bit of a tough life. Though he identifies as male, he's always had a love for things that are considered feminine: cute clothing, stuffed animals, cooking, etc. As a result he's been bullied and harassed from a young age, even threatened with death a few times for not fitting into the traditional gender roles people of the time expected of him. Even his family didn't really understand why he would be interested in such "unmanly" things or why he wanted to wear women's clothing. Thankfully, his older and younger sisters and some of his friends in the LGBT community have been supportive, allowing him to grow into the young man he is today.
  • When the country fell into civil war in 1971, Yael was still in college. However, because the war started up while he was home for break he ended up dropping out of college to help his family out and to support the town. This only lasted a few months though and in early 1972 he returned to school. When the bombs began to rain down upon the country, he and his family fled to the bomb shelter their family had owned since the previous World Wars, which allowed them to survive the blast. Since then and with the closing off of the city, Yael has been working with local educators and students to protect the local high school and college.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Clothes making: Once Yael became more comfortable with his identity, he began learning how to make clothing since, as a man, women's clothing doesn't fit him.
  • Building: Yael comes from a family known for building homes and other buildings. Although he's not very good at it, he has enough skills to be able to help work on buildings.
  • Teaching: Yael went to school to become a teacher. Although he's still learning, he has some degree of teaching skills.
• Equipment: Yael doesn't fight so he has no need for weapons. That said, he does carry around a backpack with supplies for cooking/starting a fire and spare clothing just in case he ever gets trapped anywhere and needs to stay warm. That said, the lighter and knives he uses as cooking tools can double as weapons in a pinch.
• Misc: N/A

I suck at bios, so this one is pretty short, but hopefully it's okay! Plus my computer is messing up a bit as well. Still, I hope this is fine!

• Name: Ariel 'Gunsmith' Golbeck
• Gender: Female
• Age: 28
• Appearance: "Got a light?"
• Loyalties: Ariel is loyal only to herself, and her close friends, which are few. Bandit, mercenary, thug, killer... all are names she'd gladly take up just to live life her own way.
• Values: To be blunt, Ariel doesn't give a damn one way or another on how things work out just as long as it benefits her survival. She believes the world is cruel and unforgiving, and she wishes to be on the top of the food chain one way or another... or at least a predator that no one wants to mess with. Essentially, she'd rather have anarchy where there is survival of the fittest, believing that everyone should have fight for their place in the world.
• Personality: Ariel is a playful person, who can be a bit merciless as well when needed. She enjoys a good conversation over some smokes and coffee, and wouldn't mind to be pampered and spoiled as well. But those are some of her more secret desires. She can often be called a wolf in sheep's clothing.
• Biography: Born February 27th of 1945, Ariel was raised as a child soldier for the entirety of her life for the USSR. Ariel never really knew the comforts of a sheltered life. Having had to kill since she was little, she's actually grown to love it. Picking herself up from nothing, Ariel has learned how to survive through harsh environments while being a sadistic force of nature. At the age of
• Abilities/Skills:
  • Ariel gained her nickname via the ability to create gunpowder via aether. She can create shells, bullets, grenades and various other explosives that are far stronger than normal ammunition and explosives in the palm of her hand. She's only able to produce one item at a time.
  • She's trained in CQC and knows about guerrilla warfare as well as hit and run tactics during her time as a child soldier.
• Equipment:
  • Guns; lots and lots of guns. Ranging from shotguns, magnums, submachine guns, to pistols, she has plenty of weapon stashes to be a one-woman army. Although these weapons aren't compatible with her power.
  • Her signature weapon; a Barret M95. Requires a reload after every shot however due to her power's nature.
  • Combat Knife, bulletproof vest, and a flask.
  • Her favorite Camel Crush Menthol cigarettes.
• Misc: She lives in an apartment in the residential section of Atarah, across from a cafe that she frequents.

Edited by Toukas on Nov 4th 2018 at 11:13:12 AM

"Believe in the me that believes in you!"

• Name: Haliskander Jordovich, The Phantom Cosmonaut
• Gender: Spaceman
• Appearance: Ever since his return from the disastrous Soyuz 12 mission, Haliskander has been unable to leave the confines of his sealed EVA suit. The suit itself is charred and blackened from his impossible re-entry and where the foil breaks a phosphor glow fills the space. Most of the time the opaque solar shield of the helmet is down though this never seems to impair his vision.
• Loyalties: Hal is a Soviet, it is his patriotism that made him sign up for his fateful flight. There is nothing on this earth more important to him than his country.
• Ideology & Values: The Phantom Cosmonaut believes in himself, he is an impossibility and a survivor. He also believes in the strength of the communist system, feeling that once the Soviet leaders lose their paranoia then nothing can stop the iron march of productivity.
• Personality: Hal is quiet and reserved. Given that he's inside of a spacesuit communication is difficult, though with access to a typewriter and a bit of time he proves quite eloquent and ornate with his words.
• Biography: Soyuz 12 was the first test of a new two-pilot craft and for the first half of it's planned two-day voyage things seemed like a success. And then came the impact, a meteor strike piercing through the command module. Haliskander Jordovich, as one of the two pilots of the mission would be the only witness to the events of it's destruction. Three times the remnants of the meteor burnt green; First to bring death to the copilot and unbearable pain to Hal as it tore the command module open to the harsh void, the second time to bring life back to Hal's withered frame and the third to bring power... It would be well into October by the time Soyuz 12's orbit decayed and it impacted in a conflagration a few kilometers on the Soviet side of their border with Merab. Impossibly, Haliskander had survived the return by climbing into his EVA suit though with the heat of the impact it had become fused to his frame. With the proxy conflict in Merab well underway the central authority has dispatched The Phantom Cosmonaut as an environmentally-sealed agent to investigate the Merabium mine and convince it's supposedly oppressed workers to ally themselves with socialist ideals.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Enhanced strength: Whether it was the strangeness in orbit or exposure to Merabium since, Haliskander had gained physical strength greater than the common worker or soldier. While all under the communist system Lift Together, some may lift more than others.
  • A mandatory spacesuit: While the spacesuit that has become locked around his form isn't the most agile of garbs, it provides a significant measure of protection against both damage and environmental hazards like toxic gasses and radiation.
  • The Phantom Cosmonaut feels no pain.
• Equipment: The Phantom Cosmonaut has his suit and a bent piece of metal that used to be a support strut in the command module. He seems to need nothing more.
• Misc:

It's clearly a case of backroom political albumizing.

okay wth with all the quiet unassuming types

bork

@Chariot: I think everything checks out; Yael Nekov (Chariot) is accepted!

@Toukas: I'll need a few more details on Ariel, just to flesh out her backstory and abilities more. You mention that she's a child soldier, for instance - but from where? Child soldiers weren't recruited in the US and as far as I'm aware the USSR didn't make use of them either. The conflicts of World War I and World War II would also be before her time if she was born a citizen in Merab, unless you choose to age her up. I think the most logical point to jump from is checking into conflicts contemporary with the RP that she could've been raised in as a child soldier and make her a member of a military NGO. This would also get around how she would have access to custom weaponry after Atarah's blockade, as her employers would be able to provide them.

As for her abilities, where do the bullets and explosives manifest; in the palm of her hand, anywhere within a certain amount of space of her, etc, etc.? Can she produce a large stash of grenades, etc. all at once or does she need to produce them one at a time? Basically, what are the constraints of her abilities?

@Pentigan: Looks all well and good, so I think I can safely say that Haliskander Jordovich, The Phantom Cosmonaut (Pentigan) is accepted!

Interest! I'll get a sheet up as soon as school lets up a bit.

I wear the skin of the Elder Things, having come unto my own.

• Name: Aleksander Krashinski (The Red Horseman)
• Gender: Male
• Age: 35
• Appearance: Here◊. Without the mask, Aleksander is just your plain brown-haired, brown eyed guy standing at 6'0.
• Loyalties: The Red Horseman is a strong supporter of the USA, and is sympathetic to the nation of Merab, owing to his ancestry. He hopes that Merab is established as a democracy with support from the American government, and works to achieve this personal goal. He doesn't quite realize it, but he's really the expendable pawn of The Noble Concern.
• Personality: The Red Horseman does not have a complex view of the world. There are bad guys and bullies, and heroes and innocents, and you'd better not be a bad guy or a bully. His time spent as a famous daredevil has given him a bombastic persona while he's wearing the mask and outfit: without it, Aleksander is not a remarkable man, at least not as long as he's around strangers. Despite holding himself as an example of American integrity and values, The Red Horseman is willing to take violent and underhanded means if he sees it as an easy way out of whatever situation he's in.
• Ideology & Values: The Red Horseman is a staunch supporter of American democracy, and holds himself as an example of America's values wherever he goes, with the hopes that his example will distract from past issues like Watergate and Vietnam. He is also sympathetic to the nation of Merab, being descended from Merabian immigrants to America, and hopes that the nation can attain freedom. Despite his red theme, The Red Horseman is an outspoken anti-communist, and will break whatever rules are in play if he can pull one over on the Soviet Union. He is also fairly supportive of America's corporate interests, after all, they like freedom and democracy too, right?
• Biography:
  • Aleksander Krashinski was born in the US state of Wyoming in 1938, to Merab immigrants fleeing World War 2. Raised in a small Wyoming town, Aleksander had a difficult upbringing, and was often bullied over his heritage and poor status. He had a difficult youth until he was picked up by the local greaser gang, and as soon as he got a shiny new motorcycle, Aleksander became one of the local hellraisers.

  • Aleksander's rebelliousness continued even after he moved on from the gang lifestyle. He was kicked out from job after job, and served an unsuccessful stint in the Army, but he kept his skills as a motorcyclist from his time as a greaser. Aleksander decided to become a full-time stuntman and performer, and created the persona of The Red Horseman. The Red Horseman became famous outside of Wyoming for his ability to drive a motorcycle without dying, and soon enough, stadiums were filled full of people waiting to see what he'd survive next.

  • Despite his large fame as The Red Horseman, very few people knew that Aleksander Krashinski and The Red Horseman were one and the same, owing to his mask and flighty nature. People began to believe that The Red Horseman was an invincible American hero, and he started to believe it too. He became involved with several major corporate sponsors during his rise to fame, and bumping elbows with some of America's premier capitalists rubbed off on him. It didn't take long for Aleksander to become a diehard capitalist (and a staunch anti-communist), and he became politically active as The Red Horseman, hoping his stunts would inspire people all around the world who desired freedom.

  • Aleksander was deeply troubled by the events of Vietnam, Watergate, and the Civil rights movement. Despite his courage and grit in facing challenges he set up for himself, and his outspoken criticism of the Soviets, he just wasn't brave enough to face the moral failings going on in America, and remained completely silent on such issues during the late 60s and early 70s.

  • When he heard about a conflict in his parents' homeland in Merab, Aleksander was finally inspired enough to take action. Aleksander asked for assistance from one of his close friends, who was a mid-level manager for the The Nobel Concern. As long as Aleksander helped out The Nobel Concern, they'd be happy to send him to Merab. The Red Horseman arrived in Atarah, with an improved version of his trusty bike and his costume. He was ready to make an example in the motherland, but is unaware that he is now a glorified mercenary sent to cause trouble in Merab on behalf of The Nobel Concern's shady interests.

Abilities and Skills:

• Daredevil: The Red Horseman is a famed acrobat and motorcyclist, and has defied death doing stunt jumps over cars and through burning hoops, and when that doesn't work, he's been able to survive his failed attempts with minor injuries. While the streets and roads of Merab aren't quite like the ramps and cars of the stadium, The Red Horseman has the skill and quick thinking to make some clean getaways and survive normally fatal crashes.
• Scrapper: The Red Horseman learned a thing or two about fighting during his youth as a greaser. He's not trained by any means, but he can give or take a few solid hits better than the average joe.

• Equipment:
  • Motorcycle: It's impossible to be a motorcyclist without a motorcycle. The Red Horseman's ride has been improved to its limits by a major tech company, and has the ability to create a thick smokescreen from its exhaust with a push of a button.
  • Walking Stick: Ostensibly for show, this diamond-studded walking stick can deliver a solid beating.
• Misc: The Red Horseman has some assistance provided by the The Nobel Concern. His "hideout" is in an old auto repair shop close to the Atarah Post Office, containing accessories for his bike and a bed and shower.

Edited by TailsDoll on Nov 5th 2018 at 6:29:27 AM

"@[=g3,8d]&fbb=-q]/hk%fg"

• Name: Hildegarde Dietrich, "Lady Winter"
• Gender: Female
• Age: 29
• Appearance: A tall (5'11") woman built like a stick, she has pure white hair, pale skin, and grey eyes with flecks of blue. She has sharp features, and can usually be found wearing a long coat of some sort over "appropriated" combat fatigues.
• Loyalties: She fights for neither the US nor USSR, and indeed tries her best to play the two off each other and thereby keep them away from what she's doing.
• Ideology & Values: Generally, telling everyone who isn't Merabian to fuck off out of Merabian politics, especially from the US and USSR. Her goal is to use this new power to carve out a League of Non-aligned Nations, of sorts, without the interference of either global superpower, given that it's a choice between imperialist douchnozzles or differently imperialist douchenozzles. While she doesn't actually have much attachment to Merab itself, it's more the principle of kicking the both of them out that's at stake here.
• Personality: Hilde is generally quiet and unassuming, and tends to try to act fairly small. She tends to play the part of the anxious academic rather well - right up until she stops. Because while 'anxious academic' may have described her a decade ago, she's since matured into, well, something of a terrorist, having seen the divided Berlin, trying her damndest to get the Americans and Soviets out of everyone else's affairs. She's matured into being calm and self-assured, though occasionally rather self-righteous. She's managed to carve out a small part of Atarah for her and her small troupe of freedom fighters by being brutally pragmatic and, to some's eyes, as cold at heart as the icy winds she summons.
• Biography: Born in Merab to Berliner parents fleeing from WWII (that didn't work out very well for them, and they continued to flee, though they returned to Adarah after the war), she was raised to value learning and knowledge. While never rich, her parents made enough money to be comfortably middle-class. When she finished her primary schooling, she went off back to Berlin for college. There, she witnessed the raising of the Berlin wall, and what the Soviet/Western divide did to people. While in college she joined some... less than savory groups, some might even venture to call them extremists, terrorists, though she continued her studies. While she... may or may not have helped plan... activites against both the Soviet Union and the United States, she certainly emerged changed.
  After getting her degree, she returned to Merab, and Adarah, shortly before the discovery of Merabium - and she was working in one of the labs assigned to research it. Over the intervening three years, she may or may not have smuggled samples of the mineral to old friends, but she never got caught, and surprisingly, the research lab she worked for continued to operate as the country descended into civil war. On the fateful day when the bombs dropped, she was working in the labs. The lab complex's central building was squarely hit by multiple bombs, killing the vast majority of her co-workers - a few who had been in the outlying buildings, mostly administrative workers and people on break, survived. Rescue workers found her, alive, but battered, and surrounded by a mysteriously chilled environment and uncomfortably dry air.
  With this newfound power, she saw the opportunity she'd been waiting for: a way to give both the Soviets and the Americans a black eye, and, hopefully, far more than that. So, she set about trying to gather what allies she could among the bombed ruins of the interdicted capital city. A more short term goal, of course, being finding a way around said interdiction.
• Abilities and Skills: Cryokinesis (or, technically thermokinesis, as she'll tell you), combined with hydrokinesis.
  • Thermokinesis: She can raise or lower the ambient temperature in a roughly small house-sized radius (~20ft, give or take, and she can increase this at a high strain to her) around her. As an odd side effect of her power, the effect of ambient temperature on her is reversed - the colder it is outside, the warmer she gets, and the warmer it is, the colder she gets.
  • Hydrokinesis: She can telekinetically manipulate water, so long as it is not inside of something living (i.e. she can't rip the water out of your body). This becomes exponentially more effective the lower the temperature of both the water and the surrounding area, with temperatures below freezing and ice making water vastly easier for her to manipulate in both dexterity and volume. Manipulating already-flowing water also makes it slightly more difficult.
    While she can manipulate the water vapor present in the air, this is a rapidly diminishing resource for her, and after only a short time fighting she usually has to relocate or rely on some other source of water, be it water bottles, a river, what have you.
  • She has a Ph.D in physics
  • More recently, she's aquired the ability to shoot more or less straight, though by no means is she a professional soldier and her abilities lie more in planning than fighting.
• Equipment:
  • She carries a pistol on her at basically all time - and has at least a few other guns hidden in stashes.
  • She has the tools to make, relatively safely, explosives, 'liberated' from her former place of work.

Edited by Izshta on Nov 4th 2018 at 12:58:07 PM

All are significantly abnormal in a normal world... All are significantly normal in an abnormal world.

• Name: Wanda Dojinovac
• Gender: Female
• Age: 24
• Appearance: This◊ lady,◊ at least normally. Average height, lanky, not that good looking.
• Loyalties: The U.S.S.R., because their asylum program in this instance is top notch.
• Ideology & Values: The freedom of creation of art, the freedom to readily consume as you please, the ability for one to, as long as they are not infringing on the rights of others, do anything they wish...which is all kind of ironic, considering who she works for, right? More importantly, she believes in extreme means to achieve the manifestation of these ideals in reality. Doesn't like the U.S. government, doesn't like the U.S.S.R. government...doesn't really like governments, to be quite honest family.
• Personality: Kind of caustic and rude, sometimes comes across as haughty and overly serious about art, especially. Doesn't live up to one of those ideals, as she can get violent in the heat of the moment. Can be kind of lazy. More than anything, she's confused and frightened after being roped into becoming a superpowered spy in the middle of a warzone, but at least she's good about bottling that kind of emotion up until she's alone and can panic in peace.
• Biography: To put most of it briefly: Wanda was born to immigrant parents in the beautiful city of New York, dropped out of high school, got caught up in the counter culture movement but found a lot of it wanting. Wanda fancies herself an artist who wants to push boundaries and outrage people with art that the hippies of yesteryear are too milquetoast to approach, let alone make. She's gathered some kind of following for this, debuting in the art world at a young age and being revered and vilified for...you know, getting people angry with art. And other things. Being in Merab during this whole conflict came about due to visiting extended family, which is a good excuse for when she has a warrant out for her arrest after shooting another artist after a particularly heated argument. That, combined with the drug possession charges that were sure to crop up, makes going back home kind of a problem. The fact that she entered this country illegally makes it a problem to stay, but considering the abilities that she manifested, the Soviets were suddenly very willing to let her reside here in return for friendly cooperation. She obliged.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Complete and total body morphing, which we'll break down into a few neat sections.
    • Shapechanging: Wanda can change her body down to a very fine level of detail, with little upper limit. As long as she can make it out of flesh, blood and bone, it's within her range...given some limitations. Too big and you start to run afoul of the square cube law. Too thick, and the insulation of flesh can cause overheating very quickly. Too compact, not enough space to safely store organs. Also, you'll probably freeze to death.
    • Appearance Changing: Copying the appearance of others is...doable. Unless she's got a good deal of time to study and commit someone's appearance to memory, though, it might not hold up under scrutiny. Features may seem undefined, or even impressionistic if looked at too hard. Also, she has great trouble copying voices, and her own distinctly low one doesn't fit a lot of appearances.
    • Regeneration: More of an extension of the above, she can regrow anything as she pleases and rather quickly. Most wounds she receives aren't really that much of an issue, even if some of the more important organs are hit. As long as the brain is partially intact, she can basically live forever. Fire and acid inhibit regrowth and are great ways to kill her, but ain't a guarantee. Freezing cold doesn't help either. She can theoretically expel poison or other chemicals from her body, but this is hit or miss and impossible to pull off without complete concentration (though, simply cutting off circulation (or cutting off) the affected body part is slightly more effective if done in time, if destructive.) Any parts severed or otherwise removed cannot be reattached and die in seconds.
    • Casually Turning Off Your Nerve Endings Like They're A Particularly Gaudy Lamp: Which is a double-edged sword. Yes, she can't feel pain in her entire body when it's active. That said, she can't feel any sensation in her entire body while active. Her body can't react to the stimulus of pain and try to regenerate itself, she can cause unconscious damage to herself, she could be on fire and not realize it...and so forth. Simple actions such as walking or picking up something become very difficult without relying on the feeling of touch to guide her.
  • Artiste: Fine skill with traditional mediums, dabbling experience in sculpture, and great overall sense for drawing up some real trippy shit. Has taken an interest in murals and spraypainting, recently.
  • Language Skills: She's kind of bilingual, as her parents did speak...whatever slavic language is spoken in Merab, but not fluently.
• Equipment: The Soviets have issued her a Tokarev TT pistol and several copies of forged documents for alternate identities for both sides of the border, which she securely keeps in a cavity in her body. Not the ones you're thinking of.
• Misc: Anything else to report? Nah.

• Name: Klaus Kaiser
• Gender: Male
• Age: 25.
• Appearance: This fucker. Stands at about 6’3”.
• Loyalties: When you get right down to it, Klaus is loyal primarily to his own highly idealized concept of “superhumans” (ie, those gifted by Merabium). He thinks most people from the US, USSR, and the various NG Os are just invaders trying to take Merab’s bounty. If things really go to shit though, he’ll be looking out for number one.
• Ideology & Values: Klaus believes that he and the various other people touched by Merabium are superior to normal humans. He wants to create a new world order where the supernaturally empowered rule over others while the old hierarchies of creed, class, race, and gender are eliminated. One could pretty accurately sum up his belief system by calling him a fascist, but for transhumans instead of an actual racial/ethnic group.
• Personality: Klaus is outwardly friendly to people who aren’t in the way of his goals, but is absolutely ruthless to anyone who stands against him. Murder and torture are lines he is absolutely willing to cross if that is ‘what needs to be done’. He tends to think in black and white terms, seeing little to no room for compromise or nuance in most situations – though he can pretend to be more conciliatory if it in some way benefits him.
• Biography:
  • Klaus was born from two German parents in Merab 4 years after the end of World War 2. He showed a great deal of interest in a variety of subjects from an early age, particularly politics and psychology. He read about the powerful leaders of history and secretly longed to one day join their ranks as a feared ruler. Yet, his life as an intellectual bookworm could not be further from his dreams of obtaining power. He succeed greatly in all his academic studies, but part of him regretted that he confined himself to the life of an ordinary man. This all changed when, soon after graduating college, Klaus was exposed to Merabium. From that point on, he believed he had become something great – something more than human.
  • In his professional life, he worked as a young political consultant for various candidates, He helped give their messages mass appeal, and helped sell the more unsavory parts of their lives/political platforms.
• Abilities and Skills:
  • Psychic powers, which are as follows.
    • Telekinesis: Klaus can create eerie looking ghostlike hands that spawn from his body and extend outwards. They can lift and manipulate objects in any way that normal hands could – including the good old fashioned favorite, strangling people/neck snaps. These hands are physical and can be interacted with in just the same way you could anything else. They can lift up to about 200 pounds.
    • Flight: Pretty self explanatory – he can make his entire body fly through the air. This is his most taxing ability, so he can’t really use his other powers while doing this.
    • Mind Bullets: He can create projectiles made out of pure kinetic energy, and send them flying at his victims. He can fire these with the frequency and force of a non-automatic firearm.
    • Telepathy: Lastly, he can create telepathic links with people and communicate with them mentally over an area of 1 kilometer.
  • Speaks three languages: German, English, and Merabium.
• Equipment: He carries a luger pistol just for emergency scenarios where it might be difficult to use his abilities.
• Misc: N/A

Edited by HilarityEnsues on Nov 4th 2018 at 3:53:12 AM

@Toukas: With the changes made, you're good to go! Though, uh, you left a bit of your bio hanging. In any case, Ariel Golbeck, Gunsmith (Toukas) is accepted!

@TailsDoll: I think everything checks out, and I think Taco's good with you being in the same GMO as his character. Aleksander Krashinski, The Red Horseman (TailsDoll) is accepted!

@Izshta: Your character's all cool; Hildegarde Dietrich, Lady Winter (Izshta) is accepted!

@wikkit: Don't change a thing about your profile; Wanda Dojinovac (wikkit) is accepted!

@HilarityEnsues: ...I got nothing. Klaus Kaiser (Hilarity Ensues) is accepted!

I think we have enough characters now where a character list is due. We also now have a Discord, and a link will be provided in the sign-up OP shortly!

Edited by Starbound2 on Nov 4th 2018 at 2:05:56 AM

Slowbunny, it's been far too long. Taco too, though we've at least been in a few games together the last few years. I noticed an occupied post office on the map, and a lack of any package-oriented heroes, so, here I go.

---

• Name: Viktoriya Volkov - On the streets people call her Logistics
• Gender: Female
• Age: 26
• Appearance: Like so.◊ Normally best described as "unassuming" - average height, regular clothing, doesn't wear anything flashy, just another face in the crowd.
• Loyalties: Loyal only to the dream - the dream of riches. Though she has some slight Merab leanings due to their freedom fighters tending to require her services more than the USA and USSR would.
• Ideology & Values: She's not a fan how stifling and strict the capitalist and communist worlds are, as neither ideology really seems to care for their people as anything more than a means to an end. She likes 'capitalism' in and of itself, given her own mercantile nature, but not the culture it produced in West Virginia. Likewise, she certainly thinks democracy is probably better than an empire or dictatorship, but again, not a fan of what she saw back home. She values personal freedom, letting people do their own thing, and not trying to impose strict social or religious conformity on others.
• Personality: Professional, Vicky is an expert at keeping a straight face and even straighter spine, bottling up how she feels during the day so that she can get her work done in a precise and business-like manner. When not in a situation where she's forced to put on a mask like that, she is more pleasant, but with a stubborn streak. Not particularly rude or aggressive, and certainly not uptight or judgmental, but also not a doormat or yes-man. Like (most) people back then, she enjoys a drink and a smoke.
• Biography: Born shortly after World War II in West Virginia to Russian immigrant parents (they came to America shortly after Red October) in a city heavily dependent on the coal mine - with her father and all her brothers working as miners - Viktoriya took advantage of the wide and diverse career paths available to women in the 60's in rural America and became a secretary at on office for the local coal mine.

In 1970, at the start of the merabium mining boom, her company sent a team of mining engineers and supervisors who were going on a short-term trip to provide technical and logistical advice to one of the local pro-capitalist mining corporations. Being an employee who was both American and fluent in Russian, she was just the secretary to accompany them to handle paperwork and the like.

Because she wouldn't be a character in a sign-up if things went well, disaster obviously struck and she and the engineers got caught in a bombing during the Merabium Civil War, resulting in her breathing in a cloud of raw merabium dust. Surviving and pulling herself out of the debris some time later, she was going to drag herself to the embassy to explain that she was alive and get a flight home... and then stopped, realizing that she had absolutely no prospects back home. The only thing the future held for her was a dead-end job in a dead-end town, watching everyone she knows die of black lung, dreading the day people at work start calling her a kitty puncher, and probably drinking herself to death. But she could use her newfound power to actually do something in this place, where nobody knew her and she could start fresh. It was pretty rough at first, but as time has gone on she's at least learned how to survive well enough in the city, living under the radar and between the pages of society.

• Abilities and Skills:
  • Pocket: She has a personal pocket dimension she can 'pocket' things into and out of for storage, like having access to private freight truck when she needs it. She can't store "big" things in there, like a truck or motorcycle, but anything that could fit in a large chest is fine. She can't store stuff that is "alive" in the sense people and dogs are, but she can store organic/living matter like plants, fruits, vegetables, the living cells found in inoculations, meat, and canned goods. Items put in her pocket dimension are undetectable and frozen in time until withdrawn, such as a pocketwatch not ticking forward, and as a result she can't put a radio in there like some sort of mobile communication hub (who knows if it's even possible for people to make a portable phone!). She can control the position of what comes out (such as clothes being worn, or a box having the "RIGHT SIDE UP" having the right side up) and has to be physically touching whatever she pockets. As for what happens to the things in there if she dies, well, she hasn't tested that out yet.
  • Smooth Movement: Merabium has moderately improved her physiology to allow her to move around the city with far more ease than your Average Joe. She can comfortably run down a street at the speed of a pro sprinter without exhausting herself, climb up poles and brick walls better than most people can use a ladder, and jump several times her height. Her strength, toughness, and things of that nature aren't enhanced by merabium, but are a good deal above-average due to her life of work.
  • Delivery Specialist: She has the skills you would associate with being able to deliver things - memorization of streets, cross-streets, addresses, and routes; she knows English and Russian and has passing knowledge of delivery related words like the numbers 0-10, colors, "envelope", "package", "box", "signature", in all the other major languages used in the city.
  • Secretarial Skills: She has a good knack for paperwork and the skills required in the office world, such as composing letters, filling out forms, calculating expenditures, and answering phones.
• Equipment: What tools and assets have helped you survive this war?
  • Lockers: She has a set of 20 custom-made steel chests/lockers that she uses for facilitating deliveries. Each locker has a (relatively) strong latching mechanism, and space for multiple padlocks to be locked in place. (So that clients can do things like lock the chest with their recipient's lock, but put in their own padlock inside for the person to send a secure shipment back to them). All of them are 2'x2' at the base, and she has 5 each that are 1, 2, 4, and 6 feet tall.
  • Outfits: She has at least a dozen outfits she tends to go between for blending into the crowd, such as a heavy overcoat, a dress, hats, business attire - both men and women's - and
  • Store: She has a small shop's worth of items used for trading and paying for things. Mostly canned goods, the basic medical supplies found in an extensive first-aid kit, some old coins, writing supplies, silverware, batteries, basic combat knives, some packs of cigarettes, and, most importantly of all, a few cases of vodka bottles.
  • Aluminum Baseball Bat: Each year one hundred thousand baseball bats are sold in Russia, and at most 50 baseballs. Gives an idea for great Russian pastime. Sometimes people don't respect the integrity of the delivery business, and she needs a little protection. Merab may not be America or Russia, but a simple bat can still be surprisingly effective.
  • PPSh-41: And sometimes you need a little more protection. Not a marksman by any stretch of the imagination, but she knows which end to point in the right direction and pray.
• Misc: She transports goods and messages with absolute confidence and secrecy - for a price. Anybody in the city who puts out feelers for "Logistics" can eventually get in contact with her.

N my man, good to see you; it's been a while! Miss Logistics looks a-ok to me; Viktoriya Volkov, Logistics (nman) is accepted!

And for everyone not in the know, here's our discussion thread!

Last but not least, we've officially started! I'll be keeping sign ups open for anyone still interested; looking forward to seeing everyone's posts!

Edited by Starbound2 on Nov 5th 2018 at 5:35:38 AM

Sorry everyone; I'm gonna be closing down this RP due to inactivity and, on my part, lack of inspiration/motivation to keep it going. I hope all of you had fun in the brief time that it ran - see you in another game.