[quote=@shylarah]
[@Stern Algorithm] In my opinion, the biggest difference between plate armor and scifi mech armor is aerodynamics.  I mean, add magic to plate and you even have the glowy bits!

Ailanthus in Chains -> Alice in Chains *giggle*  I already said I liked the chains.  Might even be able to get ones with some sort of element on 'em, could be nice -- or something to work towards.

Nice to see an older lady, and one with a degree!  Too often video game anime are just teens.  No, no, I'm sorry, I'm not giving up my games no matter how many levels I've got irl.  T.T  YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!  

I like the idea of someone who sees themself as bland.  Yay glasses~   But the question is, is she subject to blurry vision without them?  ...her picture reminds me of Yomiko Readman.  Don't think it's her, though.  You might need to tweak the description of her armor, if you're really going with fantasy-style plate, though I think it's not absolutely necessary.

Personality seems interesting, and it will be interesting to play with someone who is likely to flare up and/or stress.

I notice that you have used Tessa to refer to Eileen as well as Ailanthus (namely in personality).  Please do make sure that you use it to refer to only her in-game self, unless she actually sees that avatar and identity as truly her.  I know I use "you" to mean both "you the player" and "your character", but in third person IC/reference narrative, I feel the distinction should be made.

She seems well considered and interesting, and I believe her and Elian clashing should be fun.

Elian: NO HEALZ 4 U!  No seriously, I have to res one more party member because of you, that's it.  No heals.

I personally feel that Paranoid Perception is a mental benchmark, as it deals with what she observes and notices, not what she is able to do actively.  For Elian's Saw It Coming, there's an element of attention, but the primary one is the reaction.  Again, [@Gowi] needs to take a look because...benchmarks.  @.@  Cock Block is a hilarious name, and a clever benchmark.  On the flip side, I'd say that...actually most of your mental benchmarks seem more like physical ones to me.  So definitely talk this over if Gowi's not given you the go-ahead.

...Anyhow, I...honestly can't see much to be critical of beyond benchmarks, and I don't feel confident about my understanding of what Gowi's looking for there to say "do this", so I'm gonna use this new thing I learned about in a writing class last month!  We start with things I know.  I know she's not really well-adjusted, lacking in self-esteem, and generally a loner.  I know she loves her science, and is not particularly invested in Pariah as an rp-type game, and doesn't really care who she bothers.  I don't know how she ended up in her current job, how she feels about marriage and kids, and how her relationship is with her family.  I would like to know more about how she learned her trade in Pariah, and what she hopes to accomplish in the game.
[/quote]

I will answer the questions in the last paragraph, incorporate them into the CS, and then get my first post up.

1. Eileen got to her current job through grit and obedience.  Engineering positions are often considered (correctly or not) among the most well-paying, steady, and low-risk jobs so her parents pushed very strongly for her to make that her path in life so that she can get a higher education, achieve financial success and look good on-paper for her 'eventual' marriage. Still, she was not an 'exceptional' student and was unable to get a job based solely on merit (who does, these days?).  Fortunately, a friend of the family was able to put in a good word for her, allowing her to pass the hurdle that was the interview. Since joining the company, a little bit of bowing her head to irrational demands, a little bit of covering her own ass, and a little bit of broken English that Eileen learned from her time spent on the internet has allowed Eileen to keep her job past the point they would ever fire her, becoming an insignificant and overlooked cog in a rusty machine.

2. Eileen is intensely averse to the thought of marriage and kids. For some, trauma means that a part of you died at the time the trauma happened, and that dead part stays with you forever.  Having been bullied by other children as a child, a part of Eileen will never grow up, will never advance beyond the fear of other children.  As an adult, Eileen therefore hates children, having converted her fear to hate. She doesn't see children as innocent, or somehow worth more than adults, since she herself never felt valued in that way. She was also always told to stay away from boys, boys who would try to date her, boys who might get her pregnant and ruin her reputation and her chances at a good life. Now that she's an adult and suddenly everyone around her is telling her the opposite (that she needs to seek out guys and that she needs to start having children), all she can see about relationships is their hypocrisy and society's double-standards. She sees relationships as too demanding and stressful, and sees herself as falling short of societal demands when comes to being 'womanly'. She embodies Schopenhauer's Hedgehog's Dilemma and refuses to let people close enough to hurt her.

3. Eileen's relationship with her family is strained and is built more on duty than love. She begrudgingly sends them money because that's more-or-less what she was groomed to do, and it covers the guilt she feels for not actively reaching out to communicate with them. Her parents raised her, maybe focusing a little too much on her future, and neglecting her present, formative years, something that she feels some resentment for.  They focused too much on her material, physical well-being and not enough on her emotional well-being. Still, she does recognize that their care and upbringing was intended to bring her safety and security, and was done out of love, so it's hard for her to tell them that somewhere along the way, they fucked up, so she keeps her distance. Maybe she's being bratty; maybe her parents forced her to grow up too quickly.

4. Tessa learned her trade through a strange series of events. She doesn't like 'fluff' in RPGs, even if they help world-build or flesh out the environment. So everything she picks up in the form of loot has to have a reason for existing. It came to a point where she was able to identify what materials were used by what crafters, and she would either sell them to the NPC's who needed it for higher prices, or sell them at the market to player crafters. Until she started encountering crystal powder. She knew that armor makers needed leathers and metals, potion makers needed herbs, etc. but she didn't know who used crystal powder. At first she thought it was 'fluff' but she had found a use for everything else so she started asking around until she met an NPC enchanter who had need of the substance. Curious, she stuck around and observed him etching runes into weapons and armor, lining the inside with refined crystal powder ink, and giving the weapon or armor the desired properties the owner had requested. Eileen played Pariah to escape the real world, which was why she took up magic, and seeing a crafting specialization that was so far removed from reality struck a chord with her. She paid the NPC for enchanting lessons and started on her road to becoming an enchanter

[hider=Enchantment?][img]http://68.media.tumblr.com/63a90319dc3205e93b17ffea141d17db/tumblr_moit02cQrT1qlzndvo1_500.gif[/img][/hider]

5. For the time being, Tessa is fairly unmotivated.  She plays Pariah to escape, and to a certain degree enjoys mindless grinding, the addicting, slow rise to getting stronger. More than anything, she sees herself as incompetent and underwhelming in the real world, and just wants to 'be good' at something, a feeling she can only find in games, and even then, rarely. The freedom to play 'her way' and develop her own style though has made pariah more compelling, and her current goal is to obsessively optimize her 'build' with the commissioning of high-level, highly-customized armor, topped off with her own enchantments, and to then test her build against high-level in-game challenges.