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Welcome to [b]WORM: Parahumans Manchvegas[/b], a superhero/villain roleplaying game inspired by the web serial series, [i]WORM [/i]created by J.C. McCrae, AKA Wildbow. [sub](Reading the series is not required.)[/sub][hr]
It's year 2010 on Earth Zed. The timeline of this Earth is the same as ours up to one, fateful day: May twentieth, 1982, the day that the golden man appeared. For a long time, he simply flew across the globe observing and radiating sadness. 

Soon after his appearance, people with superpowers began to emerge. These powered humans, "parahumans" became the topic of discussion and the center of research. Some used their powers for selfish gain, while others stepped up to fight crime. As parahumans became a fact of life, the government began to implement laws and organizations to regulate them.

On December 13th, 1992, the first Enbringer appeared. Behemoth. A monstrous, gigantic, and near-indestructible beast. It was due to this attack that The Protectorate was founded by the government, to help protect its citizens from villains, Endbringers, and other threats.

Then one day in 1999 the golden man appeared with a white bodysuit and just started helping people. Rescuing people from accidents, natural disasters, and Enbringers. That same year the golden man was caught on camera. A woman asked his name and he spoke for the very first time: "Scion." 

Our story will be taking place in Manchester, New Hampshire. The city is up and coming with the largest population in the state and growing. There is a vibrant nightlife, tons of educational campuses, and restaurants and shopping can be found around every corner. But with a big population comes a big problem: crime. The crime rate is soaring, parahuman villains are moving in to stake their claim, and more people are triggering. Much of the city is falling into shambles, falling into disrepair. Grafitti and gang tags litter almost every surface. Drug deals are made at every corner. Windows are boarded and every lock is locked at night, and even then, sometimes you just don't feel safe.

Civil unrest is growing as people begin to fear the newly appearing parahumans. A new Protectorate Headquarters has just established inside City Hall and they have been promoting the local heroes with events, but will that be enough to counter the parahuman hate? Will the heroes reclaim the city, or will it be taken over by the emerging villains?

Whether you like it or not, you are a part of the parahuman world. 

[b][u]PLAYSTYLE:[/u][/b] Casual to Advanced writing. Sandbox/open world. Collaboration on our [url=https://discord.gg/gxwTY53JRK]discord[/url] is allowed and encouraged. The play area is currently limited to Manchester and surrounding areas, but as we grow we may expand to other cities. At least one post per day is encouraged. Fights will be in quick succession, alternating turns, with other roleplayers (either bystanders or the other party) deciding the outcome of each action (attack, retreat, counter, etc.) No dice rolling required. Characters may be created as desired or inspired by dice-rolling or generators.

[sub][b]NOTES:[/b] The roleplay may not be suitable for young or sensitive readers. Like the series, our roleplay will be edgy, gitty, and have a darker tone that comes with realism. There will be swearing, racism, drugs, violence, and possibly gore. People will get hurt. People will die. And quite possibly, your character could die, too. Every action has consequences. While the roleplay could be fun for those who have not read or are still reading the books, be warned that the roleplay may contain spoilers. I do not claim rights to [i]Worm[/i] or the fan art images in this post.[/sub]
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[hider=General Rules]
1. Obey all [i]roleplayerguild [/i]rules.
2. Submit an application prior to joining the roleplay either by PM or here in the OOC. I will be looking to make sure characters are not overpowered, underdeveloped, or overly similar. Do not post in the Character Section until approved.
3. This is a casual to advanced level roleplay. Please try to use proper spelling and grammar (excluding character speech). Include as much detail and insight as you can to add depth to your character and story.
4. Do not control other people's characters without their permission.
5. Avoid leaving the roleplay unannounced or for prolonged periods of time. If you must, please direct your character to a time/place where they will not impede plot progression or allow others to do so for you. Inactive characters may be killed or erased from the timeline if necessary. 
6. People will say and do bad things during the course of this game, especially villains. With this in mind, please try not to take things personally when on the receiving end and be mindful as to not hurt the actual roleplayer when on the giving end. Real bullying and harassment will not be tolerated. 
8. While mature content such as swearing, drugs, violence, gore, and romance is permitted, this is not intended to be 18+ only. IC posting should be PG-13. That being said, please do not come here expecting to hook up. Be aware that young eyes may be reading.
9. As always, have fun![/hider]
[hider=Discover the world of parahumans][hider=Organizations][url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/The_Protectorate][b]Protectorate:[/b][/url] The Protectorate is a government-sponsored superhero organization that spans the United States of America and Canada. It works under the Parahuman Response Team or PRT. [url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/The_Triumvirate]The Triumvirate[/url] (Legend, Alexandria and Eidolon) lead the Protectorate and respond to all S-Level threats. Each region has a local team. These teams operate out of the local Protectorate Headquarters (PHQ), maintaining regular patrols and responding to reports of villain activity.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Parahuman_Response_Team][b]Parahuman Response Team (PRT):[/b][/url] A  paramilitary organization that also encompasses police and/or emergency functions, they are trained to deal with parahumans and the fallout of their actions. The PRT administrates and reins in the Protectorate and is made up of non-powered individuals. They are also in charge of parahuman public relations.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/The_Wards][b]Wards:[/b][/url] The under-eighteen sub-division of the Protectorate. They earn a trust and minimum wage. Wards are to attend school during typical hours and maintain satisfactory grades and failure to do so will see their pay docked. Wards must be allowed to receive a full night's sleep with regularity. 

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Baumann_Parahuman_Containment_Center]The Birdcage:[/url] The Baumann Parahuman Containment Center, better known as the Birdcage, is a prison for parahumans that have committed crimes severe enough that they must be removed from society. It is not designed to allow prisoners to leave after they have been imprisoned within it. The facility is run by the AI Dragon.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/The_Fallen][b]The Fallen:[/b][/url] The Fallen are a supervillain group notorious worldwide for their worship of the Endbringers. Their crimes range from petty larceny to hijacking radio to murder. Beliefs vary from group to group, but the common belief is that humanity deserves to wiped out or that the powerful and worthy will be spared. Homophobia, prejudice against case 53s, arranged marriages, incest, kidnapping, and brainwashing is common.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Empire_Eighty-Eight][b]Empire 88:[/b][/url]  A gang of white supremacists based in Brockton Bay. Their influence is spreading into the rest of the Northeast. 

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/The_Elite][b]The Elite:[/b][/url] One of the largest villain organizations. They do not pursue traditional villainous enterprises, instead seizing an area on the economic or political level before undermining local opposition using sabotage, connections to organized crime and blitzkrieg-style strikes while remaining consistently off the public’s radar by subterfuge or careful manipulation of the media. They force villains and rogues into their group and often control a lot of Corporate 'hero' teams from behind the scenes.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Slaughterhouse_Nine][b]The Slaughterhouse 9:[/b][/url] a rotating group of 9 supervillains that terrorize North-America.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Endbringers][b]The Endbringers:[/b][/url] Monstrous beings that take turns attacking locations around the globe to cause as much damage as they possibly can. Apparently unkillable, the Endbringers retreat to their respective domains to heal after they have sustained sufficient damage, only to attack again months later. Very little is known about them or their origins. They are non-human.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Cauldron][b]Cauldron:[/b][/url] A secret organization committed to creating a parahuman army to combat an undisclosed threat. Their experiments make them highly morally questionable. They are funded through selling Cauldron Vials, which grant powers to those who survive.

[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Case_53][b]Case 53s:[/b][/url] Also known as Abominations, Demons or the Branded to the public, or Deviants and Subjects by their makers.  Case C53s are amnesiac parahumans, usually with severe physical alterations, marked with a "C". They were so-called Case 53s because their origin was the 53rd anomalous case investigated by the PRT.[/hider][h3]Powers[/h3]Powers come from a mysterious source and are very complex. They have rules, limits, and little intricacies about how they function, like clockwork machines. A lot of powers are difficult to control, some are impossible to control. Some powers are broken. It's all in the luck of the draw. 

A large number of people have the potential to trigger even if they haven’t met the conditions necessary for a trigger event. Those who have the potential will possess a [I]Coronoa Pollentia[/i] lobe in their brain, that will house a Shard and place restrictions not the power to protect the parahuman.  

This phenomenon is known as the [url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Manton_Effect]Manton Effect[/url], first recognized and codified by William Manton. The common tendency among powers is to affect either living targets or inanimate objects, but not both. This seems to facilitate their use by humans; more specifically, powers tend to have "in-built" controls to avoid harming the parahuman using them. This effect severely reduces the potential lethality of most powers. Those few parahumans that can bypass the Manton Effect are feared, and for good reason. 

Most people can gain powers through trigger events (traumatic experiences), but the rich and powerful can purchase Vials from the secret, manipulative organization, CAULDRON.

[hider=Shards][url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Shard]Shards[/url], also known as passengers or agents, are fragments of incomprehensibly immense colony [url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Entity]organisms [/url]that serve as the source of parahuman powers. Shards resemble crystalline structures folding and unfolding like hypercubes. Each shard connected to a human is already an amalgamation of smaller shards, some of which are necessary for it to happen at all. Linking Shards together produces a more complex Shard with the abilities of all joined fragments. One Shard is capable of settling in a grouping of near-identical worlds, drawing energy from all of those worlds at once. While this provides immeasurable power it is still essentially finite.

When Shards take root in a person, they establish a connection. The Shard influences the personality of its host, and the host influences its shard. The effects that Shards have on their hosts are dependent on several factors, including but not limited to: age of the host, the host's personality, the host's trigger event, how much the host embraces the Shard's need for conflict, and the nature of the Shard itself.

Parahuman's shards and trigger events often lead to psychological damage and mental derangements, which is part of why there tend to be more villains than heroes. Shards are also programmed with the urge to cause conflict, to fulfill their purpose of discovering new uses, and this leads to parahumans being more violent than they were previously. Or, their shards can alter their mental processes or directly cause mental deterioration. For example, a person with dog empowerment may have their mind altered to think like a dog, losing the ability to understand human social cues. Or, a teleporter who leaves behind a part of their consciousness each time they teleport, becoming increasingly sociopathic.
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[hider=Trigger Vision]
Anyone experiencing a trigger event sees a vision of a vast multidimensional entity, but quickly forgets it. These visions are due to the neurological linkage between the shard and the host, the amnesia tied into preprogrammed measures. Any parahuman nearby experiences a similar vision and is briefly incapacitated.
[/hider][hider=Natural Trigger Events]
The trigger event is usually a very traumatic experience. The way in which people gain powers might hint at why the villains outnumber the heroes two to one, why more women than men have powers, and why third world countries have the highest densities of people with powers. An individual needs to be pushed to the edge, their fight or flight responses pushed to their limits, before the powers start to emerge.

The circumstances leading up to the trigger event influence the power granted. Psychological stress often leads to mentally driven powers. The more physical violence that is involved, the higher the bias towards physically driven powers. The nature to the Shard itself also affects the power that is granted, but the circumstances of the trigger event are what shape the final power expression. People may develop more than one type of power classification.

Unfortunately, most people are not given an immediate solution to their problems, and some are killed outright as they trigger. Their abilities may help them cope with their issue, but sometimes their power may make their problems worse in the long-term.

Special Types of Natural Triggers:
[hider=Buds]when a shard has matured it begins splitting off, ready to find a (generally young) host similar to the original target and attach to them with the benefit of more experience. This generally takes time and/or stress on the part of the host. A Shard may bud before or at the same time as a trigger event.
Very rarely, the host will experience a second trigger very similar to their first trigger, causing the bud to consolidate in the current host instead. Although the entities consider the different "fragments" to be separate shards, and the buds require their hosts to remain in close proximity if they want to communicate. On a physical level the shard is simply devoting a part of its "CPU" to the new host. This is because the main portion of a shard is largely inactive, while only the smaller "active" portion deals with the host. When Shards bud or cross-bud there can be interaction between the parent Shards creating interesting effects.[/hider]
[/hider][hider=CAULDRON Trigger]Cauldron capes gain their powers after drinking a Cauldron vial. They are much more likely to gain physical mutations than natural triggers. Their powers are primarily based on what vial they took, although their personality also influences it. Cauldron capes are much less likely to be villains and are generally more mentally stable. Given how a subject triggered, their powers can become less reliable when in a stressful situation.[/hider]
[hider=Classifications Reference Chart][h3]Power Classifications Reference Chart[/h3]
[table][row][cell]Classification[/cell][cell]Meaning[/cell][cell]Trigger[/cell][cell]Example Powers[/cell][/row][row][cell]Mover[/cell][cell]Enhanced mobility.[/cell][cell]Drive to escape, flee, run.[/cell][cell]Flight, speed, teleportation, etc.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Shaker[/cell][cell]Has an area of effect.[/cell][cell]Environmental danger or ambient danger.[/cell][cell]Auras, land distortion, time bubble distortion.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Brute[/cell][cell]Enhanced strength or durability.[/cell][cell]Experiences of physical damage or pain.[/cell][cell]Enhanced strength, durability; armor, muscle, personal forcefields.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Blaster[/cell][cell]Capable of ranged attack.[/cell][cell]From hostile others, approaching or attacking from a distance.[/cell][cell]Lasers, shots, beams, energy blasts.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Breaker[/cell][cell]Altered state, often toggled, granting powers or altered interaction with reality.[/cell][cell]Abstract stressors. Blended or ambiguous forms of stress.[/cell][cell]Ability to become pure energy or elements, astral projections, phasing.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Master[/cell][cell]Creates minions or has a means of compelling others to take certain actions.[/cell][cell]Isolation, alienation, exile, or betrayal.[/cell][cell]Animal control, puppeting, emotion manipulation, duplicating.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Tinker[/cell][cell]Building alien or advanced technology.[/cell][cell]Solutionless problems over long periods, culminating in a crisis moment.[/cell][cell]Every tinker has a specialty. For example: weapons, vehicles, AI, time tech, gravity tech, sound tech.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Thinker[/cell][cell]Advanced perception, knowledge, data-collection, or skills.[/cell][cell]Emotional or mental strain, reaching a crisis point in a short time.[/cell][cell]The ability to learn a skill simply by watching or reading. The ability to see through walls, or hear somebody speak anywhere in the world if they mention your name.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Striker[/cell][cell]Touch based and melee effects.[/cell][cell]Immediate, in-your-face threat, usually a singular object or individual.[/cell][cell]A touch that renders people frozen in time or causes decay. The ability to add properties to weapons and items.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Changer[/cell][cell]Shapeshifting and alteration of one’s physical form.[/cell][cell]Identity/body image issues, or conflict of role vs. social expectations.[/cell][cell]Transforming to look like another person, or shapeshifting into animals. Adapting your body to stresses. Growing extra body parts.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Trump[/cell][cell]Powers that involve powers.[/cell][cell]Parahumans are directly or indirectly involved in their trigger. (rare)[/cell][cell]Add, remove, complicate, compound powers.[/cell][/row][row][cell]Stranger[/cell][cell]Powers specializing in infiltration, distraction, subtlety.[/cell][cell]Unwanted attention or social/collective pressure.[/cell][cell]Invisibility, powers that prevent others from interacting with, recognizing, or remembering oneself.[/cell][/row][/table]
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[hider=Explore Manchvegas]Coming soon![/hider]
[Hider=Learn more about the Parahuman Fandom][i]WORM[/i] focuses on Taylor Hebert, an introverted teenage girl with an unconventional superpower. She goes out in costume to find an escape from a deeply unhappy and frustrated civilian life. Her first attempt at taking down a supervillain sees her mistaken for one herself, thrusting her into the midst of the local ‘cape’ scene’s politics, unwritten rules, and ambiguous morals. As she risks life and limb, Taylor faces the dilemma of having to do the wrong things for the right reasons. 
The sequel, [I]Ward[/i] follows Glory Girl, who we meet in [I]Worm[/i]. The story starts shortly after the first book ends. The world as we knew it ended and every villain has been given a second chance. After two years out of commission, Glory Girl searches for herself and her place in the new world.
[url=https://parahumans.wordpress.com/][i]WORM official page - Read it free here.[/i][/url]
[url=https://worm.fandom.com/wiki/Worm_Wiki]Worm Wiki - find everything you need to know about Worm here.[/url]
[url=http://timeglider.com/t/f1a836311fa00bb3?min_zoom=13&max_zoom=40]Worm Timeline - The timeline for the series. We will not be following this strictly.[/url][/hider]
[hider=Links to learn more about the real Manchester, NH][url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester,_New_Hampshire]Manchester Wiki[/url]
[url=http://www.manchesternh.gov/]Offcial City of Manchester Site[/url]
[url=https://www.facebook.com/groups/217708638424036]Manchester News on FB[/url]
Feel free to share other resources!
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[hider=Collage Fan Art Full Versions]
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