Night Kiss

[ApocalypticaGM]

Overview
Night Kiss is a mystery-drama set in a fantasy world and surrounding a group of assassins. The world consists of a moderately sized continent hosting various ecosystems, regional powers, and drastic degrees of advancement. Drastic degrees, because as this is a time for inspiration to some, others find only fear, and many lust for power. Pressures arise too as it is entirely possible to sail across the sea from a clockwork metropolis to some metal fearing, magically savant village. Amidst all this diversity there is much strife. Monarchs and republics war over borders, politicians make back-room deals for 'elected' positions, and all the while mythic creatures and magicks lurk all about. Blessed with the Night Kiss, this is a world for assassins.

Premise
The world is rich and diverse, but most occupations come with copies. There are other assassins, most with patron divines, but you belong to the Night Kiss. You may have converted from another fellowship, perhaps invited, born into it, or simply happened upon membership. Ultimately, you are here now and the group has competition. Atop of keeping the fellowship afloat, politics, technological innovations, bandits, and strange magicks cause issues throughout the regions. The Night Kiss will be assigned a variety of jobs that may be simple kill-orders or could require a group to travel out and settle into a place for a time. Missions will be geared toward character development, honest challenge, and a plot that adapted to the players. The world is only just balanced and it only takes one to tip the scales.

What to Expect
Once we get a healthy number of devoted members I will throw in a mission to get things rolling. Something to get us on a bigger plot, allow people to see a part of the world, and better yet, interact. From then on I will implement simple systems to create challenge for future jobs, basically risk. You all will be able to throw in ideas and sub-plots, that's welcomed in fact, and some may well be easy and others may threaten lives or maim. Just because everyone starts within the Night Kiss does not mean they need only remain as such. What y'all do and choose not to do will effect the world and there will be opportunities to break off, compete, or even sabotage the fellowship. I am very open to anyone's imagination. That said, I do have a broad plot in mind with a handful of enjoyable sub-plots.

I'll quickly run through the big fantasy bits: magick and other-than-humans. Starting with the latter, there will be non-humans involved. Think the basic variety mixed with Skyrim, where just because it's an orc doesn't mean it's a mindless beast. Everyone is mentally capable, culturally diverse, and a strong option. Some likely have advantages or disadvantages, differing lifespans, and so on, which we can go into more later. I am also a sucker for a strong demon-posessed, vampiric, lycan character, and so on character. All would probably be contractable characteristics, like diseases, and can be worked on for advantages and disadvantages if the need arises. Now Magick is another matter. Some regions will engage in magick more often than others, some will outright ban it, and in some regions it'll be like spilling blood amidst sharks. Magick will have repercussions on your person and be split up into common & uncommon forms. Sounds complicated, but it's not. It may well be easier for one to do a minor healing spell, like meditating or focusing chi, than it would be to take that energy and blow a fireball. TLDR Non-Humans Yes. Magick Yes, w/ Limitations.
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That said, once I see enough people interested I'll put up an OOC, Character Sheet, and get things rolling. Expect a 3 day roll-over between us hitting that sweet-spot for members and having a fully-decked out OOC (I like to create my own imagery and what not). Let me know if you have any questions!

Inspiration

Night Kiss draws elements of my creation, inspired heavily by Brent Weeks' Night Angel & Lightbringer Series, Skyrim, and Dragon Age. If you're unfamiliar with all those you will do just fine. What all of these creations have in common are a deep well of lore, the ability to go from absolutely nothing to becoming world-shaking (and still considered nothing, too), and a rich, diverse world. Over time these elements will reveal themselves. I do not plan to just flog you all with paragraphs on paragraphs about whatever city you don't really need to know about. I might draw up a map of the continent and general regions, a few iconic cities/towns/villages, and you all will be free to create too. New areas will be revealed as we go and are up for suggestion.

[Krauxis]

Sounds interesting to me, at least. I'd like to participate.

[ApocalypticaGM]

Everything starts with one. :) If you have any questions or want a better sense of anything feel free to ask. It'd only better the interest check.

I do hope if anyone is holding out due to a couple details or any specific reason they will voice that. This is still rather new, the thread, so I'm not too concerned.

[SirBeowulf]

Hmm, you've got a good bit of interest here. How does our group of assassins work? Do we have a hierarchy of members and all start on the bottom of the pecking line?

Also, do you have an idea of what areas our characters should be skilled in? Poisoning, back-stabbery, charismatic woes and what not?

[ApocalypticaGM]

Night Kiss work in a very laissez-faire manner. They are made of people from diverse backgrounds with unique skills and quirks, so whoever is best suited to lead based on the job will do so. I would recommend thinking up your character's background and how they got into this business then what skills they'd likely honed based on their personal preferences and history. I'd expect most of our team to be somewhat experienced, so, wager they've put in 4 years into this work and likely have something they are very comfortable with. It's alright for these sorts of skills to be redundant, the CS I am drafting will make that work just fine. Pecking line isn't really a thing. New members merely are a mystery, so if you want a younger, new initiate it just means people are less familiar with what you bring. Everyone has a job and was accepted for a reason, the whole just may not know what that was yet. I will probably begin the plot after a significant amount of time away (say, it's been 6 months IC since the team's been gathered) so everyone enters on an even playing field.

To answer about hierarchy and skills otherwise, I should say this. Missions will highlight happenings in the greater world and require success in a few areas to accomplish. The Night Kiss may be hired to kill an innovator of clockwork and slow advancement, for example, by the tech-fearing village across the way. That means there's at least two things that must be done: 1) Kill the innovator & 2) Steal plans, destroy prototypes, etc. Both objectives probably require very different skill sets, so diversity as a whole is important. Leadership will shift with the most relevant to the job. So our most stealthy or charismatic (good w/ disguises) might lead the second objective while an apothecary, archer, or any other type could lead the first. The group will decide how to go about jobs too, so things should stay fluid. To be clear, my character will be more a facilitator and guardian of the Night Kiss than a top authority.

[Mousia]

This sounds super interesting.
Some things that come to mind to help you perhaps either develop the idea or just put curious people like me more at ease:
-how do people contract these 'diseases' that cause them to become humanoid creatures?
-how many is a "healthy number" of players?
-how big is this continent and what sorts of landforms are found in different regions? What sorts of creatures/types of people hail from different regions?
-what is religion like? Varied, or mostly consistent? Do different races have different religions or are they inter-racial?

Also, if you'd take me, I was thinking of a sort of holier than thou character. Like, she'll be a little badass, but mostly just a pompous person that works poorly with others. Do you think that'd be too much of a monkey wrench in the whole thing or do you think that'd work? Because I have this image in my mind and I'm actually kind of excited about it.

[ApocalypticaGM]

Mousia said
This sounds super interesting. Some things that come to mind to help you perhaps either develop the idea or just put curious people like me more at ease:
1.how do people contract these 'diseases' that cause them to become humanoid creatures?
2.how many is a "healthy number" of players?
3.how big is this continent and what sorts of landforms are found in different regions? What sorts of creatures/types of people hail from different regions?
4.what is religion like? Varied, or mostly consistent? Do different races have different religions or are they inter-racial?

1) Like I pointed out in the inspiration tab, I pull a bit from some sources. Diseases will be treated like Skyrim, a bit anyway, in that open conflict with those infected could potentially infect you. Vampires and Lycans would become such through the blood (potentially born that way, if mother was infected). If the blood was mixed into yours significantly and allowed to set, you may become infected. Unless someone is totally set on becoming infected, we will probably determine this sort of thing with a dice roll (just to keep it simple).

2) Depends on the roleplay. I expect some people to flake out normally, so I tend to aim for 5-7. We have three so far including me, and this has only been up less than a full day. Once we get one more I'll create the OOC, but we'll still be recruiting.

3) Size is relative to the vehicles we use to travel. This is a strange time where some regions use horse-drawn carriages, while a few have slow moving clockwork boats and carts. The continent surroundings a large body of water at its center which splits the land on the east side in a narrow river, the land resembling a backward C. Going by water is quicker than the common mode of transport, horse, but the average ship takes roughly a week to cross one end to the other depending on weather.

Land forms vary region to region, as does size. Some regions are controlled and choose to war while others are content advancing given what land they have. This'll all be on the map. You can expect to see all basic ecosystems that exist on earth plus a few surprising ones. Not all the continent will be deeply explored as horrifying myths deter some from venturing too far into the wilds. Humanoids of all sorts generally adapted to their regions, though some areas may be teeming with refugees and not 'grown with the lands'. Basically, humanoids have dominated certain regions and labelled others Wilds. Within the Wilds there are creatures told of only in lore -- if even. Some humanoids are equally unknown too, but we'll get there with time.

4) Culture is based on region. Each region has something that shapes the culture, its rituals, and its beliefs. They form around what life must be there. Now some regions are dominated rigidly with religion a matter of government, so only certain divines may be praised or acknowledged. Other regions may be loose and pay reverence as they like. Religion in this world is not something that exists in a great many forms though, it's basically polytheistic, monotheistic, and newly forming atheists (with poly as dominant). Some regions, even some specific cities may focus their prayers on a few particular divines, just one, or the whole lot. Other areas rest in the heart of humanoid control and have not seen magick in centuries -- these are largely where those without belief in the divines hail.

Also, if you'd take me, I was thinking of a sort of holier than thou character. Like, she'll be a little badass, but mostly just a pompous person that works poorly with others. Do you think that'd be too much of a monkey wrench in the whole thing or do you think that'd work? Because I have this image in my mind and I'm actually kind of excited about it.

If you're devoted and it's well-written, of course it's accepted! I never turn someone down when the inspiration is steaming off them and they do their best to illustrate it. I will have a CS once we get another person's interest.

[LittleAlouette]

Hey, so I'm totally interested. Quick question: what sort of technology are we dealing with, here? I mean, seeing as we have magic thrown into the equation, do you think mechanical limbs would be feasible? Because I was thinking of a character infected with a sort of, uh, magic-borne rotting sickness. That happens to make a lovely poison if she harvests her own bodily fluids. In all its weird usefulness, though, it would have a nasty habit of consuming her, though, and I'm thinking she lost an arm and maybe a good chunk of her leg when she wasn't accustomed to the nature of the sickness yet...

Except a one-armed, one-legged poison mistress wouldn't make the best of assassins, so I was thinking about mechanical limbs that, though they aren't anywhere near as good as the real thing, still manage to be functional. I'm thinking they'd be iron joint systems fueled by the potent internal magic consuming her from the inside?

Alright. I'm going to shut up now. But I would like to know about the state of technology and/or its relationship to magic. That really wasn't a quick question, was it?

[ApocalypticaGM]

LittleAlouette said
Hey, so I'm totally interested. Quick question: what sort of technology are we dealing with, here? I mean, seeing as we have magic thrown into the equation, do you think mechanical limbs would be feasible? Because I was thinking of a character infected with a sort of, uh, magic-borne rotting sickness. That happens to make a lovely poison if she harvests her own bodily fluids. In all its weird usefulness, though, it would have a nasty habit of consuming her, though, and I'm thinking she lost an arm and maybe a good chunk of her leg when she wasn't accustomed to the nature of the sickness yet...Except a one-armed, one-legged poison mistress wouldn't make the best of assassins, so I was thinking about mechanical limbs that, though they aren't anywhere near as good as the real thing, still manage to be functional. I'm thinking they'd be iron joint systems fueled by the potent internal magic consuming her from the inside?Alright. I'm going to shut up now. But I would like to know about the state of technology and/or its relationship to magic. That really wasn't a quick question, was it?

If you hadn't no noticed there are very few quick answers from me too -- you're in good company.

1) Magick: Good chance that the most common magick that one can be use is something to weakly ward off bad spirits and to encourage healing. Some regions will likely have developed a deeper understanding of the magical arts, but the common layperson would not have this in most of the continent. If you're expecting technology running on a battery of magick, knowing what I've just said, then you'll need to speak with me personally (if a limited number of places are magical savants, stands to assumption your tech would be from them).

2) Magick-Disease: Awesome! I absolutely love this so much that I am going to play that idea into the OOC as a drawback.Thank you! Specifically related to your character, I love the idea of a diabetes-like disease created from the misuse of large amounts of magick. We could brainstorm on this together, but if you plan on using the blood as a poison, I'd recommend making that essential to her survival. That is to say, her blood is corrupted by magick and she must give, say, 1/4 pint every 1-2 weeks. The blood works as a poison, but if she forgets or she draws too much too often she suffers (average person needs 6-8 weeks between giving 1 pint). Again, totally something I'm willing to help you craft here if you need. It's good to start thinking of weaknesses though, as they'll be useful.

3)Technology: Big question for last. Prosthetics have always been something of interest to me in fiction and I love characters who push the hegemonic norms of our society. You want to play a character who pulls strength from their difference? I'll get on the fuck dis[/] in disabled train right now with you. For our purposes I would say having a usable prosthetic is in fact possible (they had them in Ancient Egypt and Greece). I'd say you're welcome to play this. If your character, or someone else's (hint to anyone wanting deep interaction!) is a skilled 'mechanic' of sorts I'd even say I'd accept some level of modification to the limbs for a mission -- like hiding a dagger within the hand. How you'll fuel the tech is another question... I'd like it to be renewable, but by something like a battery so the limitation is more felt. Maybe the prosthetics are mechanical and still do feed off the magick in the blood, but some of the blood she gives to making poison must be put into the prosthetics like fuel (perhaps a vial suffices for however long, we don't need exact times or all that).

[I]Technology & Magick: Some regions embrace technology deeply, usually creating magnificent clockwork cities, carriages, boats, and intriguing weapons. Their devotion to 'science' is seen by most as curious, and by some as heathen. Other regions give themselves to magick with the same fervour, building an entire society off the ability to use magick (think of Brent Weeks' Chromeria), and many see this as risky, and some again as heathen. There is mostly a scale with the two on opposite ends. We will find some regions where both are intertwined though, but they're more rare.

4) I keep saying this, but I want to hammer in the point. Our missions aren't going to be quickies ended with awkward, half-smoked cigarettes and a walk of shame. The Night Kiss will have a fixed base where they may live, train, and store their needs and the like (can't decide if ours will be a large home-ship or land-based). As needed, we'll leave our base to travel to whatever region and township our job requires. We may stick around there a little while, making relationships with NPCs, learning the politics, and all that. Some areas may judge y'all for your race or accents, others may have treasures or technology that could better your life. It'll be entirely possible to have your own mini-plots within a mission while you meet the folk, potentially do work for them, or even find lovers. All in all, you all will be able to take from most of these places what you'd like. Perhaps magick-enhanced weapons, clockwork limbs, and other gems. The Night Kiss are pilgrims, in a way, and that has its benefits.

[Krauxis]

Everybody's asking questions and I'm just sitting here enjoying as the answers turn out the way I hoped they would :D

[Leodiensian]

Put me down as interested.

[ApocalypticaGM]

Working on the OOC now. Please do keep the questions coming as y'all have them, useful as I compile everything. You can expect a mock-up OP that will give the essentials until everything is finished. Some information will be discovered with time, but I'll mark those simply under construction. As usual if something is not clear enough do ask.

Happy to see so many interested and expressing it here!

[SirBeowulf]

I'll be patiently awaiting an OOC in this corner right here.

[Mousia]

Three days for the OOC, right?
Just to be clear: the Night Kiss won't have any particular political affinities, correct? As an organization, I mean. They won't turn down a job because of the political implications. I foresee some potential for drama here. *sneaks away to mull over plot options*

[ApocalypticaGM]

Three days to be done, most likely. I'll put up the skeleton with essentials like the immediate premise, a bit on setting, your characters sheets, and enough to give you all something to build from while greater detail is on the way.

As I'm developing there's a few details I've thought up not yet mentioned that I'll use to answer this. Night Kiss is the organization, yes. The Night Kiss exist in two bodies, one is where the group was created and grown, and the second is newer, made up of a few old members as well as blood -- ours is the latter. We serve no political power. We receive our missions and see them done, though individual members may opt for less direct involvement. It could be possible that the missions given to us may serve certain powers more than others, we'll see, but the goal is to be apolitical. And I suspect political strife will become a real issue as we go on. I look forward to it!

[Wind Wild]

Gosh this sounds pretty damn cool.... The fact that Brent Weeks was an inspiration is really a big plus for me. ^ ^

I can't fully commit just yet but I am really interested in joining, if RL permits.

I have a worry though, how fast will the plot be going and how regularly do you expect us to post? Personally, I'm into more fast-paced RPs, but I read that you're going to set the main plot in motion after about 6 months? Do you have any plans for until then?

[Mousia]

I do know that it says "six months IC time" and not RL time, if that changes anything for you. Timeskips could play a part. Otherwise I can't help you, but I figured to try.

[ApocalypticaGM]

The six months was in reference to how I'd have it, In Character, that everyone in the team would not be 100% comfortable with each other (making room for characters who are new to the team). The main plot would've started right then. My current plan has changed since, though, as we are a newly formed sect within Night Kiss. This will let some people create characters who have been a part of the organization yet may not know each other, as well as bringing in new members while putting everyone on the 'new to this' playing field. It had nothing to do with when plot events would occur. Our first mission will be introduce a couple big world events and get everyone connected and invested. It'll help you all be inspired as to how your characters might be rooted in the world, in addition to whatever you think up prior. Trust me, it'll be a ride.

Posting wise, I'm patient and expect patience. This is a great RP for someone who wants to go long-term, but doesn't have hours upon hours to set aside -- perhaps you work, have school, a family, obligations and all that (as I do). I expect 1-2 posts a week, though we'll move as the group can. Trust me, that may sound slow compared to some threads, but this speed has kept another project I've helped with (Apocalyptica) going for around 14 months now.

[SirBeowulf]

Well, good thing you'll have at least one No-Lifer.

[Mousia]

So, to put it quite simply (to make sure I understand, because fancy language is great, but I like to be concise and just get my point across), the character can have former training or affiliations with the Night Kiss, but no one knows each other at all and the most someone could know is if they've only heard of someone else. Correct?

I've got a fair amount of stuff on my plate and (unfortunately) a lot more than usual at the moment. After March 8th, my schedule will free up considerably, however.