[OOC] Something Wicked This Way Comes

[Gowi]

@Gowi Oh yeah. Hector is going to be incredible awkward around Pythia I think. He's 15 and at that phase where he's supposed to be "looking for a wife" if you know what I mean. That said, he also has a mother hen personality. The perfect clash of hormones and sensibility!

@Zurnt

I'm most certainly curious to where the prose will lead us though, we have a lot of interesting character dynamics and tropes going on here.

I wish your characters were just a little bit older, so I could have Thomas fight tooth and nail to get Hector laid. As it stands now, it would be a little too creepy. Alas, opportunities missed.

@rextremendum

For the standards in this sort of quasi-medieval world? Not really, though I'm sure opinions of said social politics vary. I mean Pythia was given a sort of ultimatum of "get married or get employment".

[Zurnt]

Hmm, considering my combat ability and temperament I wouldn't be shocked if Hector got offed in the first conflict. You know, the part where we get ambushed and all of the redshirts get torn to shreds by horrible monsters.

[Gowi]

Nah, Pythia will have a support construct or healing ward... or something. Though I imagine both of our characters feeling out of place when the dangerous reality of the world hits us in the face.

[rextremendum]

My reaction will almost certainly be to leg it - I doubt hideous ink monsters are susceptible to my basic plan of "telekinesis their throat shut and freeze their eyeballs" or "pop their heart" [unsure if I need line of sight. Not having it would be pretty unbalanced] I don't get paid enough to fight. Also, Gowi, while I realize in-setting it is normal for 15-year-old people to bump uglies, I personally would feel uncomfortable with it OOC.

[Zurnt]

It's something Hector will feel the need to shove deep down inside himself and let eat away him until he ends up bursting. He's a bit of a martyr, but doesn't fully understand the consequences of his actions and the kettle's been boiling away for a while now. It'll be a spectacular breakdown when and if it finally happens.

[Gowi]

Haha, yeah I get that. But it's good to be uncomfortable together! ...or something. I don't know. Pythia herself has a lot of problems with answers the universe seems to be giving her as she's as naively lawful good as they come as evidenced by her backstory and personality.

[Zurnt]

It'd be funny if Thomas wanted to run away but felt the need to stay behind and protect the kiddos. Even though the only reason they're staying behind is because they have to protect Thomas.

[rextremendum]

I always like to mix in a little bit of bastardized Nietzsche-esque humanism into my characters, an outlook of "We don't need no Gods, they made this shitty world and humans are smart enough to make it better", but that walks the fine edge of fedora-tippage, which I don't like to get into in RP forums. Since we have a dedicated faithful character, I think I might go hard on that, just for some contrast. Also, Zurnt, you overestimate/underestimate Thomas' method of evaluation. He, in a real danger situation, believes that his chances of effecting real change are very slim, seeing as he is not the best fighter, and the risk to his life, which he places both intrinsic and extrinsic value on, would be too great to justify the paltry gains estimated.

[Gowi]

Oh, you're just going to make this cooperative writing exercise even better I wager. I'm excited as hell, and I was hyped a bit at the start already.

[Zurnt]

You'd be shocked how quickly people's thought processes can go out the window when somebody they know is in a direct threat of dying right in front of them. Even a single shared conversation can make a person feel attached to the degree where they wouldn't forgive themselves for not doing their all to help the other. It's easy to bowl a stranger over and run for cover, but what about the guy who just told you about how he can't wait for his kid's soccer game? Of course, it all depends on what kind of relationship they manage to strike up beforehand. Also, whether anything in our hypothetical situation actually happens or not. I dunno, I kind of feel like placing my trust in amiable old Thomas.

[rextremendum]

I am hoping to play Thomas as a man whose central strength is ability to think analytically in stressful situations. I want to play Thomas as a foil to the emotionally-driven other characters, and one who will follow his essentially utilitarian ethics up until the absolute last. I doubt Thomas will willingly sacrifice himself based solely on utilitarian evaluation, but besides that I am going to play the character like he has time to make these quick judgments. He will, obviously, attempt to do all he can outside of combat in a hypothetical ambush, trying to do the most overall good [if the Emperor is there, for example, he would judge the political strife of the death of an above-average ruler would be worse than the kid's sadness at his dead father not being there to see his soccer game].

[Gowi]

You realize your character is going to shatter Pythia's world view when she asks questions like “Why do people suffer? Why do we hide and let plague destroy them? That isn’t nobility. That can’t be nobility… can it?”, right?

[Zurnt]

Ah, well I can only wish the best of luck then. That is, that you'll get to play Thomas and get to play him the way you want to. I still think he'll be fun to have around.

[rextremendum]

I'm looking forwards to it Gowi. I don't know how Thomas would answer those questions factually, seeing as I don't know how much in-universe evidence for the Godesses there is. However, I doubt he will take particular relish in fucking with her, seeing as the pain he would cause by shattering her world view may not be equal to the suffering that could be averted by pushing her into answering questions like "Why do you believe what you believe" and introducing her to Bayesian probability theories. Maybe the subject of faith will be touched upon as he tries to shape your young minds to be more rational, but religion is not his focus by any means. I hope I can still live up to your expectations, Zurnt, even with someone with an extraordinarily level-headed character. Hopefully I can write it well enough that you're still entertained.

[Zurnt]

My expectations are remarkably high, just so you know. And at this point, were Hector to be there, he would probably be feeling a mixture of frustration and admiration for Thomas. He respects somebody who speaks his mind and holds to his principals, but would still rather he treat Pythia with some gentility. I think it would be incredibly awkward thing to be privy to considering his personality. That feeling where you want to punch a magnificent bastard in the face but you know he's not actually trying to cause any harm. And then Hector would try to comfort Pythia and fail miserably with his narrow-minded world view and poor speaking skills.

[rextremendum]

Thomas attempts to be affable, and spread as much happiness as possible, but he can be brash at times. We'll see how the interactions play out between Thomas and Pythia [if my character even gets accepted - we're still waiting on the GM to confirm it, and I kind of want to rewrite my app at some point to get new points across]. I expect the interactions to change drastically based on small character quirks interacting with each other, then spiraling down into much more substantive subject matter. Also, who knows: she might change the conversation by saying something... 'Pithy-a' ... [cue the laugh tracks] That's it, I did it. The best joke. No one has to be funny ever again.

[Zurnt]

I don't get it.

[Gowi]

I doubt there'll be a problem with your character, anyway, it seems really well-written and composed with interesting tropes and dynamics. But I'm sure the GM will pop up soon and yell at us for spamming the OOC chatter with endless nonsense.

[rextremendum]

You know, I'd say mixing in interesting dynamics is my... "forte" BOOM DOUBLE FUCKING KILL TOO GOOD god someone really should stop me

[SanaChan]

*Rubs eyes and yawn* what the crap happened here? And no there are no guns as of yet. This isn't quite the formation of the world early, but it's we're still figuring out basic commodities early. Sorry y'all, running water is a work in progress for them