BrokenPromise

Darkest Before the Dawn: A CYOA Magical Girl Roleplay [Completed]

“Grim dark cyborg epiphany, or noble light horror epiphany?”

— Aighorost

”Interesting.”

The avatar from earlier had reformed itself just outside the Beacon branch building (herein’ the BBB) inside it’s own slice of the multiverse. As something that had yet to be born and experience other realities, it struggled to understand what had happened.

The avatar was somewhat at odds with Beacon. By extension, Oros was also at odds with them. Even barring their own concerns, Oros seemed to have a personal vendetta against the holy order of magical girls. By this very logic itself, it didn’t make any sense to have a structure like this just lying around. Oros even captured Beacon girls and sent them here. Why would they keep around a teleporter, even damaged, that could possibly be used by the enemy? Oros had briefly joined up with Beacon and likely knew what such a device was capable of. The unborn child racked its brain, but it could only come to one conclusion.

But that didn’t really matter right now. While there was little they could do about the past, they could at least prevent Penny from abusing such an exploit in the future.

With nary a thought, a pillar of flesh and plant descended from the heavens. It slammed into the earth like the fist of an angry god. Everything inside the BBB had been pushed half a mile under the earth’s surface. Everything had been crushed under a tendril that could have been as large as the earth itself. When the pillar was removed, all that remained was a deep crater, with a pool of acid eating away at whatever remained of the former structure.

Now it was time to get to work.

---

N O T H I N G T O L O S E

@DarkwolfX37

Nuncio nodded. ”Well, I don’t need much convincin’.” He squinted his eyes. ”Though if ya related to the Mint- well, never mind. Ya would have helped take down Penny.” He pulled out his phone and started to dial some numbers. ”I’ll see about gettin’ them here. If ya get me ya number, I’ll let ya know when we’re all together. Convincin’ Sammy to do anythin’ is always hard.”

---

V A L O R

Once the cradle agents were on their way, Viridian turned to Maura.

”Seems my roll here is fulfilled for now.” She stepped onto Maura’s shadow. ”It won’t do to have the new cradle mother without our power. I might be out of sight, but hopefully you’ll keep me in mind, ya hear?” And with that, she sunk into Maura’s shadow.

With Viridian’s Psychic magic, she was able to sync up her mind with Maura’s. The two were practically one now, with Maura able to call upon the cradle’s magic at will. Maura had finished her transition into Cradle’s new leader, and could feel her new power surge inside of herself.

---

S E R V I T U D E

Su’s specs

Age: 50(?)/13 | Gender: Female/Female | Air | Uniform
Fists | Focused assault, Power of Friendship, Dread wings, Avenger | Boteg
Hammerspace handbag, Enhanced Transformation, Enhanced Outfit, Overcity Shift, Sorcery, Gifted, Ally(Nuncio)
Focused, Subtle, Mana font, Mental link, Mystic might, Former Familiar | Limited, Alien mind, Paranoid, Vendetta, Former Familiar
Dragon Scale Pendant, Ether staff

STR: 03 | AGI: 05 | VIT: 03 | MAG: 07 | LCK: 04

STR: 04 | AGI: 14 | VIT: 04 | MAG: 25 | LCK: 04

Trixy’s specs

Age: 30/14 | Gender: Male/Female | Wood | Skimpy
M107 | Duplication, Devour | Cradle
Flexibility, Hammer space Handbag, Training, Big Damn Hero, Eternal Style
Top Manager, Cradle Supply, Connected, Gifted artifact | Babysitter, Exposed, Penance
Devour, Devour

STR: 03 | AGI: 05 | VIT: 03 | MAG: 03 | LCK: 03

STR: 08 | AGI: 18 | VIT: 08 | MAG: 10 | LCK: 05

Vermilion Specs

Age: 46/16 | Gender: Female/Female | Darkness, Psyche | Uniform
Countless | Regeneration, Cradle, Twin Soul | Self-Employed
Prodigy, Mythic, Routine, Ultimate Transformation, Dimensional Shift, Interdimensional Lair, All-seeing, Astolpho Artifact

STR: 06 | AGI: 06 | VIT: 10 | MAG: 10 | LCK: 03

STR: 32 | AGI: 30 | VIT: 40 | MAG: 45 | LCK: 5

”Helga!” Su flew over to her side. ”This area is very dangerous! Someone has placed traps!” After making the all-too-obvious facts known to everyone, she looked back at Helga. ”Helga, I’m not going anywhere. I’m too drained and hurt to fight on the front lines. I’m just here to lend everyone my senses. No need to rush ahead.” She smiled at her eager partner before looking towards the box. Su took a few steps closer, but kept her distance. She kneeled and wrapped her arms around her legs. ”Hello? Is there anyone in there?” She waited to see if there was a response. Su did her best to ignore the presence of the icecream, but with so much of it around, it was practically chilling the air.

Vermilion and Trixy on the other hand, were more interested in the dark hallway. Trixy had to use her scope to get any kind of visibility down the dark tunnel. Veronica had little difficulty seeing the stranger.

Veronica didn’t need magic sight to know something was off. She could smell bullshit like this a mile away. ”Since when do innocent denizens of a city walk around with cloaking magic? It’s not like magical boys in spikey armor are a common sight around these parts either.” Veronica told her agents telepathically. She was appalled such a clown was able to kill Cindy. Though perhaps if she could be killed so easily, she didn’t deserve to live anyway. ”Of course the Mint is behind this. Stand back everyone, I’m clearing out the barriers.”

In preparation for what Veronica was going to do, Trixy dropped a handful of acorns on the ground to sprout a half wall to take cover behind. She didn’t mess around either, the wall had to be at least two feet thick, and was rooted in place. Afterwards, she ducked behind her barrier.

The barrier hadn't even finished forming before two flair guns appeared in each of her hands. Veronica dove over the barrier and rushed to Valerie positron before firing with both flair guns. Normally two red-hot flairs wouldn’t do much, but several propane cylinders tumbled out of the darkness around the barriers. If someone couldn’t make out the shape, then perhaps the sound of a hissing propane leak would tip them off. But there would be little time to react before the narrow tunnel was filled with fire and shrapnel. Veronica was able to protect herself and Valerie from most of it. The blinding light from the traps nor the rolling explosion could cast light behind her cape, which she brought in front of herself just as the explosion happened. The shrapnel punched holes in her uniform, but the shards were ultimately captured in a portal to the cradle which manifested itself between Veronica’s cape and Valerie’s body. The cape was not long enough to cover their feet or shins however. The shrapnel did little to harm Veronica's legs, which were resilient to most forms of harm. The small bits of shrapnel were being pushed out of her legs as her regeneration started to work on her injuries.

”Let’s move agents, we have a scheme to foil.” Veronica cast her cape back, leaving the two relatively unscathed. ”Maura, do you think the coven will attack me? I would like to try talking to them if you think it won’t give away your presence.”

Trixy peeked over the edge of the barrier and surveyed for any potential threats. ”Sam, do you see anything with your special eyes?” She could really go for some ice cream right now, it was a shame they were on a mission.

Discord vs OOC

Discord often moves too fast for important updates to be posted. You can do an announcement tab, but it's just easier to keep up with stuff in the OOC. Can't tell you how many times I've come to an active discord with 400+ messages to read, only to see there's virtually nothing important going on and it's just memes and shitposting wall to wall.

And because I never tire of forcing my danganronpa RP awkwardly into every conversation, I found when the size of the cast shrunk down to 4 players, keeping the discord up was a fool's errand. No one used it, and it was much easier to type out long announcements without a 2000 character limit. Not only that, but OOC posts bump your RP. So randos can see your player's banter and don't have to wonder how active things are in the discord. It's better for getting more players.

Tips for writing POC, LGBT+, and other minority characters in RP

I’m going to use “progressive characters” as a catch all term for “POC, LGBT+, and other minority characters.”

I’ve written (nearly) everything under the sun from a bisexual Chinese woman to her adopted Indian daughter to a Jamaican news reporter. And I’m happy to say that regardless of what you write, you’ll do the best job if you stick to one simple rule:

Write your progressive characters the exact same way you would your normal characters.

I feel like a lot of progressive characters make this mistake where they are so focused on being non-hetrosexual/white/etc that they forget to be a compelling character with motivations and aspirations that extend past their preferences/skin.

I once had a neighbor that happened to be a lesbian, but you wouldn’t know that just talking to her. It took her a few weeks to warm up to my family and I. That was when she felt comfortable talking to us about the tragic death of her wife. Compare that to your average homosexual RP character who makes sure everyone knows how gay they are seconds after meeting them. That's also a surefire way to make your character look like a sex addict, which isn't too flattering.

While it’s good to learn about cultures, it only really helps the character if it’s important to them. As an example, there are lots of Chinese-Americans who are still faithful to the Chinese way of life. But just as many have embraced America’s culture and couldn't care less about Chinese customs. Even if they did, most of these people aren’t going to drop Chinese sayings into casual everyday speech with strangers. It feels pretentious and might even be a little embarrassing for all involved. I’ve personally seen Japanese-American characters who were born and raised in America, yet for some reason they add Japanese honorifics to their otherwise perfect English. It's all reminiscent of lazy translations done in anime. You could argue that their parents taught them to speak this way, but I have yet to hear anyone talk like this in real life. Point is, while culture can be a great thing to learn, over-applying it can turn a character into something that is both generic and bordering on racist. I think that’s something we all want to avoid.

I’d also like to add that you should absolutely bury your gays if the story calls for it. Sure, we’re all familiar with the tropes. How the black dude dies first and what not. But if your story is one that is rife with despair and sadness, excluding progressive characters from the looming threat of death is a disservice to everyone. Making your chosen minority/etc safe or otherwise infallible in a story is just as bad as indiscriminately killing them off. A writer should not be held at gunpoint by their characters.

Ultimately, the less special treatment you give your progressive characters, the better.

If you need to research something, do some reading on the area where they grew up, or the time period if that makes more sense. Learn about their job and what type of skills they may have. Read reports on what happens to people who go through their extraordinary circumstances. That information will serve you well. But also note that this kind of stuff is good for any character you choose to make, not just your progressive ones. I just spent a few hours reading about Kharadron Overlords so that I could play one in my brother's tabletop game.

Calling all dice mathematicians

@Clever Hans You'd better not be trying to get me to do your math homework.

For simplicity, let's work on one set of dice at a time. Your d8 VS my d8.

We both have the same chance of landing on any particular side. Both of our die have 8 sides, so there are 8 X 8 = 64 different scenarios that all have the exact same chance of occurring.

If I roll an 8, I'll have beaten 7 out of 8 possible outcomes you could roll. 7 beats 6, 6 beats 5, until I roll a 1 which can't beat anything. So we just have to add all my victories together and compare them to the number 64 to see my chances.

7 + 6 + 5 + 4 + 3 + 2 + 1 + 0 = 28

We both have a 28/64 chance of winning, or 43.75%. The remaining 8 rolls we tied (12.50%) We'll keep this in mind for later.

I don't think it's going to matter too much that a d6 has a slightly higher chance of landing on all of its sides. It has a better chance of landing on smaller numbers and higher numbers. Moreover, 16.6666666...% repeating is hard to do math stuff with compared to the totally chill 12.5% offered by a d8. Regardless, all outcomes should more or less have the same chance of happening, which is what matters.

Same as before, we multiply the sides of our dice together.

6 X 8 = 48

This time you have a d6. That means that for each side of my die, there's 6 possible outcomes. If I roll a 7 or an 8, I win every time. Then from 6 and below it becomes possible for me to lose. So we can add that up like so:

6 + 6 + 5 + 4 + 3 + 2 + 1 + 0 = 27

And for you it's pretty much the exact opposite:

0 + 0 + 0 + 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 = 15

And then we tie on 6 rolls, which should account for our 48 rolls.

27/48 = 56.25% = my chance of winning

15/48 = 31.25% = your chance of winning

6/48 = 12.5% = the chance we tie

Now

We now know each dice's chances of beating another dice. But it gets a little interesting here because we aren't rolling these dice as sets. We're rolling both our dice at the same time and seeing who has the highest number. As an example, my first d8 might have been a 5, which was higher than the 4 you rolled, but you rolled a 6 on your d6 and my other die was a 1. So you would have won that. But at any given time, I'm only going to have one die that has my highest number, or two dice with an equal number. Ultimately, any of my dice has to compete with any of your dice. so the outcomes are:

My first d8 against your d8
My second d8 against your d8
My first d8 against your d6
My second d8 against your d6

Because there are so many d8s, this wasn't even really worth considering, since 50% of the contests are going to be like one of the two scenarios mentioned above. So that makes this part pretty simple. We're going to divide our %s in half and add them together. And in the end...

I have a (43.75% + 56.25%) ÷ 2 = 50.00% chance to win.

You have a (43.75% + 31.25%) ÷ 2 = 37.50% chance to win.

And we have a 12.5% chance to tie.

Tense and Perspective in Roleplaying

God I hate collabs

I try to actively avoid any kind of interior monologue and try to only ever use the surface-level actions of what my characters are doing, including facial expressions, because I know the other person is going to toss in an "I thought" somewhere in there and being inside of the headspace of two people feels so wrong to read.

@Ammokkx

This is pretty much why I try to collab one-on-one as much as possible, because most roleplayers aren't aware of this.

Though you can still make neutral observations. As an example, you don't have to write "Bill thought Abigail looked good tonight," as that is clearly inside of Bill's head. As soon as Abigail's player inner monologs about how she doesn't understand why Bill is standing so close we'll have two perspectives. You could instead go for "Everyone knew Bill was into Abigail, except Abigail herself." That type of description doesn't come across as being inside of Bill's head. It's just an observation from the narrator that could be made by anyone, even Abigail.

Calling all dice mathematicians

I'd be really curious to see how much % chance switching from a D6 to a D8 actually affects your chances though. Now you've got me looking up the system...

@Mae

The chance of landing on any side of an 8-sided dice is 12.5%. Therefor, you have a 25% chance of rolling something that is unattainable on a 6-sided dice, and a 37.5% chance to at least get something equal to the highest number on a 6. Compare that to a 0% or 16%-ish chance respectively. Or if you prefer a non % based representation of this in the real world, let's do number of times out of 24 since that's a number both 6 and 8 go into. If you rolled both dice 24 times, the d6 would give you a 6 only 4 times, where the d8 would give you a 6 or greater an astounding 9 times.

Another fun test, let's pretend you have "perfectly normal" luck and you'll always roll each side of the dice the same number of times. in 24 rolls, You'd roll every side of the d6 4 times which is (1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6) X 4 = 84. Meanwhile, with the 8 you would get each side 3 times for a total of (1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 7 + 8) X 3 = 108

Calling all dice mathematicians

Does rolling two of the same die and taking the higher result actually give you better odds of producing a higher result? This is what's really making my head spin.

@Clever Hans

Short answer: Rolling multiple die and taking the better result not only more frequently yields a higher result, it more consistently avoids lower rolls.

In the game you describe, you roll 2 dice, and you always take the die with the better result. If you were just rolling 1, you have a 1-out-of-6 chance to get a 6. This is easy to see, because all we need to do is count the number of sides on the dice, which will give us all our possible outcomes.

1,2,3,4,5,6

It gets trickier for two dice. Because to find every possible combination, we need to multiply this by the number of sides for each additional dice. 6 X 6 = 36, and all the combinations are as follows:

1/1,1/2,1/3,1/4,1/5,1/6,
2/1,2/2,2/3,2/4,2/5,2/6,
3/1,3/2,3/3,3/4,3/5,3/6,
4/1,4/2,4/3,4/4,4/5,4/6,
5/1,5/2,5/3,5/4,5/5,5/6,
6/1,6/2,6/3,6/4,6/5,6/6,

See? 36. If we rolled 3 6 sided die, we'd have 6 X 6 X 6 = 216 possible combinations. But we won't worry about that for now.

So going back to our possible outcomes for a single die, you can see that there's a 1-in-6 chance of getting a 1 or a 6. But when using 2 dice, it's clear things aren't quite so balanced. Statistically speaking, you have a 1-in-36 chance to get a 1 and a gnarly 11-in-36 chance to get a 6. Had you been rolling a single die, you'd roll a 6 6 times, almost half as frequently. And you'd have rolled 5 more 1s.

EDIT: should probably mention that the number of outcomes does not always equal the percent chance of getting a particular outcome. But in this case where all the dice have the same number of sides, each dice has the same % chance to land on any particular side.

Tense and Perspective in Roleplaying

I do not like to randomly change tense or perspective, and prefer to write everything in past tense from some variation of third person.

And in case anyone didn't know, there are (at least) three ways to handle third person. You've got omniscient, where the narrative knows everything that's going on, and limited, which tells the story primarily from a character's perspective or the narrator's perspective. I tend to prefer limited, and which type of limited depends on the character.

Tense just sounds better when it's past tense. But you're never writing exclusively in one tense because there will be times you need to explain when something is happening at the same time or how something correlates to things that have happened.

Lock down another finished RP.

It was messy at times, but we completed the RP. It only took 4 years.

If one of you lovely mods wouldn't mind putting a lock on this bad boy, it would be much appreciated.

Regardless of who locks it, I'll just give @Stormflyx a random ping for no reason whatsoever.

Darkest Before the Dawn: A CYOA Magical Girl Roleplay [Completed]

“Pen pen.”

— Aighorost

I wonder if Penny’s going to appear. It would kind of be a shame if we didn’t see her again until the event ends. I mean I assume they turned down a proper fight against me because they wanted her to appear again. Oh well…

---

L O S T I N T H O U G H T

@DarkwolfX37

Needless to say, Nuncio was a little concerned when the doll girl randomly didn’t trust him and stubbornly waited for Penny to come back. He probably would have stayed with her, but that was one hell of a retcon that he had no intention of introducing He instead focused on leading Shion out of the overcity.

Needless to say, the overcity wasn’t exactly a convenient place to navigate. When they came out they were several blocks from Sanctuary.

”So uh, bit of an intermission there.” Nuncio folded his arms. ”Ya was sayin somethin’ about leaving Penrose?” He sighed. ”I ain’t gunna lie. For Faith, for Sammy? I think it’s in all of our best interests we get the flock outta here.”

---

S P E C I A L N E E D S

@Ariamis

Su wouldn’t even have time to think of a response to Helga’s question before she was cut off.

”Seems we have other things to be concerned about.” Su yanked the bandages off of her head. ”There no reason we can’t help an ally of Penrose. Let’s see what we can do.” And with that, they ran for the portal.

---

V I C T O R Y T H R O U G H V I O L E N C E

@FamishedPants@Majoras End@twave

The pile of cradle agents detonated, and everyone was thrown away from Veronica.

”What’s this? Another foe invades Penrose?” She pointed at the portal. ”We should follow the rest of Maura’s agents!” She blazed a trail straight for the portal, followed by a scrambling Trixy.

Viridian, on the other hand, seemed content to stay behind.

---

P A T C H N O T E S

Hello Patrons!

Like we promised, we’ve finally rolled out the newest balance patch for Oros, and it’s a pretty significant one!

The biggest and most notable change is that Oros is no longer a monster girl! She has a new purified skin.

In terms of balance, we wanted Oros to seem more like Mika, so we removed a lot of her monsterous abilities. Her VIT, MAG, and LCK have all been reduced slightly. She’s also lost a lot of her unfair survival options, which allows her to feel pain and survive attacks that would cause her heart to stop beating. She can also no longer void step, and her ability to sniff out Mint and Beacon players has been entirely removed! We know Beacon players needed a lot of help, and we all breathed a sigh of relief to see that go.

But it’s not all bad news for Oros mains. Oros’s martial training lets her make use of non-magical weapons in her hammerspace, and her memory link lets her share her memories with others. We understand that players who enjoyed Oros’s beast like qualities might not like this change, but it does give utility and role play opportunities to those who wish to use her more cautiously. The dev team is a really big fan of frying pan => Shotgun => Memory Link(“We dated in an alternate universe”) => Endless Eclipse => M4 => AA-12 => Tentacles => Pool Fist Dash => Memory Link(“This Was Your Death”) => Headbut.

We’re happy with how she is, but we’ll be keeping an eye on Oros until the season ends. We’ll likely have to roll out one more patch for her before the Christmas event starts.

-The Riot Team