Dervish — Roleplayer Guild

Character sheet application review time!

If your character is in the needs adjustment column, don't fret! It's not a rejection pile, there's just a few things I think need to be addressed before I can accept the character as is. I've decided, against my better judgement, to try running a larger game with more people than I'm used to and seeing how it goes. Hopefully you guys are on board with that and are all a bunch of wonderful self-starting munchkins that makes life easy for Hellis and I!

Also, this is like the first time I've had a round of auditions where all of the submissions were actually pretty solid foundations for characters and I didn't have to reject anybody outright. It's a Christmas miracle!

Anyways, BEHOLD. I'm going to do some studying now and pretend I just didn't spend like 4 hours reading and reviewing character sheets.

You kind of created an impossible situation for Serena’s birth; the game takes place in 2176CE, and subtracting 28 brings that to 2148CE as her birth year; that’s 9 years prior to the First Contact War, aka the first time humanity encountered aliens. It’s impossible for Serena to have been born on Omega, especially since humans have no idea it exists at this point. It’s important to remember that humans are still really new to the galactic stage even by  the time ME1 rolls around, and a lot of colonists aren’t originally from those worlds.

So this kind of makes a lot of the early history in your CS kind of questionable because it implies her family’s been there for quite some time when that’s impossible, and if Serena wasn’t born on Omega, then her world view wouldn’t be shaped by how hard it is to make it by on there, and things like owing protection payments to the gangs and needing to escape from Omega wouldn’t really work out the way it’s written out now. 

One thing that needs to get some revision is Serena’s biotics; if she had no signs of having it, why would they test her for it? It seems like it’s kind of added on as an afterthought rather than something that’s a manifestation like it usually is. Maybe she always shown potential in biotics, but her family couldn’t afford to send her to be trained or fitted with implants but Eclipse had the resources ready to do such a thing? As stands right now, it kind of comes across as “oh, I guess she’s biotic as well” instead of being anything meaningful.

Other than that, the back story works and is quite workable with room for character growth! You lose points for blowing up a krogan, you monster. Other than those issues I pointed out, which should be somewhat easy to correct, most everything looks a-okay in my books.

While I don’t have an issue with her eventually building a mech, I don’t think I can let her start off with one just because of the logistics of trying to move something like that around off the bat and knowing it’s meaning to her, it’ll probably make more sense from a story perspective for her to be a project she’s dedicating herself to. As stands, there’s not a hell of a lot of room on the ship and space is at a premium, so transporting and loading/ unloading a giant pet project probably isn’t what anyone has in mind. 

Overall, not too shabby! You’ll really have to figure out another solution for Serena’s early years because the Omega angle simple is impossible as is.

Duuka actually works out pretty well as a character concept, although I would like if there was a bit more in his history after leaving Omega. Although I haven’t specified, the game will be starting off on Ilium, so it’ll be good to know how the little vorcha that could managed to afford his way off Omega and how he adapted to the Terminus Systems outside of that station. Overall, pretty darn good character, and I think he’d work out well in this setting. I imagine he’d be trying to keep in touch with Si?

Have fun with those god-awful vorcha speech patterns when you’re writing, though lol.

A question about her father, how did it go from her idolizing the man and adopting his philosophy and training as her compass to what sounds like loathing? I assume things happened over the next several decades before old age claimed him, but the way it’s written it literally happens over the course of a couple sentences. I’d kind of like to know exactly what their relationship was like past he’s the reason she learned her skills and morals and she came to resent him as a hypocrite for some unexplained reason. 

The whole “115 years a member” thing kind of threw me for a loop; a member of what, exactly? I pieced together that you mean to say that Tia joined Eclipse at some point, but it kind of came out of nowhere that she did so, and 115 years is a long time to skip over without at least some acknowledgement of how she got into the organization and what she did. One thing I will make mention of is well-organized gangs like Eclipse would not tolerate any of their members just straight up murdering other members of the gang, especially superior officers, even if she had some form of justification for it. 

The only reason Darth Vader got away with casually murdering Imperial officers who displeased him is because the only person he responded to was the Emperor. A somewhat successful member of Eclipse having a track record of casually discarding other members of the organization is going to set up some red flags and you can bet it wouldn’t stand. Imagine a member of Blackwater (real life private military contractor organization with a rather infamous history) decided to shoot his superior officer, he’d likely find himself arrested and tried for that murder. 

While we’re talking about a bunch of ruthless mercenaries that aren’t above killing civilians, they got their power through organization and efficiency. Insubordination and more or less treasonous behaviour would not sit well with them and she’d find herself the target of an execution squad sooner or later if they thought she was rogue, especially since a lot of her killings sound like it’s from really petty stuff like getting stiffed on pay, and even if a lot if it sounds like she’s trying to stop corruption in the gang’s interests, but ultimately it’s her word verses theirs. That’s not a stabilizing element, and you don’t exactly walk away from a group like that on bad terms without some kind of lingering fallout. Maybe I interpreted this wrong, but it honestly comes across as a lot of vigilante justice. I will give credit where it’s due and say that it’s refreshing that her rashness has had a lot of physical consequences. I think there’s definitely some good stories to be had with all of her scars.

You’ll have to clear that up before I can give the green light, but other than that, I think she works pretty decently.

Everything looks pretty good for the most part! Only thing I think need to be addressed is the bit around Kurd. The Citadel races are very hesitant to go after anyone in the Terminus Systems because if it’s found out there’s government operations going on in the Terminus Systems, it could lead to a galaxy-wide war. While I can’t see that stopping the asari if they had sufficient cause and intelligence, it would have to be someone that did something sufficiently terrible in Citadel space against asari interests for them to take action. It would have to be very clear that they’d be denying any and all involvement for the operatives they send, who can in no way represent the asari military. Another thing is that Lisal and Valiss seem like they’re approximately equals, and all they have to go off of for what happened is word of mouth. Even if they did find out about the civilian casualties, they’d probably punish both commandoes equally since it’s all word of mouth and they can’t do an investigation. Other than that, quite a good read!

Those pirates are almost as hardcore as my Boy Scout troop. Almost.

Everything looks pretty dandy, and as I mentioned over PM, the hidden bits of his bio are all a-okay to go. The character works on all levels, although I do have to ask if he went through some form of therapy and remediation after escaping the pirates because being forced into murdering your friends for the formative years of your life tends to leave a mark/ potentially fucks a kid up. I’d just like some form of acknowledgement that Vellios was acclimatized back into turian society and cleared with the doctors in the period between his rescue and conscription. While it’s true all turians serve the public in their conscription phase, not all of it is strictly military service, so they’d definitely want to make sure their recruits were all of a sound mind before enlisting.

More curiosity than anything, but I have to ask what the deal with the killer planet that killed Rena’s dad was. What exactly was the quarian interest in the planet, and why would they keep risking lives there? It doesn’t have as much to do with Rena in particular, but I kind of want to know what the deal with that place is!

It would also be kind of nice to know where abouts these locations are, since Planet and Space Station are about as generic descriptions as you can get in a sci-fi setting, and one corner of the galaxy is quite different from the next. It would really help if we had a sense of where Rena was, why she headed there, what she was looking for and so on. Also, if there could be some fleshing out for what business opportunity exactly caught her interest and lead to the shenanigans with the gang, because it just kind of seems like some weird one-off incident where she presumably kills the first people in her life without much fanfare and gets a sweet rifle out of the deal. Also keep in mind the stigma quarians face around the galaxy; they’re almost universally looked down on, so she’d probably be very cautious about who to trust and a lot of people would be trying to take advantage of someone like Rena.

It’s not a bad sheet, but I really don’t know much about Rena that can’t be summed up in a very non-descriptive paragraph. I don’t know much about her other than she apparently has remarkable shooting skills, is good with engines, is estranged from her mother, and somehow keeps finding odd jobs to line her pockets. This is something I’d prefer to see fleshed out more before committing to it.

OH HEY I KNOW HER. KEELA BITCH.

Also, no picking fights with the Blue Suns right off the hop, you sassy ass quarian.

Since this is a sheet I’ve reviewed for previous games and have played with the character, I can instead spend this time making fun of the suit rats in general. Also, I bet the inside of their suits are super stinky. Quarians are also known to be able to succeed in their pilgrimages by returning with bulk orders of duct tape.

Anyways, Kassy is wunderbar, as usual. I look forward to her and Tanya actually getting a chance to know each other this time around!

Seeing as you live with me, we already went through basically all of the critiques have been addressed before these fine people can read them. Way to be selfish, Tricky Dicky.

I also want to point out to any of the older people here, she had no idea Jorick was the name of one of the old regulars on this forum. I had a hearty laugh at this. 

Dex is a great character that shows another side to turian society I always had a fascination with and I think she will fit in great with the story and have some powerful motivations to keep her driven. Everything looks good! She’s a good representation of someone who can make the most of the slimy underworld of the Terminus Systems.

She also possesses what I am going to call a Craptical Cloak. That’s a win.

A thing to note about biotics is that signs of biotic potential would have manifested in an individual’s youth, so in Hazan’s case he would have exhibited signs of biotic potential before the conscription age of 15. From there, he wouldn’t have had a choice in his duties and would have been shipped off to the Cabals, which are basically turian biotic special forces and are widely distrusted throughout turian society because turians are a species that doesn’t trust special snowflakes that break the mold because they’re a bunch of wet blankets. If you want Haze to be a biotic, you’ll definitely have to make his background reflect that, because it will certainly change his life entirely. Being identified as biotic in turian society is like being told you have Force sensitivity in Star Wars, only instead of being sent to a nice and accepting Temple, you’re sent to a brutal boot camp run by a government that largely thinks of you as a useful mutation that only serves a singular purpose in society. Being a turian biotic is kind of a social stigma and it makes it hard to be accepted into polite turian society. Instead of a special treatment, it’s more of a curse. 

Similar problem as was brought up before with Valiss operating in the Terminus Systems is that C-Sec has no jurisdiction there, and if anyone were caught in an official capacity there, it could cause a galaxy-wide incident and instigate a potential war. Once people disappear into the Terminus Systems, there’s not much that can be done from a legal standpoint other than wait for them to come back to Council Space and then nail them. It would make more sense for him to be pursuing a vendetta rather than being sent on an assignment and deciding to leave because he found C-Sec stuffy.

It’s all stuff that’s pretty easy to work around, but lore wise, these are pretty serious points to consider that shouldn’t be too hard to adapt to make Haze work. Other than that, everything looks fine and dandy!

Your character image is broken, as a head’s up.

Also, your character description is kind of inadequate. I get batarians aren’t overly distinctive at a first glance, but there should be enough to go off of to make a character stand out so people aren’t picturing a generic bare-faced stock model with a Blue Sun’s tattoo. You gotta give us more to work with than that. I also think you might have used a wrong unit of measurement or a key was sticking, because I don’t think he’s going to weigh 5 or 6 pounds. 

Also a thing to note about the Blue Suns is that they tend to burn or otherwise remove their tattoos to cover their tracks on sensitive jobs or when they’re going places that aren’t in their control. It might not do for Khosin to go around with a Blue Suns marking, especially since it would invite a lot of trouble from people looking to take the Suns down a peg. The Suns wouldn’t take kindly to someone who isn’t one of their own any longer sporting their image, so that would be more fights on his hands.

The part about his life and what not in the Hegemony is good, but what exactly did the colonel have him do? It just kind of ends up as a loose end plot idea that has him leaving the military and going to Citadel Space to join the Blue Suns, which doesn’t make a lick of sense because they’re exclusively out in the Terminus Systems. The only reason you run into them in Mass Effect 3 is because there’s so many holes in security from the Reaper invasion that there’s a tolerance for these merc groups running amok. It would simply make more sense for him to start looking out in Omega or one of the more batarian-controlled spaces in the Terminus Systems for that kind of work. You should probably at least mention a name for the friend who recommended him and how they know each other in some capacity, because how would he know somebody in that organization if he was up until recently fully within batarian controlled space?

Get that all addressed and I think he’ll work out rather nicely as a character! I also want to add that in the brief time I’ve known you, your writing quality has improved and I’d have a hard time picking out English not being your first language. :D 

I will make mention that you should probably knock the powers down by one, and I’d recommend getting rid of submission net entirely if you’re having him roll around with a net launching weapon. As stands, he’s carrying 3 primary weapons, some specialty ones, and rolling around with 7 powers. It’s a bit on the overkill side of things.

Family of 8? SPACE CATHOLIIIIIICS!
Also, Shanxi= nothing good is going to happen to this family. On the plus side, Alex saves a shit load of money when Christmas comes around! You made it sound like her entire family was killed off; while it’s true the turians were rather brutal, they did occupy the world and from my recollections weren’t actively trying to wipe out the civilian population. I can’t imagine Alex lost her entire family in such a short conflict, so definitely elaborate on that one.

Also, props for using Jump Zero and BAaT in the character’s history, that’s something I don’t see come up very often and for characters living around this time, it’s kind of a big deal! I can tell you spent some time reading up about it and were one of the two people in the world who actually gave a shit about what Kaiden had to say. ;D

I do like that our characters have a common military service history. It’s going to be interesting to see how their experiences with Mindoir and lost family from the First Contact War end up being a touchstone for both of them. 

A minor thing, but the N7 Lancer is in fact still the Alliance standard service rifle until sometime after ME1, so she wouldn’t need to use her father’s rifle. As well, military issued equipment is just that. Alex wouldn’t be able to bring in a privately owned rifle to replace her current service rifle. Case in point, when I was in the army reserve, I always got issued the same rifle every time I went to the armoury and I certainly wasn’t allowed to bring in my own equipment. The army’s funny that way. 

Overall, I really like the sheet and think Alex is a great character! Johnny Bravo, hoo ha.

A pretty interesting family history and it definitely colours a sense of what shaped Marco’s formative years, and I know your sheet is a work in progress, but it really kind of feels half-finished. Almost all of the back story is about other people than Marco, and all I really know about him is that his family are a bunch of reclusive controllers, his sister and him are good cooks, he came out as gay, and he served in the Alliance for 8 years. Most of the stuff that directly pertains to him fits tidily into two paragraphs, tops. What did he do in the Alliance? Was he a cook there? Why did he start a restaurant to suddenly leave it to join a sketchy mercenary group? There’s no clear motivations or goals, and  it just seems like his combat training was largely tacked on as an after thought. What exactly is he going to contribute to a mission? What motivation did he have to leave his sister behind, along with a secure and potentially profitable life? There’s a lot that needs to be fleshed out here.

I’m glad to see you’re going with Aran again, he’s such a creative character that I know you can pull off, and I’m hoping that you stick around long enough to see his story reach its crescendo this time around. 
Since it’s a sheet I’ve gone over before, anything of issue has long since been addressed and reading it again just reaffirms that it’s good to go. I look forward to see how Turbo Timmahhhh takes on the galaxy and somehow avoids not getting mauled by the Blue Suns, because let’s face it, he’s kind of distinctive.

Another familiar face! The fact I’ve gone over this before for a previous game makes this really easy. I always really liked Iosef and was looking forward for him and Tanya to interact and share horror stories about what bags of dicks batarians are. Honestly, it’s a great sheet and character and you adapted it well so Iosef can start off on Ilium without a hitch. Nothing more to add than welcome back!

Duuka
Vallis
Vellios
Kasyra
Dexuret
Alex
Aran
Iosef

Serena
Tia
Rena
Hazan
Khosin
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