Dervish

Humanity's Last Army

Taran Burke

Age

35

Species

Human

Sex

Male

Character Trait

Intrepid

Character Personality

A stoic man of considerable physical stature, Taran Burke is a man that is not unlike a large breed of dog; he’s confident in his strength, both physical and mental, that he doesn’t see the need to run his mouth and he serves as a calm and reassuring presence to his comrades in the thick of deployment. Possessing an iron will and the ever looming thought of what he stands to lose if he fails, Taran is a tenacious and loyal soldier that has been in the thick of the war for seven years now and he is determined to not only protect humanity’s home, but to drive the Bulwark back to their god-forsaken homework and turn it into an irradiated hellscape with the might of a nuclear arsenal.

A family man through and through, Taran’s a faithful man that has often worked on resource rich moons far away from his home on Mars due to the increasingly crippling prices of land and living expenses since the Fall and the sudden influx of the remnant of humanity from beyond the Local Cluster in the past century due to the Bulwark war, sending home what earnings he could to help keep a roof over the head of his wife and daughter, as well as his ailing father. They are the reason he fights, and why he left the well-paying fuel refineries of Titan to enlist.

Generally good natured, supportive, and easy-going, he is a man that lives in the moment and has long learned that you can’t change the past and there’s no sense worrying about the future because it hasn’t happened yet. He’s meticulous and rather handy with hand tools, skills devolved working with heavy refinery machinery and on the military’s exosuits, a program he was eager to quality for. In his downtime, he enjoys reading and working out to keep his body strong, a bi-product of having adapted to a life on Mars where the reduced gravity, about 1/3 of Earth’s, necessitated a steady stream of dietary supplements, far more protein than a Earthborn diet, and physical conditioning to keep the body from withering away. A millennia of colonization is not quite sufficient enough to undo several billion years of evolution, it turns out. Taran also is a fan of board games and has an interest in collecting rare earth minerals, geodes, and other geological fragments from across worlds, partially due to his career paths thus far and to keep an ongoing physical journal of sorts of all the places he’s been, as well as taking time to appreciate that in a civilization that always looks to the stars, there’s still beauty to be found just under your feet. It keeps him humble… and grounded.

Character Background

A Martian, Taran grew up in the Tharsis province, East of Olympus Mons where his ancestors were third wave colonists on the red planet centuries prior and had still had ample time to lay claim to what was once plentiful land. Having grown up in an enclosed and sealed city under a colossal dome to protect the colonists from the deadly radiation that Mars’ thin atmosphere didn’t filter out and the terraforming process still relatively early in its time table. Taran found more of an interest in the ground beneath his feet and helping take part in expanding the colony even at a young age, helping string up support structures as the large tunneling machines burrowed their way under the surface, giving the Martian cities a substantial underground system of tunnels, soon making a considerable chunk of the colony entirely subterranean. It wasn’t high paying work, but it helped his widowed and crippled veteran father Alistir make ends meet with the extra income, and it was steady and reliable.

That was, until Taran’s college girlfriend Brigid announced one day that she was pregnant. Head wheeling with the sudden news and the responsibility that came with it, Taran knew that he’d have to find work that paid more than what he’d be earning with his current level of occupation. Going to Earth was out of the question; completely overpopulated and not exactly a safe haven for people looking for work, Taran soon signed up for a Titan-based fuel conglomerate’s workforce. Having made claims to 30% of Titan’s surface on account of being the first company to have reached the fuel-rich moon, Kronos Petroleum was arguably one of the most well-off companies in the entire system; their only issue was finding workers willing to do long stretches at such a remote and inhospitable location. As a result, recruiting drives were prevalent on the crowded worlds, and those looking to make a lot of money in a short amount of time couldn’t ask for a better opportunity. Taran sure couldn’t.

Spending the better part of a decade working for KP, working 4 months on, 2 months on leave, Taran was keeping his family’s finances in order and even saving a little extra to make sure they could afford to move somewhere nicer. He became specialized in Exorigs, working with only a few centimeters of protection between himself and the hostile Titan atmosphere, performing equipment repairs and troubleshooting issues with the pumps, robotics, and drills that were essential for the operation on the moon. However, there was always a nagging feeling about the state of the galaxy, and he’d begun to have infrequent nightmares about the Bulwark; sometimes he’d return home and find his family slaughtered, or he’d be working out on Titan and being helpless as the enemy descended upon him. After years of deliberation and trying to justify the decision and the substantial reduction in pay, Taran enlisted and after completing the requisite training, was transferred to the 588th Defensive Army. As he soon discovered, the enemy is just as horrible as his nightmares suggested, and every day spent fighting them is another day his daughter gets to grow up.

Curio

Pocket-sized photo album, his mineral collection.

Appearance

One a lean but strong man due to Mars’ gravity, the 588th’s training regimen and simulated Earth gravity aboard ships, bases, and Krono Petroleum’s outposts has allowed Taran to bulk out considerably, taking full advantage of his 6’04” frame and weighing in about 230 pounds. He is physically powerful and robust, although rather pale due to a lifetime largely not being exposed to direct sunlight, and his pale blonde hair is almost verging on grey, giving him somewhat of a ghostly visage, an image only assisted by his hawk-beak like nose and broad, square jaw and dominant cheekbones. In addition, Taran has a number of burns and scars that have been earned through both the dangerous work conditions on Titan where the planet’s methane atmosphere was all too easy to cause flash ignitions and from the vigors of combat.

Taran has a prominent brow, giving him a somewhat perpetual look of concentration of skepticism, and his slate-grey eyes are only a few shades removed from his hair colour. Despite his harsh and somewhat severe appearance that makes him look older than he actually is, there is a kindness in his eyes, giving him an air not unlike an old sailor from folklore of centuries long gone.

Humanity's Last Army

<Snipped quote by Dervish>

Hot damn dude, I'm gonna have to step up my game; Get him into the character tab.

@Roughdragon1

Aye aye cap'n!

I usually write a lot more in depth character sheets, but I kinda wanted to keep in line with everyone else, and it's kind of nice being able to whip something up in a couple hours haha.

Humanity's Last Army

Taran Burke

Age

35

Species

Human

Sex

Male

Character Trait

Intrepid

Character Personality

A stoic man of considerable physical stature, Taran Burke is a man that is not unlike a large breed of dog; he’s confident in his strength, both physical and mental, that he doesn’t see the need to run his mouth and he serves as a calm and reassuring presence to his comrades in the thick of deployment. Possessing an iron will and the ever looming thought of what he stands to lose if he fails, Taran is a tenacious and loyal soldier that has been in the thick of the war for seven years now and he is determined to not only protect humanity’s home, but to drive the Bulwark back to their god-forsaken homework and turn it into an irradiated hellscape with the might of a nuclear arsenal.

A family man through and through, Taran’s a faithful man that has often worked on resource rich moons far away from his home on Mars due to the increasingly crippling prices of land and living expenses since the Fall and the sudden influx of the remnant of humanity from beyond the Local Cluster in the past century due to the Bulwark war, sending home what earnings he could to help keep a roof over the head of his wife and daughter, as well as his ailing father. They are the reason he fights, and why he left the well-paying fuel refineries of Titan to enlist.

Generally good natured, supportive, and easy-going, he is a man that lives in the moment and has long learned that you can’t change the past and there’s no sense worrying about the future because it hasn’t happened yet. He’s meticulous and rather handy with hand tools, skills devolved working with heavy refinery machinery and on the military’s exosuits, a program he was eager to quality for. In his downtime, he enjoys reading and working out to keep his body strong, a bi-product of having adapted to a life on Mars where the reduced gravity, about 1/3 of Earth’s, necessitated a steady stream of dietary supplements, far more protein than a Earthborn diet, and physical conditioning to keep the body from withering away. A millennia of colonization is not quite sufficient enough to undo several billion years of evolution, it turns out. Taran also is a fan of board games and has an interest in collecting rare earth minerals, geodes, and other geological fragments from across worlds, partially due to his career paths thus far and to keep an ongoing physical journal of sorts of all the places he’s been, as well as taking time to appreciate that in a civilization that always looks to the stars, there’s still beauty to be found just under your feet. It keeps him humble… and grounded.

Character Background

A Martian, Taran grew up in the Tharsis province, East of Olympus Mons where his ancestors were third wave colonists on the red planet centuries prior and had still had ample time to lay claim to what was once plentiful land. Having grown up in an enclosed and sealed city under a colossal dome to protect the colonists from the deadly radiation that Mars’ thin atmosphere didn’t filter out and the terraforming process still relatively early in its time table, Taran found more of an interest in the ground beneath his feet and helping take part in expanding the colony even at a young age, helping string up support structures as the large tunneling machines burrowed their way under the surface, giving the Martian cities a substantial underground system of tunnels, soon making a considerable chunk of the colony entirely subterranean. It wasn’t high paying work, but it helped his widowed and crippled veteran father Alistir make ends meet with the extra income, and it was steady and reliable.

That was, until Taran’s college girlfriend Brigid announced one day that she was pregnant. Head wheeling with the sudden news and the responsibility that came with it, Taran knew that he’d have to find work that paid more than what he’d be earning with his current level of occupation. Going to Earth was out of the question; completely overpopulated and not exactly a safe haven for people looking for work, Taran soon signed up for a Titan-based fuel conglomerate’s workforce. Having made claims to 30% of Titan’s surface on account of being the first company to have reached the fuel-rich moon, Kronos Petroleum was arguably one of the most well-off companies in the entire system; their only issue was finding workers willing to do long stretches at such a remote and inhospitable location. As a result, recruiting drives were prevalent on the crowded worlds, and those looking to make a lot of money in a short amount of time couldn’t ask for a better opportunity. Taran sure couldn’t.

Spending the better part of a decade working for KP, working 4 months on, 2 months on leave, Taran was keeping his family’s finances in order and even saving a little extra to make sure they could afford to move somewhere nicer. He became specialized in Exorigs, working with only a few centimeters of protection between himself and the hostile Titan atmosphere, performing equipment repairs and troubleshooting issues with the pumps, robotics, and drills that were essential for the operation on the moon. However, there was always a nagging feeling about the state of the galaxy, and he’d begun to have infrequent nightmares about the Bulwark; sometimes he’d return home and find his family slaughtered, or he’d be working out on Titan and being helpless as the enemy descended upon him. After years of deliberation and trying to justify the decision and the substantial reduction in pay, Taran enlisted and after completing the requisite training, was transferred to the 588th Defensive Army. As he soon discovered, the enemy is just as horrible as his nightmares suggested, and every day spent fighting them is another day his daughter gets to grow up.

Curio

Pocket-sized photo album, his mineral collection.

Appearance

One a lean but strong man due to Mars’ gravity, the 588th’s training regimen and simulated Earth gravity aboard ships, bases, and Krono Petroleum’s outposts has allowed Taran to bulk out considerably, taking full advantage of his 6’04” frame and weighing in about 230 pounds. He is physically powerful and robust, although rather pale due to a lifetime largely not being exposed to direct sunlight, and his pale blonde hair is almost verging on grey, giving him somewhat of a ghostly visage, an image only assisted by his hawk-beak like nose and broad, square jaw and dominant cheekbones, in addition to a number of burns and scars that have been earned through both the dangerous work conditions on Titan where the planet’s methane atmosphere was all too easy to cause flash ignitions and from the vigors of combat.

Taran has a prominent brow, giving him a somewhat perpetual look of concentration of skepticism, and his slate-grey eyes are only a few shades removed from his hair colour. Despite his harsh and somewhat severe appearance that makes him look older than he actually is, there is a kindness in his eyes, giving him an air not unlike an old sailor from folklore of centuries long gone.

Humanity's Last Army

Red 1, standing by.

@Corporal Lance

Red October standing by.

And hallo!

My CS is going to be a few paragraphs; I kind of like fleshing them out.

Humanity's Last Army

@Roughdragon1 Perfecto! I'm flexible, I am more than happy to work with the framework you've set out, including a sort of progression of available tech as missions go on.

Straws and spitballs conquor nations.

Humanity's Last Army

This actually sounds super rad and kind of conveniently plays into an idea I had for this level of sci-fi technology.

How do you feel about stuff similar to MAX suits from Planet Wars 2, or the power armour from Fallout? I was envisioning something like an exosuit that acts as kind of a platoon heavy weapons platform with different hard point attachments for various weapon configurations and the mechanical nature of the suit lets it carry ample weight, making engineering applications invaluable or breaking through hard cover like concrete. A weapon idea I was toying with is kind of like that rotory twin tubed rocket launcher from Halo, except it goes between a minigun and a scatter gun.

Obviously, like any piece of equipment, it needs to be maintained and fueled up on the regular and it would give off a similar radar or IR signature to a light utility vehicle and while it would ofger a lot of protection against small arms fire, heavy weapons would absolutely be a nightmare for it. Also in case of suit failure or emergency, it can be evacuated relatively quickly and have a carbine kept in an external panel for the driver, as well as have the option to have cargo containers attached to the attachment points so it can carry a lot of a squad's equipment on marches or supplies in general.

One advantage it would have over conventional infantry is that it can be dropped from low altitude without the need for rapel lines so it can be deployed to secure landing zones for the platoon under fire.

Regardless! I am totally going to work on something because it's been a while since I've done am original sci-fi kinda game.

The Elder Scrolls: Fruits of Contention - Chapter 1 (Completed)

I apologize for waiting so long to come to this decision, but I realize that I likely won't be more than a hindrance to the RP in the coming months, and therefore find I need to take my leave. As long as I'm living with my family, I will have very little control over my schedule, and because of these circumstances lack the motivation to be a member of an active group roleplay as advanced as this. Thank you all for giving me a chance to participate, and for the time I was able to be active, I enjoyed getting to write with you. I'm sorry for any inconveniences I've caused due to my inactivity, and would like to keep from creating any more.

@Graviloquence

Sorry to see you go but I totally get it! Sorry life's being a giant shitfest, but you know where to find me!

Does anybody want to do a Skyrim roleplay?

Late to the party, but I could try to give you feedback, but the TL;DR is that interest checks and OOCs are kind of like job postings in a sense, you have to look like you know what you're doing, provide details on things like the plot, what the player characters should be, world info, rules, etc. If a game just looks slapped together and barely touches on any information, it's going to steer people away. You have to make it look presentable and do some formatting, graphics also help, and overall make the game look like it's worth people's time and that you as a GM will be able to run it competently.

Like you said, Skyrim is a pretty popular game series. There's usually a handful of TES roleplays going at any given time, so you need to stand out from the pack.

Hi, I'm BACK!

Hey! Been a longass time!

Mass Effect: Borealis

The days passed by somewhat quickly, the preparation for assignments always taking up most the day. Despite not having more than a few idle chats with people in that time, there was a sense of community and purpose that had persisted amongst the Jury Riggers that had survived the clusterfuck on Virmire. Even encounters with Vellios didn’t seem so forced since Tanya and him and had their heart-to-heart following the unfortunate incident that threatened to throw everything to the wolves. For once, everything seemed to be somewhat okay, and the people she lived with and worked with were starting to become friends and develop legitimate feelings for one another. Everyone was on board with helping Drono get better. There was no financial payoff here, no bounty to be claimed. It was because someone they cared about was in need, and it was enough.

Still, despite all of this, Tanya had the memorial service lingering in her mind, mentally crunching numbers to see if the team would be able to make it to Terra Nova in time or if she’d have to find her own way with the intention of meeting up later. A picture frame of her father sat on the table next to her terminal, Eric Carson’s smile and crisp uniform a constant source of reassurance and comfort throughout her ears of self-imposed exile. Did Belle Carson even think about her estranged daughter? What was she up to these days? Tanya always thought she’d go back to Earth to reconnect with family there, but after close to 30 years, how could one just go back to another world and hope to pick up where you left off? Terra Nova was home, just not the one Belle was hoping for. Her husband killed, her daughter a traumatized wreck who needed support more than ever… all of it was just too much for Belle to handle. She lost her shit and forced Tanya out of her home, which she recalled was becoming quite run down and dishevelled as time went on. Her mother needed somebody, but she sure as hell didn’t want it from a daughter that reminded her that the Systems Alliance cost her a husband and a daughter. Would she even be at the memorial? Would she acknowledge Tanya, try to make amends? There were a lot of unanswered, supremely anxious questions that had no answers.

A hard drink of whiskey helped quell them, for now.

Focusing on the matter at hand, Tanya had a pair of blue coveralls that were of a similar shade, but different trim and manufacture than what she’d seen from pictures on the Extranet of what the service workers on Lafayette wore, and she noticed that headwear was decidedly non-standardized, so a black patrol cap seemed to be the order of the day, which wasn’t unheard of in remote former Alliance territories as casual headwear. A hard hat was a hard hat, and she definitely had a couple of those kicking around. Twirling casually between her fingers was the fake identity chit that she’d had for a few years since the electronics warfare specialist of her platoon back in the 63rd, Vasquez, pulled some strings and managed to make some authentic-seeming fake IDs for everyone for when it came time for shore leave and making sure that none of the platoon’s shenanigans managed to make it back up to their superiors. She’d used it a few times, having it modified twice now with her fake alias, Veronica Piers, just with a few credentials changed from time to time. She’d passed it on to Dex to make some further modifications that she was a contractor for Sword & Shield Electrical, one of the civilian contractor companies on Lafayette that helped keep the infrastructure maintained, and it was easy enough to access the company’s online webpage and have Dex hack into the host’s server to made some edits to the employee page so “Veronica’s” name would pop up, as well as a carefully planted picture or two on the site that didn’t show her face, but definitely would passed muster if someone looked it up.

Tanya just hoped that the company itself didn’t regularly check on their own IP.

A plan in motion, Tanya kept working on her end of things until Iosif made an announcement on intercom that they were on the approach to the station. Heading up to the bridge, Tanya leaned on the back of Iosif’s seat to look out through the view port at the station. It was familiar, in an Alliance sort of way, but a lot of work had evidentially been done to it to expand its size and shipping capacity, which was way more than anywhere out in the middle of nowhere had the right to be. She studied the Eclipse vessels, patrolling like sentinels around the station and the system for signs of trouble. The dark yellow paintjob and familiar black sun logo were visible on all of them; they definitely weren’t trying to keep a low profile. Everything about the Eclipse presence portrayed a dominating confidence that they were the unchallenged masters of this system, unlike Omega where threats existed from a number of rival factions that were eager to take what they had. On Lafayette, however, they seemed more than eager to boast their strength to intimidate troublemakers or to give themselves a more impressive profile for prospective clients and recruits.

After being granted docking permission, Iosif took the Borealis into the assigned docking space and the mission began in earnest. Giving the others a chance to disembark first, Tanya slipped out when she figured eyes would be off of the ship and with a tool bag strapped over her shoulder and an armful of emergency pylons, Tanya walked to one of the more secluded looking maintenance hatches that was obviously watched over by security feeds and the LOKI mechs. What she was counting on was her casual body language and faked credentials to sate the mechs and any of the Eclipse members who were checking cameras today. She rather hoped they were lazy and not paying close attention to the monitors. Setting four pylons on each corner of the hatch, Tanya managed to open the lock with her omni-tool when predictably, one of the LOKI mechs came marching over.

<Identification please.> The mech stated in a feminine and dull voice.

Tanya handed over her faked identity chit for inspection, clenching her teeth as the mech scanned the chit, evidentially satisfied with the credentials. <Welcome, Ms. Piers. This intrusion into the maintenance tunnels is not logged on my systems. Elaborate.> it commanded.

”Certainly. S&S has noticed a 14% increase in false positives for intrusion alarms in the service corridors and we want to check to make sure that something wasn’t smuggled on the station that’s been eating at the wires and that all the terminals are properly connected. Curtis Myers, my foreman, lost the master key that I programmed shortly after I left the station for vacation and I was called back. With what Eclipse is paying us, we didn’t want to let this slide, and we didn’t want them to catch wind that their contractor has been leaving loopholes open.” she explained to the mech.

<Acknowledged. Event logged for review. Proceed, Ms. Piers, and have a safe and productive day.> the mech said, turning on a dime and marching back to its position. Tanya slipped into the hatch and closed it above her, locking the mechanism from within. After making her way down the tunnel, her omni-tool lit up and began tracing the signal carrying wires until she eventually came to the first service terminal. The team’s voice comms were recorded into text files for her to read at her leisure, and she mentally took note of who already made their passage through customs. She keyed her own voice comms.

”Hello boys and girls, your favorite techie has found her way into the bowels of the station and given enough time and get into just about any of the station’s non-essential functions from these terminals down here. Only things I can’t do much about are Eclipse tech since its on its own network, but I can at least get you into the door and disengage alarm callouts, open and close doors, and isolate problematic things like patrolling mechs if you guys need it. My access has been logged by one of the LOKIs, so I say we have a good half hour, forty minutes before someone reviews the log at worst, a couple hours at best unless someone can access the mech’s database or individually hack into LOKI unit 423-A.” she said, recalling the serial number imprinted on the mech’s breastplate. Given that the LOKI units were being used as pseudo law enforcement, the public needed a way to identify the mechs they interacted with. ”How are we looking?” she asked everyone.