Letter Bee

Sup, Fellow Rpers?

<Snipped quote by Letter Bee>

Eyy, thanks! What a coincidence that we’re both Southeast Asians lol.

@Terry Bogard

Nice and cool!

Which part of ASEAN, btw? :P

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Era of Anarchy

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Era of Anarchy


Official Art for Gundam's 40th Anniversary

OOC Discussion Discord

I. Intro

Human Space has collapsed.

It has been 52 years since The Anarchy, where a combination of internal conflict, AI rebellion, and economic collapse led to the destruction of the rough framework of trade, commerce, and the free flow of information that had held Humanity's settlements and colonies together. Earth is divided, the Colonies are warring with each other, Mars is aloof, Venus' traders and executives want to profit, and Jupiter's kaleidoscope of squabbling factions wants to rule everything with an iron fist. Billions have already died, and 'only' millions dying yearly counts as progress towards peace.

Expectations have sunk that low.

Factions bicker over the remains.

Earth, the homeworld of Humanity, is still the source of legitimacy for whoever seeks to unite the species under one banner. For the most part, Earth and its people avoided the abuses of tyranny and control that were expected in other histories. They gave independence to the Colonies when requested, allotted Mars representation, gave Venus' entrpreneurs the chance to make money on equal terms, and as a reward, was spared the worst excesses of the Anarchy - Nothing was dropped on it from orbit, its academics and diplomats are respected, and its nations are careful not to raze each others' cities and thus destroy the prizes within.

But that just makes it a treasure to be seized, if not by a unifier, then from outside.

You can rise high.

In this anarchy, there is opportunity. The low can overthrow the high, the rich can become poor, and the ability to pilot a Mobile Suit, or even one of the legendary Gundams, can allow one to shape the tides of war, the processes of history, and the forces of social change.

You can be anything you want as long as there is room for you to rise. What you cannot be is a God, but below that are many things. Trader, Warlord, or a Lone Adventurer with a salvaged Gundam, you can be who you want to be... Or fail, die, and be forgotten - That can happen too!

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II. Region Descriptions in a Nutshell:

The Earth Sphere

Earth, Luna, and the Colonies around it are a religious and academic heartland, focused on the natural growth of Newtypes and technology that uses their unique skills. PC Factions based in the region are expected to use the Papal States, various University Towns, Switzerland, and the various Holy Sites of many religions as their inspiration and template along with the Universal Century and After War timelines. Technology and aestethic are a mix of Gundam UC and Gundam X, but nerfed; no Unicorn Gundams, Phenexes, Angel Halos, and the Gquuxx. Newtypes and Cyber-Newtypes exists but get a nerf to avoid the game-breaking power of Amuros and Banhagers.

That said, the Sattelite Cannon from X is a widespread technology and multiple D.O.M.E.s have been built in orbit above Earth, and Sattelite Cannons can brute-force through Nanolaminate, same for Solar Rays (Earth has Two). However, the Solar Rays are under GM NPC possession at the very start, yet can be acquired.

Mars

Mars is a militaristic, meritocratic, somewhat democratic... and semi-isolationist planet being forced to wake up to threats that are no longer afraid of its heavy weapons and armed populace. PC Factions based in the area are expected to take their inspiration from Sengoku and Tokugawa Japan, Wild West America, and yes, Gundam: IBO and Gundam G. Martian factions have IBO tech, only Nanolaminate works like it does in those videogames that do cross over Gundams from various settings - It can block anything below a Sattelite Cannon or Solar Ray. Also, the original Alaya-Vijyana exists on Mars, so the A-V System does not cause nerve damage or loss of control over the limbs.

Gundam Fights also exist like in Gundam G, but any Gundam G Tech is buried in secret vaults underneath the surface controlled by GM NPCs at the very start. There are rumors these include the Devil Gundam.

Venus

Venus, as hinted, is a center of commerce and a nexus of trade whose factions are mostly corporate and intent on making money, sometimes at the people's expense, other times deciding to treat their employees right in order to improve productivity, while a few busiensses are owned by the workers themselves who share profits. Player Factions based in the area have a lot of inspiration to draw on, whether the Venetians and Dutch and the Hanseatic League, or other examples of commercial powers with military might.

Venus-based factions have Gundam 00 Tech, minus the Innovators or any technology reliant on them, plus a smattering of IBO Urdr-Hunt tech, including Nanolaminate, as well as some models from Reconguista in G. GM NPC factions have the GN Drive and give low-cost access to the best FTL Communications in the setting to everyone who can pay... and their superweapon is the ability to cut off access to that. And yes, players can acquire those through their actions and their factions'.

Jupiter

Jupiter, or rather, the colonies and moons around it, has Gundam Wing technology, and enough Gundamium to make three dozen Gundams, plus a smattering of UC technology, ships, and models in addition to Neutron Jammers, Neutron Jammer Cancellers, and Neptune Systems from Gundam SEED. Also, Coordinators and Coordinator/Natural Hybrid children. Factions based in it can make whoever they want, whether peaceniks who believe in the power of love, flowery speeches, and music alongside a secret Mobile Suit Factory, or warlords who want to take over everything else, including Earth. Inspirations are Sengoku Era Japan, Warring States China, the Thirty Years War in Europe, the Christmas Truces in WW1, and of course, the Jupiter Empire in Crossbone and Teiwaz from Gundam IBO.

Oh, right, AI-controlled Mobile Armors like the Hashmal also exist, and they are joined by AI versions of UC-era MAs, such as the Elmeth, as well as AI Gundams, making them even more formidable.

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To prevent this RP from turning out like most Sandbox RPs before it, we will have multiple OOC Threads, one for the Earth Sphere, one for Mars, Venus, and the Asteroid Belt, and one for Jupiter, plus (if I can recruit them) a GM for each OOC thread under the watch of the Over-GM, aka me. There will be a 'Master OOC Thread' where all OCs will be archived, same for every major plot development, and which will also act as a 'Bulletin Board' for opportunities to advance your position like bounties, missions, and eventually, when an OC takes over Earth/Mars/Jupiter, a way to coordinate major warfare.

So, your thoughts and interest?

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Rules

1.) No godmodding, powerplaying, metagaming, etc.
2.) Keep it SFW outside of RPGuild PMs, please.
3.) No OOC feuding! If you must argue, be respectful. IC, meanwhile, you can hate each other as much as you like as long as it doesn't seep over to OOC.
4.) Please notify me if you will be gone longer than a few days. I myself will let you guys know if I will be gone.
5.) I reserve the right to control or kill off Custom Factions made by inactive players and control and write out (but not necessarily kill) OCs made by those inactive players.
6.) Custom Gundams, Ships, and Mobile Suits in general will be given extra scrutiny for overpoweredness. If they are overpowered, you must justify how you can pay for them, otherwise, they will degrade and become weaker over time without maintenance, new parts, new fuel, and un-updated antiviruses.
7.) At character creation, you cannot be a Newtype/Cyber-Newtype and a Coordinator plus the AV-System at the same time. You can, however, start as a Coordinator and 'Awaken' as a Newtype or get an AV-System in the IC itself, but this will take time, preferably IRL months spent working for that goal.
8.) All relationships between people of the same age group are allowed, whether homosexual or heterosexual, as long as it does not violate RPGuild Rules.

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Character Sheet

[b]Name:[/b] (Don't call yourself 'Zero' or 'The Red Comet'.)
[b]Appearance:[/b] (No IRL pictures)
[b]Age:[/b] (14 to 16 if a kid; older if you're an adult)
[b]Bio:[/b] (Backstory; at least one paragraph of four to five lines each - More is preferred.)
[b]Mundane Skills:[/b] (What is your OC good at?)
[b]Personality:[/b] (At least one paragraph of three to five lines each - More is preferred.)
[b]Are you a Newtype or Cyber-Newtype (Nerfed), Coordinator, or have the Alaya-Vijyana System implanted into your spine?[/b] (Type 'Y' or 'N'. If Y, you cannot be both a Newtype and a Coordinator, or have AVs at game start for balance reasons.)

Faction Sheet

[b]Faction Name:[/b] (Examples are: Orphan Mercenaries, Principality of Xeno, Generic Trade Guild)

[b]Faction Members:[/b] (What PCs are in your Faction?)

[b]Power Level:[/b] (Band of Bandits, Private Military Company, Major Warlord/Petty Dictator.)

[b]Numbers:[/b] (Larger than 15, smaller than 1000 unless you are a Major Warlord, in which case you can have 10,000 to 15,000 soldiers and five times that number of support staff/civilians.)

[b]Tech Level:[/b] (How good is your tech? Justify this in your history, but fair warning, you will have to work very hard to justify tech on the level of Anaheim Electronics or Celestial Being.)

[b]Location(s):[/b] (IRL Earth Locations or make up a location on another planet within reason and within the lore.)

[b]History:[/b] (Your Faction's History.)

Sup, Fellow Rpers?

@Terry Bogard, welcome!

Do You Have RP Pet Peeves?

Not sure if I ever brought up these points on my end:

Things GMs do/I've seen them do:
> Ignore (often significant) aspects of their own settings to hyperfocus/center attention on their character's personal matters. Like, maybe don't present an lore-filled fantasy/scifi environment just to play out a soap opera family drama. Really it's just the question of "why go through the process of setting up the lore and mechanics if those aspects aren't going to be meaningful in the grand scheme of things?
> Waiving the internal politics of their universe to enable their own (or select peoples' characters) while citing said politics to either deny or water down someone else's.
> In essence, wanting to be both ways about how they manage their RP. Establishing that everyone is on their own as far as creating plot points, yet policing how players pursue interactions between their characters and others; not having an official centralized storyline, yet more or less pulling people into their fold anyways.

Other Pet Peeves:
> People being salty because your post cuts in on a post they haven't even put up yet. I'm not sorry: if you haven't dropped your post in, then it's on you to either let people know what's up so they can hold off, or adjust your in-progress post accordingly.
> > In relation to above, not having an open, public plotting session so everyone involved can be on the same page with what everyone else in mind. Especially so in the absence of a unifying plot.
> Running multiple characters and either A) Only really giving attention to one or two of them, or B) Clumping all of them into the same IC circles/not extending into the different groups.

> In general, anyone or any character that uses Time-based powers/magic. Most of these characters bank on an idea that time is a material element, which, in application, creates an issue in terms of RPing rules. Most people apply such powers in the form of stopping/slowing the flow of time to halt or impede the world moving around them, and often don't elaborate on how Time in their context works... in itself, outside of a GM, this implies dictating the physics/metaphysics of the RP's universe to benefit the character/player, which can be problematic. To boot, the common applications of Time-based powers can be more appropriately/fairly achieved through means of Telekinesis and manipulations of momentum and/or kinetic energy. The alternatives are farm more amicable in the context of characters coming to blows, as most will be able to apply some skill or ability to work around such forces; in order to combat Time magic, you basically have to create a character specifically to combat it.

@IAmTheIsland

Yeah... I've undergone that sort of experience outside of RPGuild.

As for Time Powers/Magic... I will admit to having made OCs who use it, although I am starting to regret having given them that sort of power.

I use Discord as an OOC Plotting place, btw.

Digimon: Dawn's Glimmering (Dead)

Hale Koa Hotel, Hawaii

Cute Introvert, Andrew Starling thought as the scene around him narrowed down to this slightly older kid's face. Scared, traumatized, and it's going to take effort to try and form a bond with him, but all in all, kind; he won't take advantage of people unless pushed into doing so.

His smile grew as he held out his hand to shake, before saying, "My name's Andrew; Andrew Starling. What's your name, and wanna go to the buffet together?"

Whether the grey-eyed older teen clasped his hand or not, Andrew went to the buffet to get some rib-eye, a slab of grilled pork, copious amounts of honey chicken, and sizzled rack of lamb, and the vegetables his parents had always reminded him to eat. They passed by a tiny, brown-haired boy with slightly spiky hair who was making an improvised banana split, and Andrew couldn't help but point out, "Hey, there's a chocolate fountain at the very end of the dessert section; would that help?"

All the while, the rain and wind outside were intensifying, and flashes of lightning, accompanied by rumbles of thunder, could be seen through the windows and heard through the walls. Storms weren’t uncommon in Hawaii, and the staff were trained for that; Andrew was confident they’d got this handled, right?

The doors to the ballroom were the type to close on their own. Still, the boy couldn’t shake an uncharacteristic and subtle feeling of claustrophobia creeping in, perhaps because the situation was so unusual to begin with, and just got more off-putting as time went on without any explanation.

Suddenly, the lights went out. While there were some startled exclamations from the others, Andrew could no longer resist the urge to get up and head towards one of the Ballroom’s several double doors. He didn’t consciously justify the reason why he felt compelled to do so, but if nothing else, maybe getting some fresh air would help relieve the tension he was feeling?

Andrew Starling, pop star, felt his heart plummet as he realized the doors were locked. As he went to check another, then another, he concluded that this could only be some sort of terrorist attack. It was the only explanation he could think of that did not rely on the supernatural or paranormal, or aliens. Soon, very soon, the doors would reopen, and they may get gunned down by some sort of rogue who wanted everyone here to die -

Then he regained his determination; he was an example of what can be achieved when one seeks to look past their flaws and think clearly. This Ballroom was not exactly a death trap, after all, and there was some time before whatever mass shooter who set this trap came for them.

Andrew looked for the small boy first, prioritizing the youngest among them, but as he walked towards Nate, lighting the way with his smartphone’s torch function, that was when it crossed the border of what was normal.

He opened his mouth to scream, but by then, he and everyone else were already being sucked into the old computer on one of the tables as it lit up, and the flash of light, a swirl of colors, and complicated strings of pictograms and binary code, were the first, not the last, of the world-shattering things he saw.

The Field of Cars, File Island

Elecmon remembered the final battle, where ClavisAngemon and the other Royal Knights of Yggdrassil had led the Angelic Host to protect the Digital World from the Seven Demon Lords. Thousands of Angemon, including him, had been destroyed, some deleted permanently, others reborn in lesser forms like he was, in a future where the enemy had won, and the last foothold of the old ways was File Island, where ClavisAngemon and one last Angemon had preserved a neutral ground.

In time, he had become the guardian of the Village of Beginnings, telling stories of the old ways to new and reborn Digimon alike. But he had always yearned for the old days, and as time passed, and ClavisAngemon threw himself into arcane studies that did not yield any fruit, neglecting his duties to the last territory that held out against the Demon Lords, and letting Angemon act as his vizier and 'face'... the seed of resentment was planted and grew.

But even then, when his old friend, Dorumon, approached him from where he had been in hiding for the past twenty years, Elecmon was wary about his plan; Yggdrassil was insane, after all.

"Insanity does not have to last forever," his old friend had said as baby Digmon played around the village, enjoying the last of their innocence, "We can bring Yggdrassil back without his... obsessions. Besides, ClavisAngemon cannot keep out the Seven Demon Lords forever, not when he is obsessed himself."

Elecmon knew both were technically true; Yggdrassil can be resurrected, or rather, reformatted, to be a sane guardian of the Digital World. So his next words were, "Will you take care of the Village if I join your plan?"

Dorumon swore by his Master; that's how Elecmon knew that he could be trusted to keep that specific promise.

...And now, he was with Dorumon, in the Field of Cars, where a glowing hole in the sky was dropping a small squad of those people called Humans; children whose physical weakness was more than made up for by the emotional energies they generated, emotional energies that fed the Digital World and gave life to data.

Before they fully fell out, ClavisAngemon had said this before closing the gates to his castle and bidding him go back to the Village:

"This world isn't just data; it is a reflection of the emotional energies of Humanity, their 'cyberspace' mixed with genuine supernatural power. Both this world and the Real World, however, are merely parts of a larger collection of Planes and Worlds; a Multiverse, if you will. Do not desire to cross over or mingle with those who seek such; do not seek to bond with a Human for a selfish cause, or forever be an outlaw marked for death."

The Field of Cars, which was called that because the grassy, sandy landscape was strewn with duplicates of Human Cars; luxury cars, sports cars, taxis, police cars, middle-class cars, electric cars, and muscle cars, almost all of which were stuck vertically out of the ground like a strange forest of four-wheeled trees. It now saw new visitors; visitors dumped in a small square clearing of long, soft grass and sand that had been cleared of loose car parts.

There, he, Dorumon, and the other Digimon that the latter brought waited for them to get their bearings. They would then approach them and seal their bond once Dorumon gave them their Digivices...

OOC Notes

1.) No, ClavisAngemon is not canonically one of the Royal Knights. However, he is one in this RP.
2.) The above reveals that the main reason why the Royal Knights are not allowed to be player-controlled Digimon is because they are NPCs, not just Dorumon. Any of them that are dead are dead permanently, while any that are reborn or in hiding are, well, NPCs under GM control.

@Ryik@Aku the Samurai@TopGrail@Rune_Alchemist@Letter Bee@Duthguy@Crimson Flame@The Jest@Mike Dracopyra

Digimon: Dawn's Glimmering (Dead)

@The Jest, Approval 2/2.

Hello-New to this forum but not to roleplaying!

@deedeemcgee, welcome!

The Shmoopiest of Duders

@Shmoopsydude, welcome!

Accursed Tropes: The Last Airbender (Isekai; Fanfic Cliches infiltrating Canon, Lewascan gave me Permission)

Siku - Response

"I thought as much," General Iroh said. "Our world... Something changed, didn't it? It's more than the balance that is broken; the laws governing what should be... They've been bent."

Unalaq/Fake Aang laughed and said, "What should be?! A world where the Spirits don't get their due and are cut off from our material world? A world of loneliness and alienation hard to salve with wealth and power? We have different ideas of what should be."

The metaphorical mask had fallen off, and now, a fight was about to brew. But what about the village? Would it not be wrecked by a fight between Avatars, a Firebending Master, and a Firebender?

It also did not help that Unalaq/Fake Aang had decided that, "Very well, if Litle Siku won't join me, nor would Sokka, Katara, and anyone worth my time, then it's best to bury this place, then start anew!"

And the earth and water rose up, crushing half the village as the ground turned into a round wave of sludge and hurled itself at Siku and General Iroh; it was by some miracle that Gran Gran and the other villagers were not on that half of the village.

@Crimson Flame