Terminal

Legend of the Silver Legion Redux (Open)

- The Conceit of Prophecy -

A bardic song thought to have been written during the closing days of the Era of Heroes, during the life of the Prophetess. The written score and lyrics were discovered within a subterranean barrow in the Republic of Vitium. According to notation accompanying the score, it was written by an individual who identified themselves as a 'Questor of Matathran,' no such land or region is known to have ever existed in Askor, and likewise
no such title or profession is known to have ever existed.

The song is intended to be played on a six-stringed lute in (quite unusually) Aeolian Mode, with notation indicating the piece's nature as tavern or campfire music. The lyrics are written in a mocking and derisive tone and as though addressed to a specific, individual, unknown listener. Contemporary scholars theorize the piece to be a form of political commentary, and agree that although the notion of Prophecy features prominently within the song's topic, the Prophetess is likely not the song's subject or intended recipient - further confusing the possible date the original score may have been written.

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Let it never be said you were not warned,
Let it never be said they did not keep their word.
Here you lie, lain low and torn,
Still ignorant of what you heard.

You were warned there would be death,
But why heed the conceit of prophecy?
And yet alas you take your final breath
Perhaps the prophet knew better than thee.

Your death was not a natural thing,
No native fit of age or fear.
Hear the lornful calls of your own house,
Who cry the prophecy's conceit was dear.

The prophet spoke to thee of bravery,
Of how brazenly you bore
Your coward's heart upon thy sleeve,
That your doom was hence assured.
For how could such a witless heel
Shore up a crumbling world?

You were warned there would be death,
But why heed the conceit of prophecy?
And yet alas you take your final breath
Perhaps they knew better than thee.

And who was this loon,
This dire fool,
Who foresaw an end that loomed?
What conceit did the prophet bear,
To think that their word was dear?

Did you think fate might be denied,
Confusing indolence for favor?
Did you think your choice was mercy,
That you could steer the tides of nature?
Did you think your life was hale,
Whilst your form became as vapor?

You were warned there would be death,
But why heed the conceit of prophecy?
And yet alas you take your final breath
Perhaps they knew better than thee.

Now your works are but tattered dreams;
Your only legacy is their own word complete.
A coward you are, with your coward's reward,
While the prophet's joy is now replete.

Do not protest or beg of no fault of your own,
For no poison was sowed, no enemies known,
You ripped out the roots beneath your own lands,
And your neighbors decry the work of your hands.
The land was hearty and ripe for the harvest,
But all the fruits of your labor were trod on and tarnished.
Without cultivation endeavored with care,
The growth of the land withered and vanished,
Under your coward's hand and your coward's stare.

You were warned there would be death,
But why heed the conceit of prophecy?
And yet alas you take your final breath
Perhaps they knew better than thee.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

Tracy Guiomar

That shady nervous guy.

"I do not have the time or nerves for your drama right this second, ok?"

Tracy

Name: Tracy Guiomar
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Occupation: Busybody

Description

Tracy stands approximately 1.77 meters or 5'10 feet tall. His complexion is pale, his build is lanky and emaciated, and he wears very worn clothing with holes in a few places. His hair is mud-brown and scraggly, falling down to his shoulders and poorly kept. His face is bony, and while there are hints of what might have once been handsome, fox-like features, his skin now hangs drawn taut across his skull. He is gaunt and possesses a sickly pallor. Readily identified by the off-color blue duffel-bag always slung around his shoulder, it is easy to identify Tracy as indigent or homeless at first or fifteenth glance.

Cyberware: Absolute nothing. Tracy is pure flesh and bone, so it would seem.
Equipment: Nothing but the clothes on his back and a duffle-bag filled with more clothes. He does not even carry a wallet. The nerve of this guy.

Background & Notes

You have not the faintest idea what this guy's history is. He seems vaguely familiar for some reason, although you cannot quite put your finger on why. Searching for his name turns up nothing. He claims to have been an informant for Lieutenant Davidson, although he does not seem to actually know anything about the Lieutenant and seems hard-pressed to even describe the man when pressed, and nobody else in the department seems to have known him.

Despite practically being a non-person, he seems rather resourceful. He seems to breath corporate policy and legalese when it's convenient, he knows an awful lot of people (who have never seen or met him before), and he seems rather familiar with the streets and slums of Night City. His normal demeanor is most generously described as vigilant and most accurately described as paranoid and twitchy, not to mention oddly desperate, but on occasion he is capable of bluffing his way past security checkpoints and into gang hideouts (he claims that he has theatrical education and once aspired to be a thespian, though you are not sure you believe that).

He has no formal training or any kind of combat experience that you are aware of, and his nervous disposition makes something of a boot-licker out of him whenever his acting fails him. He fights like a snake - that is to say, only when cornered and he prefers to wound and flee rather than stick around and tough it out. His twitchiness also seems to be indicative of some unusually amped-up reflexes, right on the cusp of what somebody with wiring might have. It is dangerous to startle or panic him, but he is not really threatening in a fight.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

I will have something for you all soon.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

No, I was under the impression it was a setting lore document. Disregard, as you were.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

I am all the willing to manage those things as they come, @Hekazu. All I would ask is that if anyone has lore they wish to add to the document, that they please inform me as soon as possible. I say this so I can prioritize getting universal understanding about it out with the reference portion. Assuming you choose someone else, I strongly recommend they begin on such a project for all our sake.

@The Harbinger of Ferocity

Could I get a link to the document as well, for viewing purposes? For those of us without access to the RPG Discord Server.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

While the idea is thematically apt, what possible motive could an AI have to be involved with Davidson missing? It might be better for a future character idea, but for an initial character it seems somewhat removed.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

My present idea for a character is a twitchy, anxiety-prone bean-counter who claims to have been one of the Detective's 'little helpers.' Extremely jumpy and always looking over their shoulder. Knows more than than should. Useful at times, but untrusting and obviously has a different agenda than anyone else. They will have a lot of utility oriented skills, a fast mouth, and a silver tongue (whenever they are not about to swallow it).

Character sheet pending.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

I also like the sound of his status being unknown, not only does it service the existence of multiple parties, but with his fate unknown it encourages people to only (initially) submit characters interested in the investigation itself. Sort of hard to introduce big cats when the stakes are so nebulous. This should let everyone get a feel for the setting and brainstorm about how they want the world to develop.

On that note, do we have an intended start date, or maybe some templates to work with? As to the latter, if we do not I could whip one up for everyone to use.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

I personally am for smacking down power creep where it raises its head. Of course we are investing tremendous trust in one another already, but even trusted persons can and do prove unreliable. I believe the main issue with it is, is that when one starts to do it, many others like to follow suit. While this is only natural, you see it in most free form styled roleplays where each successive character in any sort of combat or potential player conflict game exists, it is not in our collective best interest. This is why I am saying we should utterly eschew that and leave it squarely in the realm of non-player character territory, mainly because it takes the power from one set of hands and lays all members' on it.

A player might have a collective set of non-player characters they assume and associate with for their play style, but that being their character to the point they benefit from the usual graces? It reduces that level. Call me skeptical, as my experience has taught me to trust no one in any semblance even close to that of actual trust, so dividing and eliminating potential issue is for the best. I simply do not think under any circumstances players should be anything close to mid tier importance on average and perhaps one, maybe two, edge that way.

@The Harbinger of Ferocity

That outlook unnecessarily constrains the scope of the story, especially since there is no GM to supply the perspective of such important individuals. This project on its own already requires a great deal of implicit trust in other posts; if you are not even going to trust them to write for more 'powerful/influential/wealthy' individuals as a matter of principle, you may as well just rebrand the RP into Slum Wars. Permitting for such characters to exist as NPCs that anyone can use is also unnecessarily restrictive; I do not know about you but I personally will simply never write for such a character since I did not have a hand in their creation and I will never know anything about the crucial aspects of their being necessary to write for them with high-fidelity, especially as other posters write for them as well. It creates conflicts and uncertainty. Such NPCs can exist of course, but to completely prohibit the existence of 'powerful' (however you define it) poster-exclusive characters is simply counter-productive.

Think of it from a narrative perspective of well. In the Neuromancer setting, both the trash and the most powerful individuals in the setting co-mingle to an extent, and even the Megacorportions, with nigh-unlimited power, are forced to rely on rather than combat the less powerful and influential characters in the setting for various reasons. The world has grown too complex and vast to be suppressed and run like a corporate farm.

And while the *temptation* to respond to power-gaming with more power-gaming always exists, that usually, again, exists under the purview of a GM-Review environment where posters can poke and prod at the GM's specific, personal boundaries to see what they can get away with. Here, that should not be an issue since if even one of us has a problem with something, they can raise it and present the full reasoning and logic behind their viewpoint on the matter with the expectation that the claim will be taken seriously. The appropriate response to power-gaming is not to break the setting further, but to correct the error.

So I must, again, respectfully disagree. Posters should be permitted to create character and organizations at any and every level of power, influence, wealth, and expertise. The setting itself and communal oversight by peers is sufficient deterrence, in my opinion, to preempt and oust most instances of power and metagaming.

Printed guns, melded metal - An experimental GM-less Cyberpunk RP

I would say so long as it is clear there is no one master corporation, there should not be too much issue from players introducing themes relating to them. There are surely some megacorporations of course, ones that are the real titans, but a gambit of everything vying for those upper tendrils of power and niche roles should be fine. Generally the only thing I would urge us all to stay far away from is power creep of any sort, say any of our characters being more, if involved in a corporation of course alike anything else, being mid-level at best. Not an executive, but a supervisor or manager; a boss, but not one the bosses. Likewise, a gang enforcer but not the criminal leader, a police sergeant or detective, but not the captain, so on and so forth.

@The Harbinger of Ferocity

While I agree that some amount of role discretion is necessary, I think that the nature of the setting itself is a sufficient deterrent to abuse.

Let's think, hypothetically about the actual power a Megacorporation has. One of the big players - not the only one, like you said, possibly one of a dozen or so. Its board probably wields immeasurable, inscrutable power and influence. They probably have their own private army. They probably outright own parts of the actual government due to personal connections and money. They probably have access to mountains of the latest military equipment. They probably have their own super-soldier programs, etcetera.

There is, however, a bit of a problem: Even they cannot do as they please. At least, not in Night City, where the slums are combat zones. If even a megacorporation wants to push its agenda, they are not going to be able to do so without a fight. The gangs, the people, the other corporations big and small - will push back to an equal and opposite degree.

I say we embrace the freedom permitted by the nature of the RP and employ *just a tiny bit* of trust in our fellow writers to exercise discretion and prevent power creep. If it happens anyway, the rest of us are here to keep them in check. Power creep, metagaming, godmoding, it does not have to be an issue left for a GM to watch out for and resolve. It can be a community concern, addressed publicly.

So I say: If somebody wants to roleplay as, amongst other characters, a corporation Director or a Gang Boss or nearly anything else: Let them, perhaps they will do something interesting.