Why are we here?
"Superboy Prime (the yelling guy if he needs clarification)..." - Postmania
"...dropping an orca whale made of fire on your enemies is a pretty strong opening move." - Nik
"Why throw punches when you can be making everyone around you sterile mutant corpses?" - Pendaran, regarding Dr. Fate
Name: Baikal
Age: Prehistorical. Likely anterior to life itself.
Race: Whispers and speculation of her nature reside in every university of magic and occult study on her Earth, but despite her being an old legend nobody really is able to pin down what she is. Her ties to the cold resemble at common glance an Elemental of Frost, but even these Elementals are more defined than her. Perhaps it best then to simply refer to her as what she most clearly represents: A Storm.
Gender/Pronouns: She/Her, likely
Physical Description: Almost always she appears as a soldier in uniform, blonde, in a snowstorm, facing away. Even when she may turn towards the viewer, always her face remains the vaguest hint of an impression. There are some who claim to have gotten close enough to see it, but everyone gives a different description despite swearing they know what they saw. And despite attempts at clarification, even these descriptions feel like placeholders: like the description someone would use for a cliff face or a sloping hill. And never the same cliff face or cloud formation or light flowing stream.
Homeworld/land: Unknown, but it is believed that there is a way to access another plane from beneath Lake Baikal. A plane far colder and vaster than a mere lake. It is from here that she is suspected to reside. This has never been confirmed.
Bio: Do you remember your first snowstorm? The wonder of this strange substance, not rain, not sand, cold, but beautiful. The happiness of making snowballs or snowmen with it. Then eventually, those happy thoughts were overwhelmed and you just felt the cold?
Many people got their first taste of this as the being only known as Baikal began to appear again after centuries of being considered nothing more but a standard folktale, native to various Eastern European regions of no particular size or importance. Dressed in a soldier's uniform, she began appearing all across the world in the year 2050 of her Earth. And always, she carried with her a snowstorm, causing those within range of her to gaze with awe.
You could be sunning yourself in a beach resort in the now near tropical and fairly humid Greenland only to suddenly feel a sharp chill as temperatures dropped below freezing within seconds. Then you would see her, just off in the distance. She never seems to walk, but she is constantly moving, in another spot as you try to glimpse her or approach her.
But this snowstorm wasn't a mere illusion. Or at very least, it was real enough to kill. The disruption from subzero temperatures in a world growing into equatorial temperatures all over the world...well, it was a cold snap that would strike dead many who would never imagine to dress for a blizzard in these times or at least these places. With this, the governments of Earth, in this time both technologically and magically advanced, struck out at her, or tried to.
But just as she carried the snowstorm into people's minds despite the reality of the circumstance, so could she easily keep her form's true location from people's minds, and their weapon sights. And as humans took more and more desperate measures Baikal only seemed to grow more powerful, more lethal, and more responsive to danger.
Soldiers attacking her began to find themselves struck dead in response, stuttering, frostbitten troops muttering something about the whisper behind their shoulder and the soft hand on their back before they lost all sensation forever. Powerful explosive missiles suddenly found their way into the headquarters of those who ordered them launched in an effort to blanket entire city blocks in a hopeless attempt to hit anything close to the phenomenon. It was a very real fear that Baikal would simply keep walking and appearing around Earth until there were none left to feel her chill.
But then, one day, she vanished again. The survivors in their log cabins and underground bunkers emerged, in complete confusion. There had been zero successful attempts at studying and finding out real information about Baikal.
And there never would be. The Storm had moved on from the planet entirely, for the last time.
Want: Does a snowstorm really want anything? Perhaps it can be said that it merely wishes to continue existing. But how does a storm exist, truly? It lies in differences in her environment. Differences in pressure, temperature, these are the conditions in which a storm forms, and reforms. Perhaps it is this that Baikal abides by. For what greater location for dramatic differences could there be than Khazan?
Traits/Proficiencies:
Frost Touch (CHR +15 / BRA +5) - Frost Touch: A brief brush of Baikal's blisteringly cold mind seeps into the opponent's very bones. Techniques when used in a Counter have an additional +10 CHR applied to their effect
Winter's Bone (SKI +15 / CHR +5) - Ice runs in Baikal's veins. Techniques when used in a Counter take 10 Less ENR.
Vitality Block
Raw HP: 42
Max HP 152
XP: 150
Offensive Block
STR: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT = 10
PRE: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT = 30
CHR: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT = 90
Defensive Block
DUR: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC = 10
RES: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC = 10
AGI: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC =14
Hit Block
BRA: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC = 50
SPD: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC =10
SKI: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC =51
Energy Matrix Block
ENR: 10 BASE + BUILD + TRAIT + SYNC =31
ENR VALUE 310
Latent ENR: 110
Mastered ENR: 200
Stack: 4
Movement and Action Block
RAC: 2
Movement: 5
ATK Actions: 1
Technique Actions: 2
Range: 100
RUM: 3
Affinity Allocation
Body: STR + SPD Mundane: 1, Honed: 1, Epic: 0 - 2.5%
Spirit: PRE + SKI Mundane: 4 , Honed: 2, Epic: 1 - 17%
Mind: CHR + BRA Mundane: 7, Honed: 3 , Epic: 2 - 30%
Techniques
Basically a healing spell for both Health and Mastered ENR and a crap ton of debilitating Mind Techniques, many but not all of which will be Counters.
Notes: This was fun to think up. Due to her nature though I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to play this character as a character though, or at least not in a way that's both consistent and interesting. There are writers in this thread who could pull it off but not me I think
Either way, my attempt at making a psychic force of nature, who also does Counters.
Last edited by Postmania; 12-08-2022 at 08:39 PM.
“The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.”
-Stephen McCranie
Just to illustrate how poisoned with game design my brain is, I had some vague ideas for another entirely different RPG system last night.
I resisted the urge to make a bunch of notes and a new spreadsheet engine as it was quite late at night but it's in there. 0.0
I think I only have like... two other things that I'd want to commit on a system level to.
Those of you tried to participate on the previous versions will be unsurprised to hear that one of them is Underbelly, which I feel like I could do a better job on now with what I've learned from designing Ruins of Khazan though the setting is WAY more complex than this game because everything is much more dense with information and the game has like... at minimum 6 major factions at war with one another with named NPCs and shit.
So that would be a lot of work.
The other is a dystopian existentialist survival horror game, in the style of the manga BLAME! Radiation, mutation, civilisations lost in an incomprehensibly huge megastructure that have gone mad over time. While that one has a much clearer idea about the systems that would be at play, I have only very loose campaign ideas.
But all of that is to one side at present; Ruins is my focus right now.
He said, attempting to stave of the desire to make notes.
I like the sounds of those ideas but in the future lol
“The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.”
-Stephen McCranie
I wouldn't be opposed to an Underbelly revival. It'd be like, run 4 or 5 of Mayumi.
That said, we gotta get to the start point of this one lol, and Underbelly never made it far before gassing out.
Yeah, but if you... man, we're getting into weird analogy territory, like if you disintegrated Superman's arms he wouldn't be able to go "fool! Little did you know that my arms and I are one and can be remade from me!" and will his arms back into being from pure nothingness. - Pendaran
Arx Inosaan
Technically the... first and third...(?) iterations of the game did make it to an actual start...
I have a copy of the thread of the first one before it was purged and I remember there being a simplified version which had different players which did get off the ground.
But yes, point taken, let's get this one rolling and stable before I start building anything else.
*surreptitiously hides already growing design doc for a new game system*
Lot of updates to consider, hmm. Time to get cracking on these.
Whoo, be fun to still have a character to add contrast to the team lol
“The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.”
-Stephen McCranie
Well, that was nonsensical, and I have no idea how that particular post got into this forum. Edit it out.
Last edited by Sharpandpointies; 12-09-2022 at 10:47 AM.
Why are we here?
"Superboy Prime (the yelling guy if he needs clarification)..." - Postmania
"...dropping an orca whale made of fire on your enemies is a pretty strong opening move." - Nik
"Why throw punches when you can be making everyone around you sterile mutant corpses?" - Pendaran, regarding Dr. Fate
Pie was just waiting to see if King was still in Tekken 8. He is, so he has returned at full power.
Yeah, but if you... man, we're getting into weird analogy territory, like if you disintegrated Superman's arms he wouldn't be able to go "fool! Little did you know that my arms and I are one and can be remade from me!" and will his arms back into being from pure nothingness. - Pendaran
Arx Inosaan
Why are we here?
"Superboy Prime (the yelling guy if he needs clarification)..." - Postmania
"...dropping an orca whale made of fire on your enemies is a pretty strong opening move." - Nik
"Why throw punches when you can be making everyone around you sterile mutant corpses?" - Pendaran, regarding Dr. Fate