fade rift. application.

[charmoffensive]

PLAYER

Name: Brooklyn
Age: I said to the sun, tell me about the Big Bang. The sun said, "It hurts to become."
Contact: withpanache
Other Characters: Tony Stark, Sabine
Interests: I'd enjoy making use of the Kirkwall setting by digging into the criminal underbelly aspects of it. Loxley is something of a reluctant career thief but may find himself drawn to this anyway when he first lands, just as a means of getting independent income. I'd like to use that connection not to go and play my own mafia simulator off to the side so much as the way it might work to Riftwatch's benefit (or detriment), such as getting people in and out of Kirkwall discreetly, trading in black market, stealing correspondence from well-to-do residences, etc. Eventually, however, Loxley would feel moved to do more above board acts of heroism.

CHARACTER

Name: Loxley
Canon/OC: OC
Canon Point: n/a
Journal: charmoffensive
Age: 28

Canon World

This setting uses Dungeons and Dragons as a basis for magical mechanics, monsters, races, religion, and fun anachronisms, but is otherwise an original setting.

Loxley hails from Tassia, a single continent divided into four nations that is otherwise completely isolated from any other possible world beyond it. These nations are Lloryndell, Sylvica, Ifrin, and Promias, and they are home to a diverse collection of sentient races -- humans, elves, and dwarves, but also goblins, dragonborn, tieflings, and many others, as well as an assorted collection of monsters and so forth.

Specifically, Loxley is from Promias, a very human and dwarf dominated nation whose economy is based off of its mines of valuable minerals, and thriving trade. He was born in Otho, a port city that is probably a lot like Kirkwall, now that I think about it, in terms of its criminal enterprises, but less with the blood soaked history, and more with the early marks of anachronistic capitalism and class division.

History

Loxley was born and christened as Chivalry, to his mother Melody, and father Verity. Tieflings like a good virtue name.

They were both career criminals, Melody with a talent for stealing, and Verity for selling. When Chivalry was still young, his mother was arrested, and consigned to work camps far south. Verity sank into despair and debt, and made to pay off his debt through forced labour.

Chivalry was transferred to an institute known as the Oghma School for Unfortunates, half orphanage, half juvie. This institute was mostly only cruel in its negligence, but did teach him how to read and write. During this time, he also educated himself as a cutpurse and small time thief, and honed a natural sort of acrobatic athleticism that allowed him to beat hasty retreats as needed.

He grew up from childhood crimes to adult crimes -- burglary, mainly, and his combative skills were mostly tested against other ruffians rather than victims.

Wound up in hot water and had to skip town, going under the moniker of Loxley in place of his given name -- inspired by a character in folk hero story whom he would one day go on to emulate. He was recruited as a part of a vanguard for a pirate ship, which was good fun, but did test his moral alignment and realised he hadn't the taste of villainy, in spite of literally everything else about him.

Instead, Loxley joined the Adventurers' Guild with a friend of his, a half-orc warrior woman, and formed up a team with a wizard elf, a human cleric, and a ranger who was also a tiefling who departed the group later to return to her own family. They would take jobs and follow leads of interest, while the wizard had a penchant for causing trouble and unfortunately, with a little arson and attempted murder, landed them in trouble with the city guard of the Promian capital, who landed them in front of the Empress of Promias.

The Sultana commissioned them to kill the earth-element dragon that resides at the bottom of Promias. Loxley was a little starstruck by this concept for a minute before they all realised the same thing: that hostile powers were influencing the Sultana, and that there might be grave consequences for doing as she bid. Time to RESEARCH.

In the meantime, Loxley discovered: he has superpowers, as a sorcerer coming late into his abilities.

His father also attempted to reach out to him, spinning a yarn that he had caught word of his mother being still alive, and also please send him money due to loansharks. Loxley did this latter thing and held out hope for the former, but through use of a Sending spell, realised that in all probability, this claim about his mother is a lie.

At his time of falling asleep and waking up falling out of a Rift, his party were researching the threats to come in the city of Cruxal.

Personality

Loxley deliberately affects the idea of dashing piratical hero-rogue to the point that it is ingrained and instinctual at this point -- he names himself Loxley after a fictional folk hero, a prince's son who gallivanted amongst the common people, doing good, and impressing women, and such. Upon meeting him, a fair assumption would be that he is arrogant and performative and silly and doesn't actually care about helping anyone, but then the embarrassing secret is: he does care about helping anyone, maybe everyone, not even with a particular bias towards damsels (although that's a bonus).

As a tiefling in this particular world, Loxley endures a certain amount of discrimination -- common folk making signs against evil in the street as they pass him, that sort of thing. He is well used to this and well used to confronting people as though they are already enemies that he must win over into being his friend, and so is reflexively charming and accommodating, but a prideful streak stops him short of too much genuflection.

He is blunt, given to saying what's on his mind, and has a difficult time with people who are more subtle, sideways, or outright liars. He prefers to dazzle rather than trick, and takes people at their word, sometimes even while knowing he should not.

His motivation towards do-gooding does get muddled up in his attempts to be perceived in a certain light, his attraction towards glory, his enjoyment of a good fight and his personal vindication in leaving things a little better than how he found it. However, the core streak is simply that he thinks the world is plenty ugly and violent, and its people -- the impoverished especially -- tend to suffer in anonymity and silence. He has more sympathy for a single mother struggling to provide for her children than a merchant charging a big commission to escort his wagon of goods, and would naturally want to assist the former in place of the latter. As someone who grew up in poverty, the appeal of a lot of money is very attractive, but doesn't outweigh his desire to help those in need.

Strengths & Weaknesses

Let's narrativise some D&D, shall we?

ROGUE:

COMBAT: Loxley is most adept with a rapier, laying down strikes in vulnerable spots to inflict the most damage and then prancing away from the upcoming hit. He is just as good with a crossbow, but really only if he has time to take his shot. In active combat, he prefers to get into the fray. He also uses daggers -- as throwing weapons in short range as well as hand-to-hand -- but really only if he's feeling sassy.
CHARM: He is a good talker. This is one of those skills that are entirely dependent on RP rather than expecting other PCs or even NPCs to be beholden to, but it may as well be stated that he prefers to make more friends than enemies.
FAST HANDS: Loxley is very skilled with his hands -- in the terms of stealing, lock-picking, card cheating, escaping knots, and so on and so forth.
PARKOUR: He has a natural acrobatic talent that he's been honing and practicing since a young age. Scaling buildings, jumping rooftops, cartwheels, balancing on fences, swinging on ropes, somersaulting off the backs of monsters he's trying to kill -- you get the point.

TIEFLING:

THAUMATURGY: This describes a few minor parlor tricks that Loxley has always know. They are limited to the following effects: make his voice boom three times louder, cause flames to flicker/bright/dim and change colour for one minute, cause harmless tremors in the ground, create small instantaneous sounds within a 30 foot range (raven cry, spooky whispers, creaking doors, etc.), cause unlocked windows and doors to slam open or shut, alter the appearance of his eyes for one minute.
HELLISH REBUKE: Upon being struck in battle, Loxley can cast an effect that causes his enemies to take a not-insignificant, but not lethal amount of fire damage.
DARKNESS: Loxley can create a space of pitch black magical darkness, centred on an object he can touch or see within 60 feet, with a 15 foot radius. It lasts for ten minutes.

SORCERER:

TRUE STRIKE: Loxley can take a moment to breathe, and then better his chances of his next strike in battle connecting with his target.
BOOMING BLADE: Sheathes his melee weapon with strange thunder energy, and does extra damage to his enemy both on a successful hit as well as the next time they try to move, setting off something like an imploded shockwave.
GREEN-FLAME BLADE: Sheathes his melee weapon with strange green fire, and does extra damage to his enemy on a successful hit, and also leaps and catches onto any second enemy of his choosing with five feet.
FRIENDS: For one minute, Loxley can compel someone to like him. This does not mean they do everything he says, they just perceive him as a good friend, and so are inclined to give favours, or trust him with information. After that minute, they become aware as to the spell's effects, and could become hostile. He is unable to use this spell if they are already hostile towards him. Overall, Loxley uses this one not very frequently.

SHIELD: Loxley can throw up a magical shield to fend off attacks, in reaction to a coming blow.
CHAOS BOLT: By tapping into his well of raw, unrefined magic, Loxley can throw a bolt of chaotic magic towards a target, up to 120 feet, within his line of sight. Upon hitting, it has the potential of turning into eight different kinds of damage: acid, ice, fire, force, lightning, poison, psychic, and thunder. I'll probably roll this for myself, just for fun. (Side note: Loxley is unaware he has this capability.)

Suggested Nerfs

I don't think nerfing is necessary, as these spells are not stronger than what a mage of Thedas can do, and require line of sight to use. (Although he is a level seven rogue, he is a basic bitch level one sorcerer.)

Arrival Inventory

Leather armor, very stylish. In-built into a swishy coat.

Clothing, of a somewhat debonair piratical fashion.

Well made rapier, also very stylish.

Three daggers, and a dagger sheath that has been specially made to hold poison in such a way that it doesn't lose its potency through exposure while the dagger is kept sheathed. (Not magical, needs poison refills.)

Boots of Springing and Striding, also stylish but they have a minor magical enchantment that allow him to jump three times his normal amount, which equates to about 30 feet horizontally with a running start, and 9 feet vertically with a running start.

A well-worn picture book of the Daring Adventures of Loxley, folded and hidden in a coat pocket.

He has other magic items but really I think the boots are Important enough to him that he would have them in his dreams.

Humanization

Loxley is a tiefling, which is a horned humanoid of non-human colouration, so he will become a qunari. A skinny qunari, but with other consistent qunari things such as horns, grey skin tone, and an absence of devil tail.

Fit

I don't honestly know if you guys as the mods have interest in exploring the daily aspects of a crime-riddled Kirkwall, but I feel like that would be a fun angle and an aspect that Loxley would resonate with. If you were very interested in exploring some kind of attack on the city or wanted to pursue some more left of field plots motivated from the Riftwatch's relationship to their host city, I think Loxley would participate in these angles.

Otherwise, he'll be an extra sword amongst the ranks, and his late blooming into an innate magic user will probably interact in interesting ways with the mage conflicts. He doesn't think of himself as a magic user because he just got here.

As for his race change into qunari, I can't predict how that will go -- being a tiefling in his universe does not come with cultural background or allegiance for him to stay loyal to, but he will still find it disorienting to have physical commonality with a race of people so alien to his experience.

SAMPLES

SAMPLE ONE, and some narrative below:

Contrary to popular imagination, you can still tell that it's daytime, in Darktown. Light struggles in through the exits and entrances of the underground warren, through grates that trickle in dirty rain-run off, just enough to shade the shadows a lighter grey and reflect off gathered puddles.

Only just.

But enough, bolstered by the occasional low-lit lamp, the golden light of which is diffused through the occasional cloud of semi-toxic fog. It's all rather terrible, but he's made enough trips down here to at least prepare himself; thick cloth conceals the lower half of his face, his hands are gloved, and weapons concealed. His boots clip sharp and loud against the bricked ground, and then pause at the sight of something blocking his path, although it is the noise of humming flies that catch his attention first.

He stops, considers, and then delicately makes his way around the corpse that the inhabitants nearby have seen fit to just leave there. Swarming insects rise up into the air with angry buzzing, but resettle as Loxley's shadow moves on.

Coming up to a recognisable door, painted with an obscure marking, Loxley raps his knuckles against it.

A little in-built window slides open, to a barely visible dirty face within.

"What's the password?"

"You know," he says, after a moment, pulling down his makeshift mask for better enunciation, nose wrinkling against the rancid air, "I believe it's something like, 'let me the fuck in if you'd like to turn a profit'. I have an agreement with your--"

The window shuts.

Loxley knocks again, patiently.

The window opens. This time, Loxley raises a hand, leather wrappings parted enough for queasy green light to glimmer through from his palm, and pinched between thumb and forefinger, a shining gold sovereign gleams.

The window shuts, but now follows the sound of heavy chains being moved.

"Thought as much," Loxley adds, primly, to himself. He casts one last look to the decaying form he'd stepped around some several feet back, before disappearing through the door as it opens, welcoming him inside.