The Paragon 2 (OOC, Private)

[Chenzor]

The Paragon 2

IC located here: http://roleplayerguild.com/showthrea...02#post8260502

This roleplay is currently: Pending, closed (private)
(Queue: None)

(TL;DR: Sci-fi, futuristic, somewhere around 2040, aliens invaded, world is a wasteland, you're a lone survivor of somewhere/something, wandering on your own for the last 2-3 years or w/e, world was nuked and people turned into mutants, YOU are immune, you're hunted by aliens because they don't like you)

Overview

The year would be somewhere around 2040+, where (you guessed it the world has been nuked to shit. Not in a fallout kind of way, but in a crysis 2 kind of way. Basicly there was something on earth that a race of super-advanced aliens didn't like, so they decided to invade earth and literally obliterate the whole planet. Why, exactly, I wont tell you yet.

For those of you who didn't play crysis 2, or any crysis at all for that matter, you don't need to worry. I wont base this off of the game anyway. (But I do recommend playing them! They're great!)

But for those who DID play crysis 2, you'll realise: "Chen, they didn't use nukes or shit like that!"
And it's true. They didn't. But here they did. Like I said, I wont base this off crysis, this is it's own universe and shit. So anyway, it's somewhere around the year 2040, the whole world is a never-ending field of gray and ruins. Some small communities might still be around, but it'd be impossible to find them. Why? Because if the aliens can't find them, we can't. Maybe by chance, but I wont get into that yet.
So we're on our own at the start. And has probably been for the past 2-3 years or so. Around 5 years ago IRP, somewhere at 2030-2035, the aliens invaded and began their campaign to purge mankind for some unknown reason. The first 2 or so years of the invasion went pretty good for mankind, the superpowers were able to hold their own while the smaller countries around the world crumbled and became smoking craters or dead land, but the aliens had a few aces up their sleeves. Orbital strikes. They bombed the shit out of everything they hadn't already killed the first 2 years, resulting in a sort of cataclysm. These nukes, much like our own, had a certain type of radiation in them. About a thousand times stronger than our type of nuclear radiation. Those who wasn't killed by the blast was morphed into twisted, insane, monstrous "Reavers" within two days. Or you can just call them mutants. I'll refer to them as Reavers from now on however.

However, a few 0.1% of each country that was nuked proved to be immune to the mutation, keeping their human features and ways of mind. Their sanity was held intact aswell, for the most part, but years of isolation from any other human being slowly made them go insane. (Almost like "I am Legend". Being all alone in a giant city tends to break you down after a while.)

The Story
Seeing as this is a sequel to an old roleplay called "The Paragon", the story is influenced by the original. All the characters from the original are either dead, missing or separated from each other. However, at least two or three are still alive and might be run into during the progression of this sequel.
The basic rundown of what happened in the original is this; a group of survivors in the ruins of New York City is drawn to the same location by sounds of gunshots. A single human is being chased by alien forces trying to kill her, and the three other humans drawn to the area are able to save her, kill the aliens and run off.
The woman leads them to an abandoned basement in a ruined apartment building, and on the way there they run into another group of 3 other survivors.
As the aliens close in on them from above, they are attacked by a monstrous pack of huge mutants called Reavers, and the humans are able to escape, sneaking off from the battle.
Finding their way to a small survivor community, they manage to get some food and sleep. In the morning however, it appears the aliens had followed them there, and the bunker is attacked. The humans scatter, but most are killed in the fighting except for a few, who manage to slip out from the bunker through a hidden tunnel. That is where the original ends. I have left out a few parts not to spoil the whole thing, and I've also added a few things to wrap the story up much easier.

This, the sequel, will work in similar fashion. You are a survivor, living near the wastes of New York or in the ruins themselves. Five years ago, aliens invaded earth, and two years after that the earth was bombarded and left a wasteland. You are alone, unless you have a second character and the two are companions, but the point is you're struggling to survive, to find food and water, ammunition and guns and so on.

The Invasion

So. An alien race has invaded earth, but nobody knows why. Well, for your OOC enlightenment I'll tell you. However you'd have no fricken' clue in the RP itself.
So anyway. Mankind was starting a new kind of project of a bioweapon. They called it Project 154, and was classified to the point where not even the president of the US would get to know about it. But what was Project 154? Well, in the tropical rainforests of Brazil, a fungus grew. A special kind of fungus with a wierd-ass latin name that I cba to copypaste into here, but the point is that Project 154 was all about taking this fungus and using it's properties to develop a kind of bioweapon. Let me give you a link. (Yes, this fungus thing is real.) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...cience-brazil/
Through radiation and other genemanipulating procedures, the project enabled control of this fungus. They could enlarge it, they could control it, they could grow it almost anywhere they wanted. But thing got out of control, and the fungus was spread to outside the lab's perimiters. There are theories of a saboutage, but since it was so classified nobody got around to investigate it... Except one woman, who mysteriously vanished afterwards. She was part of the CIA. However, as the fungus escaped and spread, it also started to "mutate". The genemanipulation that had been done made it grow both in size and in reach. The thing could now mind control a human being with ease. And so it did, and spread all around south america, resulting in a nation-wide quarantine of Brazil, around the year of 2028. Those who was infested with the fungus became deformed insane monstrosities, aimlessly walking around and trashing anything and everything (and everyone) until it died from exhaustion or starvation.
Appearantly, things got out of control, and this alien race, the Paragon, caught drift of this infestation. They decided to intervene, fearing that the humans (who was just about to reach perfection of space-travel) would spread the infestation to other planets, probably resulting in galactic-wide infestation. DAAYYYUUMM.
So instead of wiping the infestation out, the Paragon decided to wipe out the SOURCE. Humankind. Things got out of hand, and the planet was bombarded. Almost no life remains on Earth; great job, Paragon!

Factions

-The Paragon,
alien empire, intergalactic blablabla. Many still remain on earth to kill off the remaining human resistances. The empire itself is powerfull, super-advanced. Not much else is known. They attack any human or reaver in sight. The alien race itself stands about two times taller than any ordinary man on earth, and are extremely agile. They wield light but resistant types of armor that cover their bodies. Their weapons consists of everything from small anti-personel arms to heavy anti-armor weaponry, much like our own. The only "vehicles" reported to be used by the Paragon troops are basicly a box on two to four legs. The ones on two legs are a bit smaller, but has both missiles and heavy machinegunnery stuffs, while the ones on four legs are troop carriers with only a few mounted turrets.
Will not be playable.
Ranks:

Spoiler

Executor - Comparable to human Generals. The Executor is one of the highest ranking officers in the Paragon Empire.
Vindicator - Vindicators are any type of Paragon soldier, only having recieved a commendation of expertise. They're usually in command of a group of Paragon on certain missions or otherwise.
Stalker - Elite operative and stealth expert. Usually works alone, but groups of 3 and 5 are also common. The way to identify a Paragon Stalker is usually in the colortone of it's suit. Most Paragon suits are plain metalic, wether it be a regular Trooper or an Executor, however the Stalker's armor has a slight blue tint to it, aswell as a different design of suit-helmet. They are also capable of dangerous tasks that not even an entire squad of troopers could accomplish.
Lieutenant - Noticable from the small light-green tinted logo on it's shoulders and larger size. The Lieutenants usually command a small group of Paragon muchlike the Vindicators, but are considered lower in rank. Sometimes, several lieutenants and their teams can be under the command of a single Vindicator. The difference in the Lieutenant's suits and a regular Trooper's suit is that it's alot like a Stalker, minus the full-body cloaking system. They have enhanced strength and speed, making them fully capable of jumping from wall to wall of building. They are also alot bigger than regular Paragon.
Trooper - The meatshields of the Paragon. Has no strength enhancement or special abilities other than the technology built into their suits (such as binoculars and certain scanners and comm-systems) and isn't exactly the strongest one can come across. Even though one Paragon Trooper counts as two Human soldiers, they're considered weak on their own. In numbers, however, they're almost unstopable.

-The Reavers (Berserk)
You might ask yourself: "Are mutants a faction now?" and the answer is yes. The Berserk kind of Reavers are insane, bloodthirsty killers who actually seemst to have adapted a kind of clan- or tribesystem. A few tribes or clans wage war against each other, but the majority of Berserk Reavers are neutrally allied. They're not smart, but they can cordinate attacks and raids. They don't use weapons, but their mutation often means they have super strength, agility and probably insanely sharp claws. Watch out from stray berserk reavers.
Will not be playable.

-The Reavers (Wanderer)
The wanderer kind of Reaver is a once-human being who has had his or her mental capacity still intact. This means he and she can still talk, and still sane. They are never seen in groups, however. Most are extremely scarred after their mutation, and anti-social. They don't look very human though, and it's very hard to see a difference in Wanderer Reavers and Berserk Reavers. The only clear difference between the two is their behaviour. The Wanderers usually goes by reasoning before fighting, while the berserks never reason, only kill and eat.
Will be playable.

-Humankind
You and me, they and them. Humankind is scattered, and extremely few humans are left. Those who aren't dead already are constantly hunted by Paragon forces, including you. Should they find you, you'd either have to kill them all or run for your life. Both are insanely hard to pull off.
Will be playable

Character Sheet

Any you want. Just make sure to include appearance, name, age, gender, the basic stuff. Backstory if you want, though it's not all that necesary as long as you have a grasp of your character.

Rules

Now I'm actually one to enforce rules like crazy, because I want my roleplays to be acceptable and stuff, but I don't think there are any rules here that I need to bring to light that you already don't know. It's the basics, really.
Oh, one thing though.
You are allowed to control NPCs (Paragon troopers or stray berserks) if you're in battle with them or interacting with them and stuff, cause I'm not gonna go controlling every single NPC in the RP.
Also not sure if this goes here, but: no ERP, fellas. You're allowed to have romances and stuff, but if you're gonna have intense physical contact do it in PM. Other than that I welcome it.

As for weapons and the like - yes, this is futuristic by about 30 or so years, but there are no laser pew pew guns. You can use modern weapons if you want, but they'd be terribly outdated. If your character joined an army you can just put in "standard usmc assault rifle" like I did, or in case you're a British navy seal just type that in. To me, it's just confusing when someone posts a paragraph of different numbers and letters that are appearantly weapons that I have to google. So it's OKAY if you don't know some badass weapon, as long as you give the basic idea. 30 years in the future, after all (:

You're all allowed to have a maximum of three characters each if that rows your boat, but more than that is a no-no. Also make sure to properly title who you're narrating (as) in your post. I usually do it by writing the character's name right above the post, then when I'm done with that I skip a row or two, write the other character's name and start on that one's post. That's how most people do it, I think.

Also: My word is law. By joining this roleplay and posting a CS you accept that I am able to, as the GM, am able to do as I wish and this may sometimes include controlling your character. I will give you a warning if you cross the line but if you continue, I will kill your character.

Accepted Characters
Yuo "Joe" Tiao Li

Spoiler

Name:
Yuo ”Joe” Tiao Li

Age:
28 years

Nationality:
Taiwan; Taiwanese

Gender:
Male

Personality:
Cautious preferring logic and reasoning. Likes to have a plan - with a high interest in technology, alien and human alike.

Height:
6 ft. (roughly 1.80m tall)

Weight:
182 lbs (roughly 84kg heavy)

Appearance/Equipment:
Yuo ”Joe” has thick black hair, cut roughly so that it wont affect his eyesight. He's well built, not a mountain o' muscles but in the flexible gymnastics kind of way. He is lean built and keeps his body trimmed exercising at least once a day. His face has rough lines and he looks like he's always tired even though he isn't.

He's wearing a dark grey vest with multiple compartments used for storing smaller tools like his butterfly knife and ammunition. Under the vest he wears a black t-shirt and above it all he wears a black warm but flexible jacket. He wears grey water-resistant pants also equipped with multiple compartments matching the ones on his vest as well as a black strap holding a knuckle combat knife on his right leg. On his waist he wears a dark brown belt with holsters for his two custom made RUGER-SR1911 semi-automatic handguns. He wears black combat boots suitable for all terrains.

Reference (butterfly knife-link):http://www.blowgun.com/images/Butterfly_Knife-12315.jpg
Reference (knuckleknife-link): http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/7...gnaturecx4.jpg
Reference (gun-link): http://www.impactguns.com/ruger-sr19...ge-6700-x.aspx

Skills:
“Joe” is extremely skilled with his handgun, both offensively and defensively. “Defensively” meaning that he can manage to block blades using his guns. He might also be considered a great knife-fighter. Joe has training and experience in advanced warfare, tactics and battle alike.

Background:
Yuo ”Joe” Tiao Li has been employed at the NSC and MIB at different times*. The majority of his life before the war is classified, all that is known is that he graduated at the top of his class at the royal academy for young boys and was recruited to the bureau soon after that. Since the “war” began he has lived in an old food store where he has stocked up on canned food and weaponry.

* (NSC: National Security Council of Taiwan, MIB: Taiwanese Military Intelligence Bureau)

Other:
Yuo ”Joe” Tiao Li's wife died when the alien race initially attacked, his daughter was on her way to the US, New York, by plane but no one has seen her since then and hes been frequently searching for her in NYC.

Henrich Louis Schuster

Spoiler

Name:
Henrich Louis Schuster.

Age:
31 years.

Nationality:
French-German.

Gender:
Male.

Personality:
Friendly, intelligent and rational. Not very much of a leader, though.

Height:
1.78 meters.

Weight:
73 kilograms.

Appearance:
Henrich L. Schuster is a french-german man of average height, light-brown hair and a short beard. He's not very strong in the upper body, but makes up for it by having a good endurance when it comes to running, and he runs fast. He's skinny around the waist and is often seen wearing what was once a nice suit, but is now mainly something worthy of a poor, but still classy cockney from the late 19th century. He wears running shoes for the advantage in running and brown leather gloves.

Equipment:
Henrich Schuster has a 9mm Beretta Pistol, a few clips and a metal baseball bat. He has created more powerful weapons from salvaged waste, but they are often short-lived and collapse quickly.

Skills:
Henrich Schuster is an amazing physisist and a decent mechanic and has been active in the weapon-and spacetravel development in Europe and USA. He knows much about engines, energy and power and would be a fantastic tool for building a tiny electric generator for survival or fixing broken weaponry or vehicle parts.

Backstory:
Henrich Louis Schuster grew up in Germany and graduated from the MIT after moving to the United States with amazing grades. Henrich immediately started working with the American spaceprograms and weapon development. When the Paragon attacked, Henrich hid in the deepest chambers of the underground science facility. He came out after a few weeks down there, starved and weak. And when he came out, Washington was a war-zone. Immediately Henrich ran for his life in search of a vehicle. He found a car without a battery, so Henrich spent two days searching for a battery. While searching, he saw strange beings walk about. They weren't human, but something alien. He at last found a battery, fixed the car and drove to New York city in hope of finding survivors, for he had found nothing but chaos in D.C.

Väiinö 'Van' Koskinen

Spoiler

Name:
Väiinö 'Van' Koskinen

Age:
37 years.

Nationality:
Finnish.

Gender:
Male.

Personality:
Cynical, rational, prone to drinking, uncouth.

Height:
1.84 meters.

Weight:
~87 kilograms.

Appearance:
His hair is combed back and of a dull, greyish dark brown colour. He has a decent physique - not particularly bulky but not weak - and is of average height, at least for a Finn. He wears the same dark pair of jeans and brown boots that it seems he has worn since the time of the invasion, and for his upper body he has a formerly white but now dirty brown shirt, a grey woollen sweater and a large brown leather jacket with more pockets on the in and outside than you can count on your fingers. He has the SVT-40 hanging on his back, and the Lahti stuffed into the waistline of his jeans.

Equipment:
SVT-40 (Semi-Automatic Rifle, 10 rounds, effective range of 500m without scope)
Lahti L-35 (Semi-Automatic Pistol, 8 rounds, effective range of 50m)
Associated ammonution
Fairbairn–Sykes fighting knife (Thrusting combat knife)
A bottle of unidentified vodka

Skills:
None in particular, but a greater experience with weapons than the average person. Has some experience with seafaring. Speaks English, Russian and Finnish more or less fluently and the odd word of Swedish, Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian.

Backstory:
Van's family was left in Russian/Soviet lands after the Continuation War and, living a life of disillusioned alienation and poverty as more and more Russians moved into the area, the family did through coincidence and desperation end up involved with the Russian Mob. Van, too, ended up working for the mob and was involved in various jobs, mostly trafficking operations in the Baltic and Eastern Europe. Eventually he became involved in the smuggling of old soviet weapons and prostitutes to the Americas, particularly the U.S., where he ended up being at the time of the invasion. During the years he did earn a scar or two due to failed jobs.

He was able to survive until now through the use of his latest shipment (as witnessed by his arsenal) and cooperation with his former gangmembers, performing the odd less-than-moral deed in the name of survival. By now, though, most of his crew has faded away.

I heard the rumors it was pretty empty here, so Chenzor recruited me to get things started.

Sarah Greyham

Spoiler

Name: Sarah Greyham

Age: 28

Gender: Female

Nationality: Brittish

Personality: Inteligent, Talkative and handy.

Appearance: Sarah have red long hair, white skin tone, some freckles on her face and wears glasses. She is 178 cm tall and is quite slender. she normally wears a white lab coat, sweatpants and a red turtleneck.

Equipment: Datapad: It's a very thin touch pad which lets Sarah store and record information and data.
J5 Predator: An unfinnished prototype handgun. It's able to handle 20 shots different modified ammunitions.
Jagged rounds: A special type of ammunition, developed to inflict heavy damage on light armored infantry. Sarah is however running low on these.

Skills: Expert Scientist: Sarah is a very talanted scientist. She have mainly been researching in warfare technology but have no problems in researching in whatever she want because of her high inteligence and long education.
Handy: Sarah is not only smart, she know how to build prototypes and sometimes even safe and working creations. However she isn't any particulary
good at building any bigger ordinations without blueprints.

Short Bio: Sarah Greyham was born in London year 2018. She grew up to be a diligent and intelligent student. Her tutors understood the she was a prodigy, she learned five times faster than her classmates. When they learned adding and subtracting, Sarah was doing algebra. When they learned to read Sarah had already read three novel collections. When they learned how to use hammer and nail Sarah had already built a chair. She got to skip grade after grade. When she was only fourteen she studied at Imperial Collage of London.
Directly after she had finnished university the English military met up with her. "We could use a girl of your caliber" they said. "you could really do some good in the name of your country". She agreed and started to work as a scientist for the warfare deparment. She made some interesting prototypes for The Brittish military. The VG11 prototype was her first "success". It was a infantry armor made for engaging heavily armored vehicles. It was a multi-layered chestplate imbued with magnetics. The armor could take on extreme gunfire and can even block multiple tank shots! This allows single infantry units to take out heavy vehicles without dying in the heat of battle. There was one flaw though that would scrap the VG11 project. The magnetics in the VG11 chestplate scrambles the human nervesystem.
The soilders that tested VG11 are dead today of can't move. Sarah's most successful prototype was the SUIT, Stealth Utility for infiltration tasks. It was a fullbody stealth suit that actually allowed it's wearer to become invisable! It was made out of a thin latex suit covered in "thrireflectors". Thrireflectors are self powered 3d projectors that can reflect the envoirment. Though It's fully working there are still many cons. Firstly you can't weild any weapons because the weapon won't become invisable. Secondly it can only be used during the day or in other lit areas because the suit is powered by solar power and the thrireflectors works poorly in the dark. If it's a light envoirment the invisable effect will only last for half a minute before it needs to recharfe aswell. Lastly it's very expensive to create the suit. One thrireflector costs around 1000£. You need around 100 thrireflectors only to cover your right hand so imagine the price for a full body suit! SUIT have been used in a total of two missions by the best Brittish ops and both of them have been successful.

When the Paragon happend, Sarah was down in the bunker fetching some toxic test results. At first she thought it was an earthquake, so she had to secure all the toxic chemicals down the bunker or things could get really bad. But once she got out of the bunker it would seem things couldn't really get worse. And so she ran off to try to find any survivors. Let's say it wasn't a bountiful hunt.

[DrPhase]

Name:
Yuo ”Joe” Tiao Li

Age:
28 years

Nationality:
Taiwan; Taiwanese

Gender:
Male

Personality:
Cautious preferring logic and reasoning. Likes to have a plan - with a high interest in technology, alien and human alike.

Height:
6 ft. (roughly 1.80m tall)

Weight:
182 lbs (roughly 84kg heavy)

Appearance/Equipment:
Yuo ”Joe” has thick black hair, cut roughly so that it wont affect his eyesight. He's well built, not a mountain o' muscles but in the flexible gymnastics kind of way. He is lean built and keeps his body trimmed exercising at least once a day. His face has rough lines and he looks like he's always tired even though he isn't.

He's wearing a dark grey vest with multiple compartments used for storing smaller tools like his butterfly knife and ammunition. Under the vest he wears a black t-shirt and above it all he wears a black warm but flexible jacket. He wears grey water-resistant pants also equipped with multiple compartments matching the ones on his vest as well as a black strap holding a knuckle combat knife on his right leg. On his waist he wears a dark brown belt with holsters for his two custom made RUGER-SR1911 semi-automatic handguns. He wears black combat boots suitable for all terrains.

Reference (butterfly knife-link):http://www.blowgun.com/images/Butterfly_Knife-12315.jpg
Reference (knuckleknife-link): http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/7...gnaturecx4.jpg
Reference (gun-link): http://www.impactguns.com/ruger-sr19...ge-6700-x.aspx

Skills:
“Joe” is extremely skilled with his handgun, both offensively and defensively. “Defensively” meaning that he can manage to block blades using his guns. He might also be considered a great knife-fighter. Joe has training and experience in advanced warfare, tactics and battle alike.

Background:
Yuo ”Joe” Tiao Li has been employed at the NSC and MIB at different times*. The majority of his life before the war is classified, all that is known is that he graduated at the top of his class at the royal academy for young boys and was recruited to the bureau soon after that. Since the “war” began he has lived in an old food store where he has stocked up on canned food and weaponry.

* (NSC: National Security Council of Taiwan, MIB: Taiwanese Military Intelligence Bureau)

Other:
Yuo ”Joe” Tiao Li's wife died when the alien race initially attacked, his daughter was on her way to the US, New York, by plane but no one has seen her since then and hes been frequently searching for her in NYC.

[TheFusecog]

Name:
Henrich Louis Schuster.

Age:
31 years.

Nationality:
French-German.

Gender:
Male.

Personality:
Friendly, intelligent and rational. Not very much of a leader, though.

Height:
1.78 meters.

Weight:
73 kilograms.

Appearance:
Henrich L. Schuster is a french-german man of average height, light-brown hair and a short beard. He's not very strong in the upper body, but makes up for it by having a good endurance when it comes to running, and he runs fast. He's skinny around the waist and is often seen wearing what was once a nice suit, but is now mainly something worthy of a poor, but still classy cockney from the late 19th century. He wears running shoes for the advantage in running and brown leather gloves.

Equipment:
Henrich Schuster has a 9mm Beretta Pistol, a few clips and a metal baseball bat. He has created more powerful weapons from salvaged waste, but they are often short-lived and collapse quickly.

Skills:
Henrich Schuster is an amazing physisist and a decent mechanic and has been active in the weapon-and spacetravel development in Europe and USA. He knows much about engines, energy and power and would be a fantastic tool for building a tiny electric generator for survival or fixing broken weaponry or vehicle parts.

Backstory:
Henrich Louis Schuster grew up in Germany and graduated from the MIT after moving to the United States with amazing grades. Henrich immediately started working with the American spaceprograms and weapon development. When the Paragon attacked, Henrich hid in the deepest chambers of the underground science facility. He came out after a few weeks down there, starved and weak. And when he came out, Washington was a war-zone. Immediately Henrich ran for his life in search of a vehicle. He found a car without a battery, so Henrich spent two days searching for a battery. While searching, he saw strange beings walk about. They weren't human, but something alien. He at last found a battery, fixed the car and drove to New York city in hope of finding survivors, for he had found nothing but chaos in D.C.

[Pirate]

Name:
Väiinö 'Van' Koskinen

Age:
37 years.

Nationality:
Finnish.

Gender:
Male.

Personality:
Cynical, rational, prone to drinking, uncouth.

Height:
1.86 meters.

Weight:
~87 kilograms.

Appearance:
His hair is combed back and of a dull, greyish dark brown colour. He has a decent physique - not particularly bulky but not weak - and is of average height, at least for a Finn. He wears the same dark pair of jeans and brown boots that it seems he has worn since the time of the invasion, and for his upper body he has a formerly white but now dirty brown shirt, a grey woollen sweater and a large brown leather jacket with more pockets on the in and outside than you can count on your fingers. He has the SVT-40 hanging on his back, and the Lahti stuffed into the waistline of his jeans.

Equipment:
SVT-40 (Semi-Automatic Rifle, 10 rounds, effective range of 500m without scope)
Lahti L-35 (Semi-Automatic Pistol, 8 rounds, effective range of 50m)
Associated ammonution
Fairbairn–Sykes fighting knife (Thrusting combat knife)
A bottle of unidentified vodka

Skills:
None in particular, but a greater experience with weapons than the average person. Has some experience with seafaring. Speaks English, Russian and Finnish more or less fluently and the odd word of Swedish, Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian.

Backstory:
Van's family was left in Russian/Soviet lands after the Continuation War and, living a life of disillusioned alienation and poverty as more and more Russians moved into the area, the family did through coincidence and desperation end up involved with the Russian Mob. Van, too, ended up working for the mob and was involved in various jobs, mostly trafficking operations in the Baltic and Eastern Europe. Eventually he became involved in the smuggling of old soviet weapons and prostitutes to the Americas, particularly the U.S., where he ended up being at the time of the invasion. During the years he did earn a scar or two due to failed jobs.

He was able to survive until now through the use of his latest shipment (as witnessed by his arsenal) and cooperation with his former gangmembers, performing the odd less-than-moral deed in the name of survival. By now, though, most of his crew has faded away.

[Chenzor]

All three accepted, looks good. I like the variety in specialization. Will add a few characters of my own soon once we get another person or two.

[Chenzor]

Also let me give you a general idea of the strength of a regular paragon Trooper.
Let's say the character Yuo or "Joe" runs into one and fights it one-on-one. The alien is two times his size, and faster, and maybe even more agile. From a range, they shoot their SMGs, assault-rifles, etc., usually gauss weapons which pack an extremely powerful punch, meaning being hit by one in your elbow may in some unfortunate cases rip your entire arm off. But let's say "Joe" manages to avoid this fate, and instead dodges his enemy's bullets. He fires at the paragon himself, and hits, although the paragon's light flexible armor takes the hit and the alien does not die. At best, "Joe" would have slowed him down however. There are two possible outcomes from here on out. The first, "Joe" manages to his the alien with bullets around it's neck or lower back, or their limb-joints. These are the weak-points on a paragon trooper's armor, and the best place to aim if you want to take them down. The second outcome is trickier; close quarters combat.
In the wrist of the trooper's armor, there's a "hidden blade" of sorts, able to extract or retract at a whim. The paragon can both slash and stab with this, and it is extremely deadly with it. The average human would be felled by this ferocious metal-giant in close quarters, as they are many times a human's strength. However, seeing as "Joe" is a master with his knives, he might be fortunate enough to avoid or even parry the mighty trooper's swings and jabs, but there is still the problem of the Paragon wearing extremely resilient armor. Once again, the weak-spots are key here. "Joe" needs to jab his knife so hard onto the paragon's weakpoints so that the blade penetrates the armor and into the trooper's skin. If not for their armor, a paragon could be killed as easily as a human being.

There are, however, certain kinds of Paragon that are not like the conventional trooper. The Lieutenant, for example, is often bigger, stronger, faster, and carries a bigger gun. This means more strength, more speed, and more firepower... However bigger targets. Speaks for itself really, but a lieutenant is much harder to kill than the trooper. Think about this when battling Paragon, and you might survive through this RP!

[DrPhase]

Noted! what about Reavers either mindless or not, how are they in speed and strength?

[Chenzor]

The strengths and weaknesses of the reavers vary, however most of them grow monstrously huge, with claws and fangs that could put a great white shark to shame. Some of them are huge like the hulk, while some are slithering lizard-men.
The best comparison I could think for them though would be infested humans, thinking StarCraft-wise.... Only bigger and stronger. One could also compare them to the special-infected in the Left 4 Dead series.
Your average berserk reaver is on par with a paragon trooper, although the troopers have the advantage thanks to their weaponry and armor, although some reavers have mutations that allow them to shoot spikes or even have protective shells like turtles.
The still-sane reavers, however, are not as huge and not as strong. While some of them might be, most of them are somewhere in between a human and a paragon trooper in strength, size and speed.
... TL;DR reavers vary, about the same as paragon troopers though.

[TheFusecog]

Do the aliens patrol with aircraft and spotlights as well? Or is it just infantry?

[Chenzor]

Alien gunships are common, larger ground patrols can sometimes be accompanied by a gunship, or the gunship might take off on it's own to patrol by itself. Will be specified IRP.