@whizzball1 A magical school RP? I see no reason why that wouldn't work. The magic system interests me as well. Now you just have to create a character that you find interesting, creative limitations be damned. Filling out the character sheet would probably be the easiest way to do this.
This should do. Unfortunately, the main limitation is that the description of magic and aeons in the roleplay implies magic can only be descended from one Aeon. If that particular limitation is discarded then the only real limitations are setting and the logical limitation (as I describe in my examinations), which encourage me to make powers that fit with the theme and not just something totally random. Additionally, if the characters didn't need to be human Spectre would be made entirely out of crystal. (Right now he's human but looks crystalline when using his magic.)
Name: Spectre Merivale
Age: 16
Gender: Male
Spectre is eccentric in outfit as well as in person. Fair of skin and bright red of eyes, he doesn't care much about how he looks as long as he always follows the same motif: that of an unkempt, almost-formal businessman. His jacket or coat is never closed and certainly never proper in an office, and his white-collar shirt may as well not have a collar at all except to hold his loose tie. His dress pants tend to be close-fitting and too short, owing to his tall but thin build. His socks only ever match in colour, but his shoes are perfectly neat. You can tell he's around by the satisfying sound of his shoes striking the floor.
His hair is naturally white as snow, but he occasionally makes it look a dark ocean blue with a superficial illusion. One illusion of his, however, is by no means voluntary; when he uses his magic his body takes on a crystalline complexion, once-smooth skin overlaid with geometrically perfect facets that glitter in the light. And no matter what he's doing, if you look closely you can see a faint glow all about his person, shining through his clothes.
Year: 3
Rank: Journeyman
Room No. 314
Spectre Merivale is eccentric and slightly socially inept. His upbringing did not encourage meaningful interaction with others, friends, family, or otherwise. All he really knows is how to make witty, snarky jokes and how to enliven a conversation. But his personality is almost entirely superficial—practically everything he does and says stems from his eccentricity and sarcasm-disguised excitability.
If there's one thing about him that goes deeper than the expressions on his face, it's his abiding, unyielding pursuit of goodness. He absolutely hates the idea of unkindness and evil within himself, and his zeal against it in others is unmatched. He's not exceptionally confrontational about it if he can stop evil clandestinely or discreetly, no matter how small, even if it's his friends. In fact, he cares more about ending it in his friends than in anyone else.
He wishes he could be deeper than that, a better friend, a slightly more emotional man, but he knows it may take a while, if ever. Still, he perseveres.
Spectre's magic deals primarily with light and descends from three Aeons: Creation, Destruction, and Existence. At this point in Spectre's training, his skill lies in the first two portions, but it will not be long until he finds himself in the third.
Spectre came from a family of Destructionists but first unlocked his magic in Creation. With what power he could muster up at a young age he was able to form nigh-unbreakable constructs of light that moved freely according to his will. His magical reserves, unfortunately, were small and weak. With no real supply of power he could do little to nothing on a regular basis.
When his anger against evil awakened, so did a new aspect of his power, and he found himself able to utilise the absence of light in one way and one way only: absorbing the energy in others and transferring it to himself. If he could catch someone with his shadowy tendrils he could start to drain them. He showed restraint so as not to alienate his family further, and his magical reserves grew with practice so that he had to use his destructive power less and less. Nowadays, it certainly helps in a fight, but he prefers to go all on his own power rather than enlarge his wellspring artificially.
His real potential is in the Aeon of Existence, but only because of the nature of his potential for Creation. Spectre's constructs of light are more than just sturdy objects; they channel natural magic with incredible ease at almost no magical expenditure for their creator. At this point, Spectre is beginning to notice, and with formulae, maths, and a lot of research, he will unlock the power of the Crystal Matrix. Crystal Matrices are simply disks made of light, just like the rest of Spectre's constructs, but the disks are layered with perfect fractal patterns and etched with precise magical channels.
The Matrices pull in natural magic and use it to channel the environment itself. Each Crystal Matrix uses the environment to do purely natural things—but the flow of magic encourages rapidity, efficiency, and efficacy. One Matrix may reflect and even amplify the force of a physical attack; another may dispel the magical energy in an attack it or even encourage its absorption by Spectre. Yet another could speed up blood clotting or the knitting of bones or encourage the growth of a plant—and some Matrices take more energy from Spectre than do others. But their sheer efficiency is to be envied.
Equipment: Spectre wields a sword—a real sword—that looks like it might be made of light. He uses it to channel his magic into energetic beams of light and sometimes to "draw" his constructs in midair. It's all for show at this point, but it points to another aspect of his: precision. Spectre is incredibly graceful in every action. He will not do something if he can't do it as efficiently and precisely as possible, and the showier, the better. Every step he takes is timed, every flourish of his hands—and, in battle, every spell, every attack, and every construct. He has mastered the art of precision in all things, a quality that is important to his magic in all its forms, but he has done it at the painful cost of important social development at a young age.
Spectre came from a long line of mages that operated under the Aeon of Destruction and Destruction alone. They expected much from their firstborn, but when all their attempts to awaken their kind of magic within him failed, their disappointment was palpable. When the stress got to him and woke his magic of Creation instead, his extended family shunned him and those closest to him hid behind pity. His was a homeschooling family, so he had few real relationships outside of his home. So, isolated against his will, he spent all his time training when he wasn't teaching himself the subjects his family failed to instruct him in.
His magical reserves were incredibly tiny. With so little energy to go on at any given moment he had to be extremely efficient, and his talent for precision grew quickly. His creations fascinated his younger siblings, both of whom ended up with Destruction Magic, but his parents started keeping him away from them as if he were infecting them with his creativity. However, he discovered a chance for redemption when, extinguishing his light incorrectly, he ended up with tangible darkness in its place. Black magic—a stroke of luck! Upon experimentation, he found that he could extract the energy from plants and animals, but his parents were not as overjoyed as he had hoped. They half-heartedly encouraged further experimentation and, with unexpected kindness, let him test his abilities on them.
A whole new world opened up to him. Though his drain on the magic of others was temporary, the effect on him was both temporary and permanent. Little by little he expanded his wellspring with his parents' consent, showing great restraint even as he learned to do bigger and better things with the magic he truly loved. Disappointed with his growing love for Creation magic, Spectre's uncle pushed him to use his Destruction magic more and more. Things came to a head on the day he accidentally used it to kill his favourite pet—and, with it, he nearly killed his little sister, as well. That was the day he swore off evil entirely; his uncle was found gulity for much worse than influencing Spectre and he himself was shipped right off to a magical boarding school.
For a couple of young years he distinguished himself there with exemplary performance and marked improvement. With a few new friends acting as willing sources for his magic, he soon grew his magical reserves to an actually reasonable level and was noticed for his abilities, academic and magical, by the Breakfast University for Magic.
If Spectre was forced to sacrifice something important in order to move forward, he would choose his Destruction magic in a heartbeat. It has some use in fights, but he can improve his magical reserves on his own, now, if slower than he could at his full Aeonic potential.
If Spectre were given a single wish, he would have asked for the love of his parents a few years ago. He supposes he'll figure out himself, now, and he'd rather they actually love him rather than being forced to. Instead, he'd probably wish for the ability to create anything he wanted; he'd find that rather useful.
This should do. Unfortunately, the main limitation is that the description of magic and aeons in the roleplay implies magic can only be descended from one Aeon. If that particular limitation is discarded then the only real limitations are setting and the logical limitation (as I describe in my examinations), which encourage me to make powers that fit with the theme and not just something totally random. Additionally, if the characters didn't need to be human Spectre would be made entirely out of crystal. (Right now he's human but looks crystalline when using his magic.)
Perhaps in hindsight that was not the best RP to choose for this experiment. I was hoping you would explore your freedom more, but it looks like you put a lot of effort into this. I shall not ask you to redo it. So long as you are happy with the character and also realize they would never work in the RP I should be able to do my work. It might take some time, as I'm GMing an RP at a critical time right now. But I'll have something up within a few days.
Perhaps in hindsight that was not the best RP to choose for this experiment. I was hoping you would explore your freedom more, but it looks like you put a lot of effort into this. I shall not ask you to redo it. So long as you are happy with the character and also realize they would never work in the RP I should be able to do my work. It might take some time, as I'm GMing an RP at a critical time right now. But I'll have something up within a few days.
I put a fair amount of effort into it, I suppose. I'm happy to redo it if you believe I missed something, but I gave myself as much freedom as I could without defying the logical limitation.
Sincerely, dictionaries are terrible when you are referencing an abstract concept. Just look at how much the scientific community argues about definitions of stuff like energy, heat, etc. Even if you know what it's, you'll never get a straight answer that fills all of the criteria for that subject.
I mean, creativity and ingenuity are the same thing in various levels.
That saying is much more about say, dealing with hardship than doing "original" work. For example, what would you do, if you were hungry and had only a tuna can but no can opener (consider one that doesn't have those easy opening flaps)?
This is the kind of scenario that that saying is more about, or so I think. To overcome obstacles, human beings need to get smart, or they get dead. It can certainly apply to the artistic production as well, but if creativity were so crucial, more than half of today's entertainment industry wouldn't even exist.
Sincerely, dictionaries are terrible when you are referencing an abstract concept. Just look at how much the scientific community argues about definitions of stuff like energy, heat, etc. Even if you know what it's, you'll never get a straight answer that fills all of the criteria for that subject.
I mean, creativity and ingenuity are the same thing in various levels.
That saying is much more about say, dealing with hardship than doing "original" work. For example, what would you do, if you were hungry and had only a tuna can but no can opener (consider one that doesn't have those easy opening flaps)?
This is the kind of scenario that that saying is more about, or so I think. To overcome obstacles, human beings need to get smart, or they get dead. It can certainly apply to the artistic production as well, but if creativity were so crucial, more than half of today's entertainment industry wouldn't even exist.
Have you looked over my examinations yet? Remember, I'm not condemning all limitations or obstacles; I'm seeking to discuss common limitations writers and GMs set in stories and roleplays and whether they're poorly affecting creativity (and, to an extent, ingenuity). I'm not talking about limitations and obstacles in general, or this conversation could continue eternally and never actually get anywhere.
@whizzball1 Here are the three characters. Spectre Merivale is of course, your original guy. Drake Merivale is an alternate version that can turn into a dragon of light when he uses his magic too much, and Jade Merivale, who is a crystal mage with some refinements to Drake's sheet.
To break down what I did to make Jade in more detail, I decided that it would be easiest to replicate all of Spectre's abilities and Drake's transformation with creation magic. The core part of Spectre was his ability to make constructs, his struggle with his darker, mana hungry tentacles, and his high-utility disks that had high utility potential. The crystal constructs are pretty much the same, but Jade's tentacles are now made from "hungry crystals" that grow off of her when she thirsts for mana, and her disks also work by growing crystals on things to perform a lot of the same things Spectre's existence magic did. You could argue that her hungry crystals are destruction/void based, but since she's just creating things using someone else's mana, I don't think it's really a debatable point.
Only pointless change I made was that after making Drake, I felt like making a chick. So Jade is a girl. But that really has very little effect on her character, as Spectre's character wasn't really focused around his gender.
ORIGINAL:
Name: Spectre Merivale
Age: 16
Gender: Male
Spectre is eccentric in outfit as well as in person. Fair of skin and bright red of eyes, he doesn't care much about how he looks as long as he always follows the same motif: that of an unkempt, almost-formal businessman. His jacket or coat is never closed and certainly never proper in an office, and his white-collar shirt may as well not have a collar at all except to hold his loose tie. His dress pants tend to be close-fitting and too short, owing to his tall but thin build. His socks only ever match in colour, but his shoes are perfectly neat. You can tell he's around by the satisfying sound of his shoes striking the floor.
His hair is naturally white as snow, but he occasionally makes it look a dark ocean blue with a superficial illusion. One illusion of his, however, is by no means voluntary; when he uses his magic his body takes on a crystalline complexion, once-smooth skin overlaid with geometrically perfect facets that glitter in the light. And no matter what he's doing, if you look closely you can see a faint glow all about his person, shining through his clothes.
Year: 3
Rank: Journeyman
Room No. 314
Spectre Merivale is eccentric and slightly socially inept. His upbringing did not encourage meaningful interaction with others, friends, family, or otherwise. All he really knows is how to make witty, snarky jokes and how to enliven a conversation. But his personality is almost entirely superficial—practically everything he does and says stems from his eccentricity and sarcasm-disguised excitability.
If there's one thing about him that goes deeper than the expressions on his face, it's his abiding, unyielding pursuit of goodness. He absolutely hates the idea of unkindness and evil within himself, and his zeal against it in others is unmatched. He's not exceptionally confrontational about it if he can stop evil clandestinely or discreetly, no matter how small, even if it's his friends. In fact, he cares more about ending it in his friends than in anyone else.
He wishes he could be deeper than that, a better friend, a slightly more emotional man, but he knows it may take a while, if ever. Still, he perseveres.
Spectre's magic deals primarily with light and descends from three Aeons: Creation, Destruction, and Existence. At this point in Spectre's training, his skill lies in the first two portions, but it will not be long until he finds himself in the third.
Spectre came from a family of Destructionists but first unlocked his magic in Creation. With what power he could muster up at a young age he was able to form nigh-unbreakable constructs of light that moved freely according to his will. His magical reserves, unfortunately, were small and weak. With no real supply of power he could do little to nothing on a regular basis.
When his anger against evil awakened, so did a new aspect of his power, and he found himself able to utilise the absence of light in one way and one way only: absorbing the energy in others and transferring it to himself. If he could catch someone with his shadowy tendrils he could start to drain them. He showed restraint so as not to alienate his family further, and his magical reserves grew with practice so that he had to use his destructive power less and less. Nowadays, it certainly helps in a fight, but he prefers to go all on his own power rather than enlarge his wellspring artificially.
His real potential is in the Aeon of Existence, but only because of the nature of his potential for Creation. Spectre's constructs of light are more than just sturdy objects; they channel natural magic with incredible ease at almost no magical expenditure for their creator. At this point, Spectre is beginning to notice, and with formulae, maths, and a lot of research, he will unlock the power of the Crystal Matrix. Crystal Matrices are simply disks made of light, just like the rest of Spectre's constructs, but the disks are layered with perfect fractal patterns and etched with precise magical channels.
The Matrices pull in natural magic and use it to channel the environment itself. Each Crystal Matrix uses the environment to do purely natural things—but the flow of magic encourages rapidity, efficiency, and efficacy. One Matrix may reflect and even amplify the force of a physical attack; another may dispel the magical energy in an attack it or even encourage its absorption by Spectre. Yet another could speed up blood clotting or the knitting of bones or encourage the growth of a plant—and some Matrices take more energy from Spectre than do others. But their sheer efficiency is to be envied.
Equipment: Spectre wields a sword—a real sword—that looks like it might be made of light. He uses it to channel his magic into energetic beams of light and sometimes to "draw" his constructs in midair. It's all for show at this point, but it points to another aspect of his: precision. Spectre is incredibly graceful in every action. He will not do something if he can't do it as efficiently and precisely as possible, and the showier, the better. Every step he takes is timed, every flourish of his hands—and, in battle, every spell, every attack, and every construct. He has mastered the art of precision in all things, a quality that is important to his magic in all its forms, but he has done it at the painful cost of important social development at a young age.
Spectre came from a long line of mages that operated under the Aeon of Destruction and Destruction alone. They expected much from their firstborn, but when all their attempts to awaken their kind of magic within him failed, their disappointment was palpable. When the stress got to him and woke his magic of Creation instead, his extended family shunned him and those closest to him hid behind pity. His was a homeschooling family, so he had few real relationships outside of his home. So, isolated against his will, he spent all his time training when he wasn't teaching himself the subjects his family failed to instruct him in.
His magical reserves were incredibly tiny. With so little energy to go on at any given moment he had to be extremely efficient, and his talent for precision grew quickly. His creations fascinated his younger siblings, both of whom ended up with Destruction Magic, but his parents started keeping him away from them as if he were infecting them with his creativity. However, he discovered a chance for redemption when, extinguishing his light incorrectly, he ended up with tangible darkness in its place. Black magic—a stroke of luck! Upon experimentation, he found that he could extract the energy from plants and animals, but his parents were not as overjoyed as he had hoped. They half-heartedly encouraged further experimentation and, with unexpected kindness, let him test his abilities on them.
A whole new world opened up to him. Though his drain on the magic of others was temporary, the effect on him was both temporary and permanent. Little by little he expanded his wellspring with his parents' consent, showing great restraint even as he learned to do bigger and better things with the magic he truly loved. Disappointed with his growing love for Creation magic, Spectre's uncle pushed him to use his Destruction magic more and more. Things came to a head on the day he accidentally used it to kill his favourite pet—and, with it, he nearly killed his little sister, as well. That was the day he swore off evil entirely; his uncle was found gulity for much worse than influencing Spectre and he himself was shipped right off to a magical boarding school.
For a couple of young years he distinguished himself there with exemplary performance and marked improvement. With a few new friends acting as willing sources for his magic, he soon grew his magical reserves to an actually reasonable level and was noticed for his abilities, academic and magical, by the Breakfast University for Magic.
If Spectre was forced to sacrifice something important in order to move forward, he would choose his Destruction magic in a heartbeat. It has some use in fights, but he can improve his magical reserves on his own, now, if slower than he could at his full Aeonic potential.
If Spectre were given a single wish, he would have asked for the love of his parents a few years ago. He supposes he'll figure out himself, now, and he'd rather they actually love him rather than being forced to. Instead, he'd probably wish for the ability to create anything he wanted; he'd find that rather useful.
BUFFED:
Name: Drake Merivale
Age: 16
Gender: Male
Drake is eccentric in outfit as well as in person. Fair of skin and bright red of eyes, he doesn't care much about how he looks as long as he always follows the same motif: that of an unkempt, almost-formal businessman. His jacket or coat is never closed and certainly never proper in an office, and his white-collar shirt may as well not have a collar at all except to hold his loose tie. His dress pants tend to be close-fitting and too short, owing to his tall but thin build. His socks only ever match in colour, but his shoes are perfectly neat. You can tell he's around by the satisfying sound of his shoes striking the floor.
His hair is naturally white as snow, but he occasionally makes it look a dark ocean blue with a superficial illusion. One illusion of his, however, is by no means voluntary; when he uses his magic his body takes on a crystalline complexion, once-smooth skin overlaid with geometrically perfect facets that glitter in the light. And no matter what he's doing, if you look closely you can see a faint glow all about his person, shining through his clothes.
When he calls upon enough power though, His Draconian blood takes hold and he can become a fully fledged dragon. The crystals on his skin become translucent scales, and before long, he transforms into something far more monstrous than the laid back buffoon he initially comes across as.
Year: 3
Rank: Journeyman
Room No. 314
Drake Merivale is eccentric and slightly socially inept. His upbringing did not encourage meaningful interaction with others, friends, family, or otherwise. All he really knows is how to make witty, snarky jokes and how to enliven a conversation. But his personality is almost entirely superficial—practically everything he does and says stems from his eccentricity and sarcasm-disguised excitability.
If there's one thing about him that goes deeper than the expressions on his face, it's his abiding, unyielding pursuit of goodness. He absolutely hates the idea of unkindness and evil within himself, and his zeal against it in others is unmatched. He's not exceptionally confrontational about it if he can stop evil clandestinely or discreetly, no matter how small, even if it's his friends. In fact, he cares more about ending it in his friends than in anyone else.
He wishes he could be deeper than that, a better friend, a slightly more emotional man, but he knows it may take a while, if ever. Still, he perseveres.
The more he gives into his Draconian blood however, an alternate self emerges. It only wants to take and better it's standing, but Drake is always in control and is usually aware when this side emerges. But this is why he must always use restraint with his powers.
Drake's magic deals primarily with light and descends from three Aeons: Creation, Destruction, and Existence. At this point in Drake's training, his skill lies in the first two portions, but it will not be long until he finds himself in the third.
Drake came from a family of Destructionists but first unlocked his magic in Creation. With what power he could muster up at a young age he was able to form nigh-unbreakable constructs of light that moved freely according to his will. His magical reserves, unfortunately, were small and weak. With no real supply of power he could do little to nothing on a regular basis.
When his anger against evil awakened, so did a new aspect of his power, and he found himself able to utilise the absence of light in one way and one way only: absorbing the energy in others and transferring it to himself. If he could catch someone with his shadowy tendrils he could start to drain them. He showed restraint so as not to alienate his family further, and his magical reserves grew with practice so that he had to use his destructive power less and less. Nowadays, it certainly helps in a fight, but he prefers to go all on his own power rather than enlarge his wellspring artificially.
His real potential is in the Aeon of Existence, but only because of the nature of his potential for Creation. Drake's constructs of light are more than just sturdy objects; they channel natural magic with incredible ease at almost no magical expenditure for their creator. At this point, Drake is beginning to notice, and with formula, math, and a lot of research, he will unlock the power of the Crystal Matrix. Crystal Matrices are simply disks made of light, just like the rest of Drake's constructs, but the disks are layered with perfect fractal patterns and etched with precise magical channels.
The Matrices pull in natural magic and use it to channel the environment itself. Each Crystal Matrix uses the environment to do purely natural things—but the flow of magic encourages rapidity, efficiency, and efficacy. One Matrix may reflect and even amplify the force of a physical attack; another may dispel the magical energy in an attack it or even encourage its absorption by Drake. Yet another could speed up blood clotting or the knitting of bones or encourage the growth of a plant—and some Matrices take more energy from Drake than do others. But their sheer efficiency is to be envied.
One must not also forget his Draconian blood, which slowly transforms him into a dragon as he continues to use his magic. His Draconian form is strong, but overusing his magic runs the risk of permanently changing not only his body, but his mind as well. Drake must never lose the battle to his selfish dragon blood.
Equipment: Drake wields a sword—a real sword—that looks like it might be made of light. He uses it to channel his magic into energetic beams of light and sometimes to "draw" his constructs in midair. It's all for show at this point, but it points to another aspect of his: precision. Drake is incredibly graceful in every action. He will not do something if he can't do it as efficiently and precisely as possible, and the showier, the better. Every step he takes is timed, every flourish of his hands—and, in battle, every spell, every attack, and every construct. He has mastered the art of precision in all things, a quality that is important to his magic in all its forms, but he has done it at the painful cost of important social development at a young age.
Drake came from a long line of mages that operated under the Aeon of Destruction and Destruction alone. They expected much from their firstborn, but when all their attempts to awaken their kind of magic within him failed, their disappointment was palpable. When the stress got to him and woke his magic of Creation instead, his extended family shunned him and those closest to him hid behind pity. His was a homeschooling family, so he had few real relationships outside of his home. So, isolated against his will, he spent all his time training when he wasn't teaching himself the subjects his family failed to instruct him in.
His magical reserves were incredibly tiny. With so little energy to go on at any given moment he had to be extremely efficient, and his talent for precision grew quickly. His creations fascinated his younger siblings, both of whom ended up with Destruction Magic, but his parents started keeping him away from them as if he were infecting them with his creativity. However, he discovered a chance for redemption when, extinguishing his light incorrectly, he ended up with tangible darkness in its place. Black magic—a stroke of luck! Upon experimentation, he found that he could extract the energy from plants and animals, but his parents were not as overjoyed as he had hoped. They half-heartedly encouraged further experimentation and, with unexpected kindness, let him test his abilities on them.
A whole new world opened up to him. Though his drain on the magic of others was temporary, the effect on him was both temporary and permanent. Little by little he expanded his wellspring with his parents' consent, showing great restraint even as he learned to do bigger and better things with the magic he truly loved. Disappointed with his growing love for Creation magic, Drake's uncle pushed him to use his Destruction magic more and more. Things came to a head on the day he accidentally used it to kill his favourite pet—and, with it, he nearly killed his little sister, as well. That was the day he swore off evil entirely; his uncle was found gulity for much worse than influencing Drake and he himself was shipped right off to a magical boarding school.
Though little did anyone know that Drake's unkle was aware of what Drake was. His unkle was aware of the Draconian blood sleeping in his veins, and it would awaken soon...
For a couple of young years he distinguished himself there with exemplary performance and marked improvement. With a few new friends acting as willing sources for his magic, he soon grew his magical reserves to an actually reasonable level and was noticed for his abilities, academic and magical, by the Breakfast University for Magic.
If Drake was forced to sacrifice something important in order to move forward, he would choose his Destruction magic in a heartbeat. It has some use in fights, but he can improve his magical reserves on his own, now, if slower than he could at his full Aeonic potential.
If Drake were given a single wish, he would have asked for the love of his parents a few years ago. He supposes he'll figure out himself, now, and he'd rather they actually love him rather than being forced to. Instead, he'd probably wish for the ability to create anything he wanted; he'd find that rather useful.
REFINED:
Name: Jade Merivale
Age: 16
Gender: Female
Jade is an eccentric person who dresses the part. Fair skin and a bright red eyes. While she chooses to wear nice formal outfits, she often wears garish jackets or hoodies over them for a more grunge look. Jade does love wearing nice shoes though. One can hear the click of her taps with every step.
Her hair is often has colored to a dark ocean blue. Though with excessive use of her magic, her body takes on a crystalline complexion. Once-smooth skin overlaid with geometrically perfect facets that glitter in the light. They glow and expand across her body if she takes her magic too far.
Year: 3
Rank: Journeyman
Room No. 314
Jade Merivale is eccentric and slightly socially inept. Her upbringing had few meaningful connections, and she grew up introverted. She was pretty much raised by fictional characters from books, being as snarky and weird as they were. It's all surface of course, just a persona.
She has an unyielding pursuit of righteousness hidden under her persona. At the core of her being, she wants to be just like the perfect and pure characters she reads about. Jade hates her own negative thoughts and actions, and tries to stop others from participating in such things as well. Though she is not always vocal about it and can be quite discreet. Jade is more about quelling the evil in one's heart, not necessarily the individual themselves.
Jade wishes she could have more depth than her fairytale characters, both for herself and her friends. But she knows that with time, she will attain her goal.
Jade's magic deals in crystallization, a form of creation magic.
One of the first things that jade learned how to do was turn ordinary stone debris into crystal constructs. Because Jade has such small mana reserves, she actually can't make very many of these. But they are durable and strong, and can shelter Jade from almost all forms of mundane weaponry.
As she got older and learned of the horrors of the world, she started to experiment with her magic more. Push it's limits, even into unsafe territory. When Jade let her magic run too wild, her body would start to grow crystals, threatening to cover her entire body. These crystals would grow and extend like tendrils until they could take hold of a mana source. These “hungry crystals” enabled Jade to use the mana of others to cast spells. So long as they are bound to her hungry crystals, she can use their mana, or create crystal growths on them that can act as armor, or hinder their movement. Though Jade hates using her magic this way, as it goes against her principles.
Though through repeated use of her magic, Jade is starting to experiment with another use for her crystalline magic. Something between her hungry crystals and her crystal golems. She calls them matrix disks.
Jade is able to create a matrix disk and fuse it to her arm to be used as a shield, or throw it like a Frisbee. When they make contact with something, they shatter and alter the contacted object in some way using it's own magic. Jade could block a weapon and have it fuse with her shield, or throw a disk at a friend's weapon to cover it in crystals. Jade could strike someone's wound to fuse bones and seal up wounds with her crystals, or even cause plants to mature and produce edible crystal fruit. While the disks prey on the object's mana, Jade does need to use some of her own mana to “program” the disks. The more complex the outcome, the more mana it drains from her.
Regardless of what she's casting, once her reserves hit zero, she can still draw mana from some hidden reserve. But doing so changes her, causing her to become covered in crystals. While her original form will return to her with rest or external mana supliments, she runs the risk of losing her mind to the dark well of mana she borrows from, and could even permanently transform into a crystal statue through misuse. Jade is always trying to balance the use of her power. Crystal magic is powerful creation magic, but it definitely brings with it a void like hunger for mana
Equipment: Jade wields a sword made out of crystal. It's a catalyst for her spells, and it's shape can be altered with her magic. This includes changing it into a wip or momentarily growing twenty feet for a long range stab. Though she primarily uses it to channel her spells.
Jade came from a long line of mages that operated under the Aeon of Destruction and Destruction alone. They expected much from their firstborn, but when all their attempts to awaken their kind of magic within her failed, their disappointment was palpable. The fact that she harnessed creation magic did not make them very happy.
Her magical reserves were incredibly tiny. With so little energy to go on at any given moment she had to be extremely efficient, and so she studied tirelessly. She trained mostly alone, as her parents didn't like the idea of the extended family seeing their embarrassment of a daughter. No destruction magic? But Jade did try to find ways to impress her parents, and did it the first time she took her magic too far. They were very interested in her hungry crystals. Her parents became warmer people, but only because of this aspect of her magic. They would encourage her to embrace this twisted form of creation magic.
Jade's uncle was tasked with helping her explore her dark side. She did allow her new found love and aproval from her parents push her in this dark direction, but would eventually come to regret it. She nearly killed her younger brother, herself, and did manage to impale the family dog. Her family realized she needed a proper instructor and shipped her off, and they turned in the uncle for all of his atrocities in the field of magic. But it was too late. This experience taught Jade the horrors of dealing with such magic. She would not use such spells so recklessly in the future.
For a couple of young years she distinguished himself there with exemplary performance and marked improvement. With a few new friends acting as willing sources for her magic, she soon grew her magical reserves to an actually reasonable level and was noticed for her abilities, academic and magical, by the Breakfast University for Magic.
If Jade was forced to sacrifice something important in order to move forward, it would be her hungry crystals in a heartbeat. It has some use in fights, but she despises this destructive side of herself, as it is a grim reminder that she almost killed one of her own family members.
If Jade were given a single wish, she would have asked for the love of her parents a few years ago. She supposes she'll figure out herself, now, and she'd rather they actually love her rather than being forced to. Instead, she'd probably wish for the ability to create anything she wanted; she'd find that rather useful.
Onto my observations.
Comparing drake and Spectre, you can kind of see how even with a simple yet potent addition like ANGRY DRAGON MODE it doesn't really add anything of importance to Spectre's character. It's just a cool add-on that further beats into your head that Drake is struggling with himself, which doesn't feel especially necessary. Drake kind of feels like a kid's lunchbox, where he has all of these cool stickers plastered all over it that don't really go well together. Biohazard sticker, dragon sticker, sword sticker, crystal sticker, ufo sticker, he's all over the place. Nothing really works together, and the fragments aren't even especially original. He's just creating the illusion of something original by taking a bunch of effects we've seen before and putting them in one package.
Jade on the other hand feels like a complete package. Even though she had to stick with one boring aeon, her powers are more unique as a result. Crystal based healing spells? Crystal tentacles? Jade can do everything that Spectre can do and more, and she might actually get to join the RP if presented as a character. Maybe not because of how broad and all encompassing her magic is, but that was because I was trying to make her do everything Drake could do. Certainly if Spectre was OP, Jade would be as well. Not only that, but I would argue that watching Jade solve problems is more interesting than watching Spectre do it, if only because she has a smaller scope of power sources to draw upon. and most importantly, she does still have that internal struggle with herself. It's just with her hungry crystals instead of an entire Aeon.
I agree concerning Drake. The draconian beast mode feels tacked on. But Drake and Spectre differ on an important point. While Drake certainly fits the description and thrust of your penultimate paragraph, Spectre does not, for a reason I didn't directly express about my character: he has a unified theme. None of his powers are tacked on; his history, personality, and abilities all converge. That theme is the balance between creation and destruction, and each of his three powers has to do with one part of that balance. Jade, however, in trying to keep the powers but conform to the roleplay, loses that theme and gains a new one. The powers, however, seem more starkly general than Spectre's because they're doing a lot of different things while "just" being crystal.
Spectre's powers alone were never the full expression of my creativity; everything about him worked together in synergy, or he'd just be a character who happens to control light, shadow, and crystal all at once. I could theoretically keep the theme, but I'd have to rehash the powers in order to fit him into the roleplay. Yet, if I shrink and remould him into a slightly smaller box, I will not be able to bring the idea to ultimate fruition. Is this a problem? I don't know yet—but I think there's a better way to find out.
I find your passing remark about the broadness of Spectre's powers interesting. You seem to consider it a problem. In fact, the idea of "too much power" is a common limitation, one that raises many questions and problems of its own. But you've been talking about limitations in such a general sense that we haven't been able to talk about specific limitations like that one. There are real problems—and real uses—of solid limitations. Some of the effects of these limitations can be seen in our characters. But, unless we focus on specific limitations rather than limitations in general, I don't think we can make any real points about them. I suspect that I'll return to the examples of Spectre, Drake, and Jade often, but in a more directed context.
What do you say? Even besides the four limitations I examined in my starting post, there are other common ones worth considering, and our characters are a good jumping off point.
i like to consider the phrase in a physical sense.
if you have a huge bathtub (a roleplay with no limits) and only so much water (creativity/inspiration), you'll struggle to fill it. there'll be less substance to your writing and a lot of the times it'll just be fluff with no actual point to it, because, let's face it, if you can write only a couple paragraphs of actual content, you'll try to pad it out even just a bit.
however, if you have a smaller container (a roleplay with limits) and the same amount of water (creativity/inspiration), you'll fill it perfectly and never have to wrack your brain for extra stuff you might be able to put in. you'll avoid more cliches, you'll think of cool workarounds the limits, and you'll maybe even add a few stuff you never would've had in a setting with no limits.
it's hard to explain, but i definitely believe that limits breed creativity.
i like to consider the phrase in a physical sense.
if you have a huge bathtub (a roleplay with no limits) and only so much water (creativity/inspiration), you'll struggle to fill it. there'll be less substance to your writing and a lot of the times it'll just be fluff with no actual point to it, because, let's face it, if you can write only a couple paragraphs of actual content, you'll try to pad it out even just a bit.
however, if you have a smaller container (a roleplay with limits) and the same amount of water (creativity/inspiration), you'll fill it perfectly and never have to wrack your brain for extra stuff you might be able to put in. you'll avoid more cliches, you'll think of cool workarounds the limits, and you'll maybe even add a few stuff you never would've had in a setting with no limits.
it's hard to explain, but i definitely believe that limits breed creativity.
Yet I can provide dozens of counterexamples from my own experience. I'd like to reiterate from my first post that we can't really talk about limitations in general because different limitations tend to have different effects; I demonstrated that some limitations are very positive while others are very negative. We can definitely say concrete things about certain limitations, especially common ones that I see everywhere. Examples and counterexamples discussed in general won't get us anywhere unless we discuss specific limitations.
Yet I can provide dozens of counterexamples from my own experience. I'd like to reiterate from my first post that we can't really talk about limitations in general because different limitations tend to have different effects; I demonstrated that some limitations are very positive while others are very negative. We can definitely say concrete things about certain limitations, especially common ones that I see everywhere. Examples and counterexamples discussed in general won't get us anywhere unless we discuss specific limitations.
i was generally talking about character limitations in that post, sorry for not specifying. i find that if i'm given free reign in an rp (told what the setting is, what powers characters can have if powers are involved, and then told to go crazy) i produce work that is less in quality than what i would in a roleplay with more limits. then again, it's all about personal preference, as debating this can never give us a solid objective answer. i tend to work better when i've got someone guiding me through stuff, as opposed to being told the shit i can do and then told go to make something with it.
i was generally talking about character limitations in that post, sorry for not specifying. i find that if i'm given free reign in an rp (told what the setting is, what powers characters can have if powers are involved, and then told to go crazy) i produce work that is less in quality than what i would in a roleplay with more limits. then again, it's all about personal preference, as debating this can never give us a solid objective answer. i tend to work better when i've got someone guiding me through stuff, as opposed to being told the shit i can do and then told go to make something with it.
I think you raise an interesting point. In my experience, I work better without limitations on characters because once I have an idea for a theme (which tends to come easily to me) I can develop an entire, coherent, and logical character around that. But just because I work better that way doesn't mean others do as well. I'd like to conclude that limitations on characters, just like the limitations of logic, consistency, and setting, provide direction and reduce confusion. This is beneficial to some people and detrimental to others, the former on account of what you said and the latter because a limitation that pushes a certain theme discourages another, among other reasons. Do you disagree on any points?
I think you raise an interesting point. In my experience, I work better without limitations on characters because once I have an idea for a theme (which tends to come easily to me) I can develop an entire, coherent, and logical character around that. But just because I work better that way doesn't mean others do as well. I'd like to conclude that limitations on characters, just like the limitations of logic, consistency, and setting, provide direction and reduce confusion. This is beneficial to some people and detrimental to others, the former on account of what you said and the latter because a limitation that pushes a certain theme discourages another, among other reasons. Do you disagree on any points?
i agree entirely, it all depends on how your thought process works and your preferences. you also worded it a lot better than i did , it's definitely a case of providing direction.
I agree concerning Drake. The draconian beast mode feels tacked on. But Drake and Spectre differ on an important point. While Drake certainly fits the description and thrust of your penultimate paragraph, Spectre does not, for a reason I didn't directly express about my character: he has a unified theme. None of his powers are tacked on; his history, personality, and abilities all converge. That theme is the balance between creation and destruction, and each of his three powers has to do with one part of that balance. Jade, however, in trying to keep the powers but conform to the roleplay, loses that theme and gains a new one. The powers, however, seem more starkly general than Spectre's because they're doing a lot of different things while "just" being crystal.
Creation and destruction is in Jade's character, it's just not as obvious. I found Spectre's internal struggle more interesting than the duality of his powers. So I focused more on the hungry, evil, power granting side of his dark magic and the kind, beneficial, selfless side of his light magic. I suppose it could be made more apparent if I mentioned that her hungry crystals could penetrate Jade's victims or looked like rocky garnet, but I felt this was close enough. Alternatively, I could have gone with the light/dark theme if I used prism magic. A lot of Spectre's magic could be duplicated with a type of existence magic that dealt with splitting light into magical colors, but I felt that light representing good and darkness representing evil was too cliche.
I've already said my piece on Spectre/Jade, but you are free to think otherwise, of course.
Spectre's powers alone were never the full expression of my creativity; everything about him worked together in synergy, or he'd just be a character who happens to control light, shadow, and crystal all at once. I could theoretically keep the theme, but I'd have to rehash the powers in order to fit him into the roleplay. Yet, if I shrink and remould him into a slightly smaller box, I will not be able to bring the idea to ultimate fruition. Is this a problem? I don't know yet—but I think there's a better way to find out.
I suppose I could reiterate that Jade is basically an example of Spectre that could work in the RP. However, you're not going to agree with me and that's okay.
I find your passing remark about the broadness of Spectre's powers interesting. You seem to consider it a problem. In fact, the idea of "too much power" is a common limitation, one that raises many questions and problems of its own. But you've been talking about limitations in such a general sense that we haven't been able to talk about specific limitations like that one. There are real problems—and real uses—of solid limitations. Some of the effects of these limitations can be seen in our characters. But, unless we focus on specific limitations rather than limitations in general, I don't think we can make any real points about them. I suspect that I'll return to the examples of Spectre, Drake, and Jade often, but in a more directed context.
As a GM, something that we look for is a balance among all the characters. Strengths that enable them to overcome certain obstacles, and weaknesses that we can exploit for interesting encounters. When you have a character that is good at doing everything, it is difficult to give other characters time to shine or make a challenge that they can solve in an interesting way. It throws the power scale of the RP off, where things are always easy for the strongest characters, while their challenges are so above and beyond the rest of the players that they can't even participate. This is not to say every character needs to be perfectly balanced. But such large gaps in power and utility can discourage people with more focused kits that aren't as strong. This is why I said it would be more interesting to watch Jade solve problems than Spectre. Jade has to use her Crystal growing powers in many different ways, while Spectre has three Aeons to choose from. But looking at the characters already in the RP, I would have to say Jade and Spectre have too much raw power and utility to be accepted.
As for talking about limitations in a broad sense, I feel all limitations should be judged based on how well they are implimented. Rules are nothing more than limitations. You cannot have a game without limitations. But it's how the limitations are set up that determines how benificial or hindering they are.
What do you say? Even besides the four limitations I examined in my starting post, there are other common ones worth considering, and our characters are a good jumping off point.
Sure, this is a topic I find interesting. So long as it doesn't devolve into petty squabbling I'm fine. While Spectre is not a character I would personally play, it was important to have an approach like that to make a character like Jade. I also accept the fact that not everyone feels that Jade is a better character.
As for talking about limitations in a broad sense, I feel all limitations should be judged based on how well they are implimented. Rules are nothing more than limitations. You cannot have a game without limitations. But it's how the limitations are set up that determines how benificial or hindering they are.
That's exactly what I did with my first four examinations—judge specific types of limitations.
As a GM, something that we look for is a balance among all the characters. Strengths that enable them to overcome certain obstacles, and weaknesses that we can exploit for interesting encounters. When you have a character that is good at doing everything, it is difficult to give other characters time to shine or make a challenge that they can solve in an interesting way. It throws the power scale of the RP off, where things are always easy for the strongest characters, while their challenges are so above and beyond the rest of the players that they can't even participate. This is not to say every character needs to be perfectly balanced. But such large gaps in power and utility can discourage people with more focused kits that aren't as strong. This is why I said it would be more interesting to watch Jade solve problems than Spectre. Jade has to use her Crystal growing powers in many different ways, while Spectre has three Aeons to choose from. But looking at the characters already in the RP, I would have to say Jade and Spectre have too much raw power and utility to be accepted.
Let's talk about limitations on power levels, then; that's not something I touched upon in my examinations.
I'd first like to touch upon the idea that strong characters have easier challenges than weaker characters, and therefore weaker characters are pushed out of and away from a situation that challenges a strong character. I can provide multiple counterexamples from my own experience—examples where a challenge was meaningful both to a strong character and a weak character, challenges where a weak character did better than a strong character, and situations where characters with different levels of power both experienced interesting challenges. Even still, I'm wary of using the terms "strong" and "weak" as if power were on a sliding scale. If it really mattered that way, then skill would be moot and level power would be everything. "Power is more than just strong vs. weak; it's about the things you can handle and the things you struggle against."
For example, in my ultimate conception of Spectre, he's a being of pure crystal. His facets are shaped to geometrical perfection and he takes great care to keep himself that way—because, if his facets are deformed his magical reserves are drastically reduced and he is forced to draw power from others to repair himself. That one weakness changes the way he fights completely and opens up a whole host of challenges. Yeah, he can do a lot, and he's pretty powerful, but that doesn't mean he doesn't struggle or have things easy.
That said, you raise an important point about why the power limitation can be meaningful. As a GM, you say, it's a challenge of its own to generate interesting challenges for characters both "strong" and weak" without making one character's challenge meaningless in the face of the other's. And I completely agree. A sole writer who wants some of his characters to be very powerful while other characters are not as powerful must have a lot of skill in order to pull that off. For a GM, who isn't in control of every character? It's even harder. Not only that, but in a roleplay, all the players need to be skilled, too, in order to generate characters that are powerful but able to be challenged. But I've seen that happen very successfully, and when it does, it's entirely worth it and extremely satisfying.
In conclusion, if everybody involved in a creative work is in possession of the skill and experience to manage huge levels of power, I believe that a limitation on power is detrimental and stifling. This applies if there is one writer or many. If, however, some of the writers are unskilled at handling theoretically unlimited levels of power, power limits may help manage the RP or story. If you'd like an example (and not my own) of a creative work in which characters had huge differences between their abilities and powers and yet all had itneresting challenges and important uses, such that none of them were useless and everybody was important, I'll give you the best one of all—Avatar: The Last Airbender.
@whizzball1 I should probably clarify that when I say powerful character, I am taking their combat abilities, problem solving skills, level of intelligence, number of friends, synergy with others, etc in relation to the other characters. I am not talking about just their combat abilities. A king who commands an entire nation is a powerful character, even if he himself lacks combat capabilities. Otherwise I agree with most of what you said. But Spectre has a lot of utility powers, can summon henchmen, is deadly at range and close quarters, is very precise, Highly intelligent, has friends despite being "slightly introverted," with his only real weaknesses being maybe his ability to talk to some people and that he needs to work hard to make his magic work. Barring the fact that it's extremely easy to power play with a character like that, the only people he really needs to surround himself with are people who are good communicators.
This doesn't necessarily make him super strong in every setting. With the right team, I see Spectre filling in the roll of a support character during a big team fight, augmenting the powers of those around him. But in skimming the other characters, they were all far more specialized and couldn't do things as well as Spectre can. Power is relative.
This is another thing that can make judging power really hard. Some players make really tight kitted characters, but push those characters to the very limits of their sheet. Others have characters that look OP on paper, but they have lots of nuances that they didn't write down yet respect, making the actual character weaker. This is probably the largest contributing factor to me seeing Spectre as being so strong. Because while you may play him fairly, not everyone will.
Avatar: The Last Airbender. Good show, but Sokka spent most of his time just being comic relief. Once Aang became the actual Avatar, the only thing he really needed everyone else for was to deal with things he didn't have time for. Aang fought Ozai because he was the only one who could, and was the best choice for that event. It's wonderful if you can find RP groups that can function like that, but I don't see them too often.
@whizzball1 I should probably clarify that when I say powerful character, I am taking their combat abilities, problem solving skills, level of intelligence, number of friends, synergy with others, etc in relation to the other characters. I am not talking about just their combat abilities. A king who commands an entire nation is a powerful character, even if he himself lacks combat capabilities. Otherwise I agree with most of what you said. But Spectre has a lot of utility powers, can summon henchmen, is deadly at range and close quarters, is very precise, Highly intelligent, has friends despite being "slightly introverted," with his only real weaknesses being maybe his ability to talk to some people and that he needs to work hard to make his magic work. Barring the fact that it's extremely easy to power play with a character like that, the only people he really needs to surround himself with are people who are good communicators.
This doesn't necessarily make him super strong in every setting. With the right team, I see Spectre filling in the roll of a support character during a big team fight, augmenting the powers of those around him. But in skimming the other characters, they were all far more specialized and couldn't do things as well as Spectre can. Power is relative.
This is another thing that can make judging power really hard. Some players make really tight kitted characters, but push those characters to the very limits of their sheet. Others have characters that look OP on paper, but they have lots of nuances that they didn't write down yet respect, making the actual character weaker. This is probably the largest contributing factor to me seeing Spectre as being so strong. Because while you may play him fairly, not everyone will.
Avatar: The Last Airbender. Good show, but Sokka spent most of his time just being comic relief. Once Aang became the actual Avatar, the only thing he really needed everyone else for was to deal with things he didn't have time for. Aang fought Ozai because he was the only one who could, and was the best choice for that event. It's wonderful if you can find RP groups that can function like that, but I don't see them too often.
"This is probably the largest contributing factor to me seeing Spectre as being so strong. Because while you may play him fairly, not everyone will." That's pretty much the essence of my point on this limitation. I've made many characters with strength comparable to Spectre's, and I've never once been accused of playing them unfairly. But I believe that's because of the context. I argued that it takes skill to maintain the relevance and meaning of a powerful character in relation to others, whether as a lone writer or as many. If not everybody has that skill, it's easy for the whole thing to fall apart with power players and irrelevant characters.
I'm certain that a group of skilled RPers could pull off a roleplay without any semblance of a power limitation, especially because the RP I've been involved in longest has done exactly that. I think that, with the power limitation, I and my fellow roleplayers are given much more creative freedom. But I can also clearly see how that limitation is necessary for roleplays that are open to anybody. But I demonstrated, between Spectre and Jade, how that restricts options. Spectre's theme is less fully realised in Jade; in order to consolidate the powers it ends up getting expressed as more of a moral thing. Because all of the powers inhere in crystal alone, their relevance to the theme is less clear and their relevance to crystal even less so.
In short, I think the power limitation in whatever forms it may exist is generally necessary but restrictive to creativity. It doesn't limit all ideas, but it limits several, especially when expressed like it is in the Breakfast University of Magic (specific, power-restricting themes: the five Aeons).
, it's definitely a case of providing direction.
