The Sky and The Earth II
The Setting
Set in the magical world of Fiore, and more specifically in and around the city of Luna Crescente, our story will focus on the day to day activities of our heroes as they work towards their upcoming S Class examinations. This will be the story of two teams as they seek to make their names, gain their fortunes, and grow stronger together. A sizable village surrounded by a crescent shaped lake, Luna Crescente is a well established spot, not least because of the power of its guilds. Waterways flow freely alongside and under the streets, and the common folk are a highly festive bunch. Its position as a sort of crossroads between multiple major cities makes it a merchant paradise, leading to a comparatively sprawling business district with many specialized craftsmen. All this aside, the town is indisputably most famous for the fact that it houses two large Guilds: Harpy's Wing and Golem's Hand. The rivalry between these guilds over the last few years (and the hyperactivity of their members trying to best each other) has earned them recognition, respect and a bit of infamy.
Harpy's Wing
By far the elder of the two Guilds in Luna Crescente, Harpy's Wing was founded in order to provide a home for those who have no place to call their own; a place to belong, grow, and prosper for orphans and outcasts, as well as anyone who shares their ideals. Harpy's Wing believes in expanding the strength of the guild as a unified force, and so encourages its members to find harmony between themselves and others.
Situated just outside Luna Crescente, in the middle of the crescent shaped lake which gave the town its name, the Guild Hall of Harpy's Wing is a sprawling tower built into an ancient tree. Created in times long gone by the founder of the Guild, this living guild hall has never failed to provide lodgings to the ever growing Guild, and does not look like it will be full any time soon either. Affectionately known as 'The Nest', this is the heart and soul of the Guild's operations, and rarely will regular members be seen away from it for more than a couple of weeks at a time.
Golem's Hand
The 'New Guild on the Block' as it were, Golem's Hand was founded very recently in aftermath of a Dark Guild's assault on Luna Crescente. While Harpy's Wing was able to repel the assault after a hard fought battle, the town took significant damage during the ordeal. Founding themselves on a platform of being the sole worthy protectors of Crescente, Golem's Hand believes in the primacy of individual strength, with each strong mage representing another brick in the defensive wall of the town. They have high respect for the art of magic, but view it as more of a tool and focus on the strength of the body in order to avoid exclusive reliance on magic.
Raised in the immediate aftermath of the Dark Guild attack on the town, the Guild Hall of Golem's Hand lives up to the name of the guild; not only is it built like a fortress, but from a distance it looks almost like a stone fist rising up out of the city. Built to temporarily house the entire population of the town in the event of another attack, 'The Rock of Crescente' is the gathering place of all townsfolk in the event of an emergency, as well as a common meeting place in the evenings due to its bar and the frequent public fighting displays and contests of the Golem's Hand Guildmembers.
Character Creation and Post Expectations
Before I get onto character creation, I have a few simple things to keep in mind, as with most GMs.
1. Please don't be OOC rude to anyone involved in this. I take this reasonably seriously; IC insults/beef is completely fine as long as it doesn't translate to being toxic OOC. If you have any issues with other players in the game, please raise them with me before they cause problems for you or anyone else.
2. Play your character, not anyone else's. Any combat actions or decisions made on behalf of someone else's character (including not dodging attacks, or being generally inactive) without clear prior consent being given will be frowned upon. On the same wavelength, please don't God-mode or Metagame, we're all just here to have fun.
3. If you're going to make a potentially 'questionable' post (anything that might belong in a MA15+ film or beyond) please send me a message to confirm it's alright first.
4. Minimum one paragraph per post please, but do aim to be around 2-3 for most expository pieces.
5. Other than myself and any other individuals who will be running the NPCs in the future, please keep it to one character. You're welcome to introduce another if for any reason your character becomes unplayable or leaves the story, but only one at a time.
6. Each character can, as in the original, have a maximum of 2 magic disciplines. All custom magic will require approval before being allowed to join the story, but as long as it's not abjectly overpowered you'll probably be fine; it's how you write about the power that really determines how powerful it is.
With that out of the way, here is the CS, taken closely from the original one:
A copy of this character sheet (with the formatting included so you don't have to do it yourself) can be found at the following link:
pastebin.com/akPxLiz6
Team Creation/Organization and Relationships
A key aspect of this, moving forward, is that the two teams have to be able to function. Not perfectly to begin with, perhaps, but characters need to be functional enough in groups to work in teams. Once characters start getting approved, we'll start talking about how the teams will work: what's the leadership structure like, how are important decisions made, who has been in the team longer/shorter, what are the group dynamics like? All these things and more will be discussed before we get into IC work properly.
Additionally, I'm bringing back a thing from the last thread, which is the Relationships section for each character. Please have a look through the Character thread here to see what I'm talking about. For a character to be approved to be posting in the IC thread I'd like to you have a listing for at least 50% of the other approved characters. As you can see it's only a couple of lines each, but it really helps people get to know each others characters, as well as making sure that people know where they stand with each other. I personally had a lot of fun reading through these, and I think they're an excellent addition; I hope you will too!
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Finally, I can't stress enough that if you have any questions, requests, suggestions, or queries, you should feel completely fine coming to talk to me about them; my inbox is open for all of you!
Hopefully we can have a great time together in this wonderful world of Fiore!