Avatar - The Age of Winter

[pyroman]

You thought the water tribes housed people of peace? Nobody would have said that back then.

Long before Aang, long before the Fire Nation captured the earth, long before the longest summer the four nations had ever experienced, there was winter.

Iluq, A shaman and healer of the southern water tribe, had been born with extraordinary abilities. She had been haled from around the world for her spiritual and bending prowess, and was an assistant of Avatar Li, an earthbender who literally shaped the world. She was a young teen during his time as the avatar, and was only able to assist him for a few short years before his demise.

Once Li passed, Iluq believed herself to be more than just another human being. She proclaimed herself a greater being, and her abilities weer unchallenged as she became the chief of the southern tribe, making herself the exception of the sexist traditions. She isolated herself, allowing herself to descend into madness. Using her powers, she began to expand the ice, using the other water benders of her tribe to assist her. She knew well that she couldn't encase the world in her ice from just the south, and quickly overthrew the chief of the norther tribe to freeze the world from two fronts.

She attacked the Fire Nation first, knowing that they would be the most difficult to face. It took more than a year of fighting to finally control the fire nation, and the earth kingdom fell soon afterwards.

Still in early development, feel free to add to it or change it if you'd like!

[Gisk]

I really want to join another Avatar RP, but I'm hesitant for the plot to be "one nation is taking over everything." Because that's been the plot twice in the actual shows, and is extremely common in RPs.

I would also say that a human seeking to encase the world in ice is a bit odd. I can't get my head around her motivation for that.

Both issues would be very well put to bed, of course, if we bring spiritual involvement into this. Maybe Iluq has been fed madness by some ice spirit seeking to expand its realm. Heck, maybe she's even been full on replaced by it. The spirit is lending her power, rather than her having recruited Water Tribespeople to help with the insanity.

[pyroman]

Ah!

That's exactly what I wanted to happen. Since Li's death, she's dabbled too far into spirit stuff, and has been controlled by one to encase the world in ice and such. Though, this can be pushed back a little bit to stay away from how similar it is to the series.

[Willard]

I like the turn this is taking.

Perhaps there should be some link between the Spiritual world and the mortal realm. Something along the lines of..

"When Iluq began her expansion of the ice from both poles, she found that even her massively augmented power could not both maintain the presence of the ice and fight off the would-be defenders of the other kingdoms, never mind those who would oppose her from the water tribes. So, much as she herself had been given power by an ice spirit, she granted certain warriors under her control limited power over similar abilities, by way of 'blessing' them with spirits of their own, who in turn answer to Iluq and her own spirit. In this way, they would be strategically stationed in various locations around the world, maintaining the existence of the deathly cold ice. This would afford her limited omnipresence wherever her ice were to exist; she could sense whether it was still covering an area or not.

If those warriors were ever to be defeated and their powers drained, the ice of that area would rapidly recede, returning the land to it's previous form."

This would give the players clear objectives before going right after the 'big bad'. Areas covered in ice could be infested with water and ice spirits.

EDIT;
I'd also like to point out the potential for the involvement of other nations in terms of their military, the expansion of other plot points involving the spirit world, perhaps to the extent of the inclusion of other spirits who don't approve of what Iluq and her spirit are doing.

[pyroman]

that sounds great! I'm thinking that rather than having the Fire Nation being the first to go, it would be the first one hit by her, but the last of the nations to fall, as the new Avatar will be of the fire nation.

[Willard]

Sounds good to me. If that's the case, will the Avatar still be an active threat? Imprisoned? I'm sure Iluq wouldn't want the Avatar killed just to be brought back in another body.

[Gisk]

I should have pmed you I guess.

All good stuff.

My character idea:
Air nomad, whose bison companion was killed some time ago. In despair, she isolated herself, and never returned to the monks. She has no tattoos, but still practices airbending, and lives by her own modified version of their monk beliefs.

She's known to sell a lot of silk, and buy a lot of wine, and is looked on with pity by most air nomads.

[Gisk]

Oh, and she can teach the new avatar air bending! It'll be his first stop on the Avatar cycle.

[pyroman]

The new Avatar's existence is the reason she chose to attack the Fire Nation first. Her current state of madness was caused by a number of years by herself as well as being corrupted by a spirit. I'm thinking maybe thirteen, maybe fourteen years of slowly and subtly falling into madness to want to freeze the world.

Since the attacks on the world started, the White Lotus has been successful in keeping the Avatar safe and secret so far, managing to keep them away from Iluq for two years now, and the new Avatar has known about being the avatar for a little less than one year.

Sounds good, Gisk. The Air Nomads were just as talented as the water benders when it came to the spirits, and could certainly help the avatar with this situation.

[Gisk]

We'll work something out in pm when I'm on computer. I'll give you more details about my character then.

[pyroman]

Alright, I'll keep hashing out ideas.

[Willard]

I'd like to propose a character as well.

A water bender, and army brat child of a Major from the Northern Water tribe, he originally entered the military like his father. However, when Iluq took power, he found himself disagreeing with her goal of creating a world ice age, especially when he saw other peoples, especially benders, suffering for it. Climbing the ranks, he eventually became a special operations agent, part of an elite team of assassins and recon / spies working under Iluq and her generals. With this position, he began to funnel vital information to the Fire Nation military, to try and subvert the Water Tribe's forces.

Unfortunately, a spy within the Fire Nations army, working for Iluq directly, found out about the deception, and attempted to assassinate him, which resulted in the assisin believing he had died in a burning building. However, the corpse found wasn't his; having managed to escape, he went into hiding, awaiting his chance to strike back at the rapidly growing Water Empire.

[pyroman]

sounds awesome!

[Little Mx Inferno]

I'm interested in this as well. My character would be an Earthbender who's part of an "underground" (literally and figuratively) rebellion against Iluq in the Earth Kingdom who seeks out the new avatar to help them. Also a couple plot ideas: Since Iluq effectively rules most if not all the kingdoms, perhaps she has set up border patrols and guards and made it illegal to travel between kingdoms? This would be basically to keep other benders from reaching and potentially training the Avatar.

[pyroman]

With what Willar gave to me, using the ideas of Iluq gifting certain people spiritual powers and placing them at specific points around the world to see everyone at once (in a way), there will be guards and people who regulate traffic between the nations, and keeping tabs on a lot of people in order to find the Avatar. While she easily could stop travel between the nations, there are too many things that would be risked economically if things like trade were stopped because she outlawed travel between nations. And while that doesn't really effect the Nomads, it still hurts the other three nations, including her own water tribes.

[Little Mx Inferno]

That makes sense. Perhaps a ban on benders travelling between borders instead? And her benders would have some sort of identification or whatever.

[pyroman]

Benders are the ones that are usually background checked and tabbed, since learning bending from someone cannot bend is pretty much just as good as reading a book about bending, and are much more likely to wanting to find the avatar and help them.

Most to all of Iluq's soldiers have some sort of uniform or symbol on them so they can be identified, but those who are under cover to pretend like a civilian are given little IDs to other soldiers know.

[Little Mx Inferno]

Alright, that makes sense. Is the underground earthbender rebellion something you want to include or should I change around my character background?

[pyroman]

The underground rebellion works well with this, and I think it'll be included. It's fitting that it's out of the Earth Kingdom.

I do believe that we have enough people to start with the four of us, and while I will move the world and the roleplay, I do ask that you guys also push the boundaries of the world to make it an interesting roleplay.

I'll start working on the OOC tomorrow if you guys feel ready to push on.

[Gisk]

I do, I have fun ideas. Stuff that utilizes what I know of the world, and adding my own ideas.