[OOC] Tower of the Thin Line [still accepting]

[Shohmyoh]

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW BEFORE READING ANY FURTHER:

• Character death is mandatory. There will be certain points in the story where a character must die in order for the others to proceed. Which characters die will be decided by the players' actions.
• A certain level of secrecy must be maintained at times, both by the players and myself. This will be explained further on a case-by-case basis. Players are expected to follow any rules regarding secrecy. Failure to do so will not only hamper the enjoyment of the other players, but will also result in penalization if caught.
• There will be times when I will need to define whether a given action is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ in private, and will not be able to reveal these definitions until later. I will provide proof that I made those decisions in advance during these instances. This is to reassure players that I am being impartial and not playing favorites.
• Though keeping secrets may be required on my part, I will NEVER outright lie to players.

With that out of the way…

Tower of The Thin Line

The Story:

Prologue

"The sleeping agent is wearing off now, so you will be able to hear my voice. Familiarize yourself with the layout of your holding cell: 33 inches long, 90 inches tall, 30 inches deep, made of obsidian black steel. We recommend that you do not attempt to escape, as extreme precautionary measures have been taken to prevent such an act. The claustrophobic nature of the room, coupled with the common anxiety response of not knowing where one is has commonly caused hysterical fits in previous subjects. Therefore we will wait until your adrenaline rush has waned before continuing."

...

"Now continuing. You are one of many random samples of the general population that we have chosen to participate in an experiment. The experiment will consist of several trials of varying nature that you will undertake with a small group of other test subjects. The purpose of this experiment may or may not be revealed to you in time, but suffice to say that we seek to ascertain your definition of the word 'human'.

"You will notice a slim steel band on your left wrist. The origin of its composite metals, though most assuredly foreign to you, is irrelevant. It is impossible to remove in your current state, so we recommend that you conserve your energy. The other subjects that you will soon meet have the same band. Your test group must relinquish one of its collective bands at certain intervals to continue the experiment. The band can only be removed from your body upon death. Therefore one of the subjects that comprise your test group will be required to die before the remainder can move forward.

"Be warned: it is expressly forbidden for any subject to directly kill another subject. Doing so will result in the immediate termination of this experiment as well as all subjects involved. Every trial within this experiment will contain a failure state. These failure states will determine which subject will be terminated.

"Despite your lack of control over the proceedings so far, do not think that your desires are irrelevant. In fact, they are the crux of the experiment. How you interact with your fellow test subjects will assist in determining who among you will survive, and may also influence the nature of certain trials to come. Whether you attempt to befriend, beguile or ignore the other test subjects is your decision. We are confident that your actions will provide us with adequate data regardless.

"The door of your cell will be opened momentarily. You will then enter the connecting room and meet the other test subjects that will participate in the experiment. From there your group will be given further instructions.

"Enjoy yourself."

A group of strangers, randomly picked from the general population, has been whisked away from the daily grind of their lives and imprisoned in an unknown technological compound. An unseen voice over an intercom states that they are now unwilling participants in an experiment designed to collect data regarding the human condition. They will be forced to complete various trials of myriad form in order to win their chance to leave. A grim addendum is attached to their task: not all of them will leave the Tower alive. Which of them will survive depends on their own actions; whether they choose to help or hinder their fellow test subject may very well seal their destiny.

Will the hapless subjects befriend or beguile one another? Which of them will escape a forlorn fate? And what is the true purpose of the experiment? The subjects and The Tower both await the answers…

Characters:

There is currently one spot available for someone to join. If you are interested, please let me know and submit a character application. The first person to submit a satisfactory character will get the spot.

Five characters will be the maximum number allowed to participate. If one of the players does not or cannot join for whatever reason, then their spot will become open. I will update this section as often as I can until all spots are finalized.

@corneredbliss

@Atrophy

@MyCatGinger

@Blue Dog- pending character approval

[One spot available]

Character application will be done a bit differently: READ THE FIRST POST IN THE CHARACTER TAB before posting anything regarding your character.

General Rules:

---

If something can be done in-character, it should be done in-character. In particular, if you wish to discuss strategy regarding trials with another character, do it in-character, in full view of all other RPers.

You are encouraged to embellish and write descriptively as often as possible. This RP will focus heavily on character development and interaction, and having an interesting well-developed character may endear him/her to the other subjects. There will be times where shorter utilitarian posts may be necessary, but even then I will take steps to allow you some leeway.

Do not discuss a trial OOC while it is ongoing. After it is over, you may discuss it OOC as much as you want. If you need clarification on a trial’s rules, bring it up in-character if at all possible and the GM’s character will explain it to you. If it regards something specific like post composition that can’t be talked about IC, then you may post it OOC.

Some story events will require the exchange of PMs between myself and a player or players. Unless instructed otherwise, players are expected not to reveal the contents of these PMs to anyone else involved in the RP. To show that you have read and understand the rules, add the name of a song you really like to Part 1 of your character application.

Trust between the RPers is essential. Privately sharing information that is supposed to be secret will only hinder the enjoyment of the RP for the other players and myself. Any players caught doing so will be penalized. If you are unable to trust me and the other players, or unwilling to follow this rule, do not apply.

I will do my best to be lenient about how frequently people need to post. I realize that real life always comes first. However, if you won’t be available for an extended period of time please let me know. There will be certain parts of this RP where it would be very difficult for me to write around a character whose player is absent. Know that you risk forfeiting your character if you no-show for too long without some sort of notice.

If your character dies, you may no longer post IC. You will be welcome to continue posting OOC of course, as long as you follow the same rules as everyone else.

---

If you are willing to abide by the above, and if you are interested in taking part in this little experiment, I would be glad to have you.

[Shohmyoh]

Feel free to ask any questions you have or to let me know if I need to explain anything more thoroughly. There were other things I considered adding to the OP like a couple in-character rules or how PMs would work, but I think it'd be better to elaborate on those things as they become relevant.

[corneredbliss]

Excellent! I'll begin working on my character.

@Shohmyoh Thoughts on character images in lieu of/in addition to appearance descriptions?

[Shohmyoh]

I hadn't thought about it really, but I'm okay with it. You could add a shorter description along with the image if there's some physical attribute you wanna add, or if there's something that the image doesn't portray. But an image alone would be fine too.

[corneredbliss]

Awesome, thank you. I'll probably have mine up within the next day or so.

[Blue Dog]

This also seems like quet the interesting concept. Permission to begin work on a CS ( though I must warn I don't know how long it will take to make on.) a,so, what is the CharacterTab you mentioned? ( might just be missing it, is it in the original post?)
Actually, I just went back and read a little, are there no spots open?

[Shohmyoh]

Not at the moment, I'm afraid. Though it's possible that will change if the people who currently have their spots reserved don't come and claim them, or if their character applications aren't up to snuff (though I don't foresee that second one being a problem). I honestly didn't think this would get much attention so I let the first 5 people in the interest check reserve a spot. But I can let you know if a spot becomes available, if you like.

[Orromog]

Sorry about this, but real life just threw me for a loop yesterday and I won't be able to keep up with an advanced RP for about a month, so I'm going to gracefully drop out of this RP. I hope that somebody else can take my place and kick butt while I try to deal with real life for a while. Best of luck to all other players :)

[WhiteStar19]

@Shohmyoh Because of above, since I believe the reserved person now will shift, may I reserve a spot in case someone drops out?

[Blue Dog]

Yeah, definitely. Please do.

[Shohmyoh]

@Orromog Alright, I understand. Thank you for letting me know, and I hope everything's okay.

@WhiteStar19 I'll have to get back to you on that. Since I started with first-come-first-serve, the only fair way is for me to keep going like that. I'll have to see what @MyCatGinger and @Blue Dog want to do.

On that note, you're next in line MyCatGinger, so you are free to claim Orromog's spot if you wanna join! And Blue Dog, you can be the reserve if another spot opens up in the future, if you like.

EDIT: I put MyCatGinger as MaggieTheCat. Dunno where the hell I got that name from.

[corneredbliss]

EDIT: I put MyCatGinger as MaggieTheCat. Dunno where the hell I got that name from.

@Shohmyoh

Saw that and giggled to myself. Might start calling you Maggie, Ging.

[Blue Dog]

Sounds good! Do me a favor and Pm me if something opens up?

[Shohmyoh]

Will do, sir!

[Blue Dog]

Thank you!

[Atrophy]

Working on my character, boss! Hopefully it doesn't take me too long.

[Darcs]

I should have a character done in the morning/afternoon

[MyCatGinger]

They say the world works in mysterious ways...
How did you even get MaggieTheCat?! Maggie is the name of my highschool chemistry teacher xD

@Orromog Darn. :c I hope everything really does go all fine, bud. We'll be rooting for you from here in the shadows.
And I won't let you down, amigo! I'll make sure your worthy sacrifice wasn't in vain.

I most definitely would still love to continue with this, so I'm going to start making a character as soon as I can, too.
Though, since everybody's basically testing the waters here, I'm perhaps going to play a gender I haven't quite played before.
The main pros being that, if I die, well that's totally fine and I can learn from my mistakes on how to man-up, as it were, to make my character a more believable male.
And plus, I'm not sure about what Orromog would have played, so I'm taking a wild guess and assuming male...

Heavens bless me should I be wrong.

EDIT: Initially, I had wanted to make a 12 year old boy, but the age limit starts at 18 so I'll have to scrap that idea...

[Shohmyoh]

Awesome, sounds good!

Originally there wasn't an age limit, but I decided to cap it at 18 for a couple of reasons. One is that many of the trials will require an analytical eye, one that a younger character might not realistically have. The second reason I'll have to reveal later on.

[corneredbliss]

Didn't want to double post, so I'm just editing this in. Looks like I'm the guinea pig, so if there's anything I need to change, let me know!

Also: Interstate Love Song - Stone Temple Pilots

Part 1

Elora Murray

Approximate Age Range:

late 20’s

Gender:

Female

Appearance:

Elle stands at a height of 5'7" and clocks in at 125 lbs. She is slim and lanky, with thin, very dirty blonde hair that falls at her chest. Her eyes are a piercing light green, and are almost always rimmed with smudged black liner and mascara. Other than that, she wears minimal makeup. She's also got several tattoos: one, small outlines of what look like waves on her left wrist; two, an arrangement of faintly colored lilac and carnation flowers on the inner side of her right bicep; three, a simple outline of the Aries constellation following just underneath her left collar bone; four, a cartoonish black and white image of a dog tugging down a female's dress just above her left knee; five, a small colored image of a thunderbolt striking a heart on the outside of her right ankle.

Attire:

Elora is sporting an oversized, relaxed black sweater, which hides a plain grey tank top underneath. On bottom, she is wearing hip-hugging dark olive-green cargo jeans, tapered at the ankles, and worn-out high top black monochrome Converse. Her fingernails always have chipped nail polish and the right wrist is always ready with hair ties. She is never without a rustic golden necklace that hangs around her neck and rests just above her chest, bearing a miniature Swiss Army knife. There is a rectangular black bag hanging around her body, which holds her phone, headphones, pens, a pack of 5 Gum, wallet, hand sanitizer, and a little black notebook.

If you met this person on the street and didn’t know them, what would be your first impression of them?

First impressions of Elora usually begin with notice of her eyes. After that one would notice that she is very cool and collected, although there is something in her gaze and attitude that could be construed as either cold or impish. One would immediately notice her voice, relatively low and slightly raspy - like gravel swimming in honey.