Welcome. :D
Sign-Ups are ClosedIdea: You are one person in a small group of friends who like all things paranormal. In a world just like our own, with little supernatural events or sightings. (It's debatable for people to believe or not to believe in ghosts, psychics, etc.) One day you got together with some friends and decided it'd be fun to start up a business to investigate paranormal disturbances for either individuals or businesses. You'd use high tech equipment to measure and record and maybe even catch a glimpse of that elusive ghost.
Requirments:Be able to post more than or equal to two paragraphs. :) This is slated as high casual.
The Paranormal:ESP- Extrasensory perception. For this game there are two different types.
- Type A: These people have a mild sixth sense as it were. A Type A ESPer is someone who can sense things that aren't normal. Though all Type A people have to focus on this skill in order to make it work. Some people can see Auras if they focus. Some can sense spirits (but not see or talk to them).
- Type B: These people are highly in tune with the paranormal. They are mediums, clairvoyants, telekinesis, etc.
Ghosts:
There are two different types of ghosts. There are your ghosts that are spirits of the departed who have not passed on. Then there are the imprints of people.
The spirits can manifest in my different types. Vengeful spirits, poltergeists, women in white, demons, etc. Each spirit is different and should be treated with caution.
Common types of Ghosts: The most common type is an image. A glimpse of someone's life. These are merely after images. If you see a woman sitting in a restaurant or an old man on the stairs, these are good example of the first type of Ghost. These are harmless.
The second most common is the noisy ghost. This one bangs on walls. Or taps, or raps, or scratches (and I think you've got the point). This type of Ghost likes attention. Usually these are harmless. However there is a chance this type can go poltergeist.
The Equipment:This link is perhaps the easiest way to familiarize yourself with ghost hunting equipment.
The Job on Location:It's Portland Oregon. The location?
The Benson Hotel. Lately the managers have been seeing a new ghost and have asked your business to check it out. (Not that they're paying you much for it of course.) Nothing much is expected to happen, but it does always pay to be prepared.
The Goal:What do you want to achieve? There are a few options. Do you want to prove, without doubt, to the world that Ghosts are real? Do you want to help Ghost cross over? Do you want to scam people out of their money? Do you want to have paranormal encounters for the fun of it?
So let me know. :)
The Cast:
Name: Shaun Muertos
Age: 26
Gender: Male
Race: Asian/Hispanic
Position: Researcher
Physical Description: He has spiky black hair, tan skin, and stands at 6'7". A pair of glasses frames his dark eyes. Along his right arm are some tattoos, the most notable ones being a decorative skull, a dragon, and the earth.
Personality: He's impulsive, blunt, stubborn, and acts like a know it all. However, he's also loyal, intelligent, calm, and enjoys pranking his friends.
History: His love for history began when his father, a museum curator, took him to the museum almost everyday when Shaun was a little boy. He was always fascinated with the exhibits and stories of time gone by. His fascination with the paranormal began when he graduated college and moved into an old building. Once there, odd things began happening. Voices would be heard echoing throughout the building, apparitions would appear, and objects would move on their own. Instead of being scared, Shaun began looking for answers. He interviewed the original owners and searched for similar occurrences online. At last he came to a conclusion. The house was the location of several deaths in the 1800's. Shaun was excited with the results. He wanted to do more of that, but on a larger scale and with other people, so he signed up for the group.
Skills: He knows how to remain calm in a situation and he contains a vast knowledge on the past.
Name:: Cassie Jacobson
Age:: 24
Gender:: Female
Race:: Hispanic
Position:: As documentor of the group, Cassie records the various events they encounter and post in on their website as well as storing information in files for future use.
Physical Description:: Cassie has chocolate brown, curly hair that falls just above her shoulders. She tends to pull back it's wild strands into a messy ponytail from time to time. A pair large, chestnut eyes compliment her tan skin and child-like build. Rising to a mere hight of 5'3", she is quite small. Her typical clothing style consist of a variety of overgrown sweaters and battered jeans, accompanied by her favorite pair of laced short black boots.
Personality:: Cassie was born with a blooming curiosity to the world around her. She is constantly driven by her interest in life and works hard to achieve her dreams. If something become too dull for her, she tends to become bothered and desperately searches for something new and exciting to come her way. She can also prove to be very stubborn and feisty at times when provoked or alarmed. Cassie works very well with others, always filling those around her with her friendly and welcoming aura. In the face of danger, Cassie strays away from any position of leadership, but it always willing to lend a helpful hand or idea. Cassie has always had a strange love of the supernatural, be it in movies she has seen or the ghost stories she read as a child. She believed that there had to be something beyond that of everyday life, which was the main reason she decided to pursue journalism, that is to record the unusual and unseen.
History::Cassie knows very little of her birth mother. They had said she had met the wrong guy, who left as soon as Cassie was conceived, and drowned her sorrows with alcohol. This source of comfort her mother found in liquor quickly grew into a raving addition. When Cassie was only seven months old, she was put into foster care after her mother nearly drank herself to death one night. She was eagerly adopted by a young couple soon afterwards.
Holly and Greg Jacobson both worked as music instructors at a preforming arts institute close to where they lived in San Francisco. Together they sought raise Cassie with a strong love of the musical world. As a child, she was exposed to a variety of musical instruments, her favorite of which being the piano, and once desired to pursue a career as a musician. In high school, however, Cassie abandoned her passion in music to pursue her dream in journalism. Since graduation, she has moved from her hometown to Seattle to work as an intern for a local magazine. It was only 2 years later Cassie decided to leave her job when she decided that it had become much too strenuous and inartistic then she had imagined. After she left her job in Seattle, Cassie decided to move to Portland, Oregon, where she ran into her old friend Jackie Gelehert. The two had been good friends throughout their high school years together and she was delighted to find that they would be living in the same city once again.
Cassie has always had a strange love of the supernatural, be it in movies she has seen or the ghost stories she read as a child. She believed that there had to be something beyond that of everyday life, which was the main reason she decided to pursue journalism, that is to record the unusual and unseen.Cassie had a strong feeling that something awaited for her when she moved to Portland, possibly due to the ongoing bizarre events which occurred there. It wasn't long before she found an opening for a documentor for a newly formed paranormal investigation team on a local site. She applied in a heartbeat, convinced that she had finally found a job that she would be willing to pursue.
When Cassie found that the team was in need of a camera man, she urged Jackie to join noting his current state of unemployment. Through their years together, Cassie has sensed that there was something rather peculiar about Jackie and the events that have surround him. She wishes to discover the truth about her friend through their research into the supernatural, but attempts to conceals curiosity so that Jackie does not discover her true motives.
Skills:: Cassie harness a sharp eye for detail along an acute sense of hearing. She holds the ability to remember to smallest pieces of information for a long period of time, which has come handy to her many times throughout her years of education. Cassie often plays as the motivator for the group, influencing the others to work hard to best support their goals.
Name: Vincent Hughes
Age: 22
Gender: Male
Race: Caucasian
Position: Ghost Whisperer/Technician
Physical Description: Vincent is 5’9” and is skinny. He has short brown hair with pale green eyes. He wears glasses. The right side of his face is covered in scars, as-well-as much of his torso. Because of this, he always wears clothing that covers as much of that as possible.
Personality: Vincent is easy-going and extremely inquisitive. Under pressure he is calm and analytical, trying to work through the problem methodically. Though he is a little resentful over the upheaval of his recent past, this has led to bouts of anger and depression. He is also extremely sensitive over his scared appearance and people who doubt his spirit guide.
History: Vincent was born in Wiltshire, England. Shortly after his birth his mother died. A few years later his father remarried, an American woman. Other than that, Vincent led a painfully normal childhood; he learned, he loved, he fought, and he cried. That changed when, three days after his 17th birthday. Vincent and his father were involved in a terrible car crash that claimed his father’s life and left him in a coma for 6 weeks. When he awoke, he claimed to have had a strange dream; he had found himself floating in a sea of blackness. He didn’t know how long he had been there for; time seemed to hold little sway. After a while, he was engulfed in a magnificent white light and a voice spoke to him. The voice identified itself as ‘James’, and it told Vincent that the accident with his father had not meant to happen. He also said that as payment of his debt he would serve as a guide for Vincent. Of course no one believed him, and after a while, he began to even doubt himself.
A little over a year later, his step-mother returned to America, not having coped well after her husband’s death. She had stayed to this long to support Vincent in his recovery, though in actuality it ended up with him supporting the grieving widow. He decided to remain in England, and life slowly began to return to the common drudgery. Approaching his 20th birthday, Vincent began to notice coloured light radiating around people. At first it was only now-and-again, and lasted for a few seconds. But as time went on, it lasted longer and appeared around more people. He began to think something was wrong with him, maybe something caused by the accident. But no doctor could find anything physically wrong. They said it was probably simply stress. He tried to ignore the increasingly strange occurrences, to get on with his life.
Then James returned. Vincent felt as if he had lost the proverbial plot. In his desperation, he attempted suicide. Eventually James managed to calm him, he explained that Vincent was awaking to his psychic abilities and that he would teach him to control them. Since then, as-well-as learning to control his abilities, he became fascinated by paganism and learned as much as he could. Though he wouldn't describe himself as pagan. Six months ago his step-mother became seriously ill and Vincent moved to America to care for her. Whilst there, he found an ad for a newly formed ghost hunting group, he decided that maybe he could use his skills and abilities to help others, as-well-as maybe learn more about what happened to him, too.
Skills: He can see auras, sense spirits and his spirit guide can facilitate communication with other entities. He also has knowledge of various paganistic lore.
Name: Jackson "Jackie" Gelehrt
Age: 23
Sex: Male
Race: Caucasian
Position: Camera Operator
Physical Description: Height of 5'9" with a lean, almost wiry musculature. Short, dark brown hair with a very meager facial presence (which he keeps completely shaved to avoid looking overly unkempt). Skin has a very faint (almost unnoticeable) tanned appearance, with a few scattered freckles.
Personality: Jackie core belief is that nothing exists that cannot eventually be explained by science. As such, he is theoretically open to change his beliefs, but seems to be remaining adamant that there is no such thing as supernatural or paranormal phenomena. Aside from that, Jackie tends to be fairly easy-going, and likes to just enjoy life as it comes.
History: Throughout his life, Jackie has been at the center of lots of small, minor bizarre occurrences, such as objects he set down being somewhere slightly different when he went back to them, getting a slight chill on a warm day inside a particularly old or historic building, or frequent cases of deja vu. He's gotten rather used to it, and habitually writes it off as nothing important, since there has never been any reason for him to really suspect a relationship between them.
After growing up for all of his life in San Fransisco, he decided that he needed a change of scene when it was time for him to head off to college. He ended up at Reed College, in Portland, where he earned a BA in cinematography with a minor in mathematics. After graduation, he just kind of stayed in Portland while he started looking for a job that might actually put his degree to use, subsisting off of part time and service sector work in the mean time. On his shift during one of his stints working at a local coffee shop, he ran into his old friend from high school, Cassie Jacobson. After they'd caught up with each other, they decided to save on rent by going in together on a flat while Cassie got herself set up in her new job on a (somewhat incomplete) team of "paranormal investigators," which got a bit of a scoff from Jackie... until his job search continued fruitlessly, and the position on the team that still needed filling was a camera op, that is. Finally giving in, he agreed to be the camera guy for the team, but only until he could get a better job.
Skills: Uncontrolled (and unacknowledged) ESP (primarily psychokinesis, with a very faint and vague "sixth sense," or clairvoyant tendency, also manifesting sporadically), cinematographic experience/training, and a strong scientific background.
Name: Molly Elizabeth Heckler.
Age: 25.
Gender: Female.
Race: Caucasian.
Position: Founder of this little ghost hunting group; knowledgeable in the technician and investigation side.
Physical Description: Molly stands at a tall, for a female, 5’11, with a slim, fit build that shows she was athletic. Freckles dot across her cheeks and nose, as well as her arms and a bit on her chest. Her hair reaches just beneath her ears, enough to tuck behind them, and is extremely curly and thick, a bright red that looks almost orange in the right light. Her eyes are a striking green, the color of the sun going through a leaf, more a hazel green. Her outfits are typically comfortable, sometimes ranging around really girly to not so much; it just depends on the day and her mood.
Personality: Molly is a very collected person who doesn't buckle under pressure or panic easily. She always tries to be positive, has a tendency to give pep talks to people and herself, and enjoys being in a leadership role. She doesn't take offense to insults easily and is usually too trusting/kind to people. She doesn't really talk about her own feelings, not liking too and not wanting to burden people with her problems, as she thinks, either. She’s a good listener and encourages people often; sometimes, though, she can push someone without realizing it and sometimes, she can get competitive and almost comes off as a show off, her life of sports coming out.
History: Molly grew up with a father that was a ghost hunter. While her mother wasn't much of one, she supported her husband. Her mother came from money so Molly grew up quite happily, getting the things she needed and wanted without a fuss. Her mother put her in soccer when she was very young and Molly fell in love with it, getting into other sports as well. When she was fifteen, she convinced her father to bring her a ghost hunt.
From there, she found another passion of hers. Her father began to teach her about all the equipment and bought her, her very own too. He took on her hunts when she wasn't busy with sports but slowly, Molly was realizing she was enjoying ghost hunting more than sports. At seventeen, Molly’s parents divorced. She hadn't even known they were having problems.
Her father moved away, her mother getting custody of her, and she hasn't heard from him since. She got to keep all her ghost hunting things, though hidden away from her mother because it reminded her too much of her father, and sneaked away every chance she got to go to old, creepy buildings to explore. At eighteen, she tried the whole college scene at her mother’s request but it wasn't her.
She dropped out and, with the money not spent on college, began to support herself. She doesn't talk that much to her mother anymore; her mother wasn't happy she left college without talking to her about it and it got worse when she found out her daughter was trying to pursue ghost hunting instead of something “practical”. Molly had made a couple friends in college that were into ghost hunting and she did it a bit with them. But they were so busy with school, they couldn't do it as often as she liked.
So, after a few years of having a job and saving up money and buying two equipment vans stocked full, she decided to find an actual team of ghost hunters and take her dream more seriously. She doesn't talk about her past experiences much but she has caught a few interesting bits of evidence on the paranormal. So, here she was, with a well put-together team, about to take on her own official case. She tries to contact her father, from the last known email and number of his, to let him know what she was doing but he never replies. She doesn't mention it and pretends it doesn't bother her if it’s found out. She’s just going to concentrate on her new team and the excitement this was all bringing.
Skills: Molly has very quick reflexes and is very observant. She has a good ear and good eyesight. She also has a vast knowledge on ghost hunting, considering.
Rules:1. Be friendly. Don't cuss at people or make them feel unwelcome. If there's a problem, come see me.
2. Be polite. If someone lags on posting, let me know, don't just leave said person behind. (This is a smaller group so I don't think it'll be a problem, but if it is, see me.)
3. Be nice to me. This is my first time GM'ing. I probably will make mistakes, let me know, but be nice about it.
4. Speak up. If you want to do something, let me know,
5. Romance. If two people decide their characters should get together, it's okay. Just keep anything above hand holding in PMs. (I do not want to read it)
6. No Godmoding.
