Nevis

Ch1: Genesis Game: The Beginning of the and

O-kay, apparently time to double-post. My CS is awaiting approval/editing.

Ch1: Genesis Game: The Beginning of the and

Yep. And I just finished reading both the IC and OOC posts, so I'm aware of what's going on and of the characters already involved. It's time to finish up my CS, then.

Also-yeah. 'Dd' as 'th' is standard Welsh spelling (and that name is a Welsh word, so)...

Ch1: Genesis Game: The Beginning of the and

Apparently I'm filling in spot 3 as of now. 'ello, all!

Name: Ddraig (Thr-ey-g, r is pronounced with a single trill) Wallace. 'Ddraig', a variant of 'draig', a Welsh word literally meaning 'dragon'.

Age:19

Gender: Male

Appearance:

At 5 '5', Ddraig is small for a Caucasian male in America. Moderately thin as well and weighing only in the mid 120s, he is small and light at odds with his fierce demeanor. His face is thin, oblong and ever-so-slightly heart-shaped. His cheekbones are high, yet narrow, as is his small chin. His hair is medium-short length, only going halfway down his neck at the back, circling just above his ears and bangs falling several hair's-breadths past his eyes-all of it dyed a dark emerald green while dark-colored stubble at most a centimeter long dots his face. Most striking if one looks closely, though, are his eyes, shadowed by their deep setting. Bronze-brown-near gold/yellow in color- and fierce thin-almond eyes with uncharacteristically large irises. Shining and reflective, it is difficult to actually see them for the collage of shadow and glaring reflections, leaving him somewhat unreadable, even as expressive as they are.
Regarding attire, Ddraig has in the past opted almost entirely for rather similar outfits; a red, blue or green t-shirt, black, grey or brown pants along with a white or black hoodie, all unmarked by names, tags or designs. Only recently has he taken to wearing more textured clothing, often with mottled, cloudy designs. A bookbag-sized backpack is also a frequent item on his person, especially when he goes on his miles-long walks through town and who-knows-elsewhere. At HEMA practice, he wears simple long-sleeved black shirts and pants, a black leather vest ending just below his groin, arm and leg guards alongside a kendo mask, aside from his fetterschwert.

Personality:

Behind Ddraig's veil of stoicism lies a deep empathy and caring for other people, his integrity, his 'purpose' and a soul-devouring level of rage, resentment and hate. While he usually presents himself at most given moments as near-emotionless or perhaps mildly irritated and indifferent, what little those around him have been able to glean from him has routinely revealed an extremely intelligent young man who cares deeply for the welfare of everyone involved; bring up an elitist or entitled opinion in discussion or history class and he's liable to explode, tearing other's arguments apart for those who care to really listen-which most don't, and has come to the brink of physical violence in defense of others more than once. Even in social dealing, he is known and even somewhat respected for always taking the side he views as honest and right, rather than siding with a friend. He harbors nearly no loyalty to any individual person, though a fair amount to people as a whole. This bleeds into his views on most things; a particularly large element of this is what he views to be unfair payment based on jobs and anarchistic political views, thinking the world will work best on on voluntary, even footing.

Alongside and part of his caring for others comes an unusual spirituality. Nihilistic for years yet always faithful in the ideas of emotional healing and other practices, he is, again, unusual. It has only been in recent times that he has begun to doubt his strong conviction that there is no divine, leaving him confused and without answers in yet another area at the onset of adulthood. What few role models he has are as like to be people like the Christ and Ghandi as the more usual superhero-esque characters of most young men.

Ddraig certainly has his issues, though; apt to explode for the sake of others, he often actually dislikes being around many others. He is naturally a strong empath-the emotions of those near him wash over and into him like water filling a sponge, unable to keep them out. Aside from the often sour attitudes of other teenagers, this often makes large gatherings-not even taking into account the loneliness he feels due to a sense of not belonging-hellish. This further adds into his social awkwardness that becomes quite apparent after actually speaking with him for more than a few minutes.

As far as his goals, Ddraig is extremely secretive and silent. In truth, he himself is near clueless as to what he wants beyond same vague sense of being meant for something, some destiny or purpose. Everything else is of secondary importance to him-friends, family, lovers, materials, comfort. As he sees it, any and all of those, without some inherent purpose, seem ultimately just hedonistic-worthless pleasures in an otherwise nihilistic end. As a result, he cares little for few things and has an astonishingly empty record, especially considering his blatant intelligence and natural aptitude for so many skills. His teachers are constantly frustrated with his abysmal grades, made all the more so by, in their eyes, his wasted potential as he is among the brightest students in-class, yet completes virtually no work outside of it-when he's not dozing off.
Lovers-here meaning girls-are particularly confusing to him. He expressly refused to be interested in them until he was fifteen, and even then, far less so than is usual or even normal. An unexpressed romantic regarding romance, he strongly wants to be with one and only one girl, preferably in his entire life; this has meant that, when coupled that, again, he realizes he does not understand what he wants (or been too shy to pursue it), he has had utterly no romantic experience whatsoever. Girls still enjoy teasing and flirting with him, and he, clueless, is, for once, rendered visibly cared and confused-thus a favorite plaything of other teenage girls. His wealth of talents, intelligence and spiritual depth only add to this, and his father's affair has served to confuse what him in the matter even further.

Buried much deeper, though, and entirely unshared in its full severity is a wellspring of rage in Ddraig. Angry other students, resentful of his family, hatred towards a conquering and needlessly cruel world-thoughts apparently akin to those of serial killers and mass-murderers have crossed his mind often. Never acted on, of course; just buried, just stuffed down so they cannot get out. So he cannot hurt anyone, cannot slam other student's heads into walls, sink his teeth into the offender's shoulders, break the bones of police officers and splatter their blood on him. It is because of this that he really despises himself so much yet loves others so-that he hides himself in stoicism and irritable indifference. To hide from himself and others from himself as much as to hide from others.

Brief Biography:

Born to an ex-paramedic and ex-drug-trade suicide-mission-man, conflict and among the darkest aspects of humanity are perhaps in Ddraig's blood. Raised in mild poverty and to unusual parents, he did not enter public school until 4th grade. It was apparently before this that Ddraig became aware of the virulent hatred in
him, its early onset part of why it is so deeply embedded in him.

A messy child with a photographic memory and a harsh, perfectionistic father, Ddraig came to resent his family early on. Between long bouts of isolation (rather than attend church services that left him feeling empty and alone rather than connected) and quarreling over work and cleanliness, he came to not respect elders and the powers that be over the course of childhood and teenage years. Adolescence saw near all other children his age coincidentally move away near simultaneously, magnifying his lack of social development and thus his discomfort with other people.

Highschool continued much the same with him growing ever more distant from other people as a whole. Grades always falling lower and lower due to increasingly less homework turned in and skipping class more and more frequently, his life has generally fallen ever downwards as he saw school as pointless, serving only to indoctrinate him into a system that he disagrees with and put him into a job he'll hate and be unfairly payed for it while others were nearly (or effectively) enslaved. His only appreciable hobbies are video games and HEMA-Historical European Martial Arts. Reconstructions of Medieval and Renaissance swordplay-and he is quite talented at it. He has accidentally hospitalized other members of the group more than once, though never intentionally.

Things took a turn for the worse when he was eighteen as his father began an affair and eventually effectively left his mother. While he despised his parents, Ddraig had always taken pride in that at least his parents did actually love each other and stayed together, unlike so many other children; his illusion shattered, he now views his home as altogether, rather than just mostly, broken.

Ddraig's grades were so poor so routinely that he is currently repeating 12th grade, though at the current rate, he won't pass this time, either, and the amount of times that he
skips school altogether is increasingly growing.

Recently, he became involved in another young man's dilemmas-Dallas Robertson's. Ddraig was present at the crash, and had initially kept the panicking passerby from pulling Dallas from the vehicle-he had learned quite well from his mother that you do not remove the injured from a vehicle yourself as you can easily injure them further or worse-unless there was a serious risk of the vehicle actually exploding, which was far rarer than films suggested. Once some of the oil actually caught fire, though, it was
another matter, and Ddraig himself hauled Dallas out before the vehicle did indeed go up in flames.

His mother did not take it well. When it was determined that Dallas had gone into a coma, she blamed him for it, saying that he had removed Dallas incorrectly and put him in the coma. As Ddraig had already wondered if this was the case himself, he did little to argue the point.

Nonetheless, Ddraig has checked in regularly to see if Dallas has been opened to receiving visitors. Having saved his life, Ddraig has developed a sense of responsibility regarding the matter, as though by saving him, he had claimed and accepted responsibility for a piece of the other young man's life.

Parental Relationship:

Ddraig's relationship with both his parents is terrible. His father only recently began an affair and left his mother, now with another woman, whereas his mother is so obstinate, judgmental and berating that, thinking back on it, his father's actions aren't that surprising. Part of his hesitancy and demand for a near-perfect match for him romantically is his terror at the prospect of repeating his parent's mistakes-something he's well aware children are prone to do. Both of them are well beyond upset regarding his performance in school, besides his 'lack of engagement' in life in general.

His relationship with his father, who, while technically there, was effectively absent, besides bringing elements from his criminal background into play, is perhaps slightly worse. Of all things in the world, his father is the only thing that scares him anywhere near as much as the anger inside him.

Sum 41's Walking Disaster gives you an idea for both his parents


And for specifically his father, Lincoln Park's Numb

Talent: Fighting, most especially with a longsword

Number: 3

Virtue: Charity

Why fight the inevitable?

I'm a bit less familiar with it; ultimately, I do like what I know of it a bit more. Certainly, Milton's piece has had similar effects (the whole angels with harps thing that so many people think is actually canonical was artistic liberty on his part, for example). There's also the problem with his Lucifer quote 'it's better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven' because according to the Book of Enoch-oddly, one of the few cases of Word of Dante that I actually do (... sort of. As far as I know, they never claimed to be speaking for God/Saints/Angels; they took ownership that it was their view as far as I know)-Lucifer was described as being 'cast down to hover over the abyss eternally'. Hell was about as much of a nightmare for the Devil as anyone else; that's why it's Hell, the ultimate horror. That said, Lucifer is my individual favorite candidate for being Satan (other prominent ones being Beezelbub, Mephistopheles, Azreal and a few others), so that plays in a bit.

So, is an OoC in the works now? I think you've certainly built up some interest by now!

Why fight the inevitable?

Same.

Also, to Agent b52-Another Dark player! <D

Also... 'kind of a dick'?

Dante's works in particular I dislike more as art than a lot of other similar works. Ultimately, I just don't like his stuff and I'm glad to see this isn't drawing very heavily off of it.

Why fight the inevitable?

I meant no insult with the part regarding 'broadswords'; I was just pointing out an incorrect term.

I know one thing that goes into this is my view of the Romans as well-which is very unconventional. I view Rome as an extremely negative element in history, all empires besides. The Romans also were no 'victims'; they played the same game of raids and conquest and antagonized those same 'barbarians' more than once.

Not exactly. Yes, he did put in a lot of local Italian Christian folklore (Italy was really four areas just referred to as one; it was not a unified nation like England and France); he also invented a lot of stuff. And I am referring to the trope Word of Dante when I say that he presented-and had his works taken as-canon. The main was an ousted politician and his works were extremely political, besides that half of his specifically named subjects in Hell were people that had slighted him or that he didn't like. The Church-including the Roman Catholic of which he was member-also doesn't recognize his material as canonically correct, even though it altered the public perception of it to think that it was. In short, his work had a similar effect on the public's idea of the world and religion as a modern viking movie will give on vikings-and people who are into the actual history get the short end of the stick because 'everybody knows vikings wear horns on their helmets' and so on, besides that that influences how people perceive their descendants and the state of the world.
Beyond that, I just don't like Dante's work even as art. I find his rendition of Hell rather lacking in horror besides absurd and outright canonically incorrect (demons themselves were mentioned as chained and imprisoned in the actual Bible, besides that it was referenced as a place of howling wind, emptiness and dark at least as much as fire. It was depicted more like Tartarus with demons as prisoners as well more than a volcanic wasteland of proportional punishments). Bluntly, I find Dante's version of Hell to be lacking and far less horrific than I think the canon material implies.

Now, I prefer to get back on topic now. I imagine this tone will be a off-putting to others who may glance over this, besides.

Why fight the inevitable?

Imperfectionist said
And again, with barbarian: the original Greek word (barbaros) means "not a citizen", or "not a Greek", someone (in their eyes) uncivilized and wild, who lives on the fringes of civilization, or has none at all. D&D barbarians... are just that. They're illiterate, they are supposed to come from mostly tribal backgrounds rather than growing up in cities among more civilized folk, and thus completely fulfill the original meaning of the word. There's nothing wrong with that. Really, in English, in 2014, the word barbarian means "guy with a broadsword screaming in rage and chopping heads", ala Conan, WAY more than it means "foreigner who talks funny," making it entirely justified as a neutral title rather than a negative insult. Besides, "someone who doesn't speak Greek" is just as much an observation as "someone who has darker skin than me", so your view of the word as an incorrigible insult in the first place is shaky at best.

That was not an insult. Note, again, my use of the word 'slightly' regarding the use of the word paladins. The stretch from the notion of the historical paladins to the fantasy type draw on the same basic idea.
The actual people the term 'barbarians' was applied to weren't, though. That's a bit like saying the actual people were 'illiterate mindless savages'; it's as respectful as the Lone Ranger and Wild Westerns are to actual Native Americans. It carries a lot of implications and creates a lot of cultural damage to those people.

There was no such thing as a 'broadsword' until about the 17th century. Broadswords are a modern word and apply to several types of swords basically only from the Victorian period onward. What people often imagine are longswords, bastard swords, arming swords and/or a spatha type.

Also-no, the Greeks and Romans weren't so much racial bigots as cultural bigots.More than once, they were openly accepting of members of other races so long as they were from a Roman background, yet not for people more closely genetically related to them yet from a 'barbarian' culture. They term barbarian implied that anyone from a different culture was innately lesser than them; the entire intent behind the word from its very creation was as a bigoted slur-and the use of the word (alongside how the peoples who were targeted by the term are often presented) in modern times often implies that they were right. Paladin I was pointing out as semantics and the term isn't harmful or even far off; barbarian is taking a racial slur and making it hip.

As for Dange-because he basically did to Christian myth what Disney did to German fairy tales. He outright made up a lot of his stuff, at least half of the specific people in Hell were for petty vendetta's he had and he presented it as practically canonical material-and people believed it and that caused a wide array of negative cultural effects.

Why fight the inevitable?

Nevis said
For the record, paladin is a term that is slightly misused among fantasy settings in modern times; 'paladin' refers to the knights following Charlemagne, not 'holy knights' in general. Use it as you will, though.Here's to hoping the Divine Comedy (Dante's pieces including Inferno) isn't one of you major sources/inspirations (I do NOT like Dante's work).

Note that I said slightly misused. Using it does make some sense; it's just not correct. That said, I have little regard for the bastardization of language just because it's become accepted. Saying 'paladin' isn't necessarily the most 'accurate', though, just likely the fastest. There are multiple ways of doing paladins, after all-and multiple ways of fitting exactly that description without being one, even by modern conventional terms.

D&D especially has issues with that, though. The 'barbarian' class is actually an insult; the term 'barbarian' was a roman term for 'foreigner'. It referred to the Greek and Roman view that all of the other languages were garbled nonsense that sounded like 'bar-bar', hence the term 'barbarian'. The word is in its very origins and meaning outright bigoted; the 'N word' in modern America is actually [i[less[/i] bigoted, as the 'N word' at least used to be just a literal observation (it comes from negro, coming from latin niger-literally the word for black) that acquired a demeaning attachment over time, rather than an insult in it's literal meaning and origins.

Anyways-awesome! Out with Alligeri.

For some reason, I am imagining the island and society this starts in as similar to Malta and the Hospitaliers. Maybe because of the whole 'militarized Christian-ish island of Knights' part.

Medieval Superheroes

So the High Middle Ages and Crusades. About the time of the Norman invasions of England, too.

Medieval Superheroes

I'm grateful for that news. I generally don't like the presence of elves unless they're accurate to Euroupean folklore/mythology (... one of them, anyways).

What time period more specifcally, though? The Middle Ages are not the Dark Ages and are not Medieval Ages and are not the Renaissance nor are the early Early Modern Period. At least, for example, what century are you thinking (more for character idea than whether or not I'll be involved, though).