Supermaxx — Roleplayer Guild

C H A R A C T E R   C O N C E P T   P R O P O S A LW O L V E R I N E

 L O G A N  H U D S O N  ♦  N O N E   ♦   M O B I L E   ♦   I N D E P E N D T
C H A R A C T E R   C O N C E P T:

"I'm the best there is at what I do."

Logan Hudson is a man trying to escape a past he doesn't remember. Flashes of memory come to him in his dreams to tell him he is far older than most: the sound of nineteenth century shot and cannon soaring overhead, Logan sloshing through the water of the pacific ocean onto a beach assailed by machine gun fire, or a whip slashing long strips off his flesh in a prison camp deep in some hellish jungle. All those terrible memories his subconscious dregs up are of war, violence and death. His old life was not a pleasant one, Logan decided, and he's spent half a decade trying to leave it behind him.

No shortage of good people have helped him on his path: James and Heather Hudson of Alpha Flight gave him aid when he first awoke naked in the frozen Canadian wilderness, and Charles Xavier offered Logan a home at his institute whenever he was ready to return there. He spent some time there among Chuck and his pupils, yet the call of the road and the wood always seem to drag him away. Something in Logan's gut is calling to him, though why he couldn't possibly say. All he knows is that he'll never find it sitting around the mansion sipping martinis. 

Wolverine as a character has an audaciously long history, both editorially and in-universe. There's such a well of material to draw from that its difficult to find a place to start. Part of me wanted to reinvent Logan in some way this go-around- give some new spin on an old character we've all seen a dozen times before. But as I revised and reworked the sheet I came to the conclusion that all my ideas were shit and there's a reason Wolverine is at his best in his classic gold-and-blues. So I'm returning Wolverine to his roots as an amnesiac on-and-off-again X-Man with a past he's afraid to confront. He's a violent bruiser trying to turn over a new leaf that continuously falls off the wagon, yet gets up to try again regardless. 

My first arc with Logan will find him in the center of an assassination attempt on Congresswoman Valerie Cooper- a harsh opponent of the Mutant Control Act- by a Purifier-inspired terrorist group, the Mutant Response Division. Much as he's loathed to get involved in politics even Logan can't stand by and watch an innocent woman be murdered.

C H A R A C T E R   N O T E S:
The name 'Logan' was given to Wolverine by Charles Xavier. When asked about a surname he chose to adopt the name of the leaders of the Alpha Flight who had treated him with such warmth years ago. The Hudsons are unaware they've adopted a stray. Logan does not know his birth name.

I'm going to keep Logan's supporting cast small as we begin. It may grow larger as his story progresses, but I don't wish to claim too many mutant NPCs given how much interest there is in the X-Men and their many associates this game. I hope to work closely with those players and perhaps we may share a number of supporting characters in the future.

Valerie Cooper - Congresswoman representing the tenth district of New York. She's a young, progressive firebrand with strong national support and a wide-reaching network of allies and donors. Cooper is an outspoken opponent of Graydon Creed and Robert Kelly, and has spent every waking moment of Kelly's administration fighting him on mutant rights.

James and Heather Hudson - James and Heather Hudson are the leaders of Alpha Flight, a superhero team sponsored by the Canadian government. They, along with the rest of the team, found Logan wandering the Canadian wilderness stark naked and near feral. They nursed him back to health and gave him a place to stay for over two years as he recovered. Logan has struggled to remain in contact with them since leaving for the states, but he tries to call every couple months.

Mutant Response Division - The MRD is a well-funded terrorist group targeting key politicians and public figures that support the mutant cause. Its sponsors and leadership remain unknown, though its top assassin is a professional hitman named Matthew Riseman, a former member of the Purifiers that escaped arrest in the 80s.

Victor Creed - Also known as Saberooth, Victor is an old enemy from Logan's past that has been stalking him since his return to the states. They have a shared history involving the Weapon Plus program.

S A M P L E   P O S T:
AGE OF MARVELS: WolverineISSUE #1: Logan Goes to Washington
Lion's Head Pub ♦ Greenwich Village, New York City

Logan sat alone at the bar counter as he nursed his eighteenth Rheingold beer. He had decided it was shit three sips into his first glass. When the big man behind the counter recommended it Logan had felt an itch at the back of his mind at the name, like hearing a long dead friend's name said for the first time in twenty years. Yet when he finally put the glass to his lips it tasted wrong, somehow. Funny, considering he couldn't remember what it used to taste like; all he knew was it was better than this piss water.

The Lion's Head Pub was obnoxious busy that night. Near half a hundred people were stuffed together like sardines on the main dining room floor. All the tables and chairs were gone so the crowd could better stand around and listen to some speech. Logan was doing his best to tune it out, enhanced hearing be damned. He'd been here first and he wasn't about to go wander the streets of Greenwich looking for a different middling bar to drink a different shitty beer in. 

"What's that all 'bout, anyway?" Logan asked the bartender, motioning with his glass toward the crowd at the other end of the pub. There were posters up on tri-pod stands with some woman's face on them looking stern and defiant and bright, bold text beneath her picture declaring 'say no to hate.'

The man behind the bar turned around with a cloth in one hand and a clean glass in the other. Even with all these people around the bar itself was practically dead; everyone had either been served already or were only here for the rally. He was a tall man, broad as he was in the shoulder as he was in the gut. Logan was shorter, denser, and hairier, like the human embodiment of a badger.

"Congresswoman Cooper's an old friend of the owner. Seems like she's been here every other week since that bill hit the floor."

Logan had heard about the Mutant Control Act on the radio a few times, though it never much interested him. People being scared of his kind wasn't new. Ever since he woke up in the snow he'd been treated more like a wild animal than a man. What difference did it make if the government acknowledged what the rest of those pricks thought? "Sounds like a waste of oxygen." Logan admitted, finishing his glass.

The man behind the bar stopped to glare at Logan. "Its important, man. You can't ignore stuff like this just because it doesn't effect you. People are going to get hurt."

The grin Logan gave the man only seemed to agitate him more. He rolled his eyes and walked away to pretend to work somewhere else.

Unable to secure another drink and tired of brooding, Logan paid his tab and wandered over to the dining room side of the Lion's Head Pub. It was a bit larger than the bar portion, especially with the chairs, tables and other furniture removed. The place still felt cramped for a meeting of this size. There was a small stage up against the wall where a young woman in a suit stood giving an impassioned speech on the necessity of opposing bigotry in all its forms. Logan had to admit she was a compelling speaker. The subject seemed personal to her, and she was informative without getting lost in detail. 

"We know what discriminatory legislation like the Mutant Control Act leads to because we've seen it happen before right here in our very own city. In the 80s the city government- citing baseless fears the 'Brotherhood of Mutants' had a foothold in our streets- cracked down on our mutant population. Any visible mutation was treated like a danger to the public. Innocent men and women were violently attacked by the police and imprisoned for the crime of being born wrong."  

Her passion spread through the room like a wildfire. The crowd was visibly angry, many people shouting their agreements loud enough to drown Cooper herself out at times; but the woman had some pipes of her own, to her credit, and she never stayed unheard for long. Part of him wondered if all that fury was coming from self-preservation. Wouldn't be the first time a mutant tried to hide who they really were. 'What else could it be? S'not like there's money to be made defending dangerous freaks.'

Something caught Logan's attention, dragging his thoughts to his surroundings for the first time. He sniffed the air, sifting through the smell of sweat, cologne and alcohol. Gunpowder. There was armed security on either end of the stage so that shouldn't have been surprising. Still, even as he tried to watch Cooper, that scent nagged at him. Slowly, casually, he made his way through the crowd, sniffing like a blood hound on the trail of a downed bird. There were the two guns nearby on the hips of both bodyguards, and...something fainter. Further away.

Logan stopped at the window next to the door to peer outside. The street wasn't particularly busy tonight. There was a van from a local news station parked outside, and a small group of protesters on the sidewalk making sure they could be seen in the background of the news caster. But the scent was coming from further up, on the other side of the street. Police sniper? No, the NYPD used a specific finish on their rifles.

"Shit. Get down!" He shouted at the top of his lungs, turning on his heel to charge at the stage. The security man nearest him was caught off guard by the act and failed to draw his pistol. Clambering confusion turned to panicked screams as a bullet tore through the window and into Logan's back just as he reached Cooper, shoving her to ground to kneel over her.

Two more shots rang out, another into Logan's skull and a second into the bodyguard closest to the window, who dropped like a sack of potatoes. People ran for cover, and the door, or went nowhere at all and stood in stunned silence at the unexpected violence.

By now the other bodyguard had drawn his gun and returned fire, though he didn't seem to know what the hell he was shooting at. Logan grabbed the back of his bleeding head. "That's an apartment building, dumbass. Stop shooting." He managed to groan. He either went unheard or was outright ignored.

"Jesus, are you okay?" The congresswoman looked up at Logan with a mixture of fear and concern on her face. She attempted to grab him and push him out of the way of further gunfire, only to find it was harder to move Logan than a fully stocked fridge. 

"Just peachy, bub, now stay down." He yelled over the din, trying to get an eye on the sniper. A flash came from the third window from the left on the top floor and something dinged against Logan's forehead. There was a metallic ding as metal collided with metal and a gout of blood poured down his face. He had his target.

Logan grabbed Cooper by the shoulders and all but dragged her across the stage to where her guard was taking cover. She offered a word of thanks as she crawled into safety, making sure to keep her head well away from the line of fire. Once he was sure she was good Logan took off at a sprint. He moved faster than a man of his weight had any right to, barreling across the pub and leaping through the pane glass window before the sniper had even adjusted from the recoil of their last shot.

"You picked the wrong bar, asshole!" Wolverine roared as his claws burst out of his flesh and he barreled through the building’s front door.

P O S T   C A T A L O G:
A list linking to your IC posts as they're created. This can be used for a reference guide to your character or to summarize completed arcs and stories.

Location: Strange Reign Guild House -- City-State of Theremia, Aetheria

Graves nearly stumbled over his feet trying to escape from the repeated, hammering blows of his opponent. The dulled edges of twin swords clashed in the practice yard of the Strange Reign Club's guild house. It was an expansive piece of property just outside the city of Theremia, with numerous smaller structures surrounding the central manse that served as the guild's headquarters. Their status as one of the most successful PVP guilds in Pariah afforded them no small amount of wealth. It'd all been very impressive to a nineteen year old Andrew who'd barely touched video games prior to winning Pariah's machine in a raffle. His family never had the money to afford such extravagances as a console.

Now it served as the familiar backdrop to his regular beatings at the hands of his mentor. Graves gave swift retreat across the practice yard yet the bull of a man before him never faltered in closing the distance. Einhart leapt forward, slamming his shoulder full-force into Graves' chest and knocking him flat onto his ass. "Shit!" He shouted between heaving breaths. Fighting in Pariah wasn't quite the same as it was in real life- the pain was duller, and it never grew beyond an annoyance. But he still felt exhaustion deep in his bones.

"Tired already, bud?" Einhart grinned, resting the sword across his shoulders. "We just started!"

"Its been an hour and a half," Graves groaned, pushing himself up into a sitting position. "And I got work tomorrow morning."

The guild leader reached down to grab Graves by the collar and wrenched him up to his feet with only a single hand. "I thought you said you wanted to be the best."

"Well, I do, but-"

"And to be the best you have to make certain sacrifices. I'm not saying you gotta quit your job or anything, bud, but you gotta commit to this. The Reign ain't for casuals." Einhart cocked his head to the side. "Respectfully, 'course."

Graves rolled for Einhart's legs before the other man even knew what was happening. He took hold Einhart's greaves and used them to drag Einhart to the ground. The ensuing struggle was a blur of thrown fists, curses and steel. Graves was barely a novice at the sword compared to the venerable Einhart; but Andrew'd learned what a real fight looked like in the alleys and parking lots of Westwood. 

The brawl only ended with Einhart finally had enough of it and drew his palm against the sharpened edge of his breastplate and let his blood flow free. A sudden force knocked Graves up and off Einhart, sending the boy flying back across the yard and into a bundle of trimmed bushes nearby. "Goddamn cheating bastard!" Graves snarled in frustration, fighting to free himself from the branches and brambles of the bush. 

Einhart just laughed, wiping the blood from his hand onto a cloth. "No such thing as a 'fair fight' in Pariah. You either win or you die, simple as that."

After successfully defeating the bushes, Graves pushed himself to his feet. Shame, irritation and exhilaration all rushed through his veins as he approached. "Then teach me already. What's a sword s'posed to do for me up against mages like that?"

The older man hesitated. "It's not like the other elements, bud. The way you gotta fight to use blood magic effectively ain't easy. You're more likely to down yourself than the other guy if you can't balance your defense and aggression perfectly. That, and..." Einhart looked away, his smirk transforming into a thoughtful frown. "It messes with the way ya think. Blood magic incentivizes you to hurt yourself to grow more powerful so your brain sorta-" he wagged a finger around his temple, "-stop paying attention to the 'pain.' The buffs it pumps you up with can get you a little too excited to fight, if ya get what I mean."

The old man's warnings only made Graves sneer. "Come on. If a dumbass like you can do it then so can I. Besides, all that shit about it being cursed or whatever is just flavor text. Ain't no different from everything else."

Something about the look Einhart gave Graves made a shiver creep up his spine. That face was burned in Graves' mind as he lay in the streets of Thorinn, bleeding on the stone with consciousness slipping away from him. 

He couldn't help but wonder what would've changed if he paid heed to Einhart's warning.

Supermaxx Member

dumbass

Status

Recent Statuses

Bio

Most Recent Posts