SephyCloneNo15 posted:The Jade Lance: A His Dark Materials RP Twenty-five years ago, a man named Asriel, by most accounts a rich, idealistic troublemaker, did the unthinkable. In a world dominated by a powerful theocracy known only as the Magisterium, he made a bold move towards personal freedom. Risking everything, he took a small hole in the fabric between worlds and turned it into a doorway. From there, he gathered an army and struck down the Authority and all the misguided angels of the Kingdom of Heaven, birthing the Republic of Heaven. Asriel gave his life for his cause in that fateful war, destroying the Authority's most trusted and powerful servant, the Metatron, an act which by its own audacity sent tremors through the fabric of space and time to the most distant corners of every world. Few worlds have felt these tremors so much as this world in which our story begins. In the centuries leading towards Asriel's crusade, Christendom reigned supreme, as the Magisterium, controlling the world with an iron grip. Try as they might to quash the heresy of God's death, the rumors have spread, crippling and disuniting the Church. Recently, the Councils have become desperate. No solution is too ruthless for them... IC: Silas Moore The Council of Venice Silas flattened the creases from his robe as he stood to address the thousands gathered in Venice. He looked out at the crowd, holy men of every rank from Deacon to Cardinal, and almost as many lay people. Amantha, his black widow dæmon hung from his left ear like some grotesque earring. He cleared his throat. "Gentlemen and ladies, peace be with you. I bring glad tidings from the Ministry of Signs and Wonders." The Ministry was a newly formed branch of the Magisterium, designed to enlighten or eradicate those who disagreed with the Church, a new, subtler Inquisition, one might say. "Four years ago, I stood before you in Geneva, and asked permission to look into these issues we now face. You acceded, and the Ministry of Signs and Wonders was formed under my command. Two years ago, when the Council met in Lisbon, I promised you I had a solution, but that I could not share it until it was ready. You have all been most patient, and now, in Venice, I stand before you, prepared to unveil my methods for saving our beloved Church. "A quarter of a century ago, a heretic named Asriel did near irreparable damage to the Church. He proved undoubtably that Barnard and Stokes were correct." The Barnard-Stokes Heresy: The terrible heretical belief that there were multiple creations, perhaps even with multiple gods. "He waged war against Heaven and left us to pick up the pieces. "The old will no longer do, as the War demonstrated. In my studies, I have learned of several items of great power which, in the right hands, will restore our Church to its former glory, not just in our world, but in all the other worlds whose existence we can no longer deny. "Despite his sins, Asriel showed us how the bond between man and dæmon can be used to shatter the barriers between the worlds. In so doing, he has done us a great service. The first phase of my plan is to return to Cittàgazze and learn the secrets of the Subtle Knife and how to rebuild it, which will lead us to the items that will save our Church. Our experimental theologians have been quietly building an army, beings of unsurpassed strength, man and dæmon fighting as one, and we will soon have enough to lead the armies of the faithful on their Crusade to save the Faith." IC: Lyra Silvertongue The Botanic Garden Anyone passing the Oxford Botanic Garden would be hard-pressed not to stop and marvel at the middle-aged woman sitting alone on a bench babbling and sobbing to herself. Her Marten dæmon did nothing to console the woman, running around as though interacting with some invisible dæmon. "I broke our promise, Will," she sobbed, "And now nothing's right. I got married, y'see? And I kept trying not to compare him to you, like we promised, I just kept saying 'He en't Will. He never will be.' Pan kept reminding me too, but he was just...boring. He wasn't brave or a warrior or nothing like you. I en't in love with him. But the worst part is, I had a kid. I named him Will, after who I thought his father should've been. And now Little Will's gone. He was a Warrior, just like you, and he went and got himself killed. Oh Will... I know it's all my fault 'cause I couldn't just love the one I'm with." IC: Serafina Pekkala and Iorek Bynison Svalbard "Iorek," the witch called, riding her branch of cloud pine down to the bear-king as he dragged a walrus out of the water, "Something's amiss. You've felt it too, I presume?" The great bear grunted agreement before digging his muzzle into the carcass. "Every witch of the North, and all the creatures, from the foxes to the cliff-ghasts feels it. Trouble is coming, and it will return to the North, just as it came twenty-five years ago." "I've heard the whispers too, Serafina Pekkala," the bear said. "What would you propose?" "We call together the witches, the Panserbjørne, and anyone else who will join our discussion, and we form a plan. We must prepare, lest the obscenities and violence sneak by us and bring ruin once again." "Fair enough," the bear grunted, his muzzle covered in walrus blood, "I will gather my bears. You will gather your witches and any among the other humans who would join, and we will...discuss." Welcome to The Jade Lance. This RPG is based off of the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman. This part will take place almost entirely in the world of the first novel, The Golden Compass, primarily because I feel it's the best sandbox the trilogy offers. There are a wide variety of characters playable in this world, which I'll give a brief overview of now. The first important factor in this world is the dæmon. If you are playing a human character, the dæmon is a physical representation of your soul, and there are several important things you'll need to know about your dæmon. The dæmon is always animal formed. Any character older than early teens will have a 'settled' dæmon, meaning it can no longer change shape and has chosen a form that reveals something about your personality. (there's a great table of the symbolism behind people's dæmons on the Wiki page I linked to. Also, at the official site for the movie under the "Dæmons" heading, there's a dæmon generator that allows you to take a brief survey and will then pick a dæmon for you. If you respond how your character would, it should give you a good idea of what your dæmon might be). If you are playing a child, your dæmon will be able to change shape until it settles. Your dæmon can only travel a short distance from you. The further away it goes, the more it tears at your heartstrings as though your best and oldest friend no longer wants to be a part of your life. The exception to this rule is witches, whose dæmons can travel great distances from them. Instances of the dæmon being the same sex as the human are extremely rare. Males generally have female dæmons and vice versa. It is strictly taboo to touch another person's dæmon. When your dæmon is touched by someone other than you, it sends shivers down your spine. You're being violated after all. Dæmons can, however, freely interact with other dæmons. When you die, your dæmon disipates into the air. If your dæmon is killed, you go with it. The most common characters will be normal humans. Aside from the dæmon, there is nothing unusual about these people. The next would probably be witches. Witches are humans with several key differences. Witches do not age. They are eternally youthful and beautiful until Yambe-Akka (the goddess of death) comes to them. Witches' dæmons can travel long distances from their human. Witches do not feel cold or heat. It is considered a bad idea to refuse the love of a witch. Witches fly on branches of Cloud Pine, and have access to limited magical spells. They tend to fight with bows and arrows and daggers. The final species you may play as are Panserbjørne, or armored bears. The Panserbjørne are great polar bears who live on the island of Svalbard and have an opposable thumb. Bears have no dæmon; their armor is their soul. The armored-bears are excellent metalworkers, they forged their armor from Sky Iron and are capable of great feats of metalwork, from the very delicate to the brutich. Bears are solitary creatures, they do not feel loneliness as humans do (nor does the cold bother them) Bears are generally mercenaries, however, they still answer to their king, Iorek Bynison. When acting like a bear, bears cannot be tricked. They can catch bullets and easily see through feints and other attacks meant to trick. However, if a bear is acting like a human in some way, they can be tricked. Geographical Differences Between our World and Theirs First of all, there is no given name for any of the worlds in His Dark Materials. The world in which this game takes place is colloquially referred to among fans as "Lyra's World" or "Lyra's Oxford", but logically, Lyra's importance would go relatively unnoticed within their world, especially with the Magisterium re-consolidating. That said, throughout the game I'll mostly be referring to it as "The world" or "Our world", and when the time comes to move on to other worlds, you'll be as well-informed as the GM's can possibly make you. Lapland is the name for what we call Scandinavia. Muscovy is roughly correspondent with our Russia, and Texas remains independent of both the United States and Mexico, or Mejico as it is called. Also, Corea is how they spell the country we refer to as Korea. There are several great Empires in this world that either ceased to exist or never existed in our world, such as the Ottoman Empire, the Empire of Hungary, the Empire of Peru (which presumably covers much of South America) and the Austral Empire (presumably Australia, and possibly the nearby islands), the Saharan Kingdoms (apparently a confederation of North African monarchies). Babylon retains power and sovereignty as Babylonia, and "Levant" seems to refer to the Middle East, either as a region or a specific place within the region. Mongolians are referred to as Tartars. As far as I've discovered, there's no definitive map (ooc: I eagerly hope they'll someday release a whole-world version of that awesome map they show in the movie), so unless noted here, assume all other places are roughly as they were in our late 19th century. Character Sheet Name: Age: Race: Appearance: Personality: Job: (if applicable) Bio: Dæmon (if applicable) Name: Form: (if unsettled, just say "Unsettled") Personality: Rules: 1. Obey the TOS and all that jazz. Swearing, flaming, baiting, spamming, all that jazz just won't fly. 2. I (SephyCloneNo15), NickLitYouAFlame, and Penguinator-176 are your GMs. We are law within the game, but our PM boxes are always open if you have problems or questions. 3. PM all character sheets to GM for approval! 4. Please use the IC:/Tag: format. It makes everything easier for everyone. 5. To the best of your ability, spell correctly and use good grammar (characters with dialects excluded, but do the dialects well!) 6. There's been a lot of outrage at Pullman's use of religion as an allegory for the difference between thinking for oneself and surrendering your freedom to others. The movie tried to shake this by making the Magisterium almost entirely a political body. As you can see, the Magisterium in The Jade Lance falls somewhere between the two extremes, and some of the religious themes are necessary to the plot. If you feel this could be a potential point of offense for you, either don't join, or simply shoot me a PM and we can have a civil discussion (with some spoilers involved) about how I plan to use religion throughout the game and you can make your decision based on that. However, don't abuse this policy and feign offense just for the sake of spoilers and metagame knowledge. That's just low. 7. Be creative, original, and have fun!
Reynar_Tedros posted:So I was playing Rock Band with a few friends the other day, and someone seriously needs to make a Rock Band RPG. Start out as a small, unknown band, and chronicle their journey across the globe to play gigs (which should only take up a mere fraction of the game, considering it's hard to RP yourself playing guitar for five minutes), handle groupies, sign contracts, deal with money-hungry agents and managers, balance their romance lives with fame, and so on.
