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Approved Character [The Wayward] Adiel Avraham
- Thread starter Blizzard
- Start date
There is nothing wrong with the history, I approve it. (I'm Elysian Co-FM btw)
Future reference for the most part the history isn't -exceptionally- important for the Caelisolan or Plebian, its much more important if someone makes a Patrician due to the strict morality of the type of characters they'd be playing. but for the most part Caelisolan and Plebians are free to do whatever they want.
Future reference for the most part the history isn't -exceptionally- important for the Caelisolan or Plebian, its much more important if someone makes a Patrician due to the strict morality of the type of characters they'd be playing. but for the most part Caelisolan and Plebians are free to do whatever they want.
Blizzard
Inactive Member
I've already PMd Aendri to no avail. Wes said I didn't have to contact him, though.
Its up to the approver if they want to involve the faction manager, or Co-Faction Manager, as Syaoran is the approver, he states that he wants the faction manager to look something over. While Wes is the admin, he can't override a GM's want to involve someone else that is more knowledgeable in the race then he. So contacting Aendri was the best decision.
Blizzard
Inactive Member
Fair enough.
Aendri
Inactive Member
Blizzard, dude, you gotta give people at least 3 days to reply to PMs before assuming they're not answering. I saw your PM, and just haven't had a chance to look the character over until now, and I really don't feel like you literally posting this up almost dead on 36 hours after sending me the first PM gives me a great impression. And whatever Wes says, the Elysian CCG specifically says that Elysian characters need to be discussed with me, not just the GM. What he does with his faction is up to him, but Elysia is run by me, and I'd like to remain a bit more involved while we're still on the small side.
Leaving that aside for the moment...
The Description section needs a lot more detail. Everything needs to be full sentences, and just generally come off as less of a bullet point list, and more of a description. We're wanting to hear him DESCRIBED, in detail, not just the bare details. Does he have the overly toned look that professional body builders pick up, or just the more solid build that people who lift for function gain? Is his skin chalk white, or more on the tanned, out in the sun regularly tint that many Caucasians pick up? Are his eyes baby blue, or are they a darker, grey blue? The smirk part, the height part, all of that doesn't really need to be included here (though the smirk could remain if that's just how his face looks, not that he's actually smirking all the time). I've said it before, I'll say it again, but the description should be good enough that we could hand it to an artist, and they could come remarkably close to what you're picturing when you think of the character.
This next part is just in general, because it covers a few different areas, but the entire concept of Plebian/Patrician seems to be a bit off of how things would be normally. Patricians don't so much look down on Plebians, as they do pity them. A core of the culture and faith is based around the idea that it is the duty of all Patricians to guide and nurture the lesser beings around them, to help them come closer to the level of existence Patricians come by naturally. They're less likely to mock, and more likely to guide, and though that guidance may come in a faintly condescending manner, it's only rarely malicious in the way that your profile seems to imply repeatedly. For lack of a better way to say it, they'd not likely behave maliciously if only because they feel you're such an object of pity that it would be unnecessarily cruel to do so. While there are the occasional exceptions to the general way of things as there are with anything, they would most definitely have been the exceptions, not the norm.
Now, how you want to extrapolate that to the character is up to you. Probably the simplest way to explain it would be that he was infuriated by the condescension and implication that he wasn't as good as Patricians just because of his birth. That would allow most of what you have to remain intact at the core, but be more accurate to what the normal state of things is. You other simplest option would be to make it all in his head. Make him the kind of person who would take offense at the smallest things, so that the normal way of handling things would still come off as offensive to him. That would change him a bit more as you go ahead with playing him, but again, allow you to stick pretty close to the core character history, at least.
Until that's addressed, I can't really give a good review of the personality or history on the whole.
Some of the skills need a bit of tweaking, mostly in terms of phrasing. Fighting, for example, "have given him a basic, but sufficient set of abilities". Sufficient for what? The skills that are sufficient for self-defense are nothing like the skills that would be sufficient to act as an assassin, just to use a rather extreme example. For the rest of them, they're... passable, but I'd still like to see a little more out of them. I really tend to favor a paragraph for each skill. It's just a matter of detail, really, because how well you write a skill has just as much impact, if not more, than having the skill in the first place, especially with skills like your Entertainment, Humanities, and Knowledge skills.
The inventory is broken at the moment. Probably the easiest way to fix it would just be to throw it all together with bullet points.
This character still needs work to be ready for approval.
Leaving that aside for the moment...
The Description section needs a lot more detail. Everything needs to be full sentences, and just generally come off as less of a bullet point list, and more of a description. We're wanting to hear him DESCRIBED, in detail, not just the bare details. Does he have the overly toned look that professional body builders pick up, or just the more solid build that people who lift for function gain? Is his skin chalk white, or more on the tanned, out in the sun regularly tint that many Caucasians pick up? Are his eyes baby blue, or are they a darker, grey blue? The smirk part, the height part, all of that doesn't really need to be included here (though the smirk could remain if that's just how his face looks, not that he's actually smirking all the time). I've said it before, I'll say it again, but the description should be good enough that we could hand it to an artist, and they could come remarkably close to what you're picturing when you think of the character.
This next part is just in general, because it covers a few different areas, but the entire concept of Plebian/Patrician seems to be a bit off of how things would be normally. Patricians don't so much look down on Plebians, as they do pity them. A core of the culture and faith is based around the idea that it is the duty of all Patricians to guide and nurture the lesser beings around them, to help them come closer to the level of existence Patricians come by naturally. They're less likely to mock, and more likely to guide, and though that guidance may come in a faintly condescending manner, it's only rarely malicious in the way that your profile seems to imply repeatedly. For lack of a better way to say it, they'd not likely behave maliciously if only because they feel you're such an object of pity that it would be unnecessarily cruel to do so. While there are the occasional exceptions to the general way of things as there are with anything, they would most definitely have been the exceptions, not the norm.
Now, how you want to extrapolate that to the character is up to you. Probably the simplest way to explain it would be that he was infuriated by the condescension and implication that he wasn't as good as Patricians just because of his birth. That would allow most of what you have to remain intact at the core, but be more accurate to what the normal state of things is. You other simplest option would be to make it all in his head. Make him the kind of person who would take offense at the smallest things, so that the normal way of handling things would still come off as offensive to him. That would change him a bit more as you go ahead with playing him, but again, allow you to stick pretty close to the core character history, at least.
Until that's addressed, I can't really give a good review of the personality or history on the whole.
Some of the skills need a bit of tweaking, mostly in terms of phrasing. Fighting, for example, "have given him a basic, but sufficient set of abilities". Sufficient for what? The skills that are sufficient for self-defense are nothing like the skills that would be sufficient to act as an assassin, just to use a rather extreme example. For the rest of them, they're... passable, but I'd still like to see a little more out of them. I really tend to favor a paragraph for each skill. It's just a matter of detail, really, because how well you write a skill has just as much impact, if not more, than having the skill in the first place, especially with skills like your Entertainment, Humanities, and Knowledge skills.
The inventory is broken at the moment. Probably the easiest way to fix it would just be to throw it all together with bullet points.
This character still needs work to be ready for approval.
Syaoran
Retired Staff
Alright now that Aendri has spoken I want to say that what he said about the description was what I was going to say anyway. As for the skills, yes they need some work, here are a few points
- First is communication, being able to speak "at some level" for "all the known languages" is very vague. A couple of the languages are ones he wouldn't likely know either without study. But as the prospective negotiator of the Wayward, I'm gonna need more detail on what languages and how well he can speak them.
- For his fighitng you probably want to rewrite the info from the Celstial Navy's page(don't CP it though)
- While entertainment I can understand he's well versed in throwing a party, with Humanities I'm not too clear on what his style is, so a little more elaboration on either his methods or which ways of manipulation and coercion he's well versed in.
Blizzard
Inactive Member
@Syaoran @Aendri I've done what I could given your critiques. I redid his physical description and the description of his traits. Aendri, I used your idea of "it's all in his head", but the core story's still the same. I like this version better. It makes Adiel appear more unstable, with an undertone of "angry child", which is what I'm shooting for. The inventory's still broken, and I know for a fact I typed in the correct link for the lockpicks, but it still comes up as page missing.
Aendri
Inactive Member
Looks like Arch took care of the inventory for you. I can tell you the most common issue with linking something is that you forgot to put the : at the front of the shortlink. Since those lockpicks are in their own namespace, not the character namespace, you have to clarify that.
The phrasing in the facial/eyes section seems a bit off, like it's missing a word or two between the chin and the eyes. You also need to cut out a few of the commas in this area, they make it way more choppy to read than there is any good reason for. I can take care of it for you when I get home later, if you'd like.
I'd also like just a bit more information in a few areas, mostly the hair and wings. For his hair, is it straight? Curly? Wavy? Medium-length compared to what? Medium length hair in Nepleslia is pretty short, but Elysian tradition is a fair bit longer. On the wings, just a bit more information. What kind of wingspan does he have? How strong are his wings? Most Caelisolans still can't fly, but a lot of the more physically capable ones can at least glide.
A secondary note about the Caelisolan thing, that body didn't exist until YE30, when he would've been 18. That'll make the history a bit more complicated, since he wasn't a former Plebian, he WAS a Plebian for a lot of the early stuff. You also need to keep in mind that despite his fairly young age, he still lived through 3 of the 4 wars with Yamatai, so while having a small family would still reduce the impact, he lived through Yamatai not only murdering the Emperor, but invading his homeland, and making his entire nation leave their homes for a new planet. That's the kind of thing that would stick with a kid.
On the skills, you went a little bit too far in the other direction. While detail is important, you don't want to overwhelm a reader, either, and you still want GMs especially to be able to skim quickly and pick out the important stuff. One of the better examples of this is the Communications skill, where you don't have any of the languages capitalized, which means I have to read effectively the entire skill just to figure out what languages he knows to some extent. You don't want it to be bullet points, but you don't want an essay for every skill either.
Overall, you're very close. Just a few more small things, and you're good to go.
The phrasing in the facial/eyes section seems a bit off, like it's missing a word or two between the chin and the eyes. You also need to cut out a few of the commas in this area, they make it way more choppy to read than there is any good reason for. I can take care of it for you when I get home later, if you'd like.
I'd also like just a bit more information in a few areas, mostly the hair and wings. For his hair, is it straight? Curly? Wavy? Medium-length compared to what? Medium length hair in Nepleslia is pretty short, but Elysian tradition is a fair bit longer. On the wings, just a bit more information. What kind of wingspan does he have? How strong are his wings? Most Caelisolans still can't fly, but a lot of the more physically capable ones can at least glide.
A secondary note about the Caelisolan thing, that body didn't exist until YE30, when he would've been 18. That'll make the history a bit more complicated, since he wasn't a former Plebian, he WAS a Plebian for a lot of the early stuff. You also need to keep in mind that despite his fairly young age, he still lived through 3 of the 4 wars with Yamatai, so while having a small family would still reduce the impact, he lived through Yamatai not only murdering the Emperor, but invading his homeland, and making his entire nation leave their homes for a new planet. That's the kind of thing that would stick with a kid.
On the skills, you went a little bit too far in the other direction. While detail is important, you don't want to overwhelm a reader, either, and you still want GMs especially to be able to skim quickly and pick out the important stuff. One of the better examples of this is the Communications skill, where you don't have any of the languages capitalized, which means I have to read effectively the entire skill just to figure out what languages he knows to some extent. You don't want it to be bullet points, but you don't want an essay for every skill either.
Overall, you're very close. Just a few more small things, and you're good to go.
Aendri
Inactive Member
Just a note going ahead for thoughts on how to play him, keep in mind how important the idea of honor is to Elysians in general. An Elysian negotiator would probably end up being the kind of person who will hold to deals to hell and back, and utterly detest anyone who won't stand by their word. Good way to give him some detail as a negotiator.
