Summary for people who weren't in chat tonight:
--Discussion about VXA vs. VX. We're still on the fence about this, but it's not an immediate concern until we get other matters sorted.
--The infamous Isolde Age War was mentioned and referenced.
--PLOT SKELETON
Noemi makes the decision that she wants the investigate the Throne of the first, but has no support outside of Erastus/Kasia. > Noemi decides to fund it and do it herself. > Erastus is willing to fund, but Noemi has to find a boat and a Guardian to help them navigate the Disquiet. > Noemi thinks she can handle it, but finds that, indeed, it is too much. > Boat is hired (PC captain) after some shenanigans. > Trip to Zadni to recruit Mirek as the Guardian. > Shenanigans to recruit Mirek (likely involving rogue Guardians). > Noemi wishes to recruit lost books from the old manor house. > Into the Disquiet to get them. > Once successful, a plan is formulated to head to the First's Throne. > To the Throne! > Exploration > Once there the First's journal is discovered, alone with a sealed vault that can't be opened. The journal hints at a key to open it left with his servants. > Research into this leads to conflict with the rogue Guardians. > Discovery of the Second's (!!!) journal. This journal contains amazing secrets and powers which gets the government involved. > Things deteriorate as Noemi's group gets caught between the government and the rogue Guardians. > Scrambling, and after some incidents with the Second's journal, the secret to unsealing the vault is discovered. > Returning to the island amidst the mess, the vault is opened and the Second is freed for a brief time before being taken control of by one of the forces. > It ends up going a bit out of control and must eventually be contained. > Just as things seem to be back under control, Erastus reveals himself as the ultimate mastermind and must be stopped.
--BACKSTORY CHANGES (for those who read the original IAQ's story)
Actual backstory has changed: The First was not actually the First, as it were. The First had a brother and they first learned the art of magic together.. They came into conflict over what should be done with their gift. The First won out eventually, but the Second saw people misusing it. Thus the two went to war. The Second was defeated and sealed with the well of power (name fix pending). However, the continent was shattered and the Second poisoned the Flow. Making it so that when practitioners touched it, Disquiet is generated.
--Core characters and concepts so far:
Noemi Seredova: She remains a youngish prodigy. She is very intelligent, hard-working, easy-to-like, etc. She is one of the up-and-coming practitioners in the world. Her parents were plantation workers and well. Got dead. So she grew up with a reason to want to make things better. She was lucky in that they were attached the Sebrle Plantation, and they had very nice arragements for the orphans. She befriended Kasia Jandova there, as well as the Sebrle children (including Mirek). Her talents were noticed by Erastus Sebrle, and she was enncouraged, tutored, annd eventually sent to school by him. She has all the makings of a Mary Sue. Unfortunately, her ability to sweep people into her obsessions has a big weakness. She's rather self-absorbed. She doesn't intend it, but she is hugely manipulative and exploits people.
Kasia Jandova: Noemi's childhood friend, who has spent her entire life being swept up in Noemi's wake. She is nowhere near as talented, but has ground the work out hard to stay with her. She wants Noemi to succeed, but, most of all, she wants her to be happy. The fact of the matter is that she loves Noemi, and would follow her to hell and back, no matter what it cost. Unfortunately, that's exactly what's going to happen.
Erastus Sebrle: Formerly known as the greatest practitioner in the world. He married into the Sebrle family, cementing their seat of power in this modern world where old nobility were being transitioned out by merchants and the like. A key to ending the Betrayal, Erastus wiped out their main stronghold near the end of the conflict. However, in his absence, the Sebrle family was nearly destroyed: his brother, wife, son, and daughter killed. This... didn't set well with him and he withdrew from the world for quite a while. However, Noemi pulled him back out of his funk when she needed his help with her studies. He thinks of her as something of a daughter, and she thinks of him as her beloved Uncle Erastus. The sad truth of the matter, however, is that he has discovered the Betrayal was orchestrated by members of the military attempting to seize complete control of the government and oust the merchants and nobles from power. This kinda cast a dark outlook on his cheerful disposition. Without anyone to really strike at, his anger has festered into a desire to punish everyone for the bullshit that he went through. He is secretly hoping that Noemi's research will give him power. His love of Noemi is genuine, however. He has similar affection for his nephew, Mirek, and hopes that he can gain their loyalty. He is very intelligent, strong, and quite good at actual emotional manipulation. But he shades it all behind a smile and good-natured, if a little dark at times, ribbing.
Mirek Sebrle: Ex-Guardian and the son of the head of the Sebrle estate, life has not been good for him. Despite remaining an Imperial Loyalist, he has basically had to fight tooth aand nail to retain his families estates and title (after all, proving you were loyal is tricky) and is obviously not well liked by the people anymore. He has pretty much given up to a life of idleness in the wake of the Betrayal. In his youth he was fairly boisterous and energetic. He has quieted some since, and simmers with a lot of unresolved anger. He feels particular put out as he was pretty much left adrift by the people he knew: Noemi was too consumed with her studies to care about the Betrayal, Kasia was too busy with Noemi, Erastus fell apart because of his own issues and, well. Most other people he had liked were either dead or had tried to kill him.
Isolde Stolz: A former military commander, Isolde was ostensibly let-go following an unpopular bit of work she did. She now freelances for the Empire, doing jobs that they need someone unaffiliated to do. She is intensely loyal to the Empire and its people. She tends towards pragmatism, which has misled people to believe that she is cold.
Eirwen Glass: One of the last few (if not last) servants still on the Sebrle estate. Her family has loyally served for generations, with her father having been a butler/bodyguard to the deceased Bohumil Sebrle. She was friendly with all the characters who have been associated with the Sebrle's, but, as young woman/servant, she was kind of ignored. She has stayed on because of a fondness for Mirek and, well, because the job market fucking sucks. She is frustrated with his fall into indolance, mainly because she is jealous of him and the other named PCs. They are powerful. They are well recognized. They... well. Matter. She feels invisible/meaningless/etc. Something of an inferiority complex that has only been amplified by the very casual attitude the Sebrle family had compared to other nobles/rich folks.
<@LoLRogue> As we're moving away from SRPG, I don't like her with a full support only kit anymore, so she was taught self defense by her father, who would be, in the parlance, something of bad-ass normal.
@LoLRogue> So, Sopko wants to save Katarine which is fairly easy. Character can stay more or less the same. Function as Isolde's cohort/assistant so that Isolde is not alone in this cold, cruel world.
That aside, overall list of characters will be (Noemi, Erastus, Kasia, Aurel(Temp?)~[Andy will write more about him later]), (Mirek, Eirwen), (Isolde, Katarine). With those in mind, there's room for about 4-6 more characters, though party switching will be more fluid in general, according to Andy.
I'll bother with ideas later, but the last and most important parts:
<@LoLRogue> Before I go, though.
<@LoLRogue> Objective 1 is to reach the point where we can describe the game, more or less.
<@LoLRogue> Rough plot, rough characters, rough mechanics.
<@LoLRogue> Nothing concrete, but a hewn image of what we want to achieve.
<@LoLRogue> So, for now, don't get bogged down too much in specifics. Nothing more specific than say those brief character concepts up there.
<@SleepRogue> One last thing before I crash.
<@SleepRogue> Think about what you'd like to work primarily on in general if you can.
<@SleepRogue> We'll need to "department" people to some degree. Not to say they won't have say in other areas, but organization and final calls, etc
