PLOT WITH ME/INTRO MEME MARCH 2024

[expiationmods]

INTRO MEME

Welcome to Expiation and come on down! We're thrilled to have you here! This intro entry serves additionally as a CR meme, so you are free to use it to say hello, tell us a bit about yourself, talk about your character, and potential plans for the game.

The SOTG for March is HERE, with changes and where the game is going for the month. Feel free to browse around if you haven't already, and check out the MAIN NAVIGATION for more detailed info about the game itself.

MARCH EVENT

MARCH EVENT SUMMARY

IT’S A BEAUTIFUL DAY

Characters wake up on the morning of March 11 to note a few things with relative immediacy. First, the weather is beautiful: warm, breezy, sunny. Second, all of the locals in Aldrip and the surrounds seem to have vanished. Third, these things seem totally normal to the Chosen–who now all believe that they are native to Aldrip.

That’s right. You’ve lived here your whole life. Everything you’ve ever known is this world.

Characters will go about their daily business in lives that they believe have always been like this. You’re free to choose any jobs, roles, backgrounds, and connections with other Chosen for your characters, so long as they believe that they have always lived in Expiation. All character powers are gone, or dormant, for most of the event. More on that later.

LOST AND FOUND

Occasionally, while going about their daily activities, characters will come across an item that seems strangely incongruous with the world they know. This will begin happening after the first few days of the event. A symbol particularly relevant to your character’s canon, for example, or a book. Watches, jewelry, cards, photos, small trinkets and tableaus–all of these are fair game.

Everything in your character will tell them not to look at these objects. Their entire being will try to resist them. If they do, the item disappears when they leave its immediate area. What item? They forget about the entire encounter. Strange.

Touching or interacting with these objects or moments will force a strange memory into their head–a memory of a past life, or a dream, maybe. These are your characters’ real memories, and as the event goes on, they will be able to either collect or ignore more of them. You’re free to engage with as many or as few of these as you like. We’ll ask on the event poll how many you interact with, and how many you ignore. The final count may have lasting repercussions on your characters and/or the world of Expiation, so please pay attention to the poll! Not all of these instances need to be threaded out.

There will be an RNG ELEMENT in this event, as well. Please note that characters who are picked for RNG have a small but nonzero chance that RNG effects could have a long-lasting impact on them.

PLOT WITH ME

Player:
Contact:
Anything Else?: Anything you might want us to know? What kinds of things interest you? What's your current favourite fandom? Put it here.

Character:
Canon:
Canon Point:

Crime: The crime your character was accused of when they arrived.
Background: A brief insight into your character's history is fine here. You can talk about their personality as well.

Abilities: Any abilities that you feel is important to note about your character. Bullet points and concise descriptions are okay.

Plans: What kinds of things do you want to do in the game? Any kind of CR you want to specifically pursue? Any special character discovery or exploration you want to do? This is the place to put all of that.

How can you run into my character? What's their daily life like? Do they have a job? Do they have other habits or routines?

???: Questions? Comments? Memes? Put them here.

<b>Player:</b> <b>Contact:</b> <b>Anything Else?:</b> Anything you might want us to know? What kinds of things interest you? What's your current favourite fandom? Put it here. <b>Character:</b> <b>Canon:</b> <b>Canon Point:</b> <b>Crime:</b> The crime your character was accused of when they arrived. <b>Background:</b> A brief insight into your character's history is fine here. You can talk about their personality, as well. <b>Abilities:</b> Any abilities that you feel is important to note about your character. Bullet points and concise descriptions are okay. <b>Plans:</b> What kinds of things do you want to do in the game? Any kind of CR you want to specifically pursue? Any special character discovery or exploration you want to do? This is the place to put all of that. <b>How can you run into my character?</b> What's their daily life like? Do they have a job? Do they have other habits or routines? <b>???:</b> Questions? Comments? Memes? Put them here.

Comments

cloud strife // ff7:r

[identitycrisiscore]

Player: Sven
Contact: svensational
Anything Else?: I'm a 31-yr-old ex-community manager and QA tester! Currently unemployed, hoping to get back in that. Uh. I talk a lot about videogames and tabletop games and in general I consider myself a hobbyist when it comes to game design analysis. My primary fandoms at the moment are FF7, FF14, Granblue Fantasy, and more I'm probably forgetting! I'm not very cool but I seem to have mistaken some people that I am.

Character: Cloud Strife
Canon: Final Fantasy VII (Remake Continuity)
Canon Point: Pre-Rebirth, en route to Kalm (so no worries about spoilers for the recent game yet!)

Crime: Impersonation/Identity Theft. If you know, you know.

Background: Everyone say hello to everyone's favorite slab-of-a-sword wielding JRPG protagonist (circa 1997)! Remake/Rebirth means he has a fresh coat of paint, but let's get the simple stuff out of the way first: ex-military, current sword arm for hire, Cloud Strife is a pragmatic and cold-seeming man who not-so-subtly hides his heart of gold under a cynical, standoffish shell. Pulled into the eco-terrorist group Avalanche, Cloud's engagements with his former employer, Shinra, a corpro-state draining the planet of life to sell its energy as a commodity, spark a brand new conflict and a cross-the-planet cat and mouse game. Behind him: the ever-pursuing Shinra Electric Power Company. Ahead of him: an old long-thought-dead nemesis by the name of Sephiroth. You've probably heard of him.

Abilities: Cloud is infused with the literal processed life-blood of his world, which makes him, effectively, superhuman: Cloud is strong (despite what his build might fool you into thinking), fast, and tough, and a daring swordsman to boot. What he lacks for subtlety and grace he makes up for in a keen mercenary instinct and the Buster Sword, which he's bringing with him from home. Additionally, Cloud has two Materia (magic rocks that grant you spells and other nifty abilities), of the Fire and Lightning variants.

Plans: I'm not exactly a planner, but I'd love to explore Cloud's more honest side - it's easy for him to be caught up in the snarking, but the fact that is he's a hero through and through, despite himself, and Expiation giving him a chance to explore... well, something like normality, which is something Cloud does not actually have that much experience in, especially not when it comes to forging an identity and lifestyle outside of a world-controlling system, instead of aligned with or opposed to it.
Re: March Event. Cloud's going to become a courier/deliveryman, but, yknow, in Aldrip, you kind of have to have a bit of jack-of-all trades mentality about you. He might have his own Chocobo. I'll need to figure out more details as I go.


How can you run into my character? After the March Event, it will probably be fairly easy to find Cloud doing... basically anything and everything. The mercenary lifestyle suits him just fine, so he'll pick up small odd jobs to make ends meet or help out (though obviously, combat is his preference). He's an RPG protagonist, cause a small amount of trouble and he's bound to show up regardless.

???:


I AM DEEP IN THE FF7 REBIRTH MINES LITERALLY AS WE SPEAK SO IF I'M SLOW IT'S BECAUSE I'M GAMING DOING CANON REVIEW, that said I will try and keep tagging my TDM threads and any threads we have there I am willing to say are canon if people want to call them canon! If you'd like to move on we can hash out how they wrapped!

[bonobos]

listen, i’m here to thirdwheel clerith in the most annoying way possible both in and out of the event, i’m so serious

[identitycrisiscore]

hell yeah. let's fucking GO

realistically also i love sha-ming and him and cloud's tdm thread was a++ so i love these two being weird friends.

[bonobos]

it's so fucking funny to me because his entire thing is being A Side Character, he does not have plot relevance and he does not want it, meanwhile here he is with mr and mrs. jrpg. he's gonna go places with them and be like fuckkkkk can you guys just do your thing while i hide in the corner, thanks!

i still need to tag that back, i loved it too, i've just been slow as of late but i would love to keep it going <3 your cloud is a treat and aggie's always got something good to say about you. and obviously i'd love to do things for the event and have sha-ming be like :/ let me keep an eye on him, gotta make sure he treats her right...

[identitycrisiscore]

i'm so late to this because I've literally been playing rebirth for a week straight but oh my god, sha-ming as the childhood friend who Doesn't Approve Of The Boyfriend is so FUCKING funny as an au dynamic, i'm in tears

[scythedance]

i'm comin for that booty

also astralin would absolutely ask cloud to help on the farm

[identitycrisiscore]

hell YES, farmboy cloud, finally, what we've all wanted

[skelters]

I DIED BEFORE I COULD HIT YOUR TDM UP but i require these two chocobo haired blondies to meet...

[identitycrisiscore]

YES, absolutely, Vash and Cloud as the Chocobo Brothers (Chocobros?) needs to happen, especially because Vash is a dingus and Cloud is... a dingus but in the opposite direction.

[muskullar]

i would love for these two to bond over wielding giant fuck-off two hander swords (and also being teasingly bullied by aerith). tragically gideon needs to regain her longsword, so she's stuck with a dumb dinky rapier and will think cloud's sword is just the coolest thing she's ever seen

[identitycrisiscore]

well, she's right, it IS the coolest thing she's ever seen /j

It's even funnier because Gideon is SUPER TALL and Cloud is like... basically average height but he's still wielding this giant slab of a sword. Just a 5'8" powerhouse.

[melnik]

Hi! I'm really enjoying our thread so far, so it's canon as far as I'm concerned! c: Miller will also be a bit of an odd job purveyor during the event. He just likes to help. So, he and Cloud could easily collaborate from time to time with Miller as the middle man for some deliveries, if you'd like.

[identitycrisiscore]

Hell yes! Miller has been fun to bounce off of so far, so I'm definitely game to keep their interaction canon.

[melnik]

Sweet! I'll definitely keep an eye out for chances to tag you again later then.

[earnedmystripes]

svennnn we should do. something. with these two.

maybe they can be drinking buddies in the au?

[identitycrisiscore]

THIS TIME FOR SURE, BATTY, THIS TIME FOR SURE

AU buddies sounds plausible! Cloud in the AU is going to be a huge busybody. What's Kotetsu gonna be doing?

[earnedmystripes]

for! sure!!

kotetsu's gonna be a high school gym teacher :D so if cloud makes deliveries to the school that could be an easy in, or we could have them meet elsewhere in town. im down w anything!

[feintofhart]

STICKS LEG OUT.... I NEED SOME CLOUD TIME!!!! I'm down for them meeting for the first time during or outside of the event (I've finally figured out what I'm doing for all that), but either way: I would love to play again! if there's any hijinks you'd like to get up to, let a gal know!!

[identitycrisiscore]

FEYYYYYY LET'S GO i vanished for a week due to videogames but I'm vaguely here-ish now.

I can definitely see them meeting during the event! Claude's AU as an outsider and Cloud being a guy who travels to get bits and bobs for people seems like they'd naturally run into each other.

If you want them to meet before the event I'm game with that, too! Just still getting my feet under me.

[feintofhart]

I'm also very slow so THANKFULLY... OUR SCHEDULES ALIGN. I spot that tag in my inbox, tyvm!! I look forward to them meeting and re-meeting. :>