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synodiporia_ooc2015-08-28 06:41 pm
powersthatbe) wrote in synodiporia_ooc2015-08-28 06:41 pm
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Test Drive #11.
Welcome to the Synodiporia Test Drive Meme! Below the cuts there are two new prompts, and here are the prompts from previous test-drives, which you’re still welcome to use in this post. When you comment, be sure you specify what prompt you want to play with, and please put up your own threadstarter - it makes for a much more friendly environment that a forest of bare toplevels! OCs are especially welcome! Please take a quick look at our Directory & familiarize yourself with the concept and setting of the game before you jump in.
Our upcoming app round runs September 1st-7th. Our next Jaunt, The Lightning Age, a postcolonial steampunk romp with a hunt for a fugitive disordering a peaceful flying city, will run September 12th-October 19th, and an alternate player-driven setting, or Walkabout, will be available (but the specific setting has yet to be voted upon).
Prompt #33 is set in the sometimes Mad-Max like post-apocalyptic academia of the Ivory Tower jaunt, where an isolated school works to restore civilization decades after a brutal war destroyed it. But off-campus, things can get a little rougher…
Prompt #34 is set in the world of Heartbreak Academy, a shoujo high school world where Social Technology, or S. Tech, allows the physical conjuration of emotions - sparkles, roses, soundtracks, emotes and rainclouds. Heartbreak Academy teaches elite students how to better master their S. Tech - and as you could imagine, this makes practical exams… very interesting...
Prompt #33: Pop Quiz.
There are chlorine bombs in the library, and snipers outside.
To be more specific, the library is an open-air market set up in a suburban French high-rise parking garage, one of the few buildings on this side of the city to survive intact, and a good place for gatherings that might need a quick getaway. Academics from across Europe use it as a trading post - bringing old books, or bringing computer printouts collected in three-ring binders, driving up in dune buggies or armored trucks, landing on the ceiling in helicopters, conducting a rapid swap of the valuables, and leaving.
But this time, the warlords knew they were coming. On each floor, among the parked cars, there’s a truck or van with deflated tires and an empty gas tank, in which an oil-drum and a detonator have been mounted. It’s overkill, but worse is the fact that in half-demolished buildings to either side are snipers. To the west, they only have crossbows, but the raider on the northeast has some sort of pre-War antimateriel rifle, and he’s already scragged a buggy in the exit ramp and shot a chopper pilot on the roof.
So now, it’s up to the academics. Those who study environmental sciences are trying to find ways to neutralize the chemicals. Engineers are working to disarm the detonators or fix the vehicles enough to safely transport the bombs. The history and humanities students are given the job of finding some way to stop the snipers, and stop raiders from getting in to steal any of their texts or other resources.
And some, of course, are caught in the fine traditions of academic debate, and may need Travelers to steer them to more decisive action… but of course, there might be Travelers among the raiders, too.
Prompt #34 Partner Exercise
The exam is simple. Each of you’s been given a spare, teacher-monitored Moe-Meter and left alone in the exam hall. Using S. Tech - not just fancy manifestations, but your words and actions, your persuasive skill and acting ability, all the skills that make you effective with S. Tech - you and your partner for this exam have to bury the needle. The problem is, you have to do it in both directions - positive emotion, maxing things out with cuteness, fondness, or warm feelings - and negative emotion, hitting empty on the meter through sadness, anger, or fear. Any sort of against-the-rules physical contact is an automatic F (if your partner reports it), but apart from that, it’s up to your imagination. You have fifteen minutes - that’s like Seven Minutes In Heaven and Seven in Hell, with one minute of cooldown in between.
Our upcoming app round runs September 1st-7th. Our next Jaunt, The Lightning Age, a postcolonial steampunk romp with a hunt for a fugitive disordering a peaceful flying city, will run September 12th-October 19th, and an alternate player-driven setting, or Walkabout, will be available (but the specific setting has yet to be voted upon).
Prompt #33 is set in the sometimes Mad-Max like post-apocalyptic academia of the Ivory Tower jaunt, where an isolated school works to restore civilization decades after a brutal war destroyed it. But off-campus, things can get a little rougher…
Prompt #34 is set in the world of Heartbreak Academy, a shoujo high school world where Social Technology, or S. Tech, allows the physical conjuration of emotions - sparkles, roses, soundtracks, emotes and rainclouds. Heartbreak Academy teaches elite students how to better master their S. Tech - and as you could imagine, this makes practical exams… very interesting...
Prompt #33: Pop Quiz.
There are chlorine bombs in the library, and snipers outside.
To be more specific, the library is an open-air market set up in a suburban French high-rise parking garage, one of the few buildings on this side of the city to survive intact, and a good place for gatherings that might need a quick getaway. Academics from across Europe use it as a trading post - bringing old books, or bringing computer printouts collected in three-ring binders, driving up in dune buggies or armored trucks, landing on the ceiling in helicopters, conducting a rapid swap of the valuables, and leaving.
But this time, the warlords knew they were coming. On each floor, among the parked cars, there’s a truck or van with deflated tires and an empty gas tank, in which an oil-drum and a detonator have been mounted. It’s overkill, but worse is the fact that in half-demolished buildings to either side are snipers. To the west, they only have crossbows, but the raider on the northeast has some sort of pre-War antimateriel rifle, and he’s already scragged a buggy in the exit ramp and shot a chopper pilot on the roof.
So now, it’s up to the academics. Those who study environmental sciences are trying to find ways to neutralize the chemicals. Engineers are working to disarm the detonators or fix the vehicles enough to safely transport the bombs. The history and humanities students are given the job of finding some way to stop the snipers, and stop raiders from getting in to steal any of their texts or other resources.
And some, of course, are caught in the fine traditions of academic debate, and may need Travelers to steer them to more decisive action… but of course, there might be Travelers among the raiders, too.
Prompt #34 Partner Exercise
The exam is simple. Each of you’s been given a spare, teacher-monitored Moe-Meter and left alone in the exam hall. Using S. Tech - not just fancy manifestations, but your words and actions, your persuasive skill and acting ability, all the skills that make you effective with S. Tech - you and your partner for this exam have to bury the needle. The problem is, you have to do it in both directions - positive emotion, maxing things out with cuteness, fondness, or warm feelings - and negative emotion, hitting empty on the meter through sadness, anger, or fear. Any sort of against-the-rules physical contact is an automatic F (if your partner reports it), but apart from that, it’s up to your imagination. You have fifteen minutes - that’s like Seven Minutes In Heaven and Seven in Hell, with one minute of cooldown in between.
Molly Carpenter | The Dresden Files
This is profoundly weird. Not just being jawa-sized again, though that had definitely been the first thing that had struck Molly as peculiar about this particular world, being 16 again, with all the hormones that entailed. The whole place is ninety degrees to anything she might consider normal. Everyone knows about magic, and mind manipulation isn't just allowed, it's encouraged.
At least the whole emotion-as-magic thing is familiar, though even there, the lessons are askew from what she'd been taught: unleash, rather than control. She'd blown her first few lessons by virtue of trying to do the exact wrong thing, and while she's started to catch up, it still has her stumbling far more often than she'd like. At least her partner probably won't expect much - she might be better than a number of the other 'transfer students', but she's nowhere near the top of the class.
"Right," she says, eyeing the Moe-Meter like it might just grow fangs and start nibbling on people. "Care Bear Stare first?"
#20 - Dark Forest (Infiltrating)
The forest, with its twisting, serpentine briars and unrelenting gloom, puts Sir Margaret in mind of some of her father's old stories. Not the ones he'd told when she was a child, filled with dashing knights who always, always saved the fair Lady and slew the monster and arrived back home in time to kiss their daughters on the forehead and tell them one last story, please daddy. The ones he'd told her once she'd been accepted as a squire, parcelled out on her rare visits home and the rarer crossing of their paths, gifts born equally of pride and fear. Stories meant to warn her that there are dangers in the dark and in the forests, are and always have been, and not all heroes find their way back home.
Her sword gleams blue-white as she cuts away a creeping tendril that seeks to find its way through the chinks in her armour, and glances back past her mount's lashing tail, clublike and spotted like that of a clouded leopard. Every time they've slowed to take stock, the briars have drawn in; it's getting more than a little tiresome.
"Anyone else have the impression we're being herded somewhere?"
34
Yeah, let's at least try to head in the positive direction first.
"Why not," he says, and he's at least trying not to take out his frustration with the situation on her, "...Do you know how to start?" Seriously he's really lost over here.
no subject
'Rusty' doesn't even begin to cover it, and if she thinks too long about it, it's likely to become depressing.
It doesn't help that even thoughher current physical shape might be that of a teenager, her self-identification is still that of someone on the older end of the twenty-something spectrum, which leaves a sizeable portion of her usual toolkit currently off limits. (And when had she even turned old enough to worry about too young to flirt with?)
Molly wrinkles her nose, looking up at the tiled ceiling as though in search of inspiration. "A jaunty tune?" she suggests after a moment. It's one of the first pieces of this world's magic she'd picked up, and cheerful music swells up in time with her words, as though some sound tech off stage has flawlessly picked up the cue.
no subject
He glances around at their fellow students and notice that the most successful of them are summoning sparkles and flowers and dramatic lighting and he suddenly becomes even more certain that they're going to fail. Good thing he doesn't actually go here. "...Do you know how to do any of... that?" he says, with a vague wave of his hand. He could try, but he's pretty sure his dignity (crippled as it might be) would get in the way.
Where's Joshua when you need him?no subject
She leans back in her chair, eyeing Neku speculatively. The special effects are easy, but from what she could understand of the brief explanation their examiner had given them, their approach is supposed to be tailored. Unfortunately, unlike most of the students in their age bracket, they haven't known each other for years.
"What do you like?" she asks after a long moment's silence. "What makes you happy? I could just throw things until something sticks, but we might run out of time."
no subject
no subject
"Music," she echoes, nose crinkling in slightly-chagrined amusement. "Space opera." Horror movies hovers on the tip of her tongue, but that had gone badly wrong once upon a time, and her needle shivers lower at the memory in a clear 'do not enter' warning. "Are you into street art? Or are you more of a classic masters groupie?"
no subject
no subject
She reaches up and hooks her fingers into the hovering blobs of colour, and sweeps them down towards the floor between them. The orbs burst apart like strangely-shaded snowballs, leaving the floorboards covered with a chalk starscape, multicoloured balls of light still blinking in time with the music, orbited by tiny planets that weave and bob like dancers.
no subject
And... that's pretty cool. Hers a little harder to work with, but, uh... he'll try and summon up blobs in the shape of the Death Star? It requires a little creativity, but he pulls it off. At least the Moe Meter is going up some.
#20! SQUEE MOLLY
The voice comes from nowhere, it seems, until the hedgemaze that keeps threatening to appear suddenly shrinks back as a figure walks down the path. Even the mists seem to avoid him, thinning out as he approaches the company. And was that... citrus, suddenly, in the air? Perhaps it was just a trick of the forest, perhaps not. But the man does not seem to notice it as he steps into the torchlight provided by Sir Margaret's entourage.
The man is... oddly dressed, to be sure. His robes are in true Dolorosian style, all in amber, that seems to have a different tinge of color each time the torches flicker, the bronze threading shimmering as if it were alive. The cloak he wears, trimmed with brown fox fur, is the dark orange of the last moments of light during a sunset. Holding it in place is a giant glittering topaz brooch set in more bronze.
If she wasn't suspicious that she might be speaking to one of the infamous hedge-mages, the Illuminated, she only had to look at his hat: an orange hat, vivid, that clashes with all the other orange-colored clothes on his body; an orange that did not seem to exist in nature. With it was a large feather that appeared to be from no ordinary bird, nor even a gryphon, though it too shone dully with other colors at times.
And that citrus smell was still quite present, leaving a strange aftertaste in the mouth.
"The forest is not very... safe, especially tonight," he continues with a low chuckle. "Much as I marvel at your miraculous mettle, Milady, might I mention that midnight may not be the most mindful of moments to migrate? Even as an esteemed Knight of the Gryphon."
On the last words, he at least gives a bow of proper acknowledgement for her status.
(( ooc: Leonardo here infiltrated as the Orange Illuminant during this Jaunt. If you need any info on him, feel free to PM me! ))
no subject
"My Lord," she replies, executing a seated bow in return. Illuminated, fey and strange and deserving of respect, even here in the center of a twisted forest in the dark of night. Especially here, perhaps; her quest wouls hardly be helped by an offhand curse levelled by a mage scorned.
"Our quarry has no fear travelling by night. It's follow, or lose him entirely."
no subject
He does not move from his spot, digging in his satchel after a moment to pull out some horse jerky - a favorite of gryphons - though he hesitates before offering some to Cloudstrider. Orange plucks off a piece and eats it himself, to prove that it is not poisoned, before motioning to her mount. "May I?"
But then... Orange gets a sudden twinkle in his eye at the mention of quarry, his lips curling into a mischievous smile. "Ahhh... so it is a beast you seek in this forest tonight! Sounds quite dangerous." The last two words leave a tantalizing taste on his tongue, as if one could sink one's teeth into danger itself. While the Illuminated are a mystery, it is no coincidence that the Illuminant of Danger would appear in such a woods as this, on this particular night.
no subject
A part of her is tempted to return the Illuminant's smile; the girl she'd once been, desperate to prove herself a hero worthy of her father's legacy would have done so without pause. Even now, her blood fizzes with the promise of adventure, for all that the situation remains too serious for merriment on her part. "We hunt Rawhead," she says. "It's taken more than one victim from the outlying villages already."
no subject
"More than a dozen," Orange answers calmly, "so I have heard. Rawhead has caused quite an uproar... some rumors state that even the baron's elite could not contain the beast. Is there any truth to the rumor that it took a glaive to the shoulder, yet continued on its path of destruction? That the pole snapped off and the blade rests within it?"
His eyes glance to the rest of her entourage, perhaps attempting to gauge their discomfort, perhaps something else entirely. "I could lend you my assistance in tracking this beast, should you require services of a mage," he says finally, turning back to face Sir Margaret. "Relief for the realm is reachable with the repose of the repulsive Rawhead. And receiving righteous reputation for your retinue in return is a resplendent reward in its own right."