TEST DRIVE: April

[empevents]

— TEST DRIVE: APRIL —

Welcome to empatheias' test drive meme. This test drive is to help interested players test their characters in the game's environment. We've included a few prompts that incorporate specific elements of the game, though you'll find all of them have a lot of leeway for players to get as creative as necessary. Before diving in, here are a few things we'd like to remind everyone about the game in general:

• Date reminders. Reserves open March 25th and Applications (Canon | OC) open a week later on April 1st. Apps will only be open for four days!
  
  
• OC Reminder! Just a quick reminder that original characters are allowed. Those interested can also use the test drive. OCs do not need to be reserved.
  
  
• Emotions are key! Empatheias' premise focuses on how anyone's emotions can affect their environment, be it big or small. While not every emotion will cause a reaction, significant ones definitely will. How much effect a character will have will ultimately be up to you, the player. Also, while we're giving a lot of leeway for the test drive, keep in mind that there will be some limits in the actual game.
  
  
• Everyone has an amulet. All characters have a unique amulet that is specialized for them. It will contain all of their emotion drops and it serves as the network device. Remember, communication is telepathic. Otherwise, it works basically the same.
  
  
• Assume the character is already in the game. Because "OMG WHERE AM I IS THIS REAL LIFE" threads aren't going to be very helpful in this test drive! Plus, those are going to happen in-game, anyway. So to make things easier, just assume that they've been around at least a week or so. Still learning the ropes, but not a complete "first day" experience.
  
  
• First or third person allowed. Your threads can be in either first or third, but we'd advise being flexible about it. Remember, these threads can also be used in your application for samples! Reminder: We only require one sample and it can be done in either format. We have also made a change to our sample requirements, so look over the Applications page!
  
  
• Transfer to in-game. If accepted, you can assume threads made on the Test Drive happen in-game if the scenario can reasonably fit. These threads do not count toward AC.

Now with that out of the way, here are some prompts you guys can work from!


PROMPTS

• Prompt A: How about giving the emotions a try?

• Prompt B: Refer to the Task Board and choose a task your character may be interested in taking up. For this prompt, you could have your character ask for help, already be in the middle of the job, or react to it in some way. Perhaps they were an unfortunate victim or want to create a job countering an existing one. You could even have a prompt making a job request. Creating jobs for the purpose of the test drive is absolutely doable.

• Prompt C: How about giving the amulets a go? Start a telepathic conversation and see how it works. Remember, the amulets are sending out the owner's thoughts so might want to be careful about how the stream of consciousness goes...

• Prompt D: The Verens Emergency Response Teams are running drills to make sure that the Verens populace, natives and Otherworlders alike, are prepared for any and all emergencies. This means large scale obstruction of public areas, traffic delays, businesses closing their doors temporarily in the name of professional cooperation... and, best of all, Otherworlder participation!

1. Alpha Lava: If you asked Team Alpha, they would say they drew the short straw. They are in charge of the volcanic eruption preparedness drill! This includes cordoning off sections of the merchant’s square and residential district to conduct the following tasks: evacuation drills, where random houses are the "willing participant" of loudspeaker announcements telling them they have thirty seconds to escape their homes before they die; dunamis training exercises, to determine who would be most able to hold back or freeze incoming pools of lava; and, most helpful, the role of victim mannequin. Posing still as a statue for several minutes at a time to simulate being encrusted by molten lava is a thankless job, but someone has to do it.
   
2. Epsilon Epidemic: Team Epsilon's emergency preparedness drill is outbreak of a deadly disease! For this simulation, they will be rounding up helpful Otherworlder volunteers and distributing signs for them to wear around their necks. Following that, instructions are varied. Perhaps some people end up in quarantine, informed that Team Epsilon will shoot to kill anyone who escaped. Perhaps some people are under strict instruction to act out their sign to the best of their ability, and will be penalised if they don't! (What's the penalty? It's quarantine, or no gift bag, or both.) Perhaps they are simply dead and have to lie in the street all day. Yes, that's very boring. No, they don't have a choice. At the end of the simulation, all participants are given a gift bag filled with handmade cookies (courtesy of Team Epsilon's very own multi-talented Agent N) and gift certificate for a spa day for two. Most importantly: have fun!
   
3. Gamma Grandstanding: Team Gamma ended up with the newest preparation drill. Its official title is "People With Indeterminate Motives" (PWIM for short) to keep from throwing a wrench in the Briarlan trade deal and offending sensibilities, but make no mistake: it is about knowing exactly what to do if pirates invade Verens and conduct a hostile takeover. Some Otherworlders will be placed specifically in local business - restaurants, independently owned shops, even the zoo - and trained how to protect them from PWIM. Some businesses will be targeted; others will be ignored entirely (hope you brought a deck of cards!). Other Otherworlders will be asked to play the pirates - sorry, PWIM - themselves, complete with lame costumes (eyepatches, fancy hats, fake parrots to sit on a shoulder, itchy peglegs) for the sake of immersion. Arr! Aye, avast!

• Prompt E: Despite the rain and everybody coming down with colds during the month, everyone in Verens is still doing their best to get ready for next month's Flower Festival. And Otherworlders are definitely expected to help with prep work. After all, it's everyone's festival, so everyone should help make it the best it can be! So here's a few ways to help!

1. Sign Me Up: The Festival needs signs! Lots of signs. And lots of signs need lots of painters! Or one incredibly overworked painter, but in this case, they've decided to go the teamwork route, pairing up Otherworlders and having them make signs advertising various games at the festival! Sounds easy, right? But with emotion based paints in play, be careful. Too much negativity between partners and the wording will change, the paint could run, go too far in the other directions and the signs will be practically glowing, but possibly lead to claims of false advertising!
   
2. Special Delivery Flower Festivals need lots of flowers, and people to transport those flowers! And thanks to handy tech exchange with Briarlan, this year there's some fancy containment units for transporting them. They're really just crates with some fancy looking meters attached, meant to open up when they reach the festival grounds. Unfortunately, these new inventions probably could've used some additional testing and are prone to opening randomly sending flowers all over the place! Try and collect as many as possible and bring them back to the grounds, the festival organizers would appreciate it.
   
3. Flower Round Up! Or maybe painting signs and boxing flowers aren't your thing, so how about...corralling them? With all the good vibes in the air, it seems some of the flower arrangements have literally pulled up roots and are running around the festival. And you can't have a flower festival without flowers, so do your best to try and get them back where they belong before they run off to start some sort of flower civilization in the woods*.
   
   *They probably will not form a flower civilization in the woods, but you never know.

• Prompt F: With Verens trading with more and more cities out there, some shopkeepers have gotten an idea to try and increase sales by encouraging both citizens and Otherworlders to shop local by promoting a tour of various business in the merchant district! Though the crystal has been a little negative, they're still hoping the tour goes off without a hitch! After all, it's too late to postpone it.

1. On the Clock: The first stop is Click, Clack, Clock, a clock shop that offers delivery to anywhere on the island! Unfortunately, due to the poor weather, all of the delivery staff are out with colds, so they're looking for volunteers! And yes, you're on this walking tour, but don't be surprised if you're handed a bicycle and a clock and sent on your way to deliver a clock. Hopefully they remembered to tell you where to go before shoving you out the door.
   
2. Shine On: Assuming you haven't been conscripted into the clock store's delivery force, the next stop is at Verens' very own Restoration Works, an establishment for restoring old antiques and making them look good as new. They've set up an interactive demo for everybody, so partner up and practice using your emotions to bring some shine back to some dull scraps of metal! Sorry guys, they're not going to let you work on anything really valuable during the tour, but if you show some promise, maybe they’ll hire you on in the future!
   
3. Polg-Oh No: Finally, the tour will end with a nice relaxing meal at the Sweethearts Cafe. Or it was intended to be relaxing, anyway (who would've thought the antique store would be the calmest part of the tour?), but it seems no place is safe from the Polgo plague. Better keep an eye on your plates, otherwise the second you’re distracted, the small kitten-sized blue bugs might scurry up the table and try and run off with your food!
   
   Even if you’re paying attention, they might give it a shot anyways. So be on your guard and ready to give chase if it happens!

• Prompt G: Make your own! It could include blueberries and/or buckets.

For your threads, put the Character Name and the Canon in the subject line to help readily identify them. You're also welcome to use more than one prompt for respondents to choose from. If you have any questions or want to brush up on the game information, refer to the Game Information entry. Otherwise, tag around and have fun!

Comments

Rhino | Spectacular Spider-Man

[needlenose]

D-3

[So, technically, O'hirn was supposed to be the pirate here. They gave him a fake parrot (helpfully glued to his left shoulder- or, well, the upper part of his left arm at least, as they didn't have a proper ladder to let them reach his actual shoulder- and a neat little tricorn hat helpfully tied to the horn on his head. The works. Ordinarily, this job would be right up his alley even! Smash into a place, demand the valuables, run off with the loot. And he'd done that pretty well so far today.

Unfortunately, he wasn't really paying attention to the whole speech, so now he was seated comfortably inside a tavern- ill gotten gains spread all over the table and floor around him- playing cards with some of the locals. Because unfortunately, he had no idea where exactly he was supposed to go once he'd been all loot-ed up.]

Uh...you got any threes?

[There were a few locals trying their best to keep the spirit of the drill alive though, and at the moment they seemed to be operating in shifts of three, all trying to shove him out of his chair. Unfortunately, he's sort of a nine foot tall giant who weighs several tons, so it's going about as well as you'd think. At least he's not harming anyone? Well, at least not until somebody throws their back out. But that'd only barely be his fault. But whoever crafted those chairs he's using probably deserves a raise.]


E-3

[He didn't sign up to run around catching flowers. He really didn't. Unfortunately for him, the flowers didn't care. Which is probably why he's just...standing there, completely still, just covered in the things. He's big and he's not very quick and, frankly, he's got a hard time grabbing hold of anything scampering all over him. Probably explains why there's an entire flower bed's worth of very lively floral arrangements using him to keep away from anyone trying to catch them.

Ladders have been deployed, but the petal-covered pains-in-the-neck always run just out of reach anytime someone climbs up and reaches for them. The more dastardly ones even slap 'em around a bit, just to make the poor sap on them lose their balance and topple over.]

This is so humiliatin' ... hurry it up, will ya?

[He's got a living flower crown and matching accessories goin' on over here, somebody help. He gave up trying to grab them himself a while ago, now the best he can do is just stand there making annoyed grunts and groaning noises. Also on the list of not helping things: that tiny little rain cloud that's appeared overhead. His head. And only his head.

Somebody's feelin' a little down in the dumps about being a flower jungle-gym. Also embarrassed, and honestly that might have something to do with just how easily those poor sods trying to help keep losing their balance and toppling over. It's a vicious cycle, really.]

D-3

[baaaasic]

Arr, matey, you be goin' fish.

[Kirara's a little sad about her own pirate hat covering her nice hair, but the parrot's kind of cute, even if it's fake.

And she's about as lost on the particulars of the endeavor as O'hirn is, though the locals seem to be much more forgiving of her on it. Maybe it's because she's just a kid, or maybe it's because whenever one of the locals gives talking her down a shot she just bats her eyelashes at them and goes 'ehhh, was Kirara supposed to do that?' and then they just move on because they'd feel guilty.

She kicks her feet a little.]

Hey, Mr. Rhino, where are you from? We don't have rhinos in New Zealand. [She doesn't actually think he's a real-life rhinoceros - probably - but she figures a guy who dresses up as one has probably seen one in real life?]

[needlenose]

[And yep, there's some annoyed groaning as he draws. Both because he was sure he had that one, and also because those giant armor-coated fingers don't really do fine motor skills well, and honestly just one is like half the size of the deck.

Plus, his piratical playmate might have gotten a glimpse of some of the next few cards in the stack on his draw, during the subsequent attempts to avoid accidentally turning it into a game of 52 pickup.]

We don't got 'em in New York, neither- 'cept in zoos.

[He is 100% not an Actual Rhino, Kirara. Even if Octavius did put an absurd level of detail into some of the costume.]

Your turn.

[baaaasic]

Ooh, you're from New York? My friend is from there! The big New York zoos seem really fun, but I haven't ever been...

[She kicks her feet a little more, then - yeah, she definitely saw the next few cards in the deck. She's also not afraid to cheat, so.]

Mr. Rhino, got any sevens? [And, while she's chattering.]

Do you like rhinos? Is that why you dressed up as one? Kirara likes sheep, and she has a friend who realllyyy likes cats, so maybe she should find a friend for every animal?

[That would take literal years, if not forever - even if she just stuck to broad categories like 'cats' instead of specific kinds - but she doesn't seem daunted by that possibility.

Also, she's tilting her head a little.]

Yanno, maybe we're forgetting something.

E3

[heartofalioness]

If I went any faster, I might startle or damage the flowers.

[Allura says as she she gently plucks (heh) a daisy off Rhino's arm like it's a kitten.]

And since this happened so spontaneously, there wasn't much time to grab anything like a net.