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quaranmeme2018-01-20 07:58 pm
riverview: january test drive meme
riverview test drive memeWelcome to Riverview's test drive meme! Feel free to dip your toes in on the test drive meme to try out your character in the setting, play out a mission, and get samples for your application at the same time!
● There are currently 2 Character Slots available.
● Reserves will open on February 15th. Applications will next be open between March 1st to March 7th.
● Providing all parties are amenable, threads on the test drive meme can count as game canon, as the plot in the prompts presented is game canon.
● TDM threads do not count for Activity Check, but they do count for Activity Bonus Points, so long as all characters involved are accepted into the game.
● Threading on the TDM is intended for prospective new characters, so top-levels should only be posted by players of these characters. Since the events in the TDM are considered game canon, characters currently in the game are free to use the TDM prompts for logs and posts on the regular communities.
Feel free to use the prompts below or create your own scenario. The setting is built to be flexible, so feel free to make things up as you go.
information resources
premise ● arrival ● setting ● ask a question ● calendar ● navigation
Starting around the 20th, residents of the city will start hearing some pretty disturbing rumors circulating - the rumors originate with some members of the Perimeter Guard who are returning from patrols, pale and a little panicked. They're reporting that a herd of terrifying beetle-like behemoth monsters lumbering toward the city - one female leader clocking in at 60 feet long and about 20 smaller male companions, each around 30 feet long. Unlike the Behemoth who showed up earlier in the year, these ones are nasty, sporting horns and big enough to knock over trees and displace even the bigger monsters in the usual crowd, and they've already breached through the wall of the Abandoned City and are heading toward the city itself. A herd like this could cause some serious damage, maybe even enough to compromise the wall of the Inhabited City. Thankfully, the Perimeter Guard has a nice big ace up their sleeves in the form of a small fleet of mechs, but the problem is that the mech are still in beta-testing, prone to breaking down, and there aren't enough to go around. This means that there's going to have to be some serious support on the ground.
The attack on the behemoth beetles is two-fold. The first order of business is to send out anyone with big powers or big guns to wear them down, beating on them the old-fashioned way, with brute force. The second is to circle around behind and, while the monsters are distracted, try to herd them away from the city using bright flares, fireworks left over from the Festival of Light, and even more big guns. Volunteers to do the shooting and supplying the brave souls going out into the jungle are welcome!
What do you use to fight a giant monster? A giant mech. And thankfully the Perimeter Guard has been working on something just like that - a new fleet of 20 three-story-tall mech suits meant to be manned by two people. With the behemoth herd approaching, the Guard is calling for anyone with piloting experience, or even people willing to take a quick course in it, to help man the fleet and head out into the fray, stomping through the brush and fighting the behemoths either in the Abandoned City or the jungle outside it. The goal is to take them out, take them down, or at least help the ground teams herd them away from the city and discourage them from returning.
Mechs are piloted by two people working together - while it's not exactly drift compatibility, the two characters need to act together, with one directing where the mech goes and keeping an eye on the terrain, and the other one manning the guns and keeping an eye on the mech's defenses and energy and ammunition levels. This takes a lot of concentration and cooperation, and this day is bound to forge a lot of new friendships....and probably a few mortal enemies. On top of the difficulty of working with someone who may be a total stranger, don't forget the mechs are in beta-testing and are only being used as a last resort, which means they have a bad tendency to break down in unexpected ways.
Each mech is fitted with two large canon-style guns that can be semi-automatic or automatic with a limited amount of ammunition, one plasma sword, and a force shield that can take four serious hits before it is depleted. They have a finite amount of energy storage and are able to be in continuous use for 3 hours maximum before shutting down. Out of the fleet of 20 mechs, the mod only expects about 5 to still be functional at the end of the battle, so feel free to have characters destroy them in threads. If any player (once accepted to the game) is interested in having their character take over the mechs as a project going forward, feel free to PM the mod account and we can talk it out!
Once the city is safe enough that it isn't in poor taste to advertise fun outings, residents will start seeing ads for a new attraction in the city - the Crystal Caves. Presented as an excellent date spot, the caves are beautiful natural formations only recently discovered just a short walk outside the city. With the path cleared and patrolled by hired security to ensure that the trip there is safe, happy couples (or singles, but why go alone when you can bring a special friend or two?) can walk through the caves.
Inside, characters will enjoy a short walk along a twisty cave path where the walls appear to be made of semi-opaque crystal that shimmers with different colors, looking almost a little like the Northern Lights. After this path, the caves open into a series of beautiful caverns that seem to be made of pure crystal, with jagged crystalline formations in wide varieties of colors, some of which look almost like they've been slowly melting for decades, molten and shimmering. Visitors can find booths offering rock candy crystals on sticks and other treats, souvenirs, and for those without as much exploratory spirit or patience, guided tours that point out some of the more beautiful formations. There are also a few smaller caverns that have been converted into overnight camps where groups can stay the night and enjoy a catered group breakfast in the morning!
If there's one trait that entrepreneurs in Riverview Quarantine all seem to have in common, it's jumping the gun and opening attractions or releasing new products before taking the time to conduct enough tests. The Crystal Caves are no different, unfortunately, though in this case the effects are a little less distressing. Residents who traveled to the caves will find themselves tossing and turning at night anywhere from a few days later to a week later, depending on their mental fortitude, and slipping into incredibly strange dreams. Varying from wild flights of exhilarating fancy to personalized nightmares depending on the personality of the dreamer, the dreams are incredibly vivid and realistic, with everything feeling, smelling, sounding, tasting, and looking completely real.
The strangest part of the dreams, though, is that anyone who'd looked at the same particular crystal as another person and seen their reflections in it will experience the dream with that person as an equal participant, able to share the same dream-granted abilities and experiences, able to work together as a team or hinder progress. Whether that person was a partner, a friend, an enemy, or even just a stranger observing the same formation at the same time, if their reflections appeared on a crystal together, they will find themselves sharing each other's dreams off and on for about a week. Some dreamers might even find that just thinking about a particular person they know as they fall asleep can pull that person into their dream, even if they weren't in the caves together.
This effect can be shared between just two people or larger groups, and the dreams themselves can belong to any character affected or be a combination of all of their dreams. The dreams themselves tend toward the positive more than the negative and the fanciful more than the realistic, but where they fall on that spectrum depends largely on character temperament and personality. Characters affected simply have to have looked at the same crystal in the caves, even if it was on a different day or at a different time, or for characters who would not have gone to the caves, be thought of by a person who has while they fall asleep.
Whether your character is posting up a silly word game, trying to get hold of a friend, or putting out feelers for people to go out into the fray with, the network is going strong.
Alternately, an offer for a free app is popping up on new arrivals' devices - Friendr is a friend-finder and/or dating app. If characters choose to install it, they will fill out a short bio and parameters for what they're looking for, upload a snap of themselves, and then proceed to browse for matches. This is a typical swipe-left-or-right type app.
Friendr base code is by photosynthesis.
The code in the textbox is for the default color scheme, but the Friendr app has a wide variety of themes, so feel free to customize with colors and patterns as you see fit, but do not remove the credit line out of respect for the creator of the code.
Use the wildcard prompt to choose your own adventure and do whatever else you like in the setting!
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[ Okay but lbr it's obvious that Hux isn't.
But Ren won't let that stop him from trying to throw the blame at him anyway, even as they make their hasty retreat. He thinks that the darkness has stopped, but at times, he's certain he can see it just outside his line of sight, sprouting like so many weeds in the otherwise sterile labyrinth. ]
I. Don't. Know. [ Gritted out in sheer frustration. Is it the Force? Is it some influence of Snoke's, from beyond? Is it... the dream-Ren, wherever he is? ] But it isn't real. None of this is.
[ So... No need to panic? And yet, it does nothing to relieve that instinctual, primal fear spiking inside him. ]
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Because it was always just Ren. Ren, with his expressive eyes and worried mouth, hiding his inexperience and putting everyone else at risk. ]
This is foolish. I'm not running away from something that isn't real in my own head.
[ It's the only safe-haven he has left now that Snoke isn't around to pressure him with severe migraines when displeased. Since boyhood, people have imagined Hux was a weak-willed boy (even Brendol) but none of them ever appreciated his mind.
Coming to a halt with fists balled at his sides, he thinks logically about the situation: this is his dream, he controls reality itself, if indeed any of this is malleable then it all belongs exclusively to him. Except for Ren, of course, but naturally he would be the outlier. Hux screws his eyes shut and thinks of his own ship the Finalizer, how any degree of power he ever earned was crystallised on that ship, and in the corridor by Ren the emperor's ridiculous robes melt into the severe uniform of a general. The Durasteel walls darken in hue, shift formation to that of a Resurgent-class Star Destroyer. ]
If you won't make it stop, I will.
[ How? He doesn't know. His tactics are limited to "Think At It Really Hard", but they don't feel entirely useless. This isn't Ren's head. ]
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He comes to a halt when the other man does, watching him with open curiosity. The ship around them shifts, as does the general's garb, and the blackness... It's nowhere to be seen.
Ren's impressed. He won't say it, but he is. And yet, instead, he breathes out sharply and remarks: ]
That uniform suits you better.
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He strides past Ren with a huff, heading for a turbolift. Decisively, he snaps, ]
I'm going to wake myself up.
[ Because it's obviously all just about willpower now. Maybe. ]
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I won't stop you.
[ He's tired of this, too. It isn't worth his time, to stick around here wondering what Hux's mind will reveal. He can do that just as easily-- no, much more easily-- in the waking world, with the power of the Force at his disposal. As Hux stalks off to wake himself up, Ren goes in the opposite direction, as there's no reason to stand beside the general, as if tethered to him. ]
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The problem is, it fails.
Hux doesn't, in fact, want to wake up at all, and why would he? It's a shabby backwater moon and here is his own ship, phantom crew scattered around the more he thinks of how much he wants to stay, as though materialising directly from his craving to be as close to home as possible. Not on Arkanis, no, but right here. Ren won't be of any help in the Quarantine, he's too selfish and obsessed with his little Force-magic to actually assist Hux in formulating a plan to ensure their survival for the next five years. Ren will vanish into the crowds and Hux will be without anyone at all, not Phasma and certainly not the boy-man who could actually prove an asset if he weren't so volatile.
When he enters the bridge and heads to the viewport at the front, he's surprised a moment later to hear the same doors opening again. He has a feeling caught somewhere between dread and anticipation ...
Subconsciously, the hallways have all led to the same place. ]
no subject
But he can't deny that he sees something of 'home' in Hux. It's not the kinship he feels with Rey, that bond forged of not only the Force, but also mutual experiences with loneliness and abandonment. And he loathes Hux, but at least he's familiar. More familiar than anything else on this rock. Finally, somebody from their universe, who isn't with the Resistance. Somebody who knows only Kylo Ren and doesn't give a damn about Ben Solo.
Is it Hux's doing or his own that sends him not to his own quarters, but to the bridge?
Snappishly: ] What is this? [ AND DON'T YOU GIVE HIM A SMART-ASS RESPONSE LIKE "THE BRIDGE." ]
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[ How mortifying to be an accidental jailer this way, when the blame is squarely rooted in his corner. Since none of the crew is real he indulges in rubbing a hand over his face, pinching his nose as if to stem a headache.
A living, breathing one. ]
I'm trying to do as I said and wake up, it's proving ... arduous. Quieten down and let me focus.
no subject
How hard is it to wake yourself up?
[ Maybe quiet is the last thing you need. Now, face to face with the other man once again, Ren stares him down (at least the best he can with someone who's not that much smaller than himself) and then reaches out to pinch his arm. It's an utterly impulsive (not to mention childish) attempt at waking Hux up and ending this. ]
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Don't touch me, Supreme Leader.
[ Smashed into a console? Fine. Force-choked? Less so, but predictably violent all the same. Descending into pinching? He has some degree of dignity to cling to and it doesn't involve letting Ren manhandle him on a tepid basis. ]
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Except, this being a dream-- this being Hux's dream-- it doesn't work, and he's left with an immeasurable sense of impotent frustration. ]
Then wake up already!
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Careful, Ren. [ Singsong, smug. Too much, thrilling in the lack of power afforded to the other man. The last time Hux issued that warning he was intimidated by the reply, yet what is there to fear here? ] I may awaken yet you might not. Trapped here without your precious Force, I wonder if you would finally learn anything of value.
[ He wouldn't want Ren locked in his mind, yet the threat is quite a heavy one. ]
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That's all true, that it's one of Ren's blindspots.
But Hux underestimates him, too. People who assume he's nothing more than a spoiled child with no skills beyond the Force, who mistake his lack of emotional discipline for a lack of discipline overall... It's to their own detriment.
Physically, he's still a force (heh) to be reckoned with. And so, as Hux's smug smirking and his snide threats have the knight seeing red, Ren lashes out quickly to strike at the general's face with his fist. And then he tries to yank the other man to him, to pull him into a hold, intending to get an arm locked around Hux's throat. ]
no subject
He may not have Ren's heft or muscle but long before training with the First Order, no one at the Arkanis Academy enjoyed scrapping with little Armitage and his sharp nails. There is no such thing as fighting dirty if you win. ]
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He's missing an entire sense. The Force is so much more than magic tricks or displays of brute strength. It's a part of him at every level, part of his sight and his hearing and without it, he's impaired.
But he can push through it. This isn't real, even if the tug on his scalp and the body he's grappling with and the hard floor beneath them all feel real. Though he loses his grip on Hux, he tries his damnedest to catch the other man sharply with his elbow, snarling like a wild beast.
Let go of his hair!! ]
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He tugs on Ren's mop of hair to try and get him to expose his neck, then reaches up to rake his nails along the unseemly scar that slashes its way from brow to throat and beyond, the latter out of danger under his tunic but the rest literally up for grabs. Hux snarls, bootheels kicking as high as possible. This would never happen on the actual Finalizer for a host of reasons, so there is some cathartic pleasure to be drawn from trying to beat Ren's thick head in where the lack of the Force paints them as equals in strength.
Almost. Ren is, unfortunately, so much bigger like a wolf assaulted by a fox. The fox isn't holding back, isn't thinking of how this will play out in reality once he wakes up and his
frenemy is back to wielding sorcery; he just wants to see Ren bleed and be the cause of it. Just once. It doesn't have to be real when the memory would be sweet enough in itself. ]no subject
That's right, he just resorted to biting. Hux isn't the only one who can fight dirty. And like the general, Ren intends to draw blood, even if he has to use his teeth to do it. ]
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Stop, Ren, stop!
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He does let go when Hux backhands him, though that's only so that he can attempt to sit up and get Hux off of him. The only thing that calms him, even a little, is Hux telling him to stop.
Which Ren is, of course, taking as a sign of Hux's surrender.
But he does stop. He looks up at Hux, breathing harshly, teeth practically bared in a snarl, before he speaks up again. ]
Get off of me.
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Panting hard and fast, Hux seethes. ]
You could only ever dream of breaking me.
[ The mindscape begins to dissolve like fog around them, Hux's grip slackening as his shoulders slump. ]