ADigitalMagician Runs a Fate Game

I'm still having some trouble with my phase one. I'm just really not coming up with any good ideas for how my character ended up at the cliff city or what kinds of trouble she might be getting into there. Sorry about this :(

 

Do you have any half-formed ideas or things you think would be neat but can't quite bring together? Maybe I can help.

 

It doesn't have to happen AT the cliff city. It just has to be close enough that one of the other folks could be involved somehow.

Onnastik's origin is at the spring. @siveambrai started in a now ghost town. Mazrinedrake came from an unknown location.

As long as the others can find a way to BE involved you don't need to be in the cliff city. I can handwave that part.

Pretty much the only thing verboten for this in THIS case is the far north, and even that is. . . questionable. I can see Mazarinedrake's character make it up there during one of their adventures. And sivembrai's has a reason to travel to the north. Onnastik's got a travel theme, so also could have done it.

So basically, write whatever you feel works to bring your character from NPC to PC status, and we'll work it out.

 

Hmm. I can probably make it fit into the desert, the far north stuff is pretty well covered by High Concept. Is there much in the way of trade caravans, or tribute caravans, or anything, that would be heading to the city?

 

I pretty much assumed as much. I guessed water caravans because any oasis in a desert will be able to bank on trading for water.

 

And I have several small family groups wandering around scavenging old wrecks for spare parts and trading with caravans and patrols from the major settlements! I think a caravan would work.

 

Hmm, okay, I think I can make this work. Valfi was working as a caravan guard, and once they got to the city some of the other guards talked her into a card game, since everyone had just been paid. She lost most of her money and then noticed that a couple of the other guards were cheating, and started a giant fight over it.

 

World-building thingie I thought of while mentally embellishing my character's origin story, thought it was neat so I'm sharing:
What if residents of canyon city (and maybe people who have frequent contact with them) use tattoos to indicate their ties and relationships? They've got a warrior culture going, so it would make sense that they value aggression, but at the same time you don't want fights breaking out all the time because it's bad for maintaining social order and getting shit done. So they tattoo crests and symbols on themselves to indicate who will back them up if you start shit with them. Pissed off because somebody cut in front of you in line at the bakery? Well, his tattoos indicate that he's BFFs with a raider group that you know likes to collect skulls. Do you want your skull to end up on their hood of their rig? Then maybe you should content yourself with grumbling and leave him alone. xD

People with lots of friends would end up with massive sleeves of interlocking symbols. People who pissed their friends off to the point of severing the relationship have acid burns. :D;; Seems very Mad Maxish to me.

 

I approve of this worldbuilding detail 100% and look forward to our characters all getting their friendship tats someday! ;)

 

One condition. We all have to chant "Besties" after its done.

 

Some more worldbuild stuff to submit to the group's approval!

The events I've already described in Chaajor's backstory took place I thinking about four or five years before the game starts, but she hasn't necessarily spent all that time in Cliff City. We'll work that out as we move on with character development.

Her people are somewhat pejoratively called Scrapdogs; they wonder the wastelands looking for broken down cars and other pieces of machinery, break them down into parts small enough to carry, and take them to the established settlements to trade for food, water, and other necessities. The truth is they're trapped in a horribly one-sided, exploitative system; they spend huge amounts of energy breaking down and transporting useful pieces of machinery, saving the larger settlements the time and effort needed to do it themselves, and then trade them away for pittances. Chaajor didn't even realize how poor her family really was until she'd been living in Cliff City for a few weeks, or how stupid and cowardly most people think Scrapdogs are for the same reason.

Also had this notion that the people of Cliff City could gather a little water with dew collectors, due to the height of their settlements. They still have to get most of their water from the town of the Blessed Fountain, but it's a small degree of independence that probably really pisses the Fountain Queen off. XD Because of this particular trait of theirs, as well as the shape of the land they've built their town on, the city is also informally called Ezra's Tits, after the warlady that rules it.

 

Also I really hope we all reach a point with our characters where they willingly get friendship tattoos and chant "Besties!" together, because that would warm my heart right down to the cockles. XD

 

The canyon probably actually has a naturally-occurring river, since that's where canyons generally come from. Dew collection is probably done by criminal or otherwise marginal residents, to avoid whatever central control the ruler exercises on that supply.

 

I think we got our locations mixed up at some point. Do we still have a city that's perched on top of/inside a few naturally occurring bluffs, like the Citadel? Because that's not the same thing as a canyon.

 

And by "we" I mostly mean "I," cause I know I referred to a "Canyon City" a couple times, but that's because I'm a doof who gets words mixed up sometimes...I meant to write Bluff or Cliff...

 

Anyway, I wrote a short fic expanding on my character's origin story (kind of want to start calling her Chaajor the Fierce after this). Uh, potential trigger warning for a brief allusion to statutory rape.

“’Ey! ‘Ey, music man!”

Your voice is a harsh, raspy whisper, only different from your normal tone in terms of volume. Your parents are up by the driver’s door, haggling loudly; the rest of your family all ranged behind them. *You* have snuck up on the patrol rig from the passenger side, down by the tailgate; long as you keep your voice down, no one’ll ever know you’re here.

Including, maybe, the guy you want to talk to. You hiss at him again, watching his bare chest slowly rise and fall. He’s the *cleanest* guy you’ve ever seen this close up in your life, only a thin layer of dust obscuring his tattoos, his…uh, muscles, the shiny bits of metal sticking out of his jacket. You don’t see how he can really be sleeping out here, with all that skin exposed to the sun, but it’s a long moment before he moves, and you can’t see anything but your own face in the shiny goggles he’s got over his eyes.

You sag against the side of the rig, relieved, when he finally sits up and pushes his goggles back into the top of his head, looking you in the eye. He doesn’t even look that annoyed with you for disturbing him. You can do this.

‘I wantchu t’take me witchu,” you tell him, making an effort to speak slowly and clearly, like your parents do when haggling with the patrols and traders. No sense in going to all this trouble to talk to the man if he can’t even understand you, right? He makes a sound like he thinks something’s funny and starts to open his mouth, but that’s okay, you were expecting it. You keep going, hissing right over whatever he wants to say. “I can make music too, see, or at least I could if there was anyone out here t’teach me.” Or if your fucking parents would let you do some fucking experimenting on your own. You spare a venomous glance in their direction.

The battle bard is staring at you now, his eyebrows raised. You choose to take it as a good sign. “So I wanna make a deal with you t’become your student. Take me with you n’teach me how to make music, a-and I’ll do whatever you want.” This was the part of your plan that took the longest to put together; figuring out what you had to offer that would appeal to a bigshot city-living music man. You throw the words at him in one big rush. “I can look after your instruments and electronics and shit, and carry things for you, and you can fuck me if you want.”

He laughs.

It’s a short laugh, quiet, but that just makes it cut more. He’s not considering your offer. He’s not even taking it seriously.

“How old are you?” he says with a snort. “Do your parents know you’re talking like this?”

“I don’t give a *shit* about my parents,” you snarl, and you’re so angry, you told yourself not to get your hopes up (never pin all your hopes on a single deal, your mom’s always said, one of the few things she’s *ever* said that made any damn sense to you), but you’re still so *angry,* how dare he laugh at you, that you grab his leg.

You grab the battle bard’s leg, and this is something you’ll be proud of later: you don’t hesitate, don’t even *think* about having second thoughts, you just grab his leg and snarl, *”I’ve got the music in me.”*

And he stares at you, mouth open, and you say, “I can *feel* it, but I don’t know how to *do* anything with it, and nobody out here will *help me.* But I’m going to keep looking for someone who will, and *you* are going to feel real fucking stupid if you see me a year from now on the back of a rig that isn’t yours!”

It’s a little amazing that nobody overhears you.

He’s still staring, and in the quiet your second thoughts catch up with you and you take your hand off his leg. “And I’m fourteen,” you say, chin jutting out defiant.

He licks his lips. “Let me see your hands,” he says. You stare, and he says, “I’m not going to hurt you, kid, just let me see your hands.”

You put your hands in his.

You don’t really understand, then, what he’s doing, what the point is to the way he looks each of your fingers over, carefully bends each joint, makes you lace your fingers with his and squeeze his hands. You don’t figure out until later that he was testing your grip and flexibility; you thought you were lucky just to have all your fingers.

“Okay,” he says, once you’ve squeezed his hands hard enough to make him wince. He’s grinning, and you start grinning too when he says, “Okay, I’ll teach you.”

He pulls you into the bed of the rig, in between a bunch of equipment you don’t have names for yet, and he pulls out a half-full jug of water, and then

He shouts, “Hey, scrapdog!”

And your parents look up

And he shouts, “For the girl,” and tosses the jug into your mother’s hands.

And your heart leaps, and your father says, “'ey! That’s my kid!”

And you shout, “Not anymore I’m not!”

And then the bard’s grabbed his guitar and struck a note, and the rig’s jerking into motion, the warriors inside the cab shouting at him and demanding to know what’s going on, and you laugh

You’re so happy, and you laugh.

 

So... is phase two coming anytime soon?

(I love everything you do, Drake.)

 

As soon as I have a night where I don;t feel like I'm having a breakdown. Sorry folks.

 

Oh, if you're in a bad place then I'm sorry to be impatient! Your mental health is more important. E-hugs if you want them.

 

No, it's fine, I've been kicking myself a bit about this. You're not impatient, it should have been done over the weekend.