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We've only slaughtered a few hundred heretics at this point. Mina left far, far before that.

Sorry I got back so late. I hope school wasn't all that bad by the way.
Ooh~ I would love to read some of it, specially on Steven Universe since I've always regarded them as simple (if sometimes a bit flat) and lovable characters, so it would be nice to see them from someone else's point of view (and to read some good stuff since most fanfics try to make Steven "complex" by having him angst).
Yeah, you're right. Maybe it could be interesting to add that "legally iffyness" as a personality trait, but probably for something more serious. I'm not giving it a lot of thought, I prefer to read a little more missions and spin-offs before. On a side note, I love springhole.net, in fact, right now I have 26 tabs (yeah, I'm that kind of person) open on my phone to read when I have some time. (They have so many characterisation tips! And so many links! It's adictive).
On your agents, I'm assuming they are all from the same canon (correct me if I'm wrong) so where are they from? And what kind of superpowers do they have?
Diana,

The reality of "Huinesoron smash" aside, I don't know exactly where I could find a copy. I don't have it in my bookshelf, and my school schedule does not give me any free time to go look in the library. I guess I could eventually find time to go find an accessible library, though. Eventually. I'm still getting used to this new level of school, so cut me some slack, kay?

-Twistey

Yep, I saw them, but commenting slipped my mind. Sorry about that, and thank you!

-Alleb

Having now looked them up, Chiss sound cool, though you might have to do something about his name in that case. He would never go with a name inappropriate for his species. OTOH, you could always put it down to the coordinators screwing with him. It would amuse me if both AUs of Nume are blue. {= )

Speaking of, Nume Prime says he wasn't like that as a kid. I say that's because he grew up in a time much less accepting of geeks and he had no friends to be an obnoxious little Trekkie at.

Also, I don't think Cuthaan (or whatever he ends up being called) actually has the full-blown memory thing; Nume's is really sort of sci-fi. Cuthaan probably just likes Sherlock and has a rudimentary mind palace.

~Neshomeh

But I don't have discord at the moment (I'm not all that familiar with the program either) I would also like some links to the game to lean about it, thanks!

Because I just wanna say: hey, dese guys look like good choices for the roles.

hS

I'd forgotten about that. And yeah, he was scary as hell.

But then again, Crowley isn't totally on board with Hell. He's really an oddball.

But so is Tennant, so heck, it might just be a match made in Heaven. {= D

~Neshomeh

Really sorry if you already saw them Alleb, but I wanted to be sure, since you didn't commented them like you did for all the others.

Let's fix that!

Name: Si'Thar'Liss Ren-Vader!!

Age: 17!!! Like Bella :)) <3 <3 (:

Species: a beautiful mostly-human princess with the potential to be THE MOST POWERFUL SITH LORD EVER EVEN MORE THAN KYLO AND VADER AND THAT EMPEROR GUY (also has cat ears and a dragon tail and butter-fly wings~!!)

Description: a gorgeous young woman, five foot six, with fancily braided mid-length black hair, vivid emerald eyes, and a lot of useful muscle. She doesn't use the Force for *everything*!! Also, the cat ears, dragon tail, and wings from the last section! Oh, and she wears something kind of like Rey's outfit, except sturdier and in black and forest green (to accent her eyes. Also, a complete lack of color is boring).

Lust Object (if applicable): OH MU GOD KYLO REN IS TEH HOTTEST and also Casslian Anderthingy's pretty cool with that accent but KYLO REN AL THE EWAY!!!

(Okay, and Finn. Finn's cute. But he's light side, so it'd never work out...right? :D)

Light Side/Dark Side: Dark Side. OBVIOUSLY. (But, like, with feelings!) [[Yeah, that's a vague Starkid reference that I put in for my own amusement and, in hindsight, because she would've seen the shows and loved them.]]

Notes: Yeah, this is meant to be a fairly generic overblown Kylo Ren fangirl badficcer persona. I will be so very happy if her "butter-fly" wings end up not like a butterfly's but rather like the bread-and-butter-flies that I vaguely remember from Through The Looking-glass--they look exactly like the name describes. I'd also be very happy, however, if she didn't turn out to be as silly in personality as she seems here--she's more of a quiet person with reasonable intelligence and good SPaG skills in her actual writing. She just has a tendency towards extreme silliness in fandom conversations and overblown, under researched plotlines in the Star Wars universe, which isn't actually her primary canon--that would be Harry Potter, which she knows quite well even if she has come out with the occasional unpublished Sue plot for it. (She's not exactly me...but she does have some elements of me at fourteen. I left off the bit about the Dark Side having brownies, though--it's a different Dark Side anyway, I should think.)

She consumes pretty much all media right now, good and bad, and hasn't quite grown up enough to tell the difference consistently (hence having Twilight on the list). She often doesn't catch the faults or unfortunate implications yet. Despite this, she can have a pretty intelligent conversation about Harry Potter or Tamora Pierce's books or Lloyd Alexander's books, not to mention some non-fandom topics.

She'll probably be put off by meeting people who act in real life the way she sounds in this application. Despite that, I'm sure she'd join in half the time once she's over the shock.

I realized I should probably explain this further...

As a general rule (of what is accepted within the fandom, in my experience), you are not allowed to replace canon with your awful fanon, just because "everything is canon but not necessarily true." No, the Siege on Terra didn't get routed by the Angry Marines, don't write fanfic about the Angry Marines period, who let you in here?

It is also considered unacceptable to just outright deny any major historical event or bit of characterization: The Council of Nikea, the Drop Site Massacre, the destruction of the Interex, and so on, did happen. The Dark Angels and the Space Wolves DO have a rivalry, and if you're writing in M42, the events of Dark Imperium happened, whether you want them to or not.

What IS acceptable is discard newer radical shifts in characterization, retcons, and so on. Which is why to this day you'll see fics where the Necrons are killer robot automatons, and as far as I know nobody save Aaron Dembski-Bowden ever characterizes the Emperor as a cold, emotionless, Lex-Luthor type character who doesn't care about anyone.

In addition, it is okay - basically mandatory - to discard obvious propaganda, particularly most things about the strength of characters: yes, Space Marines are more powerful in canon then on the table, but each Space Marine is not equivalent to 2000 Guardsmen: That's insane.

Once again, hope this helps.

But my point in bringing up JJ is that Tennant absolutely can nail slimy, creepy villains as well as more conventional pop-eyed screaming villainy.

I do know Tennant was the villain, but I assume he wasn't a Crowleyesque figure of dark comedy? ;)

Crowley is very hard to pin down, actually.

*A capital-Evil character...
*...in a comic setting...
*...who isn't the villain...
*...but also isn't redeemed.

I guess he's got a lot of similarities to the MCU Loki, except that he doesn't have Loki's fondness for betraying the heroes.

hS does not have enough backing in writing theory to know the words for this discussion

Frankly, I'm amazed that you managed to find any options in 40K that are bright enough to even call grey.

hS

In which case... welcome to the Quattuorvirate, o respected ancientbie. Unless you think you might have been here before August '03, in which case Her Magnificence the Tsarina Kaitlyn would wish to have... words with thee.

((The hilariously bizarre concept of Tsarina Kaitlyn's iron-fisted rule over the Army of the PPC is as much of a joke as the hierarchy of oldbieness which led to it. All shall love her and despair.))

hS

Thanks for the cloak!

A good bit of this came from a friend of mine. Including the name (I asked first). Not a real name, of course...

Suffice to say, a good bit of description came from him - I asked for ideas - as did some of the characterization. Although in REAL life he's actually an excellent writer. And a good enough sport to get in on this :-).

You may meet him soon enough.

You needn't risk your life for that. Besides, the OC wot took my name (started as a barebones character I made for RP reasons, kinda took on a life of his own) CAN shoot fire out of his hands, so maybe I inherited the ability in reverse. I mean, what have I got to lose? Save my life, sanity, freedom, and immortal soul, of course...

As for wanting to pick of 40k, I CAN give you some advice regarding how to do so.

First off, do you want to play the RPGs, or the wargame? If you want to play the (bloody fantastic) RPGs, I can suggest that you pirate them with no moral regrets: the books are out of print, and they're likely never coming back. They all run similar or identical systems: I suggest Dark Heresy (the CoC/Spanish Inquisition/whatever one where you play normal humans trying to stop the cults of the Dark Gods^H^H^H^HBits of Emotion With an Inflated Sense of Self-Worth), or Rogue Trader (Screw over Xenos and sell things for profit! It's like the 1700s. IN SPACE), but the more fighty RPGs like Only War (Guardsman Simulator! Remember, you are replaceable and will not be missed), Deathwatch (Purge the Xenos! Burn the Heretic! Destroy the Enemies of Mankind! Play super-soldiers that GW still won't admit that they initially rippied off from Robert Heinlein!), and Black Crusade (BE the evil corrupted Chaos Worshippers you've been fighting!) are also very good.

If you want to play the WARGAME, then you'll need a lot more cash. If you recall, Magic: the Gathering has the nickname "cardboard crack", both for its price and for its addictiveness. 40k is worse. Games Workshop gouges its customers for money. I do have some tips, though:

1: Proxies are your friend: In a friendly game, you needn't own all the models in your army. Something with the same approximate height and base size will do.

2: Collect slow: pick an army, don't turn back: Don't agonize over what army to pick. Just pick one whose lore grabs your interest, and stick with it. If you don't want to blow the bank, it will be a while before you've got a big army, and even longer if you split the effort between forces. But remember you only need a few units to have a good fight with a friend.

3: On Citadel Supplies: The paints are expensive, but worth it if you can afford them. DO NOT BUY ANY OTHER CITADEL SUPPLIES. Even the paint's optional: you want (although you don't NEED) model paint, but Vallejo, Coat d'Arms (online only), ArmyPainter, Reaper, and others will provide comparable or better products in similar colors. See what your local shops sell.

4: Games to play with few models: There are Skirmish games that use the same models as 40k: Killteam: Heralds of Ruin (free from it's site if you've got the now-outdated 7e rules, but an 8e update is in the works) and GW's own Shadow War: Armageddon are both fantistic, and rather cheaper to play than 40k proper. I'd even argue that SWA might be a bit more fun. However, both use Templates and Scatter Dice (special equipment which 8th edition jettisoned). Templates can be printed or replicated with a ruler, but Scatter dice actually must be bought. I got mine for less than a dollar from a Games Workshop store.

5: Just... Don't: The real appeal of 40k is its setting and world. IMHO, it is FAR from the best wargame out there. Hell, because of SWA (and Necromunda!), I'd say it's not even the best wargame in its own setting anymore. It's gotten a lot better (well 8e screwed psykers, but in ALL other respects...), but there are better games you can play. SWA is better, the soon-to-return Adeptus Titanicus is better (heck, we might even get Epic back). It's not a bad game, and you may like it more than I do (I DO like it, but it is too expensive to get a strong reccomendation from me), but if you want to pick up a wargame to play, right now, I'd tell you to pick up either SWA or BattleTech Alpha Strike (or BattleTech proper, depending on your complexity tolerance). Both games are cheaper, have cheaper models (BT may not even require you to BUY models), and both are IMHO a lot more fun than 40k. But that's just me...

As to getting into 40k lore... Well, that's a lot easier and cheaper. You COULD spend $50 dollars on a Codex - a book of game rules and lore - for a faction you may never play (7th edition 40k Core not only suggested that you do this, but claimed it was common practice. I was ready to choke the author), or you could do what most people do and read the wikis.

First, a preface: 40k lore is a mess. A glorious mess, but a mess all the same. Some of it is self-contradictory. GW's stance is that "everything is canon, but canon doesn't mean TRUE," so some stuff might be propaganda, misinformation, or flat out lies. Like everything that comes out of C.S. Goto's mouth, but that's another story. So no source is entirely authoritative, nor is it possible to be so.

Having said that, there are three primary wikis for 40k:

- Lexicanum: If you want the facts, Lexicanum will give them to you. It may not have all the detail in the world, but if there's a thing that's been mentioned somewhere in the 40k universe, then Lexicanum's probably got an article about it.

-The Warhammer 40k Wikia: I don't have to link this one, I think. The difference between Lexicanum and the Wikia is that the Lexicanum is wide, the Wikia is deep: It may not have an article on what you're looking for, but if it does, it will probably go more in-detail about it than Lexicanum does. I believe it may also cover game mechanics and such, but I'm not sure.

-1d4chan [NSFW]: 1d4chan isn't a 40k wiki. But it is an important part of the culture of at least one portion of the 40k fandom.

1d4chan is the official wiki of 4chan's /tg/ board - which I heartily recommend visiting if you are to sort who likes that sort of thing (that is, tabletop games and 4chan) - and what a wiki it is. /tg/ is very 40k focused, so it's got articles about all the big stuff in 40k (and some of the not-so-big stuff). However, it makes no pretense of being unbiased, providing insight into both the universe and its fans. It is also home to a wide variety of excellent AARs (after action reports - like Fanfic, but they (possibly) really happened at someone's gaming table) and fanfic. Love Can Bloom, the previously mentioned Warhammer High, Love and Krieg, Gav and Bob, Half Life 40k, Orkhammer, and other classic or otherwise fics call this place home, as do classic and much loved bits of fanon, most famously the Angry Marines (ALWAYS ANGRY! ALL THE TIME!)

In addition, if you're a roleplayer outside of 40k, it holds some fics and that are well and truly legendary, and others that should be. I could write a list, but the big one, the almighty legend of roleplaying, is Old Man Henderson. If you don't know Old Man Henderson, go read it. Now. I am dead serious.

But I digress. Just read around what interests you. Then go watch "If the Emperor had a Text-To-Speech Device" once you've got the basics down. Hey, it worked for me.

The other big way to attain information about 40k lore is through the books. The output of the Black Library is of varying quality: Some books and authors are universally loved, others are hated so much that the fandom - and even other BL authors - essentially consider their works non-canon (most infamously, C.S. Goto). Due to the canon policy stated above, this can actually happen. Here are some notable authors, and also some authors I know stuff about:

-Dan Abnett: Wrote Gaunt's Ghosts (Sharpe in 40k) among many other things. Is usually considered to be one of, if not the best writer Black Library's got, or ever had. I've really got to read this guy.

-Graham McNeil: The second of BL's largely-undisputed Holy Trinity. He also wrote a lot of stuff. Most important to me is that he wrote "A Thousand Sons," "The Crimson King," and most of other lore and background that defined my Legion's character from that point onward. His work tends to be more thoughtful: less action, more dialogue. Heck, one of his most well-known short stories, "The Last Church," is mostly just two characters talking. And talking religion and philosophy at that.

-Sandy Mitchell: The third (and sadly gone - he left BL) member of The Trinity. Sandy Mitchell is the author of Ciaphas Cain series, which is a blackly comedic series about a the famous commissar- just go read it already. It's good.

-Aaron Dembski-Bowden: The first more controversial writer on our list. On one hand, his Night Lords books were very well-received, and he apparently had some responsibility for making the Grey Knights less Sue-ish (not that he could have made them MORE Sue-ish). OTOH, he wrote "Master of Mankind." Which just by its plot summary and quotes makes me and many others think he's been writing Chaos for so long that he's forgotten who the Emperor IS. Many fans consider it noncanon, or at least untrue, as is their right. In 40K, canon works the way YOU do XD (to an extent).

-John French: Some Iron Warriors fans hate this guy. Thousand Sons fans (me) and others? not so much (seriously, if you read his 1d4 page, you can tell which bits were written by IW fans). Although his IW books do sound kinda dumb. Right now I'm reading his Ahriman Trilogy. The man literally had me at the introduction - as he described his ideas and intents, it was made clear that he understood what the character was about, and he know what he wanted to do with him. Thus far, the book's been pretty good. Then again, he had excellent material to work with: IMHO, Ahriman is one of the most compelling villains, if not one of the most compelling characters in 40k.

So there we go. Absurdly long, I know. Hope it helps!

Short and sweet and sad, at the same time. It's an interesting thing to think about, for the agents who are clones of canon characters: potentially seeing the decisions made by their alternates, and the consequences thereof, and wondering if they would have made the same decisions in that situation. Tricky thing to think about.

Minor thing, but I like the different activities you show the kids doing in the Nursery. Even though the "camera" only shows them, it still lends itself to a picture of a larger, chaotically active room full of kids.

—doctorlit has an interlude in draft form that finally describes the physical layout of the Nursery, really needs to get that into beta-worthy shape

Yeah, either 03 or early 04 - I did used to be GreenCat3, got Permission waaay back when I really shouldn't have. Left for a while and only lurk on the Board, and write rarely these days, but the PPC is always close to my heart.

I do have one question: What's the fanwriter behind this character like? Their real name, the kind of fics they write, that sort of thing?

-Alleb

Pffft, I love this guy already. Thank you! Also, hello, newbie! Sorry I haven't commented on your thread--welcome to the PPC! My gift to you is a highly-fashionable cloak. Don't mind the sparkly blood stains.

-Alleb

Thank you very much!

-Alleb

Hehehe, this is going to be fun. Thank you!

I may or may not consider making him a Chiss, maybe

-Alleb