State of the Union!
❡ Aurica Nestmile hymnandmusicbox
IN CHARACTER Lyner is in camp! Lyner is living with her! She doesn't have to share him with Misha and Lady Shurelia! The only way that things could be better is if he promised to live with her forever ...and would stop being a derp, picking up adorable girls and being his Lyner-self. While initially she hated camp and had been spiralling towards just going "eh, fuck it, I don't care anymore", Lyner being here has made her care about things again. She also wants a kitten.
OUT OF CHARACTER HAHA man I was going to write this before the last app round ... and then we got a Lyner and everything I was going to say about Aurica and her development went out the window! Though, to be fair, all of Aurica's development still applies now; Aurica now knows that she can function without Lyner being there to affirm her place in the world. Her development in camp was to go "everything I did on Sol Ciel? I can do here too" - she got most of the way there, before Lyner came to camp, too. Now that Lyner has come to camp, even if he did drop, she knows that he doesn't hate her or the person she is in camp too, that she's become a better person because of him and even if he chose Misha or Shurelia, she could function. She can meet people, she can make friends and she can move on from things. She's as happy as Aurica can be, really.
odds of dropping ✭ ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩
Sure, if I had to drop to three characters, I would drop Aurica but at the moment she's entirely too much fun and I've put too much work into her character arc to drop her right now. Lyner is in camp! She has awkward times with Chroche and Luca! She's still getting her mind blown by the fact that people sing for no other reason than they want to! This is seriously fun to play!
❡ Colette Brunel divinefailure
IN CHARACTER Colette has accepted camp for what it is; she's not happy in camp, but she's not unhappy either. Camp just is, at this point. She wants to go home and sort out what's going on with their world and to implement some things to make sure that the mana cannon doesn't get used, but she's also come to accept that she can't make that happen at the moment. All she can do right now is work on what she has here in camp and try to make people's lives better while she's here.
OUT OF CHARACTER I feel really flat with Colette at the moment. I'm not sure if it's because I haven't really had a chance to dig into her self-sacrificing hypocrisy lately and instead have been cruising along with being derpy and adorable. I also haven't done enough with her overwhelming faith in people. Some of this is because I keep missing my cast and Colette and Mithos are ... not really the greatest people to thread off one another for lengthy periods of time because lol canon. It's a similar problem to what I have with Emil, but Emil is at least from the sequel. I really need to find something to do with her to get her into gear.
odds of dropping ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ ✩
I don't really want to drop Colette yet! I just kind of feel like I'm sort of there rather than being the adorable force of nature that Colette really should be, and I really need to find a way to play with my cast more. I plan to replay Tales of Symphonia, but immediately after I finish Abyss because who wants to go from a game where the main character gets utterly destroyed to a world where humans live in concentration camps? I sure don't! Tales, you so cheerful. SHE IS ON NOTICE.
❡ Emil Castagnier nut_timesharing
IN CHARACTER Emil is upset, but it's a kind of upset that he's channelling to resolve. He knows now what their future holds and ... it doesn't seem real to him. Four thousand years is a very long time, long enough that Emil doesn't really comprehend it. He understands that a mana cannon is used in the future and that this is Bad (though Emil doesn't understand why, merely that Ratatosk freaked out when he heard about it). He knows that they fail in rewriting the laws of the world because Arche uses magic and he knows that Richter's pretty upset about all this! On the other hand, Emil believes that with this knowledge they can change things. They can find out why they failed and change the future; if Emil can't, then the original heroes from ToS1 can because they can do anything.
Ratatosk is less optimistic. He's seen this happen before, seen people believe that they can make things better and he watched it all fall apart. That said, he wants to trust Arche's word that they will protect Martelbecause she reminds him of Marta, and he wants to trust Emil that they can trust humanity ... the mana cannon haunts him. He knows how bad it is, and he remembers how it felt for him to feel all the mana drain out of the world and be utterly helpless. Really at this point, Ratatosk is kind of haunted by the past and Ratatosk deals with feelings like fear and helplessness by being a pissy bitch.
OUT OF CHARACTER SO WHO FEELS AWKWARD ABOUT ALL THE DRAMA. I SURE DO. I mean, it's all IC for Ratatosk to freak out about how the future is bad, but it still feels weird. SORRY ARCHE. But bizarrely it has made Ratatosk more interesting to play; he can never really resolve the issue of how his tree died and how he no longer implicitly trusts people thanks to Mithos, but he can change in little ways. And he really has changed, which makes it fun to play. And with Ratatosk freaking out, it gives Emil's resolve a chance to shine; Emil's not really a "faith in you and unwavering kindness" protagonist (he lacks the confidence in himself to do that), but he believes in people and he wants what's best for everyone. He won't talk about it to anyone unless they ask (it seems oddly private), but Emil basically spends every moment he's not talking to people talking to Ratatosk telling him it's okay and that he is going to change things, and if he doesn't then Lloyd and Colette will because they can do anything.
odds of dropping ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩
I am not sure when this happened but Emil catapulted himself to my third most safe character in my lineup. WHAT IS THIS.
❡ Julian Keller/Hellion needsahandjob
IN CHARACTER Julian has arrived in camp and thinks it is the weirdest place on the planet. I mean. Mickey Mouse. Ms Frost talking to an apple! White bear things. There's also Laura in camp and he's not really sure what to do with that. There's something oddly nice about how no-one's made any comment about his not having any hands, but he doesn't expect that to last. He has pretty much decided that he is bailing out of this place the minute he can and he's going to take everyone with him. This place sucks.
OUT OF CHARACTER SO. HOW ABOUT THOSE LAST MINUTE APPS. I have been tossing around apping Julian for years, but the last two years have not been kind to Julian in canon, and X-23 #1 was pretty much the first time that Julian appeared as a character rather than a plot device. I'm not especially confident with him; he's a good person but he's also quite a douche at times! I'm also having the fun of trying to piece together just what's going on with Marvel canon because ... uh ... I actually don't read Marvel. I've been caught out already with basic canon details, because my bias lies towards reading DC. I've read everything that Julian is in, and I think I have a coherent backstory for him, but I'm not as confident as I wish I could be because lol I read DC more.
odds of dropping ✭ ✭ ✭ ✩ ✩
The reason why it's so high is because if I had to, I could drop Julian because I haven't played him enough to be attached to him over the ones I am more attached to! He's an archetype that I failed at playing before, but I want to do well because AJ is awesome with Laura and I liek awkward relationships.
❡ Luke fon Fabre areplicatedhope
IN CHARACTER Luke is genuinely upset; he hurt Guy, Anise and Jade by his thoughtless actions yet again! He's apologised and he knows that it wasn't really his fault but ... he still feels like it was. To cap it off, Yuri's told him that his thoughtless actions in camp in regards to how he thinks he should atone for uh. everything ever in canon upset Guy and he doesn't know what to do about it. There's a moment of kind of bittersweet acknowledgement that Yuri thinks that he's selflessly self-destructive in camp and there's a massively selfish secret that he's keeping from Guy and Anise: he's already dead and every day in camp is a day he treasures because it's a day he didn't expect to have.
Talking about all that, he's also acutely embarrassed; Jade and he came clean to each other about how they both know that Luke's been lying to everyone re: his being dead and he cried on Jade. It was cathartic but oh god crying on Jade, embarrassing forever. So now he's kind of derping around with everyone and going "this is actually kind of cool :')" and taking copious notes and writing lots of journal entries so that when he does eventually distintegrate, there's a record of things in camp. He's promised himself he will not die until he meets Tear and Natalia and his parents, and promises are important.
OUT OF CHARACTER SEE EMIL'S ENTRY RE: DRAMA. I'm in the process of replaying Abyss to get a feeling for Luke again because I'm not sure if I'm playing Luke or something like him. Thus far all I've realised is that Akzeriuth is so much more painful when you know the events that come afterward. Seriously I spent so often going "AUGH DON'T SAY/DO THAT!!" to ... almost everyone. Except Peony and Nephry because they aren't even in the first third. That said, I have fun with Luke, especially when I'm not going "augh i suck!" I'd love to try and defeat the timezone demons so that Luke and Asch can thread again and Luke and Guy can thread more often. I really do like their relationships, I just suck at teeing it up, apparently. Damn you full time work requirements!
odds of dropping ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩
I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I AM DOING WITH LUKE but it is fun so okay. Hopefully the canon review will knock out the last of the shakiness. Also I think Jade would eat my face if I dropped Luke.
❡ Ronan Nolan Jr. tobethemiracle
IN CHARACTER Ronan is bored and homesick. Camp is depressing, he can't change things, he's without a purpose in camp and he feels lost. Ronan hates feeling lost; he'd rather throw himself into a project that he finds meaningful and in camp all he has is sort of dicking around. He doesn't really talk about this to anyone because he knows that his issues are pretty minor in the scheme of things but he wants to go home. He wants a purpose. And none of these seem forthcoming. As far as object lessons go, this one sucks.
OUT OF CHARACTER So, guess who got surprised a bit by A Wizard of Mars! Most of my assumptions about Ronan when he's not terrified proved right! He's definitely changed between the books; he's far more combative, far more active and bizarrely more at peace with things. That said, I honestly do not believe that his arc with the Winged Defender is over, because it just doesn't feel finished! Ronan's a character I was concerned about a lot because I was extrapolating between what we see when he's not being haunted by things or when he's preparing to kill himself. It looks like my guesses were right, though after this long, I'm not sure I'd notice if I was off or not! GOOD TIMES.
odds of dropping ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩
I GO THROUGH LULLS but Ronan's pretty safe. Hopefully he's in the next book. That would make me happy. DO IT DD.
❡ Stephanie Brown/Batgirl comesinfourth
IN CHARACTER Angry! Annoyed! Awkward! All these pretty much sum up her relationships at the moment. It's especially annoying that Tim is here and she has awkward feelings that she's not dealing with. She refuses to because that way leads to pain and to awkwardness and she wants to move on and be a better vigilante and a better person then she was the first time she was in Gotham.
OUT OF CHARACTER I suck at playing her and I wish my timezones lined up. I hear about all the things the batcast do secondhand and in passing and it is like. Oh. I wish I could have been there for that :( In part, this isn't bad because Steph is in a way separated from the main batcast because of who she is and her history, but I do kind of have awkward "man maybe I should drop so that someone who fits the timezone better can play". I love her canon and I love playing both parts of Stephanie, but...timezones.
odds of dropping ✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ ✩
It's high because I really, really suck at keeping up with a cast that is very heavily based in EST and is very much time-critical. Alas. Either I will deal with it or drop her, I guess? Haha.
❡ Traci Thirteen acitygirl
IN CHARACTER Traci is wryly amused at camp. She knows that eventually she will leave and then hopefully she and Jaime will do stuff that is more than hold hands and make out awkwardly sometimes. But camp is weird and does funny things and sometimes it makes her magic go all whacky. It's amusing, so Traci goes along with it and only occasionally gets annoyed at it. Eventually it'll bore her, but for now learning how camp moved to a farm is interesting.
OUT OF CHARACTER loooool so I apped Traci again after the first issue of the backup because it was actually pretty good! Then the last issue mysteriously went weird and unfortunate and I can't update to it at all. I don't think I like the idea of Traci being all power-hungry because it's something that I don't think is necessarily consistent with Traci's character arc. Though admittedly, everyone picks and chooses what they want to use of Traci's history anyway, so hopefully latest canon will be one of those.
odds of dropping ✭ ✭ ✩ ✩ ✩
IF I HAD TO, I WOULD. If Jaime dropped, she would. Otherwise she'll just chill and be bemused at you all.