imperial_saga application
Player Name: Andy
Character Name: Jack Brannigan, codename Raiden
Canon: Metal Gear Solid 2
Canon Background:
http://metalgear.wikia.com/wiki/Raiden
AU Background: Pretty much the same for his childhood. He was a child soldier recruited by Char during Zeon's war with Amestris. This was about when he was 6-years-old. He was the top of his class, ran his own young boys unit, and earned various nicknames for his kill count.
After a few years in the war, Raiden is put in a relief camp, but then later taken to Sawa. He grows up, can't accept his past, and eventually represses his memories. Sawa would sort of be his "FOXHOUND" (The Patriots) to train him to be a stealth agent/ninja. He has only done training missions so far though, and has never been sent on to an actual mission.
His "training" is actually not real training at all, but a sort of virtual reality. The training sessions are made out to be stressful and as realistic as possible, he feels pain, heat, panic, the enemy on his heels. While they say it's to help better him in the field, it's main purpose is to cause a diminished sense of reality--it makes death something not so scary. And really, what better to help make the perfect ninja than one who has a diminished fear of death?
(He's supposed to have a girlfriend who is actually spying on him too, but I'm not including her for now, if only because I don't have any current volunteers. Hopefully in the future this can happen!)
The accidental "Big Shell" of his history will take place in his first real mission against Zeon (and Char), in Act 2, but if things don't work out as hoped, I'm sure it can be plotted around. Anyway, during his first mission his childhood memories will start to resurface/be blatantly pointed out to him, along with the field experience it buried, and he'll be in a very bad place for awhile.
I don't have any plans to have his plot advance him anywhere near Rising/MGS4 territory, since that really turns him into a drastically different character I'm not interesting in playing. So instead of getting turned into a cyborg, he'll just go along doing typical covert stuff, a little more jaded than before, whatever Sawa needs of him.
Personality: Raiden's good at the whole social mask thing--he pretends to be somebody he's not. Inside he's a bit insecure, selfish, and plagued by nightmares and terrors. He tries his best to fit in with everybody else, but always feels a little off. He's terrible at getting close to people, because he doesn't open himself up. Jack will lie unconditionally, and he lies enough that he starts to believe his own lies. In MGS2 there's one part where Rose says he only didn't tell her about his past, not because he didn't want to hurt her, but because he didn't want to hurt himself.
He's also very superficial, especially about women. He likes a girl that looks good, and he's infatuated more with the thought of a girlfriend than the actual girlfriend herself. It's just another part about him being terrible at opening up to people. Jack acts sort of goofy and innocent in most non-serious situations, and he can have trouble keeping his disapproval to himself. I suppose he has a bit of tactlessness, to put it nicely. The fact he heavily repressed his own childhood memories contributes as well--he doesn't like to accept the truth if it hurts him, so he covers it up, and he grew into this friendly role he shows in public. It's how he acts in private, and what he covers up that's more substantial--a sort of cold distance, and massive insecurities. What's his is his, and he doesn't like to share any real part of himself. In MGS2 he hit Rose because she went into his room, and I think that speaks volumes for how much he doesn't want to share the real him. He doesn't even sleep in the same bed as her because of the nightmares.
Oh and, he has a bit of a thing for hitting on ladies. Sometimes he can think he's pretty cool/suave. He can also be really stubborn when he knows (or thinks) he's right, or just when he doesn't want help from somebody and he thinks he can do something perfectly fine by himself. Insulting something he likes can get a similar outburst of defensiveness. Insult him personally and he can get really agitated.
Addendum: Let's go back to the mask. Everybody acts different publicly than privately, and with different groups of people. Like mentioned before, Raiden at his core is insecure, and completely unwilling to open up to other people. But the thing is, he doesn't want people to know that's how he is, so in public he'll act somewhat friendly. He'll even go to parties, hang out with groups of friends and co-works, but nothing ever feels quite right. He doesn't exactly fit in, and he knows it, but he's trying his hardest to do it anyway. Sometimes he may feel confident and egotistical when he's doing well with a group, and other it's that feeling of being alone even amongst a group. When you constantly lie about your past and yourself, it's impossible to not isolate yourself.
Ad naseum, deep down, he knows he did something terrible in the past (as a child soldier), but he's not strong enough to acknowledge the past, not yet anyway. He ignores it, and he's spent so long lying to himself that he takes the lies for truth. He's a coward when it comes to handling emotions. As a young boy who grew up on the battlefield, he was never able to properly mature in that area. This quote from near the end puts it rather nicely:
"It was because you were the only one who refused to acknowledge the past. All the others remember what they were, and pay for it daily. But you turn your back on everything you don't like. You do whatever you like, see only the things you like, and for yourself alone."
Continuing on that quote; in a big way, he's selfish because of how he refuses to let anybody in. He takes and takes and takes, and does what he can to feel good about himself, but he never, ever gives anything substantial in return. His idea of love is shallow, and so are his conceptions of friendship. It's a want of a concept, of the concept of friendship and relationships, but not an actual investment in either of them. It's something he wants, but he wants the other person to do all the work. A nice of example of it is here:
"You pretended to be understanding, to be a gentleman... You never made a conscious attempt to reach out to me... The only time you did was when I gave you no choice but to do so..."
Like I said, he's stubborn. It's only between a rock and a really hard place that he'll ever manage to come clean. And I mean, really hard.
To strangers in general, he stays rather neutral to them unless they bring up something to make him feel otherwise. (Like, say, getting a fact wrong that he knows the answer to.) Really, to anybody he doesn't know well he's rather awkward and impersonal to. However once he gets to know somebody he'll joke around a bit more.
Officials would get very formal treatment, like a soldier. He'd be extremely respectful, because that's what's expected of him. He would only back talk if they suggested he do something he was morally against.
Something I forgot to mention earlier is his gullibility. Raiden will almost blindly trust somebody who seems to be in a position of power, skill, or knowledge greater than him and seems to be working towards the same cause. In the game, he trusts and tries to cooperate Pliskin before even finding out he's Solid Snake. His gullibility is a key part of him, and it's what gets him suckered into everything in the first place:
"This is why we chose you. You accepted the fiction we've provided, obeyed our orders and did everything you were told to."
Raiden won't question orders, he won't question officials unless something is so blatantly wrong that he's forced to. He's a wonderful tool thanks to the combination of his stubbornness, emotional distance from others, and the gullibility that draws from the fact he doesn't truly know how to emotionally attach to other people.
If you don't know how to truly, deeply invest in and trust somebody, you aren't going to know enough about how people work to be able to root out the good from the bad, to be able to choose your alliances properly. He's just following blindly.
Combat Style: Raiden fights with a high-frequency blade (it gets hot and easier to cut with when you swing it, basically). He usually tries to avoid combat, instead attempting to sneak around the enemy or silently knock them out. He also can use his fists and feet for melee combat, being quite athletic (he can also flip over ledges, climb across ledges with only his hands for a limited amount of time, and do cartwheels).
Kingdom or Faction: Sawa, previously Zeon
Primary Role: Intelligence Operative
He's not a spy, but assassin and saboteur would fit the bill. (He's still in training for this role.)
Tarot Cards:
The Magician
The Devil
The Hermit
Title: Raiden (his codename)
Jack the Ripper, The White Devil (nicknames from his soldier childhood, but these would only be known by people who know of his past)
Sample Post:
http://fissionmailed.livejournal.com/1365116.html
http://fissionmailed.livejournal.com/1366273.html?thread=143780609#t143780609
That should hopefully be enough! If it's not, I can answer some Tarot questions.
Character Name: Jack Brannigan, codename Raiden
Canon: Metal Gear Solid 2
Canon Background:
http://metalgear.wikia.com/wiki/Raiden
AU Background: Pretty much the same for his childhood. He was a child soldier recruited by Char during Zeon's war with Amestris. This was about when he was 6-years-old. He was the top of his class, ran his own young boys unit, and earned various nicknames for his kill count.
After a few years in the war, Raiden is put in a relief camp, but then later taken to Sawa. He grows up, can't accept his past, and eventually represses his memories. Sawa would sort of be his "FOXHOUND" (The Patriots) to train him to be a stealth agent/ninja. He has only done training missions so far though, and has never been sent on to an actual mission.
His "training" is actually not real training at all, but a sort of virtual reality. The training sessions are made out to be stressful and as realistic as possible, he feels pain, heat, panic, the enemy on his heels. While they say it's to help better him in the field, it's main purpose is to cause a diminished sense of reality--it makes death something not so scary. And really, what better to help make the perfect ninja than one who has a diminished fear of death?
(He's supposed to have a girlfriend who is actually spying on him too, but I'm not including her for now, if only because I don't have any current volunteers. Hopefully in the future this can happen!)
The accidental "Big Shell" of his history will take place in his first real mission against Zeon (and Char), in Act 2, but if things don't work out as hoped, I'm sure it can be plotted around. Anyway, during his first mission his childhood memories will start to resurface/be blatantly pointed out to him, along with the field experience it buried, and he'll be in a very bad place for awhile.
I don't have any plans to have his plot advance him anywhere near Rising/MGS4 territory, since that really turns him into a drastically different character I'm not interesting in playing. So instead of getting turned into a cyborg, he'll just go along doing typical covert stuff, a little more jaded than before, whatever Sawa needs of him.
Personality: Raiden's good at the whole social mask thing--he pretends to be somebody he's not. Inside he's a bit insecure, selfish, and plagued by nightmares and terrors. He tries his best to fit in with everybody else, but always feels a little off. He's terrible at getting close to people, because he doesn't open himself up. Jack will lie unconditionally, and he lies enough that he starts to believe his own lies. In MGS2 there's one part where Rose says he only didn't tell her about his past, not because he didn't want to hurt her, but because he didn't want to hurt himself.
He's also very superficial, especially about women. He likes a girl that looks good, and he's infatuated more with the thought of a girlfriend than the actual girlfriend herself. It's just another part about him being terrible at opening up to people. Jack acts sort of goofy and innocent in most non-serious situations, and he can have trouble keeping his disapproval to himself. I suppose he has a bit of tactlessness, to put it nicely. The fact he heavily repressed his own childhood memories contributes as well--he doesn't like to accept the truth if it hurts him, so he covers it up, and he grew into this friendly role he shows in public. It's how he acts in private, and what he covers up that's more substantial--a sort of cold distance, and massive insecurities. What's his is his, and he doesn't like to share any real part of himself. In MGS2 he hit Rose because she went into his room, and I think that speaks volumes for how much he doesn't want to share the real him. He doesn't even sleep in the same bed as her because of the nightmares.
Oh and, he has a bit of a thing for hitting on ladies. Sometimes he can think he's pretty cool/suave. He can also be really stubborn when he knows (or thinks) he's right, or just when he doesn't want help from somebody and he thinks he can do something perfectly fine by himself. Insulting something he likes can get a similar outburst of defensiveness. Insult him personally and he can get really agitated.
Addendum: Let's go back to the mask. Everybody acts different publicly than privately, and with different groups of people. Like mentioned before, Raiden at his core is insecure, and completely unwilling to open up to other people. But the thing is, he doesn't want people to know that's how he is, so in public he'll act somewhat friendly. He'll even go to parties, hang out with groups of friends and co-works, but nothing ever feels quite right. He doesn't exactly fit in, and he knows it, but he's trying his hardest to do it anyway. Sometimes he may feel confident and egotistical when he's doing well with a group, and other it's that feeling of being alone even amongst a group. When you constantly lie about your past and yourself, it's impossible to not isolate yourself.
Ad naseum, deep down, he knows he did something terrible in the past (as a child soldier), but he's not strong enough to acknowledge the past, not yet anyway. He ignores it, and he's spent so long lying to himself that he takes the lies for truth. He's a coward when it comes to handling emotions. As a young boy who grew up on the battlefield, he was never able to properly mature in that area. This quote from near the end puts it rather nicely:
"It was because you were the only one who refused to acknowledge the past. All the others remember what they were, and pay for it daily. But you turn your back on everything you don't like. You do whatever you like, see only the things you like, and for yourself alone."
Continuing on that quote; in a big way, he's selfish because of how he refuses to let anybody in. He takes and takes and takes, and does what he can to feel good about himself, but he never, ever gives anything substantial in return. His idea of love is shallow, and so are his conceptions of friendship. It's a want of a concept, of the concept of friendship and relationships, but not an actual investment in either of them. It's something he wants, but he wants the other person to do all the work. A nice of example of it is here:
"You pretended to be understanding, to be a gentleman... You never made a conscious attempt to reach out to me... The only time you did was when I gave you no choice but to do so..."
Like I said, he's stubborn. It's only between a rock and a really hard place that he'll ever manage to come clean. And I mean, really hard.
To strangers in general, he stays rather neutral to them unless they bring up something to make him feel otherwise. (Like, say, getting a fact wrong that he knows the answer to.) Really, to anybody he doesn't know well he's rather awkward and impersonal to. However once he gets to know somebody he'll joke around a bit more.
Officials would get very formal treatment, like a soldier. He'd be extremely respectful, because that's what's expected of him. He would only back talk if they suggested he do something he was morally against.
Something I forgot to mention earlier is his gullibility. Raiden will almost blindly trust somebody who seems to be in a position of power, skill, or knowledge greater than him and seems to be working towards the same cause. In the game, he trusts and tries to cooperate Pliskin before even finding out he's Solid Snake. His gullibility is a key part of him, and it's what gets him suckered into everything in the first place:
"This is why we chose you. You accepted the fiction we've provided, obeyed our orders and did everything you were told to."
Raiden won't question orders, he won't question officials unless something is so blatantly wrong that he's forced to. He's a wonderful tool thanks to the combination of his stubbornness, emotional distance from others, and the gullibility that draws from the fact he doesn't truly know how to emotionally attach to other people.
If you don't know how to truly, deeply invest in and trust somebody, you aren't going to know enough about how people work to be able to root out the good from the bad, to be able to choose your alliances properly. He's just following blindly.
Combat Style: Raiden fights with a high-frequency blade (it gets hot and easier to cut with when you swing it, basically). He usually tries to avoid combat, instead attempting to sneak around the enemy or silently knock them out. He also can use his fists and feet for melee combat, being quite athletic (he can also flip over ledges, climb across ledges with only his hands for a limited amount of time, and do cartwheels).
Kingdom or Faction: Sawa, previously Zeon
Primary Role: Intelligence Operative
He's not a spy, but assassin and saboteur would fit the bill. (He's still in training for this role.)
Tarot Cards:
The Magician
The Devil
The Hermit
Title: Raiden (his codename)
Jack the Ripper, The White Devil (nicknames from his soldier childhood, but these would only be known by people who know of his past)
Sample Post:
http://fissionmailed.livejournal.com/1365116.html
http://fissionmailed.livejournal.com/1366273.html?thread=143780609#t143780609
That should hopefully be enough! If it's not, I can answer some Tarot questions.