DragonRage

"Jundian goblins are inherently delicious to dragons," Lexiel says, "So much so that dragons feel compelled to consume them. And yes, I am Strike Captain Lexiel. I will be leading the sortie to defend our castle. I would appreciate a brief run-down of what each of you who will be fighting alongside me bring to the table, so we can better plan our defense."

Lexiel grimaces at LOTUS' suggestion. "Lotus, was it? I think you're operating off incomplete information. I could lead the sortie against the army, but my personal skills and experience are really better suited for squad combat. In our battle against the army earlier, I could feel my auras failing to reach my allies in any meaningful way. The rank and file might have an interference field set up?" Samantha meanwhile, just squeaks quietly when all the attention briefly goes to her.

Taylor forwards his contact information to Betani immediately. "Thank you, ma'am. In her 'eagerness' to ensure Kalva's safety, she attempted to attract a dangerous wild Pokemon to our location to consume myself, Kalva, and Desmond. We later learned that a highly aggressive, wounded Gabite was active in the area. I informed her that we were in a dangerous situation, but she simply screamed louder in her attempt to lure something to devour us. Any information you contribute will be of great help in ensuring that she cannot attempt to kill anyone else. I am Cadet Taylor. It is a pleasure to meet a superior officer who does not desire my messy demise."

Taylor looks up from his A-Comm, where he has been busily typing this whole time and mostly ignoring his surroundings. Jet the meditite has been walking behind him, curiously taking in everything. "Ms. Betani. I am given to understand you are familiar with Gina? I am compiling an incident report as to her attempt to kill us all and make it look like an accident. Would you like to contribute?"

Lexiel heads out to keep an eye on things, and contribute if needed.

"This one is Maris, a humble seeker of enlightenment," The monk bows deeply in greeting, "This one did his part to protect the endangered civilians from the bandits that assaulted them."

"Sorry," Samantha apologizes, scratching her head, "On my version of earth we have kinda... different heroes and villains from most, I think. Unless there's a lot of superheroes running around where you're from."

"I'm not a werewolf! Not that there's anything wrong with that. I know a quite nice werewolf, actually," Samantha exclaims, "I'm a psychic. A full range telepath, telekinetic, and empath. Projective and receptive, if that means anything to you. But I've got way more raw power than control, so I've been practicing not breaking and slash or cooking people and things by mistake whenever I get a spare moment."

Dramatis Personae: King Murdoc as Specialist Sigurdr Volund, Ganglari Paladin Hal Henderics as Voidman 5th class Sojie, [REDACTED] Thaumaturgist Cronos 5010 as Voidman 1st class Giacomo Castillo, Human Commando Intsys as Captain La Lune, Councillor Technophile Strider as Corporal Ciara Walton, Human Soldier kj1225 as Petty Officer 3rd Class Edward Roberts, Human Scout Swampellow as Private 1st Class Shi’fan, M’shinn Commando Pigeon of Astoria as Petty Officer 2nd Class Regi Arte hen Tesmund, Vanian Technophile Sutoratosu as Master Sergeant Sigmus Volcair PHD, Dragon Thaumaturgist RustyTengo as Private 1st Class Scrag, Orc Soldier CoolGirl as Corporal Norma Christie, Human Ninja __________________________________________________________________________________________________ Chapter 1:

RP Discord: https://discord.gg/gfNSMEy It is the year 6013. Six months ago, the greatest powers in the galaxy brokered a peace treaty. For the first time in two thousand years, there is no great war. But lack of war does not mean peace. The United Federation of Planets and Coalition of Sovereign Systems might be doing their best to put their conflicts behind them, but no amount of war-weariness can fully defuse two thousand years of hate. Pirates, barbarians, rogue military assets, and magical abominations roam the war-torn galaxy, threatening the stability of the tentative treaties and cease-fires that ended the Second Pyrusan War. As a part of their measures to preserve the fragile peace, the UFP and CSS, together with the neutral Council of Five, have decided to assemble a joint task force as a proof of concept. Proof that for all their bad blood, all their differences, they can work together. You have been chosen for your skills, your tolerance, and your… expendability to join this task force. Well, it’s a better posting than the Zoe Walker response squads, at least. Poor bastards. In Void Rangers, you will be playing as a member of the joint task force of military units from the United Federation of Planets, a high-tech industrial powerhouse with a cultural distrust of magic, the Coalition of Sovereign Systems, a high-magic aristocracy who distrusts the polluting and meritocratic nature of advanced technology, and the Council of Five, an ancient nation of androids who are doing their best to keep the galaxy from exploding into war again… except the ones who think that all organics are pets at best, and vermin the rest of the time. You can be fighter pilots, mecha operators, tank commanders, marines, crew aboard a capital ship, or even members of a capital ship’s command staff. You can be soldiers, wizards, scientists, explorers, or pretty much anything else you choose to be. 6013’s galaxy and setting are eminently flexible, and there is room for practically any character somewhere. This RP will be episodic in nature, with a focus on space battles, boarding actions, non-combat encounters, and the occasional ground mission. Your characters do not necessarily have to be heroic, but they are all members of an organized and disciplined military. This implies a minimum standard of character; they at least have to be good and reliable enough people to not get dishonorably discharged by a reasonably competent officer. Character Creation: Void Rangers will be using a hybrid of the 6013 tabletop game and the Trespassers of the Multiverse V2 systems, adapted for forum gaming. Character creation should be done in four stages: Choosing your stat spread, choosing your race, choosing your class, and choosing your skills. Your stats will determine your base attributes, with your race modifying those and potentially granting special abilities. Classes grant minor but useful and unique special abilities and determine your base HP and mana pool, with skills fleshing out your character with special abilities and actions beyond basic weapon strikes, dodges, and blocks. As this is a military space RP, your characters will also have access to a customized vehicle and military-grade weapons should they so choose. The Stats: Races: 6013, as an expansive science fantasy setting, has theoretically infinite race options. Feel free to choose one of the common ones listed below, or if none of them work for you create your own with GM assistance. Ask the GM if you want to make your own through the RP’s discord. Races can grant a special resource called “Heroism”, which symbolizes luck, willpower, and willingness to take risks. Heroism points are only replenished when you level up, and can only be gained through being a race that gets them. Heroism can be spent to make most impossible tasks possible, or other tasks far more likely to succeed. Classes: Character Classes grant 3 very important things. Your class HP bonus, your class mana bonus, and your class knowledge points. Knowledge points will be expanded on in the “Skills” section, but for now just keep in mind that more is better. Each class also comes with a unique but minor side benefit. Skills and Progression: Example Skills: Fighters, Mecha, Capital Ships, and other such gear: As this is a military science fantasy RP, gear and vehicles are pretty important. Personal gear, like skills and knowledges, will be designed by the player with GM approval, though the GM can suggest base stats. Ships and vehicles will be partially player-designed, but their base chassis as detailed below. Each player who chooses to have a personal vehicle starts with four modules, each of which can occupy a single hard point and are player-designed with GM approval. In general, mecha have more hard points but less engine slots and HP than conventional vehicles. Note that the entire party can only have one kind of capital ship. Choose wisely. Vehicles work exactly like you’d expect. While in one, you use their HP and equipment instead of your own. Vessel Options: Example Hard Point Modules: Example Personal Gear: Combat:

Maris, not really knowing what else to do, finds a quiet place to meditate and keep an eye on the group.

Lucinda decides that while not being dead weight again is important, not getting fired for another poor performance is also important. She decides to spend her next period practicing the songs for the next performance, and also keeping her guitar skills up. She tentatively extends an offer to Azusa and Yuri when she runs into them in the practice round. Things might go more smoothly if they coordinate beforehand rather than improvising like- like jazz performers.

"I can, but it doesn't last very long right now," Samantha admits, "It's a work in progress. I'll probably be able to get something useful soon? I hope, anyway."

"I think that talking things over too much might be a mistake. Right now we have a massive advantage in that the enemy does not know of our capabilities or goals," Lexiel suggests, "The longer we wait, the more time they will have to prepare and adjust our plans. I propose that we four put together squads tailored to strike at a specific one of these enemies, and then hunt them down before they can ready themselves. My summons and ranged attacks might make me a good match for the one who harms all who strike him in melee, and I could likely mess with the head of the one who is fixated on the 'one god'. My appearance tends to have that effect on zealots of that flavor."

"Currently, each drone is equipped with a variety of features selected for versatility and room for upgrades," Alexandria shares proudly, "Each one is fuelled by a hydrogen fuel cell in their abdomen, which they can refill at the central hive. They are equipped with gecko tread feet for mobility on any surface, strong mandibles that can act as screwdrivers, rivet guns, or pliers as needed, and an arc welder at the mouth and sting for defense and metalwork. They can use radio signals or blink code to message among themselves and apply software updates, though they understand verbal commands in a wide variety of languages. They are keyed into my IFF protocols, and thus have the same ability to tell friend from foe that I do. I also added them to my digital security systems, to ensure that they will be prohibitively difficult to suborn. For expansion, each one is equipped with several modular ports, currently empty, to which external hardware packs could be attached to in the central hive. More extensive refits or reprogramming can also be done through the hive's central hub and any tools you might wish to use. Computing power is unfortunately a bit limited at the moment, as are materials for the fuel cells. However, once a steady supply of water and high-tech scrap is obtained, I expect available options will increase dramatically."

"If you're sure..." Samantha focuses, and an abrupt wave of meh courses through Liliya. Suddenly, everything seems, well, a little bit silly. Everyone's taking everything they're doing so seriously, and does it really matter all that much?

"Yes. We have been busy," Alexandria states, "We noticed that the castle lacks self-repair and automatic defense functions. So we created a hive of self-replicating, easily upgraded mechanical ant drones to assist us. They should follow the orders of everyone my IFF systems have tagged as friendlies, and are smart enough to remember complex instructions. However, they are not full artificial intelligences. I lack the required materials to create one of those."

"Reading stuff, the worst that could happen is that I try to do too much at once, get overwhelmed by all the information, and pass out. Manipulating emotions, the worst that could happen is that it doesn't work. Although extended use on somebody might be bad," Samantha clarifies, "It's controlling and modifying minds that gets really tricky to do without permanent damage or horrible side effects. Although I guess it's kind of comforting that mind control isn't easy to do? If you're really okay with being a guinea pig, I guess... Are there any emotions you'd like me to try in particular?"

"Well, the professor mostly trained me because he was psychic too. That made things a lot easier," Samantha shares, "Working with emotions is a good place to start, yeah. I'm a bit better at it, and if I mess up really bad it won't, er, cook your brains in your head. My big problem is that my powers got stronger recently. Like, way stronger. Before, I could sense one person's emotions at a time, and maybe lift a pencil if I really concentrated. Now, I feel like even the big stuff is like trying to pick up single grains of rice with a backhoe. So yeah, I need to practice on people. The receptive side is easy to work on. I just lower my shields a bit, and try to sort through what everybody around me is feeling for useful stuff. But even if I'm pretty sure it's safe, I don't really want to mess with the emotions of people who're supposed to be on my side. It doesn't feel right."

"Mind powers? Uh, yeah, I do. Professor X called me a projective and receptive empath and telepath," Samantha says, "So I can read and control people's minds and emotions... in theory. In practice, not so much. I only had a week of training before I ended up here, and I really don't want to mess up and, er, fry someone's brain by mistake. But reading emotions is easy; I could do that even when my powers were way weaker than they are now. I tried to read the thoughts of the guy Dackly captured. I thought maybe he'd be thinking of the answers to her questions. But it didn't work so good."

There's a goblin next to Maris. He punches it.

"... They were very well written for translations of ancient historical texts," Lexiel admits, "Call it a maybe?"

"Oh, er... Yeah, I guess I did. Oh, man this is awkward," Samantha presses her lips into a thin line, blushing pink, "Malcolm Reynolds is a character from a television show called Firefly. It's kinda a cult classic, and you look a lot like he would if he was a girl. That's all. I really need to work on my brain to mouth filter. And my brain to everything else filter..."

"Wait! I believe I recognise Saber!" Lexiel explains, "I was not born on an Earth, but I have visited them many times during my travels and read some of their history and legends. I believe this Saber is the ancient Khan of the Mongol faction known as the 'Dothraki'. Daenerys Targeryan, also known as the Queen of Dragons, who fought a war of conquest against the powers of Europe, all of whom worshiped a single god at the time. I don't recall anything about her loathing magic specifically, but everything else fits, and the information I got on your abilities, Nobunaga, suggests that some Servant abilities are intrinsic to your class. Maybe antimagic is part of being a Saber? Or maybe I just didn't read that part of her story."

"Aron!" Cobalt attempts to volunteer for Elica's team, though whether anyone understands the offer is up in the air.