wpsfaculty | application

Entry tags:

application

application

Applications

STATUS: OPEN

Once applications open, they will always be open until such time the character cap is reached. Applications will be reviewed as timely as possible, but if you haven't received a response in 3 days, please contact the mod account.

• Please post your application in one comment to this entry
• If the written history is long, you are welcome to link to it in a separate post on the character's journal.
• Applications may receive a verdict of Accepted, Declined, or Revisions.

Declined applications may be reworked and submitted one week after a decline. If they are declined three times, they may not be resubmitted.
Revisions should be submitted within 48 of receiving the request. If there is a reason you cannot, please contact the Mod Account.

• There are currently 80 open character slots.
• There are currently 0 casts close to cap.
• Reserved apps take priority over non-reserves.

When near cap, only reserved apps will be reviewed the cap is reached or all reserves have expired. All apps will be placed in a reserve queue and reviewed once a slot opens up, following the priority of Reserved → Non-Reserved.

Application Queue

application guide.

player information.

Name: Or Online Handle
Age: Your age (approximation is fine)
Contact: Any contact is fine (Plurk, Discord, PM)
Other Character(s): List other characters currently in play at Dead House.

character information.

Name: In western order, please.
Canon: Please specify which if there are multiple versions.
Canon Point: Please be as specific as possible.
Age: Please specify whether they are canonly physically or mentally older or younger than they appear as well.

(canon) background: A brief summary of the character's place in canon and their history. Bullet points are acceptable, as are links to wikis.
(original) world & history: A brief (bullet points accepted) description of the original character's world, their place in it, and their personal history.
(CRAU) background: A brief synopsis of how the character changed from their original canon version including any new abilities or skills they learned, personality changes, etc. Bullet points accepted.

abilities: Please list any abilities the character possesses, powers-based or otherwise, and specify any that would require being nerfed. These abilities would also include any specialist, non-supernatural abilities as well.

Personality: Please illustrate the character's strengths and weaknesses. 300 words is a good target length, and it need not be exhaustive, but we should come away with a solid understanding of who they are as a person.

Why do you feel this character is a good fit for the setting? This need not be exhaustive, either, and can sometimes be summed up in a sentence, but we ask that you explain why you feel the character would fit well in the game setting in regards to the types of events they'll be facing and the psychological stress they'll be subjected to.

Writing sample(s): This can be anything as long as it is from within the last year and doesn't break the 4th wall (such as dear_mun or dear_player).

submit an application.

Please copy the form below and use it for your application, which should be submitted in one comment below. If need be, histories for original characters can be linked to posts on their journals. Please remove any lines that are not applicable.

premise ♦ rules/faq ♦ reserves ♦ patients ♦ applications ♦ setting ♦ ic comm ♦ ooc comm ♦ meme comm ♦ directory

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

player information.
Name: Kara
Age:37
Contact:

caletara
Other Character(s): none

character information.
Name: Kelson Cinhil Rhys Anthony Haldane
Canon: Deryni
Canon Point: Quest for Saint Camber
Age:18

(canon) background: No wiki available, sorry for the length!

(CW: death, murder, rape, religious persecution, torture. Think of Kelson's canon like Catholic Game of Thrones). Opt in/Opt out here

abilities:

Mundane:

Weaponry: Kelson's been trained in how to use multiple weapons(archery, swords, shields, lance, etc). He also knows how to ride a horse. He also studied military history and strategy.

Politics and diplomacy: Kelson was brought up as heir apparent. As such, he as all the skills and education which one would expect in a king, such as philosophy, mathematics and medicine. He also knows latin and limited greek.

Magical:

Note: Deryni are extremely sensitive to substances that disrupts magical abilities. Due to the abilities being genetic, such substances attack on a genetic level and will painfully disrupt him on a physical and magical level and likely leave him incapacitated for a time. Fun!

More likely to be used in Game

Clairsentience: This ability has multiple uses, but most likely is probing, where he can get basic information on an item, ranging from being able to see inside something like a lock, or sussing out if a drink is poisoned. It's an ability used for knowledge rather than action.

Mind-Influence: Kelson can influence another individual, ranging from telling them to go take a walk, forget a conversation or jump off a cliff. He can also use this to blur traumatic memories and to banish fatigue in himself for a short time. Kelson’s morals are such that he only uses this for what he considers benign factors. Normally he uses this for actions such as forcing someone to go to sleep, forget conversations or leave an area.

Note: Kelson will not use this without player consent.

Mind speech

Rapport: Kelson has the ability to mind meld with others.

Shields: Kelson has magical shields which enable him to defend against psychic attack. He can raise or lower them as necessary. However, like anything, shields can be worn or forced down, or by drugs that disrupt magical ability.

Telekinesis: Kelson has minor telekinesis, used to call small objects like cups, or manipulate unseen areas like locks. He can use this ability for more destructive means like squeezing someone's heart until it stops. Kelson would prefer not too, however.

Truth Reading/Compelling: Kelson has the ability to know whether someone is lying, most likely blending psychic ability and a subconscious reading of body language. It requires very little effort, however has limitations. Half-truths are difficult to detect though. In addition, if someone is magically shielded, Kelson can’t see anything.

Unlikely to be used

Conjury: Kelson can conjure elements, like fire. He also has the ability to conjure destructive illusions based on his own imagination.

Death Reading: The ability to read someone’s memories after death. This is immediately dependent on the state of the body.

Mind-Ripping: He has the power to destroy someone's mind with brute psychic force.

Personality:

Kelson starts out the books frightened, wide eyed and innocent, still believing in the best of people. While he still believes that most people have good, after everything he’s seen and had to do, he’s come to the realization that not everyone can be saved. Not everyone is good and even if they are, sometimes you have to kill good people in order to save lives down the line. Early on in his first year of ruling, he was reluctant to do this, even to kill someone he knew as vicious and deeply harmful, Edmund Loris. Instead of killing him, he has him locked in a monastic cell. However, this mistake ends up causing hundreds if not thousands of deaths and injuries in the long run. Kelson has since learned that although there comes a time for mercy, it isn’t always the best solution. To that end, as much as he hates it, he ends up executing a bishop who had rallied behind a pretender for the throne, and who could potentially lead a revolt against him due to his own lineage. Despite not wanting the throne or to rise against Kelson, he has him executed, the safer solution. In order to save lives down the line, he has to kill a potentially good man.

He has learned how to make hard decisions, decisions that his forty year old uncle would not have dreamed of having to make, nor would want too. He’s learned when to be hard and when to show mercy, through advise and trial and error no one would want to go through.

In the beginning he’s nervous at the idea of ruling, imposing his own will and learning to listen to those around him. He’s even afraid in typical teenage fashion of being sounding pompous or egotistical. He’s afraid of what others would think of him. Even if he’s been bred for this and taught, having to actually do it so suddenly and prove yourself competent is something completely different. He gradually gains confidence. Upon attempting to dismiss his regency council, waiting until the clock struck the correct time to prove his point, he accidentally waited to long and nearly has heart failure when the clock tolled 4 pm instead of 3 pm. Still, in his first official act as king, even though he could have exerted his authority, and declared the matter closed, which he does later in many matters, Kelson instead does this song and dance, staying within the confines of established law in order to prove his point and make the law work for him. He alternates between wishing to stay within established presets and not upset people, and exerting this authority as king.

Kelson's a teenager, trying to rule a country at a time when he's still learning who he is as a person. He has the ups and downs of a moody teen, and even pines and obsesses after his first real love and rejection. After ruling as a mature fourteen year old, he's finally realized he can throw tantrums at the age of 17 when he doesn't get what he wants (namely, the girl). He tries to rule kindly, but firmly, strong in what he believes in, while trying to balance his own teenage insecurities with being king. He believes in the law--but isn't above breaking it when it suits him, or changing it. Friendship and loyalty are important to him, and he will risk consequences to do what he believes is right for them.

He's quite friendly when he's with family or close knit friends, letting down his guard and joking or wallowing. But he doesn't give that friendship easily. He can be guarded, knowing that who and what he is make him a target, and anyone might be willing to stoop to new lows in order to gain favor or assassinate him. He can be very shy and a bit unsure sometimes, and is not the partying type. While he knows how to go through the motions and be what's expected, he prefers to be in the company of the small group he trusts, rather than in the midst of a ball and the center of attention.

He’s young, he makes mistakes but he tries to learn from them, wanting to do his best for Gwynedd and his people. In the beginning, he never makes a decision without consulting his advisers. However, as the years go on and Kelson becomes more confident, he doesn’t always. This results in him making mistakes, like when his anger got the better of him and he refused to allow the men who raped the nuns confession or last rites. Morgan comes to him, multiple times after he’s randomly executed someone to point out what he did, what went wrong and how he could have done better in the future. In most cases, by this time Kelson already feels profoundly guilty and has started wallowing.

The loss of life and violence during the King’s Justice weighs heavily upon Kelson and changed him. He had to be uncharacteristically savage and ruthless during that campaign, and came across things that no 17 year old should have to see, much less be in charge of dealing with. We see him multiple times sinking into a depression or righteous anger when things aren’t perfect. He eventually learns that life is not, and that it is how we deal with those situations that defines us.

Experiencing the woman’s rape absolutely terrified him, to the point where the idea of sex is actually a little scary. It is also what helped lead to his rather ruthless behavior of his enemies in the King’s Justice. While being a hormonal teenager, it’s something he tries to work through and probably won’t completely get over until he actually has sex himself, and realizes through actual experience that not all sex is rape. While he knows this intellectually, the experience shook him profoundly.

Kelson accepts his Deryni heritage, and champions them in his role as king. He does everything he can in order to reverse the intolerance and laws that have reduced Deryni to second class citizens, while acknowledging that the powers have been used in the past to create dictatorships and that his human citizens are legitimately fearful and scared. However, he has also learned to walk a fine line, treading between Deryni sorcerer and claiming his powers as divine right by God. He knows that in the wrong company, being a known Deryni is as good as being dead. He's spent much of his reign trying not to scare his subjects and thus doesn't use magic as openly as he otherwise might. He knows that all change takes time. Being young, he doesn't always realize that sometimes change needs to be sudden and swift. He's still learning.

Kelson whines. Being a teenager thrust into a duty no grown adult would want, he succumbs to self pity a lot. Quite like his mother, who retreated into seclusion in a convent to pray for her and Kelson’s soul, Kelson is likewise prone to bouts of extreme self pity and whining. He does not let go easily. He’s still in love with a girl years later after she rejected him and refuses to let her go, and has mourned for years the bride he barely knew. He spirals into bouts of single-minded depression when things don’t go his way.

In addition, while he never outright misuses his powers, he does stray into areas that are ethically grey. For example, he regularly assumes control of some of his vassals, ordering them to forget what they’ve heard or not say a word. This not only takes the self control out of the individuals in question but shows that he assumes they don’t have the loyalty or self control to serve him as he wishes. Instead of asking for their obedience, which most of the subjects he encounters on a day to day basis would give freely, he’s compels it. In essence, he tries to control factors by magical means when he could easily find a non-magical solution for it. Most likely this a result of his two advisers, who while being morally and ethically good people, also slip into grey areas and do not have as stringent a moral compass as some we’ve seen. Most likely he is too young and not self-aware enough to realize his actions aren’t completely ethical and if this was pointed out to him he’d be horrified, if more than a little stubborn in the beginning.

All in all, Kelson does his best to be a good king and is generally well liked. He’s viewed as kind and tolerant, although some are apprehensive by his views on magic as well as his own abilities. He holds himself to a high standard and occasionally crumbles when that standard is not upheld. Usually, when he makes mistakes, it’s because he’s young and inexperienced. He always tries his best to be a good and fair king for both humans and Deryni.

Why do you feel this character is a good fit for the setting?

Kelson is from a world where horror is commonplace. In typical 12th century fashion, Kelson has been exposed to such things as physical and psychological torture, murder and magical and mundane monsters. He's exposed to this at a very young age, having grown up with a fanatic of a mother comfortable with the torture and condemnation of an entire species of people, and the maledictions of a corrupt and powerful church. He'll take things in stride, trying to figure out what's real and what isnt and if his own memories and emotions can be trusted. His life has been anything but easy, and while he may have had it easier than some given his rank, it has also brought a number of unique hardships and it's own horrors and stresses. He's a kind person, and doesn't want to see anyone hurt (himself or others). Testing his limits, adaptability and reactions will be interesting.

Writing sample(s): Hadriel log sample here

Edited 2019-05-21 16:18 (UTC)

Welcome to the Dead House.

Thank you for applying for The Dead House! There are just a few minor bits of administrative paperwork that need to happen before you can get up and running.

• Respond to this comment with the journal you'll be using for play
• Request membership at

thedeadhouse,

deadhouseooc, and optionally join

dhmeming
• Fill out your Patient Registry
• Introduce yourself and your new character on the OOC Intro Post
• Fully optional, but feel free to join our Discord Server

• Your assigned room is 210
• Your Comm tag is deryni: kelson haldane

NOTE: Due to Kelson's abilities, specifically the clairsentience, mind-influence, and rapport, we ask that you post a permissions post specifically for these abilities so that other characters might opt out of their use should they choose, or opt in. It could make for some interesting CR.

Done here. Thank you for the opportunity! I can't wait to play with you all.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

application

Kelson Haldane | Deryni | Reserved

accepted + note

Re: accepted + note