Quotes directly from the application will be in this color. My comments will be in black.
Since this application did not receive an outright acceptance, I have provided much more information in the overall review than simply "strengths" and "suggestions". This is normal procedure for applications that are not immediately accepted.
Sailor Artemis. Cynthia Agrotera. Alpha Mu Omega. Remnant
Rank.
Cynthia: Another name for Artemis, meaning Moon, but Moon has nothing to do with this Artemis, so it is just a play on names.
Just a note here: Artemis is a
goddess of the moon; she's often held as one in place of Selene, just as Apollo
is seen as a sun god rather than Helios. This is actually a major part of her
realm as a goddess, but was placed back in her sphere since Selene is a
character who is available for application.
Occupation
Occupation: Custodial work (she floats to where she's
needed to work)
Please exclude the part about
floating. I interpreted this literally as "floating" to work and it
really confused me, since Alpha Mu Omega members don't get villain fringe
benefits.
Likes & Dislikes &
Hobbies
A lot of ideas are presented
here, but they all seem added for the sake of relevance. I know that I've said
that relevance is a very good thing, but what I'm looking for is unique takes
on elements, as I have mentioned on the
message board. However, the items listed in these sections seemed to be
added because they seemed relevant to the spheres of influence listed on the
website; that, combined with the fact that you said "Artemis has nothing to do
with the moon" makes me concerned that little research was done on the actual
goddess before the character was created.
I address this later in the
application as well: the ideas that you've used in creating this character come
from several different areas and aren't set upon a sturdy foundation. The concepts
you've used have been done many, many times before, and don't make for an
exciting character.
Skills
You smell something?: Cynthia has a very keen sense of smell and
sometimes uses it to track down where lunch is coming from or if someone is
smoking close to where they aren't suppose to be smoking. She can't identify
people by their scents, but can pick up perfumes or distinctive odors to
identify people she knows. For an example: If she were to fight a Senshi and
then cross paths with them in mundane form, she wouldn't be able to catch them.
But, she can tell a Rebirthed member of AMO is coming her way from their
distinct smell of death. If she catches something that interests her she will
open her mouth to taste the scent much like an animal would.
I loved this skill and actually
think it could be beefed up: Maybe Cynthia CAN smell a reborn sailor soldier
(after they've awakened, of course) while they are untransformed. Anyway, all
Alpha Mu Omega can detect an awakened reborn soldier in close vicinity because
of the power they put off—transformed or no.
Squirrel Bait: Cynthia seems to attract wild animals such
as squirrels, raccoons, or other small wild creatures that might be on or off
campus. She keeps a bag of seed on her belt to make sure she has something to
offer them and doesn't mind one bit if she ends up with a squirrel following
her all day.
Two characters
have already have traits similar to this one: Persephone, who is followed by
bees, and Rosemary, who is plagued by fish following her in a literal and
metaphorical sense. I'd rather have this excluded or executed in a different
way so it doesn't overlap so much.
Personality
First in this section, I will
address specific points and then address the personality as a whole.
"She has an internal beeper for Rage just in case she needs to find her way back to the Fraternity or somewhere else in a speedy manner to do crowd control. "
Pretty much everyone in the
Alpha Mu Omega has an 'internal beeper'. Rage is basically infesting your
brain, and if it needs you, it's going to yank you back to the Alpha Mu Omega
house with some considerable force (though not in a literal sense unless you
ignore it). If Artemis is a unique case, please explain in more detail why it's
unique and how she, over any other AMO, got it.
The section marked "Happy!"
doesn't actually describe Cynthia as a happy person. It addresses aspects of
her personality like cowardice and hatred of battle, which should be better
explained in their own paragraphs, as they're major points of personality in a
game where combat is involved. If Cynthia really is a happy person (which she
seems to be, judging by the rest of her personality), please dedicate a
paragraph to describing why and how Cynthia is happy, and then make separate
paragraphs for her cowardice and reluctance to fight.
The section marked "Sad" is
written in list format without actually explaining anything. What I'm looking
for in these sections is "This makes Cynthia sad, this is how she acts when
she's sad, this is why she's sad".
" She tried to visit them once in their cages, but Rage informed her that it wasn't wise to play with them. Someone might see her and she would get into trouble. So, she just visits them, knowing one day they would be free... Rage told her so. "
Here, Cynthia seems to go from a
mothering figure to being very childlike. These two character types don't mesh
well together; Cynthia could conceivably try to be mothering but fail at it
because she is so childish, but I don't think that using both character types is
going to work.
Also, Rage doesn't baby his
members unless absolutely necessary, this is especially true for his Remnants,
who should be more stable than the rest of the Alpha Mu Omega. This made me picture
a Mommy-Rage talking to a 3-year-old Artemis, and I just don't think that would
happen.
"She doesn't like being stuck in cramped, caged areas for a long time.
It makes her anxious, claustrophobic, and grumpy. Cynthia is likely to snap at
someone for asking how her day was if she's been cooped up for too long. She
doesn't spend a whole lot of time in her room for this reason and hates
cleaning the small bathrooms." This was an
interesting addition. I liked it.
"Extended time in the bask of the Artemis magic has turned her Senshi
form into a fierce animal of a soldier." I'm
not sure what you were going for here, however, as mentioned on the message
board, sailor soldiers aren't chosen by a god or goddess to be sailor soldiers.
The gods and goddesses were created because Earthlings saw the sailor soldiers
and thought "These people have to be gods!" There's no group of greater powers
at work here, just
Overall
This personality didn't come
together very well for two primary reasons. The first being that it's been
written in the sectioned personality style and in doing this, has come out too
vague; it's left parts unexplained and several sections didn't make sense.
There were three sections that nailed the structural concepts behind sectioned
personality, and those were the ones labeled "look shiny", "all to the alpha" and
"chicken soup, please". The rest were either irrelevant to their stated topic
or just so jumbled that they didn't make any sense. I highly suggest just
writing the personality in one large, lump paragraph. Read the profile for
Hoplite Ares to see a really good example of lump paragraph style.
The other reason for this
personality not coming together was, as mentioned above, that far too many
ideas are presented here and they don't really work together to create a
character that seems like a real person. In moderation, some of these traits
could be combined, but you've seen to taken some to extremes and only mentioned
others in passing. I've seen these traits presented here:
Motherly, childish, naïve, quick
to anger and very very aggressive, a coward, afraid of conflict, feral,
friend-of-animals
Cynthia
first appears to be a mother figure for the Alpha Mu Omega. While I assure you that
mothering characters are perfectly acceptable, as we don't have any yet, I want
to emphasize that it isn't really a trait that a character based on Artemis should
have. One of her elements is "birthing" and another is "children". Birthing is not
the same as motherhood; you can have a child and not be a mother, and there are
already several goddesses with this element who could easily fill the position
of mother figure in either the Alpha Mu Omega or the MYTHOS organization.
Cynthia's
motherhood is then overlapped by her childishness, which isn't actually stated
but is definitely there in her actions, her blind loyalty to Rage, and the
almost simple level her mind seems to focus on. The childishness seems to
overwhelm the maternal aspects of your character's personality. These two
aspects oppose each other; generally, a character is not both mothering and
childish because mothering requires some concentration and responsibility, and
the point of a childish character is to have a small attention span and be
rather irresponsible.
You've
really played up the Dr. Doolittle Friend of Animals concept. The problem with
this is that it's executed in a way that has been done before and makes for a
boring character. Game members suggested that you move away from this concept
and try for a more feral Artemis. You tried this, but didn't really play it up
at all, almost adding it in as an afterthought; it made it seem like you were
afraid of making a potentially dislikeable character with serious faults. Do
not ever be afraid of making a dislikeable character; look at the ones we have
in the game now: Valdis is an asshole, Croix is superficial, Shazi is totally,
totally antisocial and Rosemary is inconsiderate and irresponsible and yet I
love all of them.
History
There
were a lot of little errors in usage, spelling and grammar that could've been
fixed by giving the history a quick glance-over, and there were a few points that
I believe I even mentioned directly to you on the side that didn't end up being
changed.
Seven years prior
to the current time, those left of the Enraged and their Master arrived on
Earth.
Here is
one of those instances. It's stated on the page, also, that Rage simply
rebuilds those who have fallen as long as they aren't a problem. So, there's
plenty of people "left" after the battle on Mythos and traveling through space.
Rage encouraged
them to delve into the culture, study and adapt in order to find the crystals.
She studied hard, helping others who didn't quite get it so that they could
start to live a 'normal' life. Eventually she took on the name Cynthia Agrotera
so that she could fit in better with the strange culture around her. She stuck
close to Rage and her companions, only going out to study as their master bid
them to.
A lot
of this section is kind of taking liberties with what happened when the Alpha
Mu Omega arrived on Earth. Rage wasn't really restricting his minions from
going out whenever they wanted, as long as they don't draw attention to
earthlings. Also, the culture between the two planets, while requiring some
research, isn't as strange and different as is emphasized in this section.
Cynthia was also
forced to adapt to a new problem, the earth's lunar rotation. The first full
moon she encountered on Earth caused her to loose herself to the urge to act
like an untamed creature. She went insane, forcing the other Enraged to lock
her up. No one knew what had happened, wondering if she was going mad. The
morning brought a headache and an ill feeling as she crawled in submission to
find Rage.
I don't
think that this feral behavior would've just started on Earth. It seems odd and
unlikely that the Earth moon, of all the moons in the universe, would be the
one that makes Cynthia go crazy. This attribute, I thought, would be one that
was constantly present, but made stronger by the presence of a full moon upon
her. You'll probably want to go with something more like that, rather than "The
earth moon, for some unexplained reason, makes Cynthia crazy."
Also,
I don't think that this moon-sickness would be because of Rage. When Rage takes
over a Mythite, especially a convert or a rebirth, not so much The Remnant,
their powers and abilities are mutated, but new ones generally don't just
randomly develop.
When the urges
became too much, she would ask Rage to place her in a deep sleep or trance to
keep her from doing harm to herself or others.
I
actually don't think that Rage would put Artemis into a trance during this
time. Sure, it might lock her away, but it would also definitely utilize her as
a method of hunting down reborn soldiers or creating a distraction when
necessary.
Another, less
serious problem emerged during the first winter on Earth. Cynthia fell ill and
felt like she was wasting away. This was easier to sort out than the full moon
problem and she was quarantined to her living quarters. Her normally strong
immune system seemed to have abandoned her when the cold and flu season rolled
around.
Again,
I'm not sure why this is happening on Earth of all places. While there is a
specific reason for all of this to be taking place on Earth, it's kind of a
fluke, and there's nothing that's really all that special about Earth that
makes anyone behave differently on it. I would maybe have made her allergic to
something all along (animals, for instance) and always made her susceptible to
the phases of the moon (her power waxes and wanes with the moon, with her
peaking and going crazy at full moon and being weakest and most in control at
the new moon).
Instead, she took
up a custodial position that allowed her free range of the college campus that
the fraternity had settled on.
It's
mentioned on the page several times that the AMO House is not physically located
on campus, but is actually located inside of Rage.
When she first
heard about the 'zoo' where all sorts of wild creatures were, she had to find
out about it.
Since
animals have been in captivity for thousands of years on Earth, and Mythos was
assumedly at least at ancient-Greek level of civilization, zoos should not be a
new and exciting concept for Cynthia. She could have really loved to visit
them, but she really shouldn't be surprised to see them.
The zoo gave her a
chance to study these new animals from Earth, though it was sad to see them
penned up with no place to go. One night she had snuck into some of the cages before
Rage informed her that it wasn't wise to play with the caged creatures... and
that it would make sure they were free one day. Delighted and disappointed at
the same time, Cynthia promised not to break into any more of the zoo cages to
see the imprisoned animals. It didn't stop her from going to the zoo during
evening trips though, she just didn't get to be as close. She would ponder at
times what it would be like to work at the zoo with the animals. Despite her
thoughts, she never gave a thought to leaving the campus for work elsewhere,
wanting to remain close to where her true work was.
I don't
think this history point is going to work out. If there were a zoo break in, it
would be all over the news for quite some time and PETA would probably be all
over it and there would just be a lot of trouble from everywhere. If Cynthia
had broken into the zoo and an animal cage and caused this kind of raucous,
Rage probably would've just Rebirthed her as soon as she returned to the AMO
house that evening.
Over the years,
Cynthia felt more and more comfortable around the Earthlings, fitting in a
little better than she expected. She didn't make many friends, mostly due to
lack of seeking them. She didn't want to become distracted from her true
purpose and stuck close to campus and AMO.
This
was an aspect of her personality not covered in the personality section, and is
also overlapping SailorPersephone. While, ordinarily, I would let this slide,
since we only have one other Alpha Mu Omega member, I'd much rather have at
least one that was outgoing and friendly.
Sailor
Soldier
Uniform.
I really liked
the uniform design, everything was very nice; my only problem is that
Amphitrite is already our barefoot sailor soldier because her feet are webbed. Moccasins
would be a cool choice for footwear, I think!
Attacks
Overall,
I would've liked if the attacks were more based around the goddess and the
spheres of influence. You had a really good start with the first attack, maybe
instead of just sending her into crazy-Artemis mode, it heightens her senses a
LOT so that she can track-down/hunt targets that are fleeing or hiding. The
second attack wasn't really "disease", and it overlapped with the effects of
Persephone's only signature attack.
Traits
& Skills & Etc
The
first trait was neat, but (just a nitpick) not all wolves have golden eyes. I
think that's actually more of a cat-thing.
I
loved the second trait and the second skill, both very cool.
Mythite
Magic
Amphitrite
already has an ability that is essentially, fish empathy, where she can feel
the "emotions" of sea life. However, since sea-life isn't exactly highly
developed, it's usually just very muddled, except with dolphins, where she can
almost make out coherent thought. I think if you really want to go with this,
you'll have to execute it differently, since it overlaps with Amphitrite's
ability and, even though this is a fantasy setting, the only animals capable of
coherent processing and language are guardians, and they're all dead.
Overall
Artemis
wouldn't cut it as a Remnant. As an Ancient Rebirth or Convert, yes, definitely,
but she seems to be too much trouble as a Remnant; Rage would've probably
popped her twice over by now, especially after the zoo incident. I don't think
you should focus so heavily on animals as Artemis's element; there are so many
more interesting aspects of her sphere that could be focused on. Animals should
probably be left to someone with fewer things to work with (Pan).
Strengths: The writing was good; the
personality section shouldn't have been written in sectioned format, because it
came out hard to understand, but the rest of the application made for a good
read. I really liked a lot of the skills you came up with.
What
I Loved: the
custodian aspects, the skills, the fuku
Suggestions: I strongly recommend starting
fresh and finding a solid foundation to work from. There are some good ideas
presented here, but I'm concerned that most of them were player suggestions
that you did little to modify. While it is fine to take suggestions, it's up to
you to take them and mold them to work with the character. As it is, you have a
lot of traits that seem very slapped together with little thought to how they
all relate. Rather than trying to go back through the jumble and connect them,
I sincerely believe you'd be better off starting with a fresh slate.
I
advise against using sectioned personality format when writing personality. The
personality you submitted was disjointed and confusing, with several sentence
fragments. It left things unexplained, and didn't give me a clear look into
Cynthia's persona. Had you written it the old fashioned way, I'm sure your
writing would've been lovely.
Please
be sure to read the Mythos page carefully, there were some Mythos canon
mistakes made in the app. Also, be sure to do lots of research on Artemis or
whichever god or goddess you decide to reapply for. Keep the character
relevant, but do so by picking out weird, neat, exciting and obscure things
that you don't think anyone else has done with a character of similar type.
Verdict: The writing was solid in most
parts, and there were a few good ideas, but I'm afraid that things didn't come
together very well. Declined.