Request to learn EAL and never get a chance to speak it due to low synthetic population

[Recoherent]

BYOND Key: Recoherent

Character Names: Sihle Niu, GARRUK-Unit

Species you are applying to play: IPC

 

Have you read our lore section's page on this species?:

Hell yeah! I love all the background thats present, Niennab's art for the Trinary is super cool.

 

Why do you wish to play this specific race:

Really simply? I like robots. I'm a really big fan of exploring the potential of something that… may not be quite as sentient as everything else around it. The hyper durable and modular nature of IPCs also gives me lots of great ideas for backgrounds based around rebuilding yourself quite literally, or struggle with the role you were built for. 

 

Identify what makes role-playing this species different than role-playing a Human:

In general, IPCs aren't perfect emulation of humans (or other species for that matter). They tend to be a little lacking in the emotion department and more complicated in the logic area, which can manifest in a lot of different ways (the standard trope of not understanding feelings, or feeling emotions too strongly to overcompensate, or bizarre interpretations of some orders, et cetera). IPCs are also a lot more resilient than organic species; parts are modular and durable. This can lead to a lack of understanding of their own limits, whether over or underestimating them; it could also lead to an ideal of protection of organic species and their fragile meat shells. There's also the major factor that most IPCs live in indentured servitude, and even free ones are still discriminated against. My own interpretation of these combined factors leads to a general personality of "bizarre politeness" - they're cordial, you guess? They've definitely got your back, but you're still sort of unsure as to what that entails.

 

Character Name: Malvarma

Please provide a short backstory for this character

Initially built as a cargo loader aboard Sidirourgeío station, Malvarma was decommisioned after a long period of service, in accordance with budget cuts or somesuch coming from up top. However, the mechanic who disassembled him sold him under the radar to a private owner instead of scrapping him down. Somnos traded hands numerous times during this period of his life; many owners simply kept him in a box, while others wanted him for dangerous scrap diving work out in the trash satellites. Many parts of his original frame were sold off or destroyed during this time.

One such dive went awry, and resulted in what was assumedly his total destruction in an unfortunate collision of two disparate clusters. However, fate and a relatively top-shelf posibrain cooler kept him technically "alive", until eventually a diver pulled him back out - another IPC, one affiliated with a scrapper gang aboard the station. After a period of time spent with this (currently unnamed) gang, acquiring replacement parts and continuing to scrap dive (under safer conditions), Malvarma eventually decided to apply to work aboard many of the other stations in the Tau Ceti system - one such being the NSS Aurora. After heartfelt goodbyes with his gang, he is now striking out to attempt to help others in sitations as terrible as his (and maybe still lift some crates while he's at it).

What do you like about this character?

He's a mess of an IPC who's pretty much trying to use his gift of life and freedom to its fullest, mostly through being loud and excited. He's an opportunity to play a character who's further on the "weird" scale than Sihle, who is a pretty normal person with a nomal life. I'm always a fan of large, slow and powerful robots who do slightly unrelated jobs (in this case, security). I think that somebody durable and loud like him could allow for some slowdown in combat, presenting an opportunity for RP. I'm also interested in playing as a race that potentially recieves discrimination from the station, and exploring how he would handle that.

How would you rate your role-playing ability?

Probably around a 7 out of 10.

Notes:

Talked with some of the loredevs about the Sidirourgeío gang on discord

This dude's a chance to try some departments I don't play (cargo and security) so I might need some adjustment for those.

 

I await any feedback!

[niennab]

Hello, thank you for applying! I have a few questions. To start, what do you mean by this? Particularly in regards to underestimating. 

4 hours ago, Recoherent said:

This can lead to a lack of understanding of their own limits, whether over or underestimating them; it could also lead to an ideal of protection of organic species and their fragile meat shells

Is the character’s name Malvarna or Somnos? Did their designation change? 

Is the scrapper gang related to the scrappers in Eridani? Was Malvarna in Eridani, Sol or Tau Ceti at this time?

You mention Malvarna as being free but by all accounts he’d be an illegal IPC. If not how did he acquire his freedom or was his paperwork forged? Is he still affiliated with the gang or unaffiliated? Why did the gang let him leave?

4 hours ago, Recoherent said:

This dude's a chance to try some departments I don't play (cargo and security) so I might need some adjustment for those.

You mention this portion here but how did Malvarna acquire the databases in order to work in Security?

[Recoherent]

Thanks for the feedback! Here's some overthinking in response.

 

Character's name is indeed Malvarma, I thought I replaced all references to their in-progress name but I guess I missed some. Assumedly they did have some sort of designation change upon being picked up by the gang.

 

The designation of a scrapper gang was mostly due to similarities in operation and general setup. If that sort of name for a gang is specific to Eridani then this would probably just be a scrapper gang-analogue, as this is all taking place within Tau Ceti.

 

On the topic of being free or illegal, I do intend that he's free, but didn't put enough thought into it yet. I assumed that upon decommisioning his paper trail probably ended, with traders removing identifier tags - making him distinctly illegal. The wiki does say that IPCs with no designation in the databanks are automatically picked up by Biesel, which fully makes sense. However, I'm not sure of how that sort of application would go: would an illegal IPC be able to go to a verified mechanic to start up a new set of paperwork and ownership documents? If so, it seems like there would be two main ways to go pretty much from illegal to free, which are either paying off your own cost up front, or having someone with influence in the Republic's government have you designated as free for whatever reason. 

 

The scrap diving gang's main goal is to raise money to pay off the costs of owned or illegal IPCs. As mentioned in the lore channel, this is the reason that all sorts of different IPCs aboard the Sidirourgeío join up, whether owned, illegal, or just industrious freed who enjoy the work. Malvarma essentially went through the whole process, working to raise enough money to attempt to pay off their cost up front when applying to the Republic's database. With some aid from moderately influential gang figures along the paperwork process, it went smoothly. This sort of assisted process is also present when getting synthetics properly qualified for jobs; finding the right places to acquire proper data for security and then enrolling as a cadet for pratical experience is Malvarma's experience.

 

ok while writing this i am realizing this gang is less "gang" and more "aide for disadvantaged synthetics" from the inside. rest assured there is also some ample squatting-on-railings-with-a-baseball-bat-over-your-shoulder-looking-menacing to go around.

 

Malvarma remains affiliated with them, proudly presenting their iconography (will figure that out in a little bit) as a designator. 

[niennab]

1 hour ago, Recoherent said:

I assumed that upon decommisioning his paper trail probably ended, with traders removing identifier tags - making him distinctly illegal. The wiki does say that IPCs with no designation in the databanks are automatically picked up by Biesel, which fully makes sense. However, I'm not sure of how that sort of application would go: would an illegal IPC be able to go to a verified mechanic to start up a new set of paperwork and ownership documents? If so, it seems like there would be two main ways to go pretty much from illegal to free, which are either paying off your own cost up front, or having someone with influence in the Republic's government have you designated as free for whatever reason. 

Due to his multiple sales, his paper trail would have likely started questionably but anew however surviving the accident wouldn't have made him free. There would be no proof of him acquiring or being granted freedom after all. Having survived, the government likely would have expected him to return to his owners, and thus he is now more a runaway synthetic but one likely assumed to be dead.

A synthetic could get forged papers however it seems a bit narratively convenient that the gang has enough influence and credits to both forge documents and buy the necessary databases for a synthetic to change its designation.

Synthetics that flee other systems (Sol as an example) and turn themselves in to the Tau Ceti government are given a choice between joining the TCFL for a year or being auctioned off to the megacorporations.

[Recoherent]

Ah, I either completely missed the mention of joining the TCFL or it wasn't present on the wiki! A stint there is pretty much exactly what I would expect, then, and then I can not have silly handwaving for gang power. Then, the gang's method towards illegal IPCs would be more to get them on their feet (quite literally if missing too many parts) and send them off elsewhere.

[niennab]

Sounds good! Before I process your application I realize a question was missed. Could you clarify what you mean by this? Particularly in regards to under estimating.

On 15/12/2020 at 12:34, Recoherent said:

This can lead to a lack of understanding of their own limits, whether over or underestimating them; it could also lead to an ideal of protection of organic species and their fragile meat shells.

I was wondering how you intend to play this as well, or how it will show: 

Quote

He's a mess of an IPC who's pretty much trying to use his gift of life and freedom to its fullest, mostly through being loud and excited.

 

Edited December 18, 2020 by niennab

[Recoherent]

These mostly came from my own experiences with overcompensating for percieved deficiencies, even if those decifiencies are simply imagined. There's the more obvious physical aspect of "accidentally sustaining way too much damage doing something dangerous", or the potential inverse of "staunchly refusing to do anything outside of completely specified and provided actions" - inspired a bit more by some stories of people who can't feel pain, where an outright refusal to do any actions that might result in injury of any sort can lead to an outwardly slightly strange lifestyle (in a human example, having a habit like always using insulated oven mitts to pull things out of the microwave - even if it was something only microwaved for a few seconds to heat it up a little).

 

The mental side of this is really just my own interpretations and projections, and for the most part are specific towards Malvarma and his mental state. I imagine that many IPCs would feel a constant, lurking dread, of the thought that a single mistake could mean decommisioning. Malvaram also always had something lurking in the back of his mind - that there's fully researched documents specifying his limits. That teams of engineers and scientists, the best and brightest in their fields, have rigorously proven that the best he can ever do is cargo lifting. This, alongside his constant trade at the hands of uncaring owners, and the general discrimination against synthetic lifeforms in general as being "less than sentient", has understandbly resulted in a quite deep-seated inferiority complex. His method of handling this is the method that I know how to do the best - vigorous, constant overcompensation in all ways. He's trying to take the phrase "fake it till you make it" to its logical conclusion, and in many ways has - now an ex-legionnaire, a citizen, and an employee of NanoTrasen, not property. It'll always weight on him, though.

 

I hope that answers both questions! Please let me know if you have any more.

[niennab]

Thank you for the clarifications. Due to your account being new, I took a bit longer with your application, so sorry for any wait there. However, your application demonstrates an understanding of IPCs. Accepted!