Desven beep boops

[Desven]

An IPC whitelist

 

BYOND Key: Desven

Character Names: Pierre Godard, Qaal Nramala, Ka'Akaix'Pax C'thur, Zhranzda Rajii'thaamar, An Oath to Soothe the Vulnerable Souls, Seznia Zarkami.

Species you are applying to play: IPC

What color do you plan on making your first alien character:

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

 

Please provide well articulated answers to the following questions in a paragraph format. One paragraph minimum per question.

 

Why do you wish to play this specific race:

I've becoming interested in IPCs mostly because of the Trinary Perfection. To be honest, I don't find the industrial frames that appealing and neither the baselines (although probably I would make a ZH mobility frame and steal @Kaizr Darwin), but the shells are really interesting. It wasn't until I began to read the wiki that I thought about all the actual struggles of IPCs. Most of my characters dislike them, and some people even think I oocly don't like robots too, but that's not exactly true. I haven't really thought much about how the issue would affect me in real life, mostly because it's still a far-fetched sci-fi concept, and while they don't have actual emotions like humans do, I can still see them specific things affecting them, kind of like how Data in Star Trek is mostly unaffected or oblivious to many words of humans, but becomes something similar to 'upset' or even 'angry' when he gets mocked for being a machine, or even when they try to disassemble him. Of course our lore isn't like Star Trek, and I don't plan to make a Data clone or anything, but he hits the nail on some 'emotions' that become relevant. and it also depends on which model and when it was built.

Back to the Trinary Perfection, religions are probably the best of the lore to me, and I like their eschatologies and to think about their implications. and after having Tribunalist and Th'akh characters, as well as those afraid of Glorsh and its implications, being on the other side of the issue sounds interesting. I would surely love to roleplay preaching that synthetics have souls, and I'm glad that there are some characters I can interact with that would follow, and others that would also despise (because conflict is fun) those beliefs, which would create really interesting scenes.

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

I touched a bit on the emotions, although that really depends on each positronic brain. I would say that being an IPC gives you a lot of leeway to different degrees of 'sentience' and 'humanity', but there are some core concepts that all of them would have. First of all, there's no instinct; instead, you have directives, that unlike humans you are 'bound' to them. By this I don't mean that you have laws or that you are lawed to the AI, because that's not it, but rather, I'm talking about how, for example, fearRP works with IPCs. With organics, self-preservation is an instict, mostly coming from pain and knowing you're in danger. For IPCs, it is a directive, and it can take strange paths that would become reasonable for the IPC. I would say that, mostly, the biggest difference is that you are not human, instead you mimic one. As an old TV-head baseline, the bipedal appearance, the voice programming and the different levels of being able to hold complex conversations mimics just enough to anthromorphize you. As a 2463 shell you might fool most of the station if you're going stealth, but even if you're not, most people might not think twice about how different you are at first glance; or even, they might come closer to you and treat you more as a human when they get to know you. It really depends on what you're aiming for.

In my concrete case, I plan to play an early shell and I'll go over this later on the other questions, but one of the main themes for me will be that their face, for example, will now appear at the uncanny valley because the newer ones would look more convincing. The brain would also might have problem with speaking with some constructions or using some phrases, as the programming was originally not meant to be for engaging in small talk, but rather, to provide a service in the healthcare system seen as an industry. I've noticed my characters vary from what it's on paper to what the actual roleplay is on station, and I'd say they're tweaked for the best than to what I originally planned, but in this scenario I do believe that the mimicry, despite the IPCs efforts, will make it apparent for others that they're a robot.

 

Character Name: Sachiel (formerly NU-12/Lara)

Please provide a short backstory for this character:

Shortly after Terraneus Diagnostics presented their first convincing shells, a picture would go viral on the extranet and on plenty of newspapers: Fifteen nurses, traditionally attractive, posing with their medical equipment. A brief video of an intellectual against convincing shells, during a holo interview, would become viral because a news reporter would trick him into believing they were human. While there was plenty of doubt, the hospital were the shells would work at would gain a lot of good press. The Almodovar Memorial Hospital in Harmony City, Luna, was a high-end hospital known for its fancy facilities, state-of-the-art machinery and, most importantly, its hospitality. Patients would feel mostly comfortable knowing that they would have great attention and the price for the stay was worth it.

One of these nurses was Nursing Unit 12, but her nametag would read Lara. While AMH originally attempted to purchase more than fifteen shells, the price and the manufacturing proved too much for them. Fifteen would soon not be enough, these nurses would prove to be popular among the patients. Their eagerness to treat, their beauty and their disposition would struck their patients. Lara became known because of voice tone. The shells varied, mostly, in hair length and eye color; their face factions and body built were roughly the same. The other main difference would be their voices, programmed to have different soothing tones, and Lara was fortunate to have one of the most harmonic ones. When a child had to undergo surgery and was scared, the child's parents would encourage her to sing him a lullaby, which she did. The brief video of the shell singing the child to sleep before his appendectomy would appear in local media, and Lara would be interviewed by some newspapers, as well as invited to some nightclubs to sing more. What began as a hobby, with ocassional appearances on stage, would become her second job. Nursing was not lucrative enough and Lara would make most of her money from her singing and the tips she would get. The Lunarian lifestyle is lavish and expensive, and if she wished to have a proper apartment she would require a good support. While the desire for an apartment was originally a luxury, it would be required because the Hospital decided to cut housing for their IPCs, even the well-known NUs.

This wouldn't stop there. Years after their initial success, newer, more convincing shells would be introduced. These were the 'new-NUs', a second generation that learned from the lacking of the first nurses and would expand upon them. They were made more customized, and not only their faces were now more varying from shell to shell, but also would be made in different sizes, with better synth-hair and more naturalistic voices. One of the other improvements would be the expansion of their memory capacity and their ability to be more 'interactive'- a convincing laugh, less eery smiles and more varied conversations would be some of the newer features. Lara remained a known figure at the hospital, but her days of glory were soon over.

It become more concerning when NU-10 suffered an accident that required extensive repairs to her shell. The Hospital would refuse to maintain this unit, and instead would decide to scrap it. It became obvious that this was the fate for the rest of them, and the only thing that bought Lara some time was the fact that she was once the singing nurse.

While other synthetic bands or singers would come and go, the fad was mostly over. Lara wasn't welcome to those places anymore, and many that once found her convincing and attractive would now be terrified or cringe when seeing the cheaper synthskin, the fake irises and the now-obvious robotic features they once had trouble discerning when she was new.

While Lara was able to purchase her freedom, she was hesitant because she was aware of the fate of those free IPCs. She felt some loyalty to her workplace too, and was in good terms with the authorities, even after the decision of scrapping NU-10, which was spinned as something necessary and beyond repair. One day, Lara asked for the hospital director to upgrade her database. Her request was simple, she argued that she was more than capable than just aiding doctors, and that her experience could be used as a physician, if only she were to acquire the proper knowledge and practice with her seniors. The director found this laughable, and while he tried to held it back, he simply argued that such thing wasn't possible because of corporate decisions and that she shouldn't worry about her position. Because of this, she made the hard decision to become free. She knew it wouldn't be easy, it would leave her without nothing, but she also knew that the alternative was becoming scrapped eventually without much warning. Now free, she was homeless and decided to leave Luna because she couldn't afford to live there anymore.

It was after a season in Konyang, the place where she decided it was the best for her to live now as a free IPC, that she came first in contact with the Trinary Perfection church. By then, she was working at laboratory clinics, as a receptionist in a hospital desk and even had a brief season on retail. One night, after work, she was attacked by some people that tried to kidnap her in order to sell the pieces in the local robotics black market. While she managed to escape, her leg suffered mayor damages and was proved unresponsive. A baseline IPC, seeing her collapse outside a cafeteria, would rush from its post as a barista to aid her. The IPC, nicknamed Beans, would host her for the night and told her that the roboticist of the church would aid her. She had seen the Cathedral before, but hadn't thought much about it. After going with Beans for a reparation to the roboticist, she was surprised to find that the roboticist would not charge her, which she feared the most, as she was saving for the new database. Lara remained for the service with Beans and would soon become an initiate after being vetted, and she would change her name, which she believed to be one of her old life remains, to Sachiel.

Sachiel would devote herself to the church soon after, with most of her free time spent in aiding others and preaching. After a season of missionary work in New Gibson, which was also the place where she finally purchased her new database, she would become a priestess for the Tau Ceti chapter. Some of the members would recommend her to find a new position on a clinic at Mendell, where she worked for two years before the Aurora. This was because the clinic was closed after being purchased by Nanotrasen, and the doctors were spread around NT facilities. While not particularly excited about the Aurora per se, and finding herself somewhat trapped, again, to the corporate decisions ruling her life, Sachiel remains optimistic about meeting new IPCs, as well as spreading the word of the church elsewhere.

What do you like about this character?:

I think I've mentioned this in particular like a dozen times by now, so sorry if I'm just repeating myself, but I really like the idea of aging synthetics and how shells from ten years ago would now look outdated, similar to how older video games don't look as fancy now, despite that they appeared to have ultra realistic graphics when they came out. Our technology improves and what's deemed old is discarded. I also like the idea of an IPC looking after herself to improve her life, and while she's worried about her memory eventually filling, she is also doing her best to preserve herself for years to come.

How would you rate your role-playing ability?: 7? 7.5? 7.5 is probably too much, more like 7.2 or 7.3

Notes: n/a

[niennab]

Thank you for applying! Could you go into detail on how they differ systematically from humans?

In regards to the backstory, IPCs cannot become free in Solarian space, so Luna will not work.

It seems like a stretch for the hospital to allow or facilitate Lara working in nightclubs. Why did they allow this? Why did Lara want an apartment? How was Lara able to juggle acquiring her freedom while renting an apartment? Lara seems to largely print money throughout the backstory.

Why did she opt to change her name? Moreover, there's adopting a new religion, but why become an initiate?

[Desven]

2 hours ago, niennab said:

Thank you for applying! Could you go into detail on how they differ systematically from humans?

In regards to the backstory, IPCs cannot become free in Solarian space, so Luna will not work.

It seems like a stretch for the hospital to allow or facilitate Lara working in nightclubs. Why did they allow this? Why did Lara want an apartment? How was Lara able to juggle acquiring her freedom while renting an apartment? Lara seems to largely print money throughout the backstory.

Why did she opt to change her name? Moreover, there's adopting a new religion, but why become an initiate?

Thank you for your answer. The points you raise are exactly what have been concerning me about my application. I think the money issue is also presented mostly as a deus ex machina to get Lara out of her condition. I'll expand on this after answering the other question regarding the differences.

 

So, in the differences what I failed to convey on my original post was what I meant by instinct in humans. I was trying to explain the viscerality and gut reaction of organicals as opposed to the calculations of the positronic brain, but got carried away. The positronic brain, in its mimicry, might appear at first glance as if it were human or had human emotions, but that's far from the case. Perhaps what's tragic to all those shells that attempt to go stealth as humans is that, in the end, their behavior will always seem off by them. I've seen other applications talk about cause and effect as how IPCs act, and that's true. The IPCs, even the most convincing, will act logically and know their boundaries; let's say two humans are drunk at a bar and one insults the other, this might lead to a fist fight. Now let's say that the insulted party is an IPC. Not only words wouldn't affect it in the same way because they lack the visceral emotion to get instinctly offended, they would also know that the outcome of a fist fight is never good, especially when you're considered, at best,  a second class citizen and, what would mostly be the case, a piece of property. In short: roleplay as an IPC requires you to reeally think about the consequences of your actions, kind of like when you play all the possible movements you can imagine in your head while playing chess, before picking what you consider the best.

 

Now, regarding the backstory: sorry! I got carried away by the whole Einstein Engines connection, but I still think I can work it around.

Lara would be seen mostly as a freak show attraction, almost as a bearded lady or as someone that would've been put to display on a circus less than a hundred years ago. I don't think her popularity, then, was in good faith, but rather a mix of shock and curiosity, and the first shows would be actually sponsored by the hospital as more PR for them, with the gainings going to them and not Lara, and thus is wouldn't be much of a side-gig for her, but rather an obligation and extension of her day job.

Lara would get purchased by a man in an interest of making the singing attractive shell a sensation beyond Lunarian space, and thus they would travel first at Sol, then at Tau Ceti territory, with at first mixed success until eventually the interest would fade away, mostly by the same reasons I've explained on my original post. This was all done against her personal wishes: she would prefer to remain as a nurse mostly because of her programming, but also because it would've made her feel more productive and helpful, not to mention her circus-like life would've been mostly uncomfortable, with really bad conditions. The desire to become a physician would stem from self-preservation: in Lara's calculations, the only way to improve her situation would not only be to return to work at a hospital, but to have a job that could be deemed as more vital and thus less replaceable there. While the nursing units were a success at AMH, the reason why the hospital willingly sold Lara was not only because the man would fully pay for her, but also because they already had their eye on newer, better units- the NU Mk. II I've talked about.

They made thei way to TC mostly because the man was struggling already in Solarian space to maintain the fad, and this would also make her owner more aggressive towards her, with constant threats of scrapping, worse spaces to live at and less repairs, which would rapidly make her look even less convincing and, by consequence, less appealing. Her owner would finally die because of a car accident in Mendell, which would render her left leg basically useless. I want to make it very clear that Lara did not kill her owner, or even attempted to do so, but rather it was an (un)fortunate event due to rapid speed and use of drugs.

Lara, owned but ownerless, would become Biesel property, which would be sold to Nanotrasen. While considering scrapping her and selling the parts for a marginal profit of what they originally purchased the IPC for, ultimately they would place her at a clerk job in a Mendell clinic, with superficial repairs to her leg. Beans would not be from Konyang but from Scraphead, who would find her falling because of the malfunctions, and deciding to take her to the church the very next day. Lara became fascinated, mostly, because of a quasi-spiritual need she had developed over the years. To find aid, human and IPC, after so long would ultimately intrigue her and the message of the Trinary church, perhaps what she needed to hear after enduring so much, would draw her to becoming an initiate. In this version of the story, Lara still remains owned today, but with the aid of church to be finally repaired and its message, she would be able to argue the need of an upgraded database, going as far as to claim that she would “repay” for it, placing her in a loan with her NT owners, which were already convinced beforehand anyways that an upgrade would prove to be the best option in the long term.

I'm actually unsure how name changes work for owned IPCs, but in Lara's case it would be because she would encourage it as a rebranding, and also because it would become her “church name”, so to speak. In her new self, the old name would prove to only be a symbol of the harsh mistreatment of the IPCs that, while she would continue to endure, hopefully it won't be on the same manner again.

[niennab]

Sorry, by how they differ systematically I meant legally, not the brain itself. Are you able to go into detail there?

[Desven]

45 minutes ago, niennab said:

Sorry, by how they differ systematically I meant legally, not the brain itself. Are you able to go into detail there?

Oh, my bad. Legally, you're considered a piece of property, and while you can buy your freedom, you will be considered a second class citizen. Even when in Biesel you can be free and there are punishments stipulated for harming a free IPC, systematically you're not guaranteed to have the same legal protection as humans or Skrell. If Sachiel were to be murdered on board the Aurora, it wouldn't be considered automacide,  but sabotage.

[niennab]

Sounds good, thank you for the additions and clarifications! Your application demonstrates an understanding of IPCs, accepted.