unathi [Denied] ClemTheDuck makes a sinta - Unathi Whitelist Application

[ClemTheDuck]

BYOND Key: ClemTheDuck
Character Names: Yukio Takano, Scout Tanaka, Niko Pelz
Species you are applying to play: Unathi
What color do you plan on making your first alien character: red/maroon
Have you read our lore section's page on this species?: Yes

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:
Playing a xeno race on its own is something ive always wanted to do. Unathi have a specific martial and feudal culture that appeals to me. I really enjoy the idea of playing a character with a strict moral code, someone who values honour and respect in others. The Hegemony and its focus on clans and clan loyalty gives a really good stage in which to make said character. The history and general disparity between Unathi culture and other cultures creates oppurtunity for unique interactions between Sinta and other races, and also allows for contention and growth, with say a Hegemony char being a stubborn traditionalist or learning to adapt and enjoy other cultures. I would also be lying if i said that the idea of playing a 6-7 tall lizard wasnt appealing to my interests.

Identify what makes role-playing this species different than role-playing a Human:
I think the biggest part is the cultural differences. With the Hegemony having a big focus on clan loyalty and martial prowess. While having a code of honour is nothing new to the human lore, the unathi have a larger focus on loyalty to the clan, over fealty to the emperor. I feel like this gives way to unique character motivations compared to most human nations. Should also be noted that you expect a certain level of integrity from certain Unathi, for example, a Hegemony Noble  is someone youd expect to have a strict moral code, someone who values integrity and respect. Same cannot be said with every Solarian or Biesel char. The Aut'akh are also an interesting aspect of Unathi culture, communes and a focus on self expression, especially through the use of prosthetics, is something that doesent really pop up alot in human lore, and the disconect between the Hegemony and the Aut'akh is something that is unique to Unathi. Probably goes without saying that the difference in biology changes how Unathi interact with others simple things like how unathi tend to stare directly at the person talking to them, or how baring or protecting ones throat signals vulnerability or distrust. These social mannerisms are quite alien compared to standard human social interaction and i feel like can have an effect on how a Unathi would act in a station that is filled with mostly humans.

Character Name: Skaszk Szsk

Please provide a short backstory for this character
Skaszk Szsk grew up on Skalamar, under Clan Szsk. The Youngest of 5, Skaszk looked up to their eldest, Razorak Szsk. Always trying to prove himself, Skaszk
would often rush headfirst into situations, going about as poorly as one would expect. Through his younger years hes trained hard to keep up with his brothers, going into work
in the City Watch the moment he was able to. There he would guard the outer walls of Skalamar with his brothers. 

The weakest of the brothers, Skaszk would find themselves dealing with petty criminals and mundane tasks which they would complete with enthusiasm. Every day waiting
for a chance to prove their skills to their kin. When Razorak Szsk left Moghes, Skaszk was orignially distraught, unable to go with, and questioning why he would even
want to go to human space. It wasnt until Razorak returned home again that Skaszk would learn of the experiences in Biesel. It wouldnt be until Razorak returned to 
Bisel, that Skaszk would realise that their oppurtunity lied, not in Skalamar, but across the Spur in Biesel. Signing on to Nanotrasen as a security officer in the hopes of
following in their brothers footsteps.

What do you like about this character?
I really enjoy the idea of someone who while still follows a strict code of honour and integrity, but is a bit of a dork. Skaszk isnt the best at fighting, but theyre enthusastic
and always eager to prove themselves to their peers. I also think that they have alot of room to grow, coming from a very very traditional clan, them thrusting themselves into a very diverse
and human filled culture gives alot of oppurtunity for interesting interactions and character growth. 

How would you rate your role-playing ability?
I like to say that i can stay in character very well. Im not the most descriptive person, but i think my chars are distinct and have clear personalities. Ive definitelty improved and am looking 
to further improve that through playing different races. Id honestly give it a 8/10

Notes: Big thank to Shadow for giving me the Szsk clan lore and getting me off my butt to write this.

Edited August 10, 2021 by Haydizzle
Title

[Indiana Cooper]

Hi! I like this, but I would love to know more about Szsk's personality and how it's going to play on the Aurora specifically, given the uhh....ridiculous personalities we have. How does he deal with being in an alien culture, or have you planned that out yet?

[ClemTheDuck]

13 minutes ago, Indiana Cooper said:

Hi! I like this, but I would love to know more about Szsk's personality and how it's going to play on the Aurora specifically, given the uhh....ridiculous personalities we have. How does he deal with being in an alien culture, or have you planned that out yet?

In terms of attitude towards humans, Skaszk is pretty distrustful. He feels a bit of resentment due to the contact war, but he tries to be respectful when it comes to interactions. He is focused on his job as a guard and takes it very seriously, but tends to get himself riled up when given an oppurtunity for battle, hes serious about the rules but will probably get into a fight if someone were to challenge them to one. Im planning to have him soften up and learn more but right now hes a pretty stubborn Unathi, he doesent really understand why his brother would come and work here, so hes kinda here to see whats so special about the place.

I feel like hes both interested yet distrustful of human culture, he finds smiling weird and human laughing to be slightly obnoxious. But he probably wouldnt be explicitly rude to people about it. 

[Cnaym]

One of the best role players and a constant delight to see on the manifest. Has been nice OOCly as well and I am happy to see you finally applying for a whitelist! Best luck to you and my full support :3

+1

 

[Shadow7889]

Has been a literal joy RP'ing with Clem through various characters. Takano is a blast to work with in the ISD and his engineer is exceptional as well. May seem a bit biased as he's joining the clan, but I can't help but +1 this. 

LIZARD GANG!!

[WickedCybs]

You are focusing far too much on another character the reader knows nothing about, which is to your detriment here. We know Skaszk was weak, brash and looked up to his older brother. So much so that he figured leaving was the best option when he came back. Why? Add the details there. As it stands the reasoning given could be given for a lot of other species, there's not a lot uniquely Unathi in the backstory other than the names and locations.

More background on the clan would also be good, touching on religion and the spiritual plus some info on where they stand exactly and how the contact war influenced them, particularly some notes about the spiritual at least because that's really important to Unathi in general. It would be good to see if you have any knowledge on it.

Edited August 4, 2021 by WickedCybs

[ClemTheDuck]

12 hours ago, WickedCybs said:

You are focusing far too much on another character the reader knows nothing about, which is to your detriment here. We know Skaszk was weak, brash and looked up to his older brother. So much so that he figured leaving was the best option when he came back. Why? Add the details there. As it stands the reasoning given could be given for a lot of other species, there's not a lot uniquely Unathi in the backstory other than the names and locations.

More background on the clan would also be good, touching on religion and the spiritual plus some info on where they stand exactly and how the contact war influenced them, particularly some notes about the spiritual at least because that's really important to Unathi in general. It would be good to see if you have any knowledge on it.

Clan Szsk are believers of Sk'akh and thus are adversed to prosthetics and cyborgs in general.  For Skaszk, he doesent like to interact with station borgs and AI, not just cause he sees them as soulless, but because as a City Watch guard, the concept is still pretty new to him. As a firm believer in Sk'akh, Skaszk takes his job as a city guardsman and now a security officer very very seriously, he believes he is upholding the balance as a warrior. This of course makes him very fond of medical as well.

 

In terms of the Szsk clan and the Contact war, much of the clan perished during the conflict, leaving the clan much much smaller than it was in the past. This resentment of the war and humanity for its involvement (how else did the Traditionalists get a nuke) is still felt by the newer generations within the Clan. Skaszk is still very resentful to humanity, hearing stories of the war and about the nukes. This resentment is partially why he came to Biesel. Seeing his brother go work for human corporations, to almost die working for them, and to willingly go back, confuses Skaszk. Sureley there is SOMETHING special about Biesel if Razorak is still living there instead of staying home at Moghes. 

[Kintsugi]

Going to have to echo Cybs here and say I am not at all a fan of making a whitelist character that relies on an established station character in any regard. I would recommend making your first Unathi character a stand-alone without prior connections to station characters. Furthermore, in general I'd like to see your character be expanded on. What is their personality like? Their motivations and ambitions? Etc etc. I don't mean to be rude, but as-is this seems like most of what this character is that he "likes his older brother", "doesn't trust humans", and "wants to fight some". In general, again, this application relies FAR too much on a station character to be an effective whitelist application.

[WickedCybs]

9 hours ago, ClemTheDuck said:

Clan Szsk are believers of Sk'akh and thus are adversed to prosthetics and cyborgs in general.  For Skaszk, he doesent like to interact with station borgs and AI, not just cause he sees them as soulless, but because as a City Watch guard, the concept is still pretty new to him. As a firm believer in Sk'akh, Skaszk takes his job as a city guardsman and now a security officer very very seriously, he believes he is upholding the balance as a warrior. This of course makes him very fond of medical as well.

 

In terms of the Szsk clan and the Contact war, much of the clan perished during the conflict, leaving the clan much much smaller than it was in the past. This resentment of the war and humanity for its involvement (how else did the Traditionalists get a nuke) is still felt by the newer generations within the Clan. Skaszk is still very resentful to humanity, hearing stories of the war and about the nukes. This resentment is partially why he came to Biesel. Seeing his brother go work for human corporations, to almost die working for them, and to willingly go back, confuses Skaszk. Sureley there is SOMETHING special about Biesel if Razorak is still living there instead of staying home at Moghes. 

Some good details here. That's all I wanted to ask. Good luck with the app.

[Haydizzle]

On 03/08/2021 at 00:45, ClemTheDuck said:

Character Name: Skaszk Szsk

There is nothing wrong with making a character utilizing lore someone else came up with; collaboration, sharing notes, and utilizing someone else's "auto canon" is a wonderful thing to see. Nonetheless, I do need to ask some additional questions to gauge your understanding of the lore and its themes. Feel free to send the answers of these here or to me in private:

1) What does Skaszk think of the Aut'akh and their place in Unathite society?

2) How does Skaszk feel about unathi society? Does he stand to benefit from it, or is he destined to become an outsider?

3) Let's talk OOC for a moment: Skaszk seems to put his brother on a pedestal. Is that destined to bite him in the tail? Does he think a little too highly of his brother, and if so, do you think this will lead to conflict in some form, whether with himself, his brother, or another party?

Thanks again for your time put into the application.

Edited August 5, 2021 by Haydizzle

[ClemTheDuck]

1 hour ago, Haydizzle said:

There is nothing wrong with making a character utilizing lore someone else came up with; collaboration, sharing notes, and utilizing someone else's "auto canon" is a wonderful thing to see. Nonetheless, I do need to ask some additional questions to gauge your understanding of the lore and its themes. Feel free to send the answers of these here or to me in private:

1) What does Skaszk think of the Aut'akh and their place in Unathite society?

2) How does Skaszk feel about unathi society? Does he stand to benefit from it, or is he destined to become an outsider?

3) Let's talk OOC for a moment: Skaszk seems to put his brother on a pedestal. Is that destined to bite him in the tail? Does he think a little too highly of his brother, and if so, do you think this will lead to conflict in some form, whether with himself, his brother, or another party?

Thanks again for your time put into the application.

1. As someone who spent nearly all their life living in a noble house in the Hegemony working as a city guard, Skaszk is quite distrustful of Aut'akh. As a warrior he believes in the strength of his own flesh, and thus does not agree with the idea of body augmentation being the key to greater resolve. He mostly sees them as misguided, and is wary of them.

2. Skaszk believes in tradition and duty, the old ways need to be respected and upheld, but you must do what is right for all Sinta, is his thoughts. For his whole life so far that belief has benefited him, but then again he has been mostly sheltered from outside views, being surrounded and working for the Hegemony. But now that hes in Biesel, interacting with people from diffrerent races and Unathi from different cultures, i think his beliefs are gonna be tested/changed, keep in mind he is still young, and has alot to learn about the world still. But RIGHT now, he believes in the feudal and traditional system of the Hegemonies, and the warriors code.

3. I think Skaszk looking up to Razorak all the time is stopping him from finding out things on his own, chasing the dream of being like his brother is keeping him from finding out who or what he wants to really be, and his eagerness to match with Razorak is gonna get him hurt. Its definitely going to ease his transition into working in Biesel, but if he is going to grow as a person, he needs to realise that he needs to be his own person.

[Kaizr]

Despite not holding a Unathi whitelist while simultaniously wanting one and not wanting one, I'm going to leave a +1 for Clem eitherway. Yukio, and Scout are both unique characters in both design and personality, so I have no doubt this Sinta will be just as interesting. Clem is a skilled and capable roleplayer who has shown time and time again that they are capable of respecting the lore while bringing something new and refreshing to the table.

 

o7 gamer, become hiss.

[Haydizzle]

On 05/08/2021 at 00:38, ClemTheDuck said:

A reply™

Your writing is good and you have proved that you are a capable RPer, not just with the comments from other people, but from my own interactions with your characters. I want to highlight a couple of things.

Your application does good in that it is a backstory: I have a sense of what the character has done, and how it fits into the lore. There is thought put into it as shown with your coordination with other people for making it, and to this end, I think creating a story with multiple people is the end goal of roleplaying: I enjoy seeing when people do this.

However, despite your application and answers to questions, I feel as though the themes are not clicking from you— of course, this works on the surface level as you might know the themes yet not be displaying them that well. I strongly recommend you reapply, and take the following questions into consideration: how does your character gel with unathi's themes, and how can you write about that? How does your character go against the grain and make themselves an outlier compared to unathite society? What elements of the lore are you looking to emphasize in your application?

This application is denied. You can reapply in a little less than a week from now given my delayed reply times, as I meant to post this a couple days ago. Thank you again for your time, and I look forward to seeing you post here again. Feel free to reach out to my deputies and I with any and all questions— we would be happy to hear them!