[Accepted] Zyymurgy's Tajara Application

[zyymurgy]

BYOND Key: Zyymurgy

Character Names: Kiya Tseer'akka, Shay Reinke

Species you are applying to play: Tajarran

What color do you plan on making your first alien character (Dionaea & IPCs exempt): Silver with tabby stripes

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

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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 find it much easier to play a non-human character, and I am most comfortable playing as one in roleplaying games, since I feel I pay better attention to the particulars of anthropomorphic biology and body-language than to humans'. I prefer having a tail and expressive ears, and I dislike being without them. Beyond any superficial reasons like that, I really enjoy the history of the Tajara; class warfare and inequality is fun to play, especially when other species get in on it too. Plus I love the whole, "Oops, your species are terrorists and any one of you could be an anti-human" angle; playing a really gentle, sweet member of a "dangerous terrorist" species can be fun. Being marginalized and distrusted, having to overcome adversity because of what you are not what you do, people thinking you're gross by nature of who you are and the threat you present to "normal" humanity -- it can be fun to play these scenarios in a safe, controlled environment where you know if it goes too far and gets personal, you're still safe.

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

Aside from the particulars of biology, meaning different body language, clothing needs, and an accent that physically can't be unlearned, Tajarrans are marginalized. People distrust them and the public conception is of a species that has been going through global civil unrest off and on for the past 30ish years. Add to that, NT forbids them from attaining positions in high command, and the fact that until quite recently large portions of the species were illiterate. Plus -- racists! Many humans are anti-xenos. My Tajarran would be raised by Traditionalist parents, and so would use third person speech, as well as a tendency to not speak to authority unless spoken to, and a subservient nature to her superiors. Tajarrans also have a weakness to heat and become too hot quickly, meaning fire is an increased risk.

 

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Character Name: "Zi" Zirra'sharr Rurrsiim

Please provide a short backstory for this character, approximately 2 paragraphs

Raised by a M'sai soldier who fought in the first rebellion, and the descendant of exiled nobility who served as a courier in the war, Zirra'sharr is the eldest child of the couple. When she was only around 5 years old, her parents had managed to save up enough money to move off-world; having fought in the war, they could sense trouble brewing again, and the continuing civil unrest made them believe it would be safer to move far, far away. Their occupation after the war was a simple life of helping manage the livestock on Zi's father's family's land, exiled nobility that had proven themselves to be salt-of-the-earth despite mistrust from the locals; it was a modest living, but having fought in the war, NanoTrasen was willing to sponsor their visa and hire them on to work as service workers in the Middle Colonies. But in leaving one troublesome situation, they seemed to leap into another; the couple grew up in pre-human society and were used to being treated as second class, but the challenges anti-xenos sentiment provided, while familiar, were more difficult than imagined.

Her mother, Hra'zirra, had been disabled during the war and walked with a limp; her father, Vrrashna, was left with lingering PTSD from his experiences running supplies and messages. Yet both of them clung to the ideals they fought for -- that each being was created equally, that none was naturally superior to any other. They saw this in the human species' ancient ideals, and they admired it. Though they knew many humans were prejudiced and treated xenos unfairly, they truly believed that the ideal of equality was one that won out. Finding this to be untrue in the populous they moved into, they aspired instead to instill that value in their children, and to follow it through in their lives. Hra'zirra saw nothing wrong with regaling her children with tales of glory and honor, describing the sieges on the nobility's cities, the taking of their technology and using it against those who had hoarded it; Zi grew up knowing that her parents fought for her right to be an equal among her own kind. Despite this, Zirra'sharr's upbringing was still very traditional, and she learned to get along with humans the exact way that humans wanted her to. She learned to do what was expected of her, to be obedient to those who considered themselves her better.

Her childhood was spent in a human-led school, but her friends were all xenos, Tajarran and Unathi grouped together for safety in numbers; life in the Middle Colonies was comfortable for her and her younger brother, as long as they kept their heads down and avoided large groups of humans. From a young age Zi had an affinity for the kitchen, cooking and baking catching her interest the way some children would catch interest in dinosaurs or airplanes. The specifics, the science of it, was endlessly fascinating; the fact that the basic principles of a recipe could be applied to others of its kind had a pull on her that nothing else could hold a candle to. When she came of age, it seemed only natural to enter culinary school, and at the age of 23 with a major in culinary and a minor in botany, she began an internship, and two years later, she was recommended for a position in the kitchen of the Aurora Station, following her parents into NanoTrasen's employ.

What do you like about this character?

I'm in love with the Chef class and want to learn how to manage the kitchen better, first of all. Second, I simply prefer playing felines and anthros to playing a human. And third, I love her upbringing, her parents from a war-torn country trying to raise a sweet little girl a million billion miles from their homeland, in a culture they don't quite understand that is strongly biased against them. Being raised by a strict soldier and a gentleman in a prejudiced society is an upbringing I'll have fun trying to understand and play out to a realistic degree.

How would you rate your role-playing ability?

I'm a cocky son of a bitch, so I'll say a 9/10. On sites that have a ranking that goes 1-Liner/Semi-Para/Multi-Para/Advanced, I classify myself as Advanced. I have samples available upon request and am willing to go a few rounds with whoever might need to validate this claim. I'm also planning to write a novel, for what that's worth.

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Notes:

I've asked a couple people for thoughts on this profile, and would love more feedback lore-wise.

Expanded life-story can be found here, is very tl;dr.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

Hello! Our Tajara overseer Hivefleet chicken is currently fighting bears in the Oregon wilderness and has very spotty mobile coverage. He sees your application but is unable to post proper feedback, so I had a chat with him to do it in his name.

While we appreciate you working to include the conflict on Adhomai within your backstory there are a number of issues with the application that work should be done on before Hivefleet is comfortable with accepting it.

The biggest stumble is that your Tajara, Rurrsiim, was not raised on Adhomai, which is contradictory to the main requirement of Tajara applications. Black stripes with silver fur also isn't an accepted color scheme for the M'sai. The nobility are the only Tajara with colorful fur with stripes and splotches, with the rest of the non-nobility being rather dull in color schemes. This is to make it easy to spot a member of the nobility - colorful fur with patterns all over it means you're a member of the nobility and therefore inbred, to popular Tajara consciousness. We also don't know who her parents fought for - which of the three factions did they swear allegiance to, and what does this mean for how Rurrsiim views this faction and the others?

[SierraKomodo]

Hello! Our Tajara overseer Hivefleet chicken is currently fighting bears in the Oregon wilderness and has very spotty mobile coverage. He sees your application but is unable to post proper feedback, so I had a chat with him to do it in his name.

While we appreciate you working to include the conflict on Adhomai within your backstory there are a number of issues with the application that work should be done on before Hivefleet is comfortable with accepting it.

The biggest stumble is that your Tajara, Rurrsiim, was not raised on Adhomai, which is contradictory to the main requirement of Tajara applications. Black stripes with silver fur also isn't an accepted color scheme for the M'sai. The nobility are the only Tajara with colorful fur with stripes and splotches, with the rest of the non-nobility being rather dull in color schemes. This is to make it easy to spot a member of the nobility - colorful fur with patterns all over it means you're a member of the nobility and therefore inbred, to popular Tajara consciousness. We also don't know who her parents fought for - which of the three factions did they swear allegiance to, and what does this mean for how Rurrsiim views this faction and the others?

 

Regarding that point about the stripes, I want to mention something I noted in the original backstory. There was some mention of her family being nobility, implying she'd be part Njarir and part M'sai. I may have misread/misunderstood said backstory though.

The rest of the concerns, however, I do feel are on-point - Specifically the question of who she fought for and their beliefs.

[zyymurgy]

Hello, thank you for the speedy reply! I managed to reach Hivefleetchicken on steam and they were infinitely kind enough to talk it through with me.

First, about being raised off Ahdomai: They said the policy was in place to prevent lore-breaking Tajarran who ignore the caste system while being completely unrealistic. I fully intend and expect to be 1) mistrusted, 2) mistreated, and 3) disliked by humanity as a whole and even my own species, especially as one visibly descended from nobility. I'm anticipating prejudice from all sides and having to keep a lot of things secret, IC and OOC. She also has backstory and logic behind why she would be raised offworld around humans, but I was careful to make sure that her parents raised her traditionally and she spent her formative first 5 years on Ahdomai, to create a realistic Tajarran who fits in with other Tajarran.

As for her fur pattern: her mother was pure M'sai, silver, and her father is mixed disgraced noble and M'sai, cream with slightly darker stripes. I was thinking a fur pattern like this, if possible? If not, plain silver is my second choice, but I am more than ready to be seen as "dirty noble scum" by my own people, and discussed what this would mean for my character.

And as for which side her parents were/are on: they were both Rebels, and fought for liberation. Her father survived, despite visibly being noble, because he's a second generation exile and his family had proved to their clan that they could be trusted. Her mother was nearly killed, and is now disabled.

I'm totally open to changing these sticking points, though, and if it's a hard no with the team still, I can modify the character without truly changing who she is.

And it may be missed since it's a footnote, but I did write about 8-9 paragraphs of detailed backstory for who she is, who her parents are, where they come from and what they believe. Massively tl;dr but I had a long, hard think on why she is the way she is, instead of arbitrarily deciding things that sound cool with no logical followthrough.

Thanks for considering me and working with me!

[hivefleetchicken]

Right, I've been thinking non-stop about this application.

On one hand, it's a tad on the weird side due to it being a fursona, and it falls short of the application requirements.

However on the other hand, the effort is all there and your reasoning for breaking the rules is there too - in copious detail.

After talking with you a lot on every little detail of this, I think you understand the race lore (and how to make a character that coincides with it rather than your furaffinity account or whatever) heavily - more than other people I've accepted who aren't even changing it from a pre-existing fursona. From what I've gathered from my many talks with you about this application, you've got a lot of investment in the conflict and consequences from being a runaway snowflake just as much as you are invested in the original character. I'm really grateful for this because I'm not totally offended at what you've tried to put into my race.

Your RP (from what I can tell by the backstory), your grammar, your Tajaran terminology and history, it's all stellar. Great work on the application, please don't spam yiff every second on the station. Thanks.

This Application is accepted.