Aetherpunk - Victorian Era Steampunk game - LGBT Friendly

[Crash]

Welcome to San Francisco 1869.  Shanghai of the West and Gateway to California.  The city has survived the Gold and Aether Rush of 1849, the Civil War, the British Invasion of 1863 and continues to prosper, even thrive in the shattered states of America.  Much has changed for the port city of the West in the past twenty years.  The population has increased ten-fold to nearly a million people if you count visitors that flood out meandering streets daily.  The docks remain full of fishing vessels, but the skies are now filled with airships of all shapes and sizes and steam powered trollies chug up and down the steep city hills.  The south of the city is a city in its own right, Chinatown.  Filled with the masses of Chinese laborers that came looking for gold, coolies that worked the rails and the Manchurian dynasts that fled their homeland Chinatown is as exotic as the Orient with its own rules and politics.

San Francisco is a bustling trade city that has profited through its designation as a free port on the west coast.  While California became a state in 1850, San Francisco was able to remain independent do too much of the wealth already pouring into it.  It sided with the rest of Californian and the Union during the Civil War, but its mercantile nature allowed for business as usual when it came to trade and currency of the North and South were accepted readily in the markets of San Francisco. While the West was far behind the Chinese and the British in harnessing Aether and the resulting steam technological boom that it produced San Francisco has made great strides in catching up and boasts some of the best airship factories in the world.

While the Civil War had been brewing for some time the British Invasion of 1863 took the Americas by surprise and while the North and South pitted brother against brother and all eyes turned towards each other the British launched an unexpected invasion that battered the Union forces on the brink of victory.  Union forces were pushed out of their traditional stronghold in the Northeast and forced West.  Some of the Union forces were forced to ally with the Confederacy in the South when they were cut off from the Union.  Ironically the south would have fallen if not for these soldiers. When confronted with a foreign invader they chose to stand side by side with their southern brethren and stall the British for a time on the southern front.

None of this would have mattered if Germany hadn’t chosen to attack British holdings in Europe in 1868.  England was forced to pull troops back to Europe to defend their territories leaving the British advance stalled along the Colorado State lines.  Now the Midwest is contested territory a land dotted with homesteads and military encampments.  The Union holds the West, England the Northeast and The Confederacy the South and all parties have agents in San Francisco where cloak and dagger activities have reached a fevered pitch as the war has moved into the shadows.

Underneath its prosperous exterior, trouble bubbles.  Tensions are growing between the European California’s and the Manchurian led Chinese, both influential in business, politics and crime.  The covert games between the North, South and Britain leak violence into the streets while agents of Mexico, Germany and mainland China stir the pot.  Victorian Spiritualism, Chinese Daoism, American puritanism and other darker things clash in the shadows over the rights to human souls.

What is this game?

This is a Steampunk game!  It will have some fantasy elements, but nothing over the top like wizards throwing fireballs, elves or dragons.  It uses an alternate history of the United States and will combine Victorian and Chinese styling for the look and feel that I am going for.  Pulp and Noir will work in this setting too as both fantastic Steampunk machines and dark and gritty horror work well.  This game is a sandbox.  There may be a couple of meta plots, but the players will drive most of the story.  If I get co-GM(s), then more GM stories may be added.  If your own plot takes you away from San Fran for a time (Airship Captain), that is okay we can handle that too.  This game will be very much what you the players make of it.  This is a free form game. 

What is Aether?


Aether is the fifth element, the thing that binds all other elements together. It often defies normal scientific conventions in all of its forms.  It is difficult to extract, but incredibly useful in any of its states.  As a gas it is remarkably stable and lighter than air making it perfect for airships.  As a liquid it burns slow and hot and is used to light many large cities.  Aether had not been found in its solid state yet, but liquid Aether is often used to infuse other elements altering their chemical make-up.  Aether infused coal has led to huge advancements in steam technology.  I could use some help fleshing Aether out a little bit.  I like the mad science aspect of it and I wanted something that would make steam-tech more viable long term.

Spiritualism

I love the idea of combining Victorian Spiritualism with Chinese Mysticism in a game.  I don’t want to go overly fantasy with my steampunk, but I definitely like the slightly spooky and interesting aspects like mediums, aura reading, dark magic, Confucianism, Daoism, Chinese hells…etc…etc…  Lovecraftian horror I think fits well too in moderation.

What can I play?

Airship Captain, Aether Engineer, Smuggle, Ganster, Government Agent, Explorer, Runaway Slave, Prostitute Assassin, Street Urchin, Mad Scientis….anyone who would have a reason to be in a city of intrigue and adventure - Submit Characters to Crash

1. Only real people for Face Claims

2. Magic may be in this game but I want it to stay true to Taoism, Victorian Spirituality or Voodoo. This does actually leave a lot of room. If you want a strange creature in a plot try to give these things a steampunk flare if you can.

3. Take a look at the Character Sheet thread to see what face claims have already been taken.

Rules and Regulations


The following are the rules and regulations set for Aetherpunk. Please read these thoroughly and understand that by applying it is implied that you understand what you have read and commit to it. While we attempt to keep these rules stagnant throughout the course of the game, if something begins to pose a problem we will make a rule about it and enforce it.

Disclaimer : We reserve the right to add rules as necessary.

• Be excellent to one another. Do not fight. Do not squabble. If an altercation between players occurs, please bring the matter to myself or your residential Co-GM (if I add them) who will periodically patrol the thread for me when I cannot. We will be perfectly happy to sort out the discrepancy between the players and arrive to the most fair and just solution allowed. Do not turn us into a broken family.
• Do not God Mod another player's character! Due to the nature of the characters it is easy to accidentally cross into this territory. Please do not control their actions. YOU control YOUR character. On that same tangent please do not make yourself invulnerable to everything. Nothing more boring than a “perfect” character.
• NO PLAYER CHARACTER MAY BE KILLED WITHOUT PLAYER'S EXPLICIT PERMISSION TO DO SO. There is no leeway to this rule. Don't do it.
• Never, EVER do something to a player's character they do not like. Consult with the player before making a decision that you think might be a bother to them, even if they list it as okay in their Ons and Offs. Communication is paramount between players! Please use it.
• Communication is important. If you are going to be gone longer than a day or two, please try to notify the GMs. We are very understanding about outside life – Trust me. I, myself, am a Full-Time Worker, Husband and Dad and I go to school part time. I am busy and sometimes it gets hectic. Everyone has lives. That is okay. But let us know so we're not missing you.
• You are not expected to post once a day. Poste when you can.
• Please have a good grasp of the English Language and Grammar Structure before applying. We fancy individuals that use complete sentences, full thought, and detail their posts with enough for another character to react to. I am not tying certain post lengths to this game, but I beg you not to use one to three line posts. That would be VERY difficult for another player to react to. Use your best judgment, but give enough for the players to respond to. Multi-Paragraph is best. Remember, a paragraph is a construction of thought usually ranging between three to five sentences.
• Please use tags in the header of your post.All posts should have tags noting who your character is talking too, about or noticing.  This will help people find conversations that involve their characters in threads that may hold multiple conversations.  Acceptable tags are: another character’s name, OPEN or CLOSED.  Open means anyone can join the conversation or scene.  CLOSED means that player does not want the scene interrupted by other players.
• Players are responsible for not creating Paradoxes. Players are allowed to create multiple scenes for their characters at different times of the day or week simultaneously.  It is the players responsibility of they choose to do this to not create paradoxes by playing multiple scenes that occur at the same time.

Thank you Faustus and Broken Bonds for letting me pilfer much of their rules.

Peoople Places and Things Thread

Sample Character

Name:  Lillian Nickerson
Player: Crash
Concept:  Urchin Newsie
Trouble: 
Sex: Female
Age: 18
Orientation: Bisexual
On’s: See Player’s On’s, kindness given freely, hair pulling, intelligence, excitement, danger, a rear she can bite into, the feeling of strong hands around her waist, having control, finding someone she trusts to give control to, flirting, innuendo, inventive toys, anal.
Off’s: See Player’s Off’s, people assuming she is stupid, bathroom stuff, excessive pain, no foreplay.
National Affiliation and Ancestry: Herself/Mutt

Appearance:
Hair: Short, jagged brown hair
Eyes: Brown
Height: 5’3”
Weight: 140 lbs

Description: Lilly is short with straight light brown hair that looks like it was cut with a knife, which it was.  Her clothes are what she can afford on her meager wages or steal and are often ill fitting or just plain old.  She does her best to keep them and herself clean however using the halfway houses of the city to wash away the dirt and grim that seems to cling to San Francisco most days.  Lilly is not a silly girl or generally promiscuous, she has seen where that leads for a poor girl like herself, but she knows the value of showing a little leg to get want she wants and often dressed in a way to catch an eye if needed.  Her voice isn’t shrill, but big for such a small young woman and can carry over the clamor of street car and steamcycle.  She has a whistle that can make dogs whimper and is boisterous and ribald personality with a mischievous glint in her eyes more often than not.

Personality: Lilly has spent a lot of her young life in halfway homes or on the street.  She is savvy and quick-witted.  You don’t live long or stay unsullied if you can’t act quickly and think even quicker.  Lilly’s outgoing and naturally boisterous personality is what landed her a small-time job with the San Francisco Examiner as a newsie, selling newspapers on the corner.  It isn’t much but it is a wage which is more than some can say especially after the earthquake. Away from work she can swear like a sailor and loves a crude and ribald joke.  She sometimes snorts when she laughs really hard and wraps her arms around herself like she will explode in mirth.  Lilly isn’t a quiet girl in any way, she speaks her mind, laughs like it hurts and is a bit of a screamer in the sack.  People tend to either love her or hate her for who she is, but she really doesn’t much care unless that person has become important to her in some way.  True friends and loved ones don’t come around often for a street urchin like Lilly and she values them more than money.

Background: Lilly has always been an orphan, she doesn’t know who dropped her off or when, she doesn’t even know when her birthday is.  She does know how the streets have ended for many of her friends.  They are in gangs if they are lucky, dead if they aren’t and prostitutes if things went really south.  Lilly took a different path.  She has made way through life with a ton of street smarts, a preternatural aversion to danger and not a little bit of sheer dumb luck. 

Lilly had worked as a look out, a guide, and a printing press laborer.  Her life was hard, but she had been making a name for herself as being a reliable if somewhat unrefined worker.  Then the Earthquake hit.  Honestly Lilly isn’t sure how she survived the Quake.  It may have been the fact that she was sleeping in a park at the time.  Again sheer dumb luck was in her favor.  The halfway house she had stayed in the night before collapsed and burned like much of the densely packed areas of what would become Ghost Town did.  After the quake the remaining shelters and homes were taken over by displaced people of means and people like Lilly were forced out on the streets to fend for themselves.

Work lately has been even harder to come by for an urchin like Lilly. Currently she makes a little coin selling papers for the San Francisco Examiner, but it isn’t much to go on.  Even a year later the city is still recovering and there are twice as many homeless and displaced on the streets than there were.  Things have gotten a lot more dangerous lately with violent junkies, gang wars and stories starting to circle among the old timers about strange disappearances and macabre happenings.

Know For:  Knowing what is going on in her neighborhood and what is in the current news (in her neighborhood). Enjoys a crude joke (Friends)

Goals: Survival.  Life on the street sucks.  If she ever gets past that who knows?!?  Find a passion to pursue.  Buy or be given a nice frilly dress to help bring out a feminine side that she has hidden.

Plots: She is smarter than she looks and it would be nice for someone to notice that.  Romance is really big here, but it can be unconventional romance too.  Getting in trouble, small large and in between. Lilly is a magnet for that sort of stuff.

Character Sheet Code

Code Select Expand


[float=right][img height=400 padding=8]<insert image>[/img][/float][b]Name:[/b]
[b]Player:[/b]
[b]Concept:[/b]  <A short description about who you are:  Captain of the Airship Vixen, Conflicted Member of the Eugenics League, Coolie with a Secret, Tenacious Street Urchin>
[b]Trouble:[/b]  <Everyone has a trouble. It could be addiction, troublesome family, owing money to the wrong people, arranged marriage, whatever>
[b]Sex:[/b]
[b]Age:[/b]
[b]Orientation:[/b]
[b]On’s:[/b]
[b]Off’s:[/b]

[b]National Affiliation and Ancestry:[/b] <What is your nationality and what Nation are you currently a part of?  How do you feel about your country?>

[b]Appearance:[/b]

[b]Personality:[/b]

[b]Background:[/b]

[b]Know For:[/b]  Is your character know for something?  In what circles are they known?

[b]Goals:[/b] What are your character’s goals

[b]Plots:[/b] What kind of stuff do you want your character to get into?


Game Threads
Interest Thread
OOC Thread
Streets Thread
Residences Thread
Entertainment Thread
Industrial Thread
Treasure Trove
Docks Thread
History Thread
Private Thread

[Karma]

Sweet holy Mary christmas in a breadbox I can't possibly say no to coming back to this. This is my original sheet, I'll update it to match the new format when the game gets going.

Name: Rin Sakamoto, styled “Lynn” by uncultured swine those with less nimble tongues
Player: Karma
Concept: SFPD senior violent crimes officer and detective
Trouble: Aetherspice addiction, a multitude of ties both beneficial and dangerous to the criminal underworld, internal affairs investigations
Sex: Female
Age: 32
Orientation: Openly bisexual
Ons: Violence, altered states of consciousness, adrenaline, spice, power
Offs: Violence against the innocent, white knights, bureaucracy, idiots, old men, poor hygiene
No limits other than checking with me first if you’re going to do something notable.

National Affiliation and Ancestry: American born and raised, has never left the country. Japanese father who she never met, American mother

Appearance:
Hair: Gray
Eyes: Yellow
Height: 5’9”
Weight: 140

Description: Rin’s body is as hard as her personality. Years of using her whipshots has made her extremely lithe and athletic, and combined with her drug use, has left her without a spare micron of fat. Her prematurely gray hair is not naturally occurring; steady use of aethersprite has drained the color from her hair and brightened her yellow eyes so that in certain light they seem to glow. At night, they are reflective, much like a cat’s.

Rin Sakamoto

Personality: Rin is a brusque and rough individual, partly from her upbringing and partly from her profession. She is no-nonsense 100% of the time, cutting to the point whenever possible and certainly willing to use threats of violence… and violence… to get there. Her vocabulary contains a wide range of curses and depravities, many of which come from experience and not imagination. She believes in the law but understands that, realistically, that there are many things it cannot accomplish. Trusts no one. Rin’s very tough life has left her hardened and reliant on chemicals to finish the day.

Background: Rin’s mother was an impoverished dancing girl of no particular reputation who fell in with a visiting Japanese businessman. He strung her along with promises of marriage and comfort, but when his job demanded it, he returned home without a word. From that day Rin’s mother had become a husk, worthless to anyone including Rin, who was instead raised by her wheelchair-bound grandmother. Filled with a simmering rage at both of her useless parents, she struck out on her own after her grandmother’s death. Rin was violent from a young age, a bully to other kids and a threat to unsuspecting adults. At that young age she didn’t have another way to express herself.

Early in her teens, a young beat cop named Sayla started coming around Rin’s neighborhood; Sayla was the first officer that had been assigned to that area in over a decade. Rin was initially hostile to the new authority figure, but Sayla’s patience and conviction eventually won her over. It wasn’t long before Rin would be waiting for Sayla at the start of her shift and walk with her for the duration. They became good friends, and Rin was starting to see that the world had more to offer than what she had known as a child.

Rin’s world came crashing down a year later when Sayla tried to stop a mugging. She had approached peacefully and asked the thief to lay down his gun, and just as he was about to do it, he shot both Sayla and the man he was robbing and bolted. Rin, who had been hiding in an alley as Sayla had ordered, came running out when she heard the shot, immediately understood what had happened, and took the gun from the alive, but protesting Sayla. They had done some target practice together, and since the mugger was running directly away from her, it was easy for Rin to gun him down. It had only been a shoulder hit, but the enraged, sobbing Rin wasted no time in kicking the man to death.

By the time she made it back to Sayla, she had already passed. Covered in both Sayla’s and the mugger’s gore, and dragging her friend the full mile, she burst into the precinct and demanded training. Once the other cops confirmed what had happened, and despite the fact that she was too young at the time, they took her in, being short on personnel already. Given that she was a complete unknown to the criminal scene and was already quite convincingly criminal herself, she was sent undercover without ever walking a beat. San Francisco was increasingly violent, and very few “real” cops were willing to go undercover these days, much less hungering for the chance like Rin was.

For ten years, Rin worked in the criminal underworld. She became known to her (mostly Chinese) overlords and ladies as 暴虬炸:  Bào Qiú Zhà, “Savage Dragon Bomb” for her explosive temper and lack of pity. Once she had proven herself, much of her early work was as a bodyguard, and later as a courier. Her athleticism and drive were such that An Xue Meng, one of her primary patrons, gifted her a fairly new invention: a suit of torso armor with built-in, wrist-mounted metal whips with clamps on the end that allowed for flying through the city as if it were the jungle and the vines were attached to her and not the trees.

After a decade of service (to both law enforcement and crime), An Xue Meng took Rin aside and gently made her aware that she, at least, had long ago found out about Rin’s double agency. An encouraged Rin to “go legitimate” before the cops suspected that Rin had gone native, whether she already had or not. The two of them devised a massive bust of aethersprite that served to show that Rin was still in full service of the law and to release her from her undercover work. Rin was 26 at the time. Her many contributions to “law and order” over the years as well as the public awareness of the aethersprite bust led the police commissioner to confer upon her the rank of Major as well as put her in charge of the violent crimes division. There was no shortage of rumors within the police about what Rin had done, and what she might be continuing to do, but she was far too scary to confront openly.

Since then, Rin has repeatedly distinguished herself in the field. She is always on-site for major shootouts, flying around the battlefield with her whips, smashing readily those who would injure cops or bystanders. Rin typically takes the night shift when not on a specific case, lurking among the rooftops, looking down on the darker places for any thugs looking for a quick buck from passersby. At the same time, she engages with known criminals, both leveraging her position to control their activities and sometimes also helping them. It is her belief that a certain give-and-take with cartels and syndicates will result in far less death for those who are not in the “game,” and looking at the numbers, she’s absolutely right. Death from violence, especially from mugging, has dropped drastically during her tenure.

Rin’s greatest current demon is aethersprite. Soon after An gave her the whipshot armor, she started taking the drug to enhance her reaction time. While years of whipshot use has made her stronger and faster than ever before, she has also built up a significant tolerance to aethersprite, making the actual benefit of using it more withdrawal avoidance than performance enhancement.

Strengths: Dauntless, inexorable, physically strong and flexible, tireless lover, pitiless for violent oppressors
Weaknesses: Arrogant, addicted, stubborn, susceptible to feminine wiles, hypocritical, corrupted, tends to violent oppression

Skills:

• Whips - Rin is perhaps more accurate with her whips than she is with her guns. She can use her whipshot to disarm, ensnare, and strike, as well as greatly increasing her mobility
• Intimidation - Hard living has left Rin both mentally and physically intimidating. Armored in metal and armed with a stony gaze, lesser men break quickly and predictably
• Kung Fu - Many years within Chinese syndicates gave Rin access to a significant amount of martial training. Since gaining her armor, Rin has developed her own brand of close combat that features inexorable blows
• Firearms - Rin would not be considered a sharpshooter, but her accuracy is in the upper percentile of the SFPD
• Underworld connections - Rin knows many people, and many people know Rin. In most cases, arrangements are mutually beneficial

Weapons: Whipshot, custom revolver, retractable wrist blades

Weapons

[Crash]

Wow.  Totally blown away Karma. 

I have the character sheet thread ready in the game so go ahead and reformat and send it to me.

[HairyHeretic]

Tempting. I have a fang shi (exorcist) / con artist that hasn't been out to play in quite some time

shakes the six demon bag

Would this be suitable?

[Crash]

Tempting. I have a fang shi (exorcist) / con artist that hasn't been out to play in quite some time

shakes the six demon bag

Would this be suitable?

Oh my god yes.  Wing Kong Exchange does exist in this Era of San Fran actually.

[Crash]

Here is some flavor of what can be found around town.

Peoople Places and Things

[Kaia]

putting in my hat but I've never written steampunk

[Crash]

putting in my hat but I've never written steampunk

Do you like Victorian fashion, barely hidden carnal desire, adventure and maybe a little horror?

[Madame Professor]

Missed this soooooo much! <3

Name: Delilah Sinclair 
Player: Madame Professor
Concept:  Southern Belle turned Agent of the North
Trouble:  Secrets are her game and it’s those secrets that pose a problem for the damsel. Knowing the intricate workings of the opposing factions isn’t her biggest issue, however. It’s the personal secrets, one in particular, that if it got out could brand her a traitor to the Union. The chances of anyone finding out now are slim, but she still carries evidence that could be damning. Delilah also suffers from insomnia. Makeup and a smile can hide well just how tired she can get, but the burden of her loss, her secret works, and the silence she must maintain about both keeps her up at night.
Sex: Female
Age: Twenty-eight
Orientation: Mostly Heterosexual
On’s: Clever word play, secrets, the ability to show compassion when appropriate, and that British accent.
Off’s: Uncleanliness, discrimination of any kind, pompous attitude, and bullies. 

National Affiliation and Ancestry: A true southern belle, Virginia born, Delilah puts her loyalty with the Union.

Appearance:
Hair: Auburn
Eyes: Honey brown
Height: Five foot Six inches
Weight: One hundred thirty-seven pounds

Description: Delilah is of average height and above average curves. Besides the two holes in her lobes for earrings and a few scars from injuries received since she began her career as a spy, her body in unmarred. She carries herself with the confidence of any privileged southern belle, her posture typically pristine. Her voice definitely carries the southern twang, but despite her traditional mannerism, Delilah can mimic any gesture or posture, and change her voice, sometimes dropping the accent all together, if she needs to. 

Attire examples

Something of typical, everyday attire.  Something a bit more fitting for a B&E.

Personality: It’s hard to really tell how Delilah truly is at her core. If she wasn’t apart of the Union’s agenda, she would have done splendidly on the stage. She can play any part, whichever will get her closer to her goal. But when she shows her true self, it is quite obvious Delilah is a complex woman. Forward thinking, independent, and stubborn, the auburn haired woman doesn’t fold easily. Her will is like steel, her beliefs are held close to her heart. She fights for what she thinks is right and cares deeply about the well being of people in general. This doesn’t mean she won’t defend herself and others thoroughly or that she is squeamish. In the face of danger or inequity, Delilah can push aside her tenderness to release a fiery brand of justice most wouldn’t expect from a lady of privilege. She is far from perfect, though. Her moral compass is a tad eschew. While she holds total disdain for discrimination and prejudice, thievery and assault are acceptable, for the greater good, of course. She has a sass and attitude which can make an appearance at anytime. She is also a fan of sarcasm and witty retorts and she wields them much like the weapons she may use on her missions.

Background: The ginger southern belle lived the typical life of a lady in privilege in Virginia. The Sinclair's were well established tobacco growers, their plantation acres and acres of rolling crops. Delilah was the only daughter and the youngest of the five Sinclair children. There was a bit of an age gap between her siblings, and as such, the kind-hearted child spent a lot of her time playing with the only other young girl on the plantation, Mary, the daughter of the kitchen maid. The two quickly became inseparable. Her parents didn’t really concern themselves with the playmate until much later in their daughter’s life, when it became very clear that Delilah saw Mary as an equal and not the slave she was.

When she was fourteen years old, her father caught her down in the slaves quarters with Mary, laughing and dancing, in celebration with the young maid's friends and family. Infuriated, her father punished the pair severely. The next morning, Delilah’s brothers held her back, kicking and screaming, cheeks streaked with tears as she watched her father crack a whip over her best friend’s back. The full force of her family’s opinion on the people that worked for them finally hit her. To them, they weren’t people, but property and the redhead was completely appalled by the idea. In the two years that followed, Delilah spoke very little with her family, instead spending much of her time pretending to be the perfectly lady they thought she should be. But as she came of age, she became sarcastically defiant.

Sensing the danger of letting their only daughter turn away every suitor, her parents sought to arrange for her an engagement to a brilliant mind. Henri Aronax was relatively new to Virginia, but he had taken her hometown by storm. But most importantly to the Sinclair's… he hardly seemed offended by the more radical and liberal way of thinking. And as Delilah seemed to scare off every other upstanding gentleman, her parents so desperately hoped to make this work. The two had naturally seen each other about in his time there, but it wasn’t until the Sinclair’s hosted a party that they got to know one another better. Tired of her mother’s insistence, Delilah brazenly approached the man while he was engaged in a conversation with a few other gentlemen to ask for a dance, much to her mother’s dismay. She had only inquired to cause her mother heart palpitations, but as the two danced, she couldn’t help be taken in by the gentleman. It wasn’t long before they were engaged to be married, their time together greatly chaperoned by a parent or brother, though the two could engage in conversation and hardly notice the third wheel.

The engagement was short lived, however. The evening of their engagement party, everything seemed to be fine and Delilah had finally decided she had found a place where she didn’t have to hide who she was, with Henri. But that dream was shattered the very next morning when the ginger found herself watching a duel between her fiance and her father.

It seemed over before it started and all Delilah recalls is the sound of two pistols erupting and her father’s body collapsing to the ground. Confusion rushed her as she assaulted Henri, demanding answers, none of which were satisfying. “A ghost,” he claimed, “She spoke to me, she told me the truth, and I took the justice rightfully owed to me.” It seemed her best friend wasn’t the only slave her father had abused, though this other girl died at her father’s hands. Conflicted didn’t even begin to explain her emotions, as she absolutely disdained her father’s views, but he was still her father. Their relationship was ended rather abruptly then, parting ways for what Delilah hoped was forever.

Seventeen, angry, and determined to remove herself from the ignorance of the South, Delilah picked up and ran away. Trouble was brewing between the Southern and Northern states and she knew exactly where she wanted to be when it erupted. It didn’t take her long to find the right people so she could volunteer her efforts, and using her natural ability to talk her way out of (or into) most situations, she was recruited as an agent for the Union. She started gathering information for them almost immediately, and used her family’s name and influence where it suited her. Delilah discovered she was very suited to the lifestyle of a spy.

She was nineteen and her confidence as a spy was climbing when she met the love of her life. Another party, this one a masquerade, but this one was for business. She was looking for detailed maps of trade routes between Confederate camps and the host was a known smuggler. She noticed him almost immediately, looking dashing, when their eyes met. They shared a dance, both seeming to enjoy their time on the dance floor. When the song ended, they parted ways, each coming up with their own excuse. After all, she was here for reason. Certain she had slipped the lingering eyes of anyone, Delilah snuck upstairs to the host’s office, where she found the maps in question. But sounds from outside the door interrupted her escape and she was quickly forced to try and hide, a difficult task in so much skirt. Who entered the room wasn’t the host, but the dashing man from the dance floor. Holding her breath, so hoped he wouldn’t notice her behind the door, but she acquired a cramp in her foot, and the shifting of her weight ruffled the party dress she wore. Which brought her nose in line with the barrel of a pistol.

Being the sweet talker she is, Delilah began weaving words together to keep her pretty face in tact. It was enough of a distraction that someone else tried to join the pair. In an attempt for both opposing agents to keep their cover, the handsome agent suddenly pulled her in close, locking their lips in a heated kiss. All the while, the two fought for control of the maps Delilah had in hand, but she won out in the end. Making her escape quickly after they were asked to find a different venue for their rendezvous, she secretly hoped to see the man again. And there begins the secret she can share with no one. 

The two would find more and more often they crossed paths, sometimes on purpose. And a secret love affair began between the two opposing agents. Their meetings always full of subterfuge, concealed from their handlers, but every city, every assignment brought new memories, weaving them closer and closer together. Eventually they married, in secret naturally. No one could know. For five years they enjoyed a happy marriage, despite their opposing sides, until an assignment went terribly wrong. A convergence of spy verse spy… verse spy.. verse spy. All parties of the now silent war were interested on getting their hands on the precious information of the Aether Engine. In the chaos that followed, Delilah was about to be at the wrong end of a bullet when her husband so gallantly saved her life… at the cost of his own.

Since then, Delilah has lived with the guilt that she is the reason her husband is dead, and his handsome face haunts her sleep. But as they say, the show must go on. She can’t show her remorse, can’t share it with anymore, but she puts on a well practiced mask as she keeps herself buried in her work. Which, a little less than a year ago, carried her to San Francisco. The bustling metropolis is a contested area for all parties and her skills couldn’t be needed more.

Skills: Besides being a smooth talker, Delilah has picked up a fair amount of unsavory skills for a lady, such as how to pick locks, a small amount of hand to hand, and how to properly load and fire a pistol.

[Karma]

Hell yeah, Prof!

[Madame Professor]

Hell yeah, Prof!

-Big hugs!-

It's good to see you, Karma!

[Kaia]

Do you like Victorian fashion, barely hidden carnal desire, adventure and maybe a little horror?

Yessss  *bites lip and groans*

[Karma]

-Big hugs!-

It's good to see you, Karma!

:D :D :D

*hugs!*

[Crash]

Missed this soooooo much! <3

Your character is already added Madame.  ::)

Yessss  *bites lip and groans*

Excellent....

[Karma]

God, I just read through my other characters from v1 and I'm gonna be hard pressed to not play them again.

[Dhi]

Huzzah!

[Swashbuckler]

I will have to find my v1 character, but I am.100% in

[Crash]

God, I just read through my other characters from v1 and I'm gonna be hard pressed to not play them again.

LOL!  This is a re-boot so all characters are welcome, but story wise it will start completely anew.

Huzzah!

Yay!

I will have to find my v1 character, but I am.100% in

I still have all characters archived.

[Madame Professor]

Your character is already added Madame.  ::)

Haha, perfect!

I will have to find my v1 character, but I am.100% in

Yus!

[Karma]

Aetherpunk inspired me so deeply, dude. I put more love into my characters from this game than any other I can think of. All my plans are flooding back into my mind...

[Fury Aphrodisia]

Ack! Oh I want this. I just... I'm not gonna be able to produce a character sheet tonight. But so, so interested.

[Crash]

Ack! Oh I want this. I just... I'm not gonna be able to produce a character sheet tonight. But so, so interested.

You don't have to produce one tonight.  I am going to leave this thread open as long as people want to keep signing up!

[Geeklet]

I'd love a good steampunk game, but tentative about a group game. While I see the rule about not needing to post every day, is there any sort of minimum time frame you are looking for?

[Crash]

I'd love a good steampunk game, but tentative about a group game. While I see the rule about not needing to post every day, is there any sort of minimum time frame you are looking for?

Nope.  Some will post fast, others slow.  I really hope to have a good mix of both so there will be plenty of writing partners for people.

[Karma]

That's a big reason why so many players had multiple characters in the first version. They could have as many scenes as suited their pace without needing to bog down other players more than they could handle.