Introduction

This is the recruitment and off-topic thread for the Voyage of the Saviour roleplay.

The lore and the rich visuals of the Endless games always make me want to roleplay in their setting, and after having been hooked again at Amplitude's booth on the gamescom, I decided to go ahead and see if there's enough interest here for forum roleplay in Endless Space. While I'm not against EL roleplay, I think the disparity of the races in Endless Legend makes playing a diverse cast more difficult, and the scify setting makes in my opinion for better exploration stories.

Setting

The Pilgrims, in their endless search for the Endless homeworld Tor, have outfitted a small exploration vessel, named the Savior, which has the sole task of seeking out and exploring remote star systems for relics and technology, and maybe even a hint about the fabled destination. Given the expected returns in technologies, artifacts and Dust, many heroes from all factions have signed up to be part of this potentially historic trip. Given the dangers posed by both space itself and the Endless ruins, it is certainly going to be an adventure.

This story setup is somewhat similar to Star Trek or Stargate Universe in that everyone plays a high-ranking character on the starship, which goes and explores planets. Initially, the setups for episodes will be given by me, but once the ball gets rolling, it's of course entirely possible that other players can also participate in the "GMing", so to speak (However, I will try to moderate things, so that no single person has too much influence). There will be both exploration events where the Savior hits upon something interesting and potentially dangerous, as well as downtime on board for characters to just chat and get to know each other.

The story has started, but this does not mean recruitment is closed. If you wish to join, just post a character, and we'll find a way to introduce them to the crew as soon as possible.

Characters

Each player character will have some kind of role on the spaceship, from Captain to Medical Officer or even Quartermaster. However, since it's a small ship, and the number of "redshirts" isn't much larger than the number of player characters, each of those will most likely have to put themselves into harm's way from time to time and also do some jobs on board for which they probably haven't signed up.

In terms of variety, in the following table I've ordered the known races from Endless Space in three categories: Unproblematic, which means they're both easy to roleplay and their presence on board isn't hard to explain; Limited, which are okay, but since they're more exotic or have stranger moralities, they shouldn't make up more than a third of the crew; and Exotic, which are so far out there in terms of rarity or playability that there will be lengthy discussions before a hero is approved, and there really shouldn't be more than two of those.

When choosing a race, you should keep in mind that Limited and Exotic will mean more effort during roleplay, both as the character has an alien morality or biology, and that other crew members will most likely be less familiar and therefore more reserved towards them.

Every player hero has been touched by Dust (which is why races technically without a concept of individual consciousness still appear in the above table), but does not necessarily have any special abilities resulting from that. Usually, it will be assumed that the Dust just enhances the natural abilities, so that an engineer is better at repairing or a scientist better at researching, as well as allowing them to interact with some Endless technology which otherwise would remain dormant. However, if you want an explicitly "magical" special ability beyond that, you'll have to mention so and get the approval of the group to prevent the character from being overpowered.

My Character

Name: Ajandek Ylona

Race: Human (Vaulter)

Rank: Navigator

Areas of Expertise: Astrodynamics and Spaceship Engineering

Personality: Somewhat distant and often focused, but attempting to be generally friendly.

Bio: While originally studying planetary dynamics purely out of personal interest, Ylona quickly learned to appreciate those lessons during her day job of piloting spacecraft, when her successful application of those skills allowed her to plot more efficient or faster routes. She was exposed to Dust when the trade ship she was piloting got attacked by pirates and an errant projectile caused the cargo of Dust to be dispersed into the bridge. In the ensuing moment of super-natural clarity, Ylona managed to escape the pirate trap using a risky slingshot maneuver around the nearby gas giant, saving the ship and most of both crew and cargo.

Like all Vaulters, she is adapted to a life of hardship aboard starships and in addition to her navigational skills, she is also able to at least provisorily repair damage on most ship systems and if neccessary, hold her own in a gunfight. She is more interested in finding a suitable planet for her clan to settle on than the mystical Endless homeworld, but she sees this mission as an opportunity to use her skills for more than just retread trade routes she optimized years ago.

Notes: I'm going with the somewhat inconsistently maintained Vaulter naming style of Clan Name in front of Given Name.

Current Crew Roster

Can be accessed under this link. Click on a character to get to their bio. Due to some restrictions on what html tags the forum likes, it can't be embedded directly. Beneath the name are the tasks associated with a lower rank that the character also has to do. The job they signed up for is bolded.

Unordered Lore Notes

Since there's some aspects of people which aren't that important for 4X, but more crucial to roleplay, in this section I will gather some more obscure parts of the lore that we'll treat as canon for the roleplay to prevent misunderstandings. If information is dug up that contradicts any of what I've written, I'll change it.

Relative Sizes: The ES artbook gives the sizes of some species, which I'll put in italics. The others are more or less just wild guessing, based on what the pictures look like. From smallest to largest, there are (all sizes in meters unless otherwise noted):

Eyder at 70 cm; Sophon, Mavros, Niris at 1.20; Amblyr, Gnashast, Haroshem, Kalgeros at 1.40; Sowers at 1m for their central sphere, but 1.50 to 3 depending on limbs deployed; Human, Automaton, Epistis, Galvran, Kal'Tik'Ma, Lumeris, Riftborn at 1.80; Amoeba, Sefaloros, Tikanan, Virus, Z'vali at 2m; Hissho, Horatio, Remnant, Vodyani at 2.10; Endless at 2.20; Craver (assuming Bishop rank), Bhagaba, Deuyivan, Illo, Pulsos at 2.80, Unfallen 10m.

Dust Tattoos: Pilgrim tattoos are made from Dust and enhance some of their abilities (possibly based on the pattern). For roleplay purposes this mostly means that a Pilgrim character does not need a story in their Bio about how they got exposed to Dust.

It doesn't sound like a bad idea, although I'm not sure how useful it will be. I've also not personally kept up with all developments of ES2, so for me those are just pretty colours without much information. If we're to do this, you'd have to provide some kind of legend for people like me. Also, I suspect that way too many roles will fall under "undefinable" or "scientific".4

True that would be a problem. Though I think I'll make a key anyways, and see if I can't find a way to organize all the traits.

+EDIT+ Do we know what kind of ship we will be on? I mean I know you said it is a Pilgrims ship but what class will it be (corvette, destroyer, cruiser, etc.) and do we know what basic roles we need to fill?

BlackBird1696 wrote:

Do we know what kind of ship we will be on? I mean I know you said it is a Pilgrims ship but what class will it be (corvette, destroyer, cruiser, etc.) and do we know what basic roles we need to fill?

The Savior is a Vindicator-Class ship, which is equivalent to a UE destroyer or a Hissho Falcon. The Artbook description of the latter states that it's small enough for the Captain to know every member of their crew personally, which means we're at a max crew of maybe 20 people, half of which will probably be low-ranking grease monkeys and ratings (Tell me if that sounds probable. I'm not an expert on ship crew sizes, especially for exploration spaceships).

I'll try to make a rank chart so that people have oversight which positions are still open and which ones are currently taken by somebody as a side job (Like Ylona also acting as Helmsman in combat situations since there is not yet a dedicated pilot). Maybe I'll make it some fancy svg where you can actually click on people, but not promises, since I haven't actually programmed with svg before.

Edit: I managed to get a decent looking picture, but I can't post it, because the forum html doesn't allow <object> or <iframe> tags (actually, it does iframe, but cuts out the link). Also, I haven't found out how to get links to specific posts out of this system, so I can't link to the character sheets, either.

Here's my bio re-edited so that it'll be clearer for other people.

Zennock's Character 

Name: Dr.Laudmas Acromb
Race: Robot (Not affiliated with any faction)
Rank: Chief Physician
Area of Expertise: Alien Identification, Scrap building, Recovery of Bio-organisms, Mechanics Repair.
Personality: Does not panic, rather calm, does not like to reveal private information. "Eccentric and Curious". Think of the Medic from TF2. 

Lore: 

"The captain says that my history is mandatory for me to tell? Then what would you like to know?

Oh. My name? Laudmas Acromb, nothing unusual about that. 

If you're curious, I am called a doctor because I have studied and succeeded at a academy before. Mhmm, quite impressive indeed. 

Which academy? I'm afraid that does not matter anymore as it has been destroyed during a unfortunate event in which I am forbidden to say. 

What I studied? Oh a lot of topics, in-fact I already mentioned some of them on my resume. 

Let's end this soon as I am excited to explore the great infinities of our universe. Remember, there is no need to pay me.

Oh, you want to know my name again? Laudmas Acromb. Lets not forget that."

The lore is mainly unedited, the main things I cleared up are the title, some spelling errors, and I added in a new image. Hopefully it'll be less cringey.