spherememing | February/March Test Drive Meme

February/March TDM

Welcome to Sphere's February/March Test Drive meme! This is a great place to get a feel for the game and how your characters might fit in here. Explore the setting, and get your samples and some starting CR all at the same time!

Applications and Reserves are always open!
Threads on the TDM are considered game canon if both parties agree to it!
Threads on the TDM may be considered for Activity Check if need be!

blue moon

So the people within the Sphere City miss the moon. At least, that’s what someone can draw from the fact that as January slips into February, large images of the moon are everywhere. The Full moon, to be more specific. There are silver streamers around the merchant dome, and lights have been modified to have a more silver than golden glow in appearance, even at all hours of the day there. Sure it makes things a bit difficult to see, but that’s not really a problem is it?

At night, several domes have large projections of the moon made against the domes. They’re pictures of the moon in varying states of artistic and scientific values. There's a kind of dreamy music that’s played, and a lot of the locals have silver flowers in their hair. Fire pits are common, and older residents are seated around them, telling tales of the moon and its connection to the waters above them. Some stories tell how it glows and shines or is made of green cheese. They also tell how sometimes there were people in the moon, men or women, gods or goddesses, or animals like rabbits. And some stories tell of how the moon would make people mad, and that’s where the term lunacy comes from.

Oh, and there are a few stories about werewolves too. And about how there walking among the people in the Sphere. Even now.

Food at the festival is based around the moon too, or at least the idea of the moon. There’s mooncake of course, but there’s also moon pies, half moon cheese pies, and pierogi, and various cheese and cracker platters, because the moon is made of green cheese after all. There’s moon-based cocktails, that are blue and silver. And some that are shimmering and shining.

People can draw fortunes from the moonwell, but, they’re silly and nonsensical, and people eat the silvery rice paper after they’re finished with them. A few of them however have more ominous sort of fortunes in them. Things like “help me” or “they’re out to get you” or “they’re coming and you can’t stop them.” People shrug those ones off too though. if someone asks about them.

what big eyes you have

So, there are rumors about werewolves that have been circulating around town, and people seem to be given red cloaks at random. Pretty girls and women are offered them the most, but they are open to anyone. If people put them on, which the surrounding locals will cheer and encourage them to do. Then they tell them that their clue is in their pockets and that they will save the town.

In the pockets is another silver disk with a list of names on it. One of those names is a werewolf. You’re given three clues (something like: ‘wearing a blue sweater’ or ‘bald man’ or ‘at the candy stall’) for each one, and then you either accuse them of being a werewolf or clear them. If you accuse them and you’re correct then you’re given a small vial with glowing stones in it and are told that they were actually pieces of the moon before it was lost. Whatever that means. You may want to hold onto them.

If you accuse them and you’re wrong, the game is over for you for the moment and the cloak is taken away. Each cloak has a different list of six names on it, and the names replenish every time someone gets a new cloak. Why yes, the Sphere is playing a game of werewolf with you. How the game goes entirely up to you, and whether or not your character gets invested or what. NPCs are definitely available for this if need be! Please feel free to go a little nuts with this, and player characters can definitely be one of the suspects if they're up for it.

exploration: something that was lost can be found

It’s big news around Sphere City: some old lost and sealed domes have been found along the edges of town. Not only have they been found, but they’re open! Not only are they open but the stuff inside is there on a first come first serve basis. These old domes show no signs of dust, but there are some personal effects within them, pictures and the like. They definitely belonged to someone who had been pulled into the city at some point within the last seven years.

And they’re definitely worth checking out. One never knows one might find in them. Various varieties of clothing are available, as are books, food items (probably shouldn’t eat them), toys and there may or may not be some magical or important historical things hidden here or there if your character is very lucky. Mod note: Nothing world breaky or living can be found, but small things like potions or jewelry or amulets or small weapons (daggers or guns with a very limited amount of bullets.)

mechanic: memory share

Too see the full updates on how memory shares work, please visit here

Memory shares are experienced over the networked, and beamed directly into the other person's brains as if they are experiencing it themselves.
Shares do not need to be written a certain way, but here is a mod example: Too see the full updates on how memory shares work, please visit Max Tinder memory share.
These memories are things that they are watching through the experience of the person who's memory has already happened. It's like seeing a recording that feels very real. However, there isn't anything that they can personally do within it. These are things that have already happened to the character and are fixed points.
These posts are responded to like a message on the network, and not in the memory itself.

wildcard

This is a good place to test out something like the network or an idea of your own! Remember upon waking in The Sphere, each character is fitted with a small golden circle behind their right ear. This is how they are connected to the network through a neural link. Touch and hold the button to create a broadcast of one of three types:

Audio. Your character thinks audible words onto the network.
Writing: Your character thinks text into the network.
Video. Your character projects a broadcast of a video of themselves onto the network.

Replies are determined by the player. The network needs to be accessed by choice, so character broadcasts are not automatically beamed directly into people’s heads. The Sphere isn’t that rude.

Private messages are allowed by pressing and holding and pressing and holding again as you picture the person in your mind. This can be an image or a name, err more on the side of things being more accessible than less.

photo inspiration

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It is. I did not experience this personally, but I witnessed it happening to others.

Troubling indeed, and likely even more so, if you'd only just arrived. I'm very sorry.

Well, at least we're all together for it, I suppose? A group of strangers can be a family if hardship forces them to be.

That is one way to approach this and likely the better way to do so.

[He chuckled, and his tone is light, if slightly strained, when he responds. He's not taking this sudden displacement as well as he's pretending.]

I've never met a person capable of having the world alone, Daenerys. I've only ever met egos that didn't allow themselves to admit it.

Unfortunately, those who brought us here own this world. We merely inhabit it and remain at their whims.

No, Daenerys. They only seem to, but all things are transient, and it's rare a master is never shaken.

You have a great deal of faith for a world you have not been in very long.

In my life, I've known a great many people and many groups of them. Groups of one mind have toppled nations, borders, ideals. People are not to be underestimated. They never sit idle long.

I understand that. I have seen and experienced something similar. It can be a shocking, horrific thing but also a tool for good, depending on who wields it and their reasoning.

Not always. Reason can turn to excuse if it's left unchecked.

When it is to free others? To end suffering for the downtrodden?

Yes, even then. Not all ends justify their means.

I cannot agree. When someone is in bondage and it is in your power to save them, you should not stand by.

And if those who held them did so under pain of death, or their families were held as ransom, would killing them be justified, even if, in doing so, you've also murdered their families, innocent people?

Many of those held were not with their families. They were taken as children. Young girls, not even women, forced to "entertain" their masters. Boys are tortured until they feel nothing, forced to fight and die for their masters. How can that be ignored?

I never suggested ignoring it, but sometimes there are other ways. Other times, there's a call for revolution and war, but war makes orphans and beggars of children. It shouldn't be chosen lightly.

Unfortunately, orphans are made even in peace time as well.

Yes, and it's often at the hands of leaders who believe they're making the right sacrifices. Sometimes they are.

Not always. Illness, poverty, birth, many of these things can leave children orphans.

Yes, and all those variables make any solution complicated.

Forgive me we stumbled into a darker topic than the one you sought answers to.

I don't mind if you don't. The best conversations meander into topics no one anticipated. They teach you a lot about a person.

What have you learned of me thus far?

[The smile in his voice is audible.]

That you are passionate and ambitious, those I see quite clearly. I'm also beginning to believe you would rather move at all than debate and plan. I may be wrong, but it's all admirable. I tend to overthink everything.

Edited 2020-02-15 03:54 (UTC)

Ambitious, perhaps. I would rather give up what I have for a home I have never known. Strategy is always wise, but you are right, I do not wish to sit idle.

If you overthink, it tends to drift to correct assumptions.

(no subject)

architector - 2020-02-15 04:05 (UTC) - Expand

thebrideoffire - 2020-02-15 04:06 (UTC) - Expand

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