Post by Disparagingtheboot on Nov 17, 2016 15:26:14 GMT -5
The Durance is one of the coolest parts of CtL, but it's something that sometimes people have trouble with, so why not have a thread where we can post Durances, either ones our characters have or just ideas?
Brittany Martin always loved fantasy. Fantasy novels, Dungeons and Dragons, fairy tales, anything else like that. Her favorite pastime was to walk in the woods behind her house and dream she was in a faraway land, on some adventure. But as the years wore on, she had to realize that the world had little time for fantasies. So she found herself walking in the woods once again on her seventeenth birthday, desperate to escape from the college application process, out for one final burst of fantasy. And that was when the Lady approached her, riding out of the forest on her noble steed. She offered Brittany adventures beyond her wildest dreams in a faraway land, the chance to become a hero. She's lost things from her memory, but she can never forget that she went willingly, no matter how much she wishes she could. Beautiful as the Lady's domain was, Brittany wasn't particularly prepared to be a knight. Playing D&D doesn't prepare you for having all the bones in your leg smashed by the troll you were sent to hunt. But she just barely triumphed, and managed to limp back from her first "quest" to have the bones painfully regrown by a "healing potion".
Quest after quest passed, and each time Brittany nearly died but managed to triumph and drag herself back. She gradually improved, learning swordplay and riding and growing stronger and faster. It was painful and dangerous, but she was living out her fantasies, wasn't she? Who cares if she spent an entire month in agony while her skin and organs grew back after being immolated in the death spasms of the first dragon she killed? And killing dragons got easier. And that was enough to make her ignore the peasants laboring to death in the Lady's fields or the chained servants doing her bidding. Speaking of ignoring, while the Lady lavished praise and attention on her at first, she became more and more distant. She lost interest in Brittany. She found more knights. Soon, her quests were delivered by messengers and not the Lady herself.
The quests got easier, though. Not just because she got better, but because the Lady found new jobs for her. Catching runaways, keeping her gladiators in line, putting down peasant revolts...by that time, she was so absorbed into her role that she didn't question it. That was, until she saw the old man. She hadn't seen the Lady for months. No dragons has attacked the kingdom lately. It was just a routine job: hunt down a "traitor to the kingdom". So she rode out after the escaped servant, chasing him long and hard until she finally came to the wall of thorns around the kingdom. She dismounted her house at the edge of a vast lake and approached him, and he simply knelt down before her and waited. She raised her sword, and looked into his eyes, and that was when it all came down. The sight of the man's wizened, desperate face finally broke through the years of conditioning. She looked away, to the lake, and the noble knight saw the features of a dragon upon her face: scales, a forked tongue, and curling horns. She ran for the thorns, pushing through them, the pain no obstacle as she made her escape. Now, she works as a Summer Court mercenary. The fervor with which she attacks the Gentry and her servants is the only thing she's found that gives her a reprieve from the guilt.
Brittany "Britomart" Martin is a tall woman with an athletic build, slicked-back bleached blonde hair, and perfectly bronzed skin, though she tends to carry herself in a rather nervous, edgy manner. In her Mien, she has black, pointed nails, reptilian pupils, a forked tongue, and spiraling horns coming from her head. When she Embraces the Wyrd, her horns grow longer, her teeth turn into black fangs, and her nails lengthen to slightly curved claws. A reptilian tail grows from her back, and wings of flame and ash ignite on her shoulders. Her clothing is replaced with armor that looks as if it was once gleaming gold, but is now rusted and webbed with numerous cracks from which steam rises.
Another character I'm working on was used as a living instrument of arson by a crooked Fae businessman with a sun for a head. Phoebus works by offering people increasingly expensive deals, then offering them "odd jobs" to pay off the debt, which, of course, only ever gets deeper. One way he does this is by giving them dangerous jobs involving sabotaging his various rivals in Arcadia and expecting them to pay for potions and tools to complete them (or regrow any limbs they lost doing them), and of course he's happy to give you a loan to buy that new sword. With interest, of course. He's not running a charity. She was sent to burn buildings for him, and he talked her into buying an "elixir" that would "improve her performance", which was what made her a Fireheart. He is unfailingly polite, and no matter what criminal enterprise or scam he's involved in, he remains absolutely certain that he is a legitimate and upstanding businessman. Calling this into question is best not done, as it is the only thing that can make him lose his temper.
She has bright red metallic skin and orange gemstone eyes. Her body seems plastic and flexible, shape and mass usually shifting slightly. Rope fuses encircle her, forming patterns that look like muscles growing outside her body. Her skin is embedded with shiny black lumps that ignite when she's excited or using her powers. When she Embraces the Wyrd, the black clusters warp into exhaust pipes that constantly vent smoke and flame. Her fuses light and rip free of her body, flailing around her like tails. Her flexible flesh hardens and reshapes itself, giving her a large, imposing appearance with wide, artificially spherical shoulders and hands. The smells of smoke and chemicals permeate the area around her, and bits of the environment spontaneously catch fire.
One of the reasons I made this thread is because a lot of people seem to have trouble with the Durance, and it's one of the reasons why "the PTSD angle is too limiting" and "but why can't my character have had a happy durance?" questions crop up. Some people interpret the durance as always meaning "you were randomly kidnapped, you were tortured nonstop for a few years, then you escaped", and they miss the almost infinite diversity you have in creating yours.
For one thing, the "random abduction" angle isn't the only way to go. I'm especially fond of durances that started with the changeling leaving willingly, at least initially, or having a chance to back out, or being there as a result of a deal. Brit, one of my favorite characters that I've created, went to Arcadia willingly, and probably could have left at any time, and that's why her durance was so painful for her when she thinks back: she did the things she did because, in some level, she wanted to. Other changelings can channel their rage and hatred towards their keepers, but the only person she can really hate is herself. The scariest villains are often the ones who can corrupt people and make them do horrible things without ever forcing or threatening them. Some of the most frightening keeper concepts I've seen were those who specialized in letting their changelings dig their own graves, subtly luring them deeper and deeper and letting them break themselves.
The "deal with the devil" element is, in my opinion, underused in durances, and there's so much potential there. The Gentry can offer you anything, anything at all. Giving you health or strength or beauty or riches is trivial for them. They can offer you the world and more. They can literally make your dreams come true. (One of my favorite True Fae concepts that I've come up with, who might be connected to Brittany's keeper, were a "royal family" of Fae who abducted children, told them they were the secret heirs to their fantasy kingdom, and then moulded them into cutthroat, backstabbing, ironfisted despots). You're a promising boxer whose career was ended by an injury? The Others won't just heal it, they'll make you even better. They'll give you fists that would make Tyson weep. Of course, the contract that you signed without reading the fine print specifies that a copy of you made from frozen meat and iron girders is going to be the one who gets your career, while the real you is stuck in their gladiator pits....P
Brittany Martin always loved fantasy. Fantasy novels, Dungeons and Dragons, fairy tales, anything else like that. Her favorite pastime was to walk in the woods behind her house and dream she was in a faraway land, on some adventure. But as the years wore on, she had to realize that the world had little time for fantasies. So she found herself walking in the woods once again on her seventeenth birthday, desperate to escape from the college application process, out for one final burst of fantasy. And that was when the Lady approached her, riding out of the forest on her noble steed. She offered Brittany adventures beyond her wildest dreams in a faraway land, the chance to become a hero. She's lost things from her memory, but she can never forget that she went willingly, no matter how much she wishes she could. Beautiful as the Lady's domain was, Brittany wasn't particularly prepared to be a knight. Playing D&D doesn't prepare you for having all the bones in your leg smashed by the troll you were sent to hunt. But she just barely triumphed, and managed to limp back from her first "quest" to have the bones painfully regrown by a "healing potion".
Quest after quest passed, and each time Brittany nearly died but managed to triumph and drag herself back. She gradually improved, learning swordplay and riding and growing stronger and faster. It was painful and dangerous, but she was living out her fantasies, wasn't she? Who cares if she spent an entire month in agony while her skin and organs grew back after being immolated in the death spasms of the first dragon she killed? And killing dragons got easier. And that was enough to make her ignore the peasants laboring to death in the Lady's fields or the chained servants doing her bidding. Speaking of ignoring, while the Lady lavished praise and attention on her at first, she became more and more distant. She lost interest in Brittany. She found more knights. Soon, her quests were delivered by messengers and not the Lady herself.
The quests got easier, though. Not just because she got better, but because the Lady found new jobs for her. Catching runaways, keeping her gladiators in line, putting down peasant revolts...by that time, she was so absorbed into her role that she didn't question it. That was, until she saw the old man. She hadn't seen the Lady for months. No dragons has attacked the kingdom lately. It was just a routine job: hunt down a "traitor to the kingdom". So she rode out after the escaped servant, chasing him long and hard until she finally came to the wall of thorns around the kingdom. She dismounted her house at the edge of a vast lake and approached him, and he simply knelt down before her and waited. She raised her sword, and looked into his eyes, and that was when it all came down. The sight of the man's wizened, desperate face finally broke through the years of conditioning. She looked away, to the lake, and the noble knight saw the features of a dragon upon her face: scales, a forked tongue, and curling horns. She ran for the thorns, pushing through them, the pain no obstacle as she made her escape. Now, she works as a Summer Court mercenary. The fervor with which she attacks the Gentry and her servants is the only thing she's found that gives her a reprieve from the guilt.
Brittany "Britomart" Martin is a tall woman with an athletic build, slicked-back bleached blonde hair, and perfectly bronzed skin, though she tends to carry herself in a rather nervous, edgy manner. In her Mien, she has black, pointed nails, reptilian pupils, a forked tongue, and spiraling horns coming from her head. When she Embraces the Wyrd, her horns grow longer, her teeth turn into black fangs, and her nails lengthen to slightly curved claws. A reptilian tail grows from her back, and wings of flame and ash ignite on her shoulders. Her clothing is replaced with armor that looks as if it was once gleaming gold, but is now rusted and webbed with numerous cracks from which steam rises.
Another character I'm working on was used as a living instrument of arson by a crooked Fae businessman with a sun for a head. Phoebus works by offering people increasingly expensive deals, then offering them "odd jobs" to pay off the debt, which, of course, only ever gets deeper. One way he does this is by giving them dangerous jobs involving sabotaging his various rivals in Arcadia and expecting them to pay for potions and tools to complete them (or regrow any limbs they lost doing them), and of course he's happy to give you a loan to buy that new sword. With interest, of course. He's not running a charity. She was sent to burn buildings for him, and he talked her into buying an "elixir" that would "improve her performance", which was what made her a Fireheart. He is unfailingly polite, and no matter what criminal enterprise or scam he's involved in, he remains absolutely certain that he is a legitimate and upstanding businessman. Calling this into question is best not done, as it is the only thing that can make him lose his temper.
She has bright red metallic skin and orange gemstone eyes. Her body seems plastic and flexible, shape and mass usually shifting slightly. Rope fuses encircle her, forming patterns that look like muscles growing outside her body. Her skin is embedded with shiny black lumps that ignite when she's excited or using her powers. When she Embraces the Wyrd, the black clusters warp into exhaust pipes that constantly vent smoke and flame. Her fuses light and rip free of her body, flailing around her like tails. Her flexible flesh hardens and reshapes itself, giving her a large, imposing appearance with wide, artificially spherical shoulders and hands. The smells of smoke and chemicals permeate the area around her, and bits of the environment spontaneously catch fire.
One of the reasons I made this thread is because a lot of people seem to have trouble with the Durance, and it's one of the reasons why "the PTSD angle is too limiting" and "but why can't my character have had a happy durance?" questions crop up. Some people interpret the durance as always meaning "you were randomly kidnapped, you were tortured nonstop for a few years, then you escaped", and they miss the almost infinite diversity you have in creating yours.
For one thing, the "random abduction" angle isn't the only way to go. I'm especially fond of durances that started with the changeling leaving willingly, at least initially, or having a chance to back out, or being there as a result of a deal. Brit, one of my favorite characters that I've created, went to Arcadia willingly, and probably could have left at any time, and that's why her durance was so painful for her when she thinks back: she did the things she did because, in some level, she wanted to. Other changelings can channel their rage and hatred towards their keepers, but the only person she can really hate is herself. The scariest villains are often the ones who can corrupt people and make them do horrible things without ever forcing or threatening them. Some of the most frightening keeper concepts I've seen were those who specialized in letting their changelings dig their own graves, subtly luring them deeper and deeper and letting them break themselves.
The "deal with the devil" element is, in my opinion, underused in durances, and there's so much potential there. The Gentry can offer you anything, anything at all. Giving you health or strength or beauty or riches is trivial for them. They can offer you the world and more. They can literally make your dreams come true. (One of my favorite True Fae concepts that I've come up with, who might be connected to Brittany's keeper, were a "royal family" of Fae who abducted children, told them they were the secret heirs to their fantasy kingdom, and then moulded them into cutthroat, backstabbing, ironfisted despots). You're a promising boxer whose career was ended by an injury? The Others won't just heal it, they'll make you even better. They'll give you fists that would make Tyson weep. Of course, the contract that you signed without reading the fine print specifies that a copy of you made from frozen meat and iron girders is going to be the one who gets your career, while the real you is stuck in their gladiator pits....P