Fantasy RPs, anyone?

[Scotty]

So, yeah. What it says on the tin!

Anyone interested in restarting the Fantasy section of RPs? It's basically identical to the regular RPs, except our characters can have "superpowers", basically. An example of this would be my character Rain, who you can see in the Characters section.

Now, they don't have to be new species like Rain- they can look like ordinary lions, but still have powers! Winged lions and tigers were present too, as was a blue leopard-dog-hybrid-thing and a lion that lived underwater.

Is anybody interested? RPs would basically function the same, only with superpowered characters. Not gods, either- one character had the powers to jump really high, make coloured lights and make music. He was very fun!

So yeah, reply here and we'll see if there's any interest! :D

[Leorgathar]

Hmmm I wouldn't say no to that I've never tried a fantasy RP, but I could give it a shot^^

[Deleted]

I am tentatively interested... would have to think of a character first:D.

[This Land]

Awsome !, if there are 3 members that definatly want to give this a go then i will make up a section for you. Just 3 people can RP quite well, and if you have 2 characters each then alot could be done, 2 role plays i am in started with only 2 members (myself included) and they are going quite nicely =3 ^^, plus there is always the potential for more members to join in.

Leor, krissi and scotty, if you want to think up a plot/story then feel free to make one up and i will get it created for you ^^.

[Leorgathar]

Awesome! thanks

Hmm well Scotty, what do you have in mind? I read about Rain, and he sounds like an interesting character

[Scotty]

Great, that's awesome!

Anyway, hmm... A plot.

I have absolutely no idea, really. >.> Hmm... We could have a pair of superpowered prides getting into a pretty big fight/war? Or just a thread where there's no real plot, and our characters spend a lot of time mingling?

Not sure.... Anyone else have any ideas they'd like to share?

[KanuTGL]

^ The Great Battle II? Ah, that was my favourite RP ever... *oh, nostalgia*

I'm currently in two RPs and I'm not sure if I should join another one, but if this goes ahead I might. We'll see :3

[This Land]

Stolen from Pulsar from the london thread... xP

May 14, 2012 2:07:20 GMT Pulsar said:

Hey everyone! I got a great idea for a fantasy RP.... Let's say, hypothetically speaking of course, that the world is destroyed by a nuclear fallout!... And who ever survives has to try get by in an apocalyptic world... Sounds fun right?!

worth a thought aye ? ^^

[Leorgathar]

I really love that idea, like I said in that other thread (lol, and to think it came out as a joke at first xD)

I'll quote Krissi here too, since her setting idea for this sounds quite good as well:

May 14, 2012 4:52:33 GMT @krissi said:

We could change the setting by basing it somewhere in europe or maybe America. After a nuclear holocaust where most humans have died, the lions in zoos etc might theoretically escape and form prides in these countries. We could even RP in abandoned cities and the like and make religions based on the Great Light that "destroyed our captors".

Think of the possibilities... mutant lions, lions against mechanical foes, taking control of human constructions and landmarks... you name it

I don't know if we should take this as the fantasy RP we're looking for, since it's more like sci-fi, though. But maybe we can have 2 different RPs, a fantastic and mythology oriented one, and this fallout one as a sci-fi RP. Whatever the outcome is, I'll start making new characters

[Deleted]

I suppose it depends on how you define fantasy. For me, the main difference between fantasy and science fiction is the behaviour of the characters and the way they interact. In fantasy it's usually about brothers/cousins/fathers/mothers/sisters etc in epic conflict with each other. In science fiction, the books are usually about solving a mystery, surviving in a new environment, fighting off aliens or whatever.

There are a few crossovers, especially in movies. For instance, Star Wars has a futuristic feel but is really about father/son, betrayal, becoming a hero etc. It's a typical fantasy story and even has swords and mysterious religions and Dark Lords. In books, I think Dune would fit as a crossover: Barons and Dukes and politics and strange religions among planets.

I think that just because you throw in a few crumbling cities doesn't mean that you can't have all the other fantasy tropes too. There's no reason you can't have a witch living in a tower that just happens to be the remains of the Empire State Building. Or mysterious religions. It can be what we want it to be. Crumbling cities just provides another background in which to play:).

[KanuTGL]

I'm not too into the "post-apocalyptic" genre myself, but I don't think it matters whether it's Sci-fi or Fantasy. If it's a good story idea that people want to play I see no reason why we shouldn't go ahead with it C:

[cheezeegriff]

Here's my idea:

Since the cataclysm that freed the lions of North America from their captivity, many new life forms have developed. Many once normal creatures have developed special powers, from telekenesis, to incredible speed or strength, and even the ability of flight. Despite this, the world's biodiversity remains extremely low. Many plant and animal species that survived in the old world no longer exist in the new.

Recently, in the pridelands of Mistorin, a disease has swept through the flora, killing off one of only three remaining species of grazing grasses. The lack of variety in the prey's diet means increased chance of sickness and infertility; the lions may face starvation. Studying the old texts, however, the learn of a seed bank located in a cold country far away, which may have the seeds they need to repopulate the grasslands. A number of lions are hand picked to travel to these cold wastes and retrieve the seeds. Lions with special powers that will help them in their journey. Along the way they find more lions that may help or hinder them in their quest.

Other points:
- based well after the holocaust that destroyed human civilisation. Maybe a hundred years? A few generations.
- I don't think we should make superpowers compulsory. I'm thinking of inventing a character that has the special power of being able to 'read.'
- Scotty, if you want to include that green lion of yours that makes plants grow, I think that's cool (he gave me the idea actually). For the sake of the story though, shall we say he can only encourage the plants that are already present to grow? So he'd be interested in getting more plant variety too.

Anyway, tell me what you all think:).

[Scotty]

^I quite like cheezeegriff's idea! That sounds pretty interesting, but I'm not sure about the part about not making powers compulsory... If certain lions are picked, then as you said, they'd need to have abilities that would be useful for getting to the seeds. They don't have to be especially strong, but still... We'd have to think about it. For example, why would a lion capable of reading be chosen?

We'd also need to have a think about the difficulties they might encounter. Toxic lands, animals made insane from the ruined land... Plenty to think about!

[cheezeegriff]

May 19, 2012 11:41:49 GMT Scotty said:

I'm not sure about the part about not making powers compulsory... If certain lions are picked, then as you said, they'd need to have abilities that would be useful for getting to the seeds. They don't have to be especially strong, but still... We'd have to think about it. For example, why would a lion capable of reading be chosen?

Well,
1) How else would they learn about the seed bank unless they read about it?
2) How else will they find the seed bank unless one of them can read a map? Or some road signs?

3) I think the idea of having special powers is made LESS special if everyone has a special power (To quote from The Incredibles, “When everyone is super, then no one will be.") I think having at least one "normal" lion thrown in the mix will help to show that this is a pretty elite team. And anyway, being able to read isn't exactly 'normal' for a lion, so it could be classed as a super power anyway, but at least he's not able to traverse tall mountains in a single bound etc etc.

And yes there will be plenty of difficulties for our lions. Travelling from north america to the seedbank would be treacherous even IF the nuclear war hadn't happened. Fun and adventure for all:D.

[Leorgathar]

Yeah, I can see your point there. If we had a lion who could read texts that would me really useful in our quest for the seeds (there could be science log books along the way with valuable info, as well as other things).

Also, I agree that there has to be some planning about how to set things going and what kind of world we'll be facing, but I guess most of the stuff we'll be seeing on the way we'll be making up as we play along. I wouldn't worry much about that, we'll figure out

I'll be playing a jaguar for this one, they don't need to be all lions, right?

[Deleted]

It's probably feasible to play any animal that lives in north america, wild or otherwise. So long as the rules could be relaxed for this RP?

[Pulsar]

The rules can be lieniant enough, I don't know (even for a fantasy RP) if we'd really let people start choosing animal breeds outside of those found in Africa and select other big cats.
Last thing I want to see is a lion king based forum populated by wolves and eagles and what not.

Perhaps you guys could mold the story to fit Africa.
Since it is a nuclear fallout, and such a thing hasn't even happened yet in real life, you could assume this to be further in the future, like the year 21XX or something.
The main characters could be animals from the African plains or maybe ones in a zoo or a wildlife preserve. It could be said since its so far into the future that even Africa is now at a 2nd or 1st world stage in terms of development, that means there'd be cities for your characters to travel trough. I mean, Dubai is close enough to Africa and that's a pretty built up city scape.

Maybe the story could be that the seed bank is in Europe somewhere. That would be a much more drastic landscape shift for the characters too, going from the hot arid deserts of Africa to the more colder climates of some European countries. You could also place the bank in England maybe (or former England as the case may be) that means they'd have to face the challenege of crossing the ocean to the island, plus they'd have to travel through London which would make a great descriptive place for a run down destroyed city (no offence TL =P).

That's just an idea though.

[Leorgathar]

Hmm well, I wasn't really talking about introducing new non-african animals like wolves, eagles, and whatnot. I know this is an African fauna based RP site, but with this one being a fantasy/sci-fi RP, and with talks about it being set in America, I assumed that there wouldn't be objections with me playing as a jaguar. I know it's a South American animal, but as a big cat and my fursona, it's been well accepted in the TLK fan community, so that's why I thought there wouldn't be a problem with it. But still, if you guys don't feel like I should be playing as one, then I'll understand and I'll just switch to a lion (or a leopard, if I'm allowed to keep my spots, hehe). So no problem, I'll be ok as long as I can roleplay Actually, I like Pulsar's idea of starting from Africa, so I'll tell you what, if we go with that, I'll play as an African cat

As for the location of the seed bank... well guess what? there's actually a real seed vault near Norway ;D
Svalbard Global Seed Vault

And check this out:

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault (Norwegian: Svalbard globale frøhvelv) is a secure seedbank located on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen near the town of Longyearbyen in the remote Arctic Svalbard archipelago, about 1,300 kilometres (810 mi) from the North Pole. The facility preserves a wide variety of plant seeds in an underground cavern. The seeds are duplicate samples, or "spare" copies, of seeds held in gene banks worldwide. The seed vault is an attempt to provide insurance against the loss of seeds in genebanks, as well as a refuge for seeds in the case of large-scale regional or global crises. The seed vault is managed under terms spelled out in a tripartite agreement between the Norwegian government, the Global Crop Diversity Trust (GCDT) and the Nordic Genetic Resource Center (NordGen).

This sounds exactly like what we're looking for, so it seems like we have a winner for our destination in our quest, what do you guys think?

[KanuTGL]

^ I thought that place was what Cheezee meant to begin with xD

And like I said, I'm not really into the post-apocalyptic genre, but now that you've put it that way... I'm actually quite interested to join, hehe.

I agree that starting out in Africa might be a better idea, since then we can avoid the issue that is crossing the waters between North America and Europe/Asia. And it'll still give us a lot of variety in landscape to play with.

Also, in general I believe that big cats of any kind are accepted here (or so it has been in the past, so correct me if I'm wrong here), so if Leor wants to play a jaguar character, that should be fine, no? :3 With zoos and wildlife parks around I think we could explain away the fact that jaguars don't normally live in Africa =P

[Pulsar]

I wasn't shooting down your idea of using your jaguar character Leor XD
As I said, we're lieniant enough in the case of other big cat species because many of them are similar in certain respects, you could use a jaguar I guess, since aside from minor differences in size etc, they look very similar, I'm sure that would also make for a topic of discussion in the RP since he might be mistaken for a leopard.

[This Land]

I do like the sounds of this ^^. I dont mind any big cat being RP'ed in this, as mentioned there is a valid reason as to why, but as long as we keep in reason and not go wild (pardon the pun) and play animals like Puppies, Kangaroos, Jedi Knights etc...

[Leorgathar]

May 20, 2012 19:26:02 GMT Pulsar said:

I wasn't shooting down your idea of using your jaguar character Leor XD
As I said, we're lieniant enough in the case of other big cat species because many of them are similar in certain respects, you could use a jaguar I guess, since aside from minor differences in size etc, they look very similar, I'm sure that would also make for a topic of discussion in the RP since he might be mistaken for a leopard.

Hmm hold on just a minute... *types "lienient" on my translator*... oh, I see what happened xD It's odd, but I didn't know what that word meant, silly me. =P

Alright, thanks ^^. Then a jaguar it is, I'll think of a backstory to make him fit well here

Wow, seems like we have quite a journey ahead... this makes it so exciting
Just to have some idea: From Kenya to Svalbard

[KanuTGL]

Haha, yeah, nevermind what I said about the water... xD I forgot that Svalbard isn't actually part of the Norwegian mainland

[Deleted]

May 20, 2012 19:25:41 GMT KanuTGL said:

I agree that starting out in Africa might be a better idea, since then we can avoid the issue that is crossing the waters between North America and Europe/Asia. And it'll still give us a lot of variety in landscape to play with.

No, not in africa!!!

I think Cheezee's setting would be hurt if we based it in africa. Then it won't be about lions who were freed by the cataclysm and are starting their own kingdom in a strange land. It'll just be... lions in africa. We've done that before.

So if it were my choice, I'd base it outside of africa. I think I initially mentioned North America because some people here might actually be from America and know what it's like (and it's on TV a lot), but we could also base it in asia, where the lions could meet native tigers, and where there are lots and lots of BIG cities and stuff.

Another reason I picked North America is that we could cross over the arctic sea. It'd be cool to imagine what that land is like... after a nuclear winter, is the ice thicker, or has the environment changed so it's just ocean now? Will we be fighting mutant seals or polar bears?

I personally don't see the problem of having wolves or eagles or other non-african, non-big-cat animals. I was thinking of changing Mavet into a bear XD. Basing it in north america is a plausible way of mixing species of different continents. Why would we let this opportunity pass?? I think most people would be playing lions and big cats. Would a lone wolf or eagle really be a problem?

And it doesn't really solve the problem to base it in africa, because we'll have to pass through europe anyway, where there are wolves and bears.

Anyway, I would support non-african, non-big-cat animals, but I am STRONGLY against it being in Africa. I'll give up Mavet being a bear for that XD.

[This Land]

Africa being point of origin in the role-play, I would like at least some resemblance of African culture, not just in the land but also in the character.

Basing a role-play not in Africa, and going to a place not in Africa with everything but non African animals, i feel it doesn't make it have that Lion king based role-play feeling ?

[cheezeegriff]

Some problems I suspect will emerge if we base it in africa:

1) I see less variety in basing it in africa. Maybe because I know less about the different landscapes of africa than I do America. Nothing much would change until they get out of africa, and even then, they're going to be heading up into Israel and Egypt. Deserts don't really make riveting scenery.

2) Basing it in some future city built in Africa, as Pulsar suggested: that sounds like it's going to require more brainwork to set up. As a result it won't be as colourful. For instance: it's easy to make jokes about the Statue of Liberty from a previously-captive lion's perspective. Making up fake landmarks, fake cities, fake technology for our lions to interact with seems like way too much hard work. So the city would just become a generic city. Wheras if we wanted to stick with America we could follow their progress on google maps:).

3) Krissi's right about my idea of having a pride released from captivity during the nuclear war. If they can mingle with freed lions anyway, they're going to lose their identity. If we base it in Africa I feel the lions would just slip back into being african lions, wheras if we base it overseas then we know they obviously don't belong there, they know that too, but they're trying to eke out a living. It might lose some Lion King-ness, but I would say it gains far more in terms of having animals living in a harsh, alien land, where the prey is different and not quite understood, and where the lions, being freed from captivity, are learning how to live in the wild again. Imagine playing as the big cats in the beginning of "I am Legend." Only without Will Smith:).

[Pulsar]

Well I wasn't going to be joining the RP, I was simply throwing in an alternative idea.
If it is the majority choice to do it as Cheeze suggested (and as long as TL oks it) I have no issue with it.

Just a note though Krissi, this is a lion king based forum, from it's founding the intent was for it to either house RPs with TLK, or at least RP in the general idea of it, I.e. in Africa with said animals etc.
There are plenty of other forums out there that are just for any and every animal type the members want to play. I would rather not see this site change to be just another one of them.
That's why we are rather reluctant about some of the ideas posed in this RP.

But as I said, if that's what you guys want and if TL is ok with it then that's fine.

[Leorgathar]

Hmm now I'm quite torn between the two starting points O.o

I find no problem in starting from Africa, I think the RP would still be quite enjoyable with whatever we come up with from there, and it would make it fit well enough in this TLK based roleplay forum. But at the same time I like Cheezee's ideas about starting from North America as animals in a strange world with big cities and old human technology, I agree that it could work greatly, and I'd be up for playing like that as well.

Hmm I know this could sound like an absurd idea, but how about making both? some could start from North America and some others from Africa... then we can make them meet in Europe (have them battle against each other for a while maybe?) and afterwards they go on a quest together to Svalbard. That way there could also be a noticeable contrast between previously-captive American lions and wild African ones, and we could mess around with that.

...could something like that work?

[Scotty]

Sorry for being so quiet, guys- my internet spazzed out! Just got it back!

Anyway...

I don't think there would be any problem basing it in Africa. Remember, this is set 100+ (probably longer) years in the future, so it's very likely Africa would have changed geographically- building roads through the desert, encouraging plant growth in the desert, striving to make their landscape more forested with less deserts.

And, Leo- that's a nice idea, but it would take a long time for them to meet...

If we did set it in North America- then there is the big problem of how they would manage to cross the Atlantic to reach Svalbard. I have no idea how that would be accomplished. Plus, if they started in Africa they would need to cross many sorts of terrain in any case. For example, if they crossed the sea at Gibraltar, they would need to cross Spanish and French land. They could also go around, through Asia and Russia and Eastern Europe.

[KanuTGL]

Alright then, how about this We start in, say, Egypt? How about Kairo? It's a major city, so we'd get the cityscape setting and Africa location. But it is also close to the "border" of the African continent, so we'd soon be out onto Asia and the Middle East. After that we'd work our way through Europe and hopefully by then we'll have figured out a way to get across to Svalbard, haha... If we make Kairo our starting point, we'd mostly be going through eastern Europe (unless we want to take detours around the map). If we're not interested in deserts, which indeed aren't riveting settings, an alternative starting point would be Morocco where we'd, like Scotty said, figure out a way to cross by Gibraltar and be straight away into Western Europe. That way we'd skip out on a lot of the barren landscape.

We could even begin the RP at the point where the group is about to cross from the African continent and onwards. Maybe they were escorted to that point by other survivors and were assembled at "base camp" there, but now at the "big water"/"border" they have to continue on their own. We would then spend absolutely minimal time in Africa, but it would still count as our starting point, and thus still be on-topic.

And we'll still get to cross Arctic climates (Svalbard is right in the middle of the Arctic Ocean), it would just be a little later on. Svalbard is also notorious for vicious polar bears... And who knows what a nuclear fallout could do to them

And there are also to my knowledge no wild lions north of the Sahara, so we'd still be "freed from our captors" and have to work out #3 in Cheezee's above post.

So, in short: if we start in north Africa, either Egypt or Morocco, we'd get the real big city setting, a "quick" way to Europe/out of Africa, no major waters to cross to get to those and no wild lions anywhere nearby to mingle with.

That is my final offer!