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OOC INFORMATION
Player Name: Jaina
Are you over 18?: Yes
Contact:![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
effervescible & Discord @ effervescible#8341
Other Characters in Game: n/a
IC INFORMATION
Character Name: Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad
Canon: Assassin's Creed
Canon Point: Post-Assassin's Creed 1; immediately after retrieving the Apple of Eden during the second memory seal sequence depicted in Assassin's Creed: Revelations.
Age: 26
Background: Wiki biography - Events from "Actions as Mentor" onward can be skipped as they occur past his canon point.
Arrival Scenario: Free Cities
Suitability: Altaïr has an insatiable hunger for knowledge. Having recently undergone an epiphany about his purpose in the world and a realization of all the mysteries that world holds, he describes his ambitions to "meet the best minds, explore the libraries of the world, and learn all the secrets of nature and the universe." Arriving in a new universe will only add fuel to his burning curiosity; he'll want to learn as much as he can about everything from everyone, including both the local population and the other Summoned. How do they see the world? What unfamiliar things have they created? How did the Singularity and the Horizon come to be, and what can they do beyond inspire war? He can and will endlessly add questions to this list.
Altaïr also comes from a place and time with certain similarities to Abraxas, which will directly affect how he responds to being there; circa 1191, the Crusaders and the Saracens are in the middle of a bloody war for control of the Holy Land during the Third Crusade, and the Assassins are one of numerous local groups dealing with the fallout. Despite their reputation as fanatical killers, Assassins ultimately desire peace, and will target individuals on either side of the conflict whose deaths would improve circumstances for the common people. Similarly, while the views of those in the Free Cities most closely match his own — and he isn't against working to advance the aims of a given faction if he considers it the most prudent course of action — he won't feel overall faction loyalty. Altaïr's priority will be the people affected by the struggle for control of the Singularity, among other troubles. The way he sees it, he has skills others don't, so he should use them when others can't. This won't necessarily involve murder, but he will be comfortable with societal transgression.
Finally, if he gets the opportunity, Altaïr would like to share the wisdom of his creed, which he believes opens minds and has the potential to improve humankind as a whole. (More on this below.) Even in another world, he would like to see all sentient beings become better than they are.
Between his personal intellectual ambition, his concern for the people and his tendency to philosophize, Altaïr will have plenty of reasons to engage with the setting and other characters. The trick will be getting him to sleep.
Powers: In Assassin's Creed canon, a precursor race known as the Isu once had dominion over the Earth. Some chose to interbreed with early humans, who served as a workforce for them; many many generations later, Altaïr reads as 99.999999999999% human, but has a high enough percentage of Isu DNA in his genetics to result in a few bonus abilities:
Resistance to Mind Control: This is an innate strength, not something he consciously triggers — Altaïr is shown to shrug off an attempt to control his mind through the use of an artifact designed for that explicit purpose. This is only a resistance, not an immunity; for example, a powerful telepath would absolutely be able to read or manipulate his mind, it would just take more effort than average.
Eagle Vision: Through mental focus, Altaïr can activate a kind of hereditary second sight that reveals the disposition of other living beings, which he perceives as a color-coded glow: enemies are tinged red, friends/allies are blue, targets/people of significant interest are gold and all others are a mostly-desaturated gray. This is not a godmode means of categorizing others' true natures; it is based on current intention. A member of his own tight-knit brotherhood who holds hostile intentions would appear red, while a member of an enemy faction who actively wants a truce would show as gray or blue.
Altaïr must consciously trigger eagle vision and focus on what it shows him; he cannot "tag" people for an indefinite amount of time or track their silhouettes through walls as later Assassin's Creed games depict.
This ability would have a permissions post and can fail to work on other characters. It can also be nerfed based on plot needs. In both cases, the use of eagle vision would reveal only neutral gray based on the principle of "different world, wonky results happen sometimes."
PERSONALITY QUESTIONS
Describe an important event in your character's life and how it impacted them.
At the beginning of Assassin's Creed, Altaïr is stripped of his master rank after endangering the Assassin brotherhood through a series of selfish, arrogant actions that get his fellow Assassin Kadar killed, among other negative results. To earn his title and his life back, he must undertake an important test: kill nine men whose actions are inflicting severe harm on the Holy Land and ensuring that the violent conflicts of the Crusades continue. As Altaïr proceeds through this lengthy task, he discovers that the nine men are not individual chaos-makers but instead all part of a group that set their cultural differences aside in order to wield the immense power of an artifact they discovered together: the Apple of Eden, which can compel men's actions but destroys free thought. Before they die, each of them defends his own perspective and actions, and sharply criticizes the morality of Altaïr's. This pushes him to think hard about his own philosophical beliefs and the ethics of complete freedom in a world filled with violence and suffering.
Altaïr emerges from the test a changed man — humbler, wiser and firmer in his beliefs — only to discover that his master and mentor Al Mualim is the unknown tenth conspirator, and had assigned the test not for Altaïr's benefit but to ensure no one else could control the Apple. Not only has he betrayed all the tenets that Altaïr has just re-embraced, he has personally betrayed Altaïr, who can either submit to Al Mualim's will or fight him to the death. He chooses the latter.
This is a massive betrayal on multiple levels. Not only does the closest thing Altaïr has to a living father — Al Mualim is the only person Altaïr shows respect for or desires approval from even in his most arrogant moments — try to kill him once he is no longer useful, it undermines everything he has learned over the course of the test.
It would be easy for Altaïr to let rage overtake him, but although he is clearly very angry when confronting Al Mualim, at the end of their physical battle Altaïr strikes the final blow and speaks to his dying master with focus and discipline. He executes Al Mualim not for his personal betrayal but for the betrayal of the creed. It is this difference in mindset that firmly sets Altaïr on the path he will walk for the rest of his life: a committed leader who will take the lessons learned during his test and his greater understanding of what the Assassins stand for and apply them for the betterment of the brotherhood and, Altaïr hopes, the world itself.
Does your character have a moral code, or other set of standards they try to live by?
Altaïr lives by a creed espoused by the brotherhood of Assassins for generations. An Assassin's creed, if you will. As one born to the Assassins, he accepted it as established dogma in his earlier years; now, he fully embraces it with the maturity of an adult who has examined his beliefs and mindfully committed to them. The creed's central maxim, "Nothing is true; everything is permitted" is a guiding philosophy that is just broad enough for its adherents to draw unique meaning based on their personal circumstances and cultural context while still providing a central guideline: that the rules governing society are artificial and illusory, and that humans are not truly bound by them but are capable of transcending those restrictions and forging their own futures.
The creed also includes three much more specific tenets:
Stay your blade from the flesh of an innocent
Hide in plain sight
Never compromise the brotherhood
These guidelines are both moral and practical ones that allow the Assassins to continue to thrive as a group and perform their work more effectively. Just months ago, Altaïr was an arrogant prodigy who thought that the maxim allowed him to do whatever he thought was best, but having to defend his stance and discuss the meaning of his actions during his test forces Altaïr to decide what he actually believes and why.
Today, Altaïr is a true believer in the creed, having come to the conclusion that it "does not command us to be free. It commands us to be wise." He would never attempt to force anyone to follow it, but his great hope is that people even outside the brotherhood can discover its wisdom, learn from it and open their minds; that they can avoid blind faith and obedience in favor of pursuing knowledge and forge their own paths.
Outside of the creed's specific tenets, Altaïr generally despises slavery, violence against women and children, and enforced order over individual freedom. Even before he sheds his arrogant ways, he is known to lend aid to citizens he observes being abused by city guards or others in power over them. His hands are not clean; while he will never again harm an innocent, he has no qualms about murder, and is well aware of the creed's three great ironies (that they seek to promote peace but murder is their means; that they seek to open the minds of men but require obedience to a master and set of rules; that they seek to reveal the danger of blind faith but remain practitioners themselves). He has not yet found an answer to resolve the conflict, instead considering that being two opposite things at once may simply be in the Assassins' nature.
What quality or qualities do they admire most?
Altaïr respects clarity of mind and independent thought more than anything else, even among his enemies. Having the capacity for such things does not guarantee that people will reach the same conclusions, but he views them as absolutely vital in order to see reality as it is, eventually noting that "only a mind free of impediment is capable of grasping the chaotic beauty of the world." These attributes also lay the foundation for belief in freedom of choice, which Altaïr considers a bedrock principle. He may privately despair that many people will never turn away from the illusions and arbitrary moral rules presented by various religions, for example, but he would never attempt to force them from their beliefs, even though possession of the Apple of Eden could credibly give him the power to do so.
Altaïr also highly values the willingness to question everything. This is very much a quality he has, but for a long time it was twisted. As an Assassin, he is taught to notice and question the difference between what people are told to be true and what he observes to be true. However, at the height of his arrogance, he "questions" by pushing back on absolutely everything and refusing to accept the strictures of the very tenets meant to guide him. By the end of the game, he has learned to apply his questions in good faith and with a true desire to learn from them, but he will never forget that it is within him to wrongly apply his own values if he isn't careful to choose otherwise every day.
Do they have a part of themselves they dislike?
Altaïr is not very good at connecting with people on a personal level. This isn't always immediately obvious; as an Assassin, he is trained to be skilled at social stealth and blend into settings containing a wide variety of cultures, education levels and social statuses. Although he naturally favors efficient, to-the-point communication, once Altaïr has grown past his previous abrasive arrogance, he has enough social grace to give and share information and have constructive conversations without standing out — provided the topics are not too personal.
When things do stray into personal territory, it gets a lot harder for him. Raised to view stoicism and emotional distance from family members as necessary for his role as an Assassin, shaped by tragic losses of the few personal connections he did have, Altaïr is unaccustomed to doing the work necessary to grow and maintain positive relationships. It's better to keep things surface-level, work alone and focus on his goals rather than confront messy emotions, or so he used to believe. Even when he's not in denial about what he feels, it's difficult for him to get the words out. Despite his outward arrogant demeanor, Altaïr regrets all along that his actions resulted in the death of Kadar and permanent bodily injury to Kadar's brother Malik. However, it isn't until nearly the end of his test, when Altaïr has been humbled and recognized his own flaws in the men he kills that he is able to admit it and apologize to Malik without reservation. One of the greatest differences between Altaïr at the start of the game and Altaïr at his canon point is that he now sees past his own defensiveness and arrogance to value concepts like brotherhood, honesty and affection. But knowing and doing are different things; it will take continued effort to tear down some of his emotional walls to find a healthier, more balanced state of being, and he's likely to stumble along the way.
And, about that arrogance...it's true that Altaïr is no longer the arrogant asshole who does what he wants without care for the consequences, but that trait is still there on some level. Believing that if he works hard enough, tries hard enough, then his creed will bring an end to many of the conflicts that have plagued humanity throughout its existence is still pretty arrogant. It may be well-intentioned and directed towards positive goals, but there's still a pridefulness there that is still likely to burn him, even if he wouldn't want to admit it.
What is their sign, and why? The Magician. A prodigy who is the youngest master Assassin to ever achieve the rank and whose achievements as their leader will be remembered a thousand years later, Altaïr's life centers on devotion to his vocation — often to his personal detriment. In his younger years, he prioritizes training and the perfection of skill related to his work as an Assassin (combat, but also stealth, languages and more) because that is what success means in the context of the only lifestyle he knows. At his current canon point, he values them because they are his best means of achieving things that will make a difference to humanity as a whole. At any point in time, Altaïr is the epitome of "if it's worth doing, it's worth doing well."
SAMPLES & ARRIVAL
Samples: test drive thread 1 + test drive thread 2
Player Name: Jaina
Are you over 18?: Yes
Contact:
Other Characters in Game: n/a
IC INFORMATION
Character Name: Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad
Canon: Assassin's Creed
Canon Point: Post-Assassin's Creed 1; immediately after retrieving the Apple of Eden during the second memory seal sequence depicted in Assassin's Creed: Revelations.
Age: 26
Background: Wiki biography - Events from "Actions as Mentor" onward can be skipped as they occur past his canon point.
Arrival Scenario: Free Cities
Suitability: Altaïr has an insatiable hunger for knowledge. Having recently undergone an epiphany about his purpose in the world and a realization of all the mysteries that world holds, he describes his ambitions to "meet the best minds, explore the libraries of the world, and learn all the secrets of nature and the universe." Arriving in a new universe will only add fuel to his burning curiosity; he'll want to learn as much as he can about everything from everyone, including both the local population and the other Summoned. How do they see the world? What unfamiliar things have they created? How did the Singularity and the Horizon come to be, and what can they do beyond inspire war? He can and will endlessly add questions to this list.
Altaïr also comes from a place and time with certain similarities to Abraxas, which will directly affect how he responds to being there; circa 1191, the Crusaders and the Saracens are in the middle of a bloody war for control of the Holy Land during the Third Crusade, and the Assassins are one of numerous local groups dealing with the fallout. Despite their reputation as fanatical killers, Assassins ultimately desire peace, and will target individuals on either side of the conflict whose deaths would improve circumstances for the common people. Similarly, while the views of those in the Free Cities most closely match his own — and he isn't against working to advance the aims of a given faction if he considers it the most prudent course of action — he won't feel overall faction loyalty. Altaïr's priority will be the people affected by the struggle for control of the Singularity, among other troubles. The way he sees it, he has skills others don't, so he should use them when others can't. This won't necessarily involve murder, but he will be comfortable with societal transgression.
Finally, if he gets the opportunity, Altaïr would like to share the wisdom of his creed, which he believes opens minds and has the potential to improve humankind as a whole. (More on this below.) Even in another world, he would like to see all sentient beings become better than they are.
Between his personal intellectual ambition, his concern for the people and his tendency to philosophize, Altaïr will have plenty of reasons to engage with the setting and other characters. The trick will be getting him to sleep.
Powers: In Assassin's Creed canon, a precursor race known as the Isu once had dominion over the Earth. Some chose to interbreed with early humans, who served as a workforce for them; many many generations later, Altaïr reads as 99.999999999999% human, but has a high enough percentage of Isu DNA in his genetics to result in a few bonus abilities:
Resistance to Mind Control: This is an innate strength, not something he consciously triggers — Altaïr is shown to shrug off an attempt to control his mind through the use of an artifact designed for that explicit purpose. This is only a resistance, not an immunity; for example, a powerful telepath would absolutely be able to read or manipulate his mind, it would just take more effort than average.
Eagle Vision: Through mental focus, Altaïr can activate a kind of hereditary second sight that reveals the disposition of other living beings, which he perceives as a color-coded glow: enemies are tinged red, friends/allies are blue, targets/people of significant interest are gold and all others are a mostly-desaturated gray. This is not a godmode means of categorizing others' true natures; it is based on current intention. A member of his own tight-knit brotherhood who holds hostile intentions would appear red, while a member of an enemy faction who actively wants a truce would show as gray or blue.
Altaïr must consciously trigger eagle vision and focus on what it shows him; he cannot "tag" people for an indefinite amount of time or track their silhouettes through walls as later Assassin's Creed games depict.
This ability would have a permissions post and can fail to work on other characters. It can also be nerfed based on plot needs. In both cases, the use of eagle vision would reveal only neutral gray based on the principle of "different world, wonky results happen sometimes."
PERSONALITY QUESTIONS
Describe an important event in your character's life and how it impacted them.
At the beginning of Assassin's Creed, Altaïr is stripped of his master rank after endangering the Assassin brotherhood through a series of selfish, arrogant actions that get his fellow Assassin Kadar killed, among other negative results. To earn his title and his life back, he must undertake an important test: kill nine men whose actions are inflicting severe harm on the Holy Land and ensuring that the violent conflicts of the Crusades continue. As Altaïr proceeds through this lengthy task, he discovers that the nine men are not individual chaos-makers but instead all part of a group that set their cultural differences aside in order to wield the immense power of an artifact they discovered together: the Apple of Eden, which can compel men's actions but destroys free thought. Before they die, each of them defends his own perspective and actions, and sharply criticizes the morality of Altaïr's. This pushes him to think hard about his own philosophical beliefs and the ethics of complete freedom in a world filled with violence and suffering.
Altaïr emerges from the test a changed man — humbler, wiser and firmer in his beliefs — only to discover that his master and mentor Al Mualim is the unknown tenth conspirator, and had assigned the test not for Altaïr's benefit but to ensure no one else could control the Apple. Not only has he betrayed all the tenets that Altaïr has just re-embraced, he has personally betrayed Altaïr, who can either submit to Al Mualim's will or fight him to the death. He chooses the latter.
This is a massive betrayal on multiple levels. Not only does the closest thing Altaïr has to a living father — Al Mualim is the only person Altaïr shows respect for or desires approval from even in his most arrogant moments — try to kill him once he is no longer useful, it undermines everything he has learned over the course of the test.
It would be easy for Altaïr to let rage overtake him, but although he is clearly very angry when confronting Al Mualim, at the end of their physical battle Altaïr strikes the final blow and speaks to his dying master with focus and discipline. He executes Al Mualim not for his personal betrayal but for the betrayal of the creed. It is this difference in mindset that firmly sets Altaïr on the path he will walk for the rest of his life: a committed leader who will take the lessons learned during his test and his greater understanding of what the Assassins stand for and apply them for the betterment of the brotherhood and, Altaïr hopes, the world itself.
Does your character have a moral code, or other set of standards they try to live by?
Altaïr lives by a creed espoused by the brotherhood of Assassins for generations. An Assassin's creed, if you will. As one born to the Assassins, he accepted it as established dogma in his earlier years; now, he fully embraces it with the maturity of an adult who has examined his beliefs and mindfully committed to them. The creed's central maxim, "Nothing is true; everything is permitted" is a guiding philosophy that is just broad enough for its adherents to draw unique meaning based on their personal circumstances and cultural context while still providing a central guideline: that the rules governing society are artificial and illusory, and that humans are not truly bound by them but are capable of transcending those restrictions and forging their own futures.
The creed also includes three much more specific tenets:
These guidelines are both moral and practical ones that allow the Assassins to continue to thrive as a group and perform their work more effectively. Just months ago, Altaïr was an arrogant prodigy who thought that the maxim allowed him to do whatever he thought was best, but having to defend his stance and discuss the meaning of his actions during his test forces Altaïr to decide what he actually believes and why.
Today, Altaïr is a true believer in the creed, having come to the conclusion that it "does not command us to be free. It commands us to be wise." He would never attempt to force anyone to follow it, but his great hope is that people even outside the brotherhood can discover its wisdom, learn from it and open their minds; that they can avoid blind faith and obedience in favor of pursuing knowledge and forge their own paths.
Outside of the creed's specific tenets, Altaïr generally despises slavery, violence against women and children, and enforced order over individual freedom. Even before he sheds his arrogant ways, he is known to lend aid to citizens he observes being abused by city guards or others in power over them. His hands are not clean; while he will never again harm an innocent, he has no qualms about murder, and is well aware of the creed's three great ironies (that they seek to promote peace but murder is their means; that they seek to open the minds of men but require obedience to a master and set of rules; that they seek to reveal the danger of blind faith but remain practitioners themselves). He has not yet found an answer to resolve the conflict, instead considering that being two opposite things at once may simply be in the Assassins' nature.
What quality or qualities do they admire most?
Altaïr respects clarity of mind and independent thought more than anything else, even among his enemies. Having the capacity for such things does not guarantee that people will reach the same conclusions, but he views them as absolutely vital in order to see reality as it is, eventually noting that "only a mind free of impediment is capable of grasping the chaotic beauty of the world." These attributes also lay the foundation for belief in freedom of choice, which Altaïr considers a bedrock principle. He may privately despair that many people will never turn away from the illusions and arbitrary moral rules presented by various religions, for example, but he would never attempt to force them from their beliefs, even though possession of the Apple of Eden could credibly give him the power to do so.
Altaïr also highly values the willingness to question everything. This is very much a quality he has, but for a long time it was twisted. As an Assassin, he is taught to notice and question the difference between what people are told to be true and what he observes to be true. However, at the height of his arrogance, he "questions" by pushing back on absolutely everything and refusing to accept the strictures of the very tenets meant to guide him. By the end of the game, he has learned to apply his questions in good faith and with a true desire to learn from them, but he will never forget that it is within him to wrongly apply his own values if he isn't careful to choose otherwise every day.
Do they have a part of themselves they dislike?
Altaïr is not very good at connecting with people on a personal level. This isn't always immediately obvious; as an Assassin, he is trained to be skilled at social stealth and blend into settings containing a wide variety of cultures, education levels and social statuses. Although he naturally favors efficient, to-the-point communication, once Altaïr has grown past his previous abrasive arrogance, he has enough social grace to give and share information and have constructive conversations without standing out — provided the topics are not too personal.
When things do stray into personal territory, it gets a lot harder for him. Raised to view stoicism and emotional distance from family members as necessary for his role as an Assassin, shaped by tragic losses of the few personal connections he did have, Altaïr is unaccustomed to doing the work necessary to grow and maintain positive relationships. It's better to keep things surface-level, work alone and focus on his goals rather than confront messy emotions, or so he used to believe. Even when he's not in denial about what he feels, it's difficult for him to get the words out. Despite his outward arrogant demeanor, Altaïr regrets all along that his actions resulted in the death of Kadar and permanent bodily injury to Kadar's brother Malik. However, it isn't until nearly the end of his test, when Altaïr has been humbled and recognized his own flaws in the men he kills that he is able to admit it and apologize to Malik without reservation. One of the greatest differences between Altaïr at the start of the game and Altaïr at his canon point is that he now sees past his own defensiveness and arrogance to value concepts like brotherhood, honesty and affection. But knowing and doing are different things; it will take continued effort to tear down some of his emotional walls to find a healthier, more balanced state of being, and he's likely to stumble along the way.
And, about that arrogance...it's true that Altaïr is no longer the arrogant asshole who does what he wants without care for the consequences, but that trait is still there on some level. Believing that if he works hard enough, tries hard enough, then his creed will bring an end to many of the conflicts that have plagued humanity throughout its existence is still pretty arrogant. It may be well-intentioned and directed towards positive goals, but there's still a pridefulness there that is still likely to burn him, even if he wouldn't want to admit it.
What is their sign, and why? The Magician. A prodigy who is the youngest master Assassin to ever achieve the rank and whose achievements as their leader will be remembered a thousand years later, Altaïr's life centers on devotion to his vocation — often to his personal detriment. In his younger years, he prioritizes training and the perfection of skill related to his work as an Assassin (combat, but also stealth, languages and more) because that is what success means in the context of the only lifestyle he knows. At his current canon point, he values them because they are his best means of achieving things that will make a difference to humanity as a whole. At any point in time, Altaïr is the epitome of "if it's worth doing, it's worth doing well."
SAMPLES & ARRIVAL
Samples: test drive thread 1 + test drive thread 2