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snowblindmods) wrote2015-04-06 10:43 pm
snowblindmods) wrote2015-04-06 10:43 pm
Application
| Application | |||
Applications are closed permanently. Thank you to everyone who has applied over the years! Before applying for a character, make sure you've read the rules and FAQ. You should also refer to the application guide to see what we're looking for in our applications. You may apply for one character per application cycle and three characters total. Please put your character's name and canon in the subject line of your application comment. Applications must be posted directly to this post and cannot be links. We will screen your application if you request it of us after we review it. Application challenges are allowed, but someone who did not place a reserve challenge cannot challenge a reserved application. Once reservations expire, an application challenge can only be placed before we process the character application of the applicant you would like to challenge. In the event of us nearing our application cap and having more applications than slots, we will attempt to choose the most well-written applications. First-time applicants will be processed first, then applications for second characters, and finally applications for third characters. We may allow more applications to be submitted than we have slots for in the name of greater selection. We will clarify in our response if an application is not being allowed into the game because of the cap or because of issues with the application not meeting the standards of the game. Original Character Application | |||
Hugo Vasquez | Tales from the Borderlands | Reserved
Name: Dapper.
Age: 22.
Contact Info:
Other Characters: N/A.
Character Information
Name: Hugo Vasquez
Canon: Tales from the Borderlands
Age: 35
Gender: Male
Canon Point: Post-death.
Background Link: Spoilers for the game:: [ Here ] and [ here! ] They're both more or less the same, but the second one focuses a little more on Vasquez himself. For the sake of a more cohesive application, I've gone ahead and rewritten it to be more suitable as a character history.
Formerly a much less swanky mail room employee with much less hair, Vasquez had the questionable distinction of being one of Handsome Jack's many punching bags before he worked his way up the corporate ladder. He took every fist to the face as an honor, and the almost-daily beatdowns fueled his rise to...not exactly the top, but pretty high up there in his division. He worked with Rhys for a time, resulting in an intense workplace rivalry that made pretty damn clear that they weren't going to get along--they consider each other to be their nemesis, and to say their relationship isn't friendly is something of an understatement. This all came to a head when Vasquez killed their boss and took his job, using his newfound position to demote Rhys--all the way down to 'assistant vice janitor'. Their meeting wasn't all in Vasquez's favor, however; due to an inopportune call on speaker phone and a little hacking, Rhys got just enough information about his rival's plans to throw a wrench in them.
When Fiona, Sasha, and Felix's Vault Key scam is launched, one particular brand-new Senior Vice President takes an interest in the deal, and it all begins to spiral downhill from there. With a little unwitting help from August, the son of a bandit queenpin trying to make some money under her nose, the group of con artists very quickly find themselves with ten million dollars on the line, freshly embezzled from Hyperion itself; while Vasquez had intended to be the one sealing the deal, after his meeting with Rhys that revealed the change in management, Rhys decides to take matters into his own hands. With his car and his money stolen by his rival in order to steal a transaction meant for his highlight reel, Vasquez has no choice but to handle the problem in a much more personal way--by getting another car, a needlessly overcomplicated shotgun, and going down to Pandora himself to try and sort things out himself. In the meantime, the deal's gone incredibly south--the key is revealed to be a fake, and the money is stolen by a crew of bandits that wind up using the case as the grand prize for a race. While Rhys and his crew catch a stroke of luck through discovering the core of a long-dead Atlas project, Vasquez is bearing down on them all the while. He catches up with Rhys and Vaughn after they've escaped the bandits, fully intent on killing them--with a little quick hacking, he's remarkably unsuccessful, and for a while, he's pretty well occupied elsewhere getting ready for round two. During this time, he sets up an alliance of convenience with August, and together, they form the welcoming committee for Rhys and his companions when they reach Old Haven in their search for the Gortys Project.
With both halves of the Gortys core in hand, our protagonists and their friends enter Old Haven's Atlas facility, only to find the two people who have the biggest grudges against them (at the moment) in a stroke of bad luck. Vasquez and August take Sasha and Vaughn hostage, using their newly-found prisoners to at least get Rhys and Fiona into the Galatarium, the hub of the Gortys project. While Vasquez thinks he's gotten the upper hand for once, his moment of almost coming out on top is rapidly shattered--with the assistance of the Handsome Jack AI embedded in his brain, Rhys hacks the security systems as they activate, turning the turret droids on Vasquez and his bandit allies. During the struggle, Sasha and Vaughn escape, and Vasquez is forced to retreat rather than lose his life in addition to his arm. It's somewhat humiliating, but his options are limited--not for the first time, Rhys has gotten the better of him, and he wastes no time in getting out of the way while he can.
After surviving the Gortys compound with a lot less blood and way less leverage than he'd like, Vasquez runs directly into another problem as he exits the facility--Vallory herself, the queenpin August had cut out of the Vault Key deal. No matter who gets blamed in the end, one thing remains constant; Vallory's done with Vasquez, and in order to tie off loose ends, she shoots him directly in the chest with a shotgun. Surprisingly enough, he's not out of the proverbial game yet, continuing to show up through numerous desecrations of his corpse and image until Rhys finally gets back up to Helios.
How high his ambitions, how tragic his end. It's hard to say it wasn't deserved, though.
Inventory:
[1] Suit, containing - black jacket with Hyperion detailing, white button-down shirt, black pants, yellow tie, socks, black shoes.
Assorted accessories, including -
[1] Gold pinky, prominent 'H' and all
[1] Gold tie clip
[1] Pair of 'H' cufflinks, in--you guessed it--gold
Personality:
Vasquez is one of the many sharks in the water at Hyperion, just waiting for the first sign of blood to show where the weakness lies. He's vicious and often relies on force, physically reacting with ease when Rhys threatens him in his new office, with no qualms against killing to get where he wants to go. He murdered his boss by shoving him out of an airlock so that he could take his position, and he's never once shown any signs of remorse for the action. His ambition is at an all-time high once he's in that new office, and he's already making plans to curry more favor with Hyperion by the time his former boss is floating by the window. Prideful and arrogant, he's of the opinion that he's able to get as far as he wants by virtue of a little something called destiny, although he uses the same angle to try and put others in their place without hesitation. It's nothing personal (unless you're Rhys)--it's just how things are, and always will be. There are some people who were built for success, and he counts himself as one of them. As for everybody else? Well, they're just going to have to make do with what they've got. He's certainly not going to lend a hand--although he can be convinced with the right proposal.
At his worst, he's spiteful, conceited, and manipulative, with a short temper that goes hand-in-hand with whole slew of threats and physical abuses. He's not a man that subscribes to the mantra of 'live and let live', preferring something a little more along the lines of 'an eye for an eye'--he gets mad, and gets even. His reputation precedes him in the halls of Helios, and he's able to intimidate even security with little effort--everybody knows he's a vindictive asshole, and nobody wants to cross him, with good reason. He's without a doubt an unpleasant guy, and fancies himself one of the apex predators of Hyperion. While he may not be that high up on the food chain in actuality, his opinion on his own rank is far from unsubstantiated, considering the fact that it doesn't take much from him to get people to scatter. He doesn't think much of the other departments in the company, and inconveniencing or otherwise outright ruining their activities--he doesn't even flinch at stealing ten million dollars from the company in order to get his Vault Key scheme rolling, and it's highly likely that he didn't even think about paying it back. Needless to say, this didn't earn him any favors with accounting, although he certainly didn't mind.
While he's well-known for being a douche of monumental levels, Vasquez is not without his positive traits. He wouldn't have gotten this far otherwise--without the know-how to safely navigate the murder maze of Hyperion, he'd either still be in the mailroom or dead. With how outgoing he is, socializing is his strong suit, and he finds it easy to get what he wants through simple negotiation, no matter how fond he is of simply going at things head-on. Vasquez can be charming and personable when the situation calls for it, provided he respects the person he's dealing with--whether or not they outrank him is another important factor. He's capable of playing nice, although his composure is likely to leave him whenever he's interacting with somebody he knows to be dangerous outside of a situation he controls--it's a little hard for him to keep his cool when he's face-to-face with people like Vallory who have similarly few issues with killing people. He's determined to work through things regardless of the obstacles and will take matters into his own hands to ensure they get finished rather than leave them to anyone else, even if this may be on account of his preference for being the one in charge.
His self-confidence and the ease with which he can make decisions means that he has little difficulty keeping things moving, and he's adaptable enough to roll with the punches when plans don't pan out. Instead of losing steam when his Vault Key scheme falls through, Vasquez gets right to it--he goes right down to a planet that's unequivocally declared a death trap to both exact his revenge and steer things back on course. Even if thinking on his feet doesn't always get him where he wants to go, as evidenced by when Rhys and Vaughn outsmart his first attempt at catching them, he moves on to a new step one as soon as he's able and rethinks his plans from there. It doesn't matter if things don't go his way--he'll figure out how to twist things to be more in his favor. In that way, it can be said that he's excellent at making the best out of a bad situation, although his motivations are almost always selfish.
Vasquez is nothing if not a high roller, well-accustomed to the luxury and power he's accumulated during his time with Hyperion. Like most everybody up on Helios, he's gotten a taste for the best, and the elitism he's fallen into is just about company standard--it's hard to find somebody who hasn't gotten at least a little accustomed to it, and he's no different. He's used to playing a game of high risk, high reward, and he's been having a lucky streak for quite some time now. Vasquez has gambled with personal property, company money, and even people; it's all chips on the table according to Hyperion, and sometimes you have to pay in order to win. Just about everybody is beneath him in some way or another, particularly the inhabitants of Pandora--anybody stuck planetside has very little worth in his eyes, unless they've proven themselves to be useful to his purposes. He tends to view others as means to his ends or tools to be used and then discarded--they're stepping stones at times, and once he's gotten to where he needs to go, he's done with them.
This cycle of violence means that Vasquez is a little desensitized to it; it's just business, after all, and everybody in the company knows what they're in for when they make it up to Helios. Some people don't last long--Vasquez prides himself on the fact that he's not only survived, but also thrived in the almost outright warzone that is his workplace. People get stabbed in the back (sometimes literally) or tossed out airlocks into space all the time, and keeping your head down is the best way to make sure you don't lose it. Only the people resourceful, brave, crazy, or terrifying enough can handle the high ranks of Hyperion without meeting a similar fate, and Vasquez counts himself among the brave and resourceful. (He's fond of the idea of being terrifying, too. That suits his image just fine.)
In short, Vasquez is perfectly adapted for the vicious ecology of a corporate environment. Surviving out in some frozen town, however? Not so much.
no subject
Suitability: Vasquez has honestly never really experienced anything like this. Norfinbury poses a set of challenges that aren't entirely out of his wheelhouse, but will definitely give him plenty of issues. Living on a high-tech cushy space station for a number of years has gotten him accustomed to the ease of life up there, far away from the chaotic planet below or the equally messed up moon at their back--Helios, for all its problems and corporate-sanctioned bloodshed, is a different animal than Norfinbury. There's no superiors to manipulate, no payrolls to edit; all he can rely on is his own wits, and there's no chance of a Hyperion evac, either. He's going to have to learn how to fend for himself in an unfamiliar environment, as well as dealing with things he can't talk his way out of or otherwise twist to his favor.
As somebody who's all too used to using verbal abuse and force to get his way, having to communicate with others on equal standing and being put in a situation where he has to work with people (or else) will be an interesting change of pace. It's like Pandora, but with more snow and a lot more weird things going on--being that he wasn't prepared for Pandora, he's not going to be good at this.
RP Samples:
[ test drive thread x2 ]
network sample ::
[ The audio is...somewhat of a mess, really. Muffled breathing, the steady crunch of snow underfoot, and the all-too-close drag of fabric across the microphone mean that thus far, this transmission is auditory hell for anyone that may be listening too close. Something's covering the camera, so the video feed is purely black with a periodic glimpse of light filtering through whatever's blocking the view-- it's probably for the best, really. He's got to get to the best lighting for his entrance before he starts this thing proper, although he likely should've thought about that before he'd started roaming around-- ]
[ After about another ten seconds, there's an appreciative hum, and the situation seems to have met his approval. As much as it can, anyway, given the current circumstances-- he'd much rather not deal with any of what was going on, but Vasquez wasn't about to be shown who was boss. It was him. He was the boss. ]
[ The object covering the camera is pulled away, revealed to be a hand left ungloved--it's clear that he's not faring quite as well in the cold as he'd like by how pale his fingertips are, and the fact that he's making some attempt to use his tie as a scarf is...laughable at best. Vasquez doesn't seem to be all that perturbed, however; aside from a few loose strands, his hair is just as expertly coiffed as usual, and the confident smirk on his face only shows a hint of irritation. Either he's really good at keeping his cool in front of a camera, or he hasn't quite grasped the gravity of the situation yet-- it's a tossup as to what the reason actually is. ]
So, as I'm sure we're all aware, this place has issues. [ No shit, Vasquez. He adjusts his tie-scarf absently, brow furrowing just slightly. ] I'd say this is as bad as Pandora, but-- at least there aren't bandits here, so that gets you all a free pass. For right now, anyway. [ Another pause, although this one's punctuated by the almost-fumbling of his tablet and some rather audible curses as the view turns away from him-- he really should've tried finding some gloves before this. When the device is stabilized enough (there's even a faint metallic clink as that douchey gold pinky comes into contact with the tablet, so it's at least somewhat secure), the device is pointed at an appropriately snow-drowned building, and he begins to walk toward it, camera bobbing just slightly with each step. ]
I got one question for you, though. Don't be shy, just go on and gimme an answer-- [ He opens the door with reckless abandon, strolling right on in as though he owned the place. After one accidental wrong turn, Vasquez winds up in what is presumably the living room, and it's...plain, to say the least. Quaint would be another applicable word, given the soft grandma aesthetic going on in here. There's even a little cross-stitch framed on the wall that bids a cheery 'WELCOME' in faded pink letters. The wooden frame is well-worn, just like everything else in the room, but the view doesn't last too long before the camera jerks back around, focusing on Vasquez's utterly unamused face. ]
What the hell is all this? [ An unseen gesture toward the rest of the room, still out of view. ] Is this where I'm supposed to be staying or something? 'Cause this is-- no. Not my thing. And also-- [ Once again, the tablet gets flipped around, shoved uncomfortably close to a set of porcelain salt and pepper shakers depicting two beatific children, saccharine grins painted across poorly-defined faces. They're without a doubt hideous, with gaudily-colored outfits that seem to have not weathered the firing process with the stability of their...everything too terribly intact. He'd found these monstrosities on his first foray through the house, and his reaction had been far more vocal the first time; but his displeasure had seen a limited audience, and there was no way he was going to let this one slide. After a disquieting few moments of staring directly into their dead eyes, Vasquez finally breaks the silence with a harsh whisper, tablet slightly shaking. ]
What. Are. Those.
ACCEPTED
A standard single-story house with a kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, and bedroom. The house is empty, though; it seems like no one was living here even when the town was populated. "ALPHONSE ELRIC, STEPHANIE BROWN, EDWARD ELRIC, GREED, DAY SIXTY-ONE, TRAVELLING WEST" is written on the wall, alongside "DEAR FORMER RESIDENT, WE ARE FRIENDS, PLEASE DO NOT FEEL YOU NEED TO HIDE FROM US. CONTACT LELRIC." The following is written on the dining room floor in morse code: Duster, Day 124, Gwen, Melengar, Ratibor, Blackwater, brideeth. Beneath that, also in morse code, is "House annoying. Incredibly annoying."
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Thank you for your interest in our game!
Note: In your sample we noticed Vasquez using a $ in his username! Currently, the network does not allow special characters to be utilized in usernames, but this wasn't in the FAQ before, so we wanted to let you know here! We've updated the FAQ to remedy this oversight, and we're sorry for the confusion.
Re: ACCEPTED