app for maison de portes
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alwayssunnyinantivaPlayer's Name: Poptart
Contact info:
aim: ariesInMonochrome
plurk: rustandstardust
DW:poppulchritude
Character: Zevran Arainai
Canon: Dragon Age
Version: Daylen’s timeline
Canon Point: post-Origins
Age: 20’s
Gender:Elf Male
History: here
Personality:
When you first encounter him in the game, you get the distinct impression that he’s trying to murder the fuck out of you. And he is. Zevran Arainai is an assassin first and foremost, and he’s not ashamed of it. He will tell you that he’s an assassin. He will tell your mother he’s an assassin. He will tell stories of his hard life as an assassin, his various missions as an assassin, and the people he has fucked and then – you guessed it – assassinated.
He comes with all the morals of an assassin as well. Antiva is a dog eat dog country where the rich get richer and the poor get dead. A lot of the rich get dead too, actually, as long as someone’s paying for it. Antiva is run by the Antivan Crows, a guild of infamous assassins and whoever has control of the most Crows is the strongest. Zevran, at an early age, is taught that strength and power are important, that the strong will always rise above the weak. That is why he approves of selfishness and cunning over soft-hearted mercy.
Coincidentally, the life of an assassin isn’t very much for the ambitious. Ambition is for the people hiring them, not the assassins themselves. They are, however, given excellent provisions if they excel in their field. Zevran, like any other Crow, knows how to appreciate his share of fine things, showing a particular penchant for small bars of precious metals. The only catch about this arrangement is that the only way to leave the Crows is to die. It’s a gilded cage – pretty but confining, and Zevran is suffocating within it.
After establishing Zevran is, in fact, an assassin, specifically the one hired to kill your player character, Zevran is knocked out. When you wake him up, he is outnumbered and surrounded by heavily armed company. The first thing he does? He cracks a joke: “Oh, I really thought I would wake up dead. Or not wake up at all, as the case may be.” He even makes advances at you, especially if you’re a girl.
And that’s his second and most prevalent layer: Zevran the Hedonist. He is fucking amazing at parties. A lot of the companions’ conversations with him circle around this facet of his personality. He will flirt with anything with a pulse, including drunken dwarves, and make various politically correct jokes. He loves sex, drink and general debauchery; as Wynne so aptly put it, “he seems to seek pleasure above all else.”
The more you talk to him, the more you realize this is a defense mechanism. When people put up stoic walls, Zevran puts up ones made of laughter and deflection, and it’s certainly more effective. After all, one would not feel the need to question the happiness of a man that is already smiling, right? He has this insistent need to avoid getting too attached to anything. Love is weakness. Sentiment can be used against you.
Your PC can actually get him to open up about his life, and it is a terrible life. When confronted about it, he’ll give up his act and actually give a straight answer along the lines of “there’s really no need to talk about this” or “if I ignore it, it’s like the scars aren’t even there”. He’s used to hardship that he knows it’s no use trying to act bitter about it. He tries to seize moments of levity instead and enjoys those times to keep himself sane.
If you dig even deeper, you can find out that he’s not actually that bad of a guy. He hates it when people treat fellow elves like garbage, and don’t even think of hurting children and innocents around him. How is this different from killing people for money? Simple. “I comfort myself with the thought that most of [the targets] had it coming.” There is a fine, fine line between innocent and target. No target is ever innocent; they’re in the way of power or they’ve cheated another dealer, and somebody is going to end up killing them eventually. But there’s no excuse for slaughtering mages or hurting children.
His loyalty is invaluable; his friendship is hard-earned and his love lasts forever. If you take your time with him, he will return the favor tenfold. He would even turn on his fellow Crows and lover/friend Taliesen if your friendship is tight enough; little does your Warden know that he basically signed a death sentence by doing this. Luckily, after their time traveling together, he found a desire to keep on living and fought like a cornered animal, opposing those that stood in his way and singlehandedly takes over the Crows as their new Guildmaster. (I use the term “takes over” lightly. Some of them are still trying to hunt him down.)
Fears:
Sentiment
- “An assassin must forget about sentiment. It is dangerous. You take your pleasure where you can, when life is good.” He doesn’t like getting attached to things. They could be used against him. If you even suggest love to him, he’s going to lose his cool and snap at you. Winning his loyalty and friendship is a long, difficult endeavor.
Losing People He Cares About
- Subversion of the above. When he actually starts to care about you, he’s going to be afraid of losing you too. This is why, when romanced, if his status is at “Love” and you break up with him, he’s going to permanently leave the group.
Cages
- Not literal cages, he actually thinks those ones could be hot. No. He would rather take a life of fighting assassins forever than one where he doesn’t get a choice. Locking him up, possessing his body or controlling his mind might do the trick.
Torture Devices
- Not enough that he can’t be in the same room as them, but in the Fade dream (“Zevran’s Nightmare”), he was in a rack. His intense, Crow training probably took a toll to his mind, more than he’d care to admit.
Weaknesses:
- Dies if stabbed, drowned, burned, poisoned etc.
- Terrible at picking locks
- Pretty sure substance / sex addiction counts
- Thinks with his dick sometimes, he actually has some amusing stories about that
- Fluid loyalty
- Terrible at feelings
- Kind of an asshole tbh
- Overconfidence / arrogance
- Lack of ambition
- Doesn’t know how to plan ahead
- Feel free to exploit his guilt over losing Rinna
Mundane Strengths/Abilities:
- He can last hours during sex
- Hours
- Just let that ruminate a bit
- Should I also mention his nimble fingers and nonexistent gag reflex?
- Because they’re a thing.
- Ladies and Gentlemen, the man your man could be like.
- Amazing at parties
- Massage skills
- Witty retorts
- World-class assassin skills
- Duel-weapon wielding
- Poison-making
- Good at stealth, manipulation and subterfuge
- Archery
Sensitivity/Magical Ability: n/a
Supply List:
1 The Rose’s Thorn (dagger)
1 Topsider’s Honor (longsword)
1 pair of Antivan Leather Boots
1 pair of Dalish gloves
1 The Felon’s Coat (light chest piece)
1 Mixed Metal Rounds (belt)
1 The Long Sight (light helm)
1 Falon’Din’s Reach (bow)
20 arrows
5 vials of random poison
Sample RP post:
When the ship stops, Zevran doesn’t linger at the docks. Any ordinary person would see little more than a crowded space full of crates and refugees; Zevran sees shadows and high vantage points, a hundred and one ways to get killed in a crowded area. He keeps his hood low and makes a beeline for the city tavern, careful not to draw a lot of attention to himself.
The city tavern is everything he expected it to be – seedy, smelly and never short of lingering eyes from shady mercenaries. Luckily, that’s all it is; he should be more careful if they didn’t follow his every move. (Regardless, he keeps his guard up.)
“A pint of ale, my fine, Nevarran friend,” he says, a little too loud and chipper for the mood of the entire place. “And a bowl of clam chowder, if you’ve a mind.”
The barkeep gives him a look that indicates that he’s not getting that clam chowder, alas, and disappears into the backroom. Zevran relaxes into his seat and takes off his cloak, surveying the establishment closer now. It's almost like an entire museum dedicated to collecting various human waste, some even smeared all over the walls. And the barstool smells like a toilet! Marvelous! Little surprises everywhere.
The waitress is something to appreciate, however -- a redhead human girl with long, straight hair and chocolate brown eyes. She’s curvy, a bit too sallow for his tastes, but that would make little difference when the lights are off and she’s bucking up against him.
He expertly dodges an arrow aimed for his head and pulls out his weapons. In front of him, a big, bulky guy with eyes like a hunter and a greatsword ready to cleave Zevran in half. Hm. So his earlier loudness was not for naught after all.
“Zevran Arainai? You’re a wanted man.”
“Aha! So the Crows are hiring mercenaries now? Too incompetent to send one of their own men, I take it?” he taunts, moving away from his hits. With one smooth move, he twists his dagger and disarms the man of his giant weapon. He sneaks up behind him and draws his blade to his throat. “Tell your employer to do better than this farce of an assassination. It’s an embarrassment. Now, off you go.”
Zevran pushes the man towards the door, where he promptly scrambles away.
Contact info:
aim: ariesInMonochrome
plurk: rustandstardust
DW:
poppulchritude Character: Zevran Arainai
Canon: Dragon Age
Version: Daylen’s timeline
Canon Point: post-Origins
Age: 20’s
Gender:
History: here
Personality:
When you first encounter him in the game, you get the distinct impression that he’s trying to murder the fuck out of you. And he is. Zevran Arainai is an assassin first and foremost, and he’s not ashamed of it. He will tell you that he’s an assassin. He will tell your mother he’s an assassin. He will tell stories of his hard life as an assassin, his various missions as an assassin, and the people he has fucked and then – you guessed it – assassinated.
He comes with all the morals of an assassin as well. Antiva is a dog eat dog country where the rich get richer and the poor get dead. A lot of the rich get dead too, actually, as long as someone’s paying for it. Antiva is run by the Antivan Crows, a guild of infamous assassins and whoever has control of the most Crows is the strongest. Zevran, at an early age, is taught that strength and power are important, that the strong will always rise above the weak. That is why he approves of selfishness and cunning over soft-hearted mercy.
Coincidentally, the life of an assassin isn’t very much for the ambitious. Ambition is for the people hiring them, not the assassins themselves. They are, however, given excellent provisions if they excel in their field. Zevran, like any other Crow, knows how to appreciate his share of fine things, showing a particular penchant for small bars of precious metals. The only catch about this arrangement is that the only way to leave the Crows is to die. It’s a gilded cage – pretty but confining, and Zevran is suffocating within it.
After establishing Zevran is, in fact, an assassin, specifically the one hired to kill your player character, Zevran is knocked out. When you wake him up, he is outnumbered and surrounded by heavily armed company. The first thing he does? He cracks a joke: “Oh, I really thought I would wake up dead. Or not wake up at all, as the case may be.” He even makes advances at you, especially if you’re a girl.
And that’s his second and most prevalent layer: Zevran the Hedonist. He is fucking amazing at parties. A lot of the companions’ conversations with him circle around this facet of his personality. He will flirt with anything with a pulse, including drunken dwarves, and make various politically correct jokes. He loves sex, drink and general debauchery; as Wynne so aptly put it, “he seems to seek pleasure above all else.”
The more you talk to him, the more you realize this is a defense mechanism. When people put up stoic walls, Zevran puts up ones made of laughter and deflection, and it’s certainly more effective. After all, one would not feel the need to question the happiness of a man that is already smiling, right? He has this insistent need to avoid getting too attached to anything. Love is weakness. Sentiment can be used against you.
Your PC can actually get him to open up about his life, and it is a terrible life. When confronted about it, he’ll give up his act and actually give a straight answer along the lines of “there’s really no need to talk about this” or “if I ignore it, it’s like the scars aren’t even there”. He’s used to hardship that he knows it’s no use trying to act bitter about it. He tries to seize moments of levity instead and enjoys those times to keep himself sane.
If you dig even deeper, you can find out that he’s not actually that bad of a guy. He hates it when people treat fellow elves like garbage, and don’t even think of hurting children and innocents around him. How is this different from killing people for money? Simple. “I comfort myself with the thought that most of [the targets] had it coming.” There is a fine, fine line between innocent and target. No target is ever innocent; they’re in the way of power or they’ve cheated another dealer, and somebody is going to end up killing them eventually. But there’s no excuse for slaughtering mages or hurting children.
His loyalty is invaluable; his friendship is hard-earned and his love lasts forever. If you take your time with him, he will return the favor tenfold. He would even turn on his fellow Crows and lover/friend Taliesen if your friendship is tight enough; little does your Warden know that he basically signed a death sentence by doing this. Luckily, after their time traveling together, he found a desire to keep on living and fought like a cornered animal, opposing those that stood in his way and singlehandedly takes over the Crows as their new Guildmaster. (I use the term “takes over” lightly. Some of them are still trying to hunt him down.)
Fears:
Sentiment
- “An assassin must forget about sentiment. It is dangerous. You take your pleasure where you can, when life is good.” He doesn’t like getting attached to things. They could be used against him. If you even suggest love to him, he’s going to lose his cool and snap at you. Winning his loyalty and friendship is a long, difficult endeavor.
Losing People He Cares About
- Subversion of the above. When he actually starts to care about you, he’s going to be afraid of losing you too. This is why, when romanced, if his status is at “Love” and you break up with him, he’s going to permanently leave the group.
Cages
- Not literal cages, he actually thinks those ones could be hot. No. He would rather take a life of fighting assassins forever than one where he doesn’t get a choice. Locking him up, possessing his body or controlling his mind might do the trick.
Torture Devices
- Not enough that he can’t be in the same room as them, but in the Fade dream (“Zevran’s Nightmare”), he was in a rack. His intense, Crow training probably took a toll to his mind, more than he’d care to admit.
Weaknesses:
- Dies if stabbed, drowned, burned, poisoned etc.
- Terrible at picking locks
- Pretty sure substance / sex addiction counts
- Thinks with his dick sometimes, he actually has some amusing stories about that
- Fluid loyalty
- Terrible at feelings
- Kind of an asshole tbh
- Overconfidence / arrogance
- Lack of ambition
- Doesn’t know how to plan ahead
- Feel free to exploit his guilt over losing Rinna
Mundane Strengths/Abilities:
- He can last hours during sex
- Hours
- Just let that ruminate a bit
- Should I also mention his nimble fingers and nonexistent gag reflex?
- Because they’re a thing.
- Ladies and Gentlemen, the man your man could be like.
- Amazing at parties
- Massage skills
- Witty retorts
- World-class assassin skills
- Duel-weapon wielding
- Poison-making
- Good at stealth, manipulation and subterfuge
- Archery
Sensitivity/Magical Ability: n/a
Supply List:
1 The Rose’s Thorn (dagger)
1 Topsider’s Honor (longsword)
1 pair of Antivan Leather Boots
1 pair of Dalish gloves
1 The Felon’s Coat (light chest piece)
1 Mixed Metal Rounds (belt)
1 The Long Sight (light helm)
1 Falon’Din’s Reach (bow)
20 arrows
5 vials of random poison
Sample RP post:
When the ship stops, Zevran doesn’t linger at the docks. Any ordinary person would see little more than a crowded space full of crates and refugees; Zevran sees shadows and high vantage points, a hundred and one ways to get killed in a crowded area. He keeps his hood low and makes a beeline for the city tavern, careful not to draw a lot of attention to himself.
The city tavern is everything he expected it to be – seedy, smelly and never short of lingering eyes from shady mercenaries. Luckily, that’s all it is; he should be more careful if they didn’t follow his every move. (Regardless, he keeps his guard up.)
“A pint of ale, my fine, Nevarran friend,” he says, a little too loud and chipper for the mood of the entire place. “And a bowl of clam chowder, if you’ve a mind.”
The barkeep gives him a look that indicates that he’s not getting that clam chowder, alas, and disappears into the backroom. Zevran relaxes into his seat and takes off his cloak, surveying the establishment closer now. It's almost like an entire museum dedicated to collecting various human waste, some even smeared all over the walls. And the barstool smells like a toilet! Marvelous! Little surprises everywhere.
The waitress is something to appreciate, however -- a redhead human girl with long, straight hair and chocolate brown eyes. She’s curvy, a bit too sallow for his tastes, but that would make little difference when the lights are off and she’s bucking up against him.
He expertly dodges an arrow aimed for his head and pulls out his weapons. In front of him, a big, bulky guy with eyes like a hunter and a greatsword ready to cleave Zevran in half. Hm. So his earlier loudness was not for naught after all.
“Zevran Arainai? You’re a wanted man.”
“Aha! So the Crows are hiring mercenaries now? Too incompetent to send one of their own men, I take it?” he taunts, moving away from his hits. With one smooth move, he twists his dagger and disarms the man of his giant weapon. He sneaks up behind him and draws his blade to his throat. “Tell your employer to do better than this farce of an assassination. It’s an embarrassment. Now, off you go.”
Zevran pushes the man towards the door, where he promptly scrambles away.
