🚕 TEST DRIVE 🍁 September

[sinfulmods]

Test Drive Meme

Considering apping to the City of Sin, but unsure of who to bring or if they'll fit? Feel free to give the setting a test drive here! These are a perfect way of getting your playing sample done for the application.

cityofsin | cityofsin_logs | cityofsin_ooc
Rules | FAQ | Taken Characters | Reserves | Applications


→ Comment with the character you'd like to test drive in the setting, with name and canon in the subject line.
→ Choose a scenario or create your own, and tag around!
→ If you're still tagging in the last TDM, you may continue to do so, or feel free to move your threads here. We have four test drives a year. New test drives are now posted sometime during the months of: March, June, September, December.
→ Threads in the test drive are NOT eligible to use for activity checks, however you can make them game canon if you wish — and only if both players are accepted in the game.
→ Prospective players are always welcome to contact the mod for any questions or clarifications regarding the game.

Possible Scenarios Please note that all characters will initially arrive in their assigned housing; they are free to explore the City to their heart's content after that! 01. A New Arrival: Hello, New Person! You seem to have found yourself on a sidewalk in the City of Sin with nothing but the clothes on your back and a stomach churning feeling of being displaced. Thankfully, the streets are full of people - Watch out that you don't get mugged! 02. Demonic Presences: You were just minding your own business, weren't you? But that's always when bad things seem to happen, and the City of Sin isn't really that friendly. Whatever bar or street you're hanging out in suddenly go dim, filling the area with an unnerving feeling as the shadows on the walls jump out into reality. We suggest you phone a friend for help, or maybe try running? 03. Party Hard: You've been invited to a massive, elegant party in the Tower District that spills out its doors in welcome. Obviously, this whole thing is weird and you don't know who your hosts are, but maybe you can get some free drinks and food out of it! This place might not be so bad. 04. Prominence: The City of Sin influences its population on a weekly basis. Too bad you came right smack dab in the middle of a heavy Prominence. Lust, Greed, Gluttony, Envy, Wrath, Sloth, or Pride: choose your sin and be wicked. 05. Trouble: Not everyone is sunshine and roses here. Some people are violent and cruel, raised in the sludge of a sinful city. And they like to pick on people they think can't fight back. Are you that person? Or are you the Hero who can't stand to watch? Worse yet, could you be the person doing the instigating? Villain. 06. Carnival: The City has carnivals or festivals now and then; you're lucky to catch one! With its open booths filled with cork gun games and funnel cakes, how can someone not have any fun! Go win your darling a stuffed animal, or meet someone new on the spinning cup ride. You might even see someone you know being talked into sitting in the Dunk Tank. 07. Network: There's a network device in your pocket - or at least a familiar object that seems to work in mysterious ways. Perhaps you can take to that and ask for a bit of help? Or maybe you'd prefer to have a little fun with all of this. Surely someone will reply. 08. Wild Card:Choose your own adventure in the game's setting!

Comments

[diana_abel]

"No...no. Uh, 'rock' is a type of music. They're not actual gods. Just really, really good musicians."

This was one of the many costs of Diana's love of slang, she supposed. Older Cainites usually couldn't figure out what the hell she was saying most days. While younger mortals were just baffled. Throw in the multiverse and...

But he was smiling so...

She shook her head. "The Beatles are very, very talented musicians from my world. That's all."

[izzetthough]

"You say that. I feel like some artists can command the prestige and adoration of gods, when they're popular enough." Here again he looks a little wry before tugging a grin back into place, and taking another heaping bite of that extra-spicy curry.

Mmm. Good enough to make your eyes water.

[diana_abel]

"I hope not," Diana said, tilting her head to one side, her hair sliding off of her shoulder. "Innovation, ingenuity, genius, they all come from mortality. If a musician were a god, they'd lose the talent that makes them special."

But, Diana had a bias. She believed the best in human beings. And generally, the worst in vampires.

Every Cainite's self-loathing manifested in different ways. Her was just a little...paradoxical.

[izzetthough]

"I suppose things become a little less dire when you have all the time in the world. Being efficient and making things easier only really matters when you're on the clock and can only achieve so much in one lifetime."

He snorts, nose wrinkling. "That explains a lot about the Syndicate, actually. Bunch of immortals and undead clinging to old artifice and 'tradition'. Why wouldn't they?"

[diana_abel]

"I think I know a thing or two about the undead clinging to old artifice," Diana said, just a little hint of dryness creeping into her voice. It had only been the bane of her existence for the last two centuries or so.

More than, she supposed. Her Embrace had been so carefully engineered.

She sighed, shaking her head. "Tell me about the Syndicate. Sounds painfully familiar, but I don't want to make any assumptions."

[izzetthough]

"The Orzhov Syndicate. Where to even begin."

He huffs, leaning forward onto his elbows, arms folding in front of him. "They started out as the pillar of faith for Ravnica...and I suppose in a way they still are. There's no religion like money, and Orzhov is church and bank all in one. Nothing matters to them as much as wealth and power, and keeping that wealth and power appropriately distributed. According to them, of course. Those golden cathedrals and marble floors don't pay for themselves.

"You want a slice? You go through them. And no one knows contracts and deals better than the Orzhov. You owe them a cent? Even death isn't going to stop them from collecting. Most of the oldest and most powerful members of the guild are undead themselves, and they've got no qualms about shackling your spirit to the mortal plane until your debt is paid."

An eyebrow lifts. "Bloodsuckers in every regard. I get the feeling that's not really your style, though. You're a little too liberal for their tastes."

[diana_abel]

Diana laughed. "I'm a little too liberal for everyone's tastes, if we're being realistic." Definitely for the Camarilla. And pretty much any organized religion she'd ever explored, including Noddism.

And as for politics...

Yeah...

"Honestly, though, it sounds a little bit like a group from my corner of the multiverse," she said. "They're called 'the Giovanni.' And they totes get their kicks on indenturing your soul. It's a whole...thing."

[izzetthough]

Ral shrugs as she laughs. "Eh. You seem alright to me." Of course he doesn't know her terribly well, but unless there's something intensely sinister about her beneath the surface? She's fine for knowing.

Anything more than that? Well. Lessons have been learned over the years, and he's not forgetting any of them in a hurry. People can and will disappoint, you just don't give them the opportunity to get their claws in too deep. Easy, right?

"But yeah. They love having their hierarchy and their rules. 'Wealth is power, structure breeds wealth, and guilt creates structure.' I'm...less than a fan, let's say."

[diana_abel]

She wrinkled her nose. Okay, so they were some strange hybrid of extremely capitalist Ventrue and the Giovanni. Didn't matter what label you slapped on that nonsense. It was still...nonsense. And super gross.

Diana suddenly felt like she needed to take a shower, just listening to it.

"Yeah," she said, "I can't really blame you for not digging that philosophy. But if it means anything to you, I don't think we have anything like that here in the City. I mean, don't get me wrong, there's corruption to fight. But not on that scale."

[izzetthough]

"Nah. Who you're born to and how much money you have is a terrible way to assess someone's value, the way I see it. Get a bunch of self-important so-and-sos who care more about preserving some bloodline or name, maintaining their own power, and less about the people they're supposedly working on behalf of."

His tongue runs over his teeth, as he leans back again, another 'clunk' noise against the chair back where the metal connects.

"Me? I was born to nobodies in the slums. Where I'm at today? That's all me. Being smarter, risking more and fighting harder than the other guy. That's how you determine worth."

[diana_abel]

"I can't help but wonder what you'd make of the country I've been living in the last two hundred years," she said. "It's...it's an interesting contradiction. Claims to be a meritocracy, but it's riddled with racism, sexism, Antisemitism, and a whole bunch of other miserable -isms. But at the same time...creativity, innovation, activism..."

Really, the best way to sum up the United States, in her opinion, was visiting Las Vegas. On the one hand, you had greed and excess and a thoroughly seedy underbelly. On the other hand, they'd brought water to the desert. There was artistry and culture and liberal attitudes about so many things.

But she was an optimist.

"This place," she said gesturing around the room, toward the City at large, "it's like an echo of home. Except more of the bad things and less of the good. But I'm...working on it. You should totes sign up for one of my night school classes at the library. You can learn about my world there."

[izzetthough]

"I mean, that's all you can do, right? Try to make things better. My guild...it's not just about making stuff like this." With a free hand he reaches out, patting his gauntlets where they rest on the table, between the rice and the bowl of remaining vindaloo.

"It's about maintaining the city works, building and improving things for everyone. No matter who you are. So if this city's got problems?"

Ral grins again, cracking his knuckles with a spark of static.

"I've got nothing but time."

[diana_abel]

Maybe a little Stark-style cockiness wasn't so bad. Diana remembered all the work he'd contributed to the City. If this guy was even half as self-assured and brilliant, it was a promising sign.

For the City. Not necessarily for him.

No, this place could break a man.

Still.

"I have a feeling," she said, giving him an impish--downright devilish--grin, "that I'm going to look forward to seeing what you get your hands into, while you're here."

And for good measure, she gave him a wink.