Collaborative Writing Project - Background Stories

[Cepht]

Looking to write a shared multi-character background story that takes place about 7-14 years ago with some fellow Cothians. Anyone want to join in? I've done something like this in the past and it was a lot of fun and led to some rather interesting RP when our characters eventually ran into ( or heard of ) each other years later.

If interested, The character that I want to develop will have been an ambitious follower of the light ( probably a Scarlet or some other tainted sect ) who turns his back on the light and becomes an evil warlock. The reason for his change in alignment/class is flexible. I have a few ideas but It doesn't matter too much to me as long as its believable and entertaining. New characters and existing characters are welcome regardless of race or class.

The resulting story will need to be consistent with lore and be believable as I hope to get an approved character profile out of this when done. Hopefully whoever participates has a similar goal. I hope to post the resulting story once all parties are satisfied.

Character in question is Alonus, middle-aged human male warlock - former Scarlet

[Lynoa06]

Why not..tell me more about it.

[ForsakenSoul]

This is interesting. Please tell us more so I can decide which of my characters would fit such story the best.

[Cepht]

The way we did this in the past was I and the other two players had a very simple agreement on the overall structure of the story. Our characters were to have met in their youth but then due to some circumstances, were separated shortly after. We just made the story up as we went. One of us would add a paragraph or two, then PM it and the other player would add something to it. If we wanted to revise it or mix in our character's reactions we just went ahead and edited the previous poster's work and PM'd it back to them. After going back and forth so many times we eventually had a pretty decent background story which gave a lot of insight into the rp event that it supported.

If interested, this is the story that we ended up writing. It served as a backdrop for a major RP event that we participated in. My characters were Rigwyn and Izalox. Jacula and Jaida/Cavi were the other two players - Cavi/Jaida posted the stories that she and I wrote. The event itself was run by Jacula.... hope he doesn't mind me posting this xD

http://www.hydlaaplaza.com/smf/index.php?topic=36609.0

Regarding this particular story, this is what I am hoping to accomplish:

I have a human male warlock that I want to develop. I thought it might be interesting if he started out as an ambitious, power-driven student or novice in the scarlet monastery (or some other tainted school of light) and then have him fall from grace so to speak. As for the how of it, I'm entertaining a few possibilities:

A. He might meet a female warlock who he tries to impress.. perhaps she leads him astray - or perhaps he denies being a scarlet and tries to learn the dark arts in order to impress her... and from there continues to spiral downward and eventually breaks his ties with the monastery. Perhaps he is caught with some dark literature and is cast out.

B. He might suffer some terrible form of abuse while in the monastery and turn his back on the light - blaming the holy light for not helping him when in need. Ie. He might be taken advantage of by a mentor or superior or unfairly punished. His drive for power would be at odds with such a feeling of powerlessness.

C. Perhaps he fails some test of faith miserably. If you have ever heard of the phenomena referred to as "Dark night of the soul" its basically a spiritual state where a believer is basically hurled into a major depression. In this state they are forced to rely on raw faith - not pious feelings to get by. It might be interesting if he was in this state and snapped - turning to evil.

I'm open to other possibilities too. It all depends on what objectives other players have for their characters. If someone wanted to write in an abusive/sadistic scholar, then "B" might work best, likewise if someone was interested in writing about a temptress or someone who was out to corrupt innocent scarlet novices then "A" might work best.

As for the time-frame, I think Alonus would probably need to be a young adult if we was studying in a monastery, and once he turned to the dark side, he would need a good amount of time to become proficient at being a warlock. My guess is perhaps he enters the monastery at 15, and at 20 or so he turns. This would give him another 10 to 15 years to train as a warlock making him about 35 years old. He would of course need to come in contact with a warlock mentor at some point. This is a very loose timeframe - I still need to check it against lore to make sure it makes sense.


For location, I was thinking areas in the vicinity of the scarlet monastery might be good since its very close to horde and alliance territory. Adding alliance and horde characters to the story should be pretty easy.

As you can see there would be lots of room for a variety of races and classes. Some characters may remember each other from this past event, others may have changed their appearance since then. Likewise, relics, books, and memorable objects could be written into this past event and then could surface later on.

How does this sound so far?

[ForsakenSoul]

It sounds good, though the scarlet movement started after the third war and was formed from the remnants of the Silver Hand, so if you want to be a scarlet the story should occur no more then 8 years ago. But you could always be paladin/priest trainee of the Church Of Lordaeron before the third war.

[Cepht]

You have a point ... making a fallen scarlet is tempting though I'm not sure 8 years of warlock training is a reasonable amount of time to become proficient. An ordained priest of the church of holy light would probably work just as well.

From Blizzard's Official World Dungeons site:

The Monastery was once a proud bastion of Lordaeron's priesthood - a center for learning and enlightenment. With the rise of the undead Scourge during the Third War, the peaceful Monastery was converted into a stronghold of the fanatical Scarlet Crusade. The Crusaders are intolerant of all non-human races, regardless of alliance or affiliation. They believe that any and all outsiders are potential carriers of the undead plague - and must be destroyed. Reports indicate that adventurers who enter the monastery are forced to contend with Scarlet Commander Mograine - who commands a large garrison of fanatically devoted warriors. However, the monastery's true master is High Inquisitor Whitemane - a fearsome priestess who possesses the ability to resurrect fallen warriors to do battle in her name.

[ForsakenSoul]

Well former scarlet Tavin could probably be his fellow student in the monastery before the war, but the only problem is the time frame as Tavin is now 25 years. I am trying to figure out what other characters of mine could be involved in such storyline.

[Cepht]

Anyone still interested?

Been busy ... picking this up again

I could make Alonus 25 years old (present age) so the story would thus start 8 years ago .. he could have started in the monastery at age 13, and left 7 years ago at 14 when the monastery changed in response to the third war. That would give him 7 years of training as a warlock. He wouldn't be a master by any means, but certainly proficient enough.

If you two (any possibly anyone else) are still interested, I'll start writing some of his story and forward the first few paragraphs. The story can be revised and reworked as desired. Once the entire work is done, I'll post it here.

[Leshok]

I would be interested, my character Leshok is a bit younger, age 18, but is a paladin and was raised in stormwind in an orphanage headed over by a retired Paladin. I can see many opportunities on how they could meet up.