too late for regrets

PLAYER INFO

Name: Stark
Contact Information: starkxravingxmad @ plurk
Time Zone: EST
Characters Played: Waver Velvet untalented

CHARACTER INFO

Character Name: Cliff Fittir
Character Canon: Star Ocean: Till the End of Time

History: Link to the Star Ocean Wiki

AU History: Born and raised in the sands of Caldera to a family of metal workers and trained in a small dojo on the outskirts of the city, Cliff Fittir is a talented ruffian whose martial prowess and experience in everything from street level brawls to actual battle fields is only matched by his high moral standing and sympathy for the underdog. Born an Earthkin, and a strong one, he had figured early in life that no one as big and powerful as he was had any business picking on those who couldn't fight back. It was only natural that he stood up and protected those who could be hurt, and when the war with Gigas started to escalate, it was only natural that he joined up with the Steel Battalion to protect the city he cared about. He saw Gigas as a big dog who had no understanding of the lives and culture of the people they were trying to subjugate, and that was more than enough reason for him to take on the fight.

A solid, proud individual whose passions run as deeply as his strength, he was someone who could fight with the strength and ferocity of a raging Pangoro on one turn and on the next be as mellow as a Slakoth. He was sincere in everything he did, and the vibrancy of his personality and the way he cared for those he considered among his own made him a natural leader both on and off the battlefield.

However, as the conflict came to a head, Cliff was the sort of strategist who was savvy enough to be able to pick and choose his fights. Rage and passion could only go so far, and he didn't want the lives of the people who worked under him to be in any unnecessary danger. But, not even a savvy strategist could work his way entirely out of harms' way....

Before the war's end, Cliff's passions and wiles had failed him-- many of the people and pokemon in his unit were either MIA, KIA, or captured and hauled off to the Gigas prisons. Cliff himself was among the latter group, as his strength and his intellect had caught the interest of certain parties within Gigas' forces. However, Cliff's temper made him too much of a danger to their personel to leave unrestrained while in their custody for too long. In many ways it was his saving grace, as he was passed up for any experimentation at their hands, but it also made it exceedingly difficult for him to act, and it left him helpless at their hands...

Eventually, however, he did escape. He made it back to Caldera, somehow. And, after hearing about what had happened and these upstarts from a city to the south called Union, made his way down to see what was going on. It was a chance for him to potentially start over...and a chance for him to strike another blow at the Gigas forces for daring to lay a finger on the thing he cared about most in the world: his home and his people.


Canon Personality: Boisterous, fun loving, and temperamental, Cliff is described as a hotheaded brawler with a heart of gold in the canon, and it shows in his playful attitude and his reckless abandon when he loses himself in the heat of the fight. However, don't let yourself be fooled by first appearances-- underneath the teasing grin is an uncommonly astute and intelligent man who always seems to know far more than he is willing to let on for various reasons. He has experiences in the world that the younger members of the battle party lack, even those who are military officers in their own right, and his intuituve 'hunches', though often times laughed at because of how ridiculous they are or how nonchalantly he expresses them, have rarely led him astray. And, although he introduces himself as merely a field agent of Quark, an anti-Federation group whose goal is to de-centralize the overarcing government's authority by helping other non-affiliated planets learn to help eachother, it becomes clear through the little asides and subtle actions that his role within the organization is far bigger than he is openly expressing.

But, although he is actually the mastermind behind Quark, which he built upon his ideals of self-reliance and his extreme distaste for the established order that has been putting pressure on his homeworld to join under their umbrella for the better part of the last century, he much prefers the freedom he has as merely a field agent who acts as a mentor and support to the current leader-- a young woman called Maria Traydor, who has been in his care for the last seven years. While it was his mad ideals that founded the organization, it was her charisma and intellect that sent the minor faction skyrocketing into a position that is highly noticed in the intergalactic political arena. After an attempt on his life that nearly took out the entirety of his work and awoke her latent powers of subatomic particle manipulation, he decided that enough was enough and he 'retired' into his current position.

In truth, he only founded Quark because, in his own words, "I don't like taking orders from people I don't like."

While he downplays his actions at every turn, his sense of responsibility for what happens around him is very clear. Although he allows Fayt to take the reigns in the decision making process during their tumultous stay in the Elicoor system, he was very plain about his opinions and discomforts over helping an underdeveloped planet create a large scale lightning canon to help aid in a war between two kingdoms that they had been caught between. He was willing to help Fayt in this with the use of 'college level physics' but he made it abundantly clear that he would rather be the one pulling the trigger on this weapon that he was helping create rather than handing it over to someone that he barely knew. Furthermore, when the situation truly becomes dire, he is the sort to let his thoughts remain unspoken out of concern for rattling the other members of the party. His body language is telling enough-- a pointed look and a pat on the shoulder between him and Mirage, his longtime partner, sister in training, and best friend, is the most meaningful expression of how dangerous a trap that they were walking straight into truly was. However, even in his own hesitations, he always barrels forth for the sake of the other people around him. His sense of responsibility is complimented by his astonishingly level head in a crisis. Although he is notorious for being among the first people to throw down a table and start a barroom brawl, or even start a fight with a military general who had just insulted him just after a bloody victory against the general's second-in-command, he is the kind of man who knows when to pick his fights. And, his own calm makes him something of a rock within a crisis. Furthermore, he uses his playful nature to diffuse tense situations before they even have a chance to start, as he forestalled Fayt's awakening of his own particle destruction ability at least once with the use of a precisely timed distraction and giving the young man several more things to ponder over.

Although incredibly shrewd, intelligent, and intuitive in his own right, these traits are often times overlooked by his loud, playful nature. He is quick to crack a joke or playfully flirt with a 'hot chick', make commentary with his own opinions on the situation that run the gamut of complaining about the weather to wanting to help out a theocractic nation so he could enjoy the sight of the temple maidens. He stubbornly holds to his ideas, whether right or wrong, and his hunches, while rarely incorrect, have also led the party into incidents where they literally crash onto a planet because their transport vessel was badly damaged and ran out of fuel. Furthermore, he is atrociously incompetent at anything that resembles domesticity. His crafting skills are on the level of a grade schooler, and his cooking has been known to knock people unconscious with how terrible it is. And, although it's evident that a standard college education includes high level physics and engineering by modern standards, it is amply clear that he is no scientist-- he is merely a good hearted brawler who saw something he didn't like and decided to do something about it.

AU Deviation: Relatively few, considering how much of the canon I was able to mimic in the AU for BNW. Cliff retains his boyish sense of humor, his wild temper, and his knack for strategic planning and negotiating that he has in canon, although he will be noticeably less cagey about them due to the fact that he is not wanted for alleged terrorism across the galaxy. Furthermore, the attack that took out his unit and his pokemon team was a success-- directly opposite of the thwarted assassination attempt upon him by high ranking military officers associated with the Pan-Galactic Federation. He would end up as more wary to trust enemies on their word because of his taste of failure, but his awareness of his own mortality and the influence he carries among those who trust him would be unaffected.

Canon Abilities: Cliff hails from a world that is noted for it's harsh environment, high gravity, and low atmospheric oxygen in comparison to Earth-- as such, the native aspects of his world have given it's inhabitants an uncommon strength and dexterity that surpasses that of Olympic-level athletes from Earth. Cliff is agile enough to dodge bullets as if they were a child's plaything in context of gameplay, and he is noted as being inordinately strong even among his own people. He's also a skilled martial artist of a style that resembles kickboxing with some flashy Ki effect and high flying acrobatics , and he has trained in that style for long enough that he is considered among the candidates to eventually take over the dojo he was trained in should anything happen to the current master.

Outside of combat, Cliff is an oddly shrewd individual who is capable of reading a person's body language as easily as another would read a text message, and his penchant for diffusing tense situations and cutting to the chase makes him a capable negotiator in times when it is called upon. He is also the most skilled engineer among the playable characters, and he is also a skilled blacksmith. Creating items ranging from swords to complicated stun bombs are easy for him as long as he has the right materials in place, and it is implied in the canon that he personally oversaw the mechanical and technical modifications that were done to Quark's flagship, the Diplo.

Enlightened Abilities: God of War, Fighting/Flying/Steel. Cliff in canon is noted as being a master at hand to hand combat who is noted for his strength and agility, specializing in brutal assaults with his fists, and the occassional acrobatic strike that leaves opponents in awe of his startling speed. Two of his most powerful attacks, Aerial Assault and Acrobat Locus, would find parallels as potential flying-type skills in BNW.

In his Initial Form, Cliff will physically appear much like he does in canon. Incredibly tall and solidly built, he is startlingly agile for a man in his weight-class. With or without his gauntlets, Cliff would be able to deliver fast punches, kicks, and charge attacks with relative ease. Known moves include Mach Punch, Bullet Punch, Feint, Aerial Ace, and Rolling Kick. In this form he only has his Fighting and Flying typings.

For his First Evolution, Cliff will gain his Steel typing and will learn that he'll be able to channel a moderate electrical charge through his fists, and that it will be powerful enough to deliver a Thunder Punch. Other moves include Circle Throw, Flying Press, Hammer Arm and, if he sees fit to use it in a fight, Roost to heal himself of moderate damage that he will end up taking. He'll gain the ability to jump incredibly high, which he'll use (and likely abuse).

In his Final Evolution, The combined effects of both the speed and agility of the flying type and the electro-magnetism of the steel type will allow him a form of limited flight which he will use to full advantage. Moves include the reckless Submission, Sky Uppercut, Sky Drop, Brave Bird, Steel Wing and Metal Burst.

Starter Pokémon: Hawlucha

Notes/Special Considerations: While I picked God of War for his Enlightened perk over the Engineer perk due to his outstanding prowess in combat, I do still want to incorporate the mechanical, technical aspects of his thought processes in the context of gameplay while in Brave New World. I figure that, while he won't be an Engineer in the fashion of making evolutionary stones or other combat consumables, it will likely manifest in a propensity for finding solutions to technical problems in a fashion similar to how MacGyver would. He wouldn't be able to figure out how to make a Rotom Cycle, but he might be able to do some basic repairs to his personal machines on his own.

Furthermore, if his imprisonment by Gigas is problematic, we can work around it into something different. It simply seems like the best way to parallel the consequences of his notoriety in canon.

I'm also requesting a pair of Steel-typed Gauntlets akin to the basic pair he has at the start of the game. All they would do is give him an armor boost.
SAMPLES


First-Person:

-TDM Post + Yosuke and Hayato

Third-Person:

It's good to be back.

That was Cliff's thought when he found himself in Caldera once again, after months of being away. It was good to be back in familiar territory, away from callous prison wardens and the dank, chilly weather of the North. The dry heat and coarse sands of the desert were as much a part of him as the feeling of the wind brushing against his skin when he delivered a blasting charge in the middle of a brawl, or the sweat covered sense of catharsis after a hard but satisfying day spent training in the wilderness. He didn't know how long he had been gone-- and he didn't care.

This was Home.

But, that didn't mean that the desert city was the same as it was when he had left. The occassional lazy Pangoro chewing on it's reed in the shade of a boulder and the sounds of the drunken rabble were still there, but the scars left behind by the battles with the Gigas forces were there. They had nearly lost, he gathered. If not for the forwardness of a city to the south, a walled metropolis called Union, they would have. Those thoughts were enough to keep Cliff sober even as he lingered in the bars at night, loafing with the passion and grace of a Slakoth while he listened to and processed everything that had happened.

He couldn't find his people. He couldn't find any trace of his team, Human or Pokemon alike. And that chafed him more than any of Gigas' restraints on his person ever could. After all, he had still broken free. He couldn't escape his sense of failure about the whole affair.

But the Day of Fire was around the corner. He could see the people in the thick of the preparations, the colored powders being made and packaged together for proper containment until the festivities began. It was a day to forget the old, and a day to start over new.

And then...

This Union. This city to the south whose name lingered on the lips of even the most politically detached ruffians, whose reputation contained whispers of progress and an opportunity for change. It might be worth checking out one of these days.

Soon.