#arfo

[a-blog-for-ophelia]

This little guy (1.2 meters, 4 feet) is another morph of Balaur, specifically an "Alphen"! Alphen make up the common civilian population of Balaur society, similar to unspecialized worker drones in an ant colony. Though propaganda would like you to think otherwise, Alphen are not as ferocious as they seem, and will not seek out violence (Really no Balaur would, they all have the ability to communicate and reason, at the same level as humans)

[tidesages]

[grabs you by the hand] It is time to talk about your OC (or OCs, if more than one has been on your mind lately.) Tell us about them, what have they been up to, do you have anything you've been itching to do with them?

OH HI HELLO

Yes absolutely let me drop my lad here for some blorbo spinning!

This is my tidesage OC, Brother Worth, and he is a sweetheart who's found himself in situations well over his curly little head.

Worth is the sort of man who likes to do a good job at being a tidesage... but he's saddled with the ability to attract weird adventures, and is associated with his friends, family, and partner who also often find themselves getting into sticky situations.

He's a worrywart and a completely loyal friend, a deeply empathetic man who struggles with the burden of the elements that flow so readily to his request. People tend to call him a sweetheart!

Lately he's been stuck in a campaign titled All Rivers Find the Ocean, where he and his fellow tidesages are tasked with uncovering a conspiracy that is rocking the foundations of Stormsong Valley, and maybe even Kul Tiras as a whole!

(The delightful art is by meggoart, who's been doing amazing NPC sketches)

Most recently Worth and his party (and pretty much all of Freehold) took part in a pitched battle with a k'thir where they cut off her hand, freed the mind of a kraken from her grip, and recovered a bunch of treasure from the ship she sank! This is just about the end of our Freehold arc, but we're going to head back toward the north to focus on the people challenging Brannon's rule as Lord Stormsong.

As I'm the DM for this campaign, I've got several little plans for Worth in the campaign, which is going to continue with Worth meeting one of the candidates and forming a bond of friendship, one that will cause all sorts of things to fall into place in the future. He's also going to have to make decisions about his own family ties, since this campaign is about inheritance in all kinds of ways.

In any case, I'm excited to see what happens next to Worth!

[a-blog-for-ophelia]

Realspace travel vs Exofirmament travel

Realspace travel refers to spaceships and vessels moving below lightspeed, which could apply to any ship, but mostly refers to “voyage” ships, which travel between stars at multi-year lengths (system to system)

Before contact with the Balaur, humanity stuck close to Sol, only certain companies sending slow-moving voyage ships to close systems, with the conversion of moving at 2.5% the speed of light (50 years per lightyear.) These ships mostly used mixes of cryostasis and maintenance from machine constructs during their trips.

After contact with the Balaur and the discovery of the Ophelian Firmament, Exofirmament travel became a reality.

Exofirmament travel occurs when a shipbound Unfolded Collective Computer (UCC) is stimulated with excessive amounts of energy, and makes a spatial distortion to bring the host ship to the “Exofirmament,” a plane of pure entropic energy. The generated distortion makes a protective negentropic field around the UCC host, which allows it to safely travel in the Exofirmament.

A UCC, given a destination and coordinates, can slingshot it’s host through the Exofirmament, and breach back through the Firmament and to a semi-accurate point in space at the speed of 1 lightyear per 60 hours. This can be dangerous when aiming for new locations in space due to flying somewhat blindly, but is made safer by creating an Anchor at the location, a variant of a shipbound UCC made to communicate with other UCCs as a sort of waypoint, and pull ships from the Exofirmament.

There is a major danger to Exofirmament travel, which are the bursts of radiation left at the entry and exit points of the Firmament. This demands travel to take place a safe distance away from systems or stations. (This has not stopped certain groups from using Exofirmament travel as a sort of dirty bomb, but is prevented by the placement of Anchors outside of systems.)

[a-blog-for-ophelia]

Putting together a Balaur mech :-)

Common practice is to decapitate the Balaur and store it's head separate from the body to prevent unwanted activation. The head and base of the neck are augmented to have a cavity for the pilot to mount into, and they link directly into the nervous system of the Balaur.

[a-blog-for-ophelia]

So, with my initial character (Flemat) being repurposed from Lancer, of course I should add mechs to the setting

BUT not just any mechs

A lot of the technology in Arfo runs on extreme amounts of wetware,

Computers being lab-grown brains

Heavy machinery, monstrous meat mechs reinforced with cybernetics

There’s AI... Which are a branch of the lab-grown brains able to develop further than totally lobotomized grey matter, they can pilot massive spaceships that act as giant bodies for them

There’s a lot of complicated feelings towards this kind of technology, obviously, because at what point does it turn from nonsentient nerves in a computer case to a mind-controlled Person? Does this armor plated dinosaur-forklift have rights? The automated bus that takes you to work, does it dream?

[freehonestcollection]

[arystyle]

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[shaunbutler86]

I need to draw more Afro! #afrosamurai #arfo #samurai #gonzo #anime #art #artistsoninstagram #artist #fanart #fanartfriday #ink #copic #promarkers #illustration #shaunbutler86 #oldstuff #bandana #manga #like #follow #followme (at Ebley)