Chiaruscuro Kala S'yalin

While I still pondering if there's any interesting directions to go with existing characters, I found myself creating a new one of late that's been rather interesting to think about.


Pull an existing character into a new group of people to play with? Possible, but... risks being pulled in too many directions at once, and that's not particularly good. Make a new character? Maaaybe, but what? Plenty of possible family members as characters, though that might be overdone. Hmm. One of the other players is a big anime fan. Hmm.

So the idea that came to mind was an alternate-timeline characters. Chiaruscuro Kala S'yalin was born to Dove and Kyn'Elwynn in a world where they got together. She's a family member, but the rosters of her family and the existing S'yalin clan are very, very different. The heritage gives her an affinity for life, light, and shadow. A tiger-striped white vixen is fairly striking in appearance. Add on Tyrael-style "wings" of shadow rather than light and you've got a visually-interesting character that's fairly unique.

Spinning out background, I wanted something markedly different than Kith Kanaan "Prime" and the idea of a magic-heavy war came to mind. The most pivotal point I could think of was when Carcassonne was on the verge of going to war with Tarantis as some sciency types were using some sort of fallen-angel-powered golems or the like. While that was defused on the MUCK, if it instead flared up... That lets me paint a picture of an island at conflict. With Naipon backing Carcassonne and Drachen/Threshold siding with Tarantis, there's ample power on both sides. With magic and Tarantis-tech, it's easy enough to see things ramping up before hitting a bit of a stalemate.

I envision cities under protective bubbles of major wards in order to prevent "nuking" by either side, but still skirmishes as both sides try to establish new footholds and such. It's not a pretty situation, particularly for an Archon of Life, but hey.

"Chia," then, is a princess who's seen battle and is well aware of the weight of the conflict upon her parents and people. She very much wants to end it, and as an inheritor of Mika's bloodline, she has access to her infernal tower and the research of their ancestor, Ralyn, who experimented with time magics. This leads her to try to scan the timeline for ways to end or prevent the war, which leads her to mis-cast (or perhaps not) a spell that dumps her (and her feline sidhe familiar) in the MUCK timeline.

Having played her through a handful of scenes thusfar, I've enjoyed it. The most interesting facet is trying to think of the differences between this world and her own. Simultaneously, the most difficult part of playing her is taking that and flipping it back around to view those differences from her perspective, where the things-that-didn't-happen are the very ones that did (to her).