FEBRUARY PLOTTING MEME

[returnjourney]

FEBRUARY PLOTTING MEME

Welcome to the Return Journey's first plotting meme!

In plotting memes, we share what we're doing next, our dream storylines, and any gentle workshopping on tricky subjects or character choices — essentially a CR Meme with an optional smidge of How's My Driving.

These memes are not mandatory, but they are highly encouraged because it's a place to plan CR and communicate your character arc in a way that can get others involved with yours. They're meant to be low pressure and high yield. When in doubt, ask questions!

Every month, we offer a few different prompts or character-building questions. These are entirely optional; you can absolutely just fill in the base form if you want.

<b>Player:</b> <b>Contact:</b> <b>Notes:</b> Time zone, speed, and/or any other habits you want people to know. What do you like or frequently talk about? <b>Character:</b> <b>Canon:</b> <b>Status:</b> Warden or Inmate <b>Info:</b> Give us a brief rundown on your character! What kind of CR do they offer? <b>Plotting:</b> What have they been up to? Any plans? Recent open posts or threads? <b>Goals:</b> Do you have any goals in game? Topics you want to explore? Desired CR? <b>Etc:</b> Anything else!

Monthly Prompts

This month we're asking questions themed around consequences.

Think about the thing that your character desires most — if they failed to fulfill that desire, what would the consequence be? Does it change how they pursue their desire? Is it entirely personal, or beyond them, impacting others?

What consequences does your character need to grow? Consequences are crucial to telling a character arc for both inmates and wardens. Without them, there can't be stakes or tension, and without stakes or tension, there's no impetus to grow. What's a kick in the teeth your character needs? What are they robbing themselves of when they try to avoid these consequences?

How do consequences affect your character externally and internally? How do they react? What kinds of consequences are intolerable or tolerable, necessary or unnecessary?

Comments

alice

[helenite]

Character: Alice Quinn
Canon: The Magicians (Book version)
Status: Warden
Info:

Alice is a huge nerd who's prone to nerves, likes hands-on work, and cares about her friends just a bit too much. She's very committed to her windfall, but not at all sure about the Admiralty's methods.

At home, she's a professional wizard and aimless twenty-something, who pulled the spell equivalent of a grenade on herself to save her friends. She's here to make sure that it actually worked - and to practice using her convictions, instead of just excusing them.

She can offer -

Baseline friendly CR

A nihilist worldview

Ill-advised experiments

Very ill-advised coverups

Someone to win a physical fight

Plotting:

I've been running behind this month, and I'm mostly focused on catching up on that. Please let me know if you'd like a starter, and always feel free to swing into my inbox for a thread / scene. I'll hit yours too!!

She does have a few small balls in the air -

Unpaired for the month, and staying the dorms with William to keep an eye on things.

Volunteering for absolutely everything.

Also, she blew up the Destroy-It when I get around to TAGGING THAT THREAD. Sorry.

Goals:

I'm working on deepening Alice's CR at the moment, particularly with inmates; who she feels a deal of sympathy for. So far it seems like her best friends could've ended up here!! Clearly that doesn't bear closer examination!!

If there's a plot you'd like to do down the line that involves Warden negligence or bad decisions, she's a definite option.

Personal development I'd like to happen include -

She's not dead at home! She's just been telling people that she is, and trying to consider herself dead, because what actually happened is arguably worse. This has potential to touch on some suicidal ideation discussion, so I won't touch on it unless I know you're cool with it OOC.

Sort of fucked up about the whole thing, and about killing basically a child in the process. It's simultaneously making her more and less sympathetic to murderer CR rn, and they're who's she most likely to speak about it with.

Alice has issues with avoiding conflict, and letting people get away with things for longer than they probably should. When this blows up, it tends to be big and abrupt. She should. Work on not doing that.

Her ex recently told her to take more risks, despite the fact that she takes like, a ton already. And should probably take fewer, because she's been breaking things on the Peregrine as a result.

Etc:
Please feel free to reach out if there's ever an issue, I'm always happy to edit a tag or chat something out.

prompts

[helenite]

desires -

Alice's windfall will secure the safety of her friends. She wants this for its own sake - but also, to close a chapter on that life. It's crucial that she has not included going back with them.

For better and worse, she's relying on these external events to make the hard decision for her: She needs to move on and let go of people in order for both she and they to grow. At some level, Alice knows this, and has known it for the better part of a year. She just hasn't been able to handle ripping off the band-aid.

Alice is terrified to her core of doing too little for the people she loves. She needs to learn at more than a conscious, brush-off level, that protecting people from themselves does everyone a disservice.


consequences -

Alice is an angry person, and she doesn't handle strong feelings well. Nor does anyone in her canon ever call her out on this! Being a bit passive about conflict has meant that people tend to excuse the times she does blow up.

I would really like this to not be the case in TRJ, and for it to have actual ripple effects on her relationships with others. Making yourself intentionally frightening to someone is a pretty fucked up thing to do, and she needs to learn the ways that it will sour her CR. Social consequences will always hit her harder than material ones.

[aposeme]

i know magicians canon diagonally from close cr with a quentin in anothet game and the niffin stuff is f a s c i n a t i n g to me if theres ever a time when she ends up having to poke at it.

besides this we have some fun threads going already ♥

[smugreport]

I know their CR so far is minimal but I really like the chemistry Rhys and Alice have and would love to expand on that!

Charm points:
-Rhys is also a huge nerd once you crack that outer, polished layer
-Also accidentally a murderer whoops! a chance to be vulnerable at some point wrt this? I think even though he can be a shit and minimize/act above other peoples crimes here, if he had Attachment to a person he’d be nicer.

[helenite]

i ALSO like them and would like to expand on them!!

i think cracking into nerd stuff will come more quickly than murder, but i'm definitely down for slotting that in down the line. feels pretty IC for rhys at some point to be like "i'm not like these MURDERERS" and alice to get to the point where she's like "well i am"

[smugreport]

LMAOOO Yeah I was just putting that out there, Rhys isn't going to talk about those murders anytime soon if he can help it but he'd definitely have a "not like other girls inmates" moment sooner than later.

Nerd stuff is super easy though, especially if she shows her cards first. Do you like DnD Alice? Computers???

[dealwiththe]

ooooh idk how to make it happen but alice and lucifer should deffo talk about murder sometime

lucifer has Thoughts and Feelings about it due not just to SOLVING a bunch of murders but also KILLING HIS OWN BROTHER THAT ONE TIME 🙃

[expectaspectre]

I don't have any specific plans but it's definitely on my radar that these two are like, young women of an age with VASTLY different life experiences and personalities and we should do something with them at some point, maybe when some more plot stuff comes up?? Anyway I HAVEN'T FORGOTTEN ABOUT ALICE ijs.