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

[aposeme]

these 2 are just going to be oil and water i think up to you if you want to avoid or lean into it

[dealwiththe]

YEAH PROBABLy there's a couple of things Lucifer got from his initial interactions with Volk that have made him back off

1 Volk pushes his "I want to turn everything you say into a jokey insult" button hard and normally I'd be happy to run with that because like 20% of Lucifer's personality is basically "I know you are but what am I" but Lucifer is actually... trying to be a good warden, at least this early on. So I had him back off rather than give into that impulse - but this can definitely change depending on how things go!

2 Lucifer sees Volk as a person going through a major existential crisis about the whole... interdimensional prison ship thing, having his views of reality turned on their ear etc. This is something that has happened multiple times in his canon, usually of the flavor "human realizes that God is real, Heaven and Hell actually exist, and proceeds to BSOD" - annnnnnnd 100% of the time Lucifer's reaction to it is to again, back off and give them space/time to deal with it. (He also tends to just... ignore when people don't believe he's who he says he is and carry on exactly the same regardless).

tl;dr long term I absolutely want to toss these two together but I think we may have to bide our time and wait for the right situation/circumstances/weird event shenanigans to make it happen! slow burn babyyyyyy. and in the meantime i'll keep pressing my face against the glass b/c volk is an interesting character :))))

[aposeme]

volk's life is just a string of existential crises that are all tied together like mardi gras beads

IM SO SORRY THAT I WROTE ABRAHAMIC RELIGION COMPLETELY OUT OF HIS WORLD IN FAVOR OF POLYTHEISM BEING MUCH MORE GLOBALLY DOMINANT , it would have been neat for him to have any idea of whats going on lol

it might be ffffor the best, volk is suuuuuper mad about what he perceives as lucifer's flippancy about how completely terrifying and miserable it is to be an inmate :( he will need awhile to stabilize that.

PLUS: he and lucifer have had wildly wildly different experiences with how therapy works and what it is and what it can do. like
"why did it take a few years to fix AN ANCIENT BEING OF EVIL when ive been in and out of facilities for 10 years and it turns out my shit is chronic and can never actually be fixed, just tolerated worse or better for the rest of my life

why did he have a fun and cool experience, and ive had experiences that have unintentionally traumatized me and are making being imprisoned in a facility absolute hell"

its a little bit murderous jealousy but its also a little bit "YOU ARE LYING" which ooc i know youre not? because its the canon? but volk is dealing Bad with

[dealwiththe]

I always think it's interesting to see how characters with no cultural context for Lucifer react to him though - and to me it does seem like it inadvertently fed into Volk's initial perception of him since Lucifer came in primarily concerned with reassuring the people on board who did have the name recognition that he's Not Who They Think and he's actually a Good and Friendly Dude Here to Help but since Volk lacked that context he... reacted differently! Unintended consequences! I love 'em.

But yeah for now Lucifer's giving him space and hoping he acclimates a little better so Lucifer doesn't, like, make things worse for Volk before he's even had a chance to reform at all.

[aposeme]

ITS BEEN AN ENTIRE THING , yeah i think they'll interact better once volk has had time to chill the f out