Polymythos Application

[helpdesk_hero]

PLAYER INFO

Name: Churby
Age: 30+
Contact: churbooseanon or Discord: Churby#4290
Current Characters: N/A

CHARACTER INFO

Name: David Alleyne
Journal: helpdesk_hero
Age: ~24
Appearance: Picture

Canon: Marvel Comics (Earth-616) | Mask or Menace CRAU
Canon Point: Post X-Factor 2020 #10 and Post Mask of Menace

History: Canon

Mask or Menace
Mask or Menace CRAU History
-Connected with people from his past and tried to figure out how to work with the fact that people he knew and loved back home who had passed away were back

-Ended up at continuing odds with Quentin Beck. Was mentally tormented by the man and later manipulated into being his therapist. Abandoned this work a few times and felt guilty for failing to reform a villain despite the fact that the attempts were mentally hurting David

-Fell in love with a con-artist and power thief, and even when he learned these things, he stayed with the man, developing a deep emotional relationship and devotion to the other. Managed to reform the man just enough to guide the boyfriend's con work to good, including donating to David's attempts to create a support network for teenaged arrivals.

-Was almost killed by an evil shadow of said boyfriend stabbing him in the back. Would have been paralyzed or killed if his best friend who was a healer wasn't brought to him.

-Learned control over his powers from a powerful Psy named Judd, though had a few breakdowns related to lack of control of his powers that almost shattered his mental state.

-Saved people from monsters in the battle against the Fates by surrendering all memory of his sister, Kim, and his ability to figure skate (a great passion of his.)

-Experienced an alternate he was a morally gray information broker who had a falling but with his boyfriend, and later died by the man's hand. This almost killed David when the world was restored, but as the man had stolen the powers of David's healer best friend, he was revived just before death.

-Lost his boyfriend to the man returning to his home, and grieved that by seeking comfort in the arms of a housemate, who he didn't know was secretly a serial killer. This would later result in his death when traveling back in time to the 1980s.

-Made his way through life as a reality tv host of a show based on using psychometric powers to tell people the secrets of the history of antiques and precious objects.

-Went through another alternate reality where he was one of five members of a leadership council of an island nation of people with powers. Was lovers with his best friend and a former classmate (who were in the general MoM world, dating and he was not part of that relationship). He and the best friend broke up over political disagreements and not being able to devote themselves fully to the relationship.

-Assisted others on the Council in this alternate world in smuggling children and new arrivals to their island, which caused political tension with other nations and his best friend to be kidnapped.

-When best friend was recovered in this alternate world, David led a political movement to get his island allies and more independence, only to have the summit attacked by terrorists. Almost died in the resulting attempts to stabilize the failing of the world, but was saved by the housemate he was sleeping with back in the normal MoM world.

-Traveled to the 1980s by accident when reality started to fall apart, and worked to try and maintain the timeline. When things started to fall apart with temporaral and spacial stability after this, worked with Tony Stark to use their technopathy to try and determine why the world itself was failing and restore the Porter. Ultimately helped to create enough stability to send people home.

Abilities:

Inherent Skills:
From his past and mutant abilities David as a variety of skill sets and educational knowledges that may come up and be useful. These include
-Neurology and Neurosurgery
-Trauma Surgery
-General Medical Practice
-Psychology and Psychiatry
-Degrees in accounting, math, biology
-Various forms of hand to hand combat
-Professional Chef level of culinary skill
-Fluency in multiple languages
-Knowledge (but no ability to use) of magic on par with the Sorcerer Supreme

Powers: From his time in Mask or Menace David gained an altered set of powers from his canon state, described below.

Tactile Knowledge

-When touching certain things with his bare skin David can choose to psychically learn about the thing he is touching. With objects this is known as Psychometry, and with people it manifests as Psychomimetry.

-If David has had his telepathic barriers torn down by any external force, he cannot stop himself from using these powers. Therefore he can actually be effectively tortured through mental overload if he's had his defenses ripped down and people merely start touching him or touching things to his skin.

Psychometry

-Allows David to psychically read the history of an object. This manifests in his mind as experiencing the 'life' of an object, and he knows the object's history from the moment of its 'completion'.

-Objects may develop a degree of personality over time that read over to him some such as stones feeling slow and patient or a stop sign that has existed for a while being insistent and loud about their desire that people stop moving. This power can also let him see major events around objects or the emotions of the event, such as touching a knife and coming to know it's a murder weapon and possibly even some details around the murder. These knowledges fade to merely impressions when the object is put down, and while he can relay this knowledge, it is by no means complete.
-This works on all solid, non-computer objects that are not magically or psychically warded. Powerful spells and psychic defenses on items, items that are truly self aware or powerful artifacts, can actually hurt David, and if the item has too much 'experience' tied to it without a more calm personality, it can be stressful or painful for him to be bombarded with everything at once.

Psychomimetry

-The telepathic 'copying' of knowledge and/or skills from another living being. In touching a person David can use his power to become aware of anything they know through education, practice, memorization, or rote. This can easily be abused because things that people learn through rote can include things like signatures, so he has to live by a tight moral code not to abuse this. It's also true that if someone knows something but it's wrong, he doesn't necessarily know it's wrong.

-Touching someone and gaining their physical skills doesn't mean his body will be properly trained and fit to perform the skill. These touches cannot give David access to powers.

-Knowledge and skills gained through psychometry are retained for a time related to the length of contact. One second of touch equates to one minute of retained skill and knowledge. The longest retention is two hours for two minutes. Once the period has faded the knowledge and skills fade as well though David does have an idea remaining of what he would get from the person if he touched them again.

-This power is easily blocked by magic and psychic or telepathic shielding, though David hates to use it on people who do not consent, as he feels this is cheating for knowledge and benefits. As the touch creates a psychic connection between him and the person he's touching it does create a telepathic link between minds through which David can be mentally harmed by anyone with appropriate training and powers, and those who have psychic powers/telepathy/magic would immediately know what he's doing the second he touches them.

Technopathy

-When physically in contact with a computer or computer run technology, David can directly interact with and manipulate that item. This lets him 'talk to' systems mentally, giving instructions, altering code and fucntions, and even watching through cameras or listening through microphones as if they were his eyes and ears. While he can't manipulate things he's not in contact with, systems that are connected to each other through wiring and programmed interfaces can be manipulated by him, up to the range of a city block. Beyond that attempting to muster enough power to push his control further could lead to a stroke.

-David can, when in chat rooms, create a feeling that he is directly in a physical room interacting with avatars. If psychically or magically tied to someone he can bring them with him into the experience.

-David's technopathy is absolutely tied to physical contact. Anything that blocks him from touching an item, even so thin as a piece of plastic wrap, will completely render him unable to interface with the systems.

-This cannot work on synthetic lifeforms, save to render David aware that they are synthetic. He also cannot mess with systems currently supported or inhabited by other awarenesses, whether they be AIs, robots interfacing with a system, or other technopaths.

Psychic Energy Projection

-David can project psychic/mental energy into physical form. The constructs he makes seem like objects in the form of yellow-gold light. They are directly tied to his mental strength and focus, and limited in form by creativity and size alone. He could make weapons, armor, and even images of animals or landscapes. The energy projections cannot take up more volume than David himself. Therefore if he wants it to be larger in size, the projection must be less dense and thus more vulnerable to damage (a bit like hammering metal thinner and thinner).

-All projections are created at the speed of thought and thus can appear and disappear quickly. With this David can maintain three separate projections at a time that can be no more than three feet from him. Dropped items still exist if he is focusing on them, meaning others can take and use them. All bladed items are razor sharp and could cut through steel. All barriers are as hard as bullet-resistant glass or Kevlar, meaning they can be broken or he can be harmed through them, but this requires either high amounts of force or piercing when he's at full strength. When David's tired or weak, even a less than sharp knife could penetrate his walls. Projections do not, though, bend under blunt attacks.

-The amount of light the projections give off directly relates to how much mental strength David is giving to their creation, and fading light indicates something that might soon disappear or break.

-As this is a manifestation of psychic energy and David is not a proper telepath or telekinetic, the power can easily be shut off by anything that would lock David in his own mind. Also as this falls under energy projection, anyone who can manipulate energy at all can take control of any and all of David's psychic constructs. David may be able to end the projection, but this is not guaranteed.

-Given this power is tied to David's mental energy, all projections are weaker when he's tired, mentally strained, or his attention is seriously divided.
-Projections cannot act on their own, so David cannot make something like a minion to serve him without him actively controlling it.

Questionnaire:

1. What do they care deeply about? What kind of loyalties, commitments, moral codes, life philosophies, passions, callings or spirituality and faith do they have? How do these tend to be expressed?
David cares deeply and is deeply committed to the cause of mutants in his world. His very identity is tied up in his status of being a mutant. This is especially true for the fact that in his world his people seem to finally be getting a chance to prosper and decide their own fate. He believes that the future of people and mutant kind are in the hands of all living people, and their decisions taken together shape the future. In terms of spirituality and faith he has no religious feelings, even though he knows a god. Mostly he finds himself accepting, and sometimes internally justifying, the decisions of people made around him because he wants to have faith that they won't fail him this time. That said, he is known to question some of them just because of prior distrust.

2. What kind of person could they become in the future? What are some developmental paths that they could take: best, worst, most likely?
Between his intelligence and abilities, David has the potential to not only be a great leader, but also someone who could positively change the world. His intelligence and ability to synthesize together the knowledge and skills he can gain means that with enough work and motivation David likely could change the face of technology on his world, or become a great political leader, or even just lead a team like the X-Men. However, David has a deep internal fear of himself and the potentials of his powers if he truly embraces them. The best path would be David growing confident in himself and taking charge of himself and his future and creating technology to make the world better. The worst is David choosing to use his powers and getting lost in the concept that the ends justify the means. Most likely he'll do neither, mostly out of fear of the worst keeping him from the best. Therefore David will live his life as a follower and a supporter rather than living up to his potential.

3. How do they behave within a group? What role(s) do they take? Does this differ if they know and trust the group, versus finding themselves in a group of strangers? Why?
David tends to act either as the brains of a group, the person who thinks and guides and tries to get people to finish a project or support them in saving the day, or as the team mom. His behavior tends to default more toward the brains if he's with people he doesn't know, and while he'd still be the brains around people he does know and cares about, he is rather prone to worrying more about those he's close to. This comes from his powers making him a bit smarter than most people, but he grew up knowing people who made a lot of bad life choices and he ends up hovering for their sake.

4. What do they need and want out of relationships, and how do they go about getting it?
What David wants in relationships is support and patience from the people he cares about. What he needs is people who get him to take himself less seriously, who push him out of his comfort zone, and will tell him to shut up and enjoy life for what it is. In the end these aren't things he specifically goes looking for, because that would be caring for himself and he's bad at that. Instead they seem to happen to him when he most needs them.

5. How do they understand the world–what kind of worldview and thought processes do they have? Why?
David does his best to understand the world through science and scientific inquiry. While he doesn't go full on experiments, he does his best to gather data and use rational thinking to try and find answers. Much of this derives from the way that the world around him often doesn't make sense, especially with mutant powers, and in balance David tries his best to understand the things he can around him. Some of this may come from the fact that he can never tell just WHY people make choices, which often strike him as stupid, especially when they affect his life.

6. How much do they rely on their minds and intellect, versus other approaches like relying on instinct, intuition, faith and spirituality, or emotions?
David believes in intellect over all in about ninety percent of situations. He tries to approach problems from a logical and problem solving approach. Sometimes, though, he respects that you really need to follow your heart and emotions he has literally seen the power of love save the universe

7. What is something others might find intolerable about them?
David's a bit judgemental of others, especially if he feels they have underachieved or made less than the best choices in life. This goes double for people he perceives as, in one way or another, having cheated. Cheated on people they love, cheated to achieve things, cheated to get ahead in life. He doesn't respect people who don't work for what they want.

Samples:
-TDM Action Sample
-TDM Action Sample
-Texting Meme

Why are you interested in this game? I really like the idea of the purpose of a game being to get a character to improve themself so they can potentially go home and be better for themselves and their role in their world.