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This is requested as part of the application so that you are more than
just an application. If you positively choose not to tell us, please do
not lie. That will simply set things off on a false start. You are,
however, required to tell us your age, or at least affirm that you are
18 or over. We will accept applications from people of any age.
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Real name and age.
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This is requested as part of the application so that we can contact you
in the event that the MUX moves or goes down for an extended period of
time. Again, you are encouraged to refrain from answering instead of
providing false information. This information is also crucial to the
application process, as we need to inform you of application status and
to schedule an interview.
All official MUX correspondence is via e-mail -- notification of the
receipt of your application and the results of the judging of your
application.
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E-mail address.
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Give all names and aliases of the character for which you are applying.
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Quicksilver/Pietro Maior Maximoff
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This should inclue EXACTLY what you would intend for your description
for your character. This is what people see when they look at you. Feel
free to provide more than one description, in combat attire, casual
attire, et cetera. Note that you can of course have more descriptions
for your character than the ones you submit, but you should submit at
least one. If you have a shapeshifter, submit a few descriptions. This
is important as the game -is- text based, and therefore how able you are
to describe things is important to the game.
A note about descriptions: A good description will evoke a response in
the reader without the reader being told what sort of response they
should have to the description. In other words, don't tell someone what
they feel or think when looking at your character, but rather evoke this
response by describing the things in the character that would inspire
those feelings.
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Pietro's face is handsome and aquiline, with high, aristocratic cheekbones, piercing, actinic
blue eyes, slender, sharp white eyebrows, and striking silver hair, which sweeps back with two
prominent and rebellious strands in front. His head is held high with an evident aloof pride,
and disdain can be seem around the corners of his mouth as he looks down. His face is
expressive and lively, although his most frequent expression is an impatient frown. When he
does smile, it is sharp and flinty, and his bright eyes gleam with the intensity of his passions.
Pietro's body is lean and hard, and he moves with an arrogant grace, supremely confident in
his body and its capabilities--his is a runner's body, built for speed and grace, and he is aware
of it.
Pietro's uniform is an extremely streamlined and tight-fitting charcoal-grey body suit, which
fits him like a glove. His boots are a brighter silver color, traveling half-way up his calves,
and are thicker--built for traction and shock. His gloves are of the same bright silver color,
fitting over his hands and turning back at the wrists. The design of a silver lightning bolt
travels up each of his sides, from his boots to his shoulders, and down to his wrists. His collar
is wide and open, and matched pair of silver lightning bolts lance over his shoulders, striking
toward the center of his chest. Around his waist is a close-fitting black belt with numerous
pouches and attachments, fastened by a black, rectangular buckle, on the face of which gleams
a bright, silver X.
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What is your character like -- hopes and dreams, fears, personality
quirks, obsessions, motivations, what makes them tick. Analyze the inner
workings of the subconscious mind and all that fun stuff. This is an
opportunity to make the character your own. These are both good and bad
things, things that make your character strong and things that make your
character weak. How is your character vulnerable, what inner demons does
he or she have. Feel free to include a free-form section simply
discussing the characters personality, but you MUST express the key
traits individually for the character's +traits. See '+help +traits' for
more information, and +traits some of the characters in the game to get
an idea of what we want.
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[Hope you like reading. :) ]
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Personality:
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"I am not an object for your pity! I... am the fastest man alive!"
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Pietro Maximoff, the mutant called Quicksilver, is a study in contradictions. He is cold
and rational, and at the same time passionate and hot-tempered. He is arrogant and aloof,
and at the same time fiercely loyal and compassionate. He is cynical and embittered at the
world, and yet will not hesitate to oppose evil when he sees it. How can this be reconciled?
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As I see it, Pietro could be said to have an exemplary character, but a troubled personality.
Pietro is everything that a heroic member of the X-Men should be: he is courageous, noble,
loyal, honest, dedicated ... but he is also very difficult to get along with on a personal level.
He is impatient, condescending, socially inept (not that he deigns to care), inappropriately
candid and arrogant. Pietro is one of the first people you'd want to have on a mission, and
one of the last you'd think to hang around with.
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Pietro really does have a very deep capacity for (and need for) friendship, although he
seems to actively work against people liking him. If someone manages to become his friend,
in spite of him, they'll have made a friend for life, whom they can rely on completely. He
also likes people quite a bit more than he allows them to see -- although it slips out in rare
moments.
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Because of his mutant power of speed, everything seems slow and stupid to Pietro. It's
very difficult for him to be patient with people and to take the world at its own pace. In
fact, it's amazing that Pietro hasn't gone insane, instead of just being impatient and rude. He
tries to deal with this as best he can, and usually succeeds when he's calm -- when
agitated however, he loses all semblance of patience.
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Quicksilver has never doubted that fighting for mutant acceptance in the world is the right
thing to do, but is enough of a realist to recognize that the fight could just as easily
be lost. He isn't an idealist, by any means (nor should he be, as the various hellish futures the
X-Men have encountered show). But dedication to such a cause can't sustain Pietro
without personal attachments. First and foremost, this is what he needs, and what he briefly
found with Crystal -- and what he might be able to find again with a mutant team like the
X-Men or X-Factor.
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Pietro is looking for a place where he can stop running.
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Playing Quicksilver, I'll try to capture this two-sidedness of his personality. Emerson once
said of Thoreau that he loved him, but could never like him -- that's a good thought for Pietro
as well, although he's not _that_ unlikable.
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"Val Cooper, I heard you scream Madrox's name. Did he leave a rubber snake in
your coffee cup, or were you simply having an erotic nightmare about him?"
"He...he's DEAD...It was on the news."
"Hmm. Must have been a slow news night."
"Pietro! My God, that's cold."
"It's a cold world. No one knows that better than I. Madrox was a fool, and I do not
suffer fools gladly, but if my candor bothers you, Val Cooper...I apologize. We'd best notify
the others, don't you think?" (XF #71)
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Direct: Pietro has no patience with prevarication or equivocation: he tends to say exactly
what's on his mind. This can be characterized as blunt, candid, tactless, insensitive, or what
have you, but the basic tendency is that he will say what he thinks, without regard to niceties,
and he will be the one to say what everyone else is thinking. Notice in the scene above, he
also apologizes rather matter of factly. It isn't that he lacks tact; he simply does not deign to
restrain himself from voicing his opinions. This is one of his most endearing qualities. :)
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Pietro: "You mean you want us to knock out _anyone_ who looks like Jamie Madrox?"
Havok: "That's right, Pietro."
Pietro: "Oh, good."
Havok: "Shut up, Pietro."(XF#73)
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Dry: Despite rumors to the contrary, Pietro does have a sense of humor. It usually takes the
form of dry observations, sarcastic remarks, or sharp barbs, but it's there. Old Sourpuss has
even been known to play practical jokes from time to time, as when he picked a bigot's pocket
and bought the house drinks with his money.
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"Fortunately, reading requires the most minimal effort. I have to do _something_ at an
accelerated rate. Otherwise, I'd be ordinary, and would probably want to kill
myself."(Pietro, XF#72)
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Arrogant: Pietro is very arrogant and haunty, and tends to look down on almost everyone.
("You don't think much of me, do you?" Doc Samson asked once. Pietro replied, "I don't
think much of anyone.") It is very difficult to earn Pietro's respect, but he is always honest in
his judgments about people--he will admit his respect for even those he otherwise despises,
such as Magneto, as well as for those he regards highly, such as Captain America or Charles
Xavier. His attitude to most people, however, is one of condescension; it is NOT a
mutant/human thing--Pietro is an equal-opportunity snob.
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Shatterstar: "Coward! You dodge around because you're afraid to face me!"
Pietro: "Not at all. I dodge around to make you feel as stupid as you look..."(XF #84)
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Disdainful: Pietro is arrogant, but he is not pompous, and can't stand people who have an
inflated manner to them (such as Shatterstar, above). He enjoys cutting people down to size,
especially those who think highly of themselves without reason. He detests bigots of all sorts.
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Shatterstar: "I was right. You are without honor."
Pietro: "You obnoxious punk! The _worst_ thing you could do is merit my full attention! My
entire life consists of finding ways to ease the boredom, which you're presently doing. But
you're coming dangerously close to crossing the line into the realm of being an
annoyance..."(XF #84)
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Irritable: Pietro's powers make him impatient with everything and everyone in the world, and
he is quick tempered, irritable, and easily annoyed. This tendency can lead to rash behavior in
extreme cases, but in fact his self-control is nothing short of remarkable, considering what he
has to put up with. From a normal person's perspective, he seems like a fault-finding, touchy,
high-strung jerk, but he makes extraordinary efforts to restrain himself...and often, but not
always, succeeds. It doesn't take much to set him off.
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Armored goon: "You've got FIVE seconds, freaks--or you're both dead. Five ! Four!
Three...?!"
Pietro: "--two, one, zero. Okay, go ahead: shoot. Oh--but you don't have your guns, do
you?
Goon: "Th-that's impossible!"
Pietro: "Miraculous, isn't it--what we "mutie freaks" can do when we put our minds to it?
Just be grateful I didn't beat you all senseless while I was at it. Heaven knows you little tin
racists deserve it..."(XF #92)
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Judgmental: Pietro is also rather extreme in his judgements about people. He tends to form
rapid estimations of people, and these are slow to be revised. He has a strong sense of duty,
and of right and wrong, and he despises moral cowardice of all sorts, especially of the sort of
"just following orders." Pietro's rigid judgments often blind him to seeing changes in
others, or to the ambiguities of the human soul. He tends to view moral matters in clear and
rigid distinctions.
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Formal: This tendency applies to matters of propriety as well as morality. Pietro tends to
observe the appropriate forms, believing that form is an important element in all aspects of
life. Pietro rarely "cuts loose", but is quite at home in formal events or occasions.
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Logical: Pietro prides himself on his logical mind and rationality, and tries to live guided by
reason. He has a low regard for instinct, and will often demand reasons for doing things, and
will not do things for which he sees insufficient reason. Pietro desires clarity of thought and
reasoning above all, and is unwilling to tolerate murkiness or ambiguity.
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Passionate: Despite his passion for logic (and it is a passion), Pietro is no Vulcan--he is a man
of intense passions, throwing himself into his activities with the whole of his being, whether
this be fighting for a noble cause or passionate love for a woman. Pietro has a fiery soul, and
despite his devotion to self-control, he expresses it rather than represses it. He is not a monk,
but more like an artist: he wishes to give visible form to his passion rather than root it out.
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Sensitive: Pietro's aloofness and distance from others is an indication not that he is uncaring or
insensitive, but that he is very sensitive, and hence, trusts only slowly and rarely--betrayal is
almost more than he can bear, so he keeps others from becoming close; when he does make a
friend or allow himself to love, he does so whole-heartedly and with reservation. He is
compassionate to suffering and can empathize greatly, but rarely shows this aspect, save to a
few very close friends. Of course, most of the world will never see this part of him.
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Impatient: this is more than a personality problem; it's a side-effect of his power. Since he
sees everything at an increased rate, normal human activity seems insufferably
slow to him. His most pressing problem is how to fill his time--he can read libraries in the
same time that others read comic books, so he is constantly bored and/or impatient.
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Notoriety: Pietro is well-known, known as a mutant and an Avenger, respected in some
quarters, disliked in others, but highly recognizable.
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This section should be a summary of the history of the character that
touches upon all the key life events of the character and how these
events shaped the character into the person he or she is today. For a FC,
this includes material from the comics, and for an NFC, it is entirely
made up. However, if there are gaps in a FC's history, those histories
which go out on a limb to make things up about the character will
receive more appreciation than those that simply stick to what is known
from the comics. If it isn't known, go out on a limb and write it up
yourself. This is a significant opportunity to make the character your
own.
Although the background you provide in the application should be
extensive, you will not need to use all this information in your
background trait in the game, as you can share a more limited background
with the general public. If you already expect that you will use a
different background, please submit that version as well.
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Pietro Maior Maximoff was born in the midst of a howling storm, half-natural, and, fed by the
Ur-demon Chthon's rage, half-supernatural, the blood son of Erik Magnus Lehnsherr,
Magneto, and the gypsy Magda, delivered by a midwife somewhat other than human, Bova,
the cow-woman, deep beneath haunted Wundagore Mountain, in the tiny land of Transia, in
the stronghold of the High Evolutionary, following his twin sister, Wanda, into the world by
mere seconds. After this unassuming beginning, his life took a turn for the weird.
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After a terribly confusing incident involving Bova's botched attempt to give the two children
to an insane man, which resulted in Pietro and Wanda thinking their name was "Frank" for
many years, the High Evolutionary concluded that his parenting skills weren't what they ought
to be, and presented Pietro and Wanda to a gypsy couple, Marya and Django Maximoff, to
raise as their own, telling them only their names (they were actually named by Magda, before
she went off to die of exposure, for no apparent reason).
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Pietro and Wanda were raised with love and affection by the gypsy couple, and actually had
good and happy childhoods, although they were a bit secretive, even for gypsies, and tended to
enjoy only one another's company--a strange bond existed between the twins, making them far
closer than a typical brother and sister. It was almost, at times, as if each knew what the other
was thinking without it needing to be said. They wandered with their adoptive family across
Eastern Europe, watching the slow recovering from war, and the iron hand of communism
descend on the land.
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When Pietro and Wanda were in their early teens, they discovered that they possessed
mysterious powers--of all the peoples on earth, the gypsies understood such things (although
they took them to be magical signs), and wondered and encouraged the children in the
exploration of these powers. Alas, the communist authorities were no more sympathetic to the
gypsy folk than the Nazis, and work became impossible to find--their small band was forced to
turn to theft (a venerable gypsy tradition) in order to stay alive. At some point, Django was
caught at this, and the small band of gypsies were brutally attacked by vicious townsfolk.
Never having seen slaughter or such horror before, Pietro at first tried to fight, but then
realized that Wanda's life was more important and carried her to safety.
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Suddenly, abruptly, their family was dead and they were orphans in a cold, cruel world. For
several years, Pietro and Wanda roamed the countryside, employing his powers to help them
stay alive, inevitably being given away at each stop by her wild and unpredictable powers.
Sometimes their escapes were easy and sometimes narrow, but they were always able to move
on, until one fateful day, a day which was to change their lives forever. Pietro returned from
scavaging for food, only to find Wanda in the hands of an angry mob. He was told to
surrender, or his sister would be hurt, and so he did. He was then brutally beaten, fell
unconscious--even as the villagers made their preparations to burn the witch and the silver-haired warlock,
Pietro awoke to see them blown back by shining electrical force. It hurt his
eyes to look at, but in its midst he could see, standing like some Olympian god, a man clad in
armor of blood-red and regal purple. He was their savior; he would become their tormentor;
and, unknown to any, he was their father.
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Magneto pressed them into service as members of his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, naming
them Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. For many months they served him, out of a sense of
obligation for his having saved their lives, first in Europe, and later in America, clashing with
the newly formed X-Men numerous times. From the very beginning, Xavier's students saw
that Pietro and Wanda were not truly evil, and could not fathom their allegiance to Magneto
and his cause; Pietro and Wanda fought the X-Men strongly, but also acted in ways atypical of
evil mutants, saving innocents and the like. Pietro once defused a nuclear bomb that would
have blown the X-Men and the small land of Santo Marco sky high, recognizing that it would
be a fundamentally evil act. During this period, Magneto abused and tyrannized the twins,
especially Wanda, whose powers were often unreliable and unpredictable. Pietro quickly
learned to hate him.
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A window of escape presented itself when Magneto was removed from Earth by the alien
Stranger, and the Brotherhood disbanded. Pietro and Wanda turned to the Avengers, and
petitioned for membership (largely at Wanda's insistence), and were accepted into the second
incarnation of that group (along with Hawkeye, another reformed criminal) as several of the
founding members left. For several year, the two served as active Avengers, fighting a wide
array of menaces and gaining some degree of public respect and notoriety--although within the
group, Pietro still kept much to himself, as did Wanda, except for a growing closeness to the
mechanical Vision, one which Pietro abominated. Pietro's prejudice against the Vision was to
become the source of a major conflict between he and his sister, between whom there had
never been any ill feelings before--this hurt Pietro terribly, but he could not stop himself, until
he was forcibly stopped by the telepath Moondragon, who self-righteously erased the prejudice
from Pietro's mind without his consent.
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Soon after, Wanda and the Vision were wed, and Pietro lost his sister to a machine, which,
thanks to telepathic alteration, he could not even have the satisfaction of despising. He
through himself into work with an obsessive ruthlessness that led to rash behavior, sometimes
bordering on self-destructive. Not long after this, he was gravely wounded in a bitter fight
with the mutant-hunting Sentinels, and was transported to the Himalayas by the Inhuman dog
Lockjaw, who somehow happened on the scene (I'm not making this up). There, in Attilan,
he was tended by the Inhuman Crystal, and slowly recovered his health, falling deeply in love
with Crystal in the process. Soon, he and she were married, and they lived fairly happily in
Attilan, the most exciting event being the relocation of the entire Inhuman people to the blue
area of the moon. Pietro and Crystal had a daughter, soon after this move, whom they named
Luna, as she was the first human child to be born on the moon. About this same time,
Magneto learned the truth of his connections to Pietro and Wanda, and confronted them about
it, seeking their loyalty in his latest crusade. Pietro angrily denounced him, and turned him
away, although further evidence of Magneto's reform has reached him--but he still stubbornly
clings to a bitter dislike of his natural father.
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At this time, Pietro and Crystal began to have marital problems, and separated, Pietro
returning to live on earth. After a brief hallucination of an Avengers Annual and a West Coast
Avengers Annual which are so poorly written that I refuse to acknowledge their existence as
continuity and urge all decent Marvel fans to do likewise, Pietro joined the West Coast
Avengers, where he would be in mainstream continuity at the time of out break.
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Soon after this, in the wake of the Shadow King incident, Pietro (in mainstream continuity)
leaves the WCA because "they do not appreciate my talents" and joins the newly forming
X-Factor. On MMM, I plan to simply have Pietro get fed up with the WCA's a little before
this, and will begin ICness with his leaving them to seek out someone else.
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Mutant powers, skills etc. How do they work, why do you have them, what
do they do, what can't they do. A powers section is mandatory for all
super-powered individuals. A skills section is mandatory for all
characters. Each power and skill should be thoroughly discussed,
including applications, complications, vulnerabilities, and any
idosyncracies of the skill or power. It is also imperative that you
completely delineate the levels and limitations of the power(s). Again,
as with traits, it is best if you categorize, thoroughly discussing each
power or skill in its own section for use in your +powers and +skills.
Also note that if the character is to have ANY magical abilities, these
must fall in line with the information in 'news magic'. Further, EVERY spell that your
character will have must be presented for use in a spellbook. For more
information, see '+help +spells' on the MUX.
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Powers:
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Superhuman Speed: Quicksilver can run, move, think, act, and react at superhuman speed.
This allows him to perform a variety of superhuman actions: In addition to locomotion,
Quicksilver can punch someone dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of times in the time it
would take a normal person to throw a single punch -- this is enough to render most foes
senseless. He can create whirlwinds by spinning jets of air, and he can create small sonic
booms by breaking the sound barrier in a local manner (with is hand, for instance) and knock
people out thereby (this is a power-stunt of Super-Sabre's, whom, I maintain, is not nearly as
fast as Quicksilver--see my excursus below). Pietro can also accomplish almost any normal
task at incredible speeds -- he has, for instance, searched an entire building top to bottom in
a few seconds, and can move so fast as to be invisible to the naked human eye. He can also
run up verticle surfaces, and over water. His top landspeed is approximately 25,000 mph, or
7 miles per second, and he can act at roughly 2000 times the rate of a normal human being
(see below for the more elaborate analysis and justification for this). Thus, Quicksilver is the
fastest mutant alive, by a fair margin.
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Enhanced Physiology: Quicksilver's body is both more efficient and more durable than a
normal human's, in order to withstand the rigors of velocity and acceleration. He is stronger
and tougher than a human, heals faster, and does not fatigue. Pietro can lift approximately
1000 pounds, and can take a slightly higher level of damage than an unenhanced human. His
body processes 99.99% of its intake, and his oxygen use is so efficient that he needs to breathe
in only occasionally--he can hold his breath for over half an hour, and, needless to say, he can
do a lot in that time. His body is resistant to toxins and chemicals, clearing them from his
system almost instantly (it's almost impossible for him to get drunk), and it overwhelms
diseases easily, since it has antibodies which move a thousand times the speed of normal ones,
and produces them thousands of times faster than normal as well. Pietro recovers from stuns,
incapacitations, and injuries at an accelerated rate, and needs very little sleep.
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Psychic Resistance: Two things combine to give Pietro an exceptional psychic resistance:
Quicksilver's mind, although it can be scanned by telepaths, cannot be read by them, because
his thoughts move too fast to understand--this does not apply to memories and stored
information, only to active processes. A telepath would get a signal, like a language he knew
being spoken at a 2000x pace--complete gibberish. Also, Quicksilver has, simply owing to his
heritage, a strong natural mindshield -- it is not nearly as strong as his father's, but fairly
formidable nonetheless. He can usually hold out a moment longer than others, and usually, a
moment is all he needs. He could not resist Professor X, for instance, but perhaps Karma.
ICly, I usually interpret this as being able to take a single definite action before succumbing to
a psychic assault--and I make it that one action count. Another thing that deserves comment is
that Pietro's thoughts are extremely focused and clear, and telepaths will notice that he speaks
telepathically with ease and clarity--he is capable of initiating conversations with telepaths by
focusing this thoughts, and prefers this efficient mode of communication above all others.
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Skills:
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Jack-of-all-trades: Pietro's power allows him to acquire new skills in an almost negligible
amount of time, and since one of his major preoccupations is filling his time, he has had
occasion to learn quite a bit about almost everything. Most notably, Pietro is a skilled medic,
and can treat injuries efficiently and rapidly. He knows almost all natural languages on earth,
including dead ones, and certainly German, Romany, Japanese, French, Spanish, Latin,
Greek, Russian, Italian, Chinese, etc. He is familiar with computers and most machines; he is
a skilled pilot (although he cannot drive a car). He is an expert handyman and can repair most
anything that is not inordinately sophisticated.
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Excursus on Pietro, speed, and Marvel's math and physics departments; You don't have to
read this part if you don't want to; I wrote it up as much to figure it out as anything.
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"GET OVER HERE, YA SILVER-HAIRED SIMP!"
"In the time it took you to say that, Blob, I could have circled half of Manhattan...much less
dodge you."(XF #82)
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"To your dull eyes, I appeared to be standing still, Cortez. But in the time it took you to
blink--I was across this complex several times--saving the lives of the...humans you're so
desperate to destroy." (XF #92)
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How fast can Quicksilver run? The OHOTMU says that he has been clocked at over 175 mph
(three times faster than the Cheetah, we're told). This same entry has a picture of Pietro
running up a vertical wall, punching Spider-Man. Has anyone considered the feasibility of
driving a car at 175 mph up a wall? One wonders what they were thinking over there at
Marvel--the answer, of course, is that they weren't, as usual. But wait, there's more: the
Quicksilver entry also says he could run across water for approximately 1000 feet before
beginning to sink. 1000 feet? Never mind the fact that he once ran to Australia--we'll just set
that aside for the moment--consider the physics of this. Some animals can run across water.
They can do it because they can hit the water so fast that they push off the air pocket and stay
up; humans can't, because we can't run fast enough to stay up--how fast would we need to go?
About 75 mph. Even at the ridiculously slow speed at which they have Pietro listed, he could
do it. In other words, Marvel's numbers are useless gibberish--so I'm deriving my own, based
on what we've seen in the comics, and some mathematical estimation. I realize that trying to
get sense from Marvel physics is like trying to get blood from a stone, but why not? It might
be fun.
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I'll start with a principle that I want to assume, but that I also intend to show fits the known
facts: Pietro is the fastest mutant alive. This seems to me to be a reasonable assumption,
since, among other things, he is the son of Magneto, and power of mutation does pass on to
offspring somewhat (Legion, for example), so that Pietro could be expected to have enormous
potential. In essence, I'd like Pietro to set the standard for speedsters, rather as Xavier does
for telepaths, Magneto for electromagnetic manipulators, etc. But I want to show that this is
not only reasonable, but also likely, given what we know Pietro can do.
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Pietro's most likely competition for the title of "speed king", I believe, is Northstar. Jean-Paul, according to the OHOTMU, can travel Mach 10, around 7,700 mph. He cannot
practically go faster than this without harming himself. How about Quicksilver?
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What do we know? We know that Quicksilver is capable of moving so fast that he cannot be
seen by the naked eye. (Many places--e.g. XF #92) We know that he can read a book in
something like a second. (XF #72) We know that he can thoroughly search a thirty story
building from top to bottom in about five seconds. (XF #71) We know that he can self-teach
himself the piano in a minute or so. (XF #76) We know that he can get from the East Coast to
Arizona in a few moments. (WCA Annual #2?) We know that he can circle Manhattan Island
in roughly four seconds. (XF #82) We know that he can run to Australia from North America
faster than the Averger's Quinjet can get there. (WCA Annual #2?) What can we do with
these?
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Actually, with a little estimation and math, it turns out that they're all reasonably consistent
with one another, and with my theory about Pietro being the fastest man alive. Let's take a
couple of examples: Pietro states to the Blob that "in the time that it took him to say that"
he could have circled half of Manhattan. Timing myself several times, I determined that it
took the Blob 2 seconds to shout "Get over here, ya silver-haired simp!" (try it yourself)--that
would mean that Pietro could go entirely around Manhattan in 4 seconds, or 1/4 around it
in one second. Manhattan has an approximate circumference of 28 miles, which means that
Pietro could travel 7 miles per second, or approximately 25,000 mph. How does that number
fit with other things? Going from the East Coast to Arizona (lets call it 2500 miles), would
therefore take Pietro 1/10 of an hour, or 6 minutes...assuming he could do it in a straight line.
Since it's reasonable to assume he can't, it still puts us roughly where we want to be--i.e., his
doing it in something like 10-15 minutes. Australia? At this rate, he could get there in about
an hour (unobstructed), or something like an hour (adjusted), which is also a reasonable fit
with the data--like Shakespeare's Puck, Pietro can "put a girdle round the earth in forty
minutes." This figure also gives another: Pietro can act at roughly 2000 times the rate of an
average human being. At that rate of reading, it would mean that a person could read an
entire book in an hour, if Pietro could do it in two seconds--this may even be a little SLOW
for Pietro, if we figure an average book to have 200 pages (it's off by an order of magnitude),
but it's still a decent fit with this sort of ballpark estimation. It's also approximately the
square root of C, the speed of light; that might mean *something*, for all I know.
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Thus, I conclude that Quicksilver can move roughly 2000 times faster than normal human
beings--this translates to a land speed of around 25,000 mph, or 7 miles per second, or 3.2
times faster than Northstar on the best day of his life. This is only a rough estimate, but its
accurate enough for our purposes, and it will allow me to be more consistent with Pietro's IC
speeds. I think it makes a fair case for Quicksilver's being the fastest mutant alive.
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[NOTE: I just want to be
precise. I think this number is a good one, but we could cut it in half if it troubles anyone.
What I would like to see an end to, however, is people using Pietro as a benchmark for their
above-average speed. I maintain that that's like using Dr. Strange as a benchmark for one's
mystical power--not that that doesn't happen. :p] |
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Money, power, friends, enemies, tech, what you can get ahold of and how.
Who can you run to, where can you hide, who will do things for you
unquestioningly or bail you out at 3am. In order to list an established
character as a contact or a resource, this must be approved by the
established character. This information will be used in the game as your
+contacts, and you should write this information in a form which easily
translates to CONTACT_ or RESOURCE_. You should also
include in this section of the application a petition for your tech level
rating and IC justification for this rating. Refer to 'news technology'
for more information. Any technology which is 'exceptional', that is to
say, unavailable to the general public, that your character will have,
should be writen up as well. For guidelines as to what information
should be present when writing up technology, refer to 'news tech app'.
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CONTACTS:
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Avengers: Pietro is a reserve member of the Avengers, in good standing, and has the authority
to invoke Avengers' clearance in legal situations. He can contact the Avengers for assistance
or information.
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Fantastic Four: Pietro has also had a long-standing relation with the Fantastic Four, and
considers them personal friends (his ex-wife Crystal once served as an FF member), and can
seek them out for aid or information.
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X-Men: Once again, Pietro has known the X-Men since their founding, and although
originally an enemy, was asked to join the team on more than one occasion. Although he
always passed this up, he knows who they are, and could easily go to them for assistance of
various sorts--this includes familiarity with most of their past members, as well as present
ones.
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Inhumans: Pietro was married to Crystal of the Inhumans, and lived on the moon with them
for several years. Although not separated from his wife, he remains on excellent terms with
these people, since they accepted him to a greater extent than anyone else (even if not
completely).
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Magneto's son: This is a Flaw contact, insofar as Pietro is related to a world-famous mutant
terrorist, and is subject to attacks of various sorts by both anti-mutant fanatics and mutant
fanatics.
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RESOURCES:
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Pietro generally disdains finances, but nevertheless when he and Wanda fled the Brotherhood
of Evil Mutants, he was able to manipulate a tiny fraction of Magneto's vast resources to
establish a small trust funds for himself and for his sister (more for her sake than for his).
This fund affords him about $100,000 per annum, although he rarely spends anything close to
that.
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This is optional. You can choose to write a sample dialogue with your
character, a short story, prose, a journal or diary entry, an internal
dialogue, anything that you might want to share. In someways, this is
your chance to show off what you know about the character and how this
particular character can enhance the MUX community.
While this section is not mandatory it can prove significant in cases
where there is ambiguity about the decision. An absence of an IC section
will lend itself to a No while the presence of an IC section will lend
itself to further chance for the application to be passed.
For more ideas, see 'news ic questions' on the MUX.
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1. Pietro faces the Juggernaut, livid at being unable to affect him in any way. "You obscene
goon!"he spits, "I'd tear you to pieces with my bare hands had I the power to do so!"
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2. Pietro tilts his head sharply up, his eyes narrow, his expression unreadable. "Ms Sontag,
I do not trust you," he says, matter-of-factly, "but you are the only person who can tell me
what I need to know. So...I am here to ask for you help."
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3. Pietro gazes deeply into Rogue's eyes, seeming to become lost in their emerald depths. He
draws in a sharp breath, and says, so softly that it's barely audible, "Rogue, how could I
fight you...how, when you can do this to me?"
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4. Pietro's expression is black, and he radiates hatred as his eyes bore into the caped figure
before him. He snarls, "You! How _dare_ you presume to come here--after all you did to
Wanda!? And to me..."
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5. "I greatly appreciate the respect for form and tradition that these people have, but I admit
I never thought that you would fit in amongst the Japanese, Logan. Hm. Next time I'll know
better."
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6. Pietro roars past Harpoon at mach 7, snatching his cache of slayspears and tossing them in
the lake. Rounding on him, he pauses long enough to say "Now, you ridiculous little Inuit,
let's see how you fare against someone who won't stand still long enough to be impaled"--and
launches at him, fists flying.
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What are you going to do once you have the character. This can include
short term immediate goals, things that will motivate you right off,
and should even include more long term goals, even fantastical goals,
what you would ask for if you could have anything. Not that you'll be
able to get it with any immediacy, but this is your chance to show us
how your character might contribute to the MUX in terms of tinyplots
and other interactions.
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I plan to have Pietro become an active member in a mutant team, possibly the X-Men,
depending no how things shape up with them, or possibly another. He will be a definite good
guy, and I want him to be able to interact with others in a team. It would also be fun to get
Pietro tangled up with some questionable people, since his mind is always sharply torn
between personal loyalties and abstract duties. And, of course, since he is on the rebound
from Crystal, Pietro will also get swept up in a torrid and dangerous love affair, which will
alter the destiny of all mutantkind for years to come. Maybe.
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Just that. You have a completely developed character before you, a grasp
of this person's whole life. If by chance your character gets tossed into
the Siege, what would you have happen? Where does your character end up,
how is the character's life changed, cover all bases and be as elaborate
as you like. Note that saying "absolutely nothing changes" is acceptable;
however, the Siege is a cosmic judge of sorts. It is unlikely that rather
evil beings would enter the siege and emerge unscathed.
Just because you do not have to go through the siege does not mean that
you do not need to write this section up completely. We -want- to see
what you perceive would happen to your character.
For more information, see 'news siege' on the MUX.
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I plan to leave it strictly IC whether Pietro goes through the SP. I'm neither for or against it.
Pietro's change will be subtle and profound. He will not lose any of his memories, nor will
his body or powers be altered in any way. Instead, what will happen is that he will gain a
certain perspective on his past, himself, and the world. What Pietro wants most in life and
indeed fears most as well, is intimacy--to be truly close to other human beings. Pietro has
never been able to achieve this thanks to a profound self-absorption which almost never lets
him see past his own needs, thoughts, desires, and views. Exiting the Siege, Pietro's eyes will
be opened to new perspectives on others and on himself. Looking back on his life, he will be
able to see the complexities of others for the first time. He will be able to see not only
Magneto's cruelty but also his pathetic nobility and his twistedness. He will find as much
room for understanding and pity as blame. Looking at Wanda, he will see her blossoming
love for the Vision as something other than a betrayal, and his own protests as something baser
than justified anger. Pietro will this be older and wiser, and less judgmental of others, since
more understanding. He will be able to reconcile himself to his past and his present, and
begin to look toward a future, which is something he never really has done before.
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None, some, daydreaming, writing, anything counts. How prepared are you
to play this character. List here ALL characters that you have on other
MU*s. This is an important part of your application because it gives us
an idea of what your MU* commitments entail. Have you ever played this
character before? What are your strong points as a roleplayer? Your weak
points?
Be absolutely sure to tell us ALL of your alts on the MUX so that we
can ensure that the rules set forth in news characters are applied
fairly to all.
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I've been RPing for 15+ years and MUSHing for around one and one half years... [edited the listing of alts]. I've also got lots and lots
of X-Men comics, complete up to MM's divergence, in fact, although I haven't been keeping
up religiously lately--the reason for that is simple: the life on the MUXes is more interesting
than the comics, most of the time, and I get annoyed when I see OUR characters being written
by or worse as pinheads ("Where's my portal!? GEORGE!!!" :P :P :P).
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Just that. Why did you go to all the trouble to fill out the application
for this particular character? Why do you want to play this particular
character on this particular MUX? Saying that you made the character up
is not terribly useful here for NFCs. A more appropriate response would
be for you to discuss how your creation or chosen character combined
with your playing will add to the MUX as a community, both ICly and
OOCly. Certainly something made you want to write an application... :)
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Pietro is my favorite of the x-characters after Rogue and the one with whom I most identify
personally. I have no difficulty playing an arrogant son of a bitch with an overinflated
vocabulary and diction out of a nineteenth-century style manual. Even before Pietro, the Flash
was my favorite superhero, when I was really little, because I liked his power--Pietro has that,
and IMHO a much more interesting psyche. I plan to divide my time on MM between a good
guy and a bad guy type and I'd like Pietro to be my good guy. [some personal information edited.]
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What do you want us to know about you that sets you apart from the rest
of the world and makes you someone who could and wants to contribute to
the MUX.
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[Edited; a brief description of interests outside MU*ing.]
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How much time do you plan to invest in the character. How stable is
your access.
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[Edited; an honest assessment of how much time we could expect to see the character online, and other obligations outside of MU*ing.]
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Part of the application process will include an OOC and IC interview
where we have a chance to ask you questions about your application and
to give you a chance to show us that you can play the character. We'll
make up an IC situation and do some spontaneous roleplay and get to
know each other. If your application is good enough to pass formal
review, you will be contacted for scheduling an interview. Feel free to
go ahead and tell us when you are available for the interview, it may
cut down on the turnaround time.
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[Edited; times available for an interview.]
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