4 replies to this topic

[Synik]

I'll put the odd bits of weird terms in here as we go.

If there's anything you're not sure about - please pipe up in the OOC thread.

[Synik]

Races... or perhaps even 'tribes'

Humans

You and me. The occasional bioware* implant or two, but pretty much as we are when we left the caves

[ bioware - a biological implant that enhancers the implantee's performance in some way. Non-cybernetic in nature ]

Metas

Meta-humans: people who's parents shelled out for tweaks to the standard human genome. Smarter and healthier as a rule compared to unamended humanity.

Breed

Think about what fun someone who was into body modification could have if cosmetic surgery or 'animalistic' bioware was easy to get hold of. Consider some of the more feral looking / outlandish superheroes (Beast / Mystique from Xmen), characters from Nightbreed or Dark Angel.

Necs

Necs - or sometimes Necros or Necroforms - are the goth equivalent to Breed. Pale, vampish creatures they're standard humans who've been 'bodjobbed'* to look the way they are. Some of them have died - either through illness, accident or on purpose (to see what lies beyond) - only to be brought back.

[ bodjobbed = slang for body modification. A full appearance change would be a 'biosculpt' ]

SHARCs

Sometimes spelt 'sharks'. Following on from the last big war and humanity's success with 'metas', SHARCs were the first clone troopers. They're well built with pale skin and almost white eyes. They can be rather dogmatic and you don't get a lot of SHARC stand-ups.

Meatboys / Meatgirls

Body builders who've gone for lots of bioware muscle to bulk them up. Out of all the tribes that make up Dark Age, they - and perhaps the post-humans - are the most opposed to cybernetics. If it ain't flesh, they ain't interested.

Asex

Humans who - for whatever reason - have been modified (via a biosculpt) to be of 'neutral gender' - neither male nor female. Sex is a) of no interest and b) not possible. Asex bodyguards or childcarers are quite common.

Trix

The opposite side of the asex coin: trix are humans who can shift between sexes. They have bioware and a custom biosculpt to pull this trick off.

Post-humans

Not so many these days, but there numbers are growing. Post-humans are people who've lived a very long time (100+ years). They tend to be stuck in their ways and quite conservative - after all, they'd like to live another 100 years given half the chance. Frequently loaded, they avoid risk and are more 'the power behind the throne'. Many have had biosculpts to look in their 30s, 40s or 50s. Most avoid cyberware as it can mess with the rejuve treatments.

[ rejuve - an expensive treatment that replaces failing organs or tissue with new bioware ones. Not cheap and it's difficult to maintain a body - or brain - that's evolved for 90 years of life and not 150+ ]

[Synik]

Smartgun

A missile weapon fitted with a computer and camera/laser based targeting system. The gun will be connected to the user's data plugs - either via a cable or secure wireless link - which in turn links to either a cyberoptic (artifical eye) or a set of goggles or monocle. Whatever it's linked to, a cross-hair system helps you line up what you want to shoot with what the gun's seeing.

Cookie Cutter

More advanced smart gun computers can be set to ignore particular targets - i.e.: unarmed people, friends, etc. When the cookie cutter is activated, a person could sweep a gun across a room of people, but the gun would not fire when it swept across a 'friendly'. Obviously, the system can't stop someone running into the path of the bullet, but it's a start.

Goggles / Monocle

Not everyone choses to have an artificial eye or cyberoptic. Many people will use a set of 'goggles' or 'smartspex'. These range from a thin band of tinted plastic to an opaque block that fits completely over a person's eyes (the military and security services prefer the latter).

Monocles are mainly used by street operatives. They are self adhesive and deemed disposeable technology - they are not as good as a decent set of goggles because while they can work for a simple targeting scope - they

Targeting Scope

When hooked into a smartgun, a scope appears as a set of cross hairs in your vision (either via a cyberoptic or goggle). Where the crosshair points is where the gun is pointed.

Overlay Processor

Much of Dark Age is very bioware focuses as people move away from cybernetics. Part of this is a social change following the issues with 'war machines'. An overlay processor is an implant that allows a person to take an input from another device - a targeting scope or thermal imaging camera - and then to 'mix' it with an existing sense (audio, vision, etc).

An overlay processor and dataplug set are cheaper to maintain than full cyberoptic + cyberaudio repalcements.

Edited by Synik, 11 March 2009 - 02:25 PM.

[Synik]

Movers & Shakers

Johnathan Klass

Johnathan Klass was the man who helped build Magdalene. A veteran of the Last War - the civil war that wrecked most of Europe and, in part, crashed the weather control systems. Klass organised a tent city in an old railway tunnel. The place too it's name from the nearby ruined church.

Affectionately known as the Old Man, Mr Klass is a well respected man. Founder's Day is a day dedicated to the event when he brokered the plas-steel smartstructure that would grow over the tents and tunnel to eventually become the rising star of Magdalene.

Klass is now a very old man. His true age is unknown and Klass himself won't say. He keeps the citystate running from his ivory tower. He lost his only son in a riot during the Heartland bombings many years ago. While his health may be failing, Klass's sharp wits have not failed him yet. The rumour mill always turns and the Net itself seems powered by the claims and counter-claims of what'll happen when he finally dies.

Dr Aldrich and Miss Crew

The darlings of the Necroform scene and the creators of Necroville. Fiaz Aldrich blew in from London after the war, not much on him except the clothes on his pale back and ideas rattling in his skull. He wanted a return to the flesh, none of 'this chrome nonsense': the answer he once gave to a reporter about his view of cybernetic limb replacements.

Faced with a world where going outside could kill you, millions turned inward. Simstim - simulated stimulations: 'experience vision' or 'artifical reality' - become a modern day lure. If not stimming, people wanted to change. To take a holiday from the everyday.
Alrdich rode the wave of body repair and redesign. His big break came when he hooked up with a brilliant surgeon named Anita Smith. She'd been called in to Magdalene to help many of the damaged soliders - SHARCs too - from the war. Her work drawing to an end, Smith turned her hand to plastic surgery and over the years became a highly rated biosculptor (a person who can completely redesign or 'mod' someone's body).

The tipping point for the couple was when Smith was shot dead by fanatics outside her apartment. Seemingly dead, Aldrich took her in and somehow Doctor Smith came back... mostly. Regardless of if this was some sick marketing ploy or otherwise, the newly regenerated - and newly re-designed Anita - left the Aldrich's clinic as Miss Crew (to this date, she doesn't give her first name - and no, it's not Anita). The pair of them lord over Necroville as they welcome the newly resurrected into their fold.

Adam S-13

During the war, SHARCs - Semi-Human Artificial Constructs - where created en masse to fight for and against humanity. Originally bioengineered humans, this slave race was put into production using artifical wombs and bootcamps to fill the gaps left by fallen soldiers. As the fighting grew worse, much worse, the war shifted. Changing from man versus man to man versus rogue war-machines. The ultimate bad ass heavy metal; semi-intelligent tanks and hunter-killers that warlords and criminals had subverted for their own deeds.

Adam organised the SHARC uprisings in Neo-Birmingham and Paris. Under his command, a ragtag gang of SHARCs and Tritons liberated north Germany. In return for the latter, SHARCs were granted full citizenship and control over their own breeding.

Although SHARCs aren't given batch numbers as surnames, Adam (and a few others) have kept theirs to mark the struggle they made.

Edited by Synik, 16 March 2009 - 03:28 PM.

[Synik]

Street Careers

Blacktech

A blacktech - or black market technician - is a techie. A no questions asked techie. You need your gun fixing or your mobie sorted out? Get in touch with one of these guys. Technology makes the world go around after all.

Tailor

Just like a tailor in the days of old - the 20th century to you and me - would cut you a suit. So, a blacktech tailor can make you a new you. Change your hair - literally - change your face if you want. Provided you've got the cash and you can find the right tailor, you can be anything - or anyone - you like.

Most tailors specialise. Your typical cyberdoc will be able to do simple cosemetic jobs or minor 'rejuves'. The more specialist ones deal with the breed, necroform, trix and asex communities. A tailor's reputation is everything to them as it is how they get their work.