He'd make a good "strong, silent Nordic swordsman" of a Servant, I think.
Apocrypha Spoilers
He'd make a good "strong, silent Nordic swordsman" of a Servant, I think.
Apocrypha Spoilers
Just to be sure, would a fictional character from a 19th century worldwide-famous book go here, or in the Modern Fiction thread?
@Vagrant: I don't know the hero, but the sheet looks nice.
@BehemothV2: which book?
Frankie's Monster would go here. Tolkien's Bilbo would go modern fiction.
Localizationing stuff
I think literature from the 1800s is okay. Isn't that the era that Sasaki comes from? I think the modern fiction thread is for very contemporary fiction. Like stuff written in the last 75 years.
Araya, what do you seek?
「アラヤ、何を求める」
------True wisdom.「――――真の叡智を」
Araya, where do you seek it?「アラヤ、何処に求める」
Only within myself.「――――ただ、己が内にのみ」
Araya, what is your favorite color?「アラヤ、好きな色は?」
Blue. No, ora-- Auuuuuuuugh!「青、いや、オレンジイイイイイアアアっ!」
Still, terra is right, because we have kawaii Jack the Reaper
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
I should probably have made him a Rider, but that'd be too predictable...
Servant info:
Spoiler:
Skills
Spoiler:
Noble Phantasm
Spoiler:
Yay, summer! I missed this thread and this idea has been kicking around in my head for awhile, so awkwardly dusting off my ability to remember how to word Nasu stuff. Excuse the cobwebs and silly thoughts.
(Also full credit and thanks to Magi for giving me a concept to steal in order to come up with this backdoor. I remain, as ever, unapologetically derivative ^^; ).
Servant: Caster
Identity: Xuanzang
Parameters:
Strength: D
Endurance: D
Agility: B
Mana: A
Luck: D
Noble Phantasm: A
Appearance:
A pleasant, soft-spoken young man who hardly looks his age, Caster could easily be mistaken for a delicate young teen rather than a well-traveled monk in his late twenties. His hair is a dark green, almost but not quite black, and his eyes are a warm gold. His childish, trusting smile is infectious and difficult to break.
Caster wears a sleeveless white and yellow monk's vest, with a bracelet of prayer beads around his left wrist. He also wears baggy white pants tied with a red string belt and a pair of beige sandals. He typically carries a simple shakujo staff with four jingling rings on it as his only obvious weapon. The staff changes forms as Caster activates his Noble Phantasms, shifting its identity between the weapons used by each of his former bodyguards.
When he goes beyond using their weapons and installs their actual identities, Caster becomes a much taller figure, usually athletic and muscular - with the exception of one form - and generally becomes quite handsome (again with the exception of one).
Class Abilities:
Item Creation
Rank: A-
The skill to manufacture magical items. Caster is capable of making powerful religious scrolls and artifacts, but in life, it was often said that his works were too precise and mechanical compared to the works of others. Unsurprisingly, his work compares unfavorably to more gifted artisans of equivalent rank.
Territory Creation
Rank: B
The skill to build a terrain advantageous to oneself as a magus. At this rank, creation of a workshop is possible.
Personal Skills:
Knowledge of Respect and Harmony
Rank: B
A skill that prevents any decrease in the effectiveness of a technique, regardless of how many times it is used against the same opponent
Protection of the Faith
Rank: A++
Even after making the journey to the west, Xuanzang devoted the entirety of his remaining life to translating the Buddhist texts, refusing all civil appointments and rewards for his effort. In return, he was protected constantly by the Bodhisattva, Guanyin, even from his own trusting naivete. While this skill bestows significant defensive protections to Caster, he is abnormally trusting and naive as a result, generally always confident that things will work out, to an altogether unhealthy and unrealistic degree.
Noble Phantasms:
Tripitaka - Three Reincarnations of the Golden Cicada
Rank: C-A
Type: Anti-Self
A traditional Buddhist term meaning "three baskets", or the three receptacles in which the sacred Buddhist scriptures were originally stored, Tripitaka was also the name often attributed to the monk Xuanzang during his travels to bring the scrolls from India to China. This Noble Phantasm takes the form of the shakujo staff carried by Caster and represents the anecdotal stories that he was a reincarnation of Buddha's disciple, Golden Cicada.
The effect of this Noble Phantasm is to store "other selves" in the four rings carried on the shakujo - in this case, Caster's own identity and those of the three disciples he traveled with are stored and accessible by overwriting part of his own spiritual identity. By accessing their stored incarnations, Caster can transform the shakujo into the weapons that his three disciples had wielded in their journey to the west, allowing him access to their powers and abilities. However, as he only obtains their weapons, he is only able to touch a portion of their abilities in this form.
In order to access the full power of his disciples, it is necessary for Caster to "install" or equip their very identities onto himself, transforming him into an existance that is neither monk nor disciple, but an amalgamation of both. The mana cost for a full install is significantly higher, especially depending on the spiritual quality of the disciple being invoked, so this is Caster's last resort when his own skills are insufficient.
Yueya Chan - Spade of the Deep Sands
Rank: C+
Type: Anti-Unit
The third and least of Caster's three disciples, the sand demon Sha Wujing takes the form of a golden monk's spade, with a flat shovel-like blade on one end and a crescent moon blade on the other. Having traditionally been associated with Buddhist burial rites by traveling monks, this weapon has powerful exorcism properties, and the effect is further amplified by Yueya Chan's status as the weapon of Sha Wujing, who became an arhat and advanced towards enlightenment through his travels with Caster. As a result, the purification effect and damage to this Noble Phantasm against spiritual bodies and especially Servants is greatly enhanced.
In its Installed form, Caster takes on attributes of Sha Wujing himself - his extremities become a dark, gritty texture like wet sand and his clothes become a navy Buddhist pilgrim's robe with a monk's necklace. He becomes significantly more muscular and imposing as his strength and endurance increase by one rank each. In addition, Caster takes on the properties of the sand creature who served him; early texts suggest that Sha Wujing had in fact been a deva of sand, and Caster is able to convert his body into sand, greatly improving his defensive ability while in this form as he can reshape and scatter parts or all of his body at will.
While not much of a fighter in comparison to his other two disciples' installed form, the value of this form is its tenacity, thanks to the sand-like body that was able to survive impalement by seven blades each day.
Jiuchi Dingpa - Rake of the Banished Marshal
Rank: B+
Type: Anti-Unit
A jade-green and gold nine-tooth rake used by the half-pig Zhu Bajie when he was a marshal of heaven, Jiuchi Dingpa retains all of its power and authority even after Zhu Bajie was cast out for his greed and lust. Said to have controlled fire and ice, it retains the power to freeze and burn at Caster's discretion, allowing him to weaken and then melt obstacles in his way and to greatly hamper the defenses of anything used to protect against the rake. Even passively wielded, such is the power of this rake that Caster's strength and endurance are increased by one rank each while he is wielding it.
In its Installed form, Caster's bulk and muscle mass is greatly increased, transforming him even more than his other forms into a hulking, boar-like beastman. His hair darkens to a black shade and grows long and swept back like a mane and his garb becomes red armor and green pants that scarcely fits his new bloated physique. His strength and endurance each increase two ranks while in this form, though his agility is reduced by one rank due to Zhu Bajie's lesser discipline and coordination.
In this form, Caster gains access to B+ rank Monstrous Strength, further permitting him to power up in battle, but prolonged use converts his thinking to that of his former disciple, rendering him lazier and less capable as the fight and transformation drags on if he taps into this well of strength. Strangely, due to the corrupted and base spirit of Zhu Bajie, this is also the least expensive form for Caster to maintain of his three disciples. Were it only more reliable, it would likely be as much of a trump card for Caster as the monkey king himself.
Ruyi Jingu Bang - Rod of the Monkey King
Rank: A+
Type: Anti-Army
The greatest and most fearsome of Caster's disciples, the staff of the monkey king is likewise the strongest weapon in Caster's arsenal. A magical staff of black iron gilded with gold, it resembles a pillar shrunken and repurposed into a chinese staff. The dimensions of the staff are freely malleable at Caster's will, allowing him to shrink or extend it at any time. The extension of the staff carries tremendous force, making it a high-pressure attack as well, and it remains the same weight for Caster to wield even though the weight felt by others changes to suit its current proportions.
In its installed form, Caster takes on the attributes of Sun Wukong, the infamous monkey king, increasing his strength, endurance, and agility by two full ranks each. Caster becomes garbed in black and red baggy pants, cut off at the knees to leave his furred feet bare, and a white-furred red vest that leaves his torso mostly bare along with a golden circlet. His features become more animal-like, with fanged teeth and his hair becomes shaggy and dark brown, with pronounced sideburns and a goatee along with a matching monkey's tail.
While Installed, he has full access to the shapeshifting and martial prowess of the monkey king, making this form by a large margin his most dangerous in terms of physical combat. However, like installing Jiuchi Dingpa, this Noble Phantasm has a distortive effect on Caster when invoked - his personality becomes more malicious and crafty in battle and he gains access to A+ rank Subversive Activities and Clairvoyance, but loses his innate Knowledge of Respect and Harmony. As such, he is most reluctant to use it, even though it is by far his most effective Noble Phantasm; he is more likely to resort to calling on Zhu Bajie even when Sun Wukong is clearly the most effective initial response.
Last edited by Sunny; May 26th, 2014 at 06:55 PM.
What is this? Prisma Ilya incorporated in an interesting way for a canon-style Servant?
I love it. The execution is clever and I like your workaround for the issues so often faced by people trying to work with Journey to the West.
He has a pretty clear sense of character and who he actually is, and seems exceedingly capable of adapting to a multitude of circumstances.
This is really a cool profile, so if this is you being derivative then please do continue.
@Cyber Angel
Oh Jesus how did no one else have that idea before? It's fucking amazing.
I chose Install as the term because of Illya, but yeah, the bulk of the inspiration was Magi's djinn equip stuff and more accurate to credit that. ^^;
Realized it would be a sneaky, mean little back door around the "no Wukongs for you" restriction. The harder part was thinking up powers for sandy and the pig, but I'm pretty happy with Sandman and Ganon.
This has been poking around in my head for awhile along with a couple of others, but it was probably the easiest of the ones I have percolating. I'm happy it is interesting, though yeah - I was so convinced someone else must have done him that I was putting him off.
A Saber without a sword Noble Phantasm? Has magecraft gone too far?
Servant info:
Spoiler:
Skills
Spoiler:
Noble Phantasm
Spoiler:
Lore
Spoiler:
Last edited by Zork Knight; May 29th, 2014 at 12:16 PM.
So his shield induces Conservation of Ninjutsu? That's pretty cool. Haven't really seen anything like that since F/Z's Assassin.
"We don't need martyrs right now. We need heroes. A hero would die for his country, but he'd much rather live for it." -Josiah Bartlet
List of Servants I've made
He's pretty neat. I like the idea, though a Saber without a sword is admittedly pretty weird. I assume he probably has a non-phantasmal sword, but I like to imagine he just punches everyone with his shield. With the bonus to Bravery his coat provides he gets bonus melee damage, which is handy. The idea of his shield being used as a blunt-force attack of Rank A+++ish (NP Ranks are +2 to regular attacks, and he gets the bonus damage) amuses me greatly, since I like to imagine he's hitting so hard he makes Herk take pause.
Pretty basic set of skills and no particularly unique attack, but I do like the whole dividing of power thing going on there. I feel that halving/thirding/whatever someone's power is sort of extreme, I'd maybe have it drop all enemies Parameters by a Rank for each extra enemy beyond the first. This has the side effect of making 2 Servants against him still very dangerous, but with four or more they're all suffering such big stat drops that you get the nice "can fight off 12 knights" thing whilst still providing them a very slim chance (since they presumably can't drop below E, maybe enough of them could eventually overwhelm him, possibly).
Changed Bouclier Noir's effect. Hopefully less OPish than before.