r/whowouldwin • u/OddDirective • Oct 18 '22
Event Character Scramble 16 Round 2: Rockin' Rockin'
Round 2: Rockin’ Rockin’
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DAY 4
The mission the Game Master gives this week is simple and also quite complex. “Topple the ruler of the A-East arena. You have three hours. Fail, and face erasure.” They aren’t being so forthcoming with information on what that means, so that’s a challenge your Players will have to overcome. Another hurdle is actually gaining access; there’s something in the way of getting in the actual arena, be it knowledge on the target or a situation set up by the Game Master preventing access to the arena. This leads into a scramble to get the multiple things needed to resolve this, but with some outside assistance (hint: your Reaper), your team could get past it quicker than others.
(Some examples of obstacles and situations preventing access: Separate clues to the identity of the ruler or what is meant by ‘the arena’, a techie that needs specific items to go on with the scheduled show tonight, a gourmand Support Reaper manning the barrier to the way in that needs ingredients, a Resident Evil-style lock puzzle, a heist-type setup for a specific back entrance, or having to cure certain people of Noise infestation so they can open the doors.)
Whatever way they get through it, the team reaches the inside of the arena to face off against the ruler of the arena- and their target meets them on stage. It’s a battle under the lights, and the amps are turned all the way to 11. It’s time to play!
The enemy team can factor into this in a couple ways- obviously, if a member of the enemy team is the ruler of A-East, that’s one way to do it, but they could be individuals keeping you from obtaining the things you need to get in, or they could be a rival team trying to take down the boss before your team can. Whatever the case, they’re going up against you at some point in this round, so prepare to face off!
Scramble Rules
Let ‘Em Know Who You Are: Every participant this season received four characters on their team, but many of them might not be a household name. To aid with readability, please give a brief introduction and summary of your characters, with enough information so the average reader can get excited for your team before starting.
This World Ends With You: Your writeup will depict a scenario where your team succeeds. Even if your team has a one in a million chance of overcoming the odds, show what they’d need to do to come out on top against the challenge in front of them!
Everybody Has Their Own World: Writers are allowed to make changes to their characters in their narrative to fit their story, such as allowing power stealers to gain more powers, teaching martial artists new techniques, or having characters gradually grow in strength between rounds. However, you are not beholden to following what your opponent is doing. When facing another team, you are only required to write their characters as they were submitted. This is to help with ease of research, and make things more fun for both sides.
Round Rules
Setting: This round’s original setting is A-East, in particular a music venue or other performance arena, which in the original games is in a more seedy area. The main thrust of the setting is a showy place for a ‘boss fight’, so any location with a stage would work excellently. With regards to getting there, however, there is a possibility your Players would have to search far and wide, in other locations around the city. If you can’t conceive of it another way, think of it like a fetch quest.
Key Points: The main idea of the round is the following. Your Players must enter into an arena of some description or renown, and defeat a single enemy there. That being said, there is a multi-part obstacle keeping them from getting in, which the Players and Reaper have to resolve on the way. After overcoming this, the team enters into the arena and faces off against the enemy or enemies there. The enemy team must oppose them at some point, but it can be during the multi-part obstacle and/or at the arena.
Post Limit: For this round, writers will be limited to 6 posts, or 60k characters. While it is fine to go a little bit over, anything that far surpasses this limit will be automatically disqualified. This limit does not include intro posts, or analysis of the matchup.
Due Date: Writeups will be due at 11:59 PM CST on Monday, October 31st. That’s about two weeks. At that point, the thread will be locked, and voting will go up for a few days afterwards.
Flavor Suggestions
peaceful day: Your Players participated in at least one other day before this, though they didn’t run into any trouble in terms of teams opposing them. Or maybe they did! Whatever happened that day is up to you, and you can describe it if you want; just be mindful of the space you’re working with and that you need to complete the round.
The One Star: Your team’s goal is to defeat one specific enemy- in the original game, it was a bat Noise boss fight, and another monster certainly would fit the description. That being said, there is also the option of making it a member of the enemy team, either a Player or their Reaper, which of course seems sensible. There’s also a third option of making it a different character entirely. Who or what the ruler is is totally up to you.
Kill the Itch: While the mission doesn’t specify lethality, this might be the first time your team has fought directly against the enemy team members, and erasure can be introduced by having to erase the other Players on the enemy side. How would your team react to them being the cause of others’ nonexistence- or would they try to take them down nonlethally? Would they not even fight the enemy team, for fear of erasing them? Or, alternatively, would they be a bit too enthusiastic about eliminating the competition?
2
u/Proletlariet Oct 26 '22 edited Oct 27 '22
Hiruma squinted at Edward. “Uhh… Yeah I don’t really got much I can give you. You want a history lesson or something?”
“A what?” Edward asked.
“You heard me, fucking throwback.” Hiruma sneered. “You got about 300 years to catch up on. Damn that’s a lot of dead friends.”
““If it’s been that long then…” The whole time Edward had been holding up the best of them, gracefully leaping hurdles never losing his balance. Now he was faltering; his gait became uneven, distracted. As he came up on the next obstacle, his legs faltered and his knee clipped the hurdle bar. He tumbled to a halt but didn’t seem to notice. “Then what happened to my crew? If I wasn’t there to lead with them, how did they make out? And the others at Nassau? Blackeard?”
He flashed between bewilderment and rage. He stood in Hob’s way.
“Watch it! We’ve gotta keep moving or he’ll kill us!” Hob shouted.
Edward just looked at him sullenly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Hiruma opened fire, forcing them both into a dead zig zag sprint to avoid his aim that neither men had gas left in the tank for.
“Didn’t wanna.. put it on your mind…” How winced. The bullets were passing closer and closer as his body lagged.
The hurdles finally became too high to clear. All three of them crashed into a heap of exhausted limbs.
Hiruma jammed his gun into Edward’s temple.
“Pick yourself up and keep going, fucking throwback. Don’t’cha wanna hear how it all went wrong?”
“He is not your plaything, Hiruma.”
Hob knew that voice. He had to be delirious from exhaustion because its owner was supposed to be dead.
Lifting his neck felt like his head weighed a hundred pounds.
A man in a full suit of armour stood in the shadow of a goalpost, arms folded across his chest. The gleaming metal menaced with spikes from every surface. He looked enormous---just one of his gauntletted arms was the width of Hiruma’s goalpost. The afterlife must’ve had one hell of a gym.
Oroku Saki AKA: The Shredder, Ultimate Jonin
Occupation: Ninja Crime Lord
Crimes: Yes.
“You!” Hiruma grit his teeth. “Fucking copycat. He was mine first, fair and square.”
He arimed the uzi squarely at Shredder’s head. His finger curled around the trigger.
Something whistled through the air. Hiruma howled in pain, dropping the gun. A shuriken lodged in the back of his hand.
A woman in red leapt down from her perch in the goalpost where she’d stood perfectly still, almost invisible.
Oroku Karai, Ultimate Chunin
Occupation: Foot Clan Ninja
Crimes: Murder, Espionage, Unlicensed Ninjustu
She acknowledged Hob with a sour expression. “You’re late.”
“Got caught up.” He grunted.
“You aren’t getting away with the prize that easy!” Hiruma shouted. He blew his whistle. “Sack ‘em!”
The Monokumas readied their football grenades.
Shredder raised his hand in a closed fist. In it was an odd device that looked like a cross between a walkie-talkie and a TV remote.
“Foot Soldiers! To me!” He bellowed into it. “Protect your master!”
From the shadows appeared six identical masked ninjas. Hiruma’s Monokumas went to throw their payloads, the ninjas closed and hacked them to bits.
Karai hurried over and dragged Edward to his feet. “Come.” She told him.
Hob interspersed himself between the two. “Hey, no delivery without payment. I want a way out of this city.” After a moment, he pointed to 21. “Him too.”
“Fine. You’ll get your escape route.” Karai rolled her eyes. “Now give him to me!” She reached for Edward’s wrist.
Edward tore his hand away. He stared at Hob in shock. “You bloody bastard, are you trading me to them?”
“You aren’t gonna kill him or anything, right?” Hob demanded. “For that matter, what’s Shredder doing here?” How’s he even alive.”
“It is not the first time Grandfather cheated death.” Karai boasted. “Now quickly, we must leave this place!”
More Monokumas were crawling out of the woodwork. They gathered in the middle of the deck. Just as they were about to be surrounded, Karai threw down a smoke grenade and lead them onto a waiting speedboat.
As they sped away from the ship, Hob heard Hiruma call after them.
“Big mistake you fucking copycat! You’ve got him for now, but I’ll ruin you before you can do anything with him. You hear me?!”
And then his rants faded into silence.
Karai led Edward forward into a grand chamber. The room was vast and cavernous, with banners draped from the high ceiling. At the centre was a circular pit dug into the floor with three carved staircases leading down into it. Edward guessed it was an arena.
“Why did Hob sell you to me?” he asked. “Are you going to keep me prisoner as well?”
“I hired Old Hob to liberate you from the clutches of the Templars.” Karai told him. “Be at ease. You’re among your own kind now. Our clan traces its roots to the same order of Assassins you were once part of.”
His mysterious kidnapper sat on a gilded throne flanked by two huge stone pillars. The throne stood atop an enormous raised platform so high it took a set of stairs for Shredder and Karai to ascend. As they approached the throne, they passed an enormous ninja standing at his side. A bodyguard of some sort? He glared out at Edward from behind a hood.
Edward swallowed. Thanks to Hob’s treachery he’d been plunged headfirst even further out of his depth. He wanted answers, but not at the cost of being folded into somebody else’s web of intrigue.
“Edward Kenway.” Shredder greeted him. “It is good to finally meet another Assassin in the flesh. When I arrived here in the 21st century after ”
“I hate to disappoint, but I’m not a member of your order.” He said. “I borrowed one’s name, that’s all. The man you’re looking for is long dead.”
Shredder raised a hand to silence him.
“Karai. Present his weapons.”
Karai dutifully held out a well worn wooden box. Edward’s eyes widened in recognition. When she opened the lid, inside were the pair of wristblade daggers he’d stolen from a dead man on a beach three hundred years ago.
“These belonged to the Assassin you slayed. By right of conquest, now they are yours. As is the right to live as one of us.” The Shredder said.
Edward took the wristblades cautiously. “It’s a generous gift sir, but I’m no Assassin..”
The Shredder rose gravely from his throne, his heavy armour rattling. He seized Edward’s shoulder---grip firm and made firmer by the weight of the steel gauntlet which encased his hand.
“Do you know our creed?”
Edward fumbled for the words, well aware a faulty recitation could render his life forfeit. “Er.. If memory serves, ‘Nothing is true, everything is permitted.’” He side-eyed the glint of the Shredder’s gauntlet blade. “Quite the libertine coda, eh?” Edward said through a forced smile.
“True liberty is strength.” said the Shredder. “Everything is permitted only to the strong. A pirate should know that plunder belongs to those who can take it---identity is no different. The man you murdered did not deserve to live by our creed. You do.”
Sensibility told Edward to nod along for his own safety. His temper impelled him to be stubborn.
“Might makes right.” Edward said wryly. “Doesn’t sound much different from the Templars. I’ll say it again mate, I’m no assassin. Generous offer you’ve made me, but I’ll find my own path.”
“You resist my will?” The Shredder’s grip tightened. “Good. You’ll need that resolve to survive the lesson.”
He gave a sudden forceful shove. Edward found himself falling backwards through space. He tumbled off the Shredder’s throne platform into the centre pit.
“Step forward!” The Shredder boomed.
His bodyguard stepped forward. He peeled away his mask and tossed it aside disdainfully. The man was enormous. Seven feet at the minimum. His face was no less striking. He had heavy cheeks that were red as an apple. Piercing bloodshot eyes bulged out beneath fierce bushy eyebrows.
Guan Yu, Ultimate Warrior
Occupation: Bodyguard
Crimes: An Unfathomable Amount Of Murder
“This one is called Guan Yu. Last of the Oathsworn Brothers of the Peach Garden.”
Maintaining eye contact, Guan Yu extended an open palm. The Shredder hurled down a long handled polearm, which he caught without looking and twirled expertly.
“It seems I am to be your teacher.” He told Edward with measured contempt. “I pity you. For restraint is not among my virtues.”
The Shredder laughed without mirth. He sat back in his throne with the air of a contented Roman emperor and clapped his hands together sharply.
“BEGIN!”
After Karai had taken Edward, Hob and 21 had been left to their own devices in the Foot Clan’s entrance hall. It looked a little like the waiting room at a doctor’s office, only instead of magazines there were swords and instead of posters on the wall there were also swords.
There were also the half Foot ninjas. Who were holding swords.
They stood guard around the room never taking their eyes off of the two of them. It made the already stifling quiet all but unbearable.
“You could’ve at least told him.”
Hob turned away from 21 and continued counting floor tiles.