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Applications
APPLICATIONS ARE OPEN!
The next processing date is Friday 11th October
IMPORTANT: PLEASE POST YOUR APPLICATIONS HERE ON THE NEW APPLICATION PAGE
We're so glad you're thinking of joining us in Haven, where we are all safe.
In order to apply for a canon character, please fill out the information below and post it in a comment in this entry. For an OC, please apply using the OC information. Please do not link to applications, all applications must be posted here. Please do not delete your applications; if you do not want it to be seen, you can request for it to be screened after a decision is made.
You may apply for two characters every two weeks, to a total of six characters. Only two of these may be from the same canon, and they cannot be too familiar with one another. Please make sure to mark the header of your comment(s) with RESERVED or NOT RESERVED, as well as the character name and canon. App challenges are not allowed currently.
Try to remember spelling and grammar are important, and in app length quality and not quantity is what matters. If you wish to request a specific apartment, please do so in the relevant part of the application. All parts of the application must be your own work, plagiarism will not be tolerated, though you are welcome to reuse your own old applications.
If you are asked for revisions, please don't panic! It doesn't mean the mods don't like you, only that we probably need more information before making a decision. If you are asked for revisions, you will have one week to supply them.
Every attempt will be made to place a character in their chosen apartments, though this may not always be possible depending on the slots available.
Applications are open constantly, but are only processed every other Friday at 7PM EST. The Saturday following acceptance, an IC mingle log will be posted for characters to be introduced to the game.
We now have a test drive community athaventest which is continuously open. Posts there may be used in lieu of a sample in the application. You may also link posts, logs, or threads from other games and memes in lieu of samples, though we ask that they be no more than one year old.
To see what we are looking for:
Canon Characters:
Sample Application (Faith Lehane)
Sample Application (Iroh)
Original Characters:
Sample Application (Mors)
Sample Application (Vera de Barr)
Previous Game History:
Sample Application (Abel Nightroad/Mayfield RPG)
Sample Application (Bolin/Discedo)
Applications will be processed on the following dates:
11th October
25th October
8th November
22nd November
6th December
20th December
To apply for a canon character, please fill out this form:
To apply for an original character, please fill out this form:
Lt Col John Sheppard | Stargate Atlantis | RESERVED | 2/3
Being that he possesses the ATA, or ancient gene, and much stronger than anyone else in the City even after they've all received the gene therapy (it's still only accepted in 47% of cases, and those who have the gene injected don't seem to have it to the same degree as those who have it naturally, anyway) he comes across as a bit of a 'Mary Sue' in the first season. He is “better” than everyone else, he reveals his own genius intelligence to Rodney, the smartest person in the City, his flying skills are unmatched, and the only man who outranks him dies from a wraith feeding pretty early on. John shoots him himself to avoid the nastier after-affects of such a thing, and instead of facing court-marshal he's promoted. This syndrome wears off into Season 2, but he never quite stops getting hit on by alien women. It's the hair.
When he was stationed in Afghanistan, he went against direct orders to cross back through enemy territory to try and save the lives of his team. He is unsuccessful and they all die, but himself, and he forever has a dark mark on his military record. This doesn't prevent him from gaining a very prestigious position as military leader of Atlantis, of course, but it also means they don't have to deal with his antics on Earth. John refuses to ever lose another member of his team, fighting tooth and nail and throwing himself in harm's way episode after episode. And even though Teyla and Ronon aren't even from his galaxy, he's taken his share of bullets for them (oh and shot them, too. But his mind had been compromised to where he thought he was back in Afghanistan.)
John was married once, to a diplomat named Nancy. We never learn all that much about her, but we do know he never intends to marry again. He's “not good at it” by his own admission. Whatever that means is open to interpretation, but he's claimed it was because of his Special Ops training that he “wasn't around enough.” This may be where he gets the inspiration for being so good with the locals of the Pegasus galaxy, but it's also in his character arc that he's growing; learning to compromise for the greater good. Stargate likes metaphors.
Atlantis becomes more of a home to John than Earth ever was. He's divorced, not in contact or in good graces with his family, and he doesn't really have anyone else. However, his team and expedition leader Elizabeth Weir become a “surrogate family” in Rodney McKay's words. Dr. Carson Beckett, the head of medical, also becomes close to him and his team, but he dies in late Season 3 much to the tragedy of this core group (especially Rodney). John is petrified of losing anyone else, and blames himself for any threat to his people's lives. That doesn't stop the Stargate writers from flagrantly killing off Marines under his command every episode. They're practically the “red shirts” of this galaxy. All John has in his quarters from home is an old Superbowl game on VHS and a Johnny Cash poster. Oh, and of course, his golf clubs. He sets up a putting green on one of the balconies of Atlantis, but of course it's just one giant water hazard.
He is a very curious soul, and even when he doesn't need to know everything, he wants to know everything. He has a natural thirst for knowledge that only grows stronger once he's stationed in Atlantis. Though he tries to deny it to himself, he wants to know more about the Wraith, and actually strives to work with them on more than one occasion. It's as if he senses early on that they are not what they seem on the surface: soul-sucking vampires who are implicitly evil. Unfortunately, despite all his working with Beckett on the retrovirus which turns Wraith human doesn't turn out as planned and he's once again faced with genocide. His own moral dilemma never interfere with his judgment in the heat of battle, however. At the end of the day he is always very much a soldier and will always do what needs to be done.
On the lighter side, John loves to be silly and joke around with his friends, when they aren't in imminent danger (not often, admittedly). Okay, and he also jokes around when they are in danger, just not as much. His pastimes are playing games with Rodney of all shapes and various mental aptitudes, sparring in the Athosian style with two bantos sticks with Teyla (he always gets his ass kicked), and trying to teach Ronon more about Earth. He's also a huge gossip!!! At least, with his team. They talk about boys and girls and their crushes like twelve year olds. John is just a twelve year old underneath it all anyway :(
The reason his family no longer speaks to him is that he joined the Air Force; the only thing he ever truly wanted to do. As a child he builds scale models of air planes and dreams of one day taking to the sky, though never in his wildest dreams did he imagine what he'd be doing today. He's only ever had himself to rely on, and the military offers him a degree of family he can't refuse. Even before Atlantis, he was always volunteering for suicide missions and throwing himself in harm's way, valuing others lives far above his own. They have people to return to, a life back on Earth (or Pegasus, as it were), and he'll be damned if his life is the one to stand in their way. It's luck or fate or perhaps even the City looking out for him that gets him through each scrape death-free, but part of him will always want to go out in a blaze of glory.
Despite all this talk of death and morbidity, he is overall positive, often imparting encouraging words at the zero hour. While he always allows Rodney enough time to conjure up a safer, scientific solution, at the man's failure he always has a tactical plan on the back-burner. His genius is evident in these moments, even when he himself doesn't seem to know what the plan is. The second he's under pressure, he comes through simply because he knows there's no other choice. John Sheppard does his best thinking under pressure, and often won't think unless you pressure him to. Not to say that his plans always work, more often than not they don't. But he's the only one brave enough to not accept death and failure when it's breathing down their necks, oftentimes.
He has a hard time admitting fault, or apologizing, though he'll do so in a heartbeat if it's necessary. He's highly competitive and often places bets with Rodney in their eleventh hour just to keep everyone jovial. He very obviously never collects on them even when he's right; it's merely a tactic for keeping himself and everyone around him calm. John is good at that, influencing his surroundings, both literally and more subtly. Though he's always running around doing stupid things, you can't help but admire the thought behind it, and that may be why he never gets in trouble (really) for any of the crazy stunts he pulls. Maybe it's because he's in another galaxy though after Season 2 it's only about a half hour travel time between Atlantis and Earth so we'll just assume Stargate Command on Earth is busy and therefore way behind on mission reports otherwise John would be in some serious shit like all the time. Or we could just chalk it up to science fiction TV show rules. Yeah. Let's go with that.
John is the kind of guy you know for a day and feel like you've known for a lifetime. He makes his positions clear, rarely lies though he does conceal, and is just such the typical fearless leader type you have to relate. But underneath all the posturing and Lieutenant Colonel there is a very real and very vulnerable man. He uses all these many layers of jokes and references and gruffness to hide how unsure he often is, and he does it well. He rarely loses confidence at face-value though he spends most of his life terrified. However, he would never ever let it hold him back. John isn't the type to let anything hold him back, not standing orders or an Act of God himself, not that John believes in the latter. At least the United States military is something tangible. If something doesn't jive with his personal ethics he won't do it no matter what. And first on that list is letting people die, as we touched on before.
He can be so oblivious, despite how smart he really is, often living up to the dense nature of the act he puts on. Naive too, especially when it comes to women. He never really 'flirts,' at least, not on purpose, and he finds himself in over his head more often than not. Especially being that he's not looking for a girlfriend!! Gosh. That being said he has a very hard time not becoming attached to people, and quickly, though when they die the soldier in himself is also quick to accept facts. When it's not his team, that is. When Elizabeth is dying in the Season 4 opener he is beside himself, and he nearly has a heart-attack every time Rodney's life is at risk, though he always denies it later.
Having been through his share of dream-sequences, or fake-memories, if you will, upon arriving in Haven he'll be insistent that it isn't real and also that his team is coming to get him. This won't stop him from integrating here or helping out, as we saw in the episode in which John spent six months with a village of Ancients hoping to ascend. He'll probably liken this experience to that one, being that he had to fight a giant invisible beast in order to keep his life while there. His vast experiences on Earth and in Pegasus will help him come to terms with this perhaps quicker than another person, and it is my hope he'll do very well in this setting. In summation, no one will be surprised when he seduces an alien princess on his first day without so much as breaking a sweat.
Abilities/Powers: As mentioned in the previous section, John possesses the ATA gene. Not that it'll do him much good here. He was trained in Special Ops, Desert Storm, but he has terrible navigation skills. One might even call him a Wrong Way Corrigan. His hand-to-hand is strong, even superior when it's a regular human one-on-one type scenario. The people of Pegasus, like Ronon and Teyla, have much more of a MMA background and while they try to teach him and he does improve, he's still nowhere near at that level. He is, however, quite knowledgeable in all sorts of weapons and tech, and he can backwards-program anything that has to do with numbers. He's a math genius, really, and his military mind is pretty keen as well. It's like he has the ability to see 12 steps ahead at all times. But really, his mind just works like that.
Obviously none of this is supernatural, he's just an Air Force pilot who passed a MENSA exam.