[Meta Thread] Lord Windos' PokeRole Adventure 2: The Wild Lands

[Dragonstrike]

Okay.  First of all, let me say this.

Spoiler

Fuck.  Do you know how hard I was trying to retain my composure yesterday?  I was seriously struggling with focusing on anything.  Seeing all of the goals that I had been working towards with Nathan in SR get slowly but surely dismantled one by one was rather soul shattering.  I knew Ventus was going to lose it.  I knew Nathan's best friend and starter was likely going to bite the dust.

I didn't think he'd lose his human friends one by one.  Heart and Ventus are the only ones left, if you can even call them that at this point, and assuming they're even still around.

I didn't think his dad would be held hostage and kidnapped by Cosh to ensure the Scims' getaway.  That bastard.

I was not ready to see Nathan's life get completely upended again, leaving him with little else but what he started his adventure with, but the power and tools to do something now that he never sought before.

Revenge.

Okay, so, quick summary time to recap what we know now about old characters and how that might impact this campaign, starting with my character as he is the focus of the most relevant changes.

- Nathan lost almost everything.  He never freed Mesprit, and losing Kirlia to Seikamater would have severed that connection permanently.  A Mega Diancie would never be able to fill that void.  Terra then betraying what was left of the party and siding with the Scims was the last straw.  Nathan has snapped.  This is not the nice Nathan with a love of pokemon and realistic goals we knew in SR.  This is a Nathan with an extreme drive for self improvement for power's sake.  He knows exactly how strong he needs to become if he's ever going to be able to defeat Terra, and his bias against the Scimitars is magnified several times.  He is self righteous, bitter, resentful, distrustful of almost everybody, and extremely jaded.  He is an extremely dangerous person to piss off, and Terra, the Scims, and Enigma have done so in spectacular fashion.

Everything I said about him possibly encouraging Scimitars that were less traditionalist?  You can forget that here.

somewhat related details

In SR, one of my final goals as Nathan was to hopefully reduce tensions between Creshire and Scims that were willing to change for the better.  If you remember the young woman that Nathan worked with during the delve into the Ruins, the one that shattered her gauntlet, you may also remember that Nathan was going to great lengths to ensure that she was okay.

Great lengths to ensure that she could return to her home region sooner rather than later, and that she wouldn't have to worry about being alienated from her brother.

While their methods were questionable, Scimitar technology is amazing and isn't inherently evil.  The gauntlets alone are a massive leap in the field of prosthetics.  Given enough time and reassessment, Almanac and Scimitar tech could have found moral, justified use in Creshire, and Nathan would have helped spearhead that effort.

You may remember that because she shattered her gauntlet, that young woman was now missing a hand.

You can probably tell where I'm going with this.

And that none of it happened here.  Nathan was too apathetic to forge that connection here, too focused on completing his mission...

...and too blinded by hatred and revenge in the aftermath of it all to even think about starting a family.

He can only trust himself.  Attaching himself to anyone else would just be a weakness that could be exploited.

In the universe of the Wild Lands, Nathan has no children, no spouse.

He is a lone wolf.

...I am trying so hard to not cry as well, ngl.

*inhales*

Moving on...

- Shiva.  Oh Shiva...so hurt to see what had taken place, she straight up abandoned the party...I hated to see it too.  Especially since as a Guardian of Time, she'd likely have to live with that choice, that knowledge that she abandoned her friends in one doomed timeline to supposedly save them in another, forever.

Maybe she'd be happy with it, especially compared to the alternative.  It's not for me to say.

But I don't think such an existence is typically a happy one.

With great power and knowledge come great responsibility, and great actions have great consequences in Windos's games.

Maybe we'll see her again.  I'd hope so.  Because from what we know of time travel in SR's universe, Celebi cannot change the past, but that doesn't mean that your actions didn't have an effect on the future.

- Ventus: it's not said what happened to him, so I can't really speculate much on this.  He could have been too far gone to be of much help to anybody after saving Stair City.  Or maybe he still found a renewed purpose working directly with the Creshire League like he did in SR, but now sharing similar goals to the new Champion Nathan.  I don't know which is more likely, but neither is happy news.

- Heart seems to be the only one to have escaped being directly affected by these tragedies.  He's the last bastion of visible hope among Creshire's heroes, a comforting fire on a cold night.

But he is just one man, and one man can only do so much to elicit change.

I would be glad to see more of Heart, much like how I dread what we might see of this ruthless Fairy King who's now Champion of Creshire.

There are details from his telling of the tale that interest me though, mostly because of the lack of detail.  The wand that Shiva found, for instance.  Maybe it's important, maybe not.

The rest of the tale...

...

...

...no, I don't think I need to analyze that right now.  It's more self explanatory.

...

...ya know, for a campaign that didn't need to dive into old matters, this is really diving into old matters.  At the very minimum, Terra and Cosh are going to be relevant.  And where Terra and Cosh are, this new Nathan is  likely going to be hunting for them...