-Do you know what you want to roleplay as a Temporary Autonomous Zoner? (The type here : trader, templar, etc...) Spatial pilot, jack of all trades and general bum.
-Do you have a character in mind in which you would like to roleplay? If so, tell us the history and general Roleplay. (Here you explain the character background/history, his mindset, everything related to his story. If you don't have any character in mind, no need to answer anything here) You really want to know? Are you sure? Are you positive? Alright then. This may take a while.
So I don't doubt that the person vouching for me has heard of my applicant, Richard Sykes (screen-name Seeker_Six_One) ' we've spoken before and done a bit of roleplaying. As for everyone else, I'll regale you with his story ' or at least, what I have concrete so far.
Sykes was born in 750 AS and raised on Planet Houston well before the chaotic silliness of the Nomad War. He was exposed to the hardships of life at an early age and adopted a dour, angry demeanor in life. He had few friends, many enemies and a lot of scars by the time he was old enough to work, driving short-haul planetary transports between factories and spaceports, an unenviable task for even the most hard-up worker. Many times, he was held up by roving criminal gangs (common in the prison-release mentality on the planet's surface) and forced to surrender his cargo at gunpoint.
In 800 AS, at age 30, he was conscripted to the Liberty Navy to help deal with the increased Artifact trade as part of Operation: Lockup, which gathered anyone with piloting experience of any sort into poorly equipped planetary militias tasked with hunting down and disabling ships that carried Artifacts into Liberty. Sykes and his unit, the Houston Voluntary Militia (a horrible misnomer if there ever was one), spent several months shooting down transports before they were inducted into the Navy proper ' around the time where Nomads started to infect the commanding officers and pilots of Liberty. This internal strife, which ' with the aid of pilots like Edison Trent and organizations with the Order ' soon flared into all-out war made Sykes question his already wavering faith in Christian God. If there was a God, and he was supposed to be loving and forgiving, why would he let a conflict like this break out? Eventually, he renounced whatever was left of his Christian faith and defected from Liberty, taking refuge in the Border Worlds. When the war came to its end, Sykes returned to Houston and resumed his job as a planetary transporter. However, his superiors recognized his status as a veteran of the Nomad War (and 'overlooked' his defector status) and granted him a ship and some credits, allowing him to leave Houston ' although he enjoyed his planetside job, his taste of space in the Navy had soon grown into a full-on addiction and he found himself more and more drawn to the stars, which was easier to fulfill with a ship and some funding.
Sykes flew for a while, exploring the Sector and meeting the various organizations in it before he came across the TAZ. Initially dismissing them as a bunch of 'moon-speaking lunatics', as he did more and more trading in and around Baffin he began to realize that maybe there was a god, after all ' or a goddess at any rate. He had seen the chaos that was wrought upon the universe beneath the supposed order of things and, now knowing that there was a religion that saw it as the natural way of things, made a quick and easy convert to Discordianism and the Temporary Autonomous Zoners.
And that's all I have for now.
-Do you have a recommendation from a TAZ? If so, name them. (Note: This is a requirement) The most considerate Yaoquizque (spelled without copypasta thank you very much!) will vouch for me.
-Will you follow TAZ roleplay guidelines? Do you take me for a fool? Of course I will. As soon as I figure out what they are. :P
-What is your experience? When did you join Discovery? I've played for... Well, the forum says I joined July of last year, so around six to seven months. I've had Freelancer for a couple years now, but I only recently got really into it.
-Have you roleplayed TAZ before? I have never played a TAZ character, if that's what you mean.
-Are you in other factions? If so, name them. Nope. I'm a free man.
-What will be your level of involvement in TAZ? I'll be as involved as I can be. Out of character I'm mostly unoccupied, but there will be days where I'm only on for short periods, or just not on at all. When I am involved, expect me to be right out there with you guys.
Zoner Lore :
-According to you, what is a Zoner? To me? A Zoner is life in quintessence. To be free from the opression of others, to do what thou wilt at any given time. To ply the distant black without fear of rancor or recourse from the powers that be, with the solar winds as your compass and the creak of your hull as your advisor. To use part of a quote from the great 20th Century journalist Hunter S. Thompson:
"... To sleep late, have fun, get wild, drink whisky, and drive fast on empty streets with nothing in mind except falling in love and not getting arrested... Res ipsa loquitur. Let the good times roll."
That, dear friends, is what a Zoner is to me.
-Describe the main asset of a Zoner as compared to others? Their tightly-knit community. A Zoner can always rely on their friends to pry them off the counter of a bar when they're so wasted they can't stand on their own, or to come and drive away any frisky pirates or aggressors who saw something shiny in their hold. Most companies and military organizations don't have the advantage of having quick and easy access to a friend's support, and some things will take a long time coming due to mission assignments and the like. With a Zoner, the only thing you have to worry about is (1) how far away the other pilot is, and (2) whether or not they're indisposed at the time.
(Plus, those pineal amulets are pretty hot.)
-What is the most important thing for a Zoner in the Sirian community? In my opinion, the most important thing to a Zoner is the amount of supplies they have on their ship at any given time. If they are to keep moving, living their nomadic, exploratory lifestyle, they need food to eat, fuel to fly and a star chart to show them where the stations are if they ever need to stop for lunch and a pee break.
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