InsaneJournal

Callings

Anarchist - Anarchists are dangerous renegades who desire nothing more than to bring down the state from within. Believing that there are no innocents, bombings and assassinations are the favored tools of these terrorists. Anarchists tend to be dangerous lone wolves, or operate in small, independent cells. Some cells share information and tactics, but there is no evidence of a larger anarchist conspiracy. Cells operate autonomously, pursuing their own ends.

Apothecary - This amateur alchemist either owns a small shoppe or peddles his wares on the street. Generally, these individuals lack any true medical credentials, possessing only slightly more medical knowledge than the average denizen of the Metropolis. Most are little better than hucksters, taking advantage of the desperate and gullible. The worst will sell any compound, no matter how dangerous or poorly understood, to make some quick money.

Aristocrats - The wealthy and elite of London look down their noses at the dirty streets of the city. Convinced they are better than the rest, the Aristocrats tend to believe the city is theirs to own. Generally, they are correct. In these days, those that can flash money around can accomplish much within the Bureaucracy. However, all those rumours and jokes in the East End about inbreeding and incest aren't that far from the mark. Most Aristocrats do have some sort of genetic flaw due to the need to keep their money and blood pure as possible.

Beggar - From young urchins to ancient crawlers too forlorn to form words, the streets are full of beggars. Beggars sometimes have worthwhile information, but most often are a nuisance. The most reliable, however, can be hired to perform very simple tasks. Police and criminals alike make use of the city's derelicts as lookouts and couriers, relying on their anonymity and near-invisibility on the street to compensate for their lack of usable skills.

Cab Driver - There are over ten thousand cab drivers servicing London's streets. These individuals need to be hard-working, courteous, knowledgeable, and wary. During a cab driver's long hours crossing the Metropolis daily, he may be subject to armed robbery or animate attack, and the violence that occurs daily can easily spook his horses. For these reasons, most cab drivers keep at least one firearm on their person at all times. After finishing a day's work, drivers that can afford the upkeep of working animals must care for their horses before retiring for supper.

Criminal - To be called a criminal doesn't necessarily mean that one participates in criminal activities. Most do, of course, but there are the few that simply associate with known criminals that get slapped with this label.

Criminal, Fence - Fences are criminals that buy goods from thieves for the purpose of resale. They operate out of small shoppes, warehouses, flash houses, or anywhere else that draws as little attention to them as possible. Once a thief sells the stolen goods to the fence, the fence moves them back into circulation through his contacts on the street.

Criminal, Nobbler - Nobblers are criminals employed to inflict grievous physical harm. Some nobblers are employed to take out human trash at low-class drinking establishments while others collect debts for money lenders. Still others make their living executing rough street justice at the behest of crime bosses and gang lords.

Criminal, Talented Picpocket - Sometimes called dippers or toolers, pickpockets may operate alone or in groups. Most pickpockets content themselves with stealing from the coat pockets of those they pass on the streets. A sufficiently bold and dexterous tooler, however, may attempt to snatch a watch from a gentleman's vest pocket while speaking to him. Most pickpockets start out young. From here, they graduate to more professional activities, are caught and sent to jail, or, in remarkably few cases, give up their criminal activities. The best pickpockets dress well enough to get close to wealthier marks.

Deathwatch, Officer - Deathwatch officers oversee the enlisted men. Generally, only officers are issued Galvanic weapons in the field.

Deathwatch, Soldier - Most often, Deathwatch forces will be encountered in fire teams of no more than four troops or in larger patrols made up of several fire teams. During widespread plague outbreaks, the Deathwatch take to the streets in far greater numbers. Soldiers generally carry bolt-action rifles and semi-automatic handguns. More powerful weapons are assigned to officers or crews maintaining the walls. These troops are used for killing any animates that appear in the city or step too close to the city walls.

Dhampir - Not so much a profession as it is a lifestyle. This person has been subjected to the viral change of vampirism, but managed to fight it off enough to maintain most of their humanity. Generally, the Dhampirs are so angry with what the vampires have done with them that they turn into formidable vampire hunters. They age slowly, have a haunting skeletal beauty about them, and perform with all the grace and speed of a predatory cat. Unfortunately for them, they are unable to go out in the sunlight, and still find the draw of blood to be almost more than they can handle.

Doctor - Just because you have the title of Doctor, does not make you a medical professional. Analytical minds find their way here when they delve deeper into the research of anti-agapics or the reanimation of dead tissue. The secret to eternal life is hidden within this calling, and many have not been able to resist the call. Few have been able to make advancements in the field, and even fewer have entered the field with the idea to simply help their fellows. In these days the Hippocratic Oath means nothing.

Labourer - Labourers are the working-class folk that can be found throughout the slums and factories of London. Neo-Victorian labourers tend to live short, miserable lives. Poor working and living conditions, disease, pollution, extreme poverty, and rampant alcoholism take a serious toll on the working class. Few labourers live past their forties and none are entirely untouched by the constant drudgery that slowly saps their will to live.

Lunatic Killer - The lunatic killer is a madman driven to murder by poverty, overcrowding, and hopelessness. When captured, these loners describe and uncontrollable compulsion to kill. Nightly they stalk the streets of the Metropolis in search of fresh victims. Often the activities of lunatic killers put them at odds with intelligent vampires and criminal gangs who prefer to avoid the sort of attention mass murder tends to draw to their hunting ground.

Mourner - The Mourners are an elite sect of guardians-for-hire. Installed next to the recently-deceased by bereaved families that can afford them, those of the Quiet Service watch for signs of reanimation in the corpse. The usual vigil lasts three days, during which the Mourners are not seen to eat, drink, sleep, or stir. At the first groan, burble or blink, the bedside warrior looses their sword and beheads the beast. Mourners lead lives of dignified chastity, absolutely devoted to the art of stillness and observation. (Should you wish to play a Mourner, please contact the Mods for full background information.)

Plagueman - Plaguemen are civil servants employed by the Metropolitan Health Department to collect the city's dead, and they always operate in pairs. They make daily rounds, driving horse-drawn plague carts through the narrow backstreets and alleys of London's overcrowded working-class neighbourhoods to gather the dead of the previous night. Once the corpse is located, the plaguemen must lift it bodily and carry it to the plague cart where it is unceremoniously tossed into the back with the rest of the dead. The collected corpses are delivered to the many public crematoria scattered throughout the Metropolis.

Plaguemen carry a small arsenal to protect themselves not only from zombies but also from resurrection men. Plague carts make attractive targets for gangs of resurrectionists. The plagueman's favoured weapon is the flame-thrower, though a fair number of them carry sawed-off shotguns and axes for close-in work. Rarely, plaguemen have been known to succumb to bribes and sell a portion of their cargo on the black market.

Plaguemen are occasionally taken by surprise when one or more of the corpses in their care spontaneously animate. It is not uncommon to see plaguemen setting whole carts alight with flamethrowers to quell out of control animates. This procedure has been known to spook the horses pulling the cart, sending them charging through the streets pulling the blazing pile of corpses behind them.

Police, Constable - Police constables walk the streets of the Metropolis, day and night. Virtually all constables are recruited from the lower classes and join the force in hopes of securing a career. Though a constable's pay is very low, a career as a police officer promises rewards that would otherwise be unavailable. Not only is there the potential for some financial security, but also the profession is considered to be an honourable one. Furthermore, a life on the force promises security at times when many others are unemployed. A policeman can reckon he will eat when others go hungry around him.

The regulations demand that all new recruits be under thirty-five, fit, unmarried, literate, and of good character. The minimum age is usually twenty because service before this time is not considered for pension purposes, but certificates of service include recruits as young as eighteen. Police training is largely conducted by former regimental sergeants.

Police, Detective - Though the uniformed branch may be a deterrent to crime, the police also require methods of preventing and solving crimes. The job of gathering information and tracking the movements of known criminals falls upon plain-clothes detectives, and it is the detectives that are charged with the investigations of crimes. Police detectives operate throughout London, sometimes alone and at other times with the assistance of the uniformed branch. All detectives must first work their way through the uniformed branch before being promoted to CID.

Police, Sergeant - Within the structure of the City of London Police and the Metropolitan Police, the rank above constable is sergeant. Each sergeant is responsible for overseeing thirty-six constables. These constables are broken up in four groups of nine, with eight walking beats and the ninth remaining at the police station. Sergeants generally assign beats to the constables but may occasionally go on patrol, especially with probationers or rookie constables.

During the night, the sergeant inspects the constables as they walk their beats while his supervisor, the Inspector, remains at the station, dealing with prisoners and other routine work.

Professional - Professionals represent the rank and file of the middle class. They may be clerks, lawyers, engineers, or a myriad of other professions. Professionals are timely, discreet, and well-mannered. They tend to at least appear to be model citizens at all times since acting otherwise would certainly curb their future prospects.

Prostitute - The streets of the Metropolis are filled with men and women prostituting themselves for profit and survival. The young, pretty ones may fetch a high price for their services while old whores turn tricks for smaller fees in a Sisyphusian struggle to feed their addictions. Despite the dangers of their work, prostitutes who avoid addiction and disease are generally healthier than other lower-class workers, who are forced to toil in miserable conditions for fourteen or more hours a day. There are only a few brothels in Neo-Victorian London, but most rooming houses tolerate prostitution as long as the whores pay up on time and are not too loud.

Prostitute, Adventuress - An adventuress is a courtesan, a high-class paramour courting the continuing patronage of an aristocratic lover. These women, known for their exceptional beauty, intelligence, and talents, frequent the more fashionable sections of the city. Adventuresses are absolutely free of the police harassment that plagues lower-class streetwalkers. However, they often find themselves the target of a jilted lover's or wife's revenge.

Reanimist, Alchemical - Reanimators are misguided physicians and alchemists who seek to restore some semblance of life to the dead with the application of alchemical serums. Despite a prohibition on the science, these renegades seek to learn the secret of life and death through reanimation. While most reanimists are lone, amateur enthusiasts, others belong to the outlawed Lux ex Morte. The reanimist must have access to an alchemical lab, materials for his solutions, and a supply of extremely fresh corpses.

Reanimist, Galvanic - The galvanic reanimist is a physician who uses surgical and mechanical skill to create new life from the dead. Galvanic reanimators think nothing of extensively modifying their creations, and they replace weak or damaged portions of a corpse with higher quality cadaverous materials or mechanical substitutes. Some galvanic reanimations are sanctioned, but most are the productions of rogue research into the creation of life itself. Galvanic reanimists require access to large numbers of fresh corpses and laboratories where they can work undisturbed.

Resurrectionist - Resurrectionists are the body snatchers who supply the Metropolis' illegal flesh markets and amateur reanimists. Many private medical research facilities also rely on resurrectionists to provide cadaverous material.

Resurrectionists gather corpses through a variety of means. Some rely on agents to inform them of deaths in the neighborhood so they can snatch the corpse before it can be collected by plaguemen. Others attempt daring raids on plague carts or bribe plaguemen for their cargo outright. The most unscrupulous turn to murder to procure their wares.

Toff - In the criminal vernacular, a toff is a well-dressed gentleman ripe for the picking: a man of ease, a fellow with more money than common sense. A toff could be a young aristocrat out of his depth while slumming it up in the East End, a theater goer out for a night on the town, or a well-dressed witness in the wrong place at the right time.

Underground Dweller - There are those individuals that choose to live in the Underground beneath the streets of London. Some are simply trying to lose themselves while others have immediate and pressing reasons to hide from the light of day. Many criminals maintain operations beneath the Metropolis where few sane men would dare to venture. Whatever draws a person to the Underground, it is a dark and dingy existence, rife with danger. In addition to the threat posed by other mortal subterranean dwellers, the Underground is also home to ghoul tribes, isolated packs of animates, and feral vampires.

Few Underground dwellers carry firearms. Not only do gunshots draw unwanted attention, but ammunition is also scarce beneath the streets of London.

Undertaker - Undertakers are licensed bounty hunters that track down and exterminate the abominations of the Neo-Victorian world. The evolved toward the end of the Reclamation when the cities were retaken from the animate dead. The Undertakers themselves are among the most deadly individuals to walk the streets of Neo-Victorian London. They are usually armed with the most advanced weapons known to man, including pneumatic stake guns and lightning cannons fueled by the city’s tesla-array.

Undertakers ravage the wastelands and the Metropolis for animates, vampires, and other abominations to turn in to the Bounty offices for money. Some take up jobs doing other nefarious deeds, but most do what they can if only to keep food on the table.




Abominations

Anathema: Vat-grown Humans

Changeling - Anathema are vat-grown, genetically altered humans. Most anathema appear basically human but are invariably plagued with imperfections wrought by genetic tampering. By their nature, Anathema are mentally and physically unstable.

Anathema are often the products of rogue scientists employed by aristocratic families who desperately wish to have heirs but are otherwise incapable of having children of their own. Most offspring created in this manner will have some number of genetic "improvements" made at the whims of the creating scientist. Many parents never realize that their child's unusual attributes are the results of deliberate engineering, and adopted Anathema are usually unaware of their unnatural origins

Note that Anathema are not half-lifers. Despite their unnatural origin, they are fully living creatures.

Monstrous - Anathema are the products of outlawed science. Under the law, they are semi-human, corrupt products of an unstable and illegal technology who pose a threat to the social order by their very existence. The Anathema do not have the rights of human beings; if discovered, an Anathema may be legally destroyed.

While some Anathema may pass easily for human, others are truly monstrous. These creatures either live out their lives in secret laboratories or remain constantly on the run. Many have fled into the Underground where they easily blend into the population of dispossessed living beneath London.

Animate: Plague Zombies

Ghouls: Immortal Cannibals

Elder - These creatures are effectively immortal, but they do undergo extreme physical and mental changes as they age. At birth, ghouls are short, thin, and quick. As the years pass, ghouls grow larger and more rotund, losing mobility as they increase in size. They also begin to suffer from senility and degenerative insanity. Eventually, they become so morbidly obese that they are incapable of independent movement. The elders are completely incapable of leaving their Underground burrows and must rely on the younger generations for their care and feeding.

Ghoul elders are the patriarchs and matriarchs of their tribes. Before succumbing to madness, ghoul elders act as the senior members of their tribal councils. The reverence the ghouls have for their elders is such that many lunatic ghouls are left on councils until they are nearly moribund and completely irrational.

Metropolitan - The ghouls of the Metropolis are an even stranger breed than their Wasteland cousins. These creatures have managed to make a life for themselves alongside humanity. Daily, they make their way out of the Underground or the worst aboveground slums to find whatever work is available to their kind. Ghouls occupy the bottom rung of human society, taking the dangerous and dirty work to which humanity is unsuited, no matter what the going rate.

The ghouls of London are generally not hunters. The tribes controlling the Underground have very serious prohibitions on killing humans. Instead, they purchase raw flesh at the meat markets. Desperate to avoid drawing attention to themselves, ghouls working aboveground tend to be model citizens.

Hermit - Some ghouls forsake the familial structure completely, preferring a solitary life. These hermits live by hunting humans and other ghouls in the Underground. Some are known to speak conversationally to corpses. Despite officially being considered renegades by their tribes, these ghouls are occasionally sought out for their wisdom. Most know many of the secrets and hidden ways of the Underground.

Wastelander - The ghouls of the Wasteland are aggressive and very dangerous. Hunting in packs, they prey on human travelers and ghouls from rival tribes. Wasteland ghouls are notorious for their viciousness and savagery. They war constantly with their rivals for the scant resources of the Wasteland.

Though ghouls are not noted for their intellect, they do have a cruel cunning. Ghouls prefer to attack from ambush, and always make sure they have the numbers required to bring down their quarry before making their presence known. There are never bodies left behind after a ghoul attack. The ghouls drag every scrap of meat home for their pots, even the bodies of their own kinsmen.

Homunculus: Vat-Grown Creatures

Lab Assistant - A Homunculus is a genetically engineered, vat-grown life form. Though based on human genetic stock, these creatures are extensively modified. Much simpler than Anathema, these creatures are much easier to engineer and require a fraction of the time to raise. The resulting creature often possesses a number of physical deformities.

The most complex Homunculi are generally created for use as lab assistants or skilled labour. Obviously human, but badly disfigured, the are generally explained away as "orphan wards" and kept largely away from public view. Homunculi are sometimes engineered with substance addictions to give an artificial dependence on the researchers who gave them life.

Homunculi seldom live outside the institutions in which they were created. Those who do risk destruction if they are discovered.

Mercurial: Alchemical Zombies

Intelligent - Mercurials are corpses animated through alchemical experimentation. Most often, such experiments result in creating either mindless killers that are little different than ordinary plague-spawned animates or misguided lunatics with only the barest echos of their previous lives. Very rarely, such experiments result in the creation of an intelligent undead creature.

Such creatures tend to be melancholic and withdrawn, exhibiting a morbid fascination with death and dying. The Mercurial may retain most of its memories from life and may attempt to return to its former life, often with disastrous consequences for both the reanimate and creator.

The creature is truly and obviously dead. Pale and cool to the touch, it will continue to deteriorate throughout its unnatural existence. The Mercurial has full control over its body, but moves as though it just awakened from a deep sleep.

Lunatic - Though the cast majority of experiments in alchemical reanimation produce only mindless horrors, occasionally a true abomination is spawned. Possessing only a few memories of their former lives, these Mercurials also maintain a limited capacity for reason. Driven to kill by a hatred of all living things, these monsters are far more dangerous than common animates. The lunatic undead are capable of at least short-sighted planning and can learn from their mistakes. Most reanimators carry firearms to dispose of such creatures before they can escape to the teeming hunting grounds of the City's streets.

Promethean: Created Humans

Post-Cadaverous Automaton - The post-cadaverous automaton is an almost wholly mechanical creature. The Promethean utilizes the continual application of artificial impulses, drawing its power not from biological or super-normal sources but from the intervention of technology. A small number of post-cadaverous automata are commissioned every year for civic deployment, and a certain number find use in non-nationalized industries. Only a few universities and industrial complexes scattered through Britain have dispensation to create these creatures, but rumours suggest that some factories are staffed completely by automata and their handlers.

The post-cadaverous automaton may be extensively modified for industrial labor, generally with at least reinforced skeletons designed to support the weight of tools grafted to their bodies. The automaton's great strength makes it extremely dangerous in combat, though it is a clumsy opponent. Most are limited to unarmed attacks, but those with integral industrial equipment, such as saws or drills, can put them to horrific application.

Rimmon - Love is blind... and potentially criminal. Neo-Victorian physicians are a strange breed: with a vast knowledge of both life and death, many cannot help but break laws both temporal and divine. When a loved one succumbs to a natural malady, such lunatics are driven to restore them to the semblance of life. Should the rimmon be discovered for what it is, the creature is certain to be destroyed.

Most rimmons are patchwork creatures assembled from a multitude of corpses and animated with the galvanic spark. The resurrected lover is painstakingly fashioned to appear exactly as he or she did in life. Damaged parts are replaced with a careful eye to maintain the appearance. The telltale stitch marks are made carefully and will fade over the first few weeks of half-life.

Despite appearing to be its creators dead lover, the rimmon is a blank slate. It will develop a personality over time, and may occasionally remember pieces of its former life, but it will never be the creature it was in life. The resurrected lover is a tragic figure, lost in the world of the living, melancholy, and obsessed with death. Most develop a keen interest in learning where all their component parts come from.

Thropes: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde-types

Metropolitan Bite Victim - The bite victim is an ordinary man or woman who has sustained a bite from a true thrope, most likely from venturing into the Wastelands. The bite victim's life will become a living hell. In times of stress or rage, the victim risks transforming into a rampaging monster. He or she blacks out for hours at a time, waking up virtually naked in blood-soaked rags with grievous but rapidly healing wounds.

In the metropolis, such creatures are hunted and destroyed on sight. The police have been known to take to the street by the dozens, armed to the teeth, to take down a single thrope.

Purebred - Purebred Thropes are the result of mating between two true thropes. Purebred thropes live their whole life in thrope form and do not have a human form. For this reason, these creatures are generally only encountered in packs in the Wastelands. Purebred packs will generally accept true thropes who are no longer capable of returning to human form into their ranks.

Thrope packs are amongst the most dangerous threats to life and limb within the Wasteland. Each thrope in the pack is aggressive, extremely physically powerful, and nearly indestructible. As a group, the pack is a well-coordinated and virtually unstoppable threat.

Vampires: Undead Blood-Suckers

Feral - Most feral vampires are destroyed soon after their creation. Lacking higher cognitive faculties, these undead creatures are driven by a primal instinct to feed. Competing with their own kind as well as human serial killers and hunted by Undertakers and Dhampiri, most are destroyed within weeks of rising from the dead. Only the strongest survive to carve out their own hunting grounds. These creatures are truly dangerous predators, but they remain creatures of habit.

Feral vampires tend to move in established territories and hunt in predictable patterns. Their first reaction is to attack in the hopes of making a kill; only when confronted with a significant threat will the vampire abandon its predatory activities and attempt to escape. The seasoned hunter has retained enough intelligence to cover its tracks and will certainly have the cunning to hide the dismembered corpses of its victims or avoid trailing bloody tracks behind it as it makes its way back to the nest.

Most will make nests in abandoned buildings or Underground, where there is little chance of being disturbed while at rest. The nests of these vampires are frequently littered with the remnants of old kills.

Feral vampires are extremely dangerous in a fight. They seldom use firearms but will gleefully use melee weapons. Many feral vampires prefer the thrill of dispatching its victim with its bare hands and teeth.

Aristocracy - A sentient vampire is among the most dangerous of creatures to walk the Neo-Victorian World. A sentient vampire becomes vastly more dangerous over time as it adapts to its undead form and its influence grows. These creatures are careful to avoid detection and often act through slaves, pawns, or hired thugs. It is also likely to be served by younger vampires that are part of its legacy. The vampiric aristocrat is a sentient vampire that has been around for decades, long enough to insinuate itself in Neo-Victorian society.

Despite the aristocratic airs, these aged monsters are still instinctual hunters. They maintain absolute control over their hunting grounds, which are controlled like small fiefdoms within the metropolis. The vampire believes that it owns everything within its territory and will destroy anything or anyone threatening its claim. Sentient vampires are known to remove others of its own kind, feral vampires, serial killers, and even criminals that trespass into their territory and draw attention there. These creatures are old enough to know that quiet and peaceful streets make for easier hunting.

Thug - This vampire was intentionally created by a vampire that is part of a long-standing legacy to serve its master in death. It may be a loyal soldier or an unwilling pawn. In either case, the new vampire must at least pretend allegiance to avoid summary execution. Most of these creatures are selected for their diplomacy or fighting skills. Many were young aristocrats that have been disowned by their families. Over time, these vampires may be very influential, but for now, they are at the bottom of their social order.

These vampires execute the wills of their masters. They hunt down those that would dare trespass into the vampire's hunting ground and make sure that peace is maintained on the streets.