Typical modern Earth on the outside, but sinister forces lurk in hidden areas. Besides magic and sorcery, there are the psychic phenomena known as "Stands", poltergeists that may or may not be under the control of their bearers.
Type: BlossomNatively magic and sorcery exist, as well as psychic phenomena -- and, it's said, aliens. However many of these have faded into the background in the wake of the prominence of a psychic phenomenon called "Stands". Stands are essentially poltergeists created via psychokinetic powers, given form and function by the psyche of the wielder. Some of these Stands are not under the control of their users, and people dying due to a Stand gone out of control is not uncommon.
Stands have a variety of abilities and forms, and most can be categorized by their range, form, and/or abilities. Some of these are as follows:
* Close-range Stands are so named because they tend to not be able to manifest too far from their users. In return they tend towards greater physical power and precision.
* Long-range Stands tend to be able to travel a varying distance from their users, and to have useful utility abilities. In return they tend to be less powerful in a direct confrontation.
* Bound Stands are generally linked to an object. Under most circumstances, a Stand cannot be seen by normal people; however these Stands are bound to physical objects and thus this does not apply to them, since the object will be clearly seen demonstrating supernatural abilities.
* Automatic Stands are generally not under the control of their users. Sometimes they can both travel far from their users as well as display powerful techniques. However, automatic Stands tend to be unable to adapt to changing situations. At times they can even kill their users, or only manifest upon the death of their users.
* Swarm Stands or Colony Stands are made up of many entities instead of a single one, however they are still considered a single Stand. They also protect their users in a unique way -- they don't generally transmit damage per unit, but per percentage of the group damaged. Additionally, while even a single unit of the Stand remains, the user won't die.
* Evolved Stands are those that, through some change in the user, grow into stronger forms. This can result from development of the user's psyche, or from the user being struck with one of the Stand-creating arrows. If the user is struck, their Stand may develop a second ability; if the Stand is struck, the Stand may evolve into a "Requiem" Stand, which are much stronger than normal Stands.
* Sentient Stands have personalities apart from their users. This can result from a user suppressing parts of his/her psyche for long periods of time; these traits are then transferred onto the Stand as a pseudo-personality. Sometimes these sorts of Stands also qualify as Automatic Stands, particularly if they don't have users and can think for themselves.
* A Shared Stand is a rare case in which two or more people "share" a Stand. This tends to be cases like twins with a twin link, animals in the same pack or family group, or people with incredibly close bonds of friendship and/or love.
These categories are not the be-all, end-all of Stand classification. Stands are as varied and bizarre as their users, and not all Stands will be able to fit into these categories. Additionally some Stands will qualify for more than one category at a time. A Stand could, for instance, be an Evolved, Long-range, Sentient Stand.
It doesn't happen to all off-worlders, but this world can sometimes have an odd effect on the powers of those who come in from other worlds. Sometimes off-worlders may find their powers and abilities transferred into a "container" of sorts. This "container" may or may not be humanoid, but it usually takes a form relatively important to the person, and gives itself a name that the person always knows instantly. The Speedwagon Foundation is currently studying this effect, however they have called it "Pseudo-Stands".
So far, no instance of powers being transferred to a Pseudo-Stand has actually changed, strengthened, weakened, or further limited those powers in any way save the way they're already limited. If, for instance, an off-worlder couldn't use their fire abilities in the rain, their Pseudo-Stand would either not be able to use the ability in the rain, or would not be able to manifest at all when it rains. The only thing that changes is the origin point of the powers -- when an off-worlder develops a Pseudo-Stand, the origin point of the powers tends to shift from the person to their Stand.
This is not an exact 1:1 change/transferrence however. It is not unheard of for even Stand users native to this world to retain supernatural passive abilities -- a sense of smell equal to that of a dog or wolf, for instance. Thus off-worlders may also find that their hyper-keen senses, analytical abilities, and other such passive abilities may or may not be transferred to their Pseudo-Stands.
Once actualized, Pseudo-Stands tend to change very little. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule -- off-world users can change and grow like native Stand users, and their Pseudo-Stands will change and develop in turn. They generally do not evolve in the way of an Evolved Stand, however.
(OOC: This is just a fun little mechanic to allow off-world players to cast their powers and abilities in the frame of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, and to be just as hammy and ridiculous as the characters in JJBA tend to be. This is NOT mandatory for play in this world. Players who do not wish to use this mechanic or are not familiar enough with JJBA should feel no obligation to use it. Those who do may page or @mail Josuke if they want help in framing their Perks in a Pseudo-Stand.)
There are a number of things to keep in mind if you're thinking about utilizing the Pseudo-Stand mechanic for your character. Please think about the following:
* First of all, and this cannot be repeated enough, the Pseudo-Stands mechanic is NOT mandatory in any way, shape, form, or fashion. There's no penalty to a character for their player choosing not to utilize this mechanic. It's just a bit of hammy, ridiculous fun, that's all.
* The Pseudo-Stand mechanic is not intended to make Perks stronger or weaker, to limit Perks in ways that they're not already limited, to remove limits that previously existed on those Perks, or to grant characters Perks that they don't have. The way that the character's Perks function does not change. The only thing that changes is the location -- they come out of/originate from the Stand instead of out of the person. This is not an excuse to be stronger or better somehow. It's just an excuse to be hammy and ridiculous.
* Passive abilities may or may not transfer over. A robot would still have their sensors, someone with a particularly keen sense of sight or smell, the ability to recall things from memory with exact precision, increased perceptive abilities, the ability to sense ghosts and the like would generally still have that; their Stand wouldn't have to be the source of that.
* Pseudo-Stands may be of nearly any type (please see Stand Types). But unless the Perks list an NPC, Pseudo-Stands generally aren't of Sentient type; this would be giving the player an NPC that they don't normally have and thus would count as "strengthening" Perks, or granting new Perks. Thusly, NPC Perks like Pokemon/Digimon/other pet abilities wouldn't transfer over either; the Pokemon/Digimon/other pet would exist unchanged.
* Pseudo-Stands only last as long as a player is inside this particular iteration of JJBA world, and do not persist after the character leaves the world. Once the character leaves the world, their Perks revert back to their original form and the Pseudo-Stand disappears.
* Characters' Pseudo-Stands generally stay the same ICly. Take note that this doesn't lock players out of making retroactive OOC changes if the player gets an idea that they like better for their character's Pseudo-Stands during subsequent visits to the world. However the appearance and name of the Pseudo-Stand should not be ICly ever-changing; the "power" of a Pseudo-Stand should ideally never be "to change its own identity". Pseudo-Stands don't generally have identities of their own.
* Part 3 named the Stands after Tarot cards and Egyptian gods. Part 4 onward used music groups, albums, or song names. It is not required to name one's Pseudo-Stand after a music group, album, song, or Tarot card. The name should ideally have meaning to the character OOCly, whatever it is.
* If you would like help designing a Pseudo-Stand for your character, or any of this is unclear, page or @mail Josuke. Ultimately all this is presented to give players a way to have fun with the world that is JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.
A number of supernatural beings exist in this world, in addition to humans with power. Most prominent among these are the Pillar Men, vampires, and zombies. All of these beings are vulnerable to sunlight and a form of energy known as Hamon, or Ripple, created in the human body via a specific breathing technique.
Pillar Men are a race of hyper-intelligent, super-human beings that were so-named because they are found hibernating in stone pillars. As they're immortal, their birth rates are incredibly low. The Pillar Men have the ability to absorb living tissue via touch, possess super-sharp senses, as well as being able to manipulate their bodies on a molecular level. Instead of sleeping every night, they hibernate in stone pillars for thousands of years, then wake and remain awake for a comparable number of years. However, the Speedwagon Foundation believes that the last four Pillar Men -- Kars, Eisidisi, Wamuu, and Santana -- have either been killed or dealt with, with Kars being stuck in space as a frozen block of stone, Eisidisi and Wamuu dead, and Santana being held by the Speedwagon Foundation as stone under UV lights. They are vulnerable to sunlight and Hamon/Ripple.
Vampires were originally created by the experimentation with the Stone Masks Kars created in an effort to cure his people's affliction with sunlight (they can also be created when a vampire gives a dead person a portion of his or her blood). The Stone Masks, when activated by blood, use acupuncture in the brain to release the body's potential. However, the process kills the human. It confers a portion of the Pillar Men's abilities -- greater physical condition and a variety of secondary abilities involving bodily manipulation -- to the human's body, in exchange for a violent allergy to sunlight and the need to drink blood. They are also vulnerable to sunlight and Hamon/Ripple.
Zombies are the beings created through a vampire's feeding, by draining a living human of blood. The corpse of the human then becomes animated and under the control of the vampire who drained them. Besides their master's will, all they know is hunger. They're little better than animals, though some vestiges of human intelligence can be found, and they can be quite cunning. Like the vampires and the Pillar Men above them, they are vulnerable to sunlight and Hamon/Ripple.