starguy | expiation

Player: Jans
Contact: dm or discord (jans) preferred! but my plurk is

cantito
Age: 33
Current Characters: N/A
Link to Reserve: https://expiationmods.dreamwidth.org/1800.html?thread=14600#cmt14600

Character Name: Peter Jason Quill, aka: Star-Lord
Character Canon: Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy (2021)
Canon Point: post-canon
Age: 33

Crime: Treason. Peter has done a great many crimes, and has even been working on turning a new leaf, but the one choice he doesn't regret is turning in his old boss, Yondu Udonta, into the authorities. Yondu took job that included kidnapping a child, which Peter could never forgive, so Peter threw out over a decade of their relationship and got him arrested. Obviously it's wrong to kidnap children, and Peter has personal reasons for being against that, but I'd like for Peter to be forced to examine his relationship with Yondu, who was the only father figure in his life. Plus being branded a traitor might make Peter seem harder to trust, which I would love to explore.

Background: Marvel wiki is sparse and doesn't go over the events of the game so I'll just summarize. The Guardians start the game in a rocky place (having only been formed for less than a year.) A job goes wrong, and the team ends up fined and in debt to Nova Corps, which is greatly understaffed thanks to the recent Galactic War. In the process of paying off their debt and the schemes that follow, the Guardians, Peter most of all, end up at the center of a colossal threat that quickly spreads chaos throughout the entire galaxy. This threat is called the Promise, a malignant entity that feeds off of people's "faith energy" (more like lifeforce) and traps them in their own minds, where they can be reunited with their lost loved ones, and live the lives of their dreams. At the center of the Promise is a a young girl Peter suspects might be his daughter, Nikki Gold, whom the Promise has chosen as its Matriarch. Long story short, through self-reflection, self-acceptance, and the power of family, the Guardians face their pasts, make friends, win the day, free Nikki, defeat the entity behind the Promise, and walk in slow motion towards the camera as the credits roll. Though not necessarily in that order.

Personality:

Peter Quill is a man formed by his past. He's adaptable, empathetic, altruistic, and encouraging, but also a liar, a (former) criminal, and impulsive. Having lost his mom at an early age and spending many of his teen years in space prison, Peter can be immature at times and surrounds himself with whatever reminders of his home that he can. Not his home as in, Earth in the present, but the Earth of the 80s, with synth pop, hair metal, and his favorite band's logo on the back of his jacket. To him, home will always be in his memories, and he can never bring his mother back -- so he may as well make new friends and hold onto them as tight as he can.

But Peter isn't lost in the past -- he'd much rather run from it and keep moving forward. He can be naïve at times, even hopelessly optimistic. Even when his father never came to rescue him, Peter still tried to visit him after he managed to free himself (with Yondu's help.) Sure, he was turned away, but Peter even went as far as readying a speech to yell at his dad for abandoning him. Peter is determined, endlessly so, but he wouldn't know a lost cause if it blew up in his face. Rather than dwell on the things that have gone wrong, Peter barrels ahead and often needs to fail first before he learns his lesson. But Peter would rather fail than never try. Time and again he goes the extra mile, staying on Mercury when the Ravagers declared it a lost cause, and helping even when he was a bratty young adult at 21. If people are in danger, you can bet Peter wants to do something about it. Thankfully as he's gotten older he's gotten smarter about choosing his battles, but he's still a bleeding heart.

You know what's bad for business? Selflessness. For all that he was once a space pirate, Peter never really believed in the idea of taking from everyone and serving only himself. Peter believes in doing good, helping people, and protecting his friends. Sometimes it means that he takes jobs that pay in units (of protein packs) which pisses off the rest of the Guardians (who remind him that they need money for fuel, idiot.) Peter's altruism is part of what makes him a good leader, but also part of what makes him a huge idiot.

The Guardians of the Galaxy are his family, and while it takes some time for the rest of the team to buy into it, Peter is ride or die for them on day one. As their leader, it's his duty to do right by them. Once he decides he's going to help someone, he refuses to let them down. Even if that someone is his maybe-daughter and she's being manipulated into destroying the galaxy. Even if the enemy is a mysterious entity that can brainwash people using their losses and fears. And even if Peter can get overwhelmed, even frustrated at himself, he never, ever quits.

All great ways to show how Peter is nice, but Peter also believes in doing good and helping others without necessarily respecting authority or being everyone's friend. Peter founded the Guardians to turn over a new leaf and only take jobs that would be 'honest work' but his definition of honest is flimsy at best. See, scamming, lying, stealing, and killing, when it's done to bad people, is totally fine. His morals don't really hold up to Nova's standards, and he'll basically forgive anything if he likes someone. (Drax, Gamora, Rocket, and to a lesser extent, Groot, all have larger rap sheets than him, and he still loves them.) It means he's easy to con and quick to trust people who have 'good intentions' and quick to judge people with 'bad' ones. It makes him a bit of a hypocrite and I love that about him.

Peter is also still working on being a good leader. Though he pulled it off towards the end of the game, it would be easy to fall back into his bad habits of trying to people-please and over-commit. He's the team cheerleader for a reason: he isn't afraid to share honest praise and make himself emotionally available to his friends. He's a huge flirt who does not discriminate based on gender or species, though he usually uses sex as a way to get information from people -- though he would argue that's not the case. Still, he has daddy issues up the wazoo and now he's looking at raising a daughter in space. Maybe getting pulled into another universe is his chance to run away again. Or to grow. Hopefully to grow.

Abilities: Functionally, Peter is a normal human with sweet space tech. All his abilities are tied to his tech, listed below:

Elemental Blasters: In addition to an infinite clip (limited only by how quickly they overheat,) Peter's Spartoi blasters are able to fire rounds of pure elemental power. He has access to four elements: ice, lightning, wind, and fire. Ice lets him freeze stuff, lightning shoots... well, lightning, wind lets Peter pull things (or enemies) closer to him with a gale, and fire delivers globs of lava that deal burning damage over time.
Jet Boots: Peter's jet boots allow him to hover over the battlefield for a few seconds and clear longer distances than a would be possible for him otherwise. He is able to 'overclock' them to increase how long he can hover, but the most he gets is about 20 seconds before they overheat and he has to wait to let them cooldown.
Team ~~Cheer~~Leader: Not really a superpower, but Peter is the team's tactician and the Guardians rely on him to oversee fights and direct them where they're needed. He also provides much needed encouragement by cheering on his teammates and sometimes even playing sick tunes over their comms to empower them to fight. In-game this means Peter can call a Team Huddle, which gives the team a power-boost, resets everyone's cooldowns and even brings back any KO'd Guardians. For realism's sake, I'll just say he's really good at coaxing his friends into getting their second wind, and I mean who doesn't fight better when Kickstart My Heart is playing in their ear?
Shield of Spartax: Peter's ultimate skill, the Shield of Spartax is technically an ability derived from Peter's (Spartoi) blasters. With this ability, Peter's guns create a personal shield around him that grants him invulnerability for about 10 seconds. He can only use this ability once per fight or after a Huddle, so for rp's sake I'll say it takes around 1 hour to recharge, and he can maybe use it twice in a battle if he's in serious trouble and willing to suffer his blasters seriously overheating and leaving him vulnerable afterwards.
Scanning Visor: Peter's scanning visor lets him observe his surroundings and spot weak points or items of interest, as well as view descriptions or in-world info upon performing a scan. Peter also can't shoot and scan at the same time, so mid-battle scanning puts him at risk of getting blindsided. Since there is no internet in Expiation, I'm happy to nerf this and say that anything he scans will just return "No Data" or whatever mods decide. Without a connection, Peter's visor is basically just a fancy mask. It can maybe deflect 1 bullet before shattering to pieces. When not in use, the visor compacts itself into an implant at back of Peter's neck.

Inventory: Elemental Blasters, Jet Boots, Scanning Visor, Modified Walkman (has both an aux connection with headphones and a wireless connection to Peter's comms,) Guardians of the Galaxy business cards, a communication earpiece (which won't work outside of being a glorified bluetooth for his Walkman.) He also technically has a translation implant connected to his brain.

Samples: TDM top-level and thread. Since these are old here are new ones: Gwen and Peter

Questions: Mostly just my notes on Peter's visor in the Abilities section, or let me know if I need to nerf anything else. I'm happy to have Peter's boots run out of fuel, etc. His translation implant can also be rendered useless by whatever magical means the planet has going on. Since it's been over a year since I apped Peter I don't expect him to remember Aldrip or anything but is it cool if I give him a sense of deja vu from being here? Things have changed so much... I don't remember everything either!