Zacharie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bestrpgmerchant) wrote2013-02-03 11:10 am
bestrpgmerchant) wrote2013-02-03 11:10 am
Destiny Strings NPC Application
Out Of Character Information
Name: Crystal | [salamandroid]
Age: 20
Time zone: EST, -4:00 GMT
Contact: email at crystalreport18[at]yahoo.com and plurk over at vampirize! PM works just fine, too.
Anything we should know?:
hinoto-ri needs more bats darn it
In Character Information
Name: Zacharie
Series: OFF
Canon Standing: The last time we see him in the game, before The Batter fights The Queen
Age: Unknown. Considering the nature of the game he is in, it's hard to say how old he is. The mask covering his face doesn't help much, but he sounds fairly youngish? I DUNNO. I guess "ageless" would be fair to say here.
Birthday & Astrology Sign: Just making one up, but Taurus, April 4th would fit.
Arcana: Temperance
The reason for his arcana is interesting, because when I did research on it, I found that Temperance is the card that stands between Death and the Devil. Zacharie's character does have traits of both Death and the Devil (especially the Devil, with its reign over wanting material goods and such), but all in all, his mellow, if enigmatic personality and the fact that he appears alongside the protagonist's journey to its rather tragic end seems to fit the Temperance arcana very well. Plus, I also found this:
"Temperance represents the unconscious, which can guide us, they contend, to a deeper understanding of ourselves. The one foot on the land, the other in the water, represents the unification of the external and internal, conscious and unconscious, realms.
Under these approaches, when Temperance appears, it is a warning or invitation to be prepared for a confrontation with the deepest questions of who we are, who we think we are, and who we will become."
The very immaterial and questionable quality of the world of OFF is very thought-provoking, even more so when Zacharie utilizes his fourth wall breaking powers to address the player or comment on the nature of the game. And the fact that he also appears before any huge confrontation that the protagonist gets himself into, I think, make him a very nice fit for this arcana.
Personality:
"The characters are starting to pile up, aren't they? What I'm saying is that the average player doesn't need all these complicated and unnerving dialogues. There should be more action and further questions."
"Who are you?"
"I'm Zacharie, the traditional items merchant that is necessary in every video game."
In a game where a baseball batter goes around hitting ghosts with a bat in a world where metal is harvested from cows and smoke is dug out from mines for people to breathe, it's kind of really hard to top the surreality of it all. And yet Zacharie comes along and kind of sends the weirdness factor through the roof right from the first time you talk to him. Even though the game is built on the fact that everyone is aware of the player (the Batter, the protagonist, refers to you by name and knows you are in control of him), Zacharie takes it a step further, remarking from time to time on the nature of the game and how "the graphics are good, for a video game like this". Basically, Zacharie is the only character in the game completely aware of its mechanics, and he utilizes them well for his own business of getting money from the protagonist, as well as kind of accompanying him along in his determined quest to purify the world.
Zacharie is, overall, a pretty nice guy. He chitchats with the protagonist and even the player, having a very amiable personality that makes him quite easy to talk to...well, if you get over the weirdness of him talking about everything in terms of video games and such. He also is very helpful (apparently he discounts the price of his products just for you, what a sweetheart) and even a bit playful and teasing at times (he challenges the protagonist to a race for a free item, and even though he wins, he gives The Batter the item anyways). But even so, his greed for money and his vague sense of arrogance (he actually seems surprised at one point that The Batter is smarter than he thought when The Batter clearly sees through a flimsy statement he made) seems to suggest that there is more to the nice guy than at first glance, However, he is very tight-lipped about himself, only choosing to chuckle enigmatically and talk more about the protagonist and the holy quest he is on. He is only there to serve a role, really, and this shows when he later "becomes" the Judge.
There is a character in OFF by the name of The Judge who is...well, a cat with a very toothy grin. If Zacharie is the customary RPG merchant, then The Judge is the customary RPG guide, who gives hints about how to solve certain puzzles and where to go when you are stuck. At one point, however, The Judge experiences a traumatic event of seeing his brother die in front of his eyes (his brother swallowed a bird that later began wearing him as a skin IT MAKES SENSE IN CONTEXT), and so later doesn't appear to aid The Batter, too fraught with despair. Cue Zacharie, wearing a cat mask, who proclaims that he will now take the place of The Judge and his role. And he does so well, acting completely the part right down to mimicking the Judge's overly vocabulary-filled way of speaking and even meowing as he does so.
Basically, this goes to show that Zacharie is essentially...well, a roleplayer. He has the role of being an RPG merchant and acts one way, and yet he just dons another mask at another point and acts another way. He still is somewhat the same person no matter what mask he dons (he's more laidback than the Judge while acting as him, for example), but this way of changing roles shows that...well, we may never really see the "true" Zacharie. If the merchant and The Judge are just two roles he's put himself into, where's the real him? (We only see what might be his true self at a certain event in the game, which is talked about in the backstory section.)
All in all, Zacharie is an enigma. He's really quite nice and helpful, but his motivations and reasons for helping the protagonist so willingly are never shared (which almost appear sinister when the player discovers that SPOILER the protagonist has been destroying the world instead of helping it, all completely on purpose END SPOILER. All the player gets is a smiling mask and a throaty chuckle as a reward for his or her attempts to try to figure him out. He's a neutral force, one that doesn't belong to any side in particular, and would be found helping both good and evil alike.
Overall, Zacharie is here to play a part...and play a part he does well.
Backstory:
Talk about LACK of backstory. Seriously, Zacharie is one of the most mysterious characters in the entire game of OFF, and we only get small hints as to who he might have been before, like in the tale you find in the library in Zone 2:
"A long time ago, lived an evil king. His face was so repulsive that he was nicknamed the Toad King. One day, a masked man met the King during an audience. He said the following words to him:
"Greetings, wretched monarch, leave this land at once or perish at the tip of my blade."
The king said, "I am the king and you are my subjects. You are not to go against my will." And the Masked Man slew the King with his mighty sword. The End."
Along the way, numerous things suggest that the world of OFF has been ruined once before, and we learn that a Queen and her three Guardians have rebuilt it from that devastated period into the world it is now...even though, along the way, things started to go wrong during their reign, which is where the protagonist, The Batter, comes in. The Toad King must have existed in the period before the first apocalypse, since we do not see him in the game except for mentions in books.
One might think that Zacharie is the Masked Man in this tale, what with his mask and sword, but then again, he very well could be related to the Toad King too, what with his frog-like smile on his mask. Plus, the Toad King had a repulsive face, so wouldn't that be easy to hide with a mask? The only time we see any sight of Zacharie's face is in concept art...and it doesn't look that nice.
But either way, if he's a Toad King or a Masked Man (or both), we know for a fact that he's been in the world for quite a while now, integrating himself in the economy and taking matters into his own hands before the Batter's arrival. He even built an entire amusement park for the inhabitants of the world to use for entertainment., and has placed himself firmly in the role of the middle man by selling the products the Zones of the world produce.
He seemingly had a relationship with a strange character one finds at the very end, a woman by the name of Sugar. When The Batter kills her and meets Zacharie later, Zacharie is actually struck speechless, before murmuring a "I guess it's better like that..." The extent of the relationship and how they knew each other are not known, but it is the only point in the game where Zacharie actually drops his usual mellow personality and expresses some sort of somberness for what The Batter did. This goes to show that despite his enigmatic nature, he can get close to certain people if he wants to, though this is extremely rare.
And that is where the book is shut on Zacharie's possible backstory.
DARN IT, CANON, I THOUGHT WE HAD SOMETHING THERE.
Canon Powers:
Teleportation (Physical ?)
"I'm always going to find myself in places you're going to visit before you arrive."
No, really. Zacharie never stays in one place. He always appears in a place you aren't expecting him to (even though at one point, he appears in a shopping mall, which makes rather logical sense if you think about it), and nothing seems to control when and where he appears. If asked about it, he'll probably just say that's just how being a RPG merchant works. Since he could appear in different parts of the world without any problem, as well as a place that technically nobody in existence can even get into, it's fair to say that nothing limits his teleportation.
Hammerspace (Physical ?)
I mean, this guy carries around unlimited amounts of items on him at all times, so he must just store all of that somewhere on him in an equally unlimited hammerspace.
Annnnd that's about it as far as canon powers go. Since we never see him engaged in a fight, we have no idea if he's invincible or immortal or not...but if he does things and knows things that exist outside the game, stuff like that might not be that much of a stretch.
Canon Weapons|Items:
According to the concept art, Zacharie carries a sword around with him. Nothing in canon suggests it is anything other than an ordinary sword, so yeah, it's...a sword.
Canon Allies:
None at all, except his masks. Which aren't people but HEY, THEY'RE HIS FACES.
Canon Baggage:
ALL THE MERCHANT STUFFS
No, really, being the traditional items merchant that every RPG merchant needs, Zacharie always carries an assortment of goods on him. In his canon, he carried things like bats and weapons, defensive equipment in the forms of Auras and Tunics, items to use in battle (Eyes, which identify an enemy, and Inspirations, which deal damage), and healing items in the form of Luck and Fortune Tickets (for HP), Jokers (revives allies), and things like Moloch's and Belial's Meat (the first restores CP, which is like MP in this game, and Belial's restores the entire HP and CP of the party outside of battle.) Occasionally he'll carry rare items that serve specific purposes in the game (one helps unlock the Secret Ending, for example).
In Hinoto-Ri, he'll probably replace this with various weapons and items that deal with the specific nature of Persona fights, as well as weapons for the people to use in their battles. He has to adapt and change with the new times and worlds, after all.
Persona
[Mu'aqqibat]
(This Persona was chosen because they're otherworldly beings who follow people around and ensure their journey to its fullest until the time of death is near JUST LIKE CERTAIN PEOPLE. Plus, Zacharie's floating wings in the concept art, which never appear in game, almost make it seem like Zacharie was supposed to be somewhat "angelic" in a way.)
LVL (1) | TEMPERANCE
SUPPORT SKILLS
► Basic Analysis ( Reveals an target's personas.)
► Endure (Survive being knocked Unconscious once per battle )
► Destiny String ( Allows you to see other visitor's Destiny Strings.)
► Diarama (Recovers a medium amount of HP to one ally.)
▷ CommLink ( Allows the user to communicate telepathically with other Persona users that they know.)
▷ Revolution (Greatly increases probability of Critical hits. Universal.)
▷ Treasure Radar ( Reveals location of treasure chests on every floor of the dungeon.
▷ Regenerate (5% total HP is restored at every turn (healing out of a battle takes about 6 hours for normal wounds.))
★ What Fourth Wall (The Persona babbles on about the nature of the world they are in, with a 40% chance of causing Confusion on enemies who listen (2 turns) )
COMBAT SKILLS
► Holy Arrow (Inflicts a small amount of Physical damage to one enemy with a 10% chance of inflicting the Charm ailment. )
▷ Rampage (Inflicts a small amount of Physical damage up to three times on all enemies.)
▷ Navas Nebula (Inflicts a medium amount of Physical damage with a 10% chance of Exhaustion on all enemies.)
Writing Sample
In which Zacharie sells wares on Dear_Mun because that's totally a normal thing to do.
Name: Crystal | [
salamandroid]Age: 20
Time zone: EST, -4:00 GMT
Contact: email at crystalreport18[at]yahoo.com and plurk over at vampirize! PM works just fine, too.
Anything we should know?:
hinoto-ri needs more bats darn it
In Character Information
Name: Zacharie
Series: OFF
Canon Standing: The last time we see him in the game, before The Batter fights The Queen
Age: Unknown. Considering the nature of the game he is in, it's hard to say how old he is. The mask covering his face doesn't help much, but he sounds fairly youngish? I DUNNO. I guess "ageless" would be fair to say here.
Birthday & Astrology Sign: Just making one up, but Taurus, April 4th would fit.
Arcana: Temperance
The reason for his arcana is interesting, because when I did research on it, I found that Temperance is the card that stands between Death and the Devil. Zacharie's character does have traits of both Death and the Devil (especially the Devil, with its reign over wanting material goods and such), but all in all, his mellow, if enigmatic personality and the fact that he appears alongside the protagonist's journey to its rather tragic end seems to fit the Temperance arcana very well. Plus, I also found this:
"Temperance represents the unconscious, which can guide us, they contend, to a deeper understanding of ourselves. The one foot on the land, the other in the water, represents the unification of the external and internal, conscious and unconscious, realms.
Under these approaches, when Temperance appears, it is a warning or invitation to be prepared for a confrontation with the deepest questions of who we are, who we think we are, and who we will become."
The very immaterial and questionable quality of the world of OFF is very thought-provoking, even more so when Zacharie utilizes his fourth wall breaking powers to address the player or comment on the nature of the game. And the fact that he also appears before any huge confrontation that the protagonist gets himself into, I think, make him a very nice fit for this arcana.
Personality:
"The characters are starting to pile up, aren't they? What I'm saying is that the average player doesn't need all these complicated and unnerving dialogues. There should be more action and further questions."
"Who are you?"
"I'm Zacharie, the traditional items merchant that is necessary in every video game."
In a game where a baseball batter goes around hitting ghosts with a bat in a world where metal is harvested from cows and smoke is dug out from mines for people to breathe, it's kind of really hard to top the surreality of it all. And yet Zacharie comes along and kind of sends the weirdness factor through the roof right from the first time you talk to him. Even though the game is built on the fact that everyone is aware of the player (the Batter, the protagonist, refers to you by name and knows you are in control of him), Zacharie takes it a step further, remarking from time to time on the nature of the game and how "the graphics are good, for a video game like this". Basically, Zacharie is the only character in the game completely aware of its mechanics, and he utilizes them well for his own business of getting money from the protagonist, as well as kind of accompanying him along in his determined quest to purify the world.
Zacharie is, overall, a pretty nice guy. He chitchats with the protagonist and even the player, having a very amiable personality that makes him quite easy to talk to...well, if you get over the weirdness of him talking about everything in terms of video games and such. He also is very helpful (apparently he discounts the price of his products just for you, what a sweetheart) and even a bit playful and teasing at times (he challenges the protagonist to a race for a free item, and even though he wins, he gives The Batter the item anyways). But even so, his greed for money and his vague sense of arrogance (he actually seems surprised at one point that The Batter is smarter than he thought when The Batter clearly sees through a flimsy statement he made) seems to suggest that there is more to the nice guy than at first glance, However, he is very tight-lipped about himself, only choosing to chuckle enigmatically and talk more about the protagonist and the holy quest he is on. He is only there to serve a role, really, and this shows when he later "becomes" the Judge.
There is a character in OFF by the name of The Judge who is...well, a cat with a very toothy grin. If Zacharie is the customary RPG merchant, then The Judge is the customary RPG guide, who gives hints about how to solve certain puzzles and where to go when you are stuck. At one point, however, The Judge experiences a traumatic event of seeing his brother die in front of his eyes (his brother swallowed a bird that later began wearing him as a skin IT MAKES SENSE IN CONTEXT), and so later doesn't appear to aid The Batter, too fraught with despair. Cue Zacharie, wearing a cat mask, who proclaims that he will now take the place of The Judge and his role. And he does so well, acting completely the part right down to mimicking the Judge's overly vocabulary-filled way of speaking and even meowing as he does so.
Basically, this goes to show that Zacharie is essentially...well, a roleplayer. He has the role of being an RPG merchant and acts one way, and yet he just dons another mask at another point and acts another way. He still is somewhat the same person no matter what mask he dons (he's more laidback than the Judge while acting as him, for example), but this way of changing roles shows that...well, we may never really see the "true" Zacharie. If the merchant and The Judge are just two roles he's put himself into, where's the real him? (We only see what might be his true self at a certain event in the game, which is talked about in the backstory section.)
All in all, Zacharie is an enigma. He's really quite nice and helpful, but his motivations and reasons for helping the protagonist so willingly are never shared (which almost appear sinister when the player discovers that SPOILER the protagonist has been destroying the world instead of helping it, all completely on purpose END SPOILER. All the player gets is a smiling mask and a throaty chuckle as a reward for his or her attempts to try to figure him out. He's a neutral force, one that doesn't belong to any side in particular, and would be found helping both good and evil alike.
Overall, Zacharie is here to play a part...and play a part he does well.
Backstory:
Talk about LACK of backstory. Seriously, Zacharie is one of the most mysterious characters in the entire game of OFF, and we only get small hints as to who he might have been before, like in the tale you find in the library in Zone 2:
"A long time ago, lived an evil king. His face was so repulsive that he was nicknamed the Toad King. One day, a masked man met the King during an audience. He said the following words to him:
"Greetings, wretched monarch, leave this land at once or perish at the tip of my blade."
The king said, "I am the king and you are my subjects. You are not to go against my will." And the Masked Man slew the King with his mighty sword. The End."
Along the way, numerous things suggest that the world of OFF has been ruined once before, and we learn that a Queen and her three Guardians have rebuilt it from that devastated period into the world it is now...even though, along the way, things started to go wrong during their reign, which is where the protagonist, The Batter, comes in. The Toad King must have existed in the period before the first apocalypse, since we do not see him in the game except for mentions in books.
One might think that Zacharie is the Masked Man in this tale, what with his mask and sword, but then again, he very well could be related to the Toad King too, what with his frog-like smile on his mask. Plus, the Toad King had a repulsive face, so wouldn't that be easy to hide with a mask? The only time we see any sight of Zacharie's face is in concept art...and it doesn't look that nice.
But either way, if he's a Toad King or a Masked Man (or both), we know for a fact that he's been in the world for quite a while now, integrating himself in the economy and taking matters into his own hands before the Batter's arrival. He even built an entire amusement park for the inhabitants of the world to use for entertainment., and has placed himself firmly in the role of the middle man by selling the products the Zones of the world produce.
He seemingly had a relationship with a strange character one finds at the very end, a woman by the name of Sugar. When The Batter kills her and meets Zacharie later, Zacharie is actually struck speechless, before murmuring a "I guess it's better like that..." The extent of the relationship and how they knew each other are not known, but it is the only point in the game where Zacharie actually drops his usual mellow personality and expresses some sort of somberness for what The Batter did. This goes to show that despite his enigmatic nature, he can get close to certain people if he wants to, though this is extremely rare.
And that is where the book is shut on Zacharie's possible backstory.
DARN IT, CANON, I THOUGHT WE HAD SOMETHING THERE.
Canon Powers:
Teleportation (Physical ?)
"I'm always going to find myself in places you're going to visit before you arrive."
No, really. Zacharie never stays in one place. He always appears in a place you aren't expecting him to (even though at one point, he appears in a shopping mall, which makes rather logical sense if you think about it), and nothing seems to control when and where he appears. If asked about it, he'll probably just say that's just how being a RPG merchant works. Since he could appear in different parts of the world without any problem, as well as a place that technically nobody in existence can even get into, it's fair to say that nothing limits his teleportation.
Hammerspace (Physical ?)
I mean, this guy carries around unlimited amounts of items on him at all times, so he must just store all of that somewhere on him in an equally unlimited hammerspace.
Annnnd that's about it as far as canon powers go. Since we never see him engaged in a fight, we have no idea if he's invincible or immortal or not...but if he does things and knows things that exist outside the game, stuff like that might not be that much of a stretch.
Canon Weapons|Items:
According to the concept art, Zacharie carries a sword around with him. Nothing in canon suggests it is anything other than an ordinary sword, so yeah, it's...a sword.
Canon Allies:
None at all, except his masks. Which aren't people but HEY, THEY'RE HIS FACES.
Canon Baggage:
ALL THE MERCHANT STUFFS
No, really, being the traditional items merchant that every RPG merchant needs, Zacharie always carries an assortment of goods on him. In his canon, he carried things like bats and weapons, defensive equipment in the forms of Auras and Tunics, items to use in battle (Eyes, which identify an enemy, and Inspirations, which deal damage), and healing items in the form of Luck and Fortune Tickets (for HP), Jokers (revives allies), and things like Moloch's and Belial's Meat (the first restores CP, which is like MP in this game, and Belial's restores the entire HP and CP of the party outside of battle.) Occasionally he'll carry rare items that serve specific purposes in the game (one helps unlock the Secret Ending, for example).
In Hinoto-Ri, he'll probably replace this with various weapons and items that deal with the specific nature of Persona fights, as well as weapons for the people to use in their battles. He has to adapt and change with the new times and worlds, after all.
Persona
[Mu'aqqibat]
(This Persona was chosen because they're otherworldly beings who follow people around and ensure their journey to its fullest until the time of death is near JUST LIKE CERTAIN PEOPLE. Plus, Zacharie's floating wings in the concept art, which never appear in game, almost make it seem like Zacharie was supposed to be somewhat "angelic" in a way.)
LVL (1) | TEMPERANCE
SUPPORT SKILLS
► Basic Analysis ( Reveals an target's personas.)
► Endure (Survive being knocked Unconscious once per battle )
► Destiny String ( Allows you to see other visitor's Destiny Strings.)
► Diarama (Recovers a medium amount of HP to one ally.)
▷ CommLink ( Allows the user to communicate telepathically with other Persona users that they know.)
▷ Revolution (Greatly increases probability of Critical hits. Universal.)
▷ Treasure Radar ( Reveals location of treasure chests on every floor of the dungeon.
▷ Regenerate (5% total HP is restored at every turn (healing out of a battle takes about 6 hours for normal wounds.))
★ What Fourth Wall (The Persona babbles on about the nature of the world they are in, with a 40% chance of causing Confusion on enemies who listen (2 turns) )
COMBAT SKILLS
► Holy Arrow (Inflicts a small amount of Physical damage to one enemy with a 10% chance of inflicting the Charm ailment. )
▷ Rampage (Inflicts a small amount of Physical damage up to three times on all enemies.)
▷ Navas Nebula (Inflicts a medium amount of Physical damage with a 10% chance of Exhaustion on all enemies.)
Writing Sample
In which Zacharie sells wares on Dear_Mun because that's totally a normal thing to do.