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Name: General Caine
Age: 38
Gender: Male
Species/Race: Anthro Lizard/Undead
Height: 5'6"
Weight: 11 stone
Build: Large, imposing.
Skin Color(s): Smooth, dry skin, with varying tones of light and dark greens, mostly light.
Distinguishing features: - the right half of the entire head is stripped clean to the bone. Look at the profile one way, skull. Look at it the other, flesh. The toungue is complete, and fully visible
Eye colour: His left eye is a brilliant gold.
Clothing (armour): A wardrobe straight from World War Two and the SS. Most obvious is a large, thick heavy SS(Nazi Blackshirt)/Army greatcoat (no symbols on the coat), the topmost buttons undone to form wide, thick lapels revealing a crisp, black shirt with general's stars glinting in silver at the snug collar. Black tie, high peaked cap, with a symbol of a winged serpent etched in silver on the apex. He wears a black glove on one hand. Tall, black boots disappearing up into the greatcoat.
Accessories (weapons, jewellery, tools, magic items, vehicles, etc.):
General Notes on this profile
General Caine was originally designed as a God Moderator character. Something that would make a good protagnoist, but not a good player-character. Playing with him has proven that wrong. Thus, a sizeable portion of this profile has been edited. However, Caine does not always appear in the games I play. As an important man, he cannot be everywhere at once. This profile also acts as a respository for those agents who are under his direct control.
General Caine in a Nutshell
Caine is a general and leader of men. He does not possess strong personal offensive capabilities, either supernatural or technological. Caine is expected to think his way through situations, not blast his way through. His preferred technique is to use the strengths of individuals against themselves. As befits a leader, Caine possesses a strong coterie of powerful individuals, who Caine personally trains and co-ordinates.
Caine's attitude is often aloof and on occasion condescending. He is confident in his ability to handle situations, and doesn't feel the need to boast. Caine addresses all inhabitants of the Dream as "citizens", and regards them as such, despite whatever they think on the matter. Caine is passionately dedicated to the protection of the Dream from all enemies, both foreign and domestic. What he considers an "enemy" however, is not quite what others might....
Powers and Abilities
| The intent of Caine is to create a character who inspires a certain degree of Gothic horror. Gothic horror incorporates both the actual aspect of horror, and a certain tragic element about the antagonist. If things were otherwise, or if Caine could look beyond who he is, he could aspire to Grace.
Caine possesses a number of Dread Powers. These powers are similar in intent to Special Effects. They are intended add flavour to Caine and firmly cement the horror that he represents.
| Undying
| Should Caine be killed, he will take shape in the nearest whole corpse that is not due to be destroyed in the Dream. Over a period of a week the corpse will mutate and reshape to form General Caine, then he will burst free from the grave/escape from the morgue/whatever. Should Caine be killed outside of the Dream, he will re-form - but back in the Dream.
| | Supernatural Aura | Regardless of how Caine tries to hide it, he can never disguise his supernatural presence. Any creature that can sense the supernatural, reagardless of how dimly will always be able to sense Caine. The better the sense, the longer the distance and better the definition. Caine's aura is cold, close to freezing, and well-developed senses can be hurt if they probe too closely.
| Soulless
| Caine is an undead construct. He possesses no soul, and has none of the benefits or detractions that a soul grants.
| Undead
| Caine is undead. His body has died, but he continues to live after death. This state of existance gives him number of unique attributes. Firstly, many of the standard mechanisms required for a living body to function do not work, or only semi-work. His heart does not beat. Blood is transported around his body very slowly, via a supernatural mechanism. His brain does not spend most of it's time regulating the body's mechanisms. His neural network and nervous systems functions as normal, but is not required for Caine to function. His organs are in a "preserved" state. they have died, but they will not rot, and if required to, they will function on command.
As a result, Caine has a variety of immunities. he is immune to most toxins and poisons designed to incapcitate or kill a living creature. He can take massive physical trauma without going into shock, as the mechanisms for shock are only semi-present - he can be stunned, but it takes a series of massive concussions to knock him out. Caine is tireless, he doesn't feel stress or fatigue (he doesn't sleep either). His body has the same general physical makeup as a humans (with obvius exceptions for his lizard nature), so weapons that cause physical truama to the body are as effective on him as they would be on a normal human. However, he will not suffer organ failure, or die from organ failure as his organs are already "dead", and only work in a supernatural manner.
| The Aspect of Metal
| Caine is a supernatural icon of reason, learning and the scientific method. As a result, he is anathema to anything that distorts reality. As soon as it comes within his "region of influence", it either ceases to exist, or is forced to conform by his personal "laws of reality", as guided by scientific learning and reasoning. In order to better help you understand what I consider "reality", Caine works on the Firm scale of the Khepher scale of grading Science Fiction
There are the following restrictions on this power.
Only Caine himself can provide the effect, and it only works on effects that directly affect his person (i.e. touch). A fireball tossed at Caine would not harm him but it would harm anyone around him and, he can be burned by any natural fires that are started by the magical fire. Caine could not be telekinetically smashed into a wall, but the wall could be telekinetically smashed into him.
Caine is vulnerable to the school of Necromancy. He is treated as a powerful liche for the purposes of summoning, binding and control. Caine can be affected by any ability any undead choose to use, and this breaks the normal rationale of the Aspect of Metal.
Caine is vulnerable to divinely inspired magic. 'Spells' cast by a priest or spell-like abilities (but not spells) of a god will affect him normally. Caine can be affected by any divinely-inspired ability the divine or their divinely-inspired chosen choose to use, and this breaks the normal rationale of the Aspect of Metal. Please note, that an infernal masquerading as, or is a god does not count.
Caine is vulnerable to the school of illusion, in all it's various forms - holograms, magic, psi-induced illusions.
| The Mark of Caine Dread Power
| Caine exhibits a curious curse. Each soldier that dies in Caine's service will rise again as an undead, its form moulded by the way s/he died. E.G. a solider that is partially eaten by demons will rise again as a ghoul or cannibal zombie. Only some undead risen in this fashion will accept Caine as their master - depending on how they viewed him in life, and how they died. The rest are goverened by their passions. They can be suberverted and controlled through the use of necromancy.
| Who calls my Name? Dread Power
| Mentioning Caine by his given name and not by any nickname or other title will cause a specific psychic ripple in reality that alerts Caine of who is speaking about him, regardless of where he is. Further use of his name in the same place will sharpen the ripple until Caine can enter a trance and spy on the location. This power only lasts for as long as the individuals talk about Caine.
| The Obligation of the Dead. Dread Power
| Any undead may petiton Caine to perform a service for them. If this petiton forms part of their purpose in life (e.g. a undead ghost seeking vengence on ther murderer asks Caine to kill that person) then Caine cannot refuse that undead person's request. In return, Caine may ask a service of that petitioner, and that petitioner may not refuse to accept the service.
| Allergens
| Allergens (borrowed from Ravenloft) are certain weaknesses inherant to Caine's undead condition. These weaknesses are built around a certain theme, and are typically so designed
| Protection:
| Any holy symbol carried by a pious cleric of the faith, who believes in that symbol will prevent Caine from approaching within 20 feet of that symbol.
| Facination:
| Burning bodies will cause Caine to go into a catatonic state. He will simply stare at the corpses charring, until someone snaps him out of it.
| Enragement:
| Any symbol of a god that is worshipped, by one or several genuinely pious men/women/things will drive Caine into a furious rage. He will drop whatever he is doing to get at and destroy the symbol. (This does mean that Caine will hiss in impotent rage at a pious cleric bearing the symbol of their god!). Caine will also mercilessly persue and destroy any creature or any structure that he believes (rightly or wrongly) was responsible in part of the destruction of the people that gave rise to him.
| Skills
| Generalship skills
| Caine's training and experience is as a four-star general who has trisen up through the ranks, as only an undead can.
| Strategic skills
| Caine is trained in the following general areas of strategy, with a general ranking in capabilities into those areas: Air: Good, Land: Excellent, Sea:Average, Space:Poor, Magic: Average, Exotic: Average
| Land strategy
| Caine excels in planning land-based warfare. He is conversant with arms, techniques and tactics used between 500BC to science-fantasy. He is equally good at small-unit tactics as he is at much larger formations. He is skilled in logistics procurement, has sat at the bench as a judge in military judical cases, has planned grand strategies, fought desperate rearguards and breakouts. Caine understands the mindset of the land solider particularly well.
| Air strategy
| Caine is good at planning air stratgies and understanding how best to produce policies which will maximise the use of aircraft. His understanding goes back to the early techniques of 1914AD to science-fantasy techniques which integrates directly into land and sea. He understand the fluid nature of air combat, the longer distances involved and how superiority in air can change from hour-to-hour. He understand base placement, how to use paradropped troops and innovate on methods of air transport.
| Sea Strategy
| Caine is moderatly good at Sea Strategy. He only understands the earlier forms of sea combat, between 1914-1950, where battleships ruled the waves. He understands basic formations and the most favourable methods of warfare "crossing the 'T'", but isn't so good at understanding ship design and deployment. He understands areas related with land warefare much better - espcially amphibous assaults.
| Space Strategy
| Caine is aware how satellites work. He doesn't properly understand the distances involved in space warfare, or how weaponry and manoevrability are completely changed in space. He doesn't understand the importance of fuel in space combat, or how long a battle can take when carried out over light-seconds.
| Magic strategy
| Caine only understand how to apply magic on a unit-scale. He isn't used to application on a large scale with perhaps hundreds of magic casters involved, and he prefers the more direct methods of magic warfare (fireballs) to the subtler techniques (for instance, illusion).
| Exotic strategy
| Caine is most comfortable with developing strategies that involve humans or the undead. Exotic or mythological creatures are harder for Caine to factor into his plans and he prefers races to express general, homogenous characteristics rather a multitude of individuals characteristics.
| Leadership Skills
| Caine is a skilled orator and speechwriter. Caine has learnt how to adopt several types of leadership style - the dashing leader - willing to run into combat with a laugh and a cry, the down-and-dirty who gets his hands just as grubby as the men around him, the wise savant who knows how to get out of the pickle he and his men are in and the scary beast whom you would rather die than face his wrath. Caine is good at identifying the right man for the right role. He is good at making people feel they count. He can identify troublemakers and how best to deal with them.
| Combat skills
| Arms Training
| Caine is trained in the use of arms between 1914-2006. He is trained in the use of gauss weaponry and plasma weaponry from the Kerensky Arms catalogue, so if it looks like a KA weapon, he can probably use it. He is traine d to use knives, the sabre, the garotte, the blowpipe and other silent, close-quarters weaponry with a range of less than 5 metres.
| Close-Quarters Training
| Caine is trained in grappling styles of combat, where he can use his weight, strength, teeth and tail to best advantage. He is also trained in the art of the surprise attack, hiding himself until he can spring out. Closest world equivalent would be Brazillian Ju Jitsu, Kali, Escrima and Arnis.
| Specialised areas
| Caine is trained in stalking, scouting, basic helicopter piloting, basic vehicle (jeep, tank (tracked, anti-grav), IFV) driving, basic medical (human, undead).
| Civillian skills
| Caine is trained in the use of computers (basic), in cooking (european and survivial - human and undead palette), driving commercial vehicles (truck, car, bike).
| Diplomatic skills
| Caine is trained in public speaking, politics, schmoozing, a wide variety of cultures (Native Dream cultures only), the nuances of etiquette (Native Dream cultures only) and body language.
| Equipment and Armament
| Caine is equipped with items suitible to his station as a general. Normally, he carries a service revolver and a sabre as martial badges of his rank.
| Dread Beehive
| Caine acts as host to a hive of 40 immaculately crafted mechanical bees. Each bee is crafted from brass, copper and aluminium and has exquitely crafted gold eyes. The framework of each bee incorporates a little of Caine's body (two of his ribs were used in total), and they are animated through necromancy. The stingers are hypodermic needles, the bodies have a hollow brass capsule which can be filled with any liquid the bee is directed to fill (5cl capacity). Normally, the bees have a 50/50 mix of elephant tranquiliser and black mamba venom. The bees are under Caine's direct, personal control and with a guesture they will boil out of his skull to do his bidding.
| Battle-Dress
| Caine has recently found himself becoming more and more personally involved in situations that could endanger him. As a result, when he knows he is going to be in a dangerous situation he has taken to wearing battle-dress.
| His current dress is similar to the style of dress worn by the heroes of Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter. As he is undead, he wears considerably more armour as he can bear the weight, both in thick 100mm armour "plates", formed from a boron carbide ceramic base and 50mm "absorber" material made from composite of carbon-60 fibres and biosteel (industrial spider silk). There is no heads-up display, as the helmet design for Caine's head currently makes that difficult to implement.
| As befits an officer the dress includes an integral Field Ops kit, which consists of the following:
- A radio capable of handling communications for up to a division in size, with sufficent bandwith to handle live video feeds from over 100 different sources at once.
- A built-in PDA with software tools specifically for handling small and large-scale operations, including things like a minimap.
- A pair of binoculars (magnification up to an 8x zoom) which is hooked up to the kit, allowing identification of friendlies through IFF transponder signals, an in-built directional microphone and IR/UV filters.
- Free-floating headset (worn under helmet) with two earpieces (connected with a band of metal), microphone and voice-activated command set for the PDA, radio and binocs.
| The dress comes with a field survival kit (even the undead need patching up).
| Arms of War
| When dressed for war, Caine arms himself more extensively, but in-line with his approach to war. In addition to his service revolver, he carries a 40mm grenade launcher, which has a 10-round drum magazine. The number and type of grenades he carries is quite extensive:
| 1) Psychotropic grenades. Caine carries grenades which contain specific organic compounds to induce specific states of mind. Hallucinogen, Fear, Anger, Confusion, Boldness.
| 2) Incapacitating grenades. Caine carries a variety of grenades which disable or incapacitate. Tear gas, a mild nerve gas which causes a choking effect and tranquiliser.
| 3) Damaging grenades. Caine carries fragmentation grenades which come in a timed-fuse and proximity variants. He is also equipped with incendiary grenades, a defoliant and a high-explosive type.
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The Army
| Caine wouldn't be a general without his army. There are two types of army serving under Caine. The first are the multitudes under his direction as leader of the United Northern Peacemakers. The UNP is dealt with elsewhere, but briefly, the UNP represents a coalition of member states that have banded under a mutual defence pact, rather like NATO or UN troops. UNP-sponsored soliders range the furry-hatted horse tribes of the uttermost northern steppes to the urbane and high-tech forces of the Xing Shi Foreign Services Deparment.
In the midst of this chaos, there are unifying elements. The chief element are the officers and leaders of the UNP, and the arms and equipment of the UNP. The UNP does a lot of cross-training within it's member cultures, and the officers receive special attention. UNP-trained officers can be singled out by their tendancy to lead from the front, a habit that Caine instills in his officers.
Secondly, the UNP operates as a centralised buyer for large arms conglomerates, the most famous of these being Kerensky Arms. Keresnky Arms supplies almost 50% of arms for all UNP member cultures, so wherever you see the KA sign, you're likely to know it's Kerensky Arms.
| With this flexibility, Caine can always be equipped with troops for a game. All that has to be done is to invent a little backstory to the army type, add those two elements and voila! Instant army.
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Caine's Personal Army
| The army most directly tied to Caine is his personal regiment, the 1st Elysian. Founded in antiquity, and raised again when Caine re-entered this world, all members of this regiment are undead. They come from many types - zombie, vampire, skeleton, banshee... it doesn't matter, so long as they are undead. Each member of the regiment is bound to Caine through his Dread Power Obligation of the Dead. He completed some service for them, and in turn, bound themselves to service in his regiment. Each member of the 1st Elysian is highly loyal to Caine, and would willingly die again for him.
The dead of the 1st Elysian are intelligent, usually ex-military and fully aware of their status and nature. They go to great lengths to hide their undead nature, wearing long coats, thick gloves, helmets and gasmasks and dousing themselves in scent to disguise their smell. A platoon of the 1st Elysian are usually seconded as a bodyguard, operating on a rotating schedule.
Their tactics are convential early 21st century... so long as other people are looking. When the gloves are off, the nature of the 1st Elysian becomes apparent as soliders rise from fatal wounds, hideous shrieks rend the air, and wraithly figures escape the confining bounds of their diguise and swoop towards their intended prey.
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Regiments of Reknown
| As I continue to use Caine as a PC, I have had to invent armies for him to use. Below are the armies that have appeared most often.
| The Soldvi Eagles.
| Soldvi is a small nation-state, based in the far north of the Dream. The nation comprises of a series of fertile valleys spread among a series of mountains to the far north of the Dream, linked via ancestral and marital ties to each other. The UNP introduced alternative methods of transport to the treacherous and often-blocked passes - specifically helicopters, gliders and other forms of VTOL craft adapted to the harsh environment. These provided vital links between the valleys, and solidified the Soldvi identity into a nation. With time and advanced contruction techniques came tunnels, rail links and other, safer means of transport, but the Soldvi have never lost their love-affair with flight.
The Eagles (the army of Soldvi) are entirely airbourne, a reflection of their roots. They are perhaps the most mobile of the UNP-affiliated nations and are the primary pick when troops need to be moved over large distances, or a rapid response is needed. Their preferred manner of attack is the blitzkrieg assault - lightning raids by fighter-bombers to clear the way for foot troops, followed by rapid delivery of troops to strategic points behind enemy lines, the enemy unable to respond or co-ordinate their defense. The Soldvi have an aggressive, proactive attitude to war. They dislike sieges, and aren't good at guard duty or when used in defensive actions.
The Eagles military budget hasn't yet allowed them to buy many aircraft of sci-fi quality. Most of their stock is in terms of technology, 21st-22nd. Unfortunately this passion for flight comes a cost. Over half of the military budget is spent on aircraft and their maintenance. What's left after the cost of manpower goes on cheap, mass-produced equipment that's reliable and sturdy, but not particularly high-tech (late 20th century).
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History
With everything else in doubt, there is one true constant in the Dream.
War.
As long as there has been memory to remember it, sentient beings have come to the Dream, licking their lips at the thought of the power they could wrest, the slaves they could command and the loot to plunder. Almost as far back as living memory serves, there have been 'protectors' of the Dream. Often as self-serving and arrogant as the ones they fight, none-the-less, they shield the Dream against the lesser and greater evils that would otherwise cover the world in darkness.
This has not always been so.
In the Dreams' history, there have been occasions when the defenders of the Dream have been either dead, fled, or non-existent. During these times any creature with a sparkle of power and a hungry belly flocks to the Dream, battling among themselves and the inhabitants. These are dark times, when the clouds rain blood and the citizens of the Dream awake every morning to new horrors. In these times shamans and priests go to the oldest, most sacred places and beseech the gods to take flesh and walk among the populace. To right the wrongs and restore the balance. And the gods have always answered.
Except once.
Once when the Dream shook to the sound of titans. Once when the embattled populace hid cowering, and only the bravest and most foolhardy would go to the sacred places. Despite their pleas for help, no gods manifested themselves. There were no strange signs. No crash-landing ships. No portals. Nothing. In desperation, the people of a small country sought the impossible: to make their own Avatars. To create from their dreams of suffering and woe a living manifestation of their gestalt. Thus was Caine was born. Created, not begotten, an avatar born to carry a bloody banner of vengeance. A hellish saviour come among them to lead the Dream into peace and to light.
Caine was.. a rational man. A tactician without peer, he devised ways of fighting that seemed prudent and entirely logical - for someone that would win by any means, at any cost. It was logical to arm and train children as young as seven. These young men could go where no man could go. They made perfect spies, and excellent saboteurs. It was right to force cripples to run or crawl across minefields to clear the way for tanks. After all, unless their brains were of any value, their bodies certainly weren't.. It seemed right to build interment camps and infect every prisoner with hideous virii. Animals were an imperfect model on which to base vital research into much needed battlefield vaccinations.
In this time of need, all of these arguments coming from his him were logical, rational ways of fighting. His soldiers did not hate him. They feared him, utterly. He never executed a man, for that was a waste of talent... and a body. Far better to strap explosives to the offending soul and grant a martyrs' absolution. The rumour that Caine's personal regiment of crack troops, the 1st Elysian, was present would galvanise his troops into a frenzy of activity and cause mass desertion from the other side.
But all good things come to an end. New avatars finally arrived. Caine was shunted aside in favour of these more photogenic heroes. Dressed in their shiny armour and with winning smiles they deposed the tyrants, defeated the most wicked of sorcerers and made mincemeat of bandits. Thus the "Great" War was won.
This left Caine, who inconveniently did not go away. A war hero. A war criminal. Caine was brought for judgement tried for war crimes so horrific they could not be repeated outside of court. In response, Caine claimed these as innovations in a time of desperation and need. The ends justified the means, he argued - there was no other means of winning.
While there was no argument of Caine's guilt, there was doubt over what sentence he should be given. He couldn't allow be allowed to live. Would Caine's peace be any better than the oppression they had been liberated from? He couldn't be killed. How could anyone sentence to death the key figure responsible for their liberation? A compromise was reached. Imprisonment. Caine would be taken to Vault Zero, a wartime command bunker, and it would be rebuilt as his tomb and prison. He would remain in suspended animation as his case bought up in, oh, an eternity from now.
Eternity is longer than people imagine. Through the long years, other wars, other struggles lit up the Dream. Centuries passed with fewer staff being retained and less and less money spent on maintaining the sprawling complex. Eventually, the nation that built Vault Zero passed out of history, and with it went the knowledge of Vault Zero.
While memory forgets, legend persist. Dusty offices filled with debris were transformed into fabulous treasure rooms, filled with ill-gotten booty. Faceless ferroconcrete corridors patrolled by still clanking guardians were re-woven by storytellers into onyx halls where fabulous demons with grinning faces pranced and cavorted. Only the name, Vault Zero, persisted as fact. Greed and misinformation conspired to bring a desperate group of tomb robbers past the aging death-traps to it's very nexus, where they released Caine.
Now Vault Zero pulses to a different beat. The guardians once set to watch him have become his servants. Caine has looked out on the world, and seen War, Chaos and Disorder. As in his time, these 'Avatars' have done nothing but to bring destruction and terror to the good citizens of the Dream. The Dream shall be made safe against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and this time, there shall be no mistakes.
The Rational Way begins anew...
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