TAG Talk Tuesdays – Doug/Turret
Welcome back everyone as we continue our interview with Doug Black! This week we delve a bit more into his character Turret and what makes him so unique.
First off, thank you again Doug for taking the time to sit down with us for our weekly interview series.
No problem at all and thank you for the opportunity!
Doug, this week I would like to delve a bit more into your character and hope everyone can understand them a bit better.
Personally, I believe Turret may be the most unique character in Odyssey. From what I know, they are some sort of weird amalgamation of elements. Can you please expand on that?
First off, yes in the most basic sense they are a formation of all the elements that make up a single entity. They are considered an Aetherborn though since it is Aether that holds the elementals together.
Oh okay, so there are four elementals within Turret which make them up?
Actually no, there are many, many small elementals within Turret which create them! Each of these elementals are housed in their own ‘bubbles of void/aether’ which hold all of one type of element. These bubbles do not interact directly with one another. But combined they create a single entity that is Turret.
So a little bit like how electrons in an electron cloud do not really interact with other electrons, but all the electrons together create… well everything.
Actually yes, that’s a pretty good analogy!
So how did you come up with such a unique character idea? I’m going to assume it wasn’t from the building blocks of science.
Haha, no. This version of Turret is actually the fourth iteration I developed. Players that were around for the Beta may remember another one of these iterations when they were an ooze monster in a suit of armor. While I worked with the ST (Story Teller) staff to save that Turret from death during the cataclysm, I decided they still needed some work so I redesigned them again. In the end, I decided to take inspiration from the Warforged from the Eberon D&D campaign setting, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, and the clone troopers from Star Wars. Without giving away too much about my deeper backstory, Turret was created by forbidden magics and science as a war machine that was to lack freewill, just like the original Warforged and, just like the Warforged, they have since gained sentience and freewill.
So I guess it would be safe to assume the original Turret did meet their end during the Cataclysm then. *laughs*
I’m not sure actually! I like to think they still survived and are out there as a lone vagabond vanquishing evil in the Sea of Glass. Maybe some day we shall encounter them again!
Last question for you, Doug. As I previously stated, your character is extremely unique within the setting. What are your thoughts on seeing more unique characters within Odyssey? Do you think more unique characters can make things fun and interesting or do you think too much uniqueness will dilute the setting and nothing will really feel unique any longer?
That’s a great question. I fully believe that the unique universe that Odyssey was created in provides us the opportunity to create many unique character concepts and I think players that are interested in this should take full advantage of the opportunity. First off, I would like to thank the ST and Rules staff for working with me on my concept so it fits the world. I have little doubt if others have unique ideas they will be able to incorporate them into the game. That all being said, not only do I think unique characters have a place in this world, I feel the game almost demands it! With the rifts of Arkrath being a core component to the lore of the world, it is not entirely improbable that many unique intelligent creatures that came to this world all decided to congregate together in a singular place for their safety. The basic tropes of humans, elves, and dwarves have long been expanded upon and we are just taking it another step forward. And that’s not to say there won’t be many regular races present as well; I look at the Orc Kill Squad as a group of players that all wanted to play a more benign race, and that’s great too! The diversity is one thing that will really set this game apart from others!
Once again, I would like to give my utmost appreciation to Doug Black for giving us an opportunity to learn a bit more about both your character and you as a LARPer.
Be sure to come back again next week as Mel talks with Kyle Preberg about his own extremely unique character, the Undead Surgeon, Sir Deadward. We will learn more about the experience Kyle had to help flesh out Deadward’s personality and give us a model for advancing our own roleplaying abilities!
This interview was held over Discord. Questions and Responses, while true to their initial nature, may have been edited to best invoke the feelings of the participants and allow for better flow.
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