Application: Rakktor

[Rakktor]

Name: Rakktor
Class: Shaman
Level: < 10 at the time of writing

Roleplaying and me:
While I've been absent from the game since 2011, I started played WoW with the EU release. First on Earthen Ring, where I was the leader of a small Alliance RP guild based around the concept of a Scarlet Order splinter group who avoided corruption, and wanted to reclaim the Monastery and so on (needless to say, this was not really mechanically possible). With the release of the RP-PvP servers I went to Defias Brotherhood, where I became an early member of The Starseeker Sentinels (as a Night Elf Priestess called Namida, not very famous or infamous), so I've spent my fair share of time trying to keep Red Blade Orcs out of Ashenvale. I think I was an officer in the guild towards the end of it as a functional, active thing - some time after the release of TBC - but it's been quite a while, so I'm actually not sure. After that I went to Sporeggar as an officer in what in my (relatively humble) opinion was one of the premier RP guilds on the server at the time, The Twin Serpents, a militaristic Blood Elf guild. Inbetween I've also been a member of various RP guilds in other MMOs, like Warhammer Online and Age of Conan. I've had little experience roleplaying an Orc up until now, so I intend to initially keep the In-character background for Rakktor fairly grounded.


A bit of prose to establish the character:


"Something Lost, Something Found"

The hospital tents carried a pungent reek, like the field of a battle concluded - but here, the suffering lingered, punctuated by screams and groans. Occasionally the tent flaps would be wrung aside as another mangled warrior was rushed past, and a rush of blistering cold would follow before someone forced the flap back. Thirty heartbeats later, the process would repeat. Rakktor had counted the thirty heartbeats seven times, now. Waiting, while blood pooled around the bench he was seated on. A beleaguered priestess was about to jog past him, but she must have caught a glimpse of him sitting there, because she suddenly spun on her heel and bored a pair of green eyes into him. Of course - it had to be an elf. Rakktor took some pleasure in the fact that she look distinctly undistinguished. The remnants of her neatly layered hair was a dishevelled mop, clinging to her face as sweat beaded on her face. The pearl-white front of her robes was encrusted with blood of several shades. The halls are not so gilded here, are they, elf-kin?

"Nasty business, healing on the front lines," he offered. Her only response was to exhale forcefully, trying to blow some of her hair off her face. Rakktor gave up on making conversation - instead he offered her his hand. The left one, which he had now carried in his right for some time. Then he extended his arm, which now ended only in a bloody stump. "Can you put it back on?"

She gave it a cursory glance. "No. Too late. I can only close the wound."

"How will I fight with just one hand?"

"You'll find a way. I'm - really, I apologize. It's been too long, and the Nerubian venom... We had to prioritize your friend, the one you brought back with you."

The hand was not the only thing Rakktor had carried back from the breach. "How is he?"

"He died. I'm sorry - he was tough as jerky, even for a Troll, but there was too little of him left to heal."

Rakktor stared blankly at the priestess. "So I have lost both myself and my friend. Am I dishonorable for wishing that he had died quicker, and I had kept my hand?"

She tilted her head, shrugged, and said while turning. "I never understood your concept of honor, Greenskin, but they say hindsight is the most precise of all sciences. The wound is closed. Do whatever you want with the spare hand. Check behind the tent - If you can't fight, maybe there's something you can do in the camp."
With that, she walked away. Rakktor remained seated, looking from his hand to his now-healed stump.


Years later, as they pass through Sen'jin Village, strangers sometimes remarked on the aging Orc who sat alone by the shore, mending fishermen's nets with his one hand. The Innkeeper would willingly, but in hushed tones, divulge the story. He was called Rakktor One-Hand - a veteran, they would say, of many campaigns. He came through the portal and fought in the wars against the Humans. Imprisoned, then suddenly delivered from captivity by the new Warchief, Thrall. He forged bonds of friendship with the Darkspear, and travelled with Thrall across the sea, to Kalimdor, and stood unwavering on the front lines as terror rained from the sky. He went back through the Portal to their ancestral homeland, and finally, fought in the costly Northrend campaign. There, some chilling arachnid beast tore his hand off. Supposedly, then, he refused to leave the front lines because his friends had been encircled, and instead rushed to their aid. Only when he was satisfied that they were safe, did he leave for the healers, carrying several others with him. But when he got there, a fiendish Blood Elf priestess refused to heal him, out of spite for his valor. And she didn't save the others he brought along either. So he came here, with his one hand, and now he mends nets and almost never speaks. Better if he had died with his friends. Or if another healer had been present, perhaps he would even now be on the front lines.

And then the strangers would ask, incredulously: "Did he tell you all this?"
And the Innkeep would laugh, and say: "No, this is just what we heard. For all we know, he could be a drunk."

Rakktor knew the story as well as the Innkeeper, but he always kept from interjecting - no, we didn't stay and fight, in fact, as soon as I lost my hand, I scooped up both that and what was left of Zurakh and trotted back to the healer. The Priestess wasn't more spiteful than any Blood Elf - she was just overworked and had to make choices. Sometimes they made bad choices. But they couldn't let that undo them. But let them think I am some forlorn Warlord. At least then I can fish in peace.

Something had changed recently, however. On cold nights, it used to be that Rakktor could feel his age - his joints ached, and getting to his feet each morning was laborious. He refused to become one of the wastrels who slept all day, however, and had fought this skirmish with his own flesh and bone every morning for some time now. But that wasn't the change. The change was that it had stopped. It was as if he was growing younger again. A soothing warmth seemed to emanate from where before there had been aches and pains, the groaning hinges of an aging body.

Only when he awoke one night, bathed in his own sweat, with a tumult of voices babbling in his head, and so statically charged that sparks flew from whatever he touched, did it occur to him that something might be wrong. He walked - more briskly than he had been capable of only months ago - to a Witch Doctor residing in Sen'jin, a relative of his late friend. They were on good terms, but not close friends. Still, perhaps he knew what his fever was.

As he explained his symptoms, the troll squinted at him, and began batting his hand. "Stop de talking, Rakktor, mon."

"Do you know what is wrong with me?"

"I do. Ya's not sick."

"Then what?"

"De spirits. Dey talk to you now."

"The spirits have never communed with me, Zab'rak. I am no Shaman."

"Dey do now. Ya's going ter be one."

"Why?"

The Witch Doctor shrugged. "Who can know? Maybe, I think, dey agree with me dat dere are others, many others, who can be be fishin' in de sea and mending dem nets."

"I have only one hand."

"De spirits do not care if you have one, two, or five 'ands! De last one I know fer sure, because I 'ad a cousin, who --"

Rakktor cut him off before he could launch into one of his many tales about the exploits of someone from his exceedingly large extended family. "How do I make it stop?"

Zab'rak laughed. "Stop? No stopping! De spirits 'ave decided!"

Rakktor turned and began walking away. The Witch Doctor called after him: "Rakktor One-Hand! When you grow tired of da spirits not doing what you want, go to de Valley of Trials and say dey must teach you to be a Shaman! Dey will point! Dey will laugh! But you will show dem! You are done mending nets!"


After five more nights of no sleep, Rakktor packed his scant belongings and began walking toward the Valley of Trials.


(( So basically, an old dog is begrudgingly forced to learn new tricks. The idea is that this will tie into both my relative inexperience playing Shaman, and explains why an old veteran is - from a mechanical point of view - not currently very intimidating, as he has to learn from scratch. ))

[Rhonya]

Hello Rakktor! We already spoke ingame, but I must say, I loved this story!
Gives us a very good insight in your character and some things you've already thought out. I think becoming a shaman would suit him very well with his missing hand and might prove a challenge to realise, which could be extremely fun.

Well, I got nothing else really to mark of your story! So I say, come find one of the officers ingame for you interview and we'll get the show on the road.
The officers being: Rhonya, Sadok, Rargnasha, Grogona, Gridish.
Currently we're in Ogrimmar, but moving soon to the Crossroads, so even if you're still low level it shouldn't be too much of an issue.
Hope to see you soon ingame!

~Rhonya

[Rhonya]

Interviewed and accepted by me, yay!

Welcome to the Red Blades! For the blood of the Tribe!