The Dresden Files > DFRPG

[Gauging Interest] Text-based online Dresden RPG game

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SoulCatcher78:
Crap...the forum ate my first attempt at this.

I will change his last name to Bak.  Smith was more of a placeholder until I could identify a "common" name.  It's part of his invisible in a crowd concept.

Using his money for an investment sounds good.  I was trying to figure out how much work he could actually get as an interpreter and figured he'd be living in the low income section of town.  Plot hooks abound if the corporate culture is anything like the zaibatsu of Japan, good times indeed.

Wikipedia (not always the best source for these things) says that Kkangpae involvement in Seoul is less than other parts of the country.  A Dresdenized Seoul sounds like it might be a nightly battleground between the police, the Kkangpae, Yakuza, and Triads (with magic!).

Blaze:
I am currently playing a Korean American reformed necromancer named Julian Park.  His family has ruled Koreatown in Chicago for many centuries...  Since the late 1600s. 

It is a lot of fun to bring in a Asian world view.  Because of course, the Asian mindset regarding death is very different than the European.  His specialty was necromancing people before they were actually dead.  They would hire him to keep them going at the point of death so that they could finish an important task.  His goal was to keep body and soul together just a bit longer than nature intended.  So of course he had to align himself with the bad guys, because the good guys would have just chopped his head off summarily.

Bosh:
SoulCatcher78: in Korea just three family names make up the majority of the population: 김 (pronounced Kim or Gim) 이 (pronounced "Ee" but usually spelled Lee in English for some reason) and 박 (pronounced Bak but usually spelled Park for some strange reason).

So Bak/Park is about as generic as you can get and Chung-hee is hardly rare, the only problem is Park, Chung-hee is the name of South Korea's most influencial president so maybe Kim would be a better last name if you want to blend in.


--- Quote ---Plot hooks abound if the corporate culture is anything like the zaibatsu of Japan, good times indeed.
--- End quote ---

Indeed, the Chaebol (the Korean equivalent of the zaibatsu/keiretsu, Chaebol and Zaibatsu comes from the exact same Chinese characters) are VERY strong and VERY similar to the old zaibatsu (more similar to them than the more modern keiretsu, since they're centered around holding companies instead of banks, just like the zaibatsu were).

For example the biggest Chaebol is Samsung and if you add up all of their subsidieries they have 276,000 employees, not counting a couple other large corporations with tight family links (owned by wives, ex-wives, younger sons, etc.) that own all kinds of other stuff. The Chaebol are massive, very influencial and pretty much immune to the law (one of the smaller Chaebol boss's son got thrown out of a bar and down the stairs and to get revenge he had the bouncers kidnapped and beat with metal pipes for a few days and got off with community service and some fines IIRC).


--- Quote ---Wikipedia (not always the best source for these things) says that Kkangpae involvement in Seoul is less than other parts of the country.  A Dresdenized Seoul sounds like it might be a nightly battleground between the police, the Kkangpae, Yakuza, and Triads (with magic!).
--- End quote ---

In reality, they are a bit weaker than in other bits of the country since the city is so big, the people are richer (so less need to turn to organized crime to get what they want) and the local institutions are a bit too big for gangsters to bully, but in Dresden Seoul that would just mean that the underworld is badly fragmented and engaged in some nasty turf wars like you say (don't forget the Russian and the Nigerians either :)  ).

Also a lot of the Japanese Yakuza are ethnic Koreans so they'd definitely be a big force.

Blaze: um, not to nit-pick but neither Korean-Americans (in any capacity) nor Chicago have existed until WELL after the 1600's, but the idea of pre-emptive necromancy sounds like a fun application of death magic, I'll have to steal that :)

breaker:
 I voted Vikings, but by the looks of this, its almost ensured that Seoul will be our playground for this, so I'm going with that. I'm going to follow Soul's lead and throw a character out there so you guys with more knowledge of the city can help me knit pick at it until its perfect.

Someone mentioned Russian underground, so I'm going with a character with that background.  ;D


Concept: The usual suspect that the police can't touch.
Name: Anton Alexandrov
Quirks: Thrill Seeker, Germaphobe, Enjoys Dangak
Anton's family had always been on the edge, of his father's three brothers, two had joined the mafia and one was already dead. His father, Alexander, however, was determined to keep Anton away from such influences, and he was like-was protected from his extended family's activities until he joined a University. Two weeks after he'd left home, he got a call telling him that his father had been killed in his burning office. Anton rushed home immediatly, only to find that his mother had (suppossedly) abandoned their home, she was no where to be found. He then fell under the wing of his uncle, who had offered him a job, this clashed with his University studies, so he was forced to drop out. He's worked for his uncle and been given his fair share of mafia exeperiences for his age. His talent for hiding 'hot' individuals from many people impressed his uncle and he was sent to their Seoul wing recently to assist in setting up a cross-national operation. Sadly, for the now thrill-seeking Anton, most of it had been dealt with by the time he'd arrived in Seoul, with the family already sitting on a comfortable piece of territory. Anton was left to entertain himself, getting called in by the family for this or that every few days. He adopted the practice of attempting petty, but risky crimes as practice for himself, and this occupied most of his time until a clothing store that had been owned by the family burned down, and Anton saw who did it... and man.. they weren't ******* human. Anton has now taken it on himself to dab into the magical underground with only two goals, keep all the magical creepy crawlies of the family's doorstep and have himself a hell-ofa good time.

Sorry for length XD

Blaze:
Bosh  before you nitpick, ask! The original Park ancestor who came to the area we know as Chicago, was from the Joseon period of Korea's history.  Technically he was from Ulleungdo Island, off the coast of the Mainland.  He first went to Chicago's area with Jesuits who ere trying to convert the Algonquin Peoples, and was there with Father Pierre Charlevoix, who first mentions Chicagou in a journal in 1671. 

I always do my homework.  Any decent game master ought to.  ;D

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