Such a thing as too dark?

[Sieglatan]

So I am in the process of fleshing out the persona I am planning on fighting with, and teasing the idea of a human torturer/executioner. I have never really fought as a character before, and certainly never on any sort of event level, so I feel I'm kinda stepping into this with flat feet, as it were.
As for costuming, I was hoping to step away from the fantasy aspect of bright eyed Dominic Deeganism (no offense to fans!), and be more influenced by the darker aspects of actual medieval history, like the Siege of Ma'arrat al-Numan during the First Crusade (or fantasy works like Berserk!). To achieve this, I was thinking of something like a fetish sash, lined with human tongues (made with water-formed leather and sprayed with polyurethane for that sickly shiny look) and other such gory/dark bits.
However, I am also aware that kids and their parents (as well as others more sensitive to such a theme) attend these events, and I want to be respectful towards their experience as well, and not step on any feet. Would something like what I have in mind be too rated R?
And related, are there any characters/units that embrace a darkish feel that would be willing to scribe their histories?
And lastly, what level of success has anyone pulled off fight-practical gore effects? I just finished my fighting mask, which resembles a split human skull, so I still need to wait to field test it...

[Black Cat]

I have a dark-themed character, but I don't focus on the gory stuff to the point of wearing it on my garb. I'm more into secrecy, misdirection, ambush, guerrilla tactics, sowing confusion and chaos, assassinating, and other related shenanigans. Other things my character does include creating ghostly fireballs and the practice of some forms of necromancy. My character is a nekomata in 'neko' (cat-person) form. My garb (once completed) is going to be a combination of dark-themed and Asian-inspired.

On the subject of gibs and other gore, I remember seeing the Uruk Hai use fake human skulls as part of their decor on occasion. Basically anything you'd see for decorations on Halloween should be okay, but I wouldn't go too far beyond that.

So I am in the process of fleshing out the persona I am planning on fighting with, and teasing the idea of a human torturer/executioner.

What a funny pun.

LOL

[Cade]

A couple ideas...

You can make a simple scalp by cutting a round off of a wig and gluing it to a few scraps of leather. Six or seven of these and you have yourself a nice little half string of scalps you can hang from your shoulder. Make sure you ether use short hair wigs or you braid the long hair ones so they don't get in the way.

You can make shrunken heads by burning a doll head with a lighter, just make sure you don't burn the hair. It looks a hell of a lot more disturbing when the hair is intact. You could hang those from your belt.

I would also suggest getting little chicken bones, bleaching them, and then using a bit of wire to attach three of them together as well as a fake nail from one of those ghetto, do it yourself, fingernail kits and presto you can make a finger bone necklace.

Head out to goodwill or some other cheap store, and pick up a leather coat. I picked up two for six bucks at the goodwill by my house. Bleach them, cut them apart, remove all the innards/padding/lining and then sew them back together. You now have yourself a human skin coat.


Regardless about what these ideas say about my psyche, if your going dark, that's a good way to start.

[Titan G]

**** that be as dark as you want.

[No'Vak]

**** that be as dark as you want.

QFT

[Black Cat]

For the record, when I made my comment about not getting much darker than Halloween, I really meant just don't use real human bones for your garb.

I certainly wasn't talking about the junk you see in stores around Halloween. I was talking about some of the more realistic haunted houses you might encounter around that time.

Fake stuff that looks real or stuff that is made from animal bones shouldn't be a problem.

[Sieglatan]

... I really meant just don't use real human bones for your garb.

Shoot! And I was just about to go out graverobbing and do some crafting Ed Gein style~!
Anyways, here's a pic of myself in my messy living room with the fighting mask-

The eyes are made from firing range high impact ballistic glass, and the entire inside of the mask is lined with closed cell foam.
I'm still working on the leather lobstertail helm that goes with this- so we'll see how that goes-
Thanks also for the excellent suggestions for gore effects~!

[No'Vak]

There are places online you can order human bones.

Human bones are way darker than those gay animal bones.

~Noik

[Azgarehta]

Make sure your mask doesn't block your peripheral vision.

[Sieglatan]

my first fighting mask did, and I became easy prey to flankers, so I made sure this one didn't- I have a full field of vision with this one~!

[Tonaho]

Seriously, I want to see that thing in person. Especially the finished outfit. What events will you be at this year?

[Sieglatan]

Here's a closer look from when I first finished it-


I'm really not sure what events I'll be attending- The only one I'm positive of is UCI's Battle for the Ring. That's what happens when you live on the West Coast and have no spare money to travel about...
Plus I'm still in Summer Session as well, which prevented me from going to Chaos XIII...
Sho ga ne na

[Tonaho]

Well, that works out well for me that you don't live on the EAST coast. I'm down here in Utah. We'll be throwing an event in January if you want to come over here for it. I'd love to see this gear in battle, the darker the better.

EDIT: And I forgot to mention that mask is freaking Sick. How did you make that thing?

[Cade]

yea man, how did you make that...

looks like its sewed up the middle...but *, very nice lookin.

[Sieglatan]

My realm is going to see about collecting club dues, holding fundraiser parties, raffles for leather bondage gear (tragically more in demand than leather armor, but cheaper to make, go figure), so that we can travel to places like Utah as a realm to go fight, so we'll see!

As for the construction- I made the first black mask by water molding an appropriately measured veg-tan leather mask template, and using t-shirts, strapped the thing to my lower face and forehead, and watched half of a movie with the leather hardening on my face- so that the fitted piece would be, well, fitted to my face. Then I used a dremel tool to cut the lenses out of ballistic eye-protection, and to drill small holes around the lenses to fit thread through to give them rims of buffalo leather, so the first red hit to my face doesn't force a piece of glass into my eye. I then stitched the eyes to the mask, and DAP'ed some carved closed cell foam on the inside for protection.
I then measured and cut out a pattern out of wet construction paper, placed it on the mask, and made sure that it didn't cut peripheral vision. I then cut the skull part out as one piece and immersed it in hot water and elmer's. Unfortunately, the water was hotter than I had intended, and it didn't behave like the test scrap pieces I tossed in before. As a result, the skull came out a lot smoother than intended, and a lot harder.
After a lot of cursing and stretching, I got the shape that I wanted. I then cut out ten individual teeth in such a way that they would have a curved profile. I used a micro-scalpel to carve out little divets for the teeth to rest in. After epoxying the teeth in place, I used pics of real human skulls to see where the fault lines were, and burned them in with a wood burner. Then I painted the whole thing black, and then dry brushed the skull white, so the faults would still be black.
Then I thought about Mr. Grim from Twisted Metal Black- They realized that it's sort of impossible to wear a skull as a full helmet, so they made it so the character broke up the skull and stitched it together with wire so his head could fit in it- I liked the look- so I used a razor, cut the mask in half, stitched it back together, and stitched the skull and the mask together-
oh- and the mask is affixed to my head via five leather straps connected by five buckles attatched to an O ring on the back of my head, ensuring there will be no wobbling.

[Tonaho]

very much sweet. *dreams of one day being patient and cool enough to do something of this caliber*

[Sieglatan]

Meh, I already feel a bit sheepish coming to this forum and asking for this kind of help, so I'm going to post this here, so I don't clog up the Role Playing board even more than I have

Anywhooo- At some point, I got a little bit irritated with the lack of interest shown by the other members of my realm (which I am not the leader of, so i really don't have any grounds to order peoples about), in terms of hardcore training, so I started a unit! *trumpet*

I wanted to give it a dark and monsterous feel, and if any of you get what I am kinda ripping off, then kudos-
Given what I have put on this page, what can I do to help pad the description, elicit more of a foreboding dreaded feel, etc. ?
Thanks for any input!
http://www.geddon.org/index.php/Apostles
PS- has anyone ever noticed/commented on, that the Geddon.org symbol, with the gauntlets and the shield kinda looks like Goatse.cx?

[Tonaho]

Yeah, I think we've all noticed... Geddon *shudders*

Some of those requirements I think I could handle, but good god some look tough... Most look tough.
Were I closer I'd work my * off to join up, but this stuff needing observed by two guys from California might make that difficult. Though, maybe I'll work towards it anyways. Biggest draw to it IS getting in better shape.

[Sieglatan]

Biggest draw to it IS getting in better shape.

AND the Spirit Quest- Santa Cruz style!
I made the whole "observed by two Apostles" thing so that a random fighter couldn't just show up with him and his friend saying that they bench pressed Manhattan island etc.

I'm probably going to add to the requirements a sort of besting challenge, like, "must defeat another Apostle in an exclusively Class 1 weapon duel"
I feel the requirements I have may be over-emphasizing upper body strength, which i did because I want to make the heaviest red weapon easy to use for one of our members. However, I feel like this may favor guys over girls a bit unfairly- I don't know a single girl who can do a 45lb arm curl.

But of course, we all know that, like the internet, there are no girls in Belegarth, right?

[Todo]

Wait, are you talking eighty pounds on a single bar, or eighties each arm? Because everything else there was fairly meh, and would be extremely easy if you can do three sets o' ten eighties. I think I can do an eighty once or twice... on my right arm.

[Sieglatan]

Wait, are you talking eighty pounds on a single bar, or eighties each arm? Because everything else there was fairly meh, and would be extremely easy if you can do three sets o' ten eighties. I think I can do an eighty once or twice... on my right arm.

yeah, I meant 40 lbs on each arm, or eighty on a single bar. My housemate was confused by the wording as well. Any suggestions on how to word that a little more clearly?

Yeah, guilty confession here, but when I was typing up the physical requirements of the Unit, I was basically typing out my usual workout regimen, just basically saying that if one could meet or exceed it, (which about 90% of our realm cannot do), then they were up for consideration. This kinda poses two problems- One, for someone who is like an athletic star or something is going to look at that and say, "meh." The second is that I want to have a variety of hard-hitting fighters in the unit, regardless of gender or build. For that I feel I need to make the requirements proportional to body weight or something...
Any suggestions would be much appreciated! !

[Todo]

If you want the barreling to be proportional, do things like push ups, pull ups, and sit ups. Or figure out a weight percentage for your lifting, e.g: curl 35% body weight 10x3, bench 125% body weight 1x, stuff like that.

[Titan G]

i'm far an away NOT an atheletic superstar but if the people in your realm can't meet those requirements then you need to get them to a coroner quickly, because their dead.

[Sieglatan]

i'm far an away NOT an atheletic superstar but if the people in your realm can't meet those requirements then you need to get them to a coroner quickly, because their dead.

Meh, as I said earlier, I need to revise the list of requirements to make it less gender biased, and harder, apparently. In truth, I just posted my nightly workout routine and added the thousand cuts and spirit quest (those would be way too time consuming on a nightly basis!).

If there are entire realms of fighters back East who can armcurl 60lbs on each arm and sprint 50 yards in under 7 seconds in full steel armor, then I feel sincerely short-changed by my Realm!

[Titan G]

no we get good enough that we don't have to wear armor. as for the weight thing, yes, yes there are.

[Salamander]

I swear to all that is holy, or perhaps, unholy, case being such as it were, if you go to the trouble of making that mask and wear a Halloween costume for garb, I may cry. Or stab you.

[Spike]

PS- has anyone ever noticed/commented on, that the Geddon.org symbol, with the gauntlets and the shield kinda looks like Goatse.cx?

You're welcome.

[Caleidah]

Sieglatan, first off, the armor is awesome. Very much fits the theme of someone going mad with power and exacting whatever kind of twisted dreams they have for the world.

Secondly, I appreciate the amount of Berserk that you reference for the creation of your unit. As soon as I scrolled to it and saw the word "Causality" I knew I was going to enjoy the description.

[Tiberius Claudius]

You can make a simple scalp by cutting a round off of a wig and gluing it to a few scraps of leather. Six or seven of these and you have yourself a nice little half string of scalps you can hang from your shoulder. Make sure you ether use short hair wigs or you braid the long hair ones so they don't get in the way.

This idea brought back good memories!

If you have read Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series (you should if you haven't!), then you'll remember that the character Stein, Imperial Order ambassador to Anderith wore a cape of human scalps:

Stein lifted his cape out to the side. "These are the scalps of the gifted. I killed each myself. I have prevented each of these witches from twisting the lives of normal people."

[Cade]

You can make a simple scalp by cutting a round off of a wig and gluing it to a few scraps of leather. Six or seven of these and you have yourself a nice little half string of scalps you can hang from your shoulder. Make sure you ether use short hair wigs or you braid the long hair ones so they don't get in the way.

This idea brought back good memories!

If you have read Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series (you should if you haven't!), then you'll remember that the character Stein, Imperial Order ambassador to Anderith wore a cape of human scalps:

Stein lifted his cape out to the side. "These are the scalps of the gifted. I killed each myself. I have prevented each of these witches from twisting the lives of normal people."

Yep. awesome series. I still reread those occasionally.

[Siggard]

it depends on what your standards are for 'too dark' if your sayin your worried about little kids which is pointless because you have to be at 13 to join Belegarth...so my point is, no, there is no such thing as too dark

[Caleidah]

it depends on what your standards are for 'too dark' if your sayin your worried about little kids which is pointless because you have to be at 13 to join Belegarth...so my point is, no, there is no such thing as too dark

Your overuse of emoticons is slowly flaying my soul apart.

And not in the good way.

[Siggard]

and when your soul is fully flayed, i shall sacrifice it to Tzeench...heres some more emoticons:

[No'Vak]

lol

[Tiercel]

I think you'll probably run into practicality issues before you're able to cross the line on darkness alone. I think you've got the right idea, though, to ask yourself "will this step on someone's toes" before wearing it around. For example, if your character is an ancient Israelite and is carrying around a pouch of severed foreskins from slain enemies as proof of his valor- while I'm not sure what particular group of people that might offend on sight, I'd want a back-up explanation available if a little girl asks you "why do you have that bag?"
Just for fun, I'm going to try to think up offensive ideas instead of studying tonight.

Having a dead baby as a rock rock shaped like a dead baby might be funny on your home turf, but showing off your "aborted fetus" at a national event might reach the ears of someone who just had a miscarriage.

There was one teammate that told me his character went around pillaging villages and raping the women. When the fight started, my character immediately hurled him out of bounds, off the edge of the world, to fall forever until he died of dehydration. My character and I have an issue with rape.

Someone once showed me the "shrunken heads of <a particular religious group>" as part of their garb. Maybe not so cool. Neither is making a coat from the skins of <people of a particular skin color>. However, if it's just "shrunken heads" and just "human skin" and it's not carrying any underlying baggage like that, then it's awesome.

Gore is good. Drama is bad. Any body part that could be shown in a PG-13 movie is perfectly okay to have pierced and adorning your garb. If the kids get scared, it's good for 'em anyway.

[Siggard]

i agree abut the rape thing...i'd push him off too...although my character is allied with mauraders who pillage and rape i do not agree with it...my character is evil...worships tzeench the god of chaos...but is not interested in sexual desires of low life men

[Todo]

This thread is dead. Stop being retarded.