Sortinghat Mods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
modofthehat) wrote2012-06-07 07:03 pm
modofthehat) wrote2012-06-07 07:03 pm
Entry tags:
OC APPLICATION
Thinking of applying as an Original Character or a Canon Original Character? This is the application page to visit. As with other applications, we want to make sure you read the rules, as well as the taken character list if you're applying as a Canon OC to make sure the character you are applying for has not been taken already. You also might want to check out holds just to make sure.
Please make sure that you read over the FAQ and the HP canon guide to clear anything up, and if you feel like something has not been mentioned, post a comment and someone will get back to you as soon as possible. If having difficulty with your application, we recommend you give the Application Guide a look over as well.
Wondering what the guidelines are for Original Characters? Not sure if your character counts as Canon OC or what that even is? In addition to the normal application rules, you're expected to follow the guidelines we have listed below:
O R I G I N A L C H A R A C T E R R U L E S;
Canon OC rules:
1. No Fandom OC's. What is a Fandom OC? A Fandom OC is, for example, an X-Men character you created for that world and you want to bring them here. Not allowed, unfortunately.
2. Has to be a legitimate character. What does this mean? A random passerby character with no lines does not count.
3. In the personality section please make sure to let us know how you came to some of your own choices on the personality. This means naming canon examples.
4. If you're unsure whether your character qualifies as a Canon OC or not, make sure to ASK A MODERATOR before submitting your application.
OC Rules in General:
1. The same rules that we have for regular applications still apply. So check with us first about half Veela, Animagus, Vampire or Werewolf things.
2. Your character is not a descendant or related to ANY canon Harry Potter character. There are no exceptions to this rule.
3. Please be thorough with your personality section. We want a very solid idea of this. Since we don't have another place to look up their correct personality, the last thing we want is a character who is vague enough for this to change at a whim.
4. Applications with sparkly characters who are flawless orphans who are perfect at every subject and can do no wrong and everyone falls in love with them at every moment will be rejected.
Examples of Canon OC's:
- Fionna/Prince Gumball/Marshall Lee & canon genderswapped characters (Adventure Time)
- Matt (Death Note)
- Obscure Disney Prince/Characters (i.e: Prince from Cinderella/Snow White or the Feather Duster from Beauty & the Beast)
- Nyotalia (Hetalia)
- Ancestors (Homestuck)
- Foxface (Hunger Games)
- Ditzy Doo (My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic)
- Femio (Princess Tutu)
- Silent Protagonists (video games)
T H I N G S T O T A K E N O T E O F;
1. The mods have the jurisdiction to approve or deny any application submitted.
2. Post your application with your personal journal on the application page itself instead of linking it! If you don't have a personal journal, that's okay, but we strongly prefer it for keeping track of people. Remember to PUT THE TYPE OF APPLICATION IN THE HEADER so we know whether this is a OC or a Canon OC.
3. Your application will need to include two specific words; these words can be found hidden in the rules and information pages linked in the community profile.
4. You may only apply for ONE character at a time. Once that character is approved than you may choose another. A player is not allowed more than one un-responded to application on the application forum. For all new players to the RP, we ask you wait one week before applying as a new character, this will give you time to settle in to the community.
5. If the character's canon is ongoing and it's still early in their introduction, rather than applying them as a canon OC, we will advise you to postpone your application until you can get more information on them.
6. KEEP IN MIND. This is Hogwarts, and it's a British school. There shouldn't be a huge flood of "DESU DESU DESU" at any point in time. Thus, your characters should be British, or at the very least European. If they aren't, you MUST have a GOOD reason for it! The UK is very diverse and has many nationalities, so if you want them to be a different ethnicity, they can still be British! Here are some locations where characters reside.
7. When applying for a Hetalia Character, we request that you phrase the Canon history in the context of the comic, as opposed to the actual history of the country. This is so we can see how the history translates in to the anthropomorphic character.
8. PLEASE KEEP OOC CONVERSATION OUT OF THE APP POST! At least keep it to a minimum if you are going to say something such as 'huzzah for [fill in character name here]', get their AIM and tell them in person. I am sure they would rather hear it that way.
9. We don't have App Cycles at this rp. If applying for a:
→ Student: The most important thing to remember for students is that they are students who go to school. Be prepared to observe all student rules, meaning there are IC consequences for fighting, sneaking out after curfew, and pranks. That doesn't mean not to have fun, just know your character can get in trouble for it! There are also classes with homework, but signing up and doing school work is optional. More info on student rules are here and these spots will always be open.
→ Teacher/TA: Keep in mind what characters are suitable to teach, and pick a subject that makes sense for them (and for Hogwarts if it's a non- canon class). There is a maximum of two teachers and two TAs on any given subject and occupied teacher and TA spots can be seen there. Teacher characters should do Homework often, which can be posted here. Teachers are encouraged to give out detentions, house points, and overall, remember that they're teachers. More info on teacher rules are here. Currently: OPEN TO CANON CLASSES
→ Staff Member: Similar to professors, minus the assignments, they have a degree of authority as well, but not as much as teachers. They focus on working in the hospital wing, library, grounds, etc. Just like professors, they shouldn't entirely neglect their jobs for social interaction and will use the same application form as teachers. Occupied staff positions can be seen here. Currently: OPEN TO CANON POSITIONS
10. If your application is:
→Accepted: Congratulations! Follow the instructions, add yourself to all the lists, and welcome to Sorting Hat!
→Wavered: We think your application could use a few improvements to be up to the quality of our roleplay. You have a week to adjust these issues before the character is up for grabs again. If you reapply and we still don't find it up to par, you will be rejected.
→Rejected: There are significant problems with the application, so you must wait one week before reapplying or reserving that character (unless you already have a hold on that character, but you can't renew it if the hold expires). However, if you want to apply a different character, you can do so whenever.
| S T U D E N T O C A P P L I C A T I O N | | | T E A C H E R O C A P P L I C A T I O N |
CANON OC | Italy Romana | Axis Powers: Nyotalia | Reserved; Teacher | 3/4
The Kingdom itself ran in relative peace, though it was not completely unified just yet. It wasn't until after 1866 that Italy was able to claim back Venice, meaning that Romana did not truly see her sister until then. However in exchange with forming an alliance with the Kingdom of Prussia during the Austro-Prussian War, Prussia would allowed Italy to annex Venice, a deal that King Emmanuel took which created the Third Italian War of Independence, which ended in success against Austria. This meant that Romana was finally reunited with her sister, for the first time in many years. It was one of the few times Romana's walls dropped and she showed her true emotions to another. They were one step closer to being Independent completely unified. The only obstacle being that France still controlled the Papal State of Rome. However in 1870 Prussia went to war with France, and France abandoned it's positions in Rome to fight the large Prussian Army, and when Prussia was victorious, Italy was able to take Rome from French authority. The Unification was now complete and both sisters settled in Rome, now their new capital. And while Romana will rarely show it it, she is actually quite thankful to Prussia for helping them both, knowing just how much harder it would have been had they not had her on their side.
Now unified, both girls went through a large growth spurt, their body's aging to look more like an adults. However, Romana's growth was still slower than her sister's, and to this day she is slightly shorter than Venezia and will compensate for this with ridiculous high heels. This is due simply to the fact that while The North began to flourish in the new unified Italy, the South did not, it's economy suffering and and it process of industrialisation being interrupted. This only lead to poverty and crime growing in the South, and the rise of organised crime. Many people also left her, for her sister and her industry, or for other parts of Europe or even to America for a fresh start. This left Romana as much more hardened then her sister, and with a more pessimistic outlook. As much as she loves her people, it hurt a lot to see them leave and it felt like she was a failure that she couldn't industrialise or modernise fast enough for her overpopulated land. And the rise of the mafia meant that Romana learnt the evils in life, and learnt that at times certain sacrifices need to be made, which is a rather skewered idea that even she is aware of. It never changed her strong sense of loyalty though, but it did increase her ability to hold a grudge for a long time, especially in the cases of her people and her sister.
Overall however, life was good. She had her sister back, they were their own country and even though they had their hiccups, they were independent. However in 1876 her parliamentttt, which was already favouring radicsocialismsmsmsm, removed the conservative Prime Minister Marco Minghetti and replaced him with socialist Agostino Depretis which began the period known as the Socialist Period, which was marked with corruption,
government instabipovertypovert and the use of authoritarian measures. As much as she could, Romana attempted to shelter Venezia from all the changes and corruption, but at the same time, she struggled. Finally, she was starting to understand what it was like for the other nations, such as Spain, Austria, France and Prussia. Physically she was a woman. And in this period, even her political leader would not completely listen to her, despite the fact he knew who and what she truly was. Frustration started to grow and even to this day she gets easily frustrated by obviously displays of sexism and misogyny.
Depretis first government used a political idea of transformismo, which in theory meant that a cabinet should select a variety of moderates and capable politicians from a non-partisan perspective. In practice of course, trasformismo was authoritarian and corrupt, with Depretis pressuring districts to vote for his candidates if they wants favourable concessions when he was in power. This was most likely used as the key means to how Depretis kept his support in Southern Italy, who was already weak from poor economy, poverty and the organised crime. Romana found it harder and harder to speak up, her own strength tied to that of her people, and her own stubborn personality being squashed down. She had never had a proper government before, perhaps this really was how it was run. However while Depretis dominated the government and started to use authoritarian measures like banning public meetings , placing so called dangerous individuals into internal exile and remote penal islands and adopting militarist policies, her also made elementary education compulsory and free, and abolished arrest for debt.
Needless to say Depretis' first government collapsed in 1877, his second starting in 1881, with his goals including widening suffrage in 1882 and increasing the tax intake from Italians by expanding the minimum requirements of who could pay taxes and the creation of a new electoral system called which resulted in large numbers of inexperienced deputies in the Italian parliament . It wasn't until 1887 that Depretis was pushed out of government and replaced by his cabinet minister Francesco Crispi whose major concern was the strength of Austria-Hungary, and how was best to protect Italy from them, a concern Romana shared. She had grown attached to her younger sister, despite all the years of separation and was beginning to bond with the younger girl. Not to mention she didn't think she could handle being divided yet again. However, the fact that one Crispi's ideas was to win Germany's favour, joining the Triple Alliance with both Germany and Austria-Hungary, irritated her, her older dislike of Germans returning. In Romana's eyes a German from Germany was just as bad as one from the Austrian-Hungarian empire. But yet again she was ignored, her boss unable to look past the physical into what she was.
The fact that her government was focussing so much on the foreign policy meant other important areas of Italy were neglected and alienated, such as the agricultural community of Italy. Already in decline since 1873, a government investigation was started in 1877, a report released eight years later showed that agriculture was not improving , that landowners were swallowing up revenue from their lands and contributing almost nothing to the development of the land. There was also demand from lower class Italian's to break up the communal lands, which only benefited the landlords. Most workers were not peasants but short term labourers, employed for, at best, a year, while peasants without stable income were forced to live off meagre food supplies while disease was spreading rapidly, plagues were being reported, including a major cholera epidemic which killed at least 55,000 people. South Italy was producing too many grapes for wine, this overproduction resulting from the 1870's and 80's where Southern Italy had stepped in to become the largest exporter of wine in Europe while France's vineyards were suffering from diseases from insects. And when France recovered, southern Italy was still overproducing, and had to cut back which only resulted in more unemployment and bankruptcies. And the Italian government could not effectively deal with the situation thanks to massive overspending by Depretis' government which had left Italy in debt.
Romana's feelings on the entire period can be summed up in two word. Anger and frustration. Anger her government was focusing on her people, was making alliances that she didn't truly want, but was forced to agree to, to gain power. Frustration for being ignored, simply because of her physical appearance. She began to truly understand how much she had taken for granted under Spain's care, how hard the older woman must have found it. And yet she still kept working. And so would Romana.
Then came World War I. While Italy was in an alliance with both Austria-Hungary and Germany, Italy struggles on whether to honour the alliance, originally stating that they were neutral and that the alliance was for defence purposes only. Unlike the people who were divided on whether or not to enter the was Romana wanted to stay out, knowing her country was already suffering, and that war would only exacerbate the problem. However, she was forced to cave to the demands of nationalists and her bosses and this saw her and her sister signing the London Pact and agreeing to declare war on Austria-Hungary in return for a promise of major territorial war. Still confined to the gender ideas of Italy, Romana slipped into being a nurse to the injured of which there were many. The army consisted of 875 000 men but it was poorly led and lacked military supplies of heavy artillery and machine guns, the supplies being depleted in an early war with Turkey in 1911-12. Close to 650 000 soldiers died and 950 000 were wounded and the economy struggled, only surviving thanks to large-scaled Allied funding. Deep down Romana seethed, and mourned, and did all that she could to help her people, while struggling to have any power. To this day she still regrets not doing something drastic, but a nation finding the power to refuse and reject their boss they need a lot of power. And instead of Italy's power increasing it decreased, with Italy not reviving any territories promised from the Treaty of London besides the Southern half of the County of Tyrol, Trieste, Istria, and the city of Zadar. And these gains did not outweigh all that Romana had lost, how much her people had suffered. A small seed of dislike grew inside her, growing thanks to the emotions of those in the South, and this dislike and belief of inheritance incompetence in the government is one she still caries.
After WWI, Premier Vittorio Orlando fell from power in June 1919, being blamed for the mismanagement of the Italian position at the peace conference. Economic issues from before the war were now severe and the people were disillusioned and their national pride suffered. Romana felt the shifts in her people, how the unrest grew but never spoke up, deciding that her people needed a change, and that she would not interfere. And so down went Orlando, and strikes broke out through Venezia's lands in 1920-21 and the Giovanni Gioliti became the new premier, later winning the national election in 1921 with the help of Benito Mussolini's Fascist Party which already controlled 35 seats. This only resulted in weak governments, and finally Mussolini announced a march on Rome on October 27, 1922, to which the King refused to proclaim Martial Law. In response Mussolini's 'Black Shirts', the name give to a paramilitary unit, took control of Rome and he was made Premier, receiving dictatorial powers a month later. His enemies, and the enemies of Fascism were silenced by terrorism and brute force, and while he made peace with the Catholic Church, Romana did not find herself liking this new boss. And slowly Italy became a fascist state, and Romana found herself to continue to be restricted to gender roles, Mussolini adamant that a woman's role was to be in the home, raising strong children from the country, and in Romana's and Venezia's cases, being woman who were striving to better the country by doing menial tasks.
With Mussolini's show of support to Hitler at the Munich conference in 1938 Italy again found itself becoming an ally to the Germans, and after France had been defeated by Germany in 1940 signed an official alliance to create the Axis with Japan and Germany. Again Romana attempted to protest the decision, Italy was still to weak military wise and wasn't prepared for a war, she was ignored, and thus Italy entered World War II. Again, she was moved into the task of nursing the wounded, but even as she fulfilled that she could feel herself nearing the edge where she would finally act.
Three events that were important to Romana in World War II were the Bombing of Naples, The Allied Invasion of Sicily and the German Invasion of Italy. The first left her with her scarring, a mark that has shaped her many things from personality, to her dress sense. Her insecurities have only grown with the mark, Romana seeing it as ugly and hating the blemish. It's not just ugly, it's a mark that says she didn't act soon enough, that she failed. And she she hides it under her clothes, and as of today nobody knows of it.
The next, the Allied Invasion of Sicily in August 1943 and the movement into the peninsula in September forced Mussolini to flee and he and his fascists lost power after all of this, the King bringing in a new government under Pietro Badoglio. This change helped Romana find the strength to actually do something, and it was then she joined the Italian campaign, which leads into the third event.
With the Allied movements into Italy the Germans had also made their moves, seizing control of Italy from Naples up and installing Mussolini as the leader of the Italian Social Republic, a puppet state. The act of Germany invading her sister caused Romana to finally snap, the old issues with German's coming straight to the surface. Her thick brown hair which had previously reached to her lower back was chopped off, Romana hating the fact she needed to destroy something she considered one of her greatest features. But she knew it was necessary to disguise herself as a younger male, so she could join the troops moving up through Italy and reclaiming it. She fought by her people for the first time and she fought for her sister and her sister's people. In a way, she was finally realising all that it means to be a nation.
In June 4, 1944 Rome fell, and after that the Allies reached Florence. But Romana did not follow them, her concerns with her sister who had been left behind when the Germans and Mussolini fled. Feeling as if her sister was only a pawn to Germany Romana's never forgiven the woman, and holds a deep grudge against her. If she had her way she'd stop Venezia from interacting with her, but with every attempt, Venezia protests, having forgiven Germany, an act that Romana can't find it in her heart to do.