CITY OF FIENDS ROLEPLAY
THE BREACH
The City of Fiends, formally Los Santos and also known as Los Demonios, is a major city located in southern San Andreas in an alternate dimension referred to as Divergence 10. Divergence 10 Los Santos was best described as apocalyptic. The city faced rapid population decline, extreme mortality rates, and rising violence. On December 31st, 2019, a mysterious organization known as the NAA carried out an experiment that led to the discovery of parallel universes and the creation of an unstable passage through divergent versions of Los Santos. Referred to as the breach, it was this rift and the steady trickle of people through it that helped reform this struggling alternate Los Santos.
Of those who manage to find or happen upon the NAA's breach, fewer are able to safely navigate it. Unfortunately, some travelers who succeed end up stuck in the City of Fiends, where corporations are kings of the land and crime thrives in the large, dense shadows they cast. Law enforcement is kept on tight leashes at the will and whim of those in power. Gangs and syndicates fight for influence and status, serving as obstacles to each other and those with more honest aims. Still, despite the dominance of corruption and the fluctuating strength and threat of criminals, few brave underdogs don the badge or vigilante statuses in an attempt to bring morality to a city of sin.
The strangest impact of the breach is the rising presence of varying types of humans in the city. Alternate versions of Los Santos are sometimes inhabited by humans with alternate histories and properties. It is also theorized that travel through the multiverse itself can cause side effects ranging from memory loss to cosmetic changes to biological mutation. Those who manage to arrive in the City of Fiends with qualities that differ from the city's natives or who are altered upon arrival are collectively called mutants. Despite their presence being one of the eponyms of the City of Fiends, mutants are met with as much mixed reception as chops, one of many colloquialisms for cyborgs and androids.
The breach is a means to adapt a previous character for use in this city. Arriving through the breach is a great way to be familiar with Los Santos in general or continue a character’s story while being new to this version of Los Santos.
FACTIONS
Care | Justice | Power
In 2020, the city formally restructured part of the government as three departments that most civilians and establishments fall within. These factions are the Departments of Care, Justice, and Power.
Dr. Charlie Parker seized the opportunity to convert for-profit Pillbox into a government-run hospital under the control of her Department of Care. Pillbox and its top healthcare staff are now the leading provider of transfers, positioning Care as a respected and protected vital facet of the city.
The Department of Justice presides over the courts, prisons, and law enforcement. In such a corrupt city where crime runs rampant, there are those affiliated with Justice who fight the good fight and those who are not the most moral but have found their calling in working the system.
The Department of Power, named after founder William Powers and for its domain, controls business in the city. While officially presented as a department to structure commerce in the city, many citizens are quietly aware and grateful that Powers also keeps criminals on a leash. Gangs exist with the blessing of Powers, and it is generally deemed a lesser evil that Powers supervises them.
TRANSFERS
No matter differences, technicalities, or classifications, all citizens of the city are equally susceptible to its dangers. With the rise of violence and death tolls in the city, the NAA created the technology for government funded “transfers” that relocate a person’s consciousness to a physical copy of their body. Transfers are provided to dead or terminal patients but exclude all memories regarding the patient's death or injury to prevent shock and complications. Unfortunately, there have been instances of transfers failing, resulting in permanent death.
Transfers give an IC reason for things like NLR, respawning, and revives. Permadeath is still possible when desired.
PROJECT WATCHDOG
Bolingbroke Penitentiary is home to Project Watchdog, an invention created from the very tech responsible for the breach. It is presented as a more humane and cost-effective alternative to normal prisons, but its primary goal is to reduce inmates’ sentences so that they could return to the world quicker as citizens, consumers, and workers.
While serving time at Bolingbroke, time doesn't just seem to slow down. A minute in the outside world is experienced as a month in the penitentiary, allowing criminals to serve their full sentences without losing significant amounts of time from their lives. Unfortunately, there are potential side effects.
“Bolingbroken” is a term used by those who have experienced Project Watchdog firsthand or have witnessed the potential side effects. The alteration of time and aging has disorienting effects ranging from delusion and dysphoria to hallucinations and difficulties perceiving time. The program continues because most direct side effects are inconsistent and temporary.
Project Watchdog explains and fixes issues created by months of IC time equaling minutes of RL time regarding prison sentences.
THE CODE
The code includes some of the universally accepted unofficial standards of conduct that all citizens should be aware of, as criminal organizations and law enforcement alike are more than eager to enforce them.
Mission Row LSPD employs a fair amount of local police who are present at all times, making it what many call a green zone, a significant place of neutrality that even criminals respect. Stirring up too much trouble with LSPD can cause disruptions for criminals who benefit from blind eyes and symbiosis.
Pillbox Hospital, the city's primary source of medical services and transfers, is also a green zone. Because their services are so important, medical professionals are valued by all. Kidnapping, harming, robbing, or killing medical professionals while on duty is typically met with city-wide fury.
Just as there are green zones, there are red zones, areas that are guarded secrets and extremely dangerous to uninvited individuals. Most criminal dominated locations are considered red zones where justice turns a blind eye.
While transfers are offered free of cost, repeat users raise red flags. Those who are found to overuse transfers by recklessly endangering their lives are branded financial burdens who may find themselves cut off, legally charged, or facing consequences from medical corporations. Those who opt for private transfers, expedited transfer services, or illegal transfers off the record may need to pay a premium.
Due to tension between types of beings and fear of the unknown, many people opt to masquerade as standard humans or willfully ignore odd realities such as transfers and the breach. Those who forcibly break the masquerades of others by outing beings or upsetting their sense of normalcy are often viewed as potential extremists.