Eternity/Heysuess

Here is for our rp.

Time Period: 1970's / March 13, 1971 will be a better specific date to begin with, unless you have a better idea.

Place: This is open for discussion. Some areas I'll offer up are:
-Saigon: I keep this place as my only choice so far because it was the capital of South Vietnam

Characters: (mine will be listed further below)


Plot: This is open for discussion

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Name: Suong Tuyen
Age: 18
Gender: female

Height/Weight/Build: 5'6''/128 lbs/slender
Hair Color/Hair Length/Hair Texture or Style: Black/Long (lower back)/As most, her hair is gently coarse and soft, but it is still smooth, and straight.

Profession:
-Nurse: Ky Vong Mission Hospital

Family:
-Thao Tuyen (older brother)
-Phuong Tuyen (father)
-Mai Tuyen (mother)

OTHER:
-Lives in a French Influence area
-Is Catholic and has attended Khai Tri Catholic School in Can Tho

Appearance/Picture:



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Better idea for the date: Bump it back prior to '71, as the pullout starts happening by then. We can set this in Can Tho or Saigon, either one is fine.

Name: Virgilio Alvarado, 25 years old.
Rank: Lieutenant, Junior Grade,
Height/Weight/Build: 5'9'/167 lbs/big-shouldered.

Profession: Naval Special Warfare - An experienced SEAL, Alvarado is on his third tour in Vietnam, and knows the Mekong Delta region fairly well. He is currently attached to Detachment Bravo, which works with Provincial Reconnaissance Units to try and locate local Viet Cong leadership and neutralize or capture them in raids. Due to the extensive river and canal system, the Navy are in charge of this in the Mekong Delta, as opposed to the rest of Vietnam, where the Army runs the show.

Personality: Alvarado is an aggressive hard charger that served in the Delta for three tours, though his social graces are much better than his former CO's-- he will actually try to reason with people. This degree of diplomacy put him in an interesting job where he immediately became first-hand familiar with the way the Vietnamese government works, and does not trust them. Despite this, he has a job to do, but often does it without keeping the locals in the loop, and while this borders on insubordination to orders, his CO is at Binh Thuy goes to bat for him because he manages to get results

History:
- Enlisted in US Navy, volunteered for BUD/S, Little Creek, VA. Assigned to SEAL Team 2.
-January '68-June '68 SEAL Team 2, Hotel Platoon out of Vinh Long (WIA)
-BS Psychology, San Diego State University, '70
-June '70-January '71 SEAL Team 2 Juliet Platoon, Long Binh, Mekong Delta
-'71 SEAL Team 2, Det. Bravo: Liason with Vietnamese PRU, IV Corps, Bassac River (WIA - Recovering in Saigon or Can Tho)

Appearance: 5'10, and muscular around the shoulders, he is of Mexican extract; shave as he might, the five o'clock shadow comes back after a few hours. He wears his hair longish, but well within Navy regs, which are fairly loose compared to the Army's regs (not that these are enforced much in Vietnam.)

Fluent in Vietnamese, knows some Cambodian.

Other pics, to help establish the look and zeitgeist:

All right. Now, plot ideas and story necessities.

What's the progress in the war at this point?
Where would they be meeting? (establishment?)
What kind of profession would best suit Suong? (bar girl was the role of lead actress in Miss Saigon, should we apply that here? It would prove interesting)
Excess dramas? (is your character married, attacks planned soon, etc.)

Eternity wrote:All right. Now, plot ideas and story necessities.

What's the progress in the war at this point?
Where would they be meeting? (establishment?)
What kind of profession would best suit Suong? (bar girl was the role of lead actress in Miss Saigon, should we apply that here? It would prove interesting)
Excess dramas? (is your character married, attacks planned soon, etc.)

1970-1971 is post Tet Offensive and most everyone is pretty sure that the North Vietnamese are going to win eventually, despite Ho Chi Minh's death. Richard Nixon is president, and is trying to bully the Vietnamese into surrendering so that he can pull the hell out via 'Peace with Honor.' Back Stateside, the war protests are definitely underway, and depending on what time of the year it is in 1971, National Guardsmen just got done shooting students during a protest at Kent State.

In Vietnam, the attempt is made towards "Vietnamization" of the war, but it is not very effective because the Saigon regime is extremely incompetent and is infilitrated by enemy agents, when it isn't running crime syndicates to squeeze the peasantry. One of the big things the Vietnamese Army is into is helping move heroin into the US, and they use planes shipping back dead American troops to pull this off.

Basically, the RVN is rottenly corrupt and hated by its own people in the South, as it doesn't really care about them and squeezes them, and the war has displaced a lot of Vietnamese, either intentionally or otherwise, and poverty is rampant. The Americans aren't directly responsible for some of the cruelties practiced by the Saigon government upon the people, but the Saigon government is supported by them, even as they steal from them.

Beyond that, lots of Vietnamese, particularly ethnic minorities and Catholics, are not happy with the idea of what the Communists are going to do to them when it's done. The average Vietnamese, caught between both sides, pretty much does what they have to in order to get by and are pretty exhausted by it all. The Americans are pulling out, and it's doubtful the ARVN can keep fighting the war.

Basically, the war is winding down badly at this point, but it still drags on because of politics.

I suggest the meeting actually be at the hospital or a nearby establishment. I think her profession...well, up to you. I'd actually put her in as part of one of those Catholic families that came in from the North and were buddy-buddy with the French. That'd give her a good reason to be a nurse at a mission hospital of the sort that were still running in Vietnam until the Communists won in 1975.

And my character's job is dramatic, because it involves running raids against communists and all sorts of suspense. I suggested Can Tho as a location because Saigon is a lot more secure. Can Tho is more out in the boonies where the action is.

Wow. Amazing, and I love it

All right. Sorry I'm not popping up with equally intriguing and interesting ideas. Kind of tired. But what you came up with sounds perfect. I'll work on perfecting my character now, and then maybe we can work out a few kinks, and get the IC up.

Anything else you can think of that might need tweaking?
AND I'll also change the Can Tho to the rp starting point/setting.

Not off hand. I suggested Catholic and somewhat patrician because otherwise, I don't know if my character would touch her. Bar girls and so forth were known to work for the VC.

At least one drama hook would be the price on Alvarado's head; if he's been ID'ed at all, he's probably got at least 50,000 piasters bounty for his death. I'm not sure if any Vietnamese ever actually collected these bounties, but they did exist...

Hm, true. Didn't think of that, but it makes sense. I'm reading up on the Vietnamese lifestyle during the war to kind of get a hang of things. Also, would you like to make the first post? I'm kind of feeling blank as to where to start. And you seem to make these super long amazing historical posts. Hahaha.

If you don't want to, though, you can surely decline. I won't mind But if I post up the topic, it'll probably be tomorrow.

Now, what is going to have your character in the hospital? What kind of injury; and what would've brought him there (mission wise, etc)?

Yeah, I'll get to work.

That is to say, I'll set up my character with the hospital and so forth. That's the easy part.

Alright, the post is up.

Gah! That post was amazing! Anyways, I will respond in the morning (the sensible morning, not right now), because I only got up to check things out a bit. Couldn't sleep. Anyways, later!

Thanks, but I find myself still editing it here and there. I think I'm done for the night. But sometimes I fire off a post in an hour and a half and then need to go back to it over several hours and edit it a good bit.

Unfortunately, it means that the forum at large sees the evolution a bit. But I think I'm done now.

I posted, but man: You've got to be one of the best writers on this site. Probably even the internet. Hahaha. But really- that's being honest.

Hah, thanks. But I really never think of that sort of thing. I try to be highly self-critical and improving rather than rest on my laurels. One of the reasons I'm here is to practice, experiment and work on it more and more, just like a lot of people, I'd wager.

I appreciate it, though.

I will probably post tomorrow. I had a long book club this afternoon and also threw in an extra few hours of sleep. It seems that roleplaying with you requires more brain power than usual LOL.

BUT that is a good thing, and I'm working on a post now. Just, between edits and whatnot, it won't make it up til tomorrow.

It's all good, I'm trying to recover from a two day flu thing (I caught it before it had a chance to settle in and become bad, airborne, rest and meds and I seem to have knocked it out) and I'm just catching up on loose-ends, writing wise.

So take your time, I'll feel less guilty about how long it's taken me to get stuff up for Pandora's.