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[RFC] R. Mikhail Langley-Rhodes
[RFC] R. Mikhail Langley-Rhodes
#1
It's missing a few bits and pieces, but here's what I got for Mick.  I still need to work out certain dates, but the summary under his history should help in narrowing that down a bit.  Now I just need to find that one post that had the list of Regencies of the Sliver Millennium.
{{infinities}}
{{Infobox Character
|name          = R. Mikhail Langley-Rhodes
|image         =
|image_size    =
|caption       =
|birth_name    =
|birth_date    =
|birth_place   =
|death_date    =
|death_place   =
|body_discovered =
|death_cause   =
|resting_place =
|resting_place_coordinates =
|residence     = [[36 Atalante], [[Main Belt]
|nationality   = [[Fenspace Convention]
|ethnicity     = American
|citizenship   = Convention
|other_names   = Mick
|known_for     = Balls-out Awesome Sucessor to his Old Man.
|education     =
|alma_mater    =
|employer      =
|occupation    =
|years_active  =
|home_town     = [[36 Atalante], [[Main Belt]
|title         =
|salary        =
|networth      =
|branch        = [[The Roughriders]
|serviceyears  =
|rank          = OF-10
|unit          =
|commands      = Red Wing, 1st Veritech Squadron, Sol System Group; 1st Veritech Squadron, Sol System Group; Sky Marshall, Roughriders; CinC, Roughriders.
|height        = 5'7"
|weight        = 165 lbs.
|term          =
|predecessor   = [[Mayonaka Langley-Rhodes]
|successor     = [[Andrew 'Ender' Langley-Rhodes]
|party         =
|opponents     =
|boards        =
|religion      =
|spouse        =
|partner       = Unknown
|children      = Unknown
|parents       =
|relations     =
|callsign      =
|awards        = Knight Commander of the Order of Endymion the Protector
|mission       =
|insignia      =
|signature     =
|website       =
|footnotes     =
}}
''Primary Writer: [[User:BlackAeronaut|BlackAeronaut]''
Also known as the Red Haired Fury, and Benjamin's Red Second. Just don't ever call him a red-headed step-child. He takes that personally.
== Physical Attributes ==
* Age: 25 (apparent effective ???)
* Height: 5'8"
* Weight: 165lbs.
* Build: Athletic
* Hair: Red, shoulder length, wavy
* Eyes: Blue
* Other Notes: Take his father's looks, give him his mother's coloration, and their combined style and flamboyance.
== Handwavium ==
Like his Mother, Mikhail is actually an infomorph born as an infant bio-android. As such, he doesn't have anything so much as quirks, but abilities instead.
* ''Mechanical Man'': he is able to integrate himself into machinery to gain access and control. This makes him very effective at a range of tasks from piloting to computer hacking.
* ''Not Really Ranma'': but you might think so to see him fight. He is a martial arts prodigy, mastering in Shaolin Kung-Fu, Shatoken Karate, Kenjutsu, Jujitsu, Metalicto and Panzer Kunst just to name a few, and he mixes and matches however he sees fit in a style that he calls Anything Goes.
== Persona ==
In a nutshell, Mikhail is a fighter and a showboat. If Domon Kashu were to be born amongst the Fen, it would be as this person. He likes to make loud proclamations in the middle of battle, call his shots, and cause chaos among the enemy ranks in general.
In person, Mikhail is your friendly neighborhood cool-guy. He always wears a devil-may-care grin, as though he were about to start some trouble, however he is generally a good people person. He can always be counted on to lend a hand, and he is generally multi-talented. Granted, in his own way he's showing off, but at least he's being constructive about it.
In Diplomacy he takes his Father's mindset, with his personal spin being how foolish people are to get into a fight over something stupidly petty, such as territory or trade agreements. If it were a matter of piracy, slavery, or outright murder, then he could see why, and he always makes it a point to make a dramatic speech about how a good fight should be saved for either sport or for self-defense.
As a leader, he is is Father, two-fold. He is loud, but not Haruhi-loud. He is charisma incarnate. His voice is known for cutting through noise like a tangible thing and forcing itself to be heard.
In love and as a friend, he is all about making grand gestures. To Mikhail, it is not what you say, it is what you do. Here, he oddly reverts into the strong and silent type, offering friendly smiles, gestures of encouragement and camaraderie, and a playful wink and nudge.
== History ==
When Mikhail was born Benjamin asked Gina to choose a special name for his son because he was born on the same day as his dearly departed grandfather, a man that Benjamin admired despite his shortcomings because he had lived through such a difficult time in American history.
As a fraternal twin, Mikhail has always stood by his younger-by-five-minutes sister, Kyoko. His childhood was, despite a rigorous education from his parents and extended family, more or less carefree. When he was twelve he had a bachelor's degrees spanning several fields of engineering, including biomechanics. Even so, he never really was the brain that his twin sister was and has always had far more interest in the Martial Arts, which he was encouraged to pursue by his parents.
By the time he was fourteen he started training on Veritech fighters, primarily because of their ability to transform and go hand-to-hand against other mechs such as Gundams. He proved to be a virtuoso at the controls of a Valkyrie and it has been his mainstay ever since. At the age of eighteen he had graduated from Veritech School to join the rank and file of the Roughriders. He sky rocketed through the early part of his career, thanks in part to the expansion of the Roughriders both within and without the Sol System and also due to the retirement of the First Generation Roughriders. (Certain members, however, such as the Big Three – Benjamin, Gina, and Jess – would retain their positions for many decades.) Within months he was a Wing Commander, and the year after that he was promoted to Squadron Leader. By the time he was twenty-five he was designated the new Sky Marshal of the Roughriders – the operational commander of all Roughriders aerospace combat elements, and the relief of the aging Bronwyn Ffoulks.
Mikhail spent many decades happy in this position, essentially the right-hand man of his Father, and he continued to do so under his older sister, Mayonaka Langley-Rhodes, once Benjamin designated her as his successor (the way he saw it is that the CinC doesn't get to have as much fun as the Sky Marshal). His next promotion would not come until Mayonaka's own retirement, where he was chosen to succeed her as the Roughriders CinC.
His time as the CinC was, initially, not an easy one. As Mayonaka had retired to assume Regency over the Silver Millennium Empire, she had entrusted him to lead the Roughriders in support of her efforts to stabilize a volatile Faction. There were many joint Roughrider/SAMIE operations during this time period that brought the SME to the brink of, and back from all-out civil war, and in many cases it was only because of the combined force of Mikhail's charisma and Mayonaka's sheer foreboding presence.
In the end, the Empire was stabilized and True Successor to the Throne came of age, assuming her regal responsibilities in what became a renaissance-period for the SME. Mikhail was glad for the passing of this tumultuous period and began to shift the Roughriders' focus towards 'peaceful peacekeeping'. In broad terms, this meant more resources being allocated to the HARDES Branch of the Roughriders, something for which his sister, Kyoko, was grateful for.
In time, Mikhail decided that he had enough of command and decided to retire, turning his position over to his more well-suited younger brother, Andrew 'Ender' Langley-Rhodes. Mikhail, as well as his Mother, Father, and elder sister, would all play pivotal roles in what was the one true civil war of the Silver Millennium Empire: the Rise and Fall of the Britanian Empire.
Afterwards, Mikhail would make a name for himself as a troubleshooter roving the multi-verse, under the auspices of whatever interdimensional authority whose jurisdiction he was working in. It is rumored that he did have a wife and and children, but they were not in our own home-universe and are unknown at this time.
Like his sister, Mayonaka, he has vowed that when he feels he is ready, he is going to follow his parents footsteps through The Door in hopes of seeing them again.
{{Roughriders}}
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#2
I, um...

This one needs serious rework, or maybe just scrap it entirely. Way, way too over the top here.
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"
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#3
Well, that's pretty much why I slapped an RFC tag on it. Besides, I pretty much pulled all this out in a matter of a couple hours. Good characters don't always develop overnight.

I'll see what I can do to tone it down, but just saying it needs serious rework, possibly scrapping, doesn't help me much.
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#4
Well, let's take it from the top:

Quote:|known_for = Balls-out Awesome Sucessor to his Old Man.

Quote:Like his Mother, Mikhail is actually an infomorph born as an infant bio-android. As such, he doesn't have anything so much as quirks, but abilities instead.

Quote:In a nutshell, Mikhail is a fighter and a showboat. If Domon Kashu were to be born amongst the Fen, it would be as this person.

Quote:As a leader, he is is Father, two-fold. He is loud, but not Haruhi-loud. He is charisma incarnate. His voice is known for cutting through noise like a tangible thing and forcing itself to be heard.

You're trying to sell me on the idea that this dude is the slickest thing since the Old Spice Guy, and I'm not buying it. All I'm seeing is a Mary Sue writ large: he's a lover, he's a fighter, a supergenius, generous to his friends and ruthless to his enemies, knows all sorts of KICKASS martial arts and pilots giant robots for a living, his moral compass is always pointed towards Good and he's kind to children and old ladies.

BA I am dissappoint. I expected more from you, no, I expected better from you than this mish-mash of cliches and stock fandom stereotypes. If you must - absolutely must! - detail out the lives of the next-generation Roughriders out way past the line where we'll ever get in terms of story, then for Xenu's sake make them into real people. Don't throw me this "well, Mikhail is the awesomest awesome who ever awesomed" folderol and expect me to smile and nod my head. I may be distracted, but I'm not bloody stupid.

(As an aside, the constant capitalization of 'Mother' and 'Father' adds a really weird subtext to the biography, as if Mikhail is some sort of cultist who wandered in off the street.)

That's a start. Where you want to take this is up to you, but if I were you I'd go and take a long, hard look at what you want this character to be, and how you want to get there.

--Gordon Ramsay
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"
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#5
I think you're trying too hard, BA. I mean, Mikhail's birth date is a good 2.5 years past the current "Infinities Horizon", and how many years would it be before he starts actually doing things?

I've always preferred descriptive character profiles over prescriptive ones, in any case ("This is his character as established in stories", as opposed to "This is what his depiction in stories must match"). I'd like to see stories that feature Mikhail that back this profile up, if at all possible. It does seem rather… purple. (Not proper use of the term, I know, but it has the same kind of feel as Purple Prose.)

If you're putting this up as part of the delegation project, then consider that the huge majority of creative effort is being expended upon The South Is Rising, Somebody Get A Hammer rather than advancing the canon Fenspace timeline. I'd say you have a couple years before Mikhail has a chance of entering canon.
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#6
M Fnord Wrote:You're trying to sell me on the idea that this dude is the slickest thing since the Old Spice Guy, and I'm not buying it.

The vibe I'm getting is that he doesn't always drink beer, but when he does, he prefers Dos Equis. And that ad campaign was over-the-top on purpose.

Something to consider for the re-write: Everybody has quirks and flaws; that's what makes people interesting. What are this guy's quirks and flaws?
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#7
Quote:What are this guy's quirks and flaws?
He uses time travel to write self-insert fanfiction under the name Jared Ornstead?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
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#8
Okay everyone, calm down. I already said I'd fix it so put the vitriol and pitchforks away.

I apologize for the sudden drop in quality, but things haven't been easy for me here. If you want the details I'm going to write a post in my blog about it - this is hardly the place for me to start venting.
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#9
BA, seriously, I wasn't trying to persecute; my apologies if it came across that way.

And here's hoping things work out better for you...
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#10
blackaeronaut Wrote:If you want the details I'm going to write a post in my blog about it - this is hardly the place for me to start venting.
Just read the blog post. Man, you gotta do what you gotta do - go concentrate on Real Life and don't worry about Fenspace for a while. I think we've got enough from you that we can at least keep the lights on for a few months.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#11
In fact, I thought that was the immediate plan. Go, take care of what needs doing. We'll be fine. We'll make you proud.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Reply
 
#12
Well, the immediate plan was "BA fleshes out his corner of Fenspace, then goes to take care of Real Life". I'm suggesting dropping the "fleshes out his corner of Fenspace, then" part.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
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#13
Just until I get this rat-bastard of a qualification knocked out. Probably looking at three to four weeks hard studying before I'm up for the Murder Board.
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