Apply
Before all else: thank you for considering applying to THE SIGNAL. If you haven't yet read through the setting and mechanics, I strongly recommend you do so now. It will help you decide whether THE SIGNAL is the right game for you, and give you a solid foundation to begin building your character.
Character creation
01 / 04As you go about creating your character and completing the application, please keep the following in mind.
THE SIGNAL is a grounded historical fiction RP. All characters must be human and at least 18 years of age.
To maintain the atmosphere of the setting, please have your character represent the standards of modesty, dress, and behaviour of the era to a reasonable degree. As a deliberate choice, you may have your character dress or behave outside of these norms if it is within their characterisation to do so, but please be prepared to acknowledge these IC choices.
Your character may be difficult, combative, or standoffish, and may even carry prejudices from their background. These should be treated as room for growth, and discriminatory or bigoted beliefs may not be a central aspect of your character.
Although the setting strives for realism, at the end of the day this is fiction. Character creation is not restricted by gender, race, ethnicity or sexual orientation. The story will not sanitise the time it is set in, but you may assume that your character will not face any discrimination in the ISC and Section 0, nor the plot, on the basis of any of the above.
Your character must be an employee of Section 0 to participate in the story. Conveniently, Section 0 recruits a variety of people from a variety of backgrounds—consider why they may have been interested in your character. Or, alternatively, who might've pulled strings to get your character into Section 0.
Working on a concept? Add your character to the reservation sheet so other applicants can see who's in the works.
Written application
02 / 04Member selection will be based almost entirely on the quality of the written application.
Fill out the application with your character's true details, not their cover story (if they have one). You're welcome to make a separate ‘public’ version with omitted or falsified information.
The written application contains four sections. Open each one for guidance.
01Basic InformationName · Age · Height · Date of Birth · Place of Birth · Citizenship(s) · Physical Description
This is the basic identifying information for your character. If your character uses an alias or false identity, please indicate so on your application.
Physical Description is an optional field you may delete if you like. You are strongly encouraged to provide a physical description if you choose not to submit a visual application, but this is not required.
02BackgroundPosition · Tags
Position
Your character's position should describe their role or specialisation in Section 0. Examples of positions your character may hold:
- Radio technician
- Cryptanalyst or signals analyst
- Electronics engineer
- Field investigator
- Medical officer
- Diplomatic liaison
- Interpreter or translator
- Records clerk or archivist
- Press officer
- Psychologist
- Linguist
You're welcome to get creative! Section 0 exists to investigate the strange and inexplicable, which means relying on all manner of unconventional specialists and people who simply happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Tags
Tags are the primary mechanic of THE SIGNAL. They are short, descriptive phrases meant to capture who your character is and what they're good at. Each character will begin with two tags, with opportunities to acquire more as the game progresses. See Writing good tags.
03BiographyPersonality · History · Other
The fields in this section have no minimum or maximum word count—you may write as little or as much as you feel necessary to accurately convey who your character is and where they come from.
Personality
Should capture both the positive and negative traits of your character. This may be a list of traits, bullet points, or a paragraph description. The main goal is to illustrate who your character is as a person and how they will contribute to the dynamic of the cast.
History
The history in the main copy of your written application (that is, the one the mod will see) should cover your character's life up to October 1961. Please make sure to include how and why they joined Section 0. Other points of interest you are encouraged to include are their upbringing, education, if/how they were impacted by major world events, previous employment, and defining life events.
Other
Use this to include any information which isn't covered by the other fields. This could be a playlist, mood board, likes and dislikes, trivia, or other miscellaneous information.
04OOCHooks, narrative goals & themes · Mun · Timezone · About
Hooks, narrative goals, and themes
Your opportunity to share what you hope to achieve with your character.
Hooks are aspects of your character's background which are integral to their story. This could be an event in their past, an object, a person, anything which may resurface in the present to kickstart their personal story.
Narrative goals are the direction you want your character's story to go—this could be redemption, revenge, overcoming a social, mental, or physical obstacle, etc.
Themes are ideas you want to explore. They may have significant overlap with your narrative goals, or be more abstract, such as confronting the unknown, the impact of war, the relationship between the self and institutions, or resilience in the face of insurmountable odds.
You may go into as little or as much depth as you want, and it is expected that the hooks, narrative goals, and themes of your character will change and evolve as you play them. The purpose of this section is to give me an idea of what sort of role you want your character to play in the story and how I can give them an opportunity to shine.
About
Your space to include triggers, roleplay preferences, and any other OOC information you would like to share with the mod and fellow players.
Visual application
03 / 04
Completely optional, and not factored into acceptance decisions.
Your visual application may be your own art or a commission/request drawn by another artist. Please do not use photographs of real people or AI-generated images to represent your character.
You are strongly encouraged to keep in mind the time period and background of your character when working on your visual application. If you have any questions or would like help with inspiration or research, you're more than welcome to reach out in the group's Discord server! You can also find inspiration images for period attire and aesthetic on THE SIGNAL Pinterest board.
The font used on the application is D-DIN.
Submission
04 / 04
Applications open on a date to be announced. This page will be updated with the submission link once they do.
In addition to your written and (optional) visual application, the submission form includes a few additional questions about your expectations for the group. Your responses help me get a feel for what you hope to get out of this story and how best to tailor this experience to make it engaging and enjoyable for all participants, so please take a moment to answer them!