Name: MJ Age: Old Contact:unbeliever Other Characters: Bastien, Redvers Keen, Xiomara Novoa Interests: It has been eight years and you haven't given me Druffy.
Father: Nevarran nobleman. Mother: sister of an Antivan Merchant Prince. Siblings: an identical twin and a now-deceased little sister.
Ruined his extremely comfortable childhood by developing magic and accidentally killing his sister with it at age 9.
First Circle: College of Magi in Cumberland. Kostos was traumatized and miserable and morbid, prone to hiding to avoid magic lessons and scaring the other children with death and damnation talk. Nevarran attitudes about magic plus his family's money and influence meant they were allowed to visit him sometimes, in conference room situations, to try to help him even out.
Second Circle: Nevarra City. Transferred in his teens because his aptitude for spirit magic and noble connections made him a natural choice for the Mortalitasi. Got a big head about it.
Third Circle: Ghislain, after being dragged out of bed and transported there in chains. Later found out that it was because his brother had tried to kill the king of Nevarra and his family had fled the country. The Circle tossing him outside of Nevarra's reach probably saved his life. But Ghislain sucked. Essentially a prison for mages whose misbehavior didn't quite warrant Tranquility or who were too politically inconvenient for Val Royeaux/Montsimmard. Kostos became extremely annoying about badgering the Templars to follow the rules, which didn't work but also didn't get him disappeared because his family was still rich and important.
Fourth Circle: Ansburg, where Ghislain authorities were overjoyed to send him to take on his first apprentice, a young man who shared his particular gift with spirits.
No Circle: Ansburg wasn't dramatic about it. Mages just walked out. Kostos went to Andoral's Reach with the others and was on the Loyalist's side of the vote there, but since the deal was that the Loyalists would still fight if they lost, he fought.
Wound up in a guerilla-esque unit led by Nell Voss, then wound up her lieutenant and best pal. Did some war crimes. Lost some friends. Threw up about killing people.
From out in the field, heard Fiona had indentured the mages to Tevinter. Then like 2 minutes later heard Fiona had pledged the mages to the Inquisition. Confusing and sketchy. So their group was like "nah" and kept doing what they were doing for a while.
Eventually did come in and join up when the larger threat persisted in not going away.
Highlights with Inquisition/Riftwatch: griffon riding, helping Nell lead a mage strike to force the release of phylacteries, bringing his sister's mummy to the Gallows for reasons, curing someone of Tranquility, big fight with Nell because she helped assassinate a GRAND CLERIC without telling him, etc.
Left to rejoin the rebel mage army after Fiona was killed and has been with them for most of the last year.
Personality
Kostos is terminally surly, dark tempered, and intractable. He’s an introvert in a way that he makes everyone else’s problem, starting conversations he seems immediately resentful to be forced to continue and making eye contact with the chin-down borderline hostility of someone who was told not to look at the floor when talking to people and only learned to raise his eyes. But he’s not shy, because that’s a different thing. He has next to zero anxiety about whether people like him. If he has something to say, his impulse is to say it as immediately and directly as possible, whether that’s telling someone he thinks they suck or asking if they’d like to fuck.
He’s stuck between belief in a dogmatic religion and a theoretical yearning for order and control vs. an inescapable chaotic degeneracy in personal practice. He loves to gamble and fight and make bad sex decisions and kick hives just to see. Someone only watching him and never listening to him would maybe never have any idea he’s so uptight about so many things. There’s a bit of logic to it; he thinks he’s dangerous—look at how bad his impulse control is, he is not someone who should have the ability to kill people with lightning—and he’d love to outsource doing something about that to a higher power. There's also some trauma, and then there's some basic hypocrisy and compartmentalization, because he’s human.
He has plenty of self-awareness, and he wavers between regret and defiance. There are days when he hears you honking and he would also like him to not be doing what he is doing. There are other days when he hears you honking and he’s flipping you off about it. His prevailing stance is that he sucks, but so does life, and if he’s the worst thing that happens to someone on any given day then they have it pretty good.
Somehow, despite all of this, he has friends who he cares about a lot and vice versa. I’d attribute that to a few different factors. First, some people are just into his kind of thing. Second, he's sometimes fun. He has a dry brand of humor that makes it hard to tell when he’s joking, but he does joke. He’s capable of smiling. He goes along with dumb ideas; catch him showing up to Satinalia parties looking like he wants to murder everyone including himself but nonetheless wearing whatever stupid costume one of his friends said he should wear. He’s honest (for better or worse, see paragraph 1) and terribly loyal. He will argue all the way to the bridge, but if when they get there his friends still think jumping off of it is a good idea, he’ll jump too. And if any outsider says jumping off the bridge was stupid then he'll punch them in the face.
Opinions & Affiliations
Circles: A lifelong Loyalist prior to the war, Kostos has shifted over the last few years into more of an Aequitarian. He's invested in mages having self-determination as a group, but not as individuals, and he's opposed to them using that self-determination to set themselves loose on the world. Especially steadfast in opposition to mages inheriting, marrying, or procreating.
Templars: As a theoretical group, he thinks they're necessary. As real individuals in the same room as him, he is afraid of them and therefore hates them. Touch him and there's a one in four chance he loses his shit about it.
Nations: Considers himself not a citizen of anywhere anymore but still patriotic in an expat way. Culturally extremely Nevarran and has a chip on his shoulder about other people's horror/confusion about Nevarran practices. Dislikes Orlais because he personally has never had a nice time there.
Races: Elven friends via Circles/Riftwatch but elf oppression isn't really on his radar as a thing to concern himself with. Does anyone have opinions about dwarves? They're fine. Thinks the Qun might be on to something sometimes.
Religion: Nevarran Andrastian and anyone who believes differently is incorrect.
Strengths & Weaknesses
Spirit magic: A former spirit magic child prodigy, mostly by virtue of being one Thedas' rare spirit mediums capable of communing and mentally connecting with spirits, seeing through their eyes, etc. He's extracted a lot of utility out of that talent and is nice to have around in a support role as a barrier machine, battery pack, or commander of a small unit of versatile spirit wisps. Here's a spell list including his previously approved custom specializations.
Veteran: He's been in one war or another for going on a decade, most of it with Riftwatch, so he's acquired all the familiarity with combat and weird shit that entails. He's also a trained griffon rider.
Connections: Kostos' uncle is one of Antiva's Merchant Princes, his parents are extremely wealthy in their own right, and he has some blood ties to various Nevarran noble houses. None of these are things that Kostos wants to acknowledge or would be good at leveraging on his own, but they've come in handy before and might again.
Misc: He speaks Nevarran as a first and preferred primary language, fluent Trade (with an accent), and good albeit slightly stiff Antivan.
WEAKNESSES
Non-spirit magic: Due to a combination of impatience, fear, disinterest in reading, and the plain old absence of talent, he's terrible with any non-spirit spells. In one sense lightning magic comes easily to him—if someone jumps him in an alley they'll probably get electrocuted out of reflex, for example—but in an uncontrolled way. Like fifty-fifty odds of friendly fire. His handful of primal tempest magic spells were an unsuccessful attempt to improve his control, and he only uses them if things are very dire.
Personality Insofar As It Affects Work: Like, most of it. He's churlish and blunt and stubborn to the point that he once had to resign from a leadership position in Riftwatch because he refused to make even a token apology to an offended ally. He is a bad liar and a bad actor. He wants to be a patient mage who reads books but it just isn’t his nature, so given tasks that require a lot of patience/detail he’s also likely to try to just hit it with a wrench (in a manner of speaking) instead.
Misc: He’s gotten better at outdoor survival/scouting than he was during the Mage/Templar War which was his first time outside a Circle in TWENTY YEARS, NELL, how was he supposed to tell animal tracks apart—but still it isn’t his favorite and he acts like a wet cat about being exposed to any elements whatsoever. He's worse at cards than he thinks at the table and is still paying off some gambling debts in Kirkwall.
Inventory
Light armor, clothes, good boots
Staff enchanted for cold damage and improving mana regeneration
Phoenix skull he's in the process of burning designs into
His own personal phylactery
Large black marble hand from a statue
Motivation
After previously leaving Riftwatch on good will-still-be-in-touch terms to rejoin the rebel mage army, Kostos immediately lent his support to Nell Voss' ongoing agitation for the rebel mage army to distance itself from the Chantry and the Exalted March. As a result, he's being reassigned back to Riftwatch by Fiona's acting successor, Rodrigo Valenzolo. If Nell isn't being reassigned too then it's because Kostos is less useful and less popular.
kostos averesch | native oc (reapp)
Name: MJ
Age: Old
Contact:
Other Characters: Bastien, Redvers Keen, Xiomara Novoa
Interests: It has been eight years and you haven't given me Druffy.
Name: Kostos Sicurano Averesch
Canon/OC: OC
Journal:
Race: Human
Nationality: Nevarran/Antivan
Occupation: Enchanter
Division: TBD
Mage or Not: Mage
Age: 30s
History
Personality
Kostos is terminally surly, dark tempered, and intractable. He’s an introvert in a way that he makes everyone else’s problem, starting conversations he seems immediately resentful to be forced to continue and making eye contact with the chin-down borderline hostility of someone who was told not to look at the floor when talking to people and only learned to raise his eyes. But he’s not shy, because that’s a different thing. He has next to zero anxiety about whether people like him. If he has something to say, his impulse is to say it as immediately and directly as possible, whether that’s telling someone he thinks they suck or asking if they’d like to fuck.
He’s stuck between belief in a dogmatic religion and a theoretical yearning for order and control vs. an inescapable chaotic degeneracy in personal practice. He loves to gamble and fight and make bad sex decisions and kick hives just to see. Someone only watching him and never listening to him would maybe never have any idea he’s so uptight about so many things. There’s a bit of logic to it; he thinks he’s dangerous—look at how bad his impulse control is, he is not someone who should have the ability to kill people with lightning—and he’d love to outsource doing something about that to a higher power. There's also some trauma, and then there's some basic hypocrisy and compartmentalization, because he’s human.
He has plenty of self-awareness, and he wavers between regret and defiance. There are days when he hears you honking and he would also like him to not be doing what he is doing. There are other days when he hears you honking and he’s flipping you off about it. His prevailing stance is that he sucks, but so does life, and if he’s the worst thing that happens to someone on any given day then they have it pretty good.
Somehow, despite all of this, he has friends who he cares about a lot and vice versa. I’d attribute that to a few different factors. First, some people are just into his kind of thing. Second, he's sometimes fun. He has a dry brand of humor that makes it hard to tell when he’s joking, but he does joke. He’s capable of smiling. He goes along with dumb ideas; catch him showing up to Satinalia parties looking like he wants to murder everyone including himself but nonetheless wearing whatever stupid costume one of his friends said he should wear. He’s honest (for better or worse, see paragraph 1) and terribly loyal. He will argue all the way to the bridge, but if when they get there his friends still think jumping off of it is a good idea, he’ll jump too. And if any outsider says jumping off the bridge was stupid then he'll punch them in the face.
Opinions & Affiliations
Circles: A lifelong Loyalist prior to the war, Kostos has shifted over the last few years into more of an Aequitarian. He's invested in mages having self-determination as a group, but not as individuals, and he's opposed to them using that self-determination to set themselves loose on the world. Especially steadfast in opposition to mages inheriting, marrying, or procreating.
Templars: As a theoretical group, he thinks they're necessary. As real individuals in the same room as him, he is afraid of them and therefore hates them. Touch him and there's a one in four chance he loses his shit about it.
Nations: Considers himself not a citizen of anywhere anymore but still patriotic in an expat way. Culturally extremely Nevarran and has a chip on his shoulder about other people's horror/confusion about Nevarran practices. Dislikes Orlais because he personally has never had a nice time there.
Races: Elven friends via Circles/Riftwatch but elf oppression isn't really on his radar as a thing to concern himself with. Does anyone have opinions about dwarves? They're fine. Thinks the Qun might be on to something sometimes.
Religion: Nevarran Andrastian and anyone who believes differently is incorrect.
Strengths & Weaknesses
Spirit magic: A former spirit magic child prodigy, mostly by virtue of being one Thedas' rare spirit mediums capable of communing and mentally connecting with spirits, seeing through their eyes, etc. He's extracted a lot of utility out of that talent and is nice to have around in a support role as a barrier machine, battery pack, or commander of a small unit of versatile spirit wisps. Here's a spell list including his previously approved custom specializations.
Veteran: He's been in one war or another for going on a decade, most of it with Riftwatch, so he's acquired all the familiarity with combat and weird shit that entails. He's also a trained griffon rider.
Connections: Kostos' uncle is one of Antiva's Merchant Princes, his parents are extremely wealthy in their own right, and he has some blood ties to various Nevarran noble houses. None of these are things that Kostos wants to acknowledge or would be good at leveraging on his own, but they've come in handy before and might again.
Misc: He speaks Nevarran as a first and preferred primary language, fluent Trade (with an accent), and good albeit slightly stiff Antivan.
WEAKNESSES
Non-spirit magic: Due to a combination of impatience, fear, disinterest in reading, and the plain old absence of talent, he's terrible with any non-spirit spells. In one sense lightning magic comes easily to him—if someone jumps him in an alley they'll probably get electrocuted out of reflex, for example—but in an uncontrolled way. Like fifty-fifty odds of friendly fire. His handful of primal tempest magic spells were an unsuccessful attempt to improve his control, and he only uses them if things are very dire.
Personality Insofar As It Affects Work: Like, most of it. He's churlish and blunt and stubborn to the point that he once had to resign from a leadership position in Riftwatch because he refused to make even a token apology to an offended ally. He is a bad liar and a bad actor. He wants to be a patient mage who reads books but it just isn’t his nature, so given tasks that require a lot of patience/detail he’s also likely to try to just hit it with a wrench (in a manner of speaking) instead.
Misc: He’s gotten better at outdoor survival/scouting than he was during the Mage/Templar War which was his first time outside a Circle in TWENTY YEARS, NELL, how was he supposed to tell animal tracks apart—but still it isn’t his favorite and he acts like a wet cat about being exposed to any elements whatsoever. He's worse at cards than he thinks at the table and is still paying off some gambling debts in Kirkwall.
Inventory
Motivation
After previously leaving Riftwatch on good will-still-be-in-touch terms to rejoin the rebel mage army, Kostos immediately lent his support to Nell Voss' ongoing agitation for the rebel mage army to distance itself from the Chantry and the Exalted March. As a result, he's being reassigned back to Riftwatch by Fiona's acting successor, Rodrigo Valenzolo. If Nell isn't being reassigned too then it's because Kostos is less useful and less popular.
A public service announcement; normal sibling stuff.