APPLICATION FOR SINGULARITY
Feb. 24th, 2012 03:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anteupPlayer Information
Your Nickname: linda
OOC Journal:superfluously
Under 18? nope
Email/IM: Pb2Ag (AIM), whyhotmailwhy@gmail.com
Characters Played at Singularity: Karkat Vantas
Character Information
Name: Luxord
Name of Canon: Kingdom Hearts
Canon/AU/Other Game CR: Canon
Reference: Kingdom Hearts as a series, Luxord specifically.
Canon Point: After being defeated by Sora in the World That Never Was.
Setting:
The worlds of the Kingdom Hearts universe are unique in that they are worlds-- entire planets devoted to a single canon. Most of those canons are Disney, but of course, a few (The World That Never Was, Twilight Town, Destiny Islands, End of the World, Traverse Town, Hollow Bastion) are completely plot related and filled to the brim with a strange combination of original universe characters, Final Fantasy characters, and Disney. Previous to Kingdom Hearts I, each of these worlds were separated from each other, with only a few individuals having the knowledge of other worlds and even less knowing how to navigate them (like King Mickey). However, by the time Kingdom Hearts begins, each of these worlds are being infected by Darkness (capital D, kids), which manifests itself through the creation of Heartless. This is because a group of various Disney Villains, led by Maleficent, have decided that Darkness is just the coolest thing ever, and with a little prompting from a cloaked figure with an incredibly sexy voice (the Heartless Ansem [who is actually another guy named Xehanort's Heartless, but jesus Christ let’s not get into all the crazy naming issues here, or I’ll have to break out the charts, just focus on the fact that his voice is incredibly sexy]), they begin infecting the Hearts of worlds so that they fall into Darkness and are destroyed.
“But, Linda! Why’s that a bad thing?!” You might ask. In fact, I’m asking for you. Just looking at the Heartless Ansem (Xehanort’s heartless), what are the disadvantages? I mean, if Darkness means I get to listen to that voice all day—oh baby, holla holla. Unfortunately for me, that’s not the case. When an individual or a world falls to darkness, a few curious things happen.
1) The heart is separated from the body.
2) Nobodies and Heartless are created.
So let’s break this apart. Darkness goes after the Hearts of things—worlds, people, whatever. So, it’s the Heart that is consumed by Darkness. The Heart consumed by Darkness becomes a Heartless (yeah, the name is misleading, FIGHT ME), and depending on how strong the heart of an individual was, the Heartless can either be your typical Shadows or something as terrifying as Darkside. I could get into the differences between Emblem Heartless and Pureblood Heartless, but then I'd have to jump off a fucking bridge. Basically, if you have an incredibly strong Heart, like Xehanort, your Heartless can maintain a similar form to the human it came from.
So, the Heart goes off to become a Heartless—that leaves behind the body, which, yet again, depending on the strength of Heart of the individual it used to be, becomes a Nobody (yet again, misleading, Nomura’s kinda crazy). The weakest type of Nobody is something like a Dusk, while the strongest or, as Xigbar called it, “elites” are Organization XIII (Luxord is number 10). From what we can tell through comparisons (Xemnas-Xehanort, Braig-Xigbar, etc, Roxas-Sora, etc etc), powerful Nobodies are pretty damn similar looking to their original counterparts. They just happen to enjoy putting “X”s in their names, more so than someone with a Heart would. I guess.
So, as you can guess, the conglomerate of Disney villains miss that whole Nobody part. In fact, for the entirety of Kingdom Hearts I, everyone misses that Nobody part. Instead, at this point, the Organization is working in secret, letting the Disney villains sew their Darkness throughout the worlds. Because, in the end, that helps them out, because they’re after Hearts.
See, at the beginning of Kingdom Hearts, a boy named Sora finds that he can use a weapon called the Keyblade, which releases the Hearts devoured by Darkness when he kills Heartless. Without a Keyblade, defeating Heartless means that the Heart isn’t freed from the Darkness, so it’ll become a Heartless again. When Sora defeats a Heartless, the Heart is freed and floats away… Until the Organization snatches it up. A German in the U-Bahn might exclaim to his drunken friend: “Sie haben ihre Herzen gesnatched! Oh neiiiiinnnnn!!!!!”
What unites Organization XIII is their need to regain their own lost Hearts, and they believe that the only way to do so is through creating their own Kingdom Hearts (or a bigass heart-moon in the sky). In order to create Kingdom Hearts, they need a metric fuckton of hearts. Fortunately for them, sometime during the events of the first Kingdom Hearts, Sora loses his Heart to the Darkness, which means he makes his own Nobody—Roxas. Of course, the Organization is on him like white on rice. They snatch his ass up, and Roxas becomes their own Keyblade master. Through crazy bullshit shenanigans, they also create a replica doll named Xion that leeches Roxas’ power in the hope of having two Keyblade masters. It doesn’t work, pushes Roxas to leave the Organization, and made me cry like a wee babby. Without Roxas or Xion, the Organization’s only solution is to manipulate Sora into defeating tons of Heartless (Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories happened, but it was a colossal failure on the part of the Organization and Luxord had nothing to do with it).
So, Kingdom Hearts II is basically the Organization manipulating Sora into killing Heartless so they can collect Hearts. It’s pretty damn effective. Each Organization member travels to a different world (Luxord has Wonderland in KH Days and Port Royale in KHII) where they manipulate the people and the situations to get Sora to kill Heartless. Thankfully for them, their job is made a helluva lot easier by Disney villains trying to be the edgy, cool Darkness kids.
Unfortunately, Sora figures this shit out (which is a miracle) and comes at the Organization (with a little help from Axel). He single-handedly storms their bigass castle, and cuts down the remaining members of Organization XIII (Luxord included). And then their fakey fake Kingdom Hearts gets blown up by Ansem (the real one). Because being nonexistence is suffering.
Personality:
There are two types of gamblin’ men in Kingdom Hearts. You have the cheating, oddly jazzy scumbag kind, and the British gamblers of fate (i.e. Luxord, who doesn’t have a snappy song unfortunately). However, they both share a common trait: a willingness to gamble with life. While Oogie Boogie uses the lives of others, Luxord and his personal Nobodies, the Gamblers, gamble their own nonexistence in games against Sora throughout Kingdom Hearts II. Instead of the traditional midboss fight, Luxord’s HP bar is replaced with a Time bar, and Sora must fight him while watching both his own Time bar and his HP. If you fucking suck at any sort of complicated game play and are on beginner mode, it’s easy to just beat the shit out of Luxord and call it a day before plowing through the rest of the game and crying on your best friend’s basement floor at the ending (personal experiences). However, if you aren’t a shitty gamer like I am, in order to win Luxord’s fight, you must engage in a variety of games that decrease Luxord’s Time bar if you win.
This draws attention to a few key qualities of Luxord’s personality:
1) the games are fair. Sora faced many of Luxord’s Gambler Nobodies throughout the game, where he had to play smaller stakes versions of the games Luxord presents. Which means, Sora ought to be familiar with the rules of Luxord’s games during the fight. Not only did he provide the opportunity for Sora to learn the rules, he remained fair by not changing them for his boss fight.
2) He just really fucking loves challenging others. Many of the games you must play with him during his fight are things similar to Memory—where there are several cards, and only one of them is Luxord (yes he can turn himself into a card, this is Kingdom Hearts, stop questioning shit). Sora is presented with which card Luxord is, then all of them go face down and move around. After a few seconds, Sora is presented with the backs of the cards, and must choose which one is Luxord in a small amount of time. If Sora chooses correctly multiple times, the amount of cards to choose from increase, as do the penalties of choosing the wrong one. Another game is where Sora is presented with four cards, with three black Xs and one red O changing rapidly. He must pick the O in a very short amount of time (which is very similar to the games Sora plays with the Gambler Nobodies). If Sora succeeds, mid-battle, Luxord praises him and rewards him with health. If he fails, he gets penalized by being turned into a card for a brief amount of time and losing some of his Time bar. Before beginning each game, Luxord simply states the rules—either with a “Look closely,” like with the Memory game, or “Do you know the rules?,” like with the game played previously with the other Nobodies. Only does he, towards the end of the fight, turn into a massive douchebag and just start beating the shit out of Sora with cards without any sort of game involved. Though, honestly, if I were about to get my ass kicked, I’d probably do the same. …Not with cards though. With, like, a chainsaw or something. But unlike me, even in the end, Luxord still provides Sora with chances to win, by providing a more challenging version of the XXXO game. When defeated, he compliments Sora on his game-playing skills. All of this, while backing up his fairness aspect, also shows that most of his games are aggressive. They force the individual he’s playing with to determine their own fate through their skills and knowledge of his rules. Unlike something like poker (which he does play), the games he presents Sora are not entirely luck based—one needs skill and knowledge to compete. Luxord was gambling that Sora lacked that skill, and unfortunately for him, he lost (because I can buttonmash with the best of ‘em).
So I’m sure you’re all sitting there like, “Jesus fucking CHRIST LINDA WE UNDERSTAND THAT YOU WATCHED A 4 MINUTE YOUTUBE VIDEO OF THE FIGHT AND YOU HAVE A LADYBONER FOR THE FIGHT MUSIC. LUXORD DID OTHER SHIT IN KINGDOM HEARTS. GET TO IT,” and after a middle finger salute in your general direction (it’s a sign of endearment, I promise. I love you guys to death for putting up with me), I’ll get to the other parts of Luxord’s personality.
3) Everything’s a game, including his nonlife. If you just Ctrl + F “game,” you will realize that I have used that word an ungodly amount of times. There’s a reason for this, and it links into his personality. In Kingdom Hearts ##/whatever# Days, Luxord distributes a fuckton of surprisingly decent advice to Roxas, all while making an offensive amount of game-related puns. In Kingdom Hearts II, when first appearing, he forces Sora and co. on a scavenger hunt for cursed medallions in order to defeat the massive Heartless he’s unleashed on Port Royale. Before dying, he tells Sora “you play the game quite well.” As we can see, through speech and action, Luxord often equates life to a game—one that must be played, and one that he believes he plays pretty damn well. He forces others to play by his (firmly established, and surprisingly legitimate) rules. He also realizes when he needs to play by the rules of others—towards the end of Days, he associates himself and Roxas with pawns on a chessboard, following the orders of their superiors, while hoping that they won’t be casualties in the game. Luxord understands his position as one not calling the shots, and despite his hope, realizes that being sacrificed as a pawn is a completely legit fate.
This last point, of following other’s rules, reveals another part of Luxord’s personality: feelings (about individuals and situations). As has already been explained, Nobodies don’t have hearts, which means that they don’t experience emotion (which is questioned a few times throughout the games, whether they remember what it feels like to have emotions or whether they are merely pretending). However, unlike characters like Axel, Roxas, and Demyx, Luxord never tries to explain what he “feels” and seems to be pretty apathetic in regards to regaining his heart. In fact, the only times he does express any semblance of emotion is right as he’s fading into darkness after being defeated. Sora basically slices the fuck through him with his bigass key, and Luxord, without having the strength to look at Sora, asks, “How could you... Roxas...” While it may seem like a strange thing when playing Kingdom Hearts II alone, his words are put in context through the relationship Roxas has with Luxord in Days. Luxord’s “let’s skip the formalities” attitude of Kingdom Hearts II reveals a difference in Luxord’s opinion between Sora and Roxas, considering how talkative he was with Roxas in Days. Often times, Luxord gave Roxas gifts and advice to prepare him for his missions, and when questioned about various things (like where was Xion, what happened to the bros in Castle Oblivion), he wasn’t an asshole. He wasn’t particularly helpful either, but his responses in comparison to Xigbar’s or Xaldin’s were significantly less douchey. As Luxord and Roxas investigated Wonderland, Luxord would follow Roxas’ lead if the younger Nobody expressed curiosity in something (like the White Rabbit). Unlike the older and more experienced members of the Organization, Luxord was one of the few willing to not be a total dickweed (Word, stop changing that to “duckweed” fuckkkk). So, when Sora defeats Luxord, his final words are surprisingly emotional. He is obviously feeling some level of betrayal. The Organization sees Roxas in Sora, and at various points, try to communicate with Roxas through him. Despite their lack of success, most members hold this view to the end, which explains why Luxord addresses Roxas, not Sora. While it might be a stretch to claim Luxord cares about Roxas (a longass motherfuckin’ stretch), it’s obvious he has some form of professional, workplace camaraderie for the kid.
Finally, an important part of his personality is his intelligence. There are three journal entries about Luxord and his activities in Port Royale. Two of them describe him as a “master of rhetoric” and his “wily words.” Considering Sora and co. probably have the combined intelligence of a dead cow, it’s not surprising they would consider Luxord a pretty smart guy. However, when he starts busting out phrases like “veritable maelstrom of avarice,” you know you can’t discount his intelligence. Also, your twelve year old self who skipped school to play Kingdom Hearts II can thank him for teaching you vocabulary words. And by “you” I mean me. Thank you, Luxord. I would have never gotten the word “veritable” on that fucking Scantron test without you. But he’s not all pretty words. As described above, in the background section and the horrible part of this app where every other word was “game,” he knows his schemes and rules. Furthermore, his actions in Port Royale reveal a very strong understand of the world he’s in charge of. For starters, when confronted with Jack Sparrow, his first word is “Parlé,” in a scene reminiscent of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Luxord not only knew the rules of the pirates through careful investigation and stalkery, but he was also able to manipulate those rules to his gain. He also knew about the curse on the Pirates of the Black Pearl, which, even by the world’s own standards, was a BIG FUCKING SECRET, and yet again, knew how to manipulate it to his gain. Out of all the Nobodies, Luxord seems to be one of the most effective in this regard.
Abilities, Weaknesses, and Power Limitation Suggestions:
Luxord has power over time, which manifests itself in atypical ways. The most obvious way is through the Time bars in his boss fight—where one runs out of time instead of HP. However, most of his power comes in the form of his cards and dice. He has the ability to turn himself or others into human-sized cards or dice, which he usually uses as a penalty for his games. Through using his cards, if a player loses the game challenges he issues (like XXXO game or the other ones explained above), they will be turned into cards/dice or explosions.
He also has the ability to seal individuals away, either in, like, hammer-space or fuck if I know. They never explain where Luxord put Sora’s bros during their fight. Idk, I will probably never use this in game.
Luxord, in the game, like all members of Organization XIII, travels between worlds through Corridors of Darkness. However, because there’s nothing like Betwixt and Between or the emptiness between worlds for Luxord to travel through, he won’t be able to teleport.
Luxord also has his own personal Nobody servants. They’re called Gamblers, and they basically follow him everywhere. Even places he’s left, like Port Royale or Havoc's Divide after he’s died, Sora can find a metric fuckton of ‘em. The journal entry concerning them merely states:
The games they play are less complex versions of the ones during Luxord’s boss fight. I would like to request a few to follow Luxord through the Rift, if that’s alright. If not, I’ll survive. Maybe.
Weakness-wise, Luxord certainly isn't the strongest of the Nobodies, but no where near the weakest. His main strengths lie in his intellect and his ability to manipulate the rules and circumstances of the worlds around him. However, as explained above, he knows his limits when it comes to power and knows when he's been beaten fairly.
Inventory: Fair Game, his deck of cards that he uses to fight.
Appearance: Classy-ass motherfucker.
He wears the typical uniform for Organization XIII with a few personal additions—flared sleeves and broader shoulders.
Age: Unknown, but probably in his early 30s.
Samples
Log Sample:
Luxord is not entirely sure how many individuals would classify their deaths as pleasant and is willing to bet that individuals experiencing their second death would be even less likely to classify it as such. Regardless, even as he clears the ghosts of betrayal from his mind to study this new setting, the gambler is quite certain that death by former coworker ranks surprisingly high on the unpleasant death scale. He doesn’t blame his sweet Lady Luck, though. It was Roxas’ ("that's Sora," he said) time to win her capricious hand, and in life (and nonlife), that’s just how the dice land. The past was behind him, and holding on to such emotional baggage (or, at the very least, the memory of emotional baggage) would only weigh him down.
So he lets it go. Closes his eyes, inhales, exhales, opens his eyes, and focuses on the present. It’s easy to do without a Heart. However, all he needs is his brain to conclude the benefits of such thoughts. Luxord can tell when he’s been presented with a new opportunity, and to take advantage of it, he knows needs to play this right.
So he begins reconnaissance, starting with the device at his wrist.
Network Sample:
[ Luxord's paid rapt attention to Hypatia's introduction speech, filing away the information for later use. Furthermore, he's spent his first day or so rifling through the network, reading and learning all he can. He knows he ought to have faded into nonexistence, but hasn't (and strangely enough, it seems like many others here have suffered a similar fate). He knows he can no longer access the corridors of darkness to leave, and honestly, he's alright with this. But he also knows he needs more information, and in a setting like this, it would be nearly impossible to gain that information without interacting with the general populous. ]
While it seems fate has dealt me a curious hand, I'm capable of adapting my strategies. But the question remains: are you?
If the answer is "yes," perhaps you'd like to prove your skill in a game of cards?
Your Nickname: linda
OOC Journal:
superfluouslyUnder 18? nope
Email/IM: Pb2Ag (AIM), whyhotmailwhy@gmail.com
Characters Played at Singularity: Karkat Vantas
Character Information
Name: Luxord
Name of Canon: Kingdom Hearts
Canon/AU/Other Game CR: Canon
Reference: Kingdom Hearts as a series, Luxord specifically.
Canon Point: After being defeated by Sora in the World That Never Was.
Setting:
The worlds of the Kingdom Hearts universe are unique in that they are worlds-- entire planets devoted to a single canon. Most of those canons are Disney, but of course, a few (The World That Never Was, Twilight Town, Destiny Islands, End of the World, Traverse Town, Hollow Bastion) are completely plot related and filled to the brim with a strange combination of original universe characters, Final Fantasy characters, and Disney. Previous to Kingdom Hearts I, each of these worlds were separated from each other, with only a few individuals having the knowledge of other worlds and even less knowing how to navigate them (like King Mickey). However, by the time Kingdom Hearts begins, each of these worlds are being infected by Darkness (capital D, kids), which manifests itself through the creation of Heartless. This is because a group of various Disney Villains, led by Maleficent, have decided that Darkness is just the coolest thing ever, and with a little prompting from a cloaked figure with an incredibly sexy voice (the Heartless Ansem [who is actually another guy named Xehanort's Heartless, but jesus Christ let’s not get into all the crazy naming issues here, or I’ll have to break out the charts, just focus on the fact that his voice is incredibly sexy]), they begin infecting the Hearts of worlds so that they fall into Darkness and are destroyed.
“But, Linda! Why’s that a bad thing?!” You might ask. In fact, I’m asking for you. Just looking at the Heartless Ansem (Xehanort’s heartless), what are the disadvantages? I mean, if Darkness means I get to listen to that voice all day—oh baby, holla holla. Unfortunately for me, that’s not the case. When an individual or a world falls to darkness, a few curious things happen.
1) The heart is separated from the body.
2) Nobodies and Heartless are created.
So let’s break this apart. Darkness goes after the Hearts of things—worlds, people, whatever. So, it’s the Heart that is consumed by Darkness. The Heart consumed by Darkness becomes a Heartless (yeah, the name is misleading, FIGHT ME), and depending on how strong the heart of an individual was, the Heartless can either be your typical Shadows or something as terrifying as Darkside. I could get into the differences between Emblem Heartless and Pureblood Heartless, but then I'd have to jump off a fucking bridge. Basically, if you have an incredibly strong Heart, like Xehanort, your Heartless can maintain a similar form to the human it came from.
So, the Heart goes off to become a Heartless—that leaves behind the body, which, yet again, depending on the strength of Heart of the individual it used to be, becomes a Nobody (yet again, misleading, Nomura’s kinda crazy). The weakest type of Nobody is something like a Dusk, while the strongest or, as Xigbar called it, “elites” are Organization XIII (Luxord is number 10). From what we can tell through comparisons (Xemnas-Xehanort, Braig-Xigbar, etc, Roxas-Sora, etc etc), powerful Nobodies are pretty damn similar looking to their original counterparts. They just happen to enjoy putting “X”s in their names, more so than someone with a Heart would. I guess.
So, as you can guess, the conglomerate of Disney villains miss that whole Nobody part. In fact, for the entirety of Kingdom Hearts I, everyone misses that Nobody part. Instead, at this point, the Organization is working in secret, letting the Disney villains sew their Darkness throughout the worlds. Because, in the end, that helps them out, because they’re after Hearts.
See, at the beginning of Kingdom Hearts, a boy named Sora finds that he can use a weapon called the Keyblade, which releases the Hearts devoured by Darkness when he kills Heartless. Without a Keyblade, defeating Heartless means that the Heart isn’t freed from the Darkness, so it’ll become a Heartless again. When Sora defeats a Heartless, the Heart is freed and floats away… Until the Organization snatches it up. A German in the U-Bahn might exclaim to his drunken friend: “Sie haben ihre Herzen gesnatched! Oh neiiiiinnnnn!!!!!”
What unites Organization XIII is their need to regain their own lost Hearts, and they believe that the only way to do so is through creating their own Kingdom Hearts (or a bigass heart-moon in the sky). In order to create Kingdom Hearts, they need a metric fuckton of hearts. Fortunately for them, sometime during the events of the first Kingdom Hearts, Sora loses his Heart to the Darkness, which means he makes his own Nobody—Roxas. Of course, the Organization is on him like white on rice. They snatch his ass up, and Roxas becomes their own Keyblade master. Through crazy bullshit shenanigans, they also create a replica doll named Xion that leeches Roxas’ power in the hope of having two Keyblade masters. It doesn’t work, pushes Roxas to leave the Organization, and made me cry like a wee babby. Without Roxas or Xion, the Organization’s only solution is to manipulate Sora into defeating tons of Heartless (Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories happened, but it was a colossal failure on the part of the Organization and Luxord had nothing to do with it).
So, Kingdom Hearts II is basically the Organization manipulating Sora into killing Heartless so they can collect Hearts. It’s pretty damn effective. Each Organization member travels to a different world (Luxord has Wonderland in KH Days and Port Royale in KHII) where they manipulate the people and the situations to get Sora to kill Heartless. Thankfully for them, their job is made a helluva lot easier by Disney villains trying to be the edgy, cool Darkness kids.
Unfortunately, Sora figures this shit out (which is a miracle) and comes at the Organization (with a little help from Axel). He single-handedly storms their bigass castle, and cuts down the remaining members of Organization XIII (Luxord included). And then their fakey fake Kingdom Hearts gets blown up by Ansem (the real one). Because being nonexistence is suffering.
Personality:
There are two types of gamblin’ men in Kingdom Hearts. You have the cheating, oddly jazzy scumbag kind, and the British gamblers of fate (i.e. Luxord, who doesn’t have a snappy song unfortunately). However, they both share a common trait: a willingness to gamble with life. While Oogie Boogie uses the lives of others, Luxord and his personal Nobodies, the Gamblers, gamble their own nonexistence in games against Sora throughout Kingdom Hearts II. Instead of the traditional midboss fight, Luxord’s HP bar is replaced with a Time bar, and Sora must fight him while watching both his own Time bar and his HP. If you fucking suck at any sort of complicated game play and are on beginner mode, it’s easy to just beat the shit out of Luxord and call it a day before plowing through the rest of the game and crying on your best friend’s basement floor at the ending (
This draws attention to a few key qualities of Luxord’s personality:
1) the games are fair. Sora faced many of Luxord’s Gambler Nobodies throughout the game, where he had to play smaller stakes versions of the games Luxord presents. Which means, Sora ought to be familiar with the rules of Luxord’s games during the fight. Not only did he provide the opportunity for Sora to learn the rules, he remained fair by not changing them for his boss fight.
2) He just really fucking loves challenging others. Many of the games you must play with him during his fight are things similar to Memory—where there are several cards, and only one of them is Luxord (yes he can turn himself into a card, this is Kingdom Hearts, stop questioning shit). Sora is presented with which card Luxord is, then all of them go face down and move around. After a few seconds, Sora is presented with the backs of the cards, and must choose which one is Luxord in a small amount of time. If Sora chooses correctly multiple times, the amount of cards to choose from increase, as do the penalties of choosing the wrong one. Another game is where Sora is presented with four cards, with three black Xs and one red O changing rapidly. He must pick the O in a very short amount of time (which is very similar to the games Sora plays with the Gambler Nobodies). If Sora succeeds, mid-battle, Luxord praises him and rewards him with health. If he fails, he gets penalized by being turned into a card for a brief amount of time and losing some of his Time bar. Before beginning each game, Luxord simply states the rules—either with a “Look closely,” like with the Memory game, or “Do you know the rules?,” like with the game played previously with the other Nobodies. Only does he, towards the end of the fight, turn into a massive douchebag and just start beating the shit out of Sora with cards without any sort of game involved. Though, honestly, if I were about to get my ass kicked, I’d probably do the same. …Not with cards though. With, like, a chainsaw or something. But unlike me, even in the end, Luxord still provides Sora with chances to win, by providing a more challenging version of the XXXO game. When defeated, he compliments Sora on his game-playing skills. All of this, while backing up his fairness aspect, also shows that most of his games are aggressive. They force the individual he’s playing with to determine their own fate through their skills and knowledge of his rules. Unlike something like poker (which he does play), the games he presents Sora are not entirely luck based—one needs skill and knowledge to compete. Luxord was gambling that Sora lacked that skill, and unfortunately for him, he lost (because I can buttonmash with the best of ‘em).
So I’m sure you’re all sitting there like, “Jesus fucking CHRIST LINDA WE UNDERSTAND THAT YOU WATCHED A 4 MINUTE YOUTUBE VIDEO OF THE FIGHT AND YOU HAVE A LADYBONER FOR THE FIGHT MUSIC. LUXORD DID OTHER SHIT IN KINGDOM HEARTS. GET TO IT,” and after a middle finger salute in your general direction (it’s a sign of endearment, I promise. I love you guys to death for putting up with me), I’ll get to the other parts of Luxord’s personality.
3) Everything’s a game, including his nonlife. If you just Ctrl + F “game,” you will realize that I have used that word an ungodly amount of times. There’s a reason for this, and it links into his personality. In Kingdom Hearts ##/whatever# Days, Luxord distributes a fuckton of surprisingly decent advice to Roxas, all while making an offensive amount of game-related puns. In Kingdom Hearts II, when first appearing, he forces Sora and co. on a scavenger hunt for cursed medallions in order to defeat the massive Heartless he’s unleashed on Port Royale. Before dying, he tells Sora “you play the game quite well.” As we can see, through speech and action, Luxord often equates life to a game—one that must be played, and one that he believes he plays pretty damn well. He forces others to play by his (firmly established, and surprisingly legitimate) rules. He also realizes when he needs to play by the rules of others—towards the end of Days, he associates himself and Roxas with pawns on a chessboard, following the orders of their superiors, while hoping that they won’t be casualties in the game. Luxord understands his position as one not calling the shots, and despite his hope, realizes that being sacrificed as a pawn is a completely legit fate.
This last point, of following other’s rules, reveals another part of Luxord’s personality: feelings (about individuals and situations). As has already been explained, Nobodies don’t have hearts, which means that they don’t experience emotion (which is questioned a few times throughout the games, whether they remember what it feels like to have emotions or whether they are merely pretending). However, unlike characters like Axel, Roxas, and Demyx, Luxord never tries to explain what he “feels” and seems to be pretty apathetic in regards to regaining his heart. In fact, the only times he does express any semblance of emotion is right as he’s fading into darkness after being defeated. Sora basically slices the fuck through him with his bigass key, and Luxord, without having the strength to look at Sora, asks, “How could you... Roxas...” While it may seem like a strange thing when playing Kingdom Hearts II alone, his words are put in context through the relationship Roxas has with Luxord in Days. Luxord’s “let’s skip the formalities” attitude of Kingdom Hearts II reveals a difference in Luxord’s opinion between Sora and Roxas, considering how talkative he was with Roxas in Days. Often times, Luxord gave Roxas gifts and advice to prepare him for his missions, and when questioned about various things (like where was Xion, what happened to the bros in Castle Oblivion), he wasn’t an asshole. He wasn’t particularly helpful either, but his responses in comparison to Xigbar’s or Xaldin’s were significantly less douchey. As Luxord and Roxas investigated Wonderland, Luxord would follow Roxas’ lead if the younger Nobody expressed curiosity in something (like the White Rabbit). Unlike the older and more experienced members of the Organization, Luxord was one of the few willing to not be a total dickweed (Word, stop changing that to “duckweed” fuckkkk). So, when Sora defeats Luxord, his final words are surprisingly emotional. He is obviously feeling some level of betrayal. The Organization sees Roxas in Sora, and at various points, try to communicate with Roxas through him. Despite their lack of success, most members hold this view to the end, which explains why Luxord addresses Roxas, not Sora. While it might be a stretch to claim Luxord cares about Roxas (a longass motherfuckin’ stretch), it’s obvious he has some form of professional, workplace camaraderie for the kid.
Finally, an important part of his personality is his intelligence. There are three journal entries about Luxord and his activities in Port Royale. Two of them describe him as a “master of rhetoric” and his “wily words.” Considering Sora and co. probably have the combined intelligence of a dead cow, it’s not surprising they would consider Luxord a pretty smart guy. However, when he starts busting out phrases like “veritable maelstrom of avarice,” you know you can’t discount his intelligence. Also, your twelve year old self who skipped school to play Kingdom Hearts II can thank him for teaching you vocabulary words. And by “you” I mean me. Thank you, Luxord. I would have never gotten the word “veritable” on that fucking Scantron test without you. But he’s not all pretty words. As described above, in the background section and the horrible part of this app where every other word was “game,” he knows his schemes and rules. Furthermore, his actions in Port Royale reveal a very strong understand of the world he’s in charge of. For starters, when confronted with Jack Sparrow, his first word is “Parlé,” in a scene reminiscent of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Luxord not only knew the rules of the pirates through careful investigation and stalkery, but he was also able to manipulate those rules to his gain. He also knew about the curse on the Pirates of the Black Pearl, which, even by the world’s own standards, was a BIG FUCKING SECRET, and yet again, knew how to manipulate it to his gain. Out of all the Nobodies, Luxord seems to be one of the most effective in this regard.
Abilities, Weaknesses, and Power Limitation Suggestions:
Luxord has power over time, which manifests itself in atypical ways. The most obvious way is through the Time bars in his boss fight—where one runs out of time instead of HP. However, most of his power comes in the form of his cards and dice. He has the ability to turn himself or others into human-sized cards or dice, which he usually uses as a penalty for his games. Through using his cards, if a player loses the game challenges he issues (like XXXO game or the other ones explained above), they will be turned into cards/dice or explosions.
He also has the ability to seal individuals away, either in, like, hammer-space or fuck if I know. They never explain where Luxord put Sora’s bros during their fight. Idk, I will probably never use this in game.
Luxord, in the game, like all members of Organization XIII, travels between worlds through Corridors of Darkness. However, because there’s nothing like Betwixt and Between or the emptiness between worlds for Luxord to travel through, he won’t be able to teleport.
Luxord also has his own personal Nobody servants. They’re called Gamblers, and they basically follow him everywhere. Even places he’s left, like Port Royale or Havoc's Divide after he’s died, Sora can find a metric fuckton of ‘em. The journal entry concerning them merely states:
A gambler. A high-ranking Nobody. It doesn't seem to like fighting, and just floats around aimlessly.
Use the reaction command when it attacks with cards and dice, and let the games begin!
Don't lose, for something terrible happens. Win for a chance to attack—and maybe even for a little something extra!
The games they play are less complex versions of the ones during Luxord’s boss fight. I would like to request a few to follow Luxord through the Rift, if that’s alright. If not, I’ll survive. Maybe.
Weakness-wise, Luxord certainly isn't the strongest of the Nobodies, but no where near the weakest. His main strengths lie in his intellect and his ability to manipulate the rules and circumstances of the worlds around him. However, as explained above, he knows his limits when it comes to power and knows when he's been beaten fairly.
Inventory: Fair Game, his deck of cards that he uses to fight.
Appearance: Classy-ass motherfucker.
He wears the typical uniform for Organization XIII with a few personal additions—flared sleeves and broader shoulders.
Age: Unknown, but probably in his early 30s.
Samples
Log Sample:
Luxord is not entirely sure how many individuals would classify their deaths as pleasant and is willing to bet that individuals experiencing their second death would be even less likely to classify it as such. Regardless, even as he clears the ghosts of betrayal from his mind to study this new setting, the gambler is quite certain that death by former coworker ranks surprisingly high on the unpleasant death scale. He doesn’t blame his sweet Lady Luck, though. It was Roxas’ ("that's Sora," he said) time to win her capricious hand, and in life (and nonlife), that’s just how the dice land. The past was behind him, and holding on to such emotional baggage (or, at the very least, the memory of emotional baggage) would only weigh him down.
So he lets it go. Closes his eyes, inhales, exhales, opens his eyes, and focuses on the present. It’s easy to do without a Heart. However, all he needs is his brain to conclude the benefits of such thoughts. Luxord can tell when he’s been presented with a new opportunity, and to take advantage of it, he knows needs to play this right.
So he begins reconnaissance, starting with the device at his wrist.
Network Sample:
[ Luxord's paid rapt attention to Hypatia's introduction speech, filing away the information for later use. Furthermore, he's spent his first day or so rifling through the network, reading and learning all he can. He knows he ought to have faded into nonexistence, but hasn't (and strangely enough, it seems like many others here have suffered a similar fate). He knows he can no longer access the corridors of darkness to leave, and honestly, he's alright with this. But he also knows he needs more information, and in a setting like this, it would be nearly impossible to gain that information without interacting with the general populous. ]
While it seems fate has dealt me a curious hand, I'm capable of adapting my strategies. But the question remains: are you?
If the answer is "yes," perhaps you'd like to prove your skill in a game of cards?
