Image of Mourners + Tears?? I have nothing specific for this except pretty
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As does any creature, we start out young! Referred to as Tears, these little ones have quite the awkward baby stage before they grow out and fit more into their bodies. But at least they're adorable!
Due to the nature of the ARPG, each member that joins Grave of Willows gets 2 MYO slots to start out with. But fret not! There are a number of ways you can earn more slots to fulfill your need for an army of children. (Or maybe that's just a me thing. Probably just me.)
But enough delay, let's get on with the basics.
A Tear's anatomy is slightly reminiscent of a raptor, they have smaller arms, strong-looking legs and a visible hunch on their back! Their heads are round with a point, sort of like a tear shape, with tufted ears on the sides. They're born with pupilless eyes, and their magic tears extend all the way from their eyes to their cheeks. They sport claws on all their limbs and have 4 digits on each, + the thumbs on their hands! Their tail is about medium length, ending with a slight swirl. They also sport a total of 8 tufted areas, 1 on both sides of each leg, 1 on each elbow, and 1 on each side of their face!
The tufts on their face have two shapes by default: Weightless and Fallen respectively. You may choose between one of these two types to apply to your MYO. But don't worry! There will be an upgrade to change the tufts to even more styles later.
!!The Species canonically have mouths, HOWEVER, you may go the stylized route and have it not appear!!
(I'm literally only drawing it for the MYO guide. Only for the guide.)
A Tear's mouth is nowhere near soft, complete with a full set of sharp teeth when they're of age! and because the species has no visible nostrils, they sport a forked tongue to detect smells!
Their magic tear/tuft/accent color also accounts for their mouth/tongue color and Blood.
When it comes to teeth, they may be pure white or tinted a bit yellow like the example shown!
Colors
With anatomy discussed, we can't just leave the little one blank, now can we?
First, however, note that aside from sclera or teeth, Your Tear should NEVER sport pure black or pure white in their palette unless stated otherwise. Pure black and pure white have heavy lore tied to them and as such, are incredibly rare and can only be applied under certain conditions.
That being said, onto the actual color rules!
Base Color and Secondaries. When it comes to these, you are limited to 4 colors-- 1 for the base, 3 total for secondaries. However, the colors themselves are limitless so long as they abide by the pure black/white rule! Meaning you could have a red base color with orange and purple secondaries if you so choose! (Please... avoid eye-bleeding... for the sake of the staff team please)
Please make sure the base color and secondaries are discernable enough from each other!
Markings. You get up to 5 slots for these, with symmetrical markings counting as 1. These markings cannot be too complex and cannot form specific shapes (such as hearts, stripes, or dots.) Additionally, these markings cannot take up too much space, as we need to be able to tell what the base color is!
Eyes. Can be any color that abides by the pure black/white rule. Sclera can either be a little lighter or darker than the iris, enough to tell it's different but not nearly enough to be a completely different color. Alternatively, the sclera can be pure white. You'll be able to change this later with an Attachment!
Magic Tear and Tufts. Can be any color that abides by the pure black/white rule. This is considered the 'accent' color. You may forego any of the tufts being colored or only a few locations. (Ex. Cheek tufts and leg tufts colored, elbow tufts barren. Or tufts on one leg are colored, the rest are barren.) Keep in mind you CANNOT have a single tuft colored in a pair, or have any of the tufts (and by extension, Magic tears) be more than one color. They have to match!
Teeth, Mouth, and Blood. Mouth and Blood will follow the accent color! Teeth can be either pure white or an off-white. (Yellow-tinted only!)
Eye Color Examples:
+ Pupils are an Attachment!
+Sclera completely different colors!
+ Not discernable enough!
+ Just Illegal.
General Examples:
Correct Example
Anatomy:
- Lookin' Spiffy!
- 4 digits present on all limbs!
- Tufts are present!
- Magic Tear is present!
- Just generally buttery smooth. The kind you want to smooth on toast with your hot coffee on a Saturday morning.
Colors/Markings:
- Markings are nice a simple, and base color is easily definable!
- Additionally, none are/are inching too close to pure black or pure white.
- Accent areas all match!
- Eyes are lookin' legal!
Incorrect Example
Anatomy:
- Woops, this little one has nostrils! MYOs should not sport this!
- Pupils are an attachment, and ESPECIALLY white pupils are illegal! The exception to this is if blindness is applied.
- Boy's fangs are FAR too prominent compared to the rest of the teeth!
- Additionally, while this could be simply a perspective issue, the tongue is not forked!
- Oops! On this boy there's only 3 digits on all limbs instead of 4! (if you don't count thumbs!)
Colors/Markings:
- The markings are definitely treading a thin line on being too much!
- Default MYO's should NOT start out with any markings! (Looking @ you, spots!)
- The magic tear's colors should NOT be present anywhere else outside of the tufts and insides for the time being.
- Additionally, all 3 are different colors here! That won't do!
Incorrect Color/Marking Example
- A mess.
- The two colors shown on the body make it impossible to tell which Is the base and which is the secondary! Waay too much coverage!
- There's pure white and black on the design outside of sclera and teeth!
- Additionally, The magic tear, Tufts, and eyes are all mismatched!
- Default MYOs shouldn't have any weird shapes or symbols in their iris!
- What's going on with that floating leg? I don't even know anymore. My eyes hurt.
ID's
Every Tear in The House sports some sort of Number on the side of their necks, and these numbers are their ID's!
​
This number will have to be sported on their approval, and this number will also be what a majority of those that live in the house refer to them as. However, you are completely allowed to have nicknames for your Tear!
To receive your number, look in the Discord server and head on in to #step-raight-up and request it to be randomized! The staff will then respond to your request with your Tear's official ID after we roll it from a free list. You will have 1 Week to get the approval up with this ID. This is so we can sure numbers won't be hogged for too long.
Once you have been given a number, you may now add it to your tear and Approval. There's a section on the template to display the ID if it is obscured for some reason. (EX. Pose, Cheek tufts)
The ID MUST be displayed with this color:
#93ddff
The ID also has a faint glow to it! Though it's only really noticeable in the dark.
You can choose for the ID to be on either side of the neck, but it has been noted to be most commonly placed on the left side.
Born with Disfigurements? (blindness, deafness, etc)
In Grave Of Willows, it is possible for your character to be born with a disfigurement. However, we have heavy guidelines that come with this to discourage abuse of the system.
- Disfigurements fall under Tier 4 and 5 or higher of the injury system, By default, these are locked until you have reached 300 wisps tied to your account. This means your first character will not be born with a disfigurement unless given permission otherwise.
- Making a character with a disfigurement applies to the cooldown rules stated on the injury system page.
- And finally, in the description of the application, you must write, at minimum, a 350-word story on how your Tear goes about their life with their limitation. Really think about the character and flesh them out!
Learn more about the injury system and what disfigurements can be applied below!
Poses
When drawing your character for their application, it's important to have the elements of their design visible in the image. While it may be a bit restricting, poses on applications for Grave Of Willows should simple, such as standing or sitting pose. The character should be in a side view or a 3/4 view, but absolutely not a full-frontal/back view! We should be able to tell the following from the application art:
- All markings on the design. (A little side view of all markings also work just fine, like so!)
- Main components of the species' anatomy. (This means things like the ears, tail, tufts, magic tears, etc. You may forego any sort of mouth view if you wish.)
- The eyes and by extension, eye colors. (You may have only one eye open/shown, or winking to save the poor souls who can't draw the other eye.)
- The ID. (Though considering the nature of the cheek tufts, it's alright if it looks obscured. We have a section on the template for this!)
- That MYO rules were followed correctly. (Don't panic if we point out an error-- We'll simply ask you to fix it!)
Side view example
Approval
So how exactly do you get to getting your character approved?
1st, they have to have their template filled out and uploaded to Deviantart. This makes it easier for not only you but for us also, to check the date of the application. Applications sitting in st.ash will not be valid. (Also it's unreliable for descriptions. Trust me.)
You can find the template right here!
For descriptions, you are required to have the bare minimum of the following: (Though you may add more, such as nicknames or personality if you wish!)
ID (This is essentially their name!)
Sex (Their biological gender. They may identify as otherwise!)
Tuft Style (This applies to tears using the default MYO styles. If your tear was born with the attachment to change the style, they would put that name instead.)
Species (Write Standard Tear here.)
Creation (Write MYO here.)
|ID| -
|Sex| -
|Tuft Style| -
|Species| -
|Creation| -
With the PSD Version, there's layers for the color sections so you can easily select and fill them in without the hassle of the bucket tool leaving stray pixels and utterly betraying you! (At least most of them)
Like so!
Screenshot of completed app
Approvals also count for wisps, don't forget to list it!
The next step would be to throw your kid into the approval channel!
In Grave Of Willows, our approvals are hosted on the discord server-- two channels depending if you're a new person looking to join the group, or an already established member ready to take on another character.
For new folk:
Your channel is #confirmation!
You'll need 3 things in your message before you send it in.
- Your Deviantart Username (Link is preferred! We don't want to send a group invite to the wrong individual.)
- A link to your Tear's completed sheet.
- The codeword. (This is hidden in the rules-- make sure you look it over well!)
For returning folk:
Your channel is #returning-approval!
Simply link your Tear's completed sheet. If you wish, link proof of an additional slot or ownership. We assume you're all good bois by now. Don't make us get the stick.
If your character was accepted, staff will react with a checkmark to your message! The necessary invites and roles will be sent/applied to you!
If there is an issue with your approval that needs to be fixed, staff will react with a question mark to indicate that it is currently under review. If you have your account set where only specific people can DM you which inhibits those from us, PLEASE list an alternate contact method! Examples are such as DA notes or comments. Please do not list complete off-sites like skype, however.
Once the necessary issues are fixed, the reaction will change to the checkmark and you'll be good to go!
Screenshot example
Screenshot example