Kip Hoddai

Name Kip Hoddai

Position Flamewalker

Basic Info
Personality
Skills and Abilities
History

Character Information

Written by		Shayne†
Title(s)		None
Gender		Male
Species		Devaronean
Age		32
Class/Occupation		Everyman
Affiliation		Neutral
Born		1,185 ABY
Homeworld		Expansion Region, Ulixis
Weapon(s) of Choice		Sniper Rifle, Blaster, Vibroblades

Physical Appearance

Height		5'6"
Skin Colour		Red
Weight		166 lbs
Hair Color		Black eyebrows, goatee with horns shaped and polished smooth that curve back over his head.
Eye Color		Metallic gold
Physical Description		Short by human standards he is nonetheless powerfully built. His skin is dark crimson, almost sooty in appearance and his horns were shaped as a child (a painful and archaic process practiced by certain cultures) to arch backwards and are polished smooth. His ears are pointed and his teeth are sharp and straight. He keeps a small neatly trimmed goatee of black hair on his chin. His ears are both pierced with small thick hoops in the lobes and he wears on in his right eyebrow as well. A black tattoo is drawn on the right side of his face and while it looks like art is actually an ancient writing known only to a few. Ulix have naked rat-like prehensile tails and males possess furry swath on their forearms and calves and lower abdominal areas.
Form of Dress		Typically he wears black leathers, pilot gear, knee-high boots, jacket, pants, a lot of pockets with a tool and gear belt, trimmed in brighter red. A small grinning devil's head winking is on the upper left breast of his jacket and is also emblazoned on the side of his ship, Devil's Luck. When he needs to he carries a blaster pistol and a vibroblade in his boot.
Prosthetics/Cybernetics		None

Important Figures

Mentor(s)		Aen
Lover(s)/Partner(s)		Unmated
Children		None
Father		None
Mother		None
Brother(s)		See "Other"
Sister(s)		See "Other"
Other		Kip has a large extended family, both parents are alive and he has eleven siblings. 12% of his income goes back to the family accounts automatically.

Other

Personality & Traits

General Overview		Kip is largely affable though he tends to be quiet and observant when not doing 'business'.
Strengths & Weaknesses		He has the ability to slide into a variety of roles and can be as unnoticed as a 'sassin or as loud and blustery and a slave-trader on the block. He often wears a cosmetic effect to hide his Marks. He’s not very good in talking his way into or out of situations, lacking a certain subtlety with his mouth that he makes up for with his stealth.
Ambitions		Kip's ambitions seem to be to do whatever he is directed to do and to do it well. Other than that, he's got a strange ability to make friends wherever he goes and to affect the lives of other beings profoundly. Some, who know, have said when he speaks they hear his Master Aen in his voice and he always smiles a bit if he hears them, a source of pride for him.
Interests and Hobbies		Skilled in many areas, Kip can make technical repairs, use a computer, sneak and fight. He is good as a pilot and a reasonable technician. The Ulix favor unarmed fighting styles and especially an advanced style called Trikeeda, a form that combines a lethal defensive style with a strong offensive capability. He's also fairly accomplished at getting into places he's not supposed to be in. Lockpicking, getting out of bonds and finding ways into and out of tightly controlled places is a pleasure for him, the challenge of it is vastly appealing. Occasionally the Flamewalkers ask him to do such things.
Languages		Basic, Devar, Ulix and a smattering of others.

Skills/Abilities

Fighting Style		Trikeeda (Taught by the Flamewalker sect and virtually unknown elsewhere) this martial art teaches fluidity and adaptability punctuated by seemingly soft strikes that do stackable collective damage. Only selected pupils can use Trikeeda and only the Flamewalkers know this style. The style teaches all manner of weapons, including swords, staves and spears as well as firearms can be incorporated. The forms are “Conflagration”, “Embers” and “Banked”, all states of Flame. In the hands of a Force Adept, Trikeeda becomes a blindingly fast hard-hitting deadly martial art capable of beating through armor to get to the squishy meat inside. Kip isn’t there yet but he’s pretty good at it.
Notable Abilities		Kip is just becoming sensitive to the Force, typically only able to sense it when he is relaxed and practicing his meditations, which he does daily. Kip does have some self-manipulation abilities that seem force-related but can also be accomplished by people who simply train in a particular philosophy or martial art. Kip is able to push aware the need for sleep and rest, invoking something called “rest-debt”, for up to forty hours before he begin to harm himself. In addition, Kip can enter a death-like trance where his healing resources are heightened. This is not a Force-Trance for Healing but it works similarly, is more slowly. Finally, bordering on the use of the Force, Kip can ignore heat and a certain amount of energy damage. Stun doesn’t work on him, heavy stun is like light stun and a laser or blaster weapon is less-severe. That doesn’t mean he isn’t going to be killed; its just that when he gets hit with it its never quite as bad as it should be. Kip is very good at getting in and out without being seen and he’s very good at sniping, having a maser-rifle with a 2km range and a full visual sensor-targeting scope kit with it. His natural agility and instincts make him an excellent pilot but his medical skills extend as far as slapping a med-pack on and he’s not very good at talking his way out of a fight or a bad situation.
Melee		Very Good
Marksmanship		Very Good
Lightsaber		Unknown/None
Force Sensitivity		Very Poor
Force Ability		Poor
Engineering		Average
Computers		Good
Piloting		Good
Medical		Poor
Charisma		Poor
Stealth		Very Good

History

Born in an orthodox Ulix family, Kip was the seventh of eleven siblings. Like all Devaronean children his mother was left in charge of their care and educating while their father went off into space and sent money back to keep the family and support them. Every few years he would return home to spend a month or so, visiting, catching up and usually, getting their mother pregnant again.

As soon as her mood changed with pregnancy, he took off, getting out while he could as Devaronean women get proddy once they become pregnant, though more motherly with their offspring. Kip's best memories of his mother was when she was pregnant, the rest of the time she was a bit of a tyrant, even considering their culture.

The Ulix culture is an orthodox one, requiring a tradition of deep spirituality, meditation and special order in one's personal appearance. It is not a theistic practice, more of a deeply spiritual one, which allows only the eating of certain foods, the practice of certain professions, a code of honor that is disciplined and binding and the pursuit of martial prowess. The practice of Ulixi follows the way of life and asceticism of a famous warrior from the ancient Devaronean histories, Maj Ulix.

As part of the Path of Ulixi, males have their horns shaped and must wear special hats as children when their horns begin to come in. Likewise, females get special tattoos before their fur begins to come in, which causes their fur to be bright red on the tattooed area that typically contrasts with the rest. Females are usually marked not only in a way that accentuated their natural beauty but also marks them unmistakably as Ulix women. Special individuals in the tribe, a cultural holdover from a much earlier time, hold the secrets of this practice and what it is supposed to do. They're called Firewalkers.

Also a holdover of a much earlier time, the Ulix train their children for war as soon as they can walk, developing strong melee weapon skills as well as distance weapons, training them in the traditional and the modern weapons. They are trained to survive in wilderness, to find water, to meditate and martial their personal resources and how to fight. Male or female, it doesn't matter, everyone gets the training. In Ulix society, fitness to mate is determined in large part by fitness of body and mind as well as the ability to wage the war of business.

Kip was a decent student and applied himself strongly to his studies and training. He was slightly bigger than most of the males in his training group and was stronger, working hard to maintain that edge. He also worked to improve his speed and reactions, practicing for hours on trying to catch drop of water and number of pebbles thrown into the air and training in agility. He proved particularly good with swords, staff-type weapons and unarmed combat and qualified for special hand-to-hand instruction from a master in Trikeeda, the three-stance style of the Ulix Masters.

Since he had many rivals in classes he had to apply himself to avoid being on the receiving end of beatings though his motivation was to be as independent as possible, it eventually turned on him.

As Kip turned fifteen and ended his primary training, ready to begin training in a trade, he came before the Flamewalkers for his Trials. Tested in combat, tested in arms, tested in survival offworld, tested in thought and tested in mastery of himself he did well enough, he thought. He managed to be passed along from one test to the next, passing meant continuing. Failure meant being stopped and sent back.

As the Trials lasted an entire month, Kip was gone from his family for the entire time, he and his year-mates were tested all together at the same time. Only seven of twenty made it through all of the Trials at the same time and completed them to continue to trade training. This was a great honor and earned his family prestige in their community. He was the first member of his family to have passed the Trials the first time; failure the first time was common.

But of the seven that had passed, he was the only one who was brought into the Flamewalkers as an initiate. He trained in the Flamewalkers for another six years, learning a variety of skills though not all. His teacher, Master Aen, taught him advanced meditation, advanced combat techniques and advanced technical skills. He was taught how to pilot, taught how to act and speak to others to gain and keep the upper hand (which he barely passed), he was taught how to do business in a way that he was strongest in. He always felt that Aen was waiting for something to happen, waiting for an event or some kind of… sign, before initiating a new level of training with Kip. But whatever it was never came, as Kip never asked because it was never discussed between them.

Eventually, at the age of twenty-two, Kip received his Marks of Flame and in a special ceremony. He received his facial tattoos from Aen who seemed to wield fire on her hands and somehow 'inscribed' the words onto Kip with it. Only possessing half of the Marks, Kip is an agent of the Flamewalkers and does as he is asked when asked, though it is usually infrequent and often innocuous. The rest of the time its clearly breaking some law, usually several.

The Flamewalkers gave Kip a small cargo shuttle, a small loan to get started with and a contact for a job.

His copilot, assistant and friend is a droid named F6T, a cultural droid that had been reprogrammed to serve as a technician and then later had added navigational programs to. F6T has been heavily modified and is free-willed, choosing to stay with Kip despite having the ability to make his own decisions and to leave if he wanted to.