Hogwarts School: A Harry Potter RPG

CHARACTER INFORMATION
Character Name: Gillian Blackwood
Gender: Female
Age: 29
Blood Status: Pureblood

Education:
Hogwarts - Graduating class 1952

Residence:
A flat in London

Occupation
Auror

Do you plan to have a connection to a particular existing place (for example: the Ministry, Shrieking Shack) or to take over an existing shop in need of new management?
The Ministry, Auror office

Requested Magic Levels:
Adult characters have 32 starting levels to distribute across these four categories (less levels can be used if you so desire, but no more than 32). The number of levels on the lowest ability must be at least half of the highest ability.

If you want levels above the usual 32 total, or a significantly uneven distribution of starting levels, please fill out and submit the Exceptional Levels special request form here.

• Charms: 10
• Divination: 11
• Transfiguration: 5
• Summoning: 6

Do you wish to be approved as a group with any other characters? If so who and for what IC reason?
No

Please list any other characters you already have at the site:
Freja Ward, Arthur Ward

Biography: (300 words minimum.)
Born to an old and compulsively cynical family, it was a wonder that Gillian grew into a genial idealist as a child. While she was sociable in school, though, no one who’d known her could ever describe her as popular at all. And, over time, her studiousness perhaps became inspired by spite towards her family much more than by academic interest.

Elder Blackwoods did not generally discuss politics with the children; rather, they spoke at them. Even so, from the odd overheard comment once she was old enough to understand, Gillian came to suspect that her family was host to some Hexenreich sympathisers (partly owing to the family’s German roots umpteen generations ago). Individuals quibbled on which actions, attributed to the group in the media-covered court cases, could be defended or not but a near unanimous position among the oldest members of the family was approval for the, allegedly intentional, breaking of British magical barriers.

During quiet dinners, Blackwoods would argue that this event should have been used for the pure wizards to rule rather than hide from Muggles. Gillian began to see her educational performance as a way out from her family’s sphere of influence.

But an exit from a wealthy family comes with social and financial consequences. And, however good-natured Gillian was, she did love small luxuries in life. From mid-adolescence she learned to use her privileged ability to not engage with politics when doing so would rock the boat she sat in too thoroughly. Divination and Magical Law grades would only get her so far alone. A growing cynical acceptance that wealth greased the wheels of the world crept into corners of the young woman’s mind. Corners that her senses of integrity and justice weren’t entirely comfortable sharing a body with.

As an adult, Gillian has attempted to balance on the tightrope of lengthening the divide between herself and her extended family, without the gap stretching all the way to disownment. Just in case she ever needs the net.

Roleplay: 
You come across one of these posts on the site. Please select one & reply as your character:

Option One -
Amelia Nixon was many things, but she was never a pushover reporter that people could just usher away with a busy shuffle past. She was dedicated and eager to cut to the very middle of the current political tensions because she was Amelia Nixon and her articles would most certainly become front page material.

“Sir, please! It’s for the Prophet, how do you feel-“

Another one brushed passed her, the shuffling busy masses making their way through Diagon Alley for the lunchtime rush. This had been the best possible time to get people, but none of them were giving her anything to go with.

Only momentarily discouraged, the short red headed lady took a seat on a nearby bench. Her quill resting in her left hand and her notepad ready in the opposite hand. Amelia pouted, tapping the quill against her leg as she scanned the waves of people for somebody - anybody - who looked like they had something to say.

She had been dreaming of her name in bold print, Amelia Nixon: The Source of Today’s Tomorrow. She had been dreaming of the larger office and the secretaries that would fetch her the morning coffee and fetch her anything she needed. The VIP interviews and the most exclusive press passes. But all Amelia had was a page seventeen piece on the rising number of frogs in London.

Hardened by a day of no success, the reporter stood up and started to trod off down the alley. A loose stone on the cobble path caught her heel, sending the distraught girl toppling down to the ground.

“Merlin’s fog watch, my heel is broken! Help!” she yelled as she tried desperately to recover her shoe frantically in the middle of the Diagon Alley moving crowds.

Roleplay Response:
Gillian Blackwood filtered the details of the surrounding street through the helix of smoke from her cigarette breath, and the broadsheet newspaper masking half of her face. From the front page to the tenth, the Daily Prophet had transitioned from shaming abuses of Ministry resources, a slice of life story about an aging Quidditch player struggling with hemorrhoids, to an opinion piece about pixie farts allegedly changing the climate.

Heavy emphasis on the allegedly.

Through the colour and noise, some short distance away, Gillian noticed a young woman standing among the street traffic, attempting to interview strangers with all the success a dandelion might have in asking flooding waters to stop. Blackwood adjusted her cigarette with an index and a middle finger, sucked on the end of it between her lips, and positioned her newspaper to make her less noticeable to interview seekers. She dropped her (sort of) free hand to the plastic packaged sandwich in her lap and blindly negotiated some cigarette-less time in her mouth for her food to have.

After eating just enough that she could honestly say she’d eaten something for lunch, Gillian put out her cigarette stub with a crunch of sole against cement and gathered her things.

“Merlin’s fog watch, my heel is broken! Help!”

Her attention snapped in the direction of the voice. The world’s most interviewless interviewer from earlier was struggling with her composure, along with gravity. Gillian moved a few paces in a different direction before pausing and letting out a weary sigh.

She broke through the wave of people with a walking style that consisted of dodging and discretely stiff-arming anyone in the way. Once she’d reached the red haired woman, Gillian attempted to helpfully get a hold of her arm to guide her out of the path of incoming foot traffic. “I’ve got you,” she said. “You get your shoe. We’re moving.” Her tone wasn’t unkind. But it wasn’t kind either.

OTHER
How did you find us? I’ve found you all to be pretty nice honestly