Ratbat
Jun 25, 2012 0:24:44 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Jun 25, 2012 0:24:44 GMT -5
Name: Ratbat
Age: Equivalent of very well-preserved 90s. Dates from the early Golden Age of Cybertron or before and, except recently, has always had the resources to keep himself in absolutely meticulous repair.
Gender: Masculine/indifferent.
Species: minicon
Faction: Decepticon
Occupation/Specialization: Logistics/Operations
Appearance/Altmode: Ratbat's current robot form looks like a quarter-sized Decepticon Jet Vehicon with a yellow optical band. His flight form is somewhat like Laserbeak in aesthetics (six-winged, links up to Soundwave) but has a proper head and is more batlike. His lowest set of wings can twist around to provide some semblance of grasping feet, but he can only fly, perch, or dangle in flight mode, not walk.
History:
Ratbat served since the Golden Age as the minicon representative on the High Council. A ruthless politician and industrialist, his reputation for corruption was legendary and vast resources were siphoned off to his patronage network. Generally despised by the rest of Cybertron, he was nevertheless popular among his own kind, whose interests he defended and advanced for mostly self-serving reasons. At its height, Ratbat's economic empire controlled a double-digit percentage of Cybertron's economy.
Somewhere along the way he made a misstep and found himself at the mercy of Soundwave, who forcibly reprogrammed him to suit his own purposes and bound him to service. The altered Ratbat lost a bit in the transition, but now serves Soundwave with reasonable loyalty and has made himself essential to the Decepticon cause.
Resource management is Ratbat's true gift, and for reasons of pure survival he's thrown himself fully into his assigned task of keeping the Nemesis and Megatron's armies fueled and organized. He manages the Decepticon miners, supply lines, raw energon refining, quartermaster duties, fuel rationing and everything else necessary to keep the ship from falling out of the sky. If anything happens to him, things will go to hell very, very quickly.
Personality:
Ratbat is a truly ancient mech who takes the long view. Most view the Decepticons as an army with a mining operation attached - as far as he's concerned they're the opposite. Energon is life, the surviving Cybertronians are going through the universe's supply far too fast, so most of them have to die. He's done the math on the extinction horizon. It's ugly. A certain amount of attrition is necessary even to fuel everyone else on a reliable basis. He's not beneath secretly arranging matters.
He has no deep loyalty to the Decepticon cause or its individual leaders, barring his bond with Soundwave. Unlike most Decepticons, Ratbat liked the old system just fine. Due to his age and past rank he views the conflict from a different perspective than most and is coldly bitter about most of it. He's ancient, unarmed, and not remotely warrior class - a dedicated noncombatant.
Ratbat likes to keep others in his debt and has a vague holdover tendency to both show favoritism to other minicons and view them as subordinates. He used to have more flagrant vices, but that was before Soundwave. His pursuit of efficiency can be utterly single-minded and he's always looking at ways to improve his razor-thin margins. Completely unsentimental, he'll drain offlined Decepticons of energon to add to the ration pool without a second thought. He can be icily sarcastic when annoyed or thwarted.
There are two parts to him, though. One is the surviving remnant of the old High Councilor, the other belongs to Soundwave. One is a key element in the Decepticon war effort, the other is an object lesson to the rest of the crew. Ratbat's personality changes markedly when he's in Soundwave's presence or following his orders and his independence is nearly erased, something that other Decepticons find intensely creepy. Nobody knows exactly what Soundwave did to him, but nobody wants it done to them.
Likes:
Ratbat likes efficiency, obedience, and industry. He enjoys having his own little fiefdom, and will tenaciously defend his grip on it. He likes useful subordinates, but only so long as he calculates they remain useful. Some (like miners, mechs with key civilian skills, and other mini-cons) are valuable enough to his plans that he will dedicate significant effort to keeping them online. This should not be taken as evidence of altruism.
He is required to like Soundwave, although it's a complicated situation.
Dislikes:
Ratbat dislikes waste, although some waste, like the ongoing war, he views as necessary to cull the herd. He particularly dislikes large warriors with no other useful skills and is actively trying to reduce their population. Certain military scientists are also on his list. Mostly it's not personal, just the way the math works out.
Strengths/Weapons:
Ratbat is an unarmed noncombatant and considers combat an enormous waste of energon. His primary weapon is bureaucracy. He defends himself against Decepticons by emphasizing his connection to Soundwave and against Autobots by being a helpless civilian.
Weaknesses:
While vaguely resembling a purple Laserbeak in his flight mode, he lacks Laserbeak's high-powered laser weapon and attack/data cables. Ratbat is physically fragile and will flee any serious threat.
Special skills (that are not weapon related):
Ratbat's deep experience in economic, administrative, and political matters is unmatched among the Decepticons. He is extremely intelligent and highly accomplished at getting things done behind the scenes.
His recent physical modifications include an elaborate fuel analysis and sampling rig, with dedicated sensors sensitive enough that he can determine the fuel status of a mech at a glance and find energon at much greater ranges than others. If anyone's so much as leaking on the Nemesis, Ratbat knows about it. He sometimes travels with a mining laser, but it has an automated shutoff that prevents it from harming a living mech.
He also retains holoprojection modifications from when he was a High Councilor that give him unusual range and versatility. He mostly uses these mods to give presentations and brief his miners about new deposits. They are not finessed for any sort of combat application.
Ratbat can hover silently in flight mode. This does cost extra energon, but he considers the intangible benefit he gets from not always being knee-level worth it. By subspacing everything but absolute essentials, he can reduce himself to one-tenth his normal size. Top speed is 65 mph (105 kph).
Due to his small size and lack of weaponry he is intrinsically hard to detect and can easily be overlooked. He can also be surprisingly stealthy when he wants to be. Ratbat has a gestalt bond with Soundwave.
Tech Spec:
Strength: 3
Intelligence: 9
Speed: 4
Endurance: 3
Rank: 7
Courage: 7
Fireblast: 0
Skill: 9
Threads:
Flashback (Cybertron):
The Lower Pool - Assassination attempts in Polyhex.
Central Logistics - Ratbat recruits Jazz for a mission.
Flashback (Episode 0):
Economic Intelligence - Ratbat reports to Megatron.
Episode 1:
Take Back - The Nemesis is invaded.
Conference - Ratbat encounters Jetfire in the engine room after the battle.
Allies - Ratbat offers prison break scheduling advice to Fairwinds.
Designated Snuggling Time - Ratbat checks in with Soundwave.
Age: Equivalent of very well-preserved 90s. Dates from the early Golden Age of Cybertron or before and, except recently, has always had the resources to keep himself in absolutely meticulous repair.
Gender: Masculine/indifferent.
Species: minicon
Faction: Decepticon
Occupation/Specialization: Logistics/Operations
Appearance/Altmode: Ratbat's current robot form looks like a quarter-sized Decepticon Jet Vehicon with a yellow optical band. His flight form is somewhat like Laserbeak in aesthetics (six-winged, links up to Soundwave) but has a proper head and is more batlike. His lowest set of wings can twist around to provide some semblance of grasping feet, but he can only fly, perch, or dangle in flight mode, not walk.
History:
Ratbat served since the Golden Age as the minicon representative on the High Council. A ruthless politician and industrialist, his reputation for corruption was legendary and vast resources were siphoned off to his patronage network. Generally despised by the rest of Cybertron, he was nevertheless popular among his own kind, whose interests he defended and advanced for mostly self-serving reasons. At its height, Ratbat's economic empire controlled a double-digit percentage of Cybertron's economy.
Somewhere along the way he made a misstep and found himself at the mercy of Soundwave, who forcibly reprogrammed him to suit his own purposes and bound him to service. The altered Ratbat lost a bit in the transition, but now serves Soundwave with reasonable loyalty and has made himself essential to the Decepticon cause.
Resource management is Ratbat's true gift, and for reasons of pure survival he's thrown himself fully into his assigned task of keeping the Nemesis and Megatron's armies fueled and organized. He manages the Decepticon miners, supply lines, raw energon refining, quartermaster duties, fuel rationing and everything else necessary to keep the ship from falling out of the sky. If anything happens to him, things will go to hell very, very quickly.
Personality:
Ratbat is a truly ancient mech who takes the long view. Most view the Decepticons as an army with a mining operation attached - as far as he's concerned they're the opposite. Energon is life, the surviving Cybertronians are going through the universe's supply far too fast, so most of them have to die. He's done the math on the extinction horizon. It's ugly. A certain amount of attrition is necessary even to fuel everyone else on a reliable basis. He's not beneath secretly arranging matters.
He has no deep loyalty to the Decepticon cause or its individual leaders, barring his bond with Soundwave. Unlike most Decepticons, Ratbat liked the old system just fine. Due to his age and past rank he views the conflict from a different perspective than most and is coldly bitter about most of it. He's ancient, unarmed, and not remotely warrior class - a dedicated noncombatant.
Ratbat likes to keep others in his debt and has a vague holdover tendency to both show favoritism to other minicons and view them as subordinates. He used to have more flagrant vices, but that was before Soundwave. His pursuit of efficiency can be utterly single-minded and he's always looking at ways to improve his razor-thin margins. Completely unsentimental, he'll drain offlined Decepticons of energon to add to the ration pool without a second thought. He can be icily sarcastic when annoyed or thwarted.
There are two parts to him, though. One is the surviving remnant of the old High Councilor, the other belongs to Soundwave. One is a key element in the Decepticon war effort, the other is an object lesson to the rest of the crew. Ratbat's personality changes markedly when he's in Soundwave's presence or following his orders and his independence is nearly erased, something that other Decepticons find intensely creepy. Nobody knows exactly what Soundwave did to him, but nobody wants it done to them.
Likes:
Ratbat likes efficiency, obedience, and industry. He enjoys having his own little fiefdom, and will tenaciously defend his grip on it. He likes useful subordinates, but only so long as he calculates they remain useful. Some (like miners, mechs with key civilian skills, and other mini-cons) are valuable enough to his plans that he will dedicate significant effort to keeping them online. This should not be taken as evidence of altruism.
He is required to like Soundwave, although it's a complicated situation.
Dislikes:
Ratbat dislikes waste, although some waste, like the ongoing war, he views as necessary to cull the herd. He particularly dislikes large warriors with no other useful skills and is actively trying to reduce their population. Certain military scientists are also on his list. Mostly it's not personal, just the way the math works out.
Strengths/Weapons:
Ratbat is an unarmed noncombatant and considers combat an enormous waste of energon. His primary weapon is bureaucracy. He defends himself against Decepticons by emphasizing his connection to Soundwave and against Autobots by being a helpless civilian.
Weaknesses:
While vaguely resembling a purple Laserbeak in his flight mode, he lacks Laserbeak's high-powered laser weapon and attack/data cables. Ratbat is physically fragile and will flee any serious threat.
Special skills (that are not weapon related):
Ratbat's deep experience in economic, administrative, and political matters is unmatched among the Decepticons. He is extremely intelligent and highly accomplished at getting things done behind the scenes.
His recent physical modifications include an elaborate fuel analysis and sampling rig, with dedicated sensors sensitive enough that he can determine the fuel status of a mech at a glance and find energon at much greater ranges than others. If anyone's so much as leaking on the Nemesis, Ratbat knows about it. He sometimes travels with a mining laser, but it has an automated shutoff that prevents it from harming a living mech.
He also retains holoprojection modifications from when he was a High Councilor that give him unusual range and versatility. He mostly uses these mods to give presentations and brief his miners about new deposits. They are not finessed for any sort of combat application.
Ratbat can hover silently in flight mode. This does cost extra energon, but he considers the intangible benefit he gets from not always being knee-level worth it. By subspacing everything but absolute essentials, he can reduce himself to one-tenth his normal size. Top speed is 65 mph (105 kph).
Due to his small size and lack of weaponry he is intrinsically hard to detect and can easily be overlooked. He can also be surprisingly stealthy when he wants to be. Ratbat has a gestalt bond with Soundwave.
Tech Spec:
Strength: 3
Intelligence: 9
Speed: 4
Endurance: 3
Rank: 7
Courage: 7
Fireblast: 0
Skill: 9
Threads:
Flashback (Cybertron):
The Lower Pool - Assassination attempts in Polyhex.
Central Logistics - Ratbat recruits Jazz for a mission.
Flashback (Episode 0):
Economic Intelligence - Ratbat reports to Megatron.
Episode 1:
Take Back - The Nemesis is invaded.
Conference - Ratbat encounters Jetfire in the engine room after the battle.
Allies - Ratbat offers prison break scheduling advice to Fairwinds.
Designated Snuggling Time - Ratbat checks in with Soundwave.