We continue to publish exclusive Angel of Darkness documents from Murti Schofield, the writer of the game. This one reveals more details about Eckhardt
ECKHARDT AND BREEDING
KURTIS & LARA AS PRODUCTS OF ECK’S BREEDING COMMUNITIES (?).
- The long term story arc for both Kurtis and Lara would be fascinating to explore if they were the contemporary results of some obscure branch of Eckhardt’s breeding community experiments from the 1300s onwards. It would explain some of their outstanding qualities and drives.
- Obviously the Lux Veritatis and other family trees could believably have ties with improved bloodlines branching off from Eckhardt’s improved humans experimentation.
- I’ve long felt that some deep shadowy part of Lara’s past, as yet undisclosed, might link her to some ancient historic forces that have been battling in the shadows of mythic & recorded history. She might be more deeply tied into the ancient and archaic world than has ever been hinted at before. And that, of course, was the starting point of AOD, taking Cappadocian angelic myths and the idea of ancient beings. But what if the links to her own genetic past (and that of Kurtis) were to be explored.
- After returning from his meeting with the Nephilim in 1345 with the promise of 100x years of extended life he forged ahead in his attempt to create a Nephuman bloodline capable of becoming incubation vessels for the emergence of the neo-Nephilim. Many improvements were bred into his human stock. Strength and cognitive abilities would be enhanced as well as many other desirable human traits.
- Once the ‘improved’ human stock began to exhibit stable signs of endurance and vigour Eckhardt would introduce sample individuals into the population at large to ‘seed’ a wider genetic pool. The development and improvement of such seeded bloodlines would be closely monitored and selected individuals exhibiting the qualities he sought would be reintroduced back into his more closely controlled breeder communities. This would more rapidly enhance and advance his genetic pool, his ‘…crucible for the flux of vitality and transcendent celestial potential.’
- Generations on there would be extraordinary individuals appearing in the world at large but it would be almost impossible to keep track of every emergent exemplar. The Lux Veritatis would be constantly on the look out to recruit families with outstanding abilities or potential as warrior mystics. They would watch and nurture any specials and Kurtis’ family tree could be one of these promising branches, a line traced back to one of these ‘lost’ Eckhardt breeder-batches.
- Lara too could easily be a twentieth century product of a family line with roots deep in the dark days of medieval genetic transmogrification. There would be a certain cosmic irony there.
- The coming together of Lara and Kurtis in Paris could have been chance or possibly the culmination of circumstances manipulated from the shadows regions by an ancient agency of a malignant and undying force. To be explored…!
NB Reference Philip Jose Farmer’s Wold Newton Universe where he creates a common point of origin, a bllodline, for such eternals as Tarzan, Doc Savage, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Nathanial Bumpo (Hawkeye of Last of the Mohicans), Dr Syn, Bulldog Drummond, Sherlock Holmes, The Spider, James Bond et al. Also Warren Ellis’ Planetary for reinterpreted & revitalised heroes of yore.
FURTHER TO THE FOLLOW ON GAME:
- Explore the bloodline of new character Morgau Vasiley, daughter of the renegade LV Mathias Vasiley as a part initiate into LV skills and know how. She will have gone to the dark side and can go head to head with Kurtis wielding similar weaponry and abilities in ding-dong smash ups! Yeah! Reference document on alternate LV Chirugai-like weapons.
- See document on revised last meeting between Lara, Kurtis and Karel at the end of AOD. As a kick off for game II this is one of those, ‘Oh, so you think you know what happened at the end of AOD huh! Well…get THIS!’ For a precedent, see how the third Bourne film fits almost completely into the tiny gap between Bourne’s leaving the rail station in Moscow and turning up in New York to have it out with Jessica Landy.
Clearly this all needs more thinking about and some timelines drawing up but the depth it gives to both L and K promises many exciting & worthwhile story possibilities.