Application - The Far Shore

[bakusatsuo]

Player Information

Name: Callie
Contact: callistodementia@gmail.com/lymmea/Lymmea#6855 @ Discord
Age: 34
Other Characters: Ken Joshima, Nagito Komaeda

Character Information

Name: Katsuki Bakugou
Canon: Boku no Hero Academia/My Hero Academia (whichever you prefer to list it as)
Canon Point: Canon current; that's at the end of chapter 196 of the manga right now, but I'll probably canon update him whenever something significant happens for his character.
Age: 16
History: Wiki article

Personality: Bakugou is an...interesting example of an aspiring hero. Where many people might have the disposition and desire to help others, but not the strength, Bakugou is the exact opposite - he has the raw power and skill to do almost anything he wants, but he lacks the personality and empathy a hero needs. And there's a very straightforward reason for this; when looking at his own personal inspiration for wanting to become a hero, All Might, Bakugou focused not on the people All Might saved, but on the battles he won. He concluded that what was important in a hero was their strength, and their ability to overcome all odds stacked against them. And, to be fair to Bakugou, those things certainly aren't unimportant for a hero; after all, someone who wants to save people but doesn't have the strength to make a difference is just as useless as someone who never bothers to try. But Bakugou essentially looked at the two aspects necessary for a hero, and focused only on one to the exclusion of cultivating the other. (This makes him a foil to Midoriya Izuku, his rival, who focused only on his desire to save people and for years tried to ignore the fact that he didn't have the power to follow through with what he wanted to do. Also, like Midoriya, Bakugou has only recently recognized and begun working on the second aspect of becoming a true hero he's lacked all this time.)

Bakugou had the misfortune (though it didn't look like a bad thing at the time) of growing up in a society that prizes obvious power and potential - especially in the form of the superhuman abilities people in Bakugou's world can potentially develop, colloquially called quirks. Bakugou had the good luck to develop an extremely powerful quirk(around the age of four, as is common in-universe), in the form of being able to create explosions with his hands at will by virtue of actually sweating a nitroglycerin-like substance. However, Bakugou was praised and admired far too much for essentially lucking out on a genetic dice roll, to the point where he thought having a strong quirk was a sign of personal worth...because, as it happened, people treated him as though it was. This led to Bakugou, even as a child, developing a massive ego, and looking down on those with weaker quirks...and also led to his furiously reviling association with people who didn't have a quirk at all, like his childhood acquaintance calling him a friend would be stretching it Midoriya.

Interestingly, it's demonstrated that Bakugou's antipathy toward Midoriya came from his own blatant misinterpretation of Midoriya's intentions and feelings. Whereas Midoriya genuinely admired Bakugou and was inspired by his better qualities, and in fact wanted to emulate him, Bakugou believed that Midoriya looked down on him, and viewed Midoriya's treating Bakugou as an equal to him - when everyone seemed to think of Midoriya as powerless and pitiable - as a veiled insult. Clearly a lot of this was the product of Bakugou's environment and socialization from others; some of it may even have been a projection fo Bakugou's own fears and guilt. He clearly recognized on some level that someone like Midoriya, who he treated so poorly, shouldn't genuinely like him, which could explain why he refused to believe it even though Midoriya made no secret of his admiration.

Of course, what led Bakugou to be an arrogant asshole doesn't really excuse his behavior; it just contextualizes it as a larger societal issue than just one boy with an attitude problem. And Bakugou's behavior was genuinely awful for a long time; at one point early on in the series, before they graduated middle school, Bakugou even mockingly suggested Midoriya kill himself and hope for a reincarnation that would have a quirk. It wasn't until Bakugou entered Yuuei High School, the top school for aspiring professional heroes, that he met people who could challenge his power and skill, and in turn challenge the foundation of his superiority complex enough to make him re-evaluate his thinking and behavior in any way. He had a bad case of big-fish-in-small-pond syndrome; it's shown that up through middle school, Bakugou was probably the strongest person with the strongest quirk in the limited environment he experienced, so that he was superior because his quirk was unparalleled was an easy conclusion to come to(especially when everyone treated him as so powerful, and admirable because of that power; he even had blatant sycophants in middle school). But in Yuuei, there were a number of students with powerful quirks, some equally impressive to Bakugou's own, and thus Bakugou was finally forced to realize that 1) he and his quirk weren't actually the best ever, and 2) maybe they never had been, and everything he thought he knew - and, perhaps, his attitude based on those beliefs - was wrong.

It's telling that Bakugou's behavior does quickly stop being quite so blindly arrogant shortly after learning some humility, especially after his first loss to Midoriya himself. Bakugou's ability to learn and grow, rather than stubbornly clinging to his mistakes, is what really demonstrates his potential, more so than his quirk or combat abilities. And Bakugou has indeed grown and changed, more so perhaps than any other character in the series on a personal and emotional level; if Midoriya's weakness has always been his external power, or lack thereof, and his personal journey through the series as the protagonist is about his finding and growing power, then Bakugou's journey as his foil is one of finding and growing his inner self. Compassion, humility, self-awareness, call it what you will; Midoriya's body is working to catch up with his heart, and Bakugou's heart is working to catch up with his body.

Interestingly, this doesn't mean that Bakugou didn't have any admirable aspects to begin with, or that all his positive traits are recent developments. Bakugou is capable of stubbornness, almost to the point of insanity. He refuses to be cowed by or back down from any odds, no matter how stacked against him they might be(unless there's a practical reason to back down; he's not stupid, simply determined). He refuses to give up, no matter how bad a situation looks. Bakugou genuinely lives his philosophy that a hero should be able to win under any circumstances, and is willing to throw everything he has toward that goal. To Midoriya, who grew up with him, and who personally saw a four-year-old Bakugou trounce much bigger kids (who looked like they might be old enough to be in middle school) on at least one occasion, Bakugou almost personifies victory. (The fact that Bakugou is intelligent enough to not apply such stubbornness to the idea of improving himself, of being willing to put in the work to be the best instead of refusing to accept that there's anything he could improve on, shows just how dedicated he is to his own growth.) Also, even in situations where Bakugou has been in deadly danger, he has a habit of grinning ferociously and projecting confidence - something Midoriya is actually criticized for not being able to do, elsewhere in the series, because it's emphasized that a hero needs to be able to make people believe in them and push back their own fear. We also see Bakugou's ambitious ferocity motivate his classmates on more than one occasion; even though they think he's crazy for aiming so high, he inspires them to reach as high as they can with him. Even without specifically aiming to drive others on, Bakugou's sheer determination to win, under any circumstances - even if he's fighting the #1 hero in the world, and his own figure of personal inspiration, even if he has to tear his own body apart for victory - simply pumps people up to witness.

In short, Midoriya didn't admire Bakugou for nothing, even at the height of Bakugou's asshole behavior.

In terms of his base personality, Bakugou's always been loud, coarse, rude, and openly aggressive - to the point of it almost being caricature, especially when viewed through a Japanese lens - and that doesn't look to be changing anytime soon. Bakugou has no use for social niceties or humility; when asked to address the public as a class representative before a competition, Bakugou merely stated that he'd win the competition, prompting almost outraged amazement from the audience at his audacity and cockiness. (Interestingly, he did go on to win the competition...but as he felt his final fight was thrown/fought poorly by his competitor, he was violently against accepting the victory. Bakugou has a very pronounced sense of fairness and earned respect when it comes to going up against other people. He doesn't want to accept any accolades or respect he hasn't earned, and he demonstrates his own respect for those who fight him with everything they have by responding in kind - even when his refusal to go easy on them makes him look like the bad guy.) We've also seen Bakugou openly reject friendly platitudes from people whose true intentions are just as ruthless as his own; it can be inferred that Bakugou almost sees social niceties as a form of dishonesty, and that he prefers to be up front with his ambitions and self-confidence rather than falsely downplaying them. He certainly doesn't respect people who aren't up front in turn.

While initially Bakugou didn't seem to care about, pay attention to, or even like anyone around him, his slow but subtle growth as he accepts his classmates as friends and equals, sometimes even people to be relied upon and worked with(although he's always reluctant to do this, presumably because he hates not being able to conquer the odds singlehandedly), is still noticeable in the story:

• During the first major villain attack upon their class, Bakugou ends up working with Kirishima quite a bit, although this is less by choice and more because Kirishima comes to admire Bakugou's intelligence and determination in fighting back against the villains and chooses to tag along with him of his own free will; this leads into what becomes a lasting friendship (pushed mostly by Kirishima) between the two boys.

• Bakugou also helps direct his team during the sports festival, helping them to all become semifinalists through skill and strategy (not to mention ferocious tenacity) that didn't just surprise them, but inspired them in their own right.

• Despite Bakugou's initial declaration, during an end-of-semester exam where he'd been paired up with Midoriya to fight All Might, that he'd rather lose than work with his hated rival, Midoriya pushes him past his unreasonable aversion to teamwork to get Bakugou to refocus on winning - which is, to date, probably the biggest stride forward in Bakugou's willingness to work with others, since he had specific reasons to not want to work with Midoriya and still overcame them.

• When Bakugou was kidnapped by a group of supervillains, and Midoriya and Kirishima (among others) came to rescue him, Bakugou readily accepted their help out of a dangerous situation; one could almost argue that he seems happy they came for him. (He also goes out of his way afterwards to not just find out what his rescuers did to help him, but to repay Kirishima when he finds out Kirishima blew almost $500 of his own money - or the yen equivalent - on night vision goggles to help with the rescue.)

• During the license exam, when Bakugou was facing down a danerous opponent, he kept using one of his weaker explosions to fight, which Kaminari notes is because Bakugou is taking care not to hurt him or Kirishima with his explosions. Even more telling is that when the opponent manages to incapacitate Bakugou, Bakugou manages to throw some of his support equipment to Kaminari, which Kaminari then uses to throw the opponent off - Bakugou didn't just accept help, he actively gave a classmate the tools to help him and trusted that Kaminari would put them to good use.

• His increasing willingness to work with the other students even extends outside of combat situations, or situations in which Bakugou's desire to become the #1 hero directly benefits - in recent chapters, he both helped motivate and work with his classmates in a school culture festival, both forcing his classmates to accept reality (that the other students resented their class because they feel as though class 1A is causing problems for the school at large with all the high profile villain incidents they've been unwillingly involved in) and then inspiring them to change that reality(by putting on a performance so undeniably badass that the people who resented them would change their minds about class 1A).

In short, Bakugou's come a long way from the callous, arrogant, allergic-to-team-spirit teenager he was when he was when he first entered Yuuei. He's still far from pleasant, but he's fitting in better with the class, he's less genuinely caustic to people unless they seriously offend him in some way, and a lot of his rage and yelling is much more easily recognized and brushed off by his classmates as just Bakugou's own special brand of bluster.

Bakugou has more than just bad boy bluster to him, however; he's also shown to be immensely intelligent and strategic. He has some of the highest grades in the class, and the varied and tactical ways he uses not just his own quirk, but how he directs the quirks of those he's working with in combat are often genius-level improvisation. He's also one of the fastest in the series (taking into account both teenagers and adults) to both observe and put together things - like how a quirk works, or how people are feeling, or even Midoriya's most closely guarded secret - from only a few clues. He also works incredibly hard, training ferociously, seeking out the toughest fights(even going so far as to deliberately provoke people), and always aiming to succeed indisputably - and be the best - at whatever he does. In fact, one could argue that Bakugou's quirk is one of the less amazing things about him, because without the massive support of how intelligently Bakugou uses it and how hard he's worked to make it powerful and useful, it's not likely it would have gotten him far on his own.

He's also more insightful and conflicted than people give him credit for; after his rescue from the supervillains - affter which Bakugou and Midoriya's personal hero and inspiration, All Might, was forced to retire, having almost died resolving the incident - he both put together the fact that Midoriya's mysterious new quirk had somehow been inherited from All Might, and came to the conclusion that All Might's retirement was his fault for getting captured and not being able to escape under his own power. Both these things tore him up inside - that Midoriya, his rival who had never been able to match him, somehow earned the recognition from their hero that Bakugou hadn't managed to get despite all his efforts, leapfrogging ahead of Bakugou's lifetime efforts in the span of less than a year, and also that Bakugou felt personally responsible for ending All Might's career. This ended in him challenging Midoriya to a fight that Midoriya recognized as Bakugou's desperately needing an emotional outlet - a fight which Bakugou won, and which finally drew All Might's attention to him as someone who also needed his acknowledgment and support.

It was in the wake of this fight that All Might acknowledged that Bakugou and Midoriya were both chasing the same goal, but on too narrow a perspective - that they needed to combine Bakugou's focus on winning, and Midoriya's focus on saving people, and only by embracing both halves of heroism could the two of them become the greatest possible heroes. Ever since then, Bakugou has been a little more relaxed - even going so far as to volunteer some (admittedly a little grumpily backhanded) combat advice to Midoriya, and showing genuine insight into his own behavior when addressing a child who was condescending to others - "if all you ever do is look down on people, you won't be able to recognize your own weaknesses". Bakugou definitely has a more thoughtful side to him, and is increasingly aware of (and actively addressing) his own flaws. He still has a long way to go, but his continued bravado isn't an indication of a refusal to change so much as a refusal to let other people see his vulnerabilities.

(On that subject, while there hasn't been much indication of this in canon - at least not directly - I feel that Bakugou probably has some PTSD from both an incident where he was captured and immobilized/smothered by a sludge villain, and when he was kidnapped by a league of murderous supervillains. He's only a teenager, and in both instances he was subtly shown to be afraid as any kid might be; while the series itself hasn't followed up on any lingering fears or issues he might have as a result of that incident, I believe they almost have to be there, and I'll be incorporating them into my playing of him at least a little.)

In short, Bakugou is a young teenage punk who looks shallow from the outside, but actually has tremendous depth and is currently undergoing quite a bit of personal growth, although the degree to which he advertises this - especially to anyone he doesn't explicitly trust - is limited at best. He also has massive potential and is almost unfairly skilled in a number of areas, not just when it comes to his powerful quirk.

Abilities: Bakugou's quirk, Explosion, lets him secrete nitroglycerin (or something indistinguishable from it) from his palms, which he can detonate whenever he wants; the more he sweats and exerts himself, the stronger he can make his explosions, so he actually has the potential to blow things up more the harder he's fighting. The explosions don't harm him in any way, despite him being at the epicenter of them(although one assumes the shrapnel from things he blows up could, even if the series hasn't addressed this ever). He's come up with numerous applications for his explosions, aside from the obvious 'blow up opponents' one - he uses them to propel him through the air in a form of directed flight, to swiftly dodge or reposition himself, to punch through armor and obstacles, to create light/heat, and even uses rapidfire explosions on one occasion to create a sort of corkscrew tornado around himself as he flew through the air. He can also presumably (as these applications haven't been shown in the series yet) use them to blind people in dark areas by destroying their night vision, to temporarily deafen people with sensitive hearing, and to create light/smoke/debris cover for covert movement. There are limitations to how strong the explosions he can create are without hurting his arms with the recoil, although he's shown to push through these limitations on a few occasions - but presumably he wouldn't want to do that unless he had a particularly good reason, since there could be long-term repercussions and Bakugou is shown to be mindful of things that might affect his long-term goal of becoming the #1 hero.

He's going to arrive in the Far Shore wearing his (winter) hero costume, and as a result he's going to have his support equipment with him. These include his Grenadier Bracers, which are massive gauntlets around his arm which look like oversize grenades that store excess sweat, which can be set off in a concentrated, aimed blast by pulling the grenade pin. This essentially lets Bakugou set off an explosion significantly more massive than he can manage without the bracers, as he presumably can't sweat that much all at once and would probably hurt his arms with the recoil if such a blast came directly from his hands. He also carries improvised grenades on his belt, which look and function more like hand grenades and function off of the same stored-sweat principle.

In terms of mundane talents, Bakugou has quite a number of them. He's extremely smart - both in academic and practical terms - highly observant, able to see through lies and false fronts easily(though, such as in Midoriya's case, he has been known to arrive at the completely wrong conclusion), hard-working, exceptional at improvising and quick thinking, and is good at so many things that sometimes his classmates complain that it seems like he's good at everything. This probably isn't natural skill, so much as the end result of his being so driven by competitiveness to want to excel at everything.

Strengths: Determined, intelligent, observant, adaptable, inspirational
Weaknesses: Short-tempered, uncouth, prideful, bad at communication, arrogant

God/Shinki: God
Why?: Mostly because I want to play Bakugou with his memories, but also because I feel like a lot of his current character growth - which is not just one of the things that appeals to me the most about him, but will make him actually able to have varied types of CR in a game rather than it all being negative - will be lost if he loses all context for where and who he is.

Top 3 Choices: Ares: Bakugou as a god of war and combat obviously makes sense, given his aggressive nature. However, I'm torn between this - the more destructive, negatively viewed aspect of a god of war - and...

Mars: This is, technically, just Ares rebranded for the Roman pantheon. However, there are significant differences in how Ares and Mars are perceived by the Greeks and Romans respectively. Ares is perceived as a destructive, destabilizing god, and is occasionally mocked or shown up in Greek mythology; he wasn't really liked by the Greeks, exactly, and not considered a positive aspect. Mars, however, was viewed by the Romans as representing power as a means of securing peace, and was considered one of the most important figures in their pantheon. One could argue that Ares represents Bakugou as people see him(and certainly as how he used to be), whereas Mars better reflects the trajectory of Bakugou's personal growth that he's undergoing. So while they're technically the same god, which one Bakugou is branded as could have significant meaning, and both have their merits. I'd definitely be happy with, and would have ways to play with, either option; in fact, I personally don't know which would be better, and I'd be happy for you guys to choose for me. However, since Ares and Mars are technically the same god, and I don't know if the mod team would want both in-game simultaneously - and thus picking two interpretations of the same god might not count as picking three different god options - I'm going to include four gods here to make up for listing both Ares and Mars.

Kratos: The divine personfication of strength and power. The reasons for this one are obvious. But, like Ares, Kratos is seen as ruthless and promoting unnecessary violence, so it would represent more of where Bakugou used to be (or the challenges he's currently striving to overcome) than where he is now or who he's working to be.

Tyr: The Norse god of honor, law, justice in battle, victory, and heroic glory. He hits some of the duality of Bakugou's personality - the fact that Bakugou is aggressive and warlike, but at the same time those traits are aimed towards being a hero and serving the law rather than subverting it. It also plays to his refusal to lose, and his utter rage at fights that he perceives as unfair(even, or perhaps especially, when the fights are unfair in his own favor).

God Type: Bakugou will have no real trouble embodying any of the things that the gods I've picked for him stand for - although in Ares' or Kratos' cases, he may bring a more thoughtful and less destructive aspect to those gods than they're thought of as having, at least at the point in his character development I'm taking him from. (Albeit in a rather subtle way; outwardly he'll probably seem like a perfect fit for them.) However, he's unlikely to answer prayers no matter what kind of god he is, simply because he emphasizes helping oneself and getting what one wants through one's own efforts - even when he was being graded on saving people in the provisional license exam, he was scornful of people asking for his help, especially those who weren't in dire need of it. He might answer prayers in which the odds are unfairly stacked against the person praying - out of a desire to at least make things a little less grossly one-sided - but even then, it might only happen at a shinki's prodding. A clever shinki could probably get him to do prayers via basic reverse psychology, though; Bakugou's easily worked up.

Power: Power Augmentation Inspiration - Bakugou can inspire others to do their best at whatever they're attempting to do, signficantly increasing their prowess and skill in a specific thing(such as, say, combat, but it could even apply to something like baking under different circumstances). This is limited by how much natural skill the person has in whatever they're attempting; someone who's already a good baker fighter could be thus inspired to become supernaturally good at baking fighting for a time, whereas someone who's never baked fought before could only be elevated to 'impressive for someone who's never baked fought before' levels. Proximity to Bakugou is required for this to work for Far Shore residents, but his power is a bit more lenient when it applies to mortal worshippers; provided a Near Shore follower of his has prayed to him in the last 24 hours, he can inspire them without needing to be near them.

Writing Sample

Sample: Test Drive Meme; he's also commented to other threads if his own thread doesn't have enough to judge on yet

Other

Anything Else?: Nothing specific!