Join us for another in a series of interviews with winners of awards from our recent 2022 Awards Ceremony. Our goal is to give you insight into how our fleet’s best simmers write, and imagine their characters.
This month we’re interviewing the writer behind Lt. Commander Artinus Serinus playing a male Magna Roma Security Officer assigned to the USS Arrow.He won the Yar Pin: “Awarded to Security personnel who have gone above and beyond the call of duty to safeguard and preserve their crewmates’ lives, even at the danger of their own.”
DeVeau: We got to know a little bit about you in our last interview, but would you mind delving a bit more into one of your interests – would you share your experiences with LARP and how it has shaped how you approach SB118?
The Larp I primarily played in was a “boffer” larp, that is a more combat oriented LARPing experience. So it didn’t really do much for me regarding character development, and my character was, as many people do in RPGs when they start out; a glorified self insert. I did learn some tactical tricks, a very small amount body dynamics (not as much as if I had taken up a real Martial Art per say) and to work as a member of a team. It helped me come out of my shell just a little bit too.
Would you share with us some significant things that have happened to Artinus in the last year?
2399 has been a busy year for Artinus. Here is a sampling:
He was part of the away team that captured a big cache of Breen intelligence that might further Starfleet’s understanding of the mysterious society.
During our shore leave on Casperia Prime, there was a fight between Artinus, the (then) Ensign Ar’Gorvalei and a couple of patrons that were getting handsy with a waitress at a Taco stand. Between that, and another incident involving other crewmates, the Arrow is probably barred from that particular planet.
Artinus was invited to witness Fleet Captain Oddas’ promotion, and networked with the Juneau crew just as they were getting ready to transfer over to Denali Station, which he got a brief look at as well. It was really cool coming back to a location like the ringworld we had visited on the Eagle.
He led the investigation to discover a saboteur, who unfortunately escaped, but up until then, I had rarely gotten to explore the policing side of his job in such depth.
And most recently, he originated, and co-led the efforts to set up an off-duty lounge for the crew. Hopefully, that should be dropping near the start of next shoreleave.
How has Artinus changed over the time you’ve played him here?
He was always pretty serious, confident, and self-disciplined. But the friendly edge has been blunted a bit. He’s much more jaded after seeing some of the existential dread and ever present danger that the universe has to offer. He’s making a conscious effort to correct himself in this regard, as he feels that he’s pushed some people away.
In your last interview, you mentioned that you’re a veteran and Captain Shayne mentioned how you’ve used real life experience “to formulate realistic interpretations”. Would you give us an explanation of how you use this in your simming?
That’s actually a much more in-depth question than it appears to be at first glance.
The surface level answer is that it’s helped me to write concisely, and realistically about fire team movements, how to breach, sweep and clear rooms; the three fundamentals of shoot, move, communicate; and cover and concealment and other important factors of reading a battlefield. As well as more mundane things, like proper address, marching, drilling and the like.
More subtly, it can really improve the feel of a sim to be able to express patterns of speech, thought, and body language that someone with military training might employ. This includes an exasperation with the level of bureaucracy that someone in his position is forced to deal with almost constantly.
How do you show the leadership capabilities of Artinus?
Artinus is an obsessive planner, almost unhealthily so. He really does want to account for all possibilities. He’s drawn up defense, attack, and counter-attack plans for every section of common space on the Arrow with the help of his squad leaders, and a former PC subordinate. But he’s not above improvisation, because he’s internalized the skill enough that he can plan in the middle of situations.
He sets very high standards not only for his people, but himself as well. He’s spent much of his life pursuing physical excellence, so he’s very used to rigid self-discipline. His well tuned diet and exercise regimens reflect this.
Through a twist of fate, Artinus never had a real long term infleet mentor at least for his department, and was sharing Chief duties from almost the beginning of his career. So being the mentor that he never had has been of the utmost importance to him. He takes his failings, and perceived failings in this area very hard.
Thanks to his upbringing as a child of retired diplomats, he’s fairly capable of getting people to see his point of view, even if it can come off as harsh. Despite his strong respect for the rank structure, he’s one of the few people that have been able to advise his Captain when he perceives that he’s making a mistake.
What are your future goals for you and your character in SB118?
Still aiming for the big chair in the long term. Waiting for my call up to the training team, in the meantime. I will continue to work on my art, and by the time this is published, I might be in the (Image) Collective, helping others visualize the locations that they invent for their sims, like I’ve done for the Lounge we’re planning, or the Klingon restaurant that I invented for my PNPC to visit.
Thanks for your time, Lt. Commander Serinus!
You can read more about Lt. Commander Artinus Serinus on the wiki.
