Riken

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Lady Riken Eclipse, of Valley of Smoke, Crystal Groves

"Did someone say roleplay?"

A photo of Riken being proposed to by her fiance, Kit Silvertail, at the 2015 Kingdom of Crystal Groves Yule event.

Biography

Lady Riken Eclipse, of the Valley of Smoke, Kingdom of Crystal Groves

Riken, The Roleplayer:

Amid the crowd of revelers at the tavern can be seen a small fox, the size of a house cat. Four tails are spotted as she scampers across the room with a gold coin in her mouth.

The fox disappears in a puff near the bar, and in her place, a small woman with sandy blond-brown hair, clad in a blue and purple dress. Fox ears still stick up from her head, and under her skirts, tails can be seen moving.

As she takes the coin from her mouth and drops it into a small pouch on her belt, Riken moves forward into the crowd to serve drinks.

Riken Eclipse, known simply as Riken to her friends, is the epitome of the word kitsune. Young enough to be enthralled by almost any shiny thing she encounters, but old enough to know she shouldn't be, the young kitsune is a pillar of roleplay wherever she happens to be.

Riken is 73 years old, far too young to have left the den. The naive kitsune claims to any who ask that she was given permission to leave at such a young age to start her own tavern and learn about humans. However, no one has ever met her parents, or anyone else of her clan, to corroborate this statement.

In the Kingdom of Crystal Groves, Riken is known among many circles as the one who needs to be watched. In her time, she has been:

• attacked by the deadly sin Greed, and thus the topic of an eight week long roleplay leading up to a seven deadly sins themed summer event.
• kidnapped several times by various quest villains at park and kingdom levels.
• accused of attempting to steal the crown of Crystal Groves, despite being innocent of the deed.
• ringleader of a band of roleplayers who faced down the fairy queen Mab in a duchy-level quest
• cheerleader for a team being defeated during a caravan-style event.
• created her own "kitsune language" to speak to others whenever her character gets too excited or confused.

And many other such shenanigans.

Among her roleplay accomplishments are:

• roleplaying in character during Elven Court so well that she was awarded her Paragon Healer for rezzing the king so quickly, in character, without dropping her character voice.
• known throughout the kingdom as "the one who doesn't break character."
• tricking Queen Mab into believing that her real name is Riken in exchange for a favor.
• found a way to incorporate her love of spinning yarn into her roleplay. Riken is often seen with her spinning wheel, roleplaying not, without breaking character or the wool yarn she is making.

In 2014, Riken was nominated by her peers as one of the top 10 roleplayers in all of Amtgard, an honor which she cherishes.

Riken, The Crafter:

Aside from roleplay, Riken has another love: crafting.

As of July, 2015, Riken has :

• won four park-level dragonmasters.
• placed in three kingdom-level dragonmasters.
• won one kingdom-level dragonmaster.
• won Cultural Olympian in the 2014 Olympiad competition. (The only reason she did not win overall Olympian was that she did not know she had to participate in the fighting tournament as well in order to receive that title.)

Riken will be the keynote speaker at the 2015 Arts and Crafts Boot Camp in New Mexico.

She is a fifth-generation artisan, trained in Appalachian styles of art.

Riken is often referred to by others as humble for her creations. She rarely mentions her Olympiad victory, and keeps a low profile. She does occasionally accept orders for custom works, being paid upwards of $100 for individual tunics she has created.

Riken's prized tunic creations include:

• the Olympiad-winning "tribute to sneetches" tunic, a sea-foam green affair on which 75 variously colored stars were painstakingly appliquéd with sparkly silver thread outlining. The accompanying write-up was done in Dr. Seuss style iambic pentameter to reflect the sneetches reference in the title.
• the award-winning "Winter's Playground", a four-piece fleece costume, featuring brown pants, a green skirt with a kitsune appliquéd on it, a brown tunic with a kitsune appliquéd on the back and a dozen hand-embroidered paw prints tracking through imaginary snow, and a hat with hand-embroidered paw prints.
• "A Custom Order" tunic, featuring a complicated snake wrapped around a fleur de lis appliquéd on a shield, which was then placed on the chest of a tunic.

In addition to these complex works, Riken has created more than two dozen basic tunics for people over her 10+ years in Amtgard, many of which she simply gave away to their owners.

Riken's favorite garb varies by season. In winter, she prefers to wear the Winter's Playground outfit, described above. In spring and fall, she prefers Anglo-Saxon style garb, including a navy blue chemise and a faded purple linen apron dress, complete with patches to simulate wear and tear. In the summer, she is often found in her "Tribute to Sneetches" tunic with a simple black skirt underneath.

Once she gets away from the world of sewing, Riken has her hand in many other crafts. Here is a brief listing thereof.

• Spinning: Riken owns a modern spinning wheel and enjoys spinning her own yarn. She finds this activity calming, and will often bring the wheel, named Matilda, with her to Amtgard events.
• Scroll Work: Riken practices making scrolls for the players at her local park. Every time a player reaches level six in a class, Riken makes them a personalized scroll to celebrate their achievement. She has made over a dozen of these scrolls so far, and continues to make more. She has also made scrolls for various titles and some awards.
• Weaving: Riken owns a 32-inch rigid heddle style loom, and will often weave her own cloth. She has made purses, aprons, and a jacket out of hand-woven cloth.
• Painting: She enjoys painting with acrylics.
• Writing: Writing is Riken’s bread and butter, what she loves doing the most. She is often shy about her works, though. In the 2014 Olympiad competition, she took first through fifth places in the writing competition.
• Other crafts include: knitting, crochet, basket weaving, quilting, cooking, baking, paper making, bookbinding, and glass blowing.

Riken, The Player:

Riken is often jokingly referred to as "the vampire" because she suffers from polymorphic light eruption syndrome. For those not medically in-the-know, this translates loosely as "allergic to sunlight."

She continues to roleplay, even though she must protect herself by hiding from sunlight. She has incorporated the protective clothing into her regular outfit, keeping herself shielded from the sun with bright options that reflect her kitsune nature.

Riken enjoys teaching classes about almost anything, including roleplay and various crafts. She has served as regent and monarch of her local park many times, and enjoys serving when she can.

In January, 2014, Riken met Kit Silvertail at a kingdom event.

In January, 2015, Kit Silvertail proposed to Riken, in a mundane sense, in front of 150 people gathered at the same kingdom event they had met at the year before.

The couple are set to marry in October, 2015, and plan an Amtgard roleplay wedding for spring 2016.

Riken, The Real Person:

In the mundane world, Riken is known as Gretchen Richards, a mild-mannered reporter at a local newspaper, The Parkersburg News and Sentinel, in her small West Virginian town. She has a weekly arts and crafts column in said newspaper, and has been asked to speak at several mundane engagements about her crafting skills.

Riken, The Paragon Healer

Riken was awarded her Paragon Healer in October 2014, after a stunt she pulled in the middle of Elven Court. In the pouring rain, the king of Crystal Groves (not of Elven Court), was assassinated in roleplay.

Without breaking character, Riken rushed forward, bells jingling and high pitched voice intact, and dropped the rez spell in approximately three seconds.

All of Elven Court came to a stop. The king turned his head and stared at Riken and quietly whispered “Do that again.”

Riken did. Again, everyone stared. Finally, the king whispered, “Incredible. Every single word was there.”

After Elven Court, so many extant paragons of various magic classes went to the king to ask that Riken be awarded her paragon that it was made so during court the following night.

Riken’s Travels:

Riken enjoys traveling around, playing at parks whenever she has a chance to. Riken has played at the following parks over the years.

• Nowhere Mountains - Riken got her start in the game at this park, part of the Kingdom of Neverwinter, Principality of Winter’s Edge
• Green Water Valley - Riken made this park in Charleston, W.V., her home for several years. Crystal Groves
• Valley of Smoke - Crystal Groves, Riken’s current home
• Radiant Valley - Winter’s Edge, visitor
• Dragon’s Hollow - Winter’s Edge, visitor
• Duchy of Crystal Groves - Crystal Groves, visitor
• Kingdom of Crystal Groves
• Blightstone Hollow - Kingdom of Goldenvale, visitor
• Mountain of Sixth Dawn - Charleston, WV, Crystal Groves, visitor
• Ruby Hills - Crystal Groves, visitor
• Shire of Blackthorn - Crystal Groves, visitor
• Principality of Eastern Shores - visitor (not technically a principality yet)

The Roleplay Tavern

The Fox’s Tails Roleplay Tavern is owned and operated by Riken.

After attending Feast of the Fools 2013, Riken was dismayed at hearing how many of the kingdom’s roleplayers were wandering from camp to camp in search of someone willing to roleplay. Seeing they had no centralized location to play in, Riken decided to do something about it.

At Feast of the Dead 2013, the Fox’s Tails Roleplay Tavern was unveiled under the name Phoenix Mountain Roleplay Tavern. It was a huge success.

Riken soon created an online presence for the roleplay tavern, giving her players a chatzy room to roleplay in with text whenever they wanted to do so.

Eventually, the players talked her into changing the name to Fox’s Tails, as a reflection of her kitsune nature.

The tavern is at every Kingdom of Crystal Groves event, with event coordinators often seeking Riken out to ask her to come, and working a plan for where the tavern will be into their overall plans for the event site.

Affiliated Groups

Riken is a memebr of Team Roleplay Mid-Atlantic, the Order of Disorder, the Raiders of the Lost Bread, the Fox’s Tails Roleplay Tavern, and several for-fun goofy households.

Belted Family

Riken is not belted to anyone at this time.

Notable Accomplishments

Riken feels it is important to remain dues paid and reeves qualified at all times, although she does not like to shot reeve during tournaments because she must wear dark glasses out in the sun, and fears they may prevent her from seeing a shot correctly.

Riken’s current award levels are as follows: Titles: Lady Garbers: 6 Dragons: 5 Roses: 5 Gryphon: 4 Smith: 4 Hydra: 3 Lion: 3 Owl: 2 Warrior: 2

Riken has one order of the Mask, and one order of the Zodiac.

In late 2014, a member of Riken’s kingdom issued a 25-achievement challenge, of which Riken was the only person to complete all 25 items on the list. She was given the Zodiac award for completing the challenge when no one else would.

Other Classes:

Riken always prefers playing magic. She isn’t much of a fighter, but she knows that she is not and tries to focus on being as much use as she can be to her teammates during class battle games.

Riken’s current classes are as follows:

Healer: Paragon Druid: Level 6 Scout: Level 6 Monster: Level 4 Archer: Level 3 Bard: Level 2 Reeve: Level 2

More Information

• 
• Personal Website
• Company Website

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