Joel Foster

[Ahab9]

Name: Joel Ozias Foster
Gender: Male
Age: 18
Hobbies and Interests: Gymnastics, cooking, babysitting, drinking

Appearance: Joel stands at exactly 4’ 10” and weighs 125 lbs. What he lacks in height he mainly makes up for in muscle, his body being very muscular due to his gymnastics, to the point of having a six pack. His skin is a warm ivory color, which is matched with medium-length light brown hair, barely covering his ears, brushed down and left unstyled if not covered by a hat. Joel’s face is oval shaped, paired with a medium sized straight nose, round hazel eyes with noticeable bags, slightly bushy eyebrows, thin lips, and a small bit of stubble to form a five o’clock shadow, purposely grown and left alone so that he looks older.

Joel has a tendency to dress casually for most occasions, no matter the circumstances, as he has a general disinterest in fashion for the most part, at most just wearing things his siblings suggest he should wear. On the day of the abduction, he wore a diamond plaid hoodie, with a pink and red pattern on the chest and cream-coloured sleeves and a black tank top underneath, black, tight pants, black socks and white trainers. He also wears a bracelet on his left wrist, with beads shaped like poker suits and jester crowns.

Biography: Joel was born October 11th, 2005, in Bend, Oregon. The first child of Heath and Jemma Foster, a veterinarian and surgeon respectively, he would not be the last. The upper-middle class couple would have five more children; fifteen-year-old Martin, twelve-year-old Fox, six-year-old Sasha, and twin one-year-olds Ace and Olive.

Joel had a strong interest in rolling and tumbling when he was small, which both his parents took note of. Wanting to prepare him in case he keeps this interest as he grows up, they signed him up for gymnastics classes at two years old. While he’s grown out of the beginner’s class, he regularly practices gymnastics semi-professionally and participates in competitions, well enough to participate in the National cups, at the age of 14.

He met several gymnasts coming from Saint Paul, and ends up being friends, or at least friendly acquaintance, with some of them. However, despite his preparation, he received a back injury that forced him to forfeit. While he recovered completely, a combination of the loss and his growing interest in cooking made him put gymnastics at a professional level in the background.

When he was three years old, his mother Jemma gave birth to Martin, after a complicated and drawn out caesarian section. While neither suffered further complications, this event spooked them greatly; a further complicating factor was Heath losing his job.

When Jemma turned pregnant with Fox, they were unwilling to risk for other complications during birth. After a through search, it was chosen to leave Oregon to move in Saint Paul, Minnesota, on the belief that they'll receive the best care after seeing the local hospital and its quality, along with the possibility for Jemma to transfer there. Fox's birth went without complications, and the family, after both Heath and Jemma managed to find better paid jobs into a government funded animal shelter and a private clinic respectively, chose to fully settle in the city,

The transition went smoothly for them, and they also managed to maintain their economic wealth, but due to both of them having time consuming jobs, Heath and Jemma tend to be out of the house more often than not. Joel, being the oldest, was the one the parents trusted most, and as such was the one looking after the younger kids the most ever since reaching middle school, otherwise hiring a babysitter.

This has led him to learn a number of useful life skills, such as cooking and first aid, the former of which he greatly enjoys. The chance of experiment and try out different dishes is a passion that still remained in him.

While Joel loves his family, he finds it stressful to be in charge of his siblings so often, resenting his parents somewhat for giving him a major responsibility over their wellbeing. This put a wedge between them, with Joel feeling distant to both of them; he felt closer to his mom, but only because she managed to be more present compared to his father.

He attempts to relieve the stress at times; since hitting seventeen, he started drinking from his parents’ liquor cabinet. While he has avoided being discovered by his parents, both Martin and Fox are aware of his habit, and he was once asked about it. He claimed he wasn't, but after that he held back drinking to once or twice a week, and sometimes even less.

He still regularly participated, if less frequently, in local gymnastic competitions during high school, until one of the participants suffered a neck injury, which made him undergo multiple expensive surgery operations. Joel, who wound up winning and knew him as another regular, gave the prize money to him, and showed up regularly at the hospital to visit him; mostly to talk and share family recipes. He had grown a liking to Overseas cooking, mostly main courses, and the two ends up being friends.

He still participated sporadically in local events, instead choosing to focus on improving his recipes and cooking in general. He also managed to involve his siblings in this: he tries to cook their favourite dishes after figuring them out, to mixed results; Martin favors pre-made food, to Joel's chagrin, Fox keeps asking for sushi and ramen every day and Sasha mostly wants fast food and simple courses.

Due to his hobbies and his babysitting, Joel doesn't hang with many people at high school; the strain of acting as caretaker had roughened his personality, which put off some people.

Overall, Joel's quite reserved on his own, and doesn't really have many friends, but he's close to the ones that actually are such. Academically Joel is rather average, regularly getting Cs and Bs for grades, the only class not following that trend being physical education, which he has an A in.

Joel’s plans after graduation is to take a gap year and take cooking courses to improve his skills, hoping to become a professional chef.

Advantages: Despite his small stature, Joel is stronger and faster than his frame would suggest; he also have a small cadre of skills, like first aid. Among his classmates, Joel is a reserved person, usually acting aloof near them as a way to avoid conflict when possible. When the front comes down, however, he can act as a caring brother when needed and is good at talking people down.
Disadvantages: Joel's also able to deliver a biting commentary on the fly, which could bring trouble against irritable people. His height could also be a problem against larger opponents.

Original Profile: Here!
Permission: Here!

[MurderWeasel]

Hey, Ahab! Joel's in pretty good shape, but needs a few tweaks before he's good to go.

First off, we've got some template stuff. Can you make sure all your section headers are bolded to match the template, and also that the Original Profile and Permission fields are added? Also, there doesn't need to be a line skipped between Advantages and Disadvantages.

How long is Joel's hair exactly?

"Hero nose" isn't a traditional description—I think I found the list that was originally referenced and I think "straight nose" gets the effect intended!

I'm a bit confused by Joel's bracelet description. Is it using something other than beads, or is it made with shaped beads? The latter is what I'm picturing, but I just figured I'd double check.

If Joel was born in October 2006, he'd still be 17 when SC3 takes place in May 2024! You can either bump him to 17 or shift his birth year to 2005.

Does Joel still take (more advanced) gymnastics classes? What about it does he like now? How good is he at it, having been doing it for almost his whole life?

The reason for the Fosters' move feels a little odd to me—Saint Paul has some solid hospitals, but so do a lot of cities, some much closer to Oregon than Minnesota is. Could it maybe be a case where they wanted a bigger city and that was the one where both happened to be able to get jobs?

At what age did Joel start being left to care for his siblings? How did he feel about this? Who helped watch the kids when he was too young to do so?

What about cooking does Joel like?

Can we rephrase things to avoid directly quoting Joel with the "third parent" comment? Maybe something like "While Joel loves his family, he finds it stressful to be in charge of his siblings so often, resenting his parents somewhat for foisting a level of responsibility equivalent to their own upon him." or similar?

When did Joel start drinking? How often does he do so? Does he have an alcohol problem? How aware of this is he?

Why did Joel care so much about the competitor of his who got injured? What made Joel scale back his gymnastics time? Was it because he was so busy caring for his siblings?

Can I hear about Joel's reserved nature a bit more in his bio?

I'd also like to get just a little more info on Joel's family. Could I get one defining aspect of his relationship with each parent and sibling (except the twins, since as one year olds there's not a lot to say), just to help them stand out as individuals as well as how they function as a unit?

As a senior, Joel should've already applied (and maybe been accepted) to schools. Is he going to a traditional college? Taking a gap year to help care for his siblings more? Hoping to enter a specialized culinary program (perhaps not at the traditional school start time)?

Could I get one more Advantage for Joel? A really easy one that's already supported in his bio is that he's in good physical shape. Actually, his first aid training should also go here probably.

Similarly, I'd like to get one more Disadvantage, plus maybe a bit of reframing on the one already there. You can probably count Joel's size as an option—as one of the smallest students in the class, he'll lose out on any competition of reach or size. When it comes to irritating people, does Joel tend to do this? Has it gotten him in trouble before? Do some students already dislike him due to past sarcasm?

Post when you've got that taken care of, and we'll give Joel another look. Thanks!

[Ahab9]

Hi!
Edited Joel. Let me know if more is needed!

[MurderWeasel]

Hey again! Joel's looking a lot better, but there are still a couple little things to hammer out.

First off, a couple formatting things: I missed it the first time, but "Background" should be "Biography" instead. Also, we don't need a line skipped between Advantages and Disadvantages or between Original Profile and Permission.

Could we get a little more specific with Joel's hair length, since "medium" covers a wide range? Does it cover his ears? Reach his chin?

"He met several coming from Saint Paul, and ends up being friends, or at least friendly acquaintance, with some of them." This sentence is missing an important word, I think—maybe something more like: "He met several other gymnasts coming from Saint Paul, and ended up being friends, or at least friendly acquaintance, with some of them."

I'm still a little confused about the move—couldn't they have just gone to Saint Paul for the hospital while on leave, then returned to Oregon? I might suggest, if there's not a specific reason for the move, that you just switch it up so Joel is born in Saint Paul—since the move comes so early in Joel's life right now, I'm not sure it'd change too much to cut it.

"and the family fully settled in the city, both Heath and finding jobs into a private clinic and a government funded animal shelter, respectively." <-it looks like we lost a word here too—maybe "and the family fully settled in the city, both Jemma and Heath finding jobs in a private clinic and a government funded animal shelter, respectively."

Why does Joel like cooking specifically?

What sort of competitions was Joel participating in in high school? Still gymnastics, just slightly less involved than before his own injury?

Could I get one specific thing about Joel's relationship with each of his parents individually? A shared hobby, or who he talks to more, or if one of them is more irritating to him?

Could I hear how Joel acts around others at school? It sounds like he's mostly quiet and reserved, but can get sort of mean or sharp with them when pushed, right?

Post when you've got that edited, and we'll give Joel another look. Thanks!

[Ahab9]

Hi!
Edited. Let me know if you need the former post for changes!

[MurderWeasel]

Almost there! A couple tiny details left.

First off, just caught this: "The first child of Heath and Jemma Foster, a veterinarian and surgeon respectively," and "both Heath and Jemma managed to find better paid jobs into a private clinic and a government funded animal shelter respectively," which switches their careers between the two instances. Could we get it tweaked so they match?

I'm still a little caught up on the move here. Basically, the problem I'm running into is that Joel's parents seem to have a pretty stable, comfortable life in Oregon. Then, due to some nebulous concerns about health, they travel halfway across the country during the final stages of pregnancy, and seemingly also go job hunting at the same time, which just feels like a really odd thing to be doing given everything else going on.

This is a situation where the out-of-character reason for the move is pretty clear (Joel's family has to live in Saint Paul so he can go in the game!) but the in-character one is ending up feeling like it's maybe overly complicated in service of that end, and I think what I'd recommend here is to reduce the complexity some—maybe decouple the pregnancy concerns from the move and just have them move because they got better jobs, or liked Minnesota based on a past vacation, or something. I'm super down to hash this out more directly/in real time in chat if that'd be more useful, since this is the one big sticking point that keeps coming up. I don't think it'll take too much work to get it to a spot where it feels right and also gets what you're wanting done.

It looks like the sentence about why Joel likes cooking may have gotten cut off here—we've only got the first half ("The chance of experiment and") so I'd like to get that finished.

What type of events did Joel still participate in? Was it gymnastics still? If so, could we get that specifically stated as "gymnastics events" please?

Can I get just a brief mention of Joel's sarcasm/commentary that can irritate people in his bio?

That ended up some kind of big blocks going into the whys, so the quick checklist here is:

-Sync up Joel's parents' careers so they match between mentions.
-Adjust the move so it feels a little more natural/logical.
-Finish the sentence explaining why Joel likes cooking.
-Make explicit that Joel is doing gymnastics events specifically.
-Explain Joel's biting commentary in his bio.

Post when you've got that handled, and we'll give Joel another look. Thanks!

[Ahab9]

Hi!
Edited as requested!
Same as above if you need any clarification!

[MurderWeasel]

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