The Basics of the Colors Setting

[Colors of Remnant]

The World of Colors

Colors takes place in a Remnant diverging from the original known in RWBY. Names such as the Brothers, Salem, and Ozma are but tales lost in a sea of myths. This roleplay’s setting focuses on a Remnant not tied up by the meddlings of immortals or gods, and, as a result, characters from the canon do not exist and other important characters are treated as non-existent within this version of Remnant. The clock effectively begins pre-Volume 1 of RWBY, which means the Fall of Beacon never happened. Mankind’s struggle against the creatures of Grimm continues as it has for centuries, with many other conflicts happening all over Remnant. The places and histories remain as they have been portrayed with the exception of certain aspects left to be determined by Colors’ collective canon built by the members of the community. Beacon will be the center of this setting’s Roleplay, with community members acting as Huntsmen in training within the Academy’s student body, as well as other satellite characters that gravitate toward Beacon.

Primarily, the setting revolves around Beacon Academy and its students and faculty, however this is not a hard limitation; characters who live in other parts of the world are allowed, especially characters who are not students but live within the Kingdom of Vale. Much more rarely will there be characters who live outside of Vale entirely, though they are not necessarily barred from existing. When considering your character's options however, bear in mind that their location of residence could potentially limit them in the scope of Roleplay. Not many students will be traveling outside of Vale's borders until they've graduated, and not many civilians living in other parts of the world will be traveling to Beacon.

Despite there being no hard limitation on characters needing to live within Vale's borders, students of other Academies are currently not allowed in the Roleplay outside of potential event characters or NPCs. This is to keep the focus on Beacon and Vale, mostly in one place, in order to facilitate Roleplay. It is possible that, if and when the community is large enough, this restriction will be lifted by popular vote and a more diverse range of educational institutions will be available for player characters, but for now our focus is aimed toward the biggest and best Academy out there, and it is the one with the most information in regards to its location and appearance, which help to facilitate immersive Roleplay.

Outside the Borders

The other parts of Remnant exist as they are mentioned in the World of Remnant miniseries, in their current states after the Great War. Atlas is a police/military state, Vacuo is an anarchistic desert landscape, Mistral is ruled by a shadowy government, and Menagerie remains a haven to Faunus in the tropical southern continent. These canon locations are meant to remain unchanged and consistent, so keep this in mind when you're building your character! Your character's backstory or any relevant lore on the forum should not fundamentally alter the accepted basics of each of the kingdoms or their territories. However, due to the relatively low amount of information for the extended area around each major location, there is still plenty of room to build new places that could very easily fit into the world!

One thing which is worthy of note here are the ideas of student transfer programs and other politically motivated programs which exist within the world of Colors. Students are given free choice of which Academy they'd like to attend, which means if they attend Shade or Atlas and decide this doesn't suit them and wish to transfer to Vale, the leadership of the Academies will have no issue allowing this to happen. So while you might not be able to currently play as a Shade-based student, your student at Vale can certainly have begun their career as a student of Shade.

Racism As A Concept

While racism does exist in the setting, it's generally seen as serving only a small purpose when it comes to character development. People should only be exploring the racism toward Faunus if, first off, they have the consent of the Faunus in question for their character to act racist against them. It's very easy to step on a toe and ruin a thread when your character is a jerk just because of a single character flaw and completely ruins the interaction they have with another person. That person would be entirely justified to just walk away and not deal with a racist. So on the topic of racism: keep it light, please.

While it is definitively a part of the world of Remnant as a whole, racism toward Faunus is not something we want to blow out of proportion or depict in a way that is distasteful and serves no purpose other than to depict racism. If you wish your character to have racist tendencies, keep in mind that this could potentially sabotage their efforts to make friends and you might have no control over how people might react to this, both in character and out of character. Ideally, however, this element of the world can be rewarding to utilize in writing if done correctly and particularly if you are mindful of the people you are interacting with. Always ask permission from somebody if you intend to have your character act racist toward them. If they say no, please respect their choice. They are entitled to keep such graphic examples of negativity away from their own characters if they so choose. There will be plenty of people who will probably be fine with it, so simply seek somebody else if it is your intent to explore your character's racism as a facet of their reality.

And again, please don't take it too far. If it becomes akin to the hate-crimes in the real world, you are probably doing it wrong and will be asked to stop. This is a touchy subject and does have the potential to be punished, so be respectful of others in an OOC sense when going about these ideas.