shhhh

[ofthegeek]

PLAYER INFO

Name: Dani

Age: 29

Contact: PM, comatoseroses

CHARACTER INFO

Character Name: Alec Hardison
Canon: Leverage
Canon Point: Post- finale ('The Long Goodbye Job')
Appearance: Portrayed by Aldis Hodge. 6'1", Black, lanky, surprisingly toned for a dude with his food/beverage/leisure activity habits who only gets involved in physical altercations when he Absolutely Has To.
Age: In the 26/27 area.

Character snapshot: Career internet fraud turned modern Robin Hood, Hardison is a twenty-something genius hacker with a good heart, a very healthy ego, and what some would call "a problem with authority." He's smart, competent, and aware of it, good with technology, and mainlines all things geeky pop culture. He's well-adjusted emotionally, willing to be vulnerable in ways that people in his line of work often aren't. He's not ashamed of who he is, what he likes, or how he feels. He's genuinely kind, and good at reaching out to others by patiently meeting them where they are, valuing the intent behind something more than a possibly clumsy delivery.

With that said, he's also 100% down to dig up a rich jerk's dirty little secrets, hack their accounts to transfer illegal money to get them arrested, and basically just gleefully do whatever his part is in burning their life down around them.

World description: Leverage takes place in a fairly straightforward modern-day Earth circa 2012! Except maybe a tad more technologically advanced, to keep things spicy. Hardison is part of a team of ex-criminals who use their still very illegal skillsets to provide helpful leverage for people who have been hurt in some way by people/corporations/etc. with a lot more money and power to throw around. Sometimes it's running a straightforward con to get their money, sometimes it's getting someone arrested, or getting their credibility ruined, etc. Think modern-day Robin Hoods. Their current base of operations is in Portland above a brewpub that Hardison owns and manages, although the team tends to travel all over the world as needed for a job.

History: Hardison grew up in the U.S. foster care system. The series never goes into detail on the circumstances of how he wound up there or how many homes he went through, but eventually he wound up in the permanent care of a woman he refers to as Nana. He discovered his love of and skill with computers at an early age, and never looked back. Hardison was cracking the servers of the Pentagon at age 12, and by 16/17 he was hacking the bank of Iceland to pay off his Nana's medical bills.

From there, he turned to criminal life as a hacker full-time: cyber heists, running scams on the internet, identity theft, ATM skimmers, etc. Word of the creator says the CIA at some point tried (and failed) to recruit him. He worked alone, eventually becoming fairly well-recognized in the criminal community for his skill.

And then one day, an airline CEO offered him a huge payday to work as part of a one-time hired team to steal some blueprints. When that CEO double-crossed and tried to kill them, they brought in a grifter and banded together for payback. These were his first experiences getting to work together, and getting a taste for what it felt like to use his skills to screw over a 'bad guy'.

Thing was, it felt really good.

So he and the others harangued Nate into masterminding their team. And the rest is history. They spent the next 5 years conning bad guys to help people, forming a sort of found family with each other as they went. Nate and Sophie retired to get married, leaving Parker in charge as their new mastermind. Plus a black book file full of people who cheated the world economy to contend with.

What are your character’s mental/emotional strengths?

- intelligent: It'll be a bit of a broken record throughout this app, but Hardison is a very smart dude, hands-down. He's top tier in the hacking business and a fast learner besides that, always willing to pick up/utilize knowledge even outside of the tech field to improve himself.

- emotional IQ: Out of the main cast, Hardison's probably the most emotionally honest and well-adjusted. He's not perfect by any means, but he's good at reaching out to others wherever they're at emotionally, offering reassurance or companionship, and he knows his own heart very well. He's a good communicator on this front and willing to be vulnerable.

- thorough: Being not only the tech guy, but the guy maintaining backup aliases for the crew, the one setting up HQs every time they relocate, and notably painstakingly scrubbing evidence of their existence from whatever he can as part of a con post-game, it's safe to say that Hardison has a very good eye for detail.

- kind: He's a kind, open person at a default, given to sympathizing with others. There's a point where he gives an old client contact info for Nate specifically because he thinks Nate could use a reminder about the good that they do in the world. He's quick to reach out and touch base with people when he thinks they could use it.

- creative: Hardison is a creative person, and that goes through a lot of outlets! Sometimes into writing articles/websites/etc. for someone's alias, sometimes into traditional art, or into designing the house brews for his brewpub. He makes his own music mixes and isn't afraid to improv/ad-lib to kill time if he's on the front end of a con (for... better or worse). Electronic systems can be pretty straightforward, but finding ways to work around them without getting caught takes its own brand of creative thinking.

What are your character’s mental/emotional weaknesses?

- fear: Fear (and anything in the fear-anxiety-panic area) is one of the things that tends to lead to a lot of Hardison's hangups. There are times he has to be actively calmed down because he's upset about something or scared about something (or complaining about something because he's unsettled and trying to talk his way through it). It's something that can make him hesitate or freeze up or forget something at a moment where he shouldn't. When stakes are especially high, he can balk without someone to keep him on point.

- ego: A healthy ego is all fine and good, but Hardison does let that verge over into being outright cocky from time to time. He knows that he's good, he knows that he's smart, and he never pretends otherwise. Occasional overconfidence is why he doesn't take point as the team grifter unless there's no other option: when he's playing a part, he tends to go too big and oversell it, to the point of getting himself backed into some kind of corner by the mark. It simmers down a bit over the course of the series, but definitely never deflates.

- short-sighted: All the big galaxy-brain "I figured out how this security protocol works and have mapped out the exact code we need to shut down the alarms" thinking in the world cannot undo the fact that Hardison doesn't always do his due diligence in thinking long-term or covering all the contingencies. His time running a con in canon was certainly smart and well thought-out, but he never really made backup plans, or thought ahead to ways that parts of his plan might go sideways. If the rest of the team hadn't been helping cover his tracks, it would've failed.

- immature: Hardison has a solid handle on his emotional IQ and his intelligence and how he wants to interact with the people around him, yes. Hardison is also relatively young and it shows. There are times when it's a good thing to be able to have fun, to be in touch with your inner child, and to openly embrace your geeky interests. To write lyrics to your chase music mix and personify your van and eat the Hot Pocket you dropped on the floor (...well maybe not the last one). Historically, it's also led to him dropping the ball or fumbling with responsibility during serious moments.

What events or circumstances in your character’s past have impacted them the most?

- former foster home: In early episodes, Hardison details a stretch of time spent with a foster parent who was religiously-inclined as a young kid. She'd get him all dressed up once a week and take him out to be part of door-to-door delivery of "the good word," despite his protests, mostly for the sake of making him learn how to interact with people. It laid a really strong foundation for his social skills, probably especially the ones required to successfully walk into a building full of strangers, pretending to be someone else for a con, and get what he needs out of it.

- settling with nana hardison: Moving into his permanent foster home was probably the most overall formative experience of his pre-series life. By all accounts, his Nana wasn't perfect, but she gave him a steady and reliable home and fierce unconditional love. His generally good heart and nature got supported and his ability to emotionally communicate got to develop. This is the home that was truly a home for him no matter what, with one of the first people he loved enough to consider his family regardless of their not being biologically connected.

- It was also the house where he was able to get his first computer and get into hacking, which needless to say was hugely impactful on the course of his life.

- forming team leverage: The show creator has stated here and there that the reason the series doesn't dive deeply into Hardison's past and backstory is simply that the course of the series is more of his backstory than his childhood. Working with the team for the first time made a huge impact on him-- from enjoying working with others to enjoying using his skills for more than outright crime. He's helped accomplish a lot of good in the world, grown extremely close to everyone on the team, and has worked hard to better himself both for them and for their cause. He wouldn't be close to the same person he is now if he hadn't agreed to take that first job a few years back, and for the worst.

What impressions do others tend to have of your character and how do those impressions differ from who your character truly is?
This can be a little bit case-by-case depending on the circumstances. If Hardison is in a situation just genuinely being himself, no con he's playing a part for, etc., I think the general impression others could come away with is "a huge geek with an ego who isn't taking things seriously" with a side of "not knowing how to shut up." And frankly, to some degree, these aren't totally inaccurate impressions. Hardison is very smart and good at what he does and he knows it, and he's had consistent moments of being cocky about that. He's super talkative and super invested in a lot of standard "geeky" pop culture/technology, and he can have a playful energy that reads as not understanding the severity of situations.

Hardison's unapologetically authentic to himself, his feelings, and his interests at all times. He's confident in his abilities because he knows what they are (and sometimes he's gotten in trouble overselling when he's outside of his specific niches because of that). But at the end of the day, he's long since learned the importance of taking things seriously even if he doesn't show it, and the weight of responsibility. He's a genuinely kind, friendly person who tends to care about the people around him, especially if they need help.

What motivates your character?
In canon, mostly making very rich jerks suffer by delivering payback for how they've abused their wealth and power to hurt innocent people who have no means of fighting back. The Leverage group, International or otherwise, is very focused on that larger goal as a whole. It's a tiny bit of revenge, but in the vast majority his long-term motivation is simply helping people.

Outside of that, he's a pretty ambitious and motivated person in most aspects of his life. Overcoming challenges, especially technological, appeals to him, as well as learning more about anything that he's interested in (or that he is required to learn in less than a week for a job) is very motivating for him. He finds a lot of motivation in his relationships to others, whether it's about reaching out to them emotionally or doing what he can to keep them safe with his skill set. And at the end of the day, he's also flat-out motivated to keep going by the fact that he really, really enjoys what he gets to do. Normal life whomst? He could never.

How does your character handle crisis or adversity?
Like anyone, it depends on what the exact circumstances are. Generally speaking, you don't get so far into hacking/breaking systems if you aren't willing or able to handle a challenge or some pushback. Hardison tends to be reliable under pressure for the most part, and capable of at least giving it the ol' college try when it's suddenly time to adapt to a new plan of action. If there's something he needs to do that he's capable of doing, he'll manage to do it when the chips are down. That said, he's definitely not the "cool, calm, and always collected" type. Especially if he's dealing with something outside of his wheelhouse, and especially if it's a crisis that's large-scale. Hardison tends to balk at the idea of having innocent lives in his hands, however directly or indirectly. There are multiple points in the series where he gets so anxious/worked up about a situation at hand that he needs to be talked down.

Skills, abilities, and physical weaknesses:
- Skills: The number one thing that Hardison utilizes and relies on is his intelligence. He's a hacker and technological genius who's been busting his way into government databases since his tween years. He's built safe-hacking robots, hacked into secure accounts every which way, set up tech feats that would probably be impossible in actual reality for cons, the whole kit and caboodle.

Hardison is also the de facto team forger for fake badges, passports, IDs, etc., sometimes on the fly after someone decides to ad-lib to a mark about their backstory. A lot of the digital and some of the practical groundwork that has to be laid for a con to take off is his handiwork. He's the one who routinely goes through and virtually scrubs remaining evidence of the team's presence after a job is finished, too, wherever possible.

He's a fast learner who gets tapped pretty regularly for a little bit of polymath jack-of-all-trades-ing through the course of the series, too. Sometimes you simply have to learn to forge a diary from the 1800s convincing enough to fool a dude who can recognize an artifact's place of origin by smell, and you have to get it done in a handful of days. This is simply a hazard of the job.

Hardison also has some skill and experience when it comes to more traditional conning and grifting. He's done a decent job of infiltrating businesses and workplaces without getting caught out, or bluffing his way through a security check or two. He tends not to get put onto the griftwork very often, though, because he has a tendency to go overboard with his personas in a way that gets him into trouble.

He, uh. Theoretically knows how to use a firearm, but historically has terrible aim and not very good safety practices with them when he's given one to use. And he knows some basics when it comes to hand-to-hand fighting, particularly in the self-defense area, but I wouldn't say he knows or has enough skill to genuinely be called a fighter by any stretch.

- Abilities: Hardison has absolutely no superhuman/supernatural abilities or senses to speak of! Much though he probably sometimes wishes that weren't the case.

- Physical weaknesses: Physically, Hardison is a standard human being through and through. He can be hurt, killed, or fall ill as easily as anybody out there. Given his at-a-computer career path, possibly a little more easily than some others.

Inventory: Just the clothes on his back!

HORROR INFO

What aspects of your character are you most interested in exploring in a horror setting?
Setting aside the obvious draw of getting to dig into a character reacting to traumatic/creepy/stressful situations and how it changes them, the relatively low-tech nature of the setting is also something that I'm really interested in playing with! Hardison's best skill sets are extremely technology-based. I really like the idea of taking him out of his comfort zone on that front. The show did it now and then, but it's never been something he had to cope with long-term. I want to explore how that impacts him, and play with him having to pick up new skills that he's never needed to consider before.

I think this is also a really great setting to dig into his ability/desire to connect with others. Hardison is emotionally fairly well-rounded and he likes people overall-- he tends not to view them through a particularly hardened or cynical lens, and making meaningful connections with others is something that he always values. I'm interested to see how he might connect with other characters in-game, for better or worse, and the support systems he might form or become a part of.

What is your character’s mental state upon entering the game?
Honestly, straight from this canonpoint, Hardison's mental state is about as stable as it can get. The team just pulled off a huge job that took months and months of prep, Nate and Sophie headed out to get married and retire peacefully, he and Parker and Eliot are basically more in sync as a team and a found family unit than ever before, on the cusp of starting a crusade that could draw in tons of other teams from all around the world. Real peak "one ending is another beginning" kinds of sentiment. He was safe, happy, and finding fulfillment in their chosen line of work.

What unsettles and frightens your character? What sort of encounters would chip away at your character’s psychological stability?
Of the show's main cast, Hardison tends to trend a lot more towards Reasonable Human fears than the others-- or at least, he's a lot more open about it than the others. So there's a natural baseline fear of dying, getting caught out and going to jail, most any situation where things are getting crazy and risky for him (high-speed chases, firefights, captured by bad guys, most physical fights). Your very standard fear of losing the people he cares about.

He's very unsettled by heights, less for the height and more for the prospect of falling/being pushed from them. He also takes a lot of issue with dust/dust mites, to the point that being in a dusty ventilation shaft cut directly to the next scene where he was on his second bottle of hand sanitizer.

He's used to a certain level of violence and not a stranger to death, but definitely not to the extent that a person might find in a DWRP survival/horror game. Hardison isn't a violent person. Fighting is absolutely not his niche, and outside of needing to be part of a grift, Hardison tends to be at a remove when it gets down to it. If he's ever found a body, it was intact and not too far deteriorated. This kind of stuff can do a number on him.

For all that he's super into geeky sci-fi and fantasy stuff, he holds a healthy sense of separation of it from reality, so a lot of the unknowable, impossible, creepy supernatural elements that the game atmosphere takes inspiration from would do its job in unsettling him for sure.

And to top it off, he has a running history of claustrophobia. He's cool to be in a cramped server room or storage closet, and it's not as bad when he has someone with him, but very tight spaces are an issue for Hardison. This was not helped by the time he got buried alive, coffin and all, about a year before his canonpoint. Anything in that vein would be hugely affecting.

What horrifying events or genre elements would you like to see utilized in the game? I mean, I wouldn't complain about an event subjecting him to some direct claustrophobic buried-alive callbacks for sure. Any standard up-and-down horror event fare can be really fun to play with with the right setting and characters, so I'm game to see what happens rolling with what the mods have planned out. I really like the idea of things that lean into the logically-impossible, unknowable terror energy of the premise! Truly what's more horror than being pursued by a terror you cannot name, whose very presence whittles away at your ability to reason. I support it.

SAMPLES

Test Drive: Here
Log Sample: 1
Log Sample: 2