Forums » Forum Games » Describe Your Character's Scent!

That's the name of the game here: choose a character and tell us their scent! Maybe they smell like strawberries, hamburgers, or something a little more deadly.

Post with one character at a time to keep the game going. If you've posted with the same character before and they've gained a new scent, keep each description to one per post.

Since I'm not a character, I don't have a scent!

I chose black clove as this character's scent for the sake of its symbolism. His "secondary" scents are grave dirt, given his undead blood smells like soil (it sounded more atmospheric than just dirt), and tobacco given his habit of pipe smoking, though that one's a roundabout back to clove. Cloves can be mixed with tobacco and rolled into a cigarette for a tasty smoke, called a kretek in Indonesia. They're also considered a sacred spice in Hinduism, the religion of his mother, who had a heavy influence on his morality growing up. As an herb or essential oil, clove is said to help in treating spells and rituals related to Jupiter: growth, legal matters, meditation, money, property, and spirituality. As a mercantile politician who's gone through some radical transitions of character, I imagine him using the oil as a subconsciously grounding form of aromatherapy. He's also a Libra, inclined towards balance, and the warm smooth smell of clove seems like a solid contrast to his cold sharp appearance.

Jack's profile just lists her scent as "paraffin oil, smoke", the result of her occupation as a theatrical firebreather. But in play, I tend to go a bit deeper with this. Jack has little care for her health. She's reckless, driven by greed and gluttony, less interested in her well-being and more interested in wealth. She tends to smell like her environment: something gritty and urban in modern settings, or earthy and unclean in medieval, given the fact she sleeps outside and doesn't bathe as much as a person really ought to. She always carries a sort of oily, smoky, acidic (alcoholic) aroma around her to match a caustic, unpleasant, sometimes dangerous personality.

Skull's scent is death. Not just because of what he is, reaper and jackal hybrid, but because he's always around and dealing with death. He is a mortician, as well as the main person to run the funeral home. Plus a few other things that make him have the scent of death, which I won't say here to not give everything away. So basically no matter where Skull goes, there is the scent of death around him. Now is it anything vile smelling? That I don't know. I haven't thought that far with him. Just that the scent, in general, is death. I will need to work it out to narrow down the type of death scent. It's not really unpleasant due to people can be around him. Just it is noticeable when he is around.

I enjoyed reading these descriptions. Sense of smell is a powerful tool, and can often give us a near visceral feel of that character. What an interesting way to give depth!

With Kaelee’s occupation as a ramen noodle chef, her dishes may have a tendency to rub off various scents on her person. Of note are savory spice scents, like ginger, black pepper, and nutmeg; as well as the warm, soupy oils and grease that inevitably goes with it. I imagine being in close proximity would give someone a sense of comfort, warmth, or maybe memories of simpler times. Scent can often be associated with memories, and it is perhaps for this reason others might feel at ease around Kae (and hungry!)

A sensitive nose might pick up on something peculiar beneath the layers of spice. Why would a noodle chef smell of mineral oil, saltpeter, and sulfur?

Azilie's 'scent' has always been intentionally subtle. Hints will be dropped in posts, but more as flavor text should another player want their toon to pick up on it. Given the characters career path as a soldier, weapon oil is a constant. She takes great pride in taking care of her weapons and armor, for a warrior is only at half strength if their equipment is ill kept. Yarrow, an herb with a gentle yet spicy aroma, is a frequent companion, as the plant is considered a combatants best friend - in many European countries, it was known as 'Soldiers Woundwort', due to its abilities to staunch blood flow and lower fevers.

However, a sharp mind is a different kind of strength, and knowing that, the character has a passionate love of literature. Suffice to say, libraries are a guilty pleasure and the scent of parchment and ink has a habit of clinging to her after hours of self study.

Perhaps one of the more difficult scents to the character is that of purple heather. Azilie has a great fondness for the low growing shrubbery as it was a constant for her in her youth: Rolling hills of purple heather that gave the otherwise emerald highlands of Ireland an otherworldly appearance. Its an earthy, almost herbal scent, and one of the few things that truly helps her sleep (especially when its stuffed into a pillow!).

Ehen smells of dead leaves and cold, moist breezes set at the edge of a forest of maple, pine, and cider. She once smelled much lighter - of flowers and incense, but has long since started spending far more time deeper in the woods than she does inside where she might've once burned said incense. There are subtle undertones of another scent that one would probably know if they knew it, but would be unexplained as simply being there otherwise. The smell of a bear is one you know if you smell it, but is not particularly describable.

Ven.... oh no. Ven smells like a mixture of diseased flesh and lemon disinfectant. It's not overpowering, but it's enough to make you wonder what the hell he even is. Existential scent.

Michael smells CONSTANTLY of hair conditioner. It is ALWAYS noticeable. It's mainly rose, but on an off day, it may be randomised. There's that weird little tinge of static electricity you might get off something that was struck by lightning. Also, there's the tiiiiiiniest hint of gunpowder...

Lexi reeks of cinnamon: a refreshing, earthy spice with a bit of bite. But that's to cover up all the other scents she has underneath.

She has an unclean, musty scent, because she doesn't shower much. Exhaust fumes and oil, the stiff aroma of gunpowder, and sometimes a whiff of shrapnel and burnt metal or alcohol adds to the overpowering smell.

A very keen nose may pick up hints of blood and... ceremonial ash? The ceremonial ash is the hardest to pick up.

Perfectly phrased~

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Dave smells like your grandfather's hall closet.

Mothballs. Cracked, timeworn leather. The earthen aroma of old books. That coarse polyester fabric windbreakers are made of. Old cotton. Subtle, complex notes of fine, aged bourbon.

Like creeping through the attic, opening up a musty old leatherbound chest full of fond memories. That box you found as a kid with all sorts of mysterious mundane treasures from your family history, and you had so many questions. And if you took something out of the old box it retained that musty scent - but it seemed fleeting. Hearty, but somehow endagered. You almost wanted to put it back, just so it wouldn't lose that magic.

But mostly mothballs.

Because Dave is sort of afraid of moths.

Being an angel, one would always expect Auraxiel to smell of Heavenn and other brilliant things as fantasized by those echelons of the Church who had earned their station through money.

However, being born of the Terrestrial Kingdom, the angel instead smells of the earthy petrichor, seeping from the loam after a moderate rainfall. He smells of the world, a fading memory in the minds of man. A wisp across your nose as you struggle to remember the comprehension you have of this scent.

Auraxiel smells of blood, the essence of mortals. He was born in it, and his purpose in Heaven is to bathe in the blood of Hellspawn. He fights to preserve Freedom of Will, but the price is that he may never return to the Celestial Kingdom.

Acaelus has a very spicy scent similar to sandalwood and cinnamon, with undertones of a clean-burning fire. To those of a more psionic bent, his psychic scent is a potent mixture of flame, blood, and the spicy-bitter tang of carefully tamped down killing intent.

Though he loves his drink, the smell of even strong liquor doesn't tend to stay with him as his magic quickly burns it out of his system, which sadly means he can't even keep a buzz going, though that does mean he won't have to deal with a hangover.

I'm already a bit prepared for Cecille, because I had to answer this question twice ICly and also made a list of their personal, favourite scents for a baton/meme/questionaire thing.


Anyway, that's my ramble over. I spent too long trying to shorten it.

First... Alcohol, that pungent aroma caused by purposely fermented or fermenting juices of some sort. Although usually just Rum, Xenith smelled like Rum, occasionally whiskey ...but mostly Rum. A strong whiff of that potent beverage, that the disheveled rouge always seemed to be drinking.

Secondly... Salt.
Sea salt to be exact, despite the time he wandered the land, or how he washed himself, the smell of the blue, alluring waves clung to him like a barnacle on the bottom of an old, creaky, ocean vessel.

Third... Horses, Xenith was extremely attached to his magnificent, highly intelligent and loyal steed, who's real name could only be pronounced in the silver tongue of the elves...
Most of the time the drunken warrior just called him "Stallion." Typically too intoxicated to say his good friend's full name.

*Horse snorts in annoyance.*

Probably...The smell of mixed citrus and aqua, along with dried blood...

Because I really don't know, okay?

She reeks of booze money power sex and sweat. She is as corrupt as the politicians careers and marriages she loves destroying.

Booze, sweat and iron. Metal.

Black leather, iron and makeup. She likes chains and leather for the sound they make when she move, it gave her solace of mind while walking around.

Nail polish and perfume.

sometimes she will smell like old dusty paper and steel needles, sometimes with a little touch of blood.

Formaldehyde and gunpowder

Yea so I went with Asher straight up because he probably has the most smells or most odd ones of all my characters.

On a good day (REALLY good day) he would smell of some typical teenager deodorant (most commonly Lynx) mixed with the occasional cigarette smoke.

On average usually a gross mix of those two smells (sometimes without the deodorant) and simple body odor either straight off him or his clothes and then the occasional smell of marijuana.