application ( ǣfenglōm )

[digiorno]

Player Information
Name: Anne
Age: 28
Contact: passiones or PM
Other Characters: N/A

Character Information
Name: Giorno Giovanna
Canon: Jojo's Bizarre Adventure
Canon Point: Post-Purple Haze Feedback
Age: 16
History: Giorno's history; Purple Haze Feedback summary. (As a note, PHF is a post-canon light novel set about six months after the end of Giorno's manga arc.)

Personality:

From a young age, Giorno came to associate negative experiences with his civilian existence and positive experiences with the power and privilege of gang life. With that in mind, it's really no surprise that he developed a dream to join the mafia. More specifically, he wanted to rule and reform the powerful gang known as Passione. Giorno never had much power as a child, and to him, power connotes invincibility. Further, though, Giorno wants to restore Passione to his criminal ideal, an organization that improves people's lives even while necessarily working outside the law. It's about ruling and creating a perfect criminal society that protects people rather than hurting them.

Originally Giorno's goal was to conquer Passione on his own, an impractical but not incomprehensible thought. Giorno never really had any friends; he was ostracized as a child, and people only really started talking to him after his gangster patron made them. But starting with his work with Bruno Buccellati's gang, he became deeply invested not only in the societal but the familial structure of Passione, and this is where Giorno really begins to blossom as a leader.

Giorno knew that he wanted to and would have to lead, but didn't know what leadership actually entailed. Makes sense: he was at that point a socially maladjusted 15-year-old kid with big dreams and a bafflingly weird superpower. It was only through the influence of Buccellati's gang, a found-family structure full of orphans and rejects, collected by Bruno and kept safe in exchange for loyalty, that Giorno learned how to lead. Buccellati's gang taught him that leadership means supporting, encouraging, and valuing subordinates for their individual strengths while staying aware of their weaknesses and, above all, valuing their safety, just as Giorno's patron gangster valued his.

Buccellati's gang also taught him the invaluable skill of diplomacy, also known as "dealing with assholes". To get an idea of the dynamics of the gang, consider this: Giorno came into the gang after it was fully-formed and firmly established, essentially an outsider being foisted upon a very tight-knit and naturally suspicious group of young men. Nobody was thrilled about this. One guy peed in a teapot and dared him to drink it. So what did Giorno do about it? Well, beyond drinking it, he did what he had to do. He adapted. He learned how to handle tense situations, when to be deferential and when to push his authority, when to cooperate and when to insist that he be listened to. He learned, in other words, how to gain the support of others, even if they're hostile, without driving them away. He learned how to be a diplomat, a skill which he uses heavily as don.

All of which is not to say that Giorno would be a good PTA mom. His moral compass is totally skewed; he never learned how to fit into law-abiding society. And honestly? That's fine with him. He never wanted to, because law-abiding society never did anything for him. He has a moral code, but it doesn't align with the law.

Some of his less-than-lawful traits could honestly be attributed directly to Dio. Giorno possesses an intense ruthlessness that verges on terrifying at times. He's also deeply charismatic; in fact, his charisma is often the first thing people notice about him, as it's strong enough to almost be a physical force. He uses his charisma as a tool, seeing no problem with using it as a way to further his goals, which is directly in line with Dio's goals.

Unlike Dio, Giorno is mostly in good control of his emotions. He doesn't let them control him no matter the situation; he's level-headed and analytical, with excellent problem-solving skills. However, when he gets mad, really mad, there's no containing his anger. He will find you, and he will hurt you, and you probably won't recover from his rage anytime soon. The prime example of this is Diavolo, the former boss of Passione, who hunted down Buccellati's gang and annihilated half of them. It wasn't enough for Giorno to disable him; it wasn't even enough for Giorno to kill him. No, Giorno ensured that Diavolo will keep dying over and over again, forever. In other words: don't fuck with Giorno Giovanna or his people. You will regret it.

Of course, Giorno isn't all bad, even if he doesn't act like a law-abiding citizen. But there are a few things about Giorno that tip him over from being an antihero to a true hero despite his criminal tendencies. While Giorno is too complicated to really boil down to one aspect, he is ultimately a force of life, rather than a bringer of death, like Dio. This is clearly reflected in the nature of Gold Experience, which creates life. Gold Experience, in other words, frames Giorno as a creator rather than a destroyer, one who brings instead of taking away. It's telling that Giorno not only has a deep (if often concealed) kindness and compassion for people, but for animals, too, even the ones Gold Experience creates; one of his first scenes is defending one of Gold Experience's frogs at great danger to himself.

Along his journey, Giorno discovers a tendency to get attached to people quickly and deeply. Further, his quick attachment, in combination with his self-confidence, his big dreams, and his charisma make it easy for people to trust him, to follow him, to believe that he will take care of them. And he does. He's good at taking care of people in a way that he himself was never really taken care of, giving them guidance and structure and boundaries and love, protecting them from danger while allowing them to make mistakes. It's what makes him a good don; it's what makes him a good friend.

Above all, Giorno is defined by his desire to make the world a better place. Admittedly, he goes about this in a different way than most people would, but honestly? If he were normal, he wouldn't be a goddamn Jojo. Giorno's story is about overcoming cruel legacies and making your destiny your own. He does this a little bit obliquely, but in the end he succeeds, and at the tender age of 16, he finds himself in a position not only to reform Passione, but to reach out to kids like him who never had any support and influence them in a (mostly) positive way. He's driven by the belief that people have limitless potential to change their fates and the desire to give everyone the same chance that he got.

Abilities & Skills:

➥ CHARISMA. One of Giorno's preeminent characteristics, and one of the first things most people notice about him, is that he's intensely, effortlessly charismatic — a trait quite possibly inherited from his douchecanoe of a dad, although he tends to use his power more for good than for evil. Despite his youth and relative inexperience, he's usually able to charm people into taking him seriously, as evidenced by the fact that he's managed to become don of an organization that in some ways leads an entire country at the tender age of 16.

➥ LEADERSHIP ABILITY. Linked inextricably to the above: Giorno is a very good leader, although this isn't as natural an ability as his charisma. He learns quite a bit about how to lead effectively throughout Vento, but the seeds of success were always there; he manages a good, instinctive balance between listening, directing, and delegating, and utilizes his natural skills to offset his inexperience.

➥ CREATIVE PROBLEM-SOLVING. Giorno will do pretty much any weird goddamn thing to get himself or his friends out of a fix. Part of this is attributable to the "bizarre" in "Jojo's Bizarre Adventure", a canon where large burly men squeeze themselves into ventilator shafts and bubbles are a strategic weapon, but even for the canon, Giorno's strategies tend to be pretty out there. He's able to work together well with others, especially Bruno and Mista, to come up with creative solutions to dilemmas, but he's especially adept at using his Stand powers in unique ways to track enemies, isolate danger, create escape routes, regrow body parts, et cetera and so forth.

➥ STREET SAVVY. Giorno can be a suave motherfucker when he wants to be, but it's also worth pointing out that not only was he a criminal from a young age, he aspired to be the Greatest Criminal Ever, a goddamn Gang-Star. As such, he knows what he's doing in the criminal underworld: he's an excellent pickpocket, an adept car- and plane-thief, and perfectly comfortable with, say, engineering an operative's death and making it look like a suicide. He's also familiar with arms, drug, and human trafficking, although he's pretty stridently against all of the above. Basically anything the mob can do, he can do better.

➥ MINOR WEAPONS USE. Giorno is neither the gunslinger of his group nor the one best known for holding others at knifepoint, but by the point in canon I pull him from, I believe he would have a fair grasp of how to use a knife in self-defense if necessary. Given how often people try to kill him in canon anyway, it doesn't hurt to have a little something extra up your sleeve, especially if "something extra" is a knife.

➥ BILINGUAL. Giorno's mother is Japanese, and he lived in Japan until he was about four; therefore I assume he still has some limited grasp of the Japanese language, although he's probably nothing like fluent anymore.

➥ GOLD EXPERIENCE. The simplest explanation of Giorno's power, a Stand, is that it's a psychic/spiritual manifestation of his spirit that protects and fights for its user. If a Stand is hurt or killed, that damage is reflected on the user. Giorno's Stand is called Gold Experience and has the following abilities.

🐞 LIFE GIVER. Gold Experience can turn any inanimate object into any living organism. There is no upper limit as to what kind of living thing it creates (flora, fauna, bacteria, fungi, protists), nor to how many it creates at once. Giorno controls his creations' actions and growth. They also reflect any damage dealt to the attacker. For example, if you punch a Gold Experience-created frog, it'll feel like you've just punched yourself in the face.
🐞 LIFE SHOT. When Gold Experience puts life into already-living things, it has the effect of distorting the target's perception of time and exponentially magnifying the target's sensory experience. For example, under the influence of Life Shot, one might experience accelerated thought processes, extreme disorientation due to the mind moving faster than the body, and heightened pain reception.
🐞 TRACKING. If Giorno obtains a piece of inorganic material that can be linked to a person, Gold Experience can change that material into an animal that will then function as a tracker for that person. For example, if somebody dropped an earring on the ground, he could change the earring into a ladybug and it would lead him to them.
🐞 TRANSFORMATION. Gold Experience can replicate fragments of a larger organism when it is damaged or destroyed. This is most often used in a healing capacity in order to replace or re-form damaged tissue. By Purple Haze Feedback, Giorno is able to do this so subtly that the person being healed doesn't feel it happening. The limit to Gold Experience's transformation ability is that it cannot bring back the dead, and although it can temporarily keep a soul tied to a dying body, the body itself will still die. In other words, Giorno can make a zombie, but it will deteriorate quickly. Plus it's a huge bummer so he doesn't do that anymore.
🐞 RESET TO ZERO. Gold Experience's end-of-canon form develops the ability to "reset an opponent to zero", or, to put it another way, nix the effect while keeping the cause; the opponent will in essence start an action over and over again, only to be blocked from completing it. In essence, Gold Experience can block any attack as long as Giorno has the wherewithal to see it coming. In canon, this is used to send an enemy into an cycle of endless death.

Inventory/Companions:

➥ a bag containing cards, an absurd amount of cash, assorted makeup, and a pocketknife
➥ the clothes on his back, which are in this case a gaudy suit and boots
➥ a second slim knife in his right boot
➥ at least 20 bobby pins

Choice: Vampire

Reason:

For Giorno, vampire both fits very well and will be an enormous challenge for him, beyond just the obvious So Now You're A Giant Bat Sometimes challenge. Vampires are the monsters that pass most easily as human most of the time, which aligns thematically with Giorno's canonical tactic of using deceit and manipulation to appear less dangerous than he actually is. Traditionally charismatic qualities of vampires, including but not limited to hypnotic thrall, align well with Giorno's canonical nat20 charisma.

On the other hand, Giorno's father, whom he's never met but who is the overarching canon Big Bad, is a vampire who pretty much was the worst kind of vampire you can be, and Giorno knows this thing. As such, being a vampire will stress him out a lot. With how much time he's spent carving out his own legacy and struggling to repress get away from his own trauma history, the fact that he's lost all that and is now the same kind of thing that his father was will be very troubling, making him feel helpless in a way he hasn't in a long time. Which I think will be interesting to play with!

Also, I want him to be able to do this (video clip). Nom nom nom.

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