Gwynedd 'Ned' Oakby
47 | UCPB | Gryffindor 1855-1862 | Reputation 8 | ISTJ
Head of the Muggle Liaison Office

Ned is a steadfast, dependable and highly practical career bureucrat who is becoming more and more acutely aware with each passing year that he's probably never going to make it to the Wizengamot after all. Ned's main hobby is being caught in the fallout of other people's scandals, but on his freetime he also enjoys long walks on the beach in the woods (alone) and dedicating a lot of (solitary) time to the plants in his small greenhouse. Ned likes to tell himself that he'd be happy spending the rest of his life serving the Ministry in obscurity, but considering that the Sorting Hat did put him in Gryffindor that is probably a lie.

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Colleagues - Ned's been at the ministry for nearly 30 years at this point, so he's practically part of the furniture. He started at the Department of  International Magical Co-Operation but was transferred to his current office in 1882. I'd expect him to know a lot a people, though he's also horrible at networking and considering his lack of success in rising through the ranks certain types would definitely view him as not worth their time. Ned likes to stick to the rules and do things by the book, and that would be something that is especially reflected in his work persona.[/i]

Other long-term acquaintances - Anyone close to his age/standing! Whether they'd view him positively or negatively would probably depend on how much stock they put on reputation. Ned's generally a likeable person (if a bit on the blunt/sarcastic side), but I'd expect most people in his social circle to be aware of the scandals with his brother (who was forced to resign from the Ministry in 1868 after fathering a bastard), his wife (who ran away with another woman in 1879) and his daughter (who was confirmed a squib in 1881). Until 1877 the Oakbys lived near Wales so any UC character from that direction could be family friends. Nowdays they reside in Wellingtonshire, and are in need of neighbours.

Romance - Ned is a lonely single dad - ultimately, I'd love for him to find his one true love, have a whirlwind romance for the ages, and blossom into the poetic soul I know he is deep down. At this point I'd also be happy for less serious interactions, since for a married man Ned is ridiculously clueless about romance and even innocent flirting will probably rattle him to his core - if he even realises what is happening. He also has trust issues (obviously). (EDIT: Someone with scandals of their own, either personal or family, secret or in the open, would be 10/10.)

Misc - Ned currenly lives in Hogsmeade with his mother and daughters, so all connections there would make sense. His older brother has gotten mixed up with seedier parts of the society, and I could see this continuing to haunt Ned as well (the brother's current whereabouts are murky, but he's sure to have left behind unpaid debts, unsettled scores etc.). Finally, Ned does have two unmarried daughters, and it'd be hilarious to have him try to find them husbands. In general, Ned's my first character here so I'm open to any and all ideas!

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EDIT: Family - Ned has two daughters (aged 22 and 20, up for grabs on the canon list), a disaster brother (b. around 1838) and a respectable sister (b. around 1839). The sister in particular could be tweaked to do double duty as another existing character/NPC, so if your character happens to have e.g. a pure-blooded mother of appropriate age and you're interested in making a familial connection with Ned, let me know! The brother might have bastard children running around, so if your orphan character is looking for a father he's definitely an option.

  

I'll flesh out a bit more later, but just a heads up—he is currently involved in a formal hearing! xD If you're into posting I can let you know when the Time Comes, or if not, I can do my puppet-master thing~

  

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— Aldous walks with a cane and pronounced limp as the result of a splinching accident. —

— graphics by lady ❤ —

I recently joined the site myself (February) so definitely not alone in being a newbie here

For colleagues I have Walter Staghart who's worked as an Auror for about 14 years now and I expect their paths crossed at various times at the Ministry. Walter likely sees Ned as a perfect example why marriage isn't always the best thing to pursue. We can certainly do a thread between the two, either a casual meeting or business related, whatever suits.

I don't have any female characters at the moment for romance...but I do have several unmarried men who could be prospects for his daughters, including Walter. My other characters are Terence Higgs (recently started teaching Art at Hogwarts and is the oldest of my current characters) and lastly I have Edgar Minks who publicly seems a successful investor but secretly has plenty of connections to the darker side of life as the alias Leon Bunyip.

Walter Staghart

  

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Welcome again Elvi!

Evander Darrow (ignore the current av, he's not himself right now!) wants to be Ned's best friend, please. They are v similar in personality and reliable-but-not-super-successful Ministry men and Evander understands having disappointing/scandalous family because his brother is a famous sailor who was lost on an expedition, and came back from the dead (also as a rumoured cannibal). Also Evander works in Improper Use of Magic so I can see some departmental co-operation from time to time when Muggles are involved.

Trystan Selwyn is also in the Ministry and a former Gryffindor, a few years younger, but in personality he is much more like Ned's brother and has a few rumoured bastards (and one acknowledged bastard daughter!) so I'm not sure how they'd get on. xD

Ewart Fraser is a local eccentric at the Ministry, not so much a by-the-books person though so they might be friendly or not, either way. xD

Ester Montgomery (again, ignore the current avatar) was once a respectable MC wife and mother until she ran away with a pornographer and started modelling and living in the seedy underbelly of London and has a very poor reputation now. She might have come across his brother or his former wife, I'm sure she could make him uncomfortable somehow xD

  

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look ANOTHER beautiful bee!set <3

Putting munchkin to bed so may have more to add later.

But for colleagues I have @"Percival Adlard Jr." (Not himself lately, as MJ mentioned for Evander). He is an assistant head of a department and part if the wizengmot.

For romance I have @"Dahlia Potts" (also not herself right now) and @"Anandhita Pomfrey" in May. But that's about it right now.

  

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Thank you Bee <3 Your magic has made Sisse bloom

Walter Staghart

That’s a relief! I’ve been a bit overwhelmed, so good to find another relatively new face :D

Walter and Ned would definitely know/be aware of each other. They probably move in different social circles (because of blood/class), but if there was some reason for them to work together more closely Ned would definitely come to appreciate Walter’s no-nonsense approach.

Terence wouldn’t exactly be Ned’s first pick as a son-in-law, but I guess he could be getting desperate :D But by that same logic I could see Ned trying to offer up his daughter to Walter, if he somehow managed to make an impression at work. Ned would rather have his child marry a sensible auror than an artist (gasp!), for sure.

And as for Edgar, he would perhaps be the type to acquainted with Ned’ brother. Glen's status these days is still a bit open (=I haven’t made any definite decisions on how low he has fallen, or whether he’s still alive or not…), but I guess it’d be safe to say that he and ‘Leon’ have met at some point. It could make a meeting between Edgar and Ned interesting, in turn (since both might make some false assumptions of what the other one knows)?

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Elias Grimstone

I think Evander might be Ned’s soulmate, so 100% agreed! And my first though is, Ned has a lot of conflicted feelings about Evander’s marriage (which is quite recent, right?)

And yess I also absolutely love the idea that Ester is somehow familiar with Ned’s brother. She’d also remind him of his wife, so she’ll absolutely push all his buttons by simply existing. So a thread with her could be gold.

As for Ewart and Trystan, I think Ned would try to do his best to avoid both! He’d remember Trystan from Hogwarts, for sure, and associate him with all those characteristics of the house that he dislikes (bonus points because Trystan’s an auror, which isn’t really a plus in Ned’s books). Trystan’s too much like Ned’s brother (probably - truthfully I don’t have a super clear picture of him yet :D), and Ewart is just too much, period. So I'm of course all in for any ideas where Ned would have to co-operate with either.

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Sisse Thompsett

Percy seems like someone Ned could get along reasonably well. Also their fathers seem to share age & career path, as well as parenting style, so they might’ve been at least acquaintances (if not even friends)?

As for the ladies, Ani could mesh well with Ned but both her and Dahlia might be a young for him. I’m not super picky about age, but they are both younger than his daughters. How very scandalous.

  

I love this character <3

If he's close with Evander Darrow then my most notable connection might be J. Alfred Darrow, the aforementioned famous sailor who returned from the dead and was rumored to be a cannibal (ignore his current avatar).

I have a lot of Ministry folks (active and not-currently-active). Notably @"Juliana Binns" is a spinster (with scandalous secrets) and Fortitude Greengrass might be considered marriage material for his daughters.

Dorothea Twycross lives in Hogsmeade and is interested in being friendly with his daughters.

  

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MJ made this <3

Reuben Crouch

No lie, I was just reading Juliana's profile and it's too good. I need her and Ned to interact.

Also, Ned will for sure try Dot's consultancy service (because as he sees it, his life has been one big string of bad luck). He would never do it on his own volition, of course, but if she's friendly with his daughter(s) we'll just say one of them roped him into it. He'll be 99% sure it's a scam but also a bit desperate to be told that there's a curse that can be lifted and everything will be ok. In particular, if Dot is friendly with his older (squib) daughter, he'd be likely to come in with more favourable preconceived notions.

Ford and Ned could have a competition on who will be able to offload their female relative to the other :D And Ned will definitely have strong opinions of JD - not only because of his friendship with Evander but, you know, the cannibalism. Ned'll be happy to project all his issues with his own brother on him, too.

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   Reuben Crouch

Walter would be polite, respectful and straight forward in any dealings he would have with Ned, if he wanted to ask about Muggle things he doesn't know much about, he would likely ask Ned or somebody in his department for information when required. I can see something like that happening in the past, so I think Walter would seem a decent fellow in Ned's eyes, at least he'll know the guy has a solid work ethic and to his knowledge nothing scandalous in his past.

I could have Walter seek Ned out to ask about Muggle creatures or technology that could cause the sort of injuries to the giant squid and/or take out a fishing boat on the Black Lake. It would give them something to talk about even if nothing relavent is revealed. For more information about the Black Lake Monster plot, see the following Daily Prophet articles:

Mysterious Flotsam Near Black Lake
Mysterious Injury to Giant Squid
Mysterious Monster in Black Lake
More Mystery in the Black Lake

Nobody knows what it is yet, and unlikely to be a muggle creature, but still would make a good thread topic. If interested I can start it up, if not, I'm sure we can figure out some other way to get them to thread.

For the prospective husband, we can have them talk about it, but till Ned's daughters are PC's probably best to wait on that .

Edgar is pretty careful about those he deals with as Leon, he does try to keep both halves of his life separate. (I'm assuming none of Ned's children or siblings are PC's as yet.) In either case, Edgar's pretty careful and won't make any assumptions. If he's not disguised as Leon he would deny any knowledge of knowing a person who he met as Leon and vise versa . That said, what happens in the future can end up outing him anyway.

  

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That all sounds lovely! We can thread him and Jules any time (at the Ministry during working hours or around Hogsmeade or London during off hours work for me). If you have ideas feel free to start it, or otherwise I can put it on my list to start soon (likely later this week as I'm pretty busy the next few days).

Dot and Alfred are both caught up in the current body-swap mini-plot so we should probably wait until that resolves to do anything with either of them (unless you want to have him visit with fake Dot lol). Dot would definitely be friendly with his older daughter <3 Dot is a bit on the edge of society since she didn't go to Hogwarts and lived abroad for so long, so she has a soft spot for other 'outsiders.'

  

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MJ made this <3

Walter Staghart That sounds like a solid starting point for Walter & Ned, so I’m up for a thread! And exactly, as long as no-one is playing Ned’s daughters they aren’t actually on offer - it’s just a thing that Ned might or might not bring up at (in)convenient moments (:

Reuben Crouch I'll try to set up a thread for Ned & Jules soonish! And oops starting with fake Dot was just too fun opportunity, so I couldn't resist :D

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   Reuben Crouch

Here's a thread for Ned and Walter. Let me know if I should edit anything.

Muggle Monsters

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   Gwynedd Oakby

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For Percy and Ned I could see them getting along. Given the age difference acquaintances makes sense. But I can see them being work friendly.

I'm always down for scandal, so if you'd like to hurl them I'm happy to see where it goes. No pressure though

  

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Thank you Bee <3 Your magic has made Sisse bloom

We've already talked about Bernard and Ned! Happy thread them! Whenever :D

I also potentially have Thaddeus Flint (Currently looking like a Fisk) he is the Master of The Flint Institute of Advanced Magic - where people can come for basically magical university. It's relatively new so Ned wouldn't have gone but he could consider taking a course to improve his career prospects or to become an animagus or something.

He is also a senior member of the Knights of Walpurgis, which is a basically a free masonry style organisation which his father may have been part of, which would give him an invite to join as well or he could wangle an invite. It might be something he thinks would help him with his ambitions and get him into the same social circles of other wealthy and powerful pureblood families as it is exclusively for the advancement of purebloods.

I have Murdock Greyback who is head of the DMLE, he is rather stand offish unless he really knows you, but they would come into contact professionally.

  

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Interested in Higher Education? Join The Flint Institute of Advanced Magic
~
Interested in the esoteric dark arts?  Join the Knights of Walpurgis

Sisse Thompsett I'm really up for testing out everything. Ned is a herbology nerd so he'd have something to talk to Dahlia, even if he'd be alarmed by her age and energy >D ALSO on an unrelated note, I'd love to throw Ned and Caroline together and see how they interact. Ned is Evander's old friend and he has opinions~ about wives and marriage. I'd assume he and Caroline would not be each others' greatest fans at the moment.

Thaddeus Flint Yes for Ned/Bernard! And I'd like the idea that Ned's dad was in Knights, and perhaps even he himself in his younger years (for career advancement!). But these days the whole absolute blood purity thing makes him vaguely nervous (because squib daughter, etc.) so he'd probably try to avoid them, and they wouldn't care for him either, right? As for Murdock, Ned tends to view most other (ex-)Gryffindors with a mix of exasperation and alarm. He would most likely assume that Murdock doesn't even know who he is, though since Ned was the head boy when Murdock started Hogwarts he probably would (if my math is right)?