Musings and Adventures with the Sailor Moon RPG

So the campaign work has been going well. I haven’t actually finished a single drawing of my NPCs (something I wanted to provide to the players at their introductions), but that’s less important. What I’ve noticed, though, is that it’s becoming hard to resist the temptation to go crazy with their backstories. I’d rather not go all-out with them, because I want to keep them flexible if I need to add things or make changes. I don’t know who all my players are going to be yet, but I’d like to keep them interesting and engaging for everybody (and not just me). Plus, I really want the players’ decisions to be an important part of the campaign, partly because the element of choice (if you can call it that?) is something I’m trying to build into it as a theme in the narrative; in addition of course to being only the entire point of RPGs. Not just “do you want a red fuku or a blue fuku?” but “will you question this suspicious character or will you rough them up for information?” that become increasingly more influential on the course of the game.

But nevertheless, my NPCs are still OCs, and like any of my other original characters they’re my brainbabbies and I’ve become attached to them. I’ve used them in The Sims 2 to better understand them. And I really want my players to be able to appreciate all of them. I’ve thought about it a lot, apparently to the extent that I dreamed about it last night, of me writing a fiction about how two NPCs met each other. (And appropriately I got stuck after the first two sentences. XD) To turn this post into something constructive though, I’d like to give some advice to DMs and players alike when it comes to everybody’s feelings.

If you’re a DM, it’s difficult to not take players’ reactions to your characters personally. But the way I try to think of it is, if they feel strongly about somebody, good feelings or bad feelings, then you’ve done something right. (Or, conversely, if they don’t feel anything at all about an intentionally bland and boring character, right on.) If you’re a player, try and take a second to think about the work the DM went through to make engaging NPCs, and I recommend thinking about it so you can separate your thoughts from your character’s thoughts on them. Gaming is about having fun and crafting a unique and enjoyable adventure (for me at least), so it’s important that everybody can.

Doing campaign work from a queen-sized hotel bed. Aww yeah. Yeah sure it’s just the Quality Inn but damn if I don’t feel like the ritziest gamer alive. XD These pillows look like marshmallows. But, but but, I just had a fabulous idea:

Tabletop sleepovers. Not sleeping on the tabletop, but rather NOT sleeping while you game on the tabletop. Aww yeah. >D

Okay, I’ve filled my derp quota for August with this post. Jules out!

When I responded to sammilouwho’s ask about character sheets, it got me thinking about them. As I said I’m not very impressed with the sheets provided by the system, as they waste a lot of space with biographical information that could easily go, say, on the blank side of the sheet or in the player’s notes. There’s a typo on the senshi sheet (“Bonues Points”). And, they’re a bit heteronormative for my tastes; scouts (female) have a slot for a favorite gemstone, while knights (male) have one for a favorite sport. I’m not saying that this information is less important in creating a character, but it sure does end up, I think, sitting there to the detriment of the character information that you would actually want and need to look up on a character sheet the most often - stats and abilities. Stats are off to the side in a little box while you have tangentially relevant information like blood type and birth date taking up three inches of line space, both things that need a quarter of that much space to actually write down.

For my own ease of reference, and getting more and more familiar with the character creation process, I have spent time making character sheets for all the NPCs I currently think will need them (i.e. having abilities and stuff that a character sheet would be useful for documenting). And ignoring all of the “fluff” in the system character sheet entirely I consistently needed almost a full page or more for stats, attributes, defects and derived vales. The result was a character sheet that is easy for me to read and made tailored to the way my brain works when I look for information, with plenty of space for not only the relevant information but notes and clarifications on in-game consequences that result from the character’s abilities as well as stuff jotted down for my own sake.

To make things even easier I made the “sheets” in basic text document format. I used Microsoft Word, but obviously this is something that can be done with any word processor. I make a straight-up mess when I erase things on written character sheets (with my huge handwriting no less), and there’s really nothing better to call it but that. Having them on my laptop means making changes will be and is free of grief and messyness, and it was super helpful when I was still changing things around with my NPCs at the creation stage. Hell, I made some changes as I was writing this. Technology ftw.

If the situation calls for it, I definitely recommend making your own character sheets even if they don’t have fancy boxes and whimsical fonts and logos on them. It’ll make things easier. Nobody likes to be miserable while trying to modify a dice roll, because that’s just stupid. I plan on showing the format to my players and letting them decide for themselves what kind of sheet they want for their characters. The original sheet works for some people, and so it definitely serves its purpose. I’ll also encourage them to think about making their own sheet that will work best for them, as I encourage everybody to do if you think you stand to benefit from it.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for following!

-Jules

So it’s officially August. Which means September is close, and I’m excited. A lot of people don’t necessarily look forward to the fall semester with much anticipation, but I’ve got something special to, well, anticipate. That’s right, I’m running a Sailor Moon game! >D It is going to be pretty cool, I think. I’ve really been enjoying the planning a lot more than I thought I would, because my own idea has captured my imagination and been easy and entertaining to write and plan for. I guess you could think of my game as being similar to a fanfic, but in essence that’s technically what a lot of RPG campaigns are - stories based on a premade world. But I’d like to think that my brainbaby is more than that. It was great that reading the manga counted as “research,” and that it was a cool opportunity to introduce my cool friends with similar interests to the SM fandom, but I knew from the beginning that I wouldn’t be staying within the boundaries of Naoko Takeuchi’s beloved creation; and really, that wasn’t a very practical option anyway.

I’ll be gaming with people who have next to no knowledge of the Sailor Moon universe, so I can’t fairly expect people to be able to work within that framework. Which is fine with me, because I love the characters and the places the way they are. I’ll also be working with people who’ve likely had little to no experience with tabletop roleplaying - I’m running this game for my college’s tabletop club, and we get new members every year with varying levels of experience. So giving the players premade characters, I think, would deprive them of the experience of character creation which is one way in which I think players become more invested in the game and emotionally “bonded” to the characters they’ll be playing. I think that these are things that all DMs and GMs should keep in mind, which is why I bring them up.

To me, a game is a collaborative effort. Just as every character contributes to the group, so should every player have a part in decisions that influence the story. That’s my DMing style, and I’ve experienced several others - with excellent results. For my game, I’ve chosen to not plan everything out in advance. I’ve chosen to let the player characters decide what direction the story will take after the initial bits, while gently guiding them toward what looks promising and rewarding for everybody. I’d really like this game to capture the imaginations of my players just as I’ve said it has captured mine. With all these things in mind I’m making something that everybody can shape later, based on the following premise:

It is ancient and revered tradition that every generation a group of strong and noble warriors, or senshi, presides over and protects the planets and celestial bodies orbiting around the star Eridus (or Epsilon Eridani to us Earthlings). A new team of young senshi is bravely stepping forth to protect their homelands from whatever dangers may present themselves, but are they prepared to go against the system’s first visitors if it comes to it? This game will explore the ideas of character and the human spirit, the home and the familiar versus the other, and teamwork and perseverance. We will explore an expansion of the Sailor Moon universe created by the game master, Jill, and use both some of its cherished classic elements and new storytelling directions.

I really hope that when we begin I will be able to hold the interest of my players. The bottom line of gaming is that interest is ultimately what makes a great game, and in that regard I intend to play for keeps.
 

I was making plans to write about something but I forgot what it was.

This is that? Hot damn, sign me up!

To help us wade through the Character Creation chapter, Mark MacKinnon has provided us with a sample group of players and their characters to look at as we read and hopefully understand what the hell the difference is between character points and power points and the combat benefits of neutral attributes. Provided with a little background, we learn from earlier on in the chapter that the players and their GM have decided to run a campaign taking place during the second season of Sailor Moon in an alternate universe, with the same characters but less obligation to play out the events and personalities from the series exactly. So they think about it, and our wonderful example party decides on the following:

What? So Karen likes Mercury, Jesse wants an OC, and David… what?

Dude, this would open up a huge world of opportunity. Fans of the ReixYuuichirou/Chad ship are born here. And Sailor “Nebula” isn’t even much of a stretch, when you add selective context: In the English dub (I know, curse me for even mentioning it, but the dub is the crux of the RPG) “Chad” is at the Hikawa Shrine in the first place because he’s a recuperating rock star. Even more derpy: Gasp, fanfickers might cry, he’s the secret fourth member of the Three Lights gone undercover separately to search for Kakyuu! In terms of crack, this might qualify as bona fide headcanon, but it sure would be an interesting take on a minor character and their role in the series.

Me? Well, I just find the idea hawttttt.

I came across a very cool book on Amazon a few days back by Brian Jamison called Gamemastering. Being a GMing/DMing noob myself, I was interested and did something I rarely do: I used Amazon’s preview feature to read a bit of it. Sweet Jesus I’m glad I did because even reading bits of the first few pages was immensely helpful to me in designing the game I’m working on now (an SM game, hee). GMing involves a substantial time commitment if you want to do it right, and I in particular feel varying levels of anxiety at what my players will think of my game when we start in mid-September. Reading some snippets of Gamemastering has helped alleviate some of it and also helped my game, I think. Even if running games is old hat for you, I think Mr. Jamison definitely provides us with a lot to think about. I totally recommend checking it out, and I kind of really want to buy it.

I was given my first copy of The Sailor Moon Role-Playing Game and Resourced Book when I was in elementary/primary school. Of course, I read it cover to cover. That was my first exposure to roleplaying games, and I’m glad I inadvertently rediscovered it in college. Something that bugged me then, and even now, was that while the inner senshi, Tuxedo Kamen, and all the villains listed have fully developed character sheets for player and GM reference, the outer senshi got the fluff parts like favorite food, blood type, and none of the stats. Even Pluto, who was in one of the seasons the system was modeled on. I don’t get it, honestly.

It makes me wonder, actually, what might’ve become of the book if Guardians of Order had survived into a sixth or even seventh printing of the book (or if some of the supplementals had made it to the light of PDF - I’m looking at you, Complete Book of Supporting Characters).

So this little nugget of derp is something I’ve been thinking about for a while. As you’re creating a character, one of the attributes you can “buy” using the character creation points assigned by your game master (GM) is the “Art of Distraction,” described as follows. Most of the following is context for what I want to bring up, which is in the grey Example box at the bottom:

That’s all very well and good, except that Tuxedo Kamen has half of his face concealed by his (surprise surprise) mask. I don’t see how being physically attractive (the purpose of the Appearance attribute) can be of any use to him here, unless your definition of attractive is “tall cloaked MASKED gentleman in formalwear with a penchant for dramatic entrances” (which, hey, works for Usagi). Are the other PCs/NPCs supposed to admire his jawline?

Well, we seem to be up and running! :D Sweet.

As you can see, this tumblr is dedicated to the Sailor Moon roleplaying game system and any games that may be played with it. The system itself along with some supplementals were published by the now-out of business Guardians of Order, and written and designed my Mark C. McKinnon - the designer of, in his own words, “the first multi-genre anime role-playing game, Big Eyes, Small Mouth.” It was written to reflect the first two seasons of BSSM, and to be backwards-compatible with BESM.

The purpose of this very-few-frills tumblrblogthing is to celebrate, poke friendly fun at, and answer questions about the SMRPG, as well as highlight any campaigns that may currently be running (or have been run) using the system that are brought to my attention (do it, do it!). I’d like it to serve as information and entertainment for other people like myself who enjoy Sailor Moon, RPGs, and any combination in between, and perhaps expose fans of either one to the other (much like the system itself actually). This is just an introductory post, obviously, and I would be happy to field questions or take requests for coverage if and when I get any; until then the only stuff you’ll see here will be coming out of my own noodle. So thanks for reading, and enjoy!