[Magical Psychopomp Lotus Guardians] A Shoujo Manga game. Situation.

[Elliott]

Hey all.  I used to post here as Elliott Belser, then as ElliottBelser MkII.  Now I'm just Elliott.

I've come up with my first game of real worth, and I just need to tweak it here and there.  My questions are in bold.

The game is of the shoujo manga genre - and of the Magical Girl subgenre.  Well, sort of. 

The player's characters are all ordinary teenage schoolgirls or, rarely, schoolboys from Anytown, Japan, and all of you have just met a beautiful teenage girl - looks to be Chinese, from the hairstyle, the features of her face and her clothing - who works as a delivery girl at the cheapest and yet the best dim sum place in town.  Her name is Kwan Yin.

Otherwise known as the godess, Compassion Herself.

Yeah.  That Kwan Yin.

So you all become good friends - your PC, Kwan Yin, and through Kwan Yin, your PC and the other PC's.   

Kwan Yin then recruits you and empowers you all to destroy Hungry Ghosts.  My Hungry Ghosts are malevolent beings that cannot accept that they are dead.  They destroy good things by making people who love them obsess over them until the Ghost can eat everything good about it.

Your job is two-fold: help the people any Hungry Ghost is hurting and help all Hungry Ghosts move on.

Anything I can do to punch up this setup?

In the grand tradition of all Magical Girl stories, it has an over the top, symbolically charged name.  My game is called Magical Psychopomp Lotus Guardians.  Some name, eh?  Is it too over the top or just right?

Rules to follow.

[Callan S.]

They destroy good things by making people who love them obsess over them until the Ghost can eat everything good about it.

Oooooh! This sounds really good!

Now tell me, you are gunna help out other people with this, right? I mean, I bet you can portray a really strong obsession - but Joe down the road perhaps just reads this and gives the most flat and lamo portrayal of obsession ever. He thinks you mean X when you say obsession, but X just doesn't cut it, it's flat and dull. That means the very core premise of the game is getting absolutely screwed up.

Are you going to write some rules for this, so Joe can do what you can do so well? You don't have to write rules first, you could just run a game mostly off the cuff, but perhaps record it on tape or write it down as you go (actually if all players could write down game play, that'd be great). Then go back and look at what you did - you'll probably be able to see a structure in it and write up rules that would help recreate that structure.

Does that count as an answer to one of your questions?

In the grand tradition of all Magical Girl stories, it has an over the top, symbolically charged name.  My game is called Magical Psychopomp Lotus Guardians.  Some name, eh?  Is it too over the top or just right?

Style might matter on introduction, but substance, that's where it's at. Remember the nature of this hobby at the moment is primarily through word of mouth - it isn't all just a cold sell on how the cover/title looks.

[Elliott]

Yes, yes, yes.  The core premise needs - needs - to be rulesified.

I actually have a mechanic to simulate this, right now, and would like to playtest it.

I've posted the Power 19 with said mechanic, if you'd like to take a look.