I think that's because everyone else is using a better definition of Mary-Sue than I am. I just meant generalised self-insertion.

My big worry about a gaming system is that it's sometimes impartial to character development, and the experiences of the characters are damn near crucial in an Utena-esque setting. I've seen it work, particularly with a BESM setup, and it's definitely worth the work if we can make it happen. It may also cut down on a little Mary-Sueness.

A Day Without Me wrote:

My idea is that we, right at the start, designate who our Utena-type is going to be. Now, I don't mean they need to be exactly like Utena, they don't even have to resemble her in most respects - what I mean is we definitely need a character who is going to ultimately be the one to revolutionize the world (and I'm gonna recommend that the person playing that character might want to take on playing the Rose Bride as well since the relationship between those two is so important to the story).

I'm just throwing out an idea here... One of the more interesting things for me was when Touga defeated Utena and 'gained' Anthy. I sometimes wish that things had gone on from that point for another episode or two before Utena challanged Touga and won her duel of 'Self'. (There are also times when I'm glad that didn't happen, because judging from many shows it would have degenerated into super-angst-land and ruined things.)

But anyway, what I'm trying to get to is: Will the Utena-type always be the Engaged? If not, it would be neat to have the Rose Bride written by whoever was currently engaged to her (or him), to play on the supposed control that the champion of the duels wields over the Bride. This would side-step the Rose Bride from being written out of character because he or she would be playing the role the current champion has assigned them to play.

And THEN, at the same time, the GM person responsible for Akio could play the Rose Bride straight, so to speak, via their Friday night brother-sister bonding sessions.

/end ramble

Ragnarok wrote:

But anyway, what I'm trying to get to is: Will the Utena-type always be the Engaged? If not, it would be neat to have the Rose Bride written by whoever was currently engaged to her (or him), to play on the supposed control that the champion of the duels wields over the Bride. This would side-step the Rose Bride from being written out of character because he or she would be playing the role the current champion has assigned them to play.

And THEN, at the same time, the GM person responsible for Akio could play the Rose Bride straight, so to speak, via their Friday night brother-sister bonding sessions.

/end ramble

Oo, I like that idea! I think it's a really good idea, and it really makes sense.

I do think the Utena-type should have the Rose Bride the most, though.

And I dunno if the Rose Bride should be female or male - I think it'd be kind of interesting if it was a male, personally; I must admit a personal opposition to the Rose Bride being female if our Utena is male, though - it's too... close to the fairy tale ideal; I think it works better when a girl is protecting a boy or girl, or a boy is protecting a boy - turns the fairy tale ideal upside down. Anyway, I think the Rose Bride should have that title even if its a boy.

We're taking rather a lot for granted   Our GM might want to do something unconventional.  Maybe duels work differently in this alternate universe.  Maybe the mapping of alternate-universe characters to Utena characters is not one-to-one.  Maybe there isn't a Rose Bride at all, or maybe the Champion becomes subservient to the Bride rather than vice versa.  Maybe our central archetypes are not princes and witches but angels and demons or cowboys and Indians.  For heaven's sake, we're in Holland; maybe the flower is the tulip instead of the rose.  Surely we can do better than copy-pasting Ohtori into Amsterdam!

satyreyes wrote:

For heaven's sake, we're in Holland; maybe the flower is the tulip instead of the rose.  Surely we can do better than copy-pasting Ohtori into Amsterdam!

Haha, actually, I had though of using a tulip instead of a rose - in fact, I'd love to use tulips as opposed to roses. But I like the name of the academy using the Dutch word for rose instead of tulip - I don't think St. de Tulp Academy has quite the same ring to it as St. de Roos Academy.

As for taking things for granted - well, I'm one of the people who volunteered to oversee the thing, so that's why I'm talking about it so much.

Hinotori wrote:

And since someone else volunteered and I just realised I have a lot less on my plate than I thought I did (other than these freaking weekly taxonomy tests my Prof. insists on giving) I'd be willing to co-GM. I'd even leave my kinky fetishes out of it! maybe

I just noticed this post that was back a bit - somehow managed to not read it when it first appeared! I'd be happy to have to co-GM with me.

Err, assuming everyone's fine with me GM'ing period... I kind of just ran away with my ideas 'cause no one else was making much noise about it for a while.

Last edited by A Day Without Me (12-12-2006 10:06:15 PM)

Ragnarok wrote:

satyreyes wrote:

maybe the Champion becomes subservient to the Bride rather than vice versa.

Wait, that's now how it went in the series?

Hee hee.  You make a good point.  Dominance relationships in Utena (and in general, but especially in Utena) are screwed up past belief.

St. de Tulp admittedly isn't the prettiest name, but it doesn't have to be the one we use.  A friend of mine who actually knows some Japanese misheard "Ohtori" (lit: fire-bird) as "Ohtorii" (lit: big-gate) the first time, which strikes me as a wonderful and appropriate pun.  What's the Dutch word for gate?  Again, creativity! 

I would suggest towards copy-and-pasting Ohtori into Amsterdam, personally, with a few modifications - not because I don't think we should be creative, but because we don't want to stray too far from Utena because that's what everybody knows and wants to work with.

The issue with this that I see is Akio. I don't see how we can have a new Rose Bride and keep him as is. Or are we keeping him as is, and just changing who his sibling happened to be?

I'm pro the Rose Bride being a boy -- it's an interestingly subversive idea, and would prevent said character from veering too far into Anthyism. I'm perceiving a bit of a challenge there: Anthy is who she is so much because of what being the Rose Bride involves, and the new one would have to differentiate...

Gah, that's the problem with dealing with a premise that has living symbols walking round every which way. :p

In regards to the Utena-type... I kind of think we should throw a bunch of duelists in there and, Akio-style, see who comes out on top. It could work, and it might be intriguing - so long as no one got uppity about their character not being The One, which I don't see this group doing. It could be too convoluted however. I do kind of see everyone wanting to be a duelist - I know I want to be one! - which is natural because most of the major characters are duelists, or involved in the duels... though if we're going to do things Apocalypse-arc style, there's going to have to be candidates for a duelist's Rose Bride.

Last edited by Syna (12-12-2006 10:26:20 PM)

Syna wrote:

The issue with this that I see is Akio. I don't see how we can have a new Rose Bride and keep him as is. Or are we keeping him as is, and just changing who his sibling happened to be?

I'm pro the Rose Bride being a boy -- it's an interestingly subversive idea, and would prevent said character from veering too far into Anthyism.

I'm thinking that Akio goes out and manipulates some other child into being the Rose Bride - as in, he picks out a youngish kid and then through his skillful manipulations molds them into a Rose Bride as they age - this would mean, of course, that our version takes place several years after the events of SKU.

Syna wrote:

In regards to the Utena-type... I kind of think we should throw a bunch of duelists in there and, Akio-style, see who comes out on top. It could work, and it might be intriguing - so long as no one got uppity about their character not being The One, which I don't see this group doing. It could be too convoluted however.

Yeah, that's kind of why I want to designate it from the get-go - less confusing, and although I think we're a pretty mature group, it just takes away the chance of un-necessary drama between people.

Syna wrote:

I do kind of see everyone wanting to be a duelist

Well, if we have four student council members (although I'm up for five, since there are five duelists in SKU besides Utena - I think any more than five would be a bit confusing, personally),  and an Utena-type, then we have five (or six) duelists. Then we have Akio. So there we have six or seven duelists (since Akio does duel in the end). And if we add in Black Rose (or Tulip!) duelists, we'd have ten or eleven duelists (plus our Mikage-type) [granted, Black Rose/Tulip duelists only duel once]. Given the amount of people who have responded thus far, I don't think we should run into too many problems in that regard.

satyreyes wrote:

Maybe our central archetypes are not princes and witches but angels and demons or cowboys and Indians.

I think keeping the princes-witches-princesses thing in place is important, since that whole thing is so central to SKU as a whole.

Last edited by A Day Without Me (12-12-2006 10:41:23 PM)

I'm all about confusing, but for the 84rth time there would have to be a certain right-on-top-of-thisness we'd have to achieve. That's kind of why I'd like to set a weekly/bi-weekly RP date because it gives the GMs a chance to be on top of what went on the last session as well as the rest of the characters. From personal experience, either the storyline or when it's happening needs to be well ordered if there's going to be any semblance of storyline whatsoever. Either things get automated from the git-go or we're going to need time to get flexable with the character's rolls and where we'd like them to go.

At least this seems to  be the case with anime-style RPs. (NOTRELATED: If this group turns out pretty well I think it would be also kind of cool to run a good old fashioned D&D campaign at some point in the near future. We seem to have a few fans here)

If we were going to do a Black Rose Saga, I think it'd probably work out best in kind of a free-form manner after we got some of the characters developed. That way we could kind of pick from the secondary characters who would be best suited as a duellist. I'm pre-emptively showing interest in [Mikage]'s roll right now, no matter how we go about doing it.

Ragnarok wrote:

The thing about this is how does Akio implant the sword of Dios(etc.) into a new Rose Bride? Assuming the same sorts of function will be filled that Anthy did previously, up to taking the swords of hate.

Assuming Akio can't just magic it that way as easily as a gender swap.

That could be some interesting backstory. But then again, it doesn't seem like the Sword of Dios is entirely needed here, and he could've just found a clever way of using the boy's own spirit sword (assuming everyone has one).

Last edited by Hinotori (12-12-2006 10:57:47 PM)

A Day Without Me wrote:

I'm sure Akio can manipulate the kid to get it in there - such as, the kid reaches a certain mind-set, similar to Anthy's, where they are willing to take on the Swords of Hate for Akio, and then they automatically become the scabbard for the sword.

I'm just questioning whether putting the sword of Dios into someone is something Akio is capable of. This because I'm under the impression that it was Anthy who took the sword within herself. (As part of sealing away Dios, etc. Personal opinion stuff mostly.) When the series ends and Anthy leaves, does Akio have posession of the sword of Dios? Do the swords of hate target Anthy simply for having the sword or because she is the witch who sealed Dios away?

What I'm thinking is that it would be really neat to come up with a Rose Bride who would be in a position to really take Anthy's place, pin cushion and all. Eternal torment isn't something that just anyone can withstand. Going even more off tangent, just for a moment, assuming Anthy is free from being the Rose Bride the moment she leaves Ohtori, would Akio get the swords of hate in her place? Or else where would they go? Though having Akio be in constant torment probably isn't the direction we'd want the RP to take.

Anyway, in the RP all those questions can be answered anyway you choose, or ignored altogether. That's just where my thought process lead me.

Ragnarok wrote:

A Day Without Me wrote:

I'm sure Akio can manipulate the kid to get it in there - such as, the kid reaches a certain mind-set, similar to Anthy's, where they are willing to take on the Swords of Hate for Akio, and then they automatically become the scabbard for the sword.

I'm just questioning whether putting the sword of Dios into someone is something Akio is capable of. This because I'm under the impression that it was Anthy who took the sword within herself. (As part of sealing away Dios, etc. Personal opinion stuff mostly.) When the series ends and Anthy leaves, does Akio have posession of the sword of Dios? Do the swords of hate target Anthy simply for having the sword or because she is the witch who sealed Dios away?

What I'm thinking is that it would be really neat to come up with a Rose Bride who would be in a position to really take Anthy's place, pin cushion and all. Eternal torment isn't something that just anyone can withstand.

Well, Akio wouldn't put it there, really - he'd just raise a kid who would end up with the mind-set of "Akio is my prince, if I don't do this, he will suffer." Then, the kid would be willing to take on the role. And I must admit, I always felt that Anthy no longer possesses the Sword of Dios when she walks away from Ohtori - if she still did, she wouldn't be completely free, in a way.

Teatime wrote:

On the topic of self insertions... It depends on the player. I've run into a lot of self insertion type characters in roleplay but with a bit of prodding people eventually get the idea that their character is A)not themselves and B)not perfect.

I don't anticipate running into a problem with people having perfect characters here since we all like the characters of Utena so much and mainly for the fact that they are so deeply flawed. But if there is a problem with a person's character, I think everyone here is capable to taking constructive criticism, so it should be something that, if it arises, can be ironed out without too much trouble. I have a lot of faith in you guys

I think that's a neat idea.

Theoretically, whoever plays the future Rose Bride would be the logical person to then take up the Utena-type, as these two characters wouldn't overlap until after the bride is chosen. (Assuming they'd want to do that, of course.) So then they would be able to 'regain' partial control of their former character, allowing for some subtleties to occur even when the Bride is playing their submissive role.

Yasha wrote:

To be honest, I would say that picking the Rose Bride before we even make characters is premature.

Yeah, I just don't want someone to have their character selected as the Rose Bride against their will - maybe instead of picking in advance, have it be that people who are willing to have their character become the Rose Bride would say so, and then choose it from that pool of characters.

But, ultimately, who does decide who becomes the Rose Bride? The person playing Akio? We could always do it by a random drawing or something. But, what if only one person is okay with their character becoming the Rose Bride? Then it would be pre-determined anyway.

Anyway, I'm going to request that perhaps a separate section of the forum be created, specifically for the RP and things related to it; additionally, if it is alright that a separate section be made, I would request that this thread be moved to it.