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Out of This World - A Fate RP Quest

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"The Holy Grail War...a ritual in which a number of magi summon the spirits of heroes past, to...
Dekutulla

Dekutulla

Commission Artist
"The Holy Grail War...a ritual in which a number of magi summon the spirits of heroes past, to duel in combat for the ultimate prize - the Holy Grail. Possessing the power to grant one their greatest wishes, these magi would do anything to get their hands on it, whether that be murdering the other magi (a given), draining the local populace of their life force (somewhat common), or even breaking the rules set down by the arbiter of the war themselves (rules are more like guidelines anyways). Many have heard of it, though none have ever won - all competitors have either ended up dead, or fled the war before its conclusion, or found themselves tricked by some malicious entity. This time, though, the war will be different. This time, the war is..."

You lean back in your chair, stretching your arms above your heads, working out the kinks in your back and shoulders. You've been thinking about doing this for a while, first as a whim and then as an actual plan. It helps that you're unemployed, single, friendless, and not particularly busy - lots of time to write, and the more you write the less you think of how you should be doing something else with your life. In any case, you thought you'd try your hand at a perennial classic - the Grail War roleplaying game. Many have tried to run one, but none have succeeded. Most die during night one, but even those that manage to struggle past the inevitable "fluff roleplay for three weeks" phase end up dying eventually, for a myriad of reasons. This one, though, you have a good feeling about. After all, it's you writing it!

You start typing away, filling out the intro. It's important in these games to have a good hook - if people wanted to play the basic fate stay night setup, they'd just watch the anime - at least that ends. Besides, it takes a level of prewriting that you just can't expect from random forum posters on a sci-fi nerd discussion board. No, you've gotta do something to surprise people! You gotta make it COOL and INTERESTING. You start writing down ideas for the concept, haphazardly listing them out on an unnamed google doc. It's going to be hard to find later like this, you think, so you rename it to "COOL FATE GAME". The all-caps will make it easier to find in the dustbin of your other concepts, like "mass effect but jurassic park tho", "mafia 29: this time the GM is a player", "D&D game", or that one document that you just titled with a punch of emojis. You're pretty sure the eggplant means it was erotic fiction, but you can't recall ever writing anything even remotely close to that. You haven't looked, just in case the Trump administration is monitoring your internet traffic after that time you said you wanted someone to steal his hair with a drone.

When you finally catch your train of thought and get back on track, the sun is setting and you've got about a hundred and fifty words down on the document. But that's ok! You've written thousands of words in mere hours before, you won't let this discouragement get to you. You open twelve tabs of the Type Moon wiki and get back into the swing of things. Before you know it, you've got everything you really need written down, and all you need is the twist! You look back at the google document, ignoring the fact that your opening minus the twist is still sub-1K words, and think. What do you want this game to be set in? There's a lot of options, Type Moon's a big place.

Your RP will be set in:
[ ] Fate/Stay Night style: Modern Japan! You can't literally JUST do Fate/Stay Night, of course, but who doesn't love Japan? No one, that's who. Players will fight in the city of Fuyuki, probably killing a shitton of people in their fight for the Holy Grail.
-[ ] Let's get gimmicky!: Every Servant summoned must meet a certain gimmick. Watch your players dance as they try to make a Servant they like that also fulfills your fetishes!
[ ] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.
[ ] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.
[ ] Fate/Grand Order style: You can't actually write this one for very long, but if you compress the story and rip off the japanese stuff no one has read yet, it might work? Plus you don't have to have players fight each other and you can just do whatever you want.
[ ] Fate Prisma Illya style: Play as prepubescent girls in skimpy outfits, who constantly fuck! Also, there's like, cards and wands? You can't actually do this one, one of your friends is a moderator and told you that it'd get shut down, and possibly reported to the FBI.
[ ] Original style: You made your own, original gimmick! Aren't you clever? Yes you are! Too bad you won't get nearly as much engagement, since you've never been able to effectively convey how cool your ideas are to everyone else.
-[ ] Cards: It's like Prisma Ilya, but without the child porn! To be honest, you just really like Cardcaptor Sakura's theme song.
-[ ] Elsewhere in the Nasuverse: You don't actually know how Nasuverse works, but there's like, aliens on mars and venus right? Maybe they're the big bad!
-[ ] An actual no shit completely original idea: Haha, yeah right. It's just homestuck with all the names filed off.
 
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[X] Fate/Grand Order style: You can't actually write this one for very long, but if you compress the story and rip off the japanese stuff no one has read yet, it might work? Plus you don't have to have players fight each other and you can just do whatever you want.

This is one I like. FGO got a pretty interesting plot.
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.
 
[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.

This one will be the one that works!
 
[X] Fate/Stay Night style: Modern Japan! You can't literally JUST do Fate/Stay Night, of course, but who doesn't love Japan? No one, that's who. Players will fight in the city of Fuyuki, probably killing a shitton of people in their fight for the Holy Grail.

I've heard the author is a strong expert on modern Japanese society.
 
[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.

@LupineVolt
We will ride our minivan to Valhalla, shiny and chrome. The surly children in the backseat temporarily tamed by Finding Nemo played on loop
 
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Well this should be all kinds of fun. Every option is interesting in the context of this quest format. I'm caught between Extra, Grand Order and Apocrypha.

[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.
 
[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.
 
[X] Let's get gimmicky!: Every Servant summoned must meet a certain gimmick. Watch your players dance as they try to make a Servant they like that also fulfills your fetishes!
 
[x] Original style: You made your own, original gimmick! Aren't you clever? Yes you are! Too bad you won't get nearly as much engagement, since you've never been able to effectively convey how cool your ideas are to everyone else.
-[x] An actual no shit completely original idea: Haha, yeah right. It's just homestuck with all the names filed off.

I have no fucking clue how the Nasuverse works, making it not-Homestuck may actually get me some semblance of understanding.
​
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.

Eh sure why not.

Now back to beating up Sabnock. COUGH UP THOSE FANGS YOU MASSIVE BITCH!
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.

I'd scream about how nice going to SPACE!!! is, but I do like the Extra format. Actually gives some room to the whole information gathering aspect. And really, Extra doesn't get enough love.
 
[X] Fate/Extra style: Servants on the MOOOOOON! To be honest, you really liked Fate/Extra, because of how stripped down the concept was. There was that sequel game, and then the other sequel game, and then the sequel anime, but all those failed to capture the true appeal of the original - one on one matches in an incredibly organized fashion. You figure it'll probably be a little easier to run with that setup anyways.
 
[X] The Fate/Gatsby: High society in 1920's Long Island is fraught with complication and melodrama, especially when a secret society of mages interrupts the ludicrously decadent nightly revelries with a shadowy war for power and miracles.

...guys, I think I just had the stupidest idea this site will ever see.
 
[x] Original style: You made your own, original gimmick! Aren't you clever? Yes you are! Too bad you won't get nearly as much engagement, since you've never been able to effectively convey how cool your ideas are to everyone else.
-[x] Cards: It's like Prisma Ilya, but without the child porn! To be honest, you just really like Cardcaptor Sakura's theme song.
 
[x] Original style: You made your own, original gimmick! Aren't you clever? Yes you are! Too bad you won't get nearly as much engagement, since you've never been able to effectively convey how cool your ideas are to everyone else.
-[x] Cards: It's like Prisma Ilya, but without the child porn! To be honest, you just really like Cardcaptor Sakura's theme song.
 
[x] Original style: You made your own, original gimmick! Aren't you clever? Yes you are! Too bad you won't get nearly as much engagement, since you've never been able to effectively convey how cool your ideas are to everyone else.
-[x] Cards: It's like Prisma Ilya, but without the child porn! To be honest, you just really like Cardcaptor Sakura's theme song.
 
[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.

No no no you see, if everyone has a team to be on that'll make managing people a lot easier right? Since people'll have their own built in allies and stuff. And we can just run it like a GSRP or something.

It's genius.
 
TenfoldShields said:
[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.

No no no you see, if everyone has a team to be on that'll make managing people a lot easier right? Since people'll have their own built in allies and stuff. And we can just run it like a GSRP or something.

It's genius.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I like your style. Wanna team up if this wins?

[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.
 
[X] Fate/Apocrypha style: Not exactly World War 2, but you can see it from here. Nazis stole the Grail during the second War to End All Wars, and now your players will kill each other in a display of violence Eastern Europe hasn't seen in...at least two years? Plus, there's two teams, so in theory people can cooperate instead of just trying to kill each other all the time forever.
 
"This time, the war is...being held in the Moon Cell, the massive supercomputer in orbit around Earth. A massive number of masters - or 'spiritron hackers' - have been summoned by the Moon Cell to duel against each other in one-on-one matches, with the final winner being granted a single wish on the alien device's core: the Holy Grail. Though their Servants will be mere digital recreations of heroes from the past, only simulating the true grail ritual, it is all that is left in the barren and magecraft-less Earth they have left behind. A crystalline construct at the very core of the moon, it is nearly limitless in its potential, and possesses untapped power. Of course, only the best Master will reach it..."

You finish off the last period in your dramatic ellipses and start writing the out of character recruitment drabble. You copy-paste the Servant and Master sheet formats from some other, miserably failed games, because why fix what isn't broke? The sheets are never the problems, just the people using them. You copy the rules too - some stuff about not cheating, not being a harasser, letting the GM know if you're going to quit, etcetera, etcetera. Pretty boring stuff, if you're being honest, and you are. Still, you should probably add some rules of your own...give your game a personal flair, you know? Maybe help it stand out from the rest of the dreck people post on this site.

A key factor in Fate games is that they often die on the first Night phase, as the players expend all their energy in that first night. Unable to keep themselves from whipping their metaphorical dicks out, they all rush to the same location IC and start spamming their Noble Phantasms. People often try to avoid this by setting rules down, but what do you want to do?
[ ] Let people move at their own pace. This is what basically every other game does, and often things get bogged down in the first Night phase as people blow their loads everywhere and run out of energy. Since it's an Extra grail war, though, the phases will work a bit differently, with enforced downtime and only one-on-one combat, so maybe that'll help?
[ ] Enforce strict time limits. Everyone shifts phases after about a half a week, whether they like it or not. People who are done, people who are waiting, people who are mid roleplay. All switch over.

The second key factor is who is playing what. Many games, run by foolish GMs who have high hopes of themselves, run with players controlling Masters and their Servants. Of course, most players want to play Servants, so the Master roles are usually filled with the dregs of the available player base...or by masochists. Plus, if you double up players for every team, things can get hectic, or the opposite, extremely quickly. With that in mind, you will...
[ ] Only allow applications for Servants. Look, let's be real. No one wants to be a Master. Some people are fine with it, but the draw is always being a big cool hero from myths and legends. Let's just cut out the middleman and give people what they want.
[ ] Only allow applications for Masters. Look, let's be honest. People can't write Servant sheets for shit. They're always overpowered, unbalanced, and a pain in the ass to boot. You'll have them run the Masters alone, and assign them a set of Servants you've made yourself.
[ ] Allow applications for both Masters and Servants. Look, let's be frank. You're a god amongst men when you compare yourself to the other people who GM on this site. You think their failings will apply to you? Psh, you can run with PCs as both halves nooooo problem.

Finally, how many people are you going to let into this little game?
[ ] A small number. Keep it manageable. You can make a big chunk of the tourney NPC operated, keeping it just to PC vs PC fights in a single part of the bracket. Probably the easiest to do.
[ ] A moderate number. You can probably handle like, half the bracket, right? Or about that? You'll probably have to mix in some NPC fights for people to beat up on while they wait for the PCs to advance.
[ ] Everyone is a PC. You may be clinically insane. Every single member of the tournament will be represented by PCs. You're not sure you can do that, but if you do you'll be a legend.

With those decisions out of the way, you put the finishing touches on. For a brief moment, you consider making the applications first-come first-serve...but no. No one on this site is that stupid, right? There's got to at least be some quality control thrown into the mix. Chuckling as you imagine the hypothetical idiot that would have to exist to do that, you press Post Reply. And the OP...is...up!
 
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