Mahō Shōjo

[Gumiho Girl]

I think I mentioned previously that I've joined a team who have been working on a TTRPG about modern urban fantasy. The intention for the game is specifically about marginalised folks who have been given the chance to make a difference in the world and take control of their destiny. In this game, immortal magical familiars are beimg weakened as shadowy conspiracies and cabals have gradually been absorbing the magic in the world to claim it for themselves and to prevent others from using free magic to disrupt their sinister plans for the world. The desire to change the world comes from seeing oppression in the world, and the familiars offer those with this desire a spark of power to brig chaos and change back into a world that is stagnating and dying. It's a dark setting, it's really socially conscious, and it's not designed to be everyone's cup of tea, but it is designed to tell speciic stories of hope and renewal amidst decadence and decay.

I've thought about some alternate ideas to bring to the group, and this forum has really inspired me. I'm wondering if there might be a group of familiars who specialise in awakening young girls to bring change into the world in the vein of mahō shōjo (magical girls), but it might be more appropriate to have these young heroines develop powers a bit differently to the other characters in the game. This idea might end up as a supplement to the main game, with the mahō shōjo acting as allies (or even potentially adversaries) to the main characters, or it might be a spin-off game using the same systems.

If I was to develop this idea further, what sorts of thigs might you like to see in it? What types of characters would make sense for it? What sorts of stories would this game be about?

 

[Sailor Marin]

I think the distilled magical girl fantasy is wondrous fashion / the sensation of looking amazing, the treatment of femininity as something that can be empowering, interesting magical powers, some element of heroism, and a slice of life. =3

So what I'd want to see is a good amount of non-combat mechanics, a skill system that allows for a good amount of investment in navigating them, and some sort of mechanical acknowledgement of the transformation if there is one.

 

[Senkusha]

I agree on the non-combat development, although, there should be a healthy combat system. After all, people want to vanquish evil-doers. With that said, let's look at what the Realm of the Magical Girl genre looks at, especially lately, with the development of titles like Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Magical Girl Site, and even Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha.

There's obviously the social aspect. Balancing the normal mundane life of teenagers and preadolescence like chores, homework, dating, bullying, etc with developing ethical morals, fighting crime with true justice. But there's also the cost that's involved with the development of magical abilities. Sometimes, with every use, it takes something away from the magical girl. It may even corrupt her slightly-- "power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely", right? There's also the pressure to keep a powerful secret, even amongst your closest friends. You're a Magical Girl. Imagine if that secret got out? How betrayed would your best friend(s) be? What about the Government trying to capture you, study you, hoard you?

So you'll need a system to track Empathy or Karma something. You'll need ample social-specific skills. It being magical, you'll want a list of Special Abilities that is easily definable-- an Effects-based system (there are tons of games already in existence that highlight this). You'll want the game to mechanically be cinematic (less crunch and math at the table).

With regards to the familiars, you're going to want to develop a sturdy catalog of animals to chose from, each with suggested strengths and weaknesses. I would probably also add in a random table (because I love random tables) of personality quirks for the familiars. Because, sometimes the familiar/gift bearer of powers isn't necessarily the good guy. The familiar should have its own motivations and goals to recruit a Magical Girl partner (or multiple).

All in all, it's a unique concept. We'd be playing as the familiar rather than the "protagonist" of a human magical girl. Each player would have a Magical Girl character, and play the familiar of another player's character-- that's actually a really neat idea, and it takes work off the Game Master's shoulders too.

 

[Sailor Marin]

Nod nod I assumed the TTRPG would already have combat mechanics from the non-magical girl part. x3 I can't think of any that don't honestly.

 

[Gumiho Girl]

In the Familiar game, the typical dynamic of magicians and familiars is flipped on it's head. The familiar is the one who chooses the magician, they are an immortal spirit while the magician is disposable.

In a short campaign (a couple of sessions), you'd play as a symbiotic pair with both halves balancing influence. The familiar provides mystical insight and otherworldly wisdom filtered through the perspective of an animal's stereotypes. The magician provides grounding in the real world and has day-to-day issues they need to regularly deal with. The magician needs to interact with the world around them because the need to see why magic is required in the world and they need to experience why they have been chosen as agents of change against the stagnation and oppression of the "powers that be" (whatever we end up calling them).

In a longer campaign, the familiar might cycle through a number of magicians, once they've brought change to the world a magician might find that their life gets better and their desire for change gets less...therefore they get less useful to the familiar and a new magician might be sought out. Conversely, the magician might no longer be useful because they've gone insane through the magical awareness they've been opened up to...or they might die dramatically in combat. There's plenty of reasons a magician might leave the story, but the familiar lingers on, and they need a new magician to start interacting with the world again.

The whole game is a blend of magical adventure and slice-of-life, which is why adapting it to "magical-girl" tropes would probably work well. We've certainly thought about the way power works in the game, and everything in it is designed to revolve around character arcs. It's not a D&D power trip that always gets bigger ad bigger, it's more about ongoing stories where characters come in, play their part, then leave...but we might revisit them again later as helpful mentors, shopkeepers, or people who have their own quests to give now that they've no longer got the ability to shape the world through the arcane (in some rare cases a familiar may reconnect with the same person, if that person finds a new reason to desire change in the world).

 

[Senkusha]

Ah, okay. I think I see. So the magical girls are expendable, kind of like a stick of chewing up. You pop one in your mouth, chew on it for a while, until it looses flavor, and then go for another piece-- maybe a different flavor even. So then the plot would be to further some core motivation or goal that the Familiar has.

This could be fun, because the magical girl might actually be an idiot or could even be a villain. It doesn't matter so much, because the Familiar is using the magical girl... kind of like a puppet. The Familiar may not have direct access to the Arcana, but the knows what to do with the Arcana.

Is this more accurate?

 

[Gumiho Girl]

This could be fun, because the magical girl might actually be an idiot or could even be a villain. It doesn't matter so much, because the Familiar is using the magical girl... kind of like a puppet. The Familiar may not have direct access to the Arcana, but the knows what to do with the Arcana.

Is this more accurate?

Yeah absolutely. Characters in that game could certainly come back as villains... maybe they get what they want, but they don't want anyone else getting what they want afterwards, so a new group of people are needed to bring a new balance to the world.

We're figuring that the familiars come from spirit worlds and they understand how magic works, but don't know how reality works.

It should also be noted in this game that familiars are alien/spiritual creatures who don't look like natural animals... they look like a cross between an animal and "something else" (which all depends on the spirit world they called home), anyone who is mystically enchanted, or who is another magician, see the familiar in their true form. Regular people just see a regular animal.

With regard to the magician having goals and the familiar having goals, that's always been one of the keys to the game. A familiar will often try to find someone who has goals similar to their own, after all, this helps them make strategic moves in the long game. However, sometimes a familiar will just take the best option that's available if they're starting to destabilise in the world... and sometimes this will mean picking a magician who has goals that might run contrary to the familiar's goals. This is where some of the interesting stories and situations start to appear.

All against a grand backdrop where magic is dying in the world. Do you risk the last magic in the world for a chance to bring it all back? Do you hoard the last magic in the hope that you'll be able to survive the magical winter before a new spring occurs? If everyone hoards the magical energies holding the world together, everything will collapse and there won't be a new age. That's what TTRPGs are about for most of the designers in our group... making tough decisions that reveal something about the character and about the player.