Ideas

_{I suppose we'll need some actual formatting for this page later, but for now…}

I thought this might do as sort of a scratchpad to toss around ideas for other themes we might like to explore. My thinking was anyone could add ideas for themes, what sort of thing they were interested in exploring, and others who were interested could tack on comments of what they'd like to do, what sort of characters they'd be thinking of taking, etc.

There are explanations and notes of interest below the table. The table's just meant to help people zero in on potential themes or types of themes that migth fight the criteria they're looking for at a very quick glance. Any (?) means that I wasn't sure if the criteria fit or that it could possibly fit depending on how things were set up.

— vanth September 21, 2008, at 10:21 AM

Genre Criteria Quick Reference Check List
Theme	SF	Fant	Horr	Act	Adv	Mod	Hist	Futur	Steam	Cyber	Magic	SupNat	Pulp/Noir	Tech
Aeon Flux	X			X				X						X
Buffy			X	X		X					X	X
Dr. Who	X				X	X	X	X						X
H.D.M.^	X	X	X	X	X	n/a	n/a	n/a	X		X	X		X
Indiana Jones				X	X		X				X	X	X
LotR		X		X	X	n/a	n/a	n/a			X	X
Mummy			X	X	X		X		X		X	X	X
Pirates		X		X	X		X	X^^	X (?)		X (?)	X (?)
P.Medieval		X		X	X		X				X	X
Twilight			X	X		X					X	X
UltraViolet	X			X				X				X (?)		X
WoD-esque			X	X		X	X			X (?)	X	X

Theme shortforms: SF=Sci-Fi, Fant=Fantasy, Horr=Horror, Act=Action, Adv=Adventurous, Mod=Modern, Hist=Historical, Futur=Futuristic, Steam=Steampunk, Cyber=Cyberpunk, Magic=Magical, SupNat=Supernatural, Pulp/Noir=Pulp or Noir, Tech=Technology
^ H.D.M. = His Dark Materials
^^ Pirates + Futuristic = Space pirates?

• AeonFlux / UltraViolet
  • I love the world concepts in these two movies, even if we didn't stick to the storylines so much, though if we stuck to storylines, I think UltraViolet would be the better choice of the two as the story/theme is much easier to follow. vanth
    • Ooh right, I forgot about this one. I could be down for something like this, sure. rhapsody

• Buffy, the Vampire Slayer
  • I used to be way obsessed with this show waaaaay back in the day, but sort of fell out of love with it after about the fourth season. Personally, I'd be inclined to either take the gang back to high school around Season 3 or else do an alterna-verse type of deal where we're off in another city with all new people. rhapsody

• His Dark Materials
  • Brought up in a discussion, I was wondering if anyone might be interested in HDM/Golden Compass RP… I could write up something explaining the basic tenets of the world and the theme could be such that we wouldn't rely on the events of the actual books… Witches, Armoured Bears, Gyptians, daemons… I think it's a world that could be really fun to RP in. Maybe even just as a few one-offs to see if folks like the theme, even. If anyone's curious, let me know and I'll tinker with some very basic info files. rhapsody

• Lord of the Rings
  • This would probably be better suited to a what-if type of thing than a whole separate game, unless other people are really into the idea. I was thinking more along the lines of doing another fellowship type of thing, various races coming together to complete some sort of task. Anyone not in the party could be handled by NPC. Probably something fairly simple that you'd only really need the movies to follow. rhapsody

• Pirates!
  • I really would love to do a pirate-themed something. Either PotC-based (and within that, either using the FCs at some point in their story line or doing another ship that's off doing whatever it does around that same time within the same universe, the crew would know of Jack Sparrow, etc.), or completely original. rhapsody

• Pseudo-Medieval
  • Some highly inaccurate historical RP maybe revolving around magic or the like, could have mythical races, whatever. Possible to combine with the next idea. rhapsody

• Twisted Fairy Tales
  • Shrek meets Ella Enchanted meets The Brothers Grimm meets Nursery Crimes meets… Basically, taking all those fairy tale stories and having them all exist within the same universe. Knowing us, we'd probably also want to take it dark, like the original versions versus the more lighthearted Disney versions (stepsisters lopping off their own toes to fit their feet into the glass slipper, for instance, or a Big Bad Wolf who tricks Little Red into eating her grandmother and drinking her blood). Toss into this just mundane citizens but a world in which magic exists and is part of everyday life. People could have varying access to magic, which could act almost like a currency. rhapsody

• The Mummy
  • Something one-off-ish based around The Mummy franchise. Though maybe we can skip the whole Scorpion King deal. rhapsody
  • Along these lines, also Indiana Jones could work. vanth

• WoD-esqe?
  • While I've only had cursory contact with the White Wolf/WoD universe, I've always had an affinity for werewolves (and vampires, etc. to a lesser degree). While we certainly don't have to stick with WoD canon, it might be cool to do something in which these creatures exist… Of course, it could be combined with the Twisted Fairy Tales idea. Or it could take place in the present day. Soho
  • Yeah, I know very little about WoD stuff, but do like vampires and werewolves. I'd be willing to learn some (depending on if we need to/want to use stats, I suppose) or we could always fold it in with something else too. rhapsody
  • You mean I might have something to put my $2000-3000 worth of WoD books to good use for? ;) *snickers* We could draw from it, if nothing else. We don't need stats so much as maybe just using some of the general descriptions of some of the abilities if you'd like (which I'd be more than willing to provide). Woo. vanth
  • As an aside, I've done 'modern horror' type stuff in one-shots before with others. Don't have to know WoD to do stuff like that. We can also work some of this into one of the other themes, such as the twisted fairytales, depending on what sort of thing folks are interested in. Could also base it off of a vampire/werewolf movie like Underworld, as a thought. vanth
  • Could also work something in like Twilight, which I'm building a mini-grid for. — vanth September 21, 2008, at 09:40 AM

• Doctor Who
  • I just had to say it. I don't care what era (though my Doctor's definitely Ten) or what companion. This would be awesome — an amalgamation of scifi, horror and mystery elements. (After all, everything from killer cyborg races to werewolves to evil angels have appeared in the series. There's a lot of wiggle room.) Soho

• Gossip Girl
  • I don't know if anyone even watches this show or if you're all going to think less of me for even suggesting it, but it's awesome, shut up. Anyway, the richest of the rich kids in Manhattan (and the few 'poor' scholarship cases), attending partnered private schools (Constance Billard for the girls and St. Jude's for the boys), with an omniscient and anonymous blogger who sends out blasts whenever one of them does something gossip worthy. Bitchy back-stabbing and politics in a high school setting. Familiarity with the series (either TV or books) wouldn't really be necessary, since the concept is fairly basic.

• Thursday Next
  • Recognizing that the chance is very slim anyone else has read these delightful books of absurdist fiction about fiction by Jasper Fforde, I think this would be an awesome world to RP in. A place where you can jump in and out of books, grammarsites and plot-holes are lethal, and the world behind the pages is ruled by the ever-vigilant Jurisfiction agents. Outside the book world, the Crimean War drags on, cheese is a controlled substance, the Goliath Corporation owns everything ever, and literature is the common man's popular past-time.

• PBeM
  • Not really a theme or plot, but I thought I might suggest we start supplementing on-game RP with maybe a bit of PBeM, since we're all so very busy these days. I was thinking at the very least for the big scenes like the Ball, if we did it by email, that would at least give everyone a chance to partake and mingle and all without us having to wait for the Second Coming for us all to be online together at the same time (and long enough to RP something as industrious as the Ball, no less). Anyway, it's just an idea, and I'm not quite sure of the logistics at this point: whether we'd want to set up a proper mailing list, just use replyall, set up a forum or an LJ or what… So I welcome any feedback to that end as well! rhapsody
    • We have this set up now, just in case. I think I posted about this on the game (to avoid spambots that pick up the addy here). — vanth September 20, 2008, at 02:39 PM