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[penguinofhonor]

Warning: This entire thread should be considered huge spoilers for Puella Magi Madoka Magica.
The anime's plot is really centered around the various reveals and plot twists, and this thread will spoil them all for you. So go watch the anime if you haven't yet; this RTD will still be here when you're done.

Introduction
This RTD will take place in the Madoka universe, before the ending of the anime. Specifically, we're in Anime New York. It's exactly like regular New York except that weird anime hair/eye color is commonplace.

You are a pubescent girl, age 13 to 17, who either has been or soon will be contacted by the alien Kyubey (that's me). Kyubey offers a contract - he will grant any wish, in exchange, you will be a magical girl and fight evil. It's a dangerous career.

Spoiler: rolls and combat (click to show/hide)

This uses a modified version of Sean Mirrsen's progressive RTD rules. Your attribute and/or skill value determines the size of the die rolled for any given action.

[1]: Crit Fail
[2]: CF, Fail
[3]: CF, F, Success
[4]: CF, F, S, Overshot
[5]: CF, F, S, Perfect Success, OS
[6] and above: CF, F, S, ..., S PS, OS

Bonuses add to the die size rather than change final result unless otherwise stated.

Combat works differently, on opposed rolls. The attacker rolls an accuracy dice equal to their dexterity (or their intelligence on a magic attack), then the defender rolls a dodge dice equal to their agility. If the attacker ties or beat the defender, they deal damage. If the defender target rolls a 1 on their dodge roll, the attacker has a 1/6 chance to crit for double damage.

In addition, if a magical girl takes a critical hit, she rolls for hit location. If the crit lands on a part of her body where her soul gem is, the gem is shattered and destroyed, killing her instantly. If she's hit anywhere else, the part is crippled for 1d3 days and she takes stat penalties.

A basic attack costs 1 SP. Special/magic attacks cost more based on their spell power.

The campaign will alternate between mostly RP normal life sections, where you go through the trials of a teenager's life, and mostly combat witch hunt sections, where you go through the trials of hunting down and killing randomized witches.

I expect deaths to be frequent, so make sure to get on the waitlist if you're not one of the initial five. People will go through it pretty quickly.

Spoiler: attributes and skills (click to show/hide)

Power Level:
Not all magical girls are created equal. After you sign up, your power level will be rolled on 2d6. Powerful magical girls start strong, grow quickly, and have access to some special abilities. Weaker girls have attribute penalties, grow more slowly, and fall into despair more easily. Life's tough! The power level chart is in the "starting and leveling" spoiler.

Attributes:

• Soul Points (SP) - These represent how full your Soul Gem is. Attacking, casting spells, taking damage, and experiencing grief all reduce SP. When it hits 0, you have little time left to live before you become a witch. SP is only restored through using a witch's grief seed.
• Strength (STR) - Determines how hard you hit. Your Magic Weapon will deal damage on a dice equal in size to your strength.
• Dexterity (DEX) - Determines your accuracy. Your accuracy roll in combat will be equal in size to your dexterity.
• Agility (AGI) - Determines your evasiveness. Your dodge roll in combat will be equal in size to your agility.
• Intelligence (INT) - Allows you to perform special attacks and magic attacks more reliably.
• Willpower (WIL) - Your emotional resilience. Willpower lets you resist psychological attacks and the stresses of being a magical girl.
• Charisma (CHA) - A magical girl with high charisma is a good friend and leader and can handle bystanders more easily.

Spoiler: starting and leveling (click to show/hide)

As a magical girl with a fresh contract, you will start out at level 1. She has 40 Soul Points and 4 points in each attribute, in addition to 6 attribute points to spend as she pleases. She also starts out with two free spells. Each level she gains 3 maximum Soul Points, every odd level she gains a free spell, and every even level she gains 1 attribute point. At every 10th level her wish ability grows more powerful.

Attribute points can be spent to raise any attribute by 1, but cannot be spent while in a witch's barrier. Free spells can be used to learn new special/magic attacks. To see how they're learned, look in the "Special Attacks, Magic Attacks, and Abilities" spoiler.

Leveling up requires experience, which is gained primarily through fighting minions, familiars, and witches. 15 experience is required to reach level 2, and the requirement is increased by 3 exp every level. So it takes 18 more to get to level 3, 21 to get to level 4, and so on. Power levels modify this - for instance, a power level 9 magical girl takes 1 less experience to level up, requiring 14 for level 2, 17 for level 3, 13 for level 4, and so on. Whenever experience is earned, all girls present recieve the same amount.

Power Level Chart
2: -1 to three random attributes, -2 WIL, -10 max SP, +4 exp required for each level, two random curse abilities
3: -1 to two random attributes, -2 WIL, -8 max SP, +3 exp required for each level, one random curse abilities
4: -1 to two random attributes, -1 WIL, -6 max SP, +2 exp required for each level
5: -1 to a random attribute, -1 WIL, -4 max SP, +1 exp required for each level
6: -1 to a random attribute, -2 max SP
7: No change from default
8: +1 attribute point at start, +3 max SP
9: +2 attribute points at start, +6 max SP, -1 exp required for each level
10: +3 attribute points at start, +9 max SP, -2 exp required for each level
11: +4 attribute points at start, +12 max SP, -3 exp required for each level, one boon ability of choice
12: +5 attribute points at start, +15 max SP, -4 exp required for each level, two boon abilities of choice

Curses and boons are in the "Ability List" spoiler.

Spoiler: Special Attacks, Magic Attacks, and Abilities (click to show/hide)

Special attacks are modifications to your normal attack that cost extra SP. They can either be little effects (a charging slash with a sword instead of a regular slash) or they can be huge (Tiro Finale). Magic attacks are significantly modified attacks that might have nothing to do with your normal attack, such as Mami's binding ribbons or Kyoko's spear wall. Magic attacks use intelligence for accuracy instead of dexterity. Abilities are either constant or are triggered by certain events.

Special and magic attacks are not set in stone - they're learned through combat. If a girl has a free spell, she may attempt to use a new ability (described to the GM, such as "I want to restrict her but not deal damage" or "I want to summon weapons to attack every enemy in the room," etc). This can be dangerous, as the power level of the ability will be unknown until it's used. If she succeeds, she'll learn the spell permanently.

To cast a Special or Magic Attack, pay an amount of SP equal to the spell's power level, then roll magic dice equal to your intelligence minus the power level. If that roll is successful, roll accuracy with a bonus to the result that's equal to the power level. For instance, casting a PL 3 spell with 9 INT and 4 DEX costs 3 SP and rolls a d6. If that roll is successful, roll accuracy with +3 bonus to the result.

Abilities are rarer. Each girl gets one ability depending on her wish that grows more powerful at every 10th level. Other abilities can be acquired by having certain power levels, or through unique circumstances.

Spoiler: Ability List (click to show/hide)

Boons
Determined: Choose WIS, WIL, or CHA. You gain a 25% bonus to that stat when under 25% SP.
Grateful: Whenever your party defeats a witch, roll 1d3. You and each ally gain that much SP.
Savior: If an ally reaches 0 SP, you may roll charisma to console them and return them to 1 SP on a success. You may only attempt this once per ally.
Slayer: Choose STR, DEX, or INT. Gain +2 to that attribute, as well as an additional +1 every 7 levels. This choice cannot be changed.
Solemn: You only lose 75% of the normal SP for sadness or despair, rounded down.

Curses
Adverse: -25% to all attributes in normal life.
Anxiety: Whenever you fall below 25% max SP, lose one max SP permanently.
Atrophy: -1 to all attributes while crippled. It takes you an additional day for crippled limbs to recover.
Incite: +1 to all attributes of any witch you are fighting.
Obtuse: Whenever you gain an attribute point, randomly choose two attributes. That attribute point cannot be used to raise those attributes.

Well, that was a lot of rules. It took a while to make this stuff up. Feel free to pose rules questions.

Spoiler: signing up (click to show/hide)

Signing Up
I'll be doing initial signups in several waves, choosing by most promising roleplaying characters. Basically I'll tell people what they need to sign up, then pick my favorites out of the partially completed character. Then I roll your power level and tell you to finish your character. Biographies should be extensive.

I'm going to get five characters, but not everyone will be a magical girl at the beginning of the game. The first two will start as magical girls, the second two will be introduced during or around the first encounter, and the last one will be introduced during or around the second encounter. Everyone who's not accepted in one round of signups is allowed to resubmit to later rounds.

The last three do not have to make their contracts immediately. Or, theoretically, ever. Feel free to be a Madoka, but make sure to be extra sad when your friends die because you couldn't help them.

The Original Pair(0/2)
Name:
Age: 14-17 only for these two
Physical Appearance:
Family:
Interests:
Biography up to before contract: One specification here - you two are not friends before you make your contracts. You may know each other if you happen to go to the same school, but you aren't more than acquaintances.

／人◕ ‿‿ ◕人＼

[penguinofhonor]

Players:

• Diane Gounaris (Harry Baldman)
• Gretchen W. Gardener (GreatWyrmGold)
• Willamena Woodson (Wwolin)
• Elizabeth Evans (Flying Dice)
• Alice Irrisor (Empiricist)

Waitlist:

• superBlast
• Corsair
• scapheap
• BlasterKyubey210

Dead:

• None!

Table of Contents:
Pregame RP Round 1: A Little Playing Maybe
Pregame RP Round 2: Background Noise
Pregame RP Round 3: Two More
Pregame RP Round 4: Machinations
Pregame RP Round 5: The Hunt

／人◕ ‿‿ ◕人＼

[Harry Baldman]

Spoiler: Character Sheet - warning, long biography (click to show/hide)

Name: Diane Gounaris

Age: 16

Physical Appearance: a tall girl, about 6' 3'', dressed in baggy, concealing clothing. Has no hair - no eyebrows, no eyelashes, not a single hair on her head. Most of her pronouncedly pentagonal face is in varying shades of pink or light brown, having a leathery texture and sheen. Her features look stretched, warped, even, and her nose seems to be just gone. Her hands, the only other commonly visible part of her body, seem to have the same sort of condition. In addition, her left hand is missing a pinky and ring finger. Her large brown eyes, despite the unusual appearance of the rest of her body, look rather kind, if a bit weary.

Family: father, mother (deceased), younger brother (deceased), older sister (lives on her own).

Interests: movies, their filmmaking aspects, photography to a lesser extent. Also does figure drawing, exhibits some talent at it.

Biography up until contract: Diane was born in a lawyer's family, her father Stavro a somewhat mediocre attorney, her mother Jean the perfect picture of a housewife. She doesn't remember much about her early childhood, and this is probably because they were fairly unremarkable. Somewhere along the way, however, something happened to her mother. Or perhaps it was something that was there all along, Diane isn't sure. She became unstable at around the time when Diane turned 5, only about a year after Diane's little brother Dwight's birth, with occasional psychotic episodes characterized by crying and apologies to her children followed by bouts of violence (always directed at the house, however, never the children). By the time she turned 7, her mother was already heavily medicated, her father having refused to commit her to a mental institution. The next three years were spent. They were not spent happily, nor were they spent particularly miserably. They were just spent. Her father had begun to work from home, keeping a close eye on mother, her older sister Liza had entered her teenage years, which involved her progressively alienating herself from both her parents and, by virtue of proximity, her siblings as well. Eventually she seemed to spend more days away from home than in. Perhaps this was for the best, considering what eventually happened.

The event that was about to come next was one she would remember forever. One Saturday morning, while her father was out shopping along with Diane's older sister, who had been unwillingly dragged along, her mother called her over to Dwight's room. It was odd, she was holding Dwight in her arms, and both of them were all wet. Both were crying, and the smell of gasoline hung thick in the air. It is the smell Diane remembers best. Never before or after did she feel that smell quite as strongly as that day. "Come here, baby," her mother said, and Diane approached. She knew something was wrong, but she approached nonetheless. After the first few steps, her mother grabbed her, holding her close, assuring everything would be okay.

Then she lit herself on fire. The next few minutes, the searing pain and the infinite flames as well as the sight of her mother, Dwight still in her arms, screaming and blindly attempting to grab her daughter's rapidly fleeing form, still haunt her on occasion. She ran until she could run no more, eventually falling over and waiting for the burning to stop. It did after some time. Then it was all just panicked voices, faint crackling and unending pain.

Six years have passed since that day. Her sister took the incident very hard. Her father was completely broken. Diane herself sustained severe burns to most of her body. The next 2 years of her life were spent mostly on two things - surgeries and extended care as her body returned to a more functional state. The next four saw a change of scenery - she went to a brand new home, though now she was alone with her father. Her sister had left for college, so she was mostly alone, though her father devoted as much attention as he could to her. She developed an interest in film and filmmaking, her father sparing no expense to fund her hobby. By the age of 15 she was functioning as a normal human being, though the outward signs of her old experiences were still very much manifest. Despite this, she has insisted she wants to go to public school, the long years of homeschooling and limited human contact having grown tiresome. Though her father resisted the idea, he eventually caved in to her demands, though it was certainly a fierce battle. She had gotten her wish.

Tomorrow is her first day of school. Wonder how she will handle it?

So, how is it? Good enough, or too long, dark and awkward to place in the game?

[AKingsQuest]

Man, I love that show, reserving spot. When will you be picking sheets, because I don't have time to make
one right now. But I will later today.

[Tiruin]

Interested to see how this will end up.

PTW.

[Wwolin]

I'll definitely reserve a spot. I'll type up my sheet later tonight.

Spoiler: Sheet (click to show/hide)

Name: Willamina Woodson
Age: 16
Physical Appearance: A girl with a thin build, roughly 5' 9", wearing a pair of cargo pants and a black T-shirt, along with a grey fleece-lined
coat. Her medium length hair is light brown, with a few grey hairs if you look closely, no doubt brought on by stress. Her brown eyes have an almost
hypnotic quality to them, and she almost always has dark rings around them from lack of sleep. Her skin is currently an almost sickly shade of pale,
but she tans rather than burning, and often comes back from summer vacation looking like some exotic islander.
Family: Mother, younger brother, younger stepbrother, younger stepsister, stepfather
Interests: All varieties of art, but especially interested and talented in music. Also has a love of physics and learning how the world works.
Biography up to before contract: Willamina's life has been somewhat of an adventure, even back to her conception. Her biological father was staggeringly drunk one night, and through several feats of sheer stupidity (perhaps the most famous of which was wrestling a bear), managed to catch the eye of Willamina's mother, a young woman from the city who had never gone to college, for fear that her family wouldn't be able to do without her. Any old fool can guess what happened next, and nine months later, Willamina was born in a hospital owned by the local university. It's a fortunate thing that she was born in a hospital instead of at home like her father wanted, for a slight birth defect caused her esophagus to be attached to her left lung rather than her stomach. The surgical procedure to correct this wasn't anything major, but it left Willamina with weak lungs and a long curved scar across her back, which later became the subject of many locker-room conversations. Upon seeing the hospital bill for this, her father left without ever marrying her mother, leaving Willamina a legal bastard, a fact that she takes a strange sort of pride in.

Growing up was surprisingly easy for Willamina. She was a smart girl, reading chapter books at age four, and her grandmother carried her around and doted on her so frequently that her feet almost never touched the ground. Her father even came back for a time, but only long enough to impregnate her mother with another child, this one a boy. Osmond, as her brother was called, wasn't treated to the same first-baby splendor as Willamina, but he leeched just enough attention away from everyone to make Willamina jealous. The two often fought, and at one point Osmond was hit so hard that it left a permanent scar on the back of his head. But Willamina soon grew fond of her brother, and the two were soon inseparable, always getting into some sort of trouble.

Elementary school for Willamina was dull. She could already read better than some of the teachers, and understood most math problems at a glance. She made a few friends, but wasn't what you would call popular or unpopular. She was just there, more part of the scenery than part of the conversation, always having her nose buried in some scientific book. She was never a fan of fantasy, claiming that if something couldn't happen to you, then it wasn't worth reading about. Near the end of fifth grade, her mother started dating a man named Fred, who also had two kids, a boy and a girl, named Harold and Francisca, both of whom were slightly younger than Osmond. Fred and her mother soon married, and Willimina found that Fred was really more of a zany older brother than a father figure.

Willamina's family moved just before middle school started in order to make room for a larger family, and she left all of her old friends behind. Fortunately, she joined the school's band, and soon found that she was quite talented at the flute. She made several friends within the band, and found that she could keep people entertained for hours on end with stories about her life. Her grades dropped slightly, not because she wasn't smart, but because she couldn't find the time to do homework. She also developed an interest in several anime series around this time, always favoring the stoic wordless characters and prim and proper servants over the chatty protagonists, who she said were too naive to be realistic.

High school was when Willamina's life really began to take off. She started writing music instead of just playing it, and had so many connections throughout the school that there was always room at a table for her during lunch. Some of her closest friends were a pair of ambitious twins named Peter and Maria, and the three of them would always end up planning giant projects, such as starting companies or even buying small countries, which would always get off to a good start until they became boring and were dropped for something new. Despite her sudden success socially, her laziness when it came to school work caught up with her, and she spent a good deal of her time making up excuses for her parents as to why her work wasn't in, one time almost getting a teacher fired. Her test grades were good enough to keep her from failing Freshman and Sophomore years, but now that Junior is beginning, she's worried about how she's going to have to keep her grades up to get into a good college.

[scapheap]

Let do this.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Name:Clair Razor
Age: 14
Physical Appearance:A rather small girl of 4 foot with snow white hair done in pig tails and red eyes. pale skin. Wears black clothes.
Family:Unknown, doorstep baby. Father Dark is the closest to a father figure she has.
Interests:Insects, bread making, running a gang and story writing.
Biography up to before contract: Abandon on the doorstep of the John the baptist' church, Clair was raise by the priest there, father Gregory Dark, and is a quiet girl with a large imagination. At the age of 10, she started a school gang called Black Bible to ruin a bully at the school and discover she liked ruling over people.

Now 14, BB is still going strong, now numbering just shy of a hundred members with Clair at the top and she still hasn't told Father Dark about her hobby and some strange talking cat(the talking part was not strange, this is new york, half the animals have been mutated, evolve or are humans turn into animals) just gave her a contact.

[Flying Dice]

Spoiler: Heeere, Incubator~ (click to show/hide)

Name: Elizabeth Evans
Age: 14
Physical Appearance: Elizabeth stands 4'10", and is rather willowy. Her hair, a dulled cornflower-blue, cascades loosely to just above her shoulder blades. Her face is narrow, with a strong chin and small nose. Elizabeth's skin is so pale as to be nearly translucent; the network of blood vessels in her arms and hands is clearly visible. Her coal-black eyes are close set, with a tendency to sparkle with repressed mirth. She dresses mostly in trousers and t-shirts, with well-worn shoes.
Family: Elizabeth lives with her father, William, and younger sister, Alicia, in a small flat. Her father is a detective, and Alicia is in primary school.
Interests: Literature, botany, swimming.
Biography up to before contract: Elizabeth and her family have lived in New York since before her mother died. Elizabeth spends much of her free time caring for her sister, as the nature of their father's job necessitates large amounts of time away from home while working cases. Because of this, Elizabeth has gradually become something of a shut-in, finding friends in paper and ink. This lead, tangentally, to her interest in botany, which was originally theoretical, but soon grew to encompass a number of window boxes, and, recently, a small grow-tray and light in her closet.

She would perhaps be a good student if she payed attention, but the best that could be said about Elizabeth is that she does well on something she has already investigated on her own. On a trip to visit distant relatives in Washington state, Elizabeth found that she quite adored the water, though she has few chances to swim in New York.

At the start of this unfortunate chain of events, Elizabeth is a girl who, while somewhat alone, has distracted herself sufficiently to be content with that loneliness. She lives her life day by day, trying to keep her mind on what she loves, rather than what she does not have.

--
If helpful:

Level 1
   Soul Points (SP) - 40
    Strength (STR) - 4
    Dexterity (DEX) - 5
    Agility (AGI) - 5
    Intelligence (INT) - 6
    Willpower (WIL) - 5
    Charisma (CHA) - 4
Free Spells - 2

[superBlast]

((Well... never seen the anime (except EP 1 but not too interested in it.)... though have read plenty of doujin about it lol.))

Name: Gale Flagg
Age: 17
Physical Appearance: As loli as loli can be (except the age part). Long white hair, Orange eyes, nothing else of particular interest.
Family: Grandparents(mother's side)(in the apartment next door), mother(Nurse), father (he's dead though), older brother (lives on his own but nearby, visits the family every once in a while. Goes to college).
Interests: Video games, and martial arts.
Biography up to before contract: Gale is a pretty hardcore gamer that plays all sorts of games and is quite good at most of them. She also practices martial arts at the karate dojo that a few blocks from where she lives. At school she's quite well known... mainly since she is the only student that doesn't even look like a high schooler. Though other then that she only has one close friend that goes to the same karate dojo together. They don't have too many common interests but they enjoy hanging out together. Though her friend just finds Gale extremely cute due to her loli look. Gale just recently gained her black belt and her friend is a green belt. Gale's current favorite game is Metal Gears of Solid 2.

((If you want me to give more names or slight changes I can ahead and make them real quick. Kinda suck with names though.))

[GreatWyrmGold]

Hm...this sounds vaguely interesting. However, all I know about magical girls comes from TV Tropes.

...Screw it, character sheet coming up.

[superBlast]

((Question, can I be a Male magical girl like that zombie guy from Kore wa Zombie desu ka? I know completely different anime but I just find it hilarious he's a guy... but is also a magical girl.))

[Flying Dice]

((Question, can I be a Male magical girl like that zombie guy from Kore wa Zombie desu ka? I know completely different anime but I just find it hilarious he's a guy... but is also a magical girl.))

((My guess would be no, seeing as how the all-female thing is one of the more distinctive elements of the Madoka system. It also brings back scarring memories of a certain steampunk magical girl RTD. Hilarious, but scarring.))

[superBlast]

((What there's some good canon reason all the main characters from the show are girls other then adding in as much potential fan service as possible?))

[GreatWyrmGold]

Male magical girl

Um...oxymoron much?

like that zombie guy

It strikes me that that doesn't seem much like a serious magical girl guy former person.

-----

Due to my lack of experience with magical girls, I used a little help to generate my general concept. And boy, is it...interesting.

Name: Gretchen W. Gardener (hey, it's a nice acronym!)
Age: 15
Appearance: Gretchen has large, red eyes which draw most peoples' attention. Her dark black hair would be thick and wavy if she didn't cut it so short; it's maybe a centimeter, tops, possibly half that. She is pretty thin, especially at the waist. Gretchen wears blacks and blues, often both colors at once, as well as several bracelets (not all at once, but usually not only one or two at once either).
Family: Includes Mother, Father, Elder Brother, Younger Sister, Maternal Grandmother
Interests: Science Fiction, Entomology, Thrills, Literature
Personality: Secretive and tricky. Typically more likely to hide her strengths than show them off. Obfusticates clumsiness when not around anything important. Despite this, pretty kind.
Bio: Gretchen was born to a fairly well-off family. She always had too much free time, a lot of which was spent with her older brother. Dan wasn't a good influence. While Gretchen never got into the kind of trouble her brother did, she does enjoy causing mischief. Despite this, Gretchen is a kind girl when people or certain kinds of animals get involved, and she's a good student; these are due to the more gentle influence of her father, a Christian who tries to raise his children to be moral.
What's supposed to be here, anyways?

[Flying Dice]

((What there's some good canon reason all the main characters from the show are girls other then adding in as much potential fan service as possible?))

((Um. Not to be rude, but Madoka wasn't exactly a fanservice-oriented show. It was, however, about the greatest drink ever made. Though if your only exposure has been through doujins...))