Getting "modern Anime Kids" to go for an RPG - How To?

[GrayDeath]

I know, the title is a bit clickbaity, but I could not put it in less words and get the meaning across.

Via my (almost 10 yars) younger brother, I have ben approached about getting a few of his colleagues/younger friends into our hobby ... via an existing Game, and ideally one thats easy to understand and play for "low attention span Kiddies (TM) (his words, nbot mine^^).

Now the only things meentioned was that the 3 people in question would like to try D&D (cause their aprents played it in one case, and cause they heard it somewhere in the other)ish, and that they intend to play something along the Lines of Bleach.

I am not yet sure if I will be doing the corupting of our youth, or only aiding (^^), but for now what I have on 3.5 stuff for bleacha reads:

Magical, Multi-Shape Swords they can summon/etc, and that do weird stuff
numberwise strictly limited Spells
very hard to hurt unless you can hurt ghosts, and even then seem to ahve DR rising with power
Mobile to very mobile
Seem to not know a lot outside that (low skillpts)

For me, that screams "Warlock with the Monks Movement and 1 or 2 Movement Invoications, only able to use eldritch power with the sword, evocations otherwise as spells, replace elemental resistance with some kind of incorporality or blink effectg, maybe add in the Kensais "Sword Improvement" if it can be adapted well.

Anyone have other suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

[ChaosStar]

Tome of Battle. Tome of Battle is the best for trying to fit Anime in to 3.5. Otherwise try to find a d20 system online for the show.

[Firebug]

Pathfinder Kineticist (https://aonprd.com/ClassDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Kineticist) gets most of what you want. It tends to do well mimicking 'super-hero' types. Specifically, the energy projection ones.

"Magical, Multi-Shape Swords they can summon/etc, and that do weird stuff" Is basically Blast with Kinetic Blade, probably why you were thinking warlock in the first place
"numberwise strictly limited Spells" Utility Wild Talents
"very hard to hurt unless you can hurt ghosts, and even then seem to ahve DR rising with power" Maybe not the ghost thing, but Earth Defense is basically this, increasing DR/Adamantine
"Mobile to very mobile" Various ways to fly, burrow, teleport, etc depending on element choice
"Seem to not know a lot outside that (low skillpts)" 4+Int, can get bonuses on specific skills depending on element choice

Vigilante (https://aonprd.com/ClassDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Vigilante)s could fit in pretty well, making up the 'masked crusader' type heroes. Some of the archetypes branch that out a bit. Agathiel (https://aonprd.com/ArchetypeDisplay.aspx?FixedName=Vigilante%20Agathi el) for pretending to be an animal/familiar, Magical Child (https://aonprd.com/ArchetypeDisplay.aspx?FixedName=Vigilante%20Magica l%20Child) for the little girl with a strong companion, or Wildsoul (https://aonprd.com/ArchetypeDisplay.aspx?FixedName=Vigilante%20Wildso ul) for Spiderman/Falcon/Werewolf. Not saying all of these are powerful, but could fit.

[Kayblis]

Seconding Tome of Battle. The maneuver system is hands down the best way to simulate anime fights without going diving for obscure sources for each ability. If you start off everyone with premade characters and let them refluff them as anime characters, even better.

Do note that animes like Bleach focus a lot on weapon powers and nothing else, so don't expect them to want any magic items except shinier magic swords. Maybe add a weapon progression to all characters, from one of the many sources we already have: Kensai's Sword Improvement, Samurai's Ancestral Daisho, the Ancestral Relic feat, or the Weapons of Legacy book(without the suck).

[AvatarVecna]

Tome Of Battle, Path Of War, Spheres Of Power/Might.

[Crake]

In all honesty, I'd say you'd be better off just using a different system.

[JNAProductions]

In all honesty, I'd say you'd be better off just using a different system.

Probably.

3.5 is a very fun system... When you know it really well. For getting into RPGs in general? I'd probably stick away from it.

[Rynjin]

Do note that animes like Bleach focus a lot on weapon powers and nothing else, so don't expect them to want any magic items except shinier magic swords. Maybe add a weapon progression to all characters, from one of the many sources we already have: Kensai's Sword Improvement, Samurai's Ancestral Daisho, the Ancestral Relic feat, or the Weapons of Legacy book(without the suck).

To elaborate, the swords in Bleach are living, thinking creatures that are inextricably tied to the wielder's soul, and in many cases act as sort of a spirit guide for them (though some are fickle, or just kinda *****; they have the full range of human personality).

So they're really not going to want to upgrade their weapons to new ones or anything.

The closest thing I know of is Pathfinder's Bladebound Magus (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/magus/archetypes/paizo-magus-archetypes/bladebound), or perhaps a Soulknife you fluff as having an intelligent Soul Blade.

Perhaps having it be a limited gestalt game would work; everyone is a Bladebound Magus (which works perfectly, as Soul Reapers are inherently Gish characters anyway), plus another class of their choice.

[Crake]

Probably.

3.5 is a very fun system... When you know it really well. For getting into RPGs in general? I'd probably stick away from it.

Yeah, and it has a rather rigid structure to adhere to, and very clear brackets of power. If you want to stick to one particular bracket, you get an issue where there's no real room for progression, and characters become static. Of course, typical shonen anime go from zero to god-slaying-hero anyway, so that part might not be an issue for this particular case.

[noob]

I know, the title is a bit clickbaity, but I could not put it in less words and get the meaning across.

Via my (almost 10 yars) younger brother, I have ben approached about getting a few of his colleagues/younger friends into our hobby ... via an existing Game, and ideally one thats easy to understand and play for "low attention span Kiddies (TM) (his words, nbot mine^^).

Now the only things meentioned was that the 3 people in question would like to try D&D (cause their aprents played it in one case, and cause they heard it somewhere in the other)ish, and that they intend to play something along the Lines of Bleach.

I am not yet sure if I will be doing the corupting of our youth, or only aiding (^^), but for now what I have on 3.5 stuff for bleacha reads:

Magical, Multi-Shape Swords they can summon/etc, and that do weird stuff
numberwise strictly limited Spells
very hard to hurt unless you can hurt ghosts, and even then seem to ahve DR rising with power
Mobile to very mobile
Seem to not know a lot outside that (low skillpts)

For me, that screams "Warlock with the Monks Movement and 1 or 2 Movement Invoications, only able to use eldritch power with the sword, evocations otherwise as spells, replace elemental resistance with some kind of incorporality or blink effectg, maybe add in the Kensais "Sword Improvement" if it can be adapted well.

Anyone have other suggestions?

Thanks in advance!
Mutants and masterminds would probably work better to fit bleach but it is out of the possibilities if they want dnd specifically.
Some shinighamis are knowledgable and know literally hundreds of spells (since they number their spells but in practice they throw like a dozen of different spells) so they could be casters and since they rarely cast the same spell 2 times in a fight they could be vancian casters.
Personally I think the basic abilities of shinighamis are the following things: teleport around and attack in melee (often right after a teleport suggesting they are Telflammar Shadowlords) then there is sword specific abilities that could probably be represented with custom legacy items(add in that gem of least recall and have the item be intelligent and the whole "becomes a bankai" is just the legacy item improving).
Shinighamis do not like blasting at range a lot so it could be represented by giving some blast abilities available up to 4 times a day on their legacy items.
You could use that template for symbiotic creatures (that makes you symbiont with a creature that have a type from a specific list but you just have to make them be symbiont with a sword) to have them at once the "shinighami" progression and the "sword powers" progression and extreme toughness.
It is only LA+1 and grants you all the abilities of the two creatures.

Here is an example shinighami:
Branch Shinighami: an human with class picks that grants them a lot of extra teleportation(like a 2 dip in totemist or the right amount in warlock to get dimension door as a spell like) and probably a 1 or 2 fighter level dip(due to all the feats needed for Telflamar shadowlord) then a 4 level dip in Telflamar shadowlord: it can be all complete by level 11.
Branch Sword: intelligent magical item that takes class levels to gain the ability fitting to the sword and then gets a type changing template to be a valid target for the symbiotic creature template that or get the effect of a spell that grants them a type compatible with the template temporarily(there is one at low level).
The fact you are symbiote with a sword will grant you hardness, the magical abilities corresponding to the sword and the class abilities to imitate having abilities granted by the sword.
Since the sword is an item of legacy for you then it means that you can boost the sword magical abilities for example to boost its hardness or grant it defensive abilities, the ability to cast spell X you did not fit in the sword build and so on.

My solution is so high in cheese that they might give up on understanding but it is 100% legit dnd builds.(the only flaw is that you do not actually hit people with your sword unless you make the sword be an animated magical item too at which point they can use the symbiote attack but it is a really bad option because you do not get iterative attacks)

[Grandmoose91]

What about an item familiar? Scales with them and is tied pretty tightly to the character and you can make it a sword.

[Gruftzwerg]

....

For me, that screams "Warlock with the Monks Movement and 1 or 2 Movement Invoications, only able to use eldritch power with the sword, evocations otherwise as spells, replace elemental resistance with some kind of incorporality or blink effectg, maybe add in the Kensais "Sword Improvement" if it can be adapted well.

Anyone have other suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

Warlock + UMD Monk's Belt
UMD roll = take 10 - 20(umd penalty) + ranks & CHA + items
at lvl 4 when you get to take 10 with UMD (Deceive Item) you should have 7 ranks +4 from CHA you count as 1st lvl monk for activating the item. This results that you now count as 6th lvl monk instead of the normal 5lvl progress you would get. With this trick you can easily get the unarmed strike of a 20th lvl monk without a single class that progresses the ability.
Alternatively you can do this also with the Monk's Tattoo, which only gives you +4 additional levels of progress. But in exchange also progresses monks movement speed which can be reason to pick it despite it's high gold price.

Further I would consider to pick Eldritch Glaive and refluff its visuals to your needs. It is summoned and a much better choice the Hideous Blow shape to charge your weapon (AoO for the enemy and only 1 attack per round - Eldritch Glaive doesn't have this limitations).

PS: I'm not into Bleach

[Demidos]

I'd go with your original suggestion of Warlocks, with intelligent item familiars (roleplayed by the characters themselves). Warlocks are relatively straightforward, have no limited uses of spells per day, and are flexible enough to fit a large number of builds.

I'd do a session 0 where you set out expectations, and work out each item familiar with the individual player, where they explain what they want and you can build it for them mechanically -- don't make them go through that hassle it's not worth it. I'd start the characters at level 3, to increase survivability against random crits and to allow them to differentiate their characters from the start. I might also consider something along the lines of action points / fate points to allow them to reroll certain rolls at a critical dramatic moment.

It might also make sense to do a single session where they are just becoming shinigami and they're learning the very basic abilities in the academy, so you can teach them about skill checks and attack rolls before they gain their warlock invocations and zanpakuto (spirit sword).

My biggest point would be KEEP IT SIMPLE. DND is an incredibly complex game, and 3.5 might be the most rule-heavy game in existence. These kids are "short attention span" -- They don't care if you came up with this crazy questionable RAW way to give them +3 stats, they just want to play, so don't lose them with the minutiae, keep it simple and you can always expand out from there.

[vasilidor]

your looking at the wrong system: see Big Eyes Small Mouth. or something like spheres of power if you are sticking with d20.

[Gruftzwerg]

I could also offer a Dragon Ball Super Saiyajin themed clawlock build (see signature). Dunno if that is a thing for them?
You don't need to copy the entire build to get the feeling. A base build can be broken down to 9-12 lvls to catch most of the feeling.

[Vizzerdrix]

I hear BESM is an anime focused ttrpg that is light.

[noob]

I hear BESM is an anime focused ttrpg that is light.

The starting point is that the kids asked for dnd.
Else they would not need help to make bleach themed builds because many other systems make such thing way easier(for example any PB system: just buy the abilities you need instead of trying to figure out how to put together classes that simulates the wanted powers).

[PhantasyPen]

I know some guys that actually make a homebrew d20 system based on BLEACH and 3.5e, if you want I can link you to their free (not pirated) stuff in PMs.

[Jack_Simth]

3.5 might be the most rule-heavy game in existence.It might be, if FATAL did not exist. Then again, I'm not sure if anyone actually plays it, so it might not....

[Zaq]

Remember that a lot of what you want is description.

Like, all the PCs have this "very hard to hurt unless you can hurt ghosts" thing, right? Okay, cool. That doesn't mean they all need big piles of DR. It means that most common folks in the world don't have HP. Your average Joe doesn't measure how much damage they take from a true attempt to kill them. They simply die if the sword blow lands or if they don't hit the dirt in time to get out of the way of the lightning bolt. Having HP means that you've got your anime toughness. Bam. No need to start using awkward and expensive mechanics when you can simply adjust your understanding and your expectations about the baseline.

(Why do bad guys have HP too? Well duh, they're also anime tough, even if it might be for different reasons. Great heroes need great challenges! But you can also mix in a few baddies who use 4e's "minion" style of having a single HP, since contrast makes PCs feel cool.)

[Trafalgar]

I know, the title is a bit clickbaity, but I could not put it in less words and get the meaning across.


Darn. I was hoping for a rant by some Gygaxian Senior Citizen complaining about how much every edition since OD&D sucks and how modern kids want D&D to be a video game with unlimited replays. Something like:


Back in BECMI, players RESPECTED AND FEARED their DM. Now, whenever I make a ruling, the players are immediately on their phones checking Sage Advice to see what Jeremy Crawford tweeted about it. Jeremy Crawford wasn't even born when I started playing! I don't respect anyone's opinion unless they can remember having to color in their dice numbers with a green crayon.

Back in the day, Players didn't go on a message board writing "boohoohoo, I need a Ring of Spell Storing for my build and my DM won't give it to me." Stuff like that would result in a Dragon being dropped on your player's head! In the 80s, if your DM gave your 10th level character a Dagger +1, you said "Thank You Sir!" and brought him a donut or some cookies to show how grateful you are. Now, if there isn't a Magic Item shop in every village, players call you a dinosaur and leave your table.

For me, that's entertainment!

[Aniikinis]

Your best bet to mimic Bleach would be either Dungeons the Dragoning due to the over the top nature and systems that reward stunting and dumb ideas or Mutants and Masterminds due to the vast array of characters that can be built and fairly robust, not-too-crunchy systems

[Quertus]

I'll second (third?) M&M, but… if they really want D&D, I'll suggest you build characters and/or "archetypes" for them ahead of time.

Figure out how you're going to replicate all of the signature moves / items.

Then let them pick and choose, like… "I liked the ice guy, but i want him with Flash Step / ice shards that mimic "Scatter" / … " … OK, I've about exhausted my knowledge of bleach :smalltongue:

-- OR --

Force them to go in blind, not knowing what the advancement looks like on any given "Weapon of Legacy" style sword (make them your own, not from the show). That will work better if you're confident about the feel of the "don't wield swords" characters / want to recreate the"mystery" of the swords, etc

[Dragonexx]

THere is a homebrew bleachd20

https://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Bleach_D20_(3.5e_Sourcebook)

[Clistenes]

Are you sure they aren't familiar with D&D already? Like 60 % of all manga being produced now is inspired on Sword and Sorcery type fantasy, D&D or JRPGs, and many of those are later made into animes...

Record of Lodoss War, Slayers, Rise of the Shield Hero, Re:Zero, Overlord, Maoyū Maō Yūsha, The Seven Deadly Sins, Berserk...etc., all take inspiration on Sword and Sorcery type western fantasy, and the "isekai" animes like Overlord even use classes, skills, xp...etc.

[noob]

THere is a homebrew bleachd20

https://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Bleach_D20_(3.5e_Sourcebook)

I did skim a little and noticed it represented bleach quite poorly because it tried to be more balanced than regular dnd(very ironical)

[nijineko]

I suggest that you use psionics to emulate the powers of Bleach, both of weapons and the shinigami. Probably the psion list for the most part. The Incarnate prestige would work to emulate shinigami who are usually incorporeal.

You'll want to make your swords intelligent weapons. This will make the swords creatures of the construct type. (DMG)

Since they have an INT of 3 or above, the swords can take levels as well as advance by hit dice, thus gaining skills and feats and levels. I suggest that levels be picked that can directly apply their abilities to become cooler sword powers. (Monster Manual 1)

I suggest that all the players get at least a few levels of the official 3.5 prestige class version of the Soulknife so that they can summon their sword. (Athas.org Prestige Class Appendix Vol.1, WotC says all pdf books here are official 3.5 co-owned material, thus first party)

Then if you make all the swords like the legacy weapon Mau-Jehe, except customize each one for the different players, the physical sword becomes part of them via their mind blade. (Weapons of Legacy)

You might also want to look at the Legendary Weapons and Scions prestige classes too for a similar but simpler method to have weapons progress with players than is presented in Weapons if Legacy. (Unearthed Arcana or SRD)

To represent the extreme power levels, you might want to allow the players to use the gestalt rules. Maybe the swords too.... (Unearthed Arcana or SRD)

If you are going to have players who want to play a Ritter, then consider psychic warrior and Soulbow prestige class. Maybe Illumine Soul as well. Make sure to make the Energy Conversion power mandatory for Ritters to represent their energy gathering ability.

Other psionic classes and prestige as well as Tome of Battle can emulate Ichigo's other human friends who gained powers, should anyone want to go that route.

That one arc that had the item based humans could use the Item Familiars rules, as appropriate. Might work for some shinigami blades too, actually. (Unearthed Arcana or SRD)

Hollows and other types can be pulled off with a mix of psionics and spells. Probably will need some grafts, drift abilities, mutations, or Lifeshaping to pull off the more extreme versions. (Various source books)

So it can be done, but a high level of system mastery and wide knowledge of all the sources in D&D would be a great aid.

Find some sort of master list of psionic powers if you can, there's around 880 powers in the entire game.

[GrayDeath]

See, this is why I LOVE this forum.

One relatively narrow aim, 5+ different valid suggestions.

Thank you all, and dont feel slighted if I didnt quote you, that just means I dont need to clarify/didnt find it really funny ^^




The starting point is that the kids asked for dnd.
Else they would not need help to make bleach themed builds because many other systems make such thing way easier(for example any PB system: just buy the abilities you need instead of trying to figure out how to put together classes that simulates the wanted powers).

That.

I am developer of one and codeveloper of 2 more systems. All but one of them, which incidentally aims to best reperesent normal to about triple normal abilities/Skills best and sucks at high Power (^^), could do it easier than 3.5.

However, 2 of them specifically asked for D&D, and when I do D&D at all, I do 3.X


Remember that a lot of what you want is description.

Like, all the PCs have this "very hard to hurt unless you can hurt ghosts" thing, right? Okay, cool. That doesn't mean they all need big piles of DR. It means that most common folks in the world don't have HP. Your average Joe doesn't measure how much damage they take from a true attempt to kill them. They simply die if the sword blow lands or if they don't hit the dirt in time to get out of the way of the lightning bolt. Having HP means that you've got your anime toughness. Bam. No need to start using awkward and expensive mechanics when you can simply adjust your understanding and your expectations about the baseline.

(Why do bad guys have HP too? Well duh, they're also anime tough, even if it might be for different reasons. Great heroes need great challenges! But you can also mix in a few baddies who use 4e's "minion" style of having a single HP, since contrast makes PCs feel cool.)

Excellent!

Regular D&D doesnt do mooks as clearly as anime, I will include this, probably gonna steal from exalted.
Extras with 1 HP, then con*HP dying (to avoid instakills they dont want)
Regular Guys with 2 HD and the usual dying hp.
THe REAL People with levels andall the cool ****.


THere is a homebrew bleachd20

https://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Bleach_D20_(3.5e_Sourcebook)

I did skim a little and noticed it represented bleach quite poorly because it tried to be more balanced than regular dnd(very ironical)

He said it.

I gogoled first, of course, and for a few minutes was incandescently happy about the bygone D20 era of "do everything in it"....until I realized that pre Level 15+ a Shinigami is about on par with a well built Kensai with a weak Legacy Weapon.
Ugh, for once, couldnt they go ANIME and no regrets!


Are you sure they aren't familiar with D&D already? Like 60 % of all manga being produced now is inspired on Sword and Sorcery type fantasy, D&D or JRPGs, and many of those are later made into animes...

Record of Lodoss War, Slayers, Rise of the Shield Hero, Re:Zero, Overlord, Maoyū Maō Yūsha, The Seven Deadly Sins, Berserk...etc., all take inspiration on Sword and Sorcery type western fantasy, and the "isekai" animes like Overlord even use classes, skills, xp...etc.

Sure they ahve heard and/or watcherd something that is quite classic D&D somewhere.
Probably at elast some of the reason the one without, ahem, congenital D&Ditis^^, asked for it.

They ahvent played any non Computer RPGs before though.



Tosum it up, for now my go to is this:

"Race": Shinigame. giving them boosts to all physical stats (+2+1 per 3 HD we think, that part is still betaish) and either Wis or Cha, as well as 2+3* Level difference DR vs any non Shinigami/Hollows and 50% Miss chance against non Hollow/Zanpakuto Weaponry.
As they all got it, no LA.

Warlock-alike class, that grants a proceeding Eldritch Blade Ability instead of Eldritch Blast, with a very small number of SSLA`s each doable 1+1/5th Level per day to account for Kido, and counting half their Levels as MOnk for Movmeent and Defense.

Must choose a focus on levels 1, 4, 7 and 10 (on either maximizing their melee stuff (direct BAB and Damage Bonuses), their Spells/Invocations, their Movement (this is where you gain Flash Step/Shadowpounce usable 2*focuesd times per combat), or their Defenses (thinking about asdding +2 DR/- and AC per choice)), and will give all of them Initiating with some smaller modifications.
I do not expect us to go past Level 10ish, because see below.

Topping that off with an item Familiar Blade, and we should be good. After all, they unlike with any other D&Dish game, dont need many other Magic Items, rather a superuberpowerful weapon and some lesser magic wiill do.

They want to start out "Seated but not leutenants", for the Bleach Afficionados.

My take on that is "Level 6 or 7", hence I will make a big Sesssion 0 with combined building of the characters and their Backgrounds, basic explanations, and half a dozen exercise fights (the poor D&D Heir will salivate if I guess correctly^^).


>By no means stop, anything else new WILL be read and though about.
I ahve at elast another full week until we get our "Christmas time Corona Measurements relaease" until we can play anyway.

[noob]

2dr/- is not very useful: against power attack equivalents it is roughly equivalent to increasing AC by 1 and it only reduces the damage by 10% against a 20 dmg hit.(also dr does not applies to spells for some reason but that can be changed)
I can understand not desiring to give a lot of damage reduction that stacks.
Maybe do not make it stack but instead when you pick it once it grows with level spontaneously.
Or maybe make it be high dr but against people weaker than you (was roughly the concept of dr/+x in 3.0) so that they can feel it be useful when it comes up?

[GrayDeath]

Oh sorry, forgot to add the general "Shinigami Race" mods. See the above post.

My bad.

Thats why the ability allows stacking but is relatively low (Kenpachi for example would go 1 Combat and 3 Defense, but hes quite a few levels higher so ^^)-

[noob]

Oh sorry, forgot to add the general "Shinigami Race" mods. See the above post.

My bad.

Thats why the ability allows stacking but is relatively low (Kenpachi for example would go 1 Combat and 3 Defense, but hes quite a few levels higher so ^^)-

So for example a quinchy would have an hard time hurting a shinighami because their style is shooting a thousand of arrows?(like a very optimised dnd archer).
That matches the original material surprisingly well.

[GrayDeath]

That was the Idea, yes.

Since noone is going to paly a Quincy I am more or less going by ear with them.

A cufficiently High leveled Quincy can still wreck them, so it should fit well enough.

[noob]

I found out one important thing to take in account: you should make that particularly solid hits should propel the opponent backwards and destroy massive amounts of environment to match the anime and because massive environmental destruction is cool.
Like for example you hit with a critical strike and successfully deal 60 damage at that point the opponent instead of making a massive damage save(because it is unfunny to die instantly) they make an "avoid being knocked back in a massively destructive way" reflex save and if they fail(that can be failed intentionally) then they are thrown backwards in a straight line for as many feet as the damage taken or something like that and any obstacle they meet during that trajectory is destroyed with dust clouds if applicable.
In general environment should be as tough as cardboard because it is boring you have unlimited spiritual power then be stuck because the stone wall is too tough.

[ThatMoonGuy]

Modern anime "kid" (got nearly three 10s on my back, but, hey) coming up just to comment that 3.5e does not work AT ALL for anything resembling a battle shonen. The class system is extremely limited and blocks what is one of the big appeals of battle shonen - creative uses of powers (see HxH and JJK for examples). Anime battles are not about throwing the biggest ball of power but about being smart with what you have. Characters will often have one specific ability and then try to figure out how to win battles by understanding what the enemy can do and then applying their own power in creative ways (see the following fight for reference (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnXfqoIlteI))
This is specially the case for more modern series.

I could see something like Spheres of Power working to a certain extent but, again, the class based nature of the system is not a good representation of the more individualistic nature of battle shounen powers and doesn't translate the battles well.

A point-buy based system, like M&M (or even gurps, if you hate yourself enough), would be better at giving the right feeling.

[noob]

Modern anime "kid" (got nearly three 10s on my back, but, hey) coming up just to comment that 3.5e does not work AT ALL for anything resembling a battle shonen. The class system is extremely limited and blocks what is one of the big appeals of battle shonen - creative uses of powers (see HxH and JJK for examples). Anime battles are not about throwing the biggest ball of power but about being smart with what you have. Characters will often have one specific ability and then try to figure out how to win battles by understanding what the enemy can do and then applying their own power in creative ways (see the following fight for reference (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnXfqoIlteI))
This is specially the case for more modern series.

I could see something like Spheres of Power working to a certain extent but, again, the class based nature of the system is not a good representation of the more individualistic nature of battle shounen powers and doesn't translate the battles well.

A point-buy based system, like M&M (or even gurps, if you hate yourself enough), would be better at giving the right feeling.

1: The group specifically asked to play dnd.
2: Bleach is in huge part not about smart power use but about "I go even faster, I hit even hardest" and usually swords have like one special power(like "I slow down my opponent by making him heavier(that was among the most subtlety you got from sword powers)" or "I hit harder and faster(the mc sword)" or "this sword can take any shape including the shape of a nano cloud that melts soul flesh away(was in practice just elongating the sword or instakilling Aizen once and Aizen survived because deus ex hogyoku)") and the person with the most sword special powers got like 3 sword special powers.
Meanwhile I do not remember people ever killing an important opponent with kido so kido does not really count as a used thing(it was more used as a plot tool to immobilise characters and to make walls than for fighting).
So in practice bleach is mostly "I am faster and stronger so I win" or "I am not faster and stronger so I take a beating until I get faster and stronger due to being beaten up" with once every 8 fights an opponent with a more interesting ability or a shinigami with a more interesting ability
3:Spheres of power represents poorly anime except for a select few animes (You might be watching the animes that fits sop but it does not means the other are doing so): you are better off making your own homebrew or use the broken dnd options than just using SOP in the majority of the cases.

But yes using m&m would make things 10 times easier.

[Remuko]

Anime battles are not about throwing the biggest ball of power

tell that to DB(Z), one of the grandaddies of anime battles/shonen.

[vasilidor]

I am thankful that most Shonen anime has moved past the dragon ball level of escalation. please note I said most, not all.

[ThatMoonGuy]

1: The group specifically asked to play dnd.
Meanwhile I do not remember people ever killing an important opponent with kido so kido does not really count as a used thing(it was more used as a plot tool to immobilise characters and to make walls than for fighting).
So in practice bleach is mostly "I am faster and stronger so I win" or "I am not faster and stronger so I take a beating until I get faster and stronger due to being beaten up" with once every 8 fights an opponent with a more interesting ability or a shinigami with a more interesting ability


This is mostly true but the Bahagran fight during Fake Karakura was won specifically with barrier Kido. The Shunsui vs Stark fight was also pretty strategic in nature as it was pretty much a dance around Stark's ability. And then there's the Mayuri fights but those are... special.

But, yeah, Bleach (and DBZ) exists but it is a particularly bad cases and more of an exception than the rule, specially in the context of the last 10 or so years of shonen.

But even within the limited scope of representing Bleach, D&D wouldn't work simply because while the powers are simple, the fights are not so much. D&D is a very immobile system with no depth to its melee combat so there's little to no space for strategizing during a fight, even if that strategy is using one offensive technique or the other. For Bleach that would be specially bad given that Shunpo/Sonido are core parts of its power system.

[Asmotherion]

I know, the title is a bit clickbaity, but I could not put it in less words and get the meaning across.

Via my (almost 10 yars) younger brother, I have ben approached about getting a few of his colleagues/younger friends into our hobby ... via an existing Game, and ideally one thats easy to understand and play for "low attention span Kiddies (TM) (his words, nbot mine^^).

Now the only things meentioned was that the 3 people in question would like to try D&D (cause their aprents played it in one case, and cause they heard it somewhere in the other)ish, and that they intend to play something along the Lines of Bleach.

I am not yet sure if I will be doing the corupting of our youth, or only aiding (^^), but for now what I have on 3.5 stuff for bleacha reads:

Magical, Multi-Shape Swords they can summon/etc, and that do weird stuff
numberwise strictly limited Spells
very hard to hurt unless you can hurt ghosts, and even then seem to ahve DR rising with power
Mobile to very mobile
Seem to not know a lot outside that (low skillpts)

For me, that screams "Warlock with the Monks Movement and 1 or 2 Movement Invoications, only able to use eldritch power with the sword, evocations otherwise as spells, replace elemental resistance with some kind of incorporality or blink effectg, maybe add in the Kensais "Sword Improvement" if it can be adapted well.

Anyone have other suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

Are they looking to play D&D specifically or generally a tabletop game. I would suggest "d20 Classless" as a good system to approach them, as it's core material is indeed focused on the Bleach Anime.

Otherwise, my suggestion would be to ban Full Casters (will help them get into the game) and Give them an option between Warlock, Fighter, Barbarian or Rogue. Those class mechanics are simpler to master, and in my oppinion, the Warlock class is the Closest thing in D&D to an Anime character.

[noob]

This is mostly true but the Bahagran fight during Fake Karakura was won specifically with barrier Kido. The Shunsui vs Stark fight was also pretty strategic in nature as it was pretty much a dance around Stark's ability. And then there's the Mayuri fights but those are... special.

But, yeah, Bleach (and DBZ) exists but it is a particularly bad cases and more of an exception than the rule, specially in the context of the last 10 or so years of shonen.

But even within the limited scope of representing Bleach, D&D wouldn't work simply because while the powers are simple, the fights are not so much. D&D is a very immobile system with no depth to its melee combat so there's little to no space for strategizing during a fight, even if that strategy is using one offensive technique or the other. For Bleach that would be specially bad given that Shunpo/Sonido are core parts of its power system.
Shunpo and the like could just be immediate action teleport(The whole "faster thing" with people using shunpo more in a given time is bad for balance anyway: as you noticed in bleach usually the fastest character wins and in dnd if someone gets more teleport as an immediate action per turn(ex: 3 immediate action teleport per turn) they are incredibly hard to attack in melee for those who have less immediate action teleport).
I am quite sure shunpo would be too powerful in many systems: it is a teleportation that can be done when you are going to be hit or whenever you want.
It would be like getting in m&m teleport then adding the reaction modifier on it.

[ThatMoonGuy]

Shunpo and the like could just be immediate action teleport(The whole "faster thing" with people using shunpo more in a given time is bad for balance anyway: as you noticed in bleach usually the fastest character wins and in dnd if someone gets more teleport as an immediate action per turn(ex: 3 immediate action teleport per turn) they are incredibly hard to attack in melee for those who have less immediate action teleport).
I am quite sure shunpo would be too powerful in many systems: it is a teleportation that can be done when you are going to be hit or whenever you want.
It would be like getting in m&m teleport then adding the reaction modifier on it.

The thing that makes me feel like Sonido/Shunpo is a big challenge is because the combat in Bleach is meant to be highly mobile but the mechanics of D&D go counter to that. The best melee tactic is getting close and clubbing the other party in the face until they die. And its not like you have much in the way of defense against that either, only your AC (which comes more from armor and spells than from skill) and hp. And since hp only goes down through attacking, the best way to fight is to just wait fot he enemy to get close and then spam attack until the other side is down.

Also, shunpo isn't necessarily broken if the system in question was built with active defenses in mind. It just so happens that D&D (and D20 in general) wasn't. Which is another reason why it doesn't make for a good "anime" simulator since if there's one single commonality between battle shounen is that high movement and maneuvering is fundamental.

[noob]

The thing that makes me feel like Sonido/Shunpo is a big challenge is because the combat in Bleach is meant to be highly mobile but the mechanics of D&D go counter to that. The best melee tactic is getting close and clubbing the other party in the face until they die. And its not like you have much in the way of defense against that either, only your AC (which comes more from armor and spells than from skill) and hp. And since hp only goes down through attacking, the best way to fight is to just wait fot he enemy to get close and then spam attack until the other side is down.

Also, shunpo isn't necessarily broken if the system in question was built with active defenses in mind. It just so happens that D&D (and D20 in general) wasn't. Which is another reason why it doesn't make for a good "anime" simulator since if there's one single commonality between battle shounen is that high movement and maneuvering is fundamental.

m&m does not manages well high manoeuvrability either(it grants excessive advantage).
in fact you are arguing toward "yes in shonens manoeuvrability and speed are op and all the characters needs giant megatons of it" but it does not makes it balanced it is just an acknowledgment of how broken it is in shonens (there is like very few fights where there is someone who is a tactician that is 100 times slower than the opponent and wins: those exists but are very rare because usually the tactician is close in speed(factor 10 in speed: the characters might scream "the opponent is 100000000 times faster" but you see on the screen that the opponents takes half as many actions as the tactician in practice(or takes as many if it is a well written tactics shonen) and so is in fact slower or as fast) or even faster and there is like 0 fights where someone significantly slower than their opponents and with no particular tactics can dare to hope winning the fight).
You can make a system that simulates anime manoeuvrability fights but it is highly unbalanced: people would almost always do a character with the varied speed stats at extra high value.

[ThatMoonGuy]

m&m does not manages well high manoeuvrability either(it grants excessive advantage).
in fact you are arguing toward "yes in shonens manoeuvrability and speed are op and all the characters needs giant megatons of it" but it does not makes it balanced it is just an acknowledgment of how broken it is in shonens (there is like very few fights where there is someone who is a tactician that is 100 times slower than the opponent and wins: those exists but are very rare because usually the tactician is close in speed(factor 10 in speed: the characters might scream "the opponent is 100000000 times faster" but you see on the screen that the opponents takes half as many actions as the tactician in practice(or takes as many if it is a well written tactics shonen) and so is in fact slower or as fast) or even faster and there is like 0 fights where someone significantly slower than their opponents and with no particular tactics can dare to hope winning the fight).
You can make a system that simulates anime manoeuvrability fights but it is highly unbalanced: people would almost always do a character with the varied speed stats at extra high value.

I didn't say they need megatons of it, I said maneuverability and movement are prized. The problem in D&D being that it's a system that's not designed to make melee characters move. The best tactic for a a fighter is to get to the enemy face and smack him down. That doesn't need to be the case and you don't need huge amounts of speed for it. Sure, shunpo is a super fast movement but there are other series where there aren't flash steps and the characters still move a lot (see, World Trigger). Even in real life fights there's a lot of repositioning, actually, and in action movies too but in D&D movement is mostly a suboptimal choice. If you want to represent a battle shounen fight, then you want the characters to move around quite a bit.

And even if super speed is a factor, it's not necessarily a winning factor as there are many conditions that would neuter it (limited space, for one) and other equally huge values (like defense) can be a counter. Again, it's all a matter of game design but D&D did not focus on that front.

[noob]

I didn't say they need megatons of it, I said maneuverability and movement are prized. The problem in D&D being that it's a system that's not designed to make melee characters move. The best tactic for a a fighter is to get to the enemy face and smack him down. That doesn't need to be the case and you don't need huge amounts of speed for it. Sure, shunpo is a super fast movement but there are other series where there aren't flash steps and the characters still move a lot (see, World Trigger). Even in real life fights there's a lot of repositioning, actually, and in action movies too but in D&D movement is mostly a suboptimal choice. If you want to represent a battle shounen fight, then you want the characters to move around quite a bit.

And even if super speed is a factor, it's not necessarily a winning factor as there are many conditions that would neuter it (limited space, for one) and other equally huge values (like defense) can be a counter. Again, it's all a matter of game design but D&D did not focus on that front.

We already agreed that dnd was suboptimal for this 3 posts ago so I do not really understand that post.
The reason for dnd use was not "fitting anime" the reason is that they asked for dnd specifically.

[ThatMoonGuy]

We already agreed that dnd was suboptimal for this 3 posts ago so I do not really understand that post.
The reason for dnd use was not "fitting anime" the reason is that they asked for dnd specifically.

The point is more about why it doesn't fit and what would be necessary for a system, or for a modification of D20 if such is the case, to fit in that proposal.

Besides, the players mentioned that they want to play "D&D" but this doesn't necessarily mean they want to play Dungeons and Dragons and may just want to play RPG and are using the two terms interchangeably. Not everyone knows that RPGs exist outside of D&D, after all. At least that's the impression I got, if this question was clarified anywhere and they really want D&D and not RPG in general then I just didn't catch it.

[GrayDeath]

Sorry for the delay in my answers, I was swamped with....just about everything,r eally (except Money and free time^^).


Please stop arguing against using D&D.

I tried, they decided they wanted it, argument done.

In contrast, why not instead use the same amount of energy to tell me how to change aspects of D&D to fit what they want, like noob and others did?

To quote myself:





To sum it up, for now my go to is this:

"Race": Shinigame. giving them boosts to all physical stats (+2+1 per 3 HD we think, that part is still betaish) and either Wis or Cha, as well as 2+3* Level difference DR vs any non Shinigami/Hollows and 50% Miss chance against non Hollow/Zanpakuto Weaponry.
As they all got it, no LA.

Warlock-alike class, that grants a proceeding Eldritch Blade Ability instead of Eldritch Blast, with a very small number of SSLA`s each doable 1+1/5th Level per day to account for Kido, and counting half their Levels as MOnk for Movmeent and Defense.

Must choose a focus on levels 1, 4, 7 and 10 (on either maximizing their melee stuff (direct BAB and Damage Bonuses), their Spells/Invocations, their Movement (this is where you gain Flash Step/Shadowpounce usable 2*focuesd times per combat), or their Defenses (thinking about asdding +2 DR/- and AC per choice)), and will give all of them Initiating with some smaller modifications.
I do not expect us to go past Level 10ish, because see below.

Topping that off with an item Familiar Blade, and we should be good. After all, they unlike with any other D&Dish game, dont need many other Magic Items, rather a superuberpowerful weapon and some lesser magic wiill do.

They want to start out "Seated but not leutenants", for the Bleach Afficionados.

My take on that is "Level 6 or 7", hence I will make a big Sesssion 0 with combined building of the characters and their Backgrounds, basic explanations, and half a dozen exercise fights (the poor D&D Heir will salivate if I guess correctly^^).



Thats what we ahve so far.

Game is going to ahve the session 0 some time around late January if the general situation does not change maybe even alter.

So, I am still VERY much open to hear further detailled Ideas on how to best do what they want while using D&D and Homebrew/Class Mixes.
:)

[noob]

I suggested "replace massive damage death by massive damage long range knockback that destroy the environment"
Then there is the effort that is rather important to make sure each player got a different cool zampacuto primary effect that defines their zampacuto(ex: a zampacuto that reduces people's defence and speed on a hit or miss or a long reach zampacuto(like 30 feet reach) or yet a zampacuto that allows to throw shockwaves for aoe effect on attacks) or a zampacuto that replicates a basic spell that is generically good like duplicating invisibility or duplicating a healing spell.
For the shunpo boosts I do think the shunpo feats on bleach D20 were not a bad idea(although some were underwhelming like only a 10 foot range boost: 30 foot would work better)
I think that you could also add collateral damage rules or just make it happen periodically without specific rules(for example have it happen once per fight or three times a session) ex: when you attack an opponent of a similar strength(ie not a mook) it might cut buildings in the same street or make a crater on an overhead swing.

Also attacks being spontaneously aoe against mooks could make the game match closer the base media.

[GrayDeath]

I suggested "replace massive damage death by massive damage long range knockback that destroy the environment"
Then there is the effort that is rather important to make sure each player got a different cool zampacuto primary effect that defines their zampacuto(ex: a zampacuto that reduces people's defence and speed on a hit or miss or a long reach zampacuto(like 30 feet reach) or yet a zampacuto that allows to throw shockwaves for aoe effect on attacks) or a zampacuto that replicates a basic spell that is generically good like duplicating invisibility or duplicating a healing spell.
For the shunpo boosts I do think the shunpo feats on bleach D20 were not a bad idea(although some were underwhelming like only a 10 foot range boost: 30 foot would work better)
I think that you could also add collateral damage rules or just make it happen periodically without specific rules(for example have it happen once per fight or three times a session) ex: when you attack an opponent of a similar strength(ie not a mook) it might cut buildings in the same street or make a crater on an overhead swing.

Also attacks being spontaneously aoe against mooks could make the game match closer the base media.

I read that, and as I wrote I very much appreciate it.

Thats exactly the things I want.

I already am using a "mooks dont have much HP", but I`ll probably add the ability for ANY Shinigami to to half one attacks Damage in a cone at will.

They have just not been added to the "what I ahve so far" as I ahve not yet decided on the specifics, but rest assured, a "Pushback" effect will be attached to every attack above a certain Damage potential, and only specific aprrying and a save will prevent one from being thrown.

Collateral Damage as well.

For the SHunpo, they are not really high level enough yet.
I will likely add only a monks speed up with a little extra for all levels, and add a Shunpo feat for free (and 2 or 3 more people focussing on it can take) at reaxching close to leutenant (ergo elvel 10ish).

[Elkad]

3.5 might be the most rule-heavy game in existence


It might be, if FATAL did not exist. Then again, I'm not sure if anyone actually plays it, so it might not....

Discounting fluff and sticking to actual rules, Star Fleet Battles is way up there as well.

They give you replacement pages for older books in the newer ones so you can use a 3-ring binder and keep them in a combined functional rulebook. Numbered, Indexed and Cross-referenced.

And unlike F.A.T.A.L., people actually played it instead of looking in horror and running away.

[ThatMoonGuy]

For the SHunpo, they are not really high level enough yet.
I will likely add only a monks speed up with a little extra for all levels, and add a Shunpo feat for free (and 2 or 3 more people focussing on it can take) at reaxching close to leutenant (ergo elvel 10ish).

Removing attacks of opportunity would go some way towards making the system more mobile since players wouldn't be so penalized by moving. Another hack that could help is importing the Three Action Economy from Pathfinder Unchained or changing movemento to work like it does in 5e where you can split movement in two parts - one taken before an attack and another one after it.

Once you do that, if you're using Tome of Battle (or importing Path of War, which you should since it's pretty much Tome of Battle but significantly better) then the final step would be making the battlefield count. Since you mentioned that you're gonna use knoback and environmental damage rules, this is specially important given that the players can use that to 'shape' the battlefield in their favour.

You might still have some trouble depending on the damage-to-hp relation since the more it tends towards damage, the quicker the battles and the more you're pushed towards just spamming attacks.

[Bohandas]

I'd like to point out that D&D's way of handling injury meshes perfectly with anime. Taking blows that are destroying the surrounding landscape with only minor cuts and abrasions, and continuing to fight at full power through all of it until suddenly they're not.I've never watched Bleach but I know that's exactly how it works in Fairy Tail[sic] and Seven Deadly Sins


I suggested "replace massive damage death by massive damage long range knockback that destroy the environment"
Dang, that's a really good idea


I didn't say they need megatons of it, I said maneuverability and movement are prized. The problem in D&D being that it's a system that's not designed to make melee characters move. The best tactic for a a fighter is to get to the enemy face and smack him down. That doesn't need to be the case and you don't need huge amounts of speed for it. Sure, shunpo is a super fast movement but there are other series where there aren't flash steps and the characters still move a lot (see, World Trigger). Even in real life fights there's a lot of repositioning, actually, and in action movies too but in D&D movement is mostly a suboptimal choice. If you want to represent a battle shounen fight, then you want the characters to move around quite a bit.

Ok, so two things come to mind here

1.) The Scout class, which deals extra damage on turns where they move

and/or

2.) A build that optimizes charge attacks

EDIT:
Or you coukd just not use movement related attacks of opportunity. They don't make a whole lot of sense anyway and removing them would make moving around much more viable

[Zerryzerry]

C4, a detonator, a building due to demolition soon and an alibi.

[AnimeTheCat]

oooooooooof...... recreating Bleach in 3.5 is.... unsavory in my opinion. That being said, I find it unsavory because I've tried it with a group of friends and it was more or less "fun", but mostly we were playing a homebrew system that used some core mechanics from 3.5 (much like it seems that you're creating).

From what I did, here's what I recommend to keep it more or less 3.5. Start by allowing them to choose a "profession" or "background". This isn't their class, it just determines which overlay you give their character. I think you would be fine with the professions of Shinigami, Quincy, and Visored (specifically making that separate for a reason). Shinigami will receive a sword or other melee weapon (their Zanpakuto) at level 1 and are always proficient with it, regardless of what class they pick. Visored are the same (but this will get different). Quincy will get a Quincy Focus that allows them to materialize a bow at level 1, and are always proficient with it. In D&D terms, they are all magic items, but don't have the +1 bonus at first level (read below).

Next, don't tie the Zanpakuto (the magical changing swords) to their class. Have the Zanpakuto be something akin to a weapon of legacy (from the 3.5 books Weapons of Legacy). Bind it to them, and don't force them to take any feats to unlock it's powers, tie them to quests or achievements or something. If you're not familiar with Bleach, just roll with the punches that the "kiddies" are throwing and make something that sounds badass and over the top. You're going to have to pick a theme for each individual weapon. Let the weapon grant supernatural abilities on a per encounter basis or use the pathfinder X rounds per day kind of thing. This is all in addition to their class because this is a distinct and separate connectoin/power climb compared to general combat ability or kido (magic in the world of bleach). For visored, have their abilities be distinct and different from the Shinigami's. Include something that directly improves their raw physicial abilities and changes their appearance (gives them a bone mask as is indicative of Hollows). For Quincy, give them extra arrows and such that they can fire with their bow when using things like rapid shot and many shot. Get creative and make things generally improve the "shtick" that the player is going for, and just tie it all to the weapon. Use the weapon as your main way to balance the party because so much in bleach stems from the spiritual connection that the character has to their weapon.

Let them pick whatever classes they want from Psychic Warrior, Psion, Warblade, and Swordsage. Just keep it simple to those. One change you'll probably want to make is to give all of them some kind of bonus to unarmored AC. Maybe make it come from their Zanpakuto, that's ultimately up to you. If they want to run around without armor on, just make sure you're not going to murder them too easily because of their low AC. The Psychic Warrior is a balanced individual that has tried their best to learn a combination of combat effectiveness and kido. A psion is an individual who has almost exclusively focused on Kido. Warblades and Swordsages are just what they are. They have plenty of cool attacks and stuff that should click in to place with a character that has focused primarily on combat.

Healing is going to be an "issue" so just make sure there are NPCs that specialize in it or tie some kind of regenerative ability to someone's Zanpakuto.

That should be a decent starting point. Honestly if you aren't familiar with Bleach yourself, this is probably going to be kinda tough. I have faith in you though.

[Kitsuneymg]

You want spheres of power/might (http://spheresofpower.wikidot.com/). Might paired with the various Strike talents in particular will give a massive Bleach feel. It’s fairly straightforward to build, the broad spheres do what they say on the tin, and you’re playing with attack actions, so the mess of iteratives and full attack vs move and attack aren’t a problem.

I have a game that is at 15th level now when we started, no one had played SoP/SoM before, and 2 players had never played 3.X. They all were able to build characters that do exactly what they wanted in a pretty decent manner simply by picking their themes and taking talents that sounded like what they wanted to do. It’s fairly newb friendly as 3.X goes.

For summoning weapons in particular, the armorist is the class to look at. If you wanted to be super extra, you could give everyone the bound and summoned weapon abilities (like a partial gestalt) and let them play whatever else they wanted.

SoM/SoP can be backported to 3.5 with relatively little issue if that’s a problem for you, but since it’s its own magic and martial system, I don’t see a real point to it.

[SpyOne]

your looking at the wrong system: see Big Eyes Small Mouth. or something like spheres of power if you are sticking with d20.

I was going to suggest BESM d20. :)

[Segev]

The thing that makes me feel like Sonido/Shunpo is a big challenge is because the combat in Bleach is meant to be highly mobile but the mechanics of D&D go counter to that. The best melee tactic is getting close and clubbing the other party in the face until they die. And its not like you have much in the way of defense against that either, only your AC (which comes more from armor and spells than from skill) and hp. And since hp only goes down through attacking, the best way to fight is to just wait fot he enemy to get close and then spam attack until the other side is down.

Also, shunpo isn't necessarily broken if the system in question was built with active defenses in mind. It just so happens that D&D (and D20 in general) wasn't. Which is another reason why it doesn't make for a good "anime" simulator since if there's one single commonality between battle shounen is that high movement and maneuvering is fundamental.

For flash step and similar, I will point you to Pathfinder’s nomad (psion discipline) and its Nomad’s Step. With the Fast Step feat, its a move action at will teleport.

Also, this entire class: https://libraryofmetzofitz.fandom.com/wiki/Voyager

[Calthropstu]

Several anime have d20 source books.
Slayers is a good one to get people into, and is easy to translate to D&D or pathfinder.
Overlord is literally based on 3.5. Many of the spells are even exactly the same.
A fan of One Piece might go for the Paizo PF AP called Skulls and Shackles, where you literally play pirates looking to overthrow and become the Pirate King.
D20 modern can be a good one to play your run of the mill "Imma take over teh skool and be teh STRONGEST EVAH." It can also be a decent super spy game.
Not sure what to do about giant robots, but I'm sure there's one out there.

TONS of D20 systems were made. Finding one for anime shouldn't be too hard.

[Remuko]

Several anime have d20 source books.
Slayers is a good one to get people into, and is easy to translate to D&D or pathfinder.
Overlord is literally based on 3.5. Many of the spells are even exactly the same.
A fan of One Piece might go for the Paizo PF AP called Skulls and Shackles, where you literally play pirates looking to overthrow and become the Pirate King.
D20 modern can be a good one to play your run of the mill "Imma take over teh skool and be teh STRONGEST EVAH." It can also be a decent super spy game.
Not sure what to do about giant robots, but I'm sure there's one out there.

TONS of D20 systems were made. Finding one for anime shouldn't be too hard.

D20 Future has mecha stuff iirc. its a D20 modern expansion content.

[Tiktakkat]

I think that, as many have suggested, Tome of Battle and PF Kineticist cover a lot of what you want.
I would add:
1. Weapons of Legacy - with or without the drawbacks eliminated. That gets you weapons that scale up and do "special" things.
2. The Morphing weapon enhancement can also cover shifting weapons if needed.
3. You can also try Psychic Warriors with the ACF that lets them summon a personal weapon.
And, the biggest:
4. Refluff it! any of the above and just rename and re-effect stuff left, right, back, front, up, down, sideways, and center. Especially since the kids do not know the system. Indeed, combine that with;
5. Do most of the character design for them. This amplifies just giving them standard stuff with new names as they never even see the original names. Ask them for what new stuff they would like to see on the characters, and a general idea of what they want to see the characters ultimately become, but otherwise just do the design work for them and let them play "pre-gens" to make it easier to get into the system without worrying about sufficient optimization and the like.

[GrayDeath]

I am back. Kind of.
Still suffering health problems (just got back from taking another sample of Blood tests, still all negative, sigh...), and since the game WILL happen, just not before march, I ask the follwing:

Look at the "This is what I got" above (a lot of it thanks to Noob!), and if you think you can achieve the same or better fit with LESS, pelase tell me exactly how you would do it.

Otherwise (eergo if noone has new suggestions) I think that might be a doable design, and will add some smaller balancing stuff (and of course post it here, after all, maybe someone else is trapped as I was^^).

[Jervis]

May i recommend d20 Modern with some of the many, many, many anime homebrew it has. If you don't mind leaving d20 then BESM is my favorite for anime weirdness. Running a game of it RN and its great.