"College" type game

[Teapot Salty]

So I realize that there are a lot of great "schools" in fantasy, mages college in Skyrim, Hogwarts, Fighter college, etc. I'm curious as to how you guys would implement your pc's in a school like environment, and what your basic plot line would be.

[GorinichSerpant]

Obviously picking out a dress for prom.

Slightly more seriously, the drama of that sort of event may effect the PCs even if they couldn't care less about it.

[Storm_Of_Snow]

Are they students or teachers?

Obviously there's going to be the whole reason they're there in the first place - if they're students, then they want to get qualifications, and if they're teachers, they'll be trying to teach their students.

Otherwise you're into the Buffy-esque small situations every week that build up into having to prevent the end of the world, usually at the end of the school year.

[Broken Twin]

First off, I would definitely avoid using a combat-focused system for a school-style game. Preferably classless as well, so the characters can grow as they learn and develop instead of in large leaps. Social dynamics would be a major part of the setting, both within and between the students and adults.

For ease of play, I would definitely make it a boarding school. That grants the players significant freedom from familial obligations and allows for situations where the school faculty would appear outside of teaching.

You'd need to provide the players a variety of goals to pursue, or else they'll likely end up destroying the school from shear boredom. Actual combat would be minimal, so you'll need a strong story presence to keep things from devolving into bored rolls. "I aced my calculus test!" just doesn't have the same zing as "I killed the orc!"

For a plotline for a fantasy school, I'd probably go with something along the lines of a forbidden secret from the school's past coming back to haunt them. Maybe there's rumors of a secret room that contains the last relics of the school's founders, or a great library that houses untold secrets.

Don't forget to focus on the relationships between characters. Develop cliques that interact with each other in different ways. Schools are about two things: Learning, and making connections with other people. Pretend learning is hard to make interesting for any length of time, but selling them on the characters is going to keep people interested. Oh, and school clubs, you can't forget school clubs.

Man, now I actually want to do this.

[goto124]

"I aced my calculus test!" just doesn't have the same zing as "I killed the orc!"

"I aced my orc-killing test!"

[Red Fel]

You know that one student in any anime? The one with the glasses and the narrow, often-half-slitted eyes? The one whose glasses shine creepily, and he often adjusts them by the bridge before making some sort of quiet but intense declaration? And how, irrationally, you somehow hope he never actually takes them off, for reasons you don't quite understand?

That's my character. Smirking and silently judging yours.

[Millennium]

I once had an idea for a silly one-shot where the local wizard college hires the PCs to impersonate the highest adminstration, faculty, and staff for a day, going so far as to provide disguises. Good pay, easy work, right?

What they haven't told the party is that they'll be impersonating the administration on Senior Prank Day.

[SimonMoon6]

I'd probably be influenced by Naruto.

But apart from that, I have had a vague plot idea in mind, something like the "kids" are being taken on a sort of field trip. Their professor accompanies them as he guards some caravan (or whatever). They get to see what a typical adventurer's life is like. Small minor menaces pop up which the PCs can deal with, knowing full well that if they get in over their heads, the professor can leap out to save them. (And possibly they imagine that they're getting graded on how well they do in these minor skirmishes.)

And then, when the PCs are pretty comfortable with that setup, suddenly a major villain shows up. The professor tells the kids to hide while he deals with this threat. But the major villain quickly kills the professor with one blow. Now, we get to see how the kids react. Do they run and abandon their duty? Do they stay and fight someone that they can't beat? Or do they pick up on scattered hints that suggest that the thing they're guarding might be a superpowerful item that can save the day?

(Or do they loot the professor's body and try to team up with the villain?)

[Rokku]

Sigil Prep.

[Gnome Alone]

You know that one student in any anime? The one with the glasses and the narrow, often-half-slitted eyes? The one whose glasses shine creepily, and he often adjusts them by the bridge before making some sort of quiet but intense declaration? And how, irrationally, you somehow hope he never actually takes them off, for reasons you don't quite understand?

That's my character. Smirking and silently judging yours.

Great googly moogly, Red Fel - that is an impressive barrage of TV Trope-based attacks you got there.

What they haven't told the party is that they'll be impersonating the administration on Senior Prank Day.

There were no survivors.

[Red Fel]

Great googly moogly, Red Fel - that is an impressive barrage of TV Trope-based attacks you got there.

They're super effective!

As an aside, I'd like to point out two systems I've seen used to great amusement when replicating a high school or college setting. The first is, somewhat obviously, Big Eyes, Small Mouth, the anime-inspired RPG system. The system itself has its flaws, but is quite suitable for any school-based anime-style setting. The second is, somewhat unexpectedly, In Nomine, the RPG of angels and demons. Specifically, an adaptation of it, In Anime, which basically does the same thing BESM does, but with different mechanics.

Most amusingly, the latter involves juvenile interpretations of the various Powers in In Nomine, leading to some incredibly entertaining and surprisingly in-character depictions of the various angels and demons. (Andrealphus and Lilith running the school "in crowd," for instance, while David and Michael dominate athletics, and Eli sits around getting high with Nybbas while watching bad sitcoms.)

And I realized belatedly that I didn't answer as to what my plot would be like. Sorry about that, allow me to clarify: About five minutes into the game, the players would (or should) realize that they were playing an adaptation of Kill la Kill, but with more cartoon violence.

[Honest Tiefling]

Would a strict school where those who fail are faced with great dishonor, shaming or outright death not count as a school? I imagine some systems might encourage a bit of fatality with say, magical training.

[Fouredged Sword]

I ran one on the forum. Here is the IC segment and OOC segment.

Here are my DM notes. The second post has my module breakdown.

It worked well. It takes place in a wizard school that, while it originally was in Faerun, ended up being a cross setting location after the conjuration and illusion professors got drunk. It was mostly played for laughs and to prove that level 1 wizards can form a useful and successful party. They ended up doing very well and bested my rat filled cheese cellar.

[Sith_Happens]

A lot of it depends on what sort of school the game is about. For those focused on teaching more actiony professions/skillsets, I'd look to come combination of Harry Potter, Yu-Gi-Oh! GX, Little Witch Academia, and pre-timeskip Naruto for inspiration.

[Jay R]

I would get my ideas from Harry Potter, and from books about basic military training.

I recommend research by reading Space Cadet and Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein, and watching the training sequences in The Mask of Zorro.

[LibraryOgre]

I'd look at Ars Magica. Their system awards XP based on Seasons, and you can either get XP for training, study, or adventure. So if you go with a Harry Potter-type year set-up, Harry might get XP in potions, charms, and herbology from his studying year (let's be honest... he wasn't getting much XP in potions), and "adventure" XP for his final season, because he was involved in whatever adventure he was undergoing. Neville, who didn't get involved in the adventure, got 4 seasons of study XP.

[Ravens_cry]

I'd look at Ars Magica. Their system awards XP based on Seasons, and you can either get XP for training, study, or adventure. So if you go with a Harry Potter-type year set-up, Harry might get XP in potions, charms, and herbology from his studying year (let's be honest... he wasn't getting much XP in potions), and "adventure" XP for his final season, because he was involved in whatever adventure he was undergoing. Neville, who didn't get involved in the adventure, got 4 seasons of study XP.

Ars Magica basically is Magical Academy the role playing game, with only changes in fluff and maybe some mechanics to fit a Potter-esque or, hehe, the Unseen University type setting.

[Honest Tiefling]

Unseen University as well? Might I inquire what the PvP rules are like then?

[the_david]

This always sounds like a boring railroad to me. Am I wrong? What kind of fun is there in an entire campaign that takes place in a school?

[Red Fel]

This always sounds like a boring railroad to me. Am I wrong? What kind of fun is there in an entire campaign that takes place in a school?

What kind of fun in there in an entire campaign that takes place on a battlefield? Or on a smuggler's spacecraft? Or in a dungeon? It's a matter of taste.

There are a lot of things that could make a school-themed campaign interesting. Just look at any school-based anime or manga, or book, or movie. Look at Kill la Kill, or the Harry Potter series, or Ouran Host Club, or Ender's Game. You can do a lot with the setting.

But if it's not to your taste, then it's not to your taste. And that's fine.

[Teapot Salty]

What kind of fun in there in an entire campaign that takes place on a battlefield? Or on a smuggler's spacecraft? Or in a dungeon? It's a matter of taste.

There are a lot of things that could make a school-themed campaign interesting. Just look at any school-based anime or manga, or book, or movie. Look at Kill la Kill, or the Harry Potter series, or Ouran Host Club, or Ender's Game. You can do a lot with the setting.

But if it's not to your taste, then it's not to your taste. And that's fine.

Oh man, campaign idea, the school is essentially battle school from Ender's Game, omg I need to do this.

[Ravens_cry]

Unseen University as well? Might I inquire what the PvP rules are like then?

Don't get caught.

[JusticeZero]

Gunnerkrigg Court comes to mind.. It's a school setting, but a lot of the conflict is actually created by the place having layers on layers of back story and strangeness that needs investigation and adventuring to get clues about. Also, other students create mishaps that might have to be dealt with via spells, swording, delving into arcane pocket nightmare dimensions and so on, all without alarming school staff.

[Geostationary]

Chuubo's Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine is basically perfect for this sort of thing, up to the point of supporting this more or less out of the box and in-fiction.

This also means that the plot I would use would likely be a combination of entirely mundane school concerns combined with the increasingly dramatic confrontations with the bemasked Student Council, the Six Sins of Principle Entropy who seek to create a new world in a variety of unpleasant ways, and their conflicts with you and Principle Entropy II.

Though it's flexible enough that you could run something like Kill la Kill or Gunnerkrigg Court in it too!

Obviously picking out a dress for prom.

You joke, but this is an entirely valid thing to do in Chuubo's. And it's actually pretty fun.

[BWR]

"The Principalities of Glantri", a Known World supplement for BECMI has some notes about how to run a game and play as students at the giant magical academy.

[JetThomasBoat]

I would shamelessly rip of everything I could from the plot of Final Fantasy VIII because it starts in an orphanarium/boarding school

Spoiler: and later you find out

Show

/airship

and none of my friends have played it.

Or the Personna 3 thing, where at night, they get up to monster fighting shenanigans in a timespace bending labyrinth.

On a more serious note, though, I've considered this kind of plot before but with my group, I know there would be some kind of dissent because two would want to play young humans and the third would want to play like a super old dwarf for some goofy character concept. I suppose maybe he could be the friendly janitor...

[gom jabbarwocky]

The concept of a school setting for an RPG is so canny and flexible that it is really to my shame that I haven't done it yet. All kinds of kooky adventures can be accommodated within that format, I suppose it's really just a matter of finding a system that really gels with me to use for the setting. Something that provides a lot of avenues for creativity for the players, but also has a system or marked improvement - like a classless system that still has levels - but I've yet to find one that does it quite how I'd like and I'm too lazy to homebrew an entire new system.

I'm also a little surprised that no one has mentioned X-Men yet as a model for a school-based game. Within that format, PCs could easily be students, teachers, other faculty or staff, and the concept of one or more rival schools/houses, all on top of typical superhero stuff like secret identities and superpowers. There are a lot of twists on the genre one can work with.

[Millennium]

Another thing I was thinking about doing was setting up a camera before the session begins. Then, during the session, the PCs encounter a group of students who invite them to play a game of "Existentialism." If the PCs accept, turn the camera on and turn the screen toward them: "This is what you see."

[Mr.Moron]

I'd honestly find it hard to school setting and not want to something inspired by the PS2 Persona video games.

[Slipperychicken]

I'd imagine the school would need to be pretty corrupt and dysfunctional to provide regular adventures beyond normal classwork. It would probably include things like spying on students/teachers to expose secrets, clearing failed science projects from the basement, fending off bullies, convincing teachers to alter grades, sabotaging others' work, helping NPCs score with other NPCs, and other such shenanigans.

I'd want ability growth (i.e. Leveling, power increases, skill levels) partly tied to class performance. Like if you 100% an alchemy class, you get the ability to craft several new useful items such as bombs, potions, and drugs. Getting a B might only unlock basic healing potions, and getting a C means you got a small knowledge boost.

Also, I'd want professors and other "fully educated" adults to have higher skill levels than PCs, at least in their specialty areas. The only way for PCs to reach that level themselves is to do really well in class.

I think the "world" should be a little more open than the school itself. The PCs could go out into the surrounding area, do edgier quests, and even improve "illegal" skills (most of which can't be learned in school) like lockpicking, theft, drug crafting, stealth, deception, intimidation, and evil magic.