Saturday, December 9, 2017

Tee Off

HANO GRAND RESORT, GOLF COURSE




With the slight sound of a putt, the woman standing at the last hole on the golf course smiles very faintly as she holes out. Reaching down and picking up her golf ball, she begins to walk back towards the clubhouse. As she approaches, a man walks over to her, holding an envelope.

"Kahili? You've got a letter."

Taking the envelope, Kahili rips it open, the current Alolan golf champion pulling out the letter and reading it to herself.

"Dear Kahili. I am writing to you today to inform you of an upcoming event you may be interested in..."

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The man was huge. Musclebound, over seven feet tall, and with fiery red hair, he would always stand out in a crowd. Right now, though, he was leaning on a sturdy steel railing that still creaked under his frame, looking at the letter that seemed absolutely tiny in his hand.

"A golf tournament, to be held next May on Kuwahawi Island, on a new golf course currently under construction. Not just any golf tournament!"

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Sitting in his chair and petting his cat, a lanky, red-clad man taps on the paper a few times, confirming some lines in particular.

"A golf tournament worthy of the world-class invitees this letter is addressed to, and one that promises to be far more exciting than any other. A golf tournament that encourages tactics, cunning, and planning rather than raw skill."

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Stroking his chin and looking over at some of the devices he had thought up during his last golf playthrough, another man nudges his purple top hat higher and adjusts his glasses as he checks the letter one more time.

"A golf tournament that brings together the greatest players of the world, and pits them against the skills and powers of the Kobbers! Come one, come all, and try your wits against them!"

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Out on a half-built golf course in Kuwahawi, the writer finishes looking over their letter.

"Join us in May of 2018, when the Kuwahawi Open begins. And the winner will receive a fabulous prize! ...Yes, that sounds good enough. It's going to be a long wait, but this should be the most exciting game of golf the world has ever seen!"

Monday, August 21, 2017

Kappaplot Retrokaptive

So, Kawashiro Plot is over! And what a ride it was. When I first conceived of the idea of "do a plot all about the kappa", I never thought it'd end up like this!

But we might as well look over everything start to finish, huh?

ORIGINS

The basic idea of Kappaplot and its format came about from a conversation with one Gooper Blooper. In it, we were discussing the kappa and their meteoric rise in popularity, and Goops mentioned that a plot where each kappa got some focus would work well for them. So I clung to that idea and held onto it - I didn't yet have a central idea to tie it together beyond the kappa, though, so it didn't seem like it'd go anywhere yet. However, once I rediscovered the Big Five from Yugioh, I realized I could easily make them into evil counterparts of the five kappa, and with my passion for business stuff (thanks college degree!) I could go hardcore into making them various unique corporate plots about the companies waging a war of their own. I had my basic plot, I was easily able to come up with my framework of Kappa vs. Big Five counterparts, and I was all set!

THE BIG FIVE

These five corporate goons! In the original source material, naturally, they were all playing children's card guards. Here, naturally, they're moving a little differently. My first action in taking them was to rename one - Randolph was originally named Crump, but I knew that would get immensely confusing after I used Lord Crump in the Alliance for two years. After that, it was just a matter of looking at the various jobs they had in canon and expanding on that for the business. Business strategy, lawyer, and technical expert were all easy enough, but considering my desire for business jobs I put the chief accountant as the CFO and the "right-hand man" as the executive vice president. The Big Five were basically the movers and shakers behind this plot, and were originally the only major part to it, but I decided to expand on it with four others worth talking about...

VERA CAVALIERI
The big evil boss... who barely got settled on for a while! Part of why the CEO was out of the picture for half the plot was simply because I didn't yet know what to do with her. I knew I wanted her to be a lady to contrast better with Nitori, and I knew I wanted a big boss rather than just doing the Big Five, since that would both make for a better final boss than just somehow shoehorning Five-Headed Dragon from Yugioh into the mix, and would allow for a big event starring ALL the kappa rather than the one vs one matches of the rest of the Big Five's events. One thing that was running me into trouble was the difficulty of finding pictures of cool business ladies that weren't overly sexualized - eventually, the head of COOLLADYPICTURES.COM himself, Brine, was able to provide me with the picture I used for Vera's appearance. The mech fight was because I didn't want to go "relatively normal human gives self superpowers" after Commander Bradley pulled it off last year, so I just had her use a robot - different one than had already been confronted. While I do think Vera could have used a little more buildup, I think I did well enough with her.

KEMO SARUWATARI

The big security guard himself. Having the Chief of Security as a character was mostly me thinking that "hey, if I do a big storming the castle finale, the security chief would probably be relevant". So I pulled on Yugioh again, and used a character who canonically worked for the same company as the Big Five (at first), and just had him show up. Originally he was going to have his big scene in the Gansley event, but since people didn't want to fight him then I didn't have him fight then. So I was just going to have him be important in the finale, but Ven provided me the perfect opportunity to give him a chance to strut his stuff with the pirate raid on Azure Sea, which was enough setup for the finale. Kemo died as he lived, really wanting to fight the Kobbers.

GINA MORITA
EVIL KAPPA! Evil Kappa went through a bunch of ideas. My first idea was to pull a full surprise and introduce Gina as a new normal kappa, who would be a normal character for a couple months and then pull a full-blown heel turn at the trial plot. I decided not to go with that because knowing me, either I'd end up with a Maria situation where I didn't want to have the heel turn happen, or I'd do it anyway and people would be upset with me over it. So I thought about having the kappa just randomly appear at the trial, but... that wouldn't have any impact. So then I planned to get rid of the idea entirely. But THEN I hit upon the idea of having her fired before the season started, and then showing up for this! Switching her to Mitori form was a lategame idea to give her more abilities to fight with, and there's a bit of irony that hasn't shown up in RP yet - she's stuck that way! Gina is permanently the form of someone she hates, in a final dash of comeuppance.

SCOTT IRVINE
Not an asshole! Despite being a huge asshole in one of the video games! Scott was mostly my method to show that no, Azure Sea was not 100% pure evil top to bottom, and most of the lower staff were being mislead. He also was a way to mix up the trial without having to put one of the other Big Five on the stand, and to provide that interlude during the finale. Don't worry about him - he decided to join Kawashiro after the plot was over and done with. He'll be fine.

THE EVENTS

Printed In Blood (Intro)

The opening event! The idea of evil pamphlets came to me pretty quickly as a good first shot - something relatively low-key, yet definitely dangerous for the kappa if it continued on for too long. The reason for using Speed of Sound Sonic was mostly because I had watched One Punch Man sometime before this plot and thought he was an entertaining and memorable total jerk. My idea was the usual "informant is killed before saying something" except that with the Kobbers and their powers to revive the dead, that's not going to stop them! I didn't expect Sonic to be quite so... ridiculously successful, however, and I got some feedback that the plot was considered more serious than I expected for a first plot... but, ultimately, I feel it worked out pretty well. Even if I killed Komachi. And later killed her again.

Stocking Up (Chiharu vs. Randolph)

When you think business, what do you think? The stock market! That was my main motivation for doing this plot in this way, although until the day of the plot I actually wasn't entirely sure how exactly I was going to do it. I knew I wanted Randolph to drive himself out of money, and that I wanted the kappastock to go up despite his efforts, but it wasn't until the day of that I actually put all my ideas together and basically just decided to have it be a playground type of plot, where people did tactics they came up with to boost the power of Kawashiro stock. I was really happy to see other people adding their own companies and ideas, as well! Ultimately it ended up being exactly what I hoped for - a fun, noncombat business-centric plot. Isn't it nice when things go right like that?

Battle of the Business (Nitori vs. Gansley)

Man, this one ended up being big. But I suppose when you say "go nuts to advertise a huge business expo", that's what happens, right? This plot is also what solidified Mother 3 music being a thing for this plot - honestly, it didn't have any fancy reason. I just noticed Mother 3 music worked well for the final boss, Gina's planned fight, Nesbitt's planned fight, Sonic, and the float showing up, and I decided to run with it (except for the Ace Attorney event). The main thrust of the event was like the stock market, but even more "come up with your own ideas", and oh boy did people not disappoint! I loved seeing everyone's wildly different ways to promote Kawashiro and blow Gansley out of the water, and while the Kemo fight didn't happen, that wasn't a problem - things worked out well there too, so it was all well. Honestly, after the finale, this is probably my favorite Kapplot event.

Super Robot Wars (Mitsuo vs. Nesbitt)

A good old fashioned robot clash! Perfect Machine King was a really cool design for a trading card monster, so I wanted to bring it in somehow. So why not have a big robot for a straight up fight? It also helped me break up the noncombat shenanigans with some old-fashioned combat, which was something I wanted to do. Nesbitt being the technology man made him an easy contrast to Mitsuo, which also gave me the R&D hook and allowed Azure Seas their first real shot by damaging a lot of R&D. If it was ALL the sunk cost fallacy, that just might be weird! So it was mostly that, instead. It was a fun romp of a battle, although it was kind of funny how much Cornwind wanted to #comeuppance Nesbitt afterwards. Don't worry, Cornwind! He got some!

The Tropical Turnabout (Kasumi vs. Johnson)

Unfortunately, this was by far the weakest plot of the group, I feel. It mainly suffered from a few things that kept me from really giving it the attention it deserved. The first was that my computer blowing up in April really killed my chance to properly plan out this event more than "I'll send Irvine, Kemo, and Gina", and the second is that having a lot on my plate on the day and starting late but still needing to do so to accommodate people didn't work out. The plot's content was pretty fun, really; I did enjoy the contrast between the innocent Scott Irvine and the villainous Kemo and Gina, and the Gina reveal was fun. My main disappointment is that I had to compress and rush Gina; I planned to give her two or three testimonies, and ran out of time so Johnson ended up looking completely incompetent. At least if Gina had held up under pressure he might have been better off? Still, Ace Attorney plots are fun even if I did it better with Anderson, and I think I might try one again... wiiiith a little more preplanning, next time. At least I got a full-on courtroom plot; no Devil Ed or Mengsk curse here!

Kappa Trapper (Mizuki vs. Leichter)

Fun fact! This event? Made up the entire idea on the fly the night before it happened, which I only had time to do because that was a really bad day for me and nobody was showing up anyway so I decided to delay it to get better attendance. The original idea was some form of computer situation, which I had a hard time figuring out. First, I considered the idea of simply doing a "go inside the computer and fight the virus" plot, like Ghost was last year. I decided that didn't mesh well with my plan to make over half of this plot noncombat, so next was the idea of a literal puzzle plot - trying to disable the virus by handling a bunch of puzzles. Of course, that raised the question of why Leichter (working with Gina) would even have any way to disable the system - that's why my original plan was to have Chaos interfere! With Cornwind's permission, naturally. He'd want to level the playing field and give Mizuki a chance... but the day before the plot (which was originally the day OF the plot!) me and Bree were talking it over and came to the conclusion that this made it too much like Mizuki vs. Chaos. So it ended up being scrapped and entirely overhauled into resort of death - after I made sure to check with people, considering that this was relatively hardcore by comparison. I felt resort of death still counted as a good noncombat plot anyway, considering it was entirely about avoiding traps and there was no Leichterpunching yet. At least Leichter got some hardcore comeuppance the next day!

Boil The Ocean (Finale)
Hoo boy, THIS was a huge one. And to think, it started off as just planned to be a traditional finale! It originally would basically be just the kappa and friends vs. Vera, but then I got the ideas for both Kemo and Gina and decided to go with the split boss format. I considered a dual boss, but I decided it'd be more interesting if each one got to do their own thing - originally I was going to have it be that Kemo and Gina each held a key to head down the basement, where Vera was waiting, or I was going to go full Porky and drop everyone from the top floor to the basement. Ultimately I decided I preferred "villain fights in room they started in" and went with just a straight shot up, as well as having them simply block the path.

Before Bree suggested the idea of using Mitori somehow, Gina was originally going to fight by using a lot of mechanical minions. The Mitori idea ended up meshing perfectly with my other idea regarding the Big Five. Originally, at the meeting they were fired at, Kemo and his buddies would have dragged them off to jail, and that would have been the end of it! However, a couple conversations with Goops where he theorized they would eventually become the monster forms seen in the videos of their themes made me realize "hey this would actually be a really cool idea." So I got his permission for Plague Knight potions, and had the Big Five become the five monster forms! Well, four of them; I couldn't figure out how to justify a human -> robot transformation from the potion, but I had the perfect excuse to have the fifth potion be swiped by Gina instead, so Nesbitt just wore the armor of the Robotic Knight. They were brainwashed primarily because I didn't feel them being betrayed and force-transformed worked with them fighting willingly for Vera. At least you got to murderalize the big boss lady, right?

The giant army of security was added before the Big Five but after everything else, as I thought it was a cool way to get the Kappa Mob involved and allowed for a lot of fun army stuff... and hoo boy, did it go better than expected! Between the army, the Big Five getting their proper fight as guardians, the double Kemo and Gina battle, and Vera's own fight, that was the biggest plot (and longest, hey there NINE HOUR FINALE) I've ever done... and probably will do. Man, did it wear me and everyone else out. But hey, I feel it went really well and really covered all of Azure Seas! Certainly preferred it to just a generic fight against Vera!

CONCLUSION
Kappaplot is really my first major character-centric plot (since I'd say Space Pirates and Coalition of Malice weren't super dependent on Samus and the Alliance the way this one was), and man, what a start! Ups, downs, noncombat and combat - this plot had a hell of a lot to it, and I'm really glad I did it! The kappa are one of my most successful sets of ZFRP characters, and they deserved a good solid plot - which they sure got. Thanks for participating and making it an excellent ride!

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

Kappanda

It was a chore to carry everything she needed at once, but luckily, it wasn't far from the Senritsus to Kasumi's apartment. They lived right down the hallway from each other. Ultimately, Meiling decided on two trips; on the first, she deposited the groceries for that night's dinner on Kasumi's doorstep. Then she went back for her two gifts to Kasumi. She took a moment to put on her brightest smile before ringing the doorbell.

That's what greeted Kasumi when she opened the door: Meiling, beaming at her like Kasumi was the most glorious thing she'd ever beheld. That, and also the bouquet of flowers that Meiling held out to her. "Hey, beautiful, these are for you."

Kasumi opens the door, and Meiling gets to see that she's wearing a nice blouse and a nice skirt. She looks Meiling up and down as she takes the flowers, and quietly mutters a "thank you". Standing back, Kasumi holds the door open for Meiling to enter.

"Here's your Christmas present, too!" Meiling hands her a small box carefully wrapped in shiny paper. "You can open it after I've gotten dinner started!" So saying, Meiling grabs all the grocery bags and trundles inside towards Kasumi's kitchen.


Tuesday, January 31, 2017

A Company Matter

AZURE SEA INDUSTRIES, KUWAHAWI ISLAND



The boardroom is small, only seating six people. That's enough, though. Nearly the entire board of directors is represented at this meeting, only the chair at the head of the table empty. Five men sit around the table, waiting to start, until a phone goes off.

Picking up his phone, the bald man at the other end of the table looks at his four colleagues. "She's not going to be here today."

"Hmph." This dissenting voice comes from a round-faced man, adjusting his tie. "Doesn't she know that we need to talk about this now?"

"Calm yourself, Randolph." A Southern drawl cuts through his complaining, getting Randolph to quiet down immediately. "We'll just have to move ahead. Gansley, will you start?"

Gansley, the bald man, nods. "Gentlemen, we're here because of a critical threat. There's an upstart coming to our territory." He tosses down several papers onto the table, and the other four look at them. Press releases, business articles, and legal documents, all showing that Kawashiro Technologies - that new business that had taken Las Vegas by storm - was moving their base of operations to Kuwahawi Island. "Mr. Leichter will explain the details," he says, gesturing to the man with the southern accent and sharp, pointy goatee.

"Thank you, Gansley. This Kawashiro company is only a year old, and they've already gotten a reputation for high quality, high-priced products. They completely shook up the Vegas scene, and knocked Alan Anderson off his perch. Now they're coming here. I'm sure you all recognize the danger?"

"But that's... this is our market!" another man protests, slamming his fist on the table. "I won't let my creations be undercut by some upstart who doesn't know what she's talking about!"

"Nesbitt, my friend, don't worry," says the last man, adjusting his glasses as he smirks. "If you think we'll be playing by the rules against someone who dares to do this, you've forgotten everything about how I operate."

"I assume you already have something in mind, Johnson?"

"Let's just say I've been thinking ever since I read about Kawashiro."

"So it's agreed, then," Leichter says, taking control of the meeting once more. "We'll use our usual tricks, and take this company apart like we did to all the others."

"Kawashiro Technologies will regret ever trying to interfere with the Big Five!"

KAWASHIRO PLOT
SPRING 2017

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Special Delivery

THE KING OF BEASTS - KUWAHAWI LOCATION

"Okay, this is for the housekeeping. What's next?"

"Let's see..."

Setup for the arrival of the Kobbers was going quite well. There were plenty of deliveries being made to the resort every hour, all sorts of special ingredients and materials alongside the regular preparations for an influx of tourists. Since the Kobbers were no ordinary tourists, there were naturally many extraordinary deliveries.

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

A Very Kappa Christmas

LAS VEGAS

It's Christmas time! Well, a week before Christmas. The Kawashiro Technologies building is all decked out in festive colors, and kappa continue to swarm the place, preparing for the grand-scale move to begin. With several of the basic regulations for Kuwahawi out of the way, boxes are being packed and positions reassigned.

And none of that involves Nitori Kawashiro or Mizuki Watanabe! The two top executives of the company are currently holed up in their apartment, playing Monopoly alongside Chiharu and Mitsuo Senritsu. With nowhere else to go for the festive season, Kasumi Arata also joined them, leaving the number of players at five. Currently? Nitori's winning.