Bonsai!

From PlotBunnies

This idea is for a Collectible Card Game, rather than a story. I could envision it in anime form, too, but mostof what I've written is about the game rules, rather than the setting. Angel 12:48, 15 January 2012 (GMT)

[edit] Setting

Tagline: A race to grow the biggest smallest tree

The idea with this one is that you're racing to grow a bonsai garden. I drew up some sample cards ages ago, using photos taken from the internet. These used classic anime-style "battle substitution", imagining a secret society of guerilla gardeners who treated their art as a kind of war. There are legends of famous historical gardeners, the masters of their art. There are bonsai tournaments, conducted in knockout fashion. The timescale is never really specified, but some of the "historical" flavour text on the cards describes someone turning around a contest at the last minute. I believe I also had references to famous historical generals, transformed by a spoonerised names, and the events they're most famous for translated into high-speed gardening metaphors.

[edit] Game Rules

The basic mechanic for this game is 'Five Elements'. You put coloured counters for the five elements onto tree cards, and when a tree is balanced (has the same number of each element), it can be presented to the judges and all the counters on it become 'beauty points' for your garden. The winner is the first person to 60 points; or (optionally) the person with most points after a certain time period.

However, although there are 5 elements, you don't have to use them all. If a tree starts with 2 Fire and 1 Water, for example, you only need to balance those 2 elements. However, there are some cards which will allow you to put another element onto a tree which doesn't already have it.

There are two basic things you can do with a card in your hand: Play it (for an effect determined by the card type), or sacrifice it for its internal 'elemental energy'. Each card has a few elemental symbols along the top, usually (but not always) the same as the elements used in any effect the card has. You can sacrifice (discard) that card to add one point/counter to your pool, of any element shown on that card. At the end of the turn, you draw enough cards that the number of cards in your hand and trees in your garden totals 10; if you have less than 6 cards in your hand, you can always draw at least one regardless of how many trees you have.

Types of cards include: 1) Trees - You may only 'plant' one tree per turn. A tree starts with a certain number of elemental counters on it, and is 'balanced' (removed from the game; its counters become points) when its piles of elemental counters are all the same size. You can add points to a tree by moving them from your pool at any time.

2) Ornaments - Like trees, you can plant these in your garden. The garden can contain any number of ornaments, but they aren't removed when they become balanced, and don't contribute points. Most will have some effect on the game (Example - "Tiny Buddha: 1 Fire, 2 Water, 3 Earth. At the start of your turn, you may move any number of elements from Tiny Buddha to any tree or ornament in the garden, if this would make either that tree of Tiny Buddha balanced")

3) Tools and Events - When played, these have an immediate effect and are then removed from the game. Unless otherwise specified, you can play them at any time. Some may cost elements from your pool in order to play.

Example tool: "Fine Watering Can: Cost 1 Iron. Add up to 4 Water to any single tree"

Example event: "Particularly Auspicious Sunrise: Play immediately after any player adds Water to their pool. Any tree which would become balanced by the addition or removal of 1 Fire is considered balanced."

Oh yes ... the bonsai rule. The object of bonsai is, of course, to make a tree which is properly balanced, a complete tree, without making it too big. A tree which has unequal sized elements isn't balanced yet, so is still a sapling (as previously described). But if a tree has more than 6 counters of the same element on it, it has grown too big. You can choose to remove the tree from play (optionally 'recycling' 1 point of whichever element it has to excess to your pool), or leave it to grow. A tree which is balanced with more than 6 of each element is still fully grown (and removed from the game), but doesn't give you any points.

Optional rule: You can split trees into multiple gardens. The only effect of this is to change which trees are affected by trees/ornaments which refer to "all trees in your garden". Once a tree is grown, moving it from one garden to another reduces its most abundant element to 1 (as it damages the tree). If this would balance the tree (having 1 point of each element), it is too small and weak to survive moving.