RWBY you say? Been interested in an RWBY RP for quite a while. What sort of standards are you looking for in terms of post length and stuff?

Anywho, for an opinion on what to do either way, would say AU. Not really into canon characters at all and an AU adds much more flexibility in terms of story and such. Not really sure about the past RP idea, since really theres so little known about the world in modern times let alone the past. But might work if executed well, maybe something like the founding of Beacon or something, characters needing to go out and route out the Grimm from the area, slowly learning about some antagonist force working in the area too, or somthing like that. 

Buut either way, would vote on keeping canon characters to a minimum. Players could just as easily make characters or npcs to be antagonistic and probably have it be more interesting then just taking something like Cardin and the douche brigade.

Would also volunteer for helping with brain storming, like coming up with plot ideas and doing world building.