[@vancexentan] even if you were active in places saturated with fan activity, I'm suggesting you talk to people [i]here,[/i] where the RP will be taking place. If you're still not sure what should be going into the setting, you're not ready to make the RP. if you have a collection of friends, you might want to talk to them. I prefer to talk with people one on one because I feel they are more honest that way, and they aren't influenced by the group's discussion. this is essential if you're not super crazy about the series, it's important to hear why other people ARE crazy about the series. Protip: you may be the GM, but you are NEVER the biggest fan. I may sound like I'm regurgitating the same thing over and over again, but it's really important to know what the fans want if you're making a fan RP.People want to experience Darling in the Franxx one way or the other if they are participating.

As far as how I would run it? After I got feedback from a few people, I would then decide what I could safely do to give myself the most control. Just as an example, I don't really like the cockpit situation. It's really clear whoever designed a cockpit where the girl has to bend over in front of the guy was less concerned about practicality and what would spawn the most buttseckz jokes on the internet. If my "focus group" was miffed at the awkward cockpit designs, I would revamp them to something more practical and less [s]Korean MMORPG[/s] what it is now. On the other hand, if suggesting this type of change just got people to tip their heads, then I would leave the smutpits exactly the way they were. After that's done, I'd work on the story. I tend to set up a skeleton of a story and fill in details with player hooks. I would work on a plot of course, which would mostly just be why these monsters are showing up, and the motivations of key NPCs and antagonists. this tends to come to me quickly and automatically, as revealing these details to players is why I GM in the first place.

With all the prepwork done, everything else is a breeze. At least for me. I would  make an interest check that clearly illustrates what the RP is and isn't. This means telling everyone changes I made to the cockpit, and the fact that the RP's direction will not follow the show exactly because it's still airing and, well, it's unlikely the RP will be able to follow the main plot of the show perfectly. I would note any other major changes that might turn players on or off, and then I'd let the sparks fly.

I like having a lot of control over fight scenes, so I would opt to run the fights myself. But I'm very confident in my fighting ability, and have no problem controlling large numbers of characters at the same time. Depending on the size of your player base, I would stay away from single enemies that everyone has to fight. They just aren't that interesting against large groups of players. It turns into a game of "figure out my weakness, or look silly, haha!" I would opt to have teams of powerful monsters that might be in close proximity to each other. This lets the players split up their forces, and leads to a more tactical feeling fight. Let's say you have ten players, which gives you five mechs. You could stage a battle where two people need to unite to fight two of the monsters, while the remaining mech has to hold out until the other two monsters are killed against an opponent that's stronger than they are. Everyone shares the spotlight, instead of needing to compete for it. But if you [i]really[/i] needed that one monster to fight them all, I'd make the monster in such a way that it would break up the mech's single group in one way or the other. maybe a large monster where each limb is a smaller monster, etc. 

Then it's just a matter of playing attention to what everyone is saying and tweaking as necessary.

Sadly, I can't help form the story because, as I've said, I know nothing about the show. Well, aside from the smutpits. But by the sound of it, you still need to decide what elements of the show you're going to keep in tact.

Oh, and you'd best have a back up plan for when some of the pilots decide to leave the RP without as much as a whisper. Say your group starts off with eight players, and three of them leave in the first month. if you're unlucky, that means you have one mech working and three others that are one short of a full pair. I've personally overcome this by taking control of such characters myself, but not everyone feels comfortable doing that. So figure out what works best for you.

[quote=@Inkarnate]
<Snipped quote by vancexentan>
I feel like there isn’t fewer risks involved as opposed to original works, I feel like it just has a [i][b]different[/b][/i] set of risks. But yes, I do agree that sometimes a canonical “AU” is more approachable than someone’s pet project that they want to test.
[/quote]

I guess I'm the only person who aproches a fan RP and thinks "Okay, I really hope the GM doesn't screw up how X acts, gets Y correct, and chooses not to acknowledge the existence of that horrible Z movie!