Show Posts
406
RPGs / Re: Campaigns You Would Run If You Had The Time And Players And Energy
« on: January 17, 2011, 03:17:49 PM »
A couple of campaigns that I actually am trying to bring to fruition, but have noooo idea when they'll even be feasible.
1. Call of Cthulhu: Into the Ashes: This would be a mix of Stephen King's The Stand along with some aesthetics taken from the recent remake of The Crazies. Characters would be residents of a small town in Nowhere, USA, in either the present or the very recent past (during the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq). Things would start off slowly, the only weird thing being some strange (but quite literally harmless at the start) church with some very nice but very obviously weird people. One day during some sort of holiday/festival/block party a drifter stumbles into town, causes a disturbance, and begins violent behavior that will not stop until the figure is dead - imprisonment will only result in his suicide. A day later, thousands of birds, all of different species, converge on the spot where the madman died, forming strange geometric patterns in their landing. If disturbed the birds will disperse and then gather once again moments later, if they are attacked the birds will respond in kind. They stay this way for hours, then, simultaneously, they all die, remaining in their strange shapes. Over the next few days similar attacks occur, sometimes from drifters, sometimes from previously normal members of town. On the news, there are reports of strange attacks from armies of spiders in South America, groups of people freezing to death in places where death due to the elements is impossible in Canada, strange stories of apparent vampirism in the foothills of Asia, and strange stories of abominations beneath the waves of the Pacific Ocean. The players are contacted by a member of the Army who grew up in the town, along with his superiors - they will arrive to begin the evacuation in seven days, and the characters need to maintain order until that time.
The last bit of news that is received before the power and communications go out for the last time is that researchers in astronomical labs around the world have simultaneously issued the same, puzzling bit of information...
"The stars are right."
2. Dungeons and Dragons 4E: To Slay the Beast: Standard dragonslaying fare. The players are not movers and shakers of the world, but they are at least considered heroes (or antiheroes) and have been called to the capital city of a besieged kingdom with a request - that they infiltrate the lair of the dragon who plans the destruction of the kingdom, and attempt to sever the head that directs the vast armies swayed against them. With the exception of the start and breaking back out through the siege, the entire adventure would be one big dungeon crawl, which is something that everyone in my group has expressed an interest in, but that we've never actually done. The entire complex would be somewhat living, for example the characters cannot possibly hope to destroy every foe, because more will simply come to take their places - instead they have to think tactically and make sound decisions in their hunt to slay the dragon. Because I would be playing with a smaller subset of the main gaming group instead of fuck's-sakes-nine people, I would be looking at the possibility of the players having minions or followers, customized to their background or skillset. The minions could be used in battle, and there would be some (unreliable) mechanism for healing at least some of them, or the players could choose to not directly employ them and instead benefit from, say, an additional daily power, or some sort of static benefit. This could present some interesting decisions between using limited resources (which there really isn't enough of in 4E, it keeps the tension less present, and I dislike that) or gaining a lesser benefit through conservation.
3. Pathfinder: Higher Ground: The world has been through a trying age - the low places of the world have been overrun with the dead, and civilization has retreated to the high places, mountains, and plateaus. Despite this lack of real estate, the world has pressed on, and much has been reclaimed of what was once known. Over time, the remaining governments have slowly begun to rediscover the world below, and have just barely begun to recolonize the low places. At the start, magic is present, but it is weak, unreliable, and prone to abrupt changes in potency. The players begin in a prologue, the night before the world... changes; their characters are just starting out in the world and have little to show but the most basic combat skills and a slight affiliation to one of the world's factions. After an initial short adventure/dungeon crawl, they are distant witness to an event that seems inconsequential but will have far-reaching effects on their entire world. The game would resume, five years later, as the characters are brought back together for the beginning of the true campaign - far more experienced than on their first adventure, but with a shared past that will hopefully add some fun roleplaying elements to the game. Their first adventure will be to explore the fog-choked and dead-infested streets of the town where their adventure first began, five years before. The gimmick here would be that the entire place is a dungeon, set out on a single piece of Gaming Paper, making the trek through the overrun village a test of endurance and will. From there, the players have to determine how bad this onslaught of the dead upon the remnants of the living has become, and what sort of consequences it will have.
God damn I am long-winded.
1. Call of Cthulhu: Into the Ashes: This would be a mix of Stephen King's The Stand along with some aesthetics taken from the recent remake of The Crazies. Characters would be residents of a small town in Nowhere, USA, in either the present or the very recent past (during the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq). Things would start off slowly, the only weird thing being some strange (but quite literally harmless at the start) church with some very nice but very obviously weird people. One day during some sort of holiday/festival/block party a drifter stumbles into town, causes a disturbance, and begins violent behavior that will not stop until the figure is dead - imprisonment will only result in his suicide. A day later, thousands of birds, all of different species, converge on the spot where the madman died, forming strange geometric patterns in their landing. If disturbed the birds will disperse and then gather once again moments later, if they are attacked the birds will respond in kind. They stay this way for hours, then, simultaneously, they all die, remaining in their strange shapes. Over the next few days similar attacks occur, sometimes from drifters, sometimes from previously normal members of town. On the news, there are reports of strange attacks from armies of spiders in South America, groups of people freezing to death in places where death due to the elements is impossible in Canada, strange stories of apparent vampirism in the foothills of Asia, and strange stories of abominations beneath the waves of the Pacific Ocean. The players are contacted by a member of the Army who grew up in the town, along with his superiors - they will arrive to begin the evacuation in seven days, and the characters need to maintain order until that time.
The last bit of news that is received before the power and communications go out for the last time is that researchers in astronomical labs around the world have simultaneously issued the same, puzzling bit of information...
"The stars are right."
2. Dungeons and Dragons 4E: To Slay the Beast: Standard dragonslaying fare. The players are not movers and shakers of the world, but they are at least considered heroes (or antiheroes) and have been called to the capital city of a besieged kingdom with a request - that they infiltrate the lair of the dragon who plans the destruction of the kingdom, and attempt to sever the head that directs the vast armies swayed against them. With the exception of the start and breaking back out through the siege, the entire adventure would be one big dungeon crawl, which is something that everyone in my group has expressed an interest in, but that we've never actually done. The entire complex would be somewhat living, for example the characters cannot possibly hope to destroy every foe, because more will simply come to take their places - instead they have to think tactically and make sound decisions in their hunt to slay the dragon. Because I would be playing with a smaller subset of the main gaming group instead of fuck's-sakes-nine people, I would be looking at the possibility of the players having minions or followers, customized to their background or skillset. The minions could be used in battle, and there would be some (unreliable) mechanism for healing at least some of them, or the players could choose to not directly employ them and instead benefit from, say, an additional daily power, or some sort of static benefit. This could present some interesting decisions between using limited resources (which there really isn't enough of in 4E, it keeps the tension less present, and I dislike that) or gaining a lesser benefit through conservation.
3. Pathfinder: Higher Ground: The world has been through a trying age - the low places of the world have been overrun with the dead, and civilization has retreated to the high places, mountains, and plateaus. Despite this lack of real estate, the world has pressed on, and much has been reclaimed of what was once known. Over time, the remaining governments have slowly begun to rediscover the world below, and have just barely begun to recolonize the low places. At the start, magic is present, but it is weak, unreliable, and prone to abrupt changes in potency. The players begin in a prologue, the night before the world... changes; their characters are just starting out in the world and have little to show but the most basic combat skills and a slight affiliation to one of the world's factions. After an initial short adventure/dungeon crawl, they are distant witness to an event that seems inconsequential but will have far-reaching effects on their entire world. The game would resume, five years later, as the characters are brought back together for the beginning of the true campaign - far more experienced than on their first adventure, but with a shared past that will hopefully add some fun roleplaying elements to the game. Their first adventure will be to explore the fog-choked and dead-infested streets of the town where their adventure first began, five years before. The gimmick here would be that the entire place is a dungeon, set out on a single piece of Gaming Paper, making the trek through the overrun village a test of endurance and will. From there, the players have to determine how bad this onslaught of the dead upon the remnants of the living has become, and what sort of consequences it will have.
God damn I am long-winded.
