Author Topic: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES  (Read 28364 times)

Kelkesh123

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HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« on: October 27, 2010, 08:40:54 PM »
I've noticed alot of threads relating to high school role playing games, so I just thought we could use a megathread for all of our wacky tales and adventures, as well as ask for advice and stuff while we're at it.

I guess I'll start us off with the tale of my All Flesh Must Be Eaten campaign.

The campaign is a fairly generic 'Escape the city whilst it's filled with zombies' one. The players were all Survivors, starting out in a town named Auburnton. It had a fairly modest population, had a Wal-Mart, Hospital, etc. The four starting characters were as follows :

Daniel Firestone : A mysterious office worker, took an Adversary (5), and chose the country of Canada as his enemy. He also had Occult Knowledge (4), and was generally speaking a pretty odd character. He was Covetous of money, and would often loot places while other places fought.

Vorna : A basement dwelling internet nerd who had acquired people skills through playing dating sims. He had like a 6 in Seduction, and whenever he succeeded at seducing someone, no matter how ridiculous the situation, we would pretty much all say "He's played A LOT of dating sims."

JayDee ( John Dorian ) : The resident biker guy, very very strong, played the silent type in the group. The player didn't like roleplaying much, so his character never got around to doing much.

Gabriel : A washed up spec ops soldier with Reckless and Showoff, he ended up being the first man to kill one of my NPC's by blowing his crotch off, a fact he was very proud of.

The story started because Vorna contacted everyone and gathered them together to discuss something he had found online, some generic government project relating to zombies. As he was discussing this with the various members of the group, a sick man entered the bar, and to no one's surprise, was a zombie. They off'd him, then were surprised by an NPC running in through the door. Gabriel failed a Willpower check, and snapped and shot at the NPC, killing him in one shot (do not underestimate firearms in AFMBE). The players then ran off to the docks, searching for a boat, or boat keys, but ended up being unable to find anything. They went off to the hunting supply store, which was on fire, and quickly running in to grab ammunition, firearms, and other supplies. Several looters were inside, and got into a fight with the Cast. A fight started, all the enemies were killed quickly. The team split up, with Vorna heading to the back to check for rifles. He ended up running into a big ass Acid Spitter creature, which he managed to kill in a running fight by blowing it's legs out, then blew open it's head. They escaped the flaming building, and contacted a National Guardsman named Lt. Blackwell. He offered assistance in the form of more supplies and information.
Deciding to use his Contacts (4), Daniel called the Russian government, and tried to get a slightly more equipped response.
Heading back to the Hunting supply store's parking lot, they manage to hotwire a car and escape being killed by zombies, and ride off into the sunset.
"THIS IS WHY WE CAN'T HAVE NICE THINGS!"

Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #1 on: November 06, 2010, 05:20:47 PM »
DEAR GOD I NEED HELP.

My players randomly went batshit. Things were going well. They had rescued a gangbanger named Damien from a police station and were travelling to a gas station for some rest. They got up, got in their car, and were stopped by a group of high schoolers who shouted "STOP!".

They got out, talked with the teacher leader, and the driver of the car (Daniel) jumped out and fired a tear gas grenade into the crowd. While the other players were negotiating.

I sat there with a "wat" facial expression.

 He managed to do it, and jumped in the car.
The spokesmen of the group (Vork) failed a constitution check against the tear gas and collapsed, but Damien managed to save him and bring him to the car. As they drove away, Vork decided to level a shotgun at Damien for grabbing him.

I sat there with a "wat" facial expression.

The situation was defused...somehow. There was some meta gaming involved. And the players turned the car around and drove back to the highschooler's and got out and decided to slit all their throats with a scalpel.

I sat there with a "wat" facial expression.

The characters have never done anything remotely this evil. Earlier they freed some prisoners despite getting shot several times, and they asked for no reward from the prisoners. They then starting offering medical treatment to one of them, at no gain for them. And then they decided to slit a bunch of throats with a scalpel.

I am at a loss of what to do.

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Flawless P

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #2 on: November 06, 2010, 05:50:12 PM »
Ask for a logical explanation for what they did, maybe something triggered it? Probably not though and if so punish them horribly in game by sending cops after them or something.
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Joven

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #3 on: November 06, 2010, 05:56:52 PM »
It was all a dream?
Or the reason they acted like that is because theres some curse/posion/hypnotist/mind controlling implant by somebody either out to get them, or they were in the wrong place at the wrong time and got hit with it, and now they need to clear their names, and defeat whoever did it before they're reduced to mindless puppets.

Or, since I just actually read your first post, its a side effect of a mutation of the zombie disease, it went airborne but lost alot of its potency so all the effects are heightened aggression and mild tourrettes, at least for now. So they need to find a cure (which of course there is, since its a secret government synthetic virus made as a derivitive of the zombie plague to try and turn it into a super-soldier serum or something) before it finally mutates again and turns them fully into zombies.

Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #4 on: November 07, 2010, 12:13:52 AM »
Ask for a logical explanation for what they did, maybe something triggered it? Probably not though and if so punish them horribly in game by sending cops after them or something.

I did ask. They even admitted it was pretty out of character. YET THEY STILL DID IT.

I'm honestly going for a total party kill.
They have never experienced one, and I'd find it extremely amusing.
I plan on having their allies from earlier, the Blackwell group, come in and kill them all off. Thing is, I made them to be a government cleanup team that was going to turn on the players at the last minute. Of course, now they can see the players killing a group of civilians with a scalpel.
Did I forget to mention they had a Vulcan minigun in their helicopter? Cause they did.
They also had stats far above human, as they were government experiments.
They almost all had a STR of 9, which is roughly that of a horse I believe. AKA they kicked ass, and had Inspired powers and could magick their way through things.

Might have to start playing Pokethulhu cause all my gamers have a tendecy to become meta-gamey when I do open-world games.
So in Pokethulhu that's understandable. Or maybe just something with Wushu or Risus. I would do COC but it would break their tiny little hearts very fast.

« Last Edit: November 07, 2010, 12:24:20 AM by Kelkesh123 »
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Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #5 on: November 07, 2010, 12:23:52 AM »
It was all a dream?
Or the reason they acted like that is because theres some curse/posion/hypnotist/mind controlling implant by somebody either out to get them, or they were in the wrong place at the wrong time and got hit with it, and now they need to clear their names, and defeat whoever did it before they're reduced to mindless puppets.

Or, since I just actually read your first post, its a side effect of a mutation of the zombie disease, it went airborne but lost alot of its potency so all the effects are heightened aggression and mild tourrettes, at least for now. So they need to find a cure (which of course there is, since its a secret government synthetic virus made as a derivitive of the zombie plague to try and turn it into a super-soldier serum or something) before it finally mutates again and turns them fully into zombies.


All good possibilites...
I'm rethinking TPKing them.
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And then you wake up."
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Maze

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #6 on: November 07, 2010, 12:47:31 AM »
Wait, instead of killing them using outsiders, why don't you them against each other. Start by having one getting the first symptoms of zombifications, doesn't even matter if he got bit or not. Have Player X roll the equivalent of a spot check and then give him a note that he sees Player Y with some object or something that makes him untrustworthy. Make it that a regular fever and their own paranoia did them in in the end.

Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #7 on: November 07, 2010, 06:45:23 PM »
Wait, instead of killing them using outsiders, why don't you them against each other. Start by having one getting the first symptoms of zombifications, doesn't even matter if he got bit or not. Have Player X roll the equivalent of a spot check and then give him a note that he sees Player Y with some object or something that makes him untrustworthy. Make it that a regular fever and their own paranoia did them in in the end.

That's a pretty nice idea as well. I don't really have to encourage them though, they already have an extremely high amount of tension and paranoia.
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Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #8 on: November 13, 2010, 12:03:56 PM »
WELP
Campaign ended.
I cooled my jets and offered them a plot hook. They cried RAILROADING.
I was like "Kay." and let them go back to walking towards the dentist's office. They ran into a caravan of gang banger's and joined up with them.
Went well. Then they got attacked by a helicopter. They ended up almost dying terribly, until John Dorian got a series of lucky rolls and made it up onto the helicopter, where he kicked the big boss into a rotor I believe. He died instantly. The helicopter started to go down, so he jumped out of the helicopter. And critically failed the roll twice.

He ended up with a broken arm and leg on the ground, and was rescued by his allies who each had about 2 life points left.
Felt good man.
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Flawless P

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #9 on: November 13, 2010, 02:11:46 PM »
Not gonna lie, they sound like shitty people to play with.
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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #10 on: November 22, 2010, 07:39:47 PM »
I'm stuck with a very limited amount of players, and none of them can play a good game of Paranoia to save their lives. There are three players whom I have the pleasure of joining with for thirty minutes each weekday.
1. Good Citizen- This guy is a true braniac, and he's already worked out that the best way to survive Paranoia is to not do anything.
2. Psychotic Citizen- He's pretty inexperienced with his laser, but he does fine in getting killed or getting #3 killed. Entertaining. Slightly.
3. The Citizen Who Thinks He's The Game Master- This guy declares himself to be Clearance INDIGO instead of his already given RED clearance. He obviously researched Paranoia online, and found something about GAMMA Clearance, and so he spent today talking about how he's the Team Leader and how he's got a giant gun. All the while, I continually killed him. After his last life was gone, he still argued with the other characters about what they were going to do and then claimed that he had a giant reflector shield and was a traitor from BETA COMPLEX, and that he was teleporting back using his wristwatch. The entire time this was going on, he argued with me and said that he'd be clearance ULTRAVIOLET next session.

Fizban

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #11 on: November 26, 2010, 12:44:18 AM »
The game I ran in high school went for more than two years.  It mostly ran at lunch or on weekends, but in my final year, I was running it through class times, and people were skipping class to play.  Rather gratifying.  I used to carry two school bags to school each day - one with schoolbooks, and one with D&D books.

It was a 2nd ed D&D game, homebrew campaign.  In all honesty, I can't remember a huge amount about the world, except that the national boundaries were drawn based on political system (so I had a democratic place, a communist place, a theocratic place, monarchy, tribal place etc).  It was good fun, although I'd rather like to think that I had grown somewhat as a DM since then.

One short anecdote for the readers.  The party came to a mountain range - difficult for them to climb - and had to think of a way to get over it to their destination on the other side.  The kender handler simply climbed using her climbing skill.  I think the mage turned himself into a rock scorpion and skittered up.  The bard (I had an irrational hatred for bards back then) altered self into an aarakocra and flew over.  The paladin was rather more stuck.  He had a magical cow (the explanation behind this was basically that the paladin's dragon mount got turned to stone, and in anger he called  his patron godess a cow... so that's what he got), and was puzzled as to how he would ever get himself in his full plate armour over, let alone this cow.  So he did what he  had a proclivity to do - whacked it with the flat of his sword.  It mooed loudly, and summoned a massive gust of wind which blew up the side of the mountain, propelling the whole party about a thousand feet above the top of the peak. 

The bard obviously just flapped his wings and sailed down - unfortunately to be alone in the middle of an ogre camp - and was beaten to mushy clubbed death.  The others found themselves plummetting quickly towards imminent splatty doom.  The paladin decided that his only option was to vent his anger and frustration on the cow with many well-aimed blows.  The results included the whole mountain growing alfalfa, a 100 cubic foot area of the mountain directly beneath them disintegrating, and a savage rainstorm.  Lucky for them, the rainstorm filled the gaping hole, which they plummeted into, soggy and bedraggled, but alive.  At which time, the ogre encampment was rushing towards their green, leafy, wet location.  The mage threw a couple of well-aimed fireballs, causing a great deal of damage to the charging ogres, but the paladin sought to one-up his magic friend by slapping his cow one more time.  A heal spell, great!  But not centered on them - centered on the ogres.  Not so great.  This is what one gets for being the only paladin to the godess of trickery.

The party managed to luck their way out of that encounter by using one of the wishes in the paladin's luck blade - he wished that the ogres would all be teleported into the king's castle.  Unfortunately, the only room in the castle the paladin could clearly envision was the king's private garderobe.  Imagine the king's surprise when he opened his door for his evening visit only to find that there was an entire tribe of angry ogres stuffed in there tighter than children in a phone booth.

The paladin in that game really was the star of the show.  From using his high charisma to get out of awkward situations, to combining a ring of blinking and a sword of sharpness (several lost limbs in the party later...), to attempting to "break a door down quietly", to tribal genocide and mass deforestation, he always had a unique view on how to get things done.

Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #12 on: November 26, 2010, 08:53:58 AM »
I'm stuck with a very limited amount of players, and none of them can play a good game of Paranoia to save their lives. There are three players whom I have the pleasure of joining with for thirty minutes each weekday.
1. Good Citizen- This guy is a true braniac, and he's already worked out that the best way to survive Paranoia is to not do anything.
2. Psychotic Citizen- He's pretty inexperienced with his laser, but he does fine in getting killed or getting #3 killed. Entertaining. Slightly.
3. The Citizen Who Thinks He's The Game Master- This guy declares himself to be Clearance INDIGO instead of his already given RED clearance. He obviously researched Paranoia online, and found something about GAMMA Clearance, and so he spent today talking about how he's the Team Leader and how he's got a giant gun. All the while, I continually killed him. After his last life was gone, he still argued with the other characters about what they were going to do and then claimed that he had a giant reflector shield and was a traitor from BETA COMPLEX, and that he was teleporting back using his wristwatch. The entire time this was going on, he argued with me and said that he'd be clearance ULTRAVIOLET next session.


The third one just sounds...painful. Really, really painful. I've never had a player like that, but hell, that sounds like one of the worst fates a man can have.

Quote from: Fizban
The paladin in that game really was the star of the show.  From using his high charisma to get out of awkward situations, to combining a ring of blinking and a sword of sharpness (several lost limbs in the party later...), to attempting to "break a door down quietly", to tribal genocide and mass deforestation, he always had a unique view on how to get things done.

Now THAT, on the other hand, sounds like crazy fun. Any chance we could hear more about the tribal genocide and/or mass deforestation?
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Fizban

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #13 on: November 29, 2010, 12:20:58 AM »
Quote
The paladin in that game really was the star of the show.  From using his high charisma to get out of awkward situations, to combining a ring of blinking and a sword of sharpness (several lost limbs in the party later...), to attempting to "break a door down quietly", to tribal genocide and mass deforestation, he always had a unique view on how to get things done.

Quote
Now THAT, on the other hand, sounds like crazy fun. Any chance we could hear more about the tribal genocide and/or mass deforestation?

Well, since you asked so nicely, how could I refuse?

Both instances actually took place at more or less the same time.  This was at the time that the paladin (his name was Gildor, by the way) flew his amethyst dragon to Oz, a desert land inhabited by independent tribes, and famous for the big rock, and a place called The Bush (basically, a parody of Australia). 

The paladin had it in mind that he would "evangelise" to these simple, tribal people, as a service to his goddess, and expose them to the awesome glory of Gond (yes, there is a god in Forgotten Realms called Gond.  This is a different, female, trickster Gond).  He had heard the stories about the big rock, and indeed it was quite impressively large, and red, and surrounded  by desert.  He could see from the back of his shimmering amethyst mount a few small groups of native inhabitants - after all, there was little blocking their vision for miles in every direction.  But how could he get the message out to them of the good news of Gond?  Then his cunning mind had a plan.

He looked around for a suitable writing implement.  The best thing he could find was a rather scraggly tree, the only one that he could see for miles in the sparseness of the sands.  He ordered his dragon to pluck it out, and to take it over to the big rock.  Ahh, he seemed to have the attention of the locals now who, upon seeing a dragon uproot the only bush in their entire realm (hence it's name, The Bush), which they considered sacred, were shocked.  Their shock became outrageous anger when the dragon proceeded, at it's master's command, to use the uprooted stump to carve into the only other landmark of their lands, the giant rock, "Worship Gond! Gildor was here" in giant letters across its face.

He then waited as the crowds of local tribal people came towards him, expecting to answer their questions about this new and mighty goddess they should worship.  Instead, it seemed that the pressing issue on their lips was the recent de-forestation of an entire continent, and the defacing of their two most sacred places - The Bush and The Rock.  In fact, they didn't want to talk so much as act.  With their simple, bone spears, they pointed and prodded and yelled and gesticulated wildly in their local tongues.  Of course, like all good missionaries, Gildor could not speak the native dialect, and so he just proceeded to nod and smile, before setting fire to the uprooted bush in case they were having separation issues.

This was the final straw for the natives, who began poking their spears at the armoured holy knight upon his dragon mount.  "Ooga!  Booga! Spear!" was pretty much how the paladin translated their angry ravings.  Growing sick and tired (and bored - patience was not a  virtue of his) of their idle threats, he decided to give them a show of what Gond's power was like, and replied, "Ooga!  Booga!  Breath Weapon!", indicating to his dragon that it should, as it were, fire into the crowd.  A sonic boom erupted, bodies flew, and as the dust settled, the entire nation of Oz stood depopulated - no more bush, no more tribesmen, and a defaced national landmark.

Dusting his hands, and announcing that his work here was done, he spurred his dragon to flight, and returned home, telling his party compatriots that he was successful in his mission - which was to punish the unbelievers of Oz.  That's what he set out to do, right?

Kelkesh123

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Re: HIGH SCHOOL ROLE PLAYING GAMES
« Reply #14 on: November 29, 2010, 05:31:00 PM »
Dusting his hands, and announcing that his work here was done, he spurred his dragon to flight, and returned home, telling his party compatriots that he was successful in his mission - which was to punish the unbelievers of Oz.  That's what he set out to do, right?

GOND, FUCK YEAH.

Your group roleplays pretty well, from the sounds of it.
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