Monster Squad Ideas

[Blue]

Hi gang,

As we have become embroiled in another non-hero campaign run by another player, I must look to the future. Once upon a time we used to run a halloween game. With that in mind, I'm thinking a Dark Champions level Monster Squad game might be interesting for a 1 or 2-shot session between games around All-Hallow's Eve.

In order to keep it from becoming a typical zomibe and vampire bash, does anyone have fitting suggestions for DC level monster foes? Who know, it may degenerate into a simple monster bash, but it depends on what foes I can come up with.

For a setting, I'm thinking either an abandoned Asylum, Prison, or maybe even a school (so I can throw in some spooky children). The players will likely be a SWAT-style group with limited paranormal technology (but a lot of guns) who don't really know what they're getting themselves into.

[Enforcer84]

Play the monsters.

Anyone ever see the Saturday morning adventure show, the Monster Squad?

[Blue]

If they weren't normally playing vampires and werewolves and just now going back to the campaign where we're D&D monster types (Kobolds, Minotaurs, etc) then I might consider it. But for a true Halloween mood (and a break of type) I'd rather they be human in a more-or-less real world while dealing with the unknown.

[proditor]

Hurm...my idea was the same as Enforcer's...I ran a one night Halloween "Weird Wars" special where the players were The Creature Commandos from DC Comics and got to fight Nazis as archetype monsters...

But since that would be redundant based on your ongoing games, how about cribbing some ideas from film and fiction? For setting, it's nigh impossible to beat the sanitarium in "Session 9". Actually, I've been pondering whether or not that is a viable idea for a one-off special for a bit now. Make the PC's REALLY normal (in this case, an asbestos cleaning crew) and then start the weirdness.

For the creepy kid aspect, "Resident Evil" has that outright evil little girl (The AI). Whatever the faults or merits of the flick, she was rock solid and spooky.

[proditor]

Here we go, the arguable star of Session 9, the Danvers State Hospital.

http://www.noblenet.org/danvers/pildsh.html

I once got an asylum kick and found literally hundreds of pages of pictures online that could be of great use in an abandoned asylum game. Some photgraphers go from closed asylum to closed asylum just taking pictures of all of them. The pics are cool/creepy/disheartening/affirming all at the same time.

[Blue]

They've had two traditions over the years. One was Call of Cthulhu. But I felt that was a little too close to the game our GM just stopped running (that was actually based on WoD mechanics). The other was they ran, every year (before I started) a game ripped from an issue of Dragon Magazine that involved being themselves or a boyscout troup, or some such, and they'd go into a haunted house and every year they'd all die, but they had fun.

But they haven't done anything in a couple of years so I'm trying to come up with something that will be compelling enough to draw them in, and yet not like the stuff we've been playing recently.

But there's an idea I haven't had time to flesh out recently. I'd picked up the D20 book for Dan Brereton's "Noctournals". I had been considering running a simultaneous campaign with my existing one and calling it "Nightshift". You'd be playing in the same city and never even run into the heroes, but you'd be creatures of the night, with more-or-less good intent. I think it's still viable, but since I'm not sure I can get the whole thing together, I'm so far taking the easy way out and hoping for a good one-off of some kind.

[mangahunterd]

Do a "Night of the living dead" type games where the heros are normal everyday people that were thrust in to a situation where the dead have risen and they have to band together to figure out how to stop them. One of our GM's put together a quick game just for this weekend that was based on this scenario. You could prolong it of course like the movie "28 Days Later". For a one shot do a re-hash of Evil Dead or Evil Dead 2...

[Blue]

My concern is that a zombie-hunt would be too 1-dimensional. I should mention that a typical gaming session lasts about 8 hours (Primarily because we only game once every 2 weeks and because one guy drives 100 miles and another guy 40 miles to get there). Killed one, ya killed 'em all.

Anyone got an idea for a good, creepy foe for a monster hunt, if not several? I'm looking at lists of old horror movies and so far the more fun candidates are...
--Pod People. It is after all kind a creepy to kill yourself.
--The Blob. [bill cospby voice]Who wants some jello black pudding?[/bill cosby voice]
--Post apocalyptic people. Think of "Omega Man" ("I Am Legend"). Not sure what the foe would be, but not vampires. Somethin' else.
--Ghosts are hard to do and keep original. I do have an idea though based on a short story from one of those Alfred Hitchcock books I read when I was in 2nd grade, but I fear that the others will figure it out too quickly.

[Trencher]

If not zombies then ghoul's, make your own version maybe like the zombies in the remake of dawn of the dead but smarter... They could like talk and stuff.

[PoorWandering 1]

Idea 1. I ran a one shot horror fantasy where the players were isolated in a small village terrorized by a supernatural wolf. Think Hound of the Baskervilles and you won't be far off.

One recommendation. Beware giving the pc explosives, they will be tempted to simply destroy the structure as a solution.

idea 2. Grues from infocom. Seriously, make them very araid of the dark. The team arrives at sunset called in to respond to a school shooting by say local police/fbi/what have you. The team walks in the door at exactly sunset. The local contact is missing and there are a number of civilians/students/whatever. A quick search finds the half eaten body of the contact in the photography dark room. Creepy stuff like the fact 8 rounds were fired by the contacts gun and there are only 4 bullet marks on the wall and nobody heard the shots. I recommend having the word "dark" written by the contact in his own blood as a hint. From this point on anyone alone in the dark Dies messily, use the staff/kids as replacement characters as needed. Once they figure out that something in the dark can kill them remind them that it is a moonless cloudy night and there is at least 100 yards of darkness between the door and the nearest streetlight. One of the nice things about this idea is that in the beginning the phones still work. They can call for help but that help has to cross the same 100 yards coming in. With any luck they will call for help and then get to watch that help get eaten. For a prop i recommend a large ticking clock and playing the 6-8 hrs of darkness in realtime. Remember to trash the fuse box once they turn on all the lights, the light in the basement where the box is auto shuts off to conserve power.

Just a few random ideas

Note the planecrash-strangely abandoned town-giant ants plot is always good for a dust off.

[Derek Hiemforth]

How about a kind of "Things aren't what we thought they were" game? The PCs are SWAT-types going to a conference/retreat center in a nearby state, where they'll be getting and giving training to folks from similar teams from around the region. Bad weather (or some similar deus ex machina reason) causes them to arrive late. When they get there, they immediately find the campus under siege by Shambling Undead (tm) -- male and female undead, young and old undead... they come in all shapes and sizes. The other highly trained and heavily armed folks within are holding them off. Characters must find out where these monsters came from while simultaneously helping the other special ops people fight them off.

One way or another, the trail of "What's Really Going On Here" leads to a small town nearby. It's deserted. Some clue (which could be found at the retreat center or in the town, doesn't really matter) makes the PCs start to suspect that the attackers aren't really undead. Around the same time, one or more of the PCs see some of their fellow (non-PC) special ops people at the center doing Something Really Evil (tm).

Turns out the attacking "monsters" aren't monsters at all! They're the townsfolk and the real conference-goers, transformed somehow into hideous undead-looking forms. The key to saving them is being hidden by the real bad guys (some kind of demonic dopplegangers, who the PCs initially thought were their fellow conference attendees, and who retain the skills of the people they mimic) somewhere within the conference center, and the "monsters" have been trying to get to it.

Now the PCs must fight off evil shapeshifters as well-armed and well-trained as they are, figure out what they're after, and find the key to restoring the victims.

[Capt. Kung Fu]

[QUOTE=Blue]My concern is that a zombie-hunt would be too 1-dimensional. I should mention that a typical gaming session lasts about 8 hours (Primarily because we only game once every 2 weeks and because one guy drives 100 miles and another guy 40 miles to get there). Killed one, ya killed 'em all.


I have been thinking about doing just that...and came up with Resident Evil HERO....SWAT type characters with loads of ammo...most of my players have played Resident Evil...or saw the movie they made. Arent they making a sequel or something? Anyway....it was easy to do...just went thru the Bestiary for baddies, seeing how none of my cheapskate players want to buy the Bestiary, I am safe from them peeking at the "Big Book of Baddies"....but am gonna segway the game into a "Stalking the Night Fantastic HERO" type of game...I mean what else is a bunch of PC's gonna do after fighting the supernatural....of course, Get an oppurtunity to join an elite fighting force to stop the evil in the world from running ruffshod...as it were..

[Sketchpad]

Take a look at some Asian Horror movies for some different, creepy takes on ghosts ... as for critter varients of zombies I have only one word: Licker. Coolest creature from the Resident Evil franchise

[Lord Liaden]

Perhaps too late to suggest this, but how about possessed toys? I've found that the juxtaposition of silly and cute with sinister and deadly can be very effective.

The new haunted-house interactive game created by an eccentric recluse is actually a spirit-summoning ritual, and during a demo at a local toystore the ghosts and ghoulies flood in and take over the toys. PCs have to deal with action figures with working weapons, stuffed teddy bears with real fangs, and cleaver-wielding dollies that sweetly ask, "Would you like to play with me?" as they eviscerate you.

Most of these toys would be small, hard to hit and hard to spot until they're on you. That could make for good suspense and surprise.

[Blue]

There are a few things in the basic outline I have so far that strike me as a little flat. And I do like the idea of evil toys. Perhpas if I have time today...