There has to be a way to make a setting out of this - St. Louis urban decay

[Karmakaze]

The Slow Death of a City Block: 1900 Montgomery Street

The article is primary a rant about the decline of St. Louis, but it has some good maps and photos to back it up. It details an area that was completely built up in 1909 and is now full of empty grass lots. If nothing else, the maps could probably be made into battle maps.

I can't quite pin down the setting I want to make out of this, but it's ticking away in the back of my head...

[Hermit]

Sure...

Two that come to mind immediately

Champions/Superheroes: "Champions of Hope" - A dying neighborhood, a super team in need of a home, a wealthy well connected patron with a desperate idea... these are the elements that lead to your super hero team being moved to St. Louis, offered good pay and a new base. The catch? You have to do more than fight crime, you have to try to inspire hope and economic opportunity both. Like a sports team franchise, someone is taking a gamble that you'll bring in the people or at least some small business exploiting your collective image. Others will flock to you like a castle...seeking the protection in your shadow. The question is, will it work, or will it cause this area to just become a battle zone that will have others envying the former deterioration.

Urban Fantasy: "What's eating Montgomery Street?" It's a natural depopulation and emptying... or is it? A humble city surveyor finds discrepancies, a psychic can't escape her nightmares, and a military man returns home only to find out his neighborhood is gone, and folks act like it has ALWAYS been that way...only he remembers it being vibrant as little as six months ago! Separately, these and other people can't uncover, let alone handle the terrible secret of Montgomery Street. Together, they have a chance to find the supernatural threat that may eventually devour the entire city...and none the wiser!

[Kid Jurassic]

How about a street level campaign.

How's This:

The neighborhood was had become an afterthought. Used only by gangs and dealers. Most people avoided this run down area, unless they were into something shady. Enter a new young team of would be heroes. They decide to enter this rundown hood bordering their own places of birth, and try to put their new abilities to the test. Cut their teeth on thugs, dealers and bangers, and maybe help bring the area back from the brink.

What they weren't aware of, however, was that Viper had the idea to use this rundown area as an inconspicuous base of operations for their St. Louis division.

As the young team dives deeper into the drug and gun pipelines they discover that it all may just be a front for something bigger...

[Lawnmower Boy]

Urban Fantasy, to be sure.

"Oh Grandfather of the world, ancestor of all things. By smoke and steam and stone, I summon you."

"Who summons Whiskey Jack?"

"It is I, Hist-ya-Hist, who speaks for the Corn Maiden. Look, Papa Nanabush, at the defilement the Yengisee have made of Turtle Island, to which you brought up black earth in the beginning of days? Their tenements rise over the very soil of the First Lodge."

"You are young, Wife-of-Serpent. Manitou's magic still has its secrets from you. Winter's bare earth and spring's verdant blossom will rule the diving platform the Yengisee call "Saint Louis" again before very long, as Manitou measures time. Your daughter's daughters' daughters will live to see it."

[Hermit]

Urban Fantasy, to be sure.

"Oh Grandfather of the world, ancestor of all things. By smoke and steam and stone, I summon you."

"Who summons Whiskey Jack?"

"It is I, Hist-ya-Hist, who speaks for the Corn Maiden. Look, Papa Nanabush, at the defilement the Yengisee have made of Turtle Island, to which you brought up black earth in the beginning of days? Their tenements rise over the very soil of the First Lodge."

"You are young, Wife-of-Serpent. Manitou's magic still has its secrets from you. Winter's bare earth and spring's verdant blossom will rule the diving platform the Yengisee call "Saint Louis" again before very long, as Manitou measures time. Your daughter's daughters' daughters will live to see it."

Snazzy

[bubba smith]

How about a street level campaign.

How's This:

The neighborhood was had become an afterthought. Used only by gangs and dealers. Most people avoided this run down area, unless they were into something shady. Enter a new young team of would be heroes. They decide to enter this rundown hood bordering their own places of birth, and try to put their new abilities to the test. Cut their teeth on thugs, dealers and bangers, and maybe help bring the area back from the brink.

What they weren't aware of, however, was that Viper had the idea to use this rundown area as an inconspicuous base of operations for their St. Louis division.

As the young team dives deeper into the drug and gun pipelines they discover that it all may just be a front for something bigger...

sounds like a good dark champions storyline to me

[Kid Jurassic]

sounds like a good dark champions storyline to me

Thanks...although it could go fantasy from there or both. Proditor ran a great campaign for us that had elements of Dark and Fantasy in it...lots of arcane.

[Vulcan]

Huh. I can tell you why the block (and by extension) the city is dying slowly.

It's all about the structure of the government of the city of St. Louis. The aldermen - nominally the legisative branch of the city government - officialy have no influence over the city functions. Unoficially, they wield enormous influence over the city functions by having a (unofficial) say in the oppointment of other officials, making life in their distirct difficult for officials they don't like (they do have a lot of power in their own districts - even though most of them live in the county, not the city), and many people believe there are hefty bribes being paid by the aldermen...

The catch is that officially they don't have this capability, so officially nothing can be done to curb their excesses.

Case in point: my family moved into the city, in a modest but decent neighborhood (Itaska off south Grand, for the natives out there) in the mid-'80s. The big problem in the neighborhood was the apartment buildng on the corner, which was a bit of an eyesore.

Then a new landlord bought it.

The quality of tennants immeidately plummeted, typically being drug-dealers or hookers. And yes, we are sure they were; deals regualrly went down right outside our living room window. The police were strangely unresponsive, unlike their previous rapid action to trouble in our neighorhood. When it became obvious that the police couldn't take action, we tried getting the building inspectors to condemn the building (we happened to know from some previous tennants that the building still had pre-turn of the century wiring!). The result of this was a series of nit-pick citations by the building inspectors on our property (peeling paint on the garage, things on that level) while the fire-hazards in the apartment building were ignored. Then we discover that the new landlord and our alderman were old friends...

Long story short, everyone who could, left the neighborhood and moved to the county to get away from the corrupt aldermen. And from talking to other people who moved out to the county, this kind of thing is going on all over the city.

Oh. My bad. This was supposed to be about setting a game in St. Louis. Sorry!

[Captain Obvious]

Huh. I can tell you why the block (and by extension) the city is dying slowly.

It's all about the structure of the government of the city of St. Louis. The aldermen - nominally the legisative branch of the city government - officialy have no influence over the city functions. Unoficially, they wield enormous influence over the city functions by having a (unofficial) say in the oppointment of other officials, making life in their distirct difficult for officials they don't like (they do have a lot of power in their own districts - even though most of them live in the county, not the city), and many people believe there are hefty bribes being paid by the aldermen...

The catch is that officially they don't have this capability, so officially nothing can be done to curb their excesses.

Case in point: my family moved into the city, in a modest but decent neighborhood (Itaska off south Grand, for the natives out there) in the mid-'80s. The big problem in the neighborhood was the apartment buildng on the corner, which was a bit of an eyesore.

Then a new landlord bought it.

The quality of tennants immeidately plummeted, typically being drug-dealers or hookers. And yes, we are sure they were; deals regualrly went down right outside our living room window. The police were strangely unresponsive, unlike their previous rapid action to trouble in our neighorhood. When it became obvious that the police couldn't take action, we tried getting the building inspectors to condemn the building (we happened to know from some previous tennants that the building still had pre-turn of the century wiring!). The result of this was a series of nit-pick citations by the building inspectors on our property (peeling paint on the garage, things on that level) while the fire-hazards in the apartment building were ignored. Then we discover that the new landlord and our alderman were old friends...

And there's your Dark Champions setting.

[Karmakaze]

I could see something in the Urban Fantasy range with the "missing" buildings sometimes re-appearing. It could either be ghosts or something hiding in the halfway state between the past and present.

[Killer Shrike]

My Dad's family is from St. Louis; I've been there a few times for funerals. Color me unsurprised that people don't want to live there and the city is collapsing.

Having said that, with Detroit having been blown up and made into glittering Millennium City in the CU, it stands to reason that St. Louis could take its place as the butt of every crappy city joke, which Detroit previously laid claim to willingly or otherwise.


To paraphrase Kentucky Fried Movie....

Dr. Klahn: The CIA thinks they can infiltrate the Mountain of Dr. Klahn!
CIA Agent: You can't scare me, you [CENSORED]
Dr. Klahn: Take him to... ST. LOUIS!
CIA Agent: No! No, not ST. LOUIS! No! No, please! Anything but that! No! No!

[Vulcan]

My Dad's family is from St. Louis; I've been there a few times for funerals. Color me unsurprised that people don't want to live there and the city is collapsing.

Having said that, with Detroit having been blown up and made into glittering Millennium City in the CU, it stands to reason that St. Louis could take its place as the butt of every crappy city joke, which Detroit previously laid claim to willingly or otherwise.


To paraphrase Kentucky Fried Movie....

Dr. Klahn: The CIA thinks they can infiltrate the Mountain of Dr. Klahn!
CIA Agent: You can't scare me, you [CENSORED]
Dr. Klahn: Take him to... ST. LOUIS!
CIA Agent: No! No, not ST. LOUIS! No! No, please! Anything but that! No! No!

Our group's idea is level everything inside the city limits that isn't a cultural landmark (museums, the Arch, that sort of thing) and turn it into a gigantic park, with the communities of the county surrounding it. Until the corrupt city government goes away, St. Louis city will be 'a wretched hive of scum and villany.'

[Kid Jurassic]

Our group's idea is level everything inside the city limits that isn't a cultural landmark (museums, the Arch, that sort of thing) and turn it into a gigantic park, with the communities of the county surrounding it. Until the corrupt city government goes away, St. Louis city will be 'a wretched hive of scum and villany.'

How very Deathstalker of you...I approve of your methods and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

[Vulcan]

How very Deathstalker of you...I approve of your methods and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

Wish I had one, I could use the money!

But I think you've misunderstood me. I have no problem with letting the people leave. I just want to remove the power base of the politicians i.e. the voters. No voters, no aldermen (no one to elect them anyway), no one for them to influence, no one to bribe said aldermen... And Forest Park gets a HUGE expansion.