Jack7
First Post
I've been working on some Adventure/Scenario/Mission Ideas (and possible story ideas) for RPG scenarios I'd like to see written up as outstanding adventures, or am writing up myself.
These are not really adventure, scenario, or mission seeds, as much as "grafts," because some of them are far too complicated and developed to be mere seeds. But they can be "adaptive ideas" for others to use in order to develop their own scenes and plotlines.
The description of such scenarios can be as simple, or as complicated in nature, as you'd like to make it, if you'd like to present some adventure ideas of your own in this thread. These are some of my recent ideas.
D&D/Fantasy Adventure - Hide: In this adventure the characters are exposed to some magical device, spell, or curse of which they are completely unaware. However, soon after this occurs grisly murders and vicious crimes begin to appear in any setting in which the characters are operating. At first the crimes appear as if they are targeted at the party and those around the party (such as family, friends, etc.) Only later do the charters begin to realize that some of the clues surrounding the attacks point to the party itself. The entire adventure hook relies upon the fact that one of the party members is the brutal and vicious murderer, but even the killer himself is unaware of his role because the magics or curse involved transforms the character into a brutal and vicious Mr. Hyde type character without the character even being aware this is happening to him. More than one character could become such a "Hyde" and develop such a new sub-conscious "Hide" persona, or the curse or magic may fluctuate between party members, hopping between characters. The player doesn't know who is Hide, and neither do any of the characters until they devise a way to figure out some method of trapping or destroying the Hide. Anyone killed, raped, etc. by the Hide is permanently affected by the crime or attack.
Sci-Fi Scenario - Hide: this is a variant of the Hide adventure above but is caused by a virus, a pathogen, scientific experiment, or alien technology gone awry.
Horror/Weird - Hide: A variant of the Hide scenario caused by supernatural, demonic, cursed, or weird/unexplained, or alien forces.
Sci-Fi Scenario - The Protean Wolf: The crew of an exploration vessel approaches an odd, spherical shaped craft that is apparently deserted. While closing on the vessel certain crew members black out, awakening on the alien vessel. But each crew member (the characters) awake in a body not their own and have only partial memories of their past. They cannot be sure if the people claiming to be their crew mates are really their crew mates. They must explore the alien vessel, find a way off and back to their own vessel while in this state of uncertainty about the identities of each other. In addition there is an alien aboard who can shape shift into any form it desires and it infiltrates the crew members as they explore. A similar scenario could be achieved in a fantasy setting using a shape shifting monster and magic to cause the party members to awaken in an unknown locale in bodies other than their own.
Modern/Espionage/Military Mission - Other Words: An Intelligence Agent has been communicating with a person over the internet whom he has never met. The person running the Intel agent (a case officer the Agent has also never met) has asked that the agent stay in touch with, but not meet, with the contact but has not given any details about the contact. The players do not know if the contact is a friendly, a hostile, a mark, an agent, a dupe, an ally, or what they are. All they know is that they occasionally pass encrypted and encoded communications between each other which are then forwarded to other parties without first being decoded or deciphered. The communications are complex and seem vaguely familiar but are not readable. One night while emailing each other on a secure server the contact demands the player or players meet with them and says he has something he must give them. This is strictly against the operational orders you have been given but the contact provides detailed information about you which not even your case officers, family, or friends are aware of. Worse the contact gives detailed background information about both a family member and colleague who disappeared seven years ago, at about the same time, but on different continents. The player is told Three Words and given a location and told that the contact must meet them immediately, it is a matter of national security, and life or death for thousands of people. Right before the contact signs off he sends the player an animated Avatar in an attachment that gives them an internet address in a Virtual World. The address in the Virtual World is the same as a street address in the real city in which both the player and character are operating. (For example say the player is playing in Atlanta, then the Avatar gives a real address in the real city of Atlanta which corresponds to a real address in the fictional game Atlanta as well.)
D&D/Fantasy Adventure - Against the Giants: I got this idea from old D&D adventures I used to play and really enjoy, about infiltrating and destroying the lairs and homes of different types of Giants. It is similar but in this adventure the party is sent out to destroy the lair of a group of giants who have been raiding and decimating human settlements along the frontiers. But as the characters infiltrate farther and farther into the lair of the giants they realize the giants are something very different than what they appear to be. In addition they are far more dangerous than any ordinary giants, but they may also be completely innocent of what they are accused of.
Window of Heaven/Axis of God: This adventure/scenario (or set of adventures) can be fantasy, or horror/weird, modern, or even superhero setting in nature, but would probably work best as horror or fantasy. The characters discover an extremely sacred and ancient Icon, as well as a group of protectors who ask that the party help escort the artifact to safe keeping at the main church in the capital. En route the party is ambushed and most, if not all, the protectors killed, and several party members badly injured. Remembering the tales the protectors told about the Icon being able to heal the sick and injured, and even resurrect the dead the party take it out to look at it. While gazing upon it several of the party members have their souls sucked into the Icon, and their bodies fall inert to the ground as long as their souls remained trapped. An evil, demonic, supernatural force had placed a curse upon the Icon so that it now acts as a covert soul stealing device, and transfers the souls of those stolen into the inner world of the Icon itself, which is populated by dangerous and very evil supernatural creatures who reside there, having themselves been attracted by and entrapped by the curse. The souls of the characters arrive in the Icon stripped of everything, completely naked. However the Icon itself is alive, a sort of Virtual Supernatural World, and is still holy and desires to be free of the curse, and to rid itself of the evil beings within it. The Icon gives clandestine aid and others kinds of assistance to the characters who are within it, and seeks to lead them to secret and hidden clues, relics, artifacts, saints and allies, and weapons and armor within itself that can help the souls of the characters defeat the evil forces and break the curse.
Torsion and Rubric: This is one I've been thinking about doing for a long time. Only recently have I worked out most of the details in my mind and notes. The setting can be most any type of game, such as fantasy, modern, Victorian, adventure, military, espionage, sci-fi/futuristic, superhero, or even weird/horror. The player or players are contacted and called in by what is apparently either the military forces in the area or some type of Intelligence apparatus. It turns out they had a foreign operative working undercover among enemies who have discovered the schematics or design to a new type of ship (it can be Naval, Spaceship, etc.) that possesses a dangerous new type of propulsion system or a dangerous new type of weapon. One that would be a real threat to your government/kingdom/empire/alliance/locality/military (whatever the case). The operative was supposed to have made a rendezvous to pass along information about the new type of ship but never made the meeting. The people who have contacted you want to hire you, because of your past experience in some way (related to operative, same nationality, prior work history, etc.) to go in and investigate, to see if you can find their missing man and recover the information. Once you are emplaced and begin your infiltration and investigation however it becomes clear that nothing is what it appears to be. You find your target but he appears to know nothing of what you speak nor to be anything like described (he is apparently not an operative of any kind, just an ordinary worker). You lose contact with the people running you and you begin to suspect they were not who they presented themselves to be. Furthermore there appears to be no information regarding a new ship at all, however you discover something far more dangerous than a new ship design, propulsion system, or weapon, and it appears you were somehow involved in its creation. Worse still, you begin to discover evidence that you may not even be who you think you are.
Ghost in the Machine: This adventure can be played as a Modern mystery, Horror/Weird, or even possibly a Superhero scenario. It can also be played as an Alternative Reality Game or a Parallel Reality Game. (The number of characters is determined by the number of players plus the NPCs - a number unknown to the players.) A group of people know each other through past personal associations, but some of the group are known only through their internet personas. Everyone in the party plus the NPCs play the same on-line game or are part of the same on-line community (such as Second Life, etc.) They are all involved in the same game/activity and begin playing a new adventure/scenario that seems very strange, bizarre, and challenging. As the game proceeds the players discover that some of the on-line NPCs are not who they claim to be. One is discovered to have died years earlier, another has been a missing persons since a few days after the game started, a third is wanted by the authorities and the players discover from the FBI that this person is known to be on the lam. As the game proceeds clues are also discovered that point to the fact that one or more parry members (those actually participating in the RPG, ARG, or PRG) may not be who they seem to be either. As the game proceeds things begin to occur in real life (in either game terms and/or actual reality) which mimic things occurring within the game, or things occur in the game that mimic real life. (For example a real crime might have occurred in reality and the same type scenario is played out within the game, and/or within the game within the game.) Players begin to have bizarre encounters, both within the game and within the game within the game. They find the missing person but that person refuses to return to the authorities claiming their life in endangered. They see ghosts and virtual people. They are found by bizarre creatures and discover missing or stolen items, and then discover a weird artifact that seems as if it is very ancient, and possibly even alive.
Stile of the Future: This is a scenario/mission I am writing exclusively for my D&D Campaign setting. Outside of Antioch, Syria are the remains of the dwelling place of the little known hermit Andromon, who like Saint Simeon had been a Stylite and lived as an ascetic in the desert atop a column, or pillar. Unlike Simeon, Andromon was not well known or famous except in his local area. However within the Orthodox church he had a loyal and devoted cult following because of his ability to fall into trance and then give uncannily accurate predictions of the near future. Many considered him a Byzantine prophet in the vein of the Old Testament prophets. Andromon had recently died and his body was taken by his friends and buried in secret at an undisclosed location. However his last writings had been smuggled to the church at Constantinople where it was discovered that right before he had died Andromon had built a large and well decorated Stile as a pathway over a cliff face near where he had once dwelt as a boy-shepherd. According to his last writings the Stile had really been an elaborately decorated and encoded prophecy about the next two hundred years of Byzantine future events, including detailed descriptions of coming natural disasters, plagues, wars with the Persians, battles with the Muslims, Viking invasions, and a cryptic reference to an invasion from the supernatural realm. Hoping to find the stile, have it copied, and then the information it contains mugged back to Constantinople for analysis, both the Emperor and the Church hope to use the prophecies to give them an advantage of foreknowledge about the coming years. Unfortunately that area of Syria is now under armed conflict with the Muslims and Persians in bitter and vicious on-going fighting. Suspecting an armed Byzantine invasion would probably fail and possibly plunge Byzantium into war with both the Persians and the Muslims (and the Byzantines would much rather have them fighting each other) it is decided that the Basilegate will be sent disguised as a group of pilgrims to investigate, locate, copy, and if it is real, then possibly help decipher the Stile of Andromon. It is believed that neither the Persians or Muslims are aware of the Stile and therefore pose no direct threat to its discovery but the Byzantines want all record of the mission kept confidential so as not to arouse suspicion, and so the Team will receive no back-up, no re-supply, and no assistance or support of any kind. They alone will know of their mission and purpose. However as the team proceeds to Syria and as they begin their investigations it quickly becomes apparent that if the Persians and Muslims are ignorant of the mission of the Basilegate Team then the same cannot be said for certain supernatural forces closely dogging their heels.
Below is a Crawl, designed with design principles developed in this brief essay:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/245658-essays-game-design.html
The Crawl of Man: The King of Kitharia, on the world of Ghantik has made contact with the human world (our world). That king has sent an embassy to the Court of the Emperor of Byzantium in order to establish good relations between mankind and the Eldeven peoples of Ghantik (Elves, Eladrin, etc). It is decided in council that the Byzantines (eager to investigate just who these strange people from another world really are, and believing that the Eldevens may just be the legendary people of Prester John) will also seek to establish good relations by sending an embassy to the Kitharian Court at Samarkand. Preparations are made for the expedition and it is decided that the Basilegate will be sent as representatives of the emperor as well as two priests representing the Patriarch of Constantinople and the Orthodox Church, along with a number of tributary gifts, including four Roman war dogs, as the Eldeven emissaries have never seen hounds from Earth before. After making the trip to the other world the Basilegate and the priests encamp with their Eldeven guides during the first night of the march to Samarkand. In the morning the party awakes to find they have become separated from their Eldeven guides for unknown reasons and after marching about lost eventually find themselves at a set of huge ancient ruins obviously built by some kind of giant people. Seeking a place of shelter against on-going storms they make camp in the ruins only to find in the morning that the two priests who are accompanying them have also disappeared. The dogs track the missing priests to a small cleft in the mountainside stone which leads to a set of small stone steps descending into a large underground enclosure that seems labyrinthine in design. Meanwhile, above, a large and vicious creature that no one in the party has ever seen before attacks the camp and drives the rest of the party to the cleft. The Byzantine weapons seem to have little permanent effect upon the beast above and the party cannot fight their way through the creature. Alone, on a world they know nothing about, the men of Byzantium and their war hounds are cut off from all aid, with little food, no water, and only the personal gear they carry. They are forced to seek another avenue of escape, or to simply wait and see if their Eldeven guides can find and rescue them in time.
These are not really adventure, scenario, or mission seeds, as much as "grafts," because some of them are far too complicated and developed to be mere seeds. But they can be "adaptive ideas" for others to use in order to develop their own scenes and plotlines.
The description of such scenarios can be as simple, or as complicated in nature, as you'd like to make it, if you'd like to present some adventure ideas of your own in this thread. These are some of my recent ideas.
D&D/Fantasy Adventure - Hide: In this adventure the characters are exposed to some magical device, spell, or curse of which they are completely unaware. However, soon after this occurs grisly murders and vicious crimes begin to appear in any setting in which the characters are operating. At first the crimes appear as if they are targeted at the party and those around the party (such as family, friends, etc.) Only later do the charters begin to realize that some of the clues surrounding the attacks point to the party itself. The entire adventure hook relies upon the fact that one of the party members is the brutal and vicious murderer, but even the killer himself is unaware of his role because the magics or curse involved transforms the character into a brutal and vicious Mr. Hyde type character without the character even being aware this is happening to him. More than one character could become such a "Hyde" and develop such a new sub-conscious "Hide" persona, or the curse or magic may fluctuate between party members, hopping between characters. The player doesn't know who is Hide, and neither do any of the characters until they devise a way to figure out some method of trapping or destroying the Hide. Anyone killed, raped, etc. by the Hide is permanently affected by the crime or attack.
Sci-Fi Scenario - Hide: this is a variant of the Hide adventure above but is caused by a virus, a pathogen, scientific experiment, or alien technology gone awry.
Horror/Weird - Hide: A variant of the Hide scenario caused by supernatural, demonic, cursed, or weird/unexplained, or alien forces.
Sci-Fi Scenario - The Protean Wolf: The crew of an exploration vessel approaches an odd, spherical shaped craft that is apparently deserted. While closing on the vessel certain crew members black out, awakening on the alien vessel. But each crew member (the characters) awake in a body not their own and have only partial memories of their past. They cannot be sure if the people claiming to be their crew mates are really their crew mates. They must explore the alien vessel, find a way off and back to their own vessel while in this state of uncertainty about the identities of each other. In addition there is an alien aboard who can shape shift into any form it desires and it infiltrates the crew members as they explore. A similar scenario could be achieved in a fantasy setting using a shape shifting monster and magic to cause the party members to awaken in an unknown locale in bodies other than their own.
Modern/Espionage/Military Mission - Other Words: An Intelligence Agent has been communicating with a person over the internet whom he has never met. The person running the Intel agent (a case officer the Agent has also never met) has asked that the agent stay in touch with, but not meet, with the contact but has not given any details about the contact. The players do not know if the contact is a friendly, a hostile, a mark, an agent, a dupe, an ally, or what they are. All they know is that they occasionally pass encrypted and encoded communications between each other which are then forwarded to other parties without first being decoded or deciphered. The communications are complex and seem vaguely familiar but are not readable. One night while emailing each other on a secure server the contact demands the player or players meet with them and says he has something he must give them. This is strictly against the operational orders you have been given but the contact provides detailed information about you which not even your case officers, family, or friends are aware of. Worse the contact gives detailed background information about both a family member and colleague who disappeared seven years ago, at about the same time, but on different continents. The player is told Three Words and given a location and told that the contact must meet them immediately, it is a matter of national security, and life or death for thousands of people. Right before the contact signs off he sends the player an animated Avatar in an attachment that gives them an internet address in a Virtual World. The address in the Virtual World is the same as a street address in the real city in which both the player and character are operating. (For example say the player is playing in Atlanta, then the Avatar gives a real address in the real city of Atlanta which corresponds to a real address in the fictional game Atlanta as well.)
D&D/Fantasy Adventure - Against the Giants: I got this idea from old D&D adventures I used to play and really enjoy, about infiltrating and destroying the lairs and homes of different types of Giants. It is similar but in this adventure the party is sent out to destroy the lair of a group of giants who have been raiding and decimating human settlements along the frontiers. But as the characters infiltrate farther and farther into the lair of the giants they realize the giants are something very different than what they appear to be. In addition they are far more dangerous than any ordinary giants, but they may also be completely innocent of what they are accused of.
Window of Heaven/Axis of God: This adventure/scenario (or set of adventures) can be fantasy, or horror/weird, modern, or even superhero setting in nature, but would probably work best as horror or fantasy. The characters discover an extremely sacred and ancient Icon, as well as a group of protectors who ask that the party help escort the artifact to safe keeping at the main church in the capital. En route the party is ambushed and most, if not all, the protectors killed, and several party members badly injured. Remembering the tales the protectors told about the Icon being able to heal the sick and injured, and even resurrect the dead the party take it out to look at it. While gazing upon it several of the party members have their souls sucked into the Icon, and their bodies fall inert to the ground as long as their souls remained trapped. An evil, demonic, supernatural force had placed a curse upon the Icon so that it now acts as a covert soul stealing device, and transfers the souls of those stolen into the inner world of the Icon itself, which is populated by dangerous and very evil supernatural creatures who reside there, having themselves been attracted by and entrapped by the curse. The souls of the characters arrive in the Icon stripped of everything, completely naked. However the Icon itself is alive, a sort of Virtual Supernatural World, and is still holy and desires to be free of the curse, and to rid itself of the evil beings within it. The Icon gives clandestine aid and others kinds of assistance to the characters who are within it, and seeks to lead them to secret and hidden clues, relics, artifacts, saints and allies, and weapons and armor within itself that can help the souls of the characters defeat the evil forces and break the curse.
Torsion and Rubric: This is one I've been thinking about doing for a long time. Only recently have I worked out most of the details in my mind and notes. The setting can be most any type of game, such as fantasy, modern, Victorian, adventure, military, espionage, sci-fi/futuristic, superhero, or even weird/horror. The player or players are contacted and called in by what is apparently either the military forces in the area or some type of Intelligence apparatus. It turns out they had a foreign operative working undercover among enemies who have discovered the schematics or design to a new type of ship (it can be Naval, Spaceship, etc.) that possesses a dangerous new type of propulsion system or a dangerous new type of weapon. One that would be a real threat to your government/kingdom/empire/alliance/locality/military (whatever the case). The operative was supposed to have made a rendezvous to pass along information about the new type of ship but never made the meeting. The people who have contacted you want to hire you, because of your past experience in some way (related to operative, same nationality, prior work history, etc.) to go in and investigate, to see if you can find their missing man and recover the information. Once you are emplaced and begin your infiltration and investigation however it becomes clear that nothing is what it appears to be. You find your target but he appears to know nothing of what you speak nor to be anything like described (he is apparently not an operative of any kind, just an ordinary worker). You lose contact with the people running you and you begin to suspect they were not who they presented themselves to be. Furthermore there appears to be no information regarding a new ship at all, however you discover something far more dangerous than a new ship design, propulsion system, or weapon, and it appears you were somehow involved in its creation. Worse still, you begin to discover evidence that you may not even be who you think you are.
Ghost in the Machine: This adventure can be played as a Modern mystery, Horror/Weird, or even possibly a Superhero scenario. It can also be played as an Alternative Reality Game or a Parallel Reality Game. (The number of characters is determined by the number of players plus the NPCs - a number unknown to the players.) A group of people know each other through past personal associations, but some of the group are known only through their internet personas. Everyone in the party plus the NPCs play the same on-line game or are part of the same on-line community (such as Second Life, etc.) They are all involved in the same game/activity and begin playing a new adventure/scenario that seems very strange, bizarre, and challenging. As the game proceeds the players discover that some of the on-line NPCs are not who they claim to be. One is discovered to have died years earlier, another has been a missing persons since a few days after the game started, a third is wanted by the authorities and the players discover from the FBI that this person is known to be on the lam. As the game proceeds clues are also discovered that point to the fact that one or more parry members (those actually participating in the RPG, ARG, or PRG) may not be who they seem to be either. As the game proceeds things begin to occur in real life (in either game terms and/or actual reality) which mimic things occurring within the game, or things occur in the game that mimic real life. (For example a real crime might have occurred in reality and the same type scenario is played out within the game, and/or within the game within the game.) Players begin to have bizarre encounters, both within the game and within the game within the game. They find the missing person but that person refuses to return to the authorities claiming their life in endangered. They see ghosts and virtual people. They are found by bizarre creatures and discover missing or stolen items, and then discover a weird artifact that seems as if it is very ancient, and possibly even alive.
Stile of the Future: This is a scenario/mission I am writing exclusively for my D&D Campaign setting. Outside of Antioch, Syria are the remains of the dwelling place of the little known hermit Andromon, who like Saint Simeon had been a Stylite and lived as an ascetic in the desert atop a column, or pillar. Unlike Simeon, Andromon was not well known or famous except in his local area. However within the Orthodox church he had a loyal and devoted cult following because of his ability to fall into trance and then give uncannily accurate predictions of the near future. Many considered him a Byzantine prophet in the vein of the Old Testament prophets. Andromon had recently died and his body was taken by his friends and buried in secret at an undisclosed location. However his last writings had been smuggled to the church at Constantinople where it was discovered that right before he had died Andromon had built a large and well decorated Stile as a pathway over a cliff face near where he had once dwelt as a boy-shepherd. According to his last writings the Stile had really been an elaborately decorated and encoded prophecy about the next two hundred years of Byzantine future events, including detailed descriptions of coming natural disasters, plagues, wars with the Persians, battles with the Muslims, Viking invasions, and a cryptic reference to an invasion from the supernatural realm. Hoping to find the stile, have it copied, and then the information it contains mugged back to Constantinople for analysis, both the Emperor and the Church hope to use the prophecies to give them an advantage of foreknowledge about the coming years. Unfortunately that area of Syria is now under armed conflict with the Muslims and Persians in bitter and vicious on-going fighting. Suspecting an armed Byzantine invasion would probably fail and possibly plunge Byzantium into war with both the Persians and the Muslims (and the Byzantines would much rather have them fighting each other) it is decided that the Basilegate will be sent disguised as a group of pilgrims to investigate, locate, copy, and if it is real, then possibly help decipher the Stile of Andromon. It is believed that neither the Persians or Muslims are aware of the Stile and therefore pose no direct threat to its discovery but the Byzantines want all record of the mission kept confidential so as not to arouse suspicion, and so the Team will receive no back-up, no re-supply, and no assistance or support of any kind. They alone will know of their mission and purpose. However as the team proceeds to Syria and as they begin their investigations it quickly becomes apparent that if the Persians and Muslims are ignorant of the mission of the Basilegate Team then the same cannot be said for certain supernatural forces closely dogging their heels.
Below is a Crawl, designed with design principles developed in this brief essay:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/245658-essays-game-design.html
The Crawl of Man: The King of Kitharia, on the world of Ghantik has made contact with the human world (our world). That king has sent an embassy to the Court of the Emperor of Byzantium in order to establish good relations between mankind and the Eldeven peoples of Ghantik (Elves, Eladrin, etc). It is decided in council that the Byzantines (eager to investigate just who these strange people from another world really are, and believing that the Eldevens may just be the legendary people of Prester John) will also seek to establish good relations by sending an embassy to the Kitharian Court at Samarkand. Preparations are made for the expedition and it is decided that the Basilegate will be sent as representatives of the emperor as well as two priests representing the Patriarch of Constantinople and the Orthodox Church, along with a number of tributary gifts, including four Roman war dogs, as the Eldeven emissaries have never seen hounds from Earth before. After making the trip to the other world the Basilegate and the priests encamp with their Eldeven guides during the first night of the march to Samarkand. In the morning the party awakes to find they have become separated from their Eldeven guides for unknown reasons and after marching about lost eventually find themselves at a set of huge ancient ruins obviously built by some kind of giant people. Seeking a place of shelter against on-going storms they make camp in the ruins only to find in the morning that the two priests who are accompanying them have also disappeared. The dogs track the missing priests to a small cleft in the mountainside stone which leads to a set of small stone steps descending into a large underground enclosure that seems labyrinthine in design. Meanwhile, above, a large and vicious creature that no one in the party has ever seen before attacks the camp and drives the rest of the party to the cleft. The Byzantine weapons seem to have little permanent effect upon the beast above and the party cannot fight their way through the creature. Alone, on a world they know nothing about, the men of Byzantium and their war hounds are cut off from all aid, with little food, no water, and only the personal gear they carry. They are forced to seek another avenue of escape, or to simply wait and see if their Eldeven guides can find and rescue them in time.
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