Welcome to Fill in The Gap, a column devoted to individual, "one-off" scenarios, that any GM can run for his/her group.
This month's scenario will be the last for this column. Appropriately, it's about the dead...
If you need to know more about the FITG(Fill in The Gap) system/column, please check out the first (and second) of these monthly columns. Without further ado, I bring you today's scenario:
As always, if you're going to play in this scenario (run by your favorite GM) then please read no further, for fear of spoilage.
Today's is a scenario for three players. In today's scenario, each player will take on the role of an unaging, untiring, vengeful undead - hellbent on revenge.
The Premise
Restless is a scenario about three murdered souls coming back from hell together to get revenge against the LightTech Corporation's CEO for their murders, set in the modern era with a villainous corporation as their target. Each player takes on the role of an undead creature, one a super-strong but slow and voiceless ghoul, another a flexible skeleton, and the last literally a shadow of his old self. At least, that's what the players should think when the game starts.
What's really going on, is that each character was created by the LightTech corporation's main rival, DarkTronics and implanted with false (to the point of being contradictory) memories. Each of the player's characters have been granted their own slew of supernatural powers that they can use to cause murder and mayhem on their proposed target - but that's not what this scenario is really about. Fighting their way through the "evil" corporation's ranks and to the office of the CEO of LightTech will not be a difficult challenge - the real challenge will be in determining just how much of their humanity is leftover after their transformation.
To accomplish this objective, the GM (you) has to be somewhat circumspect - planting seeds of doubt in their mind, reminding them of their former humanity, and describing in lurid detail the horror of the havoc that they wreak on innocents (if they do). Another important step is giving the player's their "backstories" privately, but encouraging (without it seeming obvious, maybe via an in character NPC action) the players to share with each other their false memories.
Eventually, most players will either murder, maim, and destroy LightTech and everyone who works there from the ground up - at which point the scenario is over, and they should be presented with the reality of what they've done. Another possibility is they turn on their DarkTronics masters, who are vastly more powered, and should be a more challenging and standard type adventure campaign with three heroes facing tough odds, but each with a collection of interesting and unique tricks (described in the characters section, you're encouraged to use whatever system can compensate for their unique abilities that you'd like).
In the characters section, you'll find details about the three character's implanted memories, and the unique powers and traits their undead forms give them.
In the setting section, you'll get a quick rundown of LightTech, DarkTronics, and the current state of the world RE: their common reactions to being faced with the undead.
In the events section, you'll get a list of interesting encounters that can occur at both LightTech and DarkTronics, which you can pick and choose from among to make the final scenario.
Please note: The point of this scenario, when all is said and done, is to take some horrifically obvious black and white moral choices and hackneyed plot-devices as well as obvious supernatural elements and piss-poor symbology, and then paste over the top of them a complicated moral story of betrayal and sadness with realistic horror blended in. It might not work for some people, since there's a lot of intentional cognitive dissonance being generated, but the scenario with the right group can be pretty rewarding. The trick is to play it with people who play any material, no matter how ridiculous, completely straight. Which is something most role-players have experience at. It's also to see how much you can dish out with a straight face, and how much your players will tolerate of the most mind-bendingly simple and obvious crap before either turning on you, or questioning what the hell's REALLY going on.
The Characters
John Winn - John Winn's implanted memories are those of someone who in life was a champion Martial Artist. He'd had his martial arts career invested in heavily by the CEO of LightTech - who, on the eve of his championship title fight, told him he had to throw the fight or else. John, being an honorable (fictional) man, refused. He and his family were murdered - he went to hell and was offered a chance to join two others to get revenge on LightTech, and its CEO. John's undead form is a kung-fu shadow, capable of hopping between any shadows he can see, and extremely agile, as well as a tough and brutal hand to hand fighter.
Michael Bee - Michael's implanted memories are those of a young teenager from an abusive home, whose parents had both died. Adopted by a loving couple, both employees of LightTech, he became a champion swimmer. As a young adult, he was in the Olympics, sponsored to go by LightTech. On the eve of the main Olympics swim event, he received a note telling him he'd better throw the match - or else. He didn't pay it any attention, and won the match anyways. Sure enough, he and his parents were murdered - he went to hell, and was offered a chance to come back and join two others wronged by LightTech to get revenge. Michael is a hulking, rotting, festering ghoul. Incapable of speech, but horrific to behold and disgusting, as well as brutally large and strong (able to lift small cars).
Sarah Harke - Sarah's implanted memories are those of a young teen Olympic gymnast, murdered by LightTech's CEO when she refused to throw a match (despite his sponsoring her). Offered the same deal as the others, she was given the opportunity to come back and join them to right their and her wrongs and get revenge on LightTech. Sarah's powers are those of a flexible skeleton - impervious to harm and able to separate any portion of her body, as well as superhuman strength and agility (neither of which quite matching to the shadow's agility, or the ghoul's strength - she falls somewhere in between on both).
The Setting
LightTech is a non-profit pharmaceutical company, devoted (on the surface) to curing puppies of cancer. Digging deeper - it's true, they're actually devoted to curing all types of cancer, they just focus especially on puppy cancer for PR reasons. LightTech employs many many scientists, researchers, and other philanthropists. Its CEO - Mr. Raven, is a kindhearted old gentleman. When killed, many LightTech employees would likely rasp "why" with their dying breaths.
DarkTronics is primarily a company that purchases waste products from other companies, and reconstitutes them into products that are generally unsafe - but hey at least they recycle. Their CEO, Dr. Ivans, lost a sports bet for a large amount of money to Mr. Raven - hence his creating (out of toxic waste products and abducted folk) three horrific undead monsters to destroy him.
LightTech employees (and most people) have never at this time or in this setting seen anything as monstrous or terrifying as the three main characters, so they should generally freeze, flee, shriek, or scatter when confronted with them. DarkTronics employees on the other hand know too well what they are, so although they'll still shriek and run, it'll be knowingly.
DarkTronics employees a lot of security, and is heavily armed and tightly guarded, which is the opposite of LightTech.
Basically - LightTech should seem too good to be true, and DarkTronics should be revealed to be evil incarnate. The clues should be obvious enough that players, if they stop for even a second to think about what they're doing, should find it appalling or insane (or both).
The Events
Below is a list of the events that can occur at LightTech and DarkTronics, please feel free to mix and match what order they occur in, or make up your own as well!
Puppy-Cancer lab - Basically a lab full of puppies at LightTech, being researched (gently) for cancer saving. Puppies researched in this way are unharmed (unless your players go all out.)
DarkTronics ads - On the street outside LightTech, ads for DarkTronics can be found stapled or plastered on many different objects in that obnoxious product placement sort of way - so that the players are aware of them.
DoppleMonsters! - At DarkTronics, monsters similar to the players can fight them - they should have similar but slightly weaker stats.
The Board Room. - At LightTech, Mr. Raven is sitting at the end of a table, working late trying to balance the books so as to guarantee the most non-profit. When encountered, he'll at first be horrified, but if he's not insta-dispatched, he'll try to reach out an olive branch and/or offer to take any (or all three) to the hospital to get medical attention for their deformities.
Sports fans - The first, and several subsequent people that they meet at LightTech and actually have a conversation with (about anything, either while torturing them or whatever) are sports fans. Either they Olympics memorabilia in their cubicles, or something else (like a baseball cap), they should be aware of the character's tragic histories (since professional athletes aren't murdered that often). But since they're all fake memories, the sports fans are NOT aware of them or have heard of any of them.
DarkTronics Obfuscation - People at DarkTronics will try to confuse them, convince them that the LightTech people have tricked them, remind them of their histories (to the point of bringing them up even if the characters haven't) to try to stop them if they're attacking Darktronics.
The Final Board Room - Dr. Ivans is in the boardroom at DarkTronics, but instead of being oblivious to the situation, he's been getting ready. He's a giant cyborg monstrosity with machine guns for arms! He should provide a challenge for the characters, but they should be able to beat him.
Anything Else - Basically, anything else you can think of that's obvious and crazy and evil at DarkTronics (like robot-monsters etc.) for the gameplay stuff there, and anything as sad and sympathetic and depressing at LightTech for the players to accidentally destroy in their mad bloodlust and need to play with their "kewl powerz".
The end
Let me know what you thought of this scenario by E-mailing me at Msturnbull@comcast.net
Thanks for reading over this last year+ - hope to write for you all again someday.
