Unholy food and drink [Horror]

[AlexanderHowl]

Imagine a situation where food and drink are made from plants grown on defiled graveyards or violated burial grounds. What would be a properly horrific consequence to consuming bread made from grain grown on a violated burial ground in the USA? How would you use such things in your horror campaigns?

[Gold & Appel Inc]

Your stomach is now haunted by a Poltergastro, of course.

[Flyndaran]

I'm pretty sure that's been the starting point of many zombie movies and even some games.

One could have those that eat it become susceptible to ghostly powers or straight possession.
A nice method for a sorcerer to bring back his previously vanquished minions.
Say, doesn't one of the PC's have a loved one with a friendly new neighbor about to have a large BBQ?

[AlexanderHowl]

Of course, another possibility would be to have the food and drink become a method of mutation. If the mutation rate is monthly, the changes might be slow enough that the residents don't recognize that anything is necessarily wrong. As long as each negative mutation is balanced by a positive mutation, they might not even care that they are mutating, as they will likely rationalize away concerns about the negative mutations.

For example, let us imagine that every month of consuming the unholy food and drink grown on a violated burial ground an average of once per day would give the character 1 CP of advantages and 1 CP of disadvantages. After five months, one character might gain Sharp Claws [5] and Berserk (15-) [-5] while another character might gain Magery 0 [5] and Xenophilia (12-) [-5]. After five years, the two characters would be mutated to a phenomenal extent, even if though they might not necessarily be showing any physical symptoms.

[Flyndaran]

I suppose it really depends on whether you want it to be an individual adventure, the kick off point of a monster hunting campaign, or full on apocalypse.

Also an important point that any player would wonder is what makes this defiled graveyard so special. Or if this danger is as common as any mundane disaster.

[AlexanderHowl]

It could be common, and the only reason it is not more of a problem is because it is diluted by the modern food system.

[Varyon]

The Brand of Sacrifice from Berserk could be used as inspiration, attracting malevolent spirits that could possess corpses, animals, etc to assault the character(s). How numerous/powerful they are could be influenced by how much unholy sustenance had been consumed recently; I’d put the effect on par with the Brand for someone who has eaten and drunk only such fare for the last 3 days (or longer), with the effect weakening the more normal fare had been consumed instead.

[DangerousThing]

One problem in the modern day is that it is common for places to be built over old graveyards.

[AlexanderHowl]

Yes, though the majority of them are properly dealt with according to the traditions of the appropriate religion (though this is usually not the case with Native American burial grounds). Tainted homes and corrupted schools are also established tropes for horror though and, if the authorities cover up the evidence, they would only be known through folklore and urban myths. A rate of 1 CP of positive traits and 1 CP of negative traits per month would probably still work though, as it would be a gradual enough change that people would attribute changes to natural causes.

[Alden Loveshade]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Imagine a situation where food and drink are made from plants grown on defiled graveyards or violated burial grounds.

This may be somewhat off topic, but what about flowers planted on graveyards? Perhaps bending over and smelling their aroma could have an affect.