[MH] Monster Hunters Adventure Seeds

[dcarson]

MH has mad science. So a Honey I Shrunk the Adventurers could make a interesting session.

[Jariel]

Zombies: Day One Savage Streets (Pg.17-22) This is more of a campaign than an adventure seed.
The PC's start off at 200 points (MH:4), have the same Patron (this can be a zero point campaign feature if you want) and start off non-supernatural. They could all be part of some inter-government task force/ private mercenary group/ etc. The first few missions are mundane and don't have a lot of weird stuff(Magic, Psi, etc.) Basic missions include fighting zombies, taking down dealers, and stoping the situation from getting any worse. Eventually the PC's will come across something unexpected or supernatural and probably lose since they weren't prepared for it. If they retreat, triumph, or have to be rescued then their Patron reveals the truth (or as much as the Patron knows). The PC's then go though a "Training Montage" and add one of the 200 point upgrade lenses to the basic PC. Then the missions are to stop the drug supply and maybe even to defeat the source of the drugs.
Some ideas:
The drugs were created by the aliens form MH:5
Why? The Nordics created the drugs to control humans. Something either went horribly wrong or this is just a minor glitch. The Greys may be studying the situation and could use the chaos to kidnap people for experiments. The Reptoids will be exploiting the chaos to kidnap people as well, but for food and will also enjoy the chance to cause some violence.
Demons: They are also taking advantage of the situation by spreading the drugs and making deals with people for their souls. Angles are also around and smiting every one they can.

[Jariel]

Other Groups: Various other factions could get involved for whatever reason. Nearly anyone from MH:3 could be used in some form or another. Intelligent beings will find use the chaos to advance their agenda and cryptids could be a change of pace fight.
Other Missions: What happens when a Demon meets a Grey, how do the Reptiods react to a Were, throw in Psis, Witches, Crusaders, Experiments and half the time the PC's will be trying to contain the various turf wars between the various alien and supernatural groups. This is in addition to having to stop the drug zombies and dealers, and real zombies are also likely to show up at some point. The only silver lining is that the secret is relatively secure. Their Patron can keep a lid on things and the various groups defiantly don't want to draw even more attention to themselves.

[nick_coffin]

I'll add a link to the adventure idea that spawned this thread:

Monster Hunters: The ATL - Mission Briefing

[Anders]

The Zombie Apocalypse - with added high-schoolers.

I'll just let you watch this video and see what you come up with... :)

[Captain Joy]

Genre: Horror
Time: Renaissance
Place: Florence, Italy
No. Players: 2
Character Points: 200
Time Committment: one-shot

Madelena Devoured

If asked, use,
Name: Monster
Password: Hunters

Spoiler:  

As written, the MHs are up against s single werewolf. If the are more PCs, just add more werewolves.

[ericthered]

I'm noting the numbers here, and this one may have ended up being a little under ambitious.

Ghost in the Shell
Magic, Robotics. Investigation

Robert Shelby is a robotics genius with a greedy bent: his personal goal for wealth is 100 million dollars. After seeing his inventions go to make his employers millions (in his eyes) while only netting him a 50,000$ a year, he quit and turned to crime, using automation to aid anonymity in his exploits. Then he ran into Raymond Corfeld. Raymond is a mage specializing in the paths of mind and matter: specifically binding the minds of humans to material objects and enslaving them to do his will. When he discovered Mr. Shelby, he knew he'd hit pay dirt. Corfeld needed good power sources and a mundane explanation for his creations (for whatever reason the secret is kept in your world). Shelby needed true AI.

The two generally stage high-profile hits on banks and other lucrative targets. Their tools of choice include self-driving vans, quad-copters with small guns mounted, tracked robots with larger guns mounted, and tracked robots with a long arm on them for opening doors and whatnot.

Their victims are taken from the same general population as most monsters keen on keeping a low profile. They do like to go after experienced thieves and gunman though, as these targets make for more accomplished robots!

The robots can only see via video cameras. Most of the time these will be relatively cheap, but speciality cameras (such as infrared or night vision) are completely within the gang's capabilities.

Its worth pointing out the magic on these robots can be countered if a mage figures out what's going on. If the central computer is opened and inspected for DNA, it will reveal the identity of the man killed to create it. The mind lives in a small computer (-8 SM), and as long as the computer is undamaged, the mind is intact. The team has raided the police to get the chips before.

The statistics given here are for robots made from 'civilians' given a modicum of training. robots made from thugs will have higher gun scores, and if Shelby and Corfeld get their hands on a campion, they're likely to build a custom chasis for him.

Quadcopter:
ST 4 DX 10 IQ 10 HT 10
Speed 6 Move 6(flight only) DR 2
Backup auto pistol - 10
Unliving, reprogramable, enhanced move 1 (x2 speed), flight, NFM

The quadcopters are meant to serve as scouts, not front line troops.

Tracked Vehicle:
ST 12 DX 10 IQ 10 HT 10
Speed 3 Move 4 DR 12
Assulat riffle - 10
OR has long arm and remove NFM
Unliving, reprogramable, enhanced move 2 (x4 speed), tracks, NFM

Tracked vehicles form the core of the assault force the team uses.

When the heroes assault the lab where the villians are hiding out, they'll come across turrets. These have a heavy machine gun in them, experienced gunners (gunner -14), and a DR 50 chassis. The slit the gun fire out (and the camera uses to aim) has a -8 to hit penalty. They can't move, but they can pivot. Cutting the power to the base is a good idea, but there are several backup generators.

The lab itself is horrendous: the 'traditional trappings' used to make the spell stronger and cheaper include cutting open the patient and smearing a piece of his brain on the chip while he is still alive and strapped to the table.

Build Corfeld as a savant rouge mage with two good paths and ritual mastery.

RPM Ritual: Bind Mind
This ritual takes mind of a person slain during the ritual and puts it in charge of a machine. Power sources are required.

Greater Transform Mind, lesser transform matter
duration, weight (of machine), altered traits (reprogramable)
Greater effects 1 (x3)

Typical Casting (tracked robot): Greater Transform mind (8)+ lesser transform matter(8)+ altered traits reprogramable (2) +duration 1 month (11) + weight (300 lbs) (3) = 28*3 =84
Typical Casting (Self Driving Van): Greater Transform mind (8)+ lesser transform matter(8)+ altered traits reprogramable (2) +duration 1 month (11) + weight (3000 lbs) (5) = 30*3 =90

Bringing this challenge into a campaign is usually a matter of the techie noticing the AI of the machines is unnatural, the mage noticing that the robots have a magical component, or via tracking down the trail of disappearances that fuel the robot's minds.

[ericthered]

The False Were-Wolves
Plauge, Curse, non-lethal

A recent archelogical dig has turned up a figurine about 5 inches tall in the shape of a classic 'wolf-man'. The item is not particuarly valuable -- the sort of thing that gets displayed by a small museum along with a dozen other items in a single case. It is, however, cursed. When touched by a human, it releases a pathogen that allows it to transform people into bestial creatures in its own form. Both the pathogen and the mystic figurine are required for the effect. Without the idol, the disease is a transitory infection (HT-1, 1d-4 (negative is 0) tox, symptoms are limited to minor aches in limbs). Within about 2 miles of the statue, its not only much more virtulent, but can transform its victims.

The transformation requires the victim to be concious and only happens after dark. Then all waking hosts with the beast-man symptom in range of the figurine must make a roll against Will -4 (don't count the symptom penalty) or transform into a beast man. Transformed beast men attack untransformed humans on sight, fighting hand to hand with claws. They will not cease their attack until one of the two is down (which can be terrifying if they are attacking a loved one of the host). This is in many ways similar to a zombie plauge, but in this case the victims can possibly be recovered -- so its worth hunters' effort to be non-lethal. Of course, the civillian population will talk about were-wolves, which these obviously aren't. The plauge probably won't effect any PC's -- its not strong enough.

The figurine will continue to spread its pathogen as long as it exists. Attempts to treat the plauge can provide a temporary relief! Of course, the plauge will keep on coming back, and the GM should hint to the PC's that this plauge has a source. The will of the figurine is 20. It can be smashed instead -- doing so will release the plauge one last time at HT-6, and may make the unwitting owners upset.

False Lycanthropy
Vector: respitory
Resistance: HT-4
Incubation: 8 hours
Damage: 1 tox (20 8-hour cycles)
Symptoms: 1/4 HP: moderate pain (focused in limbs), -2 to self control and will rolls
1/2 HP: beast-man

Beast-Man:
+5 ST
+2 move
night vision 5
high pain tolerance
Intominable
-1 appearance
Bestial
Bad Temper
Blood Lust
Claws

[ericthered]

The Haunted Lair of Chorzda
Ghosts, Demons, Traps, Investigation

From the player's perspective:

The McCune's old house has been abandoned for decades. Once the town pastor, the McCunes were given a house via a mysterious man who showed up in town, built a large and magestic house, and died soon there-after, leaving it to the McCunes. Gossip spread about what really happened, but Pastor McCune seemed to be above reproach -- he was an ideal pastor, a beacon of goodness, a man of integrity. After the first McCune died, his son followed in his steps. He also seemed to be a good man.

Then tradegy and damning mystery struck all at once. The Pastor failed to show up for the morning meeting on one sunday. The congregation waited for an hour. Then a boy came running up shouting that the family had been brutally murdered.

It was true. Each family member had been slain, all by some sick and inventive villian who used a knife, fire, and had the strength to break limbs at will. The youngest child, 13 year old naomi, was thought to have died a particuarly lingering death, tortured in the center of a room.

The body of a stranger was found in the place as well. It was an old man. Rumor said it looked like the man who built the house in the first place. A man rumoured to have died decades ago, and who was certainly not young enough to have survived this long.

The case made headlines for a long time, but the authorities couldn't figure out who was behind the killings. They searched far and wide, but in the end the case was dropped: The murder had disapeared without a trace. No one wanted to take the house, fine though it may be. It fell into disrepair, and was declared haunted. The townsfolk couldn't seem to decide was haunting it: the spirit of the old man who was cheated out of the house by the greedy pastor McCune? The tortured little girl Naomi? The grandfather of the little girl, who killed the family in the first place? The mysterious body, the betrayed partner of the killer who got away? The father of the family, bent on revenge for the sadistic murderer who walked free?

Boys dared each other into the house, but none of them stayed long. A few days ago, a boy was found dead just inside the house, a knife in his chest. Its a job for the party: a traditional ghost job.

------------------------------------------------------------
The real story :

Chorzda is a demon lord of immense power. 120 years ago, he got a cult dedicated to summoning him. They were opposed by a powerful wizard named Samuel Hillman. Samuel, one of the greatest banishers of our age, fought Chorzda five times, each time sending him back to the abyss. Finding the cult particularly resilient, and himself getting slower and older year by year, Mr. Hillman resolved to put Chorzda out of reach of the cult permanently.

He had a massive house built with a solid stone foundation, and thick, massive, floors. He summoned Chorzda himself and bound the demon to a glass bottle with iron bands. Additional wards and alarms were placed around the bottle and the trap door to the chamber was sealed under four layers of concrete. He left the house to the town preacher and his successors in his 'will' (faking death for a mage of his calibre was trivial) in hopes of placing a thick ward around the site, and permanently. He put himself in stasis, waking once a year to check on the site and renew the charms. The Chorzda cult finally seemed stalled out, and its members dissipated, dying in the service of lesser (or at least less successful) dark entities. Chorzda stayed in the basement of the house.

Of course, even the best laid plans can fail. The last cultist of Chorzda, Simon Moulder, a dark mage of not inconsiderable power, did not give up on his dark master. He knew Samuel Hillman was behind his lord's unresponsiveness, and sought the wizard. He tracked Mr. Hillman's movements in the past, and found out about the house. A mage's strength is in preparation. Simon talked his way into the house, and ambushed and killed Samuel as he came to renew the enchantments. The preacher's family (it was the first man's son) was brutally tortured to death, the trap door opened, and the protections breached -- or rather most of them were breached. Simon tripped a ward, and was killed in the resulting explosion, damaging the glass bottle in which the demon was sealed. The trapdoor sealed itself without trace, and when the family was discovered the community was horrified. The investigation was cut short by the very spells designed to keep attention away from the house. The body of Simon was never found, and Mr. Hillman didn't appear to be the killer. Or at least not the sole killer.

The house is clearly haunted. The community, to the extent that they believe in ghosts, believes that the haunters are the murdered family hoping their killer will be brought to justice. Mr. Hillman feature's prominently, either a fellow victim, a wandering psychopath, or a partner in the killings betrayed by his fellows. There are four 'ghosts' there. Simon Moulder, Samuel Hillman, Naomi McCune (the 13 year old daughter of the pastor, grand-daughter of the original, the primary target of the torture), and a shadow of Chorzda slowly leaking out of the bottle. Attacking with spells and ghost blasters can temporarily clear out the ghosts, but they will return soon enough -- the humans to their anchors, and shadows of Chorzda splitting off the main shadow.

[ericthered]

Haunted Lair of Chorzda (part 2)

Naomi McCune -- Naomi McCune was 13 years old when she was tortured in front of her family for information about Samuel Hillman and Chorzda. She is stuck in those moments, screaming out throughout the house to make the pain stop. She will scream out the questions she was killed over. If anyone is being sneaky or casting magic in the house, she will attack and attempt to kill them. She should be considered a combination of a confusion anchor and an incomplete task anchor. Any psychology rolls to talk her into leaving are at -10 until the other ghosts are gone, but she won't automatically leave once avenged. She'll need to be talked into leaving or banished some other way. If her body is destroyed, she will return in 48 hours.

ST 7 DX 10 IQ 6 HT 14
HP 20 Will 14 Per 11 FP 20
No Self Awareness
Communication
Poltergiest (TK 10)

Simon Moulder -- Simon's ghost is bound both to the skeleton in the basement, and to his cause of bringing his dark master back. His ghost is quite lucid. He has trouble with time, but has a good grasp of the situation and his new powers. He cannot leave the building, but has made several attempts to gain mortal minions. Simon's main strength is his lucidity. He's an obsessed individual, but he was that before he died. He's aware he died, and aware most people won't be sympathetic to his cause. He's also a practised liar.

Simon's ghost cannot be sent on without access to his skeleton. He will reform in 12 hours.

ST 10 DX 12 IQ 14 HT 16
HP 25 Will 18 Per 14 FP 30
High Self Awareness
Communication
Materialization
Poltergiest (20)
Possession

Samuel Hillman -- Samuel is the most powerful ghost in the house, but has low self-awareness. He is unaware he is dead, but is aware that Simon is present and has the upper hand on him, stuck in the last few moments of their struggle (and daydreams of winning the fight in the house). While he has stronger abilities than Simon, he is unaware he can no longer cast magic, and spends much of his time attempting to recast spells and get the upper hand on Simon (Which of course fail without his magery). He attributes all of his failures to 'that wicked cultist'.

Samuel died with a number of charms on him. Unlike his spells, these CAN produce real effects. He will only each one once per encounter, but they seem to return to him as soon as his mental context changes. Improper banishing results in his return in 6 hours

ST 12 DX 13 IQ 16 HT 16
HP 30 Will 22 Per 14 FP 40
Low Self Awareness
Communication
Materialization
Poltergiest (30)
Charms

The Shadow of Chorzda -- Bits and pieces of Chorzda's essence are leaking out of the broken bottle, and pieces of that are escaping out of the damaged wards in the basement. The parts outside of the basement have no intellect, only hunger: hunger to kill, and hunger to escape. The small pieces are statted below. Its worth noting the shadow is effected by the path of spirit, not undead. There are two or three of these pieces floating around, and the GM should feel free to split more off the main body if the ward containing the main shadow is disturbed.

ST 0 DX 10 IQ 1 HT 14
HP 15 Per 10 Will 14 FP 20
Spirit (Insubstantial, never invisible, appears as dark black cloud)
death touch 2d tox (living only)

Inner Shadow:
The inner shadow is as willy and cunning as any demon. Its resilient, adaptable, and tough. It is not bound to the house, and if released from its ward will try to find mortal assistance to
ST 30 DX 14 IQ 14 HT 14
HP 30 Per 13 Will 15 FP 20
Move 10, speed 8.00,
Very Fast Regeneration (3 HP/Sec), Damage resistance /2, extra attack 1, standard demonic traits
Magery 2,
Spirit Form: (Insubstantial, never invisible, 3d tox)
Demon Form: Homogeneous, claws, teeth, DR 10, sword

Chorzda:

ST 45 DX 16 IQ 16 HT 14
HP 45 Per 15 will 20 FP 20
Move 10, speed 8.00,
Very Fast Regeneration (4 HP/Sec), Damage resistance /4, extra attack 4, standard demonic traits
Spirit Form: (Insubstantial, never invisible, 3d tox)
Demon Form: Homogeneous, claws, teeth, DR 10, sword
Morph (flawed, animals or demons, solid, 250 point budget) (ST +10, DX +4, IQ +6, HT +4 to base form, remains homogenous)

Players often will not be able to triumph over Chorzda. Ideally they will be able to avoid him completely. If this is not the case, they may have to settle for escape. Or the GM may call in backup. (a full blown angel should be a bit weaker than Chorzda)

Charms and Wards:
Only a few charms and wards protecting the seal remain:
General dimensional anchor over the entire basement (no gates or teleports)
Self-Sealing Trap Door -- If there are no humans in the basement, the floor will seal itself -- inhuman PC's may end up trapped!
An Insanity effect on the general ward breach line -- effects human minds that come to close, destroys all memories.
A weakened ward against Spirit beings (the one keeping in the main shadow)
The Bottle Itself: DR 15, HP 1, powerful warding spell to keep Chorzda in (bestow a bonus)