HELP ME BARF FORTH ON MY LANDSCAPE
So hey, I’m still MCing the APocalypse world game I posted about a few weeks ago, set in the Montana mountains. I’d written earlier that I was experiencing a creative failure of apocalyptica, and that’s still the case. The environment has been merely a pristine wilderness, with a sleepy little town nestled into it (underneath the facade the town is anything but “sleepy,” and I’m not worried about Fronts or the human element in general just now).
When I try to think of how to apocalyptify an animal or the vegetation, I get nothing. I don’t want anything cartoonish. I turned to the text and the “dogs have a second bone eyelid that goes click click” bit stood out, and I thought that could guide me, but when I try to think of my own all I can think is “click click eyelid.”
So, here’s what we have to work with:
>The apocalypse was not nuclear; it was the result of biological warfare.
>There’s a sealed bunker near the town that’s related to the biological weapon programs of old.
>The town has clean, drinkable water in abundance, due to the mountain stream that runs by.
>Nobody in town seems cautious about disease or contamination.
>The town basically behaves like a genteel rural community of bygone days, partly because of a deliberate facade.
>There are trees and wolves, so presumably also prey animals for the wolves.
>No flora or fauna introduced thus far have any strange traits or adaptations.
>No flora or fauna is sickly or diseased.
>Weather patterns appear to be normal.
>There are hills and valleys and ravines and cliffs and stuff.
>There was a forest fire about 100 miles west of the mountain, the result of marauders razing a settlement. The fire didn’t reach this patch of woods, but the smoke could be seen on the horizon.
SO please help with apocalyptifying things! How would you give the wildlife and vegetation a tweak toward the weird given the world I’ve described?
Now, I’m in a bind because we’re too far in to revise or tweak the imagery too much. I can’t just say “oh I never mentioned it before now but the leaves on the trees are all black.” I’m thinking mostly I’ll need to up the apocalyptica via incursion from outside the area. What if someone arrives in town who’s from an area where the water ISN’T clean and safe? What physical afflictions might she suffer, what culture clashes might she bring?
But in general, if you give me ways to dress things up I can do my level best to incorporate and modify toward these needs. So bring it! (please and thank you)
Peace,
-Joel
Why are the town and environs so clean and safe?
What’s their experience of the Maelstrom been like?
What’s up with that facade?
Because a biologic apocalypse may have happened at a level no one can see. Maybe there’s a microbe that killed most people, but is now trying to interact with the remaining folks. See Greg Bear’s “Blood Music”, or Joan Slonczewski’s “Brain Plague”.
If a tree gets shot or cut, it bleeds blood. Make sure to mention the sickly metallic smell/taste.
People might occasionally just suffer some kind of brain thing and head off into the wilds.
The wild animals start having gooey eyes and noses. A session or two later, they start having gooey fur and open sores.
When the bunker unseals (maybe because one single extended family or other faction was told how in their dreams) it’ll justify all kinds of stuff.
Are there babies? Aren’t folks whispering about that one new baby that has two faces?
Even though food hasn’t been particularly short, folks are getting skinny. What’s the deal? Why have our gut flora forsaken us?
There’s a child who’s figured out how the livestock talk and it turns out that they’re sentient. The livestock now, speaking through this kid, can tell secrets that folks thought were secure.
Chris, I am thoroughly enjoying your body horror kick.
The maelstrom, for somebody/everybody/the wolves, is actually, a peculiar, intelligently designed, brain tumor caused by exposition to something after the apocalypse.
Also, fungi. Also, aggressive insects.
Wow, your players have built a very safe and tidy little place for themselves. Time to look through cross-hairs at everything and get some bloody fingerprints on it.
>The apocalypse was not nuclear; it was the result of biological warfare.
Biological warfare can be immediate or long-term. Look at genetic mutations, birth defects, delayed effects. Maybe now is when the lovely warm weather interacts with the biological agent and starts making people go mad (go read Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover Landfall for a neat delayed biological threat).
>There’s a sealed bunker near the town that’s related to the biological weapon programs of old.
What’s been cooking in there? Some sort of organic source of the whole program? A mouldering fungus that has eaten almost all the way through it’s containment cell?
>The town has clean, drinkable water in abundance, due to the mountain stream that runs by.
What happens if that stream dries up? What happens if it gets polluted?
>Nobody in town seems cautious about disease or contamination.
What sort of regular medical care do they have access to? How the heck are they staying healthy? Are they actually all parasite-ridden and the parasite is really weird and maelstromy?
>The town basically behaves like a genteel rural community of bygone days, partly because of a deliberate facade.
Sooo, they know it’s a facade. Why are they keeping it up? Who are they afraid of? What happens when they are in the woods away from the town? A Jeykle/Hide thing? Is there a weird place in the woods where everything’s crap, but the people can be real?
>There are trees and wolves, so presumably also prey animals for the wolves.
Weird up the prey! Squirrels with scales, four-eyed rabbits, mice with fangs. Maybe the wolves are what’s keeping everything in order.
>No flora or fauna introduced thus far have any strange traits or adaptations.
So introduce some weirdness! Have it be a thing that’s starting. Rather than “Oh, and all the leaves are black”, you can go with “The leaves are kind of dark around the edges, and the grass in the shadows looks really dark.”
>No flora or fauna is sickly or diseased.
Perfect opening for a cattle mutilation. A wave of animals getting sick is a nice tie-in to a biological weapon that lingers in the ground.
>Weather patterns appear to be normal.
Cool.
>There are hills and valleys and ravines and cliffs and stuff.
What lives in them? What’s weird about them?
>There was a forest fire about 100 miles west of the mountain, the result of marauders razing a settlement. The fire didn’t reach this patch of woods, but the smoke could be seen on the horizon.
How long ago was that? What headed this way trying to escape?
A trader comes with a bag full of weirdtech. He’s flabbergasted at the availability of clean food and water, and buys all he can with his wares. Then he leaves, with the town full of strange, possibly malfunctioning devices that do weird brainy stuff. And if that weren’t bad enough, the outside world just learned about this little paradise, and comes knocking: diseased and hungry refugees, warlords looking for a “slice” of the pie, etc.
Throw some random traveler with some John Carpenter’s The Thing action all up in that sleepy village. Get blood all over everything. Then just have more people come by… see what they do to travelers when they don’t know if they’re infected or not. At least, that’s my first inclination.
OH! I missed a big one: the landscape. What’s it’s deal? What does it want? Do the woods want people to leave them alone so they can get on with the growing super-huge? Does the little stream want to maybe drown people? Is the dirt of the village megalomaniacal and just refuses to let anyone leave? Is the sealed bunker crouching there like jealous old cat that bites anyone that comes near or is it a puppy quivering with excitement for people to come and play with it?
Yeah, I started one like that recently. Everything was neat and tidy. Hadn’t got into what the Apocalypse was, but started talking about a trader who came into town, chewing on some root/bark/something. Turns out it is a drug that weakens the veil between the person and the maelstrom. And the cult/family growers are starting to use that to push a bit harder into the settlement, as people start to get nicely and gently hooked on this innocuous drug that makes it easier to breach their mind…
The operator made the mistake of saying, oh, it’s a drug, I’ll run that all over the place. I can’t wait to see what happens when he realizes what he’s spread all over the place.
Oh, and so everything is tidy? What happens when that gets disrupted some? So everyone is calm? What about the raiders that see your town as easy prey?
And what happens when one of these not very cautions about bio-safety kids falls into the well?
Thanks everyone! A lot of great stuff that’s got my brain-gears spinning. I’m excited to note that I already have the broundwork for some of these ideas!
Joe Beason “See Greg Bear’s “Blood Music””
checks Wikipedia Oh, so THAT’S where that episode of Futurama comes from!
Chris Goodwin Body horror: great! I’ll keep this stuff tucked in my back pocket.
Christopher Weeks “People might occasionally just suffer some kind of brain thing and head off into the wilds.”
Actually the leader of the mauraders is a young man from town who was wrongfully accused, and out in exile his brain went funny with Maelstromness. So there’s precedent! I think it’s more like “too far from our bubble of normalcy people’s heads go off-kilter.”
“The wild animals start having gooey eyes and noses. A session or two later, they start having gooey fur and open sores.”
This is great, and a nice image to keep in mind for the onset of weirdness/badness. Like Meg says, it starts out normal, so the Apocalyptica comes from that status quo deteriorating. I need to wrongify things bit by bit.
Mario Bolzoni “Also, fungi. Also, aggressive insects”
Yes, exactly right. Start with stuff that’s already weird in creepy in OUR world.
Meguey Baker A treasure trove! Thank you.
“Biological warfare can be immediate or long-term. Look at genetic mutations, birth defects, delayed effects.”
I’m thinking, like I said above, that I might go with a greater and greater effect the farther you get from the safe bubble. The PCs are currently heading out to meet the threat of the marauders head-on, and thus ranging farther from home. So they can encounter the weirdness as they go, including the defects, etc. And of course these effects can start leaking into the community as well…
“Sooo, they know it’s a facade. Why are they keeping it up? Who are they afraid of? What happens when they are in the woods away from the town? A Jeykle/Hide thing? Is there a weird place in the woods where everything’s crap, but the people can be real?”
As my Fronts/Threats have it, it’s a Custom, whose urge is to promote and justify violence. It’s a consensual illusion whereby everyone turns a blind eye to the brutality that upholds order, so that they can feel like they’re decent folk hearkening back to a golden age. Their mayor, Harridan, and his narcissistic ambition are at the center of this web.
Honestly, it’s mostly PCs that spend time in the woods: Gunlugger Keeler lives off by herself and hunts wolf pelts and brings ’em to town to trade, and Brainer Lively Sin lives in the entry chamber to the bunker, contemplating Answers. I get the impression that Harridan keeps everyone afraid of the outside, and cautiously welcomes trade but expects townsfolk proper to hew close to home.
Which, on reflection, means I REALLY need to think about what it’s like when townsfolk do go into the woods.
Oh, like the two of Harridan’s enforcers that the PCs took out into the woods hunting marauder scouts and sent back home on their own after one got injured…
mwauahahaha!
“Weird up the prey! Squirrels with scales, four-eyed rabbits, mice with fangs. Maybe the wolves are what’s keeping everything in order.”
Yes! Nice! Maybe I’ll introduce something minor in the manner of the familiar: “A furry head pops out–it’s just a mouse, fanged as usual, and it hisses threateningly before darting back undercover…”
“Perfect opening for a cattle mutilation. A wave of animals getting sick is a nice tie-in to a biological weapon that lingers in the ground.”
Yeeeeeeah. I get the feeling that maybe there were bunkers like this all over, and a lot of them breached back in the day. The fact that this one remains intact is the only reason contamination is only happening NOW.
“The fire didn’t reach this patch of woods, but the smoke could be seen on the horizon. How long ago was that? What headed this way trying to escape?”
Actually, I already answered this one! Through brain-opening, Lively has seen that there’s a horde of terrified animals stampeding away from the fire. What a great opportunity to introduce weird fauna!
“the landscape. What’s it’s deal? What does it want? Do the woods want people to leave them alone so they can get on with the growing super-huge? Does the little stream want to maybe drown people? Is the dirt of the village megalomaniacal and just refuses to let anyone leave? Is the sealed bunker crouching there like jealous old cat that bites anyone that comes near or is it a puppy quivering with excitement for people to come and play with it?”
This is great, great stuff and my brains afire with the imagery. Note to self, always always think of the landscape as a being (or beings) with intent.
Oh, and I forgot this bit:
Joe Beason “What’s their experience of the Maelstrom been like?
…
Because a biologic apocalypse may have happened at a level no one can see. Maybe there’s a microbe that killed most people, but is now trying to interact with the remaining folks.”
I’ve been struggling with the Maelstrom; everyone’s been getting 10+ mostly and so the visions with great clarity have been getting more and more like little movie cutscenes that play and show them something very literal. BUT! These two statements of yours in close proximity reminded me, I’ve already laid groundwork for this “communicating microbe” business with the very first brain-opening! Lively contemplated what secrets were behind the bunker door. He’d already established that his brainer-power could sense nearby consciousnesses, human, plant, animal. So in addition to the visions of scientists and soldiers and hubris, I talked about the tiny, tiny lives whose minds he briefly touched–the ‘tiny eaters.”
So, BOOM. I’m dialing THAT shit UP/
There’s a rusty cruise ship in the middle of the forest. It’s called something ominous. Animals don’t go near it. There’s no way it could possibly have made it’s way where it is.
Small town Montana you say?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkeley_Pit
Here’s some real life nightmare fuel.
“In 1995, a flock of migrating snow geese landed in the Berkeley Pit water and died, with 342 carcasses recovered… necropsies showed their insides were lined with burns and festering sores from exposure to high concentrations of copper, cadmium, and arsenic.”
Montana is still great plains enough for Locust Swarms (only in the warmest of years so none have happened recently. The locust themselves are nuisance but the malestrom is the wasp-ocalypse that comes looking to feed on the locust.
Lots of great stuff already, but I’ll mention another thing:
I understand that you don’t want to suddenly turn around and say, “By the way, the trees were black this whole time.”
But sometimes it can be a very effective move to have some weird effect but never mention it. When it comes up in play, just shrug and tell them no one has ever found it strange, because that’s how it’s always been.
(“What? We throw the bodies of dead children into the Reservoir?” “Of course, it’s a tradition that hasn’t been broken in 15 years.” “But that would mean… oh shit!”)
I’ve used this to great effect in some games.
I really like the idea that this one bunker hasn’t opened yet, but it’s similar bunkers that caused the apocalypse.
This means that some bad news is coming their way when that things opens, explodes, starts leaking, or whatever.
And to figure out how to deal with it, they may need to look into what happened 50 years ago. “Just how bad is this bad news we’re expecting?” “What have you heard the apocalypse did to people?” “Is there anyone still alive who might know how to survive a bunker Opening?” “Where can we find that person?”