So, our intrepid hunters found themselves in a sleepy English village after reports of strange cattle mutilation. The Spooky had a premonition about being attacked by a woman in a classroom.
They quickly found the farm in question and knocked on the farmhouse door. A man answered, looking dull-eyed and jerky, making strange low moaning noises.
So… they opened fire with a handgun and beheaded him with a silver sword. By the time the man was dead, police sirens warbled in the distance.
The hunters decided to hide in the nearby barn, staying where they were while the police cordoned off the area around them (hiding the sword in the barn). When they were eventually found, they claimed to have been investigating the cows (the Expert was “prepared” enough to have papers apparently making them responsible for this) and after showing their IDs were allowed to leave.
They spotted a woman walking with a slightly odd gait through the village; the Spooky “tuned in” to her, revealing that she was waiting until she had “matured”. They followed her home and burst through the back door – the woman hit them with a chair and another fight ensued. Mid-way through, a giant flying armoured tentacled hornet thing burst out of her abdomen and flew out the door.
Next, they decided to follow up on the premonition by looking in the village school. It was late, well after school hours, and only one light was on in what appeared to be an office. They broke in through a window at the far side of the school, went through to the office and found the woman from the Spooky’s premonition. She appeared normal, but alarmed to find strangers in her school and demanded an explanation. Midway through a fruitless conversation, one of the giant hornets appeared and tried to latch on to the back of the Expert’s neck.
The Spooky, acting under pressure, managed to lever off the hornet thing with a knife causing only minor wounds to the Expert; she then shot the teacher, assuming she was somehow controlling the hornet, and convinced the Expert to “finish her off” with the sword. Escaping once again from police sirens, they hid in a church where they managed to save a priest who was in the middle of being attacked by the hornet things – they called an ambulance then left him bleeding and unconscious on the floor.
Heading back to the Expert’s Haven equipped with the remains of a hornet thing, they investigated the mystery and discovered that these things were parasites controlled by a hive mind somewehre, and their weakness was fire. They grabbed some flamethrowers from the armoury and headed back to the village.
Noticing the village pub was closed and in darkness despite being well before closing time, they decided to investigate – reading a bad situation well, they identified a flimsy cellar door and the buzzing of many hornet things inside. Kicking down the door, they opened up their flamethrowers into the darkness. They set fire to the furnishings and singed the buzzing hive in the middle of the room, and the light of the flames revealed weakly struggling semi-cocooned human forms. Deciding it was too late to save them, they finished up with the flamethrower and declared the mystery solved, escaping the burning pub to the now-familiar sound of approaching sirens.
…my keepering needs work, I’m not sure my hunters are cut out for being the good guys, but we all had fun 🙂
They do seem somewhat trigger-happy compared to mine.
I’d definitely have cops chasing them for the murder of the teacher who I’m assuming is innocent.
I’d end the session with a news report about local police investigating a string of murders and a case of arson.
The (or a!) problem I had was that the reasonable consequences of their actions was to be locked up by the police quite early on in the session, and I didn’t see a way of applying that without just bringing the game to an abrupt halt.
Also, because their first response to just about everything was to hit it they struggled to pick up clues, which left only hitting things as the obvious way forward.
Then let violence be their downfall. Live by the sword and all that.
Or have them be locked up and progress the time, making things worse.
Or have them locked up and let the monsters win, post of like when the guy in the walking dead wakes in the hospital.
I like the last one, though it does restrict the possibilities for follow-on adventures – a post-apoc setting with monsters feels like quite a different game.
Oh, the apocalypse doesn’t have to be global. That’s one of the reasons I usually confine my games to smaller communities.
Sacrificing the city but stopping the big bad from infecting the entire state/country/continent/planet can be an awesome reminder that the characters didn’t do their jobs. I usually confront them with horrific scenes as “punishment”. In your case I’d have had them attacked by infected children.
After all, they failed to stop the spread.
Or had a child cry “why did you kill my mommy” when they’ve beheaded someone whose guilt was in doubt.
I love using children.
They’re a great way to make your point.