My group had our final session of Masks last night. I didn’t plan anything and ran the whole session off of love letters, and I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. It turned out that the team’s personal nemeses had stolen a straitjacket golem which acts as a conduit to Hell from the Doomed’s sanctuary. Using that and some salvaged alien technology from the previous session which allowed living minds to be translated into digital form, they were going to upload the legions of hell directly into the world wide web (normally, we’d established, demons need mortal bodies to cross over into our plane; this was a way around that).
The team managed to track them down to the secret research hospital where Goth (the Doomed) had been unsuccessfully treated for cancer and made her deal with Mephisopheles (her nemesis, naturally) to save her life. The hospital, it turned out, was owned by Starsinger Industries, the same company which had been restoring the aforementioned alien technology and was currently working on a honey trap for The Collective, an alien armada which had made war on the Earth and ‘liberated’ all of its strong AIs several years prior. NB: that’s all the AIs aside from Command Line (the Beacon, a heroic robot) and Bluescreen (his nemesis, a robot supremacist), as they’d been developed after the invasion. Starsinger Industries is also run by Nightjar (the Protege)’s best friend’s father, and is the only major competitor for Cobb Consolidated, the company owned by Nightjar’s Protege, Owlman. With Mephistopheles and Bluescreen was Thrush, Owlman’s previous sidekick turned supervillain and Nightjar’s personal nemesis who was at the head of the organization the other two belonged to.
So, the team had their big throwdown with the three, stopping the ritual before a dozen young patients at the hospital could be sacrificed. By the end of things, Command Line had reversed the polarity and sucked Bluescreen into Hell, Goth had trapped Mephistopheles, binding him into her soul, and they’d locked up Thrush in Owlman’s secret flying supervillain prison. It was a pretty epic conclusion, and pretty much entirely player-driven. We had two Moments of Truth trigger, most of our dangling threads were tied up, and there were enough left over for a season 2 if we get the chance down the road.
One thing that didn’t come up? Thrush had been known to butt heads with Bluescreen in the past, and had a history of proactively turning on his associates. He had also been hacking into the team’s files, exploiting a secret deal he’d made with Nightjar. So while he helped arrange the ritual and the mass upload, he had an agenda; once it was done, he was going to trigger Starsinger’s honey trap and contact the Collective. The aliens would collect the demon AIs and Bluescreen, and he would permanently cripple two competing villains, while also sparking another invasion for the superheroes he hated so much to fight. Didn’t pan out, but since the team stopped Mephistopheles and Bluescreen he got most of what he wanted anyway, and now he’s back in the headquarters of his old boss, the hero he hates more than anyone. Like I said: plenty of threads for season 2.
All in all, I think it was a pretty great wrap-up. I’d recommend the love letter approach if you’re comfortable with that much improv, as it lead things in some pretty unexpected directions. If you’d like some inspiration, I’ll paste mine below; the structure for all three is pretty much identical, and I tried to present each hero with the choice of a resource, a relationship and some information. Enjoy.
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Dear Nightjar,
It’s been three weeks since your confrontation with Dr. Jones’s body in the sewers. In the intervening time, Owlman has been bringing you on investigative missions more than usual, attempting to learn as much as possible about what Thrush and his cronies are up to.
Roll +Superior. On a 10+, pick 2. On a 7-9, pick 1.
· You managed to salvage some of the Titanian nanotech which worked its way in your armor. Tell us how the tech has improved your capabilities, and what the first thing you did with these new capabilities was.
· Owlman sent you for training with another hero. Tell us who they were, what you learned from them, and the terms you left on.
· You and Owlman managed to corner and interrogate a villain tied to Thrush’s organization. Who was the villain, and what worrisome secret did they reveal to you?
On a miss, pick 1 but you’ve endangered someone as a result of your investigations. Tell us who you’ve endangered, what the source of that danger is, and how long you think you have until the shoe drops.
Dear Goth,
It’s been three weeks since your confrontation with Dr. Jones’s body in the sewers. In the time since, Saint Anger has approached you to redouble your efforts at combating Mephistopheles’s incursion into the city.
Roll +Freak. On a 10+, pick 2. On a 7-9, pick 1.
· Saint Anger has gifted you with an item from his supernatural arsenal. What is the item, what is he expecting you do to with it, and what are you actually going to do with it?
· You’ve managed to repair your stained reputation with one particular person or group. Who was it, what did you have to do to get in their good graces, and what did they offer you in return?
· Your investigations have found that Mephistopheles has attained a sizable foothold in the city, outside the view of the heroic world. What is the nature of this foothold, and what advantage did your investigations uncover that you can use?
On a miss, pick 1 but something dangerous has gone missing from your sanctuary. Tell us what that something is, why it’s dangerous, and who you suspect of the theft.
Dear Command Line,
It’s been three weeks since your confrontation with Dr. Jones’s body in the sewers. In the time since, Sonja has been cautiously supportive of your heroic efforts.
Roll +Mundane. On a 10+, pick 2. On a 7-9, pick 1.
· While she was rebuilding you, Sonja installed an experimental upgrade to help keep you safer. What was the upgrade, and where did she have to go to get it?
· Your heroic efforts have managed to attract the attention of a hero you admire. Who is this hero, and what specific deed did they find so impressive?
· After talking with the uplifted Dr. Jones and helping to repair his code, he revealed another dangerous project that Starsingers Industries is working on. Tell us what the project is, and why it worries you.
On a miss, pick 1 but while you were reinforcing the team hideout’s digital defenses you found evidence that Thrush used his backdoor to make off with dangerous intel from your mission computer. Tell us what that intel was, and why it worries you.
