A "Five Room Dungeon" ghoul nest

[Celebrim]

Well, there are many good suggestions, but not surprisingly I still prefer my own. However, reading through the others I realize that I did miss an obvious trick, that I want to point out and elaborate on it slightly.

Room 2 - Puzzle/RP Challenge

A room with dead bodies, which have been killed by the ghouls and partially eaten, but have not risen yet. Two of the people in this room are not dead yet, though they probably have been infected with the ghoul's disease. The challenge is to save the survivors or maybe kill them and prevent the creation of more ghouls.

Well played. How could I have missed this?

I don't know much about ghoul lore in Deadlands, but I generally base my ghoul lore on HP Lovecraft, and for Lovecraftian ghouls (and all their literary descendents) these survivors and proto-ghouls are almost certainly children.

 

[Umbran]

Well played. How could I have missed this?

It is clever.

I don't know much about ghoul lore in Deadlands, but I generally base my ghoul lore on HP Lovecraft, and for Lovecraftian ghouls (and all their literary descendents) these survivors and proto-ghouls are almost certainly children.

In Deadlands, the standard is that people who turn cannibal may be transformed into ghouls (not like there's a % chance for PCs, or something - it's just back story fluff, with no mechanical impact). They are not "undead" in the usual sense. The bite of the ghoul is not contagious. If you get killed by a ghoul you become dinner, not another ghoul.

 

[Brainwatch]

[/QUOTE] In Deadlands, the standard is that people who turn cannibal may be transformed into ghouls (not like there's a % chance for PCs, or something - it's just back story fluff, with no mechanical impact). They are not "undead" in the usual sense. The bite of the ghoul is not contagious. If you get killed by a ghoul you become dinner, not another ghoul.[/QUOTE]


OK, slightly off topic, but with those rules, and this topic, it just screams out for an evil soup kitchen. Beware the "Mystery Meat" in the stew on Wednesdays. An evil BBE with money and patience in an urban setting with lots of poor, hungry people around could make a lot ghouls this way.

 

[Celebrim]

OK, slightly off topic, but with those rules, and this topic, it just screams out for an evil soup kitchen. Beware the "Mystery Meat" in the stew on Wednesdays. An evil BBE with money and patience in an urban setting with lots of poor, hungry people around could make a lot ghouls this way.

The horror RPG Chill plays heavily on ideas like this, and in fact I'm fairly surprised thinking on it that it isn't a published scenario for Chill. It would however be a very good Chill scenario.

 

[Stormonu]

OK, slightly off topic, but with those rules, and this topic, it just screams out for an evil soup kitchen. Beware the "Mystery Meat" in the stew on Wednesdays. An evil BBE with money and patience in an urban setting with lots of poor, hungry people around could make a lot ghouls this way.

That'd be

Spoiler

Reverend Grimm in the City of Lost Angels

, in Deadlands. And yes, he does have a "Sunday BBQ"...

 

[Umbran]

OK, slightly off topic, but with those rules, and this topic, it just screams out for an evil soup kitchen. Beware the "Mystery Meat" in the stew on Wednesdays. An evil BBE with money and patience in an urban setting with lots of poor, hungry people around could make a lot ghouls this way.

The connection isn't quite so direct, not a formulaic and predictable, "if you eat human flesh, you are doomed in this way," in the same way getting killed by a D&D ghoul makes you into one yourself.

You can think of it as if the transformation is brought on by evil spirits. By willfully becoming a cannibal, you make yourself open to the influence of these spirits, and they can come do nasty things to you if they are about and notice at the time. If you aren't doing it knowingly and willfully, the spirits can't do nearly so much to you.

 

[Aberzanzorax]

Not a dungeon, but an idea:

The ghouls are seeking a semi-subtle form of food. They've dug into the local hospital's waste area and are slipping into the hospital at night.

While there, they'll soil/contaminate/infect whatever they can, in the hopes that people who are already ill will die of normal diseases/complications, so that they will be buried (and hence a new food supply).


Other possible plots/characters:
-the same as above but with elderly people
-a list of the portliest people in town with a crude map
-a few ghouls trapped under rock (or a cave in near a room) that are starving; they were tricked into this situation by the other ghouls to thin the competition (these might have been selected as the most ravenous ghouls for this reason). I'd give these guys low hp and low AC, but doing high damage in their starving frenzy.
-someone (a miniboss?) has been appointed as "butcher", which means he's respected enough to do the job and tough enough to apportion bits of people as rations to the ghouls.
-a mostly normal weight woman, but with a gigantic, distended stomach (the mistress of the ghoul king)