[d20 Past] Ninjas v. Nazis

[JPL]

WWII. The American OSS recruits a team of Japanese Americans with expertise in the ancient arts of assassination to carry out secret missions in the heart of war-torn Europe.

Several options here...

- A fairly straightahead fusion of martial arts and war drama..."The Dirty Dozen" directed by Tsui Hark.

- Or something pulpier, a la Hellboy. Japanese shadow-magic vs. those darned occultist Nazis and their albino cyborg apes.

 

[Gomez]

I think there where some Japanese-American units fighting in Italy during the war.


Hummm! "albino cyborg apes" Cool!

 

[JPL]

Highly decorated units, in fact. Mr. Miyagi served in one, as I recall.

Albino apes are one of my personal GM trademarks. They make every campaign better.

 

[Peterson]

A very interesting idea - as usual.

I could see both options being attractive, but for betting, I'd say the "pulp" would be more popular.

Of course, nothing says pulp to me more than Dark Taboo Japanese Mystical Martial Arts (I think that's trademarked....) Vs Alien-Implant-Controlled Hitler Clones in Space!

Wait....that's not pulp, that happened!

Peterson

 

[Ranger REG]

I think there where some Japanese-American units fighting in Italy during the war.

The 442nd Regimental Combat Team (motto: "Go For Broke"). In addition, some Japanese-Americans served in the US Military Intelligence Service in the Pacific Theater.

Mind you, they deployed the 442nd to Europe in 1943.

 

[Turanil]

WWII. The American OSS recruits a team of Japanese Americans with expertise in the ancient arts of assassination to carry out secret missions in the heart of war-torn Europe.

Several options here...

- A fairly straightahead fusion of martial arts and war drama..."The Dirty Dozen" directed by Tsui Hark.

- Or something pulpier, a la Hellboy. Japanese shadow-magic vs. those darned occultist Nazis and their albino cyborg apes.

Excellent idea. To help out shape the scenario, let me suggest to get and watch the movie Where Eagles Dare with Clint Eastwood and Richard Burton (one of my favorite movies of all times). Plenty of idea to write a module. (Basically the film is about a commando having to intrude a nazi castle perched atop a mountain peak in the Bavaria mountains. If you add ninja stuff and occultism to it, let me know and I buy the PDF on rpgnow )

 

[Committed Hero]

To help out shape the scenario, let me suggest to get and watch the movie Where Eagles Dare with Clint Eastwood and Richard Burton (one of my favorite movies of all times). Plenty of idea to write a module. (Basically the film is about a commando having to intrude a nazi castle perched atop a mountain peak in the Bavaria mountains.

The novel it is based on is written by Alaistar MacLean, who also wrote Guns of Navarone and Force Ten From Navarone. All of his books make great module fodder for commando or espionage gaming.

 

[ledded]

WWII. The American OSS recruits a team of Japanese Americans with expertise in the ancient arts of assassination to carry out secret missions in the heart of war-torn Europe.

Several options here...

- A fairly straightahead fusion of martial arts and war drama..."The Dirty Dozen" directed by Tsui Hark.

- Or something pulpier, a la Hellboy. Japanese shadow-magic vs. those darned occultist Nazis and their albino cyborg apes.

Either one, and I'd love 'em both.

John Woo directs a remake of "Where Eagles Dare" starring Ken Watanabe, or Pulpier-Supers a la Hellboy, Sgt Rock meets the Fantastic Four.

Personally, I'd do the second, but I'm biased, because we sort of did that in one of our campaigns and it was a TON of fun. Made for a fun-to-write story hour too.

I would also recommend Alaistar MacLean as a nice source of inspiration for a campaign of this sort. The books are quickly readable and action-packed, very WWII/Pulp kind of stuff, though no one will ever accuse them of being fine literature .

 

[Tom Cashel]

WWII. The American OSS recruits a team of Japanese Americans...

...from their respective concentration camps across the southwest.

Hey, it makes Starting Occupation a snap.

 

[Desdichado]

You could also do it as an counterfactual rather than a historical game. Y'know; Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan survived the War to persist into the present day and whatnot. I came up with an idea (which I still haven't run yet, but if I ever run d20 Modern again in the near future, I might dust this off) and do it that way.