Tyrion Alb
First Post
I was always a big fan of this technique in rpgs but I have found that Modern is especially suitable for this when you are doing episodic games.
A few months ago, my group (a part of an agency much like the infamous Department-7) was going to be sent to investigate some bear or dog attacks in the Ozarks. Before the game even began, I assigned each player a premade teenager normals who were camping. I gave them each two personality traits from the NPC traits page and their names.
Then I described who was sleeping with who and in what tent and then had everyone roll initiative. At about turn 3 was when the Werewolf savagely ripped apart its first victim (I still get a chuckle out of that). Since I wanted combat to end rather quickly, I used many more and more powerful werewolves that were required (new ones intercepting fleeing teens head on, etc). After the fight, I had my PC's characters sitting around watching TV when they heard about the attack on the news. They loved it when the news anchor got several facts wrong (as I had the report written up in advance).
Of course, everyone was killed within about 2 or 3 rounds but I found it did two things for the game:
--Got everyone into the game right from the beginning.
--Instilled fear and respect of the creature their "real" characters were going to be going up against.
I highly recommend this technique.
A few months ago, my group (a part of an agency much like the infamous Department-7) was going to be sent to investigate some bear or dog attacks in the Ozarks. Before the game even began, I assigned each player a premade teenager normals who were camping. I gave them each two personality traits from the NPC traits page and their names.
Then I described who was sleeping with who and in what tent and then had everyone roll initiative. At about turn 3 was when the Werewolf savagely ripped apart its first victim (I still get a chuckle out of that). Since I wanted combat to end rather quickly, I used many more and more powerful werewolves that were required (new ones intercepting fleeing teens head on, etc). After the fight, I had my PC's characters sitting around watching TV when they heard about the attack on the news. They loved it when the news anchor got several facts wrong (as I had the report written up in advance).
Of course, everyone was killed within about 2 or 3 rounds but I found it did two things for the game:
--Got everyone into the game right from the beginning.
--Instilled fear and respect of the creature their "real" characters were going to be going up against.
I highly recommend this technique.
