This is great; if we get enough of these maybe Sojourner can make them into a table or something.

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I'm writing up a "horror" game right now, have no idea what system I'd use.

The central idea is that dark forces, opposed by Dwight D. Eisenhower, used his Interstate Program to lock away the American Dream.  Seven completely mundane acts must be performed before anyone can perceive the magic that holds it hostage, and each time your perform one of those acts you become more and more vulnerable to its captors.

Every homeless person in America did at least one of those seven acts (most unknowingly), and had his/her life destroyed as a result.  Some of them completed as many as three and lived, though now they're hidden away in hobo kingdoms, relying on loyal armies of bums and vermin to keep them safe.

The dark forces have at their disposal every trucker, cabbie and bus driver in America (some sort of hypnosis, maybe?)  It's rumored they've used monsters to hunt their enemies before.

The PCs are a group of friends on a road trip, who managed to activate one of the seven keys.  Things have begun to go wrong.  They see signs that push them to distant places for unknown reasons (to a used bookstore in Tulsa, Oklahoma to find the last unexpurgated copy of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons DMG; to a truckstop in Knoxville, TN to eat only the crust off a slice of cherry pie; to the bathroom of a movie theater in Bakersfield, California, to listen to a movie through the walls.)

Along the way they run into threats more and more grotesque: cabbies with straight razors, streetwalkers who vomit bloodthirsty wasps, a pack of truckers with the legs of dogs.

The closest thing they'll have to "allies" will be the street people: those who've been run to ground by the very things the PCs are running from.  Maybe they'll find a way to work with them.  Maybe they'll be pulled apart and eaten.

Most of this is still up in the air.  I want a game that's completely reactive; one that'll let the players do any crazyassed thing they can think of to stay a step ahead of the bad guys.  I also want to creep them the fuck out.

Quote from: fonkaygarryI'm writing up a "horror" game right now, have no idea what system I'd use.

The central idea is that dark forces, opposed by Dwight D. Eisenhower, used his Interstate Program to lock away the American Dream.  Seven completely mundane acts must be performed before anyone can perceive the magic that holds it hostage, and each time your perform one of those acts you become more and more vulnerable to its captors.

Every homeless person in America did at least one of those seven acts (most unknowingly), and had his/her life destroyed as a result.  Some of them completed as many as three and lived, though now they're hidden away in hobo kingdoms, relying on loyal armies of bums and vermin to keep them safe.

The dark forces have at their disposal every trucker, cabbie and bus driver in America (some sort of hypnosis, maybe?)  It's rumored they've used monsters to hunt their enemies before.

The PCs are a group of friends on a road trip, who managed to activate one of the seven keys.  Things have begun to go wrong.  They see signs that push them to distant places for unknown reasons (to a used bookstore in Tulsa, Oklahoma to find the last unexpurgated copy of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons DMG; to a truckstop in Knoxville, TN to eat only the crust off a slice of cherry pie; to the bathroom of a movie theater in Bakersfield, California, to listen to a movie through the walls.)

Along the way they run into threats more and more grotesque: cabbies with straight razors, streetwalkers who vomit bloodthirsty wasps, a pack of truckers with the legs of dogs.

The closest thing they'll have to "allies" will be the street people: those who've been run to ground by the very things the PCs are running from.  Maybe they'll find a way to work with them.  Maybe they'll be pulled apart and eaten.

Most of this is still up in the air.  I want a game that's completely reactive; one that'll let the players do any crazyassed thing they can think of to stay a step ahead of the bad guys.  I also want to creep them the fuck out.

That sound like Unknown Armies

fonkaygarry: sounds sweet!  does sound like a UA campaign, but sweet nonetheless.  have their missions/objectives scrawled on the stalls of truck stops from one side of the U.S. to the other...

i mean seriously, there's not much creepier than a truck stop bathroom stall.

Quote from: kregmosieri mean seriously, there's not much creepier than a truck stop bathroom stall.

TRUE STORY:  My friends and I were at a truckstop in Missouri (the kind that has an adult bookstore right across the street) when a friend of mine got in line for the men's room.  One of the furry man-mountains in line looked him up and down before getting close and whispering "You from 'round here?"

I don't think he pissed till we were in Ohio.

Question re UA: Doesn't Unknown Armies come with a lot of cosmological baggage?  I don't want to overload the game with factions and such...

Thanks for the feedback.

Quote from: fonkaygarryTRUE STORY:  My friends and I were at a truckstop in Missouri (the kind that has an adult bookstore right across the street) when a friend of mine got in line for the men's room.  One of the furry man-mountains in line looked him up and down before getting close and whispering "You from 'round here?"

I don't think he pissed till we were in Ohio.

Question re UA: Doesn't Unknown Armies come with a lot of cosmological baggage?  I don't want to overload the game with factions and such...

Thanks for the feedback.

that is freaky and about par for what i'd expect of the places...and that's simply based on the graffiti in the stalls. *shudder*  (i keep meaning to take pics of one not to far from us, but who wants to be the guy with a digital camera in a truck-stop bathroom?!)

yes, imho UA has lots and lots of cosmological baggage...but you don't HAVE to use it.  i'd say take the idea and run with your own system, or adapt it to the UA system and cut everything else out.

Quote from: RPGPunditWell, we don't do Halloween down here in Uruguay (though from what I recall of North America before I left, it sure felt like the real traditions of Halloween from my childhood were all but dead too, I remember those last few years practically no one came to our house asking for candy, and we lived in a pretty populous neighbourhood).

Well in the 'Chuk sometimes weather can be an issue. We've got 4 or 5 inches of snow here in Calgary in the last couple of days, and the high today was only around 0ºC so I wasn't expecting too many kids tonight. But there was no wind so the street was really jumping from 6pm to 8pm with Grade schoolers and early teens. Didn't keep an exact count because I was out with the 4 year old, but we had at least 50 kids. Most of the tiny tots went to the mall this year though.

Quoteps. Meanwhile, note that I've gotten into the Halloween spirit by dressing up my avatar as one of my favourite fictional pipe-smoking characters.

Ah, I was wondering about why Bill. He seemed very...different from the last two.

Bill the Butcher was just another kind of Pundit from Mr. Twain...

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