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Apocalypse (1998)OverviewWhat it is, where it came from, and what I was smoking at the time :)
Dramatis PersonæWho played who, who they met there, and who tried to kill themPlayer Characters
Story: He is a Catholic priest, who is interested in the occult. He started out trying to hunt down and bust Satanic cults, but later moved to hunting vampires and other supernatural creatures. He was once turned into a vampire against his will, but managed to escape that fate through a process that involved passing his blood over a crucifix and returning it to his body. The experience has left his body somewhat damaged. He even had to file down his teeth. He is haunted by the knowledge of his weakness and inability to prevent that event. He was later publicly booted from the church for being a looney, but continued his work, with under-the-table support from a few of his former employers who believed in him and wished for his work to continue in secret. He has personally killed 8 vampires and 1 werewolf, and has supervised the destruction of 5 more vampires. He will use anything he can get hold of to give him an edge, even if they are normally considered taboo.
His sponsors have sent him to a small, out-of-the-way town in New Mexico, called Apocalypse, to contact the local church to look into some paranormal activity there. He arrived last night, staying at the Oxford Inn in town. As he began to move about the town, a stranger passed by who mentioned Kent's name and had some seriously bad “vibes.” So, Kent followed him, ending up in a residential area. Kent kept a low profile, hiding in the parking lot of a nearby church, and watched as the mystery man entered a house, followed by three others, one by one. He then heard three shots, apparently coming from the upper floor of the house. Note: A later version of this Character had him functioning in a more-official capacity, being sent unwittingly to Apocalypse to replace the aging Shadow Hunter in place there already. Story: He wouldn't believe in the paranormal at all except for an incident in his childhood where he and some friends spent the night in a
“haunted” house. He saw a woman dressed in civil war era dress pacing back and forth in front of a window.
He is still haunted by the death of his little brother. He feels responsible for it since, when his brother went out that night, he elected to stay home and watch TV. He came straight out of the FBI academy and was assigned to partner with SA Terence Aggelis, known as Aggie to his friends, an agent for 2 years. The first big case they were assigned to was a serial murder case concerning a man known only as Charles, or “Evil Charlie,” specifically because Charles started calling Taylor about his crimes. His m. o. involved kidnapping small girls from department stores, in full public view, and then taking them to a secluded place to sexually assault and dismember them. Ten girls have been found, from Montana to New Mexico, where he was last seen. He then calls the FBI to gloat and taunt his pursuers. They still have no solid evidence, other than phoned admissions, and sightings are rare and sketchy. The last lead they had had him heading for a small, out-of-the-way town called Apocalypse, in New Mexico. The Bureau sent them to investigate the lead. Upon their arrival, they managed to spot him, and followed him into a residential area. Observing discreetly, they watched him enter a house, followed by three more unidentified men, one by one. Then three shots were heard coming from the upper floor of the house. Aggie decided it was time to move in. The pair ran up to the house and kicked in the door. Story: Unknown to the Player (I had a complete story printed, as for the others, that I planned to release to the Player at the beginning of each session with the majority of it blacked out, revealing a line or two more at a time as his memory was recovered). He wakes to the sound of three shots being fired elsewhere in the house, with no knowledge of how he got there, what he was doing-or who he is for that matter.
Story: An orphan, he lived in and out of foster homes throughout his childhood. He was involved in gangs as a thief. Nicknamed
“spooky” for his tendency to go chasing after things no one else could see (blamed it on acid flashbacks). He was apprehended at the scene of the burglary of an electronics store and placed in a squad car to have his ID processed. While in the car, Ted, a drug dealer also known as
“Teddy Krueger” who had been tormenting Franks for some time, arrived and savagely killed the policeman, framing Franks for the murder. Franks was free. He discovered, after pushing buttons and pulling strings, that Ted hangs out in a small, out-of-the-way town called Apocalypse, New Mexico a lot, and was probably there now. He stole a car and headed for New Mexico.
He spotted Ted while driving around the town, and followed him into a residential area. There he saw Ted enter a house and, after discreetly parking out of the way, resolved to go in after him. Upon entering, he saw no one. He was looking around when another man, claiming to be searching for someone named Jack, enters and begins scouring the house as well. Shortly after, another man enters -a bounty hunter looking for Franks. As the bounty hunter attempts to subdue him, three shots are heard coming from the opposite room. Story: Born to an Irish mob family in Chicago. His mother died while he was young and he was left with his father, a hit-man. As he grew older, he took up his father's profession. Two years ago, his father was murdered by a rival family in retribution for a previous hit. He just recently discovered that Jack was responsible, and he resolved to avenge his father's death. After asking around, sometimes forcefully, he discovered that Jack was headed for a small, out-of-the-way town in New Mexico called Apocalypse. MacGreevy then headed there himself.
Upon his arrival, he spotted Jack, and followed him to a residential area. He watched him enter a house, followed shortly after by another man he didn't recognize. He resolved to go in after him. As he entered the house, he met a man identifying himself as Franks, who was looking for someone also. As they went their separate ways searching the house, a third man entered claiming to be looking for Franks and went upstairs after him. An argument ensued, followed shortly after by three gunshots. Note: A later version of this character was named Rafael Aguerra, represented by Antonio Banderas, and was Mexican rather than Irish-otherwise, it was the same character. Story: He lived all his life in New Mexico, with his father, Jim James, a vietnam vet known as
“Jim-Jim” to his war buddies, and three brothers. He doesn't remember his mother and his father avoided speaking of her. He spent a great deal of time hunting with his father and brothers, and is an avid outdoorsman. He spent 8 years in the USArmy Rangers.
After exiting the military, he spent a year as a repo man, supplementing his income by doing some bounty hunting on the side. He later dropped the repo business in favor of the bounty hunting. He has gone after 9 bounties, one of which escaped, a Brit named David who escaped prison where he was doing time for armed robbery and murder. He was currently hunting a murder suspect, named Jonathan Franks, from Oklahoma City, who fled to New Mexico. The bounty is $10,000, owing the high amount to the fact that he killed a policeman. The suspect was a white gang-banger with multiple small-time crimes on his sheet, mostly dealing with breaking-and-entering and auto theft. The suspect stole a car at the scene, and had been seen sporadically around the city before crossing into New Mexico. He traced the suspect to a small, out-of-the-way town called Apocalypse, where he spotted his car, and shadowed him into a residential area. He observed him going into a house, followed shortly by another unidentified man. He resolved to go in after him. He entered the house and immediately spotted Franks. He announced his intent and tried to apprehend the suspect. Then three shots were heard upstairs. Note: In the later attempt at this campaign, this character was to be played by a different Player, as Chad had disappeared from the scene a long time prior. Replacement PCs:
Major NPCs
ExecutionWhat I planned to do, and how I planned to do itThe pacing and structure of each individual session was intended to have a TV series-like feel, as each run was meant to represent a TV series “season.” At the time it was initially run, all the GMs in our group rotated GMing duties at four weeks per GM; I appealed for six, resulting in the six-episode “season.” The Pilot Episode, the only portion of this campaign that was actually played, to date, was run in late 1998. In the later attempt to run the campaign, I decided to keep the time-period of the campaign at '98-I thought the Y2K tension was fitting.I positioned the town of Apocalypse close enough to Roswell, NM, so as to encourage Players' “extraterrestrial” suspicions at the outset, although the story would never actually take that direction. For the town, I used Seminole, OK, a suitably quaint small town I was forced to visit often (as my ex-wife was from there). As such, I was able to obtain a street map, and many of the locations that were or were to be used in the game were based on actual locations in the real town. In fact, some of the local stories were used as inspiration for parts of the campaign. Using a real town gave me a much better ability to describe the places involved, and eventually I would have included photos and such in the game. In order to establish a greater “sense of mortality” in the Players, I announced that all PCs would be killed during the course of the campaign (as normally, a GM is expected to take “reasonable measures” to keep PCs alive). In a later abortive attempt to run the game, I had the Players choose two characters at the outset, for their inevitable replacements. By creating the PCs myself, I could control their backgrounds to an extent, and could be assured of getting the sort of Characters the story ultimately required, along with appropriate plot-hooks and such. Since I know the Players pretty well, I was able to tailor the Characters to their particular individual tastes, and had a reasonable idea who would be picking which. PCs were based on 150 points; I created them at 100-125 points, and left the remainder to the Players to customize-to make the Character “theirs.” They chose the names themselves. I also included a GMPC (Aggie) in the party to help “steer” them all in the right direction, initially, fully intending to kill him off relatively early. The back-stories I wrote for each Character all ended with them ending up in the same place and time, with the actual game starting at the moment the stories leave off. For the psychic Character, I used pre-prepared flash cards for his dreams and visions, which worked out as he had little control of his abilities in the beginning. As he gained control, however, I, as GM, would've been required to improvise more and more often. SynopsisWhere the Players went, who they saw, and what they conqueredPilot Episode: “Welcome To Apocalypse”: Monday, 20 July 1998
AftermathWhat went right, what went wrong, and lessons learnedThis campaign, though short-lived, contained a great many “firsts” for me, as GM. Apocalypse was my first “cinema-based” campaign attempt, and set the stage in that regard for most of my campaigns that would follow. This was my first campaign to use “Actors” in an official sense. This was my first campaign where I created the PCs for the Players (I was worried, at first, that the Players wouldn't care overmuch for this approach, but it actually turned out pretty well in the end). (Refer to GM Tips & Tools section for details on these elements) This was also my first “combat-light” campaign attempt. I consider each of these elements to have been an ultimate success, even though only the “Pilot Episode” ever saw “production.” Even though it only lasted for one session, it is considered to have been a huge success-everyone loved it (or so they claim ;) ).The game happened long enough ago that I don't clearly remember why it was never continued. The only thought I have to that end is that our gaming group at the time had significant regular-attendance problems (and still does, to a lesser extent). The nature of this campaign virtually required that all the Players be present. In the second attempt, I intended to pick up where it left off, with a few new Players and Characters and some other minor changes, but attendance problems (forever, the bane of my GMing existence) plagued the group still, and I eventually dropped the idea, to my continual regret. This was the first of my campaigns to run afoul of this issue, and as such, my greatest lesson learned was that I needed to allow more for those inevitable attendance problems. I'm still working on that. The initial conflict among the PCs was fun (and well-played), but as time went on, the group's cooperation seemed a little forced, in my opinion. Keeping a group like this working together in the long-term would've been problematic. In retrospect, I would've engineered the Characters with more “reasons to work together.” As it was, in the next couple of episodes, I planned for them to end up fighting back-to-back once or twice, which would've encouraged them to gel better. Since the game never got that far, I don't know how well that would've worked out. As is the norm (it seems, for my games, anyway) it did seem to “drag on” in spots-maybe that's just my perspective as GM, though. It always seems like we should've been able to accomplish more in less time. I've never been able to pin down why this happens, or how to fix it. That's another ongoing fight. Otherwise, though, my pacing was spot-on, and the game session ended on time. In retrospect, I made a mistake in that, after it was decided that I would not continue the campaign, I revealed the plans I had for all the Characters, and where the story was going, to the Players. In the second attempt, it had been long enough that most had forgotten what I had said, but it would've been better had I not done so. In order to reduce the chance that someone would remember, I directed those Players that had been involved in the first attempt to switch Characters. Phil, who knew more than most about my plans, I directed to play Eldred (the psychic)-that way he would have an excuse to know things he shouldn't. Later down the road, as we really loved the storyline, Phil and I worked on the idea of turning the game into an actual TV series script. As such, many further modifications were made by the two of us, and the six seasons were expanded to the normal 22 episodes (although we both agreed it would probably be better as an “HBO-type” series, with fewer but longer, higher-quality episodes). I'd still like to see this happen one day, but you know how these things go. Thus, much of my notes on the game now reflect the expanded story, and not the original, for good or ill. GMs OnlyDownloads forthcoming.Player CommentsCritical acclaim, heckling, and other comments from the Peanut GalleryNo comments submitted yet If you played in this campaign, and would like to add a comment about the campaign, submit it here.This page is part of a frameset. To see the frames, click here. |
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