Basic Action Super Heroes!

Hey guys,

I started a new BASH UE campaign last weekend. This is the proposal I sent my players via email:
__________________________________

I thought it might be neat to start a very low-level, pulpish, "superhero" game. I'm thinking of something where the characters have a single low-key power and operate at a city level, solving bizarre crimes or investigating strange situations. Ideally, the characters' non-super skills and identities would play an important part, so making cops, medical doctors, reporters, scholars, or any other heroic occupation would be a plus. I think I want the origin of powers to be mysterious, but there will probably be some sort of event or mythology that ties all the player characters together. It would be kind of a blend of Unbreakable, X-Files, Kolchack the Nightstalker, the TV series Heroes, Christopher Nolan's recent Batman movies, the TV show The Cape (even though that sucked, it had some good elements) and classic Golden Age comics.

The aesthetics of the game would largely depend on your preferences. If you guys want to play characters that actually wear superhero costumes like in traditional superhero comics - that's fine. If you want to play in a world where your characters wear mostly normal clothing - that would be cool too. I'm thinking that something between these two extremes would be best, but I'm game for whatever.

I think I'd probably set the game in the modern age (contemporary), but I could also see us setting this anytime from the 1930s to the present.
__________________________________

The players opted for a modern setting. They will disguise their identities, but won't actually wear costumes.

Thus far the characters are:

Will Garrity: aid to an alderman - ultimately gains the power to possess others

Sam Spaulding: a cop turned private investigator who ultimately gains enhanced Brawn and Agility

Jack Molsen: a crime scene photographer who gains the power to displace his image (bought as invisibility (always on) linked to illusion (always on, only to create image of self 5 feet from his actual location)

I'm posting write-ups for the first two sessions next. It's a three part story, which we should finish this weekend.

I hope you enjoy!

Best,

Dragonfly

Here you go! I haven't proofread it, so it might be rough.

Night Stalkers: “The Ghoul and the Ghost”

Late one November afternoon in Chicago, political aid Will Garrity was asked by his boss, Alderman Desmond Chase, to make a personal call to the home of Drs. Jim and Juliana Everett. It was election season, the Everetts were significant campaign contributors, and they had a complaint about the way the local police precinct was handling the case of their missing daughter, Susan Everett. While doing some background research, Garrity spoke to Lieutenant Gus Lombardi, who informed him that Susan Everett had been missing for five days, and that the police department was doing everything in their power to solve the case.

That same evening, crime scene photographer Jack Molsen arrived at a grisly murder scene on the outskirts of the city, where the corpse of a homeless man had been found sprawled out before an old sewer main, his spine crushed and pieces of flesh savagely bitten off his neck and face. While chatting with Detective Adam Bajorek, Detective Antonio Costa and forensic specialist Gordon Lester, Jack noticed what look like footprints heading away from the sewer main and toward the city. Curious by nature, and always anxious for excitement, he secretly remained on the scene after the body was removed, hoping to catch sight of any unusual traffic. After an hour of waiting, Molsen’s stakeout paid off, as three men wearing futuristic-looking HASMAT suits emerged from the sewer main. After scanning the area, they began walking to the side of the road where Molsen lay hiding behind a road barrier. Popping up from his hiding place, Molsen surprised the strangely clad men, who asked him to identify himself. Hearing a vehicle approaching, Molsen bolted to his hidden motorcycle, narrowly avoiding capture as the men attempted to stun him with taser guns.

Former police detective turned private investigator Sam Spaulding arrived at the home of potential client Dr. Jim Everett. Inviting him in, the Everetts explained that their daughter, Susan, had recently returned to Chicago after earning her Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of California, Berkeley. She’d secured a coveted position at the Chicago based R&D conglomerate, Stanton United Technologies, was set to marry her fiancé, Miles Henderson, and otherwise seemed to be on top of the world before disapearing five days previous. Her mother spoke with her by phone short hours before she left work for a dinner date with her parents, but Susan never arrived. According to the Everetts, the police were initially responsive, but little more than a day’s worth of investigation led them to conclude that Susan was mentally unstable and fled Chicago to cope with stresses in her life. Incensed, the Everetts asked Spaulding if he would accept the case and help them get to the bottom of their daughter’s disappearance.

Relentless in his pursuit of the truth, Jack Molsen gathered some gear and returned to that most eventful of Chicago sewer mains. Seeing no sign of the dread HASMAT team, he prowled into the sewer tunnel to search for clues. Only a few yards in, he was momentarily blinded as the night sight scope was suddenly overwhelmed by a strange luminesence that crossed his line of sight. Allowing his vision to recover, Molsen followed the mysterious light deeper into the sewers.

A knock sounded at the Everett’s door, just as Spaulding was about to finalize his contract with his new clients. Answering the door, Juliana Everett let Will Garrity into her home, grateful that at the responsiveness of the Alderman’s office. Introductions were made, and the Everetts explained the situation to Garrity, as Spaulding patiently waited to finalize his business contract. This scene was interrupted yet again, however, by a sudden, forceful, and persistent banging at the front door. Hurrying to respond, the Everetts were shocked to find their daughter, Susan, at their doorstep. Bedraggled, filthy, and deranged, Susan burst into the home and ran upstairs screaming wildly. Spaulding and Garrity gave chase, followed by Susan’s parents. Spaulding found Susan in her old room, frantically searching through her personal belongings and making a mess of the place. He tried to restrain her, but she resisted with unnatural strength. Attempting a more diplomatic approach, Garrity called Susan’s name in an attempt to calm her. His efforts were initially successful, and Juliana Everett slowly approached her daughter, speaking in a reassuring tone. Susan, however, suddenly flew into a rage and lunged at her mother, her mouth grotesquely widening as she attempted to bite into Dr. Everett’s throat. Spaulding, however, body blocked Susan off course, as Garrity hurried the Everetts out of the room. Grappling with Spaulding, Susan backhanded him and sent him flying ten feet across the room. She then jumped out the window, and disappeared into the darkness of the Everetts’ backyard. Looking out the window, Garrity and Spaulding were surprised to see a black, unmarked helicopter flying overhead, searching the premises with a spot light.

Hurrying to the Everett’s backyard, Spaulding and Garrity tried to pick-up on Susan’s trail. Traversing through various properties, they ended up on a quiet residential street, where Spaulding noticed a manhole cover slightly off center. Both men dropped into the sewers to investigate.

Still wandering through the sewer main, Jack Molsen spotted what he thought was the strange light that momentarily blinded him earlier. He moved in to investigate and found a chamber lit by a high tech lamp and another HASMAT team busily at work. One of the team was scanning the area with a handheld device, while the others were apparently cleaning the walls. Although Molsen attempted to remain hidden, one of the HASMAT team noticed him and attacked. Desperate, Molsen successfully shot the high tech lamp with his handgun, thus shrouding the room in darkness. His efforts, however, proved in vain, as a taser found its mark and incapacitated him. Still lying on the ground, Molsen felt a gun barrel press against his eye, and then an explosive pain in the instant that it took for him to die.

Equipped with their flashlights, Spaulding and Garrity proceeded deeper into the sewers. Trailing Spaulding by a few feet, Garrity was startled to see a shrouded, luminescent, figure glide across a T-intersection thirty feet ahead of Spaulding. Although he only saw the figure for a second, he got the sense that it turned its gaze on him for an instant before it vanished. Garrity described what he saw to Spaulding, who assumed that it was Susan and charged ahead to catch up. Rounding the corner, Spaulding and Garrity instead ran into four men wearing black suits and carrying flashlights. Spaulding asks them for identification, but the men responded by drawing handguns. Spaulding tackled one of the men to the ground, but two others filled his back with lead. Horrified, Garrity started to back up only to feel a gun barrel at the back of his head before his brains exploded from his skull.

Night Stalkers: “Second Chances”

Garrity, Molsen, and Spaulding slowly began to awaken to a white light. As they slowly regained consciousness, they each saw a luminescent, androgynous, shrouded figure hovering over them. It touched them on those parts of their bodies that ached with a dull pain, bringing great pleasure that then subsided into a soothing numbness. At that point they all snapped to full consciousness, instinctively reaching for their wounds, but finding them totally healed. The shrouded figure was gone, and they found themselves in a white, almost blindingly lit, circular chamber with no apparent openings. Their clothes and possessions were gone, and the three men found that they were wearing skin tight white body suits covering everything but their heads and faces. They briefly exchanged experiences and offerered the necessary introductions as they began to explore the chamber. An opening suddenly appeared before Spaulding as he approached one of the walls, revealing a long, narrow tube of a passage with white walls and a metallic floor lit by running lights along the side. Following the passage, the three men emerged into a large domed chamber with a control console at its center. A holographic image appeared above the console. The projected image seemed to match the figure that hovered over them as they awoke, as well as the figure that Garrity glimpsed in the sewers. “There is a great wrongness in your world,” it said. “Those who would banish you, imprison me. Use me for wrongness. This must not be. I extracted you. I healed you. I gifted you. You must use my gifts to extract me. Stop the wrongness.” With that, the image looked alarmed and started to fade, but continued to speak: “This place has been found! They will come! I must banish this place, so it will not be used! Flee for your lives, flee for your freedom, stop the wrongness! Go!” With that another tube appeared, leading to what seemed like daylight.

The three men ran down the tube, but Garrity and Moslen were shocked to find Spaulding dramatically outpacing them. Running out of the chamber at about 40 mph, Spaulding found himself at the edge of a small wilderness embankment before he could stop. Instinctively, he leaped into the air, arcing forty-five feet and landing by the shore of a lake. Garrity and Molsen emerged from the tube and ran for the embankment, but were pulled back as the strange facility imploded. Marveling over Spaulding’s newfound strength and speed, the three men were shocked to discover that Molsen was also altered. Affected by a spatial distortion of sorts, Molsen appeared to be standing five feet from his actual location.

Unsure of where they were, the three men decided to walk southeast along the lake’s shore. They eventually arrived at a ranger station. Sneaking up to the station, Spaulding overheard a park ranger speaking on his radio to a buddy, reporting his intention to take a drive in his jeep to investigate reports of vandals, despite orders from the FBI to “sit tight.” Spaulding, Garrity, and Molsen searched the station once the ranger left. They find out that they are at Shawnee National Park, which lies far away from Chicago, at the southernmost tip of Illinois. Taking some spare clothes, some petty cash, and a map, the three men planned to make their way out of the park, but a black van pulled up before they could leave. Garrity and Molsen hid as Spaulding, pretending to be a park ranger, met one of the four agents who emerged from the van. After a brief and tense exchange, Spaulding determined that the ruse had gone far enough and attacked the agent, slamming him into the wall of the ranger station with such force that it splintered wood. While Spaulding stood shocked at the extent of his strength, Molsen charged the remaining agents, who wasted their shots by pumping bullets into his displaced image. Molsen then grappled one of the three agents, incapacitating him as Spaulding delivered a bone crunching punch to another. Seeing the remaining agent take a bead on Spaulding with his handgun, Garrity jumped to tackle him, but instead vanished into the agent’s body, taking possession of his mind. Garrity instructed Spaulding and Molsen to handcuff the possessed agent. He then left the agent’s body, relinquishing possession and allowing the three men to interrogate their captive. Frustrated by the agent’s evasiveness, however, Garrity decided to retake possession, hoping that this would allow him to read the agent’s mind.

Successful in his attempt, Garrity learned that the agent worked for a shadow agency attached to the U.S. Department of Defense. Because of the agency’s structure, the agent knew little of its inner workings, but he was well-informed on his current mission. The agency was sent to handle a mishap at Stanton United Technologies (SUTech) – an R&D firm that holds defense contracts. Unfortunately, a test subject escaped from SUTech’s labs. Driven by the compulsion to eat human flesh, this test subject had the power to take the form of anybody it wholly consumed. Dr. Susan Everett had fallen prey to the creature and escaped, and the agency was called in to retrieve the creature and eliminate anybody who knew too much about the affair. Garrity, Spaulding, and Molsen were gunned down because they got too close. The creature possessed the ability to heal its wounds, but the agents assigned to hunting it down were armed with a serum that would deprive it of that ability. For now, however, the creature remained at large.

The mission, however, had become even more complicated by a secondary event. During the investigation, SUTech reported that their instruments picked up a psychic anomaly of suspected extraterrestrial origins. They also reported that they were able to trace this anomaly south, to the Shawnee National Park. A squad of agents was, therefore, diverted to investigate that anomaly, which brought them into contact with Spaulding, Garrity, and Molsen.

Worried that the agent knew too much about them, Garrity used his newfound powers to erase the last twenty-four hours of the agent’s memories. The three men then took the agents van and drove out of the park, before ditching the vehicle and purchasing three bus tickets back to Chicago. They arrived at the Windy City almost twenty-four hours after it seemed like they’d left it for good. However, with a man eating creature still on the loose and the question of their own fate still in the balance, Spaulding, Garrity, and Molsen were unlikely to find peace and normalcy anytime soon.