What fell horrors to inflict?, Players are trapped in an awakened jungle with minimal supplies. Options

[FuelDrop]

Okay. Through no fault of their own the group is trapped in an awakened jungle with limited weaponry and survival gear. Obviously that means it's time to crack open running wild, but are there any great environmental hazards that people can suggest I inflict?

[DMiller]

Some house ruling may be needed, but here goes:

The two biggest problems they face are (not including critters):
1. Heat (jungles are hot and humid)
2. Disease (lots of things carry a lot of diseases in the jungle)

Food shouldn’t be a big issue if there is a stealth specialist in the group and they still have ammo. Be sure they track their ammo usage though. All supplies are limited.

If no one in the group has the survival skill, they will likely have problems with potable water as well. The basic idea of boiling it for 10 minutes will work, but building a fire with wet wood and no kindling will be hard. They will also need shelter (even if only temporary at night). Without an actual GPS unit (above and beyond a communications unit) they will have trouble with not getting lost. It would be reasonable to assume that a com-unit GPS doesn’t have access to maps without access to the grid, so the best it will do is give very general information. An actual GPS will have the maps they need to help them get to safety.

Remember the basic rule of 3… 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water and 3 weeks without food. The numbers actually vary a bit from there but it is a good guideline.

Crossing bodies of water can be dangerous from many stand-points. Drowning would suck, but so would being eaten or infested with parasites, lots of fun to be had there. Walking though a jungle is slow and everything wants you dead, even the plants.

I hope your team has fun. Our team’s last jungle trips were a blast, but we were prepared.

[Koekepan]

A few good ideas:

Snakes. Snakes love warm temperatures, love to lurk in holes and behind things in your path where you don't see them until you step on them and they bite you. Snakes are also astonishingly well camouflaged. You may think you're invisible in your ghillie suit, but the gaboon viper is laughing at your pathetic attempts.

Insects. They bite, they suck, they lay their eggs in you, if you don't have the players reflexively scratching themselves in about ten minutes, you need to get better about describing things.

Other arthropods. Especially ones which like to crawl into well hidden places, like the boots of sleeping people. If they aren't shaking out their boots, they're annoying the scorpions, spiders and other things which set up camp the previous night when they put their boots on in the morning.

Depending on the jungle, depending on the continent, some very large and very angry things might live there. Did you know one gets jungle dwelling elephants in Africa? And that they can easily weigh more than ten tons? And the females have tusks too? And never mind elephants. There are lots of things which hunt tasty, thin-skinned human-sized snack packs. Big cats, on every continent. I don't know what else you have going on, but if you have outsize reptiles, don't underestimate the damage which a large snake, leguan or of course a crocodile could do.

Wait, insects again. Insects are so much fun. Everything is buzzing, humming or singing. Is it just innocent cicadas, or is it a beehive the size of a truck? What if it's an asian jungle, and you're dealing with asian hornets? They are a good time in a can.

Don't forget the humble mollusc. They carry lovely diseases, and will actually eat a lot of things you wouldn't think they should. Maybe the seals on some of the kit. Maybe they slip into nice, warm, dark, moist areas at night. Like nostrils. Leeches are such fun.

Oh, did I mention insects? They're pretty important. I may be wrong about this, but don't they carry one or two minor diseases? Such as sleeping sickness, malaria, west nile disease?

Bats are cute and furry and eat insects. Bats are your friends. Except when they're transmitting diseases like rabies, or any one of a number of haemorrhagic fevers. What do you do when your decker starts bleeding from his eyeballs?

There are other fun things. Jolly little misunderstandings like stumbling into a couple of big herbivores which think it's mating season, and are fighting to the death. Getting in between them, or even just annoying something the size of a cow (or bigger) which isn't getting the amount of sexing to which it thinks it's entitled can get you stomped like a bug.

Speaking of bugs, I knew I was forgetting insects. You see, insects can produce horrendous toxins. Some of them, just a little dose, but when you have five thousand insects all stinging you at once because you forgot the password to their kingdom, it's a big dose.

Then there are things which eat insects - amphibians are popular. Some of them retain the toxins from insects, or alternatively produce their own exciting toxins. Even plants can produce toxins so nasty that even eating honey from their flowers can make you incredibly sick. Oleander springs to mind as an example.

Then of course no discussion of jungle living would be complete without touching on insects, and the way that they can utterly transform things which the unsuspecting urbanite wouldn't recognise, until they put their foot through a tree trunk which turns out to have been hollowed out and turned into an ant condominium, or they inadvertently break a mud bank and find themselves covered in termites, the soldiers of which are fulfilling their biological imperative by creeping into every orifice, and biting, and depositing noxious toxins just as fast as they can.

I could go on, but I'm in my happy place and I need a little alone time.

[FuelDrop]

A few good ideas:

Snakes. Snakes love warm temperatures, love to lurk in holes and behind things in your path where you don't see them until you step on them and they bite you. Snakes are also astonishingly well camouflaged. You may think you're invisible in your ghillie suit, but the gaboon viper is laughing at your pathetic attempts.

Insects. They bite, they suck, they lay their eggs in you, if you don't have the players reflexively scratching themselves in about ten minutes, you need to get better about describing things.

Other arthropods. Especially ones which like to crawl into well hidden places, like the boots of sleeping people. If they aren't shaking out their boots, they're annoying the scorpions, spiders and other things which set up camp the previous night when they put their boots on in the morning.

Depending on the jungle, depending on the continent, some very large and very angry things might live there. Did you know one gets jungle dwelling elephants in Africa? And that they can easily weigh more than ten tons? And the females have tusks too? And never mind elephants. There are lots of things which hunt tasty, thin-skinned human-sized snack packs. Big cats, on every continent. I don't know what else you have going on, but if you have outsize reptiles, don't underestimate the damage which a large snake, leguan or of course a crocodile could do.

Wait, insects again. Insects are so much fun. Everything is buzzing, humming or singing. Is it just innocent cicadas, or is it a beehive the size of a truck? What if it's an asian jungle, and you're dealing with asian hornets? They are a good time in a can.

Don't forget the humble mollusc. They carry lovely diseases, and will actually eat a lot of things you wouldn't think they should. Maybe the seals on some of the kit. Maybe they slip into nice, warm, dark, moist areas at night. Like nostrils. Leeches are such fun.

Oh, did I mention insects? They're pretty important. I may be wrong about this, but don't they carry one or two minor diseases? Such as sleeping sickness, malaria, west nile disease?

Bats are cute and furry and eat insects. Bats are your friends. Except when they're transmitting diseases like rabies, or any one of a number of haemorrhagic fevers. What do you do when your decker starts bleeding from his eyeballs?

There are other fun things. Jolly little misunderstandings like stumbling into a couple of big herbivores which think it's mating season, and are fighting to the death. Getting in between them, or even just annoying something the size of a cow (or bigger) which isn't getting the amount of sexing to which it thinks it's entitled can get you stomped like a bug.

Speaking of bugs, I knew I was forgetting insects. You see, insects can produce horrendous toxins. Some of them, just a little dose, but when you have five thousand insects all stinging you at once because you forgot the password to their kingdom, it's a big dose.

Then there are things which eat insects - amphibians are popular. Some of them retain the toxins from insects, or alternatively produce their own exciting toxins. Even plants can produce toxins so nasty that even eating honey from their flowers can make you incredibly sick. Oleander springs to mind as an example.

Then of course no discussion of jungle living would be complete without touching on insects, and the way that they can utterly transform things which the unsuspecting urbanite wouldn't recognise, until they put their foot through a tree trunk which turns out to have been hollowed out and turned into an ant condominium, or they inadvertently break a mud bank and find themselves covered in termites, the soldiers of which are fulfilling their biological imperative by creeping into every orifice, and biting, and depositing noxious toxins just as fast as they can.

I could go on, but I'm in my happy place and I need a little alone time.

Hmmm... Maybe I should use insects? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[DMiller]

LOL, I stayed away from the critters. I was sure someone else would fill your mind with insects ideas. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Koekepan]

Hmmm... Maybe I should use insects? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

I can't imagine where you got that outlandish idea.

However, I can also recommend this website.

[FuelDrop]

Well this particular jungle is on an awakened island with a dim view of metahumans, so is actively trying to kill them...

[Koekepan]

Well this particular jungle is on an awakened island with a dim view of metahumans, so is actively trying to kill them...

OK, so probably no serious megafauna (although Komodo dragons are quite capable of doing a lot of damage, if they're there, or along with anything else).
Crocodilians are quite possible.

Black widows are pretty much cosmopolitan, so having them quietly getting multiple, agonising bites all at the same time would be good entertainment. A sudden attack by several waves of different flying insects would be amusing.

How about Army Ant columns coming upon them at night?

Of course, for the really good fun time what you need to do is throw a few annoyances like that at them, but take careful notes on the diseases and infestations they contract, along with their latent periods. Then, once they're back home, start mentioning a few symptoms. Make rolls to see if they even notice the first manifestations.

Let them think they got out without too much trouble, and just smile.

[DMiller]

Let them think they got out without too much trouble, and just smile.

Come to think of it, this is what happened to my character... Now she's a Vampire and it happened on one of our jungle excursions.

BTW Koekepan, you are Evil... I like it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[nezumi]

Danger is large and has many teeth.

Horror is tiny (and also has many teeth).

For me, I'd use some fun charts for disease! Roll 1d6 for which organ, and 1d6 for what happens to it. That last bit's a joke; it grows lesions, rots, then falls off.

Also, has anyone mentioned insects? There's a lot of them, and you are delicious.

[Sendaz]

I don't know if you have any civilians with the group or other expendable a (say having to take a small group of scientists with you from a botched extraction), but for classic bait and switch a quicksand pit with a lurking protean is always fun, victim goes in- protean wearing their form comes out. So on top of all the jungle hazards you get to play a jungle version of 'The Thing'. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Horror always work better with expendables to help make it hit home, so if your group doesn't have them already, maybe they find some. Anything from a lost patrol to Eco-minded corp brats out on a safari gone wrong (if you can play up their nagging your group might want to shoot them themselves but don't which just adds to the drama.)

[kirtimlak]

I used the book 'Hazard Pay' (4th) when DMing in both 4th and 5th. It's fun))

[Mantis]

Shadowrun doesn't really go into this at all, but on the survival side, batteries that power all your awesome electronics and such do eventually lose a charge. This can put a time crunch on the characters as their gear slowly starts to die due to lack of power. Whether you extend this to their cybernetics or not is up to you but if you are trying to play up the horror aspect, losing your combat toys while things hunt you is never good. Makes a good story though.

[Koekepan]

Come to think of it, this is what happened to my character... Now she's a Vampire and it happened on one of our jungle excursions.

BTW Koekepan, you are Evil... I like it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Edit: some googling correcting my very old brain's memories.

One of my formative experiences as a GM goes back to an old Different Worlds article titled You Gotta Be Fiendish by Larry DiTillio. I am unaware of an online copy of this article, but it offers great hints for turning player psychology into their own worst nightmare.

An example given was a statue in a dungeon, with four arms which on inspection prove to be mobile, like levers. Three of the arms do something immediate and obvious, such as dropping 100GP from a compartment, healing some wounds, and so on. The fourth apparently does nothing. It's a sure bet that while the rest of the party is exploring the room, one of the party will be yanking that arm like a one-armed bandit, not realising that every pull summons a guard which shows up behind a secret door. In the fullness of time the party opens the secret door, and finds themselves faced with a small army.

Now, I didn't strictly follow all the guidelines of that article, but I first read it during, as I recall, the first term of the Reagan administration, and I've been developing it ever since. Sometime I really should record my thoughts for posterity ...

[kzt]

Without an actual GPS unit (above and beyond a communications unit) they will have trouble with not getting lost. It would be reasonable to assume that a com-unit GPS doesn’t have access to maps without access to the grid, so the best it will do is give very general information. An actual GPS will have the maps they need to help them get to safety.

An actual GPS in actual triple canopy is likely to be a warm brick. You usually need to see the sky and you won't do that in typical flat land triple canopy jungle. No idea how SR "GPS" is supposed to work, but real life the GPS signal is really, really weak.

[DMiller]

An actual GPS in actual triple canopy is likely to be a warm brick. You usually need to see the sky and you won't do that in typical flat land triple canopy jungle. No idea how SR "GPS" is supposed to work, but real life the GPS signal is really, really weak.

Probably still better than your cell phone... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Garvel]

I recommend the spider-beasts from running wild page 130.
Nothing says fun like huge spiders bursting out of your stomach. Fruits can be infected with spider-beast larvas, and if you eat them without a succesful survival check, you have a problem.

[The Neutronium A...]

Well this particular jungle is on an awakened island with a dim view of metahumans, so is actively trying to kill them...

Zombies. The animated corpses of previous unfortunates who have been trapped on the island. And insects. Zombie insects.

[Bigity]

Awakened version of Ophiocordyceps unilateralis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis) that can use more than just ants, and have developed a taste for flesh.


EDIT: Hahaha had no idea this is basically the plot of The Last of Us.