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Kren Cooper
One of my players had a stab at GMing, giving me a chance to play. We were sent on a mission into Germany, and encountered were-creatures. They were a new type of were, capable of spreading their curse with a single scratch, a drop of spilled blood - even a cough and a droplet of phlegm. He wanted them to be SCARY. We managed to defeat the foe and complete the adventure, and two of the players bought "trophies" back to Seattle, to mess with and try to enchant or use as unique materials.

I chatted with him after the game, giving him feedback on the run and trying to help him out with stuff from a GM point of view, and he shared the stats and adventure with me. I spotted something and raised it with him.

"Dude, it says here - one scratch, one drop of fluid, anything - and the change happens. No resistance roll. No chance to fight it off. It just happens, and you transform for ever. Are you sure about that?"
"Yeah, it's a magical curse. Really powerful".

I discussed with him, and told him about how spells worked, and even stuff like VITAS and the ghoul scratches. Nope, he remained adamant that it was a horrific disease, there was no cure - and most importantly, there was no resistance roll.

Well, so be it.

Over the next few weeks, the drop in game has focused on were-creature attacks, around Seattle, slowly ramping up the fear and tension in the city. Karma bit him on the ass, as in last weeks mission, when he was playing his Drake character - he was the only one to be wounded by the were-creature target, and turned.

As I was looking at what had happened, and how the players had reacted to the threat, I realised that there was only one place I could really go with this - the big red button. *If* the disease was as awful as he says it was, then it was an apocalypse, just waiting to happen.

I had a good long think for 2-3 days, and thought about the game world, the characters and the NPCs, and checked back on how long we'd been running. It's been going for 3 years almost, and I think we have had a lot of fun, and learnt a lot - but maybe a world reset wasn't that bad an idea. So tonight, the players got to see the end of the world. I'll post below the consequences of the actions and how it ended up - but I'm curious to know if anyone else has had a similar "end of the world" style event happen, or felt as a GM that due to player action they needed to use the plot hammer pretty hard to say "no, I'm not going to hand wave this, or make it a dream sequence. Sometimes, the world has consequences, and shit happens."
Kren Cooper
Posted to my Pink-Mohawk facebook group, to tell all the other players what happened and give them some context:


I thought about writing this up as a story – but it would turn into a multi-thousand word tale, and it’s too late for that.
So – suffice to say, as Scott so eloquently put – BOOM! Here’s a brief run-down of what happened…
As a consequence of in game events, a magical artefact carrying an ancient and incredibly powerful curse was bought to Seattle, and given to an enchanter who tinkered, and messed with something way beyond their ability to master. They turned, and become a Wulfen, a weird meta-type of werewolf. They in turn scratched and turned a number of mages, who were missed and investigated – very nearly ending their play for power. So, they changed tactics, and instead travelled to the Barrens, turning gangers and homeless, waifs and strays – people who would not be missed or reported. Their numbers grew geometrically, building an army of regenerating creatures that were all psychically dominated by the Alpha. When the Alpha was ready, they were unleashed upon the city, starting in the lower rent areas, with fewer defences. Cops investigating crimes were turned, along with security guards and countless blue-collar workers. The blight spread, working in from the edge towards the high tech and high security areas of Downtown. Then they struck again, targeting mages and shamans, swelling their power base. Martial law was declared, and the National Guard mobilised.
But it was too late.
Soon there were were-creatures driving tanks and APCs, having been turned by a scratch or dominated by the mages into climbing out of their armoured transports where they could be easily dealt with. The surrounding Native American nations declared a state of emergency and sealed off Seattle, the airports forced to close under threat of air-strikes. The were-creatures cemented their hold, turning more and more of the population, with every passing hour.
Isolated fortresses were overcome by wave after wave of massed assaults, the troops regenerating bullet wounds and sometimes just running the defenders out of ammunition, before leaping in for a single fatal claw wound and painful transformation. In the bar in Black Diamond, the Puppet and Puppet Master, along with the team of Mohawks and two other runner crews set up defensive positions and fought off wave after wave of attacking creatures. They were joined by Harlequin and Ehran the Scribe, two powerful immortal elves that had some contact with the Puppet.
A flight of Dragons could be seen nearby, laying waste to a city block with jets of fire, purging the were-creature menace, roasting them with superheated plasma and scouring the city to bedrock. One of the dragons fell, bought down by magic, and was swarmed by were-creatures. One scratch made it past the massive armoured scales, and moments later the dragon rose to the sky, wracked with pain as it transformed. It lashed out to its former allies, and one by one they turned too.
Tiny fell, then rose as a were-creature, before being taken down by Jeff. A creature turned Jeff, then they both rose, and one by one the defenders were lost, consumed by the madness and the control of the Alpha. Rubrix fired his heavy machine gun on wide bursts of fully automatic fire until the barrel glowed so hot that it could no longer be used. Bo fired missiles at almost point blank range to destroy the creatures. Ursula waded into combat, wielding Harlequins magical sword and cutting down the abominations, until she too fell.
Eventually, only Valentine was left, facing the advancing horde of monsters as they approached him, encircling him with their hungry red glowing eyes ready to add him to their collective.
He raised the heavy pistol, loaded with the finest Anti-Vehicle munitions man could design. He raised the pistol to his temple.
“Not going to happen.” He pulled the trigger, and robbed them of this one victory.

The tide of destruction spread from Seattle, overwhelming the border. With every fallen warrior, the were-creatures strength grew. The turned dragons and fallen immortal elves gave them power of ancient magics and forbidden knowledge. The madness grew and grew, encircling the world, until the entire planet was consumed by a feral rage and turned into a heaving sea of madness.
The sixth age of man, came to an end that day, the 20th of December, 2060.



So – really. It was the end of the world. The Pink Mohawk universe is no more – destroyed by a tide of magical were-creatures. All of the characters along with all of the NPCs and locations are toast…. The big red button has been pushed.
Thursday 27th is a Black Trenchcoat game – the Trenchoat world is unaffected by the downfall of its parallel universe sister.
Tuesday 1st Jan, it’s time for a new beginning…
We’re not going to stop playing of course. Now it’s time for Mohawk 2 – The Pink strikes back. Or something.

The new campaign will be set in an alternate trouser leg of time, where none of this bad shit has happened, but will follow the same basic principles of Pink Mohawk…

The game is set in Seattle. We will start in the year 2060 this time, so we can explore the Year of the Comet and other events (don’t worry if this doesn’t make sense to you!)
Characters will be created as 125 build points, the same as before. Anyone that is under 30 Karma / 3 Karma Pool – well, you’ve not really had much chance to play your “character”, so you’re welcome to keep the same character concept and build. We’ll wind them back to their starting levels, and you can ride again. Anyone more than 30 Karma / 3 KP – it’s time to try something new.
Characters will be built with no more than FIFTY build points in attributes (down from a max of 60), to stop quite so many super-awesome-Mary-Sue-god-like abilities cropping up. Make the character stylish, not pumped!
Max rating of gear is 6, max availability is 8 – as before.
All characters should have their backstory fleshed out – 20 questions or a suitable intro / bio written. Make a character, not a stat-sheet!

I hope that people had fun playing in the Pink Mohawk world these last 3 years, and I hope you’ll have fun playing in Version 2!
JanessaVR
I've said for years now that, as their strain of HMHVV was originally described, the Ghoul Apocalypse should have happened long ago.
Stahlseele
Ghoul-Purree.Crop Duster.
City of your choice. Done.
JanessaVR
QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Dec 23 2018, 04:34 AM) *
Ghoul-Purree.Crop Duster.
City of your choice. Done.

Precisely my point. The whole Sixth World doesn't consist entirely of ghouls in less than a decade after that strain of HMHVV first appeared...why exactly?
Thanee
QUOTE (JanessaVR @ Jan 3 2019, 06:11 AM) *
...why exactly?


Because... House Rules! biggrin.gif

Bye
Thanee
Arkeus
QUOTE (JanessaVR @ Jan 2 2019, 09:11 PM) *
Precisely my point. The whole Sixth World doesn't consist entirely of ghouls in less than a decade after that strain of HMHVV first appeared...why exactly?


The CDC got a whole lot better at preventing huge outbreaks of stuff like this. They're probably secretly led by a dragon. wobble.gif
JanessaVR
QUOTE (Arkeus @ Jan 3 2019, 11:40 AM) *
The CDC got a whole lot better at preventing huge outbreaks of stuff like this. They're probably secretly led by a dragon. wobble.gif

It would take at least that. Over the years here, people have posted so many ways that ghoul terrorist groups (which totally do exist in canon!) could pull this off. Crop dusting, tainting the food supply, etc. In the end, it's just too easy for them to succeed in such a campaign of HMHVV terrorism.
Sengir
QUOTE (JanessaVR @ Jan 3 2019, 06:11 AM) *
Precisely my point. The whole Sixth World doesn't consist entirely of ghouls in less than a decade after that strain of HMHVV first appeared...why exactly?

Because those stats were an admitted mistake and far stronger than intended, whereas Kren's GM seemingly wants to start a zombie apocalypse with open eyes.

As for a solution, just hunker down in Kaers and hope those were-things starve before the Horrors show up, so humanity can at least get a few days of fresh air before going underground again biggrin.gif
Kren Cooper
For me, it was the shortsightedness, or lack of following the plot to it's logical conclusion. Ok, so there are super duper werewolves in this little village. They can turn with a single scratch, no resistance. They are psychically dominated by the alpha. Why haven't these things spread? Why are they only found within 5 kmof this tiny little village?

I'd though about having them as just normal were creatures, away from the village. Perhaps there was a powerful 4th age artefact, buried in the middle of the village square, with a long forgotten spell sustained / quickened by it using a weird metamagic, that boosted the were curse to a point that it was *effectively* unsoakable or irresistible - but only in Force X 100m from the artefact. Ok, and lets make it force 50 - clearly way beyond a players ability to do anything with, except maybe try and destroy. But that gives us a 5km range beyond which the were creatures are nowhere near as scary. Ok, that sort of works, and adds in an element of 4th age mystery and arcane power.

But if I dig him out of the whole, what does he learn? And I thought... he learns nothing. And so does the other guy around the table who has expressed an interest in GMing. Or worse, they learn that whatever crazy shit they spew onto a page, it's ok, because the main GM will come along and dig them out.

On one hand I thought it was a bit of a dick move to kill every single other character in the game world - and trash all the NPCs and locations. But if I wanted to save all that, I had to use a big dollop of handwavium to save them. So in the end, I decided the burned hand learns best. Besides, the locations and NPCs will still exist for our Black Trenchcoat game, and I'm just about to start up a 3rd campaign, so I can recycle them in that as well.

And the next time someone wants to GM in my campaign world, they're getting the clear instruction "if you have to make something up that's not already in the critter book or one of the core rulebooks - don't. Work out another way for your plot to work, so that it doesn't massively unbalance or destabilize the game world."
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