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I'm working on Cascade, as mentioned in a few other threads, and am trying to get some inspiration for actual adventures there. Everything always seems to start, in my head, with immediate problem management, ie: gang war, fires, things of that nature.

What I'm looking for are simply, modern age adventures for low-power heroes (that is to say, no huge gunfights in the street or flight) that can all be contained in a specific city. Things that the ole Bat or DD would handle. Does anyone recommend a specific guide for such things or have ideas of their own?

Just key off of things which regular police would be dealing with today, and have them tackle those things. Muggings, Breaking and Entering, Robberies/Theft, Identity Theft, Gang Violence/Shootouts, Missing Persons, Disaster Mitigation, Escort Duty, etcetera.

Glistam wrote:Just key off of things which regular police would be dealing with today, and have them tackle those things. Muggings, Breaking and Entering, Robberies/Theft, Identity Theft, Gang Violence/Shootouts, Missing Persons, Disaster Mitigation, Escort Duty, etcetera.

This. Then add some layers of conspiracy and corruption for the players to start uncovering. Organized crime syndicates, cults, etc. Make sure there are at least two ideologically opposed factions for each category to maintain conflict. Just make sure that you don't fixate too much on story elements that the players aren't excited by. It's a fast way to kill a game's momentum.

1.Players meet a crying woman who is bruised up. After enough cajoling they learn that her children were taken by a group of albanian gangsters who are selling the kids into the sex trade. She owes them money she used to pay tuition for a proper education, since she can't pay back the loan when they wanted her to, they took her kids as compensation.

Do the players care? well, hopefully, haha. Getting the kids back (if they're altruistic) can be tough, may require a fight or the PC's might cut a different deal with the gangsters if they can convince them they can offer something better.


2. Abusive husband/boyfriend in progress. PC stops it, teaches the guy a lesson. neanderthal is unappreciative, gets his homies together, come after PC and his friends/family.

Resolve with apology? Fighting to cause more violence? Have both sides forgotten it was about abuse and this guy needs real help?

3. A PC's friend is murdered in a drug deal gone bad. The friend was getting into the scene, accompanied another friend to meet their dealer, who had an accomplice that turned out to be a cop. the PC friend's drug connection is highly unbalanced, kills everyone when the cop is revealed.

Do the PC's help the police find the killer, or do they race to cops to the guy to get vengeance?

simple when you guys say it, thanks for the thoughts so far

Hardly simple to execute though. To make mystery stories work, you've got to have enough self-control to never give too much information to the players and confidence that they'll figure it out anyway. And in games like these, where supernatural elements like clairvoyance and object reading come into play, you've also got to be ready for your villains to be thwarted far more easily than you might expect. If you're smart though, and willing to roll with a mistake rather than let it collapse the whole story, these sorts of games can be incredibly fulfilling for everyone involved.

As a GM, I am a big fan of "stealing" material and modifying it to work in my world. I would look over some of the old Shadowrun modules for ideas if I were running an urban campaign. It shouldn't be too hard to tweak the ideas to work in Rifts, I mean, you aren't looking for a premade adventure, just ideas right? So, if they have a scenario where two companies are going to war, use that, or whatever else you can find in their old plots. Not sure if Gurps (have never played it) or other games that are set in modern era, have good story ideas, but I always like Shadowrun for the complexity of their adventures.

Bill wrote:Hardly simple to execute though. To make mystery stories work, you've got to have enough self-control to never give too much information to the players and confidence that they'll figure it out anyway. And in games like these, where supernatural elements like clairvoyance and object reading come into play, you've also got to be ready for your villains to be thwarted far more easily than you might expect. If you're smart though, and willing to roll with a mistake rather than let it collapse the whole story, these sorts of games can be incredibly fulfilling for everyone involved.

This is more of a comment than a disagreement, Bill, so bare with me.

I've had the opposite, i give away too much, but many players out there are so untrustworthy of a GM they'll assume you're just leading them astray until you spell it out for them. heh.

In answer to clairvoyance though, it can be tricky. Have you ever thought about having a villain who was so paranoid that he hires a clairvoyant to figure out who is going to try to stop him? hrm...

I have done some mysteries and I'd sort of prefer to focus away from that, though there will always be some investigative elements of course! I also think I'm not up to 'sandboxing' a game too much also, which will make this even harder when I get around to playtesting it.

If you can find Boxed Nightmares it had some decent ideas.

Sometimes the party can solve problems in an oblique way. Getting the right information to the authorities to get the bad guys arrested can be an interesting change of pace. This is particularly useful for Principled characters.