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Pen & Paper Roleplaying Central => Pen and Paper Roleplaying Games (RPGs) Discussion => Topic started by: Black Vulmea on March 04, 2014, 09:10:57 PM

Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Black Vulmea on March 04, 2014, 09:10:57 PM
Well, I know how my next post-apocalypse setting will come about: "A 30,000-Year-Old Virus Has Been Revived from Its Icy Tomb" (http://motherboard.vice.com/read/a-30000-year-old-virus-has-been-revived-from-its-icy-tomb).

Searching for pre-historic viruses for which no one alive has immunity - what could possibly go worng?
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Doughdee222 on March 04, 2014, 11:01:38 PM
One of the conceits of the Nephilim game is that all these ancient spiritual beings have their souls connected to common items. Could be anything really: jewelry, pottery, furniture, whatever. So I thought about all these old tombs and shipwrecks we are finding in the past century. How many contain items with ancient, dangerous souls attached to them? Maybe that's why there is a resurgence of evil deeds and oddball events happening in the Player Character's world.

Exploring old tombs: what could possibly go wrong?
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Omega on March 05, 2014, 10:03:53 AM
Quote from: Doughdee222;734678One of the conceits of the Nephilim game is that all these ancient spiritual beings have their souls connected to common items. Could be anything really: jewelry, pottery, furniture, whatever. So I thought about all these old tombs and shipwrecks we are finding in the past century. How many contain items with ancient, dangerous souls attached to them? Maybe that's why there is a resurgence of evil deeds and oddball events happening in the Player Character's world.

Exploring old tombs: what could possibly go wrong?

Maybee it can team up with the radiation feeding slime found living inside the Chernoble reaotor.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Bill on March 05, 2014, 11:49:42 AM
I saw that headline today and we are all doomed.


The Thing!!!!
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Sacrosanct on March 05, 2014, 12:02:47 PM
Stock up ;)

(http://www.bigberkeywaterfilters.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/wise-food-storage-bucket-84-servings1.jpg)
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Bill on March 05, 2014, 12:11:17 PM
Is that type of food cost effective for regular non end of the world use?
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Sacrosanct on March 05, 2014, 12:17:15 PM
Quote from: Bill;734778Is that type of food cost effective for regular non end of the world use?

Not really, but not too bad.  Recommended service sizes means about $2000 a year for one person.  So $167 a month per person might sound cheap, but their recommended 3 servings a day is really only 800 calories.  So for me it would be about $325 a month to maintain weight.  So you'd want to up that a bit.  Also, it can't be healthy to eat only that and not raw fresh food.  But it doesn't taste that bad, to be honest.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Exploderwizard on March 05, 2014, 12:31:42 PM
Quote from: Sacrosanct;734780Not really, but not too bad.  Recommended service sizes means about $2000 a year for one person.  So $167 a month per person might sound cheap, but their recommended 3 servings a day is really only 800 calories.  So for me it would be about $325 a month to maintain weight.  So you'd want to up that a bit.  Also, it can't be healthy to eat only that and not raw fresh food.  But it doesn't taste that bad, to be honest.

Not that it actually matters. When the apocalypse comes 90% or more of us will be eating brains anyway.

Brains. Its whats for dinner. :p
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: tenbones on March 05, 2014, 12:33:51 PM
Quote from: Black Vulmea;734652Well, I know how my next post-apocalypse setting will come about: "A 30,000-Year-Old Virus Has Been Revived from Its Icy Tomb" (http://motherboard.vice.com/read/a-30000-year-old-virus-has-been-revived-from-its-icy-tomb).

Searching for pre-historic viruses for which no one alive has immunity - what could possibly go worng?

We're immune to it. (thankfully)

But yeah - it has all kinds of possibilities that are scary, doesn't it? Like what if we they find some ancient bacteria that formed but was locked away from the rest of life on earth which developed in parallel?

scary shit indeed.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: dragoner on March 05, 2014, 01:00:40 PM
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3f/Earth_Abides_1949_small.jpg)


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Abides

;)
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: jeff37923 on March 05, 2014, 01:06:22 PM
Quote from: Omega;734754Maybee it can team up with the radiation feeding slime found living inside the Chernoble reaotor.

We had some of that growing in the Trident submarine reactor prototype I trained on. Nobody wanted to mess with it because it could survive inside the reactor compartment while it was at power - about 50,000 REM or Instant Death, No Saving Throw levels of radiation.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: yabaziou on March 05, 2014, 03:08:50 PM
Does the Ur-virus drain a level before killing your PC ?
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Sacrosanct on March 05, 2014, 03:10:01 PM
Quote from: yabaziou;734819Does the Ur-virus drain a level before killing your PC ?

No.  Save or die ;)
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Shawn Driscoll on March 06, 2014, 03:06:46 AM
Quote from: Black Vulmea;734652Well, I know how my next post-apocalypse setting will come about: "A 30,000-Year-Old Virus Has Been Revived from Its Icy Tomb" (http://motherboard.vice.com/read/a-30000-year-old-virus-has-been-revived-from-its-icy-tomb).

Who's been eating 30,000-year-old yellow snow again?
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: The Butcher on March 06, 2014, 05:42:34 AM
Quote from: jeff37923;734794We had some of that growing in the Trident submarine reactor prototype I trained on. Nobody wanted to mess with it because it could survive inside the reactor compartment while it was at power - about 50,000 REM or Instant Death, No Saving Throw levels of radiation.

It's actually Cryptococcus neoformans. Usually harmless but may cause severe disease such as meningitis in people with a severely compromised immune system, such as advanced AIDS patients, people on more toxic chemo such as the one used for bone marrow transplants, or people who have their bone marrow smoked away by the rare radiation accident with very high, acute doses of ionizing radiation.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Bill on March 06, 2014, 09:03:29 AM
Quote from: Sacrosanct;734820No.  Save or die ;)



1E viruses are deadly. Kill you dead in one round, probably with a 75% chance to kill you outright.

4E viruses don't really kill you; just do a few hp a round, with a 55% chance to be virus free each round.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Warlord Kro on March 06, 2014, 11:08:02 AM
Quote from: yabaziou;734819Does the Ur-virus drain a level before killing your PC ?

The prismatic virus:

The red shell does 10d6 fever damage, then the orange shell causes confusion, the yellow causes fear, the green affects you with a deadly poison (save at -2 or die), the blue causes paralysis, the indigo drains a level, and the violet vitrifies you (save vs. petrification).
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: Riordan on March 06, 2014, 12:04:43 PM
Quote from: dragoner;734790(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3f/Earth_Abides_1949_small.jpg)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Abides

;)
Hey, thanks! How come I never heard of that book or even its author? I'm a fan of John Wyndham's Day of the Triffids, so that sounds right up my alley. You could base a fascinating RPG on it, actually. Sort of a twist/merger of post-apocalyptic and neolithic/bronze age settings. Less Mad Max, more poking around in the recently lost and forgotten ruins of our own civilization...
Hmm....

As to the macro-virus: when it grows up it wants to be a Shoggoth.
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: jeff37923 on March 06, 2014, 01:00:01 PM
Quote from: The Butcher;734936It's actually Cryptococcus neoformans. Usually harmless but may cause severe disease such as meningitis in people with a severely compromised immune system, such as advanced AIDS patients, people on more toxic chemo such as the one used for bone marrow transplants, or people who have their bone marrow smoked away by the rare radiation accident with very high, acute doses of ionizing radiation.

I haven't thought about that stuff for decades, and now I have an adventure scenario to write. Thank you! :D

(Reading up on it, it is believed to be able to use beta radiation (!) to survive. It's the Andromeda Strain!)
Title: Let the nightmares begin . . .
Post by: dragoner on March 06, 2014, 01:21:09 PM
Quote from: Riordan;734984Hey, thanks! How come I never heard of that book or even its author? I'm a fan of John Wyndham's Day of the Triffids, so that sounds right up my alley. You could base a fascinating RPG on it, actually. Sort of a twist/merger of post-apocalyptic and neolithic/bronze age settings. Less Mad Max, more poking around in the recently lost and forgotten ruins of our own civilization...
Hmm....

As to the macro-virus: when it grows up it wants to be a Shoggoth.


I lived in Northern California where it is set, so it was cool reading it and spotting places from the setting. IMO, it is one of the better post-apocalypse novels, old though: 1949, and it lacks the usual Hollywood glitz, which could explain its lack of exposure maybe.