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Halloween Adventure

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
bone_naga
Sep 28, 2011 17:27:21 Hey guys, I'm looking for ideas for a good Halloween adventure. I am running a MCWoD campaign using 4e rules. I just started this after scrapping a previous campaign so the characters are low level. At best they, might be level 4 or 5 by the time of the adventure.

The best idea I've had so far is making a Resident Evil themed adventure in a zombie-infected town, probably using large parts from the Biohazard Amethyst adventure.
#2
Langrishe
Sep 29, 2011 7:44:31 I'm doing the same thing. Only without zombies, zombies have been done to death.

I've started planning my Halloween adventure. It is going to take place in the local tavern where the PC's will be stopping in for a drink. The NPC's staying in the tavern will become possessed and skeletons will rise from the basement.

The mystery is a simple one. The tavern was built on top of a graveyard and the dead are now restless and have possessed the tavern patrons and are attacking the PC’s.

PC’s must find the source of the dead’s power in an underground cavern where the skeletons have busted in from. I’m still not sure what caused the dead to rise but I was playing with the idea of a skeleton witch (a dead witch who has return from beyond the grave to seek revenge on those who desiccated her grave.)

The session would play out like a typical Evil Dead style spook encounter. I’m looking forward to another crazy Halloween adventure.
#3
bakha
Sep 29, 2011 7:51:05 Dead by Dawn is a good zombie adventure:

www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd/d...

#4
yronimosw
Sep 29, 2011 9:32:23 A thread on a similar subject may suggest more great ideas:
Looking for a Low-Level Halloween/Horror-Themed Adventure
#5
bone_naga
Sep 29, 2011 17:10:19 BTW guys, I only mentioned zombies because it was the only semi-solid idea I had at the time. I'm also open to other suggestions if anyone has any. I'm also considering a haunted mansion filled with puzzles, hazards, and skill challenges in addition to ghosts and such.

Thanks for the suggestions so far.
#6
belaine
Sep 29, 2011 18:18:34 I mentioned this in another thread but it would work just as well here. Have a gypsy troupe/circus come to a town. Have them be not only thieves but dopplegangers, illithid and some sort of free willed undead. Towns folk start disappearing as well as money. In the right light and with the right description, a circus can be very creepy.
#7
yronimosw
Sep 29, 2011 20:53:41 A few months ago, I wrote a review of Stephen King's Graveyard Shift taking into account the story and film's usefulness in being translated to an adventure. (link)

In general, the story "Graveyard Shift" (and the film of the same name, based on the story) essentially start out as your basic RPG Adventuring 101 "clear the rat infestation out of the warehouse" newbie adventure, though Stephen King gets a bit more creative than that (with a very creepy, atmospheric, and vaguely Lovecraftian old factory/mill setting, hiding hideous secrets in its sub-basements, and an infestation of giant, mutant rats that get more bizarre and dangerous the deeper the protagonists descend into the the tunnels and basements beneath the factory.)

I didn't try translating the film into an actual adventure, but it should be extremely easy to create a one-shot, Heroic-tier adventure loosely based on the idea: anyone who has recently seen the movie or read the short story will find that the adventure may virtually write itself for any edition of D&D, with only a little extra planning and balancing from an adventure designer. Some suggestions:

map out a factory or ruin full of levels that go ever deeper into the earth (I suggest a factory that once produced masterwork and magical equipment, as this would provide a natural source of treasure for the PCs)

populate it with hordes of rat swarms, giant rats, dire rats, dire bats, were-rats, and other variations of rat-like monsters

some sub-basements may border on a neighboring cemetary, where the rats have been fattening on corpses and even the undead (reskin zombies to rat-gnawed corpses, for example)

the lowest levels may optionally touch on the Underdark and any of the horrors to be found there

"traps" may appear in the form of clusters of poisonous fungi, rotten and weakened floorboards and staircases, poisonous miasmas from the damp and rotten mazes and passages of the lower levels, nests of spiders, centuries of dangerously stacked furniture thrown haphazardly into the cellars, and other hazards to be found in the pits beneath the decrepit and centuries-old factory

#8
TheForgottenCommand
Sep 29, 2011 22:52:56 If you are going for something flat-out creepy and horrific, nothing pops up faster in my mind than a Far Realm invasion.

It could be as simple as an oddly colored falling star or the old "planets are aligned" idea. Descriptions of foulspawn running amock, disturbing visages forming on walls and distorting paintings, and the pull and strain of reaility itself can work quite well. It is also far away from the convensional undead idea, if avoiding the cliche is something you are after.

BTW YronimosW, nice idea. I may just use that in the future...

Hope this helps
#9
bone_naga
Sep 30, 2011 22:25:26
If you are going for something flat-out creepy and horrific, nothing pops up faster in my mind than a Far Realm invasion.

It could be as simple as an oddly colored falling star or the old "planets are aligned" idea. Descriptions of foulspawn running amock, disturbing visages forming on walls and distorting paintings, and the pull and strain of reaility itself can work quite well. It is also far away from the convensional undead idea, if avoiding the cliche is something you are after.

BTW YronimosW, nice idea. I may just use that in the future...

Hope this helps

Well too late for that, lol. It's a MCWoD campaign, so basically the invasion already started. For those that aren't familiar with it, picture a modern world where far realm type lovecraftian beings tried to invade. They didn't completely shatter reality due to a relatively small percentage of the population whose minds are strong enough to hold it together, but it created a giant field of entropy that consumed most of the Midwest, and unleashed all sorts of nasties into the world including vampires, demons, and werewolves (oh my!) and corrupted other things in all sorts of creepy manners.
#10
bone_naga
Sep 30, 2011 22:26:37
I mentioned this in another thread but it would work just as well here. Have a gypsy troupe/circus come to a town. Have them be not only thieves but dopplegangers, illithid and some sort of free willed undead. Towns folk start disappearing as well as money. In the right light and with the right description, a circus can be very creepy.

I do like that one. It could even be a lead in for a larger adventure. I'll probably steal from some of the other ideas that have been mentioned here too. Thanks guys!
#11
mattador666
Oct 01, 2011 13:59:38 i'm planning on running a little halloween one-shot. haunted mansion/scooby-doo style. the players will venture into the haunted house (filled with mummies, werewoles, animated armor suits, etc.) to retrieve the former tenant's diary/curse book. they'll have to recite it to lift the curse:

'never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down...'

then i'll make it rain Kit-Kats.

#12
bone_naga
Oct 02, 2011 21:57:20
i'm planning on running a little halloween one-shot. haunted mansion/scooby-doo style. the players will venture into the haunted house (filled with mummies, werewoles, animated armor suits, etc.) to retrieve the former tenant's diary/curse book. they'll have to recite it to lift the curse:

'never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down...'

then i'll make it rain Kit-Kats.

That's hilarious. I am totally stealing that ending.
#13
kimli
Oct 04, 2011 18:53:27 I'm going to do the sleepy hollow thing.

Party starts in a tavern, people talking about last years massacre. Night moves along and at midnight, the sound of a horse galloping on the bridge and a blood curdling scream. Everyone pours out of the tavern to see the horseman and his horse, holding the head of his victim. The man's wife is screaming and the horseman slams his sword into her and leaves, disappearing into the mist.

Now they must figure out what's going on.
#14
Pyrate_Jib
Oct 06, 2011 10:47:57 Sleepy Hollow is a great idea! Even more interesting if the PCs are all strangers in the village and don't know the folklore!

The original Ravenloft was often played as a Halloween adventure back in the 80's. I remember a lot of players really enjoyed that adventure.

The creator of Sutton Hoo games told me a cool story of how he used to rent a cabin or river boat for a one night Fantasy Role Playing game on Halloween. He mentioned that the story was almost always a one shot and designed to end badly (for the players). Part of the fun was survival and telling a tale that does end in death and sadness. Not for everyone but the players did have fun!
#15
kimli
Oct 06, 2011 17:43:34 I have always loved Ravenloft. My players didn't though, so we didn't get much of a chance to play it. I am in charge of the halloween game for this reason. It's my treat, as it were.

When we were younger, we would go to my cottage and play for the weekends. Loved that. Winter with a fire and no other heat source. Fun times.

I think I will use the idea of the PCs not knowing the folklore, too.

thanks for the idea.
#16
Pyrate_Jib
Oct 07, 2011 13:28:17 Playing D&D in a cottage with a roaring fire would be very nice!
#17
bone_naga
Oct 09, 2011 20:03:30
Playing D&D in a cottage with a roaring fire would be very nice!

Hells yes!
#18
PerfectTommy
Oct 10, 2011 8:51:37 I was reading a story to my two girls the other night when I thought, this would make a great Halloween 1 shot adventure!

The Spooky Tree (Bearnstein Bears book). The story has all the elements! A creepy tree where the entrance is a slide trap, a rickety staircase over a crocodile filled stream, a narrow ledge to a key and a secret door, a hallway filled with suits of armor (at least one of which is a trap!) as well as rats and spiders, a tunnel with a Great Sleeping Bear, and an elaborate string of rooms to escape!

All of that is unmodified! That's the story content!

Always knew Mama Bear was a DM...

Now you just need motivation to enter the tree, and a villan (the bear I guess?), and you are all set with a 3-4 encounter delve!
#19
kimli
Oct 10, 2011 9:04:35 Love how you pulled a delve from that story. Great idea.
#20
yronimosw
Oct 10, 2011 19:54:34 Agreed about the roaring fire, and +1 to the kudos for pulling the great idea from a bedtime story - I love unusual sources of inspiration for adventure, campaign, NPC, and plot ideas
#21
Mythril_Sage
Oct 14, 2011 11:11:06 Why not go for zombie illithids and their brainstealer dragolich?

BRRRAAAIIINNNSSS!

#22
mattador666
Oct 20, 2011 14:23:34 edit: apologies from me and my phone.

Started my Halloween adventure last nite. The party entered Lyrick Castle to find a journal to lift a curse that befell the town. they were the 2nd party to attempt this. the first was a bunch of meddling kids who also had a dog.

they discovered that the journal (or the way to get the journal) had been broken and bound to three other objects (or horcruxes or something). the first is a compass held by a tiny pirate captain in a pirate airship-in-a-bottle. i'm not sure of the others, any advice is appreciated.

they also found a globe, which instead of a world map, was a house map. spinning the globe really fast and pointing to a spot teleports the user somewhere in the house. i'm also trying to figure out a way to incorporate the hall-full-of-doors-yakety-sax chase into the next session.

i kinda just winged it the first session. i'd love any ideas or advice for the next (in case you didn't know, it ends in a rickroll). and feel free to steal anything for yourself.
#23
mattador666
Oct 20, 2011 14:24:10 ...carry on, nothing to see here...
#24
yronimosw
Oct 20, 2011 16:40:51 Sounds like a very fun and imaginative adventure!

Perhaps another of the parts of the journal (or way to find it) is hidden in a room behind an extra door that can be seein in a reflection of a haunted mirror... the doorway might be visible in the wall of any room the mirror is examined in, and can only be entered by the PCs, if they back into the doorway using the reflection as a guide. Of course, there's no reason they wouldn't be able to see other things in the mirror, too, and not all of those things are very nice....

#25
bone_naga
Oct 20, 2011 20:12:32 Consider the globe idea stolen. I think I'll add a little to it. Once the PCs figure out what it does, they can try to hit a specific point with a Thievery skill check. If they fail, they just teleport randomly instead.
#26
mattador666
Oct 21, 2011 7:54:44 That's what I did. The first player I just bamf'd him into he powder room across the hall. Tried to set up a 'Bloody Mary' scene. He ran out rather quickly though.
#27
pluisjen
Oct 21, 2011 7:57:41 This might be a bit late, but the XDMC did a competition about horror themed adventures a few months back:

community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...
#28
ciaran
Oct 22, 2011 14:39:56 I've done two different christmas themed adventures, or rather I wove it into ongoing adventures at the appropriate time.

I have a dwarf and an orc painted up as santa from them.
#29
bone_naga
Oct 22, 2011 18:34:57
I have a dwarf and an orc painted up as santa from them.

Nice. That's actually not a bad idea. I have plenty of minis to set aside a few for themed adventures.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 bone_naga Sep 28, 2011 17:27:21	Hey guys, I'm looking for ideas for a good Halloween adventure. I am running a MCWoD campaign using 4e rules. I just started this after scrapping a previous campaign so the characters are low level. At best they, might be level 4 or 5 by the time of the adventure. The best idea I've had so far is making a Resident Evil themed adventure in a zombie-infected town, probably using large parts from the Biohazard Amethyst adventure.
#2 Langrishe Sep 29, 2011 7:44:31	I'm doing the same thing. Only without zombies, zombies have been done to death. I've started planning my Halloween adventure. It is going to take place in the local tavern where the PC's will be stopping in for a drink. The NPC's staying in the tavern will become possessed and skeletons will rise from the basement. The mystery is a simple one. The tavern was built on top of a graveyard and the dead are now restless and have possessed the tavern patrons and are attacking the PC’s. PC’s must find the source of the dead’s power in an underground cavern where the skeletons have busted in from. I’m still not sure what caused the dead to rise but I was playing with the idea of a skeleton witch (a dead witch who has return from beyond the grave to seek revenge on those who desiccated her grave.) The session would play out like a typical Evil Dead style spook encounter. I’m looking forward to another crazy Halloween adventure.
#3 bakha Sep 29, 2011 7:51:05	Dead by Dawn is a good zombie adventure: www.wizards.com/DnD/Article.aspx?x=dnd/d...
#4 yronimosw Sep 29, 2011 9:32:23	A thread on a similar subject may suggest more great ideas: Looking for a Low-Level Halloween/Horror-Themed Adventure
#5 bone_naga Sep 29, 2011 17:10:19	BTW guys, I only mentioned zombies because it was the only semi-solid idea I had at the time. I'm also open to other suggestions if anyone has any. I'm also considering a haunted mansion filled with puzzles, hazards, and skill challenges in addition to ghosts and such. Thanks for the suggestions so far.
#6 belaine Sep 29, 2011 18:18:34	I mentioned this in another thread but it would work just as well here. Have a gypsy troupe/circus come to a town. Have them be not only thieves but dopplegangers, illithid and some sort of free willed undead. Towns folk start disappearing as well as money. In the right light and with the right description, a circus can be very creepy.
#7 yronimosw Sep 29, 2011 20:53:41	A few months ago, I wrote a review of Stephen King's Graveyard Shift taking into account the story and film's usefulness in being translated to an adventure. (link) In general, the story "Graveyard Shift" (and the film of the same name, based on the story) essentially start out as your basic RPG Adventuring 101 "clear the rat infestation out of the warehouse" newbie adventure, though Stephen King gets a bit more creative than that (with a very creepy, atmospheric, and vaguely Lovecraftian old factory/mill setting, hiding hideous secrets in its sub-basements, and an infestation of giant, mutant rats that get more bizarre and dangerous the deeper the protagonists descend into the the tunnels and basements beneath the factory.) I didn't try translating the film into an actual adventure, but it should be extremely easy to create a one-shot, Heroic-tier adventure loosely based on the idea: anyone who has recently seen the movie or read the short story will find that the adventure may virtually write itself for any edition of D&D, with only a little extra planning and balancing from an adventure designer. Some suggestions: map out a factory or ruin full of levels that go ever deeper into the earth (I suggest a factory that once produced masterwork and magical equipment, as this would provide a natural source of treasure for the PCs) populate it with hordes of rat swarms, giant rats, dire rats, dire bats, were-rats, and other variations of rat-like monsters some sub-basements may border on a neighboring cemetary, where the rats have been fattening on corpses and even the undead (reskin zombies to rat-gnawed corpses, for example) the lowest levels may optionally touch on the Underdark and any of the horrors to be found there "traps" may appear in the form of clusters of poisonous fungi, rotten and weakened floorboards and staircases, poisonous miasmas from the damp and rotten mazes and passages of the lower levels, nests of spiders, centuries of dangerously stacked furniture thrown haphazardly into the cellars, and other hazards to be found in the pits beneath the decrepit and centuries-old factory
#8 TheForgottenCommand Sep 29, 2011 22:52:56	If you are going for something flat-out creepy and horrific, nothing pops up faster in my mind than a Far Realm invasion. It could be as simple as an oddly colored falling star or the old "planets are aligned" idea. Descriptions of foulspawn running amock, disturbing visages forming on walls and distorting paintings, and the pull and strain of reaility itself can work quite well. It is also far away from the convensional undead idea, if avoiding the cliche is something you are after. BTW YronimosW, nice idea. I may just use that in the future... Hope this helps
#9 bone_naga Sep 30, 2011 22:25:26	If you are going for something flat-out creepy and horrific, nothing pops up faster in my mind than a Far Realm invasion. It could be as simple as an oddly colored falling star or the old "planets are aligned" idea. Descriptions of foulspawn running amock, disturbing visages forming on walls and distorting paintings, and the pull and strain of reaility itself can work quite well. It is also far away from the convensional undead idea, if avoiding the cliche is something you are after. BTW YronimosW, nice idea. I may just use that in the future... Hope this helps Well too late for that, lol. It's a MCWoD campaign, so basically the invasion already started. For those that aren't familiar with it, picture a modern world where far realm type lovecraftian beings tried to invade. They didn't completely shatter reality due to a relatively small percentage of the population whose minds are strong enough to hold it together, but it created a giant field of entropy that consumed most of the Midwest, and unleashed all sorts of nasties into the world including vampires, demons, and werewolves (oh my!) and corrupted other things in all sorts of creepy manners.
#10 bone_naga Sep 30, 2011 22:26:37	I mentioned this in another thread but it would work just as well here. Have a gypsy troupe/circus come to a town. Have them be not only thieves but dopplegangers, illithid and some sort of free willed undead. Towns folk start disappearing as well as money. In the right light and with the right description, a circus can be very creepy. I do like that one. It could even be a lead in for a larger adventure. I'll probably steal from some of the other ideas that have been mentioned here too. Thanks guys!
#11 mattador666 Oct 01, 2011 13:59:38	i'm planning on running a little halloween one-shot. haunted mansion/scooby-doo style. the players will venture into the haunted house (filled with mummies, werewoles, animated armor suits, etc.) to retrieve the former tenant's diary/curse book. they'll have to recite it to lift the curse: 'never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down...' then i'll make it rain Kit-Kats.
#12 bone_naga Oct 02, 2011 21:57:20	i'm planning on running a little halloween one-shot. haunted mansion/scooby-doo style. the players will venture into the haunted house (filled with mummies, werewoles, animated armor suits, etc.) to retrieve the former tenant's diary/curse book. they'll have to recite it to lift the curse: 'never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down...' then i'll make it rain Kit-Kats. That's hilarious. I am totally stealing that ending.
#13 kimli Oct 04, 2011 18:53:27	I'm going to do the sleepy hollow thing. Party starts in a tavern, people talking about last years massacre. Night moves along and at midnight, the sound of a horse galloping on the bridge and a blood curdling scream. Everyone pours out of the tavern to see the horseman and his horse, holding the head of his victim. The man's wife is screaming and the horseman slams his sword into her and leaves, disappearing into the mist. Now they must figure out what's going on.
#14 Pyrate_Jib Oct 06, 2011 10:47:57	Sleepy Hollow is a great idea! Even more interesting if the PCs are all strangers in the village and don't know the folklore! The original Ravenloft was often played as a Halloween adventure back in the 80's. I remember a lot of players really enjoyed that adventure. The creator of Sutton Hoo games told me a cool story of how he used to rent a cabin or river boat for a one night Fantasy Role Playing game on Halloween. He mentioned that the story was almost always a one shot and designed to end badly (for the players). Part of the fun was survival and telling a tale that does end in death and sadness. Not for everyone but the players did have fun!
#15 kimli Oct 06, 2011 17:43:34	I have always loved Ravenloft. My players didn't though, so we didn't get much of a chance to play it. I am in charge of the halloween game for this reason. It's my treat, as it were. When we were younger, we would go to my cottage and play for the weekends. Loved that. Winter with a fire and no other heat source. Fun times. I think I will use the idea of the PCs not knowing the folklore, too. thanks for the idea.
#16 Pyrate_Jib Oct 07, 2011 13:28:17	Playing D&D in a cottage with a roaring fire would be very nice!
#17 bone_naga Oct 09, 2011 20:03:30	Playing D&D in a cottage with a roaring fire would be very nice! Hells yes!
#18 PerfectTommy Oct 10, 2011 8:51:37	I was reading a story to my two girls the other night when I thought, this would make a great Halloween 1 shot adventure! The Spooky Tree (Bearnstein Bears book). The story has all the elements! A creepy tree where the entrance is a slide trap, a rickety staircase over a crocodile filled stream, a narrow ledge to a key and a secret door, a hallway filled with suits of armor (at least one of which is a trap!) as well as rats and spiders, a tunnel with a Great Sleeping Bear, and an elaborate string of rooms to escape! All of that is unmodified! That's the story content! Always knew Mama Bear was a DM... Now you just need motivation to enter the tree, and a villan (the bear I guess?), and you are all set with a 3-4 encounter delve!
#19 kimli Oct 10, 2011 9:04:35	Love how you pulled a delve from that story. Great idea.
#20 yronimosw Oct 10, 2011 19:54:34	Agreed about the roaring fire, and +1 to the kudos for pulling the great idea from a bedtime story - I love unusual sources of inspiration for adventure, campaign, NPC, and plot ideas
#21 Mythril_Sage Oct 14, 2011 11:11:06	Why not go for zombie illithids and their brainstealer dragolich? BRRRAAAIIINNNSSS!
#22 mattador666 Oct 20, 2011 14:23:34	edit: apologies from me and my phone. Started my Halloween adventure last nite. The party entered Lyrick Castle to find a journal to lift a curse that befell the town. they were the 2nd party to attempt this. the first was a bunch of meddling kids who also had a dog. they discovered that the journal (or the way to get the journal) had been broken and bound to three other objects (or horcruxes or something). the first is a compass held by a tiny pirate captain in a pirate airship-in-a-bottle. i'm not sure of the others, any advice is appreciated. they also found a globe, which instead of a world map, was a house map. spinning the globe really fast and pointing to a spot teleports the user somewhere in the house. i'm also trying to figure out a way to incorporate the hall-full-of-doors-yakety-sax chase into the next session. i kinda just winged it the first session. i'd love any ideas or advice for the next (in case you didn't know, it ends in a rickroll). and feel free to steal anything for yourself.
#23 mattador666 Oct 20, 2011 14:24:10	...carry on, nothing to see here...
#24 yronimosw Oct 20, 2011 16:40:51	Sounds like a very fun and imaginative adventure! Perhaps another of the parts of the journal (or way to find it) is hidden in a room behind an extra door that can be seein in a reflection of a haunted mirror... the doorway might be visible in the wall of any room the mirror is examined in, and can only be entered by the PCs, if they back into the doorway using the reflection as a guide. Of course, there's no reason they wouldn't be able to see other things in the mirror, too, and not all of those things are very nice....
#25 bone_naga Oct 20, 2011 20:12:32	Consider the globe idea stolen. I think I'll add a little to it. Once the PCs figure out what it does, they can try to hit a specific point with a Thievery skill check. If they fail, they just teleport randomly instead.
#26 mattador666 Oct 21, 2011 7:54:44	That's what I did. The first player I just bamf'd him into he powder room across the hall. Tried to set up a 'Bloody Mary' scene. He ran out rather quickly though.
#27 pluisjen Oct 21, 2011 7:57:41	This might be a bit late, but the XDMC did a competition about horror themed adventures a few months back: community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758...
#28 ciaran Oct 22, 2011 14:39:56	I've done two different christmas themed adventures, or rather I wove it into ongoing adventures at the appropriate time. I have a dwarf and an orc painted up as santa from them.
#29 bone_naga Oct 22, 2011 18:34:57	I have a dwarf and an orc painted up as santa from them. Nice. That's actually not a bad idea. I have plenty of minis to set aside a few for themed adventures.