I heard Super 8 was crap

y/n?

The Jock: The toughest, best all around fighter on the team. Usually forced into hanging out with these other “losers” due to circumstances set up by the GM before the game starts, but he may be a genuine friend. When rolling the Jock, the player has to pick which sport he specializes in. Football makes him tougher. Baseball improves his upper body strength and makes him do more damage with melee weapons. Soccer makes him faster. The Jock tends to not get along with the Bad Kid. In terms of party mechanics, he’s the warrior.

The Nerd: The frailest of the team. Think Data from “The Goonies” mixed with Macaulay Culkin’s character in “Home Alone.” The Nerd has asthma and can’t run as long as the other players, although his speed is fairly average. He’s useless with a weapon. Why keep him around? On the one hand, the Nerd tends to read a lot, so he knows more about the weird goings on around the town. When the players encounter something strange, or a new type of monster, the Nerd is allowed to ask the GM for a hint as to the monster’s weakness, or about the circumstances of the weirdness. If they players choose to try and break the curse over the town, this skill will be instrumental for their investigation. On the other hand, the Nerd also knows Science, especially chemistry. Need to make a smoke bomb out of household chemicals? Or homemade napalm? He’s your man. He can even set up elaborate Rube-Goldberg devices, though the more important their function (a damaging trap, for example) the more space they take up and the longer they take to build. In terms of party mechanics, think of him as the mage.

The Bad Kid: Leather jacket. Probably smokes. Juvenile delinquent. Has a way with the ladies. The Freak is everything you’d expect from an 80s kid adventure stereotype of a “Bad Boy.” He’s useful because he’s got skills and access to items the other players don’t. He knows how to make pipe bombs, how to drive a car, and how to pick locks. He’s also the only player who knows how to use a gun. The Bad Kid may sometimes cause some friction within the group, but he’s damn handy to have in a tight spot. A decent fighter, but not very tough. In terms of party mechanics, he’s the rogue.

>>15363272

The ending was a little weak, but I thought it was a pretty solid movie. Very classic Spielberg in style.

>>15363272
Nope. Super awesome.

>>15363262
Fucking awesome idea, OP.

The Fat Kid: Think of Horace from “Monster Squad,” or Chunk from “The Goonies.” The Fat Kid is a bit of a social pariah (not as bad as The Nerd, though), and he’s got low health and the slowest movement speed. The Fat Kid, however, is also one of the most important members of the team. Why? Because he’s a powder keg. He’s used to being picked on for his weight and has been for years. He’s finally had enough. When the chips are low, he rises to the occasion. If the party (or the Fat Kid himself) is cornered and cannot retreat any further, the Fat Kid gets a phenomenal boost to his stats and is suddenly able to use any weapon in the game, even if he doesn’t know how to operate it. He’s not rendered strong enough to solo the threat but he is rendered strong enough to do (and take) serious damage. In terms of party mechanics, he’s a bit of a wildcard.

The vampires are very Nosferatu-ish in appearance. Dress in big, ancient black overcoats, possibly with some grave mould still clinging to them. They’re not AS powerful as some vampires; they’ve got no psychic or spell-casting abilities, they can only shapeshift into bats, their reflexes aren’t much better than a human’s and they can’t control the weather. However, they are super strong, can create more vampires by biting and draining another person of their blood, and can hypnotize others. Their hypnotic power is not truly psychic. Rather, it’s all about the odd qualities of their eyes; this power requires them to maintain eye contact with their chosen victim the whole time. If eye contact is broken for any reason, the hypnosis is canceled, though the victim won’t blink once hypnotized. Generally, this power is used to lead a victim away docilely, so they can be drained out of sight. These vampires also cannot change into a bat very subtlety. Instead, their body dissolves into a plume of white fog, before reforming into a large, ugly bat.

While not as dangerous as vampires in other settings, these are one of the more dangerous monsters in this setting, and should be used sparingly, usually with only one appearing in the whole campaign. Assume the others are busy elsewhere. They live in their coffins in several large, ornate tombs in the town graveyard, and spend most of the year in a state of deep hibernation. All the traditional weapons work on them; stakes, holy water, and crosses. Unfortunately, since the whole campaign takes place at night, it’s unlikely you’ll catch one sleeping. They rarely talk, except to threaten.

Werewolves in this setting do not transform under a full moon, and they’re not tragic victims. They’re completely aware of what they are, and they’re not nice. They spend most of the year as rather hirsute, anti-social recluses, only leaving their homes to find food, or just living as bums. During Halloween, however, they turn into hulking, four-legged monsters. They’re fast and strong, and want to eat people. They’re not as smart in wolf form, but they will mostly still try to take victims who are alone, as opposed to attacking crowds. If you piss one off, though, it will come after you no matter what.

Destroying a werewolf can garner experience, but it won’t kill the monster; it can regenerate even from being blown to pieces. Only damage dealt with silver will finish it off. However, the period where it regenerates offers plenty of time to run for it. Along with the vampires, they’re one of the more dangerous monsters and should be used sparingly. The players should never face more than one (maybe two) at a time.

A colony of ghouls lives in series of tunnels and catacombs (connected to the sewers) under the town’s graveyard. Ghouls look like extremely emaciated humans, are a sickly green in color, and ropes of semi-translucent green slime hang from their bony frames, with only a few rotten (but sharp) teeth in their mouths. They tend to be naked, aside from a few rags. They’re actually quite weak; a good, solid hit from a baseball bat would shatter most of their ribs or cave in their skull. That said, they do have an extremely strong grip in their hands and toes. They prefer to sneak up behind your, throttle you silently, and then drag you back to their lair, where they’ll let you rot for a while to soften the flesh before eating you. Because of their strong grip, they’re also expert climbers and can even crawl along ceilings and walls. Ghouls rarely use any weapons, preferring to attack undetected. If pressed, they might try and grab a sharp rock and hit you in the head with it, or bash you with a discarded femur. If their silent approach is foiled, they might press the attack anyway if they have superior numbers. Stiff resistance will send them scuttling back to their tunnels, though they’ll try to drag the dead or wounded with them, and will probably come back later to try again. During the year, they live in their catacombs, pilfering the graves above for food. During Halloween they start picking off fresher meat, usually using the sewer system to move about the town. They favor weak-looking targets and it’s easiest for them to pick off children.

The goblins live in the hills just outside of town. They look more or less like the Green Goblin from Spider-Man (see pic) with gangly limbs, and they’re not green. They’re normal flesh colors but very wrinkly, though it’s sometimes hard to tell given that they’re often caked in filth. The goblins spend most of the year watching the town, and going about their own affairs. On Halloween proper, they engage in various dark humor, Gremlins-esque pranks. Some of these can be lethal. For example, say they fill a Jack O’Lantern with kerosene, so that when the wick burns down enough it ignites. That’s a mild one by their standards.

Their other main goal is to kidnap young children and drag them back to the hills, where they will poke, prod, pinch, torment the child, all while rubbing ointments of a mysterious nature on them. By the next Halloween, the child will just be another goblin. Goblins are fairly weak physically, and are more of a nuisance then a true threat. If their lives are seriously endangered, they’ll probably flee, but if they think there’s fun to be had, they’ll come back later to provoke the one who threatened them. Goblins can’t leave well enough alone and have poor impulse control.

>mfw this is exactly like zombie at my neighbors

>>15363370

*zombies ate my neighbors

Ghosts: Look like transparent, pale people wrapped in white raggedy, hooded, flowing robes, with no legs hanging out the bottom. Sometimes they’re wrapped in chains. Their eyes glow red. Ghosts can move through any solid object. They don’t generally attack the player, but they do impede his progress. For example, the player is walking up stairway in a dark house. At the top of the stairs, a ghost shoots out of the wall, shrieking at him. He is startled and has to roll. If he fails the roll, he falls down the stairs and takes damage. If he succeeds, he manages to catch his footing before he falls. Ghosts can also hinder vision and slow the players down in large numbers. Say they’re running from a werewolf. Dozens of ghosts swirl around their heads, feeling like cobwebs as they push through them. They distract and blind the players, slowing them down.

Ghosts are primarily an environmental hazard, but they can attack. To do this, a single ghost dives into an object and possesses it. It can be anything, so long as it not part of a larger structure and is not too big. This can include anything from a living room lamp to a vacuum cleaner. Once possessed the object moves under the ghost’s power. It can levitate in the air and throw itself at a player, try to trip the player, or any other single action. The ghost cannot control the object for long; once it has performed this single action, it must stop possessing the object and fly off, shrieking.

The witches are all ancient crones of various sizes and shapes, and while then tend to dress in black dresses, have twisted and unpleasant features with long stringy hair, nothing else indicates they are witches. They all live together on the far side of town in a row of large, stately Victorian houses surrounded by spiky iron fences and overgrown with ivy. They never leave their homes except on Halloween. On Halloween night, they go out into the skies seeking unguarded babies. If they find one, they will suck out its breath, asphyxiating it. The breath of children is what sustains them, keeping them alive over the centuries, though it never restores their youth.

The witches can fly on broomsticks, yes, but also on any other object they choose to so enchant, including benches, cauldrons, tree branches, etc. Their powers are limited; each witch has a familiar, which serves as their eyes and ears. These include snakes, toads, black cats, crows, etc. Often, the familiars will scout out a house before the witches come in to kill a baby. During the rest of the year, the familiars have the run of the town, so the witches are kept up to date on things despite never leaving their houses. The witches are so old that they remember the town being founded, and they remember the pact that was made. They are a potential source of information if the players want to try to investigate the truth behind the town’s curse, but they will either have to be forced to provide that information, or they might part with it for a price.

This is pretty cool.

>>15363378

Never heard of it.

Go on, this is tender

Devils: Red skin. Pitchfork. Goat legs. Arrow-headed tail tip. High, Dracula-esque collar on his red robe/cape. The works. There’s never more than one devil in the game (and he’s not THE Devil) and the GM only brings him out when the chips are down. Really, really down. Maybe a player has died, maybe the players are cornered. Then the devil is waiting for them in the next room they enter. He can’t be hurt, and he’s not there to attack.

Instead, he’ll offer to get the players out of their immediate bind (though he won’t take them out of the town or kill the things chasing them) in exchange for a price. This price will be unpleasant and steep, but the players may decide to pay it. This price could be as severe as asking the players to sacrifice one of their number, or surrendering some very choice gear. In short, the devil is a player get-out-off-jail card, but it should be morally compromising in a way that might make them think twice about paying it.

Zombies in this setting don’t want to eat your flesh or your brains and they’re not the recently dead. Instead, they’re people who were unpleasant in life who, on Halloween, claw their way out of the grave. They’re slow, shambling, and rotting. Hitting one hard enough can knock off an arm or something, but they’re impossible to kill; you can only disable them. Even then, their various bits will still crawl after you.

Zombies never retreat and always attack in numbers (though usually not more then five), and their goal is to grab a player, drag them back to the graveyard, and bury them alive. The other players can attempt to rescue a captured player, but that means going to the graveyard, or intercepting the zombies en route. Some of the zombies are quite old, and may include people who remember the time when the town’s dark pact was first made and therefore can be disabled and interrogated by the players, if they’re interested in solving the mystery of the town. The zombies are a surly bunch, but they’re not particularly loyal to the dark powers that have made them into walking corpses and some of them have had a long, long time to think about their lives.

You should introduce an eldritch abomination in your campaign, OP.
Something like "That what lurks under the bed", imagine a mix of Pinhead from Hellriaser, the Tall man from Pan's Labyrinth, Hastur, Freddy Kruger and Pennywise.

The Skeletons are not particularly dangerous in this game. They seem to have minds of their own, though they never talk and have no obvious goal. They frequently engage in rather nonsensical behavior. Something makes the skeletons think it’s hilarious to hide in a barrel, cackling intermittently for a hundred years until a victim happens by who they can jump out at and grab onto. Sometimes during Halloween they just dance down the streets. Think of the Graveyard scene in “Army of Darkness” and you’ll get an idea of their slapstick hijinks. Skeletons are easy to destroy, and are therefore cheap experience, though they may lead the players on a merry chase. What’s more, a group of skeletons will start putting themselves back together during combat. The whole bunch has to be smashed up or divided before they count as defeated.

>>15363423

Way ahead of you, he's coming up.

The Bogeyman is the dark force the town founders make their pact with all those years ago. He laid the Curse of Sustainability upon the town (more on that in a bit). It is his power that keeps the other monsters in line and confines them to only coming out on Halloween. The Bogeyman feeds on the fear released on that night. Luckily, most of his power is spent maintaining the unchanging nature of the town, so if the players can track him down and destroy him they free the town and win the game. Unfortunately for them, the Bogeyman is an accomplished shapeshifter, and never brings attention to himself by killing people. He just goes around scaring them on Halloween and drinking in their fear.

The Boogeyman has four basic forms: a big hairy closet monster, a purple tentacled critter that lurks under the bed, a creepy monster clown, and a bat-winged, scale-covered creature. None of these forms are much bigger then a man, but each has their own special abilities. If the players defeat one form, the Bogeyman will flee to a new part of town and assume the next one. The players have to track him down. Once each form (or less, if the GM is feeling generous) is defeated, the Bogeyman can be finished off.

is a Mid-Western town, located in an unspecified state. Despite the economic hardships of the region around it, the Town thrives. This is because, nearly a hundred years ago, when the town was founded, a deal was struck with certain Dark Powers from The Old Country. As such, the town is under the Curse of Sustainability. This may sound like a lame name for a curse, but it has its reasons. The town continues to expand and in fact is now quite large. Despite having a population to rival some cities, the whole place still seems like a small Midwestern rural town, with no particularly large buildings, lots of trees and wooden houses, and a thriving and extensive (yet quaint) downtown business district.

In short, the Curse of Sustainability traps the town in a certain level of unchanging stasis, while at the same time allowing it to grow. In fact, the town doesn’t actually have enough jobs to support all its citizens, yet funds pour in anyway. It’s basically a money sinkhole, yet the Curse keeps investors (or the townspeople) from ever actually noticing. The larger population allows for the dark side of the founder’s deal to go mostly unnoticed; each Halloween, monsters roam the streets of the town, abducting and killing. The town has a skyrocketing missing persons list, yet the Curse of Sustainability prevents anyone from really noticing this too.

During character creation, the players have to roll for Parental Occupation. This might sound like silly fluff, but it has a couple of very useful gameplay attributes. One is resources. Let’s say one player gets the Sheriff as his dad. Well, that means there’s probably a gun somewhere in the house. Or maybe the player’s mom is a nurse. That means there’s probably a well stocked first aid supply kit in the house. Or maybe the dad is the school sports coach, and he left his keys to the sporting equipment shed at home. The other aspect is for a bit of roleplaying and plot-building. For example, say the Bad Kid rolls the coach dad. Well, then obviously he’s a Bad Kid because he’s rebelling against his square, ex-military, rules-and-discipline dad, which allows for potential roleplaying friction. Or maybe your dad is the sheriff, and you want to try and convince him you’re being chased by monsters and get some help (good luck with convincing any of the adults of this, by the way).

Before the game begins, the GM should roll up a few character templates for the parents. They players are merely rolling to see which ones they should get. It might seem easy to just make everybody a single parent, but that’s a bit of a cheap shot. You could combine them, though, making two of the players siblings. In most cases, maybe only one parent is really important, but even if dad is the sheriff, maybe mom has a collection of prized silverware that can be stuffed inside an anti-werewolf pipebomb.

You may have noticed that some of the monsters seem very powerful, while others seem to attack in large numbers. That's because this is not a pure combat-intended game. Sometimes, running for your lives is a very wise decision and the GM should make this clear before the game starts. This is why escaping the town is one of the victory parameters, although the GM should do his best to make getting out of town hard for the players.

If the players choose to stand and fight, just wading into battle will probably get them killed. Instead, the idea is to scavenge their resources and MacGyver the shit out of things. GURPS is probably the best option for this kind of improvisational stuff. The idea is to get the players to come up with crazy/awesome ways of getting themselves out of a bind. The GM should keep the pressure on, not with the goal of overwhelming them, but with the idea of provoking that kind of crazy behavior.

With this in mind, the GM shouldn't have too many landmarks for the game. He should draw up some house/shop templates, maybe one for the school/police station/town hall, and that's about it. The Town is a sprawling landscape of semi-Suburban Midwestern houses and shops, most of which are pretty interchangable. Come up with what's in them (or on the streets) on the fly, although it's a good idea to have a few events planned that can happen almost anywhere in town. For example, if they Players try to jack a car, maybe have a werewolf chase somebody into the street and they hit the monster or try to swerve out of the way and crash. A 400 lb werewolf will probably mess the car up pretty good, and it'll be getting to its feet again soon.

OP, I see you have four stereotypes for the PC's.

What about the Girly-Girl or Tomboy archetypes?

I'd imagine the Girly-Girl to fulfill a priest-like role (healing/buffs because BEWBS) and maybe thanks to a militant father or being captain of the cheerleaders won't slow down the group in a fight.

The Tomboy I'd figure to fulfill the Paladin role, with buffing the rest of the party either through insane acts of balls or by berating the rest of the team. May or may not have some kind of secret aversion to something considerably harmless (bugs, weaker mobs, etc.)

This is glorious.

The game is designed to be played each October. If the players win by surviving the night you can play again next year; an actual year has passed in game and the characters are the same people. They know what’s coming this time, so they’re getting ready. After all, the adults sure don’t believe them. Be prepared to ramp up the difficulty for a rematch game like this.

Alternatively, if you want to run an even harder game in the future, than if the players won by escaping the town, they can come back to it as adults in next year's game. They can age their characters appropriately and add some levels, becoming more standard character types and less those of the Fat Kid/Nerd/etc. After living on the lamb as teenage runaways for years, they return to town to finish it once and for all and they come well prepared. In a game like that, the GM shouldn't hold back, hitting them hard with the tougher monsters and larger groups of the weaker ones.

>>15363475

I considered that, but thought it was safest to make the "classes" gender neutral. Note it's the "Bad Kid" not the "Bad Boy." Replace every male pronoun in those descriptions with female, and they work just as well.

You can have a female Athlete for the jock, a fat girl for the Fat Kid, etc.

Anyway, that's all I've got for the setting.

Personally, I think the Boogeyman needs some sort of specific weakness for them to use against him, and I was toying with each Witch having her own unique ability that you'd roll from a table.

Feedback and suggestions are welcome.

>>15363520
What about NPCs? Just going off of Super 8, they had the stoner that drove them back into town. I think some kind of archtype NPC (stoner guy, eccentric old man, a teacher that takes them seriously, even a skeptical older sibling) could be a useful resource of some kind.

>>15363539

A good point. The option of rolling for parents covers part of that, but certainly could use more. Obviously the GM could make some NPCs on the fly, but a few more thought out ones couldn't hurt.

Any ideas on what sort of NPCs the players could bump into in this setting?

>>15363569

Crazy old man Jenkins, who knows more about what's going on in town than he lets on. He has anti-monster weapons stockpiled in his basement.

A town official who likewise knows more and is in fact in collusion with the Bogeyman. Think of the Mayor from "Jaws" only actively evil, as opposed to just incompetent.

That's all that springs to mind at the moment.

Added idea: Due to all the people who have been killed off over the years, the town has a lot of old, abandoned houses. Some of these are home to monsters, who hibernate their during the year.

Of course, the players stumble across one while navigating the town, get trapped inside, and then you can have an extended Haunted House sequence within the game.

>>15363681
Yeeeessss

>>and I was toying with each Witch having her own unique ability that you'd roll from a table.

Some suggestions for that table:

#1: The witch can transform people into animals. This will last for an hour of in-game time. The animal retains its human intelligence. The only way to break the spell is to wait it out, kill the witch, or make a Deal with the Devil.

#2: The Witch has an "Evil Eye." If you look into it, you'll see the way you're destined to die. This forces your character to run in fear if they fail a roll, and it applies a penalty to your future rolls for a while.

#3: Siren Song. The Witch can sing a lullaby-like song. As long as she's singing it, characters who fail a roll are compelled to follow her wherever she goes.

#4: Illusion. The Witch can make herself look like somebody else. This is an illusion only, not a physical transformation.

#5: The witch can turn into an animal, selected from the same list of animals for Witches' Familiars.

#6: If one of the witch's body parts is cut off, it can still crawl around on its own. If she can get it back, she can re-attach it.

>>15363520

Make the curse perpetual. Even if the kids win, the curse remains but the entire night is safe. Make it part of the contract.

Make sure to give a reason that corpses of the monsters are never found. Do this by having them loldust or that the Boogyman makes sure to clean out the memories of adults once they turn away, similar to the Silence in the Doctor Who series.

Make sure to have an emphasis on melee combat. If you are setting this in the U.S then I am sure that guns would be plentiful to a degree that makes firearms the mainstay instead of things such as baseball bats, hockey sticks and so on. Try and do a Grim Dark setting in respects to the guns being 'rare' enough that maybe a farmhouse would have one or an empty police car needs a key to access it. Make ammo scarce too so that the PCs have to focus more on keeping their guns as a last resort than a go to weapon.

Make the monsters infight. Werewolves and Vampires are notoriously bad enemies in most fiction and ghouls can be hunters of skeletons and zombies because they live mainly on rotting matter and 100 year old zombie corpse happens to be a delicacy.

>>15363743
I really like that idea, bring the whole "Hocus Pocus" thing into it (a movie my group always watches around Halloween).

As for NPCs, how about a local who can kind of pinch hit for a missing member of the party?
Like Skull from Monster House if the party lacks a nerd, or like the big brother from Goonies to fill in for a jock?
Say the part gets to take some kind of disadvantage from the start if they want to include such an NPC.

The school the kids go to is the NEW school.

There's another, older school on the far side of town, all boarded up. Something bad happened there once, one Halloween. If a monster kidnaps a player (or their kid sister or whoever), this is where they flee.

In addition to other monsters, the school is absolutely INFESTED with Ghosts, who swirl around inside it, pop out of walls, and chuck old school desks at the players. They're led by the Ghost of either A) the strict old principal or B) a kid who died tragically at the school's Halloween party during a prank, and desires vengeance on those who mocked her.

For compounded awesome, the players run into the Ghostbusters at the school entrance. They've been hired to investigate this town by a wealthy New Yorker whose son disappeared there. EKG Meter is off the scale, man!

>>15363801

I specifically downplayed guns in the setup for the game. Only the Bad Kid knows how to sue them, though the Fat Kid can use one too, when he Flips Out.

This is because I think guns will make the game more boring. The idea is to force the players to come up with elaborate ways to outsmart or trap the monsters, not to have them just run and gun through the whole game.

Most of your other suggestions are great. I particularly like the idea of a ghoul attacking a Skeleton, dragging it back to the crypts to gnaw on the bones and get at the marrow, but the whole time the bones are trying to re-attach themselves. The Ghoul Leader takes the skeleton's femur and mount the skull on one end, thereby gaining a club that bites people.

How about adding in a nightmare mechanism?
Like a Silent Hill transition, but more "dreamscape"? Pic VERY related.

Say that the houses in town that are unoccupied (nerd/bad kid knowledge check for which ones) are the kind of gateways where you can go back and forth between the two worlds, and some enemies can send or pull you into it (forcing you to navigate your way back to an empty house to leave).

Say that there's a lot more enemies there, but they all take less damage, and due to the very dreamlike state of it humans can't be hit as well there.
Otherwise just make it a more creepy version of the regular world.

>>15363892

How about the Boogeyman's presence generates patches of "Nightmare Space"? The closer you get to him, the more you encounter them. While the Nightmare Spaces are dangerous, they also allow you to track the Bogeyman, even if he's trying to hide from you.

>>15363889
What about the kids being able to negotiate with some of the critters?
Like all ghouls are generally hostile and nothing will change that, but if the kids can manage to make it to the ghoul leader they can do favors for him?

Or witches will always harass them, but they can also work some favors out of some of them too?

>>15363912

I think most of the favors the Ghoul would like them to do would be "Baste yourself in this BBQ sauce."

They COULD interact with some of the Zombies, the Devil, the Witches, the Goblins, and the Ghosts. Some of the older Zombies might be willing to help the players, since they're sick of this half-life and want to end the curse too, just so they can die for good. The Devil's whole POINT is interacting with the players. The Goblins might pretend to co-operate/help the players as part of a larger joke. The Witches might do something similar, with the ultimate goal of betraying the kids and sucking out their breath. For example, the Witch might try to get the players to eliminate one of her other Witch rivals.

>>15363837
>For compounded awesome, the players run into the Ghostbusters at the school entrance. They've been hired to investigate this town by a wealthy New Yorker whose son disappeared there. EKG Meter is off the scale, man!

Fuck. Yes.

Alternatively, if you run a game where the players come back as adult monster hunters? GHOSTBUSTERS TEAM-UP. They're trying to track down their old nemesis, the Boogeyman!

Fuck, why isn't there a Ghostbusters tabletop!

Venkmann=rogue
winston=warrior
ray+egon= ?? (not familiar with more modern settings, I'm assuming there is some sort of scientist equivilant, like a modern-day alchemist type?)

new players can take on one of those or be a new Ghostbuster.

GOTYAY

>>15364162

There is. It's out of print. There's an entire other thread about it right now: >>15361551

Speaking of Super 8. I could stream it.

Yeah, I agree with the idea you should expand the available kids. Six or eight kids of which four or five are chosen would be more interesting. You could have 'The New Kid', 'The Brat', stuff like that.

>>15364209

Would it be a shitty camrip?

>>15364231


Its definitely watchable. More like top end VHS quality.

>>15364227

I dunno, man. The four ones already there are pretty solid, enough to form a solid party core around. I'm skeptical you could come up with a unique party role for too many other classes.

>>15364263
I'd say add in a "popular kid" for charisma bonuses and let their role being the bard (give them lots of skills by saying their perfect family went camping a lot and they were in boy/girl scouts and stuff).

>>15363822

I like that idea. But if an older kid or an adult filled in, wouldn't there have to be a noticeable difference in level/skillset?

>>15364414

That's not a bad idea, but I think we need some more defined mechanic than just "give them lots of skills," no mater how good the logic.

I mean, the Charisma thing is certainly unique to the class, but it isn't very applicable when staring down a vampire, y'know?

>>15364263
Even just from a roleplaying perspective, it might be nice to have an alternate choice for each role with some different specialties.

bump

bump

>>15364444

What sort of different specialties? I mean, The Jock has different types of sport. I suppose the Nerd could get different types of SCIENCE or Lore. The Bad Kid could focus more on weapons or more on stealth/utility. The Fat Kid is kinda limited, though I guess we could have slightly different versions of his Flip Out ability.

Let's say we have two slightly different builds for each class. what would they be, and what would they entail?

>>15365495
I don't really like the Fat Kid (har har). He seems kind of boring to play.

>>15365509

Yeah, but you gotta have the Fat Kid. I mean, he's basically the Hulk. Or a Barbarian. His rage just kicks in under the right conditions. Playing him would be about contributing as best you can while you wait for the right moment, then utilizing your Flip Out ability to maximum effect for its duration.

It's the "contribute while best you can" part while waiting that is the issue. I'm open to other suggestions on ways we could improve that part of the class.

>>15365558

How about this. the Fat Kid has a taunt ability that he can use at any time. This takes the form of him either spazzing out and drawing attention, ala Chunk in The Goonies, or it consists of him shouting insults and throwing things at the monsters, generally making himself a big fat target.

This allows him to draw the heat off his comrades, and also to draw it onto himself, thus eventually leading to the activation of his Flip Out ability. This could be used tactically. Do you run away from the party, drawing the monsters off, counting on your eventual Flip Out to save you? Or do you stick near the party and distract the monsters while the others set up the trap/deal damage? In the second case, you're likely to get badly hurt, but your team might bring the monsters down before you Flip Out, thus leaving you in the lurch.

Plus, with such a strong focus on laying traps for the monsters, this makes the Fat Kid the ideal bait.

>>15365558
Make him a weakened tank. He can't dish out much damage before he hulks out, but he can soak it up like a champ. It'd make him more useful at least. Because as-is he kinda sits around like a useless sack of shit until the starts are aligned and he kills things in the face before going limp again.

>>15365668
>>15365674

I'd say make him not QUITE as tough as the Jock. The Jock is your meat and potatoes fighter, while the Fat Kid is more specialized.

an ancient Dragon magazine did this with boy scouts a zillion years ago. forget which issue

>>15363627
So, less like the mayor from Jaws, more like the mayor from Buffy? Maybe without the "wants to become a demon himself" factor.

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

See this TV show.

>>15364231

You don't watch streams for the quality man.

>>15366426
I like it.. and like the ginger willow/nergirl in it.

>>15366295

I imagined him as someone less competent then the Buffy mayor, someone in over his head, but yeah, that works too.

>>15367094
Got it. Adding in a bit more Nightmare Before Christmas mayor to the mix. This could be a truly great character.

>>15367094
>>15367159

You know how the Mayor in Jaws wears that jacket with all the little anchors on it? On Halloween, THIS town's mayor would totally wear an all-black jacket covered in a pattern of little orange pumpkins.

>>15367267

And while at first he SEEMS like a bumbling incompetent who doesn't want to face the truth, if you really push him or otherwise force his hand, out come the cackling goblin minions and you realize this guy is a desperate, haunted man who has made a deal with powers he barely understands and has sold out everyone else in the process.

Question. The Devil can grant you almost any wish, right, so long as you sign his contract?

That seems to put him almost on the same level as the Boogeyman. Both are vastly powerful beings with certain constraints on their powers. My point is, what if they're competitors? What if the Devil is poking his nose into the Boogeyman's business by helping you?

Do any "halloween" settings exist? Not necessarily something like Nightmare Before Christmas or Soul Eater. But, where supernaturals exist, and there's a strong halloween/autumn theme. People live with it instead of being ignorant of it. And supernaturals are more 'classical' instead of having vast networks and all.

More Halloween is the world instead of being this one rural town that's cursed.

This is actually really amazing. I think one more class really should be added for variety's sake, though I'm not entirely sure what it should be.

Maybe the beatnik/stoner/social outcast kid who knows the back alley routes better than anyone and gets a sizable bonus to search checks?

Or hell, the child of a cultist family who has a small grasp on magic and can cast spells. Very weak ones, of course, but spells nonetheless. Maybe the kid should be the priority target of the monsters as a result, I dunno.

>>15367418

An interesting idea, but I think it's a little beyond the scope of this game.

>>15368087

The girl. She gets better social and/or mystic abilities, but is more prone to freaking out than the rest of the group. If she can keep it together she may be able to charm or sense monsters.

>>15370123
>The girl
It was already stated the classes are to be gender neutral.

>>15368087
The child of a cultist family would be a parents roll, but there might be room for a Rich Kid who rolls parents on an different, wealthier chart and gets more abilities/resources from that (cultist would be an option, for instance)? He'd also have some social bonuses, but be middling to poor at other things.

There should probably be a dog in the campaign somewhere. Maybe not a class for the PCs, but available as a GMPC to give the players a heads-up to monsters, hold them off and otherwise move along the plot.

Some more specific class ideas:

Classes each have their own innate bonuses, and otherwise pick their abilities from a select pool. The only exception to this is the Fat Kid, because when he Flips Out he can use any item and gets massive bonuses to anything he attempts to do. He can still, however, put points into variants of his two core abilities, Taunt and Flip Out.

I bring this up, because I think we should try to list some Skills for each class.

You know, there's nothing saying there can be only four kids. You could have two Jocks, or two Bad Kids.

Hell, maybe on your first year, you play an all vanilla team, four of each class. then, next year, you mix shit up. Try and play with a party of all Bad Kids, for example. Set it in the 50s and make them all be Greasers.

Religious Kid. The kid who's parents have him home right after school can't talk on the playground with girls - name a strict parents cliche, any one - this kid's got it.

Combat is weak, but this kid's had few ways to get out of the house, and so volunteered at the local library as an assistant. And found book after book of monster stories and newspaper clippings. This is not the person to go to to fight a monster. But this kid knows them. Knows habits and weaknesses and legends, knows what to expect, and is able to keep fairly calm, most of the time.

>>15371292
>Try and play with a party of all Bad Kids, for example. Set it in the 50s and make them all be Greasers.

?

>>15371338

That sort of cuts into the Nerd's "Lore" ability.

I suggest more making sub-classes. You can, for example, have on subclass of the nerd that is more heavily about Science and traps and stuff, or you could have a sub-class similar to what you're suggest, with the nerd being more into history, mythology, getting extra bonuses to Lore checks and knowledge about the weaknesses of monsters.

If we go with the idea that there can more than one of each class in the game, then you could even have both subclasses of Nerd, working together to use Science and Traps that exploit the monsters specific weakness.

Since these Vampires are vulnerable to all the classics, there's totally got to be a sequence where you fend one off with a pizza that has garlic on it.

Movies you should try and get your players to watch in the days leading up to this game:

Monster Squad
The Goonies
Hocus Pocus
Fright Night
IT
Salem's Lot
Super 8
The Lost Boys

Any others anybody would care to suggest?

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Some suggested skills for the Bad Boy:

Lockpicking

Hotwiring

Sneaking

Moltov Cocktail Proficiency

Pipebomb Proficiency

Handgun Proficiency

Shotgun Proficiency

Rifle Proficiency

Switchblade Proficiency

Drive (motorcycle)

Drive (car)

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