d20 Urban Arcana: High School Plot ideas.

[Berenger]

Hello Playground,

I'm starting a game in which the characters are high school students, but I need some ideas for plot. It should connect different types of characters (charismatic human punk, dedicated aasimar eco-terrorist environmental activist and strong human quarterback so far). They are all level 1 and completely unaware of shadow (even the aasimar), so the first encounter with "the shadow" will also be their awakening. We start in a fictitious town in Idaho with some 12,000 inhabitants near the rocky mountains and some national forests.

Thanks in advance...

[Logic]

Sounds like you need a mystery type setting. so start with simple stuff, like a coach or teacher is not what they seem (feel free to be as strange as you like here)

The swimming pool is contaminated WITH CORPSES! Dun da DAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

[Gildedragon]

Anything I could come up with has been already done in Buffy. So checking that out for inspiration might be good.

[CaladanMoonblad]

Drug ring perhaps? Maybe performance enhancing drugs for the football team pushed by the coach (perhaps a cultist) and local homeless people disappearing (to manufacture the drugs?)...

... Old Man Yoller is said to murder any kid who trespasses on his property for the last 30 years, and now a rival group of high schoolers dares the heroes to bring something back from the old man's basement as proof of the suspected crimes... only to find something worse....

A shadow corporation is bugging the local high schoolers' homes and cars as part of some decades long experiment... and the heroes are actually test subjects for genetic manipulation...

[lord pringle]

Spend the next twenty four hours binging on Buffy, Gravity Falls and The X-Files. Then select some enjoyable elements from various episodes and voila!

[Berenger]

Thank you very much for the input.

I'll go with the demon-worshipping history teacher from europe that converts the students in his inofficial Demonology 101 medieval folklore workshop into cultists to sacrifice them and / or the aasimar PC in a greater summoning. The friend of one PC is in that workshop, when she gets talky, she'll make for a fine swimming pool "accident"...

At the same time, the Fraternal Order of Vigilance will act against the new char [tough female half-orc wannaba-marine]. Any creative (but non-lethal, at least for starters) harassments?

Further ideas are appreciated...

[Cranthis]

The various sports field has been covered in holes lately, presumably from moles or rabbits. But when the pcs stick around at night to find whats going on, its actually ZOMBIE MOLES AND RABBITS I mean demon larvae.

[Berenger]

I tried the Old Man Yoller-idea. It went pretty well. My Mr. Yoller was a troglodyte that fed upon stray dogs and the occasional trespassing child and buried the remains in a pit inside his barn. He was tomahawk'ed in cold blood by an indian member of the Black Feathers they called in for their animal rescue mission to save the maltreated dogs from Yollers kennels. Now they are afraid of the un-shadowed corpse of a troglodyte and the prospect of being persecuted for complicity in murder. I guess their guilty conscience will vanish when the police shows up to unearth all those human remains on Yollers farm. :)

Completely unrelated question: I'm planning for the birthday party of a PC. How common is this sweet sixteen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_sixteen_%28birthday%29) stuff in the USA (particularly Idaho)? Is this really done or more of a cliché? Any plot ideas for this? It's the aasimars birthday and she will get some mysterious dream about angels & her wings the night after.

[CaladanMoonblad]

Woot for Old Man Yoller being a Troglodyte : )

Sweet 16... it's more of an 80s thing, but I've heard of it through my social circle for very wealthy parents indulging their kid with a new car. A Quincenera is much more part of Spanish speaking cultures than Sweet 16 is for the United States.

I've been to Idaho before; it is a very conservative state, where guns and religion rule. It's proximity to Utah also means a large share of an unnameable (on this board) real world religion, and the population is 90% white. The median income is around 26k, which is far below the national average. So... Sweet 16 in this area? Only for uber wealthy Idahoan parents, but with the religious background of the state, it's believable for parents to want to timewarp their community to the 1950s.

There's a movie called "God Bless America" that hits most of the current teenage stereotypes in the US (the main characters are serial killers targeting rude and impolite people that they encounter).