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View Full Version : 101 Post Apocalyptic Mission Ideas



Blackhawk748
2016-05-17, 05:51 PM
While perusing the internet i found that there is a distinct lack of this sort of thing, so i figured id start one here and see how many we can get. Heres a few from another site:


1) The Wandering Stranger

A strange visitor comes to the Pc's village or camp. He's better armed than most, but friendly. Wanting to barter, and swap tales. He tells a tale of a dangerous Ancients dwelling nearby, that might have great treasure. He's unwilling to go alone, but can be persuaded to lead the adventurous PC's to it. All in exchange for a small treasure from inside. A single lost key.

The key goes to a weapons cache, he discovered it another ruin, but couldn't force his way in, he's willing to split the value of that treasure with the PC's if they help him get that key. The only problem is of course a small atomic bomb is wired to the door. Timed to go off within fifteen minutes of the door being opened. The bomb is small enough and buried deep enough to not hurt the villages "nearby, but it will ruin an adventurer's day. It can be deactivated if the PC's are smart enough though.

2) The Rad Mad

People reacted to the nuclear apocalypse in different ways. Some went quiet and grim, some sat in corners weeping, some picked themselves up and began to scratch out whatever existance they could.

and some went insane. No one knows the cause, but the Rad Mad went bat **** crazy. They roam the highways now, a fierce motorcycle gang of cannibals. They don't want your loot, they burn and despoil everything they encounter rather than use it. If they find you, they pursue you with a single-mindedness that denies hope of escape. When they catch you, they torture you to death, slowly, they skin you and sew the skin into their clothing, and then they eat you. If you are very very lucky, you are dead before they start to eat you.

Most would die rather than get caught by them.

Sometimes they take people, rather than kill them. They force them to watch as they defile and devour the person's companions and family, and then they take them somewhere. No one knows what happens after that...but occasionally a person who was taken can be seen riding with them, with skin sewed into their clothes and blood-lust in their eyes.

3) We Dig

The party comes across a shanty town inexplicably located in the middle of the desert. The inhabitants have taken great pains to live here, with an aqueduct built from miles away, the very same you followed to find this place. The inhabitants are of all ages, and the party are surprised to find how tall and pale many of them are, despite many of them being born After and living in this desert.

When you meet the leaders, they try to barter for any explosives you have. You can't part with them, but they are insistent. They will go to any lengths to take them from you, though they are not even nearly as well armed as you.

If you investigate further, you find that the whole town is centered around the Dig, which has reached a dead end two hundred meters down against solid steel. The people here come from this underground bunker, a bunker so successful that they must expel surplus populace to maintain the society. At first they tried to limit growth and fertility, then expel the old only, but soon the politics lead to expulsion of only dissidents and other undesirables. The men and women and children who live here are trying to break back in. The bunker is, by the accounts of the townspeople, fantastically well equipped, able to survive indefinitely so long as it is not over exploited.

4) Medical Care

You're wandering in a uninhabited area, one where nobody's moved into since the Apocalypse, when something happens - you get hit by a falling tree, fall down a hole, gased, or just lie down for the night.

When you wake up you're in a hospital bed, not strapped in but undressed with clean blankets and with oxygen and an IV running into your arm. The hospital also seems to be unstaffed, but pretty decently stocked.

Do you risk the wrath of whatever brought you here and loot the place? Stick around and try to make it a base of operations? Or run like hell?

5. Not as they seem

The PC's come across a small town seemingly unaffected by the apocalypse, they have shelter, solar power and enough food and water for everyone. The townsfolk seem pleasant if a bit eccentric and
Creepily religious, but upon further investigation the truth is revealed..... They are actually genuinely decent people.
It's sometimes good to play against genre

6) Green Folk

In late autumn, the PCs encounter an isolated mountain village of sheep-herders. These shepherds are friendly, generous....and green. If asked about their strange coloration, they explain that their ancestors meddled with their genetic code, causing their skin to generate chlorophyll. As a consequence, they gain much of their sustenance just from being out in the sunlight. What they don't tell the PCs is the reason for their generosity--the dark days of winter are coming, and with them an incredible need for animal protein (thus the sheep). When the snows come and the passes close, these peaceful shepherds turn into something else entirely. While cannibalism isn't strictly needed, it IS a welcome change from mutton...

7) RUMORS

In the new world, information can be a resource just as valuable as salt or gold... Only somebody has been poisoning the well. Wave after wave of sensational stories are coming from the east, and none of the news is good- cannibal raiders are descending into the valley like a biblical flood. Ancient military grade war machines have awakened from the mountains destroying everything they come in contact with. All water in the region is contaminated and unsafe to drink. All medical supplies are not to be trusted. The crops should all be burned as well because of poisonous bugs infecting the stems. All newborn babies will become flesh eating mutants. The governor of Capital City himself has gone completely mad and is building an army of religious zealots and a network of spies. The drums of doom beat on.

Except the PCs know that none of this is true. They've recently been traveling from township to township, and things aren't any better or worse than they normally are. Sure, life in the wastes is never 'great' but it isn't as bleak as this endless new wave of rumors makes it sound. Not that the wild-eyed panic stricken townsfolk will listen to them. As terror exponentially spreads and sleep becomes more scarce, it's only a matter of time before this powderkeg ignites and takes the PCs with it.

Who is behind this relentless campaign of misinformation? How are they spreading it so quickly and effectively? And why?

More importantly, can the PCs put a stop to it? Or perhaps use the mayhem for their own ends?

8. Paradise is coming!

Two or three decades after the apocalypse: The PCs are living in a small but somewhat wealthy and secure coastal village. Then, over a couple of months, they start losing contact with trading partners and other harbor towns further down the coast - and a weird rumor tells of a giant ship, a colossal artificial *mobile* island, a wonder of the old world still active and still inhabited by the idle rich who once fled to this so-called "tax haven". Only now those rich people - and their kids - have turned into human locusts, traveling the seas, living a life of luxury and decadence fueled by the weapons of their "security guards"...

And now some from me

9. Dark and Stormy Night

After running into a fairly intact building to escape a rad storm the PCs find out that they are not alone in this building. A Caravan and a few scavengers, not all of them together, have also taken shelter in this building. Things start out well, everyone introduces themselves and then sit down and share some food, however, about an hour after dinner, when everyone has gotten comfortable in various locations on the first floor one of the Scavengers goes to "answer a call of nature". Several seconds after he leaves everyone hears a scream. When the go an investigate the man has been brutally murdered.

What did it? Is it one of the people in the building, or is something else in here with them?

10. Devil's Point

A ship that the PCs where traveling on has crashed just off of Devils Point Lighthouse. When the PCs go to the Lighthouse for help, they find the door open. As the approach the open door something, or someone bursts out of the door and runs for the woods. When the PCs go and investigate the Lighthouse they find the keeper's family dead inside, the bodies to mauled to be positively identifiable.

Shortly afterward someone pulls up in a car, its the sheriff of a nearby town and hes responding to a cry for help from the lighthouse over the CB. He promptly arrests the PCs and takes them back to town. Once there they are able to acquit themselves quickly but the larger mystery still remains. Who or what was that thing and why did it kill the Lighthouse keepers?

genmoose
2016-05-19, 10:11 PM
11. Shut In

In their wanderings the PC's encounter a completely sealed facility. Maybe it's a dome, or buried deep in a mountain. They cannot get inside but are able to communicate with the inhabitants. Apparently they were able to prepare for the war and built a very successful biodome (minus Pauly Shore) that can sustain their community indefinitely. While they fear leaving the dome, and refuse to let the PC's inside, they admit that they are incredibly bored. They ask that the PC's investigate an ancient rumor passed down from their elders. In a far away town exists the central database core for a pre-war system called Netflix. If the PC's can retrieve the database and return it to the dome, they will be rewarded with clean food, medicine, and some elements of ancient technology.

12. Tin Soldiers

The PC's stumble across a very realistic but damaged android that has gone offline. After some tinkering the android is reactivated. He explains that he is from a factory over the mountains. In the days before the war, he was built to be an experimental soldier to hold back the enemy hordes. But when the bombs fell, the factory was shut down and they remained idle for quite some time. Recently a local gang/warlord/cult/whatever found the factory and managed to restart some of the androids. This one fled when he could but he fears that the bad guys will reprogram his comrades and restart the factory to build legions of robotic soldiers to conquer the wasteland. The PC's decide to help stop the bad guys either to save the wasteland from a huge threat, gain new pre-war technology and treasures, use the robots to help rebuild society, or replace the bad guys to conquer the world on their own.

13. Switchback

Following some strange EMF readings, the PC's discover a hidden secret lab. As they approach the facility things start to look very strange. Plants grow at odd rates, in some areas rocks are more heavily worn and objects appear half rusted/rotten. Inside they find a half crazed and ancient looking man surrounded by strange but very high tech equipment. Upon closer inspection the man appears to be connected to various machines forming a grotesque cyborg. He seems to have expected the PC's arrival. As they enter he introduces himself as Dr. Dyson and explains that he's actually from many centuries in the future. It's hard for the PC's to believe but he tells them that things just keep getting worse over time and eventually humanity renders itself extinct. He dedicated himself to preventing it and eventually found a way to travel through time. He managed to come back this far but cannot push any further.

Dyson tasks the PC's to find him various materials he needs such as uranium, coltan, power cells, etc. leading to many smaller side quests. Once he has everything, he will admit that he cannot personally go back any further as he is trapped in the facility due to his augmentations. So he asks the PC's to travel back in time to some point before the war and try to stop it. He's done some research to point the PC's in the right direction but it's up to them to do something to hold back the apocalypse.

Âmesang
2016-05-20, 06:23 AM
14) Pull the Plug

A bit cartoonish, but I'm imagining a BBEG diving into the depths and yanking out the plug that keeps all of the world's oceans and seas from draining away (perhaps into the hollow world within?).

Blackhawk748
2016-05-22, 08:31 PM
15. Who called for an Exterminator?

The PCs are heading to their next destination when they come across a caravan parked on the side of the road/trail that looks like its been there for awhile. When asked the caravan tells them that the area around the river crossing ahead is infested with predatory insects, they also inform them that this is the only crossing for miles.

But its not just any old group of giant bugs, oh no. Its a colony of Blood Roaches that have combined their hive with a hive of Mimics and the Mimics have been luring people into the swarms of Blood Roaches using their uncanny ability to mimic voices they have heard.

Can the PCs overcome this horrible alliance of Roaches?