Could use some help with open world post-apocalyptic game setting

[Raezeman]

Greetings all,

As my title suggest, i could use some ideas with my campaign setting.

A rough description of the setting: over 500 years ago, an apocalyptic event happened, where the majority of all humanoid population seemingly turned insane, wanting only to kill the non 'infected' (it is actually a corruption to the soul, not a disease or so, but that's not important). Think a bit like the 28 days later zombies, except all the one that turned keep all their combat skills, lake casting and so on. Now, survivors live a the last remaining city, which is massively protected with giant walls, think 'attack on titan'. Why or what happened is unknown (for the moment).

I'm playing this as an open world game, so my players can leave the city to go where they wish for various missions and exploration and finding other survivors and bring them back and ects. I have a bunch of story progress missions stuff, and smaller side quest mission stuff at the ready. The thins is, i could really do with much much more ideas for what to do and what they find.

Example: standard type of mission is to go investigate ruins of old cities to mainly check if those ruins could be turned into a first colony of the city. Naturally, interesting stuff should be found when they do explore one such city.

So, while i have plenty of ideas of given missions they could do, and stuff to find in ruins, i could do with much much more ideas.

To sum up: i'm looking for any idea you've got for in a post apocalyptic idea for:
-what to find in the ruin of an old city
-any type of mission that would need my players to leave the safety of the city
-or, of course, anything interesting for happenings inside the city that is presumed safe.

rough ideas are more than fine, i'll fill in all the blanks, just the concept would do great. my players always liked what happened so far, but i am but one man.

Thank you!

[Nifft]

Are the soul-insane people still around?

Are they still more numerous than the non-insane people?

Zombie movies generally work in terms of plausibility because the zombies are so degraded in their capabilities. In this case, it sounds like the "suddenly evil" side retained all capabilities -- so, what's your justification for allowing a small minority of normal people to survive at all?

[Raezeman]

Are the soul-insane people still around?
Yes they are


Are they still more numerous than the non-insane people?
Also yes


Zombie movies generally work in terms of plausibility because the zombies are so degraded in their capabilities. In this case, it sounds like the "suddenly evil" side retained all capabilities -- so, what's your justification for allowing a small minority of normal people to survive at all?
A group of strong survivors with capable mages found a good defendable location, which they improved with defensive magics. Keep in mind that very high level mages were not just around every corner, so the lost (as the soul-insane people are called) did not really have acces to earth-braking magic. Now, i'm pretty aware that there are probably way more reasons why this setting wouldn't be realistically possible within the d&d setting, but that's not really a discussion i wish to have now.

[flappeercraft]

Ideas:
-Players have to find the origin of this "disease"?
-Players have to rescue an important mage who was though dead or infected
-Players have to stop a breach from happening to the citadel
-Players have to find an extremely rare material component that is used for an Epic Spell used to protect the citadel, the current one running out and soon to expire

[Nifft]

Yes they are

Also yes

A group of strong survivors with capable mages found a good defendable location, which they improved with defensive magics. Keep in mind that very high level mages were not just around every corner, so the lost (as the soul-insane people are called) did not really have acces to earth-braking magic. Now, i'm pretty aware that there are probably way more reasons why this setting wouldn't be realistically possible within the d&d setting, but that's not really a discussion i wish to have now.

Okay, so it sounds kinda like... muggles all went mad, and only people with high-tier spellcasting potential are still sane?

If so, that does sound like a plausible world-wide apocalypse, with a minority population capable of survival yet also continuously under threat.

This could be a really interesting setting.


Questions:

- What do the Lost do when there aren't any non-Lost nearby for them to murder? Do they shamble around aimlessly like Walking Dead zombies? Do they rut in the streets like wild animals? Do they sacrifice their ugliest children to summon demons? Do they write porny fanfiction about other settings?

- You're framing this as an apocalypse, so presumably these Lost have not formed a sustainable civilization, in spite of retaining all human faculties. In a zombie apocalypse, this is because zombies are undead and generally last for a long time without food or shelter. Are these Lost also somehow preserved against needing food & shelter? Could they live forever, sustained by a state of angry frustration? (Are they on the internet right now?)

- Is it something about being magically-capable which allows the PCs and their allies to avoid the soul-malady?

[Cespenar]

Well, pretty run-of-the-mill stuff, but,

Players can find the following in the old city:

-Old, high-level tech/magic
-Research into the disease
-Hints to the start of the disease

Missions to leave the city:

-Recovering said research
-Running experiments with the infected
-Rescue a specialist beneficial to the city
-Bring down an old, infected hero now too dangerous to leave alone
-Bring supplies to another survivor camp

[Raezeman]

Ideas:
-Players have to find the origin of this "disease"?

All story related missions like these have been planned in full detail already!



-Players have to rescue an important mage who was though dead or infected
-Players have to stop a breach from happening to the citadel

Good ones, thanks!



-Players have to find an extremely rare material component that is used for an Epic Spell used to protect the citadel, the current one running out and soon to expire
Find the rare material component quests, got some of those already, not just for defense, but other stuff (skyships!)

Thanks!

[Raezeman]

Okay, so it sounds kinda like... muggles all went mad, and only people with high-tier spellcasting potential are still sane?

If so, that does sound like a plausible world-wide apocalypse, with a minority population capable of survival yet also continuously under threat.

This could be a really interesting setting.

Thanks! powerful lost mages do exist, but are very rare, and upon being discovered by scouts are immediatily hunted down by specialist seek and destroy teams, which was actually one of the first sessions we played in this campaign.



Questions:

- What do the Lost do when there aren't any non-Lost nearby for them to murder? Do they shamble around aimlessly like Walking Dead zombies? Do they rut in the streets like wild animals? Do they sacrifice their ugliest children to summon demons? Do they write porny fanfiction about other settings?

- You're framing this as an apocalypse, so presumably these Lost have not formed a sustainable civilization, in spite of retaining all human faculties. In a zombie apocalypse, this is because zombies are undead and generally last for a long time without food or shelter. Are these Lost also somehow preserved against needing food & shelter? Could they live forever, sustained by a state of angry frustration? (Are they on the internet right now?)


When around only other losts, they are sort of docile. They mostly wander around a bit aimlessly, fight a bit among each other to prove dominance, but don't really do anything with this dominance. Their behavior is somewhat like wild animals in a non threatened circumstance. Maybe a key detail i forgot: the lost have become ageless immortal, in the sense they they do not grow older anymore. They only die when killed. They no longer need to eat or sleep either. As if there is some sort of foul magic feeding and sustaining their body. This is the reason why there are still so many around. Even the lost of short lived races are alive after all these years.



- Is it something about being magically-capable which allows the PCs and their allies to avoid the soul-malady?
this is more story stuff, that maybe has some issues when examined in detail. Mages seemed to resist this taint the longest when it started happening, and when the spread of it suddenly stopped (story related reasons), only few powerful mages had turned

[Raezeman]

Well, pretty run-of-the-mill stuff, but,

Players can find the following in the old city:

-Old, high-level tech/magic

Several 'artifact recovery' situations already in play. My players stumbled on a massive underground drow city, which has a lot of exploration left.


-Research into the disease
-Hints to the start of the disease

Story stuff, completely worked out in full detail already my friend!

Missions to leave the city:



-Recovering said research
-Running experiments with the infected

Story stuff, completely worked out in full detail already my friend!



-Rescue a specialist beneficial to the city

Also one of the first missions they did, a search and rescue mission, which led them to more story related stuff.


-Bring down an old, infected hero now too dangerous to leave alone
-Bring supplies to another survivor camp
[/QUOTE]
A yes, good ideas. I can and will work with this, thanks!

[Raezeman]

Thanks all for the good suggestions so far, but by all means, please, keep 'em coming!

[Goaty14]

They find a tunnel made by some of the more "intelligent" corrupted that is nearly underneath the city's walls. What do they do? I don't know myself. If they blow it up, then they risk blowing a hole in the wall, or if they try to refill it, that costs labor (which could be attacked), etc.