A bit of background. I'd been thinking about using a modified version of the Shadowrun 4e system to run a Shin Megami Tensei: Persona game for a while. However, when time came to actually run the game, I figured I'd give After Sundown a shot. Characters were created as for an Origin Story, but by the end of the first game session everybody had picked up a supernatural type template, so I actually had the players create their character + persona before the game ever started--they just didn't get to use any of the "supernatural" bonuses to their stats or powers until they acquired them in-game.
For those who have played the Persona games, I picked up the continuity of the game shortly after the events of P4 Arena, but set the game on Iwatodai so that the students could attend the school from Persona 3, Gekkoukan High. Events from the Persona 2 duology were dubiously canon, but (spoilers!) Nyarlathotep was a major villain for the game, and Philemon made an appearance as well. You can skip down if you don't care about an explanation of the Personaverse.
Essential Background:
But then...nothing happened. January 31st came and went, and the fog lifted. The doomsayers disappeared. Life went on as normal. No one really remembers why the end seemed so certain, so imminent; most people have forgotten all about the disappearances and the paralytic sufferers of the mysterious illness. Maybe you remember some things. Maybe you don't. You were, after all, just a child at the time, and odds are you only remember if someone who disappeared was important to you.
It's April. The new school year started only a week ago, and students are all finding new extracurriculars or settling back into their old ones. And at the end of the school day, you found a note in your locker—an invitation to join a new club.
You have the opportunity to make a difference.
The fate of our world lies in the hands of those with the potential.
S.E.E.S
Please consider joining our club—dedicated to a future where light chases away the shadows.
FIRST MEETING WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8TH @ 6 P.M.
AT THE SHINSHOUDOU ANTIQUE STORE
Surely this will look good on your college applications, right?
The Personaverse:
Persona users, the protagonists of the series, are essentially spirit-channelers, like possession mages in Shadowrun; their bodies are supernaturally strong and resistant to injury in part due to the presence of the Persona, and they can call upon the Persona to use magic or perform other feats of strength. Your characters do not initially have access to any of their supernatural powers, nor do they have any certain knowledge of supernatural "stuff" (while you can certainly play a character whose hobbies include the occult, some or all of what they've read in books may not be true).
Aesthetically, you are creating not one, but two characters. One of these is a high school student; the other is a mythological figure or creature that serves as your character's Persona. If you want an idea of what sort of concept is suitable for your character's Persona, you can check out various internet resources (Google "list of personas" and you'll get some listings for personae that have appeared in Persona 3 and 4). Note that a Persona, even if it shares the name of some mythic figure, might take a form that is inspired by that figure as opposed to literally being that figure. Check out the design of Persona 3's Orpheus for an example—he's a lot more than just a Greek dude with a lyre.
I made some other changes to the AS rules. PCs created as an Origin Story and were then given some bonus skills and backgrounds, but not as many as an In Media Res character would get because I wanted high school students to have fewer overall points distributed than established supernatural entities. (Ultimately, I think everybody had more than enough points anyway.)
Major rules changes: Persona-users were treated as normal humans in possession of superpowers--not actually a vampire or other inhuman monster, regardless of the supernatural type of their persona. This meant that they were not affected by AS's monster weaknesses, so someone with a "vampire" persona still functioned in sunlight and nobody had a weakness to particular materials. Also, I stuck everybody on the Lunar power cycle, regardless of persona type. If I were to run the campaign again, I'd probably still eliminate the "your powers are disabled" weaknesses, but I would've kept the material weaknesses, because it's in-theme for the games that PCs become supernaturally vulnerable to certain things because of the nature of their persona. It also would probably have made the PCs feel less...invincible.
Also, I let people pick different master passions if they really wanted to.
Dramatis Personae:
Momoko Hirata//Lotis (Dryad): Cute, popular, well-adjusted high school girl, at least on the surface. Joined a cult with her father during the latter part of Persona 3's timeline. He and his friends successfully committed suicide...while she and some others held off the cops with sniper rifles. But she got mental health treatment and they released her and she's perfectly normal and fine, okay? Her Persona, Lotis, "manifests as a delicate pink lotus with a myriad of tiny perfect pink hands, clasped together with their fingers intertwined to mimic the shapes of petals. The hands in the center are vivid yellow, and those ones sway a little as they reach upward. Lotis opens and closes with a gentle breathing rhythm when she's pleased but when she isn't pleased she tightens up and oozes." Momo started the game with some Song of Swarms powers as her bonus abilities and consequently was full of wasps. Master passion: Loneliness. Arcana: The Moon.
Mitsuru Tayama//The Great Bambino (Fallen): Star baseball player and recent transfer student. Charismatic and popular, but modest about it. Excruciatingly polite. Nicknamed "Tobasuko" (Tobasco) for the "heat of his pitches." Ultimately kind of unhinged; Tayama-kun had some...interesting life priorities. His Persona is a baseball player dressed in pristine white, armed with an enormous bat. Master passion: Greed. Arcana: The Chariot.
Kuroki Sumeragi//The Dark Wizard (Khaibit): Amateur "ghost-hunter" in the school newspaper club. Conspiracy nut with an eidetic memory. Extremely socially-awkward (he had a background called "I Don't Know How to Handle This" which became sort of a running joke--it was the "what is the most socially-awkward thing I can do in this situation" background). Nevertheless, he was desperately searching for friends...he just didn't really seem to know how to make them. Lots of science-type skills and a contact in the police force (uncle, homicide squad). His Persona was described as "a tall spindly figure in dark black robes, his face is constantly obscured in in the shadow of his wide wizards hat. When he uses his powers his eyes glow, revealing he has golden irises with hourglass pupils. In his hands he wields a black staff, appearing to be made of shadows." Master passion: Despair. Arcana: The Hermit.
Koki Tsutsui//Anturo Vipunen (Frankenstein): Freakishly tall and gangly--6'7", but distressingly thin, to the point where he looks rather unhealthy, just skin stretched over bones. Koki's dream is to become a champion sumo wrestler, and he actually comes from a ninja family. Soft-spoken in that way that everybody pays attention when you do have something to say, because it's probably important--no wasted words. Bound by solidarity ethics, Koki was dependable and trustworthy to the end, and, unlike some other PCs, could be counted on to have a moral compass that didn't point off in some whacked out direction. Master passion: Loneliness. Arcana: Strength.
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Session one was basically getting the gang together. The four PCs found notes in their locker inviting them to join "S.E.E.S.," some kind of school club run by the guidance counselor, a persona-user named Chris Hayes.
Chris Hayes:
Sumeragi hit up one of his contacts, his homicide detective uncle, and learned that there had been some "mysterious deaths" in the area--10 or 20 people. The only consistent detail is that every victim owned an electric window fan. Some of the neighbors had reported robberies where the only things stolen...were electric window fans. The PCs picked up Shinshiro's trail and tracked him to a warehouse supposedly owned by the Kirijo Group...full of window fans. Which Shinshiro had been stealing to save their owners from fan death. Shinshiro, as it turned out, was a paranoid conspiracy freak. Of course, the real reason people had been mysteriously dying was because shadows were creeping around the city again...and there were some in the area, to boot. The PCs fought their first combat against Cowardly Mayas before they'd even gained their persona powers; everyone manifest a persona for the first time fighting a bigger shadow that showed up after the Mayas had been defeated.
Shadows:
"If you take a hot bath in a totally dark room, the spirits will grant you one wish."
"A strange man has been hanging around the Paulownia Mall at night. He has been seen speaking to small audiences and entertaining people by playing the saxophone."
"Shadows and the Kirijo Group are somehow linked. Kirijo has reportedly created a number of anti-Shadow weapons. The whereabouts and nature of these weapons is unknown at this time."
So the players/PCs were left to debate what major mysteries to solve...and which obvious rumors were worth further investigation.