Is there a good 'modern day' normal humans vs evil forces RP

cthulhu · Post by **cthulhu** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 12:28 pm

That isn't super depressing? I like delta green, but the fact that winning isn't really an option, merely not losing, kinda sucks a bit.

I've looked at the new hunter line, but that seems like angel blessed humans vs the darkness, rather than the SWAT team vs the darkness, if you can see the difference

angelfromanotherpin · Post by **angelfromanotherpin** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 1:00 pm

GURPS Black Ops is a pretty good time.

Sir Neil · Post by **Sir Neil** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 1:01 pm

Palladium's Beyond the Supernatural.

Psychic monster hunters stickin' it to dimensional invaders. I've played in that setting since '95, using a number of other systems when I would hit my Palladium limit. (GURPS, Marvel SAGA, d20 Modern, Shadowrun.)

Tri-Stat's Bureau 13.

Their video game was badass, and the stories are crazy over the top. "Sylvester [the Mummy Cowboy] stopped by the Father's homeless shelter in the Pioneer Square ... to bet on some horses with some strippers."

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 1:18 pm

Um... if you have normal humans fighting against supernatural evil, or for that matter large-scale completely natural evil (big religions/corporations/governments) then I think "You lose" is a guaranteed outcome. I'm not really sure what it is that you want.

Sir Neil · Post by **Sir Neil** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 1:25 pm

Consider Dracula, Koumei. Baddest vampire of them all, gets knifed in a street fight against some Englishmen.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 1:37 pm

What kind of game are you looking for?

You could get by with Feng Shui if you wanted to do gun packing action heroes against demons and abominations from the future.

-Username17

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 2:15 pm

Sir_Neil wrote:Consider Dracula, Koumei. Baddest vampire of them all, gets knifed in a street fight against some Englishmen.

My interest in vampires (who aren't called Hilda) is sufficiently low that I haven't read the original Dracula. My understanding was that Van Helsing was a man who was basically a super human, and defeated him in his lair.

What you described sounds a lot like how WoD plays out (assuming Dracula is the PC and the random Englishmen are the NPCs).

So I'm guessing that what you want is "If the humans are well trained and well equipped, they won't be out there killing elder gods, but they can certainly send the WoD crew back where they came from." In which case, possibly using Wushu could work, or something.

Count Arioch the 28th · Mon Jan 26, 2009 5:07 pm

Sir_Neil wrote:Consider Dracula, Koumei. Baddest vampire of them all, gets knifed in a street fight against some Englishmen.

The dude that knifed him was American.

Count Arioch the 28th · Mon Jan 26, 2009 5:11 pm

Koumei wrote: My interest in vampires (who aren't called Hilda) is sufficiently low that I haven't read the original Dracula. My understanding was that Van Helsing was a man who was basically a super human, and defeated him in his lair.

Van Helsing was an elderly occultist/medical doctor who just knew his stuff. He wasn't a formidable man, just smart and knowledgeable. And there were four other people with him, although Mina was pretty much there as bait/scrying.

The only people that had any sort of powers where Dracula, and arguably Mina because she was slowly turning into a vampire herself.

Sir Neil · Post by **Sir Neil** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 7:58 pm

Koumei wrote:My interest in vampires (who aren't called Hilda) is sufficiently low that I haven't read the original Dracula.

Who has? The Dracula thread is still on the first page of the Den, describing how he's hunted down and killed with math, knives, and science.

Count_Arioch_the_28th wrote:The dude that knifed him was American.

Fvck yeah, 'cause that's how we roll, but the Englishman chopped off his head at the same time.

norms29 · Post by **norms29** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 9:23 pm

Koumei wrote:
My interest in vampires (who aren't called Hilda) is sufficiently low that I haven't read the original Dracula.

Hilda? is that a reference I should get?

Sir_Neil wrote:
Count_Arioch_the_28th wrote:The dude that knifed him was American.
Fvck yeah, 'cause that's how we roll, but the Englishman chopped off his head at the same time.Consider Dracula, Koumei.

it was clearly the Bowie knife in the chest that killed him.

ZER0 · Post by **ZER0** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 9:47 pm

David Bowie? It might have been magic pants...

norms29 · Post by **norms29** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 9:58 pm

Don't make me come over there.

cthulhu · Post by **cthulhu** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 10:28 pm

Koumei wrote:Um... if you have normal humans fighting against supernatural evil, or for that matter large-scale completely natural evil (big religions/corporations/governments) then I think "You lose" is a guaranteed outcome. I'm not really sure what it is that you want.

Oh sorry, I was hoping the Delta Green reference would make it clear: But not everyone is a fan of what are some pretty bad books.

Anyway, in Delta Green the investigators are members of a global conspiracy that is the left over of a bunch of government departments that were created to fight the Cthulhu evil team.

Eventually they got disbanded because the government cut a deal with the bad guys, but they still had the offshore bank accounts and kept fighting.

Now that is hopeless of course, because you cannot win vs the Cthulhu-esque evil, but you could have the secret conspiracy still actually be part of the government, and the bad guys could be vampires.

Then your are fighting a shadow war to kneecap the other guys will keeping it slightly shady.

Feng Shui probably isn;t a bad setting, but its probably a bit fantastical, was thinking something a bit gritter.

Elennsar · Post by **Elennsar** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 11:01 pm

How much grit can you have before "fighting with a good chance of winning" eliminates it?

Normal humans (depending on what you mean by normal, but look at the general range of Earth's competent people, but not exceptional) suck ass vs. anything potent enough to be a supernatural menace to the world.

So unless "normal" is "as distinct from with supernautral stuff of their own', normals are going to lose.

Maybe not, if fighting something like zombies, but certainly vs. canny -and- capable enemies.

cthulhu · Post by **cthulhu** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 11:15 pm

Well, I dunno, I think a vampire is a serious threat, but also, in my imagining, a couple of guys with M249 SAWs with tracer rounds are probably a serious problem for a vampire.

Gritty was probably the wrong word - I was looking for an alternative to 'realism' that didn't preclude the bad guys being vampires.

I guess I'm looking for normal humans vs supernatural foes - but where the humans have team human working on their side. So they can reasonably expect equipment, help disposing of the bodies, convient search warrants, the ability to get onto a police channel and call for the SWAT team and expect them to show up, but at the same time the other guys know they are around and want to kill them and no-one wants it leaking onto the street and causing a massive panic.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Mon Jan 26, 2009 11:16 pm

Goooooogling "Hilda" or even "Hilda vampire" only provided me 2 things I can pretend are vaguely relevant: "Hilda of Polaris" (

) and this (not porn, but some might consider not quite worksafe - or wifesafe

).

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Tue Jan 27, 2009 1:14 am

Hilda: Shadow Hearts 3 has possibly the best characters of an RPG ever, including an American ninja (who wears bright red, with a lantern hanging from his head like a fish) who wields a sword hilt with a saw/cactus/stop sign/firework/swordfish on the end.

More relevant, there is a vampire called Hilda. In her mid-form she is a pink bat that has crazy good speed and strength, but no magic. She can suck calories from enemies in combat. Enough positive calories turns her into "Curvy Hilda", a human who is rather large, and has a doll-like face. She has high strength and poor magic, and is kind of clumsy. Enough negative calories turns her into "Slim Hilda", who looks like a gothic girl crossed with a magical girl/idol. She's a powerful spellcaster, shows her knickers when she casts spells, and her end-battle quotes suggests that they're really in a TV show all about her. "Keep watching for the next episode of Magical Hilda: that cute transfer student is a magician!"

Game system: maybe try Spycraft, which apparently isn't as bad as my experience of it was. That can cover elite crack, secret, crack and elite assault forces with the training and gear needed to "pop a cap in a vampire's ass" (and to know to switch to the silver ammo clip for werewolves... and they actually have a silver clip. Or a flamethrower that mixes silver dust into the fuel or something), and can even let the players go around crippling the bad dudes in the shadows over time.

Talisman · Post by **Talisman** » Tue Jan 27, 2009 3:20 am

Bigode wrote:and this (not porn, but some might consider not quite worksafe - or wifesafe ).

I clicked it.

Cute chick, but I loled at the comment:

RickUsa wrote:Hilda P My dear beautifuilll friend you are like a beautifuill gradan ho everyone whanna be with you like this or

That's verbatim, BTW. Including the "RickUsa" part (no, it's not RickUSA).

I like Savage World a bit but as I recall, cthulhu, you...don't. Something about the mechanics making you want to stab out your own eyeballs...

M-Force, by Hex Games, is a pretty decent little game about a highly-public monster-hunting agency (in a world where werewolves show up on the 6-o'-clock news). You could easily change it to covert instead of public. The system's kind of light on tactical crunch, though.

Bigode · Post by **Bigode** » Tue Jan 27, 2009 4:02 am

Talisman wrote:
RickUsa wrote:Hilda P My dear beautifuilll friend you are like a beautifuill gradan ho everyone whanna be with you like this or
That's verbatim, BTW. Including the "RickUsa" part (no, it's not RickUSA).

I've read worse in Portuguese, unfortunately. As for "not USA", that reminds me of the (Brazilian) people who tried to name children "Usarmy" and "Usnavy" (didn't hear of "usairforce" so far) because "I saw it once and it sounded cool".

shau · Post by **shau** » Tue Jan 27, 2009 4:55 am

Koumei wrote:Hilda: Shadow Hearts 3 has possibly the best characters of an RPG ever, including an American ninja (who wears bright red, with a lantern hanging from his head like a fish) who wields a sword hilt with a saw/cactus/stop sign/firework/swordfish on the end.

He's also named Frank and hides out in a ninja based theme park. One of the previews I read said that he was in fact FDR, but unfortunately this is not the case.

I really think Joachim from SH2 is the best Shadow Hearts vampire. He's a wrestler who fights with random items he finds and his quest involves beating a hundred dudes in wrestling matches. The prize for those matches includes having sex with a middle aged Indian man.