[HoE] Boise Horror

[Dusarat@aol.com]

I haven't read the adventure but...

    From the reviews, doesn't it seem like merely a string of endless 
combats?  Don't get me wrong, a little whuppin is needed for a gun-toting 
game like this, but it's hard to keep the adrenalin level high when it's one 
hard fight after another! From the other adventures I've seen (devils' tower, 
HoE adventures), they seem to never have either the 'gimme fight' (You know 
the one, it has Chow yun fat Blowing his way though nameless thugs like no 
tomorrow.. or better tomorrow as the case may be merely to establish that he 
IS a butkicker) or much time devoted to role-playing, dialogue, or the 
cinematics that can make for less fights, but more memorable ones.  Yeah, I 
have Modeen's stats, but where is a quote or two or some idea of how he 
should role-play?  He's gotta be more than just a big guy with an axe. How do 
I make him the man the party loves to hate?

    ever harder combats just drains the party, sucks fate chips, and gets old 
after a while.  And where is the motivation?  In every HoE adventure I've 
ever seen, the party can deal with it instantly by h\just saying "I walk away 
from this one", something that particularly Templars might like to do.   
Dialogue and plot can really get the party involved.  Make them care about 
the NPC's and only time devoted to dialogue and plot can do that.

    As far as I can tell, the only motivation for the party in Boise is that 
Simon asks them for a favor.  Where's the fun in that?  all of the adventures 
HoE has made have been that mold.  Where's the 'Party walks into really bad 
situation, and has to deal because if they don't, they die'.  I know it's 
hard to write modules with intrinsic motivation, but look at Ravenloft 
adventures and you'll see it's very do-able.  

1) the party finds itself trapped in a very hostile environment and has to 
figure out things or else it will get quashed (Anyone seen any sci fi movie 
with the plotline "Marooned on an unexplored planet....")

2) I've been doing this one, In a little mook fight (Some black hats try to 
rough them up, and they ace them... easily), they earn a much dealier foe 
(Could one of the black hats have a brother who's higher up?  Has more men to 
command?  COmmands automatons and other cyber-nasties of the combine?  The 
hunt is on!  play off the hunt aspect.  Snipers, never being safe, having bad 
guys pop out at the worst times.  This isn't a war here, this is a stalking.  

3)  With the biological weapons, decaying corpses, and rampant poor personal 
hygiene (which can be lethal.. anyone read "The Postman"?) the whole party, 
or just maybe one of them, contracts a debilitating and soon to be lethal 
ailment and the party has to run to find a cure.  

4) The old body switch game is a fun one too.  A fun role-playing adventure 
is one where you put in any old module type adventure BUT at the beginning, 
some calamity happens and the characters end up switching bodies.  This way 
you could have sykers with strains of six, harroweds alive again, livers 
being harrowed, or just have some enemy take their bodies and have the party 
as floating heads!  Now there's intrinsic motivation!

5) has someone managed to clone the party or make lifelike android 
constructs?  The NPC reactions AND possibilities abound!  Androids could get 
minor details wrong (android doomsayer? No, but appromated with energy 
blasts, some lights, some 'tude' and some pyrotchnics.  A big clue is when 
they hear a discription and the doomsayer thinks "Blasted your mayor with a 
yellow beam of death!?  i didn't do it and if I did, my blasts are green!"

            As for a finale?  probably the party hunts them, and they have to 
take... themselves on.  The question of whether they're good enough becomes a 
big factor.

        a) big twist, the party goes on, and at the very end, they find out 
THEY'RE the duplicates and they've been hunting their originals all the time. 
 pays off big when it works, but you need a very mature and fun party, 

        b) and who's building these robots anyway? after this one, you could 
go on to connections with Denver, or some rogue military ai lost alone with 
nothing but cameras and robot building plants to keep it company.