[Non-Marvel] Plot Idea Request

[blaster219]

I'm trying to sketch out a plot for Monday's session and I'm having a complete brain failure.

It's an "issue one" style plot that depicts the event that gives the PCs their powers and then puts them in a position to use them for the first time. We (the group) already know the first part, how they get their powers. It's due to an accident in their father's lab that "irradiates" the PCs and gives them superpowers. The bit that's stumping me is coming up with a "debut event" where the PCs are placed in a situation where they have to use their newfound abilities or people will get injured.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

[chaosnet]

Was their father's equipment accident really an "accident"? Perhaps a colleague of their father's wanted the equipment for themselves and now that it's destroyed the only way of re-engineering the device is to capture the powered up kids.

Did the father die, disappear in the accident (i.e. dimensional shifted) or what?

SHIELD may have been monitoring the father's experiments (and/or subsidizing) and now enter the scene to ensure that the power kids have SHIELD oversight. This could also work with a non-SHIELD villainous org like Hydra or AIM (or HAMMER).

Group Milestones could be created for "Finding Father" if he disappeared in the explosion, or "Find a Cure for Father" if the radiation gave him a terminal illness, or "Join SHIELD or go to Jail" if they deem the characters "too powerful" not to be trained properly.

Lots of ways to go.

[blaster219]

Snip

Sadly, none of those would really work.

We've already worked out what caused the accident, the father is one of the PCs so I can't just disintegrate him and I don't want to use the setting's SHIELD analogue so soon (I have plans for them). Nor do I want to go for "big plot" so soon, maybe in a session or two but for now, we're still getting used to the system and the setting.

[chaosnet]

Well, if they are a team already (and it seems that they are) then all you need is a carrot of what may interest them all. If they are learning their powers, then put natural disasters in the mix with looters and such so that they can get a feel for using their powers.

Maybe the natural disasters are being caused by the evil "Stormlord" who has remained out of sight while the heroes town is being pummeled by a quickly formed hurricane in off-hurricane system. A town/city in chaos is easy pickings for criminals as the police/fire/etc are tied up trying to help where they can.

The "Evil Colleague of the Father" is still possible, maybe they were jealous of the father's superior skill. Maybe they saw where the research was going and wanted to snake it away. Maybe the colleague work for Secret_Villain_Organization_01 (to be named later as layers get peeled away) and that was their impetus for sabotage.

[blaster219]

Okay, I've narrowed it down to a couple of options:

Natural Disaster
The game is set in a fictional city built in the Florida coast to the east of Orlando (inside a meteor impact crater where Cape Canaveral is in the real world) so a hurricane is a possibility, maybe a tornado. Although its a big and splashy Event, I'm thinking it might not be right for the game. Although technically its the second session/issue, this is technically the Debut issue for the group.

Kidnap/Assassination Attempt
The kids go to the same school as the teenage son of the city's Chief of Police. A group of bad guy's could enter the school, either to kidnap the kid as a way to blackmail/coerce the Chief or shoot him in an act of vengeance. This option does have the potential benefit of making the Police Chief friendly to the characters if they save her son. Also, the son could be a very useful ally.

Wrong-Place-Wrong-Time v1
Characters are at school (father is attending a meeting with the principal over his youngest son's behaviour) when a superhero crashes through the gym roof having been thrown through it by a supervillain. With the hero down, the villain starts throwing his weight around, blasting at the school.

Wrong-Place-Wrong-Time v2
Seem I really like the school angle. Same as above, except a group of movie-style criminals armed with next-generation weaponry are being chased by police. They end up screaming into the school grounds (its a private school) trigging an armed siege.

[craggle]

Could the "event" accidentally grant powers/mutation to a family pet/lab animal/nearby wildlife that then goes on a bit of a rampage in the local area, needing them to come together to contain the threat, and can be used against them for a bit of angst if needed due to indirectly having caused the problem.