Favorite T2k MacGuffin
 

MacGuffin: An object or device in a movie or a book that serves merely as a trigger for the plot. (Oxford Languages)

There are several such devices in published adventure modules for Twilight 2000. What's your favorite? After you vote, please explain your pick.

This is a great idea for a poll :cool: I'm really interested to read people's responses.
I wish that the T2k games I was involved in lasted long enough to reach the McGuffin stage but sadly they were typically too lethal for characters to survive long enough. The games just weren't enough fun to sustain a campaign so they ended before we could get into those various modules.

Having said that, I wanted to run a T2k campaign where the PCs hear rumours of a crashed Luftwaffe C-160 Transall supposedly laden with German ration packs and ammunition. The aircraft and its cargo did exist but it had crashed in remote woodlands and nobody was entirely sure where it was. I wanted to use it as a way to encourage the PCs to explore the region, the lure of food and ammo I believe would be sufficient to get them to do so.
So in that sense I think it qualifies as a McGuffin - so in that sense, I voted "Other".

I want to say B-52, but I haven't written that bit yet...

Then there's the pair of Hind's just sitting about....

I vote for the Black Madonna. Even if you don't roll right into the "Going Home" supplement, then the whole Poland supplements give you a good chance to be in position long run to become the power behind some major player and establish a long range government going forward. Complete with being that power player's fixer with all the benefits of home, hearth, and food that comes with it.

Has to be the Black Madonna. The entire concept just makes sense on a number of levels, and doesn't feel like the macguffin is something forced or an artificial deus ex machina. I also like that it veers away from the 'last' trope - last working computer, last submarine, etc etc. For sure the Black Madonna is unique, but for very different reasons.

The best MacGuffin is probably Black Madonna, but my personal favorite has to be the dirigible from Airlords of the Ozarks.

Definitely a tie between the Madonna and the technical information that the Popoviches were bringing back with them in Med Cruise - and given the name Operation Prometheus you have to assume it was some kind of ability to generate energy like cold fusion

RESET
 

Crap! I just noticed that Social Security Records are on the list twice. That means I missed one- arguably the most MacGuffin of all T2k MacGuffin's (but not necessarily the best)-

RESET

Sorry guys. I can't believe I botched it.

RESET is the uber MacGuffin if the whole offensive really was launched just to provide cover to get it

RE-SET's Back, Alright!
 

I figured out how to edit the poll, so RESET has been added. :o

I have a hidden WW2 supply/repair depot floating around with several Panther tanks plus a Nazi loot convoy that includes, among other things, the Amber Room.

Pity the poor group that finds it and then tries to keep it to themselves!!

*sigh*
No. It really wasn't. That's clear when you examine the bigger picture as I did some years ago, and there's absolutely no evidence to support that claim.

Oh I know Leg - but even the original Krakow module floated that idea as why the offensive was launched - to provide cover to get Reset.

As a rumour.

Pope MacGuffin I
 

I tried to run a campaign in Austria. The MacGuffin was the body of Pope John Paul II, being transported from Rome to his home town in Poland. I was inspired by Rainbow 6's awesome write up of the Swiss Guard in T2k.

VERY cool idea! WAY more imaginative than the stuff I usually come up with.

I preferred Black Madonna to Reset, but both are close. I really enjoyed both MacGuffins as something Really Powerful, but there's no way the PCs can use it-- they HAVE to give it to someone else for it to realize its value.

The dirigible is one I have to run with sometime, though, I've become an airship fan in the years since. I just need a group that will commit to the time that a T2k game will need.

Name a T2K adventure or any adventure for that matter in an RPG that doesn't revolve around a McGuffin? I think it's almost an RPG trope?:D

I'd say Going Home or Escape from Kalisz, neither feature a McGuffin really.

The train?

Macguffins are positive and negative.

A positive one you want to have.

A negative you don't want other people having. (The briefcase in Ronin)

I'm lucky in that I'm GMing a MERC campaign in Africa. My players take missions to get paid so they can eat. Occasionally, that payment can be unique like the time they were paid in DIAMONDS and that other time they got to "raid" a UN supply depot in exchange for a "side job" that the UN commander needed done "off the books." Burt Gommer (Tremors II) would have been proud!

After playing Far Cry 2 I wanted run a session like this.

I posted a quick game outline over at the T2K Fb page:

African MacGuffins
 

That sounds like a pretty kick-ass campaign concept, Chalk. I went through a big mercs in Africa phase a couple of years ago. Read a bunch of books about merc ops in the Congo, Sierra Leon, Angola, the Wonga Coup...

Really gritty stuff. It got rather depressing after a while. I had to stop.

Lot of MacGuffins in Africa. Diamonds in Sierra Leon, oil in Angola, Coltan (for cell phones) in Congo. After watching a doc on Netflix (can't remember the name), I briefly wanted to run a game where the mercs were protecting Mountain Gorillas from both sides in a civil war. "Guerillas in the Mist" never got past the conceptual phase. :o

For our group? It was gold bars, so our GM came up with a rumor of gold in a bank, and so....cue "Burning Bridges" from Kelly's Heroes.

Reset was a background while we were in Krakow-had a few fire-fights with people who thought we had the documents.

Exactly the same here. Too close to reality.

Not always. The group I played with accidentally missed the train totally so we went to Bremerhaven in our merry convoy of assorted vehicles. I didn't even know about the train until I read the Going Home module after the campaign!

Africa has a lot of possible MacGuffins that work both for MERC and for V2.2.

Players in Kenya could be part of Operation Harvester gathering material for the war effort as part of the US military.

Or they could be mercs and dealing with guys like Rick Blaine in Mombasa who pays for "items" that he can sell for a very high price to the right buyer. Or being paid by the LRA for things like black market fuel or spare parts for their vehicles or gold or gems that can be traded for what they need.

Or be both and have their eyes out for "items" while they are part of an Operation Harvester mission- i.e. a la Kings Ransom.

Grey Area
 

Technically, I probably didn't use the term MacGuffin correctly in the OP/Poll, but there's definitely a difference between "an object or device in a movie or a book that serves merely as a trigger for the plot" and a mission like "gather stuff", or a patron that sends the character on missions, like "the collector". A MacGuffin is almost always one really important thing. How and/or why it's important usually doesn't matter to the character charged with finding/retrieving/destroying the thing, but it still manages to drive the main plot line.