I ran one of the little quick scenarios out of the Twilight Nightmares book. I had put my players through the Black Madonna adventure and have made it with a darker tint, so there was just enough unease in them when we finished up that adventure that the Twilight Nightmare adventure of "Seeing is Believing".
I worked it straight from the book, as they had taken refuge in an abandoned farmhouse. The wind picked up as the night set in. They had built a small fire to keep warm and they decided the night's watch schedule. I made them roll for alertness and to see if they stayed awake normally, so when I did it this time they didn't think anything of it. I didn't even let the player who's character was on watch know when he had fallen asleep.
Rather than being in Oregon, it was in war torn Poland.
The man on "watch" spotted the red flashlights. Then they heard the sounds from the back of the house. Then the footsteps on the front porch. The sounds of rifles chambering rounds.
Then the Night Creepers began to come in! Bullets were flying everywhere. Grenades were thrown, bodies were racking up! My players racked up quite a body count before they were finally put down...one at a time, until they were all dead. They fought like it was their own skin they were trying to protect, rather than just their characters. Then, as the last person was shot several times and was lying on the ground as a pair of Night Creepers appeared over him and started to smash him with their rifle butts, all of the PCs woke up!
It was morning. Everyone was alive. Their weapons were intact, as were all of their ammo. What?! yelled my players. A dream. It was all just a dream...it had to be. After they had convinced themselves that's what it was, they gathered their belongings and set out, only to find a red lensed flashlight out on the front porch. Bwa ha ha! I've never seen my group so motivated to move along to another place, well away from that farmhouse.
It was a thumb's up game for me. I had a lot of fun, and I'm pretty sure my players liked it after they got over the creepy nature of the whole thing. But that's all I've ever done with Twilight Nightmares. I've wanted to do others...specifically the dinosaurs, but I never had the opportunity. Maybe I could work it into a one-shot one of these days.
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