My title isn’t very great, because I don’t know how to summarize this question to one line… But, basically, I play a “Dungeons & Dragons” type thing, with some friends and in a possible future scenario we were thinking it would be interesting to try and play as four modern day humans, who have decided to become the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse… And to imitate their individual abilities using only what would be do-able today.
For Example: If I were to play as the character who was to become the Horseman Death… His mere touch would have to silently kill any individual instantly (or at least appear to instantly kill, thoughts of a paralyzing agent used in combination with a fairly fast[but not instantaneous] acting poison have been tossed around)… The problem is, I can’t find any solid information for a proper poison that would work? It would need to have the following properties: fast-acting (maximum 1 hour, preferably 10 - 15 minutes or faster), seem like a natural death (heart attack etc…) and be administered by either pin prick or touch.
I know this question is a bit out there, but I’m hoping that anyone reading this is fairly open minded and accepts that this is just theory, no practical use would be done!
Also, Famine is seeming difficult as well for us to figure out, so any thoughts on that would be appreciated. Thanks.
One problem is that three of the four (Famine, War, and Pestilence) are more society-level problems instead of individual. You can imagine a genetic engineer that releases a superplague, but that doesn’t seem very interesting for an RPG since it would be relatively slow-acting and non-discriminatory. Have you thought, then, about adapting them to be more individual? War might simply be a guy with lots of guns. Pestilence could be… I dunno, someone with control over a robot locust swarm? Famine I’m not sure about.
We once did a “Fantasy Model United Nations” – a live-action role playing game which involved a lot of parliamentary procedure – sounds kinda dull, but, really, it was fun. People came “representing” Pern and Middle Earth and Barsoom and Narnia and so on. Four of us were the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Famine kept trying to get the lunch break cancelled. Disease had a nasty persistent cough. War kept trying to get other people to fight with each other… (“Say, Barsoom, did you hear what Narnia has been saying about you?”)
Pratchett’s and Gaiman’s “Good Omens” is also really good source material.
I’m not sure there are any really ‘undetectable’ poisons. Maybe choosing victims carefully might avoid it; maybe Death could look into medical histories for weaknesses/allergies.
A few poisons to consider:
Botulinum - very potent neurotoxin. Can be inhaled, ingested, or absorbed through eyes/broken skin. Neurotoxin poisoning kills quickly at high doses, but symptoms will probably be noticeable (e.g. muscle spasms). If done right the poisoning might seem ‘natural’. (Tetanospasmin, the toxin associated with tetanus, is another option, as it’s nearly as potent).
Digitalis - induces a heart attack. Other symptoms may be nausea, difficulties with vision. Likely to be discovered unless nobody suspects it.
Nicotine - great for poisoning by touch. Death within a few hours, with probably noticeable symptoms before death, though (sweating, palpitations, headache, seizures, etc.)
Another option for Famine is a deranged eco-terrorist or someone so far into the “paleo” diet they actually want to destroy agriculture. Hard to see what exactly they’d do to that end, though.
Thank you everyone for your ideas! I like Dr. Strangelove’s concept. And thanks panamajack for the list of poisons, I’m sure it will be of some use. I was also thinking about possibly combining different poisons for a possible faster effect time/more sudden death.
And, I guess undetectable was a far stretch, but anything that would need a special test would probably work too.
I was in a play once that used murder-by-nicotine as a plot point. The premise was that the lab work would detect it, but that the victim was a smoker, and so the presence of nicotine would be considered unremarkable. Of course, then the murderer ends up using it on a non-smoker, too, and so the gig was up.
Now, in real life, I imagine that a real forensics team could tell the difference based on the amount of nicotine (it was clearly a higher than baseline dose, after all, or it wouldn’t kill), but it might still be good enough for dramatic purposes.
For Famine, you might consider some kind of desiccant powder as an attack form. You’d need something that would act very quickly, so most of the major commercial desiccants would be out (they’re chosen for being minimally toxic, while we want the opposite. Maybe someone can point to a particularly dangerous product.
While the physical effect of pulling moisture out of the target isn’t what famine is all about, a desiccated body is about as close as you’re going to get to the appearance of starvation in a short time frame. Plus, droughts and famines are often paired together.
I’m glad I posted this, lots of good ideas.