This is the In-character Only thread for the SDMB Ghostbusters campaign.
Visitors should make comments in the Out-Of-Character thread HERE.
The previous adventure can be found HERE.
If you would like to join us playing, please visit the recruitment thread HERE.
In their previous adventure:
Four young men, answering a help wanted ad in the local newspaper, respond to an old abandoned medical warehouse that’s in the process of being converted into a Ghostbusters Headquarters.
Gerald Jacobs, a true 80s man. Gerald has spent his life perfecting his ability to be cool under any circumstances, and has a special way of always getting what he wants. He has spent nearly as much time studying the paranormal as he has spent getting his hair juuust riiight, and is the man with the plan when the evil spirits… expand?
Kristopher Senneca didn’t really believe until ghosts until he saw one up close and personal; now he’ll gladly tell you they exist, although he’s strangely closed-lipped about his last experience with them. Kris is a natural technician, with a knowledge of the Ghostbusting equipment that’s matched only by his speed in using such equipment.
Louis Cornwall is from Louisiana, and speaks with a thick Cajun accent that can sometimes make him hard to understand. His years on the racing circuit have made him an expert behind the wheel, and taught him more than a little about vehicles.
Brian “Professor” Jenkins is an ex physics teacher, whose theories about the afterlife caused some unkind words to be said about him by his colleagues. However, after developing a method to capture paranormal activity on videotape, “Prof” looks forward to proving them all wrong.
Their boss, J.T. Roth, is a very large Texan man, who has decided to open a Ghostbusters franchise in New York City for some unexplained reason. He lost a leg in a car accident, and has just finished using the last of the money from his settlement to purchase the needed equipment and renovate the headquarters. He hopes his new hires will be what’s needed to make his business succeed.
Upon arriving at the location approximately a week ago, the four new hires found their future boss locked in battle with a Phantasm. The tortured spirit of one Marie Peterson haunted this location, and so it remained abandoned for years until purchased by J.T. Once he moved in, it agitated the phantasm into action, but he was unable to defeat it himself.
Gerald managed to calm the spirit down by singing to it, and the group headed to the Hall of Records to try to find some information to help them defeat it, but were ultimately unsuccessful. Returning to the building, the crew set a plan into motion, and after some slight setbacks they all seem reluctant to discuss, the Phantasm was captured and placed in the Containment Grid, there to safely remain for all time.
Finishing the work on the building, and putting an advertisement into the local paper that they were open for business, the crew gathers one Monday morning and awaits their first client.
The date: June 23, 1986.
Monday Morning
9:00 am
You show up right on time, your new jumpsuit clean and fitted, with your name on it and your boots polished. Gathering in the break room, enjoying the doughnuts somebody brought in for breakfast and having a nice cup of coffee from the new coffee machine (assuming you drink coffee), you share small talk with the other members of your team and wait for something interesting to happen.
In John Thomas’ office, a telephone rings. You all turn your heads and listen as he answers it:
"Ghostbusters, this is JT Roth. We’re ready to believe you. How can we help?
What?
No, I’m sorry, what?
I can’t hear you, can you turn that down… what? What?
Look, I’m sorry. Hang on a second!"
J.T. covers the phone with his hand and bellows out into the break area “Hey, guys! I got a call here but it’s noisy, could one of you come see if you can make out what they’re saying?!”
You all know how things work now: one turn per day, roll the dice if you know what to roll, talk amongst yourselves as much as you can!
Be warned that the gloves are off; this can, and will, get dangerous! Be prepared for anything! 
Who wants to take the phone call?
Kris comes right over, taking the phone from JT. “Hello, this is the Ghostbusters. How can we help you?”
On the other end of the line, a male voice can just be heard over the noise in the background:
“Ghostbusters! mumble mumble reached you, you gotta mumble mumble us! Our mumble mumble won’t turn off! We can’t mumble mumble or even mumble mumble at all!”
The background noise obscures most of what whomever is on the other end is saying; sounds of racuous laughter and people talking VERY LOUDLY obscure all but a few words.
Kristopher asks the caller to speak more clearly, but it’s obvious that the caller is having just as much trouble hearing Kris, as Kris having is hearing him.
“Mumble mumble landlord but he mumble mumble good! The other tennants mumble mumble mumble and 92 cents, and you can have it all! Just mumble mumble mumble-mumble can!”
Kristopher makes out the following information: The caller’s name is Don Davidson, and he also gets an address: 66666 Flatbush Avenue. This is important information, and Kristopher jots it down on a nearby notepad.
The caller continues: “Mumble mumble some kind of horrible mumble mumble! Mumble mumble completely crazy! Please, just mumble mumble!”
Kristopher only: Please give me a BRAINS roll to see if you understood anything beyond what I’ve typed. [COLOR=“Lime”]Dificulty: 5
All other players: If you wish to pick up another phone and listen in on their conversation, give me a BRAINS, or LISTEN, or similar observation roll. Difficulty: 10[/COLOR]
There won’t be much more to hear, so don’t waste any Brownie Points on this. You have a name and an address, and that’s enough to start.
I’m going to try using color a little more in this game; I’ll use[COLOR=“Lime”] lime green for difficulty checks (when the players get to know them) and blue for information that is obviously important. I may also find a subtle color for not-so-obvious important information, I’m not sure yet. Any other suggestions?[/COLOR]
Gerald glances up from the July issue of Popular Science (headlines: “Buick’s Performance Car for the 1990s” and also “Coming: first test for antigravity”). He observes for a minute and then goes back to his reading.
“My god, this thing can hold -six- compact discs at a time! Why would anyone ever need that much music at once? I’ve -got- to get one.”
Brian listens to Kris struggling for a moment and picks up an extension.
[spoiler] Roll (Brains) 23, no ghost
And the color scheme looks good to me. Maybe a darker green for the subtle info?
[/spoiler]
Kris rolls a 4+3 for a roll of 7 on Brains. No ghost.
Brian J and Mahaloth both have information in their private messages.
Any information given to a player in this manner is private information their character knows, but other characters do not know.
A player is allowed to share this information, as they wish, in any way they wish, unless asked specifically NOT to share it by the GM or I guess any player who told them and asked them not to share it further.
It is not yet midnight; the phone call is still active and talking is always a free action.
Everyone is still able to move this turn.
See y’all at Midnight.
No no, go ahead, tell me again all about how you just happened to know that was on the cover and didn’t use Google search to look it up or anything. I’m totally believing you… :dubious:
Kris has his hand over the phone. “Yeesh, the noise in the background is a whole bunch of TV’s. I mean, my family had two growing up, but this place has a ton. It sounds like an apartment building with all the TV’s turned up full blast! Is that a paranormal thing, guys?”
Didn’t you know that the entire 140-year run of Popular Science is archived on their web site? 
Gerald looks up from his magazine again.
“It’s pretty common for ghosts to mess with electronics - you saw how Marie was able to do it with the telephones.”
I rolled an 18 for parapsychology to see if I know anything else salient based on what Kris said.
Heh… I do now! I was like, wait a minute, is he making that up or… no, it’s Johnny Bravo. I bet he googled it, let’s see if I can find it myself. There it is! And I laughed and posted, and here we are.
Nope, that pretty much covers it. I may think of something later, but as far as I know off the top of the head, that’s a perfect description of what he knows.
“2 TV’s? You rich Americans!” Brian has never heard of 2 tv’s in a household.
I think I recognise one of the shows. Mike and Milly. A morning talk show that my wife watches religiously. The other TV’s seem to be on other channels as far as I can tell.
If you can, ask Don to meet us outside his building. We may want to know what’s going on before rushing in.
Kristopher hangs up the telephone and the group gathers together in J.T.'s office. He and the Professor share what they know about the phone call with the others.
Kris says “It was noisy, but I’m pretty sure I convinced Don to meet us outside. I think I got the address right; guess we’ll find out when we get there!”
“Well, boys” drawls J.T. “Looks like y’all just got yer first assignment! I’ll stay here, call me on Gerald’s gizmo if’n y’all have any problems. Feel free to hit the equipment storage and take along anythin’ ya reckon y’all might be needin’!”
The team packs up the GhostMobile with four Proton Packs, one for each Ghostbuster. They each choose an item or two for themselves, and pack some extra equipment into the Ghostmobile just in case.
I have returned the group to the Headquarters map so that equipment can be chosen. Assume that each character has a Proton Pack. In addition, unless they choose to leave them behind, Brian has his camera and Gerald has his mobile telephone.
Remember, each character can carry ONLY THREE ITEMS at a time, without being encumbered to the point of uselessness. This means:
Kris can choose two items.
Louis can choose two items.
Gerald can choose one item.
Brian can choose one item.
Please pick your items (assume you have a Proton Pack as the third item) and take the appropriate card. Please post here, as well, to let everyone (including me) know which item(s) you have chosen.
In addition, you may choose a few items to place in the GhostMobile. To do so, just put the appropriate card on top of the Ecto-1 card. The GhostMobile can hold ten items, not including those held by characters, and not including the four Proton Packs.
[spoiler]In the movie, the Hearse had a sliding thingy which was originally used to help move a coffin into and out of the car. This was converted to hold the Proton Packs; they slid the whole assembly out and took the packs off of that, giving easy access to all of them at once.
In my mind, your vehicle has something similar on one side of the cargo compartment. The other side has built-in shelves, drawers, containers, and suchlike storage, for other gear.
The vehicle itself seats four; two in the front, two in the middle. The rearmost seat has been removed, to provide room for this storage.[/spoiler]
When this is complete, I’ll look things over and make any needed adjustments. If more than ten items are chosen for the car, I’ll choose which ones to leave behind. If fewer than ten are chosen, I’ll choose to add more items to fill any remaining space.
If we can get everyone’s cooperation, and everyone is fully equipped by tomorrow night at Midnight, we’ll continue the game immediately. If not, the turn can wait one more day to give everyone a chance. After that, the game will continue as if everyone had chosen, because I don’t want to wait forever to get back into the action!
Pick wisely, my children!
Kris grabs a PKE meter and a walkie talkie, assuming someone else will take a trap.
“Hey, guys, if you don’t know what to take, make sure we have one trap and that everyone who can carry a walkie talkie has one. It will be helpful, I imagine.”
I took a PKE meter in roll20, but now am not sure
I probalby don’t also need a PKE meter, unless we see the needd to split into two teams, one walkie talkie and one PKE meter for each team. What do you think?
I’m still determined to get soem video footage we can use, but once we get that I’ll likely leave the video camera in the lab in future missions.
Gerald will bring one of the books from his library: the Tobin Spirit Guide.
Lou, his concentration being monstly occupied by the routine maintanence of his 1951 Indian Warrior, notices the team rushing in for equipment. “Wha’s goin’ on? We godda case?” He’ll pick up the same equipment as last time.