|
What all the books for someone who doesn't know: Keeper's Handbook - the main rulebook, only thing you really need. Keeper's Screen - GM screen, pretty useful, comes with two fun scenarios. Starter Set - a starter set, the basic rules and three good adventures. Investigator Handbook - player-facing book with some extra careers options and info on 1920s, very non-essential but nice to get in a bundle Keeper Tips - GM advice they released recently to celebrate CoC's anniversary, non-essential but neat Pulp Cthulhu - some extra rules to make PCs more durable and pulpy, some info on 1930s, a few adventures. The rule bits should've been in the core rulebook, tbh, but at least you're not paying extra here. It's basically "increase hp, increase stats, give more Luck to reroll, here's an optional Talent system". Alone Against the Dark/Frost/Tide - solo gamebooks. Malleus Monstrorum. S. Petersen's Guide to Lovecraftian Horrors, Grand Grimoire - collections of all the canonical monsters and spells. Neat if you're into the lore, but you don't actually need them to play or run. Dead Light and Other Dark Turns, Petersen's Abominations, Mansions of Madness vol 1, Gateways to Terror, Doors to Darkness, Does Love Forgive - short adventure collections of varying quality but they're all at least decent and some of my favorite ones are here. Reign of Terror, Cthulhu Dark Ages, Berlin the Wicked City, Down Darker Trails - setting books for, respectively, French Revolution Era, Middle Ages, Weimar Republic Berlin and Wild West. Each will be about half setting info, half a mini-campaign consisting of several short adventures. A Cold Fire Within - A longer campaign, pulpy. The Coloring Book - wait, how did this get here?! Do not attempt to read this, I repeat Ḑ̤̐O̘̗̊̕ ̽͌͏̥̦N̢͚͌ͅỎ̽͏̳Tͮ͛͏̼͝ ̨̠͇̜̾̂ A͔̼̞͑̉͝Ţ͂̾̂̀͏͇͚̠͉Tͫ̆͏͏̜͇̣Eͥ̈̀͘҉̺͓̙M̬͔̪͐̎͐̈́͞P̸̛̛̟̥͖͉ͣTͤͧ̈҉̸̼̩ ̶̣̹͛ͩ̎̕͜͝ T̷͛͋͗̚͏̡̲̹̪̣͝O̶̴̧̗̠̦͙̫͛́̉͒ ̄̒̑҉̵҉̸̩͠͡R̴̵̋ͨ͌ͦ̃̀͟͝͡͏͏̹Ě̸̢̠̒̈́͊͟͟͝͡A͉̣̫͓̐ͭ̊̋͛ͮ͜ͅĎ̫̞̜͔̹ͨ͐̋͜͞ ̛̺̭̚̚̕͟T̸̊͡͝͏̞̺̯̳͘H̴͌̕͏̵̯̜̥̭͙̻̼͘͟͢͟I̵̡̪̖̠͔̰̜̦̖ͮ͂̔ͮͩ̀̚̕̕͘͢S̶̵̢̽ͣ҉̶̵̢̖͍̺͓̞̣̟͘
|
#
?
Jan 6, 2024 21:52
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 16:14 |
|
|
As to book reading times, I think by maybe my third session (as player, not DM) I reailzed that was totally impractical and was HPL stans letting lore get in the way of game mechanics. I either: 1. Dole out spells at the end of modules as rewards for a job well done, thereby entirely eliding the study time since all CoC/DG games end in a massive bloodbath that requires several weeks/months of laying low to avoid cops/congressional hearings. 2. Come up with some other way of transmitting the knowledge. I love Crimson Letters, it's based around Dreams in the Witch House in which the protagonist studies advanced math and ends up teleporting through time and space through wibbley hypergeometry. So people get the Gate spell for beating it, usually* from Abner Wick. 3. Come up with non D&D style 'wizard reads a spellbook' rewards to augment players' options. I mashed up Terminator with Metropolis for a homebrew while we were doing Berlin the Wicked City. The three opposing forces were Skynet, The Nazis and Weimar Centrism, so everyone sided with the robot. Gave one of them the option to be replicated and downloaded into a steampunk android (boosts to all combat skills and stats, plus armor, no healing except through electronics/mechanics/operate heavy) and they absolutely loved playing as that afterwards. E: I also have a DG contest module that I playtested once but never actually ran or submitted in which a player gets their soul stolen and put in a car, with the option to stay a KITT style sentient muscle car afterwards. *after he seals the Bad away by correcting the fake manuscript (no spoilers because every in every CL game every NPC's role is made up by the DM) he tattooes the same design from the book, the one that links up dimensions, on their arm. This takes a split second and an eternity, as Abner basically does Witch House poo poo and transports them throughout the universe and all of time, returning at the instant they left. ANYWAY just ran it for some new people, the non-combat character got antsy in the final fight (I should have telegraphed non-combat buffs/debuffs they were able to dole out), grabbed a car, and when Wick shows up who is not a nice guy anyway you DM the game, they just ran him over at full speed. Fortunately the non combat character was a forger, and tried to correct the manuscript themselves. A little collar tugging later I let them roll it out and they got an extreme success, which I played off as them doing basically the same trip, but on their own. I feel like anything less than a hard success would have been permanent insanity/TPK/end of the world, and there's really no way out of it, especially because I had multiple NPCs explicitly say copying that book has set all of reality on a path to destruction. Anyway, they're now canonically history's greatest forger cause they dashed off a Cthulhu Mythos symbol, freehand with no study, and also the oldest living organism because they experienced every moment of time, in every point of space in the universe, simultaneously. Probably still would have let them slide if they hosed up, though, because doing exactly what the book says is rarely the optimal good time PipHelix fucked around with this message at 22:36 on Jan 15, 2024 |
|
#
?
Jan 15, 2024 22:33
|
|
|
A few months ago I dm-ed my first Delta Green session going with last things last. It really helped me listening to the glass cannon play that scenario before to see what worked for them and what I wanted to change. Soon I want to dm another one or two-off so I am looking for recommendations for podcasts or streams where reasonably entertaining people play short delta green scenarios.
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2024 02:29
|
|
|
Generally speaking, I read scenarios first then if I think "this one is interesting, I want to run it / this one is weird, how do you run it?!" I try to find some playthroughs of it on podchaser.com and Youtube. Can't help you with specific channels because the only DG podcast I've listened to is Pretending to be People, sorry.
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2024 11:25
|
|
|
uncertainty posted:A few months ago I dm-ed my first Delta Green session going with last things last. It really helped me listening to the glass cannon play that scenario before to see what worked for them and what I wanted to change. It's been a bit since I listened to podcasts but I'll recommend some of the classic DG groups. Roleplaying Public Radio (RPPR) has a long list of Delta Green actual plays. They recently released two shows for Puppet Shows and Shadow Plays this year. Link to all their DG podcasts are here: https://actualplay.roleplayingpublicradio.com/category/systems/call-of-cthulhu/delta-green/ Black Project Gaming (currently not making any more podcasts I believe) has released several shows for Delta Green including: Observer Effect, Extremophilia, Music From a Darkened Room, Viscid, Reverberations and Sweetness. Links here: https://blackprojectgaming.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/BlackProjectGaming
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2024 18:13
|
|
|
Awesome, thank you so much! I was looking into extremophilia (also considering convergence and the drove) so will try to find those episodes for Black Project Gaming first!
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2024 05:55
|
|
|
The Theatre of the Mind Players did a great run of Delta Green - three whole seasons!
|
|
#
?
Feb 3, 2024 16:53
|
|
|
Mechanics Advice Request: I have a CoC group, and I have a whole bunch of DG homebrews I'd like to run. Since we've already made a hash of future history as is, I was thinking I'd introduce 'On Retainer To a Big Government Conspiracy' by running Reverberations... kinda. Idea is, its an adulterant in bootleg hooch that's making some people go blind and other people see, ya know, way WAY more. Going to mash up the Untouchables with Miami Vice, make it dumb as absolute hell. So, in my head, the effects of Reverb are limited time travel/prescience. When the players dose - and at least one of them is going to have to to prove they're not a cop in an opening drug-deal-gone-bad scene where the undercover cop they're with gets killed, stranding them on the wrong side of the law Infernal Affairs/The depahhted (ugh) style - there will be a quick scene where they are sent back to 'something they regret' and are given just enough opportunity to make some minor changes before it wears off. The addiction isn't really physiological, overuse and the SAN hit are functions of every time you get closer and closer - but never actually accomplish - to averting the worst thing that ever happened to you. Following that the conscience gets slingshotted slightly into the future - the guinea pig will see the drug deal go bad - followed by reverting to the present, just in time for the Treasury Gmen who were working this case undercover on the *other* side, Kiss Of Death style (I watch way too many bad crime movies), to pull their guns, get everyone shot and kick things off. What I'm hoping to communicate with this is that doing Reverb, while it makes you insane, also makes you impossible to surprise because you literally see your own future play out in real time. The 'Tony Montana in a huge Pile of Blow' scene is gonna be the main dealer, Savage Henry, dropping Reverb straight into his eyes, clearasil style. Maybe a monologue about how they made it to the top cause they don't waste time on regrets, only looking forward. Ok, enough bragging about my cool concept, here's how I imagine Dosed NPCs working vs non-dosed PCs 1. street level dealers/addicts not currently strung out - flat bonus to dodge and attack, maybe +10 2. Savage Henry's right hand "Miami Man" (watch the Bad Batch if you haven't) - *all* rolls against him take a penalty die an his rolls get a bonus die (he's been doing a lot for a long time) I think that's fair, especially since the final combat will be the whole party plus a support NPC or two, vs the main Combat Monster, two minor mooks, and the scag baron, see below, *AND* all those buffs don't exist against dosed PCs. here's the part I'm trying to balance: 3. Savage Henry - not a combat NPC in terms of skills but I want him crazy hard to take down. So what I imagine is, in combat: Top of every round, every single nondosed player, regardless of initiative or whatever, *must* declare whether they intend to attack or otherwise impact him in that combat round. If they do, they immediately roll whatever they said they were going to do. If its a failure, that's it, that's your turn. If it's a success, you wait your turn and roll it *again* to actually succeed. Idea is, if you roll a hit, he sees his brains painting a wall a split second before the trigger is pulled and ducks. Likewise, when it's my turn to operate Henry, I know in advance what strategy the party is pursuing and can plan a counter. Does this seem like too much? Not enough? Would it break the flow at the table? Recall that at least one NPC will be not subject to any of the above cause they're also zooted to the gills on Precog Gin. I also plan on any PC who realizes how hosed they are in the final Scarface Mansion shootout, and drinks Reverbed hooch in combat will lose one turn and be totally helpless while they flashback on their last words to their dead wife being an argument, or some such. Oh yea and the conspiracy is the government was pushing reverb onto the streets to study its effects for possible use in national defense. Savage Henry was MPD Vice sergeant Anthony Montana before he went too deep. The Handler, Officer Crockett. is rolling up loose ends Cigarette Smoking Man style now that the preliminary trials have concluded. PipHelix fucked around with this message at 21:38 on Feb 4, 2024 |
|
#
?
Feb 4, 2024 19:20
|
|
|
Also, if anyone has some good 80s bangers for the soundtrack lemme know. So far in terms of loose themes its: "Cop/Violence/Threat" Phil Collins - In the Air (obv) Jan Hammer - Miami Vice Theme Jan Hammer - Crockett's Theme Genesis - Just a Job To Do Don Henley - All She Wants To Do Is Dance Harold Faltermeyer - Axel F Private Eyes - Hall & Oates Nobodys - No Guarantees Talking Heads - Life During Wartime Stool Pigeon - Kid Creole & The Coconuts Pet Shop Boys - Its a Sin "Beach/Sun/Fun" Figures On a Beach - Positively 4th Street Higher Love - Steve Winwood Men Without Hats - Where Do The Boys Go Kenny Loggins - Playing With the Boys "Sad/Melancholy/Bittersweet" (specifically for the flashbacks) New Order - Your Silent Face Yukihiro Takahashi - Helpless (Neil Young Cover) "Drugs" (Expecting to play these in combat, after a PC rips a Reverb, I'm relaxing my 80s rules here, High energy and/or disorienting sounding) Melle Mel - White Lines Lust For Life - Iggy & The Stooges Oxy Music - Alex Cameron Dan Deacon - Someone Area (Rod) PipHelix fucked around with this message at 20:54 on Feb 4, 2024 |
|
#
?
Feb 4, 2024 20:18
|
|
|
Huey Lewis and the News - I Want A New Drug
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 00:24
|
|
|
Pete Shelley's "Homosapien"
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 01:05
|
|
|
Smuggler's Blues - Glenn Frey Headhunter - Front 242 Watching the Detectives - Elvis Costello Love Like Blood - Killing Joke I Love a Man in Uniform - Gang of Four It's No Game (Part 1) - David Bowie A Bomb in Wardour Street - The Jam Dominion - Sisters of Mercy
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 01:11
|
|
|
General: Corey Hart - Sunglasses at Night Huey Lewis - The Power of Love (though I want a new drug is a good choice too) Van Halen - Panama If you can get away with the Magnum PI theme... For beach sun fun: Glenn Frey - The Heat is On Loverboy - Workin for the Weekend Starship - We Built This City Sting - Englishman in New York Flashbacks David Bowie - Heroes Tears For Fears - Mad World Spandau Ballet - True I got into a groove here, thanks! combat/drugs one Freaky Chakra's Blacklight Fantasy (it fits because it was in the 2006 Miami Vice) Also recommend if you have spotify, throw those onto a playlist and ask it to suggest more stuff, it's pretty good at genre stuff.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 01:25
|
|
|
I love this very much but: Do we think my party will be pissed if they find out that the tweaky drug baron can see their bullets coming/is the way I communicate this clear/will the way it plays at the table not be excruciating? Edit: While I'm at it. Plan is to do the scenes in kinda scrambled chronological order. Party is gonna be split so I want knowledge in one scene not to influence the other. Lemme know if this tracks: (I'm throwing some edits in for myself so I can track what needs work being un-railroaded) 1. Intro, Crockett explains they're cleaning house on Reverb dealers and the party is there to help them go around the law to do it. Requests a volunteer who is 'sharp and can keep their poo poo together' to go undercover with one agent who is fronting as a buyer for Henry, and the rest as 'Plausible Deniability Heavies' for a hit on 'The Diaz Brothers' gang, where another undercover cop will signal them to clean house. 2. a) The hitters meet up with a militant WCTU member who drives them to a motel in the swamp. However they decide to case the place, Miami Man beats them to the punch, sneaks in, beats everyone within an inch of their life, sets up the Scarface Shower Scene and as the party enters, slits the throat of the undercover cop before attempting an escape. E: So they get to see one of the Bosses in action when he isn't trying to kill the party, try to save the dying cop, and fight off some softened up reverb-mooks from of the rival gang. 2. b) The lone undercover PC attends a buy with Henry and Miami man, after the dust settles, they're offered a job since their 'boss' is dead and Henry needs some new muscle. As they're leaving Henry tells Miami man about 'his guy' who told them the Diaz Brothers are going to be at a motel later on. E: Too railroady, they get an experience I almost entirely narrate. There's a bit where they can stop or not stop the city cop from pulling his gun after the feds are killed, but that's about it. 3. a) The next day, Henry sends the PC to watch his wife while she goes shopping 'I trust Miami Man with my life, but not my girl' or some such. Crockett rolls up incognito while she's in the changing room and informs them that if they can't deliver Henry, the feds are going to need a fall guy and their prints are all over the scene with a dead cop and two dead feds. Hopefully the PC is smart enough to mention the mistrust, Crockett can give them some surveillance photos that look incriminating. I'm trying to railroad them into getting something to split Henry and his muscle so at the big showdown, Henry is also spraying bullets at Miami Man - it should help put a wet blanket on what is other wise a Mythos Monster level tough human NPC. They'll also be a lynchpin of the first few rounds of combat when the party shows up at the Mansion so it will average out. But if anyone can think of something for this PC to do in this interlude, please lemme know, they're kinda just hanging out being spoonfed here. E: yea, again, almost nothing for them to do but go where I'm pointing. 3. b) Earlier that morning, the hitters arrive to the rendezvous with Crockett to see a bunch of suits screaming and pounding tables, throwing chairs, the whole bit. Crockett hustles them out, tells them that two cops and two feds are dead and technically they're not on the payroll. Crockett's chief does an 80s chief monologue about how the crooks are a step ahead, his ulcer, his wife, how he's late to get the kids for his weekend, etc. Crockett offers him the keys to his car, which promptly explodes. This is kinda spoonfeedy, but this group got to case a combat zone, fight some mooks, see one of the Boss Monsters in action and try to save a dying cop. And I want to try to fit this all in a oneshot. E: This is railroady, but if I think of it as essentially dispatching them to the final fight, it works. 4. The big showdown. I was thinking of having Crockett get all fake intense and tell the hit squad that he wants Henry dead. Under no circumstances bring him in alive. Hopefully this is all motivated enough that when he shows up in the aftermath, having been promoted to Chief, with a black ops hazmat team to reclaim all the reverb, that the Usual Suspects dominos all click into place - basically everyone who got killed got killed because they were where Crockett put them, and usually because Crockett sent the people who killed them. Then he throws the party a hip flask of Reverb as their McGuffin reward - basically if they ever wanna access Bullet Time in combat, have a swig - and tells them to get the gently caress out of 'his' town but makes it clear they're still dangling on his (or his boss') hook. E: If I don't split the party, with maybe one more investigative avenue, this is a good ending, I think. But with no inside man, there's no intro deal, so I need to demonstrate the rules of Reverb somehow, and I'd like to have high odds a PC tries reverb organically such that at least one of them is able to engage in combat with no penalties. My party knows that I reward touching the poop as much as I punish it, but people generally don't jump headfirst into the evil juju in a CoC game. Also I remembered after posting that Viagra Boys exist and while it's not 80s nothing communicates "This is the worst good time" like Research Chemicals or Lick The Bag PipHelix fucked around with this message at 21:14 on Feb 5, 2024 |
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 04:30
|
|
|
That sounds extremely railroady
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 11:31
|
|
|
sebmojo posted:That sounds extremely railroady Yea, that's been nagging me - but good to hear, it's easier to ignore a problem when it's just in your head than when someone calls it out. This is very preliminary though, I'm not running this for at least a month. Any ideas how to open it up? I think I have too much plot for one session and not enough for more than one, and trying to fit it by spreading it out among two groups of PCs there's not enough game for anyone. If I make it not be a oneshot, 4 hour session, I think that makes things a lot easier. I can give people more opportunities to play around with stuff and I don't have to rush them straight to the fireworks factory. Been trying to keep it to one session, but I'll chuck that over in favor of things being, you know, fun for people. But I definitely need like 2-3 more potential avenues for them to go down, at least, for a multi-session game - or at least I would default to increasing the number of paths rather than lengthen the two paths I described. Unless anyone has thoughts there. E: The more I think about it, the inside man needs a lot more to do or I need to not split the party. Might be easier to have everyone together and do the vignettes in series rather than parallel, and also grow out some more options for exploration (ironically, I've been running the series on Miami Vice for inspiration, and literally every episode kickstarts with a deal going bad and an undercover cop biting it, or a cop who's been under too long losing the plot. For real, 100%+ of eps so far. But that might be limiting my thinking about what's possible) PipHelix fucked around with this message at 19:54 on Feb 5, 2024 |
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 19:24
|
|
|
Think I cracked it. Whole party is sent to a buy as muscle for an undercover cop. Half the sellers are undercover feds the other half are low level guys, not the Bossmen themselves off the jump. A player has to dose, once the flashback/powerup scene js done, Feds pull guns, cop reaches for his badge, feds yell "gun!" and now everyone is shooting at everyone. Scene ends with the party in posession of a huge amount of contraband and money, at the scene with dead cops and feds, and since the motivator is they are already wanted criminals for doing CoC Party Stuff, everyone assumes they came out of hiding to take over the booze trade. Handler says theyre too hot to bring in, only way out is through. So the module is now "eliminate the other dealers in the trade". Basically, they got to speed run the undercover cop becomes a drug lord angle. It also makes getting close enough to the drug lord to kill him a thing they need to work organically towards via force or guile instead of "The DM puts you in their gang im the first scene but dont kill them yet!". The Carrie Nation type I'm making an Omar stand in. Strung out informer ala Bubbles is also a trope, add one of those. Maybe one other NPC that can give them stuff to do and move them up the chain and it should be unrailroaded. Or maybe not, lemme know if anyone is looking at this like christ sakes, pip.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2024 17:45
|
|
|
I mean it's all cool but you do seem to be writing stories rather than games. How many assumptions are your making about what the PCs will do? The GM advice thread is a good place to go for a second opinion.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2024 20:01
|
|
|
I ran a similar scenario at Gencon 2019, where the players were 1980s Delta Green Agents investigating an organized crime outfit that used zombies to smuggle drugs on the ocean floor off the coast of Miami, literally under the radar of the coast guard. The adventure started with the players waking up on the cartel's secret island, already zombified but still possessed of all their faculties, with no memory of how they got there. Each time the encountered a new drug smuggler on the island, it triggered a flashback from the failed raid that got them dosed with the zombie serum. The failed conclusion of the raid was predetermined, but the players could use the flashbacks to gather information that would help them in the present. If they killed an important member of the gang in the flashback sequence, that guy would show up on the island again in a different form, because the actual leaders of the cartel were spirits possessing human bodies. A couple people I went to the convention with ran the same scenario. Nobody ever figured out how to banish the spirits, because in all three playtest games the players decided it would be more fun to take over the crime syndicate themselves. We debated changing the motivations of the pregen characters, but the police squad becoming cool evil super-criminals is a staple of both detective fiction and Delta Green. We never finished writing up the final module, but Elendil004 commissioned a cool cover illustration from C R Florence. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2024 21:20
|
|
|
I got Alone Against the Static, but it seems my printer is dying so I'm having trouble printing the log sheet and character sheet.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2024 22:00
|
|
|
mellonbread posted:I ran a similar scenario at Gencon 2019, where the players were 1980s Delta Green Agents investigating an organized crime outfit that used zombies to smuggle drugs on the ocean floor off the coast of Miami, literally under the radar of the coast guard Nice, Ill check that out. E: I was skimming at work. Didn't realize there wasn't a link. Man I'd love to read that. I like the idea of non-predetermined flashbacks affecting the present/future. I was thinking about something like that for the later end of the module if people really started dipping into the reverb, but couldn't imagine how I wouldn't get lost in my own sauce. Poster's amazing. sebmojo posted:I mean it's all cool but you do seem to be writing stories rather than games. How many assumptions are your making about what the PCs will do? I think railroading the party through an intro is fair, as is having a fixed goal (knock off the main drug dealer). I dint think Ive ever read a module homebrew or official that doesnt establish the stakes and have a cearly defined exit condition. At this point in my conception the rest of the middle is up to the party, whether they want to take their money and drugs and start an empire Vice City style (that immediately occurred to me as an option, MB, so good to know I'm anticipating PC behavior/wants) or do a straight ahead vanquishing of evil. Personally I like to have a few NPCs with a strong peronality/motivation and a few setpieces to send people through in my pocket. If I were a better improviser maybe Id go without a net but the game would be a lot worse for the players if I didnt. This could be a GM fault all on its own but often the party is like 'ok now what', in which case I have the WCTU crusader roll up racking a shotgun and says "get in loser were raiding a trap house". But also I have been that PC saying 'ok now what' and had the GM refuse to give a hint because its not in the book or whatever, and that drives me nuts. The Idea Mechanic is literally cooked into the rules and I think thats the lamest thing to have to rely on. So I think Im willing to defend at least that much. PipHelix fucked around with this message at 02:21 on Feb 7, 2024 |
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2024 22:33
|
|
|
Found a blog post (not mine) about Mythos inspired Wargames and horror Wargames you could modify to host Mythos threats easily. https://fearofthedarkskirmishwargam...vUZmnNLp6VE&m=1
|
|
#
?
Feb 7, 2024 23:45
|
|
|
PipHelix posted:Railroad Is this for your usual game group or are looking to publish it? Cause only with the latter is this always a problem. I know some GMs don’t like to hear this but some playgroups want rails. It’s just they want a roller coaster with surprise twists and loops and not a steam train going over the desert. If you’re running for friends and think they will buy in to the world cause they wanna hang out with friends and roll dice then what you’re creating is fine and sounds like a lot of fun as long as you have the ability to zig when they inevitably zag from your outline. Thats the difference between a linear adventure and railroading. weekly font fucked around with this message at 21:11 on Feb 8, 2024 |
|
#
?
Feb 8, 2024 21:05
|
|
|
Have a bit of a plot question - what would be an interesting, reasonable thing someone might want to 'heal' a wounded Shoggoth, that isn't just 'human sacrifices'? The plot of our current campaign is that in 1918, a British destroyer captain accidentally depth-charged a temple the Deep Ones had sealed, containing a host of mad Shoggoths attempting to build a gate to Azathoth. The Deep Ones re-seal the temple and sink the boat, sparing only the conscripted Deep One cultists & hybrids on board and the captain, who is now their slave. Jump to 1925 and the captain commands a passenger liner, helping the cultists capture sacrifices and drop them off in the depths of the ocean - obviously going completely mad as a result. He fished a fragment of Shoggoth out of the water whilst on the lifeboats, and discovered how to nurture it back to life. Now he's hiding it as it carves out a new temple and gate beneath his house, waiting for it to bring him freedom through obliteration. (The PCs are involved as their friend was an officer on the destroyer, who also survived clinging to some flotsam but went mad. After being rescued by fishermen and spending 7 years in an Argentinian asylum, telegrammed them that he'd be returning then took the cultist-controlled passenger liner home and Never Arrived, prompting the investigation) I just can't think of what he might be doing to heal it other than "More human sacrifices" which is plausible, but in retrospect I think will just confuse the players as it looks like I probably made this too complicated to begin with. I could just have had it slowly recover 'naturally' over time, but that removes some of the breadcrumbs leading back to the captain, and makes it harder to trickle out the discovery.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2024 18:43
|
|
|
Biomass of any kind. Just absolutely enormous quantities. Enough feed for a massive cattle ranch, two years’ catch for New England, the corn output of Nebraska. Let the amount, and the financial issues, serve as bait and leads to draw in the investigators.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2024 19:30
|
|
|
Biomass and radioactive materials on the heels of the radium health craze going by the wayside when people started dying.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2024 20:15
|
|
|
Hostile V posted:Biomass and radioactive materials on the heels of the radium health craze going by the wayside when people started dying. Pitchblende and waste lard.
|
|
#
?
Feb 20, 2024 20:29
|
|
|
Oberndorf posted:Biomass of any kind. Just absolutely enormous quantities. Enough feed for a massive cattle ranch, two years’ catch for New England, the corn output of Nebraska. Let the amount, and the financial issues, serve as bait and leads to draw in the investigators. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 21, 2024 04:46
|
|
|
Large quantities of radioactive materials are good because they immediately stand out in records of purchases, allowing the players to track shipments and locate supernatural activity. The shoggoth needs a radiation source to transmute elements, adding or peeling off elementary particles to change the charge and weight of the atoms. Besides watch faces, radium paint was used to make low-light sights for firearms, similar to tritium sights in the present day. Many characters in 1925 would be Great War veterans and potentially familiar with the material, as radium night sights were used during the conflict.
|
|
#
?
Feb 21, 2024 18:23
|
|
|
Hostile V posted:Biomass and radioactive materials on the heels of the radium health craze going by the wayside when people started dying. Combine the two and have a string of graverobbings of said radium victims that lead back to the Captain. Or maybe there's been cases of passengers on the Captain's vessel that were known to take medicinal radium, who never arrived at their destinations.
|
|
#
?
Feb 21, 2024 21:45
|
|
|
I also like the idea that the shoggoth needs radioactive material because it's using it to loving do synthetic nuclear reactions to make bits and pieces it needs, I just picked my idea because it was Topical.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2024 00:12
|
|
|
These are all great ideas, thanks! I’d planned on the Captain’s house being near a graveyard, so frantically body-snatching radium victims when he’s back from sea and trying to drag them to the Shoggoth is definitely an interesting angle. Also ties nicely with Azathoth being quite linked to radiation.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2024 00:46
|
|
|
On the Night at the Opera discord Delta Green server we have some interesting conversations. This album cover from the band Darkest of the Hillside Thickets was posted.  As you do, I had some ideas for a Mythos racing game. Squamous and silly, I enjoyed writing up some Mythos factions and the cars they would drive. https://nightmarethoughts6.blogspot.com/2024/03/thoughts-on-delta-greenmythos-racing.html
|
|
#
?
Mar 24, 2024 00:17
|
|
|
While some folks may dislike the un-PC-ness of the trope of 'hillbillies', describing two distinct types is impressive. However I feel it's the Shaggai who view their vessels as more disposable than the Yithians. An Insect (From Shaggai) can plan a getaway so they don't get vapourised by sunlight should their victim get caught in a pile-up, where as the Yithian is stuck in the body without going through a fairly convoluted process to swap their mind back with the human in the far future/distant past. The Great Race of Yith were/are/will be rude jackasses from our perspective, but the Shaggai are total, malicious, assholes - the Great Race's record of swapping minds with entire other species when the poo poo hits the fan notwithstanding.
|
|
#
?
Mar 24, 2024 02:07
|
|
|
Missed opportunity for the Mi-Go to drive modified car-boats called "Mi-Go-Fasts"
|
|
#
?
Mar 24, 2024 02:33
|
|
|
Elendil004 posted:Missed opportunity for the Mi-Go to drive modified buggies called "Mi-Go-Kart"
|
|
#
?
Mar 24, 2024 02:55
|
|
|
So do the Mi-Go have their own version of Mario Kart (mi-go kart?) in which Toad is the only character?
|
|
#
?
Mar 25, 2024 01:04
|
|
|
Elendil004 posted:Missed opportunity for the Mi-Go to drive modified car-boats called "Mi-Go-Fasts" sebmojo posted:Missed opportunity for the Mi-Go to drive modified buggies called "Mi-Go-Kart"  Goddamnit. The joke was right there. LashLightning posted:While some folks may dislike the un-PC-ness of the trope of 'hillbillies', describing two distinct types is impressive. Thanks! I'm assuming you are talking about the Innsmouthers faction. It didn't cross my mind that they would be seen as 'hillbillies', but I suppose throwing molotov cocktails, traveling with their family and the Ford reference makes the trope a logical fit. LashLightning posted:However I feel it's the Shaggai who view their vessels as more disposable than the Yithians. An Insect (From Shaggai) can plan a getaway so they don't get vapourised by sunlight should their victim get caught in a pile-up, where as the Yithian is stuck in the body without going through a fairly convoluted process to swap their mind back with the human in the far future/distant past. These are real good points. First off I forgot that Shan get deleted by sunlight. There should be distinct rules for different vehicle pilots. For example you could have a Mi-go driving or a Grey drone, and maybe you get bonuses to G-forces from turning maneuvers if you choose a Grey drone to drive. I was also thinking about different engines functioning with different mechanics. For example, with the Elder Things faction, I am toying with the idea that you have a maximum amount of fuel (electricity) but the Shoggoth Engine (TM) can only be made to accelerate or decelerate, depending on if the driver spends electricity to power their Shoggoth prods. In contrast, with the Ghoul faction, there could be a hunger meter for the ghouls in the vehicle and the (corpse eating) engine itself. You would have a finite amount of space for corpses in the back, and once one of the two hunger bars gets critical, the ghouls have to make a “pit stop” to refill on corpses from your local graveyard or something. If the driver ghouls’ hunger bar becomes critical, you could push them to continue, but take penalties on attacks (throwing skulls) or something like that. The more I think about this the more I think this exercise is just an excuse to buy Gaslands: Refuelled to see if I can make a Mythos hack of it's rules. https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/296690/Gaslands-Refuelled Also it helps that I've been listening to this anime music video on a loop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J635mqk769k To bring this back to Delta Green, I was thinking of a DeMonte clan faction with old cars (more mechanical say 70’s and previous) out of Louisiana with the benefit of a cult of ghoul mechanics.
|
|
#
?
Mar 25, 2024 23:42
|
|
|
Need some advice here. The next chapter in my adventure has the investigators on a boat with a couple days before they arrive at their destination. The point of this is for them to gather information by talking to other passengers, getting rumors, and occasionally getting off when the boat pulls in, to ask around at bars and local places in order to interview witnesses. The information they acquire from this will help them figure out how to find and defeat what it is they're looking for. Problem is that I'm worried that none of my players are going to get the idea to just "Look for a passenger and ask them about the rumors of what's been going on around here". How do I suggest to them that this is an action they should take?
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2024 15:29
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 29, 2024 16:14 |
|
|
DrSunshine posted:Need some advice here. The next chapter in my adventure has the investigators on a boat with a couple days before they arrive at their destination. The point of this is for them to gather information by talking to other passengers, getting rumors, and occasionally getting off when the boat pulls in, to ask around at bars and local places in order to interview witnesses. The information they acquire from this will help them figure out how to find and defeat what it is they're looking for. Problem is that I'm worried that none of my players are going to get the idea to just "Look for a passenger and ask them about the rumors of what's been going on around here". How do I suggest to them that this is an action they should take? Possible hooks would be (in order of gentleness), seeing a crewman or officer asking around regarding some lost valuables and seeing people treat these requests with garrulous pleasure, having an established NPC propose it, and just having it in your back pocket if they seem stumped or start trying to do geomancy over the general location they're going to based on ordnance survey maps instead of, like, doing something you had planned. It might also be useful to sort of pre-sketch Chatty Cathy, the Approachable NPC, whether they are found in the passenger lounge of the ship or in a dockside bar, so you can easily slip into that voice and possibly do a bit of amusing roleplay to engage whoever the party face or faces are. (As appropriate for your own style of course.)
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2024 15:42
|
|