Cthulhu Megathread: It's pronounced "Khlul'-hloo" (Lose 1D10/1D100 Sanity)

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Cthulhu Megathread: It's pronounced "Khlul'-hloo" (Lose 1D10/1D100 Sanity)

Guildencrantz: May 1, 2012; IM ONE OF THE GOOD ONES

I'm interested in using one of these systems to run a non-Cthulhu horror game that shares some themes with the mythos. The premise is that the PC's are an X-files-esque task force in 1970's Poland, tasked with combating and concealing the supernatural, while navigating the bumbling communist bureaucracy and dealing with the issue of working for a thoroughly reprehensible institution that's mostly a tool of oppression. Cue horrific world-shattering discoveries and so on.

Trails of Cthulhu seems extremely promising, but can someone tell me how well it adapts to other settings before I buy it? The group is entirely bilingual and we play with English-language books all the time, so that's not an issue.

# ¿ Sep 5, 2012 00:20

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# ¿ May 16, 2024 18:01

Guildencrantz: May 1, 2012; IM ONE OF THE GOOD ONES

homullus posted:

I think any of the GUMSHOE games would work well, but which you use is dependent on the PCs.

Trail of Cthulu PCs are 1930s investigators.
Esoterrorists PCs are a modern X-files-type task force (but note they are working on Esoterrorists 2.0 and wanted to have it done by the end of this year).
Night's Black Agents PCs are working against conspiracies infiltrated by vampires
Fear Itself PCs are more "normal people" who may not actually survive long.

I don't own Esoterrorists, but to me either that or Trail of Cthulu (which I do own) sounds great. The former is too modern and would need to be scaled back to 1970s, the latter too long ago and would need updating. Trail of Cthulu has FAR more material available, though, and at least one adventure is set in the 1950s.

Thanks a ton! I'll probably go with Trail, then. I think it'll be MUCH easier to update to a different part of the industrial age than scale back from the information age, since that changed investigation tools so radically (computers, cell phones etc). This way I'll just have to fiddle with the professions and equipment, and the players will probably like it better if I replace/add stuff to the book rather than cut stuff out of the book, which would feel like they're being hamstrung. Plus, I really need a good insanity system, since I really want to explore that idea here.

# ¿ Sep 5, 2012 18:35

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Cthulhu Megathread: It's pronounced "Khlul'-hloo" (Lose 1D10/1D100 Sanity)