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JDCorley posted:Well, I don't know. It does emphasize the "pulp" end of pulp horror. Lovecraft's stories, for all the RPG nonsense that has built up around them, did have a bunch of slightly ill thought out action, and d20 does that pretty well. And the GM directions/advice section is actually pretty amazing, well beyond what Call of Cthulhu did for many years. The way people responded to the D20 version was strange. For my group, it was our first non-D&D game besides D20 Modern. But .. everyone really got into it, and while our first game ended up pretty silly, we had some great sessions. All of the characters were really distinct and interesting, if sometimes a bit pulp-y. In a follow-up game set in the Victorian period, we even had a few moments that seemed to actually unsettle the players. No one really seemed to miss the D&D spells and powers after a couple games - they did get very creative at applying dynamite and bits of garbage wired together with springs, however. I'm not saying that the D20 version is perfect, but we had a good time with it overall. The art and formatting for the book was cool - very evocative compared to the standard two column text of most D20 D&D books. And the chapter on DMing in there is still one of my favorites and one of the best I read until Apocalypse World. I eventually ran another CoC-themed game in the World of Darkness system and was actually more pleased with how it worked in D20. Speaking of systems, would a Call of Cthulhu or Delta Green game work well with the Apocalypse World hack Monster of the Week? Or is MotW too much like Buffy?
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Sep 25, 2012 18:12
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Another possibility would be to look up some "dark folk" type music. There's not a lot of it, and it doesn't necessarily match authentic 1920's music, but some of it has that "old-timey" sound combined with fairly dark lyrics. An example band that I'm familiar with is "The Scarring Party" with songs such as "There's no more room (in hell)" and "Eat your young."
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Sep 16, 2013 17:12
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Yes. That is what I meant; I was thinking of things like this album labelled as "Dark Roots" music: http://www.amazon.com/Rodentia-Best-Dark-Roots-Music/dp/B001GUZGES/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&qid=1379362608&sr=8-12&keywords=scarring+party. I guess when discussing something related to Lovecraft, it pays to be explicit though.
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Sep 16, 2013 21:17
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You may be familiar with it, but there is an older anime called Demonbane that merely has the Necronomicron as a magical girl. There are also a few visual novels that work in Lovecraftian imagery or monsters, but most of these are a little too much anime and not enough Lovecraft for me. Other than those, I don't really know of anything. I think Uzumaki and some other Junji Ito works touch on Lovecraftian ideas like obsession and cosmic horror, but definitely not the established mythos.
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Dec 9, 2013 19:10
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Okay, so this has never happened before, but there's a card-based Cthulhu kickstarter going: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1649598142/cthulhus-vault Sarcasm aside, it's pretty reasonably priced and is already funded. They've promised to put up a draft of the rules and a play example before the kickstarter ends; personally, that's what I'm waiting for.
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Apr 25, 2014 17:54
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I think it's a solid spine. Not too complicated, a bit squicky with the cannibalism. Here are some of my thoughts: On the story: - When I think cannibalism and wendigos, I immediately think of Ithaqua. Are your wendigos created by cannibalism, as kind of Northern ghouls, or are they something different? - I think combining Dagon and cannibalism is an interesting twist, but why do these Deep Ones worship in this way? - Why does Chef Lyman do this? Is it for a thrill? Does he really believe that the apex of cooking requires serving up intelligent creatures? - Does eating human or wendigo do anything to the eater? - Regardless of how cannibalism affects the eater, I would definitely make one of the pregens a restaurant patron or food critic who's sampled some of Lyman's odder dishes. I think answering some of these will help with your middle act, as they will provide clues. If your game is in Seattle and you're playing in Seattle is seems like sprinkling in a few more scenes at recognizable landmarks would be fun, too. On the gameplay side: - When you say that the shooters are nigh-perfect criminals, what clues does that leave for your players? It is Gumshoe, after all, and if they're willing to spend Investigative points it seems like they should be able to find something that the police have missed. - Since you're using pregens, you can get around this, but the first time that I ran with ToC, all the characters ended up being from very different backgrounds and didn't really share clues with each other. You can write the characters into a common backstory and/or use something like Dungeon World's or Monster of the Week's bond system to make sure that they actually have some connections. - Are all the villagers in on the cult or only some of them? - What happens if they decide that the whole village is in on the plot and try to arrest them all? Or if they distrust the advice from the elders? The last couple might seem like I expect your players to try and sideline the mystery - I don't, but it can be helpful to brainstorm places where it gets away from your expectations. In terms of just running the game, I also recommend checking out the many useful documents on Pelgrane Press' website. But if you only use one, I'd use the investigator matrix - which gives you a quick reference of who has which skill, so you don't have to ask who it was that had Archaeology. I hope it goes well! You should write up a game report afterwards, I always like reading those. Sionak fucked around with this message at 19:36 on Jun 5, 2014 |
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Jun 5, 2014 19:34
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Everblight posted:As a side note, it's kinda lovely to just go "savage nobles! tribal magic!" and introduce Native Americans as cannibal madmen, from a 'problematic themes' standpoint. To that end, I've replaced the Native Americans and their tribe with Scandinavian fisherman a la Deadliest Catch, because that gives them the same (more?) access to 'strange meats,' and because this is a loving terrifying sight: Man, that picture is great and I think the change is probably a good call. It also works really well with the themes from Shadow over Innsmouth with desperate fishermen striking deals with undersea powers.
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Jun 5, 2014 20:13
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Niemat posted:Hey guys, does anyone know of a good "how to play" video resource for Trail of Cthulhu? My husband and I read through the rules over a period of time (between school and work and life), so we're looking for something that would help gel everything we've read and remind us of a few of the details we may have lost along the way. In addition, I'm much more of a see examples person, so I felt like it'd be helpful in general for me to watch anyway. I do not know of a video, but there are some documents on PelgranePress to give you simpler references. There's a 20ish page version with the various professions and a one page version with just the basic mechanics. http://www.pelgranepress.com/site/?tag=download&cat=10 They're under Forms and Handouts. There is also a link to an online character generator, the Black Book, which is nice for keeping track of the 2 for 1 spends from professions. I can't vouch for any of the links, but did find a thread full of what you were asking about : http://www.yog-sothoth.com/topic/22506-actual-play-links/ I ran ToC last fall and felt like I didn't present it terribly well. So I don't have a lot of surefire tips, but I can say that it took a little while for Investigative Abilities and Spends to click with my players. The stability/sanity distinction is another one that throws people at first, especially CoC vets. As an introduction to the rules, I tried having the players share control of one character during my "opener" sequence - the idea was that they controlled a doomed character and would get to see a little bit of investigation, combat, and the injury rules. (Genre-wise, it's also like your pre-theme song doomed character in the X-Files or whatever.) I think it was an okay idea, but having the players share control of the one character was bizarre and a bit too much like Everyone is John.
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Jun 26, 2014 23:19
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That guy sounds pretty unpleasant to play or even hang out with. I am really not a fan of suicide as the solution to an adventure, even for the end of a one-shot. For one, I think it's bad design - having only one solution to any problem is not great in adventures and it's very dis-empowering even for a horror genre. It feels like like the sacrifices that can make CoC really great and more like a "kill x investigators to proceed" type moment. For two, you really don't know your players' entire background and (again, even for a horror game) that could easily touch on some stuff that they don't want to deal with in a game context, whether it's their personal experiences or something with a friend or family member. As for these mega-campaigns like Beyond the Mountains of Madness or Shadows of Yog-Sothoth, I am curious how many people have played one or more. I never have - and I find it can be difficult to get a really good Lovecraftian or horror vibe going in a few sessions of an on-going campaign. Doing so for a year or more as part of a scripted campaign seems much more challenging to me. Are these adventures usually played in more of a pulpy vein? (Going off what Pththya-lyi said and my own experiences, I suspect that there a lot more Pulp CoC/ToC games being played than Purist ones anyways.)
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Jul 7, 2014 17:57
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Aerox posted:My group just finished a year-long Masks of Nyarlathotep campaign that was incredible -- while there was the occasional down/off/exploratory session, we typically had some sort of major threat to face every time we played, and the threat of the world ending was constantly looming over the entire campaign given the timetable until Nyarlathotep was summoned. At least one major cult leader (and often more) were in every location we visited, and they were doing all sorts of hosed up Lovecraftian things all over the world. It is a small internet - that thread was one of the things I was thinking about when I asked the question. I thought that was a super cool set-up; that sort of a secret PVP type thing has appealed to me for a long time, but I've never been able to pull it off. Did your character get killed off? How'd you feel when you found out that you'd been playing against not just one devious mind but several? Any favorite anecdotes?
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Jul 7, 2014 20:09
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HidaO-Win posted:So my current GM wants a break for a few months and I've been asked to run some Cthuhlu with a good amount of investigation. I hate to point you at another forum, but honestly, there's a lot more discussion about Gumshoe/ToC in particular on the Yog-Sothoth boards, including some fairly long threads on Eternal Lies. http://www.yog-sothoth.com/forum/30-trail-of-cthulhu/ Here on SA, both the Cthulhu and Gumshoe threads are relatively quiet. I haven't run Eternal Lies myself, but a point of refresh seems like a reasonable reward for a cool enough action. I mentioned my thoughts on Trail a little further up this page, but I would definitely read through the sections on combat and sanity/stability loss a couple times; those were what took me a little while to mull over.
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Jul 15, 2014 20:20
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I would be extremely interested in any material you can share, but would rather not get you in trouble either. My impression is that they've been working on this version for a long while - I know there's been at least two GenCon panels about it and there's another one scheduled for this year. I recall Stolze tweeting about doing some of the writing last year, too. He's also running a DG session at this year's GenCon, presumably with the new rules. My impression with the Tales from Failed Anatomies kickstarter was that it was delayed until it was actually ready - the kickstarter launched much later than they originally stated, but then the eBook was out within a couple months. That was a nice surprise and I'm hoping something similar will happen with the DG rules.
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Jul 15, 2014 21:26
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KomradeX posted:
I think it's really interesting how 1920s become the standard Call of Cthulhu era, since Lovecraft was writing things to be contemporary. I'm also really stoked about the new Delta Green, though information has been very thin on the ground about it. I'm planning to check out both the Delta Green panels at GenCon - though I think this is the third round of Delta Green update panels, I also know the alpha playtest rules are in the world. And it's pretty much a dream team of writers - the originals plus Kenneth Hite and Greg Stolze. (Though I'm not sure if John Tynes is doing much of the writing this time.)
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Aug 7, 2014 14:25
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moths posted:Did I miss a Kickstarter for it or are they going a more conventional development route? The only thing kickstarted so far was the fiction collection, Tales from Strange Anatomies. Last I heard, they were planning to go the kickstarter route for the new version of the RPG as well, but it hasn't happened yet. Edit: Thanks SageNytell, that is cool to hear. Sionak fucked around with this message at 16:41 on Aug 7, 2014 |
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Aug 7, 2014 16:36
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KomradeX posted:I've always wondered why the 20s were the "standard" setting, but a lot of people don't think you can pull off a modern one with all the technology today, which presents a problem but if it were insurmountable we'd have more period horror movies. And I dunt even think you have to do stuff like the cliché, there's no cell signal and all that. Right. There's some possibilities there - and you see it in fiction with things like The Ring where the horror is actually transmitted through technology. Kenneth Hite has a really good sidebar in the GURPS horror book that talks about that. While you certainly can have the technology just give out, you can use it to add to the horror, too. Cell phones can give weird static or play messages that haven't happened yet, or (of course) the villains can tap into them. The World of Darkness God-Machine Chronicle also has some neat ideas about technology becoming more threatening rather than comforting. Lovecraft really liked working in (at the time) contemporary science and technology - like how Dreams in the Witch House mentions quantum physics.
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Aug 13, 2014 01:48
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KomradeX posted:Those Chaosium stories sound terrible. I feel like alot of Cthulhuesque stories tend toward being along the lines of CoC fan fic than aping Lovecraft's style. I read those Arkham Horror novels from Fantasy Flight and while they're not great they're pretty entertaining for what they are. Campbell's deliberate Lovecrast pastiche is mostly collected in Cold Print and it's pretty good. I've heard his other stuff is worth checking out, too. I am sure some of the other posters in the thread went to GenCon but here is my report. I didn't make it to the Call of Cthulhu 7th ed panel or the Delta Green: Lovecraft to Tradecraft panel, but I did make the first Delta Green panel and was lucky enough to play in Greg Stolze's "Blacksat" Delta Green game. Delta Green Lots of background type stuff at this panel. They talked a bit more about the distinction between the "cowboys" (who are the more traditional Delta Green operatives) and the Program, which are the ones working for/with the more official group and the remnants of MJ-12. It sounded like one of the main themes for that is the relationship between freedom and resources. Cowboys can decide how to approach a problem completely on their own, but are very limited on funding and supplies. But if you're part of the program, you have a lot of resources - at the cost of having to work with and often obey unseemly or terrible people. They specifically mentioned the Laundry and how that's not their intention at all with the program stuff. There were also three recording devices including one from RPPR, apparently, so I assume a podcast version will go up eventually. As for the kickstarter? No exact date was given on it, but they were shooting for "soon." Specifically, Fall 2014. Shane Ivey said that they basically want to wrap up the stretch goal volume of stories for Tales from Strange Anatomies before launching the Delta Green kickstarter. They also said that by next year's GenCon we would have all read the new book. (Probably.) I couldn't decide if the "Stop trying to put Ghatanothoa in everything! You're not going to make Ghatanothoa happen!" was a Mean Girls reference, but I choose to believe that it was. Blacksat - There was no NDA on this but it was a really fun session and Greg Stolze made it sound like it would eventually be released, so I don't want to spoil it. I will say that the parts of the system we used were simple and fun and will feel very familiar to BRP fans. Stolze runs a great game, but that isn't surprising. Apparently he is working on a set of missions that will gradually introduce players to the different mechanics. So they'll start with skills and sanity, then the next mission (with different characters) will work in combat, and so on, until all the mechanics have been introduced. And, if you want, you could then take the survivors from those intro missions and make them into your "real" Delta Green team. Between those, I feel really stoked for the new game. It was also my first time really playing a horror game (as opposed to running) and that was great fun.
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Aug 18, 2014 17:26
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KomradeX posted:That sounds awesome, I hope the audio for that panel shows up somewhere. I think last year it took a month or two for the panel to show up online; the RPPR and Unspeakable! guys have a lot on their plates. (The DG panels for the last couple years are online already, if you haven't checked those out.) Someone else on RPG.net said the full game KS won't be until January, but I swear I heard fall '14 at the panel. Edit: I did, but they changed their minds later. I'm also really stoked for volume 2 - I was initially leery of the DG fiction collections (because of lukewarm RPG fiction collections and lukewarm Lovecraft-inspired stories in the past) but I loved both Tales from Strange Anatomies and Strange Authorities. I've really only held off on the other novels/collections because I suspect there might be bundles in the kickstarter. Bonus Stolze quote (as well as I can remember) from the first panel, that underscores the problem with trying to weaponize the Mythos: "These things cannot be understood by humans - and when you start to understand them, you're no longer human." Sionak fucked around with this message at 22:35 on Aug 29, 2014 |
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Aug 20, 2014 03:47
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For aesthetics, that French version of Terror on the Orient Express looks simply amazing. It is one of the best looking RPG products I've ever seen. Since I started with the d20 version of CoC (which has mostly great, full-color art), it was actually a bit off-putting to see the line art in Chaosium's corebook. It seemed much less evocative to me. I'm hoping that the Kickstarter for DG makes full-color an option for the art that Dennis Detwiller's been sharing for a while on his blog. I also really like listening to the RPPR adventures, then going back and reading the adventure to see what else could have happened (if it's published and not one of their originals). If it's an adventure that I'm thinking of running later, it's almost like getting to play through it myself. For the fiction collections, I've been really impressed so far. I wasn't that crazy about Alzis in the DG corebook (oh, another master manipulator NPC..) but his appearance in Strange Authorities sold me on the character. And Tales from Strange Anatomies deftly avoids the problem that a lot of gaming and Lovecraft fiction have, where way too many things are categorized and over-explained. Many of the chapters are just weird, in the best way.
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Aug 21, 2014 18:23
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I threw this out in the October chat, but it got lost in a flood of arguing about board games. So I'll ask here: what tips and tricks do you use to keep combat tense in horror games in general and in Cthulhu in particular? I have noticed in many games, both my own and actual plays, that a lot of the tension drains away when the players feel backed into a corner and have to fight. Once the combat rules are out, people can't help but switch into a more strategic mindset. I can think of some workarounds - leave escape routes open (but at a cost), keep combat short and unpredictable, and use combat very sparingly - but I'm curious to know what other people do or if they've noticed this trend.
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Oct 8, 2014 17:12
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Yoshimo posted:So, er, what's the state of 7th Edition? Is it out yet or what? It's out in pdf but not in print so far as I understand it.
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Mar 19, 2015 20:55
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Greg Stolze (who's written for Delta Green) suggests that they always get some information. If they make the roll, they get the information with enough context to apply it and maybe survive the threat. If they miss the roll, they have just enough information to get themselves into more trouble. Generally players get a bit perplexed (hopefully in a good way) when they miss the roll and yet you still tell them this seemingly useful thing.. Alternatively, you can make failed rolls cause problems in other ways. They get the information, but a librarian is a distant relative of Corbitt or a cultist or the like and starts following them. Both of the things Yoshimo mentioned are to be avoided even if you don't go full Gumshoe (always get the clues if they look the right way). Sionak fucked around with this message at 13:51 on Jun 23, 2015 |
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Jun 23, 2015 13:49
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If you want the more up to date stuff, you can check through ArcDream: http://arcdream.com/home/category/delta-green/ You can find the open beta rules there. One of the authors, Dennis Detwiller, has a Patreon where he's been releasing some content: https://www.patreon.com/posts/1766542 The most information is actually available through recorded GenCon panels at Unspeakable! http://theunspeakableoath.com/home/category/unspeakable/ But astute investigators will notice that they have Delta Green panels from back to ... GenCon 2011, I think? They're aiming to launch the kickstarter late summer but it's not a project that moves super fast. There have also been fiction collections more recently than the original run of RPG books if you are interested in the backstory side of things.
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Jun 26, 2015 01:00
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Hiro Protagonist posted:I'm thinking of getting a Lovecraftian RPG, but I can't decide between CoC 6th, 7th, and Trail of Cthulhu. What is better for beginner groups? Is 7th even playable? Is 6th better because of its lower price? And is Trail as good/ as some say? Because I like listening to RPPR play it. Trail is pretty fun, but the rulebook is a bit oddly organized in places. I am a big fan of incorporating some of the Trail/Gumshoe principles into most investigative games. 6th ed is out, there's a ton of stuff, I'm sure you could get used stuff for cheap. 7th ed is available in pdf (I think)? but not yet in print due to Chaosium's financial woes. Hopefully it's coming, but no one really knows when. That said, it has some pretty neat design choices like pushing luck and you can get the Quick Start for free - and there's youtube videos walking you through the basic mechanics. Trail doesn't have the elegance of the 1-100 roll-under skill system, which makes the learning curve a little steeper. It's still pretty easy overall, though. Some players don't really like the resource management aspect, but it's a pretty slick game overall. (I also like the RPPR games with it a lot. I think the "always get the clue" mechanic goes very well with the inevitable nature of a Lovecraftian universe.) I guess I can't better narrow it down for you without knowing what else you're looking for from the game.
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Jul 29, 2015 01:05
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Uroboros posted:Two questions: Mansions is pretty different from either Arkham or Betrayal. Betrayal is more lightweight and faster. Mansions is sort of... 1/3 Betrayal, 1/3 Arkham Horror, and 1/3 something else. Asking nerds for a consensus on anything is unlikely. But both of the main Cthulhu games (Trail of Cthulhu and Call of Cthulhu) offer quickstarts so you can try the rules for free. I understand that Dark Heresy uses a 1-100, roll under skill system - which is similar to Call of Cthulhu - so that would probably be easy to teach to DH veterans. clockworkjoe posted:My impression of Mansions of Madness was that the investigators were almost always screwed because of how few actions they get every turn, especially when you have 3 or more players. The more players you have, the more resources the keeper/forces of evil player has to throw against you. Arkham Horror is entirely co-op, not competitive, and even if you don't win, everyone usually gets to do a lot and have fun. Arkham is more complex, especially if you add in a bunch of expansion sets. Mansions of Madness is great if you like really high production values. The minis are neat (though unpainted, out of the box) and the tiles are very pretty. But you will often be doomed pretty early on, especially if the person playing the keeper is playing ruthlessly. The clues range from "opaque" to "go to this location to find the next clue." Arkham is pretty hard to learn the first time. It plays significantly faster if one or two people know how it works, but that first time is always slow. Certain old ones like Tsaggothua make the game more of a slog as well. Both are Fantasy Flight games, meaning that you will sometimes miss incredibly important rules text until it's too late. In Mansions of Madness, we did not know in a zombie-based scenario that you could burn corpses to keep them from getting up and menacing you until the last couple turns of the game. Oops. We don't play Mansions as often as Arkham Horror, because most of our group knows Arkham well, and because Mansions is rarely shorter, as mentioned. But we play Betrayal more often than either because it's easier to teach to new people, so your experience will vary. Hiro Protagonist posted:I guess my temptation with Trail was mainly that I felt, perhaps unjustifiablely , that, while it could only do precise investigation scenarios, it could do more "pulpy" fun, allowing groups to ease into the horror or use the rules for a more light hearted game. Also, I heard that the trail core does a good job of shaking up the Mythos deities, so even experienced players may be confused and won't instantly know it's Hastur. To be honest, you can control the Pulp/Purist levels pretty easily. The book offers suggestions with regards to skills and professions that fit either tone. It's also in how freely you give out refreshes. Lots of refreshers (and giving back points for crazy stunts or moments) will make it more pulpy, while rare refreshes will make for a more survival horror experience. Sionak fucked around with this message at 02:52 on Jul 29, 2015 |
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Jul 29, 2015 02:49
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I was talking about Trail. Call of Cthulhu doesn't have refreshes because you don't have point pools - you just want to roll under your skill. It's more random overall. In Trail, you have basically a pool/budget of skills that you can add to rolls to pass them. (in addition to the Investigative skills, where you always get the clue but can spend points to get something more useful or immediately relevant.) As an example: An investigator named Randolf Cartier has awakened a ghoul in a cemetary. He's trying to get away from the ghoul by climbing up a wrought iron fence, before the ghoul grabs him. In Call of Cthulhu, he would check his Climb skill. Supposing it's 50, the player rolls two d10s to get a result of 45. That's under his skill so Randolf scrambles up the fence. In Trail of Cthulhu, he has an Athletics pool with a rating of 8 and he hasn't spent any points, so he has 8 points available. Randolf's player really doesn't want to get caught by the ghoul, so he spends four points. He rolls a 1 on a d6. The die roll of 1 + 4 points = 5, enough to beat the threshold of 4 and climb up the cemetery fence. ToC always uses a d6 and the thresholds (or DCs if you're coming from a D&D background) range from 2 (easy) to very difficult (8). Often the player won't know the exact threshold number before rolling, which brings in the strategic element of when to spend points and when to save them. Refreshes refer to getting those points back, by doing in-genre things, resting, or solving a mystery. Trail sounds way more complicated but is pretty easy once you have the hang of it. Does that make sense now?
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Jul 29, 2015 04:33
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Call of Cthulhu is somewhat pulpy from the start but has less guidance on how to explicitly tune the tone to where you want it. But you can absolutely run a pulpy game in CoC. There's been a few supplements and articles on how to make investigators a little tougher and a bit more heroic, but I don't know them off the top of my head. I think that's part of the idea of the "pushing luck" mechanic from 7th edition as well. If you prefer podcasts, RPPR did an episode breaking down CoC after running many, many games with it: http://slangdesign.com/rppr/2012/01/podcast-episode/rppr-episode-69-critique-of-cthulhu/ There are also multiple CoC focused podcasts (Miskatonic University, Good Friends of Jackson Elias, Yog-Sothoth) but they tend to focus on very specific aspects of the system/lore rather than an overview or introduction. Sionak fucked around with this message at 16:20 on Jul 29, 2015 |
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Jul 29, 2015 15:50
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Hiro Protagonist posted:Thanks, I'd heard of Miskatonic University but not the others. Last question, I promise. Is 7th edition Call of Cthulhu playable with only the Keeper's book? Don't feel bad about having lots of questions! This thread is pretty slow otherwise and while CoC (and its descendants) are great games, they don't always communicate everything that a Keeper needs to know clearly. I am not super familiar with 7th edition, but I also know that people have run past editions of CoC with just the basic QuickStart info. If you don't mind fudging exactly how a machine gun is different from a pistol, mechanically, or feel comfortable with the overall structure of a mystery game, then I think the Keeper's book plus the free quickstart are probably sufficient.
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Aug 3, 2015 17:09
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It's totally feasible. Lovecraft RPGs are great! Running games for your friend to make them happy by making their character go crazy is also great! Here is the breakdown, as simple as I can make it: Call of Cthulhu is the original. It's pretty simple overall. It was first released back in the 80's and has been (mostly) re-released with minor improvements ever since. The kickstarter you refer to was for the 7th and most recent edition. It's behind schedule, but especially if you're just interested in running a game for some of your friends and not the finer points, you really don't need it. You can find rules for free here: 7th edition: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/128304/Call-of-Cthulhu-7th-Edition-QuickStart-Rules Older: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/101292/Call-of-Cthulhu-QuickStart-Rules Those are all you absolutely need to run a game - but the game assumes you have a pretty good understanding of how to set a mood and how to make sure that the story keeps moving even if people miss some rolls. Those are important elements and it's easy to lose track of them when running a game for the first time. The system itself is fast to explain. There is an online character creator called Byakkhe (http://www.jcfiala.net/content/byakhee-coc-character-generator) that you can use to either build characters or randomly generate them. Just roll under your score for a skill (1-100) to succeed at a task. That's the most basic level. (There are more complex rules, of course, but that's the foundation.) You can find the 6th Edition books at most game stores or online. The 7th edition doesn't have printed books yet. The books add lots of monsters, background stuff, weapons charts, and that sort of thing - but you don't actually need them if you are content to run The Haunting (included with the link above) or have your own idea for a story. I like Trail of Cthulhu a lot and it was written to address some of the problems with Call of Cthulhu that come up in play or for new players. The system is different and takes a little longer to explain. I'll be happy to explain it if you'd like, but it uses a combination of rolling a d6 and spending points from a pool to do actiony things. For clues, you always get the essential clues but can spend points to get more information or get a little bit more context with it. Example rules and adventures for Trail are available here: http://pelgranepress.com/index.php/free-downloads-and-resources-for-trail-of-cthulhu/ I am not familiar with tremulus. Like many Apocalypse World inspired systems, it seems quick to pick up and play but I don't know how well it would work to get the mood across. quote:Can anyone recommend a system for me, as if I was a dumb baby? Like - do you buy the system and a separate book that outlines the story, or is it all-in-one? What do I even need to play spooky lovecraft pretend with lots of beer and dice? If possible, I'd prefer something that's story and "solve the horrible mystery" driven to something that's about rolling dice to shoot mega guns at tentacle monsters, or whatever - I'm pretty good at impromptu storytelling and saying words good, and that aspect of this kind of game sounds more fun to me than trying to outroll strength stats or whatever. Generally there's a base system book (Call of Cthulhu, Trail of Cthulhu, whatever) that has at least one adventure included. Then there are more books with more adventures or whole campaigns. A lot of the responsibility for the "story and solve the mystery" vs. "action hour vs. shoggoths" is on you as gamemaster and how you present things. This is one of the hardest things when first running this sort of game, but it gets easier with good adventures and with practice. Also, you can find a whole lot of example games at Role Playing Public Radio, a podcast that does a lot of actual play games using both Call and Trail of Cthulhu. The average game is about 3-6 hours, but there are also campaigns. http://actualplay.roleplayingpublicradio.com/category/systems/call-of-cthulhu/ http://actualplay.roleplayingpublicradio.com/category/systems/gumshoe/trail-of-cthulhu/ That's a lot of stuff, so let me know what bits didn't make sense and I'll try to answer your questions.
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Aug 20, 2015 04:01
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drrockso20 posted:So how weird is it that my personal favorite rendition of the Mythos outside of the stuff Lovecraft himself wrote, is CthulhuTech's version, cause while I'm fully aware of it having a terrible broken system and having a lot of problematic aspects in the setting especially outside of the Core book and Vade Mecum, it also just feels like the version of the Mythos most suitable for an actual RPG since in theory it gives a lot more player agency than the standard versions of the Mythos do(CthulhuTech kinda fails at this in reality cause it's adventures are terribly written railroads though) since you can actually fight back to a reasonable degree(I'll admit the nihilistic Cosmic Horror aspects of the Mythos have always fallen rather flat to me, much prefer the Personal Horror stuff like in Rats In The Walls or The Picture In The House for example) I mean, if that's how you want to play, that's great. It's not very cosmic at all and it sounds quite a bit more pulpy. But lots of people run and enjoy very pulpy games. It wouldn't appeal to me a whole lot, because I think it's throwing out the strongest flavor, but there's also a range of possibilities. Delta Green, for instance, lets characters fight back using modern weapons (and in the upcoming version, possibly government support) but then underscores the horror by making that not matter in the long run. LatwPIAT posted:Horror and people who don't take things very seriously because they are drunk is not a good mix. This is a thing that can happen regardless with the first horror game you run. My first CoC game was basically straight up Army of Darkness style stuff - it was in high school, but still not especially horrifying. Everyone had fun though. People have to buy into horror a little bit for it to really work. If they're in a really jokey, there-to-drink mood at the start it's going to be an uphill battle. moths posted:I'd probably just go with Cthulhu Dark in your situation. Or even Munchkin Cthulhu? Cthulhu Dark is pretty neat but I wouldn't recommend Cthulhu Munchkin to anyone, let alone someone who wants to actually tell a story.
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Aug 20, 2015 13:57
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On the Delta Green RPG: the books unlocked in the kickstarter (Impossible Landscapes, Control Group, and so on) will be available for purchase afterwards, right? I'm definitely in for the Case Officer's Guide and probably one of the additional hardbacks, but pledging for all of them now would be a bit too much.
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Oct 20, 2015 02:32
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Helpful to know. Thanks! I really hope kicktraq is somewhere near accurate on this one. I played BlackSat at GenCon and it was a lot of fun. I would really love to see the rest of the Control Group Scenarios. Stolze described them as being a gradual way to introduce players to all the mechanics - so BlackSat is skills, a different one is combat, another scenario leans more heavily on bonds, and so on. And any characters that survive the early missions can be part of the "real" team afterwards for an ongoing campaign. He also mentioned getting a 150% mortality rate on one of them during the playtest.
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Oct 20, 2015 16:59
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That might be a bit obvious for mythos vets (especially if they've read sections of the rulebooks on Ithaqua). The "frozen through, dropped from a great height" is a wonderful detail from the August Derleth stories, though. Personally, I've always been a bit disappointed that the wendigo myth is rarely, if ever, identified with ghouls. Ghouls hit the cannibalism notes - and the idea of potentially becoming one - but may not be as immediate a connection to old hands at CoC. Alternatively, one of the cultists could be a ghoul, blessed by Ithaqua after spending enough time in the wilderness. Why are the anti-climate change activists pawns of Ithaqua? What are they doing, how many of them are in on it, etc? Kenneth Hite also did a write-up on Wendigo recently that has some very cool ideas and special effects. http://pelgranepress.com/index.php/tag/ken-writes-about-stuff/ clockworkjoe posted:If they don't listen to RPPR Actual Play, rip off Caleb's God's Teeth adventures. I think Dennis Detwiller did a game with a diseased, violent orangutan as another example of this. God's Teeth is certainly creepy, oppressive fare - even from the first episode which is all I've finished so far.
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Oct 27, 2015 18:55
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The dreamlands also have weird pockets of forgotten gods and their own civilizations. It's not just dreams, the whole place works according to an odd system of belief and changing rules. I don't know the older CoC sourcebooks on them. I think there was one - Nocturne or something like that? for the D20 version. There's also "Sense of the Sleight of Hand Man" which is a campaign book by Dennis Detwiller. It's a pretty large book and I haven't looked at it much. RPPR did a seven episode campaign of it that you can check for ideas and an example play-through. Trail of Cthulhu also has the very cool "Dreamhounds of Paris" wherein the French Surrealists discover the Dreamlands. Just as they try to change society and mankind's perceptions in art, they try to do the same in the Dreamlands. Even better, the surrealists discover that they can influence the Dreamlands to a degree. Surely that will all end well. The suggested campaign is for the players to take the roles of actual surrealists, because their lives are way weirder than most PCs.
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Oct 29, 2015 21:57
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Gosts posted:Did a quick one-off last sunday. It was fun and so I thought I'd post about it. Story time. Sounds really fun and I quite like the monster. The murder mystery set up is a good one, though in general it's difficult to run a scary game with that many players. I am really curious why the two murderous players decided a) the butler was a shoggoth and b) shoggoths can't sing?? The thing with the clues being too difficult is really common, both in homemade and published scenarios. It's part of the reason that Trail of Cthulhu makes it easier to find clues, but still leaves it up to players to apply/interpret them. Even in CoC, it works well to let them find something on failed rolls - but maybe it's incomplete or doesn't have the full context.
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Mar 2, 2016 20:24
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(Some of the players are goons. If you're reading this, no. I'm not gonna post about anything that hasn't happened yet. So go ahead and read it if you want to know what i really think about you.)
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Fuligin posted:Wives of March looks interesting, although I'm leery about putting this group up against any weird sex poo poo- gotta ease them in first. The rest of the free adventures by Stokes look cool, although it would be nice if they were statted for CoC. I love the premise for Lover in the Ice, but again, weird sex poo poo. Both "Red Tower" and "Fall without End" don't have any sex-related content if that's a problem. Bryson Springs has a little relating to an NPC but you could adjust/cut that. If you poke around the RPPR forums (http://slangdesign.com/forums/index.php), you can find most of the monsters from No Security statted up for CoC. Red Tower can be tricky to run since it's likely that at least some of the PCs will have clashing goals and the mystery is fairly involved. Fall without End, though I haven't run it, is very clear in terms of what the objective and (later) the problem are and might be better for newer players. Covok posted:I mean more like "still giant, unfeeling/malevolent gods in a universe that doesn't care about humans" but not the same old, boring elder gods. Go for it. Even Delta Green has moved a bit away from easily recognizable mythos threats over time. While there's still colonies of deep ones statted up, there's also pernicious number sequences (The Last Equation). Or stuff that's still weird no matter how much Lovecraft you've read. One of the original run of Delta Green books (Countdown) pretty much reinvented Hastur (as an embodiment/manifestation of entropy) after feeling that its portrayal in classic CoC was lacking. Covok posted:Well, I did have an idea for elder gods based on pigs instead of seafood. No physical form and drive people insane as they feast upon people's minds like gluttons. Like, this is a lot of fun. In particular the parallels between asylums and the conditions of factory farms would be horrific. You could tie it to the mythos god Tsathoggua or to Shub-Niggurath, but if you are more interested in making it your own, go for it. Generally for a game you'd want to give the characters some chance to figure out what's going on and (unlikely but possibly) avert their fate. Why are they the ones suffering from this? Cursed, did something wrong, just bad luck? Are the elder gods really pigs or is that the closest reference point humans have? Conversely, you certainly can run a game where the point is to realize you are doomed, then die horribly (for example: http://site.pelgranepress.com/index.php/the-final-revelation/) - but even among Cthulhu players, not everyone is going to enjoy that flavor. Anyways, if you end up running it, Delta Green just put out rules for free. They work quite well for sanity blasting stories and are pretty quick to teach.
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Mar 9, 2016 05:33
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They will, but the original timeline was wildly optimistic. I have backed other ArcDream kickstarters, and while they have always been late, they have delivered and the product has been worth it.
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Mar 24, 2016 13:20
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Yeah. that's the other thing. The 50 page QuickStart book is really nice. If you got the "Everything" or "Everything digital" tiers, you have quite a few pdfs already to read through while we wait for the Agent's Handbook. Most are short stories or articles, but they're still really cool and I have enjoyed each one. The Detwiller and Glancy short stories in particular were great. I can't wait to use the King in Yellow play and the official DG response to it in an upcoming game. There's also three adventures (Kali Ghati, Last Things Last, and Lover in the Ice). And something like 12-15 pregens that are ready to go. It took years of prep (discussions, writing, playtests) before they launched the DG kickstarter. While the Delta Green publishing schedule has never been rapid-fire, the people involved are seriously dedicated to it. Sionak fucked around with this message at 22:28 on Mar 24, 2016 |
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Mar 24, 2016 21:32
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neaden posted:Has anyone had a chance to run DG with the Agent's Handbook yet and give an impression? I refrained from backing and wanted to wait for reviews since I already have quite a few cthulhu-based rpgs. Is the system good enough to be worth purchasing over just running the fluff with something else? I think so. I have run Last Things Last from the Need to Know quickstart twice now. I did both as one-shots, so I didn't really get to see how the rules for bonds (and their inevitable crumbling) work in play. Hopefully I will get to try that soon with a short campaign. However, I was impressed by how smoothly it plays. The system is tuned to be pretty lethal and unforgiving without (in my opinion) feeling bullshit unfair. At least, for a Cthulhu game. The authors clearly thought hard before adding anything to the BRP base for the game, so the additional rules either make things play a little more easily (matched dice for criticals, Lethality) or reinforce the intended mood (also Lethality, becoming Adapted to violence or helplessness). You don't have to take my word for it, though. You can just grab Need to Know for free and try out Last Things Last yourself: http://www.delta-green.com/2016/02/download-delta-green-need-to-know/ Or listen to the RPPR campaign, which shows off Bonds very nicely: http://actualplay.roleplayingpublicradio.com/tag/gods-teeth/
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May 3, 2016 01:44
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gradenko_2000 posted:God's Teeth is some of the most atmospheric Call of Cthulhu you'll ever get to listen to. It's a slow burn that builds to a deafening crescendo of tension by the time you get to God's Eye. Though, for Pope Guilty, it is still a recorded game rather than a radio show, so yes, there are players making jokes or pop culture references on occasion. The game as a whole is still very bleak and atmospheric and extremely Delta Green in tone. gradenko_2000 posted:Question for people who've run CoC: what's the pulpiest you've ever run a game? Having listened to the whole of RPPR's Masks of Nyalathotep campaign, a lot of the time they were able to outright defeat the Mythos, even if they did lose a few characters. I think this is a "know/ask your players" type thing. Both extremes are really fun as long as everyone is on board. So I'd say - go ahead and ask. How pulpy of a game do they want? What do they consider pulpy - lasting victories or full fledged Indiana Jones with weird monsters? I think a lot of players would be comfortable with the assumption that they can defeat ghouls or deep ones if they're smart. That's without going full Arkham Horror where a gravedigger beats a shoggoth to death, though. The pulpiest game I ever ran was one where I (inexplicably in retrospect) decided to use World of Darkness rules. It was the only Cthulhu based campaign I'd done where there were no PC fatalities because nWoD characters are pretty sturdy. I don't recommend doing that; I didn't consider it an especially successful experiment. My advice even for running pulpy CoC would be to keep combats short and dangerous; CoC type games are more about the frenzy than breaking out miniatures and taking a lot of rounds.
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May 3, 2016 23:04
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My understanding is that Eternal Lies is Trail of Cthulhu's version of Masks of Nyarlathotep. It's meant to be playable in different orders, but I have also heard that it makes the most narrative sense if you do it in a certain way. There's been a lot of discussion about it, including some fairly involved retoolings to different aspects like this: http://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/37078/roleplaying-games/eternal-lies-the-alexandrian-remix It is very much the big, sprawling globe hopping campaign. Armitage Files is a series of handouts that lead to many avenues of investigation, as gradenko_2000 said. Where Eternal Lies has the story pretty well set out and players are discovering details, Armitage Files gives you a ton of evocative details and handouts but doesn't define exactly what is causing the weirdness. I feel like Armitage Files would be a lot easier to wrap up in a short time-frame than Eternal Lies. Both are pretty interesting, but they are definitely pretty different approaches. I enjoyed all of the Ken Writes About Stuff columns, including the Mythos monster ones. They tend to include a short description of the monster, ways to change up their abilities, and a set of flavorful clues they could leave. They also generally include ways to tweak the monster to make it more strange or less recognizable, along with a few story seeds focused on the monster and a mention of any stories where it appears.
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Nov 5, 2016 15:53
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