/tg/ - Traditional Games

http://archive.foolz.us/tg/thread/27279504/

>>27791915
Those would make great handouts when the players discover scraps of an ancient text.

>>27792017
It's a Necronomicon. So... yeah!

Also: >>27791298

I can dump my standard CoC advice. If you want me to. But you might have seen it already.

>>27791576
>They're just going to be standard agents, but if they survive through a couple adventures, they'll get recruited by Delta Green.

Although it's tempting, you still shouldn't spend too much time getting attached to the characters in Delta Green, just like CoC.

You need to be careful not to set yourself up for disastrous character deaths after spending so much time on their development, and having to saddle players with replacement characters who don't have the same kind of detail or commitment.

I find that a WoD-style prologue exploring some key events in a new character's history (such as their first contact with the mythos, their recruitment, and so on) is the best of both worlds. Definitely wouldn't spend multiple sessions bringing characters into Delta Green. At most, I would spend just a session covering backgrounds and bringing ALL the characters into their present circumstances, ready for a first adventure. But you can normally do that in less than an entire session, and still have time for investigation.

I'm also guilty of running player-focussed Delta Green, but I did that by lowering the lethality considerably.

>>27792091
...or you just play Laundry and issue sufficient plot armor with Toshers, Plumbers, Cleaners, Baggers, MAGINOT BLUE STARS, and OCCULUS at the ready.

>>27792091
>>27792125
Well, both me and my players hate plot armor and love the lethality of CoC. Again, the first two adventures will be pretty low on the lethality scale, and they have no problems rerolling new characters. I really don't want it to be so easy to just start in Delta Green, otherwise it doesn't feel as special.

>>27792165
Have you read into Dark ORE? It's really worth a look, especially if you're planning to run DG. The DG team (parts of it) is also writing Nemesis. And it's free.

>>27792186
Never looked into it, but my group is pretty entrenched in CoC. There would have to be some really big advantages to switch to something new.

>>27792066
That's some ballin creepy music.

>>27792214
Just look at it. It's some really excellent crunch. It can give you ideas to use in BRP if you want.

I once made a dream episode where we used DRYH instead of BRP for a session. Awesome!

>>27792245
I'll take a look at it then. BRP works pretty well, but its far from perfect. I do like making modifications to it.

>>27792125
>MAGINOT BLUE STARS
There is just no way you have clearance to even know about that. Turn yourself in to the nearest surveillance camera immediately!

>>27792088
Not OP, but I wouldn't mind that.

>>27792455
1) No name dropping. Keep it vague. You don't start with the identification of a Mythos Horror, your players never see it and the cultists call it by some other name.

2) Setting is central. Much of CoC is about well portrayed locations and their cultural, historic, or scientific relevance. It lavishes in these backdrops and contrasts their radiance with the abyss of infinity and madness. This reduces humanity as a whole to a fluke, and all its glory to inconsequential happenstance in the face of older powers.

3) Limit the scope. It's always normality - little weird - imminent end of the world - TPK. If you allow steps in between you get Pulp not Horror. Characters will get savvy and the Mythos will creep into their arsenal. PC parties tend to act aloof and purely utilitarian. Don't allow it. Involve them in the story and focus on individual struggle with reason and emotion. Combat creates problems, it doesn't solve them. Even a victory always comes with a serious drawback because of escalation.

4) Prep scenes not battles. In D&D an NPC name and some combat stats is enough to start playing. In CoC you usually deal with a conspiracy or secret ritual of some kind, this needs foreshadowing. Never portray NPCs as 'the bad guys', always maintain some ambivalence and doubt. Trust is more important than damage per round. So create relationship maps to outline which NPC talks to which other NPC and how. Play up innuendo and shifty looks. Position your NPCs instead of burning them off in combat. Combat in general should be a last resort, and never a way for the PCs to dominate. But getting the chief of police to believe what your characters have witnessed and act upon it without going insane, that's a real battle in CoC terms.

>>27792490
One shots only. No fluff holds up to epic heroes and remains Horror. Tease with fluffy details, use era as plot device, but don't explain everything.

Art is important. For Horror I find animated gifs effective. Soundtrack is good. Adjust volume with annoyance but beyond Aphex Twin and Brian Eno there is Nasa's Symphony of the Planets and Conet Project numbers stations.

Describe sensory impressions, never foregone conclusions. Keep it simple. Decide if you want conspiracy, creature, or body Horror. Rely on suspense rather than effects. Roleplaying is not a visual medium.

Classic tropes include time loops, who's the cylon and does he know?, no - YOU are the demons!, last of its kind, first contact, soylent green is people, and the evergreen zombie rush.

Work with your players. No 2 groups play the same game the same way. Be flexible and contrive a maximization of enjoyment for all.

>>27792499
In a Horror game your biggest issue is always pacing. All given suggestions only work if the timing is right. The pressure you put on the players in their understanding of the world creates the framework upon which the entire plot depends.

To utilize that you need 2 things: An ability to read your players' immersion and excitement, and plot devices to regulate tension.

The first takes experience and empathy. Look for general conversational clues like displacement behavior (tapping, chewing, drinking, scratching) and listen to their tone of voice. Take a baseline at the beginning of the session and then slide it up incrementally. Don't overdo it at first, you want increasing waves of tension. The valleys are as important as the peaks, without relief and contrast you just get action.

The second is all in the prep work. Give yourself room to react and divide it up into natural seeming steps. Don't give away too much too soon, it will not increase tension at all. Instead foreshadow and provide clues, take away options over time, and make the general situation ever more dire in increments that can be felt by the players. This is where table lighting and soundtrack can be your best friends.

This is why Horror films with broken continuity still work. Logic subsides to immediacy. Human perception is a heuristics machine, whatever is most pressing in implication dominates, and causality be damned! So don't get held up by details. All that matters is to keep the players on their toes and the suspension of disbelief generally maintained.

>>27792513
Isolate the group. All CoC adventures do this.

The most obvious way is to cut them off geographically. They're on a polar research station and the next supply ship isn't due until next week. They're in a remote estate and don't know the surrounding treacherous woodlands. They're on a ship at sea, on a moving train, or on a sailing airship. This does of course not work everywhere. You can't be isolated geographically in London, Paris, Berlin, or Budapest.

So you use social isolation. Simply by what they've seen they're bound together because they know, and nobody else believes. Explain and they laugh at your joke, insist and they start worrying about your sanity, act out and they take you to a doctor, keep insisting and the looney bin awaits.

Make the individual characters matter. Maybe one is an Egyptologist, and the adventure has a hieroglyph tablet that needs decoding. Maybe one was in Europe during the Great War and witnessed a gypsy ritual that becomes relevant to the plot. The trick is not to have a sudden need for a certain character that then passes, but to foreshadow and maintain that need throughout.

And finally the characters can run away. But in doing so they inevitably doom the world including themselves to be overcome by whatever horror they failed to stop when it could still be stopped.

>>27792533
>ere the waning and fantastically gibbous moon had risen far above the eastern plain, I was awake in a cold perspiration, determined to sleep no more

Lovecraft intentionally used unsettling or unfamiliar language in his descriptions to influence the reader's state of mind.

This does not translate directly into narration. But language can create subtle dissonances that lead to subconscious expectation. If used wrong this can be hilarious, but if used correctly it can give your players perceptions and experiences they didn't anticipate, and they usually appreciate that.

>>27792546
Lovecraft: The universe is older, bigger, and weirder than anyone could ever imagine. Mankind is insignificant. There is no good or evil, or any other ordering structure man can grasp except might. And people who glimpse a shadow of these old powers are like a snowflake in a furnace.

Derleth: Man and his morale can prevail. There are bad things lurking in every dark crevice as there always have been. But humans carry a spark in them that can at times overcome the deepest darkness and shine into every corner with compassion and safety in numbers. Or it can fail and be infested by the evil it was charged to dispel.

Poe: At night the most mundane circumstances can construct demons in our minds, and those demons kill. This creates an overlap, an ambiguity, and anyone caught in this paradox will either fashion his own demise out of fear and mistrust, or explain away the perceived threat only to then be overcome by it.

Shelley: There is infinite beauty and truth to be found in the most unlikely and revolting places. But unable to overcome fear and revulsion man cannot grasp that and becomes the monster in his efforts to protect against them.

Eco: Every mind constructs the world from individual experience, and although seemingly coherent at the surface, expectations and context differ wildly from individual to individual. In this chasm madness is born and carried into the world as lies, cruelty, and murder. Over generations this becomes an ordering principle to the pitiful demise of the innocent, the inspired, and the honest.

That's some damn good advice mang, thanks.

I've been planning on running a game of Cthulu Dark with my friends since only one of them has had much experience with TTRPGs, but they're all totally up for it.

Is there any chance anyone would be able to help me plan out a one shot for them? I've had some ideas, but I'm not totally sure what I'm doing myself..

>>27792729
Man, why don't you do the haunting? I mean I know you're not doing CoC, but The Haunting is a classic horror one shot.

>>27792749
Do you ever get those moments where you feel blindsided by something obvious?

I thought about doing that, but for whatever reason I forgot (I guess it's since I got wrapped up in my own ideas). That would certainly give me a better idea as to what they enjoy, which obvs is going to help if we try again.

Beyond Lovecraft's work itself, what other sources have you guys used for inspiration?

>>27792940
Cronenberg!
Kubrik.
Graphic novels.

My current Laundry campaign is under attack by Miyazaki's Sea of Corruption from another dimension.

>>27793008
There's something wrong with those japs
It makes pretty good CoC ideas.

>>27793008
>Laundry campaign

What is a Laundry campaign?

>>27793068
Domu, man.

>>27793107
A BRP variant after Charles Stross.

>>27793107
From what I've gathered, its a pulpier and more modern Delta Green. You're part of a sanctioned government agency that deals with everything Mythos, and you can cast spells over your smart phone.

>>27793948
Magic = Math = Computers, sometimes.

There's a government agency dealing with the supernatural, old gods, the advanced species inhabiting our planet, occasional gorgonism, cultists, and a truckload of paperwork.

It balances all the occult dread with the very real threat of audits and budget cuts. That puts some irony in the dreary and provides comic relief, as well as character survivability. Therapy repairs SAN. And HR's psych guys from Health & Safety are not the kind of people you joke around with.

The books are brilliant, but with the game you can pretty much do your own thing. Agents on missions investigating the supernatural with the directive to contain it is the basic framework. But you can also do internal agency adventures, extraplanar excursions, international spy games, super villains, weird science, satanists, zombies (Formerly Human Resources), time travel, you name it.

There is an underlying myth arc with the imminent apocalypse, but you can mostly just ignore that, force a smile on your lips, and have a cup of Twinings.

>>27792940
I've toyed with the idea of a STALKER themed CoC campaign.

>>27795207
I feel like that could be really hard to pull off, but really rewarding if you did.

The quote that best encapsulated, for me, the concept of Delta Green and the Lovecraft mythos generally, was in Delta Green - Targets of Opportunity.

"Seen from the limited perspective of our four-dimensional lives, the Apocalypse isn’t an event to anticipate or avoid; it’s simply how we best come to terms with the fragility of our existence. We’re an eyeblink in the span of a universe, a universe that’s only a momentary spasm of energies. Every scientific advance drives home the transience of our existence. Decay spreads over the tottering cities of men.

When will the world end? It’s ending now. It’s been ending all along."

On the subject, has anyone heard updates on the standalone Delta Green? I'm waiting for that SO HARD.

>>27797258
Apparently, they're going to do it once they finish up the next batch of novels.

>>27795359
It doesn't sound too hard, there's lots of action oriented scenarios in DG that still come off creepy. Anomalies are definitely a cool addition.

>>27795359
>really hard to pull off
Not really. Just head into BRP, there's plenty of weird sci-fi splats for it in the BRP Monograph line.

>>27798054

Ooh, more novels? Nice - they've all been pretty great so far, and they'll obviously be used to help bridge the editions like they've previously been used to help update it.

>>27801799
Check out KS, it's full of proposals for DG novels.

>>27800258
>>27800281
I was thinking about how in Stalker, a lot of the things going on are known and somewhat understood (of course the level of understanding differs between the games and the book). Whereas the Cthulhu mythos usually features people having no idea.

>>27793068
Oh god I was going to sleep tonight but noooo

>>27793068
Oh god that fucking shit
Not that
Welp, there goes any chance I had of not having nightmares. Fuck you and you mother, anon.

>>27804844
>>27804764
It's a nice manga, but there's so much more fucked up ones. What's with the nerves today?

>>27792940
Pathologic. The less said the better. It's something that has to be experienced.

>>27792940
The Doors of Perception

I SOO want to play DG, I'd even GM it, but I'm not subtle enough for either side of the screen.

>>27805058
I'm sure if you practiced it a couple times, you'd get the hang of it. Some of my players aren't the smoothest operators, but I might teach them to be less Rambo after a couple deaths.

Is there any hope for Cthulhutech? It seemed like such a cool premise until you actual read it find out its just fetish insertion: the system and lots of Mech fights.

>>27810269
You want Chthonian Stars

>>27810269
> No Shoggoths
Whoever made Cthulhutech is worse than hitler.

Currently running a DG/Laundry hybrid myself.
I'll be running my group through a modified version of the God-Machine from http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/18324998/ in a few days.

I also did a bit of the DG recruitment process. Just one session as regular agents before being introduced into the mythos. Honestly I think it's better than having them be members of DG from the start.

Oh, and a couple of links:

http://www.palinola.com/projects/lab/greenbox/
The green box generator is pretty sweet. I think I've been through it enough that I've seen all the items, though.

http://fairfieldproject.wikidot.com/
Wondering what a green box is? The Fairfield project has that covered and more. A whole lot more.

While we're at it

http://www.miskatonic-university.org/

http://paranormaldatabase.com/

http://www.esotericarchives.com/

http://thefearmythos.wikia.com/wiki/The_Fear_Mythos_Wiki

http://www.creepypasta.com/dear-abby/

http://www.thewatcherfiles.com/dulce/chapter1.htm

>>27810818
Is the stuff on Fairfield Project regulated decently?

>>27813896
Not sure about that. All I know is that a lot of the stuff is taken from the Delta Green mailing list. What I've read seems good.

>>27813941
I love that pic. Are there more like it?
The only other thing I've seen is with mythos monsters in the Iraq war with CNN layover.

>>27813993
Sorry, that's all I've got in that vein.
And you mean like this?

>>27814054
Yup. I think there's 2 more.

>>27814079
I have this other one, not sure if I've seen the 3rd.

>>27804538

Only having played the games, I'd say such things are "known" in the sense that it's common knowledge that if you step into a springboard anomaly you'll end up dead most of the time, and badly bruised at best.

These are repeatable phenomenon. Doesn't mean we understand them though. And god help you if you come across something new.

>>27791576

All advice in this thread is good, but some more:

* In my experience, the most important thing in a CoC scenario is pacing. Start (relatively) normal and bring the weird stuff in small chunks, or bring in a hunk of weird at the beginning and let the players take time to unravel it. Be slowly but constantly ratcheting the tension up for the entire scenario.

* Red herrings are good, but make sure you have a plan to bring it back in case the players get too sidetracked.

* If used properly, the phrase "Make a Sanity check" can elicit an awesome mix of hilarity and dread that's extremely satisfying. Use appropriately.

>>27810902
No link for the SCP Foundation? That shit is a Delta Green goldmine.

>>http://scp-wiki.net

This is the one Im planning to use for my next DG game:

>>http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1425

>>27824058
Should I link 4chan and Google as well?

>>27824125
Yes.

>>27792017
If you are looking for that, this site has some decent mysterious stone tablets/crude clay figures, though some of them are overdoing it a bit...
http://web.tiscalinet.it/sculptus/
also if anyone else has any cool resources for handout creation, feel free to post them!

books

http://www.mediafire.com/folder/2gdih23dgf88b/Call_Of_Cthulhu

required reading

>>27824207
>>27824217
>>27824224
Holy shit these are awesome.

Has anyone ran a game involving Stephen Alzis or the Fate? I would love hear some stories involving either one of them.

I definitely think everyone has to try an 'unboxing' DG game once.

Green box storage is damaged, location cut off, party is the first team going in with a requirement to inventory everything.

I got the idea from RPPR but it works fantastically as a scenario independently of what they did. The actual unboxing under whatever security protocols your group decide on should be tense as hell.

http://actualplay.roleplayingpublicradio.com/2011/05/systems/call-of-cthulhu/call-of-cthulhu-delta-green-lover-in-the-ice/

http://www.palinola.com/projects/lab/greenbox/

>>27792186
Nemesis has one great sanity system, I'll give it that. I think CoC suits the 'critical break' more though.

REALLY looking forward to the new DG.

>>27824278
The NEMESIS sanity system is fantastic, but I think the ORE system is confusing as fuck. Id like to take that sanity system and use it with BRP or Cortex or something

>>27824292
The nice thing is it's pretty portable so you can do that. Same with Reign's empire-building shit.

>>27824263
I like cleanup operations, something awful has happened, but hasnt been exposed to the wider public, yet. DG operatives have to go in and 'sanitise' the area and leave no traces. That could mean burning files, trashing labs/libraries, removing any possible 'threats of exposure' like the boy scout troop that stumbled onto the site..

>>27824292
>I think the ORE system is confusing as fuck
It's really not.

You add dice to the pool for involved things (stats, skills). Then you roll. For multiple actions you roll for the lowest skill. Round down. Width is speed, height is precision. That is all.

>>27824436
So Width is how many dice rolled the same number, and Height is the value of those dice? Its been a while since I looked at the system. Can you give an example of a roll and how to interpret it?

Oh, and don't forget to throw in a Red Herring-scenario now and then. My PCs were a trigger-pressure and a SAN-roll away from wiping out the local LARPers one time. Good times. Good times.

>>27824469
Thats the artist thats doing everything for the new standalone DG game. Fuck I cant wait for that to be ready. Anyone got any recent links about it?

>>27824486

Last I heard they're planning a Kickstarter some time next year.

>>27824450
I want to bust down a door in my ORE-based criminal game called Burglars4Lyfe. I roll by Burly stat and my Knock-Knock skill together, valued at 3 and 3, respectively. So I roll 6 dice total. My roll comes out to 3, 3, 7, 6, 7, 3.

Well, I could use that 3x3 (three dice showing 3), and be pretty fast but not very professional or subtle about it, or that 2x7 (two dice showing 7), and be slow but precise.

If I'm running from the cops, you know I'm taking that wide Width and going fast with 3x3, busting down the door and leaving it open and smashed behind me. I'm through, but they are too.

If I'm kicking it down to surprise someone behind it, I'll use 2x7, bust in like the stone-cold motherfucker I am, wave my gun in his face, and shut the door behind me.

>>27824511
Shit, that doesnt seem too complicated at all. Dunno why I had figured it was before.

>>27824486
Just that it's expected for 2014, I think.

>>27824217
Are these real?

>>27825449
Yep. Just started grabbing them myself.

>>27824242
Stephen Alzis has made and will make appearances in my campaign. At least one of my players thinks he's their friend. It's hilarious.

>>27824452
That reminds me, I need to figure out a way to work in a little girl and make my players think she's got some eldritch power. I want to see how close I can get them to pulling the trigger.

>>27826078
>At least one of my players thinks he's their friend.

>>27826078
If I recall, blowing the head out of an innocent (in retrospect) girl is a pretty heavy sanity blow. If you can pull that off, that would be pretty great.

>>27826156
Well, he's not necessarily... not? Isn't his whole deal he's sort of the aspect of Nyarlathotep emblematic of humanity?

>>27826441
Alzis can be anything the keeper wants him to be, as long as he is not vulnerable and is pursuing his own agenda. Whether he is actually an aspect of Nyarlathotep or something completely unrelated is up to the keeper.

This is why Alzis is IMO greatest NPC ever. He can be the old Nyarly himself trying to manipulate everyone or he could be just a very convincing con artist. He can fuck your players real hard if they don't play by his rules or he can be the deus ex machina when the players need it.

>>27826636
I mean, he is though.

http://games.dir.groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/dglist/conversations/topics/9447

The Aftermath of SEE NO EVIL in my game was a violent shootout at the Glendale Cemetery blamed on Russian organized crime.

>>27827558
Not if I don't say so he isn't!

>>27829819
That seemed a bit overkill.

>>27824125
It's not like everyone knows about the SCP page

>>27839254
GMs do, and players shouldn't spoil it for themselves.

>>27791576
I've always wanted to run a CoC game (Or any game that deals with Eldritch Horror, really), but the group I'm in is composed largely of HFY! fetishists and thing TTGL is the epitome of perfection.

>>27839339
Easy. Play ToC.

>>27810781
>http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/18324998/
Don't forget to storytiem us, anon!

>>27839339
>TTGL is the epitome of perfection
Why do I like Gurren-Lagann?

Is it the animation? The music? The characters? The story? Nope, it's none of that. I've seen other series, some were bad, and some were good. But TTGL is different. It's power, and it's greatness are off on a scale of it's own. My heart tells me that the beauty of GL is something unmatched by anything else humans can create. From the beauty of Nia's heart, to the beauty of Kamina and Simons brotherly relationship, to the burning souls of the human race and Simon's journey through worlds, galaxies and dimensions.

It's a show where the culmination of the human mind lets itself roam free, to become the strongest, to take over all and save everyone from evil. It surpasses all boundries, it does the impossible. It crashes, slams and breaks right through.

It slides past anything before, and surpasses them all. It's beauty and fiery spirit represents our hearts and souls. The very hearts and souls of the human race that we're a part of. It shows we can break right through as long as we have the power. That nothing can stop us if we try, that even the greatest enemies can be beaten. No matter the path we must take, we can move onwards, we can continue on our journey and we can do the impossible.

It's a break-through of the human mind, soul and heart. It's something we've never seen before, we'll never see again, and is definitely something none of us will forget. TTGL is the defining moment of the human race.

>>27839339
TTGL?

>>27826078
>little girl and make my players think she's got some eldritch power.

Twin sisters do this well. Make her appear in locations were she could have gotten so fast. Or a insane girl who believes she can do that stuff and freaks out the players by drawing strange stuff on the wall and so on

>>27839430
This makes me grin.

>>27839430
That's nice and all, but being able to poke Azathoth with a drill isn't exactly very Cosmic Horror.

>>27839464
Gurren Lagann. Basically at the end of the series, the protagoists kill the Anti-God with a combination of GUTS! and giant robots.

>>27839430
The same could be said of Evangelion.

>>27839506
Well, Eva at least tries to do the whole 'Mankind is fucked by giant space gods' thing, even if they do actually managed to kill all the Angels by the time Seele gets off their ass.

Oddly enough, one of my favorite animes that deals with the Earth-is-but-a-speck thing would probably be Madoka Magica.

>>27839430
I tried to watch it but I only got to episode 12 or something.

Are there any DG compatible animes we could talk about instead?

>>27793068

that was an human once

>>27839857
That's specist!

Is anyone running a CoC game? I love the whole setting and system but have never had a chance to play it even though I own the 20th anniversary book.

Please...help me /tg/, you're my only hope

>>27810781
>I'll be running my group through a modified version of the God-Machine from http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/18324998/ in a few days.

Ha ha holy shit, that was my thread.

I feel fucking awesome right now.

>>27839883
Sry. Running a Laundry campaign and preparing a Nemesis one-shot. I have an annual con where my ex usually preps one of the Chaosium adventures. But I've never played online and don't see it working well to be honest.

I mean CoC is about atmo more than anything. And when you're playing on a screen you'd have to make the Horror something threatening on the web. That can go very very wrong, dramaturgically. But without a computer threat the screen can never convey dread. Roleplaying isn't a computer game. Jump scares are just silly in narration. Gore becomes intriguing without visual timing. You need to make the blinking cursor something to keep an eye on, just to be safe.

So no, can't help you.

>>27839987
Agreed. The way to make an online CoC session work would be to incorporate the "online-ness" into the atmosphere. For example, the investigators are on the trail of a rumored truly lethal creepy pasta and actually do communicate through Skype.

>>27829819
Huh. I honestly did not think the Man in Black browsed /tg/.

>>27839414
Maybe if it turns out well enough.
I'm not sure I'm that good of a keeper, tbh
Plus my sessions usually turn out atrociously short

>>27839483
Now there's a thought. Well, two thoughts that aren't mutually exclusive.
I was also thinking of making the evil come from something the girl had in her possession without her knowing. Though there's already a DG scenario like that in Countdown.

>>27839978
I love you, man. Thanks for letting people steal your idea.

>>27827558
In published material, it's established that while the Fate THINKS he's an avatar of Nyarlathotep, he's actually the Stranger, ambassador of the King in Yellow, waiting for the time when New York and perhaps the world are ready to become one with lost Carcosa.

>>27842396
This has been suggested in Delta Green: Eyes Only. Nothing in DG universe is 100% cannon and it's only Keepers decision whether anything is true or not.

I've always wanted to run Dead Letter from Countdown, but I'm not confident I could do it properly. Any tips?

>>27810323
I like Cthonian Stars, because it shows that the universe itself is hostile.

>>27842999
I dislike Cthonian Stars, because I think it should show that the universe itself is apathetic and uncaring.

>>27839883
still getting people together for a one shot I have planned.
1920s gangsters smuggling in Canadian whiskey get caught in a freak storm and have to take shelter in an abandoned house.

Basically it's haunted house story, but those can work really well in CoC. Just see Music from a Darkened Room

I tried to run a campaign of CoC but the players can't play a game where they aren't told what to do. The first game was trying to play it straight and hide the story while having it a bit too lethal to get them in mindset, and I was right but it got them into the mind set of "everything kills you". But then literately drop clues on them that talk about people that maybe they should look into in ways that don't make sense like what was effectively a previous investigator telling his story about how he came across psychic shit and linked it to this one person who was chased down in the past and then everyone involved in the chase died and then he disappeared and this was handed to them as a cliff note of the book for them to keep and look at and they go "we don't have an idea on what to do" when they have a stack of these sort of sheets blatantly pointing to the thing but not telling them as they should FUCKING INVESTIGATE TO GET THE EXACT DETAILS. Not a single fucking red herring if they were worried about wasting time, every single note was a fucking plot point that in two steps ran into the main thread of a plot of a guy becoming a sorcerer, or of a mythic frog like creatures in a water filled cave and not being able to place (or possibly care) why people are disappearing, or why seemingly this one book gets mentioned again and again with people seemingly having a personality change in the same way as I reused the same line fucking description of how the person was only with ye olden changes to the text that I almost underlined to go "maybe the book has is something".

They were drowning in clues but since they "only have theories there's no point in looking" or even fucking sitting down in character or out of character to try and figure out the next step based on the evidence in front of them that drops into their lap to get them started but don't do shit and thus die or game ends with mysterious thing happens you don't have an idea about.

I'm done with my rant.

>>27843248
Note I tried running 4 games. First throw away was a variant on the haunting only with mythos zombies to make it more lethal and "intriguing" to them as it wasn't some house they're doing a job of evaluating.

>>27843069
>Basically it's haunted house story, but those can work really well in CoC.
The haunting is basically the CoC initiation scenario.

>>27843248
Dude! If you GM like you write... I wouldn't have lasted 10 minutes at your table.

>>27842909
It's a pretty well laid out scenario, it's a great climax to run after a couple smaller ones, which will give you enough practice to be confident about it.

>>27842396

Funny, because my books clearly states that he is actually an avatar of Nyarlathotep.

He's not especially happy about it, but he's still a monstrous asshole.

There are other suggestions as to what he is, but the official line is "Avatar".

>>27843248

I've been there.

It's like no-one in my group has watched any procedural crime drama or the X-Files. They had absolutely no idea what kind of powers they had as FBI agents, or how to follow up leads and investigate.

They started to get the hang of it after a while, but I understand your annoyance.

One of my Laundry players who collectively never do shit, not even character art from the internet, can't get into character if their lives depended on it, and need solid rails or they just traipse around without any plan, cohension, or common sense, just complained about it not being sandboxy enough for his playing style. As if.

I'm not asking for in character discussions, just some basic awareness of the setting and plot beyond 'where's the next enemy?' They can't even be bothered to look at the rules.

>>27839504
though as was mentioned in an earlier episode, the giant robots weren't really necessary.

>>27844382
Which book in particular and where?

>>27844627
Eyes Only, page 41. It outlines how Alzis could be used as an Avatar, but there's a box on the next page saying it's basically up to the Keeper.

Pic related, Stephen Alzis

>>27844763
Ah, I can't find Eyes Only for free

>>27845154
It's almost impossible to find the full thing. Same with a full copy of Countdown (I think) with no pages missing.

>>27843248
Sorry boss, CoC isn't for every group. Your friends sound more like hack'n'slash, at least until they get a little more experience. Maybe you could try a hybrid system that encourages investigation at first?

>>27845244
I think the accepted more action-y version of CoC is Trail of Cthulhu for the Savage Worlds system.

>>27845354
I thought it was the GUMSHOE system?

>>27845226
Pretty sure my PDF of Countdown is full, it clocks in at over 400+ pages. It's a shitty scan, but at least it readable the whole way through.

>>27845444
Check the D Stacks. There were a few points in the PDFs were pages were missing in all the downloads I found, but I definitely remember one there (because it really bothered me at the time).

>>27845381
Yea, my copy of Trail of Cthulhu is GUMSHOE, and it also seems a lot less action-y.

>>27845468
Ah you're right, it looks like Page 173 is missing. I wonder if they'll ever re-release all the old DG books, even if just in PDF form.

>>27845354
>check filename
>cthulhu_japan
>loli, check
>naked chick, check
>schoolgirls in sailor uniform, check
yeah, its japan all right

We are planning on running a CoC LARP very soon. Hope it turns out "well"
.

>>27845676
Sounds fun.

Be aware that Mind's Eye Theatre has a Delta Green LARP ruleset available.

>>27845354

>I think the accepted more action-y version of CoC is Trail of Cthulhu for the Savage Worlds system.

You are thinking of Realms of Cthulhu for the Savage Worlds System. Trail of Cthulhu is the GUMSHOE system by Kenneth Hite that focuses on investigation.over pulp action.

>>27845687

Cthulhu Live 3rd Edition is published by Skirmisher. The 2nd Edition was by Fantasy Flight Games.

It is in no way affiliated with Mind's Eye Theatre, White Wolf or the Camarilla, other than being LARPS.

http://www.amazon.com/Cthulhu-Live-Edition-Robert-McLaughlin/dp/0977721108

>>27845687
We will have our own system, based on FATE.

Ellicott City - The Patapsco Female institute - Is one of the most haunted in the area. Reports of screams and there is a cold spot at the top of the huge stairs.

Yeah, no, the building has been demolished for years, only a few walls are left on the grounds. Still, it's very spooky and you can sometimes hear a pack of wild dogs, though that might just be neighboring properties or actual guard dogs since people sneak up there all the time.

Ellicott City - Seven Hills Road - right off main street, has seven hills. supposedly, if you hit the seventh hill at midnight, you will be chased by a demon car that appears out of nowhere.

This one is just silly - all of the hills are named, so which one is #7? Pretty much all of the Ellicott City listings are technically in Seven Hills; that whole town has a bad history:

>In 1879, political gangs controlled the polling locations shooting and wounding Ellicott City colored voters. The Deputy Sheriff declined to arrest the leaders for fear of his life and further outbreaks of violence
>In February 1895, shop owner D. Shea was murdered by J. Henson and was sentenced to death. Fearing that Governor Brown may release Henson due to insanity, a group of residents broke into the jail and lynched Henson on Merricks lane with a sign saying "Brown cannot rule our cort"
>In the early summer of 1972, the downtown Main Street area was extensively flooded by Hurricane Agnes; the Ellicott brothers' house on the mill property was also destroyed. A more severe flood in 1868 drowned 43 people, wiped out the granite cotton mill, C. Gambrils Patapsco Mill,John Lee Carroll's mill buildings, and dozens of homes. The city faced lesser floods in 1817 and 1837.
>The Ellicott City area was home to the fairy tale-themed amusement park known as the Enchanted Forest. The park has been closed to the general public since the early 1990s (this is one of the creepiest places you can imagine.)

Also: fires and an overturned train car crushing 2 girls w coal.

>>27845676
I played in a weird Cthulhu LARP recently.
Good props, ok storyline, decent system that does NOT scale to 50+ people all trying to interact in the same scene, but I've yet to see a system that really does. I really liked the sanity tickets and predetermined effects as you start to lose them. They were individual to each character, and written on your character sheet in a stapled shut section you could unfold as appropriate.