Need help with Cthulhu system!

[badash56]

Hey everyone!

I play in a regular gaming group every weekend. Normally we play D&D, but we do branch out and play other games every now and then. One game we have played on and off is Call of Cthulhu. It has been a good and bad experience. I usually GM these COC sessions. A few of my players really love the game. They love figuring out the mystery and love the creepy feeling of the game. A few other players enjoy playing it, but hate the fact that their characters are going to end up dead or insane at some point. I've even had one player not show up on a Cthulhu day because he thinks it is pointless since his character will be dead/insane soon. It is also frustrating for me as a GM because we have started off alot of great classic adventures but they always fizzle out because a few people cant get into their characters. So I have all these great adventures I bought that are mostly half played and what not.

Everyone enjoys the game, but a few people won't play it on a regular basis because their characters don't advance well, or end up dead/insane. Now I have explained that COC isn't about building up characters like D&D. It is more about the story and atmosphere.. Didn't help, a few still can't get into it without being able to heavily develop a character. It is kind of a let down to me, because when we do play everyone has a really great time. But I can't get anything long term going, I would love to play some classic adventures like Horror on the Orient Express, but keeping their interest up is difficult.

Now we haven't played COC in months. We've been doing multiple D&D campaigns at the same time, and they are all starting to run together. I think everyone is a bit run down on D&D. Someone brought up COC recently and a few players said 'YES YES YES' while the others brushed it off. I'm getting the desire to run it again, but I'm looking for a few suggestions on how to make the game more interesting for the other players who like more character building.

Now I think part of the problem is that the BRP system isn't too hot in the character development areas. The other problem is that COC in general isn't about developing a character. So rather than never play, I've been thinking about using GURPS instead of BRP. From talking to gaming buddies it seems that GURPS is a popular replacement for BRP. I do have the d20 book, but honestly I'm not a huge fan of the system. Has anyone played GURPS Cthulhu? Should this please my players who want more character development?

Another problem I'm going to have is the Sanity system. It is such a staple in COC, but another heart of the problem. A few players don't want to play if insanity is coming. It breaks my heart to do away with it, I love it and the classic COC style of play personally. But I rather adapt and change the system a bit if it means never playing. So what about using the standard Fright Check system in GURPS? Don't have a sanity score, just use the system where if you fail by too much you develop disadvantages? Any other suggestions?

Now I personally love the classic COC game, love investigator bodies piling up and the insanity ward filling, but I'd rather adapt the game so everyone enjoys it than never play again.

So does anyone have some advice on GURPS Cthulhu? Does it work? Does the basic fright check system work instead of a SAN score? Or do you think that will ruin the feel of the game?

Thanks for any opinions!!

[cjh]

GURPS Cthulhupunk uses an additional Fright Check called the Mythos Fright Check. The Mythos Fright Check (which ended up in GURPS Horror as the Sanity Blasting Fright Check) is basically for those situations where the alienness of situations makes a person much less resistant to frightening happenings. I thought it was a prety good mechanic.

GURPS Cthulhupunk is a pretty good integration of Call of Cthulhu into the GURPS system.

[badash56]

Cthulhupunk, yes I actually found a copy online and ordered it. Hopefully it can help me out. Have you ever played GURPS Cthulhu? If so how did it work out?

[cjh]

I thought that it worked just fine. GURPS obviously offers a different gameplay experience than does BRP, but it is still a pretty game. It is nice if you want a "non-traditional" Cthulhu experience where you can incorporate elements such as psionics. But it is still a pretty good game, its really the only non-BRP version of Cthulhu that I have liked.

If I remember correctly it could be played using only the GURPS Lite rules, except that you obviously couldn't use psionics then.

[Fulsrush]

Since you normally all play D&D, have you thought about trying the D20 version of Call of Cthulhu?

The Unknown Armies system is a nice one for playing Cthulhu with - the insanity system's a bit more forgiving than the Sanity points of Call of Cthulhu (in both the BRP and D20 variants), and the combat system, although gritty, isn't quite as deadly as BRP. Also, character creation forces players to create characters with personalities, thanks to its obsessions and rage/fear/noble triggers. Overall, UA has a very powerful yet simple mechanic behind it that doesn't take too long to get your head around.

I've got various Mythos monsters and NPCs statted up here (http://www.lancs.ac.uk/socs/lurps/resources.htm). Look at the bottom of the page for the Arkham and Miskatonic University Library pieces.

Having said all of that, I think the attitude of some of your players might not be appropriate to Call of Cthulhu's realistic style. It's actually fairly easy to play a decent, well-developed character in CoC, provided you don't try and play a D&D adventurer. I think the reason people are opting out of Cthulhu is because they want to play the heroic characters of D&D-style games - not something that compatible with Lovecraft. (On the other hand, Call of Cthulhu D20 has a chapter on integrating the Mythos into D&D fantasy settings.)

[badash56]

Thanks for the replies.

Well, I do have the d20 COC book. I've thought about using that. But for various reasons I'd rather play GURPS.

You are right though, they do want to play heroic style characters. It is weird though, they do enjoy playing COC. Everyone has a great time, they just want to be able to build characters up and not have them die so easily. They are really obsessed with D&D (well some of them are), and it is extremely hard to get them to play other games. Which sucks for me because I like many RPG games.

Hmmmm I guess basically I need to make the characters a bit more beefy. They get upset that they die so easily. I suppose any system would do. I liked GURPS because of the open ended character design system. I thought that would work a little better with the style of COC.

[cjh]

I would also suggest checking out the GURPS Conspiracy X book that Eden put out, converting their Conspiracy X book into GURPS 3e terms. Combined with Cthulhupunk, you can end up with one heck of a good GURPS Delta Green campaign. Even if you don't have Delta Green, the Aegis organization in Conspiracy X can make for a good protagonist against the Mythos, and an excellent Patron for characters.

Also, if you want to run *any* sort of horror campaign in GURPS (or really any other system), you should check out Ken Hite's GURPS Horror. Great stuff, and you will find plenty of inspiration for a Cthulhu game in that book too.

[Travis Beck]

I usually try to run a more cinematic-style CoC, more in line with Robert E. Howard's style than HPL's for exactly the reasons you listed. I use cultists extensively and either tone down the sanity losses or I use the part of humna nature that HPl was apparently unfamiliar with; the first half of the fight/flight response. Why should a character always go catatonic? Why not go temporarily berserk, instead?

Lovecraft's characters were usually either academics or artists and a good deal of the horror in his stories was the juxtaposition of twentieth century rationality with Things That Should Not Be. Howard's characters tended to be much less cerebral and more inclined to empty their Colt Peacemaker into It than attempt to work out the epistemology behind it all.

That doesn't mean your CoC game has to have a case of the vapors. Maybe a failed San check just mean the PC freezes for a crucial round or perhaps temporary insanity makes them empty their pistol into beastie instead of running away like a rational person would do.

Perhaps dynamiting the statue on the altar will have the same result as a spell or incantation of dismissal. If the Beastie can't be stopped by bullets, what about bringing the roof of the ancient temple down on top of it?

Don't let Sandy Petersen define your game. If you don't like the style of CoC, just change it. Or incorporate the elements into other game genres.

For example, I'm running a game set in the ALIENS universe. My players will soon encounter a race of troglodytic, cannibalistic, degenerate humans on another world, similar in some ways the what lived under Exham Priory in THE RATS IN THE WALLS. These creatures are about five feet tall, with beak-like noses, sloping foreheads, heavy brow ridges, powerful physiques, and thick hair and beards braided into dreadlocks. All in all they are very similar to D&D dwarves in appearance, except for the battle gauntlets with two chitin blades projecting from the fist and the blank-faced helmets they wear decorated solely by eyeslits.

But how can this be? What are these nasty things doing so far from Earth and what the hell happened to them to make them devolve like this?

The answer is, the didn't devolve! They are the last surviving remnants of Homo sapiens neandertalensis, also known as Neanderthals. Their ancestors were kidnapped en masse about 30,000 years ago and shipped here by a race of dreadlocked Ernest Hemingway Klingon-types that like to run around in personal cloaking devices and see in infared, which also happens to explain why a species that was successful for over 200,000 years suddenly vanished from the face of the planet. Perhaps the PC's will also come across the remains of the original Roanoke, VA colony too...

It's a combination of Lovecraft, Howard, and 20th Century Fox. The PC's are colonial marines and I doubt they'll spend a whole lot of time agonizing over the anthropological aspects of the situation. Especially after the microbes that were in the bodies of the modern humans the cannibals ate go to work on immune systems that have diverged for the last thirty millenia.

The horror will be on several levels. First, the terror of being killed and eaten by something so familiar yet so alien at the same time. Second, the implications that humans are nothing more than lab rats and game animals for another alien species far older than us. Third, the guilt and horror of watching fellow humans, however savage, succumb to a host of plagues no more dangerous to the players than a common cold.

[mitchw]

My first and best advice to anyone who is trying to GM anything is "You don't have to follow the rules as written." I know you know that but you have to apply it.

For COC specifically here are my suggestions

1) don't make the average SAN test permanent. Let the characters recover SAN in most cases. If the characters are dumb enough to start doing animal sacrifices, or worse, to power magic then give them the hard SAN loss.

2) Take a rule from the old Deadlands game. When the characters have finally defeated a big supernatural horror at the end of an adventure they gain a level of 'Grit'. Grit gives them a bonus on all future SAN rolls.

3) Look at some of the advice for running the Warhammer RPG. It is also a world where the big evil (Chaos) is all powerful but the characters can make a difference for the good.

There is no real reason that all of your characters have to end up dead or insane if that is not how the players want to play it.

Just like that fact that you know you can ignore/change the rules, you also know that you play for fun. If it ain't fun, why do it. Again you just have to remind yourself of these things when you sit down to play :p :cool:

Please don't think I am flaming you or making a joke. I remind myself of these meta-rules quite often. :D

Mitch

[cjh]

1) don't make the average SAN test permanent. Let the characters recover SAN in most cases. If the characters are dumb enough to start doing animal sacrifices, or worse, to power magic then give them the hard SAN loss.

You know that this doesn't apply to GURPS? I would just hate for the OP to get confused and think that GURPS has SAN rules like CoC.

[tahrikmili]

Sounds like you have a group with players more interested in character development crunch and min/maxing than BRP can (at first sight) offer. That, and COC is more about theme and mood than systematic stuff like how well you can dodge, which more often than not can't save you anyway.

Dump your whining players, take your YES YES YES players and start a new group, then come back and thank me ;)

[grimjack]

I don't think your players will be any more happy with GURPS, with respect. The basic problem remains unresolved. Characters don't build up the same way as D&D -- that's everything else they're doing. Heroic fantasy, heavy on the hocus-pocus.

Suddenly combat is always life and death, and magic is hurtful to the practitioner, not just the target.

I would either switch systems to WOTCoC or amend BRP so it works with you rather than against you. Don't worry about the game police breaking the doors down.

Suggestions (for BRP):

When a character hits 0 HP he/she is unconscious, and losing 1 hit point automatically per round. First Aid/Medicine rolls must restore the character to 1 HP, whereupon the character is stabilized. (You may laugh, but this rule has saved me no end of woe.)

Allow the characters to have some sort of period appropriate armor within reason. For my 20's group, it's greatcoats, which stop 1 point of damage.

Institute an Idea roll whenever a character is about to do something suicidal. If they make it, ask them "Are you _sure_ you want to do this?" Likewise, if they can't figure out what to do.

Always give them the chance to run like scared children away from "it".

Avoid killing characters, unless they're unrepentantly dumb by a reasonable standard. Mutilate, irritate, infect, sicken, scorch, dissolve, whatever...but don't kill them unless they back you into a corner. You lose more than a character, you lose all the time put into that character. You want the players to be emotionally involved, and that sometimes means given them a lucky narrative break. Under no circumstances ever admit to doing this. Use a GM screen, track HP lost in combat, take them down to 1 HP, and then have them pick on someone else. Graceful retreat save lives and games. Under no circumstances admit to doing this. Roll behind a GM's screen, if you must. Realism wonks can do something painful with an Elder Sign, repeatedly.

For most character stats that are 3-18, I usually go 12+1d6 or 10+1d8. Characters that are danger-ready tend to live longer.

Embrace the new sanity rules. They shall save your butt.

When in doubt, pave the wrong idea with dead NPCs.

I always show new players the comic in back of the BRP gamebook so they know what they're getting into. It gives you a bit of a psychological edge when people know things are going be dangerous and suck hard because that's the game, and not because they're poor players.

Give them their victories. Praise them after the game when they save the day, usually at great cost and pain to themselves. It doesn't matter how cool the game is if people aren't having fun. Having the GM praise them makes some of the suck worthwhile.

That's all I can think of for the moment.

[Fulsrush]

Thanks for the replies.

Well, I do have the d20 COC book. I've thought about using that. But for various reasons I'd rather play GURPS.

You are right though, they do want to play heroic style characters. ... Hmmmm I guess basically I need to make the characters a bit more beefy.


Cthulhu Dark Ages has characters get 100 points to spread between their stats, which seems to make them stronger than the average standard Call of Cthulhu character.


Alternatively, alter the dice rolls to increase the chance of a higher random stat (e.g. 10+D8, or 4D6 and discard the lowest, or something.


Perhaps allow PCs more hit points?


Alternatively, a house rule I came up with for a Cthulhu Dark Ages game I ran was to introduce Death Checks after they hit zero hit points.

Basically, 0 hit points means you're incapacitated and you have to take a CONx10 test each round or die. (With most characters, this gives a 1% chance of failure.)

Each hit point below zero means that the CON modifier is reduced by one, so a character at -3 hit points takes Death Checks at CONx7.


I tested this out with a few sample characters before using it in the game, and it seemed to work. I never saw it in practice though, as not a single one of my PCs actually hit 0 hit points over a ten session campaign. As a summary of their opponents:

- A naked cultist on a hilltop (two of them rushed him and beat him unconscious with the flats of their weapons).

- The Mi-Go that was summoned by the cultist, but was driven off after inflicting minor injuries on a few of them. (However, one of them did manage to hit another in the stomach with a great axe while trying to rescue him from being carried away by the Mi-Go.)

- Another Mi-Go that was laying into a group of fyrdmen and huscarls with a lightning gun. A PC dived through a first floor window on a tapestry and leaped onto the Mi-Go's back. He fell off and hurt himself but managed to do enough damage to the Mi-Go to scare it off.

- A Servitor of Azathoth that they summoned because the spell said 'Summon Musician of God' or something, and they figured it must have been an angel. They didn't fight it, but they did ask it a few questions before it rolled away into the woods.

- One of the PCs, while suffering from the hallucinatory effects of entering a circle of mushrooms around a shrine to Shub-Niggurath, managed to fight off three or four goblins, and actually killed at least one of them. A few nasty cuts, but the goblins were barely competent with their daggers.

- The PC who leapt at the Mi-Go later went down a hole in the ground (into a chamber measuring 9.5ft x 10 1/2ft x 11ft, and killed three more goblins with his shortsword. Maybe a few light injuries, but nothing more.

- Quachil Uttaus. One of the PCs had (in character background) made a pact with a Great Old One, and I decided to call in the debt. Quachil Uttaus's touch kills instantly, so no need for Death Checks. Incidentally, Lilith and the newborn Antichrist (and his exhausted mother) were also in the room - yes, it took two Great Old Ones and the Antichrist for me to be able to kill a PC. :eek:


Note that, with the exception of the final encounter, and possibly the Servitor of Azathoth (which was entirely avoidable), all the opponents were fairly low level. Mi-Go are typically weaker than humans (if almost immune to blades and bullets), while most goblins are pretty feeble.

True, the PCs could have, at some point, picked a fight with four Viking warriors who they encountered in Saxon territory at night, but they spoke with them instead. They also never visited the shrine at the time when a Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath was being summoned, so never had to face that.


Did I mention that this party did pretty well when it came to combat despite being made up of monks with just an armed pilgrim, abbey guard and, in the last session and a half, a Breton knight? They survived, never ending up on zero hit points, because they picked their fights cleverly (e.g. they waited until the naked cultist had removed his helmet, sword belt, axe, shield and full chainmail before attacking him) and because I knew when to stop throwing shit at them (e.g. the goblins in the magic circle - there could have been more of them, if I'd wanted, but I held off once the player and character had reached the optimum level of panic and desperation).


Also, try fielding intelligent gribblies against your PCs. A number of goblins fled into the forest, rather than fight the PCs, after one or two of them were killed. Why? Because they knew when they were outclassed. Similarly, the Mi-Go didn't stick around to get killed, particularly since they both only appeared when a certain poem was read aloud by lunatics. Smart monsters will run when hurt to any significant level.

Have you tried playing Delta Green? In that, the PCs should be able to get hold of all kinds of firearms, explosives and body armour (depending on their contacts - the US Army is always good for a loan - they haven't a clue where half their equipment is at the best of times, let alone when they're fighting several wars around the world).

[Fulsrush]

Another thought - extending the timescale of the adventure is a good way of keeping PCs alive. Give them time to recover fully between incidents. My Cthulhu Dark Ages campaign was set over approximately a year (to accomodate the pregnancy of one of the PCs with the Antichrist).

In a similar vein, reward your PCs with Sanity points after they do something heroic. Several of the written adventures do this at the end of a plot, but why not give back half the Sanity points someone lost to a Deep One once they've finished shoving a pick axe tip through its head? That's bound to slow down the descent into madness.

Another example that was suggested ages ago on this forum was to give back Sanity points when someone spends a weekend at a peaceful and relaxing family barbecue.

(I suppose it depends how well the PC gets on with his family, but the idea's still sound...)

[Balbinus]

Another example that was suggested ages ago on this forum was to give back Sanity points when someone spends a weekend at a peaceful and relaxing family barbecue.

(I suppose it depends how well the PC gets on with his family, but the idea's still sound...)

The Roman CoC monograph has a similar rule, 1d3 per week spent resting in the country away from stress and 1d4 per week when resting at an actual spa resort designed to help people relax.

The game limits it to three weeks of benefit, but personally I'd let someone rest up as long as they wanted and still gain benefit.

[Fulsrush]

The Roman CoC monograph has a similar rule, 1d3 per week spent resting in the country away from stress and 1d4 per week when resting at an actual spa resort designed to help people relax.

The game limits it to three weeks of benefit, but personally I'd let someone rest up as long as they wanted and still gain benefit.

Or maybe just reduce it to a maximum of 1 point per week after the first three weeks, depending on the timescale of the campaign (i.e. a longer term adventure could handle slower regeneration better than a more fast-paced one).

[badash56]

Thanks for all the replies! I think this poster hit it on the head:

Sounds like you have a group with players more interested in character development crunch and min/maxing than BRP can (at first sight) offer. That, and COC is more about theme and mood than systematic stuff like how well you can dodge, which more often than not can't save you anyway.

Dump your whining players, take your YES YES YES players and start a new group, then come back and thank me ;)

All of our problems with COC started when we were playing Horror on the Orient Express. It was going well until one of the PCs got killed. He was surprised that I actually let him die (I had no choice, he was cornered by many zombie type things). Ever since he passes on playing because he says its pointless. These are the type of players that max out their combat stats in COC games, and have horribly min/maxed D&D characters.

Instead of trying to use new game rules, I'm now leaning more towards just contacting the players that like to play and see if they want to start a side game. I think I will still use some of the suggestions here, I like the 'death check' house rule. I think by totally changing to GURPS you might loose some of that fear of comabt and fear of magic that is such a big part of the COC feel. I also think that players should gain some SAN back from relaxing, I like that rule.

Thanks for all the suggestions!

[Travis Beck]

someone spends a weekend at a peaceful and relaxing family barbecue.


Be careful combining phrases like "family barbeque" and "Call of Cthulhu."

Best damn chili in the state! It really...satisfies. :eek:

[Fulsrush]

These are the type of players that max out their combat stats in COC games, and have horribly min/maxed D&D characters.

The player dropped out after having a character killed? The problem's not with the game...

Anyhow, maxing combat stats is a daft idea in Call of Cthulhu, since that leaves you short on skill points from your EDU and INT stats (and it's your weapon skills that keep you alive in combat, as much as it is your stats), and a low POW leaves you insane extremely quickly. All three mental stats also determine your Idea, Knowledge and Luck rolls, the latter of which is vital for avoiding dying (you can arguably use it to fall down that scree embankment as Quachil Uttaus reaches out to touch you, or a flash of lightning distracts the MJ-12 marksman as he's about to blow your brains out, and so on).

[komradebob]

You know, it's terrible of me to admit, but I've had several/many enjoyable games of CoC when my various groups treated it more like TommyGuns & Deep Ones than horrific existential horror. If that's your players' mindest, maybe you should just run with it?