Well the final hour is upon me. Tomorrow I'm leading our group into territory never before explored. (No, not the outdoors)
Instead we are heading up to a rented lighthouse on the north western most tip of Scotland (Point of Stoer for those with atlases) for a week with one mission in my mind.
We are going to complete the largest Call fo Cthulhu campaign ever written- the 410 page Antarctic saga called 'Beyond the Mountains of Madness'
We'll be isolated from all civilisation, the GM (me) is fighting off a feverish flu and there will be 5 gamers continaully gaming for a week. And we start on our 5 hour trip tomorrow.
Despite some mandatory watching of the Shackelton film, printouts of the original HP Lovecraft and Poe storys, and even the purchase of the official Cthulhu minatures a deep sense of foreboding has overcome my former enthusiasm.
We are in a sense recreating a Cthulhu adventure in real life- a group of university graduates with an interest in outre subjects are going off to an isolated local to perform a mentally exhausting activity.
Will we all go mad? Will we end up killing each other?
One guy is bringing a camera, and I'm gonna keep a diary, so we may very well end up with Blair Witch 3 on our hands.
So I'm going outside now. I may be some time before I post again............
Steve
(Its possible I may be able to check email on our planned resupply run next Wednesday- I'll update you then)
okay, if you must, PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, DO NOT RUIN IT STRAIGHT OUT OF THE BOOK!
For god sakes, allow things to happen, and allow the pcs decisions to possibly, just possibly, AFFECT THINGS!
That was absolutely the worst role-playing experience of my life. I was losing more sanity points than my pc. I was jus t PRAYING for a tentacle to comeout of the ocean and pull my character under, but NO!
WE SPENT TWO HOURS GOING OVER INVENTORY LISTS! JUST LIKE THE BOOK SAYS TO!
and eventually, when we thought of cool things, and tried to imoplement them, THEY COULDN'T HAPPEN, BECAUSE THEY WOULD HAVE COMPLETELY DE-RAILED THE PRECIOUS 410 PAGE RAILROADING THAT IS "BEYOND THE MOUNTIANS OF MADNESS!"
please, PLEASE, improvise. use it as a sourcebook, NOT as a by-the-letter adventure.
Originally posted by unheilig and eventually, when we thought of cool things, and tried to imoplement them, THEY COULDN'T HAPPEN, BECAUSE THEY WOULD HAVE COMPLETELY DE-RAILED THE PRECIOUS 410 PAGE RAILROADING THAT IS "BEYOND THE MOUNTIANS OF MADNESS!"
I just finished running the entire "Horror on the Orient Express" campaign, and it went off brilliantly, and for the most part as-written, with a minimum of railroading.
If that can be done, BtMoM can be done. It takes two (the adventure and the GM) to run a railroad.
That being said, I <b>still</b> think you (SJE) won't come close to finishing it in one week, even playing all day, every day. I said it when you first came up with this scheme, I'm saying it now.
Location: IM IN UR CONTINUUM COLLAPSING UR WAVEFORMS
Posts: 231
And DON'T READ THE BOOK! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT'S HOLY, DON'T...
What? Oh, Mountains of Madness. No, not too many books in that one. Um...
Don't go? Yeah, that's about the equivalent. It was spooky. I lost a very beloved character on that continent.
__________________ "Lying in bed would be an altogether perfect and supreme experience if only one had a colored pencil long enough to draw on the ceiling." -G.K. Chesterson
As Jim and Brawd said, I just finished running this for them. I was pretty frustrated as a GM by the end. The plot laid down in the book itself is really amazing, but you need to railroad like mad to pull it off. I ended up giving them the latitude to really change the face of the plot.
It was all very unsatisfying, from a GM perspective. My advice is to force nothing onto the players. Look on the book as background and a general outline, and let the players discover and react to things on their own.
The PCs are not in fact in charge of the expedition, and this may frustrate many people. You will have to adjust your style to your group, of course. Apparently, Unhelig's Keeper didn't.
At BTMOM Central, we've heard a lot of stories--both good and bad. We'd sure like to hear how yours goes. This particular run sounds like it'll be madness-inducing.
Cheers.
__________________
John Goodrich, obeying Jack Ketchum's rule of polite discourse.
"You gentlemen who think you have a mission
To purge us of the seven deadly sins
Should first sort out the basic food position
Then start your preaching, that’s where it begins" --The Threepenny Opera
You do realize that five weeks from now they'll discover what remains of your gaming group.
One's body will have mysteriously vanished, leaving only his skin (unbroken) and hair in a pile on the ground, and his watch and clothing, which will have mysteriously been reversed around the left-right axis.
Two of your players will have been eaten by a third, who will believe that he's transforming into some sort of man-eating cow. The horns and hooves will back up his story.
And all the survivers will swear that you were carried off into the sky in a flaming volkswagon beetle, driven by Mr. Rogers and a bunch of three inch tall versions of the major gods of the egyptian pantheon.
That being said, have fun.
Last edited by Random Nerd; 02-15-2002 at 05:15 PM..
Wait!
Linear Mode
