General Horror/Intrigue/Call of Cthulhu Thread

[Vamphyr]

I love Call of Cthulhu, and horror roleplaying in general. I'd like to start a thread where people can ask questions about different systems and discuss characters or campaigns they're working on.

Right now I'm in the middle of writing a Call of Cthulhu 6e campaign where all of my players develop powerful psychic abillities. They will roll on a chart of 50 psychic powers to randomly determine what they get. Each person will then determine the exact percentage of success for that power.

There are 3 different levels of power for each ability, minor, medium, and major. A minor ability costs 1d6 sanity, a medium costs 2d6, and a major costs 3d6.

A minor pyrokinetic ability might be turning your hand into a torch, a medium might be causing someone to burst into flame, a major could be creating a firestorm around yourself.

There is no set limit of what each power can do, limiting the player only by their imagination. The level of the power is all dependent on how big/difficult the task they're trying to complete is. If they want to use their power for damage I've charted it out as:

Minor: 2d6
Medium: 4d6
Major: 6d6

This gives them some extra firepower/utility to characters that are extremely squishy while at the same time taking a great toll on their sanity if they frivolously throw it around. If someone were to go crazy from using their powers, suddenly the players have to contend with a madman with vast psychic power in their midsts....

[The Parasomniac]

What's percentage of success vs percentage of taking SAN damage?

[Vamphyr]

Each player can choose a percentage ranging from 1 to 99. The percent chance of success is also the percent chance of losing sanity.

So if someone chooses 99%, their power will almost always succeed when they need it to, and they will almost always lose sanity for it.

There aren't any penalties to their roll if they try using a major ability versus a minor, the only difference is the amount of SAN loss they take.

[The Parasomniac]

I would be interested in seeing a game based around this kind of format. This sounds like something you'd see in Champions or Rifts, but you plan to use this in the Cthulhu world, so I'm curious as to what kind of game you would want to use this kind of setting and system in, would it be a modern day hack and slash with some intrigue or would you stick to the general Cthulhu theme of mystery and problem solving with more emphasis on combat with creatures from the mythos?

[Fouredged Sword]

Have you seen the don't rest your head game?

[Vamphyr]

Have you seen the don't rest your head game?

Yeah! What I've set up here is partially inspired because of the powers from the Don't Lose Your Mind book they put out.

[Morph Bark]

I'm currently reading through Call of Cthulhu 6.0, and will read through Call of Cthulhu d20 and Trail of Cthulhu as well, to see which rules I should use for one-shots/short campaigns for our off weeks when we don't play DnD, and what to use for inspiration for my current project (see here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=316966)). Which of the three would you say is the best? Which is the easiest to understand? Which is the smoothest to run, or fastest in play?

(Of course, it might be that those questions all have different answers, or you have additional opinions, or think another game does the same setting and goal for mechanics better than all three of these.)

[The Parasomniac]

I'm currently reading through Call of Cthulhu 6.0, and will read through Call of Cthulhu d20 and Trail of Cthulhu as well, to see which rules I should use for one-shots/short campaigns for our off weeks when we don't play DnD, and what to use for inspiration for my current project (see here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=316966)). Which of the three would you say is the best? Which is the easiest to understand? Which is the smoothest to run, or fastest in play?

(Of course, it might be that those questions all have different answers, or you have additional opinions, or think another game does the same setting and goal for mechanics better than all three of these.)

I feel like CoC 6.0 is more straightforward and brutal, especially since everyone is just a regular human. It is easy to teach to casual players and I find it really easy to homebrew rules compared to other systems.

I'm a little biased though, I also have not looked into Trail of Cthulhu, I didn't realize it was a separate system.

[Black Jester]

Trail is very much streamlined on the investigation aspect of the genre, and that is where it really shines. It has a few idiosyncracies that are *very* different from more traditional RPGs (using basically every skill as a pool), and that can make it a bit inaccessible. Within its specific niche, it is easily as good a game for Lovecraftian horror as the original CoC, but it plays slightly different and if you are more interested in a more pulpy or action-oriented campaign, the system will not be too supportive. So, generally speaking, the "real" Call of Cthulhu is a bit more adaptable and flexible, but not necessarily better. In one core element of the game, namely the way terror and psychic stress is handled, Trail ism however, far superior to the oversimplified sanity hit pont system of CoC (but not as good as Unknown Armies, which in this regard is really impressive).

Cthulhu D20, I have no idea how it plays. I personally know nobody who ever played it, and the only way this work appeared around here, than as a 'cautionary tale' about the D20-fication mania after the licence became available. There is also a Cthulhu version for Savage Worlds, if you are interested in a primarily pulpy, action-oriented style that would probably a good choice.