Rose Red BRP

[Jodah]

So I saw Rose Red.

Let me stop right now and say that if you haven't seen it and enjoy horror, you should remedy this mistake.

Moving on. I want to run a Call of Cthulhu style game adding a set of skills called "Psychic Aptitude" that each player may (in this particular case "must" is a better word) select.

The general rules are as follows:

A player can put a number of points up to the specific skill's starting value or up to their POW stat, whichever is lower. At least one point can always be bought.
GM can activate powers whenever
Players can attempt to use the skill in 3 ways. With a success they use it but the GM determines how. With a critical success they can determine how the skill is used or they can stop the GM from using their powers.


The potential powers are as follows - this is rough list and I am open to recommendations both in percents and additional/superfluous powers.


Resonance - 5%

Resonance is the ability to have a psychic link to a specific place or person. All sorts of things can happen. Starting value is low because it doesn't strike me as a very proactive thing anyway.
Telekinesis -5%

We know what this is. Value is low for power level reasons.

Precognition - 5%

The ability to see into the future. Again, this is a story telling thing very often, though I want to make it more accessible to the player since it could be used proactively as well.

Postcognition - 10%

Seeing the past. We are beginning to get to the point that I want them to occasionally trigger it at whim.

Pyrokinesis - 10%
Cryokinesis - 10%

Fire and ice control respectively. This will be fun when it goes haywire. Useful to players as a tool otherwise.

Telepathy - 10%

Reading minds. This is a great tool for GM and player alike.

Astral projection - 10%

You leave your body unattended and send out your spirit. Your spirit has all the capabilities of a ghost, your body is defenseless. This is primarily for the rogues.

Assistance - 10%

You have no natural gifting but you can help others. A successful check doubles the target number for one of your allies. As a GM I hope this promotes plans and cooperation.

Conduit - 15%

Catch all for automatic writing, tactile feedback, or other channeling type powers. The spirits have a brief chance to talk through you - you are unaware of the information given.

Visions - 20%

These mainly happen when you are asleep. They are highly symbolic and might be of the future or the past or even the present. Story telling at its finest.

ESP - 25%

Only alerts to the presence of something else nearby, i.e. you can smell the ghost or see traces of a demon that came through, no seeing where something is exactly or getting details as to what it was.

[Jodah]

Plot Arc 1

For those familiar with the story of Rose Red, the house has the ability to reshape itself. In accordance with this, I am using the tiles from Betrayal at House on the Hill for my map in the first arc.

I think I will use one of my close friends as a sort of plant. Tell him that he needs to get together a group of paranormal investigators for a team to inspect this mysterious house where, as per the trope, many have entered but none have left. They are testing the myths, as Psychics themselves, obviously they believe this stuff is possible, but not necessarily everything that is reported is true. The be all end all, of course, is that no one has been in the house for over 100 years, and this means that the stories are older.

Little will they know that I am planning on a little traitorous action of my own. See, I will be flipping the tiles and playing along with my own BaHotH, there will be a point when someone will be alone and will receive a nasty shock - in order to save the world / appease the house / whatever their character would want they must summon the demon / complete the werewolf's transformation ceremony / whatever I decide without their friends noticing. Of course they will likely get caught, and the other house guests will become hindrances, of course I don't know what will happen then.

Plot Arc 2

This is the intermediary one. I want to aim for getting them to think in terms of a "monster of the week" style game for build up, but I don't want to just rehash what has already happened. No idea what to do here, help would be appreciated.

Plot Arc 3

The third one will involve them getting dragged to a "dud" house. Nothing happens while they are there. When they leave, and return home, each of them begins to have strange occurrences in their life. Pet dies. Plants wither. Food turns to maggots in their mouth. Visions of bloodied arms dance in their heads (or kitchens, whatevs). Drawing them inexorably to the truth - it wasn't that there was nothing in the house, it was much worse than that - whatever it was followed them home.

This is much less thought out in terms of execution dues to it being far off in the future (at least a year or so). Hopefully, I will have a better idea later.

[Another_Poet]

Sounds great. I think the powers are all well chosen (well, Resonance might be a bit meh...) and the mechanic where the GM can activate them seems to match the CoC flavor.

One thing I notice: don't the percentages seem low? As a disclaimer, I'm not familiar with the CoC ruleset, so maybe abilities often start at that % level. But if the values mean a power only works 4% of the time... well, that's a power I may as well not have.

Of course, that may not be what the percentages mean at all.

[Jodah]

Sounds great. I think the powers are all well chosen (well, Resonance might be a bit meh...) and the mechanic where the GM can activate them seems to match the CoC flavor.

One thing I notice: don't the percentages seem low? As a disclaimer, I'm not familiar with the CoC ruleset, so maybe abilities often start at that % level. But if the values mean a power only works 4% of the time... well, that's a power I may as well not have.

Of course, that may not be what the percentages mean at all.

Yeah, I personally wouldn't choose resonance if I had a choice, but someone out there is going to want to have a special link to their twin who died or something.

The lower the percentage the less I, as a GM, want them to be able to control it - aka the more it is for story telling. The exception to this is telekinesis which is balance issues (for reference see the power difference between everybody else and Jean Grey). So, for them it will usually be me saying something flies to them or the thing can't seem to get closer or what have you. The other point is that the limit is actually up to twice whatever the percentage you see it (with the exception of ESP and maybe the 10% ones, which may be limited by POW).

The other bit is that each session (or arc, but I prefer session) that they successfully use the skill, they can advance it by rolling higher than their current ranking. So despite the fact that they will likely fail much more often than not, they will advance almost every time they succeed.

My point of comparison for the low Telekinesis, by the way, is Martial Arts which starts with 1%.

If you still think they are far too low, what edits would you recommend for sake of balance and desirability?

[Vamphyr]

I posted a CoC general thread a little while ago talking about some adaptations I was making for giving players psychic powers, not sure if it's still page 1 or not.

The percentages you're giving are all reaaaaally low. If you just want to give them powers that you (as GM) control, that's fine, but if you want to allow players to control them too, you may want to raise the percentage of success. Otherwise it may turn a fun twist into a recurring dissapointment.

(Constantly failing a small percentage roll gets frustrating fast.)

The system I set up allowed the player to set up whatever percentage of success they liked, 1%-99%.

If they chose to activate that power, they would roll, if the roll succeeded, they described what they were trying to pull off. They then have to make a second roll on that same percentage to determine sanity loss. They have to roll over the percentage chosen or lose sanity. (so if you have 99% success for activating the power, you need to roll 100% to not lose san)

Based on how big/complicated/difficult the psychic feat they're trying to accomplish it qualifies as a minor, medium, or major psychic abillity.

Minor: 1d6 san loss
Medium: 2d6 san loss
Major: 3d6 san loss

Example: Beth has Pyrokinesis at 99%, she rolls and succeeds. She uses a minor power to bathe her hand in flame, lighting the way. She rolls for san loss, and rolls 76%, she loses 1d6 san.

Powers can only be used to deal a set amount of damage.

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

EDIT: Also, be careful of your players getting wise and running 1 pyrokinetic and 4 Assistants. If the Assitants succeed four times the Pyrokinetic has an 80% chance of success with your rules.

Actually that's pretty cool. 4 people funneling their psychic energies to turn one person into a human flamethrower.

[Jodah]

The percentages you're giving are all reaaaaally low. If you just want to give them powers that you (as GM) control, that's fine, but if you want to allow players to control them too, you may want to raise the percentage of success. Otherwise it may turn a fun twist into a recurring dissapointment.

(Constantly failing a small percentage roll gets frustrating fast.)

...

EDIT: Also, be careful of your players getting wise and running 1 pyrokinetic and 4 Assistants. If the Assitants succeed four times the Pyrokinetic has an 80% chance of success with your rules.

Actually that's pretty cool. 4 people funneling their psychic energies to turn one person into a human flamethrower.

I upped them a bit. I am trying for a slightly different concept than it seems you were, so your system doesn't have direct application, but I like the point. I am in favor of low odds, but a chance. Now the lowest chance is the chance of a 20 (or a 1) on d20, which people seem to be fine with.

As to the getting wise - I hope they do. That was the whole point of assistance - to give them a motivation for teamwork.

[Vamphyr]

I upped them a bit. I am trying for a slightly different concept than it seems you were, so your system doesn't have direct application, but I like the point. I am in favor of low odds, but a chance. Now the lowest chance is the chance of a 20 (or a 1) on d20, which people seem to be fine with.

As to the getting wise - I hope they do. That was the whole point of assistance - to give them a motivation for teamwork.

I like the new percentages much better now.

I figured what I was working on wouldn't directly apply, but it's usually helpful to see what other people have cooked up and I figured you might get some ideas from it.

[Jodah]

I figured what I was working on wouldn't directly apply, but it's usually helpful to see what other people have cooked up and I figured you might get some ideas from it.

There. This is what I was trying to express. Thank you for giving me some feed back.

[Vamphyr]

There. This is what I was trying to express. Thank you for giving me some feed back.

Haha, it's no problem.

I was reading over your idea for Plot Arc 2, after a couple sessions of actual monsters I would do this:

Situation arises that clearly has signs of the supernatural and that results in loss of human life.

Players arrive and begin investigating as usual.

They start to see signs of several different supernatural creatures/beings. (sulfur, wolf fur, occult symbols, bite marks on neck, ectoplasm, etc.)

What they'll come to realize is that there is no creature; have a brother/father/cousin/whatever of someone who died when the PC's were around setting them up.

He tricks them into crime scenes and sets things up to appear like they've been committing the murders and staging everything all along to swindle people.

Insert fun as PC's become wanted criminals and have to prove that this guy is setting them up.

[Jodah]

Wow. I like it, especially since it will help them let go of the idea of "needing" to find something in arc 3, bringing them to the point of having to wonder if things are real or not themselves. I think it flows nicely and helps each arc feel different.

[Vamphyr]

Wow. I like it, especially since it will help them let go of the idea of "needing" to find something in arc 3, bringing them to the point of having to wonder if things are real or not themselves. I think it flows nicely and helps each arc feel different.

Yeah! It puts them in a much more critical mindset of everything you throw at them, and that villain can be recurring during the second arc, coming to a climax when they're finally able to capture him and clear their names.

[werebuffalo]

Yeah! It puts them in a much more critical mindset of everything you throw at them, and that villain can be recurring during the second arc, coming to a climax when they're finally able to capture him and clear their names.

I think y'all are having some great ideas!

2 questions:

1. Would this be a home, f2f game, skype, play-by-post, or what?

2. Have you considered using the actual rules for psychic abilities that Pagan Publishing put out for CoC? At least for the more 'common' abilities. I think you'll find them in their 'Coming Full Circle' supplement (which is very well done). I could dig out the specific texts if you were interested.

What you've come up with, powers-wise, is cool; but personally I try not to re-invent the wheel if there's a workable set of rules already extant.

Just a thought.

[Vamphyr]

I think y'all are having some great ideas!

2 questions:

1. Would this be a home, f2f game, skype, play-by-post, or what?

2. Have you considered using the actual rules for psychic abilities that Pagan Publishing put out for CoC? At least for the more 'common' abilities. I think you'll find them in their 'Coming Full Circle' supplement (which is very well done). I could dig out the specific texts if you were interested.

What you've come up with, powers-wise, is cool; but personally I try not to re-invent the wheel if there's a workable set of rules already extant.

Just a thought.

I was not aware anything like that existed! I would be very interested in checking those rules out.

[werebuffalo]

I was not aware anything like that existed! I would be very interested in checking those rules out.

I dug out the reference. It is indeed Coming Full Circle, from Pagan Publishing, written by John H. Crowe, III. The product number is PAG1003.

The psychic material starts on page 11.

[Jodah]

I dug out the reference. It is indeed Coming Full Circle, from Pagan Publishing, written by John H. Crowe, III. The product number is PAG1003.

The psychic material starts on page 11.

I will certainly check that out. I am very similar in not reinventing the wheel.

My group is generally skype, which is fortunate and unfortunate in many ways. It does make me a bigger fan of BRP since it isn't as strict on combat.