Tips for a Survival Horror game?

[Amphetryon]

What it says on the tin. The tactics that work in other media to build the right atmosphere for horror (hard-to-locate monsters, splitting the group, inscrutable enemies that seem impervious to your attacks, supply crises) seem either contrived or more annoying than horrific within Pathfinder. Thoughts?

[Arbane]

What it says on the tin. The tactics that work in other media to build the right atmosphere for horror (hard-to-locate monsters, splitting the group, inscrutable enemies that seem impervious to your attacks, supply crises) seem either contrived or more annoying than horrific within Pathfinder. Thoughts?

Unless you're planning on stranding your characters in the outskirts of hell, keep 'em low-level.

I've often thought that an old-school dungeon crawl becomes fairly survival-horror-ish as things progress. The fighter and thief are wounded, the cleric's out of spells, the wizard's got two left, you need to either find somewhere to rest or escape, and there's a half-mile of solid rock and gods only know what monsters between you and ever seeing daylight again...

[Phelix-Mu]

Ditto on endurance encounters.

Also, try sleep deprivation. I don't know if there is a solid rule for this, but maybe look at nightmare spell (if PF has it). I'd houserule something like DC10 Will save for 24 hours without sleep, with the Will save repeating every subsequent 4 hours at +1 DC. After 48 hours, increase it by +2 per hour.

Something like that. Those that fail the save begin to misremember things or suffer from auditory and visual hallucinations, starting small and innocuous (water dripping...this works best if several party members have failed).

Crit fails result in 1d4+1 rounds of confusion during which the character appears to be doing nothing, but, in the character's mind, they are interacting with their hallucination.

Now, if you want further mindscrew, have some evil jerk be around that is invisible or something (evil fairies ftw), and who does stuff to make some of the hallucinations seem real.

If you are looking for more haunted forest type stuff, I'd advise a couple of primitive sound effects, if you can. Try to get everyone around the table quiet (maybe start speaking in a hushed, hard-to-hear tone), then add in a thumping sound (shoe removed from foot hitting table leg), rustling leaves (a paper bag crumpling), or maybe a midi off the web of an owl hooting. You'd be surprised how much a bit of atmospherics can change the tone.

If no one takes it seriously (as may happen around many tables), then drop it and toss a very challenging encounter at the party, with waves, continuing until the tension among the players is high. Then, when they are catching their breath, try the sound effects again.:smallwink: