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On 1/15/2023 at 6:19 AM, werecorpse said:

I found a website that tracks buying power of $100 from 1887. It says that the slight deflation from 1887 went on for about 10 years before slight inflation returned such that the buying value of $100 in 1887 was about the same as it was in 1908. By 1919 the buying value of $100 was about halved (so $50) for the 1920’s until the end of that decade when due to deflation again it went up to maybe $75 in the early 30’s taking until mid 40’s to go back again to about half.

All this means I’ll use the core rulebook credit rating table and just divide by 2 to show 1890’s and then 5 to show pounds. Meaning a quite convenient divide the given numbers by 10 to reflect value in pounds. 

Awesome info.  Any way you can post a link?

Edit: Nevermind, I found it 🙂

8 hours ago, Mike M said:

Hi.

We are currently working on Cthulhu by Gaslight. We aim to release this sometime next year. 

Thanks

Thank you.

Has there been any mention of a real world timeline for Gaslight?  I've read/watched a number of mentions about it and several about the campaign for it.  But nothing about a estimate of when we'll see the 7th Ed Setting book itself. 

Sorry about taking so long to reply.  It has been a busy couple weeks at work.  I appreciate all the suggestions and links.  I have been able to find enough general arrangements to be able to start on a couple intelligent designs for RPG usable deck plans.  I really really like the style that Chaosium has been using recently for ship layouts. Adding to the various existing plans like the one svensson pointed out I'm the CoC box, I now have a plan. 

Now if I can get my minds eye onto a drawing.

Thanks all.

7 hours ago, AlHazred said:

Propnomicon had a link to a site that hosted ship deckplans, but it seems to be gone; it might show up in the Wayback Machine. Anyway, the Propnomicon post can be found here: http://propnomicon.blogspot.com/2016/09/classic-era-ship-deckplans.html and there are a few sample deckplans linked, including one for an 1825 cargo ship.

Thank you 🙂

Those are great for references. 

I don't think I will find exactly what I looking for the table.  But I definitely have enough samples and ideas to make one of my own.

Now for the difficult task of getting my mental picture onto paper...or onto the computer I guess.

17 hours ago, svensson said:

A simple solution to the passenger deck is to simply add another deck to midship wheel tower.

Another solution is to use partial deck plans... isolate the bridge deck, the passenger deck, the engineering deck, and a cargo hold. That way you don't need a full and complete deck plan where all the stairwells match up and everything is perfect.

BTW, fellow Washingtonian here. I'm down in Tacoma /Lakewood. And the forest fire smoke could lay off a bit, eh?

My plan was to make a general plan at the detail level of the passenger ship in Pulp Cthulhu and then make sub maps of the various critical locations with greater detail.  They will (I hope) be large enough to read but far too small for miniatures.  I have had many scifi deck plans printed out ion 11x17 sheets and they work great at the table. I know many people are addicted to mini's, but for games that are not non-munchkin hack n' slashes such as CoC and STA, they are more of a deterrent.  I have found the game runs smoother and better if the players can see enough detail to make informed plans without being too bogged down in counting distance for everything.

I'm way up in Smokey Point (just north of Marysville).  Except for that first couple days we haven't seen much of anything from the fires up here.  Here is hoping that things get cleaned up without too much damage.  Someone was lighting fires in the I-5 medium between the Stanwood exit and Mount Vernon just before the fires broke out which suddenly stopped about the time the fire out past Gold Bar started.  We were speculating if they might be connected.  The only real conclusion we came to was the general stupidity out there. 

1 hour ago, kross said:

You might also check out Quentin Bauer's latest Raiders of R'lyeh supplement, From the Tideless Sea, currently with a day and half left on Kickstarter.

Gah..... you made me spend money...... 

Not what I was looking for, but still worth backing as a resource.

I always wondered why we have a zillion maps for inns, taverns, manors and so on because they are locations.  But as soon as we say "ship" we get nothing.  In an RPG a ship is just like an Inn, it is a location that the PCs wander around in. 

Oh well, I guess I am going to have to try to create my own.  At least we are heading toward winter and the nights are getting longer.

2 hours ago, svensson said:

As you say, to the unprofessional eye there isn't a lot of difference in merchant steamers. I have a thought might... maybe?... help a bit.  Have you thought of looking up World War Two Liberty Ships? You know, the quickly built merchant ships that the US churned out by the hundreds to replace those lost to U-Boats?

Not a bad idea.  I have a couple partial deck plans for one, but the Altair is a smaller and already has passenger staterooms in the design that go well with an adventure with investigators.  I appreciate the idea. 

I am planning a Halloween one shot using CoC circa 1890.  I am using Gaslight 6th, Hudson & Brand and Down Darker Trails for CoC source material. Though I sure would like to get an official 7th Ed Gaslight book and character sheet 😉. 

Anyway, I am looking for a deckplan for a period iron hulled steamer along the line of the MV Altair.  While there were many seagoing iron hulled merchant steamers built starting in the late 1880's, I cannot find any legible deck plans.  The vast majority of ones i have found were scanned in with low enough resolution you cannot read the writing.  The Altair plans I found are one of the rare exceptions, but it is a little larger than the norm at 435 feet in length and a 59 foot beam and is post WW2.  To be honest there is not too much difference in the internal arraignments of small steamers from 1880 all the way through the 1950's. 

The big issue is finding legible deck plans for merchant steamers.  Passenger liners galore, but nada for a merchanter.

Note: I am fully prepared to buy a good deck plan designed for use in RPG's if I can find one.  I have found a couple passenger liner ones that are pretty good on DriveThru and the one in Pulp Cthulhu is the perfect style.  But all the deck plans I have found for merchanters have been bad.  No research or even a peek at a ships layout.  I'm not looking for life like perfection, but I do expect at least 5 minutes of research.

Anyway, if you know of any good prospects please let me know.  I am going to try to make a gaming version using CC3, but I don't know if I will be able to be done before Halloween.  "I don't know" will probably be "I can't get done". 

I tend to run a lot of One Shots at area FLGS and for the last year or so I've also gone back to running them at Cons.

While I run other horror games in addition to CoC I use the same yard stick for all of them. 

1) I only run horror games for Adults, no minors at the table. 

2) I run horror, not a social interaction romance/relationship game.  The object is the horror situation, not acting out a 3 hour tea party.

3) I populate the NPC cast based on the time historical period.  The NPC cast is not there to allow arguments about morality through the modern lens.  The NPC cast is to support the horror by helping players immerse themselves in the period.

4) Horror is horror.  Sanitizing horror turns it into a scary story on Goosebumps.

Make up your own guidelines and be right up front with everyone at the table, if they don't feel it is for them they don't have to play. 

And that is not just to be mean, it is needed for the modern gaming environment.

At a Con I make sure the "adult" and "horror" is emphasized on the sign up sheets.  This is all because of an incident from a few years ago that almost made be give up on cons all together.

On 8/31/2021 at 12:34 AM, Nick Brooke said:

now lists 599 titles

Holy BatCthulhu Batman!!!

Now that is something. 

And thanks again for the catalog. especially the excel version. Being able to filter has fast become the only way to be able to find items in the time period you like to play.  

I really wish I could read Korean 🧐  Such a long list of intriguing titles.

You'll find that there is not too much difference tramps freighters, cargo liners and passenger ships from 1900ish thru the 1940's if you steer away from the juggernauts of cutting edge tech.  Most of the common vessels that were more readily available were not as flashy. 

For an immediate reference, do you have Pulp Cthulhu 7th?  It has a very well done RPG passenger ship set in 1931 for the scenario, but is easily fits for any far east liner of the 20's.

I also have a doc about Tramp Steamers that is marked as being "Complied by Greentongue" that is a very good overview for RPG's.  I also have two pages of deckplans and a couple pictures of the ship used as the documents reference, SS Semiramis.  Once you have the title they are easy to find or if you have an email address I can send them.  

I'll look through my various deckplans and floorplans to see what I have that I am free to share.  I have bought a ton of them and they are all currently mixed on my harddrive.

4 hours ago, Aerinyes said:

A never-ending struggle for the poor abused Keeper is the search for existing floorpans for scenarios. Developing my own is prohibited by both time and talent. Recently I've been struggling with finding usable maps of a luxury steamship, although frankly there can never be too many excellent maps of just about any structure. Any ideas for sources?

I have spent a lot of time hunting down and location deck plans.  Of course that doesn't mean I have found and lot of usable deckplans.

But first.  What is your definition of "luxury steamship"?   It is a rather generic term that can be applied to a very wide range of vessels from the 1800's thru the 1950's.  River craft to ocean going.   

Don't forget that there are goldmines of great ideas for games during other timeperiods besides the 20's.  Some covered by CoC products, but a lot of material and ideas can be mined from adjacent games such as ToC and Slasher Flick. 

2 hours ago, Cloud64 said:

I'm glad you enjoyed it, but it seems this a marmite mechanic. Having played using it in Star Wars Adventures, we universally loathed it. It puts a faff in between rolling the die and the result. You roll the die, gain some momentum (or already have some in a shared pool) and then have to faff about deciding what to spend it on or whether to save it for another player's action where it might be better used. It slowed everything down for us. The fundamental mistake it makes is breaking the tension of the die roll - usually you modify the target and then roll and get an instant resolution. If there is anything to be done at that stage, I don't think it should be any more than a reroll. 

We also found our GM couldn't help but build up a large pool of doom points which, by his own admittance, he could've flattened us with if he was so inclined  

I concede that if everyone is familiar with the momentum options it would flow more smoothly, but given momentum spend options also vary by context, that's a lot of overhead.

The 2d20 odds are pretty much incalculable on the fly as well,  and it's nice to have some idea of how successful you're likely to be before committing to an action.  

Dear Chaosium, please don't touch that mechanic with a barge pole. Genuinely a deal breaker for me, it's not something you can house rule out.

Dear Chaosium,

The momentum system used in the 2d20 Conan and 2d20 Star Trek Adventures (STA) actually works great and really drives the cinematic action in Conan.  The adjusted version in STA works great as well and can actually make engineering and scientific research take on an exiting tone. 

When we first played Conan there was an initial learning curve, but once got the hang of it.  Or in other words dropped our paranoia about out PC's getting hurt, it got great.  I don't understand how the GM was able to accumulate a very large Doom Pool, unless he didn't realize the spend requirements. 

I'll admit I play with role players as opposed to a Roll Players so the idea of stopping play to analyze the exact percentages prior to every action never crossed our minds.   I've played Conan 2d20 as both player and GM, and if you actually PLAY the game the action is fast and furious.  And leans pretty heavily in the PC's favor, they are larger than life heroes after all. 

STA also is a great game and one of the few that succeeded in making non-combat roles actually fun. 

I have no doubt that Cloud64 has had a bad encounter with 2d20.  But for many people that grok it, it is fantastic and their Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20 version looks like it will be another great game.  

Anyway, before condemning the system, take another shot at playing it.  Perhaps with an experienced GM.    Experienced in 2d20 that is 😉

Must be worse than I thought.  Literally no one has an opinion and there is actually no way to contact the KS without actually pledging.

I guess I'll keep my money.

So I saw this mentioned in another thread and went to kickstarter to read about it.

Does anyone have any real info on this?  Mostly about content.

I have been burned by products purporting to be about ships and the sea and then get ones that throw some terms around but basically give a 6 years olds rendition of the ships and sea part.  CoC doesn't really have anything for Age of Sail so I am hoping this will maybe be something.   But before I back it, I need to know something about it. 

I found it very odd for this issue to come up.  The only time combat has become primary in the games I have run is when the were expected to.  Down Darker Trails, Delta Green and Actung! Cthulhu.  I am not familiar with most of the adventures you listed and never ran F&J so I may just have been lucky and dodged the bullet.

Sons of the Singularity have put out two supplements that I have.

The first was The Sassoon Files for Call of Cthulhu/GUMSHOE that takes place in 1920's Shanghai.

The second was Journal d’Indochine for Call of Cthulhu that takes place in 1920's Vietnam.

I am curious on the actual content type.  99% of RPG ship rules tend to demand the publishers be broken in court and banned from gaming for eternity. 

Hopefully this product will be an adventure and not another failure for ship rules.

2 hours ago, SAVeira said:

Believe this is what you are thinking of:  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/singularity-sons/journal-dindochine/

Backed it.Just got the PDFs and think on track to get printed copies in the next month or two.

1 hour ago, sgtscott658 said:

Yup, I was able to get on the pre order list, got both the book and pdf.

Good books.  I have their other one as well. 

2 hours ago, Psullie said:

Not knowing is a huge part of horror.

Key point.  "Not knowing" and its close relative "misunderstanding the clue" are very key to a great horror game.

When running an RPG, especially horror/mystery, I have no issue taking one or more aside to impart info that the rest of the players do not know at the time.  Most role-players will already understand if not expect it.  And the rest are usually good with it once you explain the reasoning. 

I usually go over things like this in the games “session zero”.

And if a player cannot handle restricted information flow, and there are many, then perhaps horror/mystery is not a genre that they should play. 

I know that there are D&D players out there that honestly feel they should be able to read the entire adventure and the full details of the encounters just like the GM just in case the GM makes a mistake.  I don’t think they really understand the concept of role-playing, but I do know they exist. 

But for this kind of game, some kind of “secret” communication with players is almost a requirement. 

20 hours ago, Sid Vicarious said:

Stygian Fox has a 7e license and has several modern-day offerings. 

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/browse/pub/2834/Stygian-Fox/subcategory/5060_32334/Call-of-Cthulhu-Modern-Era

"The Things We Leave Behind" can be run as a campaign. "Fear's Sharp Little Needles" is worth a look too.

 

Excellent products, I've run some of the scenarios in them.

2 hours ago, Darius West said:

By and large, I have generally found in Call of C'thulhu, that if you give players any sort of power, they tend to use it extremely foolishly and wind up killing themselves with it, even something as apparently harmless as Divination.  You probably won't even have to try particularly hard.

🤣

You made me snort my drink when I read this. 😂

Hmmm....  I'll have to admit that while I have played CoC on and off since 1st edition and have only seriously returned since 7th edition and gaslight has been one of the time periods that really have my interest I have never even heard of Golden Dawn.   But I have Hudson & Brand as well as several other Stygian Fox products and they are very well done.  If they are the ones that are putting out the new edition of Gaslight, or their creative team are collaborating on it then I believe that it will be a great product. 

And prices on the collectable market do not necessarily reflect actual quality. 

In this case I cannot really give an opinion on GD's actual quality, but I know of many old RPG products that commanded high ($200 to $500) prices due to age, condition and rarity that were actually poor games or supplements. 

Once again, since I have never seen GD I can't speak to its quality, but H&B is a great product and I can speak to that.