klecser

In the adventure "Mansion of Madness" from the Mansions of Madness adventure collection, there is a strange aspect of the consequences and rewards section.  We are two parts through and I'm worried about the Crater Mansion encounter.

The first paragraph reads:

"If the investigators rescue Andrew Keetling, award 2D6 Sanity points: if they also kill Josephine or otherwise prevent her from enacting the Assumption of Night rituals, it costs each investigator 2D4 Sanity points."

I simply do not understand this last part.  I suppose it makes sense that killing Garsetti when they could help try to redeem her would cost Sanity.  But why would STOPPING HER from conducting a ritual COST them Sanity?  It seems backwards to me.  You stop an arcane Cthuloid ritual, you get rewarded, not penalized.  Is the argument that because she wasn't able to complete the ritual The Thing Beyond The Void just transfers to Crater, so that is a "loss"?  It just seems like an awfully harsh penalty when most players are going to default to "stop the ritual."

I can only assume that this is an error because earlier in the adventure it says (referring to completion of the ritual): "Living through the night of terror costs each investigator 1D6 SAN, charged to them the morning after most of the horror is over. If the player characters are out of town by this time, the bloodbath makes headlines everywhere.  They read about it in the papers and lose 1D3 SAN when they realize they are at least partially at fault."

The other strange part of this investigation is that Crater and his children have armor of 8/10 and super strong attacks.  I can see how this wouldn't be a problem with experienced investigators with access to magic, but my players are neither.  This isn't a group that is going to appreciate a Gygaxian TPK and they are very investigation focused.  The investigation kind of "expects" the investigators to confront Crater, but that confrontation is basically completely unwinnable (Two 2D6 damage attacks per round for a Crater's Child?)  with an inexperienced/un-magicked party.  Clearly I should have read the stats more closely before starting them.  In what ways can I clue them in to the level of preparation needed?  I've prepped a bit for this with the attached newspaper article, which they will receive the morning after the Garsetti House encounter (they decided to stay an extra day to further explore the house after they rescued Keetling).  If they aren't taking the hint I can play up that Big Al and Chuckie the Rat were huge dudes and they seemed to be no match for whatever attacked them.  I've also thought about maybe Devlin showing up with one of his officers with shotguns.  As the text suggests, perhaps Crater's children focus on capturing, rather than attacking and they only attack on Crater's orders?  Lastly, I could just nerf the damage of Crater's Children to 1D6 damage.   What would you do if you had an inexperienced/unmagicked Party?

1 minute ago, KeeperXav said:

lucky

Debatable. 😜

1 hour ago, MOB said:

The print version will consist of a slipcase containing Vol I and II hardback books, plus a carton containing the new Masks keeper screen, 1925 calendar, and 96 pages of handouts and maps.

I thought that 130 USD was a good value with just two books and a slipcase.

WELL DONE CHAOSIUM! 

Hold up.  Are you saying that the physical Masks slipcase will come with a new Keeper Screen or that you just get a PDF of the standard Keeper screen with the PDF?

There is a history in the game of published material including whatever occupation name the author wants using whatever skills they felt were warranted. This is in the spirit of Call of Cthulhu.  Note the text in the "Sample Occupations" section of page 40 of the 7th Keeper's Book: "Use these as a guide when creating occupations not listed here."

I realize that there are a lot of role-players out there that are "by-the-bookers."  I personally find that everyone's experience is better when you let players be as creative as possible (with permission about specific requests from Keeper).

I'm ahead of MOB posting, but I just want to throw out there that the PDF length is 666 pages and I just think that fact is spectacular.  I'm venturing that it was not deliberate, but fantastic just the same.

It is now brutally obvious why this was split into two books. 

The first book alone is over 370 pages! WHAT!?!

If anyone watching hasn't signed up for the email list, I recommend that you do.  PDF of Table of Contents plus some art.  Well worth it.  This will be a collector's item as well as "the" definitive version of this classic campaign.

The transport concept is possible but the paper reads as if they just anthropomorphically selected their favorite alien-lookin' creature and cherry-picked some reasoning. Makes me doubt the efficacy of that journal.

If I am choosing between Doors to Darkness, Nameless Horrors and Petersen's Abominations, which would you recommend?

My criteria (in order):

1) Inspirational/mineable material for adapting to other/my own adventures (although I do run published adventures as well).

2) I look for good maps/handouts as a critical aspect, especially if they could be adapted or ported to other adventures out of context.

3) Prefer Lovecraft Country settings in the 1920s, but if Abominations has a lot of mineable stuff I might reconsider.

I don't run Pulp, so Two-Headed Serpent is iffy to me, unless you think the concepts in it warrant ownership, even for a Classic group.

So, to sum up, even if I don't run an era/sub-system, mineable ideas/handouts is the most important thing to me.

Great find Eric!

I think I see the distinction you're making.  In other words: Does the overarching metagame of Call of Cthulhu railroad players into certain skills?

https://www.rpgtablefinder.com/

Looks pretty new but as it generates ground swell it might be more useful.

Most Cthulhu Investigations take place in every day buildings/towns.  So, I don't think the way tiles have been used in most games would serve Cthulhu as well.  And I'm thinking about a tile being an entire room.  CoC would benefit from room part tiles.  Even down to furniture.  I imagine Cthulhu tiles being short wall segments and furniture tiles, giving the Keeper the freedom to build whatever rooms in buildings they want.

All highly deserving.  

Was Down Darker Trails eligible in this award cycle?  That is a fantastic product too.

I just ordered the Grimoire and am excited to receive it.  I hesitated at first because I think I was approaching it from a "DND" mindset. Damage/action-focused in other words.  A few days ago I was reading the extra spells included at the back of Miskatonic University and realized that there are huge amounts of adventure ideas/hooks that can be mined from spells.  So, I said to myself that I definitely needed to pick up the Grimoire after all.

Call of Cthulhu only gives bonuses to specific occupations if it says so in the Occupation description.  The game assumes that if you want a "typical" circus performer, you are going to invest in the skills that you deem matches that archetype.  Pulp Cthulhu contains a lot of options for more "action-style" gaming that tends to feature class bonuses.

As to Dodge, you can spend Personal skill points on Dodge.  You can only spend Occupational Skill Points on Dodge if it is listed as an occupation skill or if you choose it as an occupation skill for occupations that list "one additional skill of your choice."

If you are familiar with Dungeons and Dragons (where most people enter the hobby), Call of Cthulhu works very differently.  Your CoC Investigator is a very ordinary person who has limitations as to what you can access.  You really have to pick and choose what you want to invest in in this game.  It's more "how can I get out of this?" than "how can I wreck this enemy?" If you want your game to be a little more DND-ish, Pulp Cthulhu might be more your cup of tea.  Of course, you can make whatever house rules you want for your game!

Worth noting that backing at even one dollar gets you the discount and counts toward the 4000 backers!

Here's my idea for merging the games: The grad students start as characters in a MU-set CoC game and the Investigators get to know them.  Craft a story around the basic premise of the board game.  At an apropos point of the RPG session, bust out the card game and have players play it in order to obtain vital clues or artifacts.  In some way, make grad student discards in the final round actual character deaths in the RPG, so that players have to decide whom to keep around.  Of course, you'd have to set them up so they aren't just disposable Kleenex grad students.  You might say that that is against the spirit of MU grad students.  😜

I don't think we should make the assumption that someone would TRY to go toe-to-toe with Mythos nasties.  The foes that most Investigators are most likely to succeed against are often quite common in the game: human minions.  If you tell someone "POW is useless" and a player dump stats it, they are really going to struggle.  You go from not being able to contend with Mythos creatures (never really possible to begin with), to not being able to shrug off a spell cast against you by a minion (was potentially avoidable until you dumped POW).

The original question was "What are critical skills for Investigators?"  The POW Characteristic has to be in the discussion, IMO.  If I had a nickel for every time a published or homebrew product asked an Investigator to make an opposed POW check/Resistance Table versus a human minion...  And given that it determines your Sanity score...  I mean, am I completely misinterpreting the mechanics of the game?  POW's relevance seems pretty big to me.

Same goes for DEX.  Against any serious threat, a good Dodge skill coupled with getting the hell out of there is usually your best option.  It actually surprises me that I don't see more people improving Dodge on Character creation.

I love, love, love my Switch, but this is exactly where the lower horsepower of the system hits me in my fandoms.  At least I get Resident Evil: Revelations.

I've heard some variation on what people consider the "Holy Trifecta" of CoC Skills, but mostly : Library Use, Spot Hidden/Listen, Dodge.  I think it really depends upon what you want to contribute to the party. 

I agree with all the examples Atgxtg said above.  Your investigation can really be positively influenced by one of the social skills.  And POW and INT are the most critical attributes for the game, IMO.

Bless those folks at Stygian.

Forum search results: 

6 hours ago, André Roy said:

Not sure about point 1.

For point 2,  IIRC, 24 (or 1/5 of 120) or below would be Extreme success. And Hard success would indeed be between 1/5 and 1/2 of your score.

You're right. That should have been a 1/5 value.  Edited.

I just want to verify with everyone that I am running this correctly.

If an NPC has a Power of 120, and their abilities call for opposed Power checks with players, the following are true:

1) They automatically get a Regular success on any roll (so long as they don't Fumble), because it is impossible to not roll below 120 on 1d100.

2) Any roll below 60 would be a Hard success, and 24 or below Extreme.

Correct?

As an educator, I can tell you that listening and observing are very different brain processes.  It really depends upon what flavor of an investigative game you want to play.  I can justify playing separate.  Others will prefer combined for Listen and Spot Hidden.

The long and short of all of your questions is this:  it's your game. House rule anything you want, so long as your players agree.