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The World's Most Interesting Cultist


Old Man Henerson

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Hi guys. I am working on a game using the Big Golden Book, but I have always found the Cthulhu mythos fascinating, and my game is heavenly inspired by the mythos. Anyways, I have at least three groups of cultists to work on before I begin my game so, looking for inspiration, I would love to hear about the most interesting and unique cults and cultists that you and your players have encountered in your games and what you liked about them.

Thanks :)

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I like how they handle luck in CoC7 and the fact you could be dying instead of dead when at 0 or less HP....

But anyway, I am curious to learn about your creative story writing effort! :)

I'll bet it will make more sense... Mmm.. come to think of it... The Cthulhu writer are horror writer (which is often only vaguely rationale, so, there is that)

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12 hours ago, Old Man Henerson said:

Hi guys. I am working on a game using the Big Golden Book, but I have always found the Cthulhu mythos fascinating, and my game is heavenly inspired by the mythos. Anyways, I have at least three groups of cultists to work on before I begin my game so, looking for inspiration, I would love to hear about the most interesting and unique cults and cultists that you and your players have encountered in your games and what you liked about them.

Thanks :)

One cult my players liked was a group of teenagers who had no idea what they were doing. They were cultist wannabes, but still managed to nearly end the world... They were drug addicts, cowards, and utter morons, but their antics were good comedic relief.

Until they weren't.

 

There was also a "cult" which basically believed creativity was the root of all evil and had a ritual they would use to drain its members of this powerful force, which a homebrew Great Old One was all to happy to devour.

Both of these were modern day, but could be repurposed for any game you had in mind. Hope that helped:)

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-Voice of the Legion

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I'm inspired actually by the title of the thread,

I'm picturing a a cultist modeled after the Dos Equis "world's most interesting man" commercial.

This guy has been in various cults all over the world.  He's had cults shut down by Delta Green, by The Laundry, by stick-up-their-ass New Englanders, by the Church, by rival Cults, by failed rituals consuming the entire priesthood.  He has looked away just in time from more Sanity-Blasting-Horrors than anyone else has even heard of.

At the end of the day, he only asks one thing...

 

Drink responsibly, my friend.

 

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C'es ne pas un .sig

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11 hours ago, Lloyd Dupont said:

I like how they handle luck in CoC7 and the fact you could be dying instead of dead when at 0 or less HP....

How do they handle luck in CoC? The only experience I have with it is from the Big Golden Book.

11 hours ago, Lloyd Dupont said:

But anyway, I am curious to learn about your creative story writing effort! :)

I'll bet it will make more sense... Mmm.. come to think of it... The Cthulhu writer are horror writer (which is often only vaguely rationale, so, there is that)

Yeah. What draws my interest is the cool science fiction and cosmic monster aspect of the mythos, horror and nihilism is just not my thing. Terrible Writing Advice on YouTube, sums up my thoughts about the mythos quite well.  When dealing with Cosmic Horror entities, both in my book and the game I am working on, I much prefer the tone set by the Lord of The Rings movies. The world is coming to an end, yet the characters still have hope, and will march out to meet the unending hoards of evil regardless of the cosmic odds stacked against them.

As for my cultists, there are three, or technically four, groups that the PCs will be dealing with.

The first group is The Golden Order, based in the Golden Empire in what once was Eastern Asia. They are followers of Malgud, The Golden Emperor, (my version of the King in Yellow) and are a very strict and ritualistic cult. They are often very bureaucratic, and must follow all a dizzying array of formal codes and laws set up by the Emperor when they do their work. When they are not being tied down by their own red tape, they are quite brutal to any who oppose them or their god. If you can outmaneuver them in their laws and codes however, you can easily send them into confusion and weakness.

Next is The Black Star, who live in The Land of the Black Sun and serve Dux, The Black Pharaoh. (My version of Nyarlathotep) They are an order of very cunning and cruel, much like their god, they prefer to taunt their enemies and subjects by letting them think they are succeeding only to crush them with overwhelming force at the right moment. Their rites and rituals to get in are brutal and terrifying, only the strongest are able to make it through. Once they do however, they get to live with unimaginable wealth, power, and decadence, making them a little too haughty and overconfident in their power. tricking them or doing the unexpected can cause them to start acting rashly and erratically, giving enemies the perfect opportunity to rout them. 

Finally, there is The Sea Devils. The vile and insane followers of Gorgalor, Dark Lord of The Green Seas. (My version of Cthulhu) Like their god, they hate all beautiful things, and do everything in their power to spread their master's dark spell of corruption to the world. Through dark and cosmic powers, they turn the sees into slimy green waters and the islands into swampy and moldy wastes. Their greatest power given to them however, is to transform and mutate people into human-fish hybrids known as the Culga. They greatly enjoy tormenting their enemies and subjects, and fight with reckless abandon when the go to war with humans tribes who resist them from their island fortresses. What they fear the most however, much like their lord, is those who do not fear them. Anyone who's will proves too strong for their magics, even if they are a child, fills them with terror, and should that person use the powers of light, they they can easily be routed.

The technical fourth cultist group is the grey aliens. Who have followed the mother of these gods, Dalmd-Ka the eldritch planet eating abomination, from planet to planet to worship her.  For eons, the greys have served as servitors and scouts for the planet eater, finding suitable planets to devour. it was their scouts who found the Earth in the ancient past and set up a satellite to watch over the Earth until it's life force was ripe. They are fanatically devoted to Dalmd-Ka and consider any affront or resistance to her utter blasphemy.  They view all other beings as potential food for their god, and have no qualms with dissecting and killing these "lesser beings." Their technology and psychic powers are quite advanced and they use them always with deadly proficiency, but they are quite fearful due to their fragile nature and any aggressive shows of force or power are enough to send them fleeing.

That is it for my cultist groups. This actually inspired me more than I though, I had actually not put much effort into the cults yet. So all this new material will help me a lot. Thank you. :D

I hope you enjoyed the ideas, most of the low levels members of these groups are medieval in their tech level, but the higher up members posses wired alien technologies from the greys and the beings known as The Artificers. They also posses mobile tripod walkers and eldritch versions of Symbeotes like Venom which act like a kind of mech for them to fight the players with, who will also be armed with mechs.

I have a little more info on the story of my game over in this thread here.

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1 hour ago, Dethstrok9 said:

One cult my players liked was a group of teenagers who had no idea what they were doing. They were cultist wannabes, but still managed to nearly end the world... They were drug addicts, cowards, and utter morons, but their antics were good comedic relief.

Until they weren't.

Ha Ha! :D I can just see it now, a cult full of Shaggies "Hey dude, you want to, like, summon Cthulhu man?" Granted, if Dread Lord Shaggy wants to summon Cthulhu, it can mean nothing good for the beloved Old One.  That is a cool idea though. it would be very fun to go toe to toe with this group. Imagine if you were some kind of tactical anti-mythos force and you almost lost the world to a bunch of stoners.

1 hour ago, Dethstrok9 said:

There was also a "cult" which basically believed creativity was the root of all evil and had a ritual they would use to drain its members of this powerful force, which a homebrew Great Old One was all to happy to devour.

Both of these were modern day, but could be repurposed for any game you had in mind. Hope that helped:)

What a "creative" idea for a cult, ha ha. :D That is one of the more interesting cults I have actually heard of for this game. The only down side for the game would be that it might be fairly easy for the PCs to defeat since tactics usually requires a bit of creative thinking.  Thanks for the ideas. The game I am working on now is a mostly science fiction/post apocalypse Campaign, so some of it might make in to the game in weird and unusual ways.

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1 hour ago, g33k said:

I'm inspired actually by the title of the thread,

I'm picturing a a cultist modeled after the Dos Equis "world's most interesting man" commercial.

This guy has been in various cults all over the world.  He's had cults shut down by Delta Green, by The Laundry, by stick-up-their-ass New Englanders, by the Church, by rival Cults, by failed rituals consuming the entire priesthood.  He has looked away just in time from more Sanity-Blasting-Horrors than anyone else has even heard of.

At the end of the day, he only asks one thing...

 

Drink responsibly, my friend.

 

I thought the title was a good idea. :D  I imagine running a campaign around this guy, or even the exploits of the Dos Equis man himself, would be quite the hilarious adventure.

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8 hours ago, Old Man Henerson said:

How do they handle luck in CoC? The only experience I have with it is from the Big Golden Book.

I haven't played BRP in a few month now (doing RevolutionD100) and checking BRP.. mm... it might be different.. I can see luck is you use for ordinary event as well....

I was thinking luck as a life saver.

In CoC7 luck increase like an ordinary skill, you can increase it after an adventure (using check mark or xp, your mileage). And then you can consume it, each % consumed (i.e. skill permanently lowered) to alter a dice roll by the same amount...
but hey it can increase after an adventure again like any skill....

I like the clear and deterministic slow rate and increase and how much it cost! ;)

I guess one could add any sort of extra use like luck armor (cost to be determined...)

And still use like in BRP 

The only thing I will clearly change is the starting value is 3d6x5. I would prefer something like 20+POW

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1 hour ago, Lloyd Dupont said:

I haven't played BRP in a few month now (doing RevolutionD100) and checking BRP.. mm... it might be different.. I can see luck is you use for ordinary event as well....

I was thinking luck as a life saver.

In CoC7 luck increase like an ordinary skill, you can increase it after an adventure (using check mark or xp, your mileage). And then you can consume it, each % consumed (i.e. skill permanently lowered) to alter a dice roll by the same amount...
but hey it can increase after an adventure again like any skill....

I like the clear and deterministic slow rate and increase and how much it cost! ;)

I guess one could add any sort of extra use like luck armor (cost to be determined...)

And still use like in BRP 

The only thing I will clearly change is the starting value is 3d6x5. I would prefer something like 20+POW

That sounds like a good way to run it. I have not read the book in a while, but it does sound sort of like the fate point system included in the book. A mechanic where you can build up and use luck sounds like a neet way to play the game. You are also right, you would need to increase the luck score, though since luck is derived to the POW score, you might need to make two different rolls.

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