So what's the score with Cthulhu Eternal ?

[Agentorange]

I was over at DTRPG looking at Runequest stuff and decided to have a bit of a stooge around and came across Cthulhu Eternal. , which as far as I can see is CoC in all bar name. same % based mechanics etc etc. I thought Chaosium had the licence for Cthulhu based RPG's ?

Can anybody enlighten me as to what the situation is here ?

[harunmushod]

H P Lovercraft’s work is in the public domain as he died more than 70 years ago, so the core Mythos stuff can be used by anyone, but much of the work in the game comes from individual writers who are either still alive or died less than 70 years ago, so those aspects are still subject to copyright. As far as I know, game mechanics are not copyrightable (but I think that’s possibly an oversimplification of the law in this area). 

[SDLeary]

7 hours ago, Agentorange said:

I was over at DTRPG looking at Runequest stuff and decided to have a bit of a stooge around and came across Cthulhu Eternal. , which as far as I can see is CoC in all bar name. same % based mechanics etc etc. I thought Chaosium had the licence for Cthulhu based RPG's ?

Can anybody enlighten me as to what the situation is here ?

Its based on the Delta Green engine, also known as The Misery Engine. The published game Apocthulhu, also from Cthulhu Reborn, is also based on this. 

Differences off the top...

No Size

Bonds

Sanity mechanic has Stress Types; Violence, Helplessness, and Unnatural

Automatic weapons fire and explosives are different. They have a Lethality rating; its listed as a percentage, and if (on a hit) you roll under that, the target automatically perishes. These percentages tend to be low-ish, between five and 20% IIRC.

And as @harunmushod states, much (but not all yet?) Lovecraft's work in in the Public Domain. This is how other games such as Trail of Cthulhu, The Yellow King, the afore-mentioned Delta Green and Apocthulhu, and others can exist.

SDLeary

[10baseT]

Those guys put out some great stuff. I picked up both Apocthulhu hard backs and am very pleased. It's d100 so if you don't want to use their rules, it's very easy to use the CoC 7e or Delta Green if you want. I also love their Convicts & Cthulhu and their Tickets to Leave which are CoC 7e.

Edited October 13, 2022 by 10baseT

[Mike M]

On 10/9/2022 at 9:23 AM, Agentorange said:

I was over at DTRPG looking at Runequest stuff and decided to have a bit of a stooge around and came across Cthulhu Eternal. , which as far as I can see is CoC in all bar name. same % based mechanics etc etc. I thought Chaosium had the licence for Cthulhu based RPG's ?

Can anybody enlighten me as to what the situation is here ?

Hi, Chaosium has exclusive gaming licenses with numerous authors who have created content within the “Cthulhu Mythos”, both with living authors and the estates of others. This is why such creations feature in our game books. The works of H. P. Lovecraft himself are in the public domain, so others can make use of his creations. Of course, over 40+ years, Chaosium has also created much original content within the Cthulhu Mythos too, which is not public domain.

Creators wishing to make use of Chaosium creations or those created by the authors we license from, can do so under license from Chaosium (see our website for details on licensing).

Non-licensed games are free to use Lovecraft’s creations and their own.