Running The Derelict

[joggiwagga]

Did you run the Free RPG Day scenario?  How'd it go?

I had four players (plus someone who signed up but decided to just watch) - an author, athlete, actor, and engineer, and ran the yacht captain and first mate as (disposable) npcs.  My biggest challenge was only having 2 hours to run it, which meant limited time to build up the horror or draw them around.

At the start of the game 2 players when asked to describe their characters and the sorts of accessories they'd wear two said they had some sort of silver.  A third didn't specify, but a stealth luck roll on my part decided yes, she had silver earrings.

Players investigated the superstructure, got freaked out, decided to go back to their ship ( was a great time for them to hear horrific screams of pain and some banging from the yacht), found the helm and engine destroyed and the NPCs dead and decided the best thing to do was to lock themselves into their own engine room, get it started and moving even w/out the ability to steer.  Well, the engineer did her thing well, so sure, it could start moving, at which point one of them went back up to the deck.  At this point we had a half an hour to finish, and with the amount of damage the monster could do, I wanted to avoid a straight up slaughter of the players who trapped themselves without any equipment.  I quietly asked the player who went up to the deck (his character was in very deliberate denial that they were still in danger and was the single player who never had any silver on, nor picked up any silver) if he minded me flat out assassinating him.  He was totally down for it.

A second player said he'd come up to the deck, and decided he'd lost his silver watch.  So he got to witness his friend being knocked to the deck and something invisible knock down and take bites out of his friend.  That was fun.

I let the players at least attract the monster to their yacht engine room with the bloody remnants of their friend and captain, but with no locking in or more to really trap, especially when the yacht caught on fire and then exploded, the two still with silver got to see it dive into the water after them.

Everyone had fun, and it was great to see what assumptions they made.

[Cthulhus_Voicemail]

I'm running it in a week and a half. I'm looking forward to seeing how it goes!