Ep 5 - Play Results

[morganhua]

Total Time for Episode Five: 2.5 hrs.

In Ep 4, the party had split up into two groups, but after running them separately, both groups did the identical thing and headed towards Cobb's Corner and then skirted it going south along the river, so I let the split party join up.

 

I let them run into "The Stalemate" and at one point a PC was going to attack the Farmer, but by then the Children summoned a Dark Young and ordered the Dark Young to attack the Farmer and his son.  At that point, the PCs just ran away.

 

I then had them run into "Alexandru Cuzra’s Last Stand" where they found Cuzra and they finished destroying the standing stones for him.

 

I then did "The Test" and they actually saved the little girl and her father.  They tried to persuade Dr Matherson to climb into the basement (she had the highest climb skill), but a PC critically failed and Dr Matherson was convinced it was a trap.  So, the injured PCs tried to climb down and fell into the basement and took some damage even when I gave them a bonus die after one PC made it down.  One PC went unconscious.  So, I let them pile debris to climb out.  Dr Matherson's First Aid brought both the father and the unconscious PC back to consciousness.

 

They then continued away from Cobb's Corner, braving hurricane winds, and I had them run into a Dark Young road block.  The trees weren't fallen across the road in the storm, but were standing on it.  They skirted that and I had them run into a Red Sign barrier.  The PCs risked taking damage, rushing past it, and after a PC and the girl's father fell unconscious, the PCs rescued them, they made it out of that area.  With Dr Matherson rendering first aid again to bring the unconscious back to consciousness.

 

Once outside of the storm area, I gave them a spot hidden with a penalty die to spot Shub-Niggurath arriving at Cobb's Corner.

Two PCs spotted the arrival of Shub-Niggurath, but made their San checks.  One gained an indefinite insanity.

Dr Matherson failed (perm insanity) and ran back to Cobb's Corner.  They tried to stop her, but failed.

 

In the end, they all took the 1d10+5 San loss for not trying to save Cobb's Corner.  2 PCs gained indefinite insanities from the San loss.

 

I think the issue is there's not a strong enough reason to enter Cobb's Corner.  Also two of the PCs were students with no combat skills.  Two were FOC hired gunmen who were the driving force for "The Stalemate," "Alexandru Cuzra's Last Stand," "The Test," and rescuing the unconscious PCs.  If it were left to the students, they would have just ran away from every situation.  The FOC gunmen were braver and more curious and most of the PCs were down to 3 hit points when they ran into the Red Sign (which does 1d3 and then 1 point further away), so there was a good chance they would have gone unconscious trying to pull their compatriots away from it.

A player said maybe if a town person came to the PCs to ask for their help, they might have entered Cobb's Corner, but spotting the destruction there, there was no reason to enter the town.  Knowing how hard it was to hurt the Dark Young and seeing the slaughter of the FOC military camp told them there was no reason to chance any type of meeting with the Dark Young.

Two players did mention Ep 5 reminded them of "The Madman" from the CoC 6th core book and "Alone Against the Flames" the CoC 7th solo adventure.