Spokky October Blog # 4

Happy Halloween Boils and Ghouls and this time lets take a look at some of the Classic styles of Horror and the games that fit them.

The most classic style of Horror is the Passive Victims or “Idiots in a cabin” horror. Usually it is a group of very pretty but very stupid teens who think a good idea is spending the weekend in that creepy old cabin in the woods. This never ends well for them.

While many movies follow this story, few of the Horror games do. Most Horror RPG's use the second method.

Reactive Investigators This is the X-files stile of Horror. The heroes are members of a underfunded under prepared nebulous organization who go out and investigate something spooky after the fact. Spooky old Pirate ghost, lets go check it out.

Most horror games use the Investigator style of play. The heroes work for “Some government agency” or Privet agency and find out about something horrible and go invigilate it.

And I would have got away with it to if not for you meddling kids.

his style of RPG is reflected in most of the Horror Games. Resident Evil, Silent hill, X-files, Ghost busters, Hijinks,Chill, Call of Cathulu, beyond the supernatural,M20 Horror,Hunter, MIB, Zombi Hunters, Bruise 13, Stalking the night fantastic, The list goes on.

In games like COC you really have no chance to Win, you just survive and do your best to slow the eventual awful stuff. While in more active participation games like Chill or Burrow 13 you actually have the ability to beat the monsters and win.

But for how long, how long.

The third style of Horror RPG is still relatively new and that is the World Of darkness,Supernatural, Vampire Diaries games where not only are you in conflict with Horror you are actually members of the Spooky population. From sexy soulful vampires to conflicted werwolf’s and pouty angels. This style of game was made famous by the World Of darkness/Vampire the masquerade games.

The creations of Ann rice and the Urban fantasy movement of the late 80's would have had us embracing the dark rather then fearing it.

No longer were the monsters the bad guys, now they were the heroes. With there own morals,back story and reasons to adventure.

The world of darkness/vampire the masquerade games and there many clones portrayed our Nightmares as heroes, things to be proud of not afraid of. LARP became a word, story telling diceles role playing became a thing. These games flooded the market, though most of them did not survive past the early 2000's.

Even today people still argue Team Jacob or Team Edward Well all you children of the night, I'm sorry but I am and will always be TEAM BUFFY! Horrible evil monsters are not something to be embraced, there are to be hunted down and staked.

Except for SPIKE, because he was cool.

Speaking of Buffy, that brings us to the nest type of Horror RPG. Lets hunt them down and kill them.

Games like DELTA GREEN and BUFFY would have us play thew roles of active hunters of the dark. No longer were investigators underfunded and under prepared Now the Players knew the dark existed,where they were hiding and had the skills and weaponry to hand those meddiling vampires there candy ass.

Thankfully no RPG's have yet to embrace the SAW style of Torture Porn horror films and most of today’s Spooky Movies are variations of the Hunted cabin/Idiots in the woods story. As for Horror RPG's on the market today>

They are all Zombie related Everywhere you look the Zombies have invaded our RPG's At least once every 3 months a new Zombi Survival RPG arrives-only to quickly vanish.

Despite our love of being scared, we tend to not like being in a Scarey Role Playing games As of today only a few RPG's of the Horror type have any staying power. The never ending juggernaut of Storytelling RPG's that is the World of darkness Line and call of Cthulhu style games. We see a new Zombie game but they seem to not have the staying power, maybe Zombies are overdone and its time to move on.

Personally I think the next big wave of Horror will be a throw back to the 1950's. Science gone wrong horror (planet of the apes) and Kiju horror (Godzilla).

That said SHARKANEDO IS THE BEST MOVI EVER! And I can not wait to play the SHARKANADO RPG!

So Kids, what type of scarey story will you dust off this week for your Halloween RPG?

Whatever it is, stay safe-stay sane. Have fun this Halloween and above all

Unpleasant dremes-MUWHAHHAHAH

Haloween Blog # 3. Toomb of Horrors

Good evening Boils and ghouls and welcome to another Fright Day Night Blog on ransom topics relating to the Horror genera in our Hobby.

This week I wanted to take a look at what is pretty much considered the best,hardest and scariest module of all time. TOOMB OF HORROES.(Dun,dun,dunnnnn)

S1 The Tomb of Horror's. No one knows where it is located, no one has ever survived it yet everyone has herd of it? How is that a thing?

Having run this adventure in it's many incarnations and played through it multiple time and even survived it-Once! I can say that for pure terror and horror it is not that Scary. The main fear in Tomb of Horrors is that either One of the many Traps will end your characters life or more frightening take away your characters stuff. Since Death in D&D is pretty much like to cold in our world-You get over it ! There are just so many ways to bring a Dead character back to life in D&DF that Death really is not that big a deal, but the prospect of the dungeon taking away all your characters stuff(Which it has the possibility of doing) now that is the main Fear.

Tomb of Horrors though quite deadly is not that Scary, in that there are no insistence in the Adventure where you encounter any of the defined tropes of a Scary Movie/Book.

While many of the Puzzles and traps are brilliant and the adventure it self is one of the best written, there is no actual story to the dungeon. You never really get an explanation as to who the demi Lich was, what situations led him to chose a life of un-death and why he built the Dungeon in the First place. Just to test his cleverness against any One seeking his Treasure, well if that was the point then why did the Lich leave things in the Dungeon that could actually end his un-life? There just is not enough Explanation behind the Adventure and in order to be a Truly Scarey Scenario there has to be a Story that captures the imagination of the audience and presents them with an atmosphere where they willingly suspend there disbelief.

If the Tomb has a Horror counterpart it would most likely be the Saw franchise. Clever evil all powerful Lillian creates a series of clever (And often ridicules) puzzles and traps for his victims, but each trap can supposedly be escaped?

The Tomb and the rest of the S series have been often copied but never matched. Even some of the rewrites of the Tomb are not as good as the original. There is a reason why tomb of Horrors is so well known. It is perhaps one of TSR/Mr Gygax's best works and it certainly is One of the best modules of all time. Every person playing D&D/Pathfinder deserves a chance to go through this Module once.

Its an awesome, nail biting fun run but Scarey, in the way Saw is scarey? Again the main threat to the Module is that a Character can die or more importantly lose there stuff!

Since Death in D&D is not that big a threat, the main fear of this module is that it can take away the characters stuff. Now that’s a concept that is truly horrible.

So there you have it kids, a Halloween look at the greatest D&D module of all time, S1 The Tomb of Horrors.

Perhaps you will be the One to survive the Traps of the Tomb and end the Lich's threat?

Or perhaps you will just be another Victim?

Either way, have a great weekend and

Unpleasant dreams...MUWAHAHHAHHAHA!

Haloween Fright Night Post # 2

Friday Night Frights: Pt 2: Call of Cathulu.

Good evening Boils and ghouls and welcome to another Rocktober episode of Fright day, where we use the Halloween excuse to look at Horror in Role Playing-Or just Horrible Role playing!
HA, that never gets old!

Tonight we take a look at the enduring legacy of Call of Cathulu and the general fascination with the tentacle lord.

As I have said before, I am the rare Geek who is not a fan of Ol' Squid face, but the impact the Writings of Mr Lovecraft have had on Role Playing and media in general can not be overlooked. I often wonder as I stare at the Super cute Stuffed Cathulu if Mr Lovecraft had any idea the effect his writing would have on the World?

Not only has Cthulhu graced several games, movies, books, toys,television shows but he has influenced media in all it's forums. Hellboy?=Cthulhu. Japanese tentacle Anime? =Cathulu. The Davy Jones character from that Pirate movie?=Cthulhu. Green Ronin Games" Free Port"=Cathulu. That’s just a sampling of the things the dark elder god has graced over the years.'

Lets focus though on the actual game. The Plot of an average Call of Cthulhu game is something like this. Generate character, character investigates weird happenings,character goes insane.

The game has undergone several generations and changed ownership a few times and birthed several games such as Delta Green and something called Cathulutech, there is even a Cthulhu punk movement?

This is what the web has to say about the product as copied from Wikipedia.
 

For those grounded in the RPG tradition, the very first release of Call of Cthulhu created a brand new framework for table-top gaming. Rather than the traditional format established by Dungeons & Dragons, which often involved the characters wandering through caves or tunnels and fighting different types of monsters, Sandy Petersen introduced the concept of the Onion Skin: Interlocking layers of information and nested clues that lead the Player Characters from seemingly minor investigations into a missing person to discovering mind-numbingly awful, global conspiracies to destroy the world. Unlike its predecessor games, CoC assumed that most investigators would not survive, alive or sane, and that the only safe way to deal with the vast majority of nasty things described in the rule books was to run away. A well-run CoC campaign should engender a sense of foreboding and inevitable doom in its players. The style and setting of the game, in a relatively modern time period, created an emphasis on real-life settings, character research, and thinking one's way around trouble.
The first book of Call of Cthulhu adventures was Shadows of Yog-Sothoth. In this work, the characters come upon a secret society's foul plot to destroy mankind, and pursue it first near to home and then in a series of exotic locations. This template was to be followed in many subsequent campaigns, including Fungi from Yuggoth (later known as Curse of Cthulhu and Day of the Beast), Spawn of Azathoth, and possibly the most highly acclaimed, Masks of Nyarlathotep.[4] Many of these seem closer in tone to the pulp adventures of Indiana Jones than H. P. Lovecraft, but they are nonetheless beloved by many gamers.
Shadows of Yog-Sothoth is important not only because it represents the first published addition to the boxed first edition of Call of Cthulhu, but because its format defined a new way of approaching a campaign of linked RPG scenarios involving actual clues for the would-be detectives amongst the players to follow and link in order to uncover the dastardly plots afoot. Its format has been used by every other campaign-length Call of Cthulhu publication. The standard of CoC scenarios was well received by independent reviewers. The Asylum and Other Tales, a series of stand alone articles released in 1983, rated an overall 9/10 in Issue 47 of White Dwarf magazine.[5]

The standard of the included 'clue' material varies from scenario to scenario, but reached its zenith in the original boxed versions of the Masks of Nyarlathotep and Horror on the Orient Express campaigns. Inside these one could find matchbooks and business cards apparently defaced by non-player characters, newspaper cuttings and (in the case of Orient Express) period passports to which players could attach their photographs, bringing a Live Action Role Playing feel to a tabletop game. Indeed, during the period that these supplements were produced, third party campaign publishers strove to emulate the quality of the additional materials, often offering separately-priced 'deluxe' clue packages for their campaigns.

Additional milieu were provided by Chaosium with the release of Dreamlands, a boxed supplement containing additional rules needed for playing within the Lovecraft Dreamlands, a large map and a scenario booklet, and Cthulhu By Gaslight, another boxed set which moved the action from the 1920s to the 1890s.

Now while we can talk about the Horrible Horror of the unknown and how to run a successful game of this genera, what truly intrigues me is how Cthulhu public domain and why we are so fascinated by it that we make Stuffed Animals and Breakfast cereals with him on it? (ok I may have made that part up)

Again let us turn to the font of all wisdom, Wikipedia to explore the insidious way Squid boy has been licensed over the years.

1: Chaosium has licensed other publishers to create supplements using their rule system, notably including Delta Green by Pagan Publishing. Other licensees have included Miskatonic River Press, Theater of the Mind Enterprises, Triad Entertainment, Games Workshop,[7] Fantasy Flight Games, RAFM, Grenadier Models Inc. and Yog-Sothoth.com. These supplements may be set in different time frames or even different game universes from the original game

2:
Robert M. Price described, in his essay "H. P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos," two stages in the development of the Cthulhu Mythos. The first stage, termed the "Cthulhu Mythos proper" by Price, was formulated during Lovecraft's lifetime and was subject to his guidance. The second stage was guided by August Derleth who, in addition to publishing Lovecraft's stories after his death,[4] attempted to categorize and expand the Mythos.[5]

And if you want a COMPLETE LIST ? of everything those Tentacle have Touched. Try this link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cthulhu_Mythos_in_popular_culture

Now as the full moon of October drifts over the Ocean and the white owl that lives in my Attic begins his nightly hunt, I leave you with this perplexing question. Just how did Cathulu become public domain? Because I cant find a actual answer, and if that is not intriguing enough there is always this to think on tonight as well.

What if the best way to invade the world was to make a joke of yourself? I mean it's hard to take the threat of a elder god of chaos and destruction seriously if you are looking at a super cute Stuffed Animal in his image, right?

And maybe that’s exactly what Cthulhu wants?

Unpleasant Dreams

October Horro RPG Blog # 1-Now with Candy Corn

FRIDAY NIGHT FRIGHTS

October Horror Role Playing Blog # 1

Happy Fright day Boils and ghouls. All this month I will be taking a look at Horror Role Playing games...or maybe just some Horrible Role Playing Games...HA GET IT?
Anyway. Before I open up the vaults for any one specific Horror role Playing System, let's delve in to the Question of can you in fact run a Horror Scenario in a world where your Player's have Characters with “Super powers?”
Be it Spells,Future tech,or actual Super Powers your average beginning PC in a RPG is a cut above Joe Shepherd so, can you in fact run a Scenario that is scary for Guys who can cast spells or whatever?

For Example: I recently tempted to run a Hunted Mine scenario for a D&D game. I had all the Props,Dark twisting hallways. Weird chttering sounds. Strange shadows on the walls, Brief glimpses of glowing red eye's. Every thing I thought would evoke the sens of dread I wanted the PC's/Players to feel about this Mine. Which lasted all of 5 Seconds! Between the Wizards ability to cantrip Light Spells, the Cleric detecting evil, the Rogue with his perception the Frightening Haunted mine just became a standard throw down with some Kobolds because the PC's had changed the environment due to there “Super powers”.

So? What could I have done to make that scenario work? Sure I could have Railroaded the situation by telling them there “powers” are not working but that would have been unfair . I could have made them roll a few more dice rolls and just give them wrong answers, but anything I could have thought of was again quickly defeated by the fact that your Average First level PC is a Super powered machine. It's very hard to run a dark spooky hallway scene when the Wizard has the ability to create Light as often as he wants.

Several other articles and ideas on Horror scenarios suggest things like mood music (which I had), darkening the lights in the room (Which I did not do), banning Phones from the table (Which I need to start doing), saving throws vs fear, giving them wrong answers (which I did) but frankly my personal experience is that unless you are an amazing story teller it's just not possible to create a haunted house scenario for “Super powered” beings. I for One have never been able to run a successful Ghost story and I have tried, in fact in all my years of gaming I have only ever played in One spook story game that worked!

So, again what can you do? It's hard our players of today because we are Jaded, have watched a ton of scary films and are thus prepared and our PC's have an arsenal of Super Powers?

Add to that the fact that your average RPG player has seen a lot of Horror Films and has a vast amount of experience from previous games (both video and face to face)and unlike your average “Victim” in a scary movie is in fact SMART!

You don't see Joe first level fighter going down the stairs, alone,with out a weapon, in the dark, in his Jammies that often do you? Why? Because no logical sane person would do that!

No, your average person might freak out in a Scary situation in RL but us gamer/geeks have been training for stuff like this forever! A Geek/gamer would grab a weapon or five, a flash light or torch and either get out of the house or wait for the Killer and then whack him over the head with a bat. Am I right?

Frankly Kids, I don't know if you can run a Horror scenario in today’s jaded society. It has to be a agreed upon contract with the GM and players that the players are going to ATEMPT to suspend there disbelief, shut down there logical mind and be open to the idea that the scenario is a “Scary Movie.”

I'm not sure it can be done? We are to smart, to experienced, to aware that our PC's are for lack of a better name “Super Human”. At least I could not do it, not that I wont try again. I mean, you sort of have to run a Halloween Game in October right?

This is not a “how to “article, it is more of an open letter . How would you run a Horror scenario? What would you do in a situation like that?

That’s it Halloween fans! October blog # 1.

Tune in next Fright day when we review our first Horror RPG..Till next time.

UNPLEASEN DREAMS!!!!! Muahahahahah.