Creepy...

Two instances:

1. First session of what would end up being a planescape campaign, but the Players didn't know that. They were in a haunted mansion type scenario, when they finally hit the basement (filled with catacombs and crypts, obviously undisturbed for many years), and they noticed weird rats watching them from just outside torchlight. Eventually, they noticed the rats were becoming more and more numerous the deeper into the crypts they got, and it was as if they were only moving in certain directions...effectively herding the PCs. When they finally realized this, one player said "Wait a sec...they are herding us..." and at the moment was a chain lightning from the army of hundreds and hundreds of Cranium Rats. Scared the piss out of 'em.

2. Ran the Meenlock Prison adventure from Dungeon Mag (not sure which # off hand). I recorded the whispered phrase that the Meenlocks psionically issue to their quarry, something like "We were once like you; soon you will be one of us" or something like that. I played it back on a tape recorder at slow speeds and high speeds, and because I'd whispered the phrase (but turned up the volume), it was very oddly distorted. I would play it only when they were getting close to the Meenlocks in an underground prison block, and it made for some really creepy atmospherics!


One thing I wanted to do but never got around to was this:

I was running a 4e playtest in which the PCs were accompanied by the disembodied voice of a young girl. They were tasked with fighting several "guardians" (i.e. boss monsters, usually Solos straight out of the MM1) to escape a strange land they were in (actually the Underworld: they were dead). Each time they defeated one of the bosses, the girl's voice would "grow up" slightly: get deeper, more confident, and more powerful. Eventually, a male voice would join as well, at first as a whisper, but then -- as more bosses were killed -- growing deeper and soon overpowering the girl's voice (now a woman's voice, by that point). The whole plot was that this girl's voice was the voice of a Goddess that had been slain, and the PCs were her former servants, questing through the Underworld to resurrect her. As they defeated the guardians, she got closer and closer to life; but, her terrible brother (and killer) was tied to her fate, and so he was effectively being resurrected as well. Eventually, the PCs would have to face the male God in combat, hopefully with some help from the Goddess.

I would have had my girlfriend record the female voice from "youth" to "powerful womanly voice" while I would have joined in as the male voice, all in a few preplanned speeches I would make after the death of each boss/guardian. It was an awesome idea, but the group folded before I could bring it about.

My first real campaign started this august so here is my creepy bit hope its cool enough.
The PCs find a village lacking in the children department. A visit to the pub clears things up the kids have been going missing and so has the PC doppleganger (dropped from campaign) but they meet a goliath warlord pc who over hears all this. The guy they need to talk to is at the local church as the new party begins to leave a bard performer proposes an escort mission for them in the morning. The PCs head off to the church and talk more to the man in charge about the kids and pick up a cleric PC. So now the party knows where the kids were taken. The dwarf checks for clues and so does the sorcerrer they determine the offenders are giant ants the dwarf digs a trench in an attempt to find them and fails.... of course they do find more clues and head off to the anthill. When they get there the first area the search is filled with what seems to be giant ant larva upon closer inspection it is the swollen pulsating bodies of children with shrivled limbs and ant like eyes begging to be killed. The party freaks out and lights fire to the larva kids instantly using dailies and all. and thats where we left off.

Newbie bump

All right, I just spent about 3 hours catching up on this thread.

Now for my 2 cents.

The first story I have was from a CoC game I played about 5 years ago.

I was playing as a new prof at the venerable Miskitonic University and I was tapped buy one of the local paranormal investigation societies to help check out a "haunted" theater.

the place was fairly normal looking until we reached the cellar, one of the rooms was set up as a sensory saturation chamber ((If anyone has seen the remake of The House on Haunted Hill, it's the room that Geoffrey Rush is trapped in) This one was a zoetrope of a man picking up and putting down a hat) As we all entered the room the machine came to life, and as we watched the man pick up and put down the hat, a shadow started to creep in from the side of the frame, slowly consuming the man, then the rest of the scene, ending in a series of occult characters, all the while the most recognizable part of Carmina Burana was playing in the background.

The GM had made a recording of the song, and with his laptop had altered the track to speed up and slow down randomly, resolving itself into a prolonged scream at the end.


After a thurough examination of the theater, we found a book which my character began to translate (mistake number one in any CoC game)

The GM had a handout of the translated text, as I was reading it over I did not notice him hovering nearby. I was reading the text to the rest of the party when suddenly drops of red liquid began to splatter upon the page.

The GM had quietly moved closer to me with a dropper full of stage blood, and dripped it on the page, as I jumped back he calmly explained to me that my character had begun bleeding from the nose.

The rest of that game is kind of a blur, but that is one of the creepiest moments I have ever had in gaming.


My second story is a literal example of a PC being the monster.

I was running a game of Deadlands d20 where one of my players was a blessed who was convinced that he took his orders from on high. As the players were exploring a town he began to see visions of a civil war battlefield, explosions and screaming soldiers all around, in the midst of all this chaos was a man dressed as a doctor, mutilating and fouling bodies, wounded soldiers, etc.

It turns out that this town had a doctor that fit the visions, but he had left for parts unknown a few years ago. The party began to hunt down this "butcher of the battlefield" and eventually tracked him to Atlanta. As the rest of the party was gathering information on the man, the blessed was making his way directly to the doctor's office, guided by his visions and the voice of an "angel". Upon arriving, the blessed ambushed the doctor and set upon him with great vengence. eventually killing him.

While this was going on, the rest of the party had discovered that the doctor was greatly loved by the townsfolk and had been seen performing
"miricles" of medicine. Everything they found out just cast the doctor in a better light. Realizing that they had been hunting an innocent man, they ran to the office to prevent the blessed from doing something horrible.


Meanwhile as the blessed was cleaning himself up after beating the doctor to death with an iron-bound bible, he began to hear the voice of the angel again, the voice convinced him that his friends had been corrupted by agents of evil and were coming to kill him. He fled the town as fast as possible and began planning his counter-attack.

The rest of the party arrived at the doctor's office and found the scene of the attack, they began to search for the blessed character, planning to turn him over to the authorities.

Outside of town the blessed once again heard the angel's voice, it told him that he had been chosen to be the embodiment of holy vengence upon the wicked. The angel then said to him "Do you wish to have the power to destroy those who hunt you and all other enemies of our master?" (exact quote) Without blinking he said yes. I asked the player to turn over his character sheet and start rolling a new PC. This one was now a servitor and an NPC. This character, Preacher Z, became the nemisis of the party, going so far as to crucify an entire town just to set a trap for the party.

This is a pretty long post for my first one so I will save the story of Preacher Z's end for another time.



Thanks for reading

-Quasi

In the spirit of the holiday, I thought I'd bump.

Oh good. I love this thread...

Anyone have any fun Halloween games planned for this weekend?

I love this thread...and I'm surprised I haven't posted in it.

Unfortunately, I'm also experiencing a little mental block about whatever creepiness I've thrown around in RPGs. I know I've done some...I must have.

(Damn brainworms.)

At any rate, as a PSA, I thought I'd also point out that some of the links no longer work, so if you did post something here with a link, you might want to check it out.

Here is your next creepy little girl:

Characters: Barber's Daughter

Sweeny Todd, eat your heart out.

Sorry, that pun WAS intended.

-Chuck

Ravilah said:

and the creepiness was enhanced by the fact that I had the whole room lit with nothing but red light bulbs. I dunno. I didn't think it would be that creepy, but it gave everyone the willies.

Click to expand...

Wow, i had posted in this thread 5 years ago! As for the quote above, that's a great idea to set the mood. I'm gonna steal that red bulbs idea. I have an upcoming scenario where the PCs will descend into a haunted mine ruled by a glabrezu overlord. Hell-red lights should work quite nicely

Bump, sort of rezzurect, +100 respect for thread and my first post, all in one XD

Just to throw in a few ideas I used as a way of saying thank you all for great inspiration.

First of all, I don't run a horror campaign; it is a "regular" campaign, set in my world. I draw inspiration from lot of sources, then change it a bit (or a lot); but the best moments were improvised, hope you'll like 'em as much as my players did

Generally, I like to keep players uncertain most of the time - sometimes sinister and creepy stuff is just a decoration, sometimes it's really evil. Here are more or less random bits of creepy / weird stuff:

There are 2 statues in the dungeon. The first one is of a young man, a little bit bent, as if pressing something down with full force and weight of his body. It is situated in furthermost corner of the room. There are scratches on the floor as if the statue was dragged into the room, but it's impossible to figure out exactly from where (marks fade around middle of the room). The party quickly deducted that statue looks as if it was running somebody through with a sword, so one of them decides to put her own bastard sword in place. I gave her a look that questions her sanity, and everybody expects the statue to come alive or something. Nothing happens.

Some time later, they get to another statue. This one is of a royal looking elderly person, laying on the back with a beautifully crafted bastard sword pierced through his chest. 3 of them decide it would be great idea to put the obviously moved statue in its original position, while the cleric frantically protests, detects evil (nothing there really) and whatnot. First statue is heavy, but 2 people (STR 17) can carry/push it across half the dungeon without too much difficulty.

When they put it next to fallen king, so that the young man is running the king through, i tell them to roll. This is my favourite way of keeping the tension up - they never know what they are rolling for, and a lot of times it is just for the sake of tension. I even sometimes pretend I'm trying to roll in secret while they're not paying attention, just to make them wander what will happen. Most evil thing you can do to players

So, the statues are in position, but still nothing happens. They figure out these are just statues, and the afore-mentioned fighter decides to take the nice looking bastard sword (ooo, shiny) from the statue. A few seconds later, it starts to rust very quickly, turning into rust, and lights from all sources start to dim. Behind her, a gost appears, and it bears quite a resemblance to the statue. It points in her general direction, more like THROUGH her, and says "You! BETRAYER! Your destiny forsaken, for what? For THIS?".

Any attempt to communicate with the ghost is in vain; it will follow the person who took the sword out, but will not attempt to interact with party in any way. It won't answer any questions, and neither will I as DM. They get back to exploring the dungeon, ocasionally asking wether the ghost is still following. It is.

Now, here comes a bit of cheating. They get to an archway with some kind of symbol inscribed above it. Trying to dechiper it, curious as they are, they trigger Symbol Of Sleep. The cheat is that the DC was not fixed in any way; I decided that the DC would be 1 + whatever ghost-following person rolled. She was the only one who failed. They decide to rest (had quite a bit of fighting earlier). It was great, because nobody actually looked her way, so when she woke up, she was the first one to notice the ghost is now gone... Wanna gues if they'll encounter it again?


During the break, I got a moment of inspiration, the fighter affected with Sleep had a dream, it went something like this:

You're running through the night, the grass oddly warm on your bare feet. The sky is clear, but there are no stars or moons*. Still, you can see clearly enough to avoid the trees that are made of glass. You're getting closer... Suddenly you can feel him BEHIND you. You turn around, reaching for your weapon, but you realize you have no arms. It is getting colder as the laughter in your head grows louder. You try to scream, but only centipedes exit your mouth and start crawling across your face made of stone towards your eye sockets...

* this is not a typo, there are 3 moons present in the world


Another one, thought up ad-hoc:

They were teleported to a forest in an unknown part of the world. As the night falls, they choose not to light a fire as it might attract a GKW (GodKnowsWhat). During the dinner, they notice that shadows (cast by a moon) are behaving strangely, although it is impossible to define exactly what is amiss. I roll a d4 (as there are 4 of them), and whoever is chosen, starts feeling cold. After 3 stacks of debuff (yes, I play WoW sometimes ), the person falls unconcious, visibly shaking. Just as second person was about to fall, he fired an arrow with Lght cast on it towards nearby tree. As the arrow flew, their shadows grew longer and thicker, and then second person falls (cleric, to make things worse). As the flickering shadows cross, a screaming whisper is heard, and a new shadow arises and starts attacking remaining 2 members. Now, they had only 1 stack of "shadow cold" on them, so when they're touched by shadow they begin to feel VERY cold. I doubt I'd let them fall too, but they surely didn't feel that way. After a pair of swings went sthraight through the shadow, duskblade finally gets the idea and casts Dancing Light into the shadow, which dissapears with earpiercing hiss.

They attempt to wake up 2 sleepers, which are cold to touch, but to no avail. So they set up a fire and put them near to keep them warm. A few minutes later, there is a crashing sound, and out of the darkness the GKW appears. It has a spider-like lower part of body. The upper part is vaguely humanoid; he's got huge mouth across his whole face and one eye on a tentacle sprouted from his chin. In one of his 3 arms he is wielding a whole young tree, complete with roots, and is kicking with his legs which have bull-like hooves at the end. They managed to survive the encounter, and with first rays of sun, other 2 woke up...



A few details found in dungeons, which haven't (yet) tried to harm players:

* A huge pile of teeth in a corner
* A casket hanging from the ceiling, 4 ropes are holding it by the corners. When opened, inside is a beautiful young woman with pearls in place of here eyes
* A room completely burnt (scorches on walls, floor and ceiling). Only thing found in this room is a picture frame, completely intact, but without a picture (looks like it has burned down). It doesn't look like the frame was brought here, it seems it somehow survived the flames completely intact.
* Albino beholder who is blind; it doesn't attack the players, but just mumbles some crazy stuff about future and past.



That's all for now...

I tend to do a lot of Ravenloft-related stuff, so I've done all sorts of creepy things to players over the years.

This one is the description for the main portion of a church-turned-sanatarium-overrun-by-evil that I used in my last campaign.

" This huge, two storied chamber was obviously once the main cathedral. Towering columns, eight in all, hold up the massive ceiling. The second-story glass windows have been bricked over, but the glass is intact, and hellish light shines down from them. The glass images are twisted into acts of cruelty, as demon-faced angels behead, torture and otherwise ravage supplicant figures in each of the images.



The framework of a torn-down second-story balcony can still be seen, as several ropes hang down from the rafters – some of the ropes still wrapped around the flayed bodies of humans whose gore drips onto the floor beneath you. There are a myriad of wooden doors leading off from the main cathedral to your right and left, and behind each you can hear the moans of agony of whatever lies beyond. Four cages have been arrayed around the room, with fresh straw laid within. Slithering about the room are nine slug-like, fur-covered maggots the size of a small pony, who do not seem interested in your presence.


At the far end of the room, there are four stout, stone doors. One stands at each side of the cathedral, while the last two stand near the corners on the opposite wall. Nestled between the stone doors on the far side of the room is a dias. Where once an altar likely stood, a throne made of bones draped with flesh now sits. Seated in the seat is a demonic-looking humanoid, covered in hideous warts and boils. Its arms hang nearly down to its ankles, and end in black, sharp claws. Its eyes are hollow holes, its teeth needle-like and black, and a gruesome crown of flame rings its forehead."


The "maggots" were abyssal larva from Tome of Horrors 3, made from the former inmates, and the thing in the throne was a fiendish troll. However, the party was so mortified by the scene that were prepared to leave the place and never come back (though the party's cleric couldn't stand the scene and eventually attacked; the rest aided once combat broke out, though it was a near thing)