The_Black_Cat
First Post
Paranormal Investigations
I've always loved horror gaming. I love the idea of regular people trying to stop unthinkable horrors, I love how you're never safe from danger and it's possible - likely even, that your character will die in forgettable, unspectacular death after just a few sessions. And lastly, I just like scaring the heck out of people.
I'll admit I'm not the best person to run horror. My group can role-play, but they're used to getting away with unbelievably silly things and they routinely survive things they really, really shouldn’t. This probably has something to do with the fact that they usually play D&D. Furthermore, I’m a very lenient GM, but I’m trying to curb my bad habits, like letting my players get away with all sorts of things and giving them too much information, a lot of which they shouldn’t know.
With that out of the way, I’m going to be using the Crimes People Play rules and throwing various creatures and entities from the Cthulhu Mythos, Fear Itself and lots of other sources at the players, including many of my own invention. Crimes People Play is very rules light and lets you craft almost any character you want extremely quickly. It speeds up play and lets us stay focus on the story instead of the numbers, which is great. It’s also free, which is an awesome plus.
The rules can be found here:
Haunted Attic
Player Characters
I’ve put the first letter of the player in control of the character in brackets. I have four players, D, N, C and R. R’s also tried his hand at running the game, so I’ve got a few characters as well. The second pair of brackets indicates the character archetype chosen by each player.
Keagan Fox (N) (Fast-Talking Reporter)
Keagan is a crime reporter raised Los Angeles. He is very intelligent and charismatic. He spent a few years reporting on warfare with the army and has acquired a decent amount of combat training. He knew Iris Periwinkle and Dr. Wilson before the campaign started.
Wilson Born (N) (Inquiring Doctor)
Wilson is a doctor at the Solace Hospital. He lives nearby with his grandfather, who he cares for very much. His grandfather is in his eighties and is a war veteran. Wilson joined the army as well for a short while before realizing it wasn’t his calling and returning to medical school, which he originally left to spite his tyrannical parents. He and Keagan know each other from the army.
Horace Cooke (T.B.C) (Stage Magician Custom Archetype)
Horace is a retired stage magician in his early sixties. He has two children, Eric and Stacey, and is divorced. He was married for ten years and has been divorced for twenty, but he still finds himself waking up in the morning expecting coffee to be made downstairs or referring to Margaret as his wife by mistake. He lives in a small apartment, hiding from reality and reliving his glory days.
Michel Beaubien (D) (International Spy)
Michel is a French Canadian police officer that moved to the U.S to escape from his old life. His partner came along with him. He was a well-respected officer when his life was ruined by the brutal murder of his wife and infant son. Since then, he hasn’t been the same man. He’s itching for a fight and throws himself into danger at a moment’s notice, hoping that he’ll eventually make up for the fact that he wasn’t home when a psycho came knocking. His family’s killer was never found. Also, he has a grudge against reporters, for some reason or other.
Cyrus Kane (R) (I haven’t the foggiest)
Cyrus is the perfect pawn. Smart, good with a gun and unquestioningly loyal, Cyrus quickly climbed the ranks of the CIA and became one of their highest ranking field agents. When faced with a suicide mission or a lose-lose scenario, Agent Kane is the man that’ll turn the tables.
Moriarty (R) (Hard-Boiled P.I)
Moriarty is a P.I who left the police in order to pursue justice on his own. He comes from Chicago and lives on his own, tackling whatever crime comes his way. He’s an excellent investigator and would probably be a high-ranking detective by now had he remained with the police. They call him in because of his skill, but there’s no love lost between Moriarty and the police.
Guy Tremblay (C) (Odd Foreigner)
A Quebec-born cop with a negligible understanding of the law and more bravery than brains, Guy gets things done with gratuitous explosions, flying fists and hails of gunfire. He tries to do the right thing, and doesn’t let pesky things like law enforcement or the laws of physics get in his way.
That’s the roster of characters so far. I’m not using a sanity mechanic yet, because my players have always hated numerical sanity mechanics and I’ve been brainstorming some other sanity mechanics, which I’ll incorporate soon enough.
I’ll post the beginning of the campaign soon enough.
I've always loved horror gaming. I love the idea of regular people trying to stop unthinkable horrors, I love how you're never safe from danger and it's possible - likely even, that your character will die in forgettable, unspectacular death after just a few sessions. And lastly, I just like scaring the heck out of people.
I'll admit I'm not the best person to run horror. My group can role-play, but they're used to getting away with unbelievably silly things and they routinely survive things they really, really shouldn’t. This probably has something to do with the fact that they usually play D&D. Furthermore, I’m a very lenient GM, but I’m trying to curb my bad habits, like letting my players get away with all sorts of things and giving them too much information, a lot of which they shouldn’t know.
With that out of the way, I’m going to be using the Crimes People Play rules and throwing various creatures and entities from the Cthulhu Mythos, Fear Itself and lots of other sources at the players, including many of my own invention. Crimes People Play is very rules light and lets you craft almost any character you want extremely quickly. It speeds up play and lets us stay focus on the story instead of the numbers, which is great. It’s also free, which is an awesome plus.
The rules can be found here:
Haunted Attic
Player Characters
I’ve put the first letter of the player in control of the character in brackets. I have four players, D, N, C and R. R’s also tried his hand at running the game, so I’ve got a few characters as well. The second pair of brackets indicates the character archetype chosen by each player.
Keagan Fox (N) (Fast-Talking Reporter)
Keagan is a crime reporter raised Los Angeles. He is very intelligent and charismatic. He spent a few years reporting on warfare with the army and has acquired a decent amount of combat training. He knew Iris Periwinkle and Dr. Wilson before the campaign started.
Wilson Born (N) (Inquiring Doctor)
Wilson is a doctor at the Solace Hospital. He lives nearby with his grandfather, who he cares for very much. His grandfather is in his eighties and is a war veteran. Wilson joined the army as well for a short while before realizing it wasn’t his calling and returning to medical school, which he originally left to spite his tyrannical parents. He and Keagan know each other from the army.
Horace Cooke (T.B.C) (Stage Magician Custom Archetype)
Horace is a retired stage magician in his early sixties. He has two children, Eric and Stacey, and is divorced. He was married for ten years and has been divorced for twenty, but he still finds himself waking up in the morning expecting coffee to be made downstairs or referring to Margaret as his wife by mistake. He lives in a small apartment, hiding from reality and reliving his glory days.
Michel Beaubien (D) (International Spy)
Michel is a French Canadian police officer that moved to the U.S to escape from his old life. His partner came along with him. He was a well-respected officer when his life was ruined by the brutal murder of his wife and infant son. Since then, he hasn’t been the same man. He’s itching for a fight and throws himself into danger at a moment’s notice, hoping that he’ll eventually make up for the fact that he wasn’t home when a psycho came knocking. His family’s killer was never found. Also, he has a grudge against reporters, for some reason or other.
Cyrus Kane (R) (I haven’t the foggiest)
Cyrus is the perfect pawn. Smart, good with a gun and unquestioningly loyal, Cyrus quickly climbed the ranks of the CIA and became one of their highest ranking field agents. When faced with a suicide mission or a lose-lose scenario, Agent Kane is the man that’ll turn the tables.
Moriarty (R) (Hard-Boiled P.I)
Moriarty is a P.I who left the police in order to pursue justice on his own. He comes from Chicago and lives on his own, tackling whatever crime comes his way. He’s an excellent investigator and would probably be a high-ranking detective by now had he remained with the police. They call him in because of his skill, but there’s no love lost between Moriarty and the police.
Guy Tremblay (C) (Odd Foreigner)
A Quebec-born cop with a negligible understanding of the law and more bravery than brains, Guy gets things done with gratuitous explosions, flying fists and hails of gunfire. He tries to do the right thing, and doesn’t let pesky things like law enforcement or the laws of physics get in his way.
That’s the roster of characters so far. I’m not using a sanity mechanic yet, because my players have always hated numerical sanity mechanics and I’ve been brainstorming some other sanity mechanics, which I’ll incorporate soon enough.
I’ll post the beginning of the campaign soon enough.
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