John Crichton
First Post
No more than 6.
[Dread] Jenga beat up my dice! My results from the indie horror RPG.
- Thread starter Piratecat
- Start date
Merlin the Tuna
First Post
This would be awesome. I've had Dread for over a year now and still haven't run a game, partly because it's just so intimidating since I have so little DMing under my belt, and what I have done has all been D&D 3.5E or 4E -- so a fair bit different in terms of tone and pacing. I've been trying to find experienced groups to play with since I got the book, but a recording would be a fantastic substitute.
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
I have, but only for my own deconstruction later. I wouldn't want to post anything unless the players knew up front that we were recording.
I don't do this because it removes one of the things I love about the game. When I ran a Dread game a few years back, I must have run it nine times between PegCon, GenCon and NC Game Day. Every single game was a surprise, and every one had me delighted and scrambling, because the characters were so damn different from game to game. I remember three players, all playing the same PC in different slots, comparing their PC and howling with laughter. I really wouldn't want to give that up, particularly when fear ties closely into buy-in.
I run fine with seven, but six is a better number. Be aware that for a 2 hour game, you'll want to pre-pull some blocks or ramp up the terror quickly.
Cassander
First Post
I agree about only having so much time to play. Every game I've played and run has been ~4 hours. That said, it's never a waste to have more to draw from as a player or giving the host more to work with. Also, it's only a waste if it was no fun writing or reading the questionnaire.
Yep. Definitely useful for a one shot, though you never know when there will be a sequel! I was part of a one shot that ended up going three sessions, the last of which was six hours long. From the sound of things, it seems like we might have a spin-off (same world, new characters) next year.
Anyone else ever do multi-session Dread?
And for what it's worth, it usually takes me forever to answer as well. I think the longest one was when I wrote 4 pages including all kinds of back story which I weaved in various answers, but even my shorter ones take me forever. It can take awhile to come up with a good idea. I did play one answer-the-questionnaires-at-the-table game, and while it was fun, it was not nearly as rewarding as other ones I've been in.
The best thing about Dread, I think, is that it basically forces character-oriented roleplaying, my preferred gaming style. You pretty much have nothing to do but focus on being in character, so there's less capacity for the story to run roughshod over the characters.
jdeleski
First Post
I agree with PirateCat that the game plays best with roughly 6 players, maybe as much as 8. I've run the game with 6 and 7 players. The mechanics of the game are streamlined, so the pace of the game is quick and has a highly cinematic in feel, so I suppose it would be fine to GM with more players. However, I believe that having more than 6 to 8 players would likely result in split parties, a less tightly-focused story, delays (some players wandering off when it's not their turn), and generally a less satisfactory experience.
I also would not run a Dread game with pre-generated characters, and always stick to the question-and-answer format that is described in the Dread booklet. In my experience, the players generally love to answer the wierd questions and, once they do, they OWN the character. This method of creating characters is pure genius: it asks the players to think through their characters motivations and quirks while they're having a bit of fun.
I may try to run this year's game as a multi-play experience, rather than a one-shot. I'll need to see how many players survive the opening night, though...
J.
I also would not run a Dread game with pre-generated characters, and always stick to the question-and-answer format that is described in the Dread booklet. In my experience, the players generally love to answer the wierd questions and, once they do, they OWN the character. This method of creating characters is pure genius: it asks the players to think through their characters motivations and quirks while they're having a bit of fun.
I may try to run this year's game as a multi-play experience, rather than a one-shot. I'll need to see how many players survive the opening night, though...
J.
malcolypse
First Post
I know there's at least one out there, because I listened to it before I ever ran a game of Dread.
They played it like they were more concerned with their time limit than enjoying the game, but I enjoyed listening to them.
Now comes the bad news...
I don't remember where I listened to this. Somewhere on the internet is about the best I can do. If I recall correctly, the website was a game blog where they had several recordings of sessions, but I can't find it for the life of me.
EDIT: I'll see what I can do about getting a game going on Halloween and recording it. I think it'd be fun. Also, I didn't use any
, so that had to be fixed. If anyone finds the audio I'm thinking of or has one, I'd also love to listen to them.
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Three act outline for a previous game, The Curious Murder of Artemis Hume. This is the scenario alluded to in the very first post of this thread.
Concept: Set in the 1920s. Ancient family warlock is hundreds of years old and lives on by possessing the body of a direct relative. He can only do this once there is only one person left in his familial path. Now that his previous body (the family patriarch Oliver Hume) has died, his will invites family members to his Scottish island manor house for a reading (playing, actually; it's on phonograph record) of the will. Using his ability to possess the dead, he will try to arrange the death of either his grandson or granddaughter, thus allowing him to live on for another generation.
PCs:
Edward Granby, Young lawyer
Daniel Hume, Grandson
Frances Hume, Granddaughter
Mrs. Agate Finchley, Sister in law (Oliver's late wife's sister)
Camille Bellamont (aka Cassie Bluth), Sister-in-law's personal maid (secretly a con woman)
Mr. Bertram Finchley, Sister-in-law's son
[sblock=PC Questionnaires]
Mrs. Agate Finchley, widow
Sister-in-law of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. What happened to make you realize that the spirit world is real?
2. Who is the most important spirit you’ve ever spoken to in a séance, and why?
3. As children, how did your sister go blind?
4. Why are you obsessively convinced that your sister was murdered by her husband?
5. What is your deepest secret?
6. You used to be rich. How did you run through your estate?
7. What is the most important aspect to maintaining the illusion of wealth?
8. Your middle-aged son Bertram still lives at home with you. Why?
9. Were you a beauty in your youth?
10. What did you think of Oliver the first time your older sister brought him home?
11. When you pass over, how do you expect to die?
12. What scares you the most?
13. Are you lonely?
Mr. Bertram Finchley
Nephew of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. You are over 40. Why do you still live with your mother?
2. What first triggered your interest in photography?
3. Have you ever experienced true love?
4. Why didn’t you enlist during the Great War?
5. What’s your worst habit?
6. Why do those people hate you?
7. Do you like your relatives?
8. How do you spend your days?
9. Have you considered hospitalizing your mother?
10. Do you believe in spirits?
11. What scares you the most?
12. What are you looking forward to?
13. Is it worth having a go at Camille, your mother’s French maid?
Camille Bellamont, (formerly Cassie Bluth of Liverpool)
Personal maid / grifter
1. You know in your heart that spiritualism is rubbish, but you did have one experience that could have been supernatural. What was it?
2. As a teenager, what happened to make you run away from home?
3. Why do you fall in love so easily?
4. How did you learn how to pretend to be a psychic?
5. Once you’ve conned Mrs. Finchley out of her estate, how do you plan to spend it?
6. What’s the best lie you’ve ever told?
7. In your role as Mrs. Finchley’s maid, what task do you hate the most?
8. Why did you leave your fiancée Edward during the Great War?
9. What scares you the most?
10. What are you looking forward to?
11. What is your deepest secret?
12. What really caused your younger brother to become so sick?
13. How did you learn to read Braille?
Frances Artemis Hume, Flapper
Granddaughter of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. What’s your most vivid memory of your grandfather Oliver?
2. Who was your first kiss?
3. When did you realize it all meant nothing?
4. Where did you get those shoes?
5. Do you black out every time?
6. When she died, did your mother know you weren’t a virgin?
7. What’s in your handbag?
8. Why are you afraid of the dark?
9. How do you earn your spending money?
10. What would you do without your brother?
11. Which of the nightmares is the worst?
12. Who knows you best?
13. How important is it to inherit your grandfather’s fortune?
Daniel Oliver Hume, dilettante
Grandson of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. What’s your most vivid memory of your grandfather Oliver?
2. Of the many young women you’ve dallied with, who was your favorite and why?
3. What hobby are you proudest of?
4. What did happen to that 4th grader who died when you were at school?
5. Does it bother you that you and your sister are the last living blood members of the Hume family line?
6. Why are you often late to your job?
7. How do you earn your spending money?
8. How important is it to you to inherit your grandfather’s fortune?
9. Why didn’t you enlist during the Great War?
10. How did your parents die?
11. Why do you think you will never marry?
12. Would you give your own life for your sister’s?
13. If you could be anything in the world, what would you be?
Edward Granby, Lawyer
1. Why did you go into law instead of medicine?
2. Do you consider yourself an ethical man? Do you respect yourself?
3. When you were a lieutenant in the trenches of Ypres, how many of your men died? Why do you think you lived?
4. What secret might the family discover, if they look into how the Hume estate was handled by the senior partners?
5. Why did you hate Sir Oliver Hume?
6. Why did Cassie break off your engagement during the Great War?
7. What are you proudest of?
8. Did you know you had a twin who died when you were infants?
9. Have you killed anybody since you came back from the war?
10. Have you gotten over your fear of being buried alive?
11. How do you treat men your age who didn’t go to war?
12. Why do you no longer drink?
13. What is your secret indulgence?
[/sblock]
NPCs:
Butler
Maid
Nurse
Oliver's ancient, ancient mother (who dies of old age during the reading of the will and is the first to be possessed)
Act One:
Meet on ferry dock of Loch Encht, southern Scotland. It’s autumn. There’s a misty, light rain. PCs arrive in different cars and bicker.
Taken to island, rough waves. Storm coming. Arrive on shore. Boat pilot waits, planning to bring back priest after the funeral. Will then return to the island the next morning.
Greeted by lawyer and butler.
Taken up to see Oliver's body. Visit with senile old lady and her lovely Swedish nurse. See heavy key around Oliver's neck.
Body is interred in family crypt, using PCs as pallbearers. Rain coming down hard.
Lawyer plays gramophone record for the will.
Act Two:
Agate’s family and the great-great-grandmother receive a single pound only; they are mocked about not receiving a legacy. All money given to Daniel and Frances, either both or whichever one survives the other by the end of probate.
Arguments.
Great-grandmother dies and her body disappears. Nurse murdered. Cassie sees spirits.
Raining hard now. Butler and maid murdered; bodies animate to attacks PCs.
Séance?
Find clues leading to basement study.
All family portraits, painted over hundreds of years, all painted by the same hand.
Act Three:
Stalked through claustrophobic basement by dead great-grandmother.
Find keyhole in basement, but need key.
Oliver’s body missing.
Find heads of all past relatives in sanctum, channeling life force.
Possession, attacks, and a suitable climax.
Concept: Set in the 1920s. Ancient family warlock is hundreds of years old and lives on by possessing the body of a direct relative. He can only do this once there is only one person left in his familial path. Now that his previous body (the family patriarch Oliver Hume) has died, his will invites family members to his Scottish island manor house for a reading (playing, actually; it's on phonograph record) of the will. Using his ability to possess the dead, he will try to arrange the death of either his grandson or granddaughter, thus allowing him to live on for another generation.
PCs:
Edward Granby, Young lawyer
Daniel Hume, Grandson
Frances Hume, Granddaughter
Mrs. Agate Finchley, Sister in law (Oliver's late wife's sister)
Camille Bellamont (aka Cassie Bluth), Sister-in-law's personal maid (secretly a con woman)
Mr. Bertram Finchley, Sister-in-law's son
[sblock=PC Questionnaires]
Mrs. Agate Finchley, widow
Sister-in-law of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. What happened to make you realize that the spirit world is real?
2. Who is the most important spirit you’ve ever spoken to in a séance, and why?
3. As children, how did your sister go blind?
4. Why are you obsessively convinced that your sister was murdered by her husband?
5. What is your deepest secret?
6. You used to be rich. How did you run through your estate?
7. What is the most important aspect to maintaining the illusion of wealth?
8. Your middle-aged son Bertram still lives at home with you. Why?
9. Were you a beauty in your youth?
10. What did you think of Oliver the first time your older sister brought him home?
11. When you pass over, how do you expect to die?
12. What scares you the most?
13. Are you lonely?
Mr. Bertram Finchley
Nephew of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. You are over 40. Why do you still live with your mother?
2. What first triggered your interest in photography?
3. Have you ever experienced true love?
4. Why didn’t you enlist during the Great War?
5. What’s your worst habit?
6. Why do those people hate you?
7. Do you like your relatives?
8. How do you spend your days?
9. Have you considered hospitalizing your mother?
10. Do you believe in spirits?
11. What scares you the most?
12. What are you looking forward to?
13. Is it worth having a go at Camille, your mother’s French maid?
Camille Bellamont, (formerly Cassie Bluth of Liverpool)
Personal maid / grifter
1. You know in your heart that spiritualism is rubbish, but you did have one experience that could have been supernatural. What was it?
2. As a teenager, what happened to make you run away from home?
3. Why do you fall in love so easily?
4. How did you learn how to pretend to be a psychic?
5. Once you’ve conned Mrs. Finchley out of her estate, how do you plan to spend it?
6. What’s the best lie you’ve ever told?
7. In your role as Mrs. Finchley’s maid, what task do you hate the most?
8. Why did you leave your fiancée Edward during the Great War?
9. What scares you the most?
10. What are you looking forward to?
11. What is your deepest secret?
12. What really caused your younger brother to become so sick?
13. How did you learn to read Braille?
Frances Artemis Hume, Flapper
Granddaughter of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. What’s your most vivid memory of your grandfather Oliver?
2. Who was your first kiss?
3. When did you realize it all meant nothing?
4. Where did you get those shoes?
5. Do you black out every time?
6. When she died, did your mother know you weren’t a virgin?
7. What’s in your handbag?
8. Why are you afraid of the dark?
9. How do you earn your spending money?
10. What would you do without your brother?
11. Which of the nightmares is the worst?
12. Who knows you best?
13. How important is it to inherit your grandfather’s fortune?
Daniel Oliver Hume, dilettante
Grandson of the late Sir Oliver Hume
1. What’s your most vivid memory of your grandfather Oliver?
2. Of the many young women you’ve dallied with, who was your favorite and why?
3. What hobby are you proudest of?
4. What did happen to that 4th grader who died when you were at school?
5. Does it bother you that you and your sister are the last living blood members of the Hume family line?
6. Why are you often late to your job?
7. How do you earn your spending money?
8. How important is it to you to inherit your grandfather’s fortune?
9. Why didn’t you enlist during the Great War?
10. How did your parents die?
11. Why do you think you will never marry?
12. Would you give your own life for your sister’s?
13. If you could be anything in the world, what would you be?
Edward Granby, Lawyer
1. Why did you go into law instead of medicine?
2. Do you consider yourself an ethical man? Do you respect yourself?
3. When you were a lieutenant in the trenches of Ypres, how many of your men died? Why do you think you lived?
4. What secret might the family discover, if they look into how the Hume estate was handled by the senior partners?
5. Why did you hate Sir Oliver Hume?
6. Why did Cassie break off your engagement during the Great War?
7. What are you proudest of?
8. Did you know you had a twin who died when you were infants?
9. Have you killed anybody since you came back from the war?
10. Have you gotten over your fear of being buried alive?
11. How do you treat men your age who didn’t go to war?
12. Why do you no longer drink?
13. What is your secret indulgence?
[/sblock]
NPCs:
Butler
Maid
Nurse
Oliver's ancient, ancient mother (who dies of old age during the reading of the will and is the first to be possessed)
Act One:
Meet on ferry dock of Loch Encht, southern Scotland. It’s autumn. There’s a misty, light rain. PCs arrive in different cars and bicker.
Taken to island, rough waves. Storm coming. Arrive on shore. Boat pilot waits, planning to bring back priest after the funeral. Will then return to the island the next morning.
Greeted by lawyer and butler.
Taken up to see Oliver's body. Visit with senile old lady and her lovely Swedish nurse. See heavy key around Oliver's neck.
Body is interred in family crypt, using PCs as pallbearers. Rain coming down hard.
Lawyer plays gramophone record for the will.
Act Two:
Agate’s family and the great-great-grandmother receive a single pound only; they are mocked about not receiving a legacy. All money given to Daniel and Frances, either both or whichever one survives the other by the end of probate.
Arguments.
Great-grandmother dies and her body disappears. Nurse murdered. Cassie sees spirits.
Raining hard now. Butler and maid murdered; bodies animate to attacks PCs.
Séance?
Find clues leading to basement study.
All family portraits, painted over hundreds of years, all painted by the same hand.
Act Three:
Stalked through claustrophobic basement by dead great-grandmother.
Find keyhole in basement, but need key.
Oliver’s body missing.
Find heads of all past relatives in sanctum, channeling life force.
Possession, attacks, and a suitable climax.
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
So, act one is designed to set up creepiness and introduce everyone; act two introduces a mystery, real danger and horror, and no easy way out; and act three lets them find useful clues that might kill them as they try to solve the horror and save themselves.
The delightful thing about this is that in every game the characters changed so radically. Didn't get boring once!
The delightful thing about this is that in every game the characters changed so radically. Didn't get boring once!
Plane Sailing
Astral Admin - Mwahahaha!
Speaking as an Edward Granby, I loved the questions for myself, and I thought it was brilliant the way that the interrelationships between the characters gradually resolved themselves during the game. Even though I didn't know what their questionnaires were, as everyone roleplayed according to their own responses, mine seemed to dovetail in very naturally.
It seems to me that setting great questionnaires could be the key to a good game.
Cheers
It seems to me that setting great questionnaires could be the key to a good game.
Cheers
John Crichton
First Post
I'd say they are simply a great start. Full buy-in from the players and a prepared host are the other keys.
