Help me freak out my players!

[Merkuri]

I'll second that recommendation. Heroes of Horror has some very creepy ideas.

My favorite creepy idea from Heroes of Horror was having a character look in a mirror and see his own reflection being murdered. For the next three days, he has no reflection.

 

[Mycanid]

Well good sir Whizbang ... the only "creep out" adventure I ever ran with my characters that REALLY freaked them out was in an outdoor setting. And believe it or not the main effects were created by reproducing the sounds of birds I had heard while visiting my folks in Alaska ....

 

[Nebulous]

Yeah, i'm running Masks of Nyarlathotep now, and the party just reached the subterranean tunnels in Egypt. As someone else mentioned earlier, i have EXACTLY the same Bram Stoker's Dracula soundtrack prepared, and it is creepy as all heck. They don't know what's coming, three of them died over the last two adventures, and i keep telling them this is one of the hardest parts of the campaign. Blooming black roses freaked them out so much they actually turned around and went the other direction. The best part is the list of d20 random encounters the book has prepared for you; they're all great.

EDIT: The single scariest adventure i ever ran was a homebrew Cthulhu, using pictures from the abandoned Danver's Asylum in New England. They filmed the movie Session 9 there. Scariest place i've ever seen, and all the b/w pictures downloadable online make exquisite props.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Agreed. Those are great for squicking most PCs.

I'd also bluff the PCs a bit, making them think that what they're up against is much worse than they thought. If it's zombies, try to trick them into thinking they're ghouls, for example. I only use this sparingly, but it seems to work in moderation.

Putting a good degree of background and history into the adventure can be good, so that they have a bit of context for the horrors.

Creepy-crawlies. The ceiling overhead/floor underneath the PC gives way, dropping masses of centipedes, spiders, or other harmless bugs onto the hapless character. Describe in detail how they get under the armor/clothing and crawl around. Also serves as good foreshadowing for running into their larger cousins...

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I hope my late post is still of use...

First of all, get the latest edition of GURPS Horror (which is now available for a measly $10). It is written by Ken Hite, a master on the subject of how to run horror games (he has also written the earlier Nightmares of Mine for RoleMaster), and is quite possibly the best gaming treatment of horror out there - and it is nearly stat free, so you can use it for any gaming system.


Secondly, I noticed that while people on this thread have given lots of good advice for atmospheric details, I think there is one thing missing here: An examination of the ultimate cause of the horror that lies upon this place. A string of horrific apparitions in itself runs the danger of soon seeming random to the players, so you must "reward" them in some way to keep them motivated to go deeper into the place despite the danger. Since they are too weak to be "rewarded" in defeated monsters, I suggest giving hints to the reason why this abbey turned into a Bad Place. Like an onion they should peel back the mystery layer by layer, until they at last get to the rotten core.

Let them glimpse hints to a corruption that tained the place even before it became haunted. Let them discover a hidden compartment where a small fortune is hidden - together with evidence that the treasurer of the abbey skimmed a portion of the income of the abbey. Let them discover sordid poetry hidden and written by a monk where he professes his love for another monk (Whether homosexuality is considered a taboo in your world is not of importance - what matters more is that monks should be considered chaste and celibate. It's the breaking of taboos that's important here). And finally, they discover that one of the monks was secretly a demon-worshipper, who deluded others into believing that he could fulfill their wishes - or else used them as sacrifical victims.

Each step should give them further clues, drawing them in - while still missing enough pieces of the whole to keep them interested and enticing them to investigate further, ignoring the danger signals until it is too late and they confront the horror at its source.

 

[genshou]

I ran a session that turned into a bloodbath on Friday. The PCs, as agents of Department-7, were investigating a cult led by an illithid who had been trapped in the modern world. When they were getting ready to leave, the party's healer heard footsteps ahead... and they were supposed to be in an empty building (they had cleared the place out and locked all entrances). After that, the hacker saw a short humanoid figure with long, brown hair peeking around a corner ahead. She ran forward to engage the enemy and found herself face-to-face with six fourteen-year-old girls in school uniforms, all holding meat cleavers. Classic horror staple right there. Immediately, the lights all went out and they heard light footsteps as the possessed schoolgirls charged. The girls' eyes glowed blue in the darkness...

My players were absolutely creeped out by the fact that there were no minis on the battlemat for the girls. They had no idea of where they were, or how many (there were a total of twelve, six having hidden in a side room). The PCs with flashlights were able to aim at those they were fighting, but they couldn't see whether or not more were lurking behind their current foe... or sneaking up to flank them. The girls focused on one PC at a time, attempting to surround that character and stabbing until he or she dropped, then moving on to the next target.

One of the things I kept mentioning that really unnerved my players was that the only sound the girls made was their footsteps. No evil laughter; no deep, low chanting. They didn't even scream when hit by a greatsword. Some of them even took several wounds before dropping.

What's gonna be even more fun is when I have the greatsword-wielding cowboy wake up at precisely midnight to find both pieces of the girl he sliced in two lying on the floor in his bedroom, with fresh blood and everything. Every once in a while I'll give him the impression that someone is sneaking up behind him, but nothing will ever happen. That should keep him freaked out for a good number of sessions.

 

[Wraith Form]

I hope my late post is still of use...

Thank you for your post. And I agree--your "onion layer" idea is incredibly cool, and please expect me to steal (and use) it sometime soon.

 

[Calico_Jack73]

Be descriptive with senses other than sight. The sense of hearing is great but it has been scientifically proven that the sense of smell is the sense most closely tied to our own memories so don't leave that out.

Have them hear and catch glimpses of someone watching them from the end of a long hall. If they run after the someone have the watcher dash into a corridor where the party loses sight of the watcher but finds they've gone into a dead end. This is a great way to get them to go into a particular area of the mansion. Horror movies use this technique all the time.

Don't discount the effect of the "Slow Realization". HP Lovecraft used it quite effectively and you can too (just read some of his short stories if you need examples). For your own example, have there be family paintings in the first part of the mansion and have them look like your normal portraits. As the players get further into the game have the paintings depict more and more macabre scenes. Have the last painting be of the PC's opening the door they just came through with some vile creature (the BBG) creeping up behind them and there be spattered paint on the floor. In essence you are letting the paintings tell the story as to why the haunted/cursed mansion is haunted.

Edit: For background music I've got to go with the soundtrack from Quake. You can pop the game CD into your standard music CD player and skip to the 2nd track and you are all set.