Anyone played Masks of Nyarlathotep?

[payn]

How much of this stuff is heavy handed DMing?

DM dependent im guessing but im seeing common experiences to my own appearing here. I will say my GM at the time was a classic skill play type GM. Players need to treat the game as severe survival mode. Every glass of water is poisoned, every bed has poisonous insects and snakes, every old lady is an agent to kill you. Its exhausting how little the game is allowed to breath. Even worse, the GM never provided clues and made the players discover everything. Allowing them to waste hours and sessions on pointless red herrings and wild goose chases. For example, when Gumshoe system was invented the GM claimed it to be a crime against humanity because its the players job to figure things out and survive...

I usually see published works as a coloring in book rather than a paint by numbers. They give the pattern and the complexity but if I want to paint something red Instead of blue then I do it.

Same. I see a published adventure as a toolkit first and foremost..

It feels like a lot of the stuff that’s being described surely comes down to how the DM chooses to play it? For instance presumably if the DM accentuates the importance of the border customs then getting arrested for having a gun could be a problem. But if it is assumed the character knows the kind of places they could get their hands on a gun and does so as part of their prep for section then this is accepted. I find it hard to believe it would have been hard to get your hands on firearms in any of these countries in the 1920’s.

Yeah my GM at the time made a big deal about my character having a pistol at the London border. Something to effect of how dumb I was for not knowing this of 1920's London. First of all, why is it an assumption an America player would know the laws of England in the 1920's? Second, why did the steam-liner allow passengers to bring weapons with them? Third, my character was English and I wouldn't know this but surely they would!

Simultaneously is the need for powerful combat characters not just the way the DM frames the encounters?

I think its more of a meta mindset. You the player knows you will be facing all kinds of nastiness, so you prepare by loading up on firepower and having chunky PCs that can take a hit and mentally fortified characters to weather the storm. Some GMs just expect wanton violence as part of the experience. I know a friend that GMs a lot of different genres and game types. Killing everyone in the room is the answer 99% of the time regardless.

I’ve not used Sanity before, but surely it can’t wipe out an entire party with one set of rolls? Or is it that bad?

I dont recall a single roll taking out a party. It usually takes a few bad encounters to really get things going pear shaped. Even with my killer GM.

 

[Committed Hero]

To be honest, I am generally unhappy with most Coc scenarios. They don't deal with the sort of horror that I would want CoC to deal with, which is cosmic and philosophical, and with few exceptions have the PCs as assassins rather than scholars. Indeed, quite a few CoC scenarios feel like they would be better run as D&D and seem to expect a sort of Monte Haul campaign were players abuse published spells with low SAN loss and have a lot of optimized firepower like 10-gauge shotguns and Tommy Guns and just sort of wade through the monsters like a D&D party of murder hobos. What I really want to avoid is game that feel like the later books of Charles Stross's "Laundry" series, where the alien is made into not only the familiar, but the vehicle for ego tripping about gaining super-powers. The best "Laundry" stories remain the early ones, such as when we're viewpoint character racing across a dead landscape to close a door before we let in monsters that will eat our entire universe with literally no hope of resisting except to close the dang door.

However, while this is true I acknowledge that I have a hard time inventing the sort of scenarios that I want to have.

Graham Walmsley wrote four good purist scenarios for Trail of Cthulhu.

 

[Wolfpack48]

DM dependent im guessing but im seeing common experiences to my own appearing here. I will say my GM at the time was a classic skill play type GM. Players need to treat the game as severe survival mode. Every glass of water is poisoned, every bed has poisonous insects and snakes, every old lady is an agent to kill you. Its exhausting how little the game is allowed to breath. Even worse, the GM never provided clues and made the players discover everything. Allowing them to waste hours and sessions on pointless red herrings and wild goose chases. For example, when Gumshoe system was invented the GM claimed it to be a crime against humanity because its the players job to figure things out and survive...

Yikes. That's way too much. I have seen some CoC referees that somehow equate horror with making literally everything hard/deadly. I steer clear -- there are amazing ways to run CoC, but this isn't one of them.

 

[TheSword]

DM dependent im guessing but im seeing common experiences to my own appearing here. I will say my GM at the time was a classic skill play type GM. Players need to treat the game as severe survival mode. Every glass of water is poisoned, every bed has poisonous insects and snakes, every old lady is an agent to kill you. Its exhausting how little the game is allowed to breath. Even worse, the GM never provided clues and made the players discover everything. Allowing them to waste hours and sessions on pointless red herrings and wild goose chases. For example, when Gumshoe system was invented the GM claimed it to be a crime against humanity because its the players job to figure things out and survive...

Same. I see a published adventure as a toolkit first and foremost..

Yeah my GM at the time made a big deal about my character having a pistol at the London border. Something to effect of how dumb I was for not knowing this of 1920's London. First of all, why is it an assumption an America player would know the laws of England in the 1920's? Second, why did the steam-liner allow passengers to bring weapons with them? Third, my character was English and I wouldn't know this but surely they would!

I think its more of a meta mindset. You the player knows you will be facing all kinds of nastiness, so you prepare by loading up on firepower and having chunky PCs that can take a hit and mentally fortified characters to weather the storm. Some GMs just expect wanton violence as part of the experience. I know a friend that GMs a lot of different genres and game types. Killing everyone in the room is the answer 99% of the time regardless.

I dont recall a single roll taking out a party. It usually takes a few bad encounters to really get things going pear shaped. Even with my killer GM.

That sounds brutal. I’ve always found that kind of play just slows down play and hurts immersion rather than helping it. Sorry you experienced that. Some really good watch outs there.

I’ve decided to spring the £50 to buy it. Really helpful to read the feedback from other players to highlight things I need to really pay attention to.

On a side note I have absolutely no doubt you could easily get a gun in London in the 1920’s. Your storyteller was giving you uneccessary grief on that one!

 

[payn]

Yikes. That's way too much. I have seen some CoC referees that somehow equate horror with literally everything being hard/deadly. I steer clear -- there are amazing ways to run CoC, but this isn't one of them.

This particular GM is otherwise a really good GM. I have yet to experience a set up and execution of Cthulhu adventure quite like he is capable of. His GM style though is one that RPGs are pure survival exercises and helping the PCs along is simply wimp mode. For example, our Pathfidner games were the same. Dont go to the outhouse without a cleric or its suicide level of survival paranoia.

After the group had some discussions with said GM, they relaxed on their style a bit and we had many good adventures together.

That sounds brutal. I’ve always found that kind of play just slows down play and hurts immersion rather than helping it. Sorry you experienced that. Some really good watch outs there.

I’ve decided to spring the £50 to buy it. Really helpful to read the feedback from other players to highlight things I need to really pay attention to.

My advice is know thy players. If your players are the type that default murderhobo, then id say look at the Cthulhu pulp rules to beef it up for them. If they are looking for more of a esoteric investigation, lean into that. If they want horror kicks you will have plenty of fodder.

On a side note I have absolutely no doubt you could easily get a gun in London in the 1920’s. Your storyteller was giving you uneccessary grief on that one!

Yeap, I even stood up for myself and called this out. After a discussion the GM was able to see my logic on the situation. They just had a habit of springing a trap on characters who were not the utmost careful in every regard. A symptom of their classic skill play RPG expectations.

 

[amethal]

I’ve not used Sanity before, but surely it can’t wipe out an entire party with one set of rolls? Or is it that bad?

One set of Sanity rolls won't wipe out an entire party (or rather, anything that can do that can also physically rip them apart in very short order, so it becomes moot).

However, the Keeper in this case apparently didn't let the players know that their characters' Sanity was being affected. Looking at one spooky painting won't drive you insane - but looking at ten spooky paintings, with the Keeper then asking for 10 Sanity rolls once you've finished browsing, almost definitely will.

 

[General_Tangent]

Has anyone run it using the Pulp Cthulhu rules? Be curious if/how that changed the play.

My first play-through used the Pulp rules. While the characters have more hit points to play with and some potentially cool talents they are still subject to the loss of SAN through reading books or encountering the mythos.

When it came to Kenya, the group had picked up a Chinese copy of a Mark I Vickers MG, but discovered that it needed a crew of three to lug around so it really wasn't that portable.

 

[Wolfpack48]

My first play-through used the Pulp rules. While the characters have more hit points to play with and some potentially cool talents they are still subject to the loss of SAN through reading books or encountering the mythos.

When it came to Kenya, the group had picked up a Chinese copy of a Mark I Vickers MG, but discovered that it needed a crew of three to lug around so it really wasn't that portable.

Did the survival rate change any? Deaths about the same as regular, more, fewer?

 

[General_Tangent]

Did the survival rate change any? Deaths about the same as regular, more, fewer?

For me it was about the same. If you also go for the luck rules then you can spend all your luck to cheat death, you have to have a minimum of 30 luck before you can use that ability.

 

[TheSword]

I’ve read the Peru section. Wow. That is pretty dark stuff!

Reads brilliantly though.