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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Henry" data-source="post: 7538431" data-attributes="member: 158">A disclaimer: I don't really enjoy horror games - I feel enough helplessness and discomfort watching the daily news, and part of my reason for RPGs is to offset it. However, if I were to run such a game, I think the three things I would focus on are as follows:<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Get buy-in from the players for a horror-focused game. Just as much as having two players who want to play a different game from D&D could easily sabotage a D&D game, a joking attitude or a 'Leroy Jenkins' mindset will torpedo hours of prep and atmosphere-building. If you can't get that, then you'll end up with either slapstick or dark humor (both are fine in their own right, but they're not what you sound like you're looking for).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Get the consent of the players for a horror-focused game. This may sound the same, but I'm speaking more of the fact that horror is about both helplessness and discomfort at the situation in which one finds oneself. This may sound a little 'PC' or 'touchy-feely' to some people, but I think it's important to state up-front: "Look, this game, as part of a horror genre game, may have some dark situations, some uncomfortable subjects included. This includes, but not necessarily limited to, _______, _______, and ______. Are there ANY subjects that anyone at the table, these subjects or any other you can think of, that we need to just draw a hard line and say, 'nope, not here.' I'm being totally serious here, no ribbing each other for anything." Some people do "X" cards and that's totally a table preference thing, but having an up-front discussion for a game where the GM is trying to evoke a very horrific atmosphere is going to possibly involve some themes that are going to be off the table for some folks. </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Finally, I would determine (from prior table experience or personal knowledge) what kinds of subjects make your players uncomfortable. This is the part that makes point #2 important. Not so much specifics, but the general concepts. Feelings of entrapment in dangerous circumstances? Body horror such as parasites or transformations? Sensory confusion or loss of the self? Being alone in dangerous situations? Darkness and uncertainty of surroundings? I would then introduce these circumstances, taking care to describe them but not to expound overly. Sensory confusion could be as simple as making a hidden roll, passing them notes of something they see but no one else, and making sure the discovery is ambiguous enough that it COULD be true, but there's no easy way to tell. Body horror could be as simple as describing the chills, the aches, the feeling of not being well, the discovery of a tiny protrusion from the back of the neck that feels like a tiny tail, or a tiny little clawed foot that playfully grasps your finger when you feel for it beneath the hairline... (During a Starfinder campaign involving parasites, I described the tail of the parasite coming through the back of the throat as a tickling feeling, almost like a hair in their throats, as the disease progressed the tail grew larger and if they died it would basically break their jaws as it exploded forth and attached to the spinal column, to control them as undead with whiplike tail/tongues until the final life stage...)</li> </ol>Anyway, that's where I'd go with it.P.S. Case in point for the second item: I run with a pretty jaded group for my Pathfinder game - we can get pretty "blue" in our humor. We played an evil campaign early this year; everyone said they could handle it, at table discussions everyone affirmed there was NO subject off the table. About four sessions into play, however, the subject of enslavement and murder of children as a means to accomplish some goals came up (trying to incriminate a noble we knew was guilty of the same crimes, and pinning it on him). No one described anything graphically, and it was mentioned about as matter-of-factly as a news report, but it derailed the whole session for basically the rest of the afternoon. We walked it back, and a lesson was learned. While not a horror game, it was a learning experience to all at the table that, yes, we need to rethink that question very seriously before answering in such blasé fashion. If we ever run an evil or horror campaign in the future, I'm probably gonna suggest that "X" card...</blockquote>

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