Horror game in 12 hours. What scary things can I put in a Gothic city at night, that aren't fights?

There's going to be a period in a game I'm running where the party is lost in a Gothic city at night, trying to hide from roaming monsters. I need some ideas for nerve-wracking encounters I can put in front of them, which ideally won't involve actual fights, since I don't want to spend too much time on combat.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 

log in or register to remove this ad

Freezing Fog
As the characters creep through the streets, they start to see patches of thick, billowing fog forming, seemingly at random. The fog is 'heavy' and stays close to the ground, filling an area to a depth of maybe four feet.

The fog may seem like an ideal way to hide from pursuers, but anyone who ventures within a patch finds that it carries a deadly chill, leeching heat from their body and leaving them exhausted. Those who fall asleep within the fog will die of extreme cold exposure within minutes.

The fog patches start to spread and merge together, cutting off escape routes. Smart or observant players may realise that the patches are not random - they are emerging from gratings in the road, their source being some malevolent force deep within the city's sewers or storm drain system. With that realisation, the characters may be able to maintain a clear area by blocking up drainage grates, or escape the fog by retreating to the side streets, which aren't linked to the drainage system. Otherwise, climbing may be the only solution.

The phenomenon is short-lived, perhaps only happening for a few minutes around midnight. It could be used to generate combat encounters if needed - some enemy immune to cold might use the fog as cover, or perhaps those killed by the fog later arise as frozen zombies, compelled to seek out living beings and drag them down into the sewers.
 

People randomly encountered, mouths open silently, eyes the static of a dead TV screen.

Statues crying.

A little girl in a pink pinafore dress walking calmly through the midnight weirdness, pulling a wooden toy behind her. They hear its squeak squeak before they see her. As she passes, she looks up and quite calmly says "soon you can play with me when you're dead" and walks off, vanishing into the fog. Her wooden toy is left behind, it is a wooden platform with wooden wheels and a rat has been impaled on to the platform.

They go through a door into a house to hide only to find that the door opens onto exactly the porch they came in from.
 

Remove ads

Top