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Message: <blockquote data-quote="gamerprinter" data-source="post: 6005943" data-attributes="member: 50895">Questions of PFRPG horror games and high level characters was discussed by Jonathan McAnulty, author of the Kaidan books on the comments page of the Kickstarter (I thought it worth reposting here): While most Dungeons and Dragons or Pathfinder games are not horror games, I do not believe that the rules themselves preclude horror. Nor do I think that high-level play precludes horror (though it does make it trickier). The reason I believe this is because I have used the rules to run horror games and have even written and run a high-level horror adventure (it was called Points of Possession and was available at one time free through ENWorld, but I think the file got lost in one of the transitions on that site). Successful role-playing horror games, in my opinion, depend on a combination of things. You need to be able to induce a subtle frustration, accompanied by a sense of helplessness, in the players. You also need to be able to impart a sense of wrongness or displacement through the storyline as well as the tone and mood of the game. The first of these is harder as the characters advance in power, but so long as the GM remembers the PCs are limited and does not allow them to become gods unto themselves in the game, you can always manipulate things so that the PCs do find themselves thwarted, frustrated and helpless to prevent this or that tragedy. This must be done carefully, so that the game remains fun, and the players themselves should always have the hope of success, but somethings should just be impossible to prevent, either because they are tragedies already past (such as in a haunting), or because there are forces at work that are nigh-unstoppable (the unfolding of a curse). The best horror games are going to manipulate events so that the PCs bring their own tragedy down upon them or those they love (sidenote: there are certain seeming-sociopathic players who seem to lack all empathy for the game-world or NPCs - such players are nearly impossible to do horror games with - you should know your group before attempting horror). The second ingredient: the sense of wrongness, is, I think, easily induced at any level. There are some things that just cause a reaction in most people (snakes, darkness, disease, tentacles, ghosts, dead children, etc.). Such things should not be overused so that the imagination does not become desensitized, but these ingredients, when mixed in with the overmentioned sense of helplessness, induce horror. I have tried to incorporate horror into Kaidan (following the guidelines of Michael's original ideas) in a number of ways. Each adventure in our trilogy followed a different path for horror. The first adventure relied upon a sense of displacement and helplessness from the combination of being strangers in the land and the unfolding of hidden monsters. The second adventure relied upon the theme of corruption as the PCs found themselves slowly dying as they also faced the corruptions inherit in Kaidan. The third adventure relied upon those things which induce fear in people: darkness, spiders, and dead things, so to speak.  Kaidan at large is a corrupt land. The monsters tend to share the common ability of hiding themselves in plain sight so that you never know who you can trust. Families find their loved ones suddenly possessed of a new personality and can do little to prevent this. There is no hope of heaven (or hell), just a constant rebirth into a life of suffering, ghosts and toil. Adventurers might seem to rise above this, but those of a good heart must face the fact that they can do little more but hold back the darkness here and there. Even if they obtain great power, they still must contend with the many curses of the archipelago and there are always creatures of great darkness and power ready to feast upon the more powerful souls. (Alternatively, the more powerful the PC, the more powerful their ghost when they die violently and tragically and return to haunt their comrades.)</blockquote>

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