The Shaman
First Post
Horror in roleplaying games most often involves elements of the supernatural, from vampires and vengeful spirits to unkillable boogeymen and tentacled creatures from another dimension.
Relatively less common, in my experience, are mudane, non-supernatural horrors. Off the top of my head, I can think of two basic types of non-supernatural horrors, serial killers and monsters.
Serial killers
Serial killers are well-represented in both fact and fiction, from Jack the Ripper, Elizabeth Báthory, the marquise de Brinvilliers, and Burke and Hare to Hannibal Lecktor, Sweeny Todd, and Norman Bates, but my impression is that this is less common in roleplaying games, perhaps because the squick factor is too high - dealing with an imaginary monster like a werewolf is less disturbing than a killer inspired by the likes of Ed Gein.
Monsters
The stories of the beast of Gévaudan and the lions of Tsavo open up all sorts of interesting possibilities for encounters with animals which are both monstrous and mundane. They could be wild animals running amok, trained pets (as in "The Murders in the Rue Morgue"), or 'lost' species.
Other potentially non-supernatural horror elements come to mind, such as ritual cannibals or pagan cultists, but I'm sure I'm missing a whole bunch of great ideas. I'm honestly pretty bad at horror when it comes to gaming, since my squick meter trips pretty easily - I have one encounter in my Flashing Blades game that gives me chills, but I imagine it's unbelievably pedestrian to, say, your average CoC fans.
Have you incorporated non-supernatural horror in your games? What else am I missing?
Relatively less common, in my experience, are mudane, non-supernatural horrors. Off the top of my head, I can think of two basic types of non-supernatural horrors, serial killers and monsters.
Serial killers
Serial killers are well-represented in both fact and fiction, from Jack the Ripper, Elizabeth Báthory, the marquise de Brinvilliers, and Burke and Hare to Hannibal Lecktor, Sweeny Todd, and Norman Bates, but my impression is that this is less common in roleplaying games, perhaps because the squick factor is too high - dealing with an imaginary monster like a werewolf is less disturbing than a killer inspired by the likes of Ed Gein.
Monsters
The stories of the beast of Gévaudan and the lions of Tsavo open up all sorts of interesting possibilities for encounters with animals which are both monstrous and mundane. They could be wild animals running amok, trained pets (as in "The Murders in the Rue Morgue"), or 'lost' species.
Other potentially non-supernatural horror elements come to mind, such as ritual cannibals or pagan cultists, but I'm sure I'm missing a whole bunch of great ideas. I'm honestly pretty bad at horror when it comes to gaming, since my squick meter trips pretty easily - I have one encounter in my Flashing Blades game that gives me chills, but I imagine it's unbelievably pedestrian to, say, your average CoC fans.
Have you incorporated non-supernatural horror in your games? What else am I missing?