Quoth the Raven + Heroes of Horror

[blargney the second]

I'm thinking of using elements from Heroes of Horror in Quoth the Raven. Are there any particularly juicy bits that should be brought together to form a horrid juice golem?

 

[demiurge1138]

What components? The Dread rules would work nicely - illness and despair for some of the gruesome crime scenes, shock for them seeing their allies sucked into the Raven's horrible death traps. Taint doesn't necessarily fit too well, but if you wanted to stretch things, the Raven might be a tainted raver, driven over the brink by Viktor's coaching.

Demiurge out.

 

[Rechan]

Perhaps Taint is appropriate with the Black Snow, if you want to toss some malevolence down on it. Or perhaps in the fires in the Cogs.

Taint is better applied to Hell's Heart, IMHO.

 

[blargney the second]

Nice ideas, guys! I'm leaving this thread open-ended because I'm curious how other people would up the horror-ante on an adventure like QtR. I'm trying to improve my skills at DMing horror stories because I'm *really* bad at it, so any advice is helpful!

Are there any non-crunchy parts of HoH that scream for use with this adventure?

 

[Rechan]

Have you seen the movie Zodiac? In that movie, the killer is nice and slow, taunting people in the newspaper.

Stretch the adventure out. Make the PCs feel like the Raven is watching them constantly, and is taunting them through the Inquisitive.

You can do this by having an adventure going on during the Raven's escapades. Just lengthen the time between his kills, and have it a grim reminder that pops up every other turn. This way, you can have it like something looming in the background. It'll distract the PCs - if they pursue the Raven, then their current mission might falter, or the plot of the Other adventure drags them away.

 

[blargney the second]

That's perfect! I've already set it up so that the fires in the cogs are a result of failing to accomplish a mission in time, and they'll likely want to do clean-up on that one. I'll just intersperse encounters from the two adventures.

What would you do at the table to give them the feeling that someone's watching them?

 

[Rechan]

Just notes in the Inquisitive about them. The Raven's stories detail their current actions to a T. (Type up something and print it out, to present the Raven's fragment).

Also, maybe have birds deliver little notes to the PCs.

 

[WayneLigon]

Upping the horror elements: Watch 'One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest' and use ideas and images from that for when the heroes visit the asylum. A female-form Warforged named 'Nurse Ratchet' might be cool.