So who is planning a "halloweeny" session?

[Henry]

Any highlights from previous years past?

I kind of missed that part...

My favorite Halloween Games were the first two I ran.

1) Original CoC rules; I set up an eerie atomsphere, black tablecloth, storm white noise CD playing in the background, dim lighting, etc. The characters were pregenerated PC's who were all on a steam ship in the 1920's, and an aquatic horror had damaged their boat and crawled on board, to stalk them one by one. Crew died or abandoned ship quickly, and the six were the only ones left. The Catholic Priest PC became mind controlled (I worked this out with the player beforehand), and tried to strangle one of the other players with his piano-wire rosary. One of the PC's (rich mogul) had a hunting rifle and an occult tome with him that as part of his backstory he desperately wanted to keep. Nothing would stop the thing - bullets, meat hooks, etc. In the end, the ship was sinking, they pitched and made ready the last lifeboat, and escaped the sinking ship. The rich PC had smuggled the tome on the lifeboat, and the sea-horror tried to turn over the lifeboat to get at them. A struggling-match ensued as one of the other PCs tore the book from the millionaire's grasp and hurled it into the depths. Immediately, the creature stopped pursuing them and fled into the depths, leaving them to drift in the south atlantic near antarctica....

In my second year, I ran an AD&D game that was a continuation of an ongoing storyline. They had to sneak into Vecna's Demiplane on Ravenloft, and rescue an archmage from doom. You've never seen such sneaking from non-thieves in your life - but then, avoiding thousands of poison traps and level-draining undead will do that to you. In they end, they stood near certain defeat, captured by Vecna's forces, when one of the PCs valiantly steps up, scores a critical, and cuts off Vecna's hand! Others used the confusion to free the archmage, and one even got bold enough to grapple vecna to keep him from casting spells - and succeeded in some ludicrous checks to dig out his eye! They fled through a portal created by the archmage, and promptly took his hand and eye to be buried in the heart of an active volcano. Fun, fun times...

 

[MetalBard]

Hope so...

I'm hoping that the game I'm playing in will have a "Halloween game" later this month. If there are no plans for that, I may run the group in a CoC d20 scenario. Could be fun...

Didn't get to do a Halloween game last year, but the game we were playing in had plenty of jungle-voodoo nastiness to make up for that (somewhat altered Jungles of Chult FR mini-campaign).

In previous years we've had things like introducing a death knight recently vomitted up from hell who turned out to be the valiant knight NPC that had been killed in the campaign a year earlier. His background included a hard fought recovery from demon-possessed madness. Originally a Purple Dragon from Cormyr and served with that kingdom and the party well, the possession left a taint on him...

Before that I can remember doing halloween games, but I can't remember what we did in them. I do remember one halloween game where I first introduced the party to Ravenloft. That game was fun, especially since we had a paladin in the party who went mad from a werewold attack. The paladin then started believing he was Ilmater (his patron deity) and that he was locked in a divine war with Malar. Weird but fun times...

 

[AFGNCAAP]

Have 2 different ideas in mind for a horror-themed game for Halloween: 1 fore Marvel, the other for D&D. This year, it looks like it'll be the D&D one (in the midst of a Lankhmar campaign right now).

The Halloween-themed adventure I have in store for D&D is a "side trek" (to borrow a term from Dungeon): the PCs (as well as a few accompanying NPCs/pre-gens) must survive the brutal attacks of a cannibalistic clan during their travels through the middle of nowhere. They kill travelers they encounter passing near their lair, then eat the flesh, use the skin as leather, animate the bones as servants/assistants, and use/sell the clothing & gear that their victims carried. Notable members of the clan are the barely-alive/nearly-undead patriarch, the insane necromancer, and the massive misshapen greatsword-swinging brute who has taken to wearing the faces of his victims.

Yes, for the most part, I pretty much based the idea off of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (both the original & the remake). Many of the NPCs/pre-gens will bite the bullet, and if the players aren't careful, then some of the PC will die as well. I'm currently running a Lankhmar campaign (UA generic classes, humans only, low magic, action points), and the PCs are still at very low levels (1-3); hopefully this will help increase the challenge/terror of the adventure since the PCs won't have access to much magic other than spells. This is more or less a bizarre, macabre encounter than the PCs have in the midst of going from point A to point B (in regards to the main storyline/plot). Then again, if there are any survivors of the family after the PCs encounter them, then I may have them crop up in future adventures....


If I were in the midst of my Marvel campaign, then I was going to use this idea:

A vampire sets up shop in the PC's hometown/base of operations. The vampire has infiltrated the local Vampire LARP community, and has started to use them as livestock & minions. Quite a few members of the LARP group don't know of the vampire's true identity, while those who do are either dead or willing cohorts in the vampire's service. The PC heroes get involved when one of the bodies of the vampire's victims is found in a local park; not long afterward, the PCs stumble across an attack by one of the vampire's converted minions.

A red herring in store for the PCs is a lone werewolf on the loose in the city at the same time (who's nowhere near as secretive as the vampire in its activities). It'll take a bit of investigative work by the PCs to determine that the werewolf isn't the only thing threating the city at night....

This idea was sorta inspired from a few friends' experiences participlating with the local Vampire LARP community (before WW took over the Cam); I was just entertained by the idea of a real vampire infiltrating, manipulating, and using a group of people who frequently entertain themselves by roleplaying vampires (with many bad/creepy/problem players being victims, thralls, or minions to the vampire).

 

[Stormborn]

OK, so I say this every time a horror theme thread comes up but...

Play Unknown Armies by Atlas Games. Pleanty of material, including one-shot scenarios and entire campaigns.

Great if you like the works of Tim Powers or other modern magic/horror writeres.

Plus has a more interesting madness mechanic than CoC.

 

[Dr_Rictus]

I haven't done one before, but I've been wanting to for a while. I'm hoping this is the year; I have a plan that hasn't quite come together yet.

 

[Kax Tuglebend]

i'm hoping to try running the old Ravenloft Castles Forlorn using 3e or HARP, mind you i've been meaning to do it for about 4 years and the best i've managed is a game of Zombies!!! (board game)

either that or something dark involving Alchemical, Eldritch and/or Mock Zombies from Lords of the Night: Zombies

at any rate the house shall be lit with church candles!

 

[DonAdam]

I ran 6 teenagers go camping last year. It was a blast.

Can anyone point me in the direction of a good Cthulhu one-shot? Preferrably one in which the players don't have to know anything about the mythos to really enjoy it.

 

[Azul]

This is the second year I'm including a horror-movie themed interlude in our regular D&D campaign. Last year, the party fought hoards of brain-eating alchemically-created zombies.

This year, I'm debating which movie theme to use. I like the flavour of the slasher movies, but the fatality rate in those movies is too high unless I intend to wipe out most of the party (ressurection is scarce in my campaign). I'm leaning towards the "devil child" themes (a la Children of the Corn, Rosemary's Baby and the Omen) but I might break it up into two parts - a light hearted campy part (Shawn of the Dead inspired maybe) for the pre-sundown part of the game and a darker, ambiance-laden part for after dark.

My game world has a day (winter solstice) where all the dead buried on unconsecrated ground rise for just that night as undead. These one-night-only undead cannot enter consecrated grounds, so most folks just spend the night on holy ground at all-night religious ceremonies while the living dead howl and moan in the streets until dawn. Anyone caught outside after dark on that night is in for very bad time... Anyway, I'm thinking of using this event to set up one or both parts of my halloween night session. It is only a month or so away in campaign time.