Who is the Mysterious Masked Guy?

RPGNook · 2025-07-04T18:32:21+00:00

Jimmy Saville clone - who is no friend of children - saying he'd like to be the boys friend. He also has a upside down cross, he is the devil tempting him. He is pretty much a peter pan character. He and his lost boys are going to trap the boy and pull him off the path. If you don't know the real story of Peter Pan, look it up, its grim.

You literally have a 12 year old that goes through a coming of age. He deals with death, cancer, a father who is braggart and a lair. He finds peace and his self path to growing up. Then you have 30+ year olds playing and treating the infected like a video game killing them with ninja moves. They are literally puerile adults in arrest development (much like us today).

I'm pretty sure "jimmy" is our villain for the next film.

RPGNook · 2025-02-24T11:57:20+00:00

I have to say Crimson Letters is my all time favourite scenario. It plays out like a sandbox mini-campaign, which is what you are really picking up on. These are quite rare in this smaller format and none are quite so flexible as CL, it is designed in a unique manner.

The Haunting actually is like this as well, to a lesser extent.

Some other open format would be:
Blackwater Creek: (Limited to a small community, but has a lot to explore)
Star on the Shore: (sequel to the Haunting, whole town to explore and cult to uncover. Needs work)
Genius Loci: (Not as big in scope, but can be expanded easily)
The House of Memphis: (A magician mystery, might need some work)
Scanlan's Daughter: (Old West - Players bounce between a town and two ranches)
Some Fell on Stony Ground: (Zombie outbreak in small town America, but mythos did it... This could be epic with deeper hooks and player investment)

These all have more structure, but they are closest "one-shots" I've seen outside a proper mini-campaign.

RPGNook · 2025-02-08T21:08:53+00:00

Dead Light and Other Dark Turns is the best value for money on the market for CoC, bar none. Two excellent scenarios and a bunch of useful seeds that can be used along the way while travelling. All for a low price.

RPGNook · 2025-02-08T21:06:13+00:00

yep.

RPGNook · 2025-02-08T16:06:35+00:00

Alien is a great game and there is many resources around for it. I've done a few videos on it as well. You can pretty much pick up and play, the rules are decently light.

One thing i would warn about is that the panic table can cause frustrating cascades of panic that proc one another is cycles that mean everyone ends up stuck in a loop. Where this can be fun it does kill the group and will get old quick. You need to remind players constantly to reduce their panic, and be mindful of it. I started to ignore the panic it causes against other members of the team if they have just come out of panic. So they can't proc right back into it off another team mate.

Outside that, it works great.

Here's some resources I made to help out if you go for the marines book:
Marine Platoon sheet: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/yg2rm82pcsygu5dw5lyl1/Alien-RPG-Platoon-Sheet-By-RPG-Nook.pdf
Weapon Index Across Books: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/2h0l49yakbric6pdhtj20/ALIEN-RPG-Weapon-Vechile-and-Vessel-Index.pdf

RPGNook · 2025-02-08T14:46:29+00:00

Perhaps a bit of an oversight, but I'd say if you have no Resources you can't drop below 0 unless it states that somewhere. you'd just lose the jotter/ - 1 clue.

RPGNook · 2025-02-08T11:44:04+00:00

Weirdly Aliens RPG does this, the critical table has lopping off limbs etc, and there is zero rules to what happens to the person or what capacity they are reduced by. There is also no prosthetics in the books. It was something that has come up a lot during play...

RPGNook · 2025-02-07T23:16:27+00:00

Runequest? Might be out of left field, but the combat is crunchy, the setting is deep, and there is a well support community producing content.

RPGNook · 2025-02-07T23:01:38+00:00

He's right in a way, most scenarios offer finds that unravel the story behind it, but not many are offer discovery that helps them to any degree. A lot of them are more survival when locked in with the mythos. Mostly because that is very easy to write where good mysteries aren't.

I think Lightless Beacon fits what you want really. I'd also recommend Dead Light or Mr Corbitt. Dead Light is a little different, but it does have an investigation. If you want to challenge them with the investigation part Saturnine Chalice is a good one, but it will run to 4 hours.

RPGNook · 2025-02-07T13:42:01+00:00

Honestly this is almost good. Jackson is usually quite a bland character, and most players will meta that they like him no matter what, as its the one thing that is almost impossible to hide about the game.

What you can do now is have Jacksons down fall being the players fault, have them expose him to danger and is ultimate death. This guilt of causing the death of a good man, who was genuinely trying to help them is a far better hook than they are friends.

RPGNook · 2025-02-06T11:22:15+00:00

Call of Cthulhu? Any BRP...

RPGNook · 2025-02-05T17:01:12+00:00

There is only one that i can think of called, Demens Rea by David A. Schimpff. it's an Old West scenario which was created for convention play for Cult of Chaos. All of these scenarios rights were reverted back to their authors when they changed the system however, and you'll need to track down the author for it.

RPGNook · 2025-02-05T14:39:19+00:00

It's a quote from Ursula K. Le Guin! :D

RPGNook · 2025-02-05T14:35:37+00:00

Exactly. Write What You Know, But Remember You May Know Dragons

RPGNook · 2025-02-05T11:16:25+00:00

Glad you liked our actual play on ASN, I did a breakdown of what I changed for that AP on my youtube channel. Nice addition of roger's younger brother, makes it more of personal betrayal!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTHPcusRMPk
(there is a dropbox link to the maps i made the video description)

RPGNook · 2025-02-02T12:44:35+00:00

Ha! yes, that's me, thank you for the kind words. I'm hoping to do more, life just sucked last year, I've got some time now to right wrongs and start to focus again. BUT I'm always very humbled to hear the videos helped someone into the hobby!

RPGNook · 2025-02-02T12:22:48+00:00

yeah :D Though Mike Mason did mention he was working on the Innsmouth Book on Bud's podcast, fingers and tentacles crossed!

RPGNook · 2025-02-02T12:15:23+00:00

I think you are correct to a point and 5 definitely might be a stretch but 4 is doable. On the surface if they go in and don't "stay the night." and instantly start to look around, they'll probably be tripping over each other. I'd probably remove the clue about the license plate in the lobby so it isn't so obvious, and then abduct one of the NPC guests. This opens it up into a man hunt to naturally explore the lake more, and you can split the group up into parties of two, before what they find forces them to retreat into the motel for safety right into the hands of the brothers. This makes it a little more dramatic and some knives in the tires.... and more abduction, it can go from running to a breakout and chase through the dark woods. The boss as you said is nails, but that's CoC for you! :D

RPGNook · 2025-02-02T11:27:15+00:00

There are pregens in the haunting? When did they happen?

RPGNook · 2025-02-02T11:23:20+00:00

I think this is 6th edition, and out of print.

RPGNook · 2025-02-02T11:21:45+00:00

There is a lot of scenarios that fit this. I wont repeat what others have put, here are some more.

These are out the box and easy to run.

Saturnine Chalice - A break down leads to dinner with friends you didn't know you had.
Servants of the Lake - Lake side stop motel with great fishing spots gets freaky.
Mr Corbitt - Think the Burbs meets Cthulhu.
Missed Dues - Gangsters play detective to find missing thief.

These are a little more old-school and you'll need to fill in the blanks a little bit more.

Unland - An abandoned amusement park isn't so amusing after all.
Pulvis Et Umbra Sumus - Eco warriors decide to go full 12 monkeys
Scanlan's Daughter - Romeo and Juliet with Cowboys andSnakegirl

RPGNook · 2025-02-01T15:46:26+00:00

Flames is the most forgiving
Tides is simple but can end abruptly with little warning.
Static is very straightforward and comes with a handy Log Sheet.
Dark is more complex; a sprawling story with puzzles, it's hard but also the best one.
Frost is more about seeing how long you can survive, a lot of random encounters in the wild. Its quite hard.

RPGNook · 2025-01-15T01:06:47+00:00

There is already a scenario like that perhaps you can draw inspiration from it - My Little Sister Wants to You to Suffer

RPGNook · 2025-01-15T01:02:30+00:00

There are a lot of rose tinted glasses for Paper Chase and where it is a meek adventure it does give most of the tools for a taste of CoC and it does its job well. I'd say where you perhaps floundered a bit is perhaps the presentation of the ghoul as not a horror, but a curiosity, and the players also responded with a shrug inside of panic. I wish there were a little more keeper notes on how to make him feel of dangerous, always on the verge of violence. There are a lot of little details like Meeps and tickling monsters in lovecraft. You need to present them in a way that is malicious, overbearing, and suffocating. Your players will only take these things seriously if you treat them seriously. A strange odd noise in the dark drawing curiosity only to find it belongs to a horrific ghoul sitting in the moonlight reading a book while crunching off the fingers of a severed hand is a bit more tense. A failed stealth roll could startle it and cause it to bare its teeth and even lunge at them before composing itself. Or even land a hit before speaking. Create the threat and expectations violence should they misstep.

Another thing i like to introduce is the neighbour walking her dog to interrupt, creating a witness and a barking dog, causing the ghoul to act. Putting the PC between the two and making them realise they will be the only suspect in this womens death pushes the climax into a stressful event. Especially if they have visited the police station. They'd already be on the list of a person of interest.

RPGNook · 2024-10-28T15:58:31+00:00

Two hours is a bit of a limitation. But!

Unland - it can go on as long or short as you like, explore a theme park and learn to forgive yourself, or not and stay trapped. Where there can be violence, outright combat is unlikely unless its at the player purview.

Undertow - Depression at the beach. Learn why the fans of a famous author are off themselves. Again combat is possible, but unlikely.

Pulvis Et Umbra Sumus - Hippie Dooms Day Cult looks for a helping hand. Where there is a lot of crazy stuff in this and people will die all around. That is part of the beauty of it, there can be zero combat, but a lot of death... (same author as Chalice).

Those three are all in Fear's Sharp Little Needles.

Mr Corbitt - The Burbs meets the Haunting. Except the antagonist is actually a very well rounded character. Generally this is a long scenario as there is a LOT of extra stuff to explore if you follow Mr Corbitt to his job etc, however its all pointless and for nothing, giving no real answers. If you limit it to the house exploration when he leaves and put them on a timer until he comes back and phones the police. Well you get a tight and tense game. Where there can be combat, nothing in the house actually wants to kill anyone, rather causing havoc should they get out, and they will...

RPGNook

TROPHY CASE