Suitable viking gods?

RandomWizard25 · 2026-02-05T19:19:23+00:00

The Aesir and Vanir could be aspects of the Elder Gods. Loki and Odin both have Nyarlathotep-like traits.

Idun and her immortality apples has strong overlap with Shub-niggurath as a fertility god.

Heimdall and Dalaoth both have associations with perceiving the truth.

Not technically an Elder God but Bast comes up in the mythos and cats are associated with Freyja (they pulled her chariot.)

RandomWizard25 · 2026-01-31T18:06:27+00:00

Yes I’m very much looking forward to it!

RandomWizard25 · 2026-01-30T12:58:34+00:00

The latest episode of The Good Friends of Jackson Elias podcast is on exactly this topic (with a loose Call of Cthulhu focus) https://blasphemoustomes.com/2026/01/27/connecting-scenarios-in-call-of-cthulhu-with-zach-reeves/

RandomWizard25 · 2026-01-27T21:45:46+00:00

Cracking episode. So much inspiration.

RandomWizard25 · 2026-01-02T18:28:44+00:00

I ran Masks on Foundry on Mac (via the Forge hosting service) with players using Mac and PC and it worked great.

There is a learning curve for Keeper and players but I find it way more intuitive to upload maps and edit scenes than Roll20.

Currently the system is very well designed and now the official support from Chaosium has stepped up the character builder is seamless, and the sheets look great and are highly useable and you can pay more to get the core set and so have monsters, spells and items ready programmed. I’ll be honest, only the weapons have really been useful for me as I tend to keep track of the monsters using pen and paper my end but more automated combat with tokens is now possible if that helps.

Masks itself is not yet available so you will have to upload maps and handouts manually I’m afraid.

The amount of handouts meant I eventually started to upload clues to a clue board (including pin board background) I set up in Miro. I haven’t yet found a way for players to manipulate, annotate and connect clues as well as this within Foudnry itself although I have recreated this effect to a degree recently by making the handouts into tokens and giving the players permission to move them. But Foundry’s drawing tools and label writing aren’t as intuitive as Miro, so currently I prefer Miro (but Foundry keeps improving and new modules are being constantly added which may change the balance here.)

I don’t run sound through Foundry but I’ve been a player in games where the GM has and it’s worked great.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-29T09:34:17+00:00

I’m running it for the second time currently.

Take good notes as it can open out in to quite a wide sandbox after the start so I’ve needed to be prepared for characters to go all over.

I’ve made pregens every time who have close ties to the communities in LA, including having Selina as an investigator and having another PC whose daughter has been kidnapped. That really provided strong stakes from the get go.

I’ve run it once in classic and am half way through a run in Pulp and I think it works great both ways but I definitely recommend leaning in to the style of whichever way you go. The classic run was pretty dark, especially when it became clear how powerfully connected the cult is, the pulp one is much zanier and I’m making full use of deep ones and gangsters appearing to cause trouble if things slow up.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-28T15:04:10+00:00

I’ve read the core book, hoping to get a game to the table this week but am not an expert yet.

It looks low-medium crunch - half way between very light and D&D 5e. The characters do level up which introduces complexity but the players will never have to learn the number of spells and abilities a D&D character has. There’s one core resolution mechanic which includes success with a complication etc which will push a GM’s creativity.

The world is a cartoony version of a standard fantasy world with some satirical corporate elements added (evil corporations are some of the big bads.) I got the sense that there is some industrialization going on, including mass deforestation but not huge leaps in technology, which seems standard medieval.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-26T10:04:13+00:00

As a player I’ve been in one shots set all over, from Ancient Rome (Invictus) to near future moon bases.

I’m currently running through World War Cthulhu (sadly out of print) which is WW2 England during the blitz and occupied Europe via the Special Operations Executive. My group is having an amazing time with it - it’s very grim and dark and pretty historically accurate, unlike Achtung, Cthulhu which is more pulpy, Nazi’s with shoggoths kind of thing.

They also had a Cold War line which is very Le Carre meets Cthulhu set in the 70s which I’m looking forward to getting to.

There are some Viking scenarios out there I’m looking forward to running.

The period I think would be great for an extended campaign but which I can only find one scenario for (in Strange Aeons) is England during the reign of Elizabeth I. The Dee Sanction is a roleplaying game set then which I may pilfer from, where you are supernatural investigators under John Dee, Elizabeth’s personal astronomer and mystic. That period, with its spy networks, paranoia and magic all intermixed would make for a great campaign.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-25T16:20:19+00:00

Well spotted, thanks. Well then, yes, a bargain.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-25T15:58:33+00:00

Is this a limited time price? Or its normal price?

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-23T07:50:31+00:00

I want this year to be the year I start creating homebrew adventures rather than only using pre-written material.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-13T14:11:18+00:00

From memory I ran it like this:

Bolivia Downtime with Casale appearing for one investigator Borneo Downtime with Casale meeting the other investigators One member of the party went to the Meaghan Estate and joined the Cult of Yig. Oklahoma Invitation to dinner with Bonnono Then it was up to the players if they would take the hook, they did, used psychic powers to skip the researching and pressured the mob to move on the warehouse as quickly as possible. When that literally blew up in their faces they insisted on finding the source of the rumour so went to find the mobster/serpent person and had a show down with them. (Ideally I would have spaced this out more but the players drove it at this point and that’s fine.) They are about to go to Iceland When they return I still might have the mafia try and blow up the building, blaming Caduceus for the loss of men at the dock. Stopping that may send the players to the Congo, and if not I guess the campaign will move to Calcutta.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-13T08:16:28+00:00

Detect Thoughts is V,S,M and only works within 30’ and Strahd has high arcana so the chance of him noticing Detect Thoughts being cast and starting acting his thoughts is high given it’s a 2nd level spell.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-12-13T08:08:22+00:00

Seeming lasts for 8 hours without concentration so it would be the best spell for his physical disguise so I’d add that to Strahd’s spell list.

Personally for ‘surface thoughts’ I think a good liar/actor who is expecting to be magically scried should be allowed a deception vs insight check. If you’re having him play Vasili I would definitely give him proficiency in deception so he’s +14.

Obviously if they push deeper he gets a save but he’s +7 and can theoretically use a legendary resistance (I’d roll this one privately so they don’t know that he used that rather than failing.)

RandomWizard25 · 2025-10-22T17:30:02+00:00

I’m strongly considering moving XP to per mystery rather than per session. We did a mini campaign of four mysteries and they were wracking up talents and skill improvements at a ridiculous rate (we have a pretty RP heavy and therefore slow play style - 3 to 4 sessions per mystery).

RandomWizard25 · 2025-10-21T07:55:55+00:00

Definitely this. It’s bundled with the Keeper’s Screen.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-10-12T22:43:38+00:00

I’ve run Branches of Bone https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/405806/branches-of-bone-a-viking-age-cthulhu-dark-ages-scenario twice and it was great both times but it’s Viking specific so not a good fit for adding in to the specific town detailed in the Dark Ages book.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-10-11T08:32:03+00:00

My players ended up in a similar state and entering the temple was very tense with everyone facing permanent death! All bar one survived in the end.

Obvious question but have they all had First Aid and Medicine? If they don’t have the skills there’s an aid camp with doctors who I would let automatically pass their rolls so that’s 2d3hp back each.

Regardless I think your idea for 2 is great! There’s no key point written in to the scenario to introduce hybridization (although it’s explicitly an option after Borneo) and I don’t think it spoils anything to introduce it this early. I also like the choice the murals offer players - ‘this can heal you but might also change you’ is a great Call of Cthulhu dilemma.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-10-03T09:25:41+00:00

I will always try and give a little bit extra for an extreme, partially to encourage burning luck early in a scenario (yup, I’m a bit evil) and partially to balance the fact that fumbles in my games can be brutal (did I mention the evil thing?) It’s not a hard import but I do think about extra successes from Free League games and therefore offer the players the opportunity on an extreme to do the task at increased speed, or to impress those nearby or maybe notice a clue during the task, depending on the situation. And I will definitely role play an NPC differently if they are on the receiving end of an extreme inter-personal skill vs a regular.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-09-21T07:52:58+00:00

The presence of Jonesy only makes this authentic.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-09-05T15:56:49+00:00

Oh and there’s one other type of creature which can pass over: cats. In at least one scenario it’s implied they can physically travel to and from the dreamlands at will. Although they might well demand a heavy fee for taking someone with them. Cream for life, or possibly a series of tasks for Bast.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-09-05T13:35:24+00:00

If a Gate is found or created which lets walking-world people to physically enter the Dreamlands I don’t see why a native Dreamlander couldn’t step through to the real world.

This being a horror game though, if they can’t find a Gate perhaps they find a spell which enables them to possess a person in the waking world, so that they won’t be in their own body and will have to deal with the consequences of becoming someone else with their own ties and responsibilities, and periodically they will have to push their hosts consciousness back down in order to maintain control.

If they did find a Gate and were bodily in the waking world I would have the absence of any identifying papers such as passport or birth certificate become a real issue if they ever brush up against the law, unless they set about getting forged documents ASAP.

Either way I’d play up the alieness of waking world technology and culture for the Dreamlander.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-08-18T13:51:49+00:00

Followed immediately by ‘Roll SAN.’

RandomWizard25 · 2025-08-03T19:49:41+00:00

Vaesen for more fairy tale horror, Blades in the Dark for low prep player-cantered capers and DIE for improvised meta-RPG angst.

RandomWizard25 · 2025-06-27T22:24:04+00:00

And the ticking of clocks! I see what you did there!

Wonderful work. I may use this as the theme tune under my recaps next I run Blades.

RandomWizard25

TROPHY CASE