Does anyone have good tips or resources for including Lovecraftian elements into a game? Has anyone had success making the unknowable truly horrifying and frightening to players?
I imagine it relies a lot on suspense and tension in narrative and set up of scenarios, but I’m curious how others have done it. The main problem that I see is trying to mix Lovecraft’s flavor with what is essentially pulpy D&D (in feel). Thanks.
Pirate World has a lovecraft focus for the sea monsters. Everything else is fairly pulpy and light, like Dungeon World, but the deep depths of the ocean are meant to be totally unknown and full of terrible things that’ll eat your mind.
Pirate World’s tone is a bit different, focusing more on black humour and terrifying things, so that helps a bit!
There’s a fair bit about this in the setting chapter, and to strengthen it one of the main classes, the Reefmonger, even has a Blessings meter that gives strange effects (like manifestations, or talking in gibberish) when they’ve been exposed to the nightmarish creatures they summon.
I’d love to see/ hear how other players, GMs and hacks handle it. I think there’s a PBtA hack called Tremulus that does Lovecraft, but I’ve not tried it myself.
Grab a copy of Graham Whalmsley’s ‘Stealing Cthulhu’, its chock full of great advice for any lovecraftian game. Also, ‘Tremulus’ is Sean Preston’s take on Cthulhu using the Apoc engine. Much can be stolen from that game that will port into Dungeon World.
This is my first time hearing about Tremulus. I’ll check that out!
And yeah, James Hawthorne, the reason I’m asking is because we started our Pirate World game :p
Haha, yeah, just making sure others knew 🙂
Nathan Roberts, what’s Tremulus like? I’ve not had a shot at it yet.
My AP / thoughts start about halfway down 🙂
http://www.story-games.com/forums/discussion/17369/tremulus-got-my-pdf-copy/p2
Thanks, Nathan!
hey Kirby, I like injecting my rather light-hearted campaigns with elements of horror. One thing I like to do is include real-world props. So, for example, my players came across what appeared to be an abandoned laboratory.
When they began to search, I pulled out a bag I had pre-filled with lab notes, scribblings, letters to loved ones, etc. The lab notes slowly described a series of experiments that went horribly wrong, including details about the monster, potential weaknesses, etc. It ended up being a short-hand version of the mountains of madness.Â
They still talk about it to this day, and how horribly unsettling it was.
Another thing I like to do is introduce extreme contrast. When they were exploring an old dusty dungeon, they came upon a room that was immaculately clean. No dust, no dirt, etc. They were immediately suspicious, and spent the rest of the dungeon on their toes.Â
Just have fun with it. Mystery is the key to suspense. Always have more to the world than the players will see.
Thanks for the advice, David Schirduan !
It’s funny that you mention the real-world props because I was just looking up some pictures in order to put together a Necronomicon of sorts.
Also, Nathan Roberts , Stealing Cthulhu looks amazing and I am going to grab a copy as soon as possible!