Halloween RPG

Fourier

Options are Ghostbusters, set in (a simplified) New York in the 1980s:


Or Call of Cthulhu set in New Orleans in the 1930s:


Everybody knows Ghostbusters I think.

Call of Cthulhu tends to be about otherworldly beings influencing or being summoned by the inhabitants of remote American towns and villages. The general atmosphere is like a supernatural detective story, with hidden cults and the fantastical elements only becoming obvious toward the end. The beings are sort of ambiguous between fantasy (gods, spirits) and scifi (aliens), Lovecraft's work coming from before the genres split.

Anybody with interested sign up here.

EDIT: It won't be literally just Halloween night

Necro

I'm off for most of Halloween week...

*Checks calendar*

Apologies, ALL of Halloween week.

Sign me up!

Banjo

Tentatively very interested - but would this be a one-night "it's done when it's done" gig for Halloween night (a la April Fools) or more like our usual couple of hours a night over a few days/weeks/months?

Fourier

It'd be spread over a few days. It's really "time around Halloween RPG", but that title is less catchy!

I'd be busy myself Halloween night.

Banjo

Grand There's only so much nose-in-phone I'll get away with when I'm meant to be applying greasepaint and wigs and outlandish costumes made from whatever was in the recycling that week. And then when the mrs is done letting me live out my robot circus master fantasy we'll have to dress the kids up too.

IN!
I ain't afraid of no ghost / I regularly question my sanity when faced with abomination (Delete as applicable)

Necro

I might not be applying any Halloween makeup etc (have boys, and the wife takes care of all of that as she loves Halloween), but I'd be on candy hand-out duty regardless so not playing Halloween night suits me too.

Either game option is good with me too

Fourier

Which do you two feel like more: "serious horror" (Call of Cthulhu) or jokey (Ghostbusters)?

Necro

I'm honestly good with either, ghostbusters seems like a hoot and I've wanted to play Cthulu for ages so happy to let Banjo make the call

Banjo

Necrominus wrote: »

I'm honestly good with either, ghostbusters seems like a hoot and I've wanted to play Cthulu for ages so happy to let Banjo make the call

Hmmmmm....
On the one hand Ghostbusters is one of my favourite films of all time, but on the other in recent years Old Man Henderson has become a personal hero and RPG guiding light....
On the third hand, which may belong to a ghost or a Whatley cause I don't remember growing it, I can't keep up with my existing Rpgsposibilities as it is and I don't want to be the third wheel while you two get your shoggoth on - I've read VtM, I know what goes on!

GMs choice I think.
There is no Banjo, only Zuul / Gimme back muh damned gnomes (delete as applicable)

Fourier

I'll go with Cthulhu then.

Details to follow.

Fourier

Call of Cthulhu is based around the same rule system as many other games (Runequest, Mythras) called BRP or Basic Role Playing. I'm going to explain the rules a bit generically as we might play the other ones at some point and this'll be handy to refer to.

The core of the system is:
1. You have Characteristics and Skills. Like most RPGs characteristics are sort of the innate or primary qualities of your character and skills are learned knowledge/abilities. The BRP games mostly differ in their skill lists.
2. How good you are with a skill is rated out of 100. To succeed in a check you have to roll under your rating. Call of Cthulhu also has the Characteristics being rated out of 100.

Creating a character is mostly about being given points to spend in pushing up your skills.

So the Firearms(Handgun) skill might have a base value of 25%, but you spend 20 points in char gen raising it to 45%.

The base skill value in some BRP games depends on your characteristics, but in Call of Cthulhu they are fixed, i.e. everybody has a base value of 25% for Firearms(Handgun).

Necro

Fourier, are we creating our own characters for this setting or going with premades? Not an issue for me either way just wondering.

A femme fatale may be required for Banjo though :pac:

Fourier

This looks long, but it's quite simple.

As explained above, roll under or equal to your rating and you succeed, roll over and you fail.

There are a few other types of successes and failures.

Hard Success: Roll under or equal to half your skill
Extreme Success: Roll under or equal to a fifth
Critical Success: Roll 01
Fumble(Critical Failure): Roll 100, or if you are below 50% in the skill it's 96-100

Different BRP games have different divisions between the success types.

Some rolls will require the higher success types (i.e. you need a Hard Success or better).

Cthulhu is "harder" than other BRP games, so it cuts out Easy Successes where you can roll over your skill. For example Mythras has an Easy Success being rolling under one and half of your skill.

Opposed Rolls:
When going against an NPC, you both roll and the one with the best success type wins. On a draw the one with the higher skill rating wins.

Other games like Mythras just have: [Critical] beats [Any Other Success] beats [Failure] and on a tie it's the one who rolled higher.

Combat:
Initiative is just based on DEX, higher DEX people go first.

You get one action: Attack, Dodge, Fight Back, Spell, Maneuver or do nothing.

When somebody attack you, you can either fight back, dodge or maneuver. All three work as opposed rolls.

Fight: Winner inflicts damage. Attacker wins on tie.

Dodge: If dodger wins, no damage. Defender wins on tie.

Maneuver: Just covers "anything else", i.e. something that does no harm and isn't dodging, like disarming or pushing them over.

There are special bonuses if the attacker gets an Extreme or better success, but they depend on the situation so I'll deal with them if they come up.

All the other BRP games work similarly, just with slight differences. Mythras has dodge reduce damage, not just cancel. Also getting higher successes not only lets you win, but you can add on effects. So if an Attacker got Critical and the Defender just a success, the Attacker can add that his attack blinded the Defender.

Sanity:
The main rule that makes Cthulhu different from the other BRP games, you slowly go mad. Sanity is just a counter that various things like seeing a monster subtract from. As you go lower you start having hallucinations etc.

Other:
Cthulhu also has Chase and the simplest Magic rules of any BRP game (because there is only one type of magic). The first are really just for me, the second I'll deal with if anybody makes a magic character.

Fourier

Necrominus wrote: »

Fourier, are we creating our own characters for this setting or going with premades? Not an issue for me either way just wondering.

A femme fatale may be required for Banjo though :pac:

Creating, I'll send the rules onto you soon.

Fourier

Pushing:
Forgot this above, you are allowed to reroll non-combat rolls. However if you do, failure is catastrophic. You also have to justify why you get to reroll. The justification has to have risk. In game it is a seperate attempt, so the the first thing fails and then your character goes a step further.

Example: Door is stuck, roll and fail. Player says his guy absolutely throws himself at the door full force with no holding back to prevent injury.
Example: Trying to get a police officer to let you in and fail. Do something that risks arrest like bribe etc.