I was recently asked for some advice from a younger Call of Cthulhu Keeper who wishes to introduce the game to newcomers to both the game and Lovecraft: what adventure would I recommend as a good introduction to it? That's when I realized that I haven't played Call of Cthulhu in more than a decade, unless you count Delta Green, which I don't. Consequently, I don't have any good answers to this question. However, I suspect many of my readers might.
So, if you were going to introduce new players to Call of Cthulhu, what adventure would you use? Bonus points if the scenario can be reasonably completed in two 4-hour sessions or less. It can be for any edition of the game or any publisher. Just don't say "The Haunting," because, much as I like it, I don't think it's all that representative of what Call of Cthulhu is about.
I used Paper Chase with newbies once, and they liked it. Starts out mundane and almost incidental, becomes relatable and even stirs you sympathy, and it ends introducing them to the terrible wider reality of an underground world full of ghouls. One of my players said "this kinda freaked me out."
ReplyDeleteWhere did this appear? It sounds interesting.
DeletePaper Chase is in the 7th edition starter set along with Edge of Darkness and Dead Man Stomp. All three make excellent introductory scenarios and the starter set has plenty of good advice for keepers and players new to Call of Cthulhu
Delete'Paper Chase' originally appeared in the Cthulhu Companion and has since been reprinted in the Call of Cthulhu, Seventh Edition Starter Set.
DeleteTotally agree with this recommendation. I was very happy with the 3 adventures in the starter set by chaosium.
DeleteIf "The Haunting" is out, I suggest "Edge of Darkness". I believe it's in the current starter set, and was in at least the fifth and sixth edition rulebooks too.
ReplyDeleteIt was in Cthulhu Companion. It's also in the starter set now.
ReplyDeleteHere is a video that recommends the best for beginners. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6E_lirLnTN8
ReplyDeleteThe Crack’d and Crook’d Manse from the Mansions of Madness book is the quintessential CoC scenario in my opinion. For a modern day scenario, Forget Me Not from The Things We Leave Behind is a perfect scenario to introduce new players to the game.
ReplyDeleteSomebody made handouts for The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse:
Deletehttps://www.reddit.com/r/callofcthulhu/comments/8nu15m/i_made_handouts_for_the_crackd_and_crookd_manse/
I've had tremendous success introducing new players to Call of Cthulhu with "Mr. Corbitt" The first adventure in the Mansions of Madness book. It's short, very creepy throughout, and ends with something truly horrific. If you run it really well, you might even get some of the players to feel sorry for the horror at the end which will create a create in-game conflict among the characters as has happened in my games a number of times. The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse from the same book, as pointed out already, is also excellent. What I typically do is run Mr. Corbitt first and then run the survivors through The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse for the beginnings of a potential campaign, as much as you can have a campaign with Call of Cthulhu.
ReplyDeleteAs I recall Edge of Darkness is super solid. All of the hallmarks - investigation, strange objects, failed cults, scary-don't-fight-them critters, and easily consumable. There's even a follow-up.
ReplyDeleteAgree about the haunting.
ReplyDeleteUm, sorry - I've used "The Haunting" again and again and its always been a huge success.
ReplyDeleteA thing I love about The Haunting is that it's almost like a jazz standard at this point: you can riff on it almost infinitely. I'm pretty sure I've never run it the same way twice, and I don't just mean different groups having different approaches--I've switched up solutions, clues, context, and whatever while keeping the backbone of the composition intact.
DeleteIt lends itself really well to rearrangements and improv, better than a lot of scenarios, esp. a lot of investigative scenarios. Probably part of the reason its stayed around despite being almost as old as I am.
The lightless beacon is very good, fits the time frame, and is free!
ReplyDeleteThey solved ‘The Haunting’ pretty quick by setting everything on fire.
ReplyDeleteHeck, play the first scenario of Masks of Nyarlathotep. Instant long term campaign.
ReplyDeleteAlso in the 7th Edition Starter Set is what I consider one of the best solo adventures ever designed for a fully fleshed out RPG, and that is Alone Against the Flames.
ReplyDeleteThere's even a puzzle mechanic used taken directly from the Fighting Fantasy gamebook, House of Hades (as it was called in the US. House of Hell in the rest of the world).
Of course, this is for those who want a taste of CoC playing alone before unleashing something like Paper Chase on their players.
A friend of mine observed: the hardest part of running CoC is that the (real life) players know they're in a CoC campaign.
ReplyDeleteSo he decided to fix that problem.
We the players started playing what we thought was an Advanced RECON campaign. After a couple sessions, when we were deep in the jungle on an extended mission, we began to encounter very strange, very terrifying things...
One of the best GM ideas I've seen in 40+ years of gaming. Start as one campaign, and then down the road the players gradually realize they're actually playing a different game. Made everything much more impactful because we were genuinely surprised, there was no expectation supernatural horror was coming, etc.
Great idea! And it could work with a variety of games.
DeleteAs an aside, coincidentally I just looked at my old 1st edition Recon game. Ah, nostalgia… 3 stats, roll % dice for your score. Rolled an 01 for your Strength? Oh well, you sure are weak yo be in a Special Forces unit… Good times!
This approach can be a huge success -- as it was in your case -- but I've also seen it backfire badly.
DeleteBecause sometimes people really want to play Advanced Recon or whatever and not cosmic horror, and wouldn't have signed up for the game if they knew.
So it's a risk.
I think that's brilliant!
DeleteI've only done sort of the opposite -- run Delta Green scenarios with no unnatural events going on. Sometimes not even a mission that was bogus, but just a simple administrative job, or an errand to set up a safe house for future use. They _always_ ended in bloodbaths. The more I refused to feed the agents' free-floating suspicions of whatever setting detail they were given as being clues to Mythos contamination, the more the quantum paranoia built up and the more savage and deranged the denouement would be.
That was a long time ago, before I radically changed (limited) who I gamed with. And I don't play DG/COC any more either, I guess. In retrospect, though, I have to say it was pretty entertaining.
Don't think I know "Edge of Darkness" as a CoC scenario, but assuming it keeps the plutonium drug frenzy, the Clapton soundtrack, and Joe Don Baker's cowboy CIA clique, it must be a total banger!!! ;)
Delete@Gern Blanston many years ago a friend of ours ran a scenario that was heavily influenced by Edge of Darkness. It was a lot of fun. In retrospect, Edge of Darkness is of a Delta Green scenario.
DeleteI personally find it hard to believe the DG authors DIDN'T have _Edge of Tomorrow_ in their own 'Appendix N', but that difficulty is likely because it was prominent in my own, internal, personal 'Appendix N' before I ever encountered the game ;)
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