INTRODUCTION

Disclaimer: Maybe this is wrong. Maybe I should get a blog. But if I put these things in a blog, how do I know you degenerates are going to read it?

Fawcett's Fate is the current, working name of the Call of Cthulhu campaign I'm working on right now. The premise is to have the Investigators, led by American aviation pioneer George Miller Dyott, follow in on the footsteps of legendary explorer Percy Harrison Fawcett, who disappeared in the Amazon jungle in 1925 in search of an advanced civilization he called simply, jealously and enigmatically "the lost city of Z".

My main source is David Grann's book of the same name, which I'm still in the process of reading. But this being the Design, Development & Gameplay forum, this thread is not about the fluff; it's the crunch.

My trusty old Call of Cthulhu 5.5e (15th anniversary edition!) core rulebook is fairly laconic on the subject of running long treks through untamed wilderness.

And if there's one thing that a lot of reading and a little running of TSR D&D and OSR material taught me is that having hard-and-fast procedure for long exploratory expeditions, whether above or under the ground, is a very good thing. It avoids illusionism, keeps the GM (that's me) honest and entertained, and the players on the edge of their feet.

In fact, I might actually rip off the B/X D&D or LL procedure entirely, if not for one thing: I need a system that generates tension and danger without depending on "encounters" as defined by TSR D&D. Reports of Fawcett's jungle rangings focus on the heat, the hunger, the bugs, the all too frequent incidence of infectious disease, the risk of swerving away from one's route, and of course, attacks by hostile natives. All of which took a considerable toll on the explorers' sanity, a very important effect that CoC is optimally geared to handle, and which to boot dovetails nicely with HPL's overarching theme of Nature and the Universe being monstruously uncaring and wont to kill and/or drive mad those who probe its darker corners.

So here are the tools I need to model each of the above mentioned dangers:

Heat. Rules for heat stroke and dehydration.

Hunger. Rules for foraging and starvation.

Bugs. Rules for how bad will the bugs sting you (because they will sting, everyone), and risk of complications; mostly, infectious disease (see below).

Disease. Rules for contracting, suffering, recovering and/or dying of malaria, yellow fever, rabies, tetanus, erysipelas, necrotizing fasciitis and maybe also for more common fare such as pneumonia (for those soaking wet clothes after an inadvertent river swim) and UTIs (stay hydrated!) that may also trouble our heroes.

Getting lost. Rules for land navigation.

Hostiles. Just stat them up and assign a chance that they'll show up for each area of the map.

Madness. Assign a SAN loss value for each of the above dangers, plus a baseline, time-dependent loss for merely treading beyond the sheltering veil of civilization for extended periods.

In addition to the mechanics for the events themselves, I shall assign a chance (on that "disdained mechanic", d%) for each to happen, complete with circumstantial modifiers.

My initial timetable will be to tackle one of each each week, which should give me enough time to finish reading David Grann's book (which should also prompt revisions as I advance).

It is entirely possible that there are rules for one or more of these things in CoC supplements or other BRP games. I'll look into a few of them myself, and if anyone knows of any books that cover these things, feel free to mention them and I'll gladly look into it. But on the meanwhile, I'm getting my hands dirty tinkering with this old friend, hopefully with comments from my esteemed audience.

Stay tuned.

Ive never played CoC so I have nothing to contribute for rules. But I would like to say the whole campaign concept gets two thumbs and a six pack up. Awesome.:cool:

Quote from: Ronin;732125Ive never played CoC so I have nothing to contribute for rules.

Bloody shame; you should. If aí have gleaned anything about your preferences, I feel you'll like it.

Quote from: Ronin;732125But I would like to say the whole campaign concept gets two thumbs and a six pack up. Awesome.:cool:

Thanks!

I should have the heat, dehydration and heatstroke rules up by Sunday.