Has anyone established functional Sanity rules for encountering the same monster multiple times? How long between encounters must there be before an investigator must make another SAN roll? If never, the monsters seem to become ho-hum after a short while, but if always, even meeting a Ghoul will rapidly drive anyone to Sunnyvale.

My friend keeper proposes that one keeps making Sanity rolls until one has lost the maximum for that monster type (6 for Ghouls, e.g.), then one is "used to" the monster. I had the idea that one monster is worth up to three Sanity rolls, beyond which is null. The 4th ed proffers you keep on rolling until you've succeeded at a number of rolls equaling the maximum SAN damage (again, 6 successes for Ghouls). This seems harsh, even for Lovecraft; has anyone played this way?

What are your thoughts about this?

Quote from: Neoplatonist1 on March 08, 2023, 09:04:11 PM
Has anyone established functional Sanity rules for encountering the same monster multiple times? How long between encounters must there be before an investigator must make another SAN roll? If never, the monsters seem to become ho-hum after a short while, but if always, even meeting a Ghoul will rapidly drive anyone to Sunnyvale.

My friend keeper proposes that one keeps making Sanity rolls until one has lost the maximum for that monster type (6 for Ghouls, e.g.), then one is "used to" the monster. I had the idea that one monster is worth up to three Sanity rolls, beyond which is null.

What are your thoughts about this?

In the CoC rulebook (pre 7.0) there is the "getting used to awfulness" rule, which modifies the sanity mechanics for experiencing the same thing twice, or seeing the same creature twice

Quote from: MerrillWeathermay on March 08, 2023, 09:06:00 PM

Quote from: Neoplatonist1 on March 08, 2023, 09:04:11 PM
Has anyone established functional Sanity rules for encountering the same monster multiple times? How long between encounters must there be before an investigator must make another SAN roll? If never, the monsters seem to become ho-hum after a short while, but if always, even meeting a Ghoul will rapidly drive anyone to Sunnyvale.

My friend keeper proposes that one keeps making Sanity rolls until one has lost the maximum for that monster type (6 for Ghouls, e.g.), then one is "used to" the monster. I had the idea that one monster is worth up to three Sanity rolls, beyond which is null.

What are your thoughts about this?

In the CoC rulebook (pre 7.0) there is the "getting used to awfulness" rule, which modifies the sanity mechanics for experiencing the same thing twice, or seeing the same creature twice

Sounds promising; could you elaborate?

Quote from: Neoplatonist1 on March 08, 2023, 09:06:58 PM

Quote from: MerrillWeathermay on March 08, 2023, 09:06:00 PM

Quote from: Neoplatonist1 on March 08, 2023, 09:04:11 PM
Has anyone established functional Sanity rules for encountering the same monster multiple times? How long between encounters must there be before an investigator must make another SAN roll? If never, the monsters seem to become ho-hum after a short while, but if always, even meeting a Ghoul will rapidly drive anyone to Sunnyvale.

My friend keeper proposes that one keeps making Sanity rolls until one has lost the maximum for that monster type (6 for Ghouls, e.g.), then one is "used to" the monster. I had the idea that one monster is worth up to three Sanity rolls, beyond which is null.

What are your thoughts about this?

In the CoC rulebook (pre 7.0) there is the "getting used to awfulness" rule, which modifies the sanity mechanics for experiencing the same thing twice, or seeing the same creature twice

Sounds promising; could you elaborate?

From page 78 of the 6th edition. "Once an investigator has lost as many Sanity points for seeing a particular monster as the maximum possible for the monster, he or she should not lose more Sanity points for a reasonable interval" (may be a day, week, month, etc. --Keeper's discretion

likewise, the SAN lose for reading a magic tome only happens the first time a tome is read

Another optional rule I recall was that eventually a commonly encountered monster would stop being as shocking. I think it was included in the mess that was the 4e rulebook, the first version I owned. I don't know if that made it into later editions- 4e was just an earlier edition rulebook with multiple small supplements tacked onto the back and no real organisation.

When a PC has succeeded at a number of Sanity tests against a type of creature equal to the die type for how much SAN is lost on a failure, then the PC automatically passes future SAN tests against that creature. A Deep One has a SAN loss of 1d6/0, meaning that after six successful SAN tests on seeing a Deep One the Investigator has become used to the sight. A Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath has a SAN loss of 1d10/1d3, meaning it'd take ten successes to get used to them and even then the Investigator would take 1d3 SAN every time.

These are of course optional and non-canon rules requiring extra tracking of what creatures a PC has encountered. May GMs, even if liking the idea, might just rule that Investigators "get used" to creatures at a certain point and leave things at that.