Quote from: DrewThere's definitely scope for action adventure in CoC, and the story examples you cite are all applicable examples of such. Saying that isn't so (as Erik is) is just another limited view of what the game can be about.

However, the system and setting are primarily geared toward investigative horror stories where the protagonists are in constant danger of being overwhelmed. Much like early-career WFRP, in that respect.

You are correct, of course, and I think that Sandy Peterson had that in mind when he put it together. But there is room to move, though,

Quote from: DrewI'm not trawling the net listening to podcasts for you Erik

I'm not expecting you to. Just sit down and tape one of your own. All mine were shit, like those. So were a bunch of the goddam vampire games where we just said SIR YES SIR to the uber npcs.

Quote from: AosYou are correct, of course, and I think that Sandy Peterson had that in mind when he put it together. But there is room to move, though,

Indeed, but the game as written keeps characters capabilities very close to the normal human baseline. It takes considerable setting and system drift to play it Buffy style.

Quote from: Erik BoielleI'm not expecting you to. Just sit down and tape one of your own. All mine were shit, like those. So were a bunch of the goddam vampire games where we just said SIR YES SIR to the uber npcs.

Then I'd say you had a poor GM, although Vampire was notorious for encouraging that style of play. CoC is a different game, though.

And if I were currently in a CoC game I would tape a session for you. I'm not though, and there's no way I'm going to disrupt my groups schedule just to please some random bloke off the internet.

Read the book. Set up a game. Bring your imagination to the table and see what transpires. You may be surprised.

Quote from: DrewIndeed, but the game as written keeps characters capabilities very close to the normal human baseline.

Which means you either need to accept normal human plots that don't involve the foiling of plots by nameless cults (and certainly not a string of them in exotic locations around the globe, culminating in a climatic final battle in a rocket pit), or ditch it for something else.

(I'm thinking something like The Visit, a heartwarming comedy set during visiting hours in a mancunian prison. Although to be honest, even thats a little OTT being a story. Maybe something less intense, like the exciting adventure of buying a house - said to be the second most stressful event to happen to most people, after bereavement.)

Either is fine, but it is a choice that I think needs to be made.

Quote from: Erik BoielleWhich means you either need to accept normal human plots that don't involve the foiling of plots by nameless cults (and certainly not a string of them in exotic locations around the globe, culminating in a climatic final battle in a rocket pit), or ditch it for something else.

(I'm thinking something like The Visit, a heartwarming comedy set during visiting hours in a mancunian prison. Although to be honest, even thats a little OTT being a story. Maybe something less intense, like the exciting adventure of buying a house - said to be the second most stressful event to happen to most people, after bereavement.)

Either is fine, but it is a choice that I think needs to be made.

Part of the attraction of the game (and the horror genre in general) is playing relatively normal people catapulted into extraordinary situations that fundamentally alter their worldview.

Managing these sorts of game involves the application of simple, common sense GM'ing techniques that most people I've met mastered during their teens. If you can't see how you could make it work at the table then I've nothing further to add.

Incidentally, theres a recording of a game run by Sandy Petersen here:-

http://www.yog-sothoth.com/modules.php?name=Downloads&d_op=getit&lid=511

1: The characters are SOLDIERS and have GUNS and a MISSION

2: He shamelessly uses horror movie techniques to isolate the characters (their radios don't work - and the keys to the Humvees mysteriously go missing when they want to make a run for it - and Army Humvees don't have keys!)

3: Theres actually nothing activly trying to kill the characters. Theres some weird shit happening, but its not as immediatly dangerous and a sorceror or a gang of raging cultists.

Quote from: Erik BoielleWell no, because every time they try something like that they either get killed or its patently transparent that the GM is only avoiding killing them because that would spoil the fun.

They could switch out the adventures so instead of nameless cults with hundreds of followers and vast, formless beasts there is one serial killer on a island, but in order to realistically have a chance of fighting these plots they would have to be Van Helsing.

To be fair, most published Cthulhu adventures - especially in recent years - have leaned towards the "lone serial killer on an island" or "small cult of deluded fools who might summon a monster by the end of the investigation, if the investigators drag their feet too much" model. Masks of Nyarlathotep and Horror on the Orient Express are very much atypical Cthulhu modules, mainly for the sort of reasons you cite.

Quote from: DrewHowever, the system and setting are primarily geared toward investigative horror stories where the protagonists are in constant danger of being overwhelmed. Much like early-career WFRP, in that respect.

This made me giggle.

The WFRP magazine Warpstone had a series of "Making of" articles by the original designers of the game.
The direction they had been given for the general feel of the world and the first adventure series (The Enemy Within) was "make it like CoC".

Quote from: Dirk RemmeckeThis made me giggle.

The WFRP magazine Warpstone had a series of "Making of" articles by the original designers of the game.
The direction they had been given for the general feel of the world and the first adventure series (The Enemy Within) was "make it like CoC".

Exactly, although my sentence structure does make it look like WFRP inspired CoC, doesn't it?

My first contact with CoC was in TSR UK's Imagine back when I was a nipper. Issue #13, April 1984:

http://www.acaeum.com/ddindexes/periodicals/imaginescans/imagine13.html

Excellent stuff.

For all it's worth, my own guidelines for successful C&C play
- opponents are humans not creatures. Play should focus on foiling/helpling/subverting/whatever their antics. Mythos creatures should stay in the background 90% of the time.
- said adversaries are actual human beings with fathomable motives. They're using the Mythos as a mean, not an end. Of course, they're misguided fools to do so and all this will end in blood and madness anyway, but it will take much longer.
- since they're actual human beings and not psychopaths, they will balk at such thing as killing (the PCs) in cold blood. They will be recpeptive to negociation attempts. Heck, the PCs may even end up sympathizing with them (but see above).
- Anything bigger or nastier than a goul must be used with utter parcimony. If it is inconvenient to warn the players about what's coming, obvious avenues of retreat should be provided. BTW : would you walk 10 miles to crush some bug ? No ? Well, why should a Great Old One do so ?
- If you need a bit of action/adventure, the Dreamlands are your friends.
- Not emulationg HPL's stories is a feature, not a bug. It doesn't make much sense except for one-shots with small groups.

It's all in Delta Green's intro. Really.

Weekly, running a succesful d20 CoC campaign since 2003. With the same goddamn PJs.

Quote from: WeeklyFor all it's worth, my own guidelines for successful C&C play
- opponents are humans not creatures. Play should focus on foiling/helpling/subverting/whatever their antics. Mythos creatures should stay in the background 90% of the time.
- said adversaries are actual human beings with fathomable motives. They're using the Mythos as a mean, not an end. Of course, they're misguided fools to do so and all this will end in blood and madness anyway, but it will take much longer.
- since they're actual human beings and not psychopaths, they will balk at such thing as killing (the PCs) in cold blood. They will be recpeptive to negociation attempts. Heck, the PCs may even end up sympathizing with them (but see above).
- Anything bigger or nastier than a goul must be used with utter parcimony. If it is inconvenient to warn the players about what's coming, obvious avenues of retreat should be provided. BTW : would you walk 10 miles to crush some bug ? No ? Well, why should a Great Old One do so ?
- If you need a bit of action/adventure, the Dreamlands are your friends.
- Not emulationg HPL's stories is a feature, not a bug. It doesn't make much sense except for one-shots with small groups.

Sound advice.

Quote from: Weekly- Anything bigger or nastier than a goul must be used with utter parcimony. If it is inconvenient to warn the players about what's coming, obvious avenues of retreat should be provided. BTW : would you walk 10 miles to crush some bug ? No ? Well, why should a Great Old One do so ?

Hell yes to this (and all your other advice).

In the longest CoC campaign I participated in (I took part for some while in the legendary decades-long campaign that Mike Lay, one of the contributors to Beyond the Mountains of Madness, has been running), the arrival of one of the big monsters would be an indicator that we had seriously screwed up. Most of our adventures were against human adversaries, and the rest tended to be against adversaries on a human scale - ghouls, deep ones, vampires, anything that will succumb to gunfire just like anyone else and isn't powerful enough to kill multiple PCs in a single combat round.

This is excellent -- thanks for posting the link!

Quote from: Erik BoielleFascinating tool for analysis recordings.

I absolutely agree -- I've been listening to Hal and crew with their RPGMP3 podcasts and making notes of what does, and doesn't work with the game.  Infinitely more useful than reading an "actual play" report that's so highly editorialized by the person posting it.

If anyone has other links to recordings of actual game sessions, I'd be very interested in getting them.

Quote from: Warthur"small cult of deluded fools who might summon a monster by the end of the investigation, if the investigators drag their feet too much" model.

This is a good way to get passive players to stop turtling and put their characters in danger.  Make sure they understand it's not that the cultists might summon a monster... they will summon a monster.  And monster's job #1 is eating the player's characters.  Make sure they understand that if they sit back and do nothing, something nasty will come and find them.