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I'm begun assembling what I already have ready-to-go for my Gothic Fantasy supplement for LotFP, but I wanted to ask what folks actually would want to find in such a product.  What would you find useful?

Here's my preliminary breakdown of sections:

On the player side of the equation...

- Introduction: What is Gothic Fantasy?
- Gothic character archetypes
- Add-on Career Path system for generating Gothic Fantasy characters
- Multiclassing rules for LotFP
- Dark Secrets tables for fleshing-out character backgrounds
- Random equipment tables
- Random-roll "Gothic-appropriate" names
- Appendix N of Gothic lit

On the GM side of the equation...
- The elements of Gothic fantasy (how to incorporate the uncanny, the carnivalesque, spectrality, etc.)
- Toolkit on making a Gothic setting (with example setting)
- Advice on making Gothic villains (with sample villains)
- A "Night Gallery" of the usual suspects (vampire, Frankenstein's monster, werewolf, ghost, mummy, etc.) with LotFP stats
- Grimoire rules (add-ons for the drawbacks to reading eldritch tomes) with sample grimoires and new spells
- Poisons, Disease, Curses, and Body Horror tables
- Sample Gothic Fantasy adventure scenarios: The Horror at Humphrey House, The Black Casket, or, The Antiquarian's Lament, and Into the Crypts of Von Orlocke

I'd add "Gothic Alchemy/Experiments" - Modern Prometheus or Strange Case are part of Gothic Horror after all, right? And the unnatural experiments are quite often prominent theme.

Quote from: Rincewind1;516340I'd add "Gothic Alchemy/Experiments" - Modern Prometheus or Strange Case are part of Gothic Horror after all, right? And the unnatural experiments are quite often prominent theme.

That is a great fucking idea.  Added to my list.  Thank you.

Quote from: misterguignol;516341That is a great fucking idea.  Added to my list.  Thank you.

:hatsoff: Hope you make a good job of it - I love me some Gothic Horror (Ravenloft is one of the two settings I ever bothered to run in DnD).

Also, checking through the Dark Secrets table - did you consider giving some mechanical weight to them? An optional rule, so to speak.

Also - I do not think LotFP has such mechanics, though I may be mistaken, but I'd also suggest

A) Sanity mechanic, or the variation of it (something akin to 3e's Ravenloft Fear, Horror and Madness mechanic, perhaps?)

And in conjunction with it
B) I'd suggest that you do not only make the grimoire rules, but also rules for learning spells - and how would  they affect physique and mentality of the character. I'm unsure here, but I think magic, magic - like technology, basically supernatural in general degenerates the character in Gothic fiction.

Which'd lead to suggestion C

C) Limit the clerical magic - I'd suggest leaving the creation of holy water, and the healing, protect from demons/undead etc, etc, spells, and perhaps some offensive anti - supernatural spells. You could also perhaps consider giving them Turn Undead - like ability as a form of a spell. Cleric as a spiritual leader with just a few divine abilities to help the allies fight the unnatural and the terrible, so to speak. But I am perhaps delving too much into your sphere now.

Quote from: misterguignol;516339- A "Night Gallery" of the usual suspects (vampire, Frankenstein's monster, werewolf, ghost, mummy, etc.) with LotFP stats

Unusual suspects would be more interesting, for my money.

Best of luck with the project!

Quote from: Rincewind1;516343Also, checking through the Dark Secrets table - did you consider giving some mechanical weight to them? An optional rule, so to speak.

Maybe, but what kind of mechanical weight are we talking about?

QuoteAlso - I do not think LotFP has such mechanics, though I may be mistaken, but I'd also suggest

A) Sanity mechanic, or the variation of it (something akin to 3e's Ravenloft Fear, Horror and Madness mechanic, perhaps?)

Hmm, I kinda doubt I will include something like that to be honest.  I'll consider it though.

QuoteAnd in conjunction with it
B) I'd suggest that you do not only make the grimoire rules, but also rules for learning spells - and how would  they affect physique and mentality of the character. I'm unsure here, but I think magic, magic - like technology, basically supernatural in general degenerates the character in Gothic fiction.

Already in the cards.

QuoteWhich'd lead to suggestion C

C) Limit the clerical magic - I'd suggest leaving the creation of holy water, and the healing, protect from demons/undead etc, etc, spells, and perhaps some offensive anti - supernatural spells. You could also perhaps consider giving them Turn Undead - like ability as a form of a spell. Cleric as a spiritual leader with just a few divine abilities to help the allies fight the unnatural and the terrible, so to speak. But I am perhaps delving too much into your sphere now.

I'm not going to mess with the raw material of the game too much, so probably not.  Keep in mind that it's Gothic Fantasy, not full-on Gothic lit emulation.  Under the trappings it's still going to play like a D&D game.

Quote from: Thalaba;516345Unusual suspects would be more interesting, for my money.

Best of luck with the project!

I will likely do a couple different takes on each monster so there are some surprises.

And thank you!

Quote from: misterguignol;516352Maybe, but what kind of mechanical weight are we talking about?

My suggestion would be, perhaps, a form of "race"? Like +1 to Stat A, -1 to Stat B. Or perhaps a minor perk, like "Once per day/week, you can do this". I am not really that comfortable with LotFP's mechanic to suggest something of much substance, sorry :(. Perhaps it's a foolish idea.

Rincewind's idea is AWESOME (the initial idea, haven't read the detail of subsequent posts).

Also love the ToC, MG. I suppose you're covering lycanthropy and vampyrs under Curses. Right?

As for Gothic Fantasy - some good points raised on the last one indeed. I'd perhaps suggest that the Sanity mechanic, or Fear mechanic, if you decide to include one, is not handled like in CoC/ToC (Where it is basically a resource for character's life's length), but perhaps a Madness/Insanity table could be a part of the GM stuff - give a GM a random table he could roll for NPCs mental disorder, or things that the PC could get after a particularly nasty adventure.

Basically, something similar to the Disease/Poison table ;). I'd say that it'd be good if only as a reference for a GM about mental disorders (I never myself used CoC's 20% = mental disorder rule, but I liked the list).

So is this going to be actually playable, or is the point just to be really showy and pretentious at character creation and then be an unplayable mess?

Because one of the things that is good about LotFP you know, is that its actually still playable, and playable as D&D.  And its more playable of course the less you pay attention to any of the nonsense Raggi says about "weird fantasy".

But it sounds to me like what you're doing is setting up a bunch of "cool" visuals: "ooh gothic fantasy, awesome! mist-enshrouded moors, kick ass! Guys with stovepipe hats! Wicked!! Everyone is utterly fucked up by dark secrets! Yeah! No one has any class abilities! Yay! Everything is full of dark imagery! Woo!"

So the two questions are:
1. How do you end up with something actually playable other than a bunch of PCs that look cool and then don't really have anything to do in a world that makes no sense?
2. Where's the fucking meat?

RPGPundit

I have no idea how you reached that conclusion Pundit, based on MG's work so far, and especially the comment that he's not planning to change the core of LotFP too much. Judging so far, there'll be quite a bit of meat, enough "fluffy" visuals, and a core mechanic that'll allow PCs to go out and explore a Gothic Setting. But I leave the rest of "defence" to MG.

QuoteBecause one of the things that is good about LotFP you know, is that its actually still playable, and playable as D&D. And its more playable of course the less you pay attention to any of the nonsense Raggi says about "weird fantasy".

Um, so just play it as DnD then? I have no problem with Weird/Gothic settings for DnD. Since when DnD is just Dungeons and Dragons (that sounds so punful).

Quote from: misterguignol;516339I'm begun assembling what I already have ready-to-go for my Gothic Fantasy supplement for LotFP, but I wanted to ask what folks actually would want to find in such a product.  What would you find useful?

Here's my preliminary breakdown of sections:

On the player side of the equation...

- Introduction: What is Gothic Fantasy?
- Gothic character archetypes
- Add-on Career Path system for generating Gothic Fantasy characters
- Multiclassing rules for LotFP
- Dark Secrets tables for fleshing-out character backgrounds
- Random equipment tables
- Random-roll "Gothic-appropriate" names
- Appendix N of Gothic lit

My experience with LotFP is limited, it has been explained to me and I have flipped through the rule book so keep that in mind with my response. Overall this sounds like a cool idea, but execution and your core concepts are going to be everything.

GOTHIC CHARACTER ARCHETYPES: Are these mechanical or conceptual. This could work, but i think you should be careful about veering too much in te direction of radically altering the setting assumption (like when ravenloft staeted bringing in too much 17th and 18th century stuff to keep with the gothic lit feel---a lot players didn't like this). So i would go with universal ideas here.      

MULTICLASSING RULES
If you plan to add in multiclassing rules to the system, i would be cautious. If only because it may produce some unexpected results and i am not sure how it contributes to the gothic fantasy goal. But i coukd be missing something here.

DARK SECRETS
i like this concept. My only advice is maybe not make it universal for all characters. Perhaps a percentage chance that any given character starts with a dark secret. An over abundance of these in a party may diminish the effect.

RANDOM ROLL GOTHIC APPROPRIATE NAMES
This seems like it isn't needed. Gothic is much deeper than things like names. And players probably want some measure of control over naming their characters.

APPENDIX N OF GOTHIC LIT: This is a good idea and probably will benefi greatly fom your expertise.

WHAT IS GOTHC FANTASY: I prefer mine heavy on the gothic, light on the fantasy. How you adress this question will probably determine both the rest of the book and who reads it/does not. Do you you have any core principles here?


I will respond the gm stuff shortly. So far, i think this is interesting.

Quote from: RPGPundit;516488But it sounds to me like what you're doing is setting up a bunch of "cool" visuals: "ooh gothic fantasy, awesome! mist-enshrouded moors, kick ass! Guys with stovepipe hats! Wicked!! Everyone is utterly fucked up by dark secrets! Yeah! No one has any class abilities! Yay! Everything is full of dark imagery! Woo!"

I thought you were all about genre emulation, Pundy.

QuoteSo the two questions are:
1. How do you end up with something actually playable other than a bunch of PCs that look cool and then don't really have anything to do in a world that makes no sense?

As playable as any LotFP character.  Which is to say, definitely playable.

Quote2. Where's the fucking meat?

What counts as meat to you?  You say the proposed ToC, right?  There are new systems and random tables in there, son.  Monster stats, new spells, rules for grimoires, three adventures.  Is that not meat by your definition?

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;516496GOTHIC CHARACTER ARCHETYPES: Are these mechanical or conceptual. This could work, but i think you should be careful about veering too much in te direction of radically altering the setting assumption (like when ravenloft staeted bringing in too much 17th and 18th century stuff to keep with the gothic lit feel---a lot players didn't like this). So i would go with universal ideas here.    

This section would be conceptual rather than mechanical.  It's essentially a "cheat sheet" for players who want to make a character that fits the genre but who haven't read a lot of Gothic lit.  Read through the archetypal character types found in Gothic lit, pick one you like, and use it as the framework for your character.  Instant genre appropriateness.

QuoteMULTICLASSING RULES
If you plan to add in multiclassing rules to the system, i would be cautious. If only because it may produce some unexpected results and i am not sure how it contributes to the gothic fantasy goal. But i coukd be missing something here.

I've used these rules since I got LotFP and I haven't really found any issues with cascading unexpected results.  The reason why I'd include them is that many characters in Gothic lit have a mix of abilities best emulated with multiclassing.

QuoteDARK SECRETS
i like this concept. My only advice is maybe not make it universal for all characters. Perhaps a percentage chance that any given character starts with a dark secret. An over abundance of these in a party may diminish the effect.

Interesting stuff for me to think about here.

QuoteRANDOM ROLL GOTHIC APPROPRIATE NAMES
This seems like it isn't needed. Gothic is much deeper than things like names. And players probably want some measure of control over naming their characters.

It's optional, of course.  But it's also super helpful for GMs who don't want to have to come up with genre-appropriate names on the fly ;)

QuoteAPPENDIX N OF GOTHIC LIT: This is a good idea and probably will benefi greatly fom your expertise.

My list of Gothic works is definitely better than the ones found in Ravenloft books ;)

QuoteWHAT IS GOTHC FANTASY: I prefer mine heavy on the gothic, light on the fantasy. How you adress this question will probably determine both the rest of the book and who reads it/does not. Do you you have any core principles here?

I want to stress that the supplement will definitely be a toolkit; I want to leave the mix between Gothic and Fantasy up to the GM running the campaign.  Hell, everything in the book is "optional"--nothing is "core."

QuoteI will respond the gm stuff shortly. So far, i think this is interesting.

Thank you for your feedback!

Quote from: misterguignol;516339On the GM side of the equation...
- The elements of Gothic fantasy (how to incorporate the uncanny, the carnivalesque, spectrality, etc.)

This stuff can be very useful, but it can also be not so practical if it gets bogged in lit theory or jargon. So i would try to make my terms and the concepts approavhable as well as useful for your standard GM. It is one of those things where your greatest strength can become your greatest weakness if you arent careful. So far this all looks good, i have just seen gaming products get too academic and result in no practical benefit for the gm. So it will help if you connect all ese elements to concrete in-game events. (i.e. Here are some examples if how the uncanny may arise in a game session).

Quote- Toolkit on making a Gothic setting (with example setting)
- Advice on making Gothic villains (with sample villains)

I like that both of these have samples.

QuoteA "Night Gallery" of the usual suspects (vampire, Frankenstein's monster, werewolf, ghost, mummy, etc.) with LotFP stats

Excellent to include these. I would also include creative variations as well.

QuoteGrimoire rules (add-ons for the drawbacks to reading eldritch tomes) with sample grimoires and new spells

This sounds good, but am not familiar enough with LotFP magic to know for sure.

QuotePoisons, Disease, Curses, and Body Horror tables

You may want to add a subsystem on gothic curses. Ravenloft had something like ths and as a GM I found it very useul. It looks ike these are tables, so how will they work? Is body horror table a bunch of wierd things can can randomoy go wrong? Body horror (done well) can be very effective in an rpg, but you probably want to elaborate on it and give advice on how to incorporate it.

QuoteSample Gothic Fantasy adventure scenarios: The Horror at Humphrey House, The Black Casket, or, The Antiquarian's Lament, and Into the Crypts of Von Orlocke

One can never have enough of these. Definitely cram in as many as possible. I suggest adding in a bunch of advnture seeds as well.

Quote from: misterguignol;516499I want to stress that the supplement will definitely be a toolkit; I want to leave the mix between Gothic and Fantasy up to the GM running the campaign.  Hell, everything in the book is "optional"--nothing is "core."

I missed that part. If it is a toolkit of options that makes a big difference. In that case for the "what is gothic fantasy" section i would probably want to see an overview of possible answers to the question. And I would want to see it not just in terms of lit history, but game history as well. For example, you could go over the various rpgs that qualify as gothic fantasy and explain how each addressed the genre (maybe assessing tge strengths and weaknesses if each). That way, i can tailor the game to my taste more.




Thank you for your feedback![/QUOTE]

Brendan's got a point with the Dark Secrets being random if you have a dark secret all all - perhaps a "Past of the Hero" table, with a few results, and Dark Secret being one of them? Or spread the Dark Secrets to the various results on such a table, like for example

1d10:

1: War - roll on War Encounters table
2: Famine
3: Unemployment
4: Love

etc. etc. I know it was my favourite (well, only favourite tbh) part of a certain Polish dark fantasy RPG, Monastyr.

I'd also suggest a Gothic Environment suggestion table. Explain how to gothic up the environment, how to add flavor to "You see a bridge..." how to build from the moment that players come a location, and perceive its "strangeness."

Quote from: Silverlion;516594I'd also suggest a Gothic Environment suggestion table. Explain how to gothic up the environment, how to add flavor to "You see a bridge..." how to build from the moment that players come a location, and perceive its "strangeness."

That's a great idea...something like the random dungeon dressing tables from the DMG?

I like keeping clerical ideas and religious structure as a strong theme. Few things are as gothic as the austere interpretations of an all-prevalent human institution protecting the masses, in the name of the divine, from the earth's horrors (spiritual and physical). Gothic is a whole lot about faith, often about holding things together while things fall apart.

The trouble is trying to get rid of the "reset buttons" and "safe houses" that make clerics so powerful in such settings. So an amalgam of personal/structural corruption (indulgences) and alien culture confusion (colonialism) would help such a mix. As would be some "Dark Sun" tailoring to the allowed spell list. In a desert world, remove create water spells; in a gothic world, remove ??? spells (lasting light?, cure disease?, cure serious wounds?...).

Quote from: Opaopajr;516615I like keeping clerical ideas and religious structure as a strong theme. Few things are as gothic as the austere interpretations of an all-prevalent human institution protecting the masses, in the name of the divine, from the earth's horrors (spiritual and physical). Gothic is a whole lot about faith, often about holding things together while things fall apart.

The trouble is trying to get rid of the "reset buttons" and "safe houses" that make clerics so powerful in such settings. So an amalgam of personal/structural corruption (indulgences) and alien culture confusion (colonialism) would help such a mix. As would be some "Dark Sun" tailoring to the allowed spell list. In a desert world, remove create water spells; in a gothic world, remove ??? spells (lasting light?, cure disease?, cure serious wounds?...).

Remove Raise Dead and the like. Give greater versions of Animate Dead, which bring the subject closer and closer to what they were in life (LotFP's spell already works a bit that way), and move it to MU on level 3. The whole "I have the power to bring her back...but I can not use it" temptation ;)

Quote from: Rincewind1;516616Remove Raise Dead and the like. Give greater versions of Animate Dead, which bring the subject closer and closer to what they were in life (LotFP's spell already works a bit that way), and move it to MU on level 3. The whole "I have the power to bring her back...but I can not use it" temptation ;)

Yep, there is no Raise Dead in LotFP.

Also, the Gothic isn't nearly as religion-friendly as people here seem to assume.  Keep in mind that much of the Gothic is set in Catholic countries yet was written by Protestants.  Which means that depictions of religion tend to show it to be corrupt and backwards in comparison to Enlightenment values.

If a character is a monk in a Gothic novel he's more likely to rape someone's daughter or poison the prince than he is to brandish a cross against vampires ;)

I was going to say something but Rincewind1 basically already said anything I would say beyond maybe doing something like Warhammer and using a dual insanity/corruption track for arcane magic use.

Quote from: misterguignol;516628Yep, there is no Raise Dead in LotFP.

Also, the Gothic isn't nearly as religion-friendly as people here seem to assume.  Keep in mind that much of the Gothic is set in Catholic countries yet was written by Protestants.  Which means that depictions of religion tend to show it to be corrupt and backwards in comparison to Enlightenment values.

If a character is a monk in a Gothic novel he's more likely to rape someone's daughter or poison the prince than he is to brandish a cross against vampires ;)

Good ;).

And yeah, Pit and the Pendulum was set in Spain, Pits of Inquisition, after all. So the Church can be a hero, but can also be a villain. Although when we talk DnD "Cleric", I am thinking more about Van Helsing (who is, as I understand, the original idea for Cleric actually anyway) when it comes to Gothic setting. Perhaps change the name (or at least give some fluff) for the Cleric being not necessarily an ordained priest, but a man/woman of deep Faith with capital f?

Quote from: Rincewind1;516631Good ;).

And yeah, Pit and the Pendulum was set in Spain, Pits of Inquisition, after all. So the Church can be a hero, but can also be a villain.

Yep, notice who rides in to save the protagonist in that story: the French Army, who are basically the secular antidote to the Spanish Inquisition!

QuoteAlthough when we talk DnD "Cleric", I am thinking more about Van Helsing (who is, as I understand, the original idea for Cleric actually anyway) when it comes to Gothic setting.

I think the inspiration was actually film versions of Van Helsing.  In Stoker's book, Van Helsing is more of a scientist than he is a man of faith, really.  

QuotePerhaps change the name (or at least give some fluff) for the Cleric being not necessarily an ordained priest, but a man/woman of deep Faith with capital f?

I like the name because it's quite generic; it just means "agent of the religion," which could be anything from a monk or priest to a templar or "inspired" fanatic.  I've got the fluff written for the "Pious Cleric" archetype, and I think that would fit what you're talking about.

Quote from: Marleycat;516630I was going to say something but Rincewind1 basically already said anything I would say beyond maybe doing something like Warhammer and using a dual insanity/corruption track for arcane magic use.

I like your suggestion, but I also don't want to stray too far from the LotFP rules.  Rince did convince me to work up a system for Terror, Horror, and Madness.  I could give some notes in the text how that might fit together with the magic system.

Quote from: misterguignol;516633Yep, notice who rides in to save the protagonist in that story: the French Army, who are basically the secular antidote to the Spanish Inquisition!


I like the name because it's quite generic; it just means "agent of the religion," which could be anything from a monk or priest to a templar or "inspired" fanatic.  I've got the fluff written for the "Pious Cleric" archetype, and I think that would fit what you're talking about.

The Napoleonic Army is an antidote to anything, I had discovered ;).

And I guess you're right. My point was to distinct between Cleric and Priest, so to speak, because of the reasons you had posted.

Quote from: Marleycat;516630I was going to say something but Rincewind1 basically already said anything I would say beyond maybe doing something like Warhammer and using a dual insanity/corruption track for arcane magic use.

I'd second this in a way - magic generally as source of Corruption. Of both mind and body.

Quote from: misterguignol;516634I like your suggestion, but I also don't want to stray too far from the LotFP rules.  Rince did convince me to work up a system for Terror, Horror, and Madness.  I could give some notes in the text how that might fit together with the magic system.

Cool.  You are talking about Lamentations of the Flame Princess I assume?  Never read it myself but I hear good things about it.

Quote from: Marleycat;516638Cool.  You are talking about Lamentations of the Flame Princess I assume?  Never read it myself but I hear good things about it.

I am indeed!  That acronym really throws people off, I should stop be lazy and type it all out ;)

You can actually download an art-free version of the rules from the publisher's website if you want to check it out.  The rules are basically a thematically-skewed version of B/X D&D.

Quote from: misterguignol;516607That's a great idea...something like the random dungeon dressing tables from the DMG?

Yes. With ways to flavor even mundane setting elements with more oozing, loathesome creatures singing to the moon in their tangled grotesque worship while floating atop ponds chocking with primeval debris and devouring the buzzing flies of the foetid swamp.

Quote from: Silverlion;516641Yes. With ways to flavor even mundane setting elements with more oozing, loathesome creatures singing to the moon in their tangled grotesque worship while floating atop ponds chocking with primeval debris and devouring the buzzing flies of the foetid swamp.

I like the way you think, friend.

I'm on it.  Adding it to the list.

I just assembled my rough draft of the player's side of this supplement...30ish pages, without art.  Also without decent formatting ;)

When I get a computer I'll  definitely do so.:)

It was throwing me because I thought you were talking about Legend of the Five Rings until I read through the thread. On the otherhand I am certain my FLGS had it in stock 3-4 months ago but I was getting Fantasy Craft at the time, only so much money ya know. :)

Quote from: misterguignol;516643I just assembled my rough draft of the player's side of this supplement...30ish pages, without art.  Also without decent formatting ;)

Same here. Since I'm writing a game of similar themes, mind if I steal some of the stuff you come up with (classeless/level-less gothic horror fantasy game called Mourngyre.)

Quote from: misterguignol;516643I like the way you think, friend.

I'm on it.  Adding it to the list.

I just assembled my rough draft of the player's side of this supplement...30ish pages, without art.  Also without decent formatting ;)

Is this something that will be published in print or posted online?

Important does not necessitate having to be favorable. Gothic, even the American Gothic derivative, has more to do with a dour traditionalism being a world character. Few things encapsulate that so well than an austere view of religion. It's the world's darkness that's interesting, leaving the good v. bad contrast flexible.

I'd have to read LotFP world settings, but I'd personally dig an African/Caribbean Gothic style. Or perhaps a Russian Gothic? I'll have to go check out the art free version and see what I'd like to see more of...

Quote from: Silverlion;516657Same here. Since I'm writing a game of similar themes, mind if I steal some of the stuff you come up with (classeless/level-less gothic horror fantasy game called Mourngyre.)

Well, keep in mind that I may be publishing all this stuff myself or indeed having it published by an actual imprint.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;516676Is this something that will be published in print or posted online?

Might be either, to be honest.  Too early to tell.  I'm going to show a complete draft to a publisher--if they are interested, cool.  If not, I'll do POD/PDF.

Quote from: misterguignol;516707Well, keep in mind that I may be publishing all this stuff myself or indeed having it published by an actual imprint.

Hey, no worries. I'll make my own :D

Quote from: misterguignol;516708Might be either, to be honest.  Too early to tell.  I'm going to show a complete draft to a publisher--if they are interested, cool.  If not, I'll do POD/PDF.

Speak with Jim, if you did not yet.

Quote from: misterguignol;516497I thought you were all about genre emulation, Pundy.

I am, but some genres are more pretentious than playable.  The problem that I see emerging here is the type of mentality that you get from the CoC or WFRP - Swine: namely that everyone has to have gimped characters that are all about playing their weaknesses until they get devoured by something they're powerless to do anything about, and they themselves are never heroic, and always morally corrupt in some way, and combat is seen as something unseemly.

QuoteWhat counts as meat to you?  You say the proposed ToC, right?  There are new systems and random tables in there, son.  Monster stats, new spells, rules for grimoires, three adventures.  Is that not meat by your definition?

That could be meat. Some of the other things people were describing was not, it was just window dressing for pretentiousness' sake.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;517217The problem that I see emerging here is the type of mentality that you get from the CoC or WFRP - Swine: namely that everyone has to have gimped characters that are all about playing their weaknesses until they get devoured by something they're powerless to do anything about, and they themselves are never heroic, and always morally corrupt in some way, and combat is seen as something unseemly.

Oddly, I haven't proposed anything that would gimp the characters.  Any "weaknesses" I have proposed are just plot hooks in disguise.

Quote from: misterguignol;517219Oddly, I haven't proposed anything that would gimp the characters.  Any "weaknesses" I have proposed are just plot hooks in disguise.

Hm. This feels a bit too much like this form of thought:

I do not like Gothic Fantasy
I do not like Swine games
Therefore, Gothic Fantasy is Swine.

Quote from: RPGPundit;517217I am, but some genres are more pretentious than playable.  The problem that I see emerging here is the type of mentality that you get from the CoC or WFRP - Swine: namely that everyone has to have gimped characters that are all about playing their weaknesses until they get devoured by something they're powerless to do anything about, and they themselves are never heroic, and always morally corrupt in some way, and combat is seen as something unseemly.


RPGPundit

Fortunately my "Gothic Fantasy" has more elements of horror, with combat, heroes and the like. A more "dark and scary" Hammer Films if you will. Or if you will a game setting drawn from Frankenstein, Dracula, and Werewolf stories. Set in a fantastic world so we don't run into "Historical" problems, and can add our own monsters* as well.

After all combat was dark and brutal against Dracula, but the characters were heroes (most of them) facing him down.


*Mad clockwork inventor killing people and turning their skins into coverings for his clockwork people. Strange creatures that seem human but are empty of souls, facing either the horror of self, or the horrors around them. Clay men with souls, trying to belong to a world of men by fighting the good fight against true monsters perhaps. Voodoo zombies, mind control, mad witch-hags, flesh eating harpies dwelling in savage foreboding abandoned places, and so on.

Hey, misterg, can we get a preview of your appendix n?

Quote from: Aos;517248Hey, misterg, can we get a preview of your appendix n?

Here you go (http://talesofthegrotesqueanddungeonesque.blogspot.com/2012/02/appendix-n-for-gothic-fantasy.html).

Quote from: Silverlion;517247Fortunately my "Gothic Fantasy" has more elements of horror, with combat, heroes and the like. A more "dark and scary" Hammer Films if you will. Or if you will a game setting drawn from Frankenstein, Dracula, and Werewolf stories. Set in a fantastic world so we don't run into "Historical" problems, and can add our own monsters* as well.
.

I tend to stick with very hammer style horror for things like Ravenloft myself. Combat is far from unseemly in my games, but for me the funzone is more on the side of investigation and intrigue. Usually the adventures culminate in a combat against the big bad vampire, werebeast or what have you, and there is often a terrifying encounter or two elsewhere, but i dont structure the adventure itself around combat encounters. That isif i am doing something suited for rp heavy play like CoC or Ravenloft. If we are talking zombie apocolypse then combat will take a more central role.

I think where people get tripped up on gothic horror is doing mood amd atmosphere for its own sake (if that makes any sense). And with CoC in particular the issue I see is too rigidly adhering to the lovecraft story format. It is a great game for mystery and investigation, but if you only keep it about the pcs eventually going mad or things imploding, it can be hard to have a cool ongoing campaign. With Ravenloft the problem I have seen is GMs making things to monotone in order to "go gothic". You really need to mix in some other elements to keep the game fresh. Also, in my experience taking horror rpgs too seriously can lead to problems.

Quote from: misterguignol;517250Here you go (http://talesofthegrotesqueanddungeonesque.blogspot.com/2012/02/appendix-n-for-gothic-fantasy.html).

Thanks for the list.

Edit: looking at list now. Some I have read, some I haven't. Dracula, Frankenstein, Jeckyl and Hyde (rosemary's baby is on there and that is probably my favorite horror novel) i like stuff like that because they are all pretty exciting. Some other stuff, like lefanu, i read but just didn't enjoy because I fund it dull or just felt like I was struggling to find the story (this isn't a knock on your list though). With at divider in mind, are there any on the list you would especially recommend or disuade me from? I haven't read the monk or castle otranto because i assume they will bore me. And though I go to the house of the seen gables twice a year here in salem, i have never read the book because i always assumed it was a familily epic/love story that happens to have a curse and some witch trial background elements.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517279Thanks for the list.

With at divider in mind, are there any on the list you would especially recommend or disuade me from? I haven't read the monk or castle otranto because i assume they will bore me. And though I go to the house of the seen gables twice a year here in salem, i have never read the book because i always assumed it was a familily epic/love story that happens to have a curse and some witch trial background elements.

You actually might like The Castle of Otranto; it's a short novel and has a ton of melodramatic action per page.  It's got a rapid-fire plot with unlikely developments all over the place.

The Monk is similarly littered with action and crazy developments, but some people find the frantic pace of the plot twists a bit much.  Still, I can't see it boring you necessarily.

The one it sounds like you should stay away from is Ann Radcliffe.  Her books are looooong, and are infamous for big stretches where she describes the majesty of nature while nothing happens.

Quote from: misterguignol;517292You actually might like The Castle of Otranto; it's a short novel and has a ton of melodramatic action per page.  It's got a rapid-fire plot with unlikely developments all over the place.

The Monk is similarly littered with action and crazy developments, but some people find the frantic pace of the plot twists a bit much.  Still, I can't see it boring you necessarily.

The one it sounds like you should stay away from is Ann Radcliffe.  Her books are looooong, and are infamous for big stretches where she describes the majesty of nature while nothing happens.

Thanks. Sounds like I have been wise to avoid Radcliffe.

Quote from: RPGPundit;517217I am, but some genres are more pretentious than playable.  The problem that I see emerging here is the type of mentality that you get from the CoC or WFRP - Swine: namely that everyone has to have gimped characters that are all about playing their weaknesses until they get devoured by something they're powerless to do anything about, and they themselves are never heroic, and always morally corrupt in some way, and combat is seen as something unseemly.

RPGPundit

I do think this is a genuine pitfall of the genre and it can happen if people take some of the above suggestions as universal advice. Personally I think horror campaigns work best when the characters are themselves good and heroic like van richten. And I am someone who loves evil campaigns. But in my opinion, playing evil characters just isn't that scary for some reason (one of my chief complaints with games like vampire). Where I think Misterguignol's tools are useful is they provide the possibility of interesting backgrounds that can come up in play and challenge the rest of the party. That is why I said everyone shouldn't have a dark secret. Because then it just becomes an excercize in characterization (again it is kind of the same issue I have with vampire). But if there is always the possibility someone in the party made a pact with the devil or is cursed for some past misdeed, that keep you on your toes and can provide some fodder for adventure if used judiciously.

This is also why I like the Ravenloft powers check system. For the most part it keeps the party relativley heroic, since it both punishes and rewards evil behavior. But it also makes for some interesting session when characters do decide to go down that path. In all my years of playing I have never had more than one character in a given party fail any powers checks.

Pundit, when and if you run horror style campaigns, what approach do you take and what do you avoid?

Quote from: Silverlion;517247Fortunately my "Gothic Fantasy" has more elements of horror, with combat, heroes and the like. A more "dark and scary" Hammer Films if you will. Or if you will a game setting drawn from Frankenstein, Dracula, and Werewolf stories. Set in a fantastic world so we don't run into "Historical" problems, and can add our own monsters* as well.

After all combat was dark and brutal against Dracula, but the characters were heroes (most of them) facing him down.

Don't get me wrong, that's awesome.  I'm complaining about when people want to make Gothic fantasy less Hammer Films' (or even the original Bram Stoker's) Dracula, and more Wuthering Heights.

RPGPundit

Quote from: misterguignol;517250Here you go (http://talesofthegrotesqueanddungeonesque.blogspot.com/2012/02/appendix-n-for-gothic-fantasy.html).

Ah hah.. and speaking of Wuthering Heights, there it is...

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;517302Don't get me wrong, that's awesome.  I'm complaining about when people want to make Gothic fantasy less Hammer Films' (or even the original Bram Stoker's) Dracula, and more Wuthering Heights.

RPGPundit

God forbid people have different play styles than you!  

To make this nice and clear though: what I am making is a toolkit; people can dial in the style and type of Gothicism they want with it, from light touches of Gothic atmosphere to Hammer Horror to full on Romantic dramatics.  

How other people make use of it is no business of mine.

These distinctions are also quite silly; while you fear that the Gothic is pretentious, it seems you haven't read much of it--The Castle of Otranto, the first Gothic novel by most estimates, has more sword-fighting than any Hammer Horror film, for example.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517295Pundit, when and if you run horror style campaigns, what approach do you take and what do you avoid?

Well, first, there's horror, and then there's "Dark Fantasy", which is the style that Albion is in. For horror, I would use my CoC games as the example. The player characters are usually in a position of being investigators of some kind, either through happenstance, or because they work for some government agency or secret society, or because they're law enforcement or detectives.  The horror is found as a seemingly quirky but average town is revealed to be a cesspool of dark and ancient secrets,  or a murder case turns into a ritual killing spree, or some old indian mounds turn out to hide unspeakable terrors from unknown dimensions.
The player characters should first be investigating the situation, reel from it as they start to discover the stark and terrible truth, and then get to work on figuring out how to KICK THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF IT, even at the cost of their own lives.

For "Dark Fantasy" I would give you the example of my Dark Albion game, and recent events in the English campaign.  You have a party that includes a Cleric who's somewhat cowardly for a paladin of the Unconquered Sun, and a rogue who had been mutated by exposure do primal chaos material and has gone somewhat mad from lengthy ownership of a cursed chaos dagger. The rest of the party are your average good guys: a hard and dirty soldier, a very well-studied and highly moral Oxford Magister, a slightly crazy warrior woman, and a Scots Man.
The group went out into the border regions, in the Pennine mountains near the Wall, to search for a Cleric who had gone missing; they found out he'd gone to Deathfrost mountain, and that he'd gone there because he'd heard about the existence of some ancient Fae evil in that place. They follow him there, find out that the mountain was once, thousands of years ago, the site of a particularly dark elven temple to a god of death, that they had slain on that mountain thousands of human slaves as sacrifices, and that the selfsame (other) Fae had ultimately struck out against the leaders of this cult thinking them too dangerous, and magically entombed them.  They also found the cleric, who had gone mad and froze to death on the mountain, near a very ancient stone building.
A couple of the players, the chaotic rogue and the crazy warrior woman, manage to find a secret tunnel in the stone building leading into the tomb; the others, meanwhile, scared shitless by the magic of the place, are trying to hightail it out of there and go back to warn their lord (Lord Percy), and the Clerical Order, of what they've found here.  The rogue and the warrior woman accidentally break the seal that keeps the dead sleeping, and soon ELEVEN THOUSAND zombies and ghouls are awakening under and on the mountain.  Trapped, the two women flee deeper into the dungeon, while the rest of the group aboveground flees from the 2000 or so surface zombies, down to the tiny village of Dun at the foot of mountain.  Do they keep running, or bemoan their fate while sipping vermouth and reciting bad poetry, or just go existentially mad?
FUCK NO.  They rally the 50 villagers and make an organized retreat to the nearest castle, even though they had already heard that the castle had been recently abandoned due to a horrific massacre caused by the ghosts of a pair of dead lovers.

While they're running, the two ladies in the dungeon end up finding the tomb of Cyris, the Elven Vampire Lord who was high priest of the cult of Duvan'ku, Lord of the City of the Dead.  He is trapped in the tombs, and the only way to get out for him is to have a mortal invite him out of their own free will.  The crazy warrior woman refuses and runs off to keep hiding in the dungeons. The chaos rogue readily accepts, her soul already corrupted, and agrees to work with Cyris to restore the rule of Duvan'ku on earth.  With her help, Cyris revives his Mummy general (while the crazy warrior woman slew his Wight commander, in the process of finding a hiding place) and he leads his 9000-zombie army up to the surface world.

The other PCs get to the haunted castle, they investigate and learn that star-crossed lovers from rival families had consumated their love over the Raven Stone, an ancient Cymri shrine, and were later both slain when the families fought.  After confirming the fortified manor house is haunted by the ghosts of these dead, the PCs head into the forest with some of the peasants to dig up the hastily-buried corpses of the lovers so that the Cleric can give them a proper burial under the Unconquered Sun. While the corspe-exhumation is happening, the first of the hordes of zombies begin to catch up to the PCs. They fight very valiantly to try to hold the line while the peasants take the bodies back, managing to retreat to the keep, and the corpses of the star-crossed lovers are properly sanctified.  The peasants can now safely enter the keep, and the PCs, rather than hiding out there, ride hard north for the Wall, to send out a warning from there with the Wall's signal fires, to Percies and Nevilles alike, of the great army of undead that is forming in the mountains.

That's as far as they've gotten, but as you can see while I don't forbid someone from succumbing to dark forces, or being corrupted in their souls, or being cowardly (even though its particularly unbecoming in a cleric), the message here is HEROISM. The PCs didn't just lie down and die in a fit of ennui over the existential nihilism of life when they were faced with thousands of the walking dead, they made a plan, they organized a retreat, they fought back, they saved the innocents that they found themselves in charge of, and now they're leaving safety to go do their DUTY.
I imagine the next adventure will involve Lord Percy, badly outnumbered and his men terrified, hoping to get help from the Neville family who hate and distrust him and will thus be likely to think it all a trick, or failing that from anyone he can, to try to march out and fight Lord Cyris, trying desperately to kill him before the Fae Vampire can have time to replenish his strengths, build a new temple to Duvan'ku, and become too powerful to be stopped. And of course the PCs being sent in as "specialists" to do whatever the really impossible dirty work might be that's required.

This sort of stuff is, to me, Dark Fantasy.

RPGPundit

The Monk (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/601) and The Castle of Otranto (//The%20Castle%20of%20Otranto) @ Project Guttenberg.

Free and instant access to 19th century lit, the classics and an ever growing library of pulp sf- reasons why you should buy a kindle.

Quote from: Aos;517308The Monk (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/601) and The Castle of Otranto (//The%20Castle%20of%20Otranto) @ Project Guttenberg.

Free and instant access to 19th century lit, the classics and an ever growing library of pulp sf- reasons why you should buy a kindle.

I'm definitely seeing more and more Kindles and Nooks in my classroom in place of printed books.  On some level it weirds me out, but that's the shape of the future.  It probably makes sense for English majors especially.

That sounds like an awesome campaign to me pundit. I think the key is you basically expect the pcs to confront the threat heroically but you allow for the possibility of corruption which is cool. Generally this is how I approach horror. As I said, as much as I love evil parties in things like modern crime rpgs, evil parties in a horror campaign just dont work out well for me.

The ennui thing you describe is something I have encountered a lot in vampire cpcampaigns around here, and so I can sympathize with your position (though I have been following misterguignol's blog for some time now and his horror advice all seems pretty cool to me and free of pretention--though he does bring his knowledge of the suibject to the table in a good way). The angst filled vamire thing doesn't have much appeal for me. Characters succuming to temptation or being warped by evil on occassion can be cool, but I tend to dislike games where people are doing little more than using their characters as vessels to voice their own bleak world view (which is how I usually interpet such behavior).

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517312The ennui thing you describe is something I have encountered a lot in vampire cpcampaigns around here, and so I can sympathize with your position (though I have been following misterguignol's blog for some time now and his horror advice all seems pretty cool to me and free of pretention--though he does bring his knowledge of the suibject to the table in a good way).

First, thank you for your kind words!

Second, I actually can't think of a single Gothic tale that is all about ennui and simply lying down in the face of terror or horror.  I'm not quite sure where that idea came from, to be honest.  I mean, you see it in parodies of the Gothic (Thomas Love Peacock's Nightmare Abbey springs to mind), but the early Gothics especially are all about heroic action.  

The Castle of Otranto has dungeons, sword-fights between knights, etc.  The Old English Baron has yet more knightly combat and encounters with the undead.  Even Ann Radcliffe's more flowery works have dungeon exploration, encounter in which bandits and assassins must be fended off, and wilderness treks.

Sounds like typical D&D-isms with a specific atmosphere to me.

Quote from: misterguignol;517314First, thank you for your kind words!

Second, I actually can't think of a single Gothic tale that is all about ennui and simply lying down in the face of terror or horror.  I'm not quite sure where that idea came from, to be honest.  I mean, you see it in parodies of the Gothic (Thomas Love Peacock's Nightmare Abbey springs to mind), but the early Gothics especially are all about heroic action.  at to me.

I blame Anne Rice.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517315I blame Anne Rice.

Could be!  I barely made it through Interview with a Vampire.  When I took over teaching the Gothic course here, the first thing I did was to strike Anne Rice from the reading list.  

(Notice that she didn't make my Appendix either, heh.)

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517315I blame Anne Rice.

You beat me to it, although my understanding is that Rice only wrote one or two of the novels that bear her byline.

Quote from: misterguignol;517316Could be!  I barely made it through Interview with a Vampire.  When I took over teaching the Gothic course here, the first thing I did was to strike Anne Rice from the reading list.  

(Notice that she didn't make my Appendix either, heh.)

I know the book was written in the late 70s but it felt like in the 90s her stuff and an overabundance of symoathetic villains came together in a lot of gaming stuff. Its unfortunate because in small doses thisis fine (the section in frankenstein where the monster gives his point of view is awesome) but done too much it gets really emo or just becomes becomes an excuse for evil behavior (he isn't evil, just misunderstood....even though he just murdered your whole family).

Quote from: Aos;517317You beat me to it, although my understanding is that Rice only wrote one or two of the novels that bear her byline.

I wouldn't know. Havent heard she didn't write her own books but not a big fan. I read most of Interview but lost interest the last hundred pages or so (which is ashame because early on the book held my interest). Couldn't get past the first hundred pages of vampire lestat. Then only book of hers I finished cover to cover is The Mummy (which didn't bother me as much as the vampire books).

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517315I blame Anne Rice.

Unwittingly yes, but I'm pretty sure Pundit was thinking of Twilight when he wrote that.

Quote from: Benoist;517324Unwittingly yes, but I'm pretty sure Pundit was thinking of Twilight when he wrote that.

Which would be weird because Twilight isn't Gothic.

Quote from: misterguignol;517325Which would be weird because Twilight isn't Gothic.

In the minds of soccer moms it seems to be. :(

Quote from: misterguignol;516339I'm begun assembling what I already have ready-to-go for my Gothic Fantasy supplement for LotFP, but I wanted to ask what folks actually would want to find in such a product.  What would you find useful?

Honestly? Something that would help me create the kind of dark and forboding atmosphere that The Name of the Rose had without invoking any of the cliched in-game genre standards (i.e. Cthulhu, undead) but still allowing me to include them if I feel like it.

Quote from: Benoist;517327In the minds of soccer moms it seems to be. :(

I don't think they consider it Gothic if they think of such things at all. Whatever, soccer moms get a bad rap, they have just as much right to their silly interests as we do.

I much prefer horror games to focus on ordinary people rather than heroes.

I find it much better defines the games for me. If the PCs are all heroic investigators then the distinction between dark fantasy (as Pundit terms it) and Horror becomes too blurred.

I played me a lot of CoC our PCs are always ordinary. We have had a few, a pair of detectives, a forensic pathologist, an Occult historian, a reporter who were natuarally inquisitive but mostly we play ordinary people who find themselves in horrific situations. It seems to resonate more and fits the genre from slasher flick to The Mountains of Madness.

My ideal set up for a Horror game would run like. Make up an ordianry guy in a modern/1920s/victorian setting. Plumbers, teachers, whatever... then have them all travelling to work or on business on the 7:34 to Paddington when .....

So Alien is Horror but Aliens is Dark Fantasy ....

Quote from: jibbajibba;517330I much prefer horror games to focus on ordinary people rather than heroes.

I find it much better defines the games for me. If the PCs are all heroic investigators then the distinction between dark fantasy (as Pundit terms it) and Horror becomes too blurred.

I played me a lot of CoC our PCs are always ordinary. We have had a few, a pair of detectives, a forensic pathologist, an Occult historian, a reporter who were natuarally inquisitive but mostly we play ordinary people who find themselves in horrific situations. It seems to resonate more and fits the genre from slasher flick to The Mountains of Madness.

My ideal set up for a Horror game would run like. Make up an ordianry guy in a modern/1920s/victorian setting. Plumbers, teachers, whatever... then have them all travelling to work or on business on the 7:34 to Paddington when .....

So Alien is Horror but Aliens is Dark Fantasy ....

That is what I generally like to call "Hitchcock's Approach To RPGs", in honour of such movies as 39 Steps and The Man Who Knew Too Much, and what is my favourite approach when I play WFRP and Cthulhu. Ordinary people, who got tangled into a mess beyond their understand/abilities, forced to the wall and fighting for survival.

In WFRP, they either die, fall to Chaos, or become heroes in the progress. In CoC, well - if they are lucky, they bought humanity another few years, and they aren't insane.

But lucky they are rarely.

This is why I am in favour of MG's Dark Secrets table and the "What did you do as X" at the Professions table - because I'd see is as the Thing, that caused the character from a Gothic game to become an adventurer. Something that shook them so much to the core, that returning to their prior lives was just...off the limits.

Alternatively, MG - you might want to give "Drive" table, in spirit of Trail of Cthulhu. Now - I am not talking about ToC's Drives as they are used for "whipping" players into getting back to the plot (which is silly - the other side of the medallion, rewarding them with Stability if they give into their Drive, is something that ain't too bad though), but I am talking as an idea that a hero from Gothic fiction has that "something", that drives him into adventuring and uncovering terrible secrets, that are perhaps best left untouched.

This might be just better served by existing Dark Secrets though. The way I'd see it - you can decide that your character has a DS, or not. If he has not - the DS will be his first encounter with horror. Something that'll haunt him, forcing to adventure further. In Stroker's Dracula, the characters'd continue to be the vampire hunters, as the terrible fate of his betrothed'd drive him to vengeance.

Take note - such understanding of Dark Secret also prevents taking it as the "Oh, I had seen my wife die, so I will drink myself to death" approach to this subject. Of course, a person with such DS might be a heavy drinker, but you get what I mean, MG - that Dark Secrets are treated as motivation for the character, rather then as an excuse for such a character to become a miser emoboy of the party.

Quote from: Rincewind1;517357Alternatively, MG - you might want to give "Drive" table, in spirit of Trail of Cthulhu. Now - I am not talking about ToC's Drives as they are used for "whipping" players into getting back to the plot (which is silly - the other side of the medallion, rewarding them with Stability if they give into their Drive, is something that ain't too bad though), but I am talking as an idea that a hero from Gothic fiction has that "something", that drives him into adventuring and uncovering terrible secrets, that are perhaps best left untouched.

Could you speak more to what a Drive Table would be?  I've never seen Trails of Cthulhu.

Sure. Here's an example Drive from ToC (I think posting one small paragraph from 250 pages large PDF is okay. Also - give ToC a try if you like CoC, if only for bonus material and some thoughts on scenario creation, if you dislike GUMSHOE mechanic):

Revenge
"Ezra Weeden, though his periods of
espionage were necessarily brief ...
had a vindictive persistence which the
bulk of the practical townsfolk and
farmers lacked..."
— The Case of Charles Dexter Ward

Something out there hurt you,
or hurt someone you care about.
Therefore, it must be destroyed,
burned out, taken down, exposed
... whatever it takes, and
whatever it costs. Any trail that
might lead to your vengeance is
a trail you have to follow to the
bitter end.
Especially appropriate for:
Criminal, Private Investigator

Examples: Ezra Weeden in
Charles Dexter Ward, and the
narrator of The Lurking Fear
after the death of his friend
Munroe. Followers like Dr Willett
(in Charles Dexter Ward) may
change their Drive to Revenge if
their associates are killed, sucked
through a portal, or otherwise
removed from play.


Basically - the motivation(also a good name) of an "ordinary guy" character, for setting off to risk his life in a dangerous world, fighting terrible monsters. For Gothic Fiction, Revenge'd be perfect -as well as such motivations as Ennui (I hunt vampires because it's the only thing that gives me a rush anymore - great for a former soldier), Curiosity (I do wonder how all this is possible), Scholarship (I wish to learn as much as I can - perfect motivation for a Magic User), etc. etc. Of course, those are mostly stolen from ToC, so you'd need to come up with some of your own, more fit to Gothic Fiction then to Cthulhu - for example, Zeal (I will lead the light of true faith against the darkness)

Quote from: misterguignol;517304God forbid people have different play styles than you!  

To make this nice and clear though: what I am making is a toolkit; people can dial in the style and type of Gothicism they want with it, from light touches of Gothic atmosphere to Hammer Horror to full on Romantic dramatics.  

How other people make use of it is no business of mine.

These distinctions are also quite silly; while you fear that the Gothic is pretentious, it seems you haven't read much of it--The Castle of Otranto, the first Gothic novel by most estimates, has more sword-fighting than any Hammer Horror film, for example.

And Lovecraft's stories have way more solving the problem with guns/fighting than people generally believe, but that doesn't stop the CoC swine from insisting that putting a single point in "pistols" is somehow a cardinal sin against the game "genre".

But if you present your sourcebook in toolkit format leaving it up to the GM to set the kind of campaign he wants, I have no quarrel with you.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Benoist;517324Unwittingly yes, but I'm pretty sure Pundit was thinking of Twilight when he wrote that.

No, I was thinking of Wuthering Heights, and of the general stereotypes some people have of the gothic horror genre; and the general way pretentious Swine want to alter every genre to fit their absurd notions.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;517374No, I was thinking of Wuthering Heights, and of the general stereotypes some people have of the gothic horror genre; and the general way pretentious Swine want to alter every genre to fit their absurd notions.

RPGPundit

Oh OK.

Quote from: RPGPundit;517373And Lovecraft's stories have way more solving the problem with guns/fighting than people generally believe, but that doesn't stop the CoC swine from insisting that putting a single point in "pistols" is somehow a cardinal sin against the game "genre".

But if you present your sourcebook in toolkit format leaving it up to the GM to set the kind of campaign he wants, I have no quarrel with you.

RPGPundit

Except that it actually almost never works against the powerful creatures of Mythos. At best, it stalls them. Even in the most triumphant for humanity story, Dunwich Horror, they had to use Ibn - Ghazi powder and Necronomicon to stop the Spawn of Yog - Sototh

Quote from: Rincewind1;517386Except that it actually almost never works against the powerful creatures of Mythos. At best, it stalls them. Even in the most triumphant for humanity story, Dunwich Horror, they had to use Ibn - Ghazi powder and Necronomicon to stop the Spawn of Yog - Sototh

Yeah but it stops your average cultist dead in his tracks.

I think what pundit is saying is there is nothing wrong with making an effective monster hunter or investigator in CoC. Of all the CoC games i have run, the pc that remains most memorable was a gun wielding Catholic priest.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;517389Yeah but it stops your average cultist dead in his tracks.

I think what pundit is saying is there is nothing wrong with making an effective monster hunter or investigator in CoC. Of all the CoC games i have run, the pc that remains most memorable was a gun wielding Catholic priest.

Ah, fair enough. I will admit that cultists are generally rather rare in my CoC games. In fact, I don't think I ran a single game where they were a prominent foe. There was one with zombie - like creatures that came from the like, but shotgun worked just fine on them - until too many of them arrived.

Here's a different approach to the whole "Dark Secret causes the unnatural" theme. It's taken from Torg's Orrorsh Sourcebook.

Some acts are defined as Wicked. When characters perform such an act, they gain Corruption. This Corruption causes spiritual deformities (which characters with True Sight can see) and can eventually turn the person into one of the Horrors of Orrorsh.

(I gather this is not unlike Ravenloft Powers checks, though I've never read much Ravenloft.)

Rather than beginning with a Dark Secret, the actions of the characters can become such. If they choose to violate the "laws of morality", they become the monsters they fight. And many of the monsters they fight, were once people like themselves.

That seems aptly Gothic.

This is indeed very similar to the Ravenloft Power Checks, DW.

Quote from: Benoist;517525This is indeed very similar to the Ravenloft Power Checks, DW.

It is, but Ororsh is pretty awesome too.

Quote from: Daddy Warpig;517524Here's a different approach to the whole "Dark Secret causes the unnatural" theme. It's taken from Torg's Orrorsh Sourcebook.

Some acts are defined as Wicked. When characters perform such an act, they gain Corruption. This Corruption causes spiritual deformities (which characters with True Sight can see) and can eventually turn the person into one of the Horrors of Orrorsh.

(I gather this is not unlike Ravenloft Powers checks, though I've never read much Ravenloft.)

Rather than beginning with a Dark Secret, the actions of the characters can become such. If they choose to violate the "laws of morality", they become the monsters they fight. And many of the monsters they fight, were once people like themselves.

That seems aptly Gothic.

I thought that'd be the part of Body Horrors and Curses table.

Quote from: RPGPundit;517373And Lovecraft's stories have way more solving the problem with guns/fighting than people generally believe, but that doesn't stop the CoC swine from insisting that putting a single point in "pistols" is somehow a cardinal sin against the game "genre".

But if you present your sourcebook in toolkit format leaving it up to the GM to set the kind of campaign he wants, I have no quarrel with you.

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Well in my experience guns rarely work agianst the stuff I have met in CoC.

I have no qualms with people haveing whatever skills are relevant to their character. I expect a baseball player to have 70% in 'bat' I expect a cop to have 60% in pistol. What annoys me I have to admit is the guy playing a librarian who has 75% in Brawl, 80% in Pistol, 90% in Spot Hidden and 20% in Library Use ........

In one otherwise excellent CoC game we travelled to Dreamlands, the Keeper had planned it to be the focus of the campaign, but very quickly it lost the essence that made it CoC. We were a Reporter, an actor, a Historian, a gentleman of private income and his butler and very quickly we turned into a cliched D&D party and lost sight of the thing that made CoC such a different game.

One of the best sessions of CoC we ran and I was not involved in it at all as it was the Historian visiting and old house on his own. Involved the PC running and hiding from a load of zombies. It involved him trying to fight them off with household implements, stabbing them with his fountain pen and so on. A great session and it got to the horror that you wouldn't have had if it had been a bunch of students that just happened to all be trained Commandos and were all armed to the teeth.

So I have played plenty of tough CoC charactewrs I guess the question would be if you have every played CoC characters who have no combat skills.

I'm reading The Monk right now. Ambrosio seems like a stand up guy.

Quote from: Aos;517947I'm reading The Monk right now. Ambrosio seems like a stand up guy.

Actually, he's about as morally consistent as any given D&D character.

Quote from: misterguignol;517948Actually, he's about as morally consistent as any given D&D character.

Yeah, he's already fucked over Agnes and more or less forgiven himself for it within a couple three pages. Now I assume he's going to find out Rosario is a chick and give herm a proper shagging.

Quote from: Aos;517956Yeah, he's already fucked over Agnes and more or less forgiven himself for it within a couple three pages. Now I assume he's going to find out Rosario is a chick and give herm a proper shagging.

In D&D terms we call that house rule "getting XP for carousing."

Quote from: misterguignol;517963In D&D terms we call that house rule "getting XP for carousing."

The best form of xp.

I'd put in a section on how to handle insanity. Don't just tell your players "You're crazy now".

Do it by sending them notes about what they see or whispered conversations about what they overheard. Make it seem like they've stumbled upon hidden knowledge, not that they've lost their marbles.

Stay away from the other pcs at first. Only working back to them later. So as to prolong the ruse. Have a few pieces of information be useful (the paranoid mind picking up on a few things) have the rest of it be inconclusive.

But don't just pass notes to the insane individual, do it for everyone. Then no one will know who is crazy and who isn't just by the notes. "Is this something I saw, or am I insane?"

Quote from: Nazgul;519298I'd put in a section on how to handle insanity. Don't just tell your players "You're crazy now".

Do it by sending them notes about what they see or whispered conversations about what they overheard. Make it seem like they've stumbled upon hidden knowledge, not that they've lost their marbles.

Stay away from the other pcs at first. Only working back to them later. So as to prolong the ruse. Have a few pieces of information be useful (the paranoid mind picking up on a few things) have the rest of it be inconclusive.

But don't just pass notes to the insane individual, do it for everyone. Then no one will know who is crazy and who isn't just by the notes. "Is this something I saw, or am I insane?"

Generally, this is what I do: a character who has gone mad doesn't start exhibiting their symptoms until the next gaming session.  After all, madness takes time to develop, right?

In the interim between game sessions I will inform the player what kind of madness their character has, what its effects are, and how they want to role-play it.  It's like your note-passing system in that it can make insanity a surprise that is revealed in play, but I time it so that it doesn't require anything in game at the moment of acquisition.

I am a big fan of passing notes in play though.

Quote from: misterguignol;519302Generally, this is what I do: a character who has gone mad doesn't start exhibiting their symptoms until the next gaming session.  After all, madness takes time to develop, right?

In the interim between game sessions I will inform the player what kind of madness their character has, what its effects are, and how they want to role-play it.  It's like your note-passing system in that it can make insanity a surprise that is revealed in play, but I time it so that it doesn't require anything in game at the moment of acquisition.

I am a big fan of passing notes in play though.

Notes are great, especially for madness. Generally speaking, the "team - play" of mental disabilities was my favourite part of Trail of Cthulhu, and one I'd suggest reading and considering for all but the most hardcore immersionists.

Quote from: Rincewind1;519385Notes are great, especially for madness. Generally speaking, the "team - play" of mental disabilities was my favourite part of Trail of Cthulhu, and one I'd suggest reading and considering for all but the most hardcore immersionists.

I wish ToC wasn't $40.

Quote from: misterguignol;519388I wish ToC wasn't $40.

Hells, it's that expansive? I got the book as a birthday present.

Quote from: Rincewind1;519389Hells, it's that expansive? I got the book as a birthday present.

It is on Amazon at least.  Just checked.  

Is it a particularly big rulebook?

Quote from: misterguignol;519390It is on Amazon at least.  Just checked.  

Is it a particularly big rulebook?

About 250 pages.

Quote from: Rincewind1;519394About 250 pages.

I'm interested in it, but I don't think it's something I can really buy right away.

I also keep hearing good things about Bookhounds of London.

Quote from: misterguignol;519395I'm interested in it, but I don't think it's something I can really buy right away.

I also keep hearing good things about Bookhounds of London.

I'd be more then willing to discuss  them (my current ToC campaign is using Bookhounds of London and Occult's Guide to London), but perhaps in another  thread, so we leave this one to well, you?

:P

Quote from: Rincewind1;519398I'd be more then willing to discuss  them (my current ToC campaign is using Bookhounds of London and Occult's Guide to London), but perhaps in another  thread, so we leave this one to well, you?

:P

Hah, sure!

I think that one of the things that perturbs me in this is that the term "Gothic" was one of the things that utterly ruined Ravenloft, for example.

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Quote from: RPGPundit;519563I think that one of the things that perturbs me in this is that the term "Gothic" was one of the things that utterly ruined Ravenloft, for example.

RPGPundit

How so?

In various ways. It made it a woe-fest, for starters.  Everything was a "human tragedy".  Shit, they even tried to suggest that the Illithid Brain in that one domain was somehow a tragic figure.
Characters were all but expected to be emo.  Corruption wasn't about the embrace of evil so much as the embrace of personal tragedy.

Seriously, my antidote to this will be to one day run a dark-fantasy ravenloft game where the PCs' explicit job will be to go realm-to-realm kicking the shit out of the monsters, rather than "trying to escape" or finding that whatever they do the darkness wins out through cheap tricks, etc. etc.

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Quote from: RPGPundit;519830Seriously, my antidote to this will be to one day run a dark-fantasy ravenloft game where the PCs' explicit job will be to go realm-to-realm kicking the shit out of the monsters, rather than "trying to escape" or finding that whatever they do the darkness wins out through cheap tricks, etc. etc.

Oddly, that's always how we played it, except the PCs could win out and rub the darkness's face in it.

Quote from: RPGPundit;519830Corruption wasn't about the embrace of evil so much as the embrace of personal tragedy.

You're actually wrong about this point though; I just checked the section on Powers Checks and there is nothing about personal tragedy in there; it's all just a gradual embrace of evil, in fact.

Quote from: misterguignol;519833You're actually wrong about this point though; I just checked the section on Powers Checks and there is nothing about personal tragedy in there; it's all just a gradual embrace of evil, in fact.

While let's face it, a personal tragedy is a perfectly valid (and quite common) reason for why you'd turn to a more...risky means of gaining power, to settle the score etc.

And a question remains if Dark Powers aren't some form of a multiplanar parasite, feeding off bad feelings. That'd be kinda cool I think - not perhaps as main lore, but as one of the possible explanations.

Quote from: Rincewind1;519836While let's face it, a personal tragedy is a perfectly valid (and quite common) reason for why you'd turn to a more...risky means of gaining power, to settle the score etc.

Sure, it's just not built into the mechanics or the fluff in the campaign setting book I have (Domains of Dread).

QuoteAnd a question remains if Dark Powers aren't some form of a multiplanar parasite, feeding off bad feelings. That'd be kinda cool I think - not perhaps as main lore, but as one of the possible explanations.

Leaving the Dark Powers undefined was one of the few times the TSR writers of the 2e era left something unexplained...thankfully.

Quote from: misterguignol;519840Sure, it's just not built into the mechanics or the fluff in the campaign setting book I have (Domains of Dread).



Leaving the Dark Powers undefined was one of the few times the TSR writers of the 2e era left something unexplained...thankfully.

2) Word. I think I'll use my "parasite" thingie from now on - that'd explain a lot to me, at least.

1) True - Dark Powers just """reward""" (triple quote marks, because well, reward, yeah right :P) evil acts, eventually punishing you by granting your own domain and binding with a curse.

I am pretty sure that that Fascist - government guy had no personal tragedy. He is a walking tragedy though, as he's doomed to fail on his each conquest, while lusting after more power.

Quote from: Rincewind1;519842I am pretty sure that that Fascist - government guy had no personal tragedy. He is a walking tragedy though, as he's doomed to fail on his each conquest, while lusting after more power.

i'd be tempted to play Vlad Drakov like Black Adder...military minded, but incompetent and doomed to fail.

Quote from: misterguignol;519846i'd be tempted to play Vlad Drakov like Black Adder...military minded, but incompetent and doomed to fail.

That's pretty good, provided based on Blackadder from Season 2 on. Perhaps he is usually thwarted by his loyal but dumb general Henry and his foolish squire, Baldrick? ;)

Quote from: Rincewind1;519849That's pretty good, provided based on Blackadder from Season 2 on. Perhaps he is usually thwarted by his loyal but dumb general Henry and his foolish squire, Baldrick? ;)

Think about it this way: he's got a fanatically loyal military, right?  What if they are super loyal, just...dumb and incompetent?

Hmm, maybe we need a new thread for making Ravenloft cooler than it is in the books.

Quote from: misterguignol;519852Think about it this way: he's got a fanatically loyal military, right?  What if they are super loyal, just...dumb and incompetent?

Hmm, maybe we need a new thread for making Ravenloft cooler than it is in the books.

I always thought it was more because his one neighbour was a guy who could wipe out the entire armies with his own superliche powers, and the other...well, probably something similar. But the dumb and incompetent army is an idea :D. I'd however limit that to the High Echelons - so you can create the "Lions led by Donkeys" campaign. Trench warfare in Ravenloft, anyone?

It's an idea (the new thread) - keep us updated on your work on the material (and give me a smack if you need help with anything).

Quote from: misterguignol;519833You're actually wrong about this point though; I just checked the section on Powers Checks and there is nothing about personal tragedy in there; it's all just a gradual embrace of evil, in fact.

That is correct, but i think pundit has a point about the emphasis on tragic villains. In my opinion, this is a legitimate weakness of ravenloft, in that it plays that hand too strong. Like I said in a previous thread, tragic villains can be fun, but too much of it gets old. On the other hand, i dont think the tragic villain should be confused with the curse bestowed on each domain lord.

My view is this, it was the 90s, pretty much every horror movie, game, book etc was about the tragic villain. You had interview with a vampire and the 92 Dracula (which was more of a love story). It was in the air.

Also when you step back, and take Ravenloft a little less seriously, the tragic thing isn't so bad and becomes a bit humorous. I think the best example of this is Rudolph Van Richten (who is no villain but certainky painted as tragic).  In each of the guide books he describes his various monster nts in which the vast majority of his companions get slaughtered. It actually becomes a running joke (like red shirts in stae trek). In his past, van richten killed most of a gypsy caravan who had sold his son to a vampire lord. By the final van richten guidebook he realizes he has been cursed to see everyone he loves die at the handsof monsters. So if you accept the camp factor of ravenloft, the tragedy in it can be entertaining.

But on the whole this is one aspect of the game i comfortably criticize. It is easy enough to overcome though, and it really seemed to stem fom a desire to make fully fleshed out villains---the problem is they equated fleshed our with sympathetic. I actually touch in this point in Horror Show under e sympathetic villain entry.

Quote from: misterguignol;519840Sure, it's just not built into the mechanics or the fluff in the campaign setting book I have (Domains of Dread).
.

The Domains of Dread book is pretty free from that stuff (though if you look at the individual lord entries you will see a pattern of it. In the red andblack boxed sets though, they do talk pretty explicitly about tragic villains. In my opinion here is where they wemt wrong: instead of pointing out tyat memorable villains can als be tragic and sympathetic, they took the position that they should be those things. Showing that the monster from frankenstein wasn't just a mindless killg machine but sympathetic and eloquent (which they do in the black boxed set is great) but using it to say all villains should be like this (which they kind of did) isthe issue.

Quote from: misterguignol;519846i'd be tempted to play Vlad Drakov like Black Adder...military minded, but incompetent and doomed to fail.

That is how i always saw him: maybe a good soldier but a less than capable general.

His curse was one of the better ones IMO.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;519924That is correct, but i think pundit has a point about the emphasis on tragic villains. In my opinion, this is a legitimate weakness of ravenloft, in that it plays that hand too strong. Like I said in a previous thread, tragic villains can be fun, but too much of it gets old. On the other hand, i dont think the tragic villain should be confused with the curse bestowed on each domain lord.

Oh, sure, I agree with that.  I'm positive I've said here before that the long backstories for each Dark Lord are 99% useless because they never come up in play.  And some of them are downright silly.

Quote from: misterguignol;519945Oh, sure, I agree with that.  I'm positive I've said here before that the long backstories for each Dark Lord are 99% useless because they never come up in play.  And some of them are downright silly.

Ok, so I take it you wouldn't be doing that in your setting?

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;520156Ok, so I take it you wouldn't be doing that in your setting?

RPGPundit

Oh, definitely not.  I have zero interest in writing backstories for potential NPCs or villains that won't come into play.  That seems like a waste of my time and smacks of the failed novelist!  I believe in only writing up back-story if it has bearing on the adventure (inasmuch as the characters learn something of the backstory as part of the adventure, etc.)

I am fine with having the backstory if it helps me run the character (evn if the players dont ever learn about it). It is also nice to have that info in case the pcs investigate the npc's history. Where i think it goes south is when the npcs recite their personal history to the characters. It can be useful as hidden architecture that occasionally surfaces.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;520159I am fine with having the backstory if it helps me run the character (evn if the players dont ever learn about it). It is also nice to have that info in case the pcs investigate the npc's history. Where i think it goes south is when the npcs recite their personal history to the characters. It can be useful as hidden architecture that occasionally surfaces.

I can see what you mean, but there are a lot of Dark Lords in Ravenloft that have ridiculously convoluted backstories that in no way link in to any adventures or investigations.  Especially when the backstory occurred on a plane the PCs have no access to!

Damn right.  The guideline in writing a setting is whether the information will either be A) directly useful to the players or B) directly useful to the GM in how he presents stuff to the players.  If its neither, then its just failed-novelist wankery.

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I disagree. It is highly preferable that the backstory comes into play, but I do not consider it a necessity, especially if the book is "Villain's Gallery" rather then an adventure.

Everyone has a history. Is it not a part of a living world, that you see the Bad and the Good Guys as more then what the party just encounters?

Quote from: misterguignol;520161I can see what you mean, but there are a lot of Dark Lords in Ravenloft that have ridiculously convoluted backstories that in no way link in to any adventures or investigations.  Especially when the backstory occurred on a plane the PCs have no access to!

I agree there is a lot of pointless background in domain lord entries. For me the threshold isn't just whether it links to adventures (which is important) but whether it helps me run the character. It is much more useful in my opinion to frontload personality traits in an npc entry, then supply background information relevant to playing the npc. So if it isn't direclty useful to the players (say for an investigation) that is okay as long as it is useful to me. But I absolutely need the info that would come up in an investigation (and having interesting nuggets in there always helps).

Quote from: Rincewind1;520279I disagree. It is highly preferable that the backstory comes into play, but I do not consider it a necessity, especially if the book is "Villain's Gallery" rather then an adventure.

Everyone has a history. Is it not a part of a living world, that you see the Bad and the Good Guys as more then what the party just encounters?

Sure, but is more effective and believable in my opinion to suggest the noc's background through his actions, rather than have him explicitly rattle off details about his past. What matters to me is presenting an interesting and believable character to the players. They dont need to know his life story, but it should be clear through his personality and behavior that he has a life story.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;520305Sure, but is more effective and believable in my opinion to suggest the noc's background through his actions, rather than have him explicitly rattle off details about his past. What matters to me is presenting an interesting and believable character to the players. They dont need to know his life story, but it should be clear through his personality and behavior that he has a life story.

I agree - it's same as with monologues. Good for films (until they went terrible cliche), bad for RPGs.

Still, let's not suddenly say that "Backstory = Failed Novelism". Backstories are a part of a coherent setting.

Quote from: Rincewind1;520311I agree - it's same as with monologues. Good for films (until they went terrible cliche), bad for RPGs.

Still, let's not suddenly say that "Backstory = Failed Novelism". Backstories are a part of a coherent setting.

No one disputing that. Pundit was saying that it is failed novelism if the background information is not useful for the players or the gm.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;520318No one disputing that. Pundit was saying that it is failed novelism if the background information is not useful for the players or the gm.

Ah, arright.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;520318No one disputing that. Pundit was saying that it is failed novelism if the background information is not useful for the players or the gm.

Exactly.  I use lots of backstory in my settings; I try to make sure its stuff that will actually be usable.  With a lot of settings, you get the feeling that the material is there to be read, to show off the "author's" creativity, and not to actually be in any way relevant to its use as a game setting.

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Quote from: RPGPundit;520517Exactly.  I use lots of backstory in my settings; I try to make sure its stuff that will actually be usable.  With a lot of settings, you get the feeling that the material is there to be read, to show off the "author's" creativity, and not to actually be in any way relevant to its use as a game setting.

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And it wouldn't be a bad thing on its own suppose, except ot actually interferes with my ability to grasp the key info about important characters. When the backstory gets too deep for anything in a gaming product, i find it is very easy to lose track of what is important. This is actually one of my issues witht the 3E Ravenloft gazeteers. Most people seem to like them, so take this with a grain of salt, but I found them too densley packed with setting scenery. They ended up being less useful to me than if the domain entries had been each cut in half.

Since The Butcher brought the thematic connection up in the movies thread, I will go ahead and suggest The Phantom of the Opera (http://www.therpgsite.com/showpost.php?p=520877&postcount=290) (1925 Lon Chaney version) as a possible source of inspiration (e.g. Appendix N or what have you). The opera house of the movie is an excellent gothic environment while also possible to be viewed as a honest-to-goodness D&Desque dungeon. It is set in a more modern era than the baseline you are looking at, but opera houses have been around for a while, and who knows what might have been hidden underneath tehm. :)

Quote from: Melan;520926Since The Butcher brought the thematic connection up in the movies thread, I will go ahead and suggest The Phantom of the Opera (http://www.therpgsite.com/showpost.php?p=520877&postcount=290) (1925 Lon Chaney version) as a possible source of inspiration (e.g. Appendix N or what have you). The opera house of the movie is an excellent gothic environment while also possible to be viewed as a honest-to-goodness D&Desque dungeon. It is set in a more modern era than the baseline you are looking at, but opera houses have been around for a while, and who knows what might have been hidden underneath tehm. :)

Yes, I did. :D

I am inevitably reminded of "Dark Thane Macbeth", an AD&D 2e adventure that came out on Dungeon magazine (can't remember which issue, it was circa the tail-end of the TSR era), which featured, you guessed it, a D&D-fied version of Shakespeare's Macbeth as an adventure. I remember that MacDuff was a high elf, and the Lord and Lady Macbeth were drow (I shit you not), but precious little about the adventure itself; it was probably a classic 2e railroad.

But a less self-aware version of the same story (or rather, the same characters, with the same plans) might make for an interesting Gothic D&D session. Think about it; meeting some of Shakespeare's most infamous characters, killing them, and taking their stuff. Macbeth is not properly Gothic literature, I know, but I feel several of its elements fit with the sort of game I think misterguignol's aiming at here.

Quote from: The Butcher;520958Macbeth is not properly Gothic literature, I know, but I feel several of its elements fit with the sort of game I think misterguignol's aiming at here.

Actually, I've been making the argument in my academic work for a long time now that the Gothic was really an 18th century version of the early modern "revenge tragedy."  (Especially when it comes to the Gothic's political content.)  Also, Shakespeare was Horace Walpole's primary influence when he wrote The Castle of Otranto; Otranto functions as a "Gothic Hamlet," but he certainly borrowed a bit from Macbeth and King Lear as well.

Quote from: The Butcher;520958Yes, I did. :D

I am inevitably reminded of "Dark Thane Macbeth", an AD&D 2e adventure that came out on Dungeon magazine (can't remember which issue, it was circa the tail-end of the TSR era), which featured, you guessed it, a D&D-fied version of Shakespeare's Macbeth as an adventure. I remember that MacDuff was a high elf, and the Lord and Lady Macbeth were drow (I shit you not), but precious little about the adventure itself; it was probably a classic 2e railroad.

But a less self-aware version of the same story (or rather, the same characters, with the same plans) might make for an interesting Gothic D&D session. Think about it; meeting some of Shakespeare's most infamous characters, killing them, and taking their stuff. Macbeth is not properly Gothic literature, I know, but I feel several of its elements fit with the sort of game I think misterguignol's aiming at here.

The entire ravenloft line was Kind of like that. Castles Forlorn (if I recall) was a take on MacBeth, and the created was a redo of Pinnocchio. Most of the stuff was ripped wholesale from the sources (Adam= franksenstein's monster, Srahd=dracula, Vlad Drakov=Vlad Tepes, Van Richten=peter cushing's van helsing--IMO--, etc).

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;520522And it wouldn't be a bad thing on its own suppose, except ot actually interferes with my ability to grasp the key info about important characters. When the backstory gets too deep for anything in a gaming product, i find it is very easy to lose track of what is important. This is actually one of my issues witht the 3E Ravenloft gazeteers. Most people seem to like them, so take this with a grain of salt, but I found them too densley packed with setting scenery. They ended up being less useful to me than if the domain entries had been each cut in half.

Yes, that catches a very good point about what exactly the problem is with this kind of thing.

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