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So I am looking at running Carrion Crown as soon as I finish my Serpent Skull Campaign. Carrion Crown is suppossed to have a gothic horror theme, but I have always found horror to be a difficult theme to invoke in such a gamist system as Pathfinder.
My players have little experience with horror, but seems to be keen on the premise. They do however have a pretty gamist and tactical mindset. Most of our other Campaigns have been pretty combat heavy and RP'ing and fluff has taken a backseat to the action for the most part. I think this is in part due to the way the rules work and my players familiarity with them.
Usually we run pretty powered up games, but for Carrion Crown I am planning on going for the standard 15 point buy and try to focus more on the characters than the mechanics. I have been looking into modifying some of the stability and sanity rules from Trail of Cthulhu, but frankly I am concerned that my players wouldn't like it that much as it would be yet another thing to keep track of during the game.
I do have some experience running horror games using other systems like Call of Cthulhu and Dark heresy, but that was with other groups and mostly one-shots. This will be the first time I try my hands at a full horror Campaign with players that have little to none experience with the genre.
Have anyone here successfully run a horror game using Pathfinder or similar rules heavy systems? Do you have any advice on techniques to use or recommend any optional mechanics to amp up the horror feel?
This is kind of a plug, but Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Rule of Fear has a series of helpful tips and tricks you might try to heighten the mood of frightening encounters and adventures.
Regardless of the game system, I find that one of the biggest things you can do is cut down on distractions. I tend to get pretty hardcore about this in my games, but what it comes down to is that if people are playing on their phones, painting miniatures, making Monte Python references, or whatever, they're not investing themselves in their characters. Removing distractions around the game table is maybe the number one thing I would suggest to help keep a group focused, and thus more susceptible to identifying with the feelings of their characters and the mood of the GM's story.
Again, I go into this a good bit in Rule of Fear, with more on using music, sowing suspicion, and the like. So if you're already thinking about playing Carrion Crown, this is the companion guide to that AP, so it might help!
I have extensive experience running horror using 3.5, d20 Modern, adapted rules from the d20 version CoC, and am writing some horrific passages into our upcoming Pathfinder game.
The thing about horror, at least in my experience, is that no mechanic can effectively simulate it. Though all of those games were using "rules heavy" systems, the real horrific elements were not tied to the mechanics. Well, except maybe for the general unease people feel when concealment from fog or supernatural darkness interferes with their attack rolls (I happen to love Silent Hill, so indulge in quite a bit of fog and supernatural darkness).
Instead, horror is about what you cannot immediately solve with a roll of the dice, or quantify on page X of a rulebook. The best horror comes from having our expectations twisted and the familiar turned monstrous. Those things are going to come from your descriptions and the atmosphere you create. Think fewer rules and stand-up fights, more riddles, more obscure documents, more weird maps and items that produce effects that can't be understood without some sacrifice. For starters.
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Thats spot on Bruunwald!
If you want to keep a horror atmosphere, you have to play a few mind games with your players.
1: Mess with them a little to cause some paranoia.
Do things like say: "Hey Bill, make a perception check! You got a 25? Ok, you don't see anything unusual." (the roll does not really matter but don't tell them that, let them guess what they might have missed)
2: Use vivid descriptions and minor events to inspire fear.
"You thought you saw something move out of the corner of your eye but when you turn to look, it is gone."
3: Use scary but harmless events to build up the fear.
"In the long torchlit corridor, you notice that the torch at the far end of the hall winks out, then another and another as if they were candles snuffed out by a giant invisible hand. The darkness creeps towards you step by step as they go out....what do you do?"
4: Twist perceptions with the bizzare:
"The sound of the crying infant is coming from the closet. As you throw open the door to find the baby, you come face to face with a grinning demon with large fish like eyes and teeth like foot long needles. It lets out a wail like a hungry infant and grabs for your throat"
5: NEVER let them see the monster until the finale. Let them see the "results" of the monster.
"The inkeeper's wife takes your coins and shows you to your room for the night. She tells you that they don't usually get visitor this late at night, but your party (and your gold) are certainly welcome. She tells you to make your self at home and clean up with the fresh water in the basin then bids you all good night. "Don't let the candles burn too long! she says as she closes the door on her way out." <Party does whatever..talks about what to do tomorrow, cleans up etc.> About ten minutes later... "You notice a trickle of red fluid running under the door...BLOOD! You throw the door open to reveal the body of your hostess lying on floor. Her head is...missing. Her hand clutches the coins that you gave her minutes ago. The inn is as quiet as a tomb."
Thats how horror works.
This is kind of a plug, but Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Rule of Fear has a series of helpful tips and tricks you might try to heighten the mood of frightening encounters and adventures.
Regardless of the game system, I find that one of the biggest things you can do is cut down on distractions. I tend to get pretty hardcore about this in my games, but what it comes down to is that if people are playing on their phones, painting miniatures, making Monte Python references, or whatever, they're not investing themselves in their characters. Removing distractions around the game table is maybe the number one thing I would suggest to help keep a group focused, and thus more susceptible to identifying with the feelings of their characters and the mood of the GM's story.
Again, I go into this a good bit in Rule of Fear, with more on using music, sowing suspicion, and the like. So if you're already thinking about playing Carrion Crown, this is the companion guide to that AP, so it might help!
I'm a subscriber so I am definitely getting rule of fear :D.
While I wasn't particularly impressed by the player's guide (especially the inclusion of a hero point system which I think clashes a bit to much with the genre), I absolutely loved the Haunting on Harrowstone. I am really looking forward to the other installments of this AP.
My players are pretty easily distracted so that will really be something I have to deal with. One player in particular is addicted to his cellphone which have a tendency to call at the most inappropriate moments. Since he has a kid he refuse to turn off his phone in case of an emergency. All my players have a tendency to joke around, A LOT. It is hard to hear oneself think sometimes through all the banter, laughing, singing and otherwise fooling around.
I will be telling my players to try to stay more in character and take in the atmosphere, but it will be hard. I was hoping maybe someone out there had some rules or methods that might work to increase immersion and get my players a bit more invested in the setting and their characters.
@bruunwald and type2demon: That's some great advice, I'll keep that in mind when I start playing this AP.
I have extensive experience running horror using 3.5, d20 Modern, adapted rules from the d20 version CoC, and am writing some horrific passages into our upcoming Pathfinder game.
The thing about horror, at least in my experience, is that no mechanic can effectively simulate it. Though all of those games were using "rules heavy" systems, the real horrific elements were not tied to the mechanics. Well, except maybe for the general unease people feel when concealment from fog or supernatural darkness interferes with their attack rolls (I happen to love Silent Hill, so indulge in quite a bit of fog and supernatural darkness).
Instead, horror is about what you cannot immediately solve with a roll of the dice, or quantify on page X of a rulebook. The best horror comes from having our expectations twisted and the familiar turned monstrous. Those things are going to come from your descriptions and the atmosphere you create. Think fewer rules and stand-up fights, more riddles, more obscure documents, more weird maps and items that produce effects that can't be understood without some sacrifice. For starters.
This is true. Facing a monster that you as a player have no idea how to deal with, even if you don't metagame is more scary than facing a tough monster you have faced before.
This is true. Facing a monster that you as a player have no idea how to deal with, even if you don't metagame is more scary than facing a tough monster you have faced before.I have extensive experience running horror using 3.5, d20 Modern, adapted rules from the d20 version CoC, and am writing some horrific passages into our upcoming Pathfinder game.
The thing about horror, at least in my experience, is that no mechanic can effectively simulate it. Though all of those games were using "rules heavy" systems, the real horrific elements were not tied to the mechanics. Well, except maybe for the general unease people feel when concealment from fog or supernatural darkness interferes with their attack rolls (I happen to love Silent Hill, so indulge in quite a bit of fog and supernatural darkness).
Instead, horror is about what you cannot immediately solve with a roll of the dice, or quantify on page X of a rulebook. The best horror comes from having our expectations twisted and the familiar turned monstrous. Those things are going to come from your descriptions and the atmosphere you create. Think fewer rules and stand-up fights, more riddles, more obscure documents, more weird maps and items that produce effects that can't be understood without some sacrifice. For starters.
I'm only wondering how you can pull this out without leaving the players feeling cheated when they have knowledge skills up through the roof.
So I am looking at running Carrion Crown as soon as I finish my Serpent Skull Campaign. Carrion Crown is suppossed to have a gothic horror theme, but I have always found horror to be a difficult theme to invoke in such a gamist system as Pathfinder.
My players have little experience with horror, but seems to be keen on the premise. They do however have a pretty gamist and tactical mindset. Most of our other Campaigns have been pretty combat heavy and RP'ing and fluff has taken a backseat to the action for the most part. I think this is in part due to the way the rules work and my players familiarity with them.
Usually we run pretty powered up games, but for Carrion Crown I am planning on going for the standard 15 point buy and try to focus more on the characters than the mechanics. I have been looking into modifying some of the stability and sanity rules from Trail of Cthulhu, but frankly I am concerned that my players wouldn't like it that much as it would be yet another thing to keep track of during the game.
I do have some experience running horror games using other systems like Call of Cthulhu and Dark heresy, but that was with other groups and mostly one-shots. This will be the first time I try my hands at a full horror Campaign with players that have little to none experience with the genre.
Have anyone here successfully run a horror game using Pathfinder or similar rules heavy systems? Do you have any advice on techniques to use or recommend any optional mechanics to amp up the horror feel?
Our group not focused on RP? Noooo, you mean how I as a GM am reading 3/4 of the fluff-passages of the AP aloud to hardly anyone but myself while people are ignoring me in favor of discussing mostly irrelevant rules, and stopping the game every time someone doesn't agree on a rule? Never!
The easiest way to swing back from WH40K play and back into RP is to reward the latter more than the former. The system as stands rewards being bad-ass and being good at stomping the opposition, and ignores personal RP or story arcs. You know as well as I that I write in tons of story arcs for almost any given character I make, and try to find several levels of personal involvement in the plot, but I feel a little alone there, I'll admit.
More stuff to keep track of may be fine, if it is organic and makes sense. The Pathfinder Award points in Serpent Skull has not subtracted from the play, but quickly grew kinda pointless in my mind as it did not scale to stay relevant (so far anyway). And, too much of one thing will grow old, as we have seen in both our current campaigns. We are tired of travel and exploration in Serpent Skull, and micromanaging the kingdom in Kingmaker. I can see having horror on our tails ALL the time, and keeping track of sanity will quickly become old, and if people go around shaken and having to roll will saves all the time, it punishes the martial types who already need to shave off points in the mental department to function in their roles with 15pb.
Not to mention how sanity works as per now: Save or fail, and have to find a LV11 single-class cleric to fix it? Screw that noise. I sure hope the "Rule of Fear" stuff is less debilitating.
And as you say; playing horror scenarios where a misstep is death, and being on the knife's edge all the time is fine with one-shots. I put too much time into my characters to be comfortable with that.
But yeah, this might be an interesting exercise in furthering/recovering RP-drives. We both know everyone HAVE the chops to pull it off. I guess we just need to agree on certain things and approach things from a constructive angle. Make sure everyone knows that this is not about being cool enough to beat the bad-guys so much as it is about understanding them and THEN deal with the problem.
I'm only wondering how you can pull this out without leaving the players feeling cheated when they have knowledge skills up through the roof.This is true. Facing a monster that you as a player have no idea how to deal with, even if you don't metagame is more scary than facing a tough monster you have faced before.I have extensive experience running horror using 3.5, d20 Modern, adapted rules from the d20 version CoC, and am writing some horrific passages into our upcoming Pathfinder game.
The thing about horror, at least in my experience, is that no mechanic can effectively simulate it. Though all of those games were using "rules heavy" systems, the real horrific elements were not tied to the mechanics. Well, except maybe for the general unease people feel when concealment from fog or supernatural darkness interferes with their attack rolls (I happen to love Silent Hill, so indulge in quite a bit of fog and supernatural darkness).
Instead, horror is about what you cannot immediately solve with a roll of the dice, or quantify on page X of a rulebook. The best horror comes from having our expectations twisted and the familiar turned monstrous. Those things are going to come from your descriptions and the atmosphere you create. Think fewer rules and stand-up fights, more riddles, more obscure documents, more weird maps and items that produce effects that can't be understood without some sacrifice. For starters.
As much as I advocate otherwise my players don't take knowledge skills as much as they should. That is how I intend to pull it off. If they do take knowledge skills then I will have to think of something else.