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[Call of Cthulhu] The Haunting Character Creation
Bogart
Streetwise HerculesRegistered User, Moderator Mod Emeritus
Streetwise HerculesRegistered User, Moderator Mod Emeritus
Call of Cthulhu, for those unfamiliar with it, is an RPG system set within the world created by the famed horror writer and casual racist HP Lovecraft. All those stories written by other people about things older than the human race and unknowable to our puny minds threatening our world were inspired by his writing. Unknowable, indescribable, unnameable and impolite horrors from beyond our simple understanding of time and space collide with our world to further unguessable plans and schemes, the slightest glimpse of which might send a strong man insane. Ancient cults who worship and serve beings they cannot comprehend lurk in dark alleys, waiting to club you over the head and make you the star attraction of their latest ritual sacrifice to a god whose name you cannot pronounce. Forbidden books of esoteric knowledge are pored over by studious academics and deranged occultists in equal number, driving them mad or giving them insight into the unseen world. Most terrible of all, there is no internet, so research has to be done in libraries.
*Shudder*
The Haunting
The Haunting is an absolute stone-cold classic adventure that perfectly sets up the setting, tone and gameplay of the Call of Cthulhu RPG. And now you have the opportunity to die horribly experience it for yourself. It will be set in HP Lovecraft's fictional town of Arkham, New England in 1920's America, so brush up on how to do the Charleston* and some appropriate slang for the era (go watch Miller's Crossing and then ask everybody in Arkham what the rumpus is). Since the adventure itself is designed to be completed in a single evening's play (say four hours of face to face gameplay), we should hopefully be able to see it through to the end in relatively short order. This will be the third adventure I've run in Critical Failures (I ran two D&D 4E adventures to completion a couple of years ago, but fancied something a little lighter on fiddling with maps and stats and heavier on RP).
Two spots on the adventure will be filled by @BobCesca, who will be playing an academic of some sort, and @Japan (they will be posting their character sketches as well), and to complete the party I think three or four more investigators would do nicely. Simply post a character sketch or concept of your 1920's investigator and their place in Arkham, NE. Be as brief or as lengthy as you like. Remember that knowing your way around a library is just as valuable a skill as knowing which end of a shotgun goes boom. Combat is occasional rather than regular, but thinking is mandatory. Running away is often positively encouraged. You'll need to be able to commit to checking the thread and posting once a day (or thereabouts - everybody is busy sometime), and you should possess the willingness to see the adventure through rather than post twice and then flake out.
One thing you must have in your character sketch is a link, however slim, to the occult. Perhaps your grizzled, mutton-chopped university professor has made some studies of those volumes kept in the locked room in the basement at the Miskatonic University to which only a select few hold a key. Or maybe your hard-boiled PI still has awful dreams about that foggy night his partner was dragged screaming into the river by something terrible a year ago. Or maybe your bored heiress fancies a little adventure and has a hankering to investigate the occult after her eccentric Uncle Rotherham committed suicide in that ghastly and suspiciously ritualistic way last year. Or maybe you're Cthulhu**.
Anyway, the ones I like most will form a party of investigators into the strange goings on at the old Corbitt house that have seen so many novice investigators horribly killed. I'll close applications when there are too many or in a few days or when it becomes clear that no one wants to play, whichever comes first. If all goes well with the adventure I would love to run something of larger scale and length (but episodic, to make it manageable) afterwards for the same players. Unless you are horribly killed or driven insane, of course.
Helpful articles and resources below (mostly ripped bleeding from the other CoC adventure in CF):
Have a gander at this if you're unfamiliar with the CoC system: Call of Cthulhu Quickstart Rules - All of the basics you need to make a character and start playing, though slightly out of date. IMPORTANT NOTE about the quick start rules: the adventure you're about to play is actually contained in the quick start rules, at the end, so don't read anything past page 11. There's nothing stopping you, of course, but why be that guy? No one likes that guy.
You might also want to take a look at this site: Yog-Sothoth - General Call of Cthulhu site, and possibly this list of tips: How to Survive a Call of Cthulhu Adventure
We'll be using one thread for both IC and OOC (OOC stuff and game mechanics will be kept in spoilers) and Invisible Castle for rolls. If you're unfamiliar with Invisible Castle go take a look now and make a roll. Please copy and paste the following to use as the campaign name for the rolls in Invisible Castle so I can easily keep track and see your pathetic attempts at cheating.
PA The Haunted House
Post your rolls using the BB Link provided by Invisible Castle after you roll, like this: Example roll (1d100=3)
You might also want to take a look at this site: Yog-Sothoth - General Call of Cthulhu site, and possibly this list of tips: How to Survive a Call of Cthulhu Adventure
We'll be using one thread for both IC and OOC (OOC stuff and game mechanics will be kept in spoilers) and Invisible Castle for rolls. If you're unfamiliar with Invisible Castle go take a look now and make a roll. Please copy and paste the following to use as the campaign name for the rolls in Invisible Castle so I can easily keep track and see your pathetic attempts at cheating.
PA The Haunted House
Post your rolls using the BB Link provided by Invisible Castle after you roll, like this: Example roll (1d100=3)
This next stuff is about character creation, and will only become important when the party has been chosen.
There are two options for creating your characters. You can either let me do it for you, working from your character concept to determine what skills I think you'll possess, or you can do it yourself. Obviously, if you want me to do it your character concept should tell me things about their background, their interests and possible skillsets ("Gams McCready is a leggy heiress with a taste for the finer things in life. She races cars in her spare time for kicks, won the gold medal at the XXVIIth Annual Hoity-Toity Country Club pistol shooting competition and is well-versed in the art of manipulation to get her way"). To create your CoC character yourself if you are without the 6.0 rulebook and don't want to do it the old fashioned way, go here and grab the top two downloads:
Byakhee - Character Generator
This gets you the CoC 5.0 ruleset character creation stuff. We'll be playing CoC 6.0, so you'll also need to go here to and scroll to the bottom of the page and download the zip file there:
A 6.0 update for Byakhee
Unzip all of the contents of both zips into a directory and run the Byakee executable.
Online character sheets can be found here, so once you/I have created your intrepid investigator, fill in one of these and provide a link: The Keep - Online character sheets
Byakhee - Character Generator
This gets you the CoC 5.0 ruleset character creation stuff. We'll be playing CoC 6.0, so you'll also need to go here to and scroll to the bottom of the page and download the zip file there:
A 6.0 update for Byakhee
Unzip all of the contents of both zips into a directory and run the Byakee executable.
Online character sheets can be found here, so once you/I have created your intrepid investigator, fill in one of these and provide a link: The Keep - Online character sheets
*There will be no performing of the Charleston.
**You cannot be Cthulhu.
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I either want to play a "psychic" conman or a Freudian psychologist.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
One of the best RPG's out there, after all this time! I would be very interested, though I will hold off on taking the spot of an excited and available newcomer until I'm sure I can commit; I will probably only be able to post at most once a day in the future. Do you have any plans for altering The Haunting to avoid familiarity? Or is this one going to be by the books?
Also, do we have a set up for how our investigators are meeting/know each other? Is this leaning towards Pulp or Purist (incidentally, have you looked in to Trail of Cthulhu?)? I know everyone likes making their favorite Humphrey Bogart/Psychic gymnast/Nun with a shotgun, but I think the game really shines when groups are more believable as opposed to disparate.
I'd love to play a rich, spoiled dilettante seductive bad boy who thinks he's the worst thing in Arkham.
Until... the actual bad things in Arkham
So, after the DM sets up a scene with you and the rest of the party entering the suspicious mansion all the clues you've collected point to as the centre of the local cult of Yig worshippers, and lays out the room you can see, you post something like:
"Gams MacCready steps warily over the threshold, holding her pistol in front of her ready to send lead into any snake loving cultist who crawled out of the woodwork. She knelt beside the west door, listening carefully for any movement of voices."
And then in spoilers you might say that you're trying to make some rolls to move silently and listen at the door. And you can interact with other players and so forth. Have a look at some of the other IC (in character) threads in the forum to get a feel for how to post. Basically, you play your character by posting. Sometimes you'll be doing stuff I ask you to do, like take a turn in combat or test to see if you lose SAN points when you look at some eldritch horror, but mostly you'll just be telling me what you want to do and what your character says to everyone else in the game.
Posting once a day is what I expect from everyone, but this is flexible. You have an exam, or a busy evening or you're out over the weekend and you can't post: all fine. Disappearing for two weeks without giving me notice: less fine. I am an understanding DM.
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I am fine with anything except character ideas that are clearly unworkable in a team (my character is a sadistic murderer who hates women, the Irish and dogs), ludicrous (my character is the King of Spain) or just plain annoying (my character is Carrot Top).
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What about a character who thinks they're the King of Spain?
EDIT: Also, Dread Cthulhu being able to be a player just doesn't seem fair. :P
Cecil Grey, born in Arkham about twenty years before the present day. So sometime in the 00s, I imagine. He's as old money as they come. The Greys make old money look like new money. He's a dilettante, obviously, but he's the fifth son of the family and something of the black sheep of the family. Although he has a lot of classical education, in the last couple of years he's been spending a lot of time in speakeasies and boxing rings and women's beds. He's somewhat notorious among a certain group of people as a scoundrel, a seducer, and a thug.
Talking to him does little to abate that reputation. His words are usually intelligent and his speeches planned, but his jabs can be cruel and downright classless. There's no doubt he has a temper, and he drinks just a little bit too much. He can handle his own in a fight, he's a bit of a fencer and a lot of a boxer though he never learned to fire a gun, and he's not afraid to threaten and bully to get his way. Anger is his usual reaction to horrible, sanity-blasting effects, probably.
He used to be much more well behaved, but it was the mysterious disappearance of his younger sister Joyce three years ago that started his downward spiral. His isolation from his family came from their apparent inside knowledge of the kidnapping, but unwillingness to pursue the case and their stymying of the FBI's efforts to track the missing girl down. In the darkest part of his heart, Cecil suspects one of his older brothers to have unearthly powers, and that they sacrificed her as part of a bizarre ritual. When he sleeps, he hears the chanting from the subterranean halls beneath his ancestral home. He has confided these bizarre fears to no one.
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He can tend to be a fairly pompous individual, who is at times over-confident in his grasp of the psychology of others. A series of notable cases in which he managed to (to his knowledge) cure a number of patients that were suffering from neuroses regarding matters of the Occult (which he aggressively disbelieves in) has left him with quite an ego regarding such matters. His brand of psychoanalysis is focused largely on dream interpretation and the use of psychoactive medicines. He is one of the few remaining proponents of extensive cocaine use for the treatment of psychological disorders. Dr. Lieber has traveled to Arkham at the behest of a wealthy individual who claims to suffer from psychological trauma due to Occult forces.
Probably by the book, with some possible hooks to a sequel adventure if people are enjoying it.
The characters will be bought together for the first time at the start of the adventure, unless particularly fruitful ways of forming connections between them spring to mind from the character sketches.
i.e. Someone posts a professor of esoteric literature from the Miskatonic University, and then someone else posts a student visiting Arkham to look into certain books stored at the university, etc.
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Barnes is quick to accept the opinions of perceived superiors due to his time in the military. He is more than a little superstitious, carrying with him several "lucky charms," including a rabbit's foot and a badly dented steel cigarette case. He lives in an inexpensive garret apartment and drives a motorcycle with a side-car. He has taken several courses dealing marginally with the occult in the Anthropology and Psychology departments and frequently volunteers for his professor's projects and experiments.
Possible connections: Student at MU could be connected to a fellow student or professor. He has an interest in the occult and is superstitious, to a point. He is the sort who would volunteer for an "expedition" sponsored by a professor or to "guide" a wayward fellow going into a sketchy neighborhood.
Evelyn Engelbrecht, Short, around 5'1" and fit athletic. She was born eighteen years ago to Gerhard and Ursula Engelbrecht who where not a rich family but not a poor either. Her parents were comfortable in running their business; A book store. So naturally Eve, was taught rather early on how to read and enjoy good works of literature. She began school a year early as such since she was already able to read and write passably by the time she was 4. However she was taken out of school by the age of 14 due to being well trouble maker. She would constantly make fun of the rest of the students to the point where she would send them running from the class because of how much she pitied their lack of knowledge.
She hated being the smart kid all the time, hated it so much that, well being a romantic at heart, she ran away. (gasp!) However unlike most girls her age that are forced (or willing) to take to the street, she not only survived but she was soon thriving under the patronage of a rather infamous jewel thief. He found her height and build well suited to running the roofs as it were, and getting into and out of sticky situation. Eve, who now calls herself Lyn is not quite yet on the wanted lists of Arkham, but she is still toeing the line as the police do not know who she is either and she wants it that way.
Her interests lie well within the rights to try and get any artifact or items of the occult as she can most likely find a top buyer for things in that realm.
She is a rather spunky girl for her time, dressing any where from boys clothing to that of if she was going out on the town. She is never seen without a small silver and garnet ring that sits on her left forefinger and the fact that she has several other tiny chips of garnets in her ears and one in her nose. (4 chips in her left ear, 3 in her right.)
From the Desk of Darth Vertroue Diplomat to the USA.
The first time Julian Roth almost died was as a child. They had masks. They chanted. When they drove the blade in he screamed. And in the moment before the police kicked down the door, Julian Roth would have sworn he saw something terrible in the dark.
It stayed with him, though he learned to pretend it hadn't. Kept the worried look off all their faces. Every time he mentioned cults or monsters, they reminded him it was just a dream. Something he had imagined to cope. Eventually he stopped arguing. But he never forgot what he saw.
With his parents murdered, they'd sent him to a home. Julian was lucky. His new dad was a judge. Strict, commanding, fair in his own mind. The Judge wasn't enjoyable, but he was better than the dark. Julian was happy to be safe. But he could only kid himself for so long.
The second time Julian almost died was in his late teens. A road trip to a small town in the country. Of the dozens of leads he'd scratched together, it was the last. Backroad ended at a tall cornfield. He walked. Hours passed before the clearing where he found himself in front of a burned down cabin. In the stone cellar something moved in the dark. He pulled the Judge's gun from his pants and fired before it clawed him up too bad. Never saw what it was, but it bled as it scrambled out into the night. Julian didn't bother to look for it.
It was just after graduation from the Judge's alma mater before Julian looked into the dark again. The Judge had died. His funeral was well-attended and properly elegant. Julian spent the night nodding in thoughtless reply. Thank you for the condolences. I'll be fine. No, I just finished. he'd say. Going into finance. The whole thing proceeded like a dream. He was barely aware of anything until he found the box in the back of the old man's closet. Until he found the photo of his parents, standing in front of a majestic mansion, shoulder to shoulder with the Judge. He found that mansion in the town of Arkham.
It was the third time Julian Roth almost died.
George doesn't know who his parents were, doesn't really care to find out - he's grown up prideful of his own resourcefulness and placed his trust only in himself and Christ. However, recently he felt something inexplicable when he looked up at the night sky, and is finding his memory failing him on the precise details. Did something pass over the moon? He can't quite explain it but now he feels there's something lurking, clouding his faith. And he's been having the strangest dreams...
He's been doing odd handyman jobs in New England, but feels oddly detached from the goings-on around him. These uneasy developments have made him fear that he might have had a brush with the devil, and the normally devout man is finding prayer to not be of help. George may not fully believe in the supernatural, but decides to investigate any possible doubt, just to verify.
and the gengars who are guiding me" -- W.S. Merwin
He's tall, blond, broad-shouldered and all-American; even the new seams in his face and the flecks of grey at his temples just make him look distinguished, as his mother likes to say. He wears natty suits - nothin' too ostentatious, but he wants you to know he's got it - and a sharp hat at a jaunty angle. He's always been restless, curious, eager to move. He was never happier in his life than he was toodling in his Model T up and down the coast, bringing the blessings of modernity to lonely widows and busy housewives from Maryland to Maine. Yeah, he got into some scrapes, he drank hard and jumped out of more than one second-story window, but Chet always laughed and said the scars added character. Still...he didn't keep that heavy-duty tire iron in the back of his Ford around just for looks.
But then there was that one house last year. Some no-name town in Delaware, or was it Rhode Island? One of those nice old families that had clearly gone to seed, just a frail woman who looked to be eighty but said she was only fifty-five. Her and her weirdo son. Some kind of writer, she said. Some kind of fruitcake, more like. Chet spent the better part of two hours demonstrating the superior Hy-Lux suction (don't make that face, you goddamned panderers) and signing them up for the Lifetime Plan when it turns out they can't pay. Or won't. Chet got hot, and he yelled at the kid - that sallow face just got on his nerves, you know? Those long, drumming fingers. Fucking weirdo. Finally the kid says something like "you want your lucre, sir? Take it!" - hand to God, he really said it that way, lucre - he pulls a book off the wall, opens it, and produces this heavy gold thing, this amulet or cameo or something on a chain, and tosses it to Chet. "That will more than recompense you for your time. Now leave my poor Momma in peace, vulgarian," and slammed the door in Chet's face. Fine, whatever. Chet pawned it a few towns later and it turned out it was worth at least two, three hundred bucks. Well, that's what the guy paid him, so it was probably worth a lot more.
But Chet - and this is the part he doesn't tell people unless he gets really hammered, so who fucking knows - Chet swears that he started having bad dreams after that. Like, real bad. He took a couple months of accumulated vacation to go on a trip West, get some of that sunshine and air, and came back paler than when he'd left. He swears he went back to the house on his next circuit and couldn't find the street, or the numbers had changed, or something. Whatever. Look, I'm just repeating what he told me. You ask me, I figure he's been spending too much time in those juke joints uptown in New York, but what do I know?
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After completing her time at Cambridge, one of the professors, Professor Housman, found Ida a research position in the States where she was left alone to research the occult in classical cultures in peace. The University recently acquired a bequest and while most of the books were fairly innocuous, a few rare and never before seen ancient inscriptions were found inserted into one of the Greek texts. Ida began translating straight away, but the more she reads, the more strange she feels, like someone, or something, is watching her...
James "Jimmy" MacPhail never was one for regular work, but always had an eye for, let's say, "opportunity". During the War there were plenty of ways for a man of parts to make a few clams, as long as he could make nice with the draft board, or at least escape their attention. Just a matter of doing the right person the right favour, or knowing who can put you on the books in an employment "essential to the war effort".
He's not much to look at, not very tall, dark haired, and broad shouldered. If asked, would say that there's "not much to tell" about himself. No family that anyone knows anything about. As far as he's concerned, anybody who matters knows what they need to know about Jimmy MacPhail. Jimmy, though, frequently knows quite a lot about everybody else. Especially those that like to drink and hold the ear of a sympathetic barman.
Jimmy's present employers (though he'd resent the term) are the proprietors of a speakeasy known as The Pearl. Offering the discerning patron something a little more refined than the backalley dockyard rumhouses. Don't let the decor and the snappy dressers fool you though, a lot of guys with a bit of flash are nothing but trouble. Jimmy's job, among other things, is to make sure that trouble doesn't start, and if it does, that it's handled in a manner that doesn't strain the ability of the law to fail to notice The Pearl's operation. Can't go beating up guys in alleyways. You'd ruin your suit, for one.
These days, there's no shortage of ambitious types looking to make a name for themselves, but there's still a need for one who knows the right faces, can keep a level head when dealing with those that can't handle their hooch, and can be trusted to meet the rum-runners sailing down from Canada to secluded bays that the police could be relied upon to avoid, if you take my meaning.
It was on one such run two months ago that Jimmy picked up his scar. It had been arranged that he'd be the one to collect a few casks of whiskey being landed by boat conveniently close to the docks, but screened by a headland. The chosen night was moonless, and Jimmy just had to signal from the shore to bring the boat in. They'd load the stuff onto the truck, money would change hands. Easy.
Except for the damn fog. It pressed in as he drove down the tree-lined track that led to the beach. The lights on the truck and the lantern he'd brought with which to signal didn't seem to penetrate it, seemingly swallowed by the dark instead of diffusing into grey. Colour drained out of his surroundings as he pressed forward, the track to narrow to turn the truck. The darkness first swamped the truck lights. Jimmy stopped and became aware of a odour, a rank, vinegary smell like rotting seaweed. The fog seemed to turn viscous, catching in his throat and inhibiting his movements. Suddenly, it was difficult to breathe, the fog invading his lungs and driving out the oxygen. Jimmy blacked out as he flailed against the cold, slippery resistance.
He woke up in the daylight. Lying on the beach, tangled in seaweed and stained with a black, tar-like substance. Pain in the lower part of his abdomen. Probing fingers found a ragged, savage wound, like someone had just raked and stabbed with a dull blade. No boat, no truck, and no hooch.
The wound healed into a strange, twisted shape. Almost looked like that Jap picture writing or something like that. Some nights it hurts. The feeling of the blood throbbing in it making it pulse and burn. On those nights, the dreams come.
So, character creation. There are links in the OP for those who want to create their own investigators. Those who don't want to create their own character (it's actually pretty easy), please let me know ASAP so I can do it for your lazy ass. Character sheets will be held on the Keep (link in the OP). For those who are creating their own CoC 6th edition character, please use the following rules:
Take these pre determined rolls for your characteristics: 16, 14, 13, 12, 12, 11, 11 and 9. You should add 1 to the score you assign to either INT or SIZ. You should add 2 to the score you assign to EDU.
When assigning points to skills please try and make them relevant to your backstory, or your character's profession. No skill should exceed 75%.
INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT NOTE: whether you are creating your character or not, I expect each of you to have at least read the quick start rules (not the adventure part!) and be familiar with the basic concepts of play. They're pretty simple, and involve rolling a d100 against your skills and using your head the rest of the time.
Once all the characters are created I'll move to a second thread and well let this one die. The new thread will be for both IC and OOC posts (the latter made in spoiler tags).
SO. Pertinent points. If you want me to create your character LET ME KNOW. If you are one of the six chosen investigators but have changed your mind and no longer wish to take part LET ME KNOW. Read the QUICK START RULES. And DO NOT lend any Elder Gods money. You won't see it again.
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I much prefer option b.
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Quick question: at the bottom, The section headed "Weapons" has a section for melee: do those need to be taken as skills? In other words if I want my character to be able to throw a punch do I need to spend points there?
The quick start thing doesn't elaborate.
EDIT: This thing seems to indicate that I do.
50% in punch, 25% in kick, 25% in grapple.
I'm not totally sure everything is correct (I have never done this before), but here are the numbers if anyone cares enough to check them/wants to tell me that my character is horribly broken and will instantly perish:
CON 12
DEX 11
SIZ 12+1 = 13
INT 16
POW 11
APP 13
EDU 9 + 2 =11
Occupational skills: EDU x 15 = 165 points (these are the points added to the base chance, not the percentages)
Bargain 10
Conceal 10
Drive Auto 20
Fast Talk 30
Hide 25
Persuade 30
Spot Hidden 15
Handgun 25
Hobby Skills: INT x 10 = 160 points (again, points added to base chance)
Fist/Punch 25
Grapple 30
Law 40
Sneak 35
Climb 30
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Grand.
Cesca's is up too, incidentally.
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Everybody else's characters look fine to me. We're almost ready to go.
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