Spes Magna Games

Woke up early this morning (like I do pretty much every morning ever), and so I watched No Estamos Solos, a Netflix import from Peru. While this movie doesn’t cover any ground not already covered dozens of times by better movies, it does feature some decent performances by Marco Zunino (as Mateo, the papa); Fiorella Díaz (as Mónica, Mateo’s second wife); and Zoe Arévalo (as Sofía, Mateo’s daughter from his first marriage).

I’m pretty sure there’s a checklist for screenwriters working on haunted house and/or possession movies. No Estamos Solos faithfully checks all the boxes, to include some scenes that look so familiar I’m pretty sure they were lifted from other films. On the plus side, the film is short (76 minutes), so I didn’t have to wait long for the bumps, chills, and predictable confrontation between Padre Rafael (played by Lucho Cáceres) and the forces of evil.

Rather than another monster for The Cthulhu Hack, here are a dozen things that can happen in a haunted house, as filtered through the prism of AD&D spells.

Tags: AD&D, horror, place of power

Yesterday, I watched Be Afraid, a new-to-Netflix, painted-by-the-numbers monster movie starring TV’s Brian Krause as Dr. John Chambers, a dedicated family man who contends with sleep paralysis, things bumping in the night, and dark secrets in a sleepy town. It’s not a good movie, but it’s not horrible either. If you’re looking for a minimally suspenseful film that faithfully walks in the footsteps of dozens of other movies, you could do worse.

Also, here’s another movie monster for The Cthulhu Hack.

Shadow Men
Hit Dice: 3
Nota Bene: Shadow men, humanoid in form, have moist, hairless flesh that appears wrinkled and scarred, as if they had been skinned and burned. They have skull-like faces with hollow eye sockets and pointed jaws with ragged fangs. Their heads have no visible ears, and their long fingers end in talons.

Shadow men avoid light, coming out to terrorize and hunt at night or to defend the lightless entrances to their lairs. They exist only partially in our reality, and are able to move through shadows and darkness unseen and unimpeded by physical obstacles such as walls or distances. Shadow men attack with their claws and fangs (2d4 points of damage). They can be seen only via peripheral vision (Save with disadvantage when appropriate).

It is believed those killed by shadow men become ghosts of sorts, perhaps under the control of the shadow men.

Tags: horror, monsters, The Cthulhu Hack

Still at home due to Hurricane Harvey. I report back to work this coming Tuesday. One hurricane homebound activity included watching Tall Men, a 2016 slow-paced psychological thriller starring Dan Crisafulli as Terrence Mackleby and Kay Whitney as Lucy, Terrence’s sort-of girlfriend. It’s not a bad movie. Quirky in a way reminiscent of David Lynch. To keep it brief, after Terrence declares bankruptcy, he applies for the Card, impressed by its low interest rate and his compulsion toward debt. Terrence buys a new car, and then his first bill comes due. He can’t pay, and it turns out not reading the fine print has some pretty serious consequences, enforced by the movie’s eponymous tall men.

Here is a version of the tall men for The Cthulhu Hack.

Tall Men
Hit Dice: 2
Nota Bene: Tall men, some sort of lesser servitor race perhaps, appear very much as one would expect. Dressed in suits, always somewhat disheveled and often stained by dirt, these creatures stand at least seven feet tall, but their height seems to vary, as if they can grow taller at will. Their faces are never clearly seen, either obscured by shadows or else wrapped tightly in gray cloth. They never speak. Tall men are remarkably strong. Strength saves against tall men are made with disadvantage. Tall men are not particularly fast, but they move with stealth (Wisdom saves to notice them are made with disadvantage), and these creatures can somehow disappear and reappear as long as they are not viewed directly.

Tags: horror, monsters, The Cthulhu Hack

Another trip through From Unformed Realms, this time aiming to create a Lovecraftian horror for use with Swords & Wizardry!

Its leathery flesh, covered with finger-length spines, sharp and dark, glowed faintly from deep cracks and pocks, as if some internal fire guttered just beneath its skin. It walked upright, like a man, but balanced itself by means of a sinuous tail that ended with a knobby clump of something like bone. Where arms should have grown from its shoulders extended writhing, muscular pseudopods, growing and retracting, seeking to touch, to grasp…to burn!

Mephitic Horror
Hit Dice: 5+5
Armor Class: 4 [15]
Attack (Damage): 2 pseudopods (1d4)
Move: 9
Save: 12
Alignment: Chaos
Challenge Level/XP: 8/800
Special: Constrict and burn, immune to fire, spittle, toxic bile

Mephitic horrors are a sort of evil elemental that serve unholy entities that seek to return to the Material World in order to terrorize, enslave, and devour. In melee, mephitic horrors attack with their pseudopods. A creature struck by a pseudopod is ensnared to be crushed and burned, which causes an additional 1d6 points of damage per round the victim remains grasped. Instead of a pseudopod attack, mephitic horrors may spit up to twice per round (once per pseudopod attack not made). This spittle has a range of 30 feet. If it hits, the target suffers 1d4 points of damage as the spittle burns. The target must also make a saving throw to avoid being blinded for 1d6 rounds. A mephitic horror that takes more than 5 points of damage from a single attack involuntarily coughs up a gout of toxic bile. Creatures in melee combat with the mephitic horror when it regurgitates must make saving throws to avoid being splashed. The ghastly bile quickly worms its way into flesh. Those exposed to the toxic bile (meaning those that failed their saving throws) develop painful, aggressive tumors after 2d6 days (a Cure Disease suffices to overcome this malady, the exact effects of which are left to the Referee’s discretion).

Adventure Hook: The discovery of an intriguing artifact leads to a long-abandoned fort controlled by bandits for nearly three months. The bandits stumbled across the fort while trying to evade the authorities. One or more mephitic horrors prey on the bandits, seeking to slaughter them all.

Tags: horror, monsters, Swords & Wizardry, The Cthulhu Hack

I recently acquired several Paul Baldowski’s The Cthulhu Hack products-in-print via All Rolled Up. One of these products is From Unformed Realms. According to the introduction, this 20-page booklet is a “system-free supplement for a Gamemaster running games involving creatures of alien horror for role-playing games of all genres, fantastical or horrific”. The author suggests rolling 3d6 six times “to generate a customized aggressive horror”.

Each set of 3d6 determines a category, subcategory, and specific trait. There are six categories, such as Extremities or Fluids. Each category included at least three subcategories, and each subcategory includes six specific traits. That’s quite a lot of variety, and it looks like fun, so let’s play. I get 3d6, one black, one purple, and one red, and I roll them six times each, recording the results in the color order already mentioned. I get these results:

3, 4, 4: Skeleton, Bone Mutations, Blades
5, 6, 6: Appearance, That Looks Like, Ooze
1, 4, 2: Extremities, Weapons, Pincers
5, 3, 5: Appearance, Protuberances, Digestion
2, 6, 4: Senses, Vision, Compound
1, 2, 4: Extremities, Limbs, Spines

In other words, something like this:

Before our horrified eyes, the blasphemous thing lurched forward, glistening wetly in the moonlight. Shadows of bones rolled within its amorphous bulk, translucent and fetid, and some of those skeletal remnants slid from within, hooked and sharp and some clacking like monstrous pincers. Globular compound eyes bobbed within its body, pressing toward air. Even in the dim lunar glow, we could see half-digested remains: a dog, several rats, and — God help us! — a man’s arm!

Turning to The Cthulhu Hack core rules, I put together some quick monster stats:

Hit Dice: 5
Nota Bene: The gelatinous horror moves stealthily (roll with Disadvantage to hear it before it’s too late), and its fluid form is difficult to grapple (also roll with Disadvantage). It is impervious to flame or heat. Its compound eyes see in nearly all directions at once. It attacks 1d4 times per Moment, and each attack inflicts 1d4 points of damage.

After From Unformed Realms describes the various traits by category and subcategory, there is a single page “Summary of Traits” followed by two pages of “The Obligatory Appendix”. The latter provides tables that answer questions such as “The Hook?”, “Location?”, and “Horror’s Motivation?”, and with a few more dice rolls I determine the gist of an investigation into madness and death. Bolded parts of the following sentence indicate the results of dice rolls.

A chance visitation leads to a boot camp that has been a cover for anarchists for nearly two years for the purpose of medical research. The boot camp has become the target of the horror because the camp is built on the monster’s food source.

And there you go. In a fraction of the time than it took me to type, format, and edit this blogpost, I’ve got the framework for an investigation that pits the players’ characters against secretive, Mengele-like anarchists unaware that a Horror from Beyond lurks at their doorstep.

Excellent.

Tags: horror, monsters, The Cthulhu Hack