I was considering shifting to a horror-type D&D adventure for the last few games in October for the purposes of Halloween. However, we had a player who couldn't make it, which would have left us with too few players to play D&D. So, I decided to run Spirit of the Century.

Still keeping semi in-theme, I used the idea of the Temple of the Pale White Lady from Hero Games' Pulp Hero supplement Thrilling Places. This is a nice little adventure locale with a suitable Lovecraftian theme reminiscent of Dagon and The Shadow Over Innsmouth.

I've already adapted to using the "Change How Consequences Work" rule in the Faster Conflicts variant, but the rules still don't harsh on the characters enough for horror. I don't like the "Change How Stress Boxes Behave" variant because it could break some endurance stunts in play, but I did make sure the creatures the characters faced had a damage bonus. It's still not nasty enough for horror, but I liked the way it felt for general SotC and will probably use something like the weapon damage mod for future SotC/FATE games.

I also plugged into the social combat system to emulate a sanity system. When players see something mind-shattering, it's resolved as a social combat round against them. Consequences are appropriate fear/horror/madness results. Nobody took a consequence in this game, but the eroding composure stress did give a feel of tension in the face of the alien horrors.

Anyways, it still ended up being a rather pulpy game. The party chased down cultists. There were two very satisfying events in this game. First, when the evil high priest is throwing the cute newfound ingenue over the cliff, the two fisted pilot swings down on a vine and saves her.

Second, the "mountain of a man" character tackled the high priest and goes diving over a cliff, survives, and is getting the upper hand on the priest. He lays a good one on him, good enough to get a hefty consequence. I give him the opportunity to give him not an injury style consequence, but a situational one, "in the path of my own monsters". With the monsters approaching the site of the sacrifice, the priest found himself in the monster's path.

I do regret that the less combative character didn't get to do much. I'll have to think up more maneuvers a character like that can do, but once you are in combat, resources and contacting don't help much. One thing I considered running (and in hindsight, should have) was an adventure in the vein of Fobidden Planet, where force is useless and social combat (convincing the unwitting villain that he is the only one that can stop the beast) is the only choice.

Quote from: Caesar Slaad;258105I also plugged into the social combat system to emulate a sanity system. When players see something mind-shattering, it's resolved as a social combat round against them. Consequences are appropriate fear/horror/madness results. Nobody took a consequence in this game, but the eroding composure stress did give a feel of tension in the face of the alien horrors.

That is such a great idea, and yet seems so obvious, that I can't believe this is the first time I'm hearing of it.

Quote from: Caesar Slaad;258105I do regret that the less combative character didn't get to do much. I'll have to think up more maneuvers a character like that can do, but once you are in combat, resources and contacting don't help much.

Yeah, resources and contacting are probably the most limited for combat, but on the other hand, I really feel that it is on the player who takes this kind of character to come up with ways they can be involved.  SotC gives them the power.  It takes some practice, you have to get your mind around the tagging rules and you have to push your imagination, but ultimately you can have a non-fighty guy who is pulling declarative maneuvers left and right, helping to set up the fighty players to pull of the big hits.

Can you give me an example of one of the combat scenes and the top 6 skills of the non-fighty guy?  I'll see if I can come up with some appropriate maneuvers.

Sounds like a cool session overall!

Quote from: walkerp;258175Can you give me an example of one of the combat scenes and the top 6 skills of the non-fighty guy?  I'll see if I can come up with some appropriate maneuvers.

There were 2 combat scenes.

Background factoid: the islanders send their old people to be sacrificed; the alien entity in fact prefers them. But these are dark haired natives so the cultists don't really know the difference between gray hair and blond. And the cute female villager/translator the party met had a streak of white hair due to illness when she was younger.

In one combat scene, the party is combing the beach looking for a research assistant who disappeared. They heard a scream and went running out to a beach where the natives sent their old people to get collected by the eel-men, who load them onto boats manned by cultists to take them to another island to be sacrificed. While running to save the cute young villager (who had a streak of white hair, and who was trying to get he aunt to leave the beach), the eel man see two blond party members traipsing across the beach and try to take them. One is killed, the other retreats (but the blond muscleman--might apex skill--grabs a hold of him and gets out far enough to see the eel man loading villagers onto boats before it dives to ditch him.

The second combat scene was on an amphitheater outside an inhumanly constructed temple overlooking a cliff; the high priest and 2 assistants (including one non-islander... a hint that this cult goes beyond the islands) are casting spells on would-be sacrifices before binding their hands and feet and tossing them to the sea where the eel-men await to take them to "the pale white lady", who feasts upon their souls.

Monica Peabody's skill and stunt loadouts are:
Skills (Stunts):

• Superb (+5) - Resources (Grease the Wheels)
  
• Great (+4) - Contacting (I Know a Guy Who Knows a Guy, Network of Contacts), Rapport (Best Foot Forward, Popular Gal)
  
• Good (+3) - Empathy, Endurance, Resolve
• Average (+2) - Academics, Art, Deceit, Leadership
• Fair (+1) - Alertness, Athletics, Fists, Guns, Weapons

In hindsight, if I had looked more at here character sheet outside of combat, I could have given her a bigger role in mystery solving. But her combat options still seem pretty limited.

QuoteSounds like a cool session overall!

Thanks.

I ran a different SotC (well, more "FATE Planetary Romance") game over the weekend I might post something about here soon.