How Much Combat do you Like in Call of Cthulhu?

3rik · December 12, 2014, 06:33:23 PM

I think you can throw as much violence into a CoC game as you feel like. Doesn't make it any less CoC.

Quote from: TristramEvans;803996Lovecraft's Mythos are eminently gameable, but his stories largely aren't, with a few exceptions. Call of Cthulhu isnt actually a very Lovecraftian game anyways, it just happens to be set in Lovecraft's + 100 years of fanfics' and tributes' world.

As it says on the cover of 6E: horror roleplaying in the worlds of HP Lovecraft. I don't think the game claims to emulate Lovecratian literature particularly strictly anywhere in the book, though I may have missed it in the organisational mess of 6E.

Quote from: Lynn;804056While I think he rejected the pseudo-pantheon that Derleth tried to formulate, the game has Derleth creations from Derleth stories in it (and a lot of other writers as well).

I *think* that it's also stated somewhere in 6E that if you like that kind of thing you can of course add it in yourself.

Spinachcat · December 12, 2014, 06:38:39 PM

I love combat in CoC. It makes players shit themselves. However, I tend to let combat be based on choices by the players (aka, you poked the beastie, now it wants to eat you). My cultists are usually too insane to be proactive in hunting down PCs, as the cultists on focused on their much higher purpose.

Quote from: Zak S;804096Like this style of play: http://dndwithpornstars.blogspot.com/2013/06/nosebleed-noir.html ...was inspired by the desperate way the combat system works.

Great article. Thank you.

Zak S · December 12, 2014, 06:56:41 PM

Quote from: Spinachcat;804206I love combat in CoC. It makes players shit themselves. However, I tend to let combat be based on choices by the players (aka, you poked the beastie, now it wants to eat you). My cultists are usually too insane to be proactive in hunting down PCs, as the cultists on focused on their much higher purpose.

Great article. Thank you.

Thanks, Cat

TristramEvans · December 13, 2014, 02:46:49 AM

I don't actually use the system from CoC. I appreciate the BRP system and think the latest Runequest is perhaps the closest thing to perfection I've encountered in a fantasy system, but for Mythos games I much prefer my house rules; a streamlined version of FASERIP with a Tarot-based sanity/magic system.

Enlightened · December 13, 2014, 02:10:54 PM

If I'm remembering correctly, in the rules light game Cthulhu Dark, the combat system is basically:

"If the PCs get into a fight, they lose. No rolls, they just lose."

3rik · December 13, 2014, 02:14:21 PM

Quote from: Enlightened;804349If I'm remembering correctly, in the rules light game Cthulhu Dark, the combat system is basically:

"If the PCs get into a fight, they lose. No rolls, they just lose."

That sounds pretty shitty.

Will · December 13, 2014, 02:58:15 PM

I think investigators should be quite able to fight regular folks and cultists, maybe some basic monsters with difficulty.

But Cthulhu eats 1d6 investigators per round.

Another system option is Unknown Armies. The system is clearly an evolution from BRP COC (evolution, not better)

Bren · December 13, 2014, 05:37:39 PM

Quote from: Will;804355Another system option is Unknown Armies. The system is clearly an evolution from BRP COC (evolution, not better)

Now I'm wondering what selection pressures caused UA to have a better survival rate it it's habitat.

Also outgrowth is feeling neglected.

Enlightened · December 13, 2014, 07:27:40 PM

Quote from: 3rik;804350That sounds pretty shitty.

For what it's worth, it specifically says:

"If you fight any creature you meet, you will die. Thus, in these core rules, there are no combat rules or health levels. Instead, roll to hide or escape."

crkrueger · December 13, 2014, 07:39:26 PM

How...completely uninteresting in every possible way.

3rik · December 13, 2014, 07:44:44 PM

Quote from: Enlightened;804417For what it's worth, it specifically says:

"If you fight any creature you meet, you will die. Thus, in these core rules, there are no combat rules or health levels. Instead, roll to hide or escape."

That... still sounds pretty shitty.

Rezendevous · December 13, 2014, 09:08:33 PM

I don't get where the idea that CoC must have no or little combat comes from. Not every CoC game I've been in has had much of it, but there's usually been at least a bit, and I've played in some CoC games that had a fair amount of it.

Come to think of it, a number of the official adventures and campaigns Chaosium has published for CoC feature significant combat -- Escape from Innsmouth, Masks of Nyarlathotep, No Man's Land, etc. Combat tends to be present in Delta Green as well.

Lynn · December 14, 2014, 03:32:34 AM

Quote from: Rezendevous;804433I don't get where the idea that CoC must have no or little combat comes from. Not every CoC game I've been in has had much of it, but there's usually been at least a bit, and I've played in some CoC games that had a fair amount of it.

Come to think of it, a number of the official adventures and campaigns Chaosium has published for CoC feature significant combat -- Escape from Innsmouth, Masks of Nyarlathotep, No Man's Land, etc. Combat tends to be present in Delta Green as well.

I recall it from my 1st edition CoC, it being mentioned that gun combat is deadly and it shouldn't be encouraged. I have 6th Edition but I don't recall the same admonition.

I agree though - it seems to me like Chaosium still liked to pack combat into the game, at least in the many of the early published campaigns and scenarios. I started running Shadows of Yog-Sothoth back in the day; the Silver Twilight vs Party ended with Party losing, guns + magic.

Delta Green is an entirely new take on Lovecraft.

Omega · December 14, 2014, 05:12:41 AM

Quote from: CRKrueger;804418How...completely uninteresting in every possible way.

For a more emulative Lovecraftian jaunt. It fits. Long as you dont meet any cultists. Wonder how it handles those? Do they count as monsters and thus unbeatable? Or are they beatable but via some non-combat resolution?

Interesting if your leanings are to the non-com side.

Omega · December 14, 2014, 05:14:38 AM

Quote from: Rezendevous;804433Combat tends to be present in Delta Green as well.

Delta Green at times feels like it is all about shooting mythos thingies and not much else.

Which to me is pretty boring really.