Hey, I have a second game I run aside from Deadlands.

So, I want to get into Call of Cthulhu.

The new edition seems like a good place to start.

What supplements should I get from all the other editions, being primarily a fluff man.

What are the ones to avoid?

I especially am interested in campaigns and adventures.

As one who is also planning to run CoC in the near future, I would be interested in responses in this thread. Particularly any modules/campaigns that offer a hex-crawl or sandbox style would be cool.

The Lovecraft Country books, especially the first three: Arkham Unveiled, Kingsport, Return to Dunwich... are the closest to sandbox-style sourcebooks that I know of.
https://rpggeek.com/rpgseries/1300/lovecraft-country-series

The best campaign is probably still Masks of Nyarlathotep.
People have been going on of late about Orient Express but I never thought it was in the top tier, except for having lots of fancy handouts and such.

The Lovecraft Country stuff makes for pretty excellent sandbox play, especially the Arkham book. Some of the lines best adventures are set in Arkham, and it can be a lot of fun following the community through the years. And Arkham University makes for a good source of replacement PCs with esoteric interests.

As far as campaigns go, Masks of Nyarlathotep has a great rep, but in practice can be very arbitrarily deadly, and this is true of all of the early campaigns in my experience, though this isn't necessarily a total non selling point. Tatters of the King is a much more narratively based campaign (think an "adventure path" type thing), which is not normally to my taste for Call of Cthulhu, but in this case I have to say it is an excellent campaign and not likely to be lethal for PCs as long as the players are being fairly smart.

Semi-Ninja'd! Same talking points, sleight divergence of opinion!

Edit: A final note, CoC adventures run the gamut from sandboxes to railroads, often in the same collection of adventures. Most of the campaigns function well weaved into an ongoing sandbox style setting, but pulling this off as a GM can be something of an acquired art. What are you looking to avoid? Do you have a premise in mind? A premise can be very useful in a horror campaign, whether it be a loose confederate of Arkham University intellectuals or a Private Detective Agency who starts specializing in uncanny cases.

One of my favorite non-Mythos campaigns is shorter one, Our Ladies Of Sorrow by Miskatonic River Press. It's based on the same source as Dario Argento's 'Three Mothers' trilogy: Susperia, Inferno, and Mother of Tears.

I have Dreamlands and liked it.

For a really weird setting look up End Times by Dr. Michael C. LaBossiere. I playtested that wayyyyyyy back and was really interesting setting once you got through the introductory adventures. Essentially the stars came right and all heck broke loose as the monsters came crawling out of the woodwork. Some flee to Mars and form a desperate colony there. Which is where the campaign is set.

Silent Legions by Sine Nomine. It's specifically designed for sandbox vs. cults.

Also, another enthusiastic vote for End Times.

There are number of good supplements/scenario books about and as 7e is backwards compatible everything is good to go.

The new Cults of Chaos (see Chaosium's website) is offering a multipart campaign for free set around Miskatonic University that will fit right in with the Akham area books mnetioned above. Part 5 has just been released with 6 coming on the 15th September. There's also an area at the Chaosium site offering freely downloadable scenarios.

I like Edge of Darkness (from the 6e rulebook) as a good intro as an alternative to The Haunting from the 7e quickstart. Another good (non-Mythos) scenario is The Haunted House from Curse of Cthulhu but that takes several sessions to run due to the ins and outs of the story.

Supplements that deal with foreign cities are always good as they don't involve local knowledge making them more unsettling. Cubicle 7's Cthulhu Britannica series are good for the UK (London (boxed set), Shadows over Scotland, Avalon and Folklore) with the London set having a great campaign in Curse of Nineveh.

I'd recommend Golden Goblin's Tales of the Crescent City for a supplement covering New Orleans. GG do a lot of good stuff relating to CoC.

Modern supplements i.e. The Things We Leave Behind (just released) have some great scenarios that crawl with horror.

I GMed End Times and had alot of fun with it , as did the players.

LaBossiere's work on Strange Aeons has some interesting adventures too.

Quote from: Manzanaro;917589The Lovecraft Country stuff makes for pretty excellent sandbox play, especially the Arkham book. Some of the lines best adventures are set in Arkham, and it can be a lot of fun following the community through the years. And Arkham University makes for a good source of replacement PCs with esoteric interests.

This is my favorite group of modules. Set everything in a creepy New England atmosphere in Lovecraft Country and you're good to go.

For 7E directly, the best material currently out there is the Cthulhu Britannica stuff put out by Cubicle 7. The London box set and World War Cthulhu lines are very professionally polished and fully engaging throughout. Depending on the style of play you are after, the Pulp Cthulhu book due to be published looks to be a lot of fun too. The Orient Express Campaign is impressive too, but very large and, to be honest, is a bit overwhelming to set up.

The backwards compatibility for older editions is do-able, and there is appendix-based conversion notes in several publications to assist with this this too. For the most part it amounts to multiplying the core stats by 5% (and ignoring a few of the newer, more peripheral rules, I have to say). But if we want to go back, then obviously Masks of Nyarlathotep is a classic and for me, so is Beyond The Mountains of Madness. I also have a soft spot for the out-of-print, and very campy Blood Brothers books, but that may just be me, and Modiphius have made a good fist of delivering Achtung Cthulhu! if that's your bag too.

In terms of my appreciation of style and tone, though, the grittier Delta Green RPG system holds a candle for running things like True Detective or other campaigns in a more thriller-styled way. The mechanics are less forgiving, with less bells and whistles over aspects like Luck points and the like.

Actually, I have noted that the new 7E mechanics now only really differ from the old Marvel Supers FACERIP system insofar that you roll low on percentile dice rather than high. In a functional sense the use of Luck points, and upfront scales of success are functionally very similar. I'm not sure what this says about it's functionality as a horror system as opposed to comic strip action - although there is the sanity system to keep it in check I guess.

Creature Compendium, because "Monster Manual + Gods" will eventually be useful.

The House of R'lyeh is good because it continues on from where 5 Lovecraft stories ended, and it even offers interconnections for converting all 5 into grand campaign. Basically an opportunity for that Lovecraft fan to go squee as they continue play from roughly where the author left off.

It's really hard to go wrong anywhere as most products are solid — the big issue is time investment for the table. So certain grand campaigns can stall or be overwhelmed if your group is irregular or novice. So, as cool as Beyond the Mountains of Madness is, not the easiest start (it is traveling to Antarctica, so...).

Quote from: Opaopajr;917691The House of R'lyeh is good because it continues on from where 5 Lovecraft stories ended, and it even offers interconnections for converting all 5 into grand campaign. Basically an opportunity for that Lovecraft fan to go squee as they continue play from roughly where the author left off.

Actually I second that. Good set of scenarios.

Quote from: TrippyHippy;917688Actually, I have noted that the new 7E mechanics now only really differ from the old Marvel Supers FACERIP system insofar that you roll low on percentile dice rather than high. In a functional sense the use of Luck points, and upfront scales of success are functionally very similar. I'm not sure what this says about it's functionality as a horror system as opposed to comic strip action - although there is the sanity system to keep it in check I guess.

You havent read many comics if you think it cant do horror.

ahem.

Unless they really overhauled CoC then it shouldnt bee too much like MSH.

Hermes Serpent already brought up Curse of Nineveh, one of the newest campaigns available, but I'll second it -- it really is spectacular.  (The wonderful London Boxed Set is also well worth your money, but by no means necessary -- but I'll say it's one of the best boxed sets I've bought in recent memory, second only to the recent revision of Horror On The Orient Express.)  Cubicle 7 has become my benchmark for quality Cthulhu material, actually -- both World War Cthulhu and World War Cthulhu: Cold War are excellent, with Cold War being a particular favorite of mine.

Also, if you're looking for campaigns, both The Armitage Files and Eternal Lies are for Trail of Cthulhu, and easily converted over to Call.  (Somebody's already converted Eternal Lies, and Armitage Files has precious few stats.)  Pagan puts out magnificent material -- all of the old Delta Green material is still available and compatible with previous CoC editions and easily converted and outstanding stuff.

Chaosium also released a new adventure collection called Nameless Horrors, and while not a campaign, a few of the adventures in it are real standouts, with one of them being particularly creepy and unnerving.  

As a play aid for any Lovecraftian game, I also second whoever brought up Silent Legions.

Honestly, CoC is having a bit of a renaissance right now.  It's a great time to be playing.