Quote from: Theros;1115273What do you think?

The concept doesn't seem unreasonable to me. The implementation might need some work.

1. One implication of the table is that most violent career criminals (PC or NPC) either already are or soon will be insane. Which would make them legally not guilty of murder by reason of insanity. I don't particularly like that implication.

2. Practically speaking I'd expect you'll end up with players arguing that after the PCs attack, most instances of case 5 should really be case 4 since the cultists are now trying to kill the PCs back. I'd find having that argument tedious, but unilaterally denying their point is apt to lead to cranky and resentful players.

3. Some characters should have some ability to be hardened to those types of SANITY losses. Which, and When, and How will take a bit more workup and starts to move you from the simple CoC Sanity system to something with more than one thing you are tracking, possibly similar to descriptions I've heard of Unknown Armies. You and your players may (or may not) want the added bookkeeping.

4. Probably the most important concern I have is that you seem to be trying to address an out-of-game problem (your players are acting like murder hoboes) with an in-game solution. I'd want to talk with my players and get them on board with an addition to the Sanity rules  first. Then the Sanity loss is a reminder of what we've agreed to about play style and an additional risk/reward decision rather than a great, big club to hold over their heads to make them play the right way.

Quote from: Theros;1115296Exactly, but players get pissed when they have to answer to the reasonable, predictable consequences of their actions. Even if a cultist is evil, it is still murder in the eyes of the law.

If you are talking about the CoC universe then what exactly is reasonable and predictable?

The only Lovecraft story that I can think of involving an official response of sorts was when the army was called in to deal with the Deep Ones.

Quote from: Theros;1115308But in the case of Dunwich Horror, the Wizard Whatley really doesn't conform to what CoC RPG adventures (or at last many players) understand to be cults (expendable minions that are gunned down in droves).

Despite no specific depiction the story does mention cults a few times... such as when Armitage is trying to decipher the code Wilbur's diary is written in, noting it's an ancient cypher used by forbidden cults.

The Thing On The Doorstep is another that, while not depicting a cult, does mention groups that Asenath/Ephraim Waite is dealing with.
It seems to me that human cultists and their activities would be the entry level to most investigations into the machinations of the Mythos on Earth... even if a lot of what the cults are doing is just a muddled guess at what the Old Ones actually desire.

The specific numbers could be haggled over, depending on the table, but overall a great idea!

CoC already has similar SAN saves for Investigator's first time witnessing a corpse, so why not when Investigators attempt to make their own?

Also I liked the named limits to testing, so it cannot be spammed by punitively narrow-sighted GMs; good anticipation of pedantic (bad faith?) usage. Even CoC says those "corpse witnessing" SAN tests (and the like) tend to inure Investigators in an adventure arc to future similar incidents in session. That way the game removes license from spammed splatterpunk as a vindictive GM's weapon... and also makes 20th Cen wars playable for investigations.

Thanks for sharing!

edit: Bren's 4th point is crucial, "In-game solutions to ou-of-game problems" is chasing the dragon. Better to be direct and have The Talk (tm) to same-page players on their expected responsibilities.

Quote from: Theros;1115273What do you think?

And yet, if your cultists attempt to murder the party, they would suffer no such penalties. (Is a functioning cult even possible if you apply the sanity rules to the cultists?)

I think what you have going on is really a case of differing play styles, and neither one is wrong. They may well be incompatible, though, which is why it is good to clearly establish the ground rules for a campaign.

To the OP before implementing your house-rules make sure to talk to the players and see if they agree to their use. Nothing kills a campaign and/or friendships than house rules dropped out of the blue at random in a campaign.

Second if the players agree also give them a sense of hope. Yes I know Lovecraft stories are about perpetual doom and gloom and how humanity is basically screwed. Still give them some hope. Let them gun down some cultists if said cultists are of course attacking them first.

Third be prepared to possibly walk away as Lurkndog has pointed out the players and yourself may have differing styles of play and one cannot simply assume players will just accept the houserules. A new group may need to be found.

Quote from: Theros;1115308Despite being the namesake of the RPG, others have argued that The Call of Cthulhu is not an archetypal Lovecraftian story, so I'll leave it at that. But in the case of Dunwich Horror, the Wizard Whatley really doesn't conform to what CoC RPG adventures (or at last many players) understand to be cults (expendable minions that are gunned down in droves). And I'll take your comment about ATMoM to be sneering. I'd like to point out that the framework of the story did not in the least stop Chaosium from shoving coteries of human foes into the adventure that is based upon the story (i.e. Beyond the Mountains of Madness). It stands to reason that if cultists were oh so important for Lovecraft's method of storytelling, he could have too included them in ATMoM, despite its setting on the very bottom of the Earth.

Yeah, it was snark.

I have shot down your attempt to argue cults are somehow un-Lovecraftian, with one key point being that the Lovecraft story "Call of Cthulhu", after which the game is named, includes a big old gunfight with cultists.

You've obviously read some Lovecraft and yet you still tried to argue this point, which suggests you have some sort of beef going on about cults. I only came here to set the record straight; I don't give a monkey's if people use cultists in their games or not.

Quote from: Lurkndog;1115357And yet, if your cultists attempt to murder the party, they would suffer no such penalties. (Is a functioning cult even possible if you apply the sanity rules to the cultists?)

You are correct, the already insane cultists wouldn't really incur a  penalty from losing more Sanity. Many, probably most, cultists already are insane, some cultists (and all the cult leaders) have already had their SAN reduced to 0. Once SAN hits 0, there are no penalties beyond turning a PC over to the GM to run as a madman or insane villain. And the GM is already running those crazy cultists.

Quote from: Bren;1115388Many, probably most, cultists already are insane, some cultists (and all the cult leaders) have already had their SAN reduced to 0.

I would think such cults exist on a spectrum in regards to just how much of the Mythos has been revealed to them, how much they understand it. Looking at real world religions and cults that spin off of them... there are various degrees of divergence and zeal. Some Mythos cults, I'd imagine, are the dabblings of high society misfits, bored dilettantes, who only believe a fraction of what's described in the expensive old books they collect.
The movie The Ninth Gate portrays a whole ecosystem of occultists... some merely academics, collectors, delusional hedonists, but others who are very seriously committed. Even within a cult, I'd expect levels of casual involvement along with the true believers.
There have been plenty of real world religious folks who have gone to war and killed for their beliefs... were they all insane? So I'm not sure a violent Mythos cultist must necessarily be all that further around the bend.
I also figure that Mythos cults mix with other local beliefs, that few are 'pure' in their revelations... so some cult that mixes radical Pentacostalism with snake handling and a bit of Yig worship seems plausible, IMO.

I don't support Chaosium anymore, but when it comes to Lovecraft's Stories vs. Lovecraft RPGing, there will be massive chasms of difference and that's cool. Regardless what system you use, you will pick and choose what you want from HPL and what you will leave behind to make your game work at the table.

Also, as for HPL's nihilism, humanity is doomed and the gods could not care. But that doesn't mean the end is nigh. The Earth is a big place and lots of terrible things can happen in the shadows long before society falls to monsters. Its quite possible for human heroes to win and live out their lives with terrible knowledge, but perhaps no more danger...except what's in their minds.

Quote from: Theros;1115296Exactly, but players get pissed when they have to answer to the reasonable, predictable consequences of their actions. Even if a cultist is evil, it is still murder in the eyes of the law.

Thus, the "tone of the campaign" conversation between GM and players is all important.

There's "real world" consequence concepts, and there's cinematic, heroic unreality where action heroes can leave piles of corpses and the cops shrug their shoulders because they were all bad guys so who cares?

Both options can be great fun, but as always, make sure the GM and players are on the same page.

Quote from: Simlasa;1115318Because they all went insane long ago... now they're just malevolent sociopaths looking for their next fix of violence.

There is truth to this as well.

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you. - Friedrich Nietzsche

Investigators aren't okay. Delta Green teams aren't chosen randomly, and serving among them makes you more and more incapable of just rejoining society, let alone the regular military.

In many way, Dark Heresy got this right. The Inquisitors recruit highly driven, talented disposable people and sends them into the blender and promotes those who survive and succeed...which leads to ever increasingly unstable people at the top of the command chain!

Personally, I'm good with the PCs become Monsters themselves. Is John Wick or Rambo really okay? Can Indiana Jones really sleep soundly at night knowing what he knows?

Quote from: Theros;1115273I like my Call of Cthulhu games to have some degree of verisimilitude with reality... I find that makes the horror stuff even more horrifying. But one thing that takes me right out of the suspension of disbelief is when players instantly reach for the shotgun when they discover a cultist. I'm serious... I've had players find some black candles and an evil-looking tome in a basement and they immediately go and murder every last unarmed man, woman and child in the house. I've thrown the police against players that are quick to draw their firearms but it doesn't seem to dissuade anyone at the end of the day and it actually pisses off some players.

It's just bad roleplaying to be frank. If players feel a group is dangerous, then they should go to the police. Or they should at least capture a cultist alive and interrogate him for more answers. But the response is always "the only good cultist is a dead cultist." The players are acting like insane psychopaths.

Then that gave me the idea... if it is insane to shoot at someone just because you suspect they are evil, then why not just make murder a sanity-loss situation? Why not make gunfights in general take a toll on sanity? That might send the message to the players to use their freaking heads instead of their sidearms!

So here is what I am thinking. Tell me if it is a great idea or it will break the game entirely. Rules are for 6e (no 7e answers please):

[table=width: 600]
[tr]
   [td]Sanity Loss[/td]
   [td]Situation[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
   [td]0/1[/td]
   [td]Each round that guns are fired at humans (regardless of number, only test once)[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
   [td]1/1D3[/td]
   [td]Each round a player character fires a gun at a human (instead of previous sanity loss)[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
   [td]0/1D4[/td]
   [td]Be present when a human is killed (but not by you)[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
   [td]1/1D6[/td]
   [td]Kill another human in self-defense[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
   [td]1/1D10[/td]
   [td]Kill another human while the player-characters are the instigators of the violence (instead of previous sanity loss)[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]

What do you think?

I think you are trying to use Rules to fix a Player problem and that never works.

A suggestion, before implementing this rule, create scenarios where the cultists are evil but need to be kept alive because they have the knowledge needed to destroy the Big Bad when it appears. Or they know where other cults are and can identify those cultists. Or need to be kept on friendly terms to get them to divulge this vital knowledge.

Worst case, it fails and the Players remain murderhoboes but at least you got some more role-playing out of them.

Quote from: Simlasa;1115390I would think such cults exist on a spectrum in regards to just how much of the Mythos has been revealed to them, how much they understand it.

The cultists to which a sane and reasonably balanced investigator applies 12-guage shot are the ones who are sacrificing unwilling victims to summon/appease/entertain their dark chaos gods. They aren't garden variety kooks and casual believers.

QuoteLooking at real world religions and cults that spin off of them... there are various degrees of divergence and zeal.

The real world may not be a very good model for cults in a Call of Cthulhu RPG. In the real world there is no such thing as the taint of the Deep Ones, nor do people end up changing form into a ghoul because they spend too much time whispering to things in a grave yard before deciding to share a meal, nor can you cause someone to shrivel up and die or render them into their essential salts and then raise them from the dead, nor can you actually summon up one of the thousand avatars of Nyarlathotep to gain blasphemous, mind altering, and efficacious knowledge.

QuoteSome Mythos cults, I'd imagine, are the dabblings of high society misfits, bored dilettantes, who only believe a fraction of what's described in the expensive old books they collect.

If it makes for a better game for you and your players, then by all means imagine away. If there is an outer circle, they are dupes and willing pawns who haven't yet engaged in ritual sacrifices to summon beings from beyond our reality...who then actually manifest.

Regardless, the loss of sanity by the dupes, kooks, and willing pawns just pushes those NPCs further down the path towards being either a willing victim or a willing villain, but in no case does the loss of sanity (due to violence or any other cause) remove that NPC from play. In your prior post, you seemed to suggest that the OPs proposed sanity losses for violence and murder wouldn't work if the Keeper applied it to both the PCs and the NPCs. Clearly that is not the case.

I'm curious, are you actually playing or running Call of Cthulhu?

Quote from: jeff37923;1115393I think you are trying to use Rules to fix a Player problem and that never works.

A suggestion, before implementing this rule, create scenarios where the cultists are evil but need to be kept alive because they have the knowledge needed to destroy the Big Bad when it appears. Or they know where other cults are and can identify those cultists. Or need to be kept on friendly terms to get them to divulge this vital knowledge.

Worst case, it fails and the Players remain murderhoboes but at least you got some more role-playing out of them.

Yes, The Talk (tm) is the right answer to same page play expectations of players. And your advice of increasing NPC asset value should normally work. But Theros is lamenting that these players beeline to "Only good cultist is a dead cultist," even if they merely suspect it. This might need more than The Talk to reinforce prudence.

But after such a mature chat about expectations, and explaining the tonal shift of play from Judge Dredd to  mere mortal CoC investigators (doing heroics in *spite* of consequences), this sort of houserule could reinforce the new expectations.

Quote from: Bren;1115399The cultists to which a sane and reasonably balanced investigator applies 12-guage shot are the ones who are sacrificing unwilling victims to summon/appease/entertain their dark chaos gods. They aren't garden variety kooks and casual believers.

So you're saying the PCs would never get it wrong? Set fire to a bunch of run-of-the-mill high school Satanists by mistake? The OP's description of his Players suggest such things might be likely...

QuoteThe real world may not be a very good model for cults in a Call of Cthulhu RPG. In the real world there is no such thing as the taint of the Deep Ones, nor do people end up changing form into a ghoul because they spend too much time whispering to things in a grave yard before deciding to share a meal, nor can you cause someone to shrivel up and die or render them into their essential salts and then raise them from the dead, nor can you actually summon up one of the thousand avatars of Nyarlathotep to gain blasphemous, mind altering, and efficacious knowledge.

Sure, those things happen... but does that necessitate that every wannabe Mythos worshipper has such success? Does talent and dedication play no part in it? You read some scraps of the Necronomicon and POOF! you're a dread sorcerer? What about someone who reads a dread text and decides it's all a bunch of nonsense? (Imagine Scientology is actually the TRUTH of our world, but many of us hearing its tenants continue to mock the idea of Xenu).
Again, I'm thinking of The Ninth Gate and its depiction of rich cultists who go all out with the trappings and still don't have much of a clue regarding what they're really dealing with. Also, the tomb robbers in The Hound, who collect all sorts of nefarious items but aren't active cultists/believers, not overtly insane... until they dig up something truly malevolent.

QuoteIf it makes for a better game for you and your players, then by all means imagine away. If there is an outer circle, they are dupes and willing pawns who haven't yet engaged in ritual sacrifices to summon beings from beyond our reality...who then actually manifest.

I'm mostly going off of what I've read of RW secret societies and cults, where there are indeed 'levels' of involvement... inner circles of deeper secrets. A bottom level cultist might think they're involved with a charity that runs soup kitchens... and not notice the disappearance of a few of the customers each month. 'The Church of Starry Wisdom' doesn't sound all that malevolent on the surface, does it?

QuoteRegardless, the loss of sanity by the dupes, kooks, and willing pawns just pushes those NPCs further down the path towards being either a willing victim or a willing villain, but in no case does the loss of sanity (due to violence or any other cause) remove that NPC from play.

Not sure what you mean there... who you're arguing with.

QuoteIn your prior post, you seemed to suggest that the OPs proposed sanity losses for violence and murder wouldn't work if the Keeper applied it to both the PCs and the NPCs. Clearly that is not the case.

Did I? I don't see where I promoted that notion. I do generally like things like the Madness Meter from Unknown Armies, where PCs can drift between extremes of insanity or numbness.  

QuoteI'm curious, are you actually playing or running Call of Cthulhu?

Yep... though, from your hostility, I take it I'm not doing it in a way you'd approve of.

It makes sense any cult would have members of various levels of belief and involvement. You have initiates and acolytes and true believers. Definitely those who are more posers vs. those more devoted. If you read about Occultism in the early 20th century, and how it was a fad among celebs and hipsters of the day, there's no question there's a wide range between those who enjoyed dressing up and having a spooky time at a seance vs those allegedly involved in human sacrifice for demon summoning.  

Having that real world gradation among believers would be fine in a horror game.

But its equally cool for your horror game to draw people by D&D alignment. Sign on to the Cult of Dagon? Great, you're Chaotic Evil and fully vested with cult powers and you're proper shotgun bait.

Just different types of horror campaigns.