S.A.V.E. me from this

[subplotkudzu]

Just had the second Emirikol session and they've reached Deitrich's manor house. I forgot to being up the map I was planning to use for it, but everyone was comfortable with a roough description. As per usual when I need a fancy house I pull out the map from Pacesetter's CHILL module "Haunter on the Moor" with its lovely Victorian. Always a classic, and I already had the map. 

In flipping through the module again tonight I was reiminded of one of the big flaws in CHILL, typified in this sentence: "to kill a bargest a character must plunge a dogwood stake through the creatures chest or belly while dancing the samba and singing Rule Brittania." 

Ok, I made that last part up - it has to be while the beast is corporeal. But it might as well be the latter - the PCs are in the middle of nowhere, have nothing to research with, and have never encountered this beast before. I mean honestly, how are they supposed to figure out which tree on the property they're supposed to cut into stakes to attack the spectral hound, and how are they supposed to catch it while solid? Really, how is that supposed to work? A revelation like "well, it looks like a dog, so maybe dogwood could hurt it?"

The first time I ran this module the characters were stuffing fowling guns with the tines snapped from the good silver forks in the hopes of wounding the beast under the theory that it might be a werewolf. They ended up shooting each other when the creature started throwing its voice onto the various PCs, which is just as well - If I had tried to tell them the dogwood theory I suspect some of those shotguns might have perforated my spiffy CHILL GM screen....

Comments

[kriz1818.livejournal.com]

I seem to recall that your attempt to clue one of us in (me?) involved a dream with a barking tree in it. Which didn't work.

[doc-mystery.livejournal.com]

Hey, I like Pacesetter's Chill.

Other than CoC, it was one of the earliest decent Horror RPGs, and one of the few to try to follow the classic Horror tropes.

Just a few weeks ago, I discovered I had misfiled the mail rules in an extra boxed set I had of first edition "Call of Cthulhu", so I was able to move it into (mostly empty) box I still had. While I still have the main two books, the map, and the cardboard chits (and a couple of adventures), I don't have either the fast start rules nor the adventure you have.

::B::

[brianrogers.livejournal.com]

Don't get me wrong - I like it as well. I still have most of my modules for it, and I strongly regret getting rid of my first edition rules wen the 2d edition came out (1) There was much to like in the system, setting and tone.

But it would be nice if they just admitted that some of the modules were meant to kill player characters. This one reads much like Dracula without Van Helsing turning up: you're up against an adversary about which you know nothing that can only be hurt by specific things... Go to! The longer ones (Haunter is actually 3 short adventures) give the players more of a chance to research and survive.


1) The 2nd edition hardcover is inferior in almost every way, being too strongly influenced by VtM to become 'edgy' - something I didn't realize until later. I had similar misgivings on with my WEG Star Wars sets. This convinced me that new editions of games aren't always better than their predecessors - evolution in a game line produces complexity, not necessarily improvement. Hence, my sticking with D&D 3.0, thanks.

[doc-mystery.livejournal.com]

Nod about n+1 rules editions not always being a panacea. Other games that had the problem you cite above includes WEG's Paranoia, Ghostbusters and Traveller.

::B::