I want to run a multi-session supernatural mystery adventure in my game. Evil forces are trying to learn the forbidden arts of witchcraft, in order to get the attention of a long-lost god who is considered by many to be “the devil.” The PCs will have to learn and delve into witchcraft themselves in order to stop this from happening. A mysterious mentor will teach them how to use a Tarot deck (Raider-Waite-Smith, if anyone cares) to learn the lessons required to be able to use witchcraft. Seven cards of the Major Arcana (this is Tarot terminology) will provide the vital clues on how to do this.
I think I’ve got the mechanics of this down. I know about Justin Alexander’s Three Clue Rule, and so on. What I’m struggling with is how to elicit the athmosphere I want. If you’ve seen the movie The Ninth Gate, read the DaVinci Code, or seen the Netflix show Archive 81, I think you know what I’m talking about; that sense of “What the f— is going on here? I just have to know how this all connects together and get to the bottom of this!” The TV show Lost is probably another good example, but I haven’t seen it myself.
Things that I think will help:
- Thematic music. Every time the topic of the Tarot deck comes up, some mysterious-sounding specific song should be played. This trick is used in Wagner’s The Ring opera, as well as in the Lord of the Rings movies (for example, the ring has its own theme which is played when the ring is mentioned).
- Frequently giving the PCs new little bits of information which seem to lead them to the conclusions they’re hopefully craving.
- I think personal stakes will probably help to keep the players engaged, which in turn will perhaps contribute to the “I just have to know more” feeling I want to elicit.
One trick I can’t really use is what the DaVinci code did - it used a story that in some ways sounded so plausible that the reader could think “Wait, could what’s proposed in this book actually be true?” That worked in that story, because it took place in the real world and was about Christianity which many in the western world take very seriously. I can’t really do the same with my homebrew world which has very little in common with the real world.
So - does anyone have any ideas or suggestions on how to accomplish this? Again, it’s the atmosphere of mystery that I’m primarily concerned with here, although mechanical discussion would be welcomed too.
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Read Call of Cthulhu 7e (And generally Lovecraftian horror) ! The part about how to run the game explain a lot on how to structure the scenario, how to create a sense of horror !
My advice :
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Start from the end => how do you get to the end of the mistery ? Have a set of clues, handout you cam give to your player when they are investigating that allows them to reconstruct the full picture !
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Hurt the characters personally => the cult of your RPG should try to scare away the character by hurting their loved one, they should be made dangerous to the player by directly hurting them! Show how unpredictable and dangerous this situation is :)
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Lock down access to information => they need to learn about witchcraft ? They’ll have to steal books, travel around dungeons and be the first to get the resources they need to counter the plan of the cult.
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EDIT: Show the effects of the action of the cult on the world around the characters => unspeakable experimentations on the people of the city, and murders, property trespassed etc… This could be a hook!
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(EDIT: About the hook) The party could be asked to help… I don’t know… The Magic Academy (lol) to recover a dangerous tome of forbidden knowledge and this could be what lead them down the rabbit hole!
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EDIT: TL;DR This should feel like a rabbit hole while you know exactly where they’re going because you have lists of events, clues, riddles that allow them to get the big picture! Good luck with your project !
Use music made for Call of Ctulhu for ambiance !
- You don’t need to understand to fix/survive/save. You heard there’s a way to … , but you would have to … . And it makes no sense but that’s how you can influence it.
This is excellent advice, thank you very much. Luckily, I have Call of Cthulhu behind me in my bookshelf which I haven’t even read (6e though, but I’m sure it too contains good advice).
Oh wow I wasn’t old enough to witness the release the 6ed but I need to check it out to see the evolution of the rules
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I would say that most of the wisdom in Trajectory of Fear (https://nerdsonearth.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Trajectory-of-Fear.pdf) would work here as well even though it’s about Horror.
If you think about the steps presented there as of Unease, Suspicion, Anticipation and Revelation then the advice should work really well.
“I can’t really do the same with my homebrew world which has very little in common with the real world.” I don’t think that is necessarily true but it requires the players to have a proper understanding of what is normal and expected.
Thank you, I’ll check out that PDF!
Dry ice certainly makes the atmosphere look mysterious.
Take your time, do not show anything supernatural or gore ab initio. Start with a very mundane plot, the first victim is a lawyer who has tie with the mafia, and an affair. So at first something banal and ordinary. Then add minor uncanny elements, that and drift very slowly to the supernatural mystery.
If everyone believes ab initio that there is supernatural and monsters, you’re not anymore in the fantastic/horror genre
Good points, thank you!
