What's a solid, rules light system for a realistic survival game with supernatural elements?

Alright! In that case: Call of Cthulhu.

I absolutely adore CoC, it's my favorite system to run. My one gripe about it, especially in a context like this, is that basic stats do nothing to affect skills. I can have the lowest strength possible and still be a master at jumping and climbing.

Also, no stat for Perception really fucks with things.

That's not a huge deal. As a GM, you just give skills and attributes a sanity check. Spot Hidden is good enough for Perception, if something is easy to spot the GM gives a flat bonus to spot. All you need to remember is that base is 25% and assess difficulty accordingly (+30, +5, -15 or whatever).

>rolling to see if you see things

>Call of Cthulhu
Isn't it the game where you lose anyway no matter what you do?
Plus it has little survival stuff, so I don't think this is what OP looks for.

No, it's the game where you have to manage long-term and short-term stats (sanity and health) while solving the mystery. It's easy to lose since you're deliberately underpowered by RAW, but it's not "lose anyway" unless the GM is a doche

No, that depends entirely on the GM. Many games are actually pulp-style, which lends itself to campaign-play. Admittedly, it is in the spirit of Lovecraft to play puritan-style but most CoC games I participated in as player were rather soft on the players.

Is there a possibility of reading that weird book and not going mad?
Is the best way to just ignore all weird noises and sights and just do the detective work?

>Is the best way to just ignore all weird noises and sights and just do the detective work
In theory yes but that's like saying:
>Isn't the best way of surviving just not going adventuring at all and opening a shop or something
The game is about people investigating the mythos, why play if you don't plan on investigating the mythos

You're right, it just quite feels that you will go insane the moment you see the monster or something.
being honest, didn't read much on game's mechanics, so maybe I'm just being ignorant here.

Let me ride off OP's thread, I'm looking for a system which does eerie post-apoc well. Something based on avoiding conflicts but with rare high tech / supernatural powers elements.
No matter the complexity. It needs to be a slow reflexive game, so Apocalypse World is not an option.

>a slow reflexive game

The Quiet Year is a game about a town struggling in some kind of apocalyptic aftermath. It follows the townsfolk's lives as they try to hang on through to the end of the year, when rumor has it the mysterious "Lords of Winter" will arrive and things will .

>you will go insane the moment you see the monster or something

Even in the spookier stuff Lovecraft wrote, it tends to take a little more than that for the protagonist to totally lose it. And it also depends on the person's breeding, education, and temperament. The super-sane german soldier guy in that submarine kept himself together for a long-ass time because he was a boss, while the hillbillies in the Dunwich Horror broke more quickly.

You roll once per turn for who dies in which way.

Just make things up, because tables are rules-heavy.

Possible reasons include sepsis, starvation and inter-personal conflict, as well as "out of scope" which includes anything supernatural that a realistic person couldn't have anticipated.

>The super-sane german soldier guy in that submarine kept himself together for a long-ass time because he was a boss
I think I should get the books at last.

>I think I should get the books at last.
You don't even need a book.

Here are his fiction writings
hplovecraft.com/writings/fiction/

Here are his other writings, listed by category.
hplovecraft.com/writings/

Damn, thanks!
So he wrote short novels mainly?

Man, GURPS is probably my favorite system but regardless of how complex or simple you consider it when someone asks for 'rules-light' the subtext there is pretty clearly 'not GURPS'.

I don't know, but there are a bunch of short stories up there. I'm sure he wrote some full-length books at some point (?), but I can't be bothered to look.

GURPS

Lovecraft's main thing was short stories appearing in weekly magazines, he wrote a couple novels and some of his multi-part magazine stories were later compiled into longer books (these ones read a little weirdly as a result)

Interesting, so should I start reading novels chronologically or there is a book good for starters?

Mutant: Year Zero. You might have to tinker with it a bit to make it less Mad Max-ish, but it's all there.

>a book good for starters?

I started off reading "Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos", which is a collection of short stories, I believe all of which can be found on that site I linked before.

As far as the stories themselves, some of my favorite ones were Pickman's Model and Call of Cthulhu. Herbert West - Reanimator is wonderful. I also thought The Alchemist was great.

Reading them chronologically might be good, since that lets you more see some ideas that Lovecraft carries with him through much of his work.

Thank you, that's all I wanted to know.
Time to get spooked.

???
If a game is rules light, then the realism is player and theme determined. Realistic Rules Light is possible. It's actually easier to do than rules heavy, because inevitably in a rules heavy game, you'll run into a scenario where the rules say to do X despite X making no sense.

Its more like rolling to see whether or not a glint of the trapdoor catches your eye or not

Have you considered stealing Betrayal at house on the hill's system, adapted for role playing? It's mainly about the gradual improvement/degradation of the heroes stats through mental and physical damage, and the use of (often cursed/ with trade-offs) gear to manipulate/offset/enhance this. For example, offensive combat attacks are normally done with strength, but finding a mindbullet ring lets you do it with WILL instead. Your stats double as your hitpoints, and so you have to be careful not to get too hurt, mentally or physically.

>I have perfect visual knowledge of my surroundings at all time
>I never miss something
>I never fail to recognize camouflaged things

Take your Mary Sueflake and stick it up your cunt, spidey shitposter.

I know, I'm not a fan.

Fuck you, I'm an OSR grognard, I play 3d6-down-the-line level 1 dirtfarmers with 3 HP who go down into the murderhole and die in a bloody heap. But we don't roll to see if you notice shit, unless you're the thief, who's got a d100 sixth sense.

That's what it's called Spot Hidden.

But as far as success/failure represent a fork in the story, you should be.

>But we don't roll to see if you notice shit, unless you're the thief, who's got a d100 sixth sense.
Because every PC has to play a specific role in the party based on their class? Groan.

Someone on Veeky Forums made this.