Bloodborne Campaign Ideas

I guess your peanut brain overheated from writing two entire sentences and now you're just pasting your scribblings ad infinitum.

In the setting playing as ordinary citizens trying to survive barricaded indoors on the night of the hunt could be good. I'd probably use 10 candles for it

I'd recommend making up your own city/setting in the Bloodborne universe without making it Yarhnam itself. That way you can make up your own lore for that particular location to be hidden about the monster filled streets, and keep your players on the prowl for subtle clues and such to figure out what this location's roll in everything might be.

OP here.

>The games revolve around the feelings of loneliness and isolation.

I know I can't run a conventional campaign that emulates the entire gameplay of Bloodborne since it's about playing a solitary murderhobo. But I still like the setting and feel of it so I want to recreate as much as I can.

This is purely about a campaign/setting and not about making a recreation of the Bloodborne mechanics in tabletop.

Ehh, lorewise there's very little leeway.. Most obvious option was blood ministration, whether to cure the plague and not turn into a beast, or to just enter the dream and try to become a hunter for the sake of hunting.

Outside of that...i guess eldritch experiments? Failed cult ritual opened a gate, you all get sucked in? Shared dream?

Or the dream bubble containing Yharnam gets torn open and the beasts run off into the waking world. That could work too.

>newest game gets called the worst

Truly a surprise

There are people who honestly think DS2 is better than DS1. Some people are just truly incomprehensible.

There are also people that obsess over which game is the best instead of fucking playing them

I see you're still in this thread that you don't like, getting annoyed about things.

Really, you should just close this thread without replying to me.

I don't think this is entirely true, you just need to be more specific about what you're aiming for.

Can you capture the entire soulsborne experience in a tabletop? Of course not, because one of the things the series does best is make excellent use of its medium.

However, its perfectly possible to imagine an RPG using certain elements of it, even if just the setting.

Before Yharnham completely fell, for example, I can see a game about a group of Church Hunters slaying beasts while struggling against becoming them being a compelling concept, or just taking the abstract ideas Bloodborne involves and using them as the backdrop of a dark fantasy RPG.

But OPs question is a bit too general to be useful, they need to narrow down the specific elements they'd want to capture.

DS3 has the best gameplay in the series. I think DS1 is still a better game, but have you tried going back to DS1/2? It's hard after how smooth and responsive everything is in DS3.

Monsters are roaming the streets at night, slaughtering all in their path. And you are bloody sick of the noise so you put on your coat, pick up your trusty sword-cane and give them what for.

>Ebritas
>source of the old blood
At least get the lore right ffs

Bloodborne obsessive here.

The game gives little in the way for expansion in anyway, it's very much a standalone story with a set progression of events. There's nothing you can change that won't mess up something else, but I've got a few small ideas for maybe one shots?

It's clear to us that between the founding of the Healing Church and when the Good Hunter wakes up in Yharnam, there's been a considerable span of years, the best guess is a few hundred, since the Church Pick weapon refers to the weapon being mentioned in 'old beast hunting tales'. This shit has passed into the folklore of the people, it has been a long time and is normalized in people's daily lives. Taking this into consideration, there's no end to the personal adventures of beast hunts over the years you could tell, ones where only a few people turned in the city, maybe a lot of people went bad at once, maybe hunting down a rogue vicar turning into a Cleric Beast, before they escape into the streets and cause havoc. Characters could be veteran Church Hunters or conscripts called to hunt. All localized in the labyrinthine streets of Central Yharnam and the Cathedral Ward.

Another could be Church Hunters trying to survive the Blood Moon. The streets are crawling with beasts and other monsters and you're on a ticking clock until you pop. I don't know what the story would be, though.

Byrgenwerth adventures in the Pthumerian Labyrinths, you could be one of the first hunters scoping out the tunnels as bodyguards to Byrgenwrrth scholars. You could even play later Church Tomb Prospectors, too. Looking for blood samples, things to examine, study, experiment with, you could see all kinds of stuff down there.

You could try and play the fall of Old Yharnam, when the Blood Moon came down the first time and the city was left to burn and rot. Hunters or even civilians trying to escape and fight for survival and the place runs red with blood and people are turning to beasts all around you.

>he does not engage in jolly co-operation

>Bloodborne setting
I'd not use the actual setting, change some things so your players can't just look up the lore and secrets...

I don't want to reiterate what is already all over the internet, but: DS3 suffers badly from its confusion whether or not it wants to be Dark Souls or Bloodborne. And the multiplayer is just terrible, not even the fanboys defend it.
>have you tried going back to DS1/2?
I still put DS on from time to time, it doesn't age. Actually, it's DS3 which is hard to go back to.

>There are people who honestly think DS2 is better than DS1
These are the people playing for PvP.

Since this has basically become a Dark Souls/Bloodborne thread: I'm currently going through Dark Souls 2. Are the DLC areas supposed to be such a spike in difficulty? What's the ideal order of doing them?

The DLC areas are hard, but if you do them when you're meant to (After you've entered Vendricks dream) they're level appropriate. I tend to go in release order, Sunken, Old Iron and Ivory.

Can you explain this a bit? Because I never actually heard it. My experience of DS3 was that it felt like a much truer successor to DS1 than DS2 did in its mechanics, but also brought forward the quality of life measures like the not annoying as fuck jump button, and weapon arts are just a delight.

They are, and they're more difficult for sorcs too since just about every single boss is resistant to magic. I had to respec just to do damage to some bosses, fucking joke.

I never beat the blue Smelter as a sorcerer. Fuck this shit. This is an insult.

>My experience of DS3 was that it felt like a much truer successor to DS1 than DS2
If you've only ever played DS1 as a dex build in balder armour and with DWGR, then perhaps. Otherwise no. Heavy builds are not viable because no poise. Magic is not viable because it's pure shit. The only way you've never read these complaints before is if you've never read anything about DS3 on the internet at all.
>weapon arts are just a delight
Weapon arts are useless.

I've played through every game primarily as a Paladin, big heavy armour, shield and a variety of one handed weapons plus miracle support. I never really noticed it being a problem in DS3? And while I haven't looked deep into it, I've been involved a few discussions where this didn't come up.

From what I understand it's not that poise doesn't exist, but that now it does something very different?

I've consider the ideas of making a Bloodborne styled campaign myself. So, what angle are you trying to work it?

More Gothic or Cosmic horror? Fighting against the Church conspiracies or the corruptions of the blood?

Personally, i'd like to play a character Similar to Simon. A Commoner hunter that became a spy for the church, and learned too much. Now the Choir wants him dead. The Vilebloods want his information by any means necessary, While an unidentified Old one whispers to him to "Keep going."

I could see a modified Don't Rest Your Head working as a super light basis for Bloodborne.

Exhaustion is your stamina and fatigue. Keep drawing upon it harder and you risk serious injury or death.

Insanity is your Beasthood or Insight. It lets you do incredible things, but the more you draw on it the more you risk losing yourself to it, of becoming the very thing you hunt.

Then again, DRYH is perfectly structured for the kind of high powered self destruction story that IMO the background of Bloodborne is ripe for.

Would you limit your players to existing trick weapons, or let them create their own?

The latter, absolutely. What's the point in playing a Bloodborne game and not coming up with your own ridiculous awesome weapons?

Old Iron is probably the hardest area in the game.

It does something so minimal it's essentially non-existent.

Also, as someone who also preferred to play paladin type characters, I don't see how you wouldn't have noticed how much weaker miracles are than they were in the previous two games.

I think the problem with players making their own Trick Weapons is 'Where do you draw the line?'. I mean, stuff like Saw Cleavers and Kirkhammer's are simple enough, but then you get to the body-infesting parasites and magical wheels.

I say go whole hog. Why the fuck not?

What kind of trick weapon would you create?

I'm not terribly creative. so I'd likely steal an idea from someplace...

...fortunately I am very good at idea theft.

The easiest route is probably taking inspiration from old gothic tales and baroque storytelling.

I wish we had mandatory tripcodes like pol, so we can just hide posts from people who don't contribute to discussion.

...

...

...

Old blood =/= healing blood. It seems to be pretty strongly implied that Ebrietas is the source of the blood that fucked everybody up and started the plague. Her location in the upper reaches of the choir/healing church suggests they obviously knew about her and it doesn't seem too much of a stretch to assume that the 'miraculous blood ministration healing' was due to transfusions of old one blood. Ebrietas being the only old one the church seems to have readily available, it makes sense that she's the source of the healing blood.

...

...

...

In the japanese translated lore, the Bloodletter Beast in the Chalice Translations is accurately translated to something like 'Source of the Blood'.

...

I'm working on a campaign right now set just prior to the burning of Old Yharnam.

The Bloodborne analysis by redgrave was really helpful in giving me a concrete jumping off point.

Bloodborne itself is kind of an ode to gothic horror, so that's where I would start if you wanted to make a custom setting

...

Also, all the Blood that's good is that way because it's got the touch of Oedon right?

I like both of these because they're relatively simple. Too many fan weapons go full magical or involve really outlandish transformations.

or lovecraftian horror. thats where I started my Bloodbrew before the project stagnated...

I know right?
trick weapons are best when simple...

...

>or lovecraftian horror. thats where I started my Bloodbrew before the project stagnated...
I mean, a good chunk of lovecrafts stuff is gothic horror, but that's just splitting hairs.

The point is: gore and monsters, with the plot twist that man was the monster all along.

You must be great at parties.

>with the plot twist that man was the monster all along.
I managed to pull a reverse on that in my setting

another important thing
bloodborne is NOT STEAMPUNK

Honestly? Pretty much the same way you'd play a Dark Souls or Castlevania campaign: you're in the fucked up world that is (X); fight, survival, struggle and see if you can make it.

But seriously, now; I think Bloodborne, from what little I know of it, is practically tailor-made for a dark fantasy setting. It can be as deep or as shallow as you want, whether you want to explore the twisting depths where "because I had to" starts to ring hollow in light of your own mutating flesh or simply hack and slash your way through the Beasts of the Old Blood.

Really, the hardest part with something like this is picking a system you wanna run it in and then converting or creating any creatures, spells, feats, etc you need to make it feel like playing the game.

On a random topic, do either of this songs fit this thread?
youtube.com/watch?v=8eSrmSsz7mQ

youtube.com/watch?v=vHZVBv6mdFU

>I managed to pull a reverse on that in my setting
I don't get it, but I'm a little slow. Wouldn't the reverse of man=monster be monster=man? I think I read a Goosebumps book like that once.

same way Lovecraft did it in At the Mountains of Madness

the monsters MADE man

in setting, a colony of ancient aliens establishes itself on the planet. the "gods" of the setting were an anarchic splinter group dedicated to fucking about. THEY made man, along with most of the monsters. game starts just after the splinter group dies of old age and just as the alien tech is reactivating and waking the rest of the aliens back up...

I would likely start off the campaign focused on the hunt and the church. I'd save the cosmic horror stuff for way later. The PCs might either be hunters or visitors, but the hunt has started. The PCs will have to fight men and beasts. Along the way, they may learn some things about the church that might be unsavory (highest ranking members have beastblood, beasthood was started by the church, the hunt is meant to kill opponents of the church and beasts alike, the church has been corrupted by an outside source, etc). Or, the church might be going through a power struggle between some factions (or might just be a cliched cult).

It has been a while since I've played BB so I would likely do a bunch of things that contradict the game's lore. Even if I was more familiar with it, I'd probably ignore most of the lore anyway because I want to run a gothic-horror themed game. I would recommend changing all proper nouns to make the connections less obvious.

I'd likely ditch the Hunter's Dream as well in favor of a different location that acts as a hub for the PCs, similar to Majula in DaS2. There could be different NPCs that assist with repairs or selling items, and don't require the PCs to go to some altered realm.

Other sources for inspiration:
>Castlevania series (vampire warlock antagonist, giant castle with a bunch of traps and horrors)
>Grandia 2 (storyline involves an individual who must collect all parts of the game's devil so she can be killed by the church. Provides a cliched "good guys are actually evil" plot,)
>Innistrad setting of MTG. (The story may not be the greatest, but throwing in more zombies, werewolves, and vampires would be something I would do).

Eh, kind of overdesigned for my tastes but what do I know. My project is for Pathfinder so it's not like I'm making good decisions.

>My project is for Pathfinder
at least you have a system.

I made all of that fluff and I had no system to play it with so it's just a setting document.

Speaking of, where does blood factor into your setting?

mine didn't have a blood related thing. there was a shared corruption component but it wasn't in blood. keyed radiation combined with the fact that lots of different animal groups are essentially Shoggoths with a hereditary habit of being a certain configuration. exposure to some energies causes changes in shape or capabilities of animals.

I only called it bloodbrew because I made it after alternating between binge reading Lovecraft and binge playing bloodbourne

bump

Who would be the best person to enlist in your party and why is it Ludwig the Holy Blade?

>Can tank the beasts
>Has a rad space sword
>Paladin as fuck
>Can pull himself back from the brink even after becoming a beast to fight and die as a warrior
>Did nothing wrong

That's better than some designs that actually are in the games.

"Good blood" is just church propaganda.

All the blood is tainted. The taint just depends on the source.

He had too much faith. Blind faith leads to beasthood.

These are a bit too fantastical.

I could see the elbow blade working though.

...

Just an idea if you're planning on GMing, but what if you did what Bloodborne did with its whole preview and marketing campaign and completely hide all of the Eldritch Space Horror behind Classic Monster Horror.

Have your players think its going to a victorian styled game about hunting werewolves and fighting monsters and have it slowly transform into a nightmarish journey through dreamscapes and battles with nightmarish warping entities.

Personally I recommend having a hidden insight stat for each player in the GM notes, so one player getting strange and off putting information due to their insight makes players worry.

also, change some things so the players get confused if they try and metagame

>bloodbourne
Ha

Personally, I'd go with the PbtA system. And my decision has nothing to do with Arianna! None at all!

>PbtA system
not familiar with that.

why that system?

Powered by the Apocalypse

it's a game engine with a ton of games based on it

pretty popular at the minute so a lot of people are making systems using it

Powered by the Apocalypse is lighter system where the GM reacts to the players actions. It's the source of the Dungeon World rpg. With that in mind, this can stray from the idea you'd want for your ideal bloodborne game.
Thing is, there is a book called Monster of the Week that is described as "An action-horror role playing game about a group of monster hunters", which I think fits pretty well.
It would probably need some tweaking of course.

Monster of the week is very much more aimed towards a Scooby-Doo or Slasher Flick kind of feel though, which I don't think quite gets bloodbornes horde of enemies guarding giant monsters.

I'm not sure what system would really work for it, since its difficult to get the speed and frantic action of bloodborne, though I can think of some general non-system-related ideas.

>Player turns have a 1 minute or 30 second timer, depending on the severity of the situation. They've got to think fast and think on their feet in combat, or they get Gascoigne'd.
>The GM keeps a hidden Insight stat for each player, and gives them possibly conflicting perception check information depending on it. This works best if done in Roll20 or something similar, where you can whisper it to them.
Players have a pretty low health total, but a nice amount of quick breaks in between tough areas.
>The GM completely hides the inevitable ELDRITCH REVEAL. They were expecting werewolves and frankensteins, they end up fighting star gods and traveling nightmares.
> Trick weapon stuff could be a bonus action during a turn, maybe with a cooldown or something. You can tack on a small extra hit to your attack via the transformation, but you can't retransform until a couple turns from now.

To translate into an RPG and keep true to the TONE ( not the mechanics ) of BB/Souls
>Lethal resource based combat
As opposed to D&D every turn you roll 1d20+mods until something dies, you would be carefully managing a dice pool to insure you don't get killed while simultaneously using that pool to kill the beast while also making sure you have enough resources to retreat if necessary.

People seriously underestimate just how important the stamina system is for the gameplay and tone in Soulsborne. I want to strange morons who think they can just copypaste the lore while keeping a generic d20 system and have an accurate soulsborne system.
It makes me want to write up a homebrew myself.

DIY: Blood can be used to conduct electricity.

Any (black) zappy enemies (Bloodletting Beast/Darkbeast Paarl tend to be black and blue and experimented upon (possibly by Iosefka).
This is contrast to the vicar beasts that are white and red, from either blood or fire.

Bloodletting and Vicar Amalia are also two characters that visibly metamorphosise during the game. All others are triggered out of sight.

If you'd make three characters I would suggest

>immortal headless hamster
>birdman becomes death
>hammerguy is a one-eyed snake

Yeah. It needs to be fast but crunchy, needs to simulate stamina well.

I've been working on a Dungeon Crawling card game that has a sort of Dice Pool that you end up spending to roll your attacks and actions, and spending dice outside of your turn for reactive actions like dodging and such, and I realized it simulates the feel of Souls combat somewhat. I might end up doing something similar as a Tabletop RPG system.

>DIY: Blood can be used to conduct electricity.
youtube.com/watch?v=UosmKd1krWU

This user has the best idea in the thread so far. A dice pool that needs to be managed for offense and defense.

The pool should be determined by a couple of the stats, I'd say the two highest combined, with the number in the tens column (stats range from

>like the not annoying as fuck jump button
Fuck people like you man. How hard is it to tap a button to jump? Instead, now you need to hold forward on the joystick while running, then press in on the same joystick that is controlling your movement... pressing backwards while aiming forwards... which fucks up the precision of your jump if the joystick slips even a little. Jumping was never an issue in DS1. Tap a button. Jump. How is that hard?

Clicking an analog stick is way, way easier than tapping a button you're already holding down to have to run. It's a vastly superior control solution.

>Take finger off
>Tap button quickly
Never had any issues with this.

Clicking while tilting forwards can actually change the direction of your jump. You are pressing the control stick that controls the direction. It is objectively shitty.

Never had that problem. Meanwhile, in DS1, no end of trouble. The button press not registering and just running off a cliff, or the sprint ending as I lift off my finger so I end up rolling off a cliff. I can't see how the new way isn't vastly more precise and manageable.

Would something like song of swords work with some changes?

Rather than not jumping when I want to ds1/bb's system has me jump when I'm trying to roll out of a run all the time.

ghost bump

>The games revolve around the feelings of loneliness and isolation

Nope. Played a 4-man session of Bloodborne a couple of months back, and it was still a good setting with company. We'd take turns on the controller whenever we died, and it was a right laugh.

Hard to say, i'd have trouble sticking to one idea
Whatever i made, it would definitely have some powder keg influence

Soulsborne, you say?