I love horror elements in non-horror games. Things that unnerve or even scare the players without necessarily being unbeatable monsters or even particularly dangerous, just unsettling.
Some examples I've thought of or stolen from media:
> Someone's writing a message on the foggy window. You're on the second floor.
> Writing is spiraling outward from the center of the paper as if an unseen writer is furiously working away at it. The sentences are nonsensical, but your name appears among them.
> Everyone in town owns the same antique clock. Not just the same model either, it's the exact same clock, little scratches and even dust coating included.
> Your knock at the door is mirrored perfectly from the other side.
> Every single person in town says "Hello Felix" while moving to avoid a seemingly empty space as if someone was standing there.
This one probably requires a little context and probably relies more on delivery than anything. > The PCs discover a book, it's some kind of play > Upon reading it, the DM simply says "And that's where it ends" > Through some clarification and confused questions from the players, establish that literally everything in the entire session leading up to this point, including picking up and reading from the book, was simply the PCs reading the book.
The closest thing I had was in a maptools game where we used RPG style sprites, one of the healers was eaten by ravens, and had an accompanying sprite.
Lincoln Williams
> The home or hideout of a bad guy looks completely aboned and empty. Upon reaching the last room they find only a small figurine/animal that shares some physical/thematic resemblance with them. Upon leaving, nobody in the setting but the party has any knowledge the character even existed.
This works best if the villain wasn't that bad. Their fate evoking more pity than any sense of justice.
Adam Turner
Thing's I've personally done in games that have successfully spooked out my parties: >Slur the letter "s" every time it comes up in a certain NPC's speech bonus points if the reason for doing this isn't snake-related >Have players enter a town where races of all kinds (ranging from gnomes to ogres) are living in peaceful harmony and have NPCs the players have met before show up and believe they have always lived there >A figure in blue robes is often seen watching the party from a mile away. It always disappears before the party can get close to it and there's never any sign of magic being used
Kayden Hall
...
Logan Powell
>Personal, intimate items of the party go missing at night, trinkets, weapons with sentimental value, maybe a lock of hair, are discovered missing in the morning. >Appear under a tree when the party wakes up the next morning with a flower, lolly, or small vial of perfume next to it.
Brody Campbell
>Not letting the players deal with the villains themselves. >Removing villain through DM fiat. >Removing villain off screen.
Wrong. Stop.
Xavier Butler
I'm guessing by "villain" he means a simple bandit or something. Still i do disagree with it.
Juan Garcia
Heres one I used recently >Player picks an amulet up from a pedestal in an empty otherwise room >A few seconds later he finds himself in a dark hallway >As he begins walking down it the door behind him opens up and they hear footsteps coming towards them, and get faster if the player tries to run >Other party members see him staring blankly at the amulet, and if they move it his head/eyes follow it >Person in the hallway walks to the end, finding a locked door >Shortly after this they snap back to reality and the gem in the amulet cracks
Curse/something being freed from amulet after this point is optional.
Noah Torres
Another one I remembered: >Party traveling through area where time "slips". >Group settles down and starts a camp when it gets dark. >Rogue notices someone sitting by the dying fireplace. >Realizes it's a shade and attacks. >Shade flees >Night immediately turns to sunset. >thousands of footprints surrounding camp.
John Sanders
>The forest is full of chirping and other animal noises, every animal the PCs find has been dead for several days. >Every time you turn around you notice it takes people about a half second to start moving. >Shadows point towards the sun
Jaxson Green
>Children's laughter where there are no children >Dreams of dead loved ones chastising the party for their good deeds, as if they've done something wrong >Seeing your reflection blink
Joshua Gutierrez
>"and thats where it ends" This is both kind of cool and a dick move.
Matthew Perry
> Through some clarification and confused questions from the players, establish that literally everything in the entire session leading up to this point, including picking up and reading from the book, was simply the PCs reading the book.
"A magic reset button!" - typical Murderhobo's reaction
Christopher Long
>"And that's where it ends" I can't tell, do you end the campaign there? Do you just continue like nothing happened? Did the book predict all the PCs die?
Brayden Ross
...
Noah Ortiz
Fucking dolls
James Gonzalez
I'm working on a custom near-future horror-ish fantasy setting and the most unnerving non-threatening thing is probably the servitors. People will occasionally donate their body to be reused essentially as a drone, animated and preserved by a bound spirit.
They stand on street corners and wander along predetermined routes constantly observing what's going on, reporting back to their overseer (usually local law enforcement, but they are also employed by federal agencies, particularly the Department of Paranatural Affairs) via a radio implanted in the servitors head. They sort of lurch about, moving as if being puppeteered by someone who hasn't quite gotten the hang of it yet.
They're too clumsy to use weapons and aren't really physically adept, but in large enough numbers they can immobilize people in a wave of bodies.
Ghosts that don't fight, but sort of moan, cry or knock are always good for setting a tone
Gavin Cooper
See this is why people use the term BBEG instead of villain. I'm 99% sure he meant a minor villain or a major one among many. You wouldn't have an empty home or lair before a BBEG, but you could up to a member of a larger plot.
Besides he clearly said it would work better if the villain wasn't that bad. A BBEG isn't usually a mild annoyance or a small difference in philosophy.
Alexander Mitchell
This would be really neat but pretty hard to pull of in descriptions. I'd have something force them into a cabin and pull the old "The paintings are windows" routine but with night/shades instead.
Hudson Miller
>The restraunt only serves really finely diced or tenderized fish >It's harder to notice the meat still squirming that way
Nathan Harris
>NPCs forget who you are or that you were there the moment you're out of their vision. >You ask for a cup of coffee at a diner, the waiter turns away, fills a cup, then turns back and greets you like you just entered again. He drinks the coffee like it was for him and asks if you'd like a drink to start off. Repeat.
Andrew Taylor
Had a reality-warping BBEG who realized he was a character in a roleplaying game and was trying to break out by becoming me, the GM. Every time he hit someone, the character would hallucinate that they were the player controlling their own actions, up to and including the BBEG referring to them by player name. I would literally describe anything they did in response, up to and including repeating their own words back at them.
It got to the point in one runthrough that a guy had a near mental breakdown over it. I still feel kinda bad and kinda proud of that one.
Other things tend to be descriptions targeted at specific players. One of my players is extremely imaginative/empathetic re: sensory descriptions. Naturally I took the opportunity to describe in horrible detail a vision her character had of a knife going into her ancestor's throat. Another time I killed her appetite by commenting that a magical vision looked like shit tastes and sounded like the feeling of a fingertip caressing the inside of a dead man's rib cage.
Gabriel Fisher
A cat with very distinct eyes follow the players around. It's never seen sleeping, and players often times wake to it staring at their face. If they kill it, another animal with the same eyes pop up and does the same thing. Sometimes, it's a person. Always watching.
One day, one of the players makes a nat 1 perception check, or the equivalent thereof. They see a the skull of a cow in the shadows. Later that night, when they close their eyes to sleep, they see that skull in their mind. Everywhere they go now, they see that skull, and it always gets closer. Somedays, they find dead bodies with the mask.
The players are sleeping in a cabin in the woods only to be awoken by loud knocking. Looking out, they see an inhuman silhouette. At the door is a large, bushy man with a wide grin with too many teeth. His hands are disproportionately large and have long nails. He demands shelter, and leaves cursed gifts for the party.
Ryan Cooper
I had various trinkets and items show up wherever the PC's where resting. Small stuff that didn't seem to belong to anybody. Necklace, bracelet, holy symbol, wine bottle etc. Then the PC's arrived at a town with a serial killer and those were all items from the victims.
The killer was among the NPC's that travelled with them, but there was a red herring that it was some sort of supernatural ghost thing so it worked out quite well.
Bentley Price
What if it's a minor villain, created for the sole purpose of setting up this freaky little moment?
>When in a big city, the party will occasionally catch glimpses of pale children staring forlornly at them from beneath the sewer grates
>The party stays the night at a raucous, lively inn, before waking up the next morning to find the entire place dusty, shuttered and empty.
>When trekking through the wilderness at dusk, the party comes upon a campsite that looks as if they'd set it up with their own gear.
Bentley Cruz
Dude, my names felix, and thats real fuggin creepy
Joseph Edwards
The party cones across a sleepy little hamlet where everyone seems off. Have the party make a perception check, the ones that pass notice that tge people in their peripheral vision don't move and start again if they shift focus to them. Have one in particular chosen by arbitrary means make another one, regardless of the results they take a look behind them and all the townsfolk are staring directly at them. Have the same character wake up in the middle of the night if they sleep in the inn and notice light coming in through the window, if they investigate describe dozens of people standing outside just staring.
Alexander Sanders
I'd love to pull the old 'Fable 2 Winter Lodge" trick
Its a reference to something, cant remember what though.
Xavier Butler
This isn't a bad a idea actually. The house is actually an illusion and the PCs have entered a spider's lair. The more stuff they check, the more other things turn into spiders. If they understand what's going on quick enough, then they can escape. If they keep inspecting, the whole house crumbles into the pit of the spider queen.
Eli Turner
>Party is travelling through a fey forest >Describe the animals as they walk through the forest, the squirrel climbing up the tree, the birds flitting along the branches, the deer that looks up at them then resumes grazing, etc >The animals keep repeating these actions >Over, and over, and over, and over >Party starts to feel something is wrong as that squirrel ends up climbing a tree with the same acorn in its mouth >Rogue goes after the squirrel, he tries to catch it but instead drops it >It shatters on a tree root, having been made of porcelain all this time >After this revelation, party slowly realizes that all of the animals were porcelain statues all along, and all of them were pointed looking directly at the party
I managed to make several people uncomfortable with that. The best part is, it was wholly unexpected because my games are usually extremely lighthearted.
Owen Smith
Fuck, I was playing alone at night when I got there. I immediately put the controller down and went to bed.
John Richardson
Exact same thing happened to me. Say what you will about Fable, as a series, and as something that doesnt live up the the promises of its creatior, but damn if it didnt master some parts. The mood in both 1 and 2 were absolutely fantastic.
Sebastian Morales
It's not really, it's just that entities name from my current campaign. If something else has done this though I'd love to see it for inspiration.
Maybe you're in a non-horror game right now, and your DM is interjecting horror elements as we speak, Felix.
Joshua Sullivan
I ran a horror session for my players once. I knew it'd be difficult and had to really bring my players in for them to suspend disbelief. >session session starts as normal, PCs roll into next town. >they witness funeral procession for very young girl, died of illness. >clergyman offers them a room at church >during the night, storm begins At this point, I dimmed the lights and played a loud rainfall loop >PCs hear noise in graveyard adjacent to church On a speaker hidden in the room, I played very faintly the sound of a girl crying (used the witch's sobbing from L4D)
more like this throughout the session, and just when they were getting spooked, my drunken roommate loudly interrupted my game and ruined the moment. At that point, it was too late to recapture the magic. Everyone was disappointed, but they said afterwards they appreciated what I was going for.
Josiah Roberts
Have an old man offer to pay the party to get rid of some stray dogs that have been tormenting him. If the party takes care of them have the old man refuse to pay them because "They are still there, can't you hear them?" When the players listen they can hear the sound of hounds barking as if from far away. Keep telling them this as they go about their business in the town but describe the sound getting a little closer each time. Eventually in the dead of night as they are at camp, or in an inn describe a cacophony of hounds all around them as if just out of sight, but if they go outside or take a torch to the edge of camp there is nothing there. The barking becomes more and more aggressive with growling and howling, but they are never attacked. Then it just stops.
Thomas Miller
Used this to great effect during a horror game, but I suppose it could be used in any SF game
>Be DM >Inna spaceship >I describe the room, typycal spaceship pilote room with helms, portholes, consoles, instruments... >While I do this, I knock on my room's window, three times >"Why did you do this user?" >"I didn't do it. That's what you hear." >Livid stares
I did this several times during the game, taking them by surprise. One of the players has been scared of windows a whole week after that.
Jose Perez
>When in a big city, the party will occasionally catch glimpses of pale children staring forlornly at them from beneath the sewer grates
Did this in a game once. "Mom says I'm not supposed to talk to topsiders."
Zachary Collins
>PC is alone at home when they hear a loud clonk from another room. They cannot find the source of the noise. >a month later they come home just in time to see a trap door in that room's wall being shut.
Wyatt Brown
>Running Ravenloft >Players are inna church trying to deal with the priest's vampire spawn son >He's good at hiding/stealthing, ranger gets fed up with it and casts "detect good/evil" >"Okay, enough of this, where is he" >I say "Right behind you" and play a jump scare violin shriek from my laptop
So many bricks were shat. And technically it's a gothic setting, not horror, but I like slipping in that uneasy feeling whenever possible.
>Roll a random encounter in the woods >It's an empty grave >Players were chill but now start getting freaked out asking why it's there, who dug it, etc.
Mystery is best spooking tactic
Colton Myers
Got a pdf of that random encounter table?
Thomas Jenkins
>"And that's where it ends" There's a short story called The Tome of Tourmaline that has this premise. I think it's available online for free somewhere.
Ryder Perry
This isn't just an idea, it's something I did.
It wasn't hard at all. It came naturally to me. Like, other curious things.
Brayden Roberts
To be honest I haven't ACTUALLY done it, so much as am planning to. Maybe it would be better and cooler to simply end the session there, but it wasn't really gonna be anything super dramatic... just a weird thing for them to find and fuck with their heads
Tempted to name the book "The King in Yellow" but afraid one of the players may think I'm trying to make a direct reference and start explaining to me how these things are completely unrelated, when all I want to do is make a small omage to a sort of spooky book/play within a book.
Zachary Flores
Now that I think of it, I did something similar in a campaign, but it was more closely tied to the plot.
Essentially some rando asks the players to find a book for him, and not to read it when they find it. Obviously they agree, and mark it down as a side-quest thing. Eventually this rando keeps appearing and asking how the book finding is going. Appearing in places he really shouldn't have been able to get to (monsters, traps, time, etc).
Long story short, they find the book and of course they read it. It for the most part recounted the story of the campaign so far without naming names, and made a few references to a player character who died. None of the players had died at that point.
Luis Clark
DnDtard.
Brayden King
...
Levi Carter
>any time somebody gets up in the night innkeeper is always still awake practicing expressions and conversations in a mirror
Luke Bell
Weird cult-like messages on the TV and radio.
Camden Jenkins
more like
Ryder Smith
In the same way of thinking.
>players enter the villains lair >there are corpses of the villain everywhere >there's a locked room ahead >the villain is screaming gibberish at the top of his lungs on the other side of the door >the players manage to get through the locked door and enter the room >the corpses of the villain are stacked even higher in this room, piles of villain corpses stacked five bodies high >the villain readies a weapon and says in a hoarse voice "this time, this time i'm gonna live..."
Of course, the villain dies, and so the players will never learn just why the fuck the entire building is filled with the corpses of the villain.
Austin Howard
>Children's laughter where there are no children whoa what an original and unique concept! did you come up with that one yourself? you're like the next stephen king!
Owen Cook
It's almost like we AREN'T professional writers or something
Julian Bennett
The closest I ever got to having any horror (wasn't really scary) was having the players find a black cube buried in the sand on a beach, guarded by some monster who had been there for thousands of years. Every once in a while I'd drop hints that it wasn't just inert and had some powerful magic juju, or I'd have other sinister objects that seemed to be the same material. If they asked powerful beings about it they wouldn't get an answer. In the end, they never figured out what it did (and I didn't either).
Austin Kelly
neither am i but cmon, that's like the oldest horror cliche there is
Brayden Kelly
Blow-up dolls are scary, but for the wrong reason.
Samuel Sanders
Can you guys help me kinda "troll" my players? I want to scare them but it's actually all completely harmless stuff. For instance >Mimics of the party are seen at the dark end of the hallway, and copies every movement but flipped the other way. At the end of the hallway, you realize it was just a mirror
Kayden Martin
They start receiving creepy letters.
Turns out it's actually some cryptic game of two pen-pals and the postman is a dumb lazy cunt putting the post in the wrong box.
Gabriel Gray
Yo I got you famalam.
"Shadowy figures suddenly appear below you, mimicking your actions! What do you do?" See what they do, then just go "It's your shadows, you retards." Alternatively, you could have some creepy guy offer them free stuff then after he leaves tell them he was actually just a nice guy.
Aiden Walker
All the birds outside are singing the exact same song. Not in unison, but it's the exact same song.
Mason Jones
Its a magic 8cube, clearly
Cameron Cox
What is the point of things like this? My players would be pulled OUT of the feeling of the game if there was an unanswered question like that.
Sebastian Richardson
Tell us What your setting is like so we can give more on point ideas.
The party finds an old knife with a tarnished steel blade and worn staghorn handle. The tarnish won't come off but it otherwise seems normal, holding a fine edge despite it's apparent age. If picked up it feels good in the hand and cuts well as any quality knife. The weird comes in if it's left behind or misplaced. weeks later and miles away, there's a staghorn knife just sitting there. The tarnish is the same, the grooves of the antler are identical. Is it the same knife or are they just being paranoid? If taken nothing untoward happens. If left behind they encounter it again in another time and place, again and again.
Camden Hernandez
The party crash landed on an island and is basically running around stopping multiple people trying to bring the end of the island around in their own ways, and I wanna give it a very sinister undertone if they dig deep enough. So far the BBEG are gonna be a giant viking, a young sorceress, some long dead king raised to life and some alien shit underground. The viking has a small camp area with an arena, the undead king has a small kingdom and the sorceress a large manor if that help.s
Hunter Johnson
This
Dear anons, Lovecraft horror/suspense does NOT work in RPGs. There's a reason everyone only cares about the monsters.
Lovecraft suspense amounts to >things happen >things are weird and unexplainable >Oh man, things are really weird and scary >it ends >no explanation. The end.
Which is fine since that's the end of the story. Unless your campaign ends right there, it's going to leave players confused and bothered.
Parker Hall
To be fair, I intended these to be more like prompts. I think if you're going to use scary shit in your non-horror based campaign, you definitely need to explain it, just not necessarily right away. Let the explainable set the mood, but don;t nescesarily let it end there.
Daniel Morales
>Abloo bloo 2spoopy4me What a faggot
Benjamin Evans
The point is to remind the players that there are forces and mysteries in the world beyond their ability to know or comprehend. I once had my players end up in a village overnight where some seriously freaky shit happened, and I never once explained anything that was going on, because there was no way for their characters to know. They survived and continued on, but every single one of my players remembers that game session. What horror requires is for the GM to be a capable storyteller, know how to effect pacing, and players who are ready to play ball when it comes to mysterious circumstances and roleplay their characters rather than numbers.
Christian Ross
It does, i was about to suggest they get weird phone calls that turn out to just be a wrong number and a speech impediment. But that doesn't fit your theme it sounds like.
Instead how about in the manor they find blood mixed with fine burbon in some of the decanters. Red herring them to think there are vamps about but really it was a gift she didn't care for but couldn't get rid of without insulting the giver. She may be evil but that doesn't mean she can't have manners.
Near the vikings place crows follow them, watching with interest. As they draw closer to a patrol or the camp more crows show up. They aren't spys they just know people who wander to close to his camp die and they're just savvy scavengers. Crows are scary smart so figuring this out is well within their normal abilities.
Undead heralds of the king walk the lands bearing his tattered standard on a pole with a bell atop. Every few steps the standard bearer plants the pole snd makes the bell chime ominously. Priests in tattered garb walk in front with censors walk before and aft with cowls drawn. They do a slow deep gregorian style chant in a "holy" language used by priests from the kings time. If deciphered the chant is something to the effect of "he is risen. All shall kneel. He is risen. All shall bow. He is risen. All shall fall. All shall fall and rise again. All will hail the risen lord. Always and forever. He is risen, never to fall again"
The alien shit... not sure really. Perhaps they start seeing creatures from the deep and dark braving the light. Just random underdark shit, beasts or non-sentients for best effect that never, Never come to the surface. What could be driving these things into the light?
Henry Johnson
See for starters. "The keenest emotion is fear, most of all fear of the unknown." Show, don't tell. Give them the unexplained with no way to directly slash and burn their fears away, until they overcome their ignorance. Monsters can be slain but misdirection and uncertainty will leave them twitchy. Ambiance, music, lighting. All these things can help get the players in the right mood. In the right light even little things can cast big shadows.
Nolan Barnes
Closest thing I've come across was a Ravnica campaign I played in. We cleared out a Rakdos hideout and found a secret door with a bunch of Chromatic Lanterns surrounding a pool of water in which "our reflections were smiling". Tossing something into said returned two identical items. GM misunderstood me when I said "let's try this out" and ask if I really intend to have my character jump in. I regret not doing so, the Azorius were close behind us and disenchanted the pool.
Jason Evans
Fey always are a good scource for this. >walking down a road, some odd noise spooks the party, stop to look arround, the path they just walked up is just trees >fey refer to day and night as people, next session do so when narrating as GM. >Animal calls randomly mix in human words "hoot, hoot, RUN, hoot"
Brayden Campbell
Well, it isn't just you, either. There are several things in this thread that have the formula of "a creepy thing happens. you dont know why. the creepy thing is now gone."
Thomas Morales
>you definitely need to explain it Why? Unless the players are already major powers, why do they need to be spoonfed things they may never know? I feel it makes the world bigger, more layered, that things are going on that need not be about the players. The hopes, ambitions, rise and falls of others.
William Brooks
>and players who are ready to play ball
I think is actually the key, the most important part of any horror game or game with horror elements. The players have to want to be scared, they have to play along. I think it's perfectly fine for a GM to throw horror stuff at the player's in right context and it may work or it may fall flat (which can inform your decision to keep doing it or not), but if you really want anyone to feel fear, everyone in the room has to be working together to make that happen.
Kevin Jenkins
Not really spooky but a rather alarming thing. >players are Homebrew Cavalier, Warforged ranger, Half-Elf paladin Ranger and a Kitsune Magus Samurai thing. >Magus meets a little girl >little girl is a sorceress descended from the greatest Mage literally ever. >capable of almost anything >Paladin tells her to fuck off and do her own thing >Kitsune was attached to little girl >he does not go after her >despite going after her before
They all know that she can do literally anything. But fuck that shit, clearly starting a revolution is more important.
Landon Nguyen
Actually, I'm a professional writer myself.
> A hoarse voice whispers a certain PC's name over and over again, getting louder and louder each repetition, but no one else is able to hear anything. Finally, when the hoarse whisper is about to drive them mad, it goes silent.
Joshua Ortiz
It was more of a joke, but it ended up being spooky for one of my players when they met an old man with this donkey. The party jokingly asked what the donkey's alignment was, I jokingly said evil, laughs etc. Then the Paladin did an in-character Evil check.
>"Nope, nothing." >"See guys, the donkey's not evil." >"No, I mean you can't detect anything. It's like the donkey isn't even there." >proceed to tell the paladin the donkey stopped chewing its food and is now staring at him "as if into your soul" >everyone else laughs >paladin is just like "...oh shit", in-character terrified out-of-character speculating the donkey is the BBEG
Jaxon Bell
There are people I know that I would NEVER invite to a horror campaign. It's like inviting your mom to a regular campaign; it just doesn't work and it ruins the experience for everyone.
inb4 >but my mom is cool and plays dnd
Evan Evans
>DM inserts supur speshul little magical wizard marry sue self insert girl. >Players see right trough him, and proceed to do the things they want, not dealing with his shit. >Somehow alarming At least your players aren't complete faggots, unlike you.
Hudson Collins
Stolen.
Charles Parker
Bait-and-switches can do a lot.
>DMing for High School group >Party chasing down artifact from a dead civilization in a desert >Find it, have to deliver it to town >When the party breaks for dinner mid-travel, I stay behind an extra few minutes >Erase the amulet from the bearer's character sheet >Write it in on That Guy's inventory >He's playing a rogue, everyone suspects him of trying to screw the party over >(Because he has tried to screw the party over a few times) >Party comes back, I have a private talk with That Guy about unrelated shit, future plans, "clerical errors I've made" >Send him in, have private talk with the bearer >He wakes up to see That Guy standing over him, amulet in hand, ready to kill him in his sleep >Sees That Guy runs off as soon as he wakes up >This, of course, didn't actually happen >Bearer goes inside, checks his inventory, of course amulet isn't on it >Bring him back to the full party, chaos ensues >Everyone's arguing, accusing That Guy and the bearer >That Guy only has his word, since amulet is literally on his person >That Guy knows he's being framed, but keeps arguing his innocence in-game >As the party is arguing, softly play the sound of children giggling through my speakers >Only guy not arguing, Mr. Neutral hears it and raises an eyebrow >"Yeah, real funny, user." >I smile at Mr. Neutral >"...wait, you mean we actually hear that?" >"Well, they don't seem to have, but you did." >"...GUYS?!"
Ghosts of some child soldiers of a dead race. Had a lot of fun with them. Wigged the party right the fuck out.
Jeremiah Wright
I should also mention that I clarified everything after the session was over, just in case they didn't realize through figuring out they were being haunted that That Guy had really been framed.
There were no hard feelings, and they all seemed to like it. Even That Guy admitted it was well executed.
Jason Collins
If you want to see it that way, go ahead.
Ryan Wright
bump
Thomas Lee
The best way to evoke a form of dread is to hide the monster from them. Stuff like just seeing a monstrous tail slinking into the bushes or finding the corpses of its previous meals.
All of that stuff can make the encounter with the monster pretty spooky. Keep in mind that method loses tension when the monster becomes a beatable threat.
To counter that, add a little twist that sends a small shiver down their spine.
>Party enters town, people are scared. They say small children come in the night and attack, cart off victims and leave them screaming in the forest.
>Party decides to find them. Wait till night to find the things. Maybe they are harassed by the monster-things, don't show them in the light yet. Soon they hear screaming coming from the woods.
>Chase source of screaming. They're lead to a clearing in the forest, dimly lit. They can see bodies hanging from nooses swinging from the trees. Don't forget the details! Details about the bodies are really important.
>They're not real bodies. There's no real screaming (or maybe there is). They're evil scarecrows that kill people and turn them into scarecrows. Bodies drop from nooses and attack.
>This here kills the tension you've been building. The monster becomes beatable. The PCs take solace in the fact that killing scarecrows become real. Scarecrows defeated, party returns to town victorious.
>As they're leaving town, down the only path available, a single noose, empty, swings in the breeze from a tree. The forest is silent.
Bentley Evans
Not small kids, sorry. Decided to change the story halfway through. :/
Adam Nelson
>Party is traveling through the wilderness, camping for the night >Light can be seen further down the valley near the river, two days travel from their location >Next night, light can again be seen >When they reach the spot where the light should approximately be, only a almost featureless, monolithic idol, eroded by the weather, can be found. >If they camp not too far from the idol, no light can be seen. >If they stray further, the light reappears Chances are that they want to investigate it. Never have them discovering the origin of the light If you want you can have them hear ominous sounds, close to infrasound, or have them have trouble sleeping when close to the idol
James Gutierrez
>infrasound Now that I think of it, if you have the equipement, you could use infrasound (
Dylan Torres
This reminds me of a situation I had a few months ago.
>Party is comprised of a Fighter, Rogue, Paladin, and Barbarian. >Sent to retrieve macguffin from a mountain palace a few miles away. >Along the way, they meet a mage who says that he wants to help. >Party blows him off. >When they meet him in town, they blow him off. >When they meet him on the outskirts of the mountains, they blow him off. >They reach the mountain fortress but they have to make climb rolls to reach the top. >Nobody brought rope and nobody invested in climb because "fucking DM, who uses climb?" >Keep in mind, I said "mountain fortress" long before campaign was a thing. >They decide to roll a climb check and inevitably most of them fall to their deaths. >Fighter is the only one to reach the top, where he finds the mage who they blew off earlier >"How the fuck did he beat me to the top?" >"He prepared Fly today." >Everyone goes nuclear and bails Joke's on them, I didn't like 'em anyways
Nathan Long
If they ever go looking for the old man they learn he died suddenly and no one will talk about it
Thomas Campbell
This is pretty great user. Thanks for linkin
Aiden Wright
That just sounds fucking evil, user.
Kayden Wilson
That is a bad DMPC/DM Pet situation, and I would have pulled the DM aside out of game and told him to knock it off. Your situation is in no way comparable, unless your mage was some super powered little cat girl that screams "Avoid the GM's magical realm".
Bentley White
I have all of these on my Warlock's Demiplane. It's a labyrinth, dimly lit and enclosed above, made of stone bricks populated entirely by unmoving porcelain dolls and anyone my warlock has deemed a big enough threat to the world to be permanently moved there. It also contains the children's laughter with no visible source just around every corner you turn, never quite reaching it. I really love it when I get to add flavour to my spells like this.
Michael Torres
fucken skinwalkers. fuck off.
William Butler
I have often been told that 17 Hz is the Creepy Frequency. Do I need anything besides a stereo system in order to play it?
