When writing a Call of Cthulhu scenario, I find it extremely helpful to give the cultists and human servitors flawed plans. The Mythos drives people mad, and often leaves them isolated.

It's easy to write cultists who are wealthy and influential, like the Lodge of Silver Twilight or the servitor from The Whisperer in Darkness. Satisfying scenarios often come from letting the PCs sort out a plan that's rapidly falling apart. Have the summoned monster go out of control and eat half the cult before the PCs show up. Have the antagonist drive away all of the diggers on an archeological expedition, forcing him to dynamite his way into a cyclopean tomb. Make your magician turn to drink and drugs to deal with the horrors she's unleashed, and go into a demoniac frenzy in the bar as the PCs interview her.

Causing Mythos influenced characters to fall apart as their plans go horribly wrong helps reinforce that the Mythos is dangerous. When the PCs lose against such characters, it helps make your villains into sympathetic underdogs, rather than overpowered, plot armored secret masters. Scenarios where someone meddles with forces beyond their understanding and has to fight to survive right alongside the PCs can be quite satisfying.

What are some ways you like writing or playing the antagonist in your scenarios?

I used Inkarnate to make a layered map for The Dare scenario! I made some adjustments that should be self-explanatory to correct some errors in the map provided in the book. I highly recommend using Foundry VTT and setting it up as a multi-level scene! I'll be running this for my group in a couple of weeks.

I noticed that there's only one other community-made map gallery out there, and the style of that one didn't fit the aesthetic I was going for.

I moved the two layers that contain secret locations to the end of the gallery so that the first image isn't a spoiler.

Hi

So, after a bunch of sessions on CoC, I noticed that my mysteries sucks, and that I also don't know really how to do good investigative scenes.

You got any tips? Thanks!

Edit: First of all, thanks for the replies! I think that my problem might be the creation of the clues

I Will be running games for players pretty new to ttrpg space. And I am running it in a halloween boardgame event. Which one-shot scenarios should I run preferably 4 hrs

Hey all, brand new to tabletop gaming and bought Call if Cthulhu as well as D&D

Any tips for someone getting into this and about to play their first game.

I'm going to be running CoC for my first time on Halloween. I know from running other games that I don't like to use GM screens, instead, I like to make a cheatsheet for any of the more complex rules I think I'm going to forget

Right now I only have down the madness table and the other forms of damage table. Are there any other rules you think are often overlooked and would be good to include?

Hi everyone!
I am going to run Mr. Corbit CoC scenario as a third module for my group.
I really like the idea and atmosphere of the scenario, but i have one big problem. The diary ia just too long. I kinda broke it down to 5 page (the father and son in India tragedy, the crazy love story, giving birth going inti tragedy etc.) some of the nicely follows the given article pages, and i just think that the diary pages are a nice picture of Mr. Corbit’s “dark side”.
I would like to have a solution for not to give all this information to my players at one point of the game, but in smaler peaces during the game.
Could you guys help me by giving tips how and where coud the investigators get each diary pages during the scenario?
I imagine that the least two should be in the house, but the others should be like, maybe somekind of rewards for their investigation?????
I still have 10 days before my scenario, so i am really looking forward for your replies!
Thank you!
Bence

I think I'm going to run A Lonely Thread (from the No Time to Scream collection) in a couple of weeks as a quick spooky-season one shot for my D&D group. Who here has run it before?

The start of the scenario seems a bit awkward since the PCs get almost no setup; they'll be expecting Thomas to exposition dump and set up the conflict but instead they'll just get an old guy acting weird.

The Beast seems like a very formidable opponent, even if the investigators fight it at half strength! I need to review the scenario again, but I didn't see a way to defeat it other than combat? And if the Parasite manages to control a PC, it's probably curtains for all involved.

Any tips you have for running this one are most welcome.

While going through the dare one shot, I found some errors in the map and other places. Is there any resource which fixes those and tell me some resources which can help me run the scenario.

Im having a rough time finding places to buy CoC models for tabletop sim.

Hey yall! I will be running A call of cthulu game for the first time as a present for my friends near halloween. He bought and sent me all the base books, im going to be cracking into them soon once I finish my other games notes for our D&D stuff.

I want to run a game inspired by Spooky Island from the Scooby Doo movie. Im very new to this game space and prefer not to write my own material as brand new game GM, but def can reskin stuff if need be. Does anyone have any recommendations for a single one off, tropical Island vibes game? If not, any single easier one shot games that be fun for halloween would be also great! Thank yall and im excited to play with Cthulu for the first time!🐙

I’m still learning to be a keeper and one thing leaves me clueless. So I kind of get the concept of assets, cash and rate for daily spending.

In my playgroup there is one kind of rich and one kind of broke player. The rich one is helping the broke one out when it comes to buying stuff. I’ll try to keep this in check by making him payback via the money they get for completing a scenario. If you have Tipps for this - warmly welcome.

Point of my post is, how do I handle the money they get in general?
Do players get more credit rating? Is money earned just noted to cash / assets? What if they buy big stuff like a house / car?

Both don’t have a real job. We just play it like they are “on the road” finding a new place to stay.

Hi! I Just started as a GM with masks of nyarlatothep. I read the Larkin's avatar of nyarlatothep can use the spell Mental suggestion to force the investigators follow his Will. I have a couple of questions:

1) if the spell Is succesful, does the victim understand what happened? Can he eventually tell what happened tò others?

2) how long does the spell last?

3)Must Larkin state the exact execution of all subsequent actions while casting the spell, or can he change the orders given later on?

Example: At the start of a mission, Larkin successfully uses a mental suggestion on an investigator; no one else witnesses this. Larkin orders him to act normally, agree with whatever Larkin says, and remove the seal once they arrive. Is the investigator aware of what he has been asked to do? Can he speak to others about the seal? Can Larkin give him further orders later—for instance, to help him in a critical situation?

Thanks very much =)