Recommend a starter scenario, please

**anodyr** · 9th August 2012, 08:38 PM

Hi all,

I may be putting together a game for a new group of players soon, and in the interests of making things as straight forward (and painless) as possible, I'm looking for a published scenario that fits the following criteria:

1) suitable for 3-5 investigators
2) set in the 20s/30s
3) can be completed in one evening session (assume 2.5 - 3 hours of game time) with players new to the system
4) has a nice bunch of pre-gen characters, ideally with a bit of background (but not pages of info) that ties them into the scenario.
5) delivers a good taste of mythos gribble weirdness ( I'm sure most of the published adventures do this, but I believe some are more mythos-y than others, and I'd definitely like it to be a mythos game rather than just a ghost story, you know?)

So, thems the criteria - can anyone think of a good scenario that ticks all the boxes?

Thanks,

Anodyr

**trevlix** · 10th August 2012, 03:30 PM

The Haunting, available in the Quickstart or the rulebook, is the standard answer for this.

Thinking outside the box, it all depends on what books you have access to. You may also want to consider Crack'd & Crook'd Manse from Mansions of Madness (I have pre-gens if you want them).

**ElijahWhateley** · 10th August 2012, 04:45 PM

The Haunting, depending on whether the Shambler gets involved and how much the investigators look into the cult, may not provide as much Mythos weirdness as you'd like.

**KneelBeforeZod** · 10th August 2012, 05:04 PM

Edge of Darkness.

My fave to run for beginners. It doesn't have pregens, but has one of the best "form a group of various people that would otherwise never meet" devices.

1. Has the chance for a VERY grisly PC kill early on (your players need to know upfront this is CoC and this can happen)
2. Has some nice foreshadowing (dead animals, missing people)
3. Has a nice false alarm scare (crazy homeless guy in the basement)
4. Involves a creepy backstory and a mythos ritual (I had a thunderstorm track and some lustmord playing on my surround sound during this)
5. Only has one real location of significance (keeps it short, easy to prep)
6. There are some amazing props for it floating around on this forum if I recall.

I usually run Haunting second.

**Asmodas** · 10th August 2012, 07:12 PM

Edge of Darkness is my usual choice for new players, but another interesting choice would be "Punitive Measures" from Unspeakeable Oath 16/17 (still available rather cheaply through Arkham Bazaar). It involves a bunch of U.S. soldiers on a raid in Mexico during the Pancho Villa sorties around 1914, as I recall. It is pretty short and self-contained, and has enough combat and Mythos weirdness to give both new players and their characters (those who survive, anyway) a good reason to come back for more investigations.

**Varjag** · 10th August 2012, 07:36 PM

Uncle Silas (Arkam 1920 Book). No pregens tho. Not super deadly as written, but can be made so easily for a more active protagonist. A very nice intro into the world of mythos.

**PhoneCallOfCthulhu** · 11th August 2012, 03:05 AM

Originally Posted by trevlix

You may also want to consider Crack'd & Crook'd Manse from Mansions of Madness

I agree with you but I think that Crack'd and Crook'd Manse is a bit too long for the time he has (2.5 to 3 hours).

**Shimmin Beg** · 11th August 2012, 08:12 AM

Given these:

Originally Posted by anodyr

4) has a nice bunch of pre-gen characters, ideally with a bit of background (but not pages of info) that ties them into the scenario.
5) delivers a good taste of mythos gribble weirdness ( I'm sure most of the published adventures do this, but I believe some are more mythos-y than others, and I'd definitely like it to be a mythos game rather than just a ghost story, you know?)

I am not sure the Haunting is a great match.

For one, it doesn't have pregens, and the suggested hook for getting the players to investigate can seem a bit fragile - that $100 for poking around some guy's house seems a lot less appealing once things get genuinely sinister, and especially so given you can then legitimately just go and say "yeah, that house is weird" and head home.

Secondly, the Mythos is in fact all but absent. There's

Spoiler:

but nothing notably Mythosy about it. The

Spoiler:

could just as well be any

Spoiler:

in any setting. So what you have is

Spoiler:

that may appear if the party do a particular bit of research in a particular way, though they won't know what it is; and depending how you choose to run things,

Spoiler:

and that is not explained or referenced in the scenario. So unless your players are already very familiar with Lovecraft and (probably) the game, it's just some ghost story.

**The_Tatterdemalion_King** · 11th August 2012, 08:23 AM

Originally Posted by Shimmin Beg

So unless your players are already very familiar with Lovecraft and (probably) the game, it's just some ghost story.

I think that's why people like it; it forces the GM to become conscious of which aspects of the mythos they feel are missing for re-inclusion—orientalism, weird sf, cosmicity, etc.

'Trail of Yig' reads like it would be a good intro; it's a pretty straightforward save-the-world roadtrip.

**Halloweenman33** · 11th August 2012, 02:33 PM

Personally, I would let the players create their own characters. Not only is character creation easy, but it will let them get a handle on the system and won't force a premade character upon them. I know that as I player I personally hate to have a premade character forced upon me (not a fan of scenarios that are written for pregens) and much prefer to create my own.

**Shimmin Beg** · 12th August 2012, 07:47 AM

Originally Posted by The_Tatterdemalion_King

I think that's why people like it; it forces the GM to become conscious of which aspects of the mythos they feel are missing for re-inclusion—orientalism, weird sf, cosmicity, etc.

Oh sure, you could do all kinds of things with it, but at that point it's not looking particularly painless and low-maintenance for our OP who wants a bundle of Mythosy goodness.

**The_Tatterdemalion_King** · 12th August 2012, 01:52 PM

The old TOME adventures might work well, since they're basically stories turned into scenarios.

**neorxnawang** · 12th August 2012, 03:01 PM

I'd like to suggest my contribution to Protodimension #10 (free download), Whitechurch, VT. I deliberately wrote it to address what I see as shortcomings in the usual suspects of introductory scenarios. It makes a low grade tome available to the players going forward; has a discrete thread with a couple different interlocked scenes; isn't especially deadly; introduces them to the importance of research and investigation to solve a mystery; gives them some NPC contacts; makes them make a choice with consequences; is designed with giving a group of occult interested people a reason to assemble and work together without them not necessarily knowing each other in mind; and has clear but open ended suggestions for a next adventure or two.

http://www.protodimension.com/zine/w...-Fall-2011.pdf

**anodyr** · 17th August 2012, 08:22 AM

Thanks for the help all, plenty of ideas there for me to check out.

Thought I'd found a good one in the Cthulhu Classics book - cant remember the name but it involves a trip to Belize on the trail of a lost professor and a journey to Leng... anyway, I figure if all else fails that could be a goer, though I may ditch the second half (the trio to Leng) and just focus on finding the temple and having the squigly goodness happen there...