The Chance of a Lifetime
I have been playing RPGs on and off for a good while now and along my journey a few campaign have been highlights. From the world of Greyhawk I managed to escape from the Queen of the Demonweb Pits, From the Warhammer I fought the Enemy Within and even found the Doomstones. Then on my return to role-playing I was lucky enough to spend 18 months working through the various Masks of Nyarlathotep. All of these campaigns were once in a lifetime opportunities as there’s never a second chance to play a campaign for the first time. Sure, when there is a rewrite you can enjoy the new materials and all parties play the plot differently but you know what I mean. When a space on a Horror on the Orient Express campaign came up, I jumped right in. If someone is happy to run the game for folks donating their time, then I count my lucky stars.
The Long game
I’d say I was a veteran player so wanted a character for the Orient Express that was going to support other so straight away I wanted to play a doctor as I knew people would get hurt and go insane! I would expect combat as all too often cultists and monsters will try and stop you doing what you need to do so I also wanted someone who could handle themselves so probably a Army Doctor. With that guide in mind, I let my dice rolls shape the good doctor and did very well with 85 Intelligence and Education of 80. I was quite average on the rest and missed out on a damage bonus by five points! Most of my points went into being a well-trained doctor and Psychoanalyst. I made a choice not to put any points into Spot Hidden as over the course of the game I’d be sure to improve this skill by natural successes and progression right? Well after 13 sessions in or over 50 hours of game play I’ve not passed a Spot Hidden roll!
Insane Already!?
Other rolls I’ve not been passing is the Doctor’s sanity rolls! There is a doozy of a start the campaign which saw my doctor lose 12 points in a single game day! They are now indefinitely insane which in a campaign is… interesting. In the adventure their insanity made them blind, not so good if you need to make a jump roll and this psychological blindness which can happen at any time not to mention losing his grip on reality. They have recovered their sanity quite well but are not cured as there isn’t really any downtime between adventures as, well, we’re on the train. No time to go off, pay some money to shrink an get cured. In the Masks campaign we were able to have the intervention of a god to help the insanity in the group but that’s not an option for us just yet although we have picked up a nice mythos tome to read. Fortunately, with my Doctor’s Psychology and Psychoanalysis skill, he can do some sanity first aid when reality gets a little screwy but we do need to think about long term solutions as currently 75% of the party is indefinitely insane!
The Grim Reaper is waiting…
The only reason my character ended the Masks campaign alive was because we were playing the Pulp! Cthulhu version. In all the other campaigns over the years my characters have died because that’s the name of the game! The exploding Minotaur with the boiling lead blood was a bit of a surprise but it lead to new characters new opportunities. So I know Dr H Lewis is going to die at some point as will his replacement and probably the replacement after that depending on how crazy things get. Is it worth getting invested on the character if they are just a sheet of stats to be replaced by another sheet at some point? Or course! Call of Cthulhu is game where you can roll skill advances to make your character better in the next game but drama is the story told in those dice rolls. In the time Dr Lewis has, he’ll develop a little story arc about seeking answers to healing people having seen tangible evidence of what can only be described as magic. Is he on the verge of discovering the cure for death or the verge of going mad and trying to become an immortal? When he is gone, the other players be reminisce about how he couldn’t spot anything hidden, how he got smashed out of his head on Dreamland wine and comment on the Doctor’s good company. Then his replacement will be sad not to meet his friend the doctor as the Orient Express pulls into whatever station and will vow to take up his mission and the story will continue and another grand adventure to be told.