Hello and Welcome to Roll4Sanity where we become mythos investigators in the world of ‘Call of Cthulhu’ Role-playing. Over the next few blog entries we’re going to take a look at all the time periods that have given rise to a Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition game supplement. This month we’ll be looking at the era known as Pulp! Cthulhu set in the 1930s. Look out for a YouTube video here and a podcast episode!
Comic and Silver Screen Heroes
Whilst 7th Edition Call of Cthulhu era books are a wealth of information about the time period in which they are set, Pulp! Cthulhu is so much more than that. The characters you create are not the flimsy normal people but the top 1% of humanity who choose exciting careers or the more modest individuals with heroic qualities. When adventure calls they step up to protect the world from evil using their extra skills, enhanced attributes and various talents they have acquired. It’s as though they have stepped straight from the Pulp Fiction of the Time.
The Road to War
America in the 1930s is very similar naturally to the 1920s except there is hope in the air. The depression comes and goes so more money is flowing in America with great opportunities for development and exploration. America hit rock bottom and now the only way is up. In the shadows, the organised crime syndicates have diversified having lost the income from supplying illegal booze to Americans which leads to some unhealthy alliances. In Europe, distrust and the discontentment left over from the end of the ‘Great’ war has found its footing slowly poisoning minds which jealously look at progressive America as something to exploit. Steamships, Airships, railways and improved automobiles mean fast transport for fast living with aspiring minds wanting to be a worlds first!
So how is Character Creation different?
Looking at the character creation process, the first benefit of a Pulp Character is the outstanding attribute. To understand how remarkable characters are, lets remind ourselves that having 70% in a skill or attribute is an exceptional score for exceptional people found in top sports people or great scientists. Depending on your keeper, a Pulp character could start with one attribute, chosen by the player, at 90%. 90% Strength, Appearance or Power? That puts this character as a world leader in that attribute!
Once that attribute has been decided, the player then picks an Archetype for the character which defines which occupations they can take. So an Adventurer type might become an aviator for example. It’s here at the architype stage that we get our first skills even before we have even rolled the rest of our attributes! 100 skill points can be divided between the dozen or so skills that an architype would have.
Once the rest of the attributes have been rolled you can see how your character is shaping up and, again depending on your Keeper, you now choose one to three ‘Pulp Talents’ from the 40 or so available. Some Keepers like to have folks roll one talent randomly which can be fun to build into a character and their back story. These talents are just that, a talent your character has which sometimes relies on a luck spend, other times it is a bonus die to a skills check or something special like a psychic power or have advanced technology.
With attributes, Occupation and talents decided, it is time to work out skill points. If Education or Intelligence are your enhanced attribute, you will have a very healthy amount of points to spend. And the extra Pulp skills are great. As mentioned, there are Psychic powers that you can spend skill points on to improve, the ability to build gadgets and even Hypnosis. With personal interest skill points to spend as well, a character should come out with a great selection of skills to round out their character.
It gets better when you play!
Your Pulp! Cthulhu character gets double the amount of hit points to help, there are no major wounds when half your hit points are lost on a single hit. During the adventure, should they suffer about of madness as you play, your character may pick up an ‘Insane Talent’! What is this? Imagine an unearthly escape mechanism that kicks in to save your character. It can be rolled randomly or assigned by the Keeper. Usually, the insane talent is tied into a skill like spot hidden and a bonus die applied or the character is just successful until a failed luck roll. Keepers can have fun with this so use insane talents responsibly!
Your characters are lucky! When you return for a second session of a game, your character will receive a boost of luck as a pool of points to bolster failed skill rolls when your character does outlandish actions. Luck can also be spent to luckily avoid your weapon jamming or from taking as much damage. The Cliff Hanger luck spend as I call it is where your character can drop all their luck (min 30 spend) and avoid certain death. In the game your character tackles the villain and they both go over the cliff edge plummeting to their deaths. The other characters morn your loss only for your character to emerge with an outlandish story about landing on a passing Golden Eagle who flew the character back to the top of the cliff, battered and bruised but very much alive!
But where is the horror?
With such seemingly invincible characters where is the good old horror and insanity? Being vulnerable is what makes the game and being able to die at any moment or go insane is all part of the fun. There are a couple of ways to look at this I would say.
The first is Pulp! Cthulhu provides movie like adventures designed for players whose characters will make it to the end of the story. The monsters are stronger and there are more of them but they are part of the plot as opposed to its end. Indiana Jones doesn’t get shot in the back with a poisoned dart, the escape is just the beginning. Plenty of horror and mystery on the way for a fun thrill packed adventure.
The second way to see Pulp! Cthulhu is an extra dimension to your usual Call of Cthulhu adventures. Sanity is still sanity and a character entering a bout of insane violence with world class machine guns skills make a game very real no matter how much luck you have. Characters can endure more so they may fight through the Deep Ones only to be captured by a Star Spawn of Cthulhu. A pulp character survives the horrors rather than being spared the release of death. Will they wish they were dead?
I’m a fan of Pulp! Cthulhu as you can tell and would really recommend it. Playing a less damageable character is very fun and not being afraid to open that door or wonder what that noise was is a different gaming experience. Don’t get me wrong, excitement, horror and death can await around every corner and playing Pulp does not guarantee a ‘win’. This is still the Call of Cthulhu horror role-playing – only the Keeper ever truly wins.