Has your gritty modern supernatural horror campaign/setting endured?

[OttoVonBigby]

My new setting idea is a scary, creepy, but not hyper-dark (i.e. not nWoD dark) alternate real-Earth timeline, involving ruptures between parallel universes which (A) unleash Nasties from time to time and (B) induce psionic (or low-level super) abilities in seemingly random people. I'm leaning towards more alien-ish, Cthulu-lite opponents than Judeo-Christian-myth-derived opponents. The backstory I'm considering is that (for reasons I haven't yet figured out) some transdimensional factions want Earth protected, and some don't--and which side is the benevolent one will never be totally obvious, if either.

So far so good. My concerns about this germ of a setting idea are
1) I worry that I will get bored with it as GM--that the storylines will become repetitive; "Heroes investigate rumors; heroes discover Nasty-of-the-Week; heroes defeat it."
2) I worry that Big Reveals will come too quickly and we'll end up doing maybe a dozen sessions before the campaign, or player interest therein, winds down.
3) I want to maintain a whole "general populace has no idea about these events" thing, and I'm not sure how easy it will be from a campaign-design perspective to keep it all "quiet." I certainly don't want to overlay some obvious narrative device like "transdimensional beings can only be seen if you BELIEEEVE and you also have to clap your hands to keep Tinker Bell alive" or whatever.

I don't want to do all the setup for a new setting if we're just gonna go back to our fairly prototypical D&D campaign in a few months.

Thus, my question is, have any of you been in similar campaigns that really endured...that lasted a good long while, with a good slow building of dread--slow enough to make the payoff(s) impactful, but not so slow that everybody gets grimmed-out... and without the campaign going off the rails into Global Apocalyptic Panic territory. And if you've had success with those goals, to what do you attribute that success?

[urkthegurk]

1) I worry that I will get bored with it as GM--that the storylines will become repetitive; "Heroes investigate rumors; heroes discover Nasty-of-the-Week; heroes defeat it."

DO they defeat it?

Seriously though, if this is going to be horror (not just horror-themed fantasy) then the chances of success have to be VERY ambiguous. I'm not saying you shouldn't 'let' players succeed- their success should still ride on their actions alone, like in any other game. But victories might be few and far between, and somewhat tainted with failure when they do come. Not everything that goes bump in the night can be CAUGHT. So shake that nice-DM habit of letting them out alive.



2) I worry that Big Reveals will come too quickly and we'll end up doing maybe a dozen sessions before the campaign, or player interest therein, winds down.


Don't do big reveals.

A murder is a reveal. Let them find that. The murderer should be found after a suitable period. But why the murder took place, the nature of the malaise that affected the villains mind, the mysterious power behind his gaze that made the servants turn a blind eye for so long... Let them guess at everything.



3) I want to maintain a whole "general populace has no idea about these events" thing, and I'm not sure how easy it will be from a campaign-design perspective to keep it all "quiet." I certainly don't want to overlay some obvious narrative device like "transdimensional beings can only be seen if you BELIEEEVE and you also have to clap your hands to keep Tinker Bell alive" or whatever.

Nothing like this has happened before, at least not to credible witnesses or people who lived to tell about it. Minds snap when they look these beings in the eye. Tales of Witch trials and so on may have been evidence of their earlier influence, but on the witches or the witch-hunters?

The players, while not particularly powerful from a standard RPG standpoint, are possibly among the only mortals who've lives have been touched by the supernatural (although many have felt murmurs), and this is what's brought them together.



I don't want to do all the setup for a new setting if we're just gonna go back to our fairly prototypical D&D campaign in a few months.

Thus, my question is, have any of you been in similar campaigns that really endured...that lasted a good long while, with a good slow building of dread--slow enough to make the payoff(s) impactful, but not so slow that everybody gets grimmed-out... and without the campaign going off the rails into Global Apocalyptic Panic territory. And if you've had success with those goals, to what do you attribute that success?

One of my longest running games has been a horror-themed game. Its currently on hold because two of the main players live in different cities currently, and are incapable of using a computer. But I find it has a certain longevity, beyond even a standard fantasy game. I admit, I do dip into pulp and noir themes, as well as a little steampunk, and my world is definitely more high-fantasy than yours, but the PCs are quite subtle and under-powered in comparison.

[Veklim]

You could look at Spycraft for inspiration on covert opertions and abilities, perhaps implementing E6 rules with it to maintain a certain level of 'realism' if you want. Generally horror themes mean PC deaths, uncertain odds and often no clue of the powerful machinations behind seemingly brutal but mundane, mortal crimes.

To keep it going, consider the root of at least some of the problems to be seated in government and the intelligencia, this means the 'source' of the problem is secretive and well protected, staying out of reach of the players even after they eventually trace clues far enough.

[Yora]

Have you seen Buffy the Vampire Slayer? Or if that one is a bit too silly with high school teens saving the world, the spin-off Angel is also very good and a bit more gritty, taking place in a big city with the worlds only good vampire working as a monster hunter and paranormal investigator, assisted by some human monster hunters. Combined they have over 250 episodes and I don't really remember ever thinking "oh, this story again...".

You could say the main setup is, that demons come in different degrees of evil and there's a considerable number of lower demons who fear the greater demons just as much as humans do. So they prefer to keep things low and quite, as do the human monster hunters and mages. Nobody wants to attract too much attention either from the human public or the greater demons. Also, while stronger than humans, the demons and monsters are not super-powerful and could be killed by strong human forces, and they need evil humans to supply them with things they need. So the demons and vampires usually keep their human interactions to humans who already are in on the secret.

[Veklim]

...Angel is also very good and a bit more gritty, taking place in a big city with the worlds only good vampire...

To the contrary, Angel may be good, but Spike will always be better :smallamused:

Dear ol' Joss has a way with group-dynamic stories, probably why he landed the Avengers film tbh (not seen it, reserving judgement), but his stories work on an element of comedy and light relief to sit in contrast to the more unpleasant stuff. Much of the catalogue of Buffy & Angel revolves around this clever mix of drama and humour, but I feel it's not going to be a wonderful model for something as dark as this...

I guess here, but you have checked out Call of Cthulhu right? I know it's on the other extreme to Buffy & co (guessing you want something in the middle of these two...) but the sanity stuff makes good sense in a horror, and can make plot evolve on it's own as the group interaction intensifies. The way CoC handles group dynamics (mercurial at best!) is probably going to be of some assistance to you.

[SamBurke]

So far so good. My concerns about this germ of a setting idea are
1) I worry that I will get bored with it as GM--that the storylines will become repetitive; "Heroes investigate rumors; heroes discover Nasty-of-the-Week; heroes defeat it."

Then you need to set them up well. For example, have a number of over arching themes and recurring villains. Not the cheesy ones, but the annoying, memorable ones. In addition, if you can create a lot of roleplay (by hinting as often as you can about it), then you'll get a lot of mileage out of the session, and have to do less actual fighting. Switch up the plot as often as possible. If you want monsters to be a big deal, have them be a big deal.




2) I worry that Big Reveals will come too quickly and we'll end up doing maybe a dozen sessions before the campaign, or player interest therein, winds down.

Don't have there be big reveals. See above.



3) I want to maintain a whole "general populace has no idea about these events" thing, and I'm not sure how easy it will be from a campaign-design perspective to keep it all "quiet." I certainly don't want to overlay some obvious narrative device like "transdimensional beings can only be seen if you BELIEEEVE and you also have to clap your hands to keep Tinker Bell alive" or whatever.

One of my favorite things to do is Beuracra... bureaucracy. Basically, they spend their own resources covering things up. This leads to excellent moral questions (a MUST for any horror game), such as " do we kill them, or rehabilitate them?" "is it morally right to erase someone's memory and brainwash them?" "To what extent are we protecting, and what extent are we hoodwinking the general public?" Things like that.




Thus, my question is, have any of you been in similar campaigns that really endured...that lasted a good long while, with a good slow building of dread--slow enough to make the payoff(s) impactful, but not so slow that everybody gets grimmed-out... and without the campaign going off the rails into Global Apocalyptic Panic territory. And if you've had success with those goals, to what do you attribute that success?

Crap needs to go DOOOOOWN. Make it a gritty, personal drama. Each and every person who dies MUST be important to the players, and they must want them to survive. That way, every time, it hurts. Kill off the most popular player. You should have player death relatively often, but not so much it becomes a cliche. UNLESS they fear it each time, in which case, you're doing the right thing.