Victorian Cthulu

[ZiggenTheLord]

does anyone know any good non homebrew classes for a Victorian age hp Lovecraft horror campaign ? Gothic class ideas are ok as well, preferably dps/meleebut casters work too, thank you

[Inevitability]

How set are you on using D&D for this? Because it honestly isn't that good at horror.

[DrMotives]

Good horror is more about mood and storytelling, I think. I've had great horror campaigns with the right DM. (I was not the right DM for horror). As far as non-homebrew for horror, there isn't much though. Heroes of Horror has lots of 1st party stuff for it, and then Ravenloft was farmed out to 3rd party officially licensed developmentment in 3.x. There is the Masque of the Red Death material, which is exactly the setting you're looking for. But it changes characters to a bunch of low-power, super fragile options with almost no features. Like playing NPC classes from the DMG, just with more fluff. I haven't tried running it, but it seems balanced so as to cause high PC mortality, which maybe is the point.

[Ashtagon]

Masque of the red death is basically this.

D20 past also had a significant amount of text devoted to this.

[Mordaedil]

How set are you on using D&D for this? Because it honestly isn't that good at horror.

Yeah, D&D is more of a combat system and isn't really designed to mesh with horror elements. You could still use D&D for the combat elements that do not involve Cthulhu, but generally dropping stats altogether for the horror elements is usually a good idea.

[atemu1234]

Ravenloft is probably a good place to check for thematic ideas; it's about gothic horror. Most classes are probably workable as well; though unless you're going for Theology v. Chaos you aren't going to get very far with clerics.

Maybe D20 past is your best option for most of this.

[Segev]

Ravenloft or Pathfinder's Occult Adventures are what you're looking for, I think, if you want to use d20. Occult Adventures has the feel for it, I think. At least, it tries hard.

[Ashtagon]

For reference, relevant content in d20 Past, d20 Modern, and d20 Urban Arcana includes:

Spiritualist (very low-key divine caster; gains spells per level, not spells per day)
Mesmerist (weaker psionics user; may be overpowered relative to occultist and spiritualist)
Explorer (a ranger without the bonus weapon feats)

d20 Past also contains basically all the weapons you might need to do Victorian era combat. It also contains new feats, spells, and modifications to vehicle combat rules, skills, and occupations (occupations are a d20 Modern subsystem).

Tangentially relevant:

Frontier Marshal (gunslinger lawman from the Wild West. ymmv, but right time period)
Shaman (d20 Modern's druid class, but without the wildshape)
Sorcerer (d20 Modern's sorcerer class, but with more dragon magic features)
Pulp Scientist (d20 Modern's artificer class; feats weren't properly proof-read, but is otherwise functional)

From d20 Urban Arcana, the thrasher and glamorist advanced classes are tangentially relevant, and the incantation magic system may be of prime interest (it's more developed than the incantation magic system in the D&D SRD).

From d20 Future, the swindler advanced class (basically a luck manipulation class) may be of tangential interest. However, that's about the only thing likely to be of use in that book.

From d20 Modern, shadow slayer (think "Buffy") and occultist (arcane counterpart to spiritualist) should be your go-to classes. Of the core advanced classes, soldier, gunslinger, infiltrator, daredevil, bodyguard, investigator, personality, and negotiator should be fine. Martial artist is too out-of-place for Victoriana. Field scientist, field medic, and techie rely too much on higher tech levels.

[nintendoh]

I had a 2 person + dm survival horror game that was amazing effective. The first person who died paid for the whiskey and pizza. We're a bunch of fat alcoholics so that's a terrifying prospect.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Segev
Occult Adventures has the feel for it, I think. At least, it tries hard.

I’d definitely recommend Occult Adventures, since several of the classes were directly inspired by Victorian-era spiritualism.

The mesmerist is a favorite of mine, but the psychic is a decent spellcaster as well.