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Old 12-02-2019, 07:36 AM   #1
AlexanderHowl
 
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Default Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

I was just wondering which fictional settings that you have used for your GURPS Horror games? Have you have found any that were too horrific? When converting the fictional setting to GURPS rules, how much did you weigh setting balance versus rules balance?

For example, in the Old World of Darkness, the Garou were pretty much furry superheroes that were nearly indestructible in their battle form when facing mundane weapons. Even with a judicious use of alternative abilities, starting Garou were easily 500 CP, making them easily the most powerful starting characters in the setting. They were, however, going extinct, while Kindred, one of their traditional rivals, were prospering despite being comparatively weak (starting Kindred were around 250 CP).
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Old 12-02-2019, 08:24 AM   #2
vicky_molokh
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

I haven't used it in full, but I have integrated elements from Madness Dossier in some of my campaigns.
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Old 12-02-2019, 08:48 AM   #3
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

Warhammer Fantasy. The Old World is great for gothic horror.
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Old 12-02-2019, 01:22 PM   #4
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

I like the idea of using GURPS Cabal as a framework replacing the World of Darkness, with an entirely different "Shadowy Cabal of Supernatural Beings". Mostly because everything about the Cabal itself can be customized for your Campaign. It can be a Local Coven of Evil Cultists and Ghouls, or a Global Conspiracy of Necromancers and Monsters. It has many Lodges and Grand Masters, meaning the Cabal can have any goal or agenda a GM can want to use and not have to justify too much. It can have any scientific, social or supernatural resource you want to use in a Horror game.

The Cabal is the best foundation for a Horror Campaign I can think of.
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Old 12-02-2019, 01:36 PM   #5
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

I ran a campaign in Charles Stross' Laundry Files setting. This is a fairly flexible background, and I was able to run a fair variety of scenarios in it.
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Old 12-02-2019, 02:03 PM   #6
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

Quote:
Originally Posted by LoneWolf23k View Post
The Cabal is the best foundation for a Horror Campaign I can think of.
It might not be the best but it is really good and as you say is very versatile in the number of styles it supports. In my mind it really is one of the books most in need of an update from Third Edition to Fourth, not so much needed for rule changes as some compatibility things.
If I were to update it I would make it more compatible and balanced towards Monster Hunters and have GURPS Voodoo as an expansion.
Madness Dossier and Madlands are good horror settings though.
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Old 12-02-2019, 04:34 PM   #7
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

I did a nice zombie apocalypse with some conspiracy elements. My solo player was highly paranoid and the zombie infection was especially splattery so it was some quality horror.
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Old 12-03-2019, 10:01 AM   #8
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

It wasn't pure fiction, but a fictionalized version of World War II with the weird and the occult provided the scariest horror backdrop I've ever played in. It didn't even get into artillery, bombs, machine guns, mines, and freezing to death at Stalingrad – while that's plenty horrific, most gamers are too steeped in "violence as a solution" to appreciate it. It was set in concentration camps and the Gulag. Nazi occultists experimenting on your fellow prisoners, or zombies in an isolated camp in frozen Siberia, adds supernatural grimness to a situation that's already utterly and completely bleak . . . and if you're interned without enough to eat, never mind weapons, the "shoot the zeds in the head"/"toss dynamite at the shoggoth" approach to the problem is off the table.

On the other hand, fictionalized Victoriana just doesn't cut it for me. While by comparison to today the streets were darker, society was less fair, and life expectancies were shorter – and I'm sure ol' Jack was scary – it's overused as a setting. Just about all the gamers I know seem to want to turn it into a weird-science steampunk game where the PCs are Jekyll/Hyde or a superhuman version of Van Helsing, or at least wealthy dilettantes who go around armed to the teeth. I've seen GMs try to steer games away from that, but the results are never pretty . . . the best GM I know still ended up having to accept half-vampire combat monsters in order to get enough players to sign on, whereupon the campaign stopped being horror and started being Blade in 1880s London.
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Old 12-03-2019, 10:24 AM   #9
AlexanderHowl
 
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

An issue with late 19th century horror is that it does tend to devolve into steampunk. One of the more effective horror games set in that time had the UK go to war with the USA over Alaska and Hawaii, with part of the horror coming from the UK supplying Native American guerilla fighters with training and weaponry. The game ended with a decisive defeat for the USA, with the UK claiming Alaska and Hawaii, and with the USA being forced to cede the Dakota, Montana, Washington, Idaho, and Wyoming Territories to the Native American Tribes as a buffer nation between the Western USA and Western Canada.

The horror ended up being on the weaker side of a conflict against a major power. With the UK in the 1880s being capable of destroying American shipping and blockading American ports, especially in the Gulf of Mexico and the Great Lakes, the situation grew more bleak with every session. While the PCs won minor victories, it was not enough to matter.
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Old 12-03-2019, 05:53 PM   #10
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Default Re: Best Fictional Settings for GURPS Horror [Horror]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Refplace View Post
It might not be the best but it is really good and as you say is very versatile in the number of styles it supports. In my mind it really is one of the books most in need of an update from Third Edition to Fourth, not so much needed for rule changes as some compatibility things.
If I were to update it I would make it more compatible and balanced towards Monster Hunters and have GURPS Voodoo as an expansion.
Madness Dossier and Madlands are good horror settings though.
I'd kill to see Cabal integrated with Voodoo and Monster Hunters. It would make running Facets a lot easier, since I've been trying to kludge the first two together, on my own.

While my campaign has had some elements of horror, it's mostly an inter-dimensional wainscot-fantasy action-adventure story, which is what my players wanted.

That said, as a horror setting, Cabal would be pretty amazing. It has just about everything you'd need for a campaign sustainable for a long, long time.

I also second Madness Dossier as a great example of how to integrate horror with some pretty dark and pointed humor.

I mean, c'mon! A PowerPoint presentation that really does turn people into brain-dead zombies? How awesome is that?! :)
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