Author: Craig Pay

The Lightless Beacon is one of my favourite Call of Cthulhu scenarios, especially as a one-shot for new players. The investigators are dropped straight into a mystery ‘in medias res’ with none of the usual frontloading. 

My only issue is that one of the pre-generated investigators has a tendency to overshadow the others. After comparing investigator characteristics and skills with those in the scenario it’s apparent why, so I’ve created investigators with more balance.

On page 15 of the Pulp Cthulhu rulebook there’s an optional rule allowing players to select an occupation before they pick an archetype.

My players seem to prefer this method but it can cause a lot of scanning back and forth through the rulebook trying to list which archetypes are then available.

Here’s a list of Pulp Cthulhu archetypes by occupation to save your players some time. I hope it proves useful!

Here’s a new house rule I’m adding to my Pulp Cthulhu games. It’s a riff on a similar rule in a Cubicle 7 publication, but I can’t say which one to avoid spoilers for my players!

Archetypes in Pulp Cthulhu seem somewhat forgotten beyond character generation. What’s to stop a Sidekick going Cold Blooded? Or an Outsider acting like a Bon Vivant?

This new house rule should encourage heroes to keep roleplaying the traits associated with their archetype, with a few bonus skill points awarded after each scenario as an incentive.

I like the skill-based system in Call of Cthulhu, but I’ve always thought that characteristics are somewhat underutilised, so I’ve decided to add the following house rule to my game…

A player may suggest the use of a characteristic instead of a skill roll to increase their chance of success, attempting the roll at one level higher difficulty: Normal requires a Hard Success, Hard an Exceptional Success, and Exceptional a Critical. The Keeper must deem the suggested characteristic appropriate: such as DEX for Throw or CON for Swim.

I love the Luck rules in Call of Cthulhu, and especially those in the Pulp rules. Here are three new Luck Spends and a modification to an existing rule. Feel free to use these (or not) in your own games!

“Keep Calm and Carry On!”

Cost: 20 Luck

A player may spend 20 Luck points to avoid the effects of Temporary or Indefinite Insanity. A subsequent loss of 1 or more points of Sanity will trigger insanity as normal.

Alternative names: “Oh dear. How sad. Never mind…” or “Always looks on the bright side of life! [sung]” or “Everything is AWESOME!” or “Hakuna Matata! [also sung]”

I’ve been running a Pulp Cthulhu campaign set in 1929 Chicago. The investigators have been running around the city, jumping in and out of taxis, on and off the “L”. They’ve had a few run-ins with the Mob and I know it’s only a matter of time before there’s a car chase.

Taking Mr Skorkowsky’s advice I bought some Models of Yesteryear cars and then I decided to create some road tiles using Inkarnate that I could drop onto the table. I’m planning on using these with the Chase rules in the Keeper’s Rulebook (p.130ff).

Here are the results. Feel free to download and print for your own game. And let me know if you have any ideas for more obstacles. So far I have wandering sheep in a rural setting and scattered crates in a city. The rulebook mentions two guys carrying a pane of glass–a classic!–there must be more.