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Survival Horror in 1880s Siberia.

Posted by tibiotarsus
tibiotarsus
member, 2 posts
Mon 26 Sep 2016
at 20:18
  • msg #1

Survival Horror in 1880s Siberia

The setting:
Siberia, 1883. A landmass bigger than Europe, nearing twice the size of the United States, comprised mostly of unbroken taiga forest. A climate that veers from scorching continental heat in the low plains under the midnight sun to cold enough to freeze fire before it can spark in the long dark of winter.

For a century, Imperial Russia has been consolidating its claims in the Far East and the new surge of social unrest has seen many more convicts and exiles sent to the katorgas and colonies of Siberia. The lines of contact between these outposts and Russian civilisation are slender; the natives are quiet and wary; and something has been driving the game herds away.

Hunger has begun to set in. Darkness threads through the aurora borealis. Something has awakened to the West, something that grows strong in shadows...and in northern Siberia, winter is three months of night.






This is set to be a small, intense game with a relatively low post rate; I am looking for 1-3 more players with an interest in atmospheric/weird horror and reasonably historically accurate non-Western settings.

The rules are mostly Call of Cthulhu based (6th & 7e), with some elements of Shadow Theory (described as "a cross between Richard Matheson's I Am Legend and Silent Hill"). Although I hope to streamline the mechanics considerably during play, this game aims for a more narrative/character-driven focus and rewards curious and creative interaction with the people and environment (see SAN rules for brewing tea). Plenty of setting notes are provided.
Gamer75
member, 108 posts
Tue 27 Sep 2016
at 04:38
  • msg #2

Survival Horror in 1880s Siberia

how important is knowledge of the systems
tibiotarsus
member, 3 posts
Tue 27 Sep 2016
at 07:32
  • msg #3

Survival Horror in 1880s Siberia

In reply to Gamer75 (msg # 2):

Unimportant, save for understanding that the conceit of Call of Cthulhu is to see how long you can run around before you are dead or insane (you don't "win" CoC, you maybe survive it), and the conceit of Shadow Theory is that humans are social animals and going completely, selfishly feral after a disaster rather than valuing and helping fellow survivors is insane.
tibiotarsus
member, 4 posts
Wed 5 Jul 2017
at 07:13
  • msg #4

In Imperial Russia, plot follows YOU!

The present situation in-game:
The settlement beside Krestyakh prison camp has been partly destroyed by a wave of vampires. They came from nowhere, out of the taiga, enough to blot out the snow around and collapse the church roof under their sheer weight after most of the settlers took shelter there.

This morning, those that made it into the prison stockade and survived the night thanks to some mysterious, ambiguous intervention of an ancient native power are looking at a settlement at least half uninhabitable. The convicts are in high spirits because no guard is yet known to have survived the night; they have dragooned the blacksmith into breaking their chains. Everyone else has yet to resolve a plan for the situation.

The natives over the river were unaffected and saved those they could, yet remain wary.



Curious investigator wanted

Firstly, be forewarned that The Long Dark is a game with a slow post rate. I'd like at least 2-3 posts a week from you to keep it rolling smoothly, however. I intend to keep the game small, so if I get several RTJs for this I'll pick the one (possibly two to compensate for RPoL attrition) that appeals to me most.

The settlement is currently in a state of shock and grief, the deep breath before a decision. I'm looking for a player with a dynamic, active play style, someone willing to poke around - wisely or otherwise - and make their own subplot to be woven into the main one.

Players with historical, anthropological and folkloric interests welcome.
tibiotarsus
member, 11 posts
Tue 20 Mar 2018
at 20:55
  • msg #5

In Imperial Russia, plot follows YOU!

Place/s available in The Long Dark, a tale of survival and weird cosmic horror in 1880s Siberia!


What TLD is:
  • a taped-together but functional hybrid of Call of Cthulhu and Shadow Theory
  • an examination of the adaptation of ordinary human beings to the kind of localised apocalypse suffered by many isolated communities in the historic period.
  • interested in historical accuracy in non-Western settings
  • a weaving of Native Siberian and Slavic myth with the underlying themes of the Lovecraft mythos
  • a game about use of wits, observation and skill against things brute force is unlikely to help with.
  • a tale of survival, hell-forged bonds and small heroisims


What TLD is not:
  • a game ever likely to have a super-fast post rate
  • epic-heroic or action horror
  • your Hollywood apocalypse where everyone immediately starts eating each other raw but blue-eyed white men with stubble somehow become natural leaders
  • your Hollywood past where native diversity and female body hair are mysteriously absent, but everyone is open-minded (except all men are sexual predators for some reason)
  • a longform lecture on the setting
  • a bear dating sim


The jumping-on point:
We're about to start Act II, what you might call the main Walking Dead arc of the campaign. New players can take one of the handful of civilian or convict survivors from the settlement of Krestyakh, recently destroyed by a wave of vampires erupting suddenly and mysteriously from the taiga, or be picked up along the way.

The question of what on earth was pushing vampires to migrate over weeks of uninhabited snow and forest has not been resolved.



You might like The Long Dark if you like:
frontiers, nonstandard monsters, Northern weirdness, homesteading crafts, Guillermo Del Toro, Nan Shepard, China MiƩville, Ursula LeGuin, more monsters, snow, arguing with Communists, brutal optimisim, Russian novels, trees, soft fluffy winter-coated reindeer, the prospect of death from every angle, being nice to ponies, magic that will mess you up, horibly losing your sanity, vodka, bears, and even more and weirder monsters.
This message was last edited by the user at 21:16, Tue 20 Mar 2018.
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