Forget Me Not (1920s style) Part 1

So here's the write up of our first Call of Cthulhu RPG session back in the winter of 2018 (originally published in the Yog-Sothoth forum on my 'A Pretend Terror' blog), as narrated by my character, Harry Harrison.

WARNING: Spoilers!

The Diary of Harry Harrison: Mystic

19th September 1922

Oh how the spirits must laugh at the living; entwined as we are with the fickle hand of fate!

One minute I am providing spiritual succour to the bereaved souls of New York’s elite, the next I’m covered in mud and lying in an upturned truck in the middle of nowhere!

How I got here I have no recollection. Neither do I remember teaming up with my three companions, or they me. All we have discovered is that we have been exploring the town of Clio, Michigan – most notably the old Cooper farmhouse: a place notorious for grisly murders and mysterious disappearances. We also found photographic equipment and wax audio recording among our effects – clearly we meant business!

It appears that there was also a fifth member of our party – a red-haired lady by the name of Lynne who may have been more acquainted with one of us than the others. It was in her room that I found a notebook, detailing the locals we had apparently been quizzing about the Cooper House – possibly by way of producing a movie and/or on behalf of the ‘Second Sight Co-operative’, whose card we have discovered in some of our motel rooms (a place, I might add, we have no memories of booking into!) Lynne however has since gone missing and her whereabouts is unknown.

If this wasn’t mysterious enough, we have also been afflicted a terrible condition that the local doctor has been unable to diagnose (X-rays serving only to baffle him). Eating and drinking holds a particular terror - it hurts to swallow and some of us have been vomiting copiously. Also, how shall I put this, I have been evacuating my bowels in a spectacular fashion. I have suffered greatly from this malady, and I swear that, in the resultant issue, something moves!

Normally friendly dogs hurl themselves at us, while our investigations, not to mention our maladies and the resultant mess, are making us less and less welcome in this small town. Impromptu dance sessions do nothing to alleviate our misery and serve only to compound our woes.

Moreover we have been tormented by terrible dreams and visions. Mysterious figures leaping at us from the cornfields, monsters and creatures that Hell itself would refuse entry, things been forced down our throats… Our sanity has suffered as a result and I begin to wonder whether I will survive another night in this accursed town!

Yet survive I must, as my companions and I must unravel this mystery - for the sake of our own peace of mind if nothing else. Tomorrow we intend to stock up on weapons and supplies, having had our truck repaired. We have arranged to visit the Cooper House – a place built by one Edmund McCumsey: an English scholar and author of the esoteric tome Before Daedalus (a copy of which we have been unable to find at the local library).

It was in this house that John Cooper disembowelled his entire family to get rid of things he claimed were ‘inside them’. I fear that such things are also inside me!

I await the night with fear and trepidation…

OOC notes:

Playing location: A vault under a 17th century half-timbered building.

Whatever happened to JP?

So, my last post was on the 3rd of March, a couple of weeks before this whole Covid-19 stupidness kicked off. Our children were sent home from school, businesses had to hurriedly readjust, social distancing became a thing and civilisation all-but collapsed for the want of a supermarket delivery slot. 

Terribly, our next game of Frostgrave was postponed and I was obliged to work (and teach my children) from home, which meant any tables I might have been eyeing up for some lockdown painting and solo-gaming were instead requisitioned as makeshift offices and classrooms.

Meanwhile we struggled to keep our nerve while my significant other, a member of the medical profession, watched and worried as her colleagues began to test positive for the virus and we spent a fraught couple of weeks looking out for symptoms in the household.

Alas the crisis is not yet over, although restrictions are slowly being lifted and we no longer have to scavenge for nuts, berries and click & collect appointments at Morrisons, but the dining room table is still groaning under the weight of laptops and textbooks.

So, no wargaming for me, but happily I have been able to continue with my roleplaying sessions; something I had been getting into a lot pre-Coronavirus.

Our monthly-ish face-to-face Call of Cthulhu sessions have moved to a bi-weekly slot over the internet, using Roll20 for dice rolling and Facebook Messenger for voice (Discord is apparently the chat server of choice but I and a couple of my fellow gamers have issues with the sound quality).

I have also really got into Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (4th edition) – basically a grim and gritty alternative to D&D in which PCs start off as squishy low-level plebs (something all CoC players will appreciate). Again, we use Facebook Messenger for voice, but use Foundry VTT for the dice rolling etc. (we originally used Roll20 and it looks like the makers of WRFP4e are in talks with the folk behind this platform, so we may migrate back).

Both games are great, seat-of-your-pants fun as we avoid getting killed, maimed, driven insane or otherwise subjected to unpleasantness, whilst trying to solve whatever mystery and defeat whatever horrible fiend is laid before us by our erstwhile GMs (Sean and Ad respectively, who must both be congratulated on doing a fantastic job so far).

All this leads me to a question for you, dear follower. I have been publishing accounts of our Call of Cthulhu games on the members-only Yog-Sothoth forum (keeping notes is quite useful in our investigations). In an attempt to add some more semi-regular content on this blog, would you like me to copy these reports onto Tales of Frostgravery?

I’ve not been taking notes during out Warhammer Roleplay sessions, but I could always dredge my memory and write the occasional summary of them too. Again, would this be something you’d like to see?

Until next time, stay safe, follow your local guidelines and don’t book the 3:30 PM delivery slot!