Call of Cthulhu: Madness In London Town - RPG review
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- čas přidán 19. 01. 2017
- Review and Game Master suggestions for the Call of Cthulhu scenario "Madness in London Town."
A pulpy race-against-time adventure set in 1920's London.
UPDATE: Goodman Games no longer sells their Age of Cthulhu line, which breaks my heart. If you're interested in picking this scenario up, you might check Ebay, Amazon, or other means for a used edition.
D&D: "its our starter set and will take somewhat over 6 sessions."
CoC Modules: "It's 254 pages, but you can play it in a single session"
Not with one of my groups, a call of cthulhu one-shot usually takes at least two 4 hour sessions or more. 😄
@@crax83 I mean super late but from what Seth has said his "single sessions" are usually like 8 hours lmao
Those are all good complaints, but there is another big one.
The wax museum doesn't have a bathroom.
You've got a point
Actually, thinking about it, it's a small museum near a lot of other touristy places, so they'd *probably* have public washrooms nearby.
That’s the source of the titular “Madness”.
Why would it have a bathroom? Do you expect people to bathe there? I find the lack of a water closet to be far more egregious.
The first time Jack the NPC gave a player’s perspective. Though Crack’d and Crook’d Manse defines his character, in my opinion, this is the one where he officially began chipping in.
I laughed out loud when Jack dropped the razor.
OoOooOh it cuuuut me
My players had done the Blackwater Creek scenario so I took your suggestion and had the milk found in Merriweather's house smell like it... they were so freaked out they burnt the house down
As they should have.
If the players don't burn a house down in a call of cthulhu scenario something is wrong. 😄
19:42 my characters reaction after losing only 1 SAN for seeing Cthulhu
Lmao I love the sanity montages for the weird old module sanity events. The other one in the review about the slug monster was great too
Suggestion for the cultists in the wax museum. You could have it that, knowing the PC's are investigating the case, the cultists came to burn the building and all evidence within to the ground. They already have a blowtorch, just give them some gasoline cans and some knives or clubs for weapons.
That's a great idea.
Seth Skorkowsky Thank you!
Also expanding on that awsome idea you could have it as the investigators are walking threw the museum they could at different points smell a strange smell and if one is a mechanic, driver etc they could recognize that this is the small of gasoline. This would add some excellent tension as the players would be incinerated if they even so much as drooped a cigarette and also would make the fight with the cultists more tense because if the players knock the blow torch out of the cultists hand they would all be incinerated.
I require Jack's stats, as he will be making frequent appearances in my campaign. :)
Jack's current incarnation (he's had many) is: STR:60, DEX:65, INT: 75, CON:68, APP 65, POW: 55, SIZ:65, EDU:70. Occupation - Detective. Pulp Archetype - Hard Boiled.
Depending on the specific adventure, I flip between either him or an older Gentleman named Steffan based off of the Duke de Richleau from The Devil Rides Out. I used the Gentleman for Madness in Londontown.
Fantastic, thanks!
when you said "stuffed animals" what came to mind was "plushies"
now I want to play a call of cthuthlu adventure set in a teddy bear factory
just a quick historical note, in 1920's Britain hand guns did require a licence to be bought but smooth bore weapons could be bought on the day with no need of any formal paperwork.
i don't know the system so I'm unsure if it replicated in the rules but when i intend to run the story i will make it clear that shot guns will be easy to obtain but at the same time difficult to carry on your person in cities without a damn fine explanation.
What is the classification of “smooth bore weapons?
@@grahamcarpenter691 Guns with no rifling. For practical, 1920s purposes you're mostly looking at shotguns.
I never get tired of Jack and his switchblade :)
I think I've commented on CZcams videos about 10 times during all the years of watching and I do use CZcams almost every day. But I feel I have to comment on your videos. You sir, make excellent videos and I find it odd that your uploads don't have more views. This is one of the absolute best rpg-channels on CZcams, thank you so much to making the stuff you do. //Swedish DM
Thank you very much. Glad you've been enjoying them.
I often lose sanity when I unexpectedly see myself in a mirror, and I almost lost a toe to dropping a razor. That's why I feel so much safer in this nice, comfy, padded cell.
I'm absolutely on love with Jack the NPC.
Thanks. I've had way too much fun playing him.
It's a shame that a company known for a "kick-the-door-in" game (DCC) couldn't shake that when writing. "We write hack and slash adventures! How hard can writing a Call of Cthulhu scenario be?"
The sanity check skit is hilarious.
"Why would he just give them a key to his apartment?" "The five foot squares mean he has a twenty-foot bed." Well, that answers that. Swinger, looking to party with the party, as it were. :)
Seems legit to me.
😊 enjoying the rewatching of your reviews .
I guess this is the first instance of Jack the NPC?
Good videos I have been watching alot of them while playing factorio.
Not the first (that was the original The Haunting review) but probably the oldest still out there
Nice that the publisher put Jack on the cover.
I don’t know if you noticed this or not but at least 10 (I’m not sure how many there were) Age of Cthulhu PDFs are available on the Paizo store.
Finally now I understand that it's sanity loss that's been afflicting me each time I see myself in the mirror! That makes so much more sense than "I'm getting old"!
I love your Call of Cthulhu adventure reviews.
One suggestion could be that the investigators find a black market where they can purchase illegal weapons and ammunition for inflated prices, but if they get caught, this will be a major offense in the eyes of the law.
I was a little disappointed at this scenario with the errors within. Tigers in the African section of the museum is just wrong. There were several errors in the geography of the scenario as well. The historical errors annoy me too. I love your referencing the Investigator Weapons Guide. Such a great book. Great to see Jack again, too. Your using him is genius imho. Have you ever thought about recording your game sessions and posting them? I do that.
Yeah, the module has several goofy errors I didn't even have time to get into. Mostly typos and the date on one of the clues was off. Tigers in Africa, I figure you can just say lions and keep the stats the same. I saw some complaints about geography but those didn't bother me. I mean... this is a world where there is a Miskatonic River, so it's similar to our world but not. Though, that map of London was just bad. Most of my real issues with it came down to how the handouts make no sense as to why the characters would find them interesting. I was real hesitant to run the adventure at first, but the good parts are great, so I figured they outweighed the negative side.
We discussed recording games before but decided against it. Mostly it's because we use game-time as the time we can all just cut loose and freely say horrible things, make awful jokes, and laugh at gaming farts. We devolve into a bunch of foul-mouthed teenagers and the presence of a camera would prevent the care-free time away from our families and real life.
Oh, my players do that too, even when being recorded.
I purchased this one at Origins or Gen Con one year but was disappointed enough at the lack of research or even their trying a little bit to get simple facts straight that it put me off their products altogether. And agreed about the handouts. I want to do as little work as possible when I use a purchased scenario as a whole at least.
I will say that their newest scenario "The Lost Expedition" is much better. I'd joined the Kickstarter for it and that was how I got "Madness in London Town" as an add-on. I have only one complaint with "Lost Expedition" so-far, but how well it plays next month will be the real test.
Sidenote: Seeing you (Seth) comment on a module you haven't played yet after watching the review of it is kind of surreal.
Idk, i think the Tigers I'm Africa thing is a Monty Python reference
"This is why i drink" - Jack in this video my favorite))
I'm starting to believe Jack is a different person! *Rolls Dice* Failed Sanity Check!
Yep failed that roll too.
Perfect! Thanks so much Seth! (and Jack!) I can do a lot with many parts of this module.
Another way to justify the key? Witlow meets the PCs at the airport/train station/port and takes them to his (large) townhouse/suburban London home first thing in the morning, where they will be staying while visiting him in England, but has to go straight to setting up the party after promising to show them the great city of London the next day
Also a way to give them the key to the wax museum. Have Scotland Yard give the PCs his keys since he has no next of kin and his boss assures them the PCs are his closest friends and the key to the Wax Museum is the only key that can't find a use for at his home (other than the office key his boss takes back). Wondering what the 1 key on his ring is can be another route to finding Zephram's flyer interesting
The key to the museum and the ads: they could be in an envelope marked "Sephrams", in the writing of the person investigating. Makes it seem more like a thing to look at.
You are an A CLASS role player. Props
"I don't know. This is why I drink." - Jack, everyman.
I ran this adventure, and our players had a blast with it. We used regular Cthulhu rules and that Dark Young was brutal- fortunately, my investigators were pretty good at running away, and they managed to escape the thing, except for one guy who was trapped in the car. I think we only lost one investigator during the adventure though.
19:28 someone threw a baloon at me and i jumped out of my seat. didnt see it coming, it spooked me. these seem perfectly reasonable
Thank you.
"This is why I drink"
Hey man, I really like your videos! They're very helpful! What would you say are the best CoC campaigns? I've been wanting to start DMing Call of Cthulhu but been unsure on where to start, any help would be appreciated.
Thank you very much. There are a lot of legendary scenarios I have but haven't tried yet, but from my experience, if you're a new GM to CoC, I'd start with The Hunting, Edge of Darkness, or Dead Light. While I haven't run any of them yet, the first scenario in Doors to Darkness "The Darkness Beneath the Hill" looks pretty solid. It's on my shortlist of adventures to try soon. Out of all of them, I'd start with The Haunting.
I plan to run The Darkness Beneath the Hill as it takes place in Providence!
Is that the chtulhu wars models for the stonehenge finale?
Have you attempted the Christmas call of Cthulhu adventures on chaosium? I picked them up for the holidays and haven't been able to decide on one of them.
It sounds like it was raining whilst you recorded this
"This is why I drink"
I hear ya, Jacky boy.
It's shocking that modern games still do not have player maps in them.
Revisiting this again, as I have a new group interested in playing a CoC module and I really enjoy this one, so wanted to grab Seth's tips & tricks. (when a source is this good, ya use it! heh.)
Just thought it a fun mention to note, that looking at the detailed map of Stonehenge for this (t.s. 3:06), the outline bears an eerie familiarity to one of the depictions of Nyarlathotep! (i.e. the one found in the S. Petersen Field Guide). Sure, one needs to let their imagination go a bit wild but it did stick out to me at least enough for a double check, heh heh.
If someone wants to use that detailed map for a Nyarlathotep scenario, well, could it perhaps work ? Just a thought.... :)
I wonder if this would work as a "dimension jumping" adventure for my D&D campaign, since it's low on guns anyways...
Late, I know, but you're the DM, you can literally do anything...
Hey Seth, I notice you mention quite a few Pulp of Cthulhu adjustments to a few of your campaigns. When do you feel this is necessary? After DMing Scritch Scratch yesterday for Free RPG day, I got a feeling that player death is just too easy too often and I'd hate to get into CoC seriously only for my PCs from my friends to die all the time
Question is pulp Cthulhu a stand alone set of rules or do you need the 7th edition core books?
You will need the 7th Edition Keeper's Guide.
Fantastic, keep up the good work! Listened to your interview on MUP, and enjoying going through your back catalog. I've got a small podcast if you're ever interested. Take care, stay safe, watch out for shoggoths.
Hollywood Superstar, Shub-Niggurath! Wait that’s not how the song goes! XD lols.
its England, thugs tend to be bar brawling types in media using knives and blunt instruments so i think they would be sufficiently armed
were can you get maps blown up ? 3:06 im running curse of strahd and i think that could save me some time for the castle map
How did that work for you? Running CoS soon myself
I find this happens a lot especially with amateur adventure path writers where there's a very specific way to do something I find that rarely works you have to write each scenario as a sandbox because you have no idea how players are going to approach it especially for obvious shit like back doors
On the wax Museum. Couldn't you just have the cultist wait as the PCs go into the front rooms and then return, ambush them at that point? I would figure the PCs would exit out the way they came in, and if not, oh well. Maybe the cultist could follow them from the museum and ambush them later. I really need to read this one. Great channel btw, love your videos.
19:23 is the second time your videos have made me laugh
Best review channel on YT imo
How easily could this be converted to a different city? I’m looking to run a campaign in New York City.
"This is why I drink" haha!!
With all the mundane stuff causing sanity loss (I remember that from another one of your videos, chronologically after this one I suppose), is it safe to assume that by definition PCs are so insane that seeing normal stuff gives them "insanity" in the way it technically gives them back sanity (only they'd call it insanity because they are insane but in denial)? Hope that makes any sense.
Module is THICC!
I liked 'player Seth'. He made me laugh...and now I want him in more module reviews. :)
Oh there will be more. Don't worry :-)
Hey Seth, which did you run first between Madness and Blackwater Creek?
Blackwater we did first. That was followed by several more adventures before we made it to Madness.
@@SSkorkowsky Thanks for the reply! Love your videos man!
P.S. Jack is Awesome
When you're playing Pulp Cthulhu, I think you ought to disregard the weapon guide. Can you imagine the Mummy (1999) if Brendan Fraser wouldn't have had his guns? Pulp isn't just two fisted action, it's also not worrying about the details too much.
True, but pulp also fits the idea of black market shopping. Or an organization they work for could pull strings to get you fire arms. This allows interesting storytelling as once you break free from a larger group, say Cadusius during the Two Headed Surpent, you now lose your access to fire arms in areas that wouldn't normally allow them, forcing players to either smuggle them in themselves or find them on the black market.
IMO basic uneasiness and simple scares shouldn't cause sanity damage. At BEST you can make sanity checks to see if it spooks the player, but not deal damage. The rules even state that failing sanity checks always cause some visceral reaction. That mirror and Razor blade causing sanity damage is silly (The ONLY explanation is if the entire building is causing your sanity to slip... but I doubt that is the explanation)
Its just supposed to replicate actors and actresses on screen when stuff like that happens in movies and they’re always so shocked. That and probably whatever CoC tournament thing happened in the past, because this feels like something designed to run in a couple hours and be a one shot.
My everquest servers are locked so chain watching these videos, I really want to play Call of Cthulhu
The map looks like a stained glass window xD Yeah it kinda does, but any old European city, that has any self respect, looks like that when looking its map....
Found a review of the game from 2009 which echoes many of the comments you made, and adds a few more.
gamerati.com/madness-in-london-town/
There are no classes in Cthulhu!
Yeah... misspoke. Should have said professions. Blame it on years of D&D screwing with my vocabulary. I think most CoC players will understand the meaning, which is that character profession doesn't matter for the adventure. A large number of modules require that the PCs are detectives, journalists, or academics and not just Average Joes.
I like jack but he should die and then come back somehow.
Goodness how sick were you when you did this? Your voice sounds so hoarse (or is this just how extra gruff you made Jack the NPC?)
It is good to know that in England everybody respects the law and nobody sells weapons illegally.
God, are ALL the scenarios by this Indy publisher this bad!?
Thankfully not. We have listened to our customers and work hard to get the details and the feel right. I would like to think that you would find the more recent scenarios much improved.
RE gun comments in 1920's gun laws where liberal so having a gun is not unusual see Peaky blinders its only after 1936 that they got at strict
Are you thinking of the US GCA of 1936? The UK firearms act was in 1920, but as others have pointed out, it did not affect smoothbores.
@@kevingooley9628 well 1920 quite lax an upper class white character would have no trouble "pass me the Thompson Bunter" yus milord :-)
Madness in London town has a 40 minute comerial. This is stupid Please see if you can change this otherwise I will NOT watch your U_TUBE
Dunno why it's doing that. Settings show as only "Skipable" ads.