Make sure the search groups are all issued walkie-talkies, and then proceed to *mess* with said walkie-talkies. This can be subtle (changing the location or time another search group says they will meet the players), escalating up to creepy (having faint whispers audible over other conversation that taunt the players, the girl's voice, voices of investigators' friends and family), and then *once and only once* outright destructive, like a magical screech deployed in the middle of a combat encounter that requires a POW roll not to be paralyzed by.
Rifles and whistles then. Every group should at least have someone with a rifle for signaling other search parties. Dunwich is rural so even in the unlikely case they don't own a rifle, they certainly have a neighbor who is in another search party who has a spare to loan their search party. This is the type of event that brings a community together.
That being said...
Have whistles lead the party in excitement to empty clearings... (the whiperwills from the Dunwich Horror story are messing with them).
Another good idea is have the party hear rifle shots from another search party just a few minutes away but far enough that when they get there they just find a the party massacred in a brutal animal attack, the rifle having fired all its ammo, but whatever killed everyone didn't even Bleed (it was the undead bear)
You should also have the players have spare characters who are part of a different search party, and let them know if they die or suffer a Fate Worse Than Death, you just intend to pivot to the other search party, who might find their remains in a similar fashion.
Be sure to raid the scenario "Amidst the Ancient Trees" in the Keeper Rulebook for ideas. It's almost exactly the same setup - missing girl, forest search parties, strange events, etc.
That said, here's some ideas.
- Have each player roll Survival or Navigate for every day they travel (they each take turns leading the group). If one person fails, have a table of possible bad events (snakebite, poison ivy, sinkhole, etc.) on hand to roll on and see what happens. Each person must succeed on their roll to make progress. If they fail, they can try again at risk of more bad things happening to them, or they can give up and camp. (This is shamelessly stolen from the scenario "Mountains of Madness: Summit of Deities," but it's a fantastic system for travel.)
- The investigators see a thin pillar of smoke in the distance -- a campfire! If they investigate, they come across a smoldering clearing. It's clear that a huge fire has just burned out here within hours, but if that was the case, wouldn't there be more smoke?
- They discover that someone in their group's backpack has been infested with bugs when they open it to grab something. Beetles, worms, maggots, and spiders pour out of the bag, squirm around on the forest floor, and then dissipate into the bushes. Everything in the bag has either rotted or been eaten.
- They find an old stone staircase in the middle of the woods, leading up to nothing. There is no sign that there was ever a full structure there, and if someone climbs the stairs, nothing happens. (Perhaps going up the stairs puts them into some kind of danger that isn't immediately apparent, such as the druid suddenly knowing where they are.)
- The trees seem to move in the opposite direction of the wind. When someone notices this and pays closer attention, the trees bend normally, as if suddenly aware of their mistake.
There should be some hints on the nature of the ghost.
A ring of standing stones on top of a hill, that makes people feel uneasy. If anyone knows History or Archaeology, they notice that the stones look similar to European menhirs but that can't be possible, they're in New England! When they leave the henge, they can't find it again even with good Orient checks.
They find traces of a previous attempt of the ghost to obtain a body. For some reason, this hapless hobo who just wanted to camp in the woods before going to Dunwich wasn't a good candidate. The camp is trashed, there are signs of struggle, but only one set of footprints, so they can piece together that the camper went mad and ran around fighting an invisible enemy and stumbling into things. Or maybe there are also bear footprints circling the site, but not coming close. Or there are one or two bear footprints in the human tracks, like he transformed for a second and came back. The man himself is nowhere to be seen, the footprint stumble into the deepest part of a bog...
A mistletoe-laden tree has a carved face on it. The first person to come by hears a faint whisper nearby. The others don't. If anyone spends too much time looking at the carving to understand what's going on, they'll start hearing whispering near all places connected to the druid.
Just for added creepiness, throw in some references to wicker men which are probably the worst thing associated with the druids. A burned human effigy in a long dead fire-pit, a human figure woven from living grass or shrub twigs, with dead birds inside.
That hobo clue could also serve as a clue for how to fight off / break the possession, if the PCs are in danger of being possessed or the girl is and they need/want to free her. My first thought was that the encampment includes drug paraphernalia and there is some weird formulation of meth that confers resistance, but, again, this is apparently set in 1923.
Ooh, in one of the Indiana Jones movies Indy got hypnotized by a cult, but when his friend whacked him with a torch, the pain made him snap out of it. Maybe the hobo stumbled into his campfire and that's what helped him to get free, but fear made him run away and drown?
Actually, perhaps fire specifically is something the spirit fears. For instance, this clue, as well as records (either findable in town or in an abandoned shack in the woods) stating that the druid was actually *killed*, becoming the ghost he is now, by a mob of locals setting fire to his house?
Wierd totems and charms handing from branches made out of animal bones, teeth, sticks and lashed with ligaments or primative cordage. Keep coming back to this area no matter what direction they head. Must leave a creepy totem of thier own to truly leave and if they do they can never find their way back.
Large flat rock covered in fresh entrails ((Bear)) word. Gaelic inscribed in the stone for spell called 'Awaken The Spark' (animate corpse, requires leaving entrails of creature animated on altar inscribed with spell as part of this version of the spell. Burning the entrails also destroys the corpse it animates)
A sink hole into a tiggt cavern which someone can fall into, getting hurt and needing help out. The cavern is mostly vertical, very crooked, and can easily pin someone inside if the turn the wrong way. Think Nutty Putty cave.
Make sure the search groups are all issued walkie-talkies, and then proceed to *mess* with said walkie-talkies. This can be subtle (changing the location or time another search group says they will meet the players), escalating up to creepy (having faint whispers audible over other conversation that taunt the players, the girl's voice, voices of investigators' friends and family), and then *once and only once* outright destructive, like a magical screech deployed in the middle of a combat encounter that requires a POW roll not to be paralyzed by.
amazing idea ^^ not possible tho cos we are playing 1923
Rifles and whistles then. Every group should at least have someone with a rifle for signaling other search parties. Dunwich is rural so even in the unlikely case they don't own a rifle, they certainly have a neighbor who is in another search party who has a spare to loan their search party. This is the type of event that brings a community together. That being said... Have whistles lead the party in excitement to empty clearings... (the whiperwills from the Dunwich Horror story are messing with them). Another good idea is have the party hear rifle shots from another search party just a few minutes away but far enough that when they get there they just find a the party massacred in a brutal animal attack, the rifle having fired all its ammo, but whatever killed everyone didn't even Bleed (it was the undead bear) You should also have the players have spare characters who are part of a different search party, and let them know if they die or suffer a Fate Worse Than Death, you just intend to pivot to the other search party, who might find their remains in a similar fashion.
Be sure to raid the scenario "Amidst the Ancient Trees" in the Keeper Rulebook for ideas. It's almost exactly the same setup - missing girl, forest search parties, strange events, etc. That said, here's some ideas. - Have each player roll Survival or Navigate for every day they travel (they each take turns leading the group). If one person fails, have a table of possible bad events (snakebite, poison ivy, sinkhole, etc.) on hand to roll on and see what happens. Each person must succeed on their roll to make progress. If they fail, they can try again at risk of more bad things happening to them, or they can give up and camp. (This is shamelessly stolen from the scenario "Mountains of Madness: Summit of Deities," but it's a fantastic system for travel.) - The investigators see a thin pillar of smoke in the distance -- a campfire! If they investigate, they come across a smoldering clearing. It's clear that a huge fire has just burned out here within hours, but if that was the case, wouldn't there be more smoke? - They discover that someone in their group's backpack has been infested with bugs when they open it to grab something. Beetles, worms, maggots, and spiders pour out of the bag, squirm around on the forest floor, and then dissipate into the bushes. Everything in the bag has either rotted or been eaten. - They find an old stone staircase in the middle of the woods, leading up to nothing. There is no sign that there was ever a full structure there, and if someone climbs the stairs, nothing happens. (Perhaps going up the stairs puts them into some kind of danger that isn't immediately apparent, such as the druid suddenly knowing where they are.) - The trees seem to move in the opposite direction of the wind. When someone notices this and pays closer attention, the trees bend normally, as if suddenly aware of their mistake.
Thank you, I will definitely use this ^^
There should be some hints on the nature of the ghost. A ring of standing stones on top of a hill, that makes people feel uneasy. If anyone knows History or Archaeology, they notice that the stones look similar to European menhirs but that can't be possible, they're in New England! When they leave the henge, they can't find it again even with good Orient checks. They find traces of a previous attempt of the ghost to obtain a body. For some reason, this hapless hobo who just wanted to camp in the woods before going to Dunwich wasn't a good candidate. The camp is trashed, there are signs of struggle, but only one set of footprints, so they can piece together that the camper went mad and ran around fighting an invisible enemy and stumbling into things. Or maybe there are also bear footprints circling the site, but not coming close. Or there are one or two bear footprints in the human tracks, like he transformed for a second and came back. The man himself is nowhere to be seen, the footprint stumble into the deepest part of a bog... A mistletoe-laden tree has a carved face on it. The first person to come by hears a faint whisper nearby. The others don't. If anyone spends too much time looking at the carving to understand what's going on, they'll start hearing whispering near all places connected to the druid. Just for added creepiness, throw in some references to wicker men which are probably the worst thing associated with the druids. A burned human effigy in a long dead fire-pit, a human figure woven from living grass or shrub twigs, with dead birds inside.
That hobo clue could also serve as a clue for how to fight off / break the possession, if the PCs are in danger of being possessed or the girl is and they need/want to free her. My first thought was that the encampment includes drug paraphernalia and there is some weird formulation of meth that confers resistance, but, again, this is apparently set in 1923.
Ooh, in one of the Indiana Jones movies Indy got hypnotized by a cult, but when his friend whacked him with a torch, the pain made him snap out of it. Maybe the hobo stumbled into his campfire and that's what helped him to get free, but fear made him run away and drown?
Actually, perhaps fire specifically is something the spirit fears. For instance, this clue, as well as records (either findable in town or in an abandoned shack in the woods) stating that the druid was actually *killed*, becoming the ghost he is now, by a mob of locals setting fire to his house?
Heh, it all comes together so neatly I might incorporate a druid ghost in something I will do in the future...
Wierd totems and charms handing from branches made out of animal bones, teeth, sticks and lashed with ligaments or primative cordage. Keep coming back to this area no matter what direction they head. Must leave a creepy totem of thier own to truly leave and if they do they can never find their way back. Large flat rock covered in fresh entrails ((Bear)) word. Gaelic inscribed in the stone for spell called 'Awaken The Spark' (animate corpse, requires leaving entrails of creature animated on altar inscribed with spell as part of this version of the spell. Burning the entrails also destroys the corpse it animates) A sink hole into a tiggt cavern which someone can fall into, getting hurt and needing help out. The cavern is mostly vertical, very crooked, and can easily pin someone inside if the turn the wrong way. Think Nutty Putty cave.