MACE 2016 Cults of Chaos GM Message

I sent this out to those that sign up for the Call of Cthulhu 7e Cults of Chaos games….

Hello.

Your friendly neighborhood Call of Cthulhu GM emailing you 🙂  I am emailing you because you signed up for my game. First off, Thanks Very much. I really look forward to it. I am reading the adventure now and it looks fun. Different but fun.

I wanted to introduce myself but also find out how many of you knew what you were signing up for. A Time to Harvest is a organized play series made by Chaosium that I have volunteered to run and promote. The sole purpose of this organized play, at least in my opinion, is to get people playing the new Call of Cthulhu 7th edition, which I love to death. It is a great new system that is 100% backwards compatible to the old system. If you played the old system, this new system will be REALLY easy for you. If you have not, no big deal. It is still easy and very fun.

If you don’t know what “organized play” is, it is no big deal. It just means you can take a character, play in this episode at MACE and maybe play in the next episode at MACE West (or some other con), developing your own character along the way.

It is important to know that A Time to Harvest Episode1 and 2 are a series. Part one is being run Friday night, Part 2 is Sat afternoon. If you did not or could not sign up for Part 1, that’s fine, we will roll with it. However, there will be references to E1 during E2 that you might not totally understand. If I can find another GM to run E1, I will let you know. However, the link is only mild and I think you can still play in E2 without actually experiencing E1. We’ll make it work.

For those familiar with organized play like PFS or D&D AL, this is not like those in a lot of ways. The Keepers of Cults of Chaos are not compelled to make sure the players have the same experience no matter what table they are at. At least, that’s the way I feel. All I am worried about is making sure you have a good time playing Call of Cthulhu 7e. There are certain plot elements that I have to make sure happen but outside of that, it’s your game.

But there is one similarity I want to try to help you with and that is characters. In organized play, they prefer you bring your own character. I will try to have some pre-gens prepared but it would be a better experience if you brought your own.

In that effort there are two links I want to pass on to you to help you in that vein. Here are a series of generic characters available on Chaosium’s web site…

http://www.chaosium.com/gm-resources/

Go to Pre-Generated Characters. These will need some fleshing out, however. These only have stats and skills.  Additionally, to help you along that path, there is the quick start rules to create characters and play the game

http://www.chaosium.com/free-quick-start-pdf/

These two resources should get you started making your character for this campaign. This campaign has specific guidelines about the type of character and they are…

The investigators should ideally be students or post-graduate students at Miskatonic University. Miskatonic’s academic body comprises the following departments:

Administration

College of Languages, Literature, and the Arts

College of Sciences

College of Medicine

College of Law and Business

For A Time To Harvest, the investigators should be drawn from either the College of Languages, Literature, and Arts, or from the College of Sciences; however, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that housemates or friends studying medicine or law might be drawn into the campaign in the opening stages, or be called upon to become replacement investigators perhaps later on. The two colleges consist of the following schools; investigators could belong to any of these, although particular focus should be given to Human Conduct (Anthropology), Rhetoric (English), Applied Sciences (Metallurgy), and Natural Sciences (Geology).

The College of Language, Literature, and the Arts houses five schools: Antiquities (Classics, Archaeology), Arts
(Fine, Music), Human Conduct (Anthropology, Geography, History), Rhetoric (Classical and Modern Languages, English), and Natural and Revealed Religion (Philosophy, Religion).

The College of Sciences houses four schools: Applied Sciences (Engineering, Metallurgy), Natural Sciences (Biology, Geology), Physical Sciences (Chemistry, Physics), and Mathematics

Email me if you have any questions. These adventures are very involved for a GM (a lot of read) and between this, organizing MACE, and real life, It would be a big help to me if you had a character ready. This way, you are a little more invested in the game. I have never done organized play or anything like it, but I love Call of Cthulhu and I want to make sure you have a good time.

Thanks for your time

Ron McClung
MACE 2016
Cults of Chaos GM