[Cryptworld] "Creepy Comic Conversion" Issue 4 Now Available

Halloween is right around the corner, so it's time to curl up in your coffin and curdle your blood with a new comic from the Creepy Comic Conversion series for Cryptworld!

I love horror comics, especially the long-forgotten ones that have entered the public domain. As a way to bring these amazing terror tales back to life, I’ve grabbed one at random and converted one of the stories as a mini-Cryptworld adventure. In this full-color 22-page zine, you first read the short comic story, then the back-half is that same tale now fleshed out and statted up for an evening’s gaming.

Presenting Issue 4 in the "Creepy Comic Conversion" series, this time featuring "The Thing in the Pool" from Tales of Horror Number 2 (1952):

In "The Thing in the Pool", four people have suspiciously disappeared without a trace from a recently constructed house at 55 County Road 810 in Loomis, Connecticut. Sebastian Corday, the architect of the home; George and Ann Winsor, the new residents there; and Keeto Murillo, the groundskeeper of the residence, were last seen at the house a week ago. The players are tasked with investigating the grounds and determining the fate of the victims, but where could they have vanished to?

Issue 4 of the "Creepy Comic Conversion" series is now available in PDF at Drive Through RPG! (Full-color print copies will be available very soon there too!)

[Review] The Great Escape By Zadorf Games - A Solo WWII Prison Escape Card Game

...an Allied soldier jumps out of a nearby hole, knocks dirt off his shoulder, looks around nervously, and then pulls you in close...

"Listen up, 'cause I ain't got much time. I just escaped from Stalag 12 and the guards'll be looking for me any second now. We prisoners trained for this day by playing The Great Escape by Zadorf Games. I suggest you grab a copy so you can be ready when it's your turn. Great, it sounds like they released the dogs. I gotta go!"

The Great Escape is based on the exploits of POWs during WWII as they escaped from enemy encampments and made their way across the countryside toward freedom. In this great solo card game, you're playing the role of Escape Officer, trying to help as many of Your Boys escape as you can. A lot to expect from 48 cards, but The Great Escape pulls it off nicely with clever 3-stage gameplay.

In the first stage, you're digging three tunnels from the barracks in three directions. The objective is to build at least one tunnel of 10 cards in length to go under the wire. The center of each card shows a tunnel schematic, either empty, propped up, or ventilated. Every third card must be propped up, and every fifth card must be ventilated. And the final card of the tunnel must be propped up. You deal cards one at a time building your tunnels trying to meet the building objectives. Meanwhile, cave-ins, guards, and spies hamper your efforts. You may end up with all tunnels caved in or discovered, and the game ends! If you can get at least one tunnel built, the game moves to stage 2...Escape!

All cards played thus far are swept aside and you play with the remainder of the deck. You begin dealing down, revealing prisoner after prisoner, each with their own set of escape tools, papers, and disguises. With each prisoner revealed, more are escaping the camp. When a Guard appears, the tunnel has been found and sealed! And stage 3 begins...Avoiding Capture!

The prisoners revealed are laid face-up in front of you. The remaining deck act as the guards who have now scattered across the countryside looking for the escapees. The bottom icon of the cards reveal the guard's actions for that turn. If there's a train, they're checking the train stations, so any prisoner holding a ticket is caught. Remove those and reveal a new guard. Compass? Any prisoners heading in that same direction are recaptured. Dogs? One random POW is brought back. A radio? Any spies in your group turn in THREE prisoners! When the deck is depleted, any prisoners left have managed to avoid the guards and escape! Count up your score, and try again.

The deck is half the size of a regular deck of cards, but there is a LOT of action and replay in this game. I like how the game is only just starting if you successful build a tunnel. And even then, there's no guarantee that you'll win! (All of my prisoners were recaptured and brought back to camp.) The game is extremely portable with tons of action, and will likely be one of my go-to travel games. The Great Escape by Zadorf Games is only £7.99 with FREE UK delivery; for the rest of the world, it's £10.99 (around $14). Go get a copy for yourself. We'll meet up on the other side of the fence. Good luck, soldier.

"Unskilled" Skill Attempts In Cryptworld/Timemaster/Rotworld

So you're playing Cryptworld (or Timemaster or Majus or Rotworld -- any of the Pacesetter-brand RPGs) and you want to perform an action you're unskilled at. For example, someone needs immediate surgery, but your character doesn't have the Medicine skill. Or the pilot is killed and you're the only one who can land the plane, but you don't have the Pilot skill. Well, the section on "Exclusive Skills" (CW rules, pg. 16) makes the consequences clear:

EXCLUSIVE SKILLS
Characters can use most weapons without having skills for those weapons; they just use their Dexterity or Unskilled Melee score as the base chance for success. Not all skills work this way; many cannot be used unless characters actually have the skill. Such skills are called exclusive. Characters without exclusive skills may never, under any circumstances, attempt to perform actions that require these skills.

Sounds pretty dire, doesn't it? So, in the examples above, the patient dies and the plane crashes. Even the original Pacesetter games have similar limits under the section "Unskilled Attempts to Perform Skills.". But that's kind of a hardline approach, and it's a rule I've had to work around in play.

"So none of us took the Pilot skill!?"

An "exclusive skill" simply means that the PC was never properly trained in that field. They didn't go to school, they have no training, and they've never practiced. But can they try it? Sure, but the odds will be incredibly stacked against them. Here are a few ways to approach it though:

METHOD 1: DOING A LOT OF MATH
In Chill 1e (page 14), they suggest calculating the skill base for the unskilled character, adding adjustments for skill levels, then dividing by 10 (rounding down) to give a percentage for the PC to fumble their way through it. So, for example, the History skill is calculated by PCN plus WPR divided by 2. So someone with a Specialist-level Skill with PCN of 60 and WPR of 70 would have a History skill of 80 (60+70/2=65, then +15 for Specialist level.) But for someone who is unskilled in History, the chance for that PC would be only 6. (60+70/2 = 65, then 65/10 = 6.5 or 6). So they'd have a 6% chance to recall something they may have heard on TV or in a classroom about the historical information at hand. Pretty rotten odds, but it beats "never, under any circumstances".

METHOD 2: USE ABILITY AND LUCK SCORES FOR MINOR ROLLS
I've used this system for non-life-threatening skills, such as Forgery, Investigation, Tracking -- something where there is no chance of injury in case of failure. For these I'll allow the PC to roll a check versus an appropriate Ability, so Forgery might use DEX, Investigation and Tracking might use PCN, etc. However, behind the screen, I would make a hidden roll versus that player's LUCK score. That roll would determine how well they fake their way through the unskilled task. So if they succeed their roll, but the LUCK roll is a failure, they may not realize that they still failed until it's too late. (The forgery is discovered to be fake; their investigation gives them incorrect info; they follow the tracks in the wrong direction.) If the LUCK roll is a success, I treat it as a specific check to determine just how well they succeed. The lower the roll, they better they did.

METHOD 3: USE A SKILL YOU HAVE IN PLACE OF A SKILL YOU DON'T HAVE
This is the system I use at home and at conventions. I stress to my players if they can JUSTIFY how one of their skills is appropriate to a situation, I’ll allow it. So instead of a Demolitions skill roll to cobble together some makeshift explosives, I’ve had a player use their Chemistry skill. Need to get past that keypad-locked door, but you don't have the Security Devices skill? No problem, as I've allowed players with the Computers skill or the Electronics skill use their abilities for that same situation. Heck, I’ve given accountants a chance to discover clues using Accounting, as they explained, "My highly analytic mind can find patterns where others may not see them." If the player can describe how their skill can be used in any situation -- as long as it makes sense in some way --I’ll allow the roll.

For your next game, don't be so hung up on the exclusivity of skills. Allow the players some leeway, and use one of the systems I've described to give them a chance to succeed. Otherwise, this may be the end result if someone doesn't take the Stunt Driving skill...

[Cryptworld] All "Creepy Comic Conversions" Now Available In Full Color Print

Greetings Boils and Ghouls! I wanted to let all of you Cryptworld Creeps know that the entire run of Creepy Comic Conversions for Cryptworld are now available in full-color print! That's right, you can get your hands on an actual hardcopy horror comic from the 1950s, then play that very adventure statted out for Pacesetter's Cryptworld horror RPG! Each issue is only $3.99 (or 99 cents if you want just the PDF).

Click the image below or this hyperlink to be taken to the full Creepy Cryptworld Catalog of Color Comic Carnage!