The Rain in The Cyclopean City: An H.P. Lovecraft/Cthulu Mythos Roleplay.

[Haydrian Cindel]

April 6, 1925
Dear Recipient

Light fog and soft misty rainfall greet most travelers in Arkham these days. The city inhabitant's seem unaware of the strangely out of season weather, going about their daily routines with out so much as a shrug towards the sky, smiling and waving to each other cheerily. After all, what's a little rain in a city like Arkham? Most locals learned to ignore strange happenings a long time ago. What happens in the shadows, usually stays in the shadows, and it isn't wise to make room for those shadows.
Of course there are those who feel a bit differently about the strange happenings in Arkham. People who live in rundown apartments with oddly angled roofs and doorways, older folk who live on the outskirts of town and mutter about fish faced people, never going out on clear nights, and corpses that don't stay dead, lunatics locked up in the Asylum's who gibber and moan about strange dreams, dreams of ancient gods and dreams of previous and future lives spent soaring in outer space, and Old Jeremy. Old Jeremy who used to talk about a map his uncle left him, along with a letter that contained all sorts of madness. Old Jeremy who always used to talk about the day he'd figure out what city the ancient map was of, and he'd finally set off to find out what had become of his uncle. Old Jeremy who ran out of his rickety shack in the middle of town jumping and shouting with glee, claiming he'd found the city! Old Jeremy who left home two years, three months, and five days ago... and hasn't been heard from since. Old Jeremy who wasn't around when the rain came, nearly a year after he left.
Folks have turned it into a joke, "The rain'll stop when Old Jeremy comes a crawlin back from his crazy adventure half starved, and crazier than when he left." They then slap each other on the back, and chuckle, somehow reassured that the rain really isn't all that strange, Old Jeremy really was crazy, and Arkham isn't any different from the rest of the world after all. But it is.

Apologies for the bizarre introduction, I find my mind wanders these days. Ever since Jeremy disappeared things have gotten worse. More of the shadowy visitors have been knocking on his door, though I never answer it. I'm a house sitter after all, not his butler. Oh, of course I haven't introduced myself. Again, apologies, sometimes I get distracted what with... the whispers… you know the ones, the ones you swear are coming from inside the shadows in certain corners of a room even though there's nothing there? Just the wind, most people say, and well normally I say.
It's just being alone in this old house I think. Has me on edge. Ah what a mess! I've just reread everything I've wrote and decided I'll have to rewrite the whole thing. Don't know why I'm still scribbling on this paper anyway. It's all these strange things that have been happening, especially the rain. I swear there's something not right about that rain, though it could just be that I'm missing the sunlight. Plenty of that outside of Arkham, which is one reason I'm so loath that I have to stay here and mind this house for Jeremy. Honestly, did he truly need to pawn his problems off on me? I'm fed up with all the strange things going on here, and no one willing to talk about them! I swear if one more

No time to explain! The visitors came again, broke the door down, beat me something horrible! I'm off to purchase a weapon or two for when they come back and to send this letter off! No time to rewrite it! My name is Harry Everfield, a friend of Jeremy Stockhold. I'm watching his home for him and I'm worried something horrible has happened to him! I checked his address book and found a list containing names of people he wished me to send for should I ever have reason to believe he may be in dire trouble. Well I surely do. Please make your way to Arkham city, 1111 South Curlew Drive with all haste! I don't know how much time Jeremy has left.

I don't even know how much time I have left...

Regards

Harry Everfield, House Sitter

*********

Hello everyone! I am a huge fan of all things H.P. Lovecraft, and as is the norm, the Cthulhu Mythos is my preferred home amongst his creations. That said while this roleplay will take place within that Mythos we will be honoring Lovecraft's wishes and adding our own ideas and flair to his mysterious world.

Our roleplay will take place in the late 1920's, to early 1930's though we will avoid the years of World War 2 as that would hinder some of my plans for the roleplay. Player characters may begin wherever in the world they would like, with a few stipulations. They will all be recipients of the above letter, must all speak good English, and be at least moderately inclined to actually travel to Arkham and discover what has become of Jeremy. Characters May Not have powerful motivations that would prevent them from pursuing the main story of this roleplay, nor may they be the type that will cause significant trouble for other player characters. This roleplay will require a decent amount of team work as it will be a detective type story with a Lovecraft twist.
That said you can have troublesome characters such as gangsters, cheats, murderers etc. etc. as long as their personalities are such that they will act like normal human beings majority of the time. Your intelligent, you know what I'm trying to say.

Characters may be of any profession, and have almost any level of knowledge in any field, save that they may not have had any 1st person encounters with the supernatural up to this point.

Any who I think that covers the basics! Lemme know if your interested, and feel free to type up a character sheet for me to go over. I'd like to get this rolling soon!

Also feel free to PM me any questions, I would love to get ahold of someone interested in being a Co-GM, and post potential CS here for now..

[Roland]

@Haydrian Cindel Hello! I'd be interested in this, but I will try to write the sheet a bit later this weekend.

[Gurren1]

Oh yes definitely interested in this! I was actually wanting to make a Lovecraftian RP for my arrival back on the site, but I see you beat me to that! Anyways, count me in!

[Haydrian Cindel]

Ferd will be my character joining this adventure, you can use this as an example character sheet for the sort of information I want to know, but you can add more info if you would like.

Character Sheet

Name: Ferd Smith

Age: 35

Occupation: Former Military Intelligence Officer, Currently Unemployed but claims to be a "Private Investigator currently studying the complex tendencies of certain unnatural occurrences."

Interests: Survival Prepping, Stamp Collecting, Supernatural Occurences, and Astronomy

Fears and Phobias: Ferd is terrified of never finding the answers he's looking for, and has a phobia of mailmen. He swears it's a real phobia, and can't be categorized as a social phobia since only postmen ever trigger this fear.

Superstitions: Ferd believes in nearly every superstition he's ever heard. In his opinion he's seen plenty of proof to back them up.

Skills: Well versed in Judo, Kung-Fu, American Boxing, Gunplay, Lockpicking, Persuasion, Impersonation, general Deception, Sneaking, German, Russian, Polish, Spanish, Mandarin, Latin, Hieroglyph's, and Tax Evasion. No really. He hasn't paid taxes in ten years. Says it's all some sort of conspiracy.

Intelligence/Sanity: Ferd is a very intelligent and surprisingly sane person... Well, for the most part. He got perfect scores all through out his schooling and received high praises for his work in the military before his discharge. However he has reason to question the reality he thought he knew. His sanity is solid and reliable, even in the midst of supernatural events, though people around him would likely be dubious concerning this fact. He makes no effort to hide his fascination with the supernatural, causing his sanity to seem questionable at best.

Backstory

Ferd Smith was born in Boston Massachusetts to normal parents. He lived a fairly normal life for the majority of his child hood. In fact nothing particularly strange took place in Ferd's life until his third year serving as a Military Intelligence officer, and his 6th year in the military itself. The year was 1919 and he was 29. He was on an undercover assignment in Germany, keeping an eye on things as was the governments policy since the Great War. For Ferd this was an average assignment, and he didn't expect anything out of the ordinary. Things had been quite in the Prussian state for years now, with the only notable occurrence being the birth of a new political party calling themselves the Nazis. The end of the war had left them in a tight spot financially and socially so they weren't exactly in a position to be causing any trouble. Ferd was fairly certain he was wasting his time in Germany, which irked him greatly. He was far more concerned about the rebellion in Russia. That communist party just rubbed him the wrong way.

Ferd spent his days fairly leisurely. He would lend a hand in welfare relief efforts from time to time, and of course he never slacked off on his regular duties, but since there wasn't much to investigate he found that he had a lot of time on his hands. It wasn't long before he found himself sitting in pubs, conversing with elderly locals. He found them charming, and strangely relatable. Especially one group of elderly men who he met in an old town outside of Frankfurt. They called themselves the "Dumm Opa's", or Silly Geezers. Ferd loved these old men dearly. They would discuss all current events as only the elderly can, full of satire and sarcasm. He spent many happy hours with these men, but not as many as he should have liked. It all ended rather suddenly one day. One of the men who was named Shultz didn't come to the pub one evening. The others didn't seem very concerned, but Ferd couldn't help but wonder where the old fellow was. It wasn't like Shultz to miss an evening at the pub.

He began questioning the others about Shultz's absence, but they laughed him off and told him to have another drink. Ferd was confused, they didn't seem themselves. He noticed shaky hands, and darting glances. He tried to follow these glances but couldn't understand what they were looking at. The ceiling?

Ferd never saw Shultz again, and after than night the rest of the Dumm Opa's disappeared as well. Ferd put off all of his official duties to investigate their disappearance, but found himself blocked at every turn. Family and friends claimed never to have known them, public records made no mention of them, and things like bank accounts had disappeared along with them. Only two things remained to even hint at their existence. Ferd's memory of them, and their empty homes. Homes that no one bought, looked at, or even seemed to realize existed. Ferd once dragged a random passerby into one of these homes and yelled at him to acknowledge it's existence. The man just stared at Ferd with blank fear. It finally sank in for Ferd then. The man was serious. He didn't see a house, and the world had no recollection of the existence of the old men. Only he remembered. But why him? So many questions.

Ferd was discharged from his duties on account of his seemingly fragile state of mind shortly there after. He didn't care. He knew he was sane, and he knew what he'd seen. More than that he knew what he needed to do. He needed to see the supernatural with his own eyes. Someone needed to come to understand the strange things in the world, so that some day maybe someone could save the next group of Dumm Opa's...

[Haydrian Cindel]

@Gurren1 Awesome! Glad to have you! I just got the example CS up, so go ahead and post your CS hear when it's done.

[Haydrian Cindel]

Oh also, I'd love to know everyone's familiarity with both Lovecraft in general, and the Cthulu Mythos. You don't need to know much to play this roleplay, but it'll help me in creating atmosphere, dropping hints, and the like.

[Haydrian Cindel]

Also I'm planning to wait 1 to 2 more days before starting the OC and IC, to give more people a chance to join. I'd like 1 or 2 more at least, but I'm not opposed to going with the three of us.

[Gurren1]

@Haydrian Cindel I definitely will get one up! As for familiarity I have read most of the original work and was playing Arkham Horror the Card Game with some friends for awhile. I would say my knowledge in the lore is good enough to get a reference.

[Roland]

Still a bit WIP

Name: James Daniel Anderson

Age: 27

Occupation: Weird and speculative fiction author, part-time journalist

Description: A man of average height, brown, straight and short hair. Build otherwise like a runner.

Interests: History, hiking, running, boxing, the occult and arcane events, folklore, archaeology, jazz.

Fears and Phobias: Drowning, burning to death, number thirteen, blank pages, artillery barrages.

Superstitions: James believes that cats bring bad luck and nightmares if they are near him at nighttime.

Skills: Speaks Swedish and English. Excellent eye-hand coordination for playing darts and throwing other small objects. Keen imagination and curiosity. Boxing, a clear outfighter with long arms and small arms training from the military, mainly rifles, pistols, revolvers and knives. Outdoor survival and navigation.

Intelligence/Sanity: James has been said to be a decently smart man. He has a keen mind and imagination, but he might jump into the more... imaginary conclusions than most. When a hunter sees foot prints and declares they're deer's prints, James might say they're unicorn's, and start formulating a story in his mind.

Backstory:

Born in 1898 on a well-to-do farm near the town of Wake Springs, Maine. Wake Springs is a small town of no great importance, and you would have great trouble find it on regular maps of the day. His parents were a Swedish speaking Finn and an Irish-American woman of local descent. James was named after Joanna's grandfather.

His father, Emil Anderson was a Evangelical Lutheran from a small Ostrobothnian fishing village, while his mother was a Catholic Irish-American Joanna O'Connor. As a child James read voraciously of anything he got his hands on, from farmers' almanacs, newspapers and fairy tale books and adventure novels he loaned from other locals or bought for his parents whenever he could spare a minute from farm work.

His father died at the age of barely thirty-five after his heart failed. Emil had been diagnosed with heart problems a couple years before by a local doctor, but he could ill-afford medical treatments or medication. By his mid-thirties, Emil's farm had suffered from drought, and his financial problems mounted with new loans from local banks and the farm was sold to cover most of the loans. Joanna had worked as a seamstress at a local clothing shop, but after the farm's auction she moved with the now teen-aged James to her aunt's apartment in Brooklyn, New York City. The trio shared a small but cozy apartment.

James did well at school, but never excelled. His teachers often said his mind wandered somewhere else, and he was bullied by other kids for his curious interests and topics. He was mostly introverted and enjoyed his own company, often writing short stories and essays. For example, one of his early characters included a cowboy named Dutch McAllen, the brave and formidable sheriff of County Galloway, Texas. When attending the City College, James wrote serial stories for the students' newspaper. His most popular story was The McAllen's Last Duel at Noon!, which was published in four parts over the autumn semester.

While attending college, James' life took a change. The United States was gearing towards joining the Allies for the European Great War, and many young people were either joining or otherwise being employed by the industry for the war effort. James joined the United States Army and was shipped to Europe in the middle of 1918, taking briefly part in the Hundred Days and Meuse-Argonne campaigns against the Germans during the autumn of 1918. After the Armistice, James was shipped back to the United States and he continued writing new short stories. A tragedy hit him shortly after the Armistice, when his mother died of the Spanish Flu.

Now in his twenties, James created a few new characters, fantastic locales and wondrous beasts and sold his stories to newspapers, short story collections and cheap pulp magazine, earning a decent living. He utilized his war experiences in many stories, like The Tales of the Messengers Cody and Barks and The Mummy Strikes Back!. James has usually added fantastic or horror elements into his stories. He finished bachelor's degree in English by 1921. James also started to work as a part-time journalist, usually writing book reviews and interviews on other authors.

James met Jeremy through a publishing agent. The agent knew that James had an interest for the mysteries, occult happenings and arcane trivia, as he often used those in many stories. Jeremy, apparently had knowledge of a lost city hidden somewhere in the world's oceans or something. James had heard of similar legends of Atlantis and desert city of Iram o' Pillars during college classes on folklore and ancient mythology. James spent an evening interviewing and chatting with Jeremy, and they shared their addresses for future correspondence. They would exchange letter every few months, until Jeremy vanished and James was sent a letter by his house sitter.

Interested in the case for using it in future stories and finding out what has happened to Jeremy, James has decided to keep a diary on his findings.

[Haydrian Cindel]

Just realized I still haven't told ya'll what year I decided this is taking place in, my bad! The year will be 1925.
@Roland Your character is looking good! I think he and Ferd are going to get along, possibly a little to well for a normal persons tastes. And it's fine that it's still a bit of a work in progress, I just did some minor editing on Feeds page as well. I know I didn't ask for you to include this in the CS, but have you decided what sort of connection James will have had to Jeremy? Ferd is going to have met him during travels. Being intrigued by Jeremies story he left him his card and told him to call if he ever found the place.

[Gurren1]

My Character WIP

Name: Ambrose Tull

Age: 38

Occupation: Former Boxer

Interests: Reading, exploration, Native American Moundbuilders, football, conservation

Fears and Phobias: Being forgotten and the fear of the open ocean

Superstitions: Before every boxing match Tull would kiss the back of his ingrained pocket watch for good luck

Skills: Formiddable boxer and strong man, an expert in ancient moundbuilder cultures

Intelligence/Sanity: Tull went to a prestigious University in the south where he graduated in the middle of the pack. However, his immense interest in the moundbuilder societies kept him interested in academia. His intelligence is that of a well-rounded individual with some niche interest. As for sanity, Tull has a stubborn personality and would step up to most problems but like most humans that have only touched the paranormal his sanity would break at monstrous horrors.

Backstory: Ambrose Tull grew up in a moderately wealthy home just outside of Nashville, TN. His father was a well-respected teacher around the community and expected great things out of the young Tull. When Ambrose came of age he went to the prestigious Greene University in Nashville where he played Football and made a lackluster attempt at studying. During his early years time at Greene, he became a star linebacker for the team and earned his nickname of "Titan Tull". However, this stardom would come to a crashing end when he fractured both of his legs ending his football career during junior year. During this rather unhappy time in the young man's life, he was introduced to Professor William Leggers, an archaeologist, who lead Tull down a path of strange curiosity for the mounds built by ancient civilizations that dotted the south. His senior year was filled with adventures with Prof. Leggers to these mounds all around the area studying and excavating their secrets.

One of these sites known to the locals as Ayi'ig mound in rural Mississippi caught the attention of Leggers to an almost fanatic fascination. Ambrose accompanied him two times to the mound. During the second visit, a strange statue no more than 2 inches tall carved from a fantastic purple stone which Ambrose had never seen since. This statue seemed to take a hold of the professor and on the trip back was the only thing he could talk about. After this trip, Ambrose saw his beloved professor once more in his office talking to a man who went by the name of Jeremy. The two were talking about nonsense and Ambrose excused himself after a few minutes of this odd conversation, not knowing that the next day Leggers had left town suddenly with no trace. Ambrose was dishearted by the event but could do nothing as others around him seemed indifferent about the whole event. This did not stop Tull from always keeping the strange man named Jeremy in his head. Something in the young man knew that he had something to do with the disappearance.

After graduation, Ambrose decided to use his size for sport and that was boxing. He was gifted in this combat form and quickly rose through the ranks winning match after match and selling out venues so spectators could see the 'Titan Tull". In his most famous match he fought against Levi “The Knocker” Bricks heavyweight champion of the Southern Boxing Association. In this match that lasted just 10 seconds Ambrose knocked out the champion with one thundering punch. This propelled him to minor stardom in the boxing community and left him to train even harder to impress more people. However, in his free time, he still studied the mounds around the south fixated on finding more of these purple statues to see what Leggers saw in it and with his newfound fortune mounted excavation of many of these mounds. Sadly, years passed and with no signs of the statues and three loses in a row he retired from both of his interests and settled down with his wife in Albany, NY. Ambrose thought his days of exploration and adrenaline were over, now he needed to start a family after all he was nearing 40. But his curiosity about what happened to his old professor never left him and when one day a letter came in the mail Ambrose knew he had to get his answers. In his heart something told the old boxer that Jeremy was to tell him about Leggers and immediately started preparing for the journey to Arkham.

Here is my character I hope my tie in with Jeremy is good with you but if not I change it. Might change somethings.

[thegreenleafe]

I'm interested! I'll be typing something up.

[Haydrian Cindel]

@Gurren1 Looks excellent so far, lemme know what/if you decide to make any changes. You tie in to Jeremy is fine as well, in it could be fun to work Leggers into the story somehow if your interested.
@thegreenleafe Awesome! Glad to have you, let me know if you have any questions.

Since we have 4 of us now, I'll get the OC and IC pages up within the next few hours, along with my initial post so we can get rolling. @Gurren1 and @Roland go ahead post your CS on the OC. You can update them their when/if you decide to edit them at all. @thegreenleafe Post your CS here first so I can go over it, then after i make sure it's good to go you can send it over to the OC.

Also I don't y'all to feel rushed if you prefer to iron out your CS a bit more before making a first post, that's fine, I just want to get the initial post up 1 cuz I'm excited and 2 so I can start setting in game atmosphere and what not.

[thegreenleafe]

Let me know what you think @Haydrian Cindel

Valentino Ricci

Name: Valentino "Val" Ricci

Age: 26

Occupation: Bootlegger

Interests: Fast cars, baseball, reading

Fears and Phobias: Drowning never sat well with Valentino, despite the fact he has on the giving end of that situation a handful of times. The first time Valentino killed a man he was forced to hold the man's soon-to-be-deceased head under water. Just the struggling before finally collapsing still sent shivers down his spine.

Superstitions: Val will knock on wood to prevent bad luck, as well as the occasional sign of the cross for more dire situations. The quick hand of his mamma also instilled an unhealthy fear to not spill olive oil.

Skills: Pistols, amateur fighting, Italian, driving, charisma

Intelligence and Sanity: Val never did make his way Chicago university, not that he doesn't have the brains, he just never was cut out for school. The lack of book smarts is made up by street smarts. Val is not the kind of man to break under pressure, however some of his past deeds are pushed down deep, searching for a way out.

Back Story: Chicago born and bred Valentino was the only son of Salvatore Ricci, one of the Caporegime, the captains, of the Chicago mob. He was a strict man and a loving father, however when it came time to choose Salvatore put his other family first.Despite many broken promises Val still loved his father and from a young age to the current day he would do anything just to gain approval. This pushed Valentino into a life on the other end of the law. It really started with the trouble in school, which slowly increased to petty vandalism and finally to a full time job running bootleg alcohol from Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.

Bootlegging is something near and dear to Val. The thrill of it all, pumped by each beat of heart gives him something he can't find anywhere else and its lucrative. Being in your 20's with a pocket full of cash makes you spend money like a fool and for the right car Val would spend a fortune. Luckily, one of the perks of being associated with gangsters was that they might be able to pick one up off the docks for a fraction of the price. However this lifestyle does have drawbacks. It was years ago, but Val can still remember it clearly.O ne of his father's men was seen talking to the police and any form of crime, organized or not generally does not look kindly on rats. Val still doesn't know why his father chose him to do it, maybe he needed to show dedication or possibly just prove he was a man, yet he still had to do it. It shook him to the core, but he soldiered on. Val has killed many men, but nothing was as haunting as the first.

As the years went on Val continued to make himself useful to his father and those above him. Things were good in his life until his father came down with tuberculosis. It started with blood on his handkerchief and quickly progressed. As of this year he has been confined to his bed and stays wracked by red viscous coughs. It was not too long back when a letter crawled in speaking of the an old debt that needed to be repaid. In his father's place Valentino Ricci is sent out and dispatched to settle matters of a time past.

[Haydrian Cindel]

@thegreenleafe Perfect! Move it over once I get the OC up.
I especially like the gangster backround, and the debt tie in. Can't wait to work out the details behind that with you.
Ya know Old Jeremy must have got around a good bit to have met and indebted the people he seems to have :)

[Haydrian Cindel]

Alright guys here's the link to the roleplay, I'm still working on my initial post but you can move over CS anytime

[Haydrian Cindel]

Ok, Initial post is up! See you all over in the OC, you can ask me any questions there or PM me!

[Roland]

@Haydrian Cindel Thanks for the info, I will be editing my sheet today. And I am not sure yet about how James will be connected. I will figure something out.