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Have any of you ever run a game, or played one where the complete works of H.P. Lovecraft existed within the game's universe? If so, how were they used? If not, would you ever incorporate them in future games and how would you use them?

My thought is that the game would have to be set in modern times with internet access and the Barnes and Noble leather bound edition for 20 bucks. Maybe a character has some kind of affinity for science fiction, or paranormal studies etc... they would likely have read some HPL but perceived it as fiction, so no loss to SAN, but when that character encounters something mythos related, it would come with implications in his/her mind that the other characters would be ignorant of. So maybe you'd add a SAN modifier, and give extra mythos knowledge every time this character saw something mythos related; because, after all, he'd possess knowledge on the matter, only that knowledge is gradually being converted from fiction to fact... and that can't be good for one's mental health.

This same concept could apply to other tomes within the mythos. Sometimes simply reading a book regardless of how staggeringly terrifying it is would have no effect on the reader's SAN if that reader was a skeptic and saw the book only as fiction or lore. A character would have to read it and understand/believe the implications of the book before they actually lost any SAN, but that leads me to another question. Could one gain Mythos Knowledge without losing max SAN under special circumstances? Or would that flout the rules of the game entirely?

That's a fun idea. I know that some of the earliest readers of Lovecraft got exposed to his stories through special US Armed Services editions that were available in base libraries for soldiers. So I could imagine an adventure that might start on a US base somewhere in the 40s or 50s (Korea? Occupied Japan? Shanghai 1948-49? Egypt 1956?), and maybe supply an actual Lovecraft story in one of those editions as part of the Mythos research phase of the scenario....

You should check out The Laundry.

"The Laundry"? I take it there's a pre-written scenario with these concepts explored then? lol

I know that some of the earliest readers of Lovecraft got exposed to his stories through special US Armed Services editions that were available in base libraries for soldiers. So I could imagine an adventure that might start on a US base somewhere in the 40s or 50s (Korea? Occupied Japan? Shanghai 1948-49? Egypt 1956?), and maybe supply an actual Lovecraft story in one of those editions as part of the Mythos research phase of the scenario....

That sounds fascinating, I never expected it would be easy to get a hold of Lovecraft's work pre-internet. All you have to do is sign up for the army ! lol That sounds like a fun campaign, especially set in 1950's Egypt.

More on The Laundry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_St ... ndry_Files
But there is also an RPG made by Cubicle 7 that is set in that world, it's also called The Laundry: http://www.cubicle7.co.uk/our-games/the-laundry/

Wordcraftian wrote: My thought is that the game would have to be set in modern times with internet access and the Barnes and Noble leather bound edition for 20 bucks. Maybe a character has some kind of affinity for science fiction, or paranormal studies etc... they would likely have read some HPL but perceived it as fiction, so no loss to SAN, but when that character encounters something mythos related, it would come with implications in his/her mind that the other characters would be ignorant of. So maybe you'd add a SAN modifier, and give extra mythos knowledge every time this character saw something mythos related; because, after all, he'd possess knowledge on the matter, only that knowledge is gradually being converted from fiction to fact... and that can't be good for one's mental health.

It's an interesting idea. However, I think that to suddenly find out that something like the HPL Mythos was real would be a pretty mindblowing experience. At least the first time your character learned the truth of this, at least. Perhaps such a character would be jaded against this type of knowledge after X amount of experiences with Mythos beings suddenly being real, instead of just fiction?

Wordcraftian wrote: This same concept could apply to other tomes within the mythos. Sometimes simply reading a book regardless of how staggeringly terrifying it is would have no effect on the reader's SAN if that reader was a skeptic and saw the book only as fiction or lore. A character would have to read it and understand/believe the implications of the book before they actually lost any SAN, but that leads me to another question. Could one gain Mythos Knowledge without losing max SAN under special circumstances? Or would that flout the rules of the game entirely?

The idea of a skeptic is interesting, too. But maybe the tomes themselves are created in and unsettling way as well (Bound in human flesh / written in blood / with Comic Sans as a font, you know the type of horrors we're talking about), which would prompt some sort of SAN loss regardless?