Call of Cthulhu: starting point or distraction?

[monty]

A friend -- a long-time Lovecraftian -- suggested the _Call of Cthulhu_ non-computer RPG.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0786926392/103-7083738-8508625?v=glance

I suppose there are general problems associated with computerizing non-computer RPGs?

Would it be better to start fresh?

[angelbob]

The Call of Cthulhu RPG is a good system for what it does, but it'd be hard to adapt well into a MUD.

It's percentile skill system (like, if you have 90% in a skill, you generally succeed 90% of the time) allows for some truly awe-inspiring enemies -- a CoC Big Baddie can scrape you under its heel in a way few AD&D enemies ever could, especially given the very limited advancement available in CoC.

However, this same simple skill system makes it very difficult to automatically set up encounters. The difference between a so-so encounter and an Oh-My-God-It-Killed-Everybody encounter is surprisingly subtle, and definitely requires a certain amount of fixup on the Gamemaster's part. Naturally, if you can avoid all forms of combat and competition, this isn't an issue, but that'd make it harder to do your storyplotting.

The Sanity system is nifty, and I've seen an interesting adaptation of it to the computer medium -- CthulhuMUD did this, and did it pretty well. However, the way they adapted it was very combat-oriented, which makes sense on a combat-oriented MUD, but loses some of the feel of the original. That's a tradeoff. But the original requires a *lot* of human interpretation, and basically can't be easily programmed. It simply requires too much creativity and too much ad-libbing that a computer is incapable of doing without massively powerful AI.

The settings are good, but they're also the part that's most heavily copyrighted by Chaosium, and so the part I'd feel worst about stealing ;-) Chaosium has produced a beautiful living, breathing Arkham area, including Innsmouth, Dunwich and Kingsport, and has populated them extensively with beautifully-arranged characters and powerful subplots. And *that*, boys and girls, is all under copyright and shouldn't be stolen. You can go back to Lovecraft's own (now public domain) work and steal all you like of that, but make sure to respect Chaosium's copyright. Yeah, they can sue you, but mainly you just shouldn't steal from anybody that hard-working.

So yeah, the system has some good points, but mostly it'd need adaptation. It's a good source of inspirational material and 1920's historical bits.