u/Z3r0B3at

Recently I have been struck by the inspiration via the various games, shows, ect I have been consuming that I have got it in my head that WW1 could be an interesting setting to run a story through. It is in the most early, 'huh that might be neat' vague planning stage so nothing concrete.

The vibe I feel could play well to horror, the tight claustrophobic trenches where who knows what is around the next corner, the haze and fog of No Man's Land after nightfall hiding whatever might be skulking among the bodies left to rot, what madness might desperate men harrowed by the war turn to in their foxholes to try and break the stalemate, perhaps call on whatever the idol dredged up in the mud is depicting for salvation.

Now I could easily see just running this as vanilla CoC just fine as the time of WW1 is next door to the stock 1920's setting so technology, economics, ect are not too far removed. It might even add to the tension to have players that are just the poor soldiers/civilians caught out where one rifle crack across the way could kill them unceremoniously, but I tend to be a Keeper that does not aim to kill my players ASAP and prefer having the starting band in it for the long haul to see the story idea develop, unless the dice step in to say they ain't gonna make it.

To this end I am for the first time looking to the Pulp Cthulhu book that has been gathering some dust on my shelf for some options for more 'lasting' Players in a more conflict rich setting. Book itself even talks about setting how 'pulpy' I would want to make a game so its a scale almost. Its not an idea I am fully ignorant of as I have run the wild west supplement 'Down Darker Trails' a few times so I already am thinking of the 'Bonus Health' rule at the very least.

My main question being for those with history running Pulp Cthulhu where tends to be the cut off where the mix goes from horror to more the out and out 'strange action' as ideally I am wanting a middle ground, as fence sitting as that might sound. I would still like some sanity shell shock to take my players but also want the people in a warzone to have a good chance to see peace scared and rattled individuals

Have had a game going for a little bit now to try and get a feel for the system and for the most part feel it is going very well. The one stumbling block of course being that age old problem of "RNG thought it would be funny to hand a player a holy grail when scav-ing". Namely my players rolled for weapons and managed to find some arms dealer dead drop apparently.

They spent the AP for more weapon drops and dice gave them a gatling laser, a railway rifle, and a damn fine Plasma Rifle. The first and the last are easy enough to reign in with plasma being very scarce and the gatling laser just eating too much ammo to be reasonable right now. Its that railway rifle that seems to be worrisome as its ammo is only rarity 2.

As my rule of thumb so far I had set for myself that "Rarity 0-2 should be common enough to find" mainly so i could set up shop handouts ahead of time rather then grinding a session to a crawl while I crack open my book to play "do they have this in stock", mostly since a few of my players lack a pdf/book so look to me to share mine.

So now someone is hitting like a truck with a damn fine weapon that puts me in that awkward spot of "At least one of them is punching above their weight class, maybe two soon as someone is quite taken with the idea of making that gatling laser work." and I worry sending stronger things at them might smear the less well armed into bloody messes.

I could just slap "times are getting lean" on my merchants to lower the easy to find bits to 0-1 so the spikes are harder to find, but same player is the type to say "these spikes are solid metal I should be able to recover some if not all my ammo from the corpses" but IDK, any more seasoned GMs in the system have advice?

I want to use some of the gift bag QoL stuff namely the extra crafting recipes, Pet Pal always on, the faster movement, and the Fort Joy mirror. Though I feel like I lack object permeance and not 'seeing' any pop up after I turned them on with the extender installed gives me pause. I know I installed it right as I see it listed in the loading screens and the main menu I am assuming it will be on and I just need to find something to trigger an achievement I haven't already gotten to check

So I am trudging through Fort Joy on my personal save and came up on the ship with the DLC contamination armor questline. I have started the fight and for whatever reason if its specifically the lizard magister there getting hit by almost ANYTHING my game crashes. The one time it didn't crash attacking her was with my rogue that has no elemental damage...which then crashed when the crazy elf attacked her.

This a known issue or am i just very unlucky and this may be one quest i just can't do?

So I have been doing my first proper playthrough of Divinity OS2 with a friend of mine. So far we have cleared the first chapter after a few longer sessions but planning a bit of a solo run to do lagging behind our co-op game. In the co-op game gone for a bit of a death knight necro/warfare with big armor and two hander weapons.

I like being on the frontline so likely doing something similar but aiming for a different game plan. Opting to be ether undead dwarf for the extra hp and dodge or undead human in case I want to try and get a little crit chance. Planning to stick mainly to Warfarer to deal general physical cc and damage and Geomancy as a way to have some magic damage and healing potential. Of course maybe do small branches into other skill schools like scoundrel for the venom blade buff.

Really its a matter of what my weapon game plan might be, I know two handers from my experience so far can do decent work and that just putting points into Warfarer will up all physical damage I do. Though part of me does like the idea of doing double melee, plus if i went dwarf and double axes I maybe could lean more into that dodge buff with the parry master talent I noticed before. There was also the fact of sword and board could give me options to truly be a venom tank since it gives a way to try and keep armor up in the face of an onslaught.

I have seen in passing talk of its mostly 'two handers are generally best for melee damage' but those posts tend to be kinda years old. Doubt any updates between then and now have done any earth shattering changes to combat, but figured its maybe worth asking as a relative noob to the series.

Real simple as I have not found any real quick snappy shorthand to have as a reminder to my scatter brain. I am assuming its just any none elemental arrows, melee with most weapons, and in the case of necromancer spells those are physical guarded. Any and all elemental damage is solely in the wheelhouse of magic armor? My brain for whatever reason insists "earth damage is just throwing rocks so thats physical damage" when in all likelihood its magic since it is mostly spell based

So I say "new-ish" as i had played say Age of Empires years ago but can't really recall what the gameplan was back then. I have been trying to look stuff up on my own but the extend of "tips and tricks" when it comes to army stuff is "remember the unit triangle of infantry, ranged and cavalry, myths are good against basic units, heroes vs myth and basics against heroes.

Is my gut instinct of just "5-10 of each basic type, handful of myths, a few heroes" the correct line of thinking? Assuming you divy them up into their own squad to try and target more precisely rather then just run your blob into their blob hoping for the best