Characters can also add a “dark dice” to rolls at the risk of increasing their ruin, a stat that represents how close they are to being consumed by the evil forces of the forest. An expelled apprentice will get an extra die when trying to decipher an occult text, while a ranger may get a bonus to rolls involving disarming traps. There are plenty of Incursions, the name Trophy Dark gives to its premade scenarios, to be found online, but the core book also includes easy rules for GMs to create their own.Ĭharacters are created by picking an occupation and a background, both of which add dice to their action rolls if they are applicable to what the character is attempting. It’s a game about what pride does to desperate and greedy characters as they push deeper and deeper into a harsh realm. Trophy Dark casts the players as a group of doomed treasure hunters on an expedition into a harsh forest that doesn’t want them intruding. The game is intended to run about two hours, so it’s the perfect choice for a lean, mean thriller with a dark heart at the center. If despair fills up first, none of the players make it out alive.
If hope fills up first, the players get away, likely scarred by the situation. Once the action starts, it’s a race between two tracks that are filled up by the player’s successes and failures: hope and despair. Actions are resolved by rolling a pool of D6s, with bonus dice being added if a player can narrate a quick, tragic flashback that shows why their character is proficient in their task. Players and the GM work together to set the scene, quickly creating the setting and the characters collaboratively before the dice even hit the table. Using a simplified version of the influential Blades in the Dark rules, Quietus allows you to drop right into the action and start building the tension. Designed for a Game Master and one or two players, this game of melancholy horror is inspired by movies and shows like The Babadookand Haunting of Hill House. If you’ve got a small player count for the evening and not much time to prep, this one might be the best choice. Well-known games like Call of Cthulhu and Vampire: The Masquerade are more often used for long-running campaigns, but there are plenty that can be used for a one-shot. A spooky RPG night is a perfect plan for Halloween, but it can be hard for people new to the tabletop world to find the right game. While tabletop RPGs are often most associated with the fantasy genre, there’s a large subset of them that fall squarely in the realm of horror.