Building Threats and Encounters

Threats are anything that forces a meaningful choice: an enemy, deadline, hostile witness, locked archive, wound, cult, or creature that cannot be fought conventionally.

A creature entry should communicate its role at a glance: characteristics, Hit Points, movement, armor, relevant skills, attacks, Sanity cost, habitat or organization, and special rules. Hit Points may be bespoke for major creatures; do not silently recalculate authored threat values from investigator formulas.

Combat uses one action and movement per turn. Attacks use the canonical percentile ladder. Critical attacks maximize weapon damage, add damage bonus, and ignore ordinary armor; Extreme attacks maximize weapon damage; armor is flat and non-stacking. Major wounds occur when one hit deals at least half maximum HP; 0 HP causes unconsciousness and bleeding, and negative CON HP is death.

Build encounters with exits, cover, negotiation, or objectives other than killing. A creature needs a tell, desire, limitation, and consequence outside combat. A weakness can be a name, location, ritual, social obligation, or specific material—not only a damage multiplier.

Sanity begins at POW capped by Maximum Sanity. A Stability check uses POW × 5 with current-Sanity modifiers. A loss of 5 or more Sanity in a scene or a fumble causes a bout; losing one-fifth or more of Maximum Sanity in an encounter adds temporary insanity; zero Sanity creates Indefinite Insanity.