With their strange diction and their sinister air of otherworldliness, they might as well have been dropped into his father’s library from outer space. Petersen had no context for the book - no knowledge of the man or his times, no preconceptions whatsoever. It was an Armed Forces edition of Lovecraft, one of many hundreds of titles printed cheaply on pulp paper and distributed for free among the soldiers and sailors fighting in World War II. Poking around his father’s library as a boy in the 1960s, he came upon a battered old paperback called The Dunwich Horror and Other Weird Tales. Lovecraft in the most perfect way imaginable. Players will need more than a high AC to survive these encounters, and even adding one or two of the foes from Horrors of the Dark to a regular encounter will force players to prioritize their targets or else face a swift defeat.Sandy Petersen first encountered H.P. There are also a fair few monsters in the PDF with special abilities and attacks that require saving throws, with the creatures in question having several variants at increasingly high Challenge Ratings so that a Dungeon Master can always have something to challenge their party with, no matter their current level. They also make an interesting change from the mostly high-fantasy stable of foes provided by the official RPG books, allowing dungeon masters to introduce elements of the eldritch and even cosmic horror to their games. Firstly, a Dungeon Master can use it as another source for monsters in their games, increasing the variety of foes faced by their players – pulling a surprise on veterans, who will suddenly be confronted by creatures whose capabilities they are unsure of. Those have to be built by the Dungeon Master themselves using the monster statistics presented in the PDF.Īs it stands, there are two main ways to use this PDF. However, it should be noted that Horrors of the Dark does not contain any encounters or pre-built adventures.
The PDF even includes a collection of phrases from the game and the best time to read them out to players to convey Darkest Dungeon's spirit better.
From the lowly cultists to the damned Miller and even the bloodthirsty Countess, all have been faithfully adapted to function within the format of Dungeons & Dragons and present a challenge for even veteran players.