The way that tabletop roleplaying enables people to interact with stories is very special. Like video games, players take an active role in the narrative, but TRPGs have the added element of allowing for almost limitless freedom. This puts the direction of the story entirely within the hands of the game masters and the players, making them directly responsible for whatever happens. 

Which is why tabletop RPGs are such a potent method for experiencing horror stories. It’s one thing to watch a character be forced to make a snap decision in a terrifying situation, it’s another thing entirely to be the one in charge of that choice. If you love horror, then creating and running a horror roleplaying game campaign or one-shot - a TRPG story that can be told in a single session - could be the perfect way of indulging in your fondness for the genre. 

But where do you even start? How do you make and run a great horror RPG campaign? 

Firstly, you want to decide what kind of horror roleplaying experience you want to provide. What are some of your favorite types of horror stories? Do you like ones dripping with tension? Or are you a fan of wacky and silly tales filled with spooky frights? Figuring out your inspirations of choice will give your game mastering endeavors a clearer direction. 

What type of horror RPG campaign/one-shot you choose to pursue will affect how and what you’ll want to plan going forward. 

• A tense and creeping story along the lines of films like Hereditary or Alien will likely have you creating a campaign/one-shot focused on storytelling, and providing plenty of opportunities to build and release tension.
• A slasher story with a central protagonist who stalks the players like A Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the Thirteenth, will benefit from you creating a single location containing recognisable points of interest, places to hide and methods to fight back for players to use. 
• A horror infused action/adventure tale such as Evil Dead 2 or Zombieland will need a fast-paced thrill-ride with several set-pieces, wherein players can engage in a healthy dose of monster killing and running away from explosions. 
• Consider, even, a story that has players becoming the monsters/horror creatures themselves - akin to The Nightmare Before Christmas or even Twilight - where they’ll need to navigate ordinary society incognito, with various scenarios that challenge players to keep their cool under pressure. 

These four examples outline the sheer variety of approaches you can take, as well as provide ideas if you’re unsure of the direction you want to go in. 

Which tabletop roleplaying game you decide to create this campaign for, will also affect the type of horror story you’re probably going to tell. Many GMs like to take a TRPG like Dungeons & Dragons and fit their own horror story within that mold, whilst others will choose a certain RPG because they want to create and run a certain type of horror story that would work well with that game. 

For instance, Call of Cthulhu is a fantastic tabletop RPG to play if you want to make a tense, investigative horror story, whereas Vampire: The Masquerade is better suited to a story in which the players themselves are the monsters, whilst the Dread RPG is a great game to tell a stalker/slasher story with. 

Once you have an idea of what kind of horror roleplaying campaign/one-shot you want to make and run, you can create a to-do list of everything you need to include in your story using Legendkeeper’s Wiki Page function. Include a memorable killer, add some terrifying monsters, make sure there are plenty of opportunities for frights, chuck in some hiding places, maybe some puzzles or action sequences - doing this will help you keep track of everything you have added to your plans and everything you have yet to add. 

Though player freedom is important - after all, you want them to make their own stupid mistakes so you can kill them in a gloriously grizzly fashion - creating a rough story outline, as well as an overview of your horror world, will help you provide your players with some great building blocks to interact with. Using Legendkeeper’s wiki page function, you can create pages featuring the key ingredients of your story and world - i.e. characters, locations, events, creatures etc… Which you can then refer back to during the game to nail your GMing.

 Legendkeeper even has a function that allows you to hide sections of a wiki page from your players, thereby enabling you to share pages with your players to help them make characters and have a better understanding of the campaign/one-shot’s world, whilst keeping the details you want hidden - like story twists, hidden character agendas and secret areas - a surprise until they’re discovered or reveled within the game itself. 

Certain horror RPG campaigns/oneshots live-and-die by their maps, which is why Legendkeeper’s own map creating, editing and sharing function is ideal. With the Legendkeeper map functionality, you can make a detailed map of the primary location/locations for your horror campaign/oneshot; marking out hiding spots; hidden items; puzzles; monster spawning camps; traps; escape routes etc… This is an especially important job for horror campaigns/oneshots that lean into single-location scenarios along the lines of Alien’s Nostromo spaceship, The Thing’s Antarctic research station or Halloween’s Haddonfield suburb. 

When actually running the campaign/one-shot, there are various ways to really deepen the spooky atmosphere for your players: from using candles (safely!) to set the right lighting, to decorating your roleplaying environment to fit the story, to making an evocative soundtrack to fit the world and tone, to using detailed narration to immerse your players in the scares. 

Whatever your approach to the horror itself - whether you’re devoted to creeping your players out or just here for a spooky laugh - ensuring your players are having fun is the most important element of GMing. So, check in with your players, listen to any concerns they might have and be sure to ask whether there’s anything they’re potentially uncomfortable with experiencing beforehand. There are several excellent, free RPG safety tools you can find online - like the X card and lines/veils - that you can use to ensure that all your players can have a good time playing your campaign/one-shot. 

Good luck with your horror roleplaying efforts and check back with the Legendkeeper blog for more advice on how to be a better game master and player.