Or why most people won't connect the dots. Players sometimes fall in the trap of metagaming when their characters are investigating strange groups and evil organizations. Metagaming is using the sort of omniscient knowledge that only a reader of Lovecraft would have.

In the game knowledge of strange shit happening out there should not automatically imply any knowledge of the cause(s). Think agnostic, and keep thinking it. So long as a person or group never gets a peek at the Necronomicon or any of the other usually suspect tomes, they won't have the names and profiles of the shakers and movers and won't have any glimpses of the true history of the world.

But why wouldn't they have a peek at the Necronomicon? Howzabout - they don't believe in that sort of mumbo jumbo, so they didn't look. Reasonable? Never heard of secular humanism? Do you think The Amazing Randi would suddenly become a believer simply because he saw something that could only be explained by the occult? Hell no. He would assume that he didn't see it properly, or it was an incredible fake, or the present scientific model needed to include what he saw in the model. But he emphatically did NOT see anything beyond the realm of science because there is no such thing.

OK, so imagine that you are a LEO of some sort and involved in investigating organized crime in the NYC area. You find that some of the Soprano family have been talking at the Badda Bing about something called the Network (yeah, you could hear the capitalization), and they talk in hushed tones. The mike planted at Corrado Soprano's doctors office caught some conversation with his nephew about something called The Fate (there's those capital letters again), and Corrado called them (The Fate) a bunch of Stregas that scare the piss out of him. He's taken to lighting candles at church daily.

The nephew, Anthony Soprano, had a discussion with someone named Furio in the basement of his home. He wanted to know if this Furio, who apparently is a new arrival from Naples, had ever heard of the Fate or anything like it.
Furio had no answers, but did have a great deal of advice about tactics to use in defense against sorcerers. The latest photo surveillance of Anthony Soprano shows him wearing several new pieces of jewelry, and he has also begun attending church daily.

An exhaustive search for all references to The Network and The Fate eventually reveals repeated references to a businessman named Stephen Alzis. The file eventually created on Stephen Alzis over the years; which includes photographs of him with various historical figures; indicates that:

• He is apparently much much older than he looks, judging from the records
• He has been killed several times- He is a very scary fellow- He has an ambiguous official existence
• He scared a lot of people who subsequently died under mysterious circumstances

From this, our hypothetical challengers of the unknown conclude that Stephen Alzis:

• Is a name that gets used for effect, like those four or five Marie Leveaus that reigned in New Orleans
• Cultivates an atmosphere of fear and mystery- Is a very scary fellow(s)
• Probably has died a few times
• Has killed more than a few people
• Is really good at this voodoo hoodoo shit that scares gullible types

"So why do they all look alike? Shit, I dunno. Trick photography, identical fuckin' twins, Photoshop, plastic surgery, whatever. Maybe it's a family business, ya think that's maybe possible what with the organized crime aspect and all? He puts on a good show and it's obvious he's got the goombas believin' it, but don't try to tell me that he's an immortal sorcerer or some kinda demon or somethin'. Jeezuss, try to act like a detective every now and then, huh? Once you've eliminated the *impossible*, and by impossible I think we can include immortal sorcerers and demon-spawn, whatever remains, no matter how im*probable*, must be the answer. So try to take this Fate shit with a grain of salt, awright?
"Now, I'm not sayin' this scumbag isn't fuckin' weird. I've seen some shit I can't explain, and if you've been on the streets you have too. So what? So it's weird and we can't explain it. It still comes down to makin' a case and puttin' the bad guys away. Or maybe sorta accidentally firing a few warning shots into his brain pan if we know he's dirty and the case doesn't satisfy those pussies in the DA's office. Ya gotta keep your eye on the prize and ignore the weird shit that doesn't fit. If it doesn't fit it'll probably acquit, so why go there?

"Like I say, I've seen some weird shit. If this guy could hypmotize you with a glance and make you eat yer own piece, I wouldn't have a problem with that. Shit, you tangle with some of those Jamaican posses you'll see that kinda thing every other day, but with more chickens involved. Some people can do that sort of thing. You ever see those televangelists smackin' people on the forehead and makin' cripples walk? Same thing. Witch doctors, faith healers, hypnotists, Uri fuckin' Geller. I saw this thing on the History Channel about Rasputin. Now there's a guy who was hard to kill. That's history, right on TV."

People with this sort of POV could still study the occult and even become experts in it, but they would be studying what their *subjects* believe.


Credits: Mark McFadden