The Good Friends of Jackson Elias

By Paul Fricker, Matthew Sanderson and Scott DorwardLeisure Games

The Good Friends of Jackson Elias episodes

February 05, 2019 The Dunwich Horror (part 3)
We’re back and we’re ready to start our investigation into the actual Dunwich Horror. Somehow, it’s taken two episodes and half the story to get here. Everything that’s happened so far is simply prologue. Admittedly,...
The post The Dunwich Horror (part 3) appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
57 min
January 22, 2019 The Dunwich Horror (part 2)
We’re back and we’re continuing our exploration of the hidden corners of Dunwich. The locals seem quite welcoming and some of them may even be described as undecayed. Those Whateleys are especially interesting, although we’re...
The post The Dunwich Horror (part 2) appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
1 hr 3 min
January 08, 2019 The Dunwich Horror (part 1)
We’re back and we’re examining these strange bite marks, boarding up the windows and trying to work out where that damnable smell is coming from. This is the start of our look at Lovecraft’s classic...
The post The Dunwich Horror (part 1) appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
52 min
December 25, 2018 Heaven & Earth
We’re back and we’re heading off to Potters Lake in search of the secrets of creation. We hear good things about the apples there too. This is our look at the weird, evocative and highly...
The post Heaven & Earth appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
58 min
December 11, 2018 The Two-Headed Serpent
We’re back and we’re cocking our hats, lighting some torches and wondering where the hell all these snakes came from. Why did it have to be snakes? This is our look at how we developed The...
The post The Two-Headed Serpent appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
53 min
December 04, 2018 Special: Dragonmeet 2018 with The Smart Party
We’re back and we’re once again locked in battle with our good friends Baz and Gaz from The Smart Party. For the first time since 2015, we managed to arrange a joint seminar at Dragonmeet....
The post Special: Dragonmeet 2018 with The Smart Party appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
56 min
November 27, 2018 Call of Cthulhu for Beginners
We’re back at the beginning, where we started our grim journeys many years ago. Looking at our grey hair and wizened features, it’s difficult to imagine that we were ever young. Yet here were are,...
The post Call of Cthulhu for Beginners appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
58 min
November 13, 2018 Violence in Call of Cthulhu
We’re back and we’re loading our shotguns, lighting a bundle of dynamite and laying waste to everything we see. This is our look at the role of violence in Call of Cthulhu. Boom! Main Topic:...
The post Violence in Call of Cthulhu appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
54 min
November 13, 2018 Episode 143 – The Good Friends tussle over the role of violence in Call of Cthulhu

Violence in Call of Cthulhu

We’re back and we’re loading our shotguns, lighting a bundle of dynamite and laying waste to everything we see. This is our look at the role of violence in Call of Cthulhu. Boom!

Main Topic

If you’ve spent any time discussing Call of Cthulhu online, you’ve probably had someone tell you that if your investigator so much as enters combat, you’ve lost. This is a game of careful investigation, putting pieces together and learning secrets man was not meant to know. If that’s the case, why do most of our games end up with everything in smithereens?

Careful investigation in progress.

This is not to say that violence in Call of Cthulhu is a bad thing. We’ve all played plenty of fun, action-packed games. It just seems like the easy option sometimes. In the real world, we (as individuals, not a species) usually sort out our conflicts non-violently. An average group of investigators, on the other hand, tends to resolve most scenarios with extreme prejudice. Why is this and what are the alternatives?

Can’t we all just get along?

Following our usual format for such discussions, we look at the portrayal of violence in Lovecraft’s fiction, the role it plays in Call of Cthulhu and how we might put together a scenario that doesn’t rely on a violent resolution. Then we punch each other in the face and burn Paul’s house down.

News

Dragonmeet is mere weeks away and we’re giddy with excitement. All three of us plan to be there and we would love to meet you. For most of the day, we can be found in the podcast zone, doing podcast-related things. Then, at some point, we shall appear on a seminar with our good friends Baz and Gaz from the Smart Party. We will debate whether all RPGs are pale imitations of D&D (spoiler: they’re not). If you can’t make it in person, we plan to record the seminar and release it as a special episode.

Other Stuff

Violence is only one of the unspeakable acts that people perpetrate upon each other. Our singing is another. We sing twice in this episode, thanking two new $5 Patreon backers. Being torn apart by a rampaging mob of investigators has nothing on this.

And speaking of Patreon, issue 4 of The Blasphemous Tome is almost ready to go to press. This is the print fanzine we produce to say thank you to our backers. Anyone backing us by the end of this year will receive at least one copy. See our recent post for more details.

54 min
October 30, 2018 The Thing
We’re back and we’re eyeing each other suspiciously, freezing our bollocks off and watching in dismay as our blood sample runs screaming out the door. This is our look at John Carpenter’s 1982 science fiction/horror masterpiece, The Thing....
The post The Thing appeared first on Blasphemous Tomes.
51 min