Big thanks to Necronomicon users @Cthulhu and @Devius for help with this. For the record, please come join us, we'd love to have you involved in our community of cultists! Our join link is right here, and you can hit me up as @Vantablack Pharaoh there (However, my name changes frequently, so don't be surprised if it differs by the time you read this post). Read on and enjoy the list!
- 1) The Day Job: "You all know each other from working together before, as friends, or through some other connection." This can include families, friend groups, workmates, or former friendships. A very common method, this comes prepackaged with a ready made connection in place.
- 1a) The Losers Club: "You are or were a ragtag group of friends or outcasts in the past, now you're back together again." This is stolen directly from IT, and it makes for an interesting dynamic with characters. Why were or are they outcasts? What sort of relationships do or don't they have with each other right now? How did these misfits come together to start with?
- 1b) The Sordid Past: "You all did something or were involved in something in the past that shattered your relationship, now you're meeting again to reconcile." This can be jaded family members, former friends, ex-partners, or something else sinister. It need not be a friendship-ruining event, either. Consider how cancer that someone recovered from would cause it to be sordid, or even old work contacts that failed.
- 1c) The Scooby-Doo: "You are a group that solves supernatural mysteries in order to prove them fake." Another classic, if predictable, and can overlap with category three below. Usually, this tactic implies that the skeptics will get their worldview shattered by the Mythos somehow, or things will not be as they seem at first glance.
- 1d) The Ghostbusters: "You are a group that solves supernatural mysteries in order to prove them real." The correlation of the Scooby-Doo, this setup ensures that everyone is already a believer. They want to prove that the strange exists, but it implies that they will get much more than they bargained for when the Mythos shows up.
- 2) The Jackson Elias: "You are all friends with or know someone who has asked for your help with something, and that's how you meet." Taken from Masks of Nyarlathotep, you might consider this to mean the friend in question will die. That's not necessarily the case, but the Keeper can certainly make it look that way. In any case, if a mutual friend of the PCs dies suddenly after asking for help, it means they have a sudden tying together event that naturally makes them want to figure out what happened and why. It's a very natural introduction that can shock the players, and works better the longer an NPC is known to them.
- 2a) The Rupert Merriweather: "Your mutual friend is dying and has a last request they want you to fulfill." This one is taken from the scenario Edge of Darkness from the 5.6e Call of Cthulhu Keeper's Tome. It implies the NPC is known and allows for a mutual goal even before the PCs know each other. Who would ever refuse the last request of a dying friend, after all? A heartless person with no spirit of adventure, that's who.
- 2b) The Boomer Lives: "Your mutual friend or an outside source thrusts you into weirdness simply because they ask you to investigate for some reason, and they have no further bearing on the scenario." Named after an old Nostalgia Critic meme, this is a great way to introduce a Jackson Elias style character, as it generally implies by its nature that the NPC in question lives. Their only goal is to give you the plot and skedaddle, making things easy, if a bit clunky in terms of storytelling. Plus, you can use it several times to set up a nasty inversion with the Jackson Elias or the Rupert Merriweather above.
- 2c) The Christmas Carol: "You all were separately asked to look into something, and meet while investigating at the final point." Much like Ebeneezer Scrooge, the Investigators were all individually visited by someone or witnessed something that has led them to start looking into things. This either implies that they all meet up after following their leads to the same conclusion, or they all meet up to compare notes because they know each other. It also sets the Investigators up as the sort to go poking their nose into things to find the truth.
- 3) The Secret Society: "You all belong to a social club, secret group, or members-only style club, and know each other that way." Another classic, this one has been reiterated time and again. It implies the Investigators are part of some special group that most people are not involved in, and thus sets them up as the heroes of the tale early on.
- 3a) The Inner Circle: "You are all members of an elite group of some kind, the best of the best." This implies expertise. These Investigators were all asked to deal with something because they are the best at what they do, or they have certain skills hand-picked by the person who asked them to do it. It may also imply they volunteered when asked. The scenario Amidst the Ancient Trees from the 7e Keeper's Tome uses that latter implication to pull the Investigators together.
- 3b) The Delta Green: "You're all involved in a government or military group, or any other sort of Top Secret organization." If I have to explain the name to you, you're living under a rock. Using this tactic usually lends an air of secrecy or conspiracy thriller to a game, just like in the Delta Green RPG. The idea is that these are Investigators that operate under the radar, doing spook work that others won't do and preventing the layman from knowing. Think of it like a reverse X-Files and you have the right idea, then get prepared for a quite Noir-flavored, morally grey campaign.
- 3c) The Goodfellas: "You're all criminals who have been asked to do a job." Yet another common one, this is one of the myriad of ways any game involving mobsters, dames and dolls, crime, prohibition, or any other high-stakes Tarantinoesque tale can be run. It's used in the scenario Dockside Dogs to great effect, and I've used it in Dead Man Stomp as well. It provides a high-stakes action-packed crime drama thriller element, and allows Investigators to be a little more ruthless rather than trying to be bookish or do-gooders like in your average Pure Lovecraftian game.
- 3d) The Expedition: "You are all members of a private expedition someplace exotic, and know each other only by name, title, and accolades." This one implies Indiana Jones type antics possibly, but also calls up the specter of academia's hold. It establishes that the group is elite and respected in their fields, and also implies they were hand chosen, like the Inner Circle. Plus, being stuck together in an expedition to a foreign land with people you know only by their work is a good way to introduce tension and forge PC friendships... or rivalries. All stuff you can reap for later when the Mythos shenanigans kick in.
- 4) The Lovecraft: "You by random chance all uncover or stumble into something worrisome." This is also known as the Purist approach, and for good reason: if it ain't broken, don't fix it! Who better to help you start off your game of Lovecraftian terror than the Old Gent himself? Taking a page from Lovecraft's book, we can have a group be in the right place at the right time to see something and meet that way, or uncover something on their own and meet while researching, or just have some mundane event turn up as strange. Just like how the narrator in The Call of Cthulhu inherited a mystery about a cult, your PCs have inherited some mystery that defies explanation. This tactic establishes that they are maybe too curious for their own good, and that they are the type to jump at the call to adventure... even if that adventure leads to their ultimate doom.
- 4a) The Twilight Zone: "You all just had something blatantly odd happen to you that you do not fully understand or even want to investigate, but you all keep being dragged into it anyway." Much like the show for which it's named, this tactic assumes the Investigators witnessed or uncovered something, but are reluctant to investigate. However, once one weird thing happens, a sort of weirdness magnet occurs - perhaps these people are destined for Mythos adventure, or perhaps they have no choice but to deal with it. This method gives the group a reason to bond through commiserating on their situation ("Why does this always happen to us?!"), and can promote some good humor and deep character development later.
- 4b) The Outer Limits: "You all just had something blatantly odd happen to you that you do not fully understand, and feel you must investigate it." This one's like the Twilight Zone, but it assumes the Investigators actually want to investigate the thing they witnessed. They must know the truth, of course, and this method can imply that the PCs are looking for "something more" to shake their lives up. Just like the show it's named for, it also implies a "be careful what you wish for" twist, that things are going to be much worse or lead to terrible demise for everyone involved, or otherwise has some sting in the tail to be wary of.
- 4c) The In Media Res: "You somehow all got into this situation and need to figure out what the hell happened." This starter provides a unique way to begin a game by having everything start right in the middle of the action. Why are you chained to an altar about to be sacrificed to Yog-Sothoth? Who are these other people with you? How the hell did you get involved in this situation anyway? Who is that man chanting, and why does he seem familiar? This can also cover amnesia-based plots, like the start of Forget Me Not from the excellent The Things We Leave Behind. As long as you're starting it in the middle of some sort of action or the aftershocks of some big event, it works to confuse the players and naturally draw them into the action by bringing it to the character themselves.
- 5) The Classic D&D: "You all meet at an inn, or in some other place, by total chance." This one's much-maligned, but a classic trope for a reason. In the case of CoC, it may very well be "You all meet in a speakeasy", or "You all meet in a theater", or even "you all meet on a ship". Many scenarios do this - Thoth's Dagger has players meet at an auction, The Mauritania has them all meeting on a boat, and Dead Man's Stomp uses an upscale speakeasy and lounge. Don't knock the classics, folks.
- 5a) The Great Escape: "You all meet while you are trying to escape somewhere or planning some daring heist." This is one that lends an air of roguishness and stealthy wit to a game - think like a Metal Gear Solid or Ocean's 11. The film for which it's named involves prisoners escaping a Nazi encampment, which is always a fun start for a scenario, because come on, who the fuck doesn't wanna punch Nazis? It can bring a pulp flavor to a game, and emphasize action as a theme in a game. Alternately, it can be a daring and clever escape from kidnappers, which naturally makes everyone wonder just why they were nabbed to begin with. Plus, it's just really fun to pull off a daring escape or heist. Who wouldn't jump at that chance?
- 5b) The Azkaban/Asylum: "You're all imprisoned or trapped somewhere terrible." This implies the Investigators are criminals, asylum inmates, or some other person that might be locked up, but not always. Perhaps they have been kidnapped by Mi-go and must escape. Maybe they all are being experimented on. Maybe they just so happened to be stuck in a terrible location by no fault of their own. This survival horror trope is common because it's effective at putting the players in a closed oubliette - they cannot get out and have restricted freedom with few supplies, meaning if they want to make it out alive or even figure out what's wrong, they must be clever since they are at a disadvantage. The horror game Outlast uses this trope, as does Silent Hill, The Suffering, Resident Evil, and many other pieces of horror media, in order to make the player feel helpless. It often has the same effect on TTRPG players as it does on video game players... that effect, of course, being fear.
- 5c) The LOST: "You have been stranded or affected by some terrible event and must work together now to survive." Named for the infamous TV show and similar to the above, but the circumstances are even more dire and the survival horror elements even more pronounced. Now not only do the PCs have no freedom, they also have even more limited supplies. The PCs may even be wounded, traumatized, or otherwise in danger. A scenario set after a shipwreck would fit here, as would a scenario set at Ground Zero during 9/11. This also provides natural tension because the group is desperate to survive, and implies even more of a survival horror scenario than the above. In any case, they must survive being trapped with very limited supplies or even none at all, making for a terrifying game.
- 5d) The Storm: "You meet because you're all stuck someplace small because of weather or some other complication." A touch less desperate than the LOST and not nearly as horrifying as the Azkaban/Asylum, this scenario puts Investigators in a less traumatic but no less survival horror style situation. Sure, the storm, monster, or curfew will only last so long, but it's still not fun to be stuck with strangers while Mythos horror is afoot. Usually in this case, Investigators will be slightly more prepared... but not always. The scenario Deadlight uses this type of tactic, though not at the beginning of the scenario. It's a great way to introduce a oneshot and connect characters to each other due to their trial by fire situation.