How do you make demons really scary?

[Morrus]

It's easy to make a monster powerful. Stick a couple of big numbers on it, and you're done. A tarrasque is powerful. It ain't scary, though.

How do you make your players afraid of demons? You know how The Omen is more scary than Star Wars, despite a child being able to make a window fall on someone doesn't exactly compare blowing up the entire planet.

What abilities and traits do you give your scary demons that make your players hesitate before turning the lights out that night? How do you distinguish between powerful cabs scary?

Here's my initial attempt at a demon. It is only partway they, but I gave it some malevolent planning abilities that I hope players will find creepy. I have a long way to go though.

 

[Crothian]

Stats are not scary. It doesn't matter on paper how powerful the creature is. To make it or anything in an RPG scary it is all about the presentation. I like the unknown when trying to make something scary. I don't tell the PCs they are facing a demon, I describe what the creature is never confirm what it is. Even if the PCs make a knowledge roll, I would phrase it like "Ya, you think it is a demon". I would try to describe its powers and abilities in ways that do not automatically allow the PCs to know what the creature is doing or is capable of. I like to keep these type of monsters a mystery for as long as I can.

 

[Morrus]

Well, not telling the players much about the monster is certainly a start - I think we probably all got that far though! It's what you have the demon do, how it acts, what makes it scary? What's the talent and art firm that makes The Omen scary, but not Magneto (though Magneto is cool in other ways, of course). I think we all agree that stats aren't the answer to anything other than power level.

I think the answer goes far beyond just keeping things from the players. That's easy!

 

[gamerprinter]

Sometimes when I want to invoke "scary" into a given monster, I show evidence for what it does, even without actually encountering the monster. For example, I've been working on a possible campaign for Kaidan, and in one instance there is a child (a seven year old boy) who is currently possessed by the spirit of an evil onmyoji wizard. At the first encounter with the PCs, they see a child hiding in a rice paddy, near a village where everyone is dead, slaughtered by someone/something, and the child is apparently the only survivior. When a large group of pitchfork wielding commoners seeking the missing threat, they arrive at the boy's location before the PC party do, and the child begins to point at the PCs as being the culprits in the slaughter. The boy escapes before the party can confront him, while trying to negotiate with the angry mob to convince them, they are not the culprits.

Also before the next actual encounter with the boy, more evidence of slain commoners are found everywhere. The players all begin to get paranoid, that this murderous and lying child is continuing to point at the PCs as the culprit of all the murders. While this creates paranoia among the players, rather than actual fear - it is impacting their emotions in a way that a direct so-called scary encounter with anything else does not.

So I guess there need to some means of building the horror before an actual encounter to make that encounter seem scary to the PCs. Any direct engagement without this build up is anti-climatic at best, without an ounce of 'scary' in its presentation.

In my #30 Haunts for Kaidan, for example, there's a minor oni that gets 'accidentally summoned' and begins a reign of terror, killing people and inadvertantly creating haunts in doing so. In fact a third of haunts presented in that guide are all from the victims of this particular oni. The oni in question is very weak physically, so not really a threat to any experienced adventurers, however it is very sly and willing to do the most heinous acts unto weak locals. So again, this is a case where evidence of dark activities encountered before any actual encounter with a monster, creates the emotion and the concept of scary to the players - not the actual encounter with such a being itself.

Scary has to be presented as a build up long before an actual encounter. I could not invoke scary, if I provided no background build up at all.

 

[Celebrim]

Don't use them?

I'm struggling to think of a prominent horror movie that actually has demons as its primary antagonist, and I'm not coming up with one. The Exorcist maybe, except if we would be honest, I'm pretty sure it's not the 'demon' that is scary in that movie (if it is scary, I haven't seen it to judge), but the little girl. Children are creepy, which is why they are prominent fixtures of so much horror whether it is movies like The Poltergeist or The Shining, or video games like F.E.A.R. When you site The Omen as being scary, I don't think its actually the occult providing the scare - it's the fact that its a creepy little boy.

Demons aren't creepy. They are gross. I think you'd be able to manage gross with the occult quite well. You'd probably be able to nauseate your players. I'd be surprised if you managed scary. Ghosts are scary. Werewolves are scary. Aliens are scary. Zombies and vampires use to be scary before popular media made them more familiar to most people than say rats, snakes, or centipedes. If you want to make demons scary, you'd have to make peoples understanding of them more like ghosts, werewolves, or aliens.

Going a different way. Children are scary. Old people are scary. Some people are scared of spiders, snakes, or darkness. But almost no one is actually terrified of the occult.

 

[Evenglare]

Uncanny valley. Might give you some ideas. Here's a great video on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEikGKDVsCc

 

[Jhaelen]

How do you make your players afraid of demons?

I've given my answer to that in your previous thread. Basically, it's all about how you describe them and their powers.

What abilities and traits do you give your scary demons that make your players hesitate before turning the lights out that night?

The 'Horrors' from the Earthdawn RPG might serve as a good inspiration for scary powers. They have a baseline ability to 'mark' a person. Once marked, they always know where the person is (range depending on general power level of the horror) and can use any of their other powers on them or through them. They can also telepathically speak to them and enjoy using it to slowly drive them mad or corrupt them. Eventually, they can use their powers to transform them into 'horror constructs', i.e. lesser demonic beings.

 

[Janx]

this is an interesting question. In general, everybody agrees that raw stats and powers aren't what makes something scary.

General consensus is that what is unseen/unknown tends to be more scary. Having something harmless/innocent like a child is more scary/creepy.

I thought the demon in Fallen was pretty scary. It has no body, but it can posess you. Initially, it's hard to identify where it is. This scores it unseen/unknown points during the revelation of its initial actions. It also enables using NPCs that were thought to be harmless/innocent, scoring points on that factor.

So I'm inclined to think that a body-less demon is potentially more scary than a big monster.

I think cues from Dread and other horror cames come into play. The early encounters for PCs need to be with the aftermath of the demon's actions, not with the demon. The party comes across a crime scene that is gruesome or inexplicable (ex. how did the killer get into the locked room and out?).

Later, the PCs get glimpses of the demon or demon's aspect. Perhaps an NPC behaving oddly (a clue), or a hint of a shadow or movement in the water that can't be explained, but also doesn't appear to be anything when they stop and go look at it.

Then, the demon starts whittling down the PCs side, taking out NPCs off-camera, or even taking out a PC (isolate the PC from the party (but not the player), hand them a note of who they meet and tell them NOT to say their name or identify them, so the dialog the party hears is vague but indicative that the PC knows his assailant).

One of the last strategies, which I think is highly risky as it enters railroad territory, is that a Demon is very powerful. As such, at some point, the PC should be/feel powerless. Either by means of manipulation, or direct control (like Hold person), the PC should experience being in the presence of something that can do anything it wants with them. This needs to be used cautiously, but like the Fallen example, the PC may get controlled by the demon who commits a crime to frame the PC. This should enrage the player if it happens, but also terrify the player that it COULD happen to his PC.

 

[MasterTrancer]

As I see it, you can use one of two themes.

The first is turning upside down what is given: from this stems the "scary child" figure, the innocence turned evil. Use with care though, because the killer baby, the fiendish seminarist (and so on...) can be a bit of a clichè, and lead to a "seen that already" attitude.

What I think is most powerful, and with endless possibilities, is the "unknown": that is, not knowing what will happen, which powers the enemy you're facing has, what can it does to hurt you...and how can you hurt it.

I'm all with who preceded me: stats are not scary...also because as long-time players all of us learnt WHAT we're facing, and HOW to deal with it. I still remember though the first ghoul I met, a long time ago, when BECMI wasn't at all "old". Risking the paralysis, after which looking as your party was moped down one by one was all you could do, at the hands (nails? bites?) of something which you hadn't known about yet...

Also, as a last resort: horror movies, the ones that keep you awake, work at best when they put us in front of ourselves, of our fears...a demon, in flesh, disposable (in whatever mean) is not so much as scary as, say, a little pest that doesn't let the PCs rest, so robbing them of respite, and which is not confrontable by normal means, and can be disposed of with a side quest (though I'd prefer not).

My ramblings, on the brink of yawning

Good night!

 

[RangerWickett]

We fear the unknown and the inexplicable. With that as a basis, GMs have to understand that a fight that lasts more than a few minutes (at the table) is long enough for the players to lose any sense of dread they may have of a creature, unless you manage to keep them uncertain of the monster's nature.

So yes, have the demon leave traces of horrible crimes for the group to find. Have it be glimpsed across a ravine in the dark, dragging away a screaming nun. Have it scrawl Abyssal curses in blood on the walls of the party's inn room while they sleep. Make them wonder how it could have done that and whether they're safe.

And if they get into a fight with it, keep it short.