JUST ONE MORE THING: Adding "Unexplained" to Sean McCoy's Investigation Sheet

 

Henry Heart survives his 3rd investigation; the sheet barely did.

RECENTLY

In the previous investigation sheet post, I outlined how I thought Sean's sheet could be used to help design CoC investigations better by creating multiple plausible suspects while still allowing the Keeper to specify a single "true" perp. It would also have (hopefully) an additive effect of not causing the players to immediately jump to mythos solutions.

In my recent CoC game, my character was able to pin the responsibility not on an NPC friend who had become possessed by the soul of a vengeful wizard to carry out revenge killings, but instead on Troy Parker. Troy was an NPC who brought the body-jumping, murderous wizard back to the present. But because there was enough evidence pinning him to the scene of the initial murder that kicked off the investigation, he showed up at a planned murder, AND that he attacked my character and friends in public-- we could convince the Arkham police he was the guy.

Aaand conveniently we had already killed him. But got paid *dick* for all our efforts, which is why Henry Heart pocketed that $11 from Troy the Corpse's pockets.

Now the investigation sheet helped a lot. Despite a fair number of persons of interests and body swapping, Troy was the only one with a completely plausible connection to what was going on. But the body-swapping brought out a missing element of Sean sheet for CoC. A category for the "unexplained" associated with each person of interest.

"UNEXPLAINED"

I use the word "unexplained" instead of "supernatural" because I want the investigation sheet to look like something a detective might actually use. Again, to try and maintain some preference and push for the rational over the mythos. "Unexplained" sums up loose ends, unnerving bits, and pieces that don't quite fit. This category, I think, could be useful to players because it will: 

1. Clearly outline which suspects could most easily be turned over to or sought by the cops because they are linked to the crime by mundane alibis, means, motives, and opportunities
2. Help players track links between persons of interest which might be only supernatural
3. Allow players to keep track of themes of unexplained phenomena which might mark yet additional mythos party involved (e.g. mi-go agents monitoring the investigators dealing with the Church of the Starry Wisdom)
4. Provide a reason for PCs to not turn someone over to the cops because they want to cut a deal with them for their mythos knowledge  (which happened in our recent game)

For the Keeper, I think it just helps further demark who is a true suspect, a false one, and who is steeped in mythos but may really not have anything to do with the investigation at hand. It could also provide the hook for the next investigation or adventure.