Ruminations on the eve of our first session

The gears are in motion, the date is set, and we are getting ready for our first gaming session. There are several things I have been mulling over in my head. I feel pretty confident I am over the initial jitters I had about running a game improvised to this extent. This, I believe, is mostly because I decided to go with two story-lines  the present day of the 1930s and the history of the mask in the flashbacks. The present day narrative is something more familiar I can lean on as it will be more traditionally structured and less improvised. Having said that, I will try to use parts of it to get player input to encourage and instruct them before we get to the first flashback.

Enter the Heroes

Maybe I shouldn't call them heroes, this is Cthulhu gaming after all, and they are more than likely  to become screaming lunatics, before dying in a suitably horrible fashion. So, let's call them investigators, regardless if they investigate these matters voluntarily or not. We will have three players, as well as a few others possibly making guest appearances during the flashbacks. The guests will create characters especially for a given flashback and used to highlight and bring distinct flavor of the period into the game as well as hopefully memorable appearances. And they are expendable when necessary (in cooperation with the player of course).

Location: New Awlins

There are several reasons why I ended up with New Orleans as the location for the 1930s part of this adventure. I have always been fascinated with the Crescent City and it is actually my intention to visit NOLA later this year. Therefore, I already have several guide books in my bookshelf ready to serve as inspiration and reference. Also, I own Chaosium's Secrets of New Orleans, which, although maybe a bit thin on the inspiration side, gives very good insight on what the city was like at the time. So, with these books at hand I have a good starting point.