Yesterday morning was my second time playing Shadow of the Demon Lord. The last time I played it, probably a year or so ago, ended in a party wipe, which was fine since it was a one-shot, but because we played at level 0, it didn’t feel like we really got into the meat of the game very much. I was hoping for a slightly different experience this time around, and got it.

Shadow of the Demon Lord is designed by Robert J. Schwalb, who worked on 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons, and much of the design philosophy that sets that edition apart from 3rd Edition (and 3.5) shows up in spades here. Specifically the mechanics, particularly in combat, are fairly streamlined, and there’s much more of an emphasis on rolling dice instead of tracking modifiers. This pairs with an emphasis on storytelling and the GM’s judgment over a more comprehensive ruleset. It took me just a little while to get acclimated to how combat worked, but by the end of the session it felt like it ran smoothly.

But what really sets this game apart is the tone. There’s a spell in the game called hateful defecation. I don’t even need to tell you what that spell does for you to start to understand what I’m getting at here. The game is designed to be truly horrifying, and doom should be always impending. My friend Ben gave a talk at Nerd Nite last week about H.P. Lovecraft’s work and his influences on modern literature and storytelling, and many of the thematic elements that Ben highlighted—insanity, the insignificance of humanity, the perils of curiosity—exist within this game.

There’s even a prominent mechanic called “insanity.” Seeing horrible shit can make you go a little crazy. Going a little crazy isn’t awful by itself—you suffer some penalties for a short time—but once you go mad, things can get real bad, real fast. One of the possible consequences of madness is that your heart stops and you die. There’s only a 5% chance of that happening, but it’s still amusing to know that it’s on the list, and to let my players know too.

I love when my players are a little scared. I love the tension and the suspense when they feel like there’s a good chance that opening this door will mean coming face to face with horrible and sudden death. It delights me when my players are convinced that there are no good choices, and all roads will likely lead to their entertaining demise, especially when it’s in service of telling a good story. And it’s a pretty lethal system, with a high damage to health ratio, both for players and monsters, at least compared to D&D, so one misstep can mean the end.

I don’t always want that, of course, but sometimes it’s nice to let that bit out. And this weekend was a particularly good weekend for it, because I felt like I had some Shit to Work Through, and planning a twisted adventure for my players was both a welcomed distraction and a satisfying outlet.

In the end, most of the PCs survived. One of them, played by Chris from my office D&D group, died in the last fight, being partially eaten by a ghoul. Erik expressed that he liked that you always felt the pressure in combat like you were moments away from your death. At one point, early on in the session, he also asked me with some surprise and incredulity, “Did you make this up or did you find this somewhere?” (I made it up.) It’s not quite as satisfying as hearing, “When will this nightmare end?” in our second or third session of The Curse of Strahd, but it’s pretty close.