CORRUPTION IS NOT INSANITY
In Fate of Cthulhu, we’re moving away from representing the effects of exposure to the Great Old Ones and their ilk as “insanity” or some other form of mental illness by default. We’ve chosen instead to call the effect corruption and propose a wide variety of ways that such an effect could manifest in characters. You’re never obligated, as a player or GM, to portray a character with corrupted aspects as being mentally ill, “going crazy,” or any such thing.
However, we do recognize that Lovecraftian fiction and games have included the suffering of mental trauma as a cost of engaging the mythos. If you want to express a character’s corruption as the development of mental trauma or illness, we recognize that as a valid choice consistent with the genre. That said, we’re sensitive to the fact that roleplaying games don’t have a great track record for representing mental illness well, or for treating people who have mental illnesses with respect. We hope you’re sensitive to this too, and we offer the following advice if you want to make this a part of your game without, quite frankly, being an asshole about it.
DON’T DIAGNOSE
One of the best ways to avoid falling into harmful tropes is to describe how your character’s behaviors and responses change, but avoid the temptation to diagnose them with some kind of mental illness.
A corrupted character might become very ego-driven and go to extremes to protect their self-image, but that doesn’t mean they are a narcissist in the clinical sense. They might start triple-checking their survival gear at random intervals instead of concentrating on the world around them, but that doesn’t mean they have OCD. If you start with the diagnosis, you’re a lot more likely to guide the character into over-the-top, simplified stereotypes based on what you think that diagnosis means.
Likewise, don’t use diagnostic names as shorthand in corrupted aspects. Something like Everyone’s Out to Get Me is much more accessible and respectful than Paranoid Schizophrenic.
DON’T PUNISH
The purpose of corruption is to demonstrate how people change when they’re exposed to cosmic, worldaltering horrors. It’s not a form of “damage” that makes a character less viable or less of a protagonist. (It’s more of a resource that, when spent by the player, pushes the character towards transformation. The next section covers this.)
Never feel obligated to force a character to act cartoonishly out-of-sync with the rest of their aspects because they are corrupted, and as a GM, don’t constantly demand compels of a character who doesn’t act out their corrupted aspect in an extreme manner.
Aspects are a way to help you put things in the spotlight, but you decide how often they’re relevant. If one character’s corrupted aspect threatens to put them in too many situations where they can’t be effective or will end up being the butt of a joke, back off or revise that aspect into something that won’t be as disruptive.
DON’T MAKE IT EXOTIC
Trauma, both mental and physical, is a normal outcome of engaging in stressful, dangerous activity. Avoid the temptation to single a character out as being unique if they end up with a mental or physical health issue as a result of corruption. It would be much weirder if they confronted the mythos and came out unscathed, right? Look at their traumas like you look at any other trait in the game—represent and describe them if they’re relevant, and don’t worry about them if they aren’t.