While I was at the Critical Role live show in Chicago, they had recently announced a two-part horror series titled Thesher. Thresher uses the rules of Candela Obscura with a completely different setting. The world of Thresher was developed by Matt Linton and Jacqueline Emerson. If any of those names ring a bell, Jacqueline Emerson played Foxface in The Hunger Games. The game features a cast of talented actors, including Noshir Dalal (whom I have talked about extensively on the blog), Jacqueline Emerson, Jane Douglas, Mark / Mara Hulmes, and Abubakar Salim. Jasper William Cartwright was the GM for this series and I have been a big fan of his podcast, Three Black Halflings. I watched Thresher as soon as both episodes were released and this series was fabulous.

In the first episode, it sets the stage for the story. The five characters are sent to investigate a distress signal sent by Admiral Anders. Each character has their own reason for being there. For example, Betty (played by Mark / Mara Hulmes), is looking for her long lost brother. The other character’s motives are murky as horror tabletop tends to be. When the characters arrive to the station, they learn that only one person survived, a mysterious Dr. Blackwell. After encountering mysterious fish like entities, they realize how truly in danger they are and question how they plan on making it out.

I loved every bit of this. I liked how each episode wasn’t too long. I find that, even when I watch Critical Role, my attention span starts to wane. Having episodes at two and a half hours or less, I can pay attention to what’s going on. I like how Candela Obscura is used in a completely different setting. If someone wanted to play Candela, but didn’t like the already pre-created world, this proves that you can take the system and modify it into your setting. I liked how the characters had to make rolls to determine if they would panic and lose oxygen. It added to the high stakes of the adventure and it made it realistic. If I were diving deep underwater and there was darkness all around me, I’d panic too.

As horror tabletop often does, shit hits the fan in the second episode. Without providing spoilers, there is one character that’s working against the group and the reveal of that was epic. My jaw dropped as I’m listening to the episode because I assumed that everyone would be working together without ill intent. This was not true. There were other reveals made about another character potentially lying about their identity and that reveal was also well-done. Thresher pulled me in and that is fully due to the cast of the show.

Immediately after finishing Thresher, I watched the cooldown to both episodes. The cooldown is exclusive to Beacon members and it lets the cast talk about what happened and how things went down. It was interesting listening to the cast because there were little nuggets of information that would foreshadow what happened at the end. I missed these, but I’d love to rewatch Thresher knowing what I know now.

Thresher is a perfect example of why I love horror tabletop. It’s setting the stakes high from the get-go and allowing the cast to get creative as to how they are going to try and escape. If I ever become a GM or a gamemaster, horror would be my jam. I’m not sure if I will ever have the time to learn a game system and write my story, but Thresher has inspired me to do so.