This Old Haunted House (BRP)
What is a Haunted House?
Is it a decaying mansion brimming with spires¸ turrets¸ and intricate grillwork? An abode of great age with its rotting façade and long-lost¸ eldritch secrets hidden inside¸ beneath decades of cobwebs and dust? Does it require spine-chilling drafts and creaking wood that causes stalwart investigators to calm their breathing in nervous anxiety? Or perhaps it is a house hand-built by skilled and discreet craftsmen who don't mind an eccentric owner's request for a secret passageway or hidden room?
The ideal haunted house seems to issue from the 18th and 19th centuries. Nothing adds to a supernatural mystery than an old abandoned house¸ whether standing on some lonely country back road or in the middle of the big city. Where once a stately manor stood on a rural estate may now be rotting amidst a sprawling suburb.
Every small town has such an old abandoned house¸ inspiring local folklore with its spooky¸ mysterious past and its supposed horrors still lurking inside. Elderly neighbors whisper hushed rumors about previous owners¸ and what horrors occurred. Youngsters dare each other to enter; teenagers use them for reckless (or romantic) adventures; unknowing and long-lost relatives inherit them; and sinister persons (or things) use them as headquarters for nefarious plans.
Keepers of Unknown Lore are welcome to tweak the designs presented here¸ adding more secret doors and passages¸ and strange landscaping to whatever neighborhood they wish to place their own haunted house. Does your scenario needs an organ loft where mysterious music flows fourth at midnight? A Victorian-era tower turret is perfect. A hidden basement room where once Revolutionaries¸ Criminals¸ or Cults secretly met? A decaying Colonial cellar is just the place.
So go on¸ thumb through this collection and find the house of your nightmares!
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