Experienced Investigators, or Random People?

I'm leaning toward experienced investigators for reasons I cannot reveal, but I want to hear anyone else's opinions before I set it in stone.

I'm good with that, if I am to understand then basically we need to have some sort of pre-experience within the backstory/drive/occupation for the character if that's the direction we go?

I have no opinion because I am the Jon Snow of this game.

To clarify, what being an "experienced investigator" actually entails? Someone that already knows that something isn't quite right? Being part of a detective agency? If the difference lies between being someone that is actually a proper investigator, contrary to someone that is not("random people"), I'm fine with both though I prefer being a someone random. Especially for a Purist game. That said!

Does it have to be one or the other? If you make a background prompt (i.e "Why are you attending multimillionaire Mortimer's party?", or something more guided like "Why are you helping Ms. Woods?") or demand (''You're under Bergerson's thumb and for x reason you'd never challenge him"), I think it becomes potentially easier to tie the characters in the story. In that case, being seasoned investigators or not isn't that important as long as the players can justify the context where their characters find themselves in. Just a suggestion, of course!

My assumption is that several of us would be a detective, a private investigator or an investigative reporter or some variation on those themes. In addition we could have other professional people like a professor of ancient studies or a medical specialist. A professional investigator does not necessarily have to investigate crimes. In a recent Cthulhu game here that seems to have died out there were only three of us, a private investigator, a crime reporter and a professor from Miskatonic University. That was me. When I was in high school I always wanted to work for Arkham House in Wisconsin. They published fantasy and horror fiction almost exclusively. And what's even more amazing is that they are still in business in Sauk City, WI. And my dreams are from 55 years ago.

Right! Personally, I'd prefer to be a professional that not necessarily is a detective, P.I or anything like that, especially because it's hard to insert a woman in these roles at that time. A professor, doctor, anthropologist, social lite, or even antiquarian seems more credible, to me at least. Though we could just shrug it off! Be it as it may, I can work with whatever, Falcon, so it's really up to you.

By experience, I mean characters who have been previously exposed to the mythos. You do not need to be experienced with the game or be part of a group of any kind. You also do not need to be a professional investigator of any ilk.

Unless someone has an objection to that, we'll go that route.

No objections from me!

Yep, that makes sense

Also, do you happen to have a word or text version of the ToC character sheet that we can use on the custom page for character building? Perhaps from a previous game you have played or DM'd?

I wasn't suggesting experience with the Mythos but only experienced with investigative methods. A research scientist or medical researcher is experienced in that way and so is an investigative reporter and a private eye. Someone from academia could have knowledge of the mythos without having any experience with it and in this case wouldn't have an immediate concern that what he has been called on to look into look at would have anything to do with the mythos. The question then would be

It's just really difficult for any of us who are familiar with the mythos to pretend that our characters are not.

Well, as far as THAT goes, you might just -think- you know the mythos. There's ALWAYS another layer....

I'm having a lot of difficulty finding a free download of Trail of Cthulhu. I can't remember the last time I paid for a pdf. It's been years. I see a one page document that says how to create a character but it also refers to much later pages in the rulebook that there is no access to. Can you help?

Aldrusian, the quickstart rules are amazingly condescended and can be found for free right here.

Hi all new here I seen that you're having trouble looking to create a character I tried this site check it out. https://www.dholeshouse.org/

Hey Lwunder! So this is a common confusion between the two games, but we're playing Trail of Cthulu, not CoC. :D Same content, different system. I've got a quickstart guide in the game description, and if you like online tools, theblackbook.io is the official character creator for it.

Ahh ahh yes thank you. Will look it up

No problem! Let me know if you have questions.