Call of Cthulhu 7e Chase Rules Guide

Introduction

A Call of Cthulhu 7e chase is not a footrace measured in yards. It is a sequence of urgent places where people make choices under pressure: a crowded market, a locked service door, a wet stairwell, an alley with two exits, or a traffic jam that may become an opportunity. The rules turn those choices into movement, risk, and changing distance without asking the table to measure every street corner.

This guide covers the core procedure for foot, vehicle, and mixed chases. It explains when to establish a chase, how locations and movement actions work, what hazards and barriers do, and how conflict fits into a pursuit. For the broader decision to escape rather than fight, start with When to Fight and When to Flee. For close combat that happens during the pursuit, use the Combat Rules guide.

Hot Take

A chase gets exciting when the fastest character is not automatically the winner. Give the slow investigator a route choice, the passenger a reason to act, the pursuer a real decision, and the whole table a location worth remembering. Speed starts the chase; choices decide it.

A Chase Is a String of Decisions

Use a chase when both sides are trying to reach or leave a place and the route itself can change the result. The quarry wants distance, concealment, or a destination. The pursuer wants to close the gap, keep sight of the quarry, or force a confrontation. The locations between them should create choices that neither side can solve by simply choosing to move again.

Do not use full chase rules for every departure. If the fleeing investigator is clearly faster, the pursuer has no plausible route to follow, or the scene has no interesting location choices, resolve the escape quickly and return to the investigation. A single roll and a strong description are better than a long procedure with no uncertainty.

Likewise, a trapped character has to get out of the room, basement, railcar, or dead-end alley before a chase can begin. That escape may be a combat action, a skill challenge, negotiation, or a barrier problem. Once the character has a route and someone is trying to follow, the chase begins.

Give Both Sides an Objective

The quarry's objective may be "lose the police," "reach the train," "get the artifact to the car," or "get the wounded investigator to the doctor." The pursuer's objective may be capture, recovery of evidence, stopping a ritual, or simply keeping the quarry in sight until reinforcements arrive. State these objectives before setting out locations. They tell the Keeper which hazards matter and they give players something better to do than run in a straight line.

Establish the Chase

Start by deciding whether a complete chase scene is needed. Each participant makes a speed roll appropriate to how they are moving:

• A character on foot or using another self-propelled mode makes a CON roll.
• A driver makes a Drive Auto roll for a vehicle chase.

The result adjusts that participant's MOV for the duration of the chase:

• Success: MOV does not change.
• Extreme success: MOV increases by 1.
• Failure: MOV decreases by 1.

Compare the quarry's adjusted MOV to the pursuer's. If the quarry is higher, the quarry escapes and no full chase needs to be played. Describe how the advantage matters: a cleaner route, better endurance, a sharper turn, or a reliable vehicle. If the pursuer's adjusted MOV is equal to or higher than the quarry's, establish the chase and move to the interesting moment.

This procedure prevents a foregone conclusion from becoming several rounds of bookkeeping. It also lets a strong speed result matter before hazards enter the picture. A slower quarry still has plenty of agency once the chase begins; they simply need terrain, judgment, or help instead of raw pace.

Example: Do Not Play a Chase That Is Already Over

Lena runs from a warehouse guard. Lena succeeds on her CON roll, keeping MOV 8. The guard fails and drops from MOV 7 to 6. Lena's adjusted MOV is higher, so the guard loses her. The Keeper describes Lena cutting through a fish market while the guard slips on wet cobbles and loses sight of the route. There is no need to build a chase map after that result.

Speed Rolls and Adjusted MOV

Adjusted MOV lasts for the whole chase. Write it down for every participant. Do not reroll CON or Drive Auto every round in hopes that someone suddenly becomes faster. The movement system needs a stable baseline so hazards, barriers, and decisions have visible value.

In a mixed chase, use the mode that is actually carrying the participant. A passenger does not make a separate speed roll; the driver's vehicle determines the vehicle's movement. A character who switches modes makes a fresh speed roll: Drive Auto when they get behind the wheel, CON when they abandon the car and run. Recalculate their movement actions to match.

MOV sets the chase's baseline advantage after endurance and handling have been tested, rather than stating a real-world top speed. Vehicles may accelerate later. A pedestrian may take a route that a car cannot use. The number gives the rules a starting point; the locations give the fiction its meaning.

Cut to the Chase

When the speed rolls say the pursuer can keep up, do not begin with a long accounting of every block already traveled. Place the pursuer two locations behind the quarry. In exceptionally tense circumstances, the Keeper may begin one location behind. Starting farther than two locations usually creates empty turns before the chase becomes interesting.

This is the right moment to begin at a meaningful decision: the street is narrowing, the train platform is near, the storm drain is open, or the next vehicle turn could decide the pursuit. The table has already established that the quarry did not simply outrun the pursuer. Start where the route can change the outcome.

Use a simple original tracker:

Pursuer ... [market] ... Quarry

Each bracketed space is a location or the passage between locations. Add names, tokens, or initials as the scene grows. The track is not a tactical grid. It is a shared answer to two questions: who is where, and what must they get through next?

Locations Are Narrative Distance

A location is a meaningful chunk of the chase, not a fixed number of feet or yards. A stretch of empty road may be one location. A locked door may separate two locations. A stairwell, a crowded lobby, a rooftop gap, a kitchen, a narrow alley, and a parked car can each become a location because each changes the available choices.

Locations need equal dramatic usefulness, whatever their physical size. A hotel chase might use these locations:

foyer -> service corridor -> kitchen -> back stairs -> alley -> parked sedan

The foyer creates crowd and visibility. The corridor offers speed but few exits. The kitchen offers obstacles and staff. The stairs create a height decision. The alley offers a vehicle or a dead end. The labels remind everyone what actions are possible without needing a detailed map.

When a chase runs alongside ordinary combat, make locations small enough that the time scale stays compatible. One group should not cross a city district while another group takes a single combat round to open a door. Adjust the chase's scope until both groups can act in the same fiction.

The Chase Round and Movement Actions

A chase uses rounds just like combat. Chase and combat rounds are interchangeable. Participants act in DEX order from highest to lowest; tied DEX uses an opposed DEX roll to determine who acts first.

Each participant receives movement actions every round. Everyone gets one by default. Then add the difference between that participant's adjusted MOV and the adjusted MOV of the slowest participant. The slowest participant therefore has one movement action; someone one MOV higher has two; someone two MOV higher has three.

For example, if the slowest person has MOV 5, a person with MOV 5 has one movement action, MOV 6 has two, and MOV 7 has three. Spend one movement action to move forward one clear location.

On a turn, a character can spend movement actions to move, initiate one attack using Fighting, Firearms, or Drive Auto, cast a spell, or take another action that consumes meaningful time. The character can delay their turn, as in combat. Pushed rolls are not used in a chase because a failed attempt can normally be tried again on a later round while the situation continues to move.

Movement Is Not Mandatory

Spending every action to move is often correct, but not always. A quarry may spend a turn opening a barrier because the better route is beyond it. A passenger may fire once to create space. A pursuer may stop to call for help or choose a route that cuts off the quarry. Let an action change the chase rather than pause it.

Hazards: Risk That Lets Everyone Move

A hazard makes moving forward risky or costly but does not prevent it outright. Mud, a crowded street, a narrow alley, wet tiles, a sharp turn, a low fence, a rooftop, roadworks, and a sudden pedestrian are all possible hazards. Put the hazard between locations, describe it before the participant reaches it, and tell the player what skill or choice might handle it.

The Keeper sets an appropriate skill and difficulty. Climb might clear a fence, Dodge might weave through a crowd, STR might force through mud, DEX might keep someone balanced, and Drive Auto handles a vehicle hazard. Players may propose alternatives that fit the fiction.

After negotiating a hazard, the participant moves into the next location whether the roll succeeds or fails. On a success, they move through without further delay or harm. On a failure, the Keeper may apply damage appropriate to the incident and should roll 1D3 lost movement actions. Those lost actions may become a debt against the participant's current or next round of movement.

Caution Buys Control

A participant can spend one movement action before the roll to gain one bonus die, or two actions to gain two bonus dice. This is the cautious approach. It is especially useful when a failure could put a wounded investigator in danger or when a slower pursuer will catch up if the quarry loses too much time.

The choice should be visible. "You can force the wet stair at Regular difficulty, or spend one movement action to take a bonus die" gives a player agency. Recklessness may be right when the threat is already one location behind. Caution may be right when the route ahead is otherwise safe.

Barriers: Problems That Stop Movement

A barrier blocks progress until the character passes it, removes it, or finds another route. A locked door, a high wall, a chasm, a police roadblock, a fallen tree, or a sealed gate can be a barrier. The difference between a hazard and a barrier is practical: a hazard lets determined movement continue; a barrier does not.

The Keeper should allow more than one solution when the fiction permits it. A locked door can be picked, forced, climbed around, bypassed through a window, or abandoned for another route. A car may maneuver around a roadblock, find an alley, or smash through. Explain the likely cost before the action, especially when a vehicle might be wrecked by a failed attempt.

Failed barrier rolls may cause delay and may cause harm where appropriate, but the main consequence is remaining on the current location. This makes barriers valuable because they give the pursuer a chance to close distance. They should be placed for a reason: to tempt a risky shortcut, to reward a particular skill, or to reveal a choice of routes.

Breaking Through

Characters and vehicles can break barriers by applying damage. No attack roll is required to damage a barrier. Vehicles are especially dangerous: each point of Build inflicts 1D10 damage, but a vehicle that fails to destroy the barrier is wrecked. If it succeeds, it takes damage equal to half the barrier's hit points before impact, and debris may become a hazard for those behind it.

Use this option for memorable decisions, not routine door opening. A damaged barrier changes the chase for every following participant. The quarry may get through but leave rubble, a wrecked car, or a public disaster behind.

Conflict During a Chase

Participants generally need to be in the same location to attack each other. Firearms can reach across locations when range and visibility support it. Initiating an attack costs one movement action, and characters retain their normal number of attacks per round.

A target still gets the usual chance to fight back or dodge when challenged, even if they have no movement actions left. Movement economy should not remove a character's ability to defend themselves.

Gunfire has two options. A character on foot can stop and shoot with the normal options for one combat round (one rifle shot, up to three handgun shots, and so on); this costs 1 movement action and they do not move. A character who keeps running or driving can fire without spending a movement action, but each attack roll takes one extra penalty die. Shooting at a vehicle's tires adds another penalty die, and a tire has 3 armor, is damaged only by impaling weapons, and bursts after 2 damage, costing the vehicle 1 Build.

Fighting maneuvers are particularly useful in a chase. A successful maneuver can trip, push, or otherwise force the target to face the equivalent of a failed hazard: 1D3 lost movement actions and appropriate damage if the fiction calls for it. A specific maneuver goal, such as knocking a weapon away or shoving someone through a gate, can be resolved as normal combat would resolve it.

Do not turn a chase into stationary combat by default. Every attack should answer a chase question. Does it create distance, prevent escape, take the keys, force a vehicle off the road, or stop someone from reaching a barrier? If it does not, the combat may be a separate scene now.

Vehicles, Acceleration, and Passengers

Vehicles follow the same location and movement-action structure, with Drive Auto used for speed rolls and driving hazards. They add one decisive option: acceleration. When spending one movement action, a driver may move more than one location:

• Move 1 location normally.
• Move 2 or 3 locations with one penalty die on hazards encountered.
• Move 4 or 5 locations with two penalty dice on hazards encountered.

The driver declares acceleration before moving and must travel the declared distance unless a failed hazard stops the move. Visibility matters. A busy city may reveal only a few locations ahead, while an open road reveals more. Speed is safer when the driver can see what is coming.

Passengers do not make speed rolls or receive movement actions. They still act once per round in DEX order. A passenger can fire, throw something that obstructs a pursuer, use a skill, tend to an injured ally, navigate, or work on the immediate objective. One passenger who spends their action helping the driver rolls Spot Hidden or Navigate; on a success, the vehicle's next acceleration takes one fewer penalty die. Do not make passengers spectators. A passenger with a map, a firearm, a medical kit, or the evidence can change a vehicle chase.

Vehicle conflict uses regular combat, substituting Drive Auto for Fighting and Dodge. A vehicle used as a weapon deals 1D10 damage per point of Build, loses one Build for every full 10 damage it takes, and suffers half the damage it deals. Build limits on maneuvers apply to vehicles too, so a car trying to shove a truck two Build larger takes two penalty dice. Ramming and vehicle maneuvers should carry real risk for both sides. The exact vehicle damage rules matter most when the group chooses to turn a chase into a collision; otherwise, keep the emphasis on position, terrain, and escape.

Routes, Hiding, and Ending the Chase

The lead participant should regularly receive meaningful route choices. A strong swimmer may choose the river. A driver may choose a crowded avenue or a narrow alley. A quarry may take the obvious path toward a station or a hidden service route with a barrier. The choice needs to expose a tradeoff, and it can be lopsided while doing so.

Either side can call for a group Luck roll to introduce a sudden hazard. On a success, the players may decide where and when a hazard appears in their favor. On a failure, the Keeper introduces one that works against the investigators. Alternate who calls for these rolls so one side cannot repeatedly shape the chase. Sudden hazards are normally Regular difficulty.

A quarry can attempt to hide if the situation offers a plausible place and enough lead. The Keeper sets difficulty based on the location and the pursuer's distance. If the pursuer fails a Spot Hidden roll, the quarry evades capture. Hiding a vehicle requires a combined Stealth and Drive Auto roll. Hiding is a choice to give up motion for uncertainty, not an automatic exit.

The chase ends when the quarry is no longer identifiable or traceable, reaches a secure destination, or when the pursuer catches the quarry and the scene becomes conflict, capture, negotiation, or something else. When the chase ends, return to ordinary scene resolution. Do not keep moving tokens after the meaningful question has been answered.

Multiple Participants Without Confusion

Add all pursuers and quarries to the same location track. Determine adjusted MOV, movement actions, and DEX order for each. The rulebook places them in a set order: the slowest pursuer goes at the back, and each faster pursuer starts ahead of it by the difference in MOV. The slowest quarry starts two locations ahead of the foremost pursuer, and each faster quarry starts ahead of that by its own MOV difference. A character who joins mid-chase makes a speed roll, and if they are the new slowest participant, everyone's movement actions are recalculated. Nobody recalculates when a character leaves. Keep the tracker readable by grouping characters who are moving together only when they really do share a location and goal. The moment one investigator stays behind, takes another route, or stops to help someone, give them their own marker.

For a group on foot, slower members determine the practical escape plan even though faster members have more movement actions. The group may split, carry someone, use a vehicle, or assign a rear guard. Make those decisions explicit. For a vehicle, the driver controls movement while passengers use their own turns to support the escape.

Use a concise tracker, such as:

Cultist ... [stairs] ... Vera + witness ... [alley] ... Jonah in sedan

This shows the problem immediately. Vera must get the witness through the alley; Jonah must keep the sedan available; the cultist may reach the stairs before either happens. The tracker is a prompt for decisions, not an illustration the Keeper needs to perfect.

Player Guidance

Ask where the next two locations lead and choose routes that use your investigator's strengths. A good Climb skill makes a wall attractive. A poor swimmer should not choose the canal just because it is dramatic. If an ally is slow or wounded, make that part of the plan before the pursuer closes the gap.

Spend movement actions deliberately. Caution can buy bonus dice on a hazard. A movement action spent on an attack or barrier can be correct if it changes the distance problem. Running straight ahead is not always the fastest route to safety.

If you are a passenger, take an active job. Navigate, protect the driver, watch the pursuer, handle evidence, tend to someone, or create an obstruction. A chase is a team scene even when only one person controls the vehicle.

Keeper Guidance

Build only the next several locations, not an entire city map. Give each location a distinct choice, then add the next one as the group approaches. Start a full chase only when speed does not resolve the outcome and the route will produce interesting decisions.

Describe hazards before the character commits to them. State the likely skill, difficulty, and tradeoff. Let players propose reasonable alternatives. A chase is fair when players can choose their risks, not when a hidden obstacle produces surprise penalties.

Keep the tracker visible and update it after every turn. Announce the lead in plain language: "The pursuer is one location behind; the next point is a locked gate." Clear position makes action feel urgent without arbitrary complications.

End the chase when the core uncertainty is settled. A successful escape should create an aftermath, not another unexplained pursuer. A capture should create a new scene with choices, not erase the investigators' agency.

Chase Checklist

To establish the chase:

• Confirm that the quarry has an escape route and that the route can matter.
• Make CON or Drive Auto speed rolls and adjust MOV for the full chase.
• End the scene immediately if the quarry's adjusted MOV is higher.
• Otherwise start the pursuer one or two locations behind the quarry.

To run each round:

• Track locations, adjusted MOV, movement actions, and DEX order.
• Give each participant one default movement action plus the MOV difference from the slowest participant.
• Present a route choice, hazard, barrier, or conflict opportunity.
• Resolve movement and update the visible distance.

To finish:

• Let hazards delay and harm without automatically stopping movement.
• Let barriers stop progress until someone solves, removes, or bypasses them.
• Use attacks and maneuvers to change the chase, not to replace it with a brawl.
• End when the quarry escapes, hides successfully, reaches a destination, or is caught.