Third Preview is up, this time its about the new monsters.

The Innsmouth Look deck seems pretty intimidating. But the randomness of being instantly devoured is nice.

How does one remove the Beings of Ib? Can they be defeated in combat? Also, I wonder how they spawn.

Servitor of the Outer Gods seems pretty cool too. Nothing too special, but another horrifying flying monster.

Looks great. It must be pretty close to shipping. Can't come soon enough.

wow, just wow! i love the innsmouth look card! Beings of Ib look fierce! Innsmouth is no joke! i hope the investigators are up to the challenge!

Innsmouth is certainly no joke! Already we can tell that their promise about it being the deadliest town is true. Look at that Innsmouth Look card, for example. And the Servitors of the Outer Gods! I never thought that they would actually make monster chits for those! Most fearsome indeed, though I do somewhat miss the days before Kingsport, when the only monster chits which could devour you were the Masks of the Crawling Chaos.

Speaking of monster chits, it looks like we're going to get one for Barnabas Marsh! I'm presuming he's the current head of Innsmouth's most important family.

The Beings of Ib are an excellent idea and it looks like they're really going to make Bokrug a formidible AO.

I figured we would get a chit for the lloigor, but it worries me when they say the lloigor are immune to all weapons. So they're Physically AND Magically Immune?

Actually, I believe they receive a new trait, "Weapon Immunity", but I could be misremembering. I know something in Innsmouth gets that, though.

KevinW said:

Presumably the idea is that it's immune to all weapons but not to spells. Ouch! You are a callous heartless evil bastard, sir.

Mmmm, I ... don't like this.

I'm not a fan of the idea of being randomly devoured. My play group tends to spend time building up their characters and getting a little attached to them during the game, even if they turn out to be ****. I think a devouring should only occur as a punishment for a major screw-up or as a potential outcome of a risk you take voluntarily. However this new card now brings devouring into the realm of "Whoops, bad luck, NEXT!". Which I don't like.

I'm quite happy with the regular monster who has been spoilered who can devour you, because you don't have to fight him. You tool up and pick your moment to strike, it's your choice when you take the risk. But this aforementioned card will just appear at random.

However, I shall wait and see the card in action before I pass final judgement. But from what I understand of the new mechanics so far and the way this card will work ... I don't like it.

Stenun said:

I think it can only happen to you if you're in Innsmouth. And perhaps only at certain locations there. So, you can plan for it as a possibility and make sure you don't have certain irreplacible items when you go to that town.

Avi_dreader said:

There are 10 Innsmouth Look cards, but there preview is pretty clear that there's only one card that devours you. It seems likely that some location encounters in Innsmouth will make you draw from the deck, although they probably won't be very common. It wouldn't surprise me if Dagon or Hydra also made use of the cards. But either way, it seems like you can quite actively minimize your chances of getting the card. Although presumably, whenever someone draws the card, it gets shuffled back into the deck - otherwise the small size of the deck makes it easy to card-count.

The 'Deep One Rising' track is starting to sound interesting. There are presumably only six spaces on it, because there are only six Uprising tokens. There are probably other ways of adding tokens to it too. But I am starting to wonder what happens when it reaches six.

Someone mentioned that they saw numbers on the Innsmouth locations. Maybe that relates to the number of Look cards you draw when at that location.

Meh. Shan scares me more than that Servitor TBH. He isn't that tough, really. Also, "weapon immunity"=dumbed down Colur out of Space, so I'm not scared. To be perfectly honest? I double we'll see any monster that's stronger than the Colour, which is still the strongest monster in the game, even if counting masks. Colour=badass. The new Ancient One, however, scares the hell out of me. But I'm pretty confident we will get some broken investigators, so I'm not scared. Innsmouth Look does sound insane though.

kroen said:

I'd say the Star Vampire, the Dhole and now the Servitor are all worse than the Colour, and certainly way worse than the Shan.

thecorinthian said:

How so? The Coulur hurts you even if you're not fighting him. I didn't say the Colur is the strongest just because he's hard to kill. He isn't the strongest because he has horror -3 and 4 sanity damage. He isn't the strongest because he has physical+magical immunity and 2 toughness. He isn't the strongest because he drains sanity, the most precious resource in the game, almost every time it moves. He's the strongest becauuse he's all of these things together. Star Spawn? Dhoul? is this a joke? just ignore them. I'm actually really surprised on you that you think these monsters are stronger than Colur. The shan/servitor is debateable, but colour vs. start/dhoule/servitor? it's not even a debate. I'm disappointed with you.

kroen said:

The reasons for the difference of opinion are becoming obvious:

You think sanity is the most previous resource in the game. I tend to rate gate trophies more highly, since there's a very limited number of them and there's very little you can do to increase their availability (whereas Sanity points, and the dollars to buy them with, are infinitely replenishable). Other more precious resources include Clue tokens, monster trophies, and Basil Elton.

That's not to mention that the Colour doesn't even drain very much sanity: on average it'll only move about once every six turns, and it'll only drain sanity on half of those occasions. You say that it's easy enough to ignore the Dhole; I say that it's also easy enough to ignore the Colour Out Of Space.

You're probably right about the Star Vampire; I was remembering it as having an immunity but actually it's only got one resistance. But the Dhole...aaaargh the Dhole! It's the big daddy of them all. Michael McGlen, with a .357 in one hand and a Gladius in the other, still doesn't have nearly enough dice to make it likely that he'll succeed before he dies. He'd need Clue tokens to pass the Horror test in either case, but in the case of the Colour, he will certainly kill it using base Fight alone.

Tibs said:

There are numberical modifiers, not only on the Innsmouth locations, but on all the street areas as well. I don't think, however, that these numbers have anything to do with the Innsmouth Look deck. Instead I think these are the modifiers which apply to a sneak check that he investigator in Innsmouth must make every turn. Remember when it said in the preview that you might well find yourself thrown in jail and eaten by a shoggoth for poking around Innsmouth? And previous posters have said they can see a jail on the Innsmouth board.

I've tried to ignore the Colour once. Wasn't pretty.

Also if you're ignoring your monsters you lose nothing. If you ignore the Colour you're punished. And great, bring Micheal as an expample. Monster investigators don't have high enough fight to deal with the Colour without spending clue tokens. So the Dhoul os tough, big deal. Ignore it and you're fine. Ignore Colour, on the other hand... first of, 1 sanity is a lot, especially for non-spellcasters. Second, it's something. Dhoul does nothing. To be honest you don't sound like yourself.

thecorinthian said:

thecorinthian said:

I can't resist adding my opinion to this off-topic debate. The Color is certainly a powerful monster, but the strongest? No. The Dhole is also not the strongest because with only a -1 awareness he can be easily evaded.

The Star Vampire, on the other hand, has a -3 Awareness; he can be evaded only with great difficuly. He also has three sanity damage, -3 to the horror check, three toughness, -3 to the combat check, Physical Resistance, and he's a stalker! Now that is a monster that you cannot sneak past or ignore, epsecially if you're in an unstable location and he moves to the street area in front of you.

Hee hee hee... Caaard count? Whomever would do such a thing? ::Thinks back to first few months of playing Arkham Horror before realizing that encounter decks required reshuffles::

thecorinthian said:

guh, double post.

thecorinthian said:

I think they move every three turns and drain on half of them. So about once every six turns, EVERYONE in Arkham will lose a sanity. My Colours seem to come in pairs too. Most investigators can't easily take him out either, though some can.

I've never had difficulty with the Colors, honestly. Whenever they come out I ignore them until I can find a gate to Another Dimension and just get rid of the problem that way. Since there's almost always someone in a gate, not even everyone gets hit, and sanity is very easy to replenish.

The Message said:

Beeing semi-colorblind I am having a lot of trouble just seeing what kind of colour they are. What do we have now, like eight different borders?

It's way too late now but a nice icon as well would have helped a lot.

Svavelvinter said:

They were talking about the Colour out of Space, not border colors. The new border is white, which assumedly means "lack of movement type" seeing as the Beings of Ib never actually enter Arkham.

Svavelvinter said:

Good point though, this is not a game that's particularly friendly to the colour-blind! One of my regular group has difficulty for the same reason.

It's a shame that the 'white border' turned out to mean 'no movement type' instead of being something new. On the other hand, since it quite possibly only appears on the Beings of Ib, it would be possible to house-rule that it has another meaning for monsters which are actually on the board.

Kroen: there's no monster you can completely ignore, except maybe Serpent People. Although even then, all monsters clog up the monster limit. The advantage of killing the Dhole is that it will certainly be replaced by something easier, and often it's a good idea to kill it while you've got the chance, rather than let it move into a street where it seriously gets in the way.