What happens if the first player gets devoured by something other than Quachil Uttaus? We played that the first player marker gets passed and the decks get rebuilt, but there doesn't seem to be anything specific covering this, which might imply that the replacement investigator is the hunted one - and Quachil gets to keep their progress.

The book says

During the game, the first player marker is never passed
until Quachil Uttaus finally tracks down the first player
and devours him. Until then, his doom hangs over the
investigator’s head.

So that would lead me to believe that until Quachil Uttaus is the one doing the devouring, the first player marker isn't passed.

True. The bit that doesn't answer is whether the decks get reshuffled for a new Investigator. In this game it would have been important, since with one card left in the third deck, the Investigator was fed to the Deep Ones by the jail cell. Having their replacement immediately turned to dust before getting a chance to do anything at all would have been really inconvenient (well, unless we'd drawn Tommy...)

or the new investigator get the old one's burden... ie at 3rd Dust deck with one card left in it.

According to the rules, devoured investigators discard all of their cards, which would include dust cards (and which would make sense, in addition ^^).

Boy, we can debate anything, can't we?

I say Quachil Uttaus tracks the Investigator, not the Player. After being devoured, it just seems silly for Quachil to "pick up where he left off" and track a completely different Investigator based on a utterly non-themed connection. If you really don't want to assume that Quachil will immediately target the next available morsel, then how about this for a gameplay reason: note that the First Player has NO Investigator at the end of that turn, and thus the token MUST be passed.

jgt7771 said:

Nope, you immediately draw a new investigator when the old one is devoured, so the first player will have an investigator at the end of the turn.

Way I see it, the player has no investigator until the next turn and the first thing you do is pass the first player marker, then put your guy down. Or alternatively, when the first player is devoured they pass the token since they're investigatorless.

Personally, I don't like being told what goes down by a dead guy.

Now I'm confused. All I found in the rules was:

DEVOURED INVESTIGATORS
In rare cases, investigators may be devoured. The player
immediately discards all of his cards (except unspent
trophies) and shuffles his investigator sheet in with the
unused investigator sheets. The player then draws a new
investigator at random and sets up the investigator as if
he were starting a new game (as described in “Game
Setup” earlier in these rules).

...so why do you both say the player doesn't have an investigator until the end of the turn? Did I miss something?

Apart from that, I'm not arguing against your position: Not passing the first player token in this case just screws a single player, without fulfilling any thematic function, so I'm against it, too. I just think the argument that you don't have an investigator is invalid, since you always have one.

HëllRÆZØR said:

...or the screwed player decides to actually pay the 2 clue tokens...

Personally, I think it thematically. It kind of explains why a new investigator joins the team all of a sudden:

After devouring his prey, Quachil Uttaus chooses another human to hunt down. So it's no wonder that person gets drawn into the story and the fight against the Great Old One...

We always take out a devoured player for the rest of the turn. That way they can get their character setup while we finish the round and the new investigator shows up when some new wierdness occurs from the mythos card. It also keeps people from going to to the hospital twice in one turn when they're at 0 stamina for the turn and get it back at the start of the next turn.

Hmmm. Okay, Hellraezor, I guess you got me. Like many before me, I have fused my "established procedure" with "manual law". I do the exact same thing Gatha does: let the player start the next turn with a new Investigator. Surely you don't let a player begin playing a new Investigator in the middle of a turn?

But it's moot. As you said, it's not like we're disagreeing with our final position; we just have different ways of getting there.

Besides, even if one chose not to pass the First Player Marker, one better frikkin' refill the Dust decks for the new Investigator. (Quachil is chasing Investigators, NOT Players!) Starting a new Investigator with (possibly) 1 card left in Deck 3 is just--I'm terribly sorry--a stupid waste of time and energy: "Okay, I got Bob all set up...oh wait, I've got no Clues...Bob's devoured. Shoot. Give me another one." That's RIDICULOUS.