Yay! I got my IH today! Even Avi won't ruin my mood !

Spent about 3 hours sleeving, re-sleeving and organising my AH to fit it into 2 boxes.

*spoilers*

Okay, I looked at the cards. I prefer to clear things up front, not have to wonder about them during the game. Since IH is still quite fresh, can't do my usual MO of reading, reading and more reading to clear everything up.

#1: Esoteric Order of Dagon encounter reads: "A gate opens suddenly [...] Move immediately to Y'ha-nthlei and have an encounter there."

a) "gate opens" just flavor text?

b) What else bypasses the Y'ha restriction? Specific encounters that tell you to go to Y'ha only?

#2: Falcon Point encounter talks about changing weather, where you draw Mythos cards until you get an Weather one, and put it into play, ignoring everything from gate to monster move. Vs. Ithaqua, you draw, but then ignore it?

#3: Science Building encounter: "You may move any open gate from its current location to the unstable location of your choice." Now, don't see much point in it, but a sealed location can't have a gate appear, nothing about moving a gate there. Should it be "unstable location without a seal or an open gate"?

Dam said:

Welcome to the party, Dam. We've missed you since you never showed up in Kingsport.

1a) I want to say "yes", because why move you to Y'ha-nthlei as well. If that doesn't work, I think if it doesn't use the words "A Gate appears!", it's just flavor?

1b) I want to say "Pretty much". I haven't seen EVERY card yet, but we've all been comfortably shut down about Silas using his ability to ENTER there.

2) I say Ithaqua makes you do exactly that: you draw it, but when you try to put it into play, Ith shuts it down.

3) I say try to go with "the LEGAL unstable location of your choice." By "legal", I mean "a location where a gate could naturally pop open if a Mythos card directed it as the board conditions are set up at that exact moment."

jgt7771 said:

Most you guys just got on the wrong bus, I was almost all alone in the right bus !

Thanks for those answers, figured something along those lines.

Additional one that cropped up:

Aquatic movement, monsters only move from Aq. location to Aq. location? IH has IIRC 2 street areas that are Aq. Seems kinda wasteful is an investigator is at, say, Unvisited Isle, some aquatic in an IH aquatic street, but won't move to the investigator. Or are people playing any aquatic to any aquatic that has an investigator?

From any aquatic to any aquatic. (That's supposed to be the point of being Aquatic: dive and surface.) Operate them similarly to the way you do the Hounds or the Hunting Horror: if they start in any aquatic space, move them to any Investigator in any other aquatic space.

This will become quite a blast when the >mumble mutter murmur< Mythos card comes into play.

Note also how useful this sort of movement might be when chartering a boat at Falcon Point...

jgt7771 said:

Tell me about. It was silly times all round, and thanks to anti-dilution, Innsmouth cards come up more frequently than other expansion cards.

Dam said:

Wah hah hah. You got Innsmouth today and I'm going on a trip tonight and won't be on the forums until the last day of July or August 1st. The stars are right for Dam today ;') until Ancient Ones eat him as I pray they will. Anyways ;') enjoy your vacation from me.

Dam said:

That's what you think. The short bus is not the right bus ;'D

Dam said:

1a) I remember another encounter that's kinda the same at the Silver Twilight Lodge (don't remember what expansion it is though) where a gate appears, a monster pops out, and then the gate closes. The gate opening just serves as a mechanic for getting the monster there as far as I'm aware and doesn't actually open a gate in your location and then discard the gate. I'm thinking this is much the same, and just 'opening a gate' to get to you move locations.

1b) I haven't gone through all the IH stuff myself, but I'm pretty sure it works like the Strange High House in KH does, where normally you can only get there through the radio station, but there's a mythos card and maybe an encounter or two that can move you there as well.

2) Yeah, against Cthugha I'd say this does about the same. It would just serve to draw through the deck for those two AOs.

3) I consider a sealed unstable location to be a stable location, as gates can't open there (except bursts of course) and monsters can't appear there through encounters, so this card wasn't really a question for me.

EvilAmarant7x said:

Not for Clues I guess? Otherwise Prof. Rice-Rice-Baby wouldn't drop Clues on sealed locations (too lazy to check, but Akachi has Ricesque Pass clause with the PS as well IIRC).

Dam said:

An unstable location is an unstable location, a stable location is a stable location. An unstable location with a seal on it is just that, an unstable location with a seal, no more, no less. I'm almost certain there is no where in the manual that indicates it becomes a different kind of location. Yeesh... What a bad last post, but ;') hey, got to leave sometime, right? Later guys.

Seems like if there's a sealed location you can't move a gate there b/c there's an elder sign. It's like trying to put a bike in a wall.

Well, first IH game done, against Cthugha. Ashcan Pete just laughed in the face of Cthugha's "Sweltering Heat" . Oddly enough, Cthugha nerfed himself at times, due to the "Weather" cards being straight up discarded. 2x Gardner's Place and 1x Devil's Reef gate openings were nulled. D. Reef and Order of Dagon did open though and Dunwich saw activity as well. Deep One Rising got 2 tokens that's all, several of the monsters in IH were either Yellow or Green (and Pete did lure a Deep One Hybrid to Arkham, instead of it hitting a Vortex off D. Reef). Had plenty of weapons to go around, if I'd done proper trading (there was very little trading in this game), each char would've probably had minimum of +5 to combat checks. Ursula starting with 4 Clues and a randomly drawn Elder Sign didn't hurt. Jim Culver got Find Gate as start-up and was rolling in Clues, sealing 2 gates himself with Clues. Rita Young was the one who suffered most from "Sweltering Heat" as I had her bouncing around DH and IH. As far as personal stories go, Pete failed his, even though there was a chance of him getting it done, as D. Reef opened on the 2nd Mythos card and it was a Dreamlands gate. Others didn't get close to their, Jim because no Undeads were drawn, Ursula had 0 monster trophies. Rita had a Cultist, but nothing else, Pete did the heavy-lifting in the killing line of work. Sealed off Cthugha in 1h 30 mins, with him (?) being at 8 of 13 doomers. Did a count at one point, I think I drew 15 Mythos cards, with 3 discard, re-draws for Weather.

I think you might have played something wrong.

If Cthugha's special ability is just like Ithaqua's in regards to weather cards, then you still have to do all the other stuff on the mythos card, including gate, monster, monster movement, clue. But instead of replacing the current environment with the new weather one, you discard the new weather one with no further effect.

Tibs said:

I'll be honest, I did think about it, even compared the texts.

Ithaqua: "In addition, all Weather cards are discared without their special effects taking place."

Cthugha: "In addition, all Weather cards are ignored when drawn - a new card being drawn instead."

Don't see them as the same ability, especially given the "- a new card being drawn instead" addition/clarification/confusion-adding/etc. bit. The way they are worded, Ith targets the phase 4 of the Mythos card resolve sequence, Cthugha the whole card. Or then it's bad wording, IF their powers were meant to be the exact same (which I suppose they could be, given one is hot, the other cold).

No, I think it's definitely the "ignore the whole card". It seems to just be a friendlier way of saying "When Cthugha is the Ancient One, go through your entire Mythos deck and carefully remove all the Weather cards. Then carefully shuffle them all back in after the game."

I wonder if this affects the gate activity balance at all? That would be an interesting subtle power...

Ithaqua: You do everything on the card except the special ability. That means you open a gate, add/remove clues, add a monster, move monsters and then that's it. Discard the card.

Cthugha: You simple discard the card and draw a new one. As Cim pointed out, it is just a "clever" way of saying, remove all weather cards. Balance of which gates open will be affected slightly.

For Arkham Horror only, lose 1 each at: Graveyard, Woods, Historical Society, Hibb's Roadhouse, and Black Cave

For Dunwich Horror only, lose 5 at Gardner's Place, 2 at Wizard's Hill, and 1 at Whateley Farm

For Kingsport Horror only, you lose a Gate Burst at Independence Square

For Innsmouth Horror only, you lose 2 each at Esoteric Order of Dagon and Devil Reef, and 1 at Marsh Refinery

For CotDP only, you lose 1 each at Independence Square and Silver Twilight Lodge plus a 2 Doomer

For KiY only, you lose 2 at Black Cave and 1 each at Independence Square and Graveyard

For BGotW only, you lose 1 each at The Historical Society and a Gate Burst at the Grave Yard

Gate Balance notwithstanding, I think the point is that Cthugha will never have a Mythos Card without its text being read. Ithaqua actually gives the players a break if you draw a Weather Environment: Gate, Clue, Movement...then NOTHING. Cthugha, at the very least, will give them a Headline EVERY Mythos Phase.

Okay, second IH game today, vs Ghatanothoa. Poor Hanky-Panky got devoured on the second turn, with the first flip of the Visage Tokens. He was replaced by Silas Marsh though, who successfully read KiY, then sealed a gate and passed his Personal Story to seal another. I'm predicting that Silas will never survive till the end, unless he's drawn as a mid-last turn replacement just prior to final combat. Otherwise, he's getting devoured .

Speaking of Ghatanothoa, his ability reads:

"If it has Ghatanothoa's face on its front, he is devoured. If not, leave the token faceup. Once four visage tokens are faceup, turn them facedown and shuffle..."

Oddly (perhaps), it doesn't say shuffle if the face token is drawn, only once four are faceup. Is the intent to shuffle when four are faceup or when the face token is revealed? That's how I played it BTW. Seems silly that if, like in my game, the first flipped token is the face token, the next 3 occasions of gaining 2+ Clues would be free-of-charge, so to speak.

Of course, Ghatanothoa lost (6-seals), but what do you expect from a game with Sister Mary ?

Here's your answer from the rulebook:

Ghatanothoa
Remember, leave visage tokens faceup after revealing them
unless either Ghatanothoa’s face is revealed or there are
four visage tokens faceup after revealing the new token.

Morgaln said:

Hehe, whoops. Oh, well, at least I know what to read next time in the can .

Argh, so much for my prediction on Silas. Faced Chaugnar Faugn today, Silas, Darrell, William and Ursula. Having recently mentioned on the lack of monster surges, got 2 in the first 3 turns. This in turn helped Ursula pass her PS quite easily. With Darrell completing Sacrifices to Make (remove 1 doomer; IMO about right on how hard removing a doomer should be, not like Eltdown Shards from KH), I was all set to win by closing gates barely an hour into the game. 2 gates open, Ursula and Silas return. Ursula seals hers, Silas rolls an 8-die close roll and fails. Mythos bumps in a monster surge, next turn Silas fails a 4-die Horror check against a Ghoul and flips out (having had only 1 San left after his OW jaunt). After that he adamantly refused to succeed in any OW trips, always getting LiTaS, thus no gate trophy and no passing his PS. 1h 30 minutes later, I'm on 5 seals, helped in no small amount by Darrell flipping over Coded Messages. Silas has partly redeemed himself, taking out Barnabas Marsh to remove a doomer. Ursula casts Find Gate and returns, making a 4-dice close roll and seals the 6th gate with Chaugnar Faugn at 11 of 12 doomers. DOR track was at 4. Weirdly, Dunwich had 4 of the 5 locations open a gate this game, STL opened a gate AND surged, IH had the standard Devil's Reef gate (with an even more standard Yellow monster on it), nothing else. If it had gone to final combat, I don't know. I had 2 GOO attack cancellers picked up during the game and three Allies around as well, so at least 3 investigators would've made it to 4th round. Final note about the game is that I was getting surprising amounts of Exhibit Item encounters (being stuck at Train Station does that, darn you Mirage of Lakes), getting my hands on total of 3 during the game. Naturally, no Parchments nor did I get any Elder Signs from the UI deck, dispite going through a hefty chunk of it.