Today I played the last game in the Nodens cycle. A complete rotation of the 24 AO (no Atlach, too boring, but Daoloth in), played with AH, DH, KH, LatT and MH in, no Heralds and clearly Nodens in.

24 victories, 6 by closing, 18 by sealing gates, 0 by final combat.

The shortest game: Abhoth, defeated in 6 Mythos (including the setup Mythos); the longest one: Yibb-Tstll, 21 Mythos, with 2 rifts that opened and 2 seals that bursted, plus Mad Bomber and The Terrible Experiment (both passed). All games ended with less than 10 doomers on the doom track (but one: Hastur had 10 doomers), and the minimum advancement in the doom track was in the Daoloth game, with only 4 doomers present when the last gate was sealed.

Some highlights: Rhan was defeated again, now I'm leading 7-0 against him. And he was defeated by rather an improbable party, with Ashcan, William, Mary, Dexter and Akachi. Akachi was the only one particularly good, but the game was broken by the design of Ashcan, being, since the setup, the bottom-most card in the Common Item deck Ancient Journal. Yig was hyperfast, with Riots showing up early in the game, and then Cover-up in the latter part. Doom track at 9 but fortunately I got a Strange Sightings just in time for Finn to return and seal the last gate. We discovered Vincent has a secret passion for collecting bullwhips: got two in the Hastur game, one in an abandoned locker at the Train Station, the other one a couple of turns later at the Police Station. Hank collected 5 clues while exploring clueless Lost Carcosa, but ended up being turned to dust by the last card he drew from the highest numbered Quachil deck. Azathoth was a cakewalk, but for the first five turns he was nightmarish, with everyone who dared to entered Leng ending up LiTaS (seriously, 3 characters in a row...).

Some thoughts: playing without Heralds represents certainly a lower challenge, but actually I had a lot of fun nonetheless. Some more time to pursue this or that secondary objective, some more time to toy around whacking monsters. Adding LatT cards proved to be fun (they are so bizarre... really love them), but the double gate Mythos showed up only once. Nodens helped a tiny bit, but actually not too much so that it could be considered a constant nice addition to the game, also to incentivate people shopping for Blessings and not for clues.

So, the year has come to an end: my balance for the 2014 is 37 AH games played, 36 victories and 1 defeat (Daoloth + Dagon & Hydra, never had so many surges like in that game). It has been a year where my usual Arkham devotion has been distracted by external events, but I'm happy that in the last month I was able to recover a little bit, playing 16 games in 40 days. For the first time in my life, it's not the game I played the most during the year (LotR LCG occupies the first position in the ranking, with 109 plays, followed by Battlelore 2nd edition, with 55 plays), but it's, as always, the game I had most fun playing. Not so sure what will happen during 2015. It'll be a year of change for many things, but I know Arkham will give me some moment of respite when outside is not Sunny and Clear (if you allow me to paraphrase a notorious celtic poem, 'cause Arkham's in the heart, and every hearth doth need a home ).

Happy end of the year folks! May you spend the last days around a warm fire, playing games, telling each other stories, doing all what you like the most, and be ready for the next one!

JULIA

Julia,

It seems as though, after four small box and four large box expansions, you're still managing to destroy the game with such an impressive Win-Loss ratio, that you need to play blind-folded or don't reduce factors due to additional boards or more wine consumption.

In truth, it's great that you're still a vibrant member of the community, sharing stories and lending a hand to the newer members. Congrats on another incredible run, my friend!

Ciao,

Joe

Thanks Joe. You know, the game is so huge that we keep on discovering encounters we never had before even after 350+ plays. Endlessly entertaining, I'd say

Let's see if I need to be blindfolded or how it goes with the next series (other 24 games with Father Dagon in, I guess)

Julia,

Your comment "endlessly entertaining" certainly resonates with me, as I'm trying to instill that same mantra when developing the current set of games. What makes a game fun once and what has the staying power to last a long time are two fundamentally different approaches. I have far fewer games on my shelves than other "board game geeks" but I'm attracted to more thematic games with tons of re-playability than something that plays well a few times, and then you "figure out the solution" as it were.

One of the approaches taken in Arkham Horror , in addition to the game mechanics, was the inclusion of dozens of card decks, each of which added a specific element to the game, which...when randomly selected, guaranteed billions of possible scenarios (I'll let Andrea and Tibs work out the calculations for greater precision ). After nearly a decade, Arkham still has the great combination of excitement, whether it's your 1st or 351st game. Now, that's an accomplishment!

Ciao,

Joe

Joe,

you scored a great point here. We started logging games in excel during 2010; if I look back at those stats (adding data and memories from the period 2006-2009, where we didn't have a real log, but some notes taken during games), I see few games that survived the passing of time:

- Carcassonne: more than 500 plays, and still one favorite. It's not a great game per se (other tile placement games are a lot better), but it's fun and it's quick.

- Arkham Horror, 350 plays

- Dominion, 200 plays (with or without expansions)

- LotR LCG, 113 plays, but 109 in the last 4 months, I guess it'll stay for a lot longer in my top ten of the most played games

- Doom, Descent 1st edition, Elder Sign, Fury of Dracula, Wiz-War all with 70+ plays

- X-Wing (even though we haven't played enough games of it yet, but the structure of the game is incredibly promising and there are just too many options to grow tired of it)

- Battlelore 2nd edition (it's a new addition to the collection but we played almost 60 games during 2014 and it's a fantastic game that is about to become even more fantastic)

some other games are fantastic (see games belonging to the 18XX series) but require too much time; some others are great but require a lot of players to be good so they are not played that often either; most of the other games are fun as long as the hype lasts, and then for one reason or another they are somehow less interesting. Not saying they are not worth the investment; just saying there are some hidden gems among many good games that are able to renew themselves and survive the passing of time, and among those, Arkham is the brightest. I'd say it's an Arkhamstone , if I may borrow Thrain's most precious gem as example

Julia,

As always, well-stated. That's quite a compilation of statistics...and a lot of games!

Ciao,

Joe

Very nice Julia. Sadly my arkham has slowed down between work and school . A game I have picked up recently is smash up, as it takes about 30 minutes to play and super easy to teach, its a nice filler when I have someone to play with but they don't want to do the arkham quest. Best of luck in 2015!

Best wishes to you too Smash up is indeed fun & easy, an excellent choice as a filler or for non-gamers. Sorry that you had to slow down your Arkham time, wish you more free time in the nearest future

Julia,

It seems as though, after four small box and four large box expansions, you're still managing to destroy the game with such an impressive Win-Loss ratio, that you need to play blind-folded or don't reduce factors due to additional boards or more wine consumption.

In truth, it's great that you're still a vibrant member of the community, sharing stories and lending a hand to the newer members. Congrats on another incredible run, my friend!

Ciao,

Joe

I completely agree that you're awesome

And I do appreciate all your help. Just out of curiosity is there any other games you guys play? I have only purchased Arkham.

:blush: I'm just trying to help in the way I was helped when I started the hobby, on a very distant December 2006.

Other games? That's a really *long* question (both for me and for Joe, who's a 30+ year wargame veteran who started testing games when I still was not on this dull earth). You can skim my collection at BGG here (and you can also see my face, at least you have an idea of who you're talking to) to have a general idea. As for me, my top five (in no particular order) is Arkham Horror, Elder Sign, Battlelore 2nd edition, Lord of the Rings LCG, Chess, Dominion.

Ouch..."still was not on this dull earth..." hahaha, really!?!? Love ya'

As for me, I'm a huge fan of The War: Europe 1939-1945, Arkham Horror, City of Iron, Shadows Over Camelot, A Game of Thrones, and Historia.

Cheers /Ciao,

Joe

That's awesome. I come from the warhammer 40k/D&D track myself, but I grew frustrated when I moved and couldn't find a good community to play with. I am slowly trying to drag people into roleplaying games, but I thought I'd start off slow, with just board games. I got some people into Pandemic pretty easily (which is really just a board game, only 45 mins of your time), and so it was easier to get them to sit down for Arkham Horror.

turns out AH has been some of the most fun I've head with a table top in a LONG time. Big fan of FFG now.

Yep, FFG games are different. You love them or you hate them, there's no middle ground