thecorinthian said:

Gah, -1 to score, no way, devoured is better !

And Silas isn't really looking out to get devoured, at least not by chance. He's looking for the stuff required for his PS (gate trophy, monster trophy and 3 Clues I think) so he can willingly take one for the team. True hairy hero !

Jedit said:

I'm disappointed to learn I've been playing it wrong. I almost even more disappointed to find out that it is wrong. I was just following the cards, which seemed pretty clear at the time.

Despite the possibilities of cheese (or alleged cheese), I still think paying the clue tokens and moving the FO token at least leaves some semblance of strategy (though I guess if I knew the story QU references I might change my mind.). Just rolling a die and letting the first player know he has 3 to 14 or so turns to live is pretty disheartening in group play. Don't forget, it cost us 12 clue tokens to apply the cheese: In a large group game, I always take, what I consider, to be a weaker investigator. Barnaby was available. He did a bang up job, however, closing three gates and sealing the most important gate, Devil Reef, and bailed out 4 from jail. But I mostly accepted the dust fate because no one else was apparently going to and already too many clue tokens were wasted.

BTW, anyone who would deliberately dust or devour Wendy apparently doesn't understand her potential, sign or no sign.

Coincidentally the first first player was Roland who eventually was devoured just a few seconds before QU was dispatched.

In game terms, as I said earlier, devourment isn't really a much of a penalty. It's more of an embarrassment. But to group players, its a traumatic event (at least to most of my group). They were not very happy to hear that certain death was hanging over someone's head. I can't imagine the reaction if they know who it was from the beginning of the game.

mageith said:

I have to disagree with this conclusion. Yes, sometimes devouring isn't that harmful; other times it can really damage your group's chances to win. I just concluded a game with Ghatanothoa, where we started out with Jim Culver, Harvey Walters, Lily, Bob and the worst opening weapon draw I've ever seen. We had on Spectral Razor, a bull whip, a calvary saber, and a rifle. So a couple of characters were shopping with what money we had while the other two gathered clues. Then the Dunwich Mythos card which lets you trade clue tokens for one turn came up. Bob's personal story requires that he possess five clue tokens before he has three monster trophies, and rewards the player with $15. So Jim swung by and traded his four clue tokens to Bob, who saw Ghanotohoa's visage and was instanly devoured. Good-bye Bob, four clue tokens and eight dollars.

Hank came up in his place and Harvey Walters spent most of his money on the Brazier of Souls. This was given to Jim, who headed down to Innsmouth to seal the Devil's Reef gate. But he only had three clue tokens (from reading the Old Journal Bob had given him right before death), so he swung by the Esoteric Order of Dagon to pick up the last two. Good-bye Jim, five clue tokens and the best weapon we had, which cost us seven bucks. And Jim's replacement? Vincent Lee.

We never really recovered from those early losses and when Ghatanothoa awoke (which he did very quickly, considering we got two of the two Doom token rumors) he had no trouble annihilating us.

So I don't see how you can say that being devoured really isn't much of a penatly, since you can lost an awful lot and end up with a far inferior character. Do you perhaps play with six or more people? Maybe then it doesn't matter as much, but when you have only four Investigators having one devoured can really hurt your chances of victory..

Solan said:

See, first trade away the important stuff, then pick up Clues . I did that in my last Ghatanothoa game, Minh and Akachi start at the same end of the board, so Minh moves to Akachi, gives her all her other stuff, then reads KiY, success, Visage, devoured. And she was replaced by Dexter Drake, talk about getting an inferior replacement !

I play with 4 and both G games have seen people devoured from Visage tokens, both games someone with 5+ Clues. Just gotta remember that it's 1 in 8 shot to begin with. Heck, even 1 in 5 odds I'll take, but that's just me, reckless to the end .

Solan said:

mmmm Weren't those (mis)calculated risks? Behind my statement was the fact that the reincarnated player gets a full new investigator, and if you follow the rules to the T, keeps his gates and trophies. Ghatanothoa's power is designed to make you think twice about picking up multiple clues.

Death by double doomers is a pretty hefty kick to recover from too.

Death by trading clues: or how to ****** defeat out of the mouth of victory. You didn't have to be greedy.

As to death by Old Journal: Even drawing one tome against Y'golonac brings on doom. At least you had a choice to use it or not. Greed kills.

Death by Vincent. What can I say.

Bad breaks is all part of the game. They are designed to overwhelm a team almost half the time.

I usually play with 3 or 4 people and one investigator per person. Last game was with six. Devoured investigators are simply replaced immediately without even losing a turn.

I think my point in the comment was that playing solo with four investigators is much easier than playing with 4 people each having one investigator. None of my players would have made the choices your investigators made, at least not fully loaded as you describe.

mageith said:

Whether risking a one in eight or one in seven chance of being Devoured is a miscalculated risk is a question I'll leave for another time. The issue I was adresseing here was your stated conclusion that being devoured isn't much of a penalty. Yes, we did follow the rules and immediately got a new character each time, while retaining all of the previous character's monster and gate trophies. Was that enough to compensate for what we lost with each devouring? Of course not. Which goes to prove my point that to characterize mid-game devouring as merely an embarassment is a mistake. Depending on the character and circumstances, having a character devoured mid-game can potentially be a serious blow to the team.

Unless I am mistaken, the devouring point was brought up with relation to Quachil Uttaus. So here, you see the death coming for a while, and have a chance to trade away any cool stuff you have, or to use clues that you grab, if even against a random monster. This is very different to the random devourings forced by Ghatanothoa or Yog-Sothoth. Against these guys, that's a risk you take every time you pick up 2+ clues or go someplace where you might get Lost in Time and Space. Random devourings can be extremely disastrous (mostly when you have that guy in for the last seal!). But long-forseen devourings, not quite as much.

They can still sting though. I still feel for Silas, getting devoured by Quachil in three turns, right before he could have passed his mission.

Dam said:

That sounds to me like a solitaire game

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

Bah, you just gotta "motivate" your group into submission .

IMO, If you can't afford to lose a character, than don't take the risk. Again the context of my discussion is group play. Almost never for them is the reward great enough to take the "unnecessary" risk of having an investigator devoured. In many, I'd so most cases, for the hardened gamer, in this game, devourment is OK (sometimes even desired). Devournment with 5 clue tokens and/or the best weapon, isn't.

I don't think I said "merely" an embarrassment. On a more personal level, I would never have taken the risks you did with investigators loaded as you describe--not for one or even two additional clues or to save a turn (which might be the only thing in game more valuable than a clue.)

Timing is everything.

Being devoured can indeed be dibilitating. I don't think I've ever gone after it if there was another way. I'd probably be OK with a rule that gave all survivors a -1 Sanity, a -1 to Maximum sanity or even a madness card when one of their number is devoured. I'm not OK with the rule that allows the heir to keep gate and monster trophies. But as it stands, usually devournment is not debilitating. I still stand by my statement, that it's usually not much more than an inconvenience in game terms and an embarrasment in personal terms. For the record, I neither like to be inconvenienced or embarrassed (or debilitated).

mageith said:

Are we talking in-game here Mageith, or is this a more general principle?

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Are you serious?!? Devouring is never a good thing, even when it wins the game! These are PEOPLE! You guys need help - you are talking like the Ancient Ones themselves!

dj2.0 said:

Couldn't agree more.

Last game I had Hank frogmarch that poor sick kid Tommy to the Asylum and hold him down until the electroshock thepary kicked in its magic.

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

dj2.0 said:

That's one way of looking at it. But I take the view that one or two lives are inconsequential when the fate of the whole human species is at stake!

thecorinthian said:

Yeah, especially when that life is one useless doctor named Vincent Lee .

I had a chance to seal a gate with Gloria today at the cost of getting devoured. Not a fan of Gloria by any means, just that she was packing a hefty arsenal of some really cool stuff, so declined. Don't know if I should have though, only got 3 seals down before QU woke up. Kate Winthrop drawing the "discard the deck" Dust cards for the first two decks in 3 draws certainly didn't help matters. 0 Elder Signs for the 2nd game in a row. At least this time it took a whole of 16 Mythos cards to get 12 doomers (Cthugha got 13 in 13 yesterday). Weirdly, was swimming in Exhibit Items (2x Summoning Glass, Book of Bast, etc.), and even with the DP Herald in play, only 1 investigator got Cursed. Of course, as Kate was devoured, her replacement was the infamous doctor mentioned . Since Kate had 3 monster trophies as she got devoured, meant Vincent auto-failed his PS. Yay.

Dam said:

Finally the trophy inheritance rules make sense.

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

<<For the first time yesterday an investigator pulled a double injury card and was devoured. It was one of my favorite investigators, Roland, played by my son, just two player turns before the final gate was sealed. A needless and horrible death--The game was virtually won.>>

I had this happen to me for the first time yesterday. In my case it was a solo game w/ 5 investigators and Lily Chen was roaming the streets after failing her PS and drawing a fight -1 injury and xenophobia madness. I was not best pleased by this turn of events. It was truly a blessing when she drew the second -1 fight injury after losing a fight with a Byakhee of all things. Her random replacement was Carolyn Fenn, which was nice.

The idea of devoured investigators being a blessing, and even investigators who want to be devoured is messing with my sanity points. I have this absurd vision going through my head right now of Tommy and Silas running around Innsmouth in togas, shaking their fists at Cthulhu and screaming Eat Me! EAT ME! a'la John Belushi

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

Yes.

Actually what I was talking about is in-game. Somehow I seem to have ended up defending the opposite side of this discussion. All I am really trying to say is that 1 player games with multiple investigators are MUCH easier than group games, at least my group games. Dam was "bragging" about how his investigators face death (He's playing solo) and I mentioned how horrible it is for most of my group when their hand-picked investigator faces devournment. (Of course this is way off topic.)

And devournment is can be a very good thing, especially win it wins the game. For that is our goal to win the game (save the world). It feels better if we can do it without anybody being devoured, but in GAME TERMS, being devoured can actually be an advantage lots of the time and its not really that big of setback if the players are somewhat perpared for it. A devoured investigator is replaced by a random character and gets to keep all eraned trophies. Not even a turn is lost.

Even in a very bad case, all the GAME has lost is a few clues and may a turn or two. Compare that to a gate burst! This is usually much worse. You have to gather five more clues and spend three more turns minimum to make up for it. My games last about 18 turns so if it takes one turn to gather 1 clue and three turns to move through the Other worlds that's about half an investigators game do replace a gate burst, is it not?