When a power surge occurs, is it really so that the player decide where to put the spawning monsters? Do they not all end up in the Outskirts if there are too many monsters already in play? I am asking this because last night, we had 5 power surges in a row, with 5 new monsters every turn.. and we did not want the Terror Track to go up any more, so we just placed them all over the board at the open gates.... which resulted in a LOT of monsters.... it felt really unplayable at that point.

You place the surged monsters on the board one by one, yes the first player decides where they go, and if the monster limit is reached, the rest go to outskirts. You may not want them to, but surges do that.

5 monster surges in a row should teach you to shuffle better .

Does everyone play that non-Arkham gates all get monsters before outskirts if the monster limit is breeched?

i've always done it this way. In most cases, but not always, I think going to the outskirts would be better for the players as the Terror Track is rarely a factor. (Although I am guilty of forgetting that vortexed monsters are supposed to add to TT).

BTW am I right in my understanding that Dunwich only gets 1 token each mythos that monsters vortex, regardless of number of monsters. But that for DOR it is 1 token per monster?

I played Dunwich as 1 token per monster for some time before changing, and for the first few Innsmouth games assumed DOR was the same, but I think I had that wrong.

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

I think it's 1 per monster for both (at work, can't check; or could, but I'll go with my gut instinct/don't want to dl the rulebooks on the work comp).

Dam said:

Hehe, yes...

So.. if I have reached the monster limit on the board by the time I get a power surge, all of the "power surged monsters" are placed in the Outskirts?

Yeah, IIRC 8-investigator games have 0 Outskirts limit, so if town is at monster limit, 1 monster surge will pop up Terror by 8 (each monster to Outskirts causes it to overflow) . Assuming gates are only open in Arkham.

Dam said:

You are right Dam, I just checked on the pdf.

Rats. I played Dunwich like that at first then for some reason thought I was doing it wrong and switched

Wish the edit function on this forum didn't vanish so quickly or I'd plaster an "Ignore" over my earlier message.

BTW my main DOR trigger has been sealed gates pinging, not monsters jumping into a vortex

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: I always figure out how the monsters would be distributed evenly across all gates in all towns, then when actually placing them take the monster limit into effect. Has led to cases where there were a couple gates open in Dunwich, a few surges happen, and all of a sudden it's a very unfriendly place, with more overall monsters than Arkham itself has.

ricedwlit said:

Hmm, I always assumed the surges were applied just to Arkham (or rather the board on which the gate causing the surge is located), but I can see what you are saying. Is there an official ruling on this somewhere?

Nyogtha said:

I can see how "every open gate currently on the board" (AH rules, pg 9) could be interpreted that way, but given that everything else in the expansions says that "Arkham" means "Arkham and Dunwich"/"Arkham and Innsmouth" - and bearing in mind that the AH rules predate extra boards - I think that "the board" means all the boards that are in use, not just the physical bit of board the gate is on.

It would make Dunwich especially rather too quiet otherwise, I think, though Innsmouth would probably still be okay.

Nyogtha said:

To be honest your interpretation never occured to me, although I suspect that for once I have it "right" for the reasons that Cim suggested.

This game is riddled with quirks that seem entirely unambiguous until you find that someone else has read them in a completely different manner. I think of it as a feature of the game

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Sorry, might be a language problem, but I didn't quite get the questioning of Mariana : what was the thing wrongly done / house ruled way of monster-surging ? the discussion after that didn't help me to get what you were talking about, sorry. Help ?

Hem said:

Hello Hem,

• When a monster surge occurs a bunch of monstesr are placed on the board equal to either the total number of investigators or the total number of open gates (whichever is greater).
• These are divided as evenly as possible amongst open gates with order of placement/positioning chosen by the first player (before each monster is drawn)
• But when the monster limit for arkham is already exceeded no new monsters (other than spawn) can be placed in Arkham. Monsters that would be placed in Arkham go to the outskirts instead
• but, but the monster limit does not apply to the other boards e.g. Dunwich. Nor do monsters in the other towns count towards the monster limit

Hence my question: if there are open gates in both Dunwich and Arkham when a surge occurs, and the monster limit has been reached how do people chose to place their monsters? Do they place at the Dunwich gates first (i.e. on the board) or at Arkham (ie go to outskirts). Depnding on the situation one or other choice would be more beneficial to players. I try not to bias how I do this.

I always place the first monster as if it emerged out of the surging gate. Subsequently I try to go round the board clockwise as much as possible. I can be guilty of biasing towards monser appearance in Dunwich rather than outskirts as it is more fun.

However, I think this is one of those situations where players do get top exercise their choice, rather than there being a correct method.

Apologies if I made this sound a bigger deal than it is

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Nah nah, it's clearer now. That your doubts were about how to put monsters after a surge when using other towns boards where gates might have opened... that, i didn't get before but now it's ok, thank you. Though I think I recall some other thread where a guy was asking something like that, about "well let us put them all in this other town since it doesn't count against the terror level track !". I never faced that situation before (putting other montsers in other towns) so I m no big help right here.

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

Hmm, yeah I think Cim and yourself have it right. That method would make more sense with the everything is classed as 'in Arkham' and it would account for why some of the expansion boards remain quiet a lot of the time. Maybe this is the mistake others made that have said such things as the Dunwich Horror never appearing, etc. I shall use this method in my next game and see how it pans out.

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

For me, let's say Arkham at limit, 3 open gates in Arkham, 1 in IH and 1 in DH. Since 5 gates open > # of investigators (for me anyway), 5 monsters will surge. Each gate gets assigned 1 monster, only then do I start looking at what can and can't be placed. IH and DH get their monster, 1 each, the 3 going to Arkham go the Outskirts (possibly overflowing it).

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

First Player chooses. We read aloud all our cards--usually with a fair amount of theatrics and commentary--and the Mythos card always goes to whomever is the First Player. They do everything that goes with the Phase: draw Gates, draw Monsters, etc. When a surge occurs, the Monster Limit is counted, and we figure out exactly how many monsters are being drawn (number of players vs number of Gates), and the Gates that may be targeted. Then it's completely up to them. One at a time, First Player calls aloud the location, then dips in for the monster. Some go clockwise, some go top-bottom-left-right, some do it Lovecraft-style with no recognizable pattern at all.

When I was teaching people how to play, I would declare everything I was doing, and the audible procedure kinda stuck. Something like: "Woods...>shuffle< Cultist. Wizard's Hill...>shuffle< Mi-Go. Black Cave...>shuffle< Zombie...Monster Limit reached...Outskirts." I suppose it adds time to our game durations...but it's a party game. And we rarely make mistakes or miss anything when everyone can hear what's going on.