I mean: nothing fould forbid them to introduce a new monster which devours you if you fail any check against it (evade, horror or combat).

Since monsters and GOOs are Lovecraftianly cruel, they're kind of welcome.But I wonder whether they actually test some messy mechanics (like Personal Stories), or Investigators:

People have been discussing (and despising) Daisy Walker (the Librarian) for being so ridicolously overpowered.

Now the story repeats with Patrice the violinist: compare her to, say, Vincent "loser" Lee or Monterey Jack (which is my favourite character ever anyway ), and you'll laugh to tears.

I'm not going to discuss about the above mentioned investigators (there are enough threads around about'em): i'd ust like to know your impression.

I just find it so strange that they carefully planned fixed parameters about the $25 value of starting possessions, and the total amount of Skill point & Focus, without caring much about overall balancement.

Also, I really wonder why only investigators from the base AH game got one Special Ability, while *almost* all the new characters (from DH, KH and IH) got two- often each being as powerful as a "full single one".

There are definitely some investigators that are more powerful than others overall, while many will be very useful in particular circumstances. The unbalanced nature doesn't really bother me, given that it's a cooperative game and that we pick investigators randomly. Of course, playing as Dexter or the Professor isn't quite as appealing once you've seen Daisy, but their personal stories go some way to rectify that.

That, along with the unpredictable cruelty of the game and the fact that we've already seen Daisy and Patrice and we know what they can do means that we're not too bothered by the strong investigators too much. If you draw one, great, but maybe you want to try someone else. Of course, I could see things going differently if a particular group is playing in a league, or is going for a good W/L record or something. Personally, we aren't thrilled if a game is too hard or too easy.

It still bugs me that a Librarian is a better spellcaster than a Professor, a Magician, or a Witch, though. The story rationale, in particular, seems a little weak.

Gott said:

My bias vs KH is well-documented, so no need to go into that. But will say that can't really agree on DH investigators having 2 powerful abilities. Marie's are a once-a-game (were pre-PS, now twice per game) and situational, Diane ok and so-so (first doomer is usually wasted), Jim Culver ok and very situational. Rita Young has one of the worst abilities of any set.

mattherobot said:

Spells are actually from books so that have probably found their way to the library. Still, I agree, until the PS came along she was the only one that figured that out.

Dexter is a stage Magician. And a professor is a professor (with a strong mind). Not necessarily wizards.

Apparently not only can the professor only cast a few spells per game, his real strength is taking a tommy gun in hand and blowing normally sanity blowing monsters away. In other words, he's miscast.

It shouldn't have taken much playtesting to see the imbalances in Daisy and Patrice. So it almost makes me think its deliberate, to give groups a chance to win once in awhile.

What irriates me even more is the weaker characters--espcially Vincent. He should be much more significant based on his own personal story and his PS didn't really fix him much. His counterpart, Carolyn, is really quite cool. She was the best magic caster in the base game and didn't even start with a spell. Also, I'd like to know how the politician actually works.

Other items that show a lack of playtesting are the Rare book collection and Velma's Gratitude. I can't get players to do them when they're free.

Dam said:

And I personally find that a real shame, since I like Rita's style and backstory; she seems like a cool chick. She's just completely and totally worthless - debatably for me the most worthless character in the game.

Scelous said:

I find these comments unfair. She's an extremely competent character, able to do many things well. She's probably not casting any spells, but that's fine. Her ability is definitely not the most proactive, but extremely useful when she does go down, making her the monster fighter with the least to lose. She also gets an extra stat point and starts with a retainer. Sure, not the best of characters, but she doesn't deserve the title of worthless.

I feel like she still does much better than the above-maligned Vincent, anyway.

Scelous said:

She's one of my favorites. I don't think you yet appreciate the value of high speed and sneak. And she can fight too. Her special ability doesn't usually come into play, I'll grant you that. But her stat design is really nice. And if her scholarship retainer holds, she can buy what else she needs.

Gott said:

I sometimes think that people here worry too much about the precise balancing of game mechanics. First of all, this is very much a game of chance, and if you draw investigators, items etc. at random, then that can be considered just another element of that. Secondly, and more importantly, this game relies on story and theme for its effect, so an interesting ability, personal story or game effect could be said to be more important than the power balancing. This isn't chess; It is defined by elements of chance, theme and complexity, not its game mechanics.

Scelous said:

I don't really mind drawing Rita. Would prefer Joe D over her, they have pretty much the same stat lines, Rita gets +1 Will but Joe's ability just comes into play so often (and a guaranteed +4 weapon doesn't hurt). But Rita can work it, definately. I just know when I draw her, I'm getting a char with basically no special ability. Or an ability that only comes into play when you seriously mess up.

So, yesterday we played a game, and I drew Tony Morgan, the Bounty hunter.

His personal story's "pass" condition grants him a nice $15 if he collects 4 Monster trophies.

But his "fail" condition has him to discard all his monster trophies, but from that moment he also gains 1 Clue Token whenever gaining a newmonster Trophy.

So, guess what: he starts with 3 Clue tokens. "Failing" is very easy if you start collecting clues, and in my opinion, it's even better than gaining $15!

i did it yesterday: I managed to collect 2 clues on the very first game turn: I hadn't got any monster trophies yet, so i didn't lose any, and was able to play the whole game with a new, Clue-generating ability.

I was amazed.

I checked out some other Character's personal stories, and saw similar "positive failure" conditions.

Then I suddenly realized that this is too broken: if an investigators "wins" something by both failing or succeeding, this means, basically, a "free gift".

I'd understand if this was developed to improve the weaker ones, but some of them are just balanced enough (like Tony). THey didn't need this kind of tweaking.

Monterey Jack's Personal Story is almost outrageous: he's got the worst WILL / SAN ever, and he's got to collect 3 Monster Trophies in order to pass.

And, should he gain 5 Clus, he fails and losess his special ability unless he pays Clue tokens for it. That's f****** lame.

Gott said:

There aren't many of them, but I read these (Sister Mary's being the only other I can think of) as ones where it's not so much a pass/fail as two alternative paths the investigator could take, one of which is arbitrarily labelled the Fail condition to fit in with the template the rest of the personal stories use.

Yeah, ok, it's just about "choosing your path"- but that doesn't prevent'em from getting a "free gift".

I don't know, this game is becoming more similar to Dragon Ball than to a Lovecraftian Horror tale.

Gott said:

It's of course purely dependant on what you draw. If you draw easy 1 toughness one that have an easy or no Horror check, he can get it done in no time. As for losing his special ability, can't say it would hurt me that much. MJ starts at Curiositie, so if you're going to have him do shopping, he can easily spend 2-3 turns shopping, after which most 4-investigator teams have very little money left (assuming here that the other traded most of their cash for MJ). At least for me, shopping happens on turns 1-3 for the most part, after that, it's rare.

mageith said:

I agree. I played a game recently in which I was devoured very late on (the doom track was at 11) and everything was against us - high terror level, loads of monsters, DOR track at 5, etc, etc. I started as the Violinist and she handed us a sealing victory on a silver platter. It took three turns and there was no serious trouble doing it. She's ridiculous.

As to whether she was playtested - I guess she probably was, although they may not have realized just how good the ability is before testing it. I say that because I think the ability (or a similar one) had occured to various other people, myself included, before IH came out, and cropped up on custom investigators in one form or another. And I think that when anyone suggested it, we usually yelled "No! No! It breaks the game!".

The thing about AH is that not every component has to be balanced. By which I mean: not every component needs to be on the same level of power. There are so many modular components that you're really meant to set it up to provide the sort of challenge you want, and the idea that there's one AO or investigator which is overpowered is simply not a problem because you don't have to use it. I don't think anyone can complain that the easiest cards in AH are too hard, or that the hardest cards are too easy. The difficulty range is huge and there are plenty of cards to use in games of every possible difficulty.

On the other hand, if they were going to introduce a character whose ability is so game-changingly helpful, I'd have preferred that it was a Guardian rather than an investigator. The Violinist is the single best thing that any team can have on their side, I think - certainly waaay more useful than Hypnos and co.

The personal stories are a bit odd. I'd assumed that they were meant to be a 'patch' for the investigators, so basically the investigators who have turned out to be weak have got good personal stories, and the investigators who are already overpowered have got weak personal stories. But actually, it seems like there are plenty of cases in which the story is no use at all in fixing the investigator's problems.

The most modular game in history is Magic: the Gathering, which after 16 years and 49 expansions is now well past 10,000 functionally unique cards. Ask any designer who has worked on that game about cards that were broken, and they will tell you this: Players are devious, players want to win, and there are a hell of a lot more players than there are designers. Players will find loopholes that you have overlooked, players will eke out every last bit of utility from anything you design, and if it can be broken, they will break it.

If you think that's just an excuse, take a look at the forum stats. Over 5000 people here own Arkham Horror. The playtesting for Innsmouth was probably done by less than fifty. I submit that we've spent more time testing it than they have.

Jedit said:

True, although I think that MtG cards have a conspicuously higher standard of balance than ...just about any other game components in existence. After 16 years and 49 expansions, Wizards really know what they're doing. And anyway, the get-out clause for MtG is that although it's completely modular, it's not really meant to be completely back-compatible. Every set is designed to be a stand-alone card base in itself. Cards from Shadowmoor aren't really intended to be played against cards from Arabian Nights or Fallen Empires. The rules have changed quite a bit anyway, so a lot of very old cards are difficult to use. If AH was like MtG, then each new 'board expansion' would have a complete new town, not just an extension you stick on the edge of the main board.

(There are rules advantages which MtG has, too: players start with nothing and rely on random draws in order to get cards. If you played a few games of Magic in which players were allowed to choose the cards for their starting hands, the game would instantly be unbalanced. Not least because there would be plenty of ways to kill your opponent on turn one. Anyway, drifting off the point somewhat...)

Jedit said:

Hehehehe... true.... and it would take hundreds of eight-player games to playtest every investigator against every AO, herald, monster etc. But in some of the most severe cases, you wouldn't need to playtest a lot of times... a couple of games would be all it would take to notice the 'problem' with the Violinist. It could be one of those 'playing style' issues: once you account for the playing style of a regular group of players, and the house rules they use that no-one else does, the experience of the game can be very different, and no amount of playtesting will help with that.

well from my point of view we are given to option to play what is in the box... it doesn't say we have to we can remove what we don't like.. if people think some characters is overpowered play others which is more challenging I think that there is characters for new players and advanced players so yeah there has to be some very nasty ones as well as weaker ones.. I usually tend to play those who is more challenging not those super power characters ... as for items and spells it's the same remove what you don't like in the game you are free to customize your own gaming style as long as the group you're playing with agrees..

I think of Arkham as a game with lots of variations and it's only up to ourself to decide what to use or not use we are given the core rules. Ofcourse you can still use all the content and complain about it but it's rather pointless and I'm pretty sure they're fully aware of what they're making. FFG has made many good boardgames and so far I haven't tried one i didn't like.

My team is really bad at teamwork, so the violin is next to useless for us. We're the players who go "Yes! I'm Joe diamond and have a speed of 6, I started with the motorcycle and just drew the ruby of Ry'Leh! That's awesome, I get like 11 movement a round!" while we have two other characters limping along with a speed of 3.

And unless we offer a decent trade, Joe will not give up his movement boosters to the slower characters.

We usually lose.

I could see Patrice not giving up a single clue token over the course of a game.

Graksnor said:

Emily had SO MANY clues when she played Patrice, even she shared. It was a breakthrough moment.

mageith said:

thecorinthian said:

A couple of eight player games? With 48 Investigators to test I can see it involving larger games, but the more Investigators in the party the more diluted Patrice's ability becomes as she has less Clues to take from the board. And of course her Clue-sharing ability is useless in solo play, though I would imagine she could solo almost any GOO including Q-U due to her massive Clue gain.

Jedit said:

I think Q-U might be an exception here. Q-U will devour an investigator, on average, after 8 draws from the Dust Deck. Assuming there's no lucky closing victory, sealing victories are also going to take far too long. So, let's go for a fighting victory. A combination of Arkham, Innsmouth and Dunwich and no monster surges will open 8 gates (the solo limit) after 8 draws. This will happen - just - before the 8th Upkeep. So that's 8 clues from the gate, 10 collected from the board (with a bit of luck), and 5 from the doom track hitting 9 as it fills up. With only $2 and no-one else to lend you any, the PS is not going to give another 5. Taking three turns to get a bank loan and then shopping to pass probably isn't a good use of time - better to pick up clues from the board, and maybe get some more from encounters.

So, that's 23 clues. Q-U has a 12 doom track, so you need >50% of them to hit. Possible with a blessing, but where do you get a blessing from? Going through a gate and grabbing a blessing would take 4 turns out of clue gathering. Perhaps five toughness of monster trophies would show up in arkham encounters - but Patrice isn't a great fighter, so you'd have to hope for a lot of easy 1-toughness monsters to show up in early encounters.

I don't think you've got much of a chance. Even under ideal conditions, your chances are about 25%. In a real game, with a monster surge eating a couple of clues, and no blessing, they're much worse.

Jedit said:

Hmmmm... I haven't tried Patrice in an eight-player game yet. Maybe it wouldn't be quite so much a guarantee of victory. But I still reckon she'd be the best investigator you could possibly take. She'd benefit the group more than any one other investigator would.

Cim's right about Quachil Uttaus though. It would hardly take anything for you to be completely screwed, and the chance of getting an event that significantly helps you (for example, getting blessed by a random encounter/Mythos card) are slim.

Heh heh... I love Quachil Uttaus. Me and my friends made what I think is an accurate assessment of QU the first time we played against him: "His final battle is ever-so-slightly harder than Azathoth's."

cim said:

Yeah, that's because I got Q-U confused with Chaugnar Faugn. Patrice is one of only a few Investigators who has a good chance of surviving his Faugn Annoying attack for four rounds, as she'll get enough Clues to do so from gate openings.

Gott said:

I've had Tony twice since PS came into play, and the first time it didn't dawn on me to fail quickly. The second time, I did as you did and passed his PS on turn 1 or 2, before he had a single trophy. I really like that clue generation ability better than money (I rarely shop), and always thought Tony was somewhat weak. This makes him a fun character for me, rather than "DARN, I got the unarmed bounty hunter again!"