Dam said:

I disregarded that part from the rules, vowing to choose randomly forever. I don't remember if the rules say that you're supposed to pick before or after, but it probably doesn't matter. People do it both ways, and it's kind of fun to know how many.

Tibs said:

Game setup steps:

Step 4: Choose investigators (either random or picky-choosy )

Step 5: Reveal Ancient One

FTFS !

Dam said:

Does that stand for "Follow The Freaking Steps?" or "From The Freaking Setup?" Or maybe, "F-- THAT, Fo Sho !"

Or "Find Tsathoggua's Favorite Snack."

Well like I said, I never cared about it because I vowed to go random. Some players like to go that route sometimes, I guess. I don't really care to bust into the rules for something so minimal.

Tibs said:

Without rules there is chaos !

Dam said:

Wow, mageith, sealing Hastur in 20 turns, nice (even if 3.5h time-wise). Of course the picky-choosy on investigators is a bit iffy for me , but at least you picked before the GOO.

Speaking of picky-choosy, where did that "selected after knowing the GOO" bit come from? Or cherry-picking as I call it. Definately nothing in the rules. League scenarios?

We discussed finishing him off face to face and playing a second game, but went for the finality. In the end we only had one unspent gate and four unspent monsters as we through everything at him. We had five monsters surge. Minh and Charlie really raised above expectations but it was a very thoughtful and close game by all.

Its not completely picky choosy. We had four very serious investigators who don't get to play very much. Emily always insists on choosing to some degree. However the choosing is limited to those investigators who have not been previously devoured in the campaign.

So far we've lost some top notch investigators: Daisy Waller, Hank Sampson, Jacqueline, Kate, Roland, Wilson and Patrice Hawthorne.

It its completely random, that usually means I'm playing a solo game.

Oh, party-time, Rail Pass is mine ! William Yorick will always carry the honor of being the first investigator in my games to get the RP. With his $4 and stop-over at Train Station, drew the right encounter for once! And it only took 79 games with the DH expansion . Seriously, never got one during the AH + DH days. Also been getting those CotDP Benefits/Detriments as well as Exhibit Items quite a bit of late.

Still no Finn, thus no Bank Loan (no Zoey or Tommy yet either).

Dam said:

Dam said:

Same thing happened to me in our latest game. I'd never had a rail pass before, despite playing probably 50+ games with the Dunwich cards mixed in.

I know why it's finally happened now, though: Innsmouth has increased the number of train station encounters I have, because I tend to stop there if I don't quite have enough movement to get to where I want to be in Innsmouth this turn (which is quite a common occurence because the rail depot in Innsmouth isn't a location where you can have an interesting encounter, so there's no reason to stop there).

Anyway, the fact that the rail pass has at last actually shown up means that the Sheldon Gang Membership is officially the most useless Small Card That No-One Ever Gets.

Yesterday, a player was Carolyn, she went into the woods after closing a gate, met miss Sheldon in person, passed her way in the gang, just moved a bit in the uptown above, did a bad thing with the gang, had a 5 wih the dice, got a common item, which was a carbin rifle, which allowed her to go on a location i forgot but where she wanted to go BUT where there was a horrible magical immuned monster... which she exploded with her rifle. Everything went so smooth, in three turns for her, and the player was glad having this experience... so trust me, sheldon gang can actually rock !.... when it happens, that is .

PS : oh, and to keep on with this topic's subject, STL rocks too, and my woman became fond of the inner sanctum, and thanks to her i've almost seen the whole encounters of that place in only two games

I'd love to try out the Sheldon Gang membership, but it never comes up.

It is a pity that FFG didn't create an invetsigator that started with a membership, but not having done so in DH, they weren't going to in subsequent expansions which didn't include the relevant card. Perhaps in the mythical "patch" expansion.

Meanwhile, I've considered allowing certain investigators the opportunity to take out membership as part fo start up at a cost.

Maybe Michael, Skids or Finn (although Finn alreday starts with a whole bag of goodies) . But they'd have to buy membership. What would be a reasonable fee?

$8?

Michael and Finn could afford this, but Skids only has $5.

Anyone think this is unreasonable?

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

thecorinthian said:

Totally. Encounters at Train Station also offer a nice chance at the Exhibit Item, which is probably why I've had quite a few in recent games (of course none today as Cursed Relics hit).

thecorinthian said:

I've had that once. Darke's Blessing is one that I don't think I've even seen the encounter for in all the games.

Dam said:

Those Dunwich 'condition' cards are so pointless. Only two of them are worthwhile, and the encounters that cause them to be flipped over are so rare, even if you're only using Dunwich + base game. But even if you actually get the encounter, you usually need an outrageous selection of trophies or items in order to trigger the card - like a gate trophy, a monster trophy and a clue token for Coded Messages. Who the hell is going to spend the time and the resources to try to get the card flipped over? Madness.

It's a shame really, because I quite like the idea that there are 'variables' in town which can change during the course of a game. It could just have used a more extenstive implementation.

thecorinthian said:

On the other 3 I'll agree, but vehemently disagree about Coded Messages, it's a game-winner! Newspaper sees a lot of traffic, so the chances of getting that encounter are decent. Getting it early sucks, but around mid-game, if I draw it and can flip it, it's getting flipped! Trading Clue tokens is HUGE! You can dive in a char with less than 5 Clues, while others do some legwork in town, collecting Clues, then once the OW-tripper returns, move to that location and trade him/her the Clues. It's the way Patrice perhaps should've been.

Dam said:

Wouldn't the clue-trader get sucked into the gate just in time for it to close behind them? Leaving them with no escape unless a 2nd gate is opned or opens soon (or gate box etc etc).

Although I suppose if they only get LiTaS it isn't a big deal. Makes me think they should really get devoured as in the 1st edition (not that I ever had it).

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

CM allows trading only during movement, so you could run there, trade and move away. Or depending on turn order, the closer's turn would be preferrably first, so if movement points are exhausted, gate is still hopefully closed + sealed, then the others have their Arkham Encounter phase. Coded Messages was the reason I won against Chaugnar Faugn in my first outing against him, trading Clues saved the bacon on that one. You're only really giving away 3 Clues (CM need 1 gate trophy, 1 monster trophy and 1 Clue; Science Building would give you 2 Clues for the gate) for the ability to trade Clues for the rest of the game.

Dam said:

What?

"so you could run there, trade and move away"

I thought that was what you said. Surely not. OK thinking about it, you don't gte sucked through until Arkham encounters, but surely you can't really just pop into the gate location for a chick natter and gossip then pop off when you see the guy with the sandwich board reading "ARKHAM ENCOUNTER PHASE IS NIGH" approaching. Tell me it aint so. Tell me no-one does this. It just ain't right, surely?

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

If you got movement points, there is nothing preventing you from leaving the location during the same movement phase, regardless of any open gate there. Trading doesn't end your movement.

Mariana the Ex-Nun Cultist said:

I do it sometimes. If someone just fell short of the clues they need to seal, sometimes I have a player with Research Matierals, an Elder Sign, or some clue-generating item come by and drop it off. But getting them there and off the gate, or getting them there in such a way that the gate would be closed before they were drawn in, is much more difficult than it sounds.

Tibs said:

Yeah, sorry to offend your moral sensibilities Mariana, but the "last-second drop-off" is a valid tactic! It's useful for deploying Elder Signs without risking sending them in the OWs. And sometimes it's handy to trade other items this way too, although usually only in odd circumstances. Only the reckless will try it.

It requires that the player with the item is moving after the player who's in the OW, so that the latter will come back and then the Arkham player can move on to the gate and make the trade. The player who's dashing in to do the drop-off won't have the benefit of an explored marker, so he or she will have to fight any monsters which are present. And if the dashing-in player can't move away, the closing player really has to close the gate first time, or else the other guy will be sucked through, making the whole thing less efficient than if it had never been tried. Of course, the Elder Sign itself takes away some of the suspense. In most cases you'll be able to tell whether the drop-off will work in advance. One other good reason for moving on to another player's explored gate is for a stronger monster-hunter to kill the monsters which would kill the closing player on their next turn, so that once the gate is closed, both investigators can move away unimpeded.

Regarding 'clue-generating items': I should point out that this tactic mostly won't work with tomes, because if you hand them to someone who's just come back from an OW, that person won't have any movement points to spend this turn.

thecorinthian said:

True, it doesn't work that turn, but if the closer can stick around for another turn, something like Old Journal or KiY would be cha-ching! Mythos would of course drop horrible monster(s) from a surge, but hey, them's the breaks !

Looks like the STL propaganda machine is working ! 4 of the last 5 sessions reported on Tibs' have STL Membership (1 before my game against Nyogtha, my game, then no, then 2 more).

thecorinthian said:

Yeah, had that one a few times. It's pretty funny when the strongest monster-hunter clears the gate, just to realise that the gate closer miraculously managed to use 5 dices for a total of NO successes at all, and is then sucked into the other world just to find himself being somewhere else when the next mythos card triggers a monster surge that doesn't only fill the city with monsters to block all the important ways, but also kills off the wannabe gate closer almost instantly.