I just set up a 6-investigator, all-expansion game. Since Wilson and Jenny both started at the Train Station, Jenny was going to immediately give Wilson 11 bucks at the start of the game so he'd have 15 (to pass his story), and then she'd go to the Bank to get a loan. She also started with a Safety Deposit Key, so that was perfect.

The first Mythos card of the game put a gate at Devil's Reef. Since I was using my anti-dilution, there was also a 5/6 chance that there would be a second monster. There was. Well since we had the King in Yellow herald, I really didn't want those monsters entering the vortex and causing Blights.

During turn 1, the Visions of Hypnos card put a clue at the Train Station. Good omen! I gave it to Wilson, who also had the King in Yellow tome, which would give him enough to seal the Devil Reef gate. I even had Monterey Jack use all 4 movement to go to the Train Station to give $2 to Wilson so he could afford his trip to Innsmouth and to rent a boat, and still pass his personal story (but first Wilson had to make a pit-stop at the Esoteric Order to earn a buck and get the two clues). Monterey also gave Wilson the Silver Key to help him evade the Star Spawn on the gate, in case it was still there, and only worry about the Ghoul. With Monterey's remaining $5 I was hoping to pick up an Elder Sign at the Curiosity Shoppe: I did, and it was the 4th item drawn, which means Monterey's ability was directly responsible for obtaining it.

Things were looking great.

The Mythos card for that turn was "Strange Sightings." that's the one where there's a monster surge and every monster movement symbol comes up. Needless to say, four very pissed off monsters game out of the Devil Reef: none were stationary nor flying. Four more came out because of my anti-dilution rule but it didn't matter anyway. Six monsters dived into the vortex, causing Shub to awaken and immediately kill everyone.

Didn't even finish round 1; there was 1 doom token on Shub, and already the terror level was at 9 and Shub awoke and killed us.

ouch, Tibs... That's probably on the list of top 10 worst mythos luck in AH. That's when you hit 'reset.' =)

Tibs said:

Were you planning on giving Jenny Wilson's Motor Cycle as a loaner? Jenny can reach the Bank from TS on turn 1, but can't use the Safety Deposit Key that turn. Next turn, she could use it, but could only reach Asylum/Indepence Square, not Curiositie Shoppe.

Tibs said:

Jenny can jinx games almost as well as Dexter. And of course, the real reason you got pulverised is that you tried to pass Wilson's PS . With IH, Wilson becomes (for me) the Task/Mission runner for those early turns, as it is a waste to collect Clues on him. Maybe in your combo, starting with the KiY, you might sneak in and out of a gate and seal one before he fails his PS. Somehow though, I have feeling he'd get LiTaS in the OW and fail, costing you those Clues.

I feel your pain. Had almost the same experience on my first play of Innsmouth. Ok, it needed 2 mythos phases for it to happen, but still - the game was over in like 5 minutes.

Awww, thats cute, shubby wuvs you!

Tibs said:

Is this a house rule, as i thought Inv's can only pick up clues in locations where they END their movement phase or if the clue appears as part of a mythos card, it can be picked up immedaitely.

Tibs said:

With all expansions in, aren't the chances of picking up an elder sign from the shoppe really slim? It wouldn't even be something I would have consdiered trying, but perhaps I should try it more often!!?

As for PS, has anyone come up with a list of difficulty of success for them? Lola Hayes seems highly unlikely to succeed hers, of the times she's been in my games, she's past it only once, and that was via complete luck, the exact details of which escape me, but it certainly wasn't via Ma's boarding house or any other location card encounter... it might have been something to do with the OW she was in at the time, i just remember the ally came completely out of the blue

just 4 turns to try and pick up an ally seems very difficult to achieve

pumpkin said:

If I did my math correct back in the day (it's iffy, no doubt), I have a 1/8 shot of drawing an Elder Sign at the C. Shoppe if nobody got any Unique Items during setup. Standard draw 3, buy 1, Monterey and Uniques already in the game change odds. 4 Elder Signs, 98 Unique Items, so just under 1 in 24. If all 4 investigators shop on the first turn, 50-50 shot of getting one. Of course, that's a purely math view of the situation, this is Arkham where the weird, the wacky and very rarely, the wonderful (passing a Rumor that gives each investigator a Unique Item, drawing 2 ES) happen.

KH adds another ES and 11 other UIs, so 5 in 110, with no trimming of decks.

Thanks for the responses!

awp832:
See, the game was over (read: end of 1st turn) at 11:30, and it takes me like 15 to 20 minutes to set up. There was no "reset" this time

Dam:
Ordinarily, I would give the motorcycle to Jenny. In fact I was planning to at the start of the game. But I wanted Wilson to be as agile as possible in order to reach Devil's Reef. It was early enough that a 2nd turn at the Bank was no problem at all (usually takes an extra turn anyway).

kilrah:
Innsmouth stings. My house rule aims to keep Innsmouth and Dunwich dangerous even when gates there are relatively infrequent. I'd like to think that my chances of getting an opening gate on Devil's Reef followed by two monster surges would be just as likely if using only Innsmouth: a fluke.

dj2.0:
Yes, she kissed us deep with tongue all right
The best part is that it was a surge of monsters that was solely responsible for Shub's awakening.

pumkpin:
Investigators may also immediately take clues placed on them during the Mythos phase. A lot of players equate Hypnos's clue to the placement of a Mythos card clue, so we play it that way. Also, I realize that the chances of obtaining an Elder Sign are very small, but isn't that the main reason anyone shops at the C. Shoppe ever? Besides, even if I didn't find one, there would still be four interesting items to consider. In other words, I was expecting not to draw an Elder Sign, and would have been fine if I didn't.

The worst thing was that I haven't used the King in Yellow herald in a while and I was kind of longing for it. Now I won't see it again for at least 3 games. Shub I won't see again for at least 19 games.

Time to go rock another Ancient One. Wish me luck fellas!

Hypnos's ability takes place at the beginning of the Upkeep phase, not Mythos. Therefore no free clue. Sorry!

johnwatersfan said:

When was this decided? I'm pretty sure ColtsFan is with me on this too.

Not as bad as yours, but we just got done receiving a thourough boning by lady luck. Game lasted about 8 turns.

2 investigator game, Tsathoggua ancient one, Groth herald, Innsmouth board.

Highlights:

- Sister Mary randomly picked for one investigator. We have a house rule where she can rebless herself for free at the church, but Tsathoggua prevents this. Sister Mary then goes on to lose her blessing the first check at the start of turn 2.

- End of turn 1 mythos card is The Stars are Right rumor. Discard an ally to pass, add a doom token on a '1' or '2' at the end of every turn until you do. Thanks to Tsathoggua we cannot get allies from Ma's. One player gets 3 encounters in a row that grant an ally if they're in the deck; none of them are. First 3 rolls come up 1 or 2. By turn 5 there are 10 doom tokens total.

- 2 "gate and a monster appear" encounters come up, one of them on the first turn, wasting 3 turns of valuable early clue gathering for one player. Said player goes to the church as soon as he returns since there was a clue there (Hypnos). Picks an encounter that loses a sanity for every open gate. There are 7 gates =(

- We decided beforehand to stockpile clue tokens and do all our sealing at once to slow the deep ones track. With the doom track at 12/13 and neither investigator with both gate & monster trophies to fight Tsathoggua we decide to start sealing. Sister Mary goes to a gate with 11 clue tokens. Her first other world encounter she has to fight Ithaqua! With only 2 stamina! She is forced to use up all her clue tokens to pass the fight check and proceeds to roll 8 failures in a row and is devoured.

- Tsathoggua wakes up. Neither of us has any monster trophies. =(

So that was the worst game we've ever had. Side question: do you use the epic battle cards for an ancient one in the other world encounter? We passed figured "epic battle" only referred to when an ancient one wakes up at full power.

johnwatersfan said:

Hypnos's ability takes place at the beginning of the Upkeep phase, not Mythos. Therefore no free clue. Sorry!

When was this decided? I'm pretty sure ColtsFan is with me on this too.

So what if he is? You would both be wrong, then...

You just have to read Hypnos' "Visions of Hypnos" ability to see that it all happens at the start of the Upkeep phase, not Mythos.

OK let me clarify: an investigator may immediately receive a clue that appears on him from a Mythos card's clue-placement text.

Since the clues dropped by Hypnos appear in a very similar manner, I (we) figured the same rule should apply. The phase itself is not the important part, it's the manner which they appear.

GrooveChamp:
No, we do not use the Epic Battle decks for the dual-colored gate cards. Epic Battle is, in my opinion, something that is supposed to be reserved for the climactic showdown when all else is lost. Having it twice in one game--or more--lessens the "epic" feel. Not to mention, this would make those rare OW encounters far too difficult.

I've actually re-printed the cards to clarify that Epic Battle does not work on them. I've also changed Yuggoth/Shub to Lost Carcosa/Hastur for multiple reasons I won't name here, but mostly because I felt it was both more appropriate, and more balanced considering what Ithaqua and Cthulhu do to attack.

Sure it's similar, but it's not the same. The rulebook only states that you can pick up clues on the board when you end your Movement phase in the location, and the only exception to that is in the Mythos phase section where it says that a player gets it directly instead. Just curious, do you also give the clue to the investigator whenever a clue appear at his location, regardless of the phase, as in... for example, someone goes to Ma's Boarding House and choose Professor Rice as an ally?

Hypnos and Mythos cards both say, "a clue appears at," which is why I assumed they operate the same way.

With Professor Rice, I don't know... I haven't had that come up in a while. Yes, I guess I'd probably do that too.

The rules say and do not say a lot of things. For example, the rules don't say that investigators no longer receive clues during final combat, only money. But that would make Roland Banks immune to losing against Nyarlathotep during final combat. And this isn't even an odd case of multiple expansion interaction; Nyarlathotep is in the base set. For that matter, with Rex Murphy's personal story passed (his story, of course, comes in the same set with Roland), Rex could be immune as well. There was a simple, understandable oversight in the rules, so I feel a simple, general rule needs to be applied: investigators may not receive money or clues during final combat. The designers might agree.

As for the Hypnos thing, I honestly don't know what Kevin would say if he suddenly appeared in the thread and gave an answer. Seems like it just would have been easier if the rule was that you could generally only pick clues off the board during Movement. Not being able to pick them up when an encounter moves you to another spot (where you're going to have an encounter and explore), but being allowed to take them immediately when they appear during Mythos (where you likely will not) seems counter-intuitive.

As a side note: what does everyone do if a Mythos card drops a clue on an investigator who is standing on a gate? Does the gate prevent the clue from appearing in the first place? Or does the investigator "catch" it before it the gate swallows it? If there was an official clarification on this, I can't remember.

Tibs said:

From here its no clue can appear. "There is no spoon".

As for the cluedrops, my feeling is if Kevin did appear, hed say its ok if clues land on an investigator no matter the phase. It just seems an intuitive, simple solution. I also agree that clue gaining shoud be binned for final combat.

Tibs said:

Not to burst your awesome first round loss story (I only managed to get Dexter eaten first round in),

but aren't you supposed to first resolve movement and then the monster surge?

(As mythos card are resolved in the order: gate->monster movement->text->clue token).

Or have I been playing the card wrong (It's way cooler your way, though)?

Genejack said:

In your sequence gate = monster surge. Gate opens at an already open gate (or Strange Sightings), you get a monster surge, so step 1 of the Mythos phase. You got the order mixed up in other steps as well.

"1. Open Gate and Spawn Monster
2. Place Clue Token
3. Move Monsters
4. Activate Mythos Ability" (p. 9)

O yes, I overlooked the first monster surge. I knew I should have known better than to try to correct one of the hardcore players .

No no, Genejack has a point. The occurrence of a monster surge is the text of the Mythos card.

How do people resolve these cards, by the way? I know it's supposed to be Gate > Monter movement > Clue appears > Special Text, but "Strange Sightings," "The Next Act Begins!" don't actually have a gate location (or a spot reserved for for similar effects, such as double-doom). I usually read the Mythos card from top to bottom, doing the monster movement last.

Is this correct? Incorrect? Are you sure? What's everyone's thoughts on this matter?

Here are the two cards in question (Intermission doesn't count because only one thing happens on the whole card):

In both cases, the gate-related stuff is listed first, so I assumed the cards were supposed to be top-down.

For the sake of internal consistency, I play Strange Sightings and Intermission just like the "special event" replaces a gate opening. True, there aren't a lot of instances where that will matter, but it's good to have a procedure. So in the case of strange sightings, it would be 1) have a monster surge 2) grant the clue 3) move the monsters. The whole point of the card, especially within the context of the Black Goat, does seem to be to get some monsters out and circulating.

As for clues, I do play that investigators get clues that fall on them in all circumstances (like Akachi or Professor Rice). I have not played with Hypnos yet, but Tibs's stance seems a fair approach.

It's been a long time since it came up, but I think I would also play that if you're moved to a location, you can pick up the clue. It's more intuitive that way, and the people with whom I play can't fathom going to a location and not getting the clue. The other reason is that it was clarified in the IH rulebook that now, when a player is moved to a location with a monster, they must fight that monster. This was a change from a previous ruling. No such ruling was made referring to clue tokens, but it seems reasonable to me that they go hand in hand.

I've always played Strange Sightings as move, then surge. To me the monster surge is no different then the various cards which have text "... releasing <n> monsterst into the ... ", the only difference being that it's a distributed placement.

Yeah, well "monster surges" ordinarily only occur during the part of resolving a Mythos card when you're checking the new gate's location. Hence the confusion.

An official resolution would be nice.

Tibs said:

thats correct, so on these cards move is first, before the surge.

Oh and it isnt

Gate > Monter movement > Clue appears > Special Text,

but

Gate > > Clue appears > Monter movement > Special Text

Tibs said:

I'm with you on that one Tibs, if a clue appears at your location you take it regardless of phase. Unless it specifically states otherwise somewhere about the Hypnos cards it would seem logical and common sense that the same ruling would apply.

As for the surge thing, since it is a card's effect I would assume it comes last as it would with any other Mythos card effect. The layout of the Mythos cards needs re-doing if there is ever a new edition/reprint they are so misleading when you first play.

Well, back to designing my new Call of Cthulhu campaign - ahh, rpging how I've missed you!