jgt7771 said:

I have to admit, you showed me a few tactics I would not have normally thought of with Mark (what I usually use him for is fodder, and I get him devoured or retired as soon as convenient— I shudder if another player picks him, since most people are attached to their pawns of flesh).

Man, I had not thought of any of those tactics when playing Harrigan. It should've occurred to me that Other World are where you run into the most encounters that just say "You don't get to make a skill check, you're delayed." I wish I had given his flamethrower to Tony Morgan so that Morgan could actually do his job.

(By the way, can anyone tell me why I set a forum avatar but it doesn't show up?)

The sarcophagus, right? It shows up for me.

mageith said:

Could you share your disabling (fixing) results with Strange Eons? Many thanks.

FWIW, here are the fixes I use for those two:

Daisy: has a focus of 1, may only use her spell ability once per turn.

Patrice: has a focus of 1; other investigators may only spend her clues to add to skill checks, but never for anything else.

and

Wendy: cannot become Deputy of Arkham.

I've heard it said that old crotchety Harvey is a much better monster killer than Mark. I guess you're only as old as you feel.

Only played this game twice. Played the Gangster and Sister Mary and found both quite good. The gangster just went sweeping through the street gunning every monster down and now and then sealing a gate with an elder sign. Sister Mary was pretty useful as she is a decent spellcaster and I had no trouble defeating monsters and sealing gates.

Both of these extremest character were much better then I had imagined. Great thing about Mary was her High WP and decent lore making sealing gates easy.

Tibs said:

Do you also use fixes for the other 46 investigators? I played too few times to know if they would need a fix, but I'm happy to follow the advise from people who do know.

Many thanks.

Fluffy James said:

For Patrice, she doesn't get a clue token every turn and she can only help people in the same world (usually this means sealing a gate, but can mean battle.) In the Other Worlds, investigators are on their own. She still gets her 5 clue tokens for her personal story and at the 9th gate.

When I make or adjust characters I think characters should be able to get between 1 and 2 points of bonus per turn. She gets 20 points of extra clues and my games usually last less than 20 turns. And she still has the very helpful ability to help others which is more powerful than even the ability to trade clues.

Daisy only gets to get a -1 off her Casting cost once per turn and she doesn't get to choose her spell from the Liver of Ivon tome. Instead she gets a random tome (which may be the Livre d'Ivon).

I found her to be too powerful and I always picked the same spell (Summon Shantak).

But what I meant by my comment was that with Strange Eons, you can fix them however you like and they still they look pretty much like an original component.

All the other investigators are A-OK. Sister Mary was a little weak until her personal story came around, and Tony Morgan is $1 short of adding up to the same "value" of starting stuff as everyone else, so if you're really obsessive about it you can start him with an extra dollar. But nobody else is really in dire need of a change.

I sure wouldn't say A-OK. But most are OK enough within broad and tolerant variances. Another one I "fixed" was Vincent. Once he passes his personal story he may heal one stamina token for any one in the same town/city. I've off and on tweaked a few others and the politician definitely needs a clarification which one could do oneself with Strange Eons.

I've also fixed Patrice's personal story (just because I can) to clarify what the author really meant by "draw". The plain English really means she's completed her story from the getgo and every, absolutely every time I've played with someone else running the game, they've interpreted it that way.

Not everyone plays 3-4 games a week and dreams about it in between and realizes the disparities in the game. The saving grace is that these same people really don't know the power in these characters.

I've seen Daisy played 6 times when other people have run the game and not only have they never maximized her spell choice, they haven't even utilized Ivon's liver at all. Just no clue. Even Patrice is usually under utilized by amatuers and Mandy's power is often forgotten about. Its seems most newly drafted investigators are too busy trying to buy a sword of glory or shotgun to be bothered with the innate power of their characters.

Even Vincent isn't despised because of his icky power but he's despised because he's just too slow and doesn't start with any decent fixed items. You'd think a doctor would have acquired a decent unique object d'art useful against Old Ones, but he hasn't, just some spells that he usually can't even cast. And certainly there should be something in his oddly shapped leather doctor's bag that would help, but usually there's not.

mageith said:

So true. That's why I'm asking to get some insight.

If you dig around in the forums there's been a lot of discussion about which investigators are Tier 1, which are Tier 2, etc. Mandy, Joe, Daisy, Patrice, Hank, Leo, Carolyn and maybe Darrell and Wendy are near the top. Joe seems to be many people's favorite. Vincent, Jim, and Amanda are near the bottom. Since Innsmouth and personal stories came along, Dexter and Mary have moved up in the rankings somewhat, while Kate seems to have moved way down.

While there are definitely some investigators that are more situational than others, it's possible for them all to shine and the rankings don't really concern me all that much (although Patrice... something's definitely off there).

What bothers me more is how there are some nonsensical thematics->mechanics issues. One of my favorite investigators is (or rather would be) Tony - but why in the world does he start without a weapon, and shouldn't the handcuffs go to Tommy?

Monterey also bothers me a little but -his stats are more like an Indiana Jones style brawler/ruins explorer rather than an actual archaeologist. An actual archaeologist would probably be more of a jack-of-all-trades with decent lore and a balance between sanity and stamina, for example.

Lastly, I hate how uneven some of the PS are - many of them are outrageously cool... but quite a few are completely unimaginative (Gloria), don't provide a good enough benefit for the cost (Jenny, Vincent) or are just carbon copies of each other (Dexter, Harvey).

I posted on it a while back, but I plan on writing some simple houserules for certain investigators and PS stories and printing off new versions of them. Speaking of which, does anyone know where I can get digital copies of the portraits for use with Strange Eons?

You know what? I'm still mostly happy with this. Another few dozen games down, plus the addition of the Lurker expansion, and I haven’t really changed my mind too much. It’s probably safer to say that each Investigator has a “range” from the median value at which they are listed—maybe 4 or 5 up or down depending on the game—which takes the Tier system and makes it more like Clouds.

Here are the only solid changes I would make:

46. Luke Robinson, the Dreamer – A bit too low. In Speed Arkham games, where everything is about Gate entry and closing, Luke’s Clue generation outweighs his faults. Probably deserves to be just inside the 30s.

42. Minh Thi Phan, the Secretary – Too low. Clearly, I underestimated the usefulness of +1 die to any check, compared with the relative ease of finding at least one Ally. Bump her up another 8 or so.

33. Silas Marsh, the Sailor – Too low. I got lost in his Special Abilities without really noticing that he’s very competent in his stats and with all those starting Commons, he has a great chance at being able to look after himself. That’s a lot more solid than a few others above him. Mid 20s.

30. Patrice Hathaway, the Violinist – You know what? Forget it. It took me longer than the rest of you, but she’s broken. It’s almost impossible to lose with Patrice: sure, it CAN be done, but you’d have to play…well, like ME. Rereading the debate in the middle of this thread, I choose to give up, and I refuse to rate her at all. >FZZZT<

Einlanzer80 said:

I just go to Arkham Horror Wiki and download the portraits from there.