Hi gamers!

I originally posted this in Fan Creations, but I thought it might be appreciated here too...

I've been playing the Arkham Nights base game for a couple of months, but I really love the storytelling in it. So last week I began a solo game and am blogging each turn. My goal was to play one turn every couple nights and write about it, but so far it has been one turn every day. The story is told from Vincent Lee's perspective. He met Mandy Thompson who agreed to help him protect Arkham. And when things quickly became dangerous, they enlisted the help of Mandy's friend, Joe Diamond. So they are my party of three for this game.

It is suspenseful because I usually have to wait 24 hours or so to see what happens next, but it's been fun so far. Things start looking good and I'll think I'm going to win the game, then a monster surge happens or something similar and I have doubts any of my investigators will live through the night (in the game). I'm staying as true as possible to the rules and am not fudging any rolls or card draws.

If you're interested in seeing how the game/story is going, check out arkhamnights.blogspot.com/.

It's just a way to have a little more fun with this game.

Enjoy!

MuneMud said:

Vince is obviously no fool.

thats a good blog, looks good and interesting, tell me more about arkham nights, as im relativly new to A.H, whats it all about

One of the sleeping Ancient Ones (god-like beings) is chosen and the players try to prevent it from waking up. There are gates to Other Worlds opening all over Arkham and monsters are coming out. Eventually if too many gates open, the Ancient One awakens and the group must fight it. If they defeat it, the players win. If the Ancient One defeats the players, they lose. But prior to the Ancient One awakening, the investigators must fight off the monsters and close the gates around town. If they can get all the gates closed, the Ancient One doesn't awaken and the players win.

That's about as basic of a description as I can give, but there are a LOT of other mechanics involved (going to Other Worlds, using money to buy weapons and other items, casting spells, hiring allies, etc) and side-stories going on. And this is just the base set, I haven't added any expansions yet. Good clean horror fun.

isnt that the same as A.H?

My mistake, I thought you had asked about Arkham Horror. I blame it on all the turkey I ate yesterday.

I named the blog Arkham Nights because my gameplay time is usually after the wife and kids have gone to bed, therefore my Arkham time is at night. I picked three investigators and started a solo game. I play through one turn each day and then write about what happened that turn on the blog using Vincent Lee as my narrator. The biggest problem I see is if Vincent ends up dying, but I'll deal with that if it happens. Now that I've been doing it for a week or so, it makes me think of the old serials from a long time ago ("tune in next time to see if they escape..."). And this only takes a few minutes a day, that's the beauty of it.

I envision my current game taking place over the course of one night in Arkham. If after this game I decide to do another story using other investigators, that game will also take place over the course of one night (I guess in a parallel universe or something, how many times could the same town keep being invaded by monsters and Ancient Ones?). So that's the second meaning of Arkham Nights, each story/game takes place during the course of one night.

Nice use of imagination You have to invent some plot elements afresh each time (like how they all discover what is happening and what needs to be done) I would suggest in terms of story they dont realise the need for sealing or closing until someone does it, or attains 5 clues. You can weave in a different way each time, especially if you are inventive with what the collection of clues means.

Also, if you conceive it as one night, how do you rationalise mythos cards that reference weather like Sunny and Clear, or events like the 4th July Parade? It might be better to make it one night per turn - that way if your narrator is devoured, you can easily manage a switch to another character as narrator (eg Doc is devoured fighting shoggoth. His last diary entry is smeared in goo. Mandy finds it the next morning, along with a slime trail leading to a bloody smear in the street).

oh dear sorry, it makes sence now, i thought it was some older game i was missing,lol.

thats a really good idea and as i said i like the way you have put it together

The clues are definitely something that don't directly translate well from game to story. In the game, I may send an investigator to a nearby location because there are two clues there, but in the story how does that work? Without putting a whole lot of thought or work into it, I've been getting by. My Vincent did have 6 clues when he sealed his first location, so I attributed his knowledge of sealing to the amount of clues he'd found. But it's definitely a story element that needs to be better developed in my story...

I've never read thru the mythos cards outside of a game, so I didn't realize there are cards that refer to day time or whatever. I had considered doing one turn = one night, but I thought if the game dragged out for a long time then this problem could be in Arkham for weeks or a month. But I suppose that could be. Let's consider this first story my beta version, a time when I and the readers can work the kinks out, hehe. I've been doing a lot of "winging it" from the start.

Thanks for the feedback!

I've been working on horror/atmospheric/alternative music for the last couple of autumns. After listening to some of it recently, I figured it goes well with the game. I've added a section on the right side of my blog where I'll be posting some of my music. Why not?

I would key in clues to the ancient one and sometimes make them rumours (not the mythos card kind, but gossip in Arkham). For example, if the Ancient One is Yig, a gathered clue in the woods may be a scale, and 2 clues on the Witch house would be an old tale associated with the Witch house that mentions scales. In one turn your clue is a scale found in woods, in the other you build on this by sending them to investigate the witch house after they hear this tale. You build clues on the following of clues, like a detective tale.

As for the passing of time, it is certainly possible the situation in Arkham could pan out over weeks or even months, but maybe the best solution is to default to one night for the whole game, but stay flexible with it for the needs of the story you write and the turn of cards.

When I saw the heading Arkham Nights, I thought this was a blog using the fan created variant in the files section of BBG.

I've seen those files, but have not tried to use the variant yet.

I think it would be pretty cool if you already knew when you will spend the clues when you get them. That way, you could integrate them very well, but it also would be kinda hard to come up with explanations.

You could may some clues OW specific if you plan to have them go there so they know how to seal it, how to break the cultist's ritual on the other side, trapping them there, etc. And they don't have to go there for clues. Might be Vince went to Hibbs for a card game and overheard something interesting or found a message telling him a gate was open at the Historical Society. Could even be a useless ally who'll sacrifice themself to close the gate to the Dreamlands b/c, lets be real, who wouldn't want to be stuck in the Dreamlands? Stopping big ugly is just an excuse.

Having been at this for a couple of weeks now, two things have really stood out.

One, obviously, is the clue situation. Coming up with a reason for someone to find a clue at a location that fits into the overall story isn't much of a problem. But trying to come up with how they fit into the story being discovered by different investigators at different locations every day seems to take a little more time than I have right now. Therefore, I've been fudging a little with the clues. Of course, if I would only do a couple turns/posts each week as originally intended, maybe I would have the time for a better-developed story. But it's still hard for me to wait just one day to see what happens to these guys next! Impatient. Plus the game would drag out for months at 2-3 turns a week!

The second thing is time-related also. I seem to have landed in a rut of "xxx moves here, they have this encounter, and then a gate/monster appears here..." Same thing with this, if I had more time or waited longer between turns, I could have a more developed story and better-developed characters.

I definitely appreciate the clue suggestions and will try to improve them, but for this particular game/story I will probably continue as I have been doing without much of an overhaul because I want to see how this ends up. I constantly feel like I'm "on the verge" of closing all the gates, but then the doom track increases and my doubts return. As of now, my doom track is at 10 of 13, so it won't be much longer... I'm gonna miss these investigators when they've been devoured! haha

Well, I just played out the end of the game. I won't say how it ended, but if you've been following it or are just curious as to how my solo game went, there will be two more posts: the one tomorrow (Sunday) explains the last turn of the game and Monday's post will wrap things up.

This was fun. I can't believe it took three weeks to complete. I also didn't realize there was some other fan content already named Arkham Nights or I would have used a different name. If I decide to try this again or if I come up with some other project, I'll post here for fellow players to see.

Thanks all, it's been fun!