On an unrelated note- does anyone have any info on how the forum formatting works? The quote function is a menace

Two_Hands said:

I did think of the possibility of the whole party being devoured first up. My thought was that it is fairly unlikely, and it adds a bit of tension to the early part of the game, which is not necessarily a bad thing

Another possibility I though of was to have only the first player devoured if they have no gate trophies. A bit less harsh, bit still scary for non- gate jumper investigators.

The main idea behind the "Pay the Ferryman" rule was to make it increasingly difficult for the team to seal gates. Especially for the last one or two, they'll be scrabbling for cash to prevent getting bounced on return to Arkham (that's why I linked it to seals on the board). It's a minimum of $30 to get six seals, so they can't spend too much on gear.

I should probably mention too, this is for a scenario idea which will have little to no content from the expansions- so this herald is intended to make vanilla Arkham a challenge

Yeah, the quote function (and the formatting) on these forums are quite a PITA ::laughter:: Anyway, if you want to focus on the money issue, that's fair. Just go with something harsher: 2$ / seal on the board aren't that difficult to handle unless you forbid the Bank Loans. Go with that, and add: Start of the Game: the Bank of Arkham is closed for the whole game.

Now, it starts getting interesting ::laughter::

Let me know!

Anyway... as a side note... vanilla Arkham can't really be a challenge. It's kinda too easy winning by closing gates, so technically much less money is required. You only need only three seals on high freq locations and you can work on the closing victory

Two_Hands said:

Also, you really need to upload the image in higher quality. This thing isn't something that would look nice if printed. As for the picture, I second that it is very cool :') Aaaand, now I return to lurking at the threshold of the forums ;')

Avi_dreader said:

Thanks

I will upload it in a higher quality when I can (it was the default output resolution from strange eons, and I didn't really check it)

Unfortunately I can't do that at the moment as we have builders in repairing earthquake damage, so I can't get to my main PC

That's… good :-) Love the picture :-) Not so sure it's perfect Arkham, but it could be a lot of fun to play

MNT's herald made me think a lot and… that's Julia's version of a possible Eihort Herald. Comments and feedbacks are really welcome, as always.

Clearly, it's intended to be challenging and *nasty*

Are Cultists stalkers when the terror level reaches 6 or from the beginning ? The way it's written, I first thought it was when it reaches 6. But then have doubts.

I'm not playing enough to evaluate that guy correctly, but brood tokens seem spreading fast Just hope there are enough token in the box

Hugues said:

Well… yeah, I hope there are enough tokens in the box. Anyway, tokens are not supply limited, so, in case, you can use proxies. Buuuut… I guess that if you ever run out of Eihort's brood tokens, is more or less 100% game over. Anyway, you're right, it's a nasty bastard ::devil::

And cultists are stalkers from the beginning of the game. Otherwise I'd have worded it something like "when the doom track reaches 6, cultists gain Stalker. Place a brood token and a cultist on any gate in Arkham". I'm sorry if this is confusing!

If stalker from the beginning, i would assume to see that information at the beginning of the sheet, or at least with an empty line between the paragraph about rising terror. But maybe i'm just confused somewhere there is no reason to be.

What happen if a gate is closed with Brood Token on it ? They disappear or stay in that location ? Is there any mean to safely remove some brood token from the board ? Sounds really nasty

Hugues said:

Re: stalker. Yes, you're right, I came to the same conclusion, I'll upload a newer version starting with the "cultists are stalker" sentence, to avoid confusion. Thanks for pointing this out :-)

Re: closing gates. Gates are not related to Brood tokens in any way excpept for spreading the disease. Hence, once a token appears on the board, it stays there until somebody picks it up. And the picking is related to the end of the movement phase. So, an investigator closing a gate (if nothing strange - read OW encounters or Science building encounters) normally has to spend a movement phase on that gate before attempting to close the check. Hence, if there is a token on the gate, he takes it and must check for Eihort's brood before attempting to close the gate.

If somebody closes the gate thanks to encounters or De vermis mysteriis, the token remains on the board, triggering further nasty things. So, no way of removing brood from the board ::devil:: it's the only way to make Eihort a little less exploitable (it's one of the easiest AOs around because of a loophole as big as the whole universe. Suggestion for an incredibly tough game: play Eihort, my Herald and Avi's Arbiter of reality)

Ok, Ive modified slightly the layout so that it's definitely clear that "cultists are stalker" is a different paragraph. Hope this clarifies the doubts!

Looks very interesting! I like the way the Black Infestation forces you to chose between picking up brood tokens early or letting them grow and grow…

With the Black Infestation, the roll to see if they spread, is that before or after the Mythos card is drawn? If the Mythos card is a monster surge that places a new brood token, it could matter.

Adelphophage said:

Thanks for the appreciation and the feedback! Yes, you're right, it certainly does matter. I'll reword it in "at the end of the Mythos phase"! Thx!

Julia said:

After thinking carefully about this, the best thing is "at the beginning of the Mythos Phase". Otherwise bad luck can make the brood appearing at doom 3 and 6 too dangerous (rolling at the end of the phase, a '1' implies two broods arriving on doom 3.

More or less 18 months ago, I had a little brainstorming session with Avi about a possible Ghatanothoa Herald. Now, after some reworking, here we have the final result (which is the second installment in the nefarious series opened by The Shapeless Mouths).

Any feedback is, as usual, really appreciated

Uploading the revised (by Avi) version of Avi's Galaxy of R'lyeh:

Regarding the Ayrman'thai herald:

So, basically the first two Lloigors are just completely unstoppable in almost every regard, right? You kill them and they both get returned? I suppose having two absolutely horrible monsters that can't ever be removed is probably acceptable since the special movement happens before normal movement, the monsters don't move every turn, and Lloigors have an awareness of +0.

What exactly do you mean by "investigators cannot retire"? Do you mean that if one gets devoured, you just start up the same character, or do you actually mean that once the game starts people aren't allowed to leave until the game is finished?

Last I checked, standard Mummys are one of the worst monsters ever created, and this herald seems to take cultists, easily the most common monster in the game, and makes them all mummies. What are you even supposed to do against that? Not to mention, you are further punishing players for even trying to deal with them by forcing Visage flips. Difficult is great, but this just seems brutal.

None of the individual elements are too harsh (though some are ridiculous) , but all the elements in tandem create an environment that literally seems impossible to win against.

Regarding The Galaxy of R'yleh:

So, what exactly constitutes a "stack"? Is it only when R'yleh gate activity occurs, or is it any time two or more monsters happen to be in the same area? I'm assuming the former since otherwise this just gets out of hand waaaaay too easily.

I love the first clause of "Interdimensional Invasion", making other world encounters a bit more exciting overall while introducing a neat danger element. The reshuffling of R'yleh gates is a little rude, but it makes sense for the sake of this setup. The last clause that involves making Cthulhu harder is not something I feel so great about. In order to replicate a -8 Cthulhu, you need to be playing with both Father Dagon and Mother Hydra, and even that combination doesn't cause Cthulhu to recover 2 doom tokens a turn instead of 1. I feel the last clause needs to be tuned down a tad.

Does a stack always remain a stack? Like, what if there's only one monster left in a stack; it doesn't really seem like a "stack" by that point.

The Aquatic expansion on the main board is a nice addition to this scenario. It doesn't really add a whole lot to the game, but it's a nice touch.

What is the winning strategy to a scenario like this? You've made it incredibly hard to even close gates let alone seal them, and you definitely won't win against a -8 Cthulhu with double recovery.

Hi there!

thanks for the comments! First of all, you're quite new to the forum, so let me precise a point: all my creations and all Avi's are destined to advanced players. With this, I intend players who win most of the time with normal Arkham and play the game absolutely strategically (hit it, hit it hard, and win in 10 Mythos). So all the Heralds I and Avi have created over the years appear to be insanely difficult to "normal" Arkham players, and challenging to the advanced players. Among those, there are a few recorded as "Avi's & Julia's Heralds" (the Gath one and the Shapeless Mouths) destined to be used only by *high* level gamers (otherwise it's a slaughterhouse).

Now, as for your feedback:

- yeah Lloigor are unstoppable. You must play in order to avoid them, as long as you can. Plus, clearly you've problems if you play only core Arkham. Adding expansion boards make this easier

- investigators cannot retire means exactly that they cannot retire, as per rules in the DH rulebook, pag 6: you're allowed normally to retire if you have 2 Madnesses / Injuries. Now you cannot. Similar to Avi's Arbiter of Reality ability, if you're familiar with that Herald

- yes, mummies are difficult (not the worse monster ever, Colours, Servitor of the Outer Gods and some others are much worse), but they are thematically correct, Gathanothoa's gaze transformed people into mummies

Anyway, I usually tend to playtest the Heralds I create before posting them here. I played two games with this one, won both of them for sealing, so, trust me, it's not impossible to win against this dude. Plus, it's intended to be used with Gath, and Gath is really an easy AO, with a long doom track, so you have some free turns to study how to move properly on the board.

Galaxy: as told in the original post, this is not a Herald I created. It was created by Avi a long time ago, but he needed to reword some points so that it could be used for Scenario 21 of his League ( here ). If you follow the hyperlink, you'll notice that the Scenario is much more brutal than the Herald, but still, I passed, on the first try. And played several times with this Herald here, losing some games and winning more often (I'm 4 - 1, IIRC). I'll point out your questions to Avi so that he can answer you directly; in case he cannot, I'll answer you here.

Chat soon

JULIA

Shining Aquas said:

Mmm… One last thought… If you'd like to learn a lot about strategy "fast." Try reading through the posting history of the old timers on this forum. I'd suggest me, Tibs, Dam, Julia, and Jgt. That'll keep you busy for a while.

Avi_dreader said:

Thank you sweetie! It's always a pleasure reading your ranting posts about strategy :-) And also thanks for help with the R'lyeh Herald

Shining, a very last note. If you're interested in a good strategy against the Galaxy of R'lyeh you can go here and read reply 614. It's the report of my game against Avi's Scenario 21, with the Galaxy Herald. As you'll notice, I scored a closing gates victory in ten Mythos with Cthulhu's doom track stuck at 4 doomers.

And please, don't take this wrong. I'm not autopromoting my way of playing. It's just a general talk about strategy, and it's easier (both for me and you) pointing you at something already existing (plus, a commented, real game it's always something more interesting than pure theory) rather than starting the same talk anew

(ignore this post)