You cannot play a Heroic and a Villianous character at the same time. My wife likes to use Hastur and The Agency, but runs into problems with this. Granted it makes sense that good wouldn't help evil, but it severly cripples her deck. I use Yog and Shub and this is a heavy hitting combo against her. Sure she gets more magnifying glasses than me, but if I wound or make her characters go insane, she cant use it. One thing about the good helping evil... in some of Lovecraft's stories a good investagator would find some evil relic or manuscript and bring it back to society, which in essance helps evil by spreading the cults and the knowledge. I wonder if anyone else has issues with tthis ruling, or an advice as to how and best counter it.

You would think if this was so important, then they'd have made an 8th faction that was not a mythos base because it seems only the "good" factions can really work together without any penalties.

We play by the rules now, but think it is silly that some characters cant work together, even if it is some sort of helping out without really knowing it... like in the Lovecraft stories. Maybe instead of not entering play together, at least not commiting to the same story???

well casual play you can bend the rules however you like really. but usually heroic/villainous have extra/stronger abilities than cards of that cost. i think the idea that certain cards cant be played together is a good, as long as it keep balance and shouldnt just be a novelty thing. but then there is the old cthulhu with a tommy gun so i guess all bets are off. like there is no broken combo in undercover secruity and keeper of the golden path or whatever. atleast in lcg i dont really see anything broken if played together but the rules are what they are, kinda like day/night.

Well for casual play, since Cthulhu can use a tommy gun and Shub Niggurath can drive a car, I think we'll change the rules to where she can play heroic and villianous characters together, just not commit them to same stories. I'll keep you all posted as to how that works, thanx for the insight PearlJamaholic!

About the attached cards or for the "event" cards (spell, curse, madness...) I think would be better a rule like Arkham Horror, which states if the owner must use one or both hands, the same as for the spells.

Would be nice too a level of "capacity" or aptitude to play that spells, i.e. the skill value

And could be two types of spell cards, that summoned by the characters (which must tap to summon) and those which affect the environment (such as "Rain: fire arms cannot be used 'til...")

And... and...

The amount of ideas is too great!

Well, that's how the game is. It's an additional drawback, and in general heroes/villains tend to be a little stronger because they also carry the drawback.

Marius said:

Well now were back to square one. So by this logic, anyone that has two factions that are villianous will be stronger than anyone playing a heroic and a villianous faction because they can play any card they want without any draw backs. I think I'll stick with you can play any character, just not commit heroes and villians to the same story.

PAZUZU777 said:

You can play any way you like, ofcourse. But yeah, it gives a soft limit on what factions you can play together efficiently. It's a deckbulding choice if you want to be highly specialised, or more allround, but less efficient. If you're playing Hastur it means you'll have a harder time getting those investigation icons ór have good efficient characters, but no Victoria, for example.

But it's your gaming table...

Marius said:

I hear you Marius, I just think FFG should've made a fourth faction that was "good/heroic" and maybe made this question I pose not so difficult to answer. If they'd give us more of a 50/50 good/evil ratio...

O.K. The ratio 50/50 would be nice, but remember the game is based on Lovecraft Mythos where the Earth is an insignificant world in an immense Univers dominated by the Ancient Ones

Bielius said:

Correct. Actually, I don't think any of the factions is 'Good', really.

Agency are shoot first, ask questions later type fascists. They won't hesitate to kill anyone 'just to be on the safe side.'

Miskatonic University is always on the edge of what is moral, in the name of science and progress. They'll break that Elder Sign seal, just to see what's behind it, do any dangerous experiment and keep the Necronomicon around just to be sure.

Syndicate - These are good people, making a buck - kneecapping anyone who stands in the way.

From a design standpoint, 50/50 is a bit boring. For an example of this train of thought you can read up on that on the excellent www.sirlin.net

The interest of Cthulhu's LCG is to have different factions which can make different things. Some are more powerful, that's right. You must choose what you want to do when you build your deck. If everybody can shoot, take control, play heroic and vilianous at the same time, it will be boring and it wasn't necessary to design different factions. Then, with existing card you can play heroic and vilainous characters in the same deck, just put cards to remove your heroic characters (by killing them, returning in your hand, driving insane, etc..) before putting into play under you control an vilainous character, and vice versa. It's not the rules you need change in this case, just your deckbuilding.

Marius said:

Great!

Actually, the ratio Heroic / Villainous is even more skewed, since from the 3 'human' factions, only Agency and Miskatonic have a good chance to produce heroes. Syndicate is more about laying low and small-time crooks, and anti-heroes - Syndicate believes more in avoiding problems, and thus, keeping low instead of taking too much credit for things and making too much of a fuzz.

While 'Heroic' and 'Villainous' are connected keywords, they aren't totally symetrical. Historically, even though both are drawbacks, Heroic has been slightly more of a bonus, where Villainous has more drawbacks, due to the cardpool:

Cards like Strike the Shepherd and Special Operative are more common and more powerful than anti heroic cards. The Dunwitch Horror can't even use it's ability when you control a heroic character to protect you. It also has some nice buffs like Crimson Dawn.

There where some good Villainous boons as well (Even Death May Die, Evil Awakens!) but the cards that work well against Heroic characters where substantially weaker (like Framed!)

The fact that only 2 out of the 7 factions are like to produce Heroes, and only a few cards actually are means that those cards where far less used as well.

Since most Ancient Ones are villainous, Windy Gallows Hex (which grants Heroic) was included in some deck for the extra Investigation, but also to help remove Ancient Ones, and some of the more iconic villains like Omar Shakti and the popular Ravager from the Deep. You're more likely to find a good target for Villain removal, while Heroes usually die to more open ended removal.

If everything was 50/50, it would be a far less interesting meta-game call to include certain cards. Now that it's about 30/70 it's far more interesting to bet what cards to play, and what cards to include should you encounter something you'd need to remove.

Dadajef said:

Interesting view points all of you. Thank you. I quoted this because I noticed "returning in your hand". Do you mean it is possible to return cards to your hand? Does this cost anything to do? Do you have to pay to replay them? I guess I missed this rule, I'm still a bit of a newbie and havent played any other gamers except my wife which is equally new to this.

Not the answer you are looking for, but suggest to your wife to swap out Agency for Syndicate! A few Low Blows, Vengeful Mobs, Expendable Muscles and Patsys and she'll forget all about those goodie-goodie Heroic cops!

Yes I suggest to put some cards in your deck to return characters in it's owner hand (agoraphobia, path of blood for example). You can play it on you opponent's character or on your own characters. it depends the situation.

You can also shot your own characters with a shotgun blast for example if one of your own characters is a problem to play another card from your hand.

BrooklynMike said:

This.

Syndicate makes everything more awesome!

THAT'S what I'm talking about!

BrooklynMike said:

Yeah that worked out better for her, much to my disgust... Richard Upton Pickman is now my mortal enemy!

What made me crack up the most was when my opponent played The King In Yellow him (it?) self and I sent in the thugs with "Low Blow" to take him out. I can just imagine the scene in some dark alley:

"You, yeah you in the yellow robes ... c'mere, We wanna talk to you"