Tonight, during a game, my friend and I had the following exchange:

"No wiat, don't do that!" "Why not?" "Because if you do that then we'd win." "Oh yeah. Ok, I won't." We then both had a brief moment's thought before laughing. :-)

For those of you who are curious to know ...

My friend and I are currently working our way through all the Ancient Ones trying to beat them all in every way possible (apart from Azathoth in a Fight for obvious reasons). The conversation above was conducted during a game against Cthulhu who we had previously beaten by sealing him up. We hadn't beaten him by fighting or by having no open gates and the correct number of gate trophies and the action I was stopping my friend doing was using his Elder Sign to seal a sixth location because we didn't want to win that way again. So play continued and we eventually won by having no open gates and enough gate trophies.

We then played against Cthugha who we spectacularly failed to seal - and believe me, it was a SPECTACULAR failure - and who then ate us.

So whats your plan for beating Quachil Uttaus in combat?

Veet said:

"Walk softly and carry a big stick" -Old African Proverb

I don't think that will work on him....he's physical immune.

Veet said:

And Magical Immune, in case you were planning on using the Fetch Stick. Of course, Zoey Samaras + Prof. Armitage/Richard Upton Pickman gets you full bonus.

Dam said:

no, they dont, because by then all allies are boxed.

dj2.0 said:

Darn, forgot the stupid Mummy eats them as well. Oh well, half-bonus .

This thread ended up being oddly prophetic as today we did indeed face Quachil Uttaus ...

Who I think has actually been something of a self-inflicted wound for this game. I believe the reason he is so nasty in the Final Fight is an effort to encourage players to NOT spend the game preparing for the Final Fight and actually go for one of other means of winning instead. But Quachil Uttaus is SO hard that before the game even started, once he'd been revealed as our randomly chosen Ancient One, we had a conversation and decided the only way we were EVER going to beat him in a fight is if we did indeed spend the entire game preparing for it. I have never spent the entire game preparing for the Final Fight before, but today I did because it really is the only chance you have of beating him.

We had Patrice Hathaway, Lily Chen, Silas Marsh and Trish Scaraborough with the Fight skill. So we kept Patrice and Trish safe all game, kept Lily safe-ish and sent Silas out to do all the dirty work - also getting the First Player Marker to sit on Silas so he could deal with the Dust Decks. He got devoured just before QU woke up and was replaced by Michael McGlen.

When Quachil Uttaus finally woke up; Lily's personal story kicked in removing 2 Doom Tokens, Trish spent 34 of Patrice's clues and rolled 68 dice. End of Quachil Uttaus.

And you know what? Yes, it was a boring game. But there is no other way to do it. Which I think is completely stupid. The Final Fight should be a last ditched attempt to win the game when all else has failed but with Quachil Uttaus, it's not. It's yet more pain when the main body of the game has already gone against you UNLESS you've spent the game waiting for him to wake up.

Hence why, I believe, he does the complete opposite of what he was intended to do. And he certainly takes the fun out of the game.

hmmm...one question - when people draw from the dust deck, do they fan them out and pick one, or draw from the top? I do the former and manage to dodge him pretty effectively, staying in dust deck 1 for most of the game and reaching 2 only when there are 4-5 seals down. QU gives me no problems except a need for speed. I win by sealing this way, but if forced to draw from the top, I am certain I would lose at least 1 investigator. Of course I had my third eye burned apart and sliced open on the altar of Leng, but theres nothing in the rules about not using occult perceptions Choosing is more tense and seems intended given Ghatanothua is in the same box and its a *lot* of fun, so I cant agree with the notion that he takes the joy out of play, although I see your point, I just think you need more practice at russian roullette

dj2.0 said:

I'm not complaining about the Dust Deck. I'm complaining about QU in the Final Fight. He's too hard - unless you've spent the entire game preparing to fight him then he will win, gauranteed. Which defeats the idea of having the Final Fight as the last chance to win. Because you won't.

So you either spend all game preparing for him to wake, or if you try and win by sealing/closing and then he wakes up anyway you might was well quit there and then.

Stenun said:

I'm not certain I have a problem with that. Most of the time I lose when facing one of the non-AH Ancient Ones anyway; the only reason this is any different than Azathoth is in the Investigators' delusion that they HAVE a last chance. You seem to share this belief.

I think that's one of the four things Dam and I seem to agree on: if the Ancient One wakes up, you haven't won anything. The Final Battle isn't for the Investigators; it's for the Ancient One to get a chance to say "thank you" to the monkeys who've been scratching at his feet in an amusing attempt to stop the end...

"Do you seriously think I'd explain my master-stroke if there remained the slightest chance of you affecting its outcome? I did it thirty-five minutes ago."

jgt7771 said:

Hey, don't hog the info. What are the other three ? Or did you just wing a number above one ?

jgt7771 said:

Lucky I bought this sonicy thing then...

Dam said:

Hey, don't hog the info. What are the other three ? Or did you just wing a number above one ?

2. One needs to have more Unique Cards in their deck than those received in the base game to dilute Elder Sign frequency. (Although we may disagree on the reason for this: difficulty of game vs. increased specialness of Elder Signs).

3. Shotguns have ABSOLUTELY NO EFFECT AT ALL on Monsters with Physical or Weapon Immunity.

4. Trish is **** sexy.

dj2.0 said:

Lucky I bought this sonicy thing then...

"...the Nightmare Child who would be King with his army of meanwhiles and never-weres..."

Where's the AH Expansion for that???

jgt7771 said:

This deserves to be QFT more !

jgt7771 said:

Its in the pâté.