If you had to choose the top 5 best investigators, who would you pick and why?

Russell Simmons: The Photographer - Great Attribute set up and between his ability and retainer he gathers SOOO many useful items and allies and skills and... you get the idea.

Leo Anderson: The Expedition Leader - Attributes make him a blank slate perfect for adapting to whatever ally, skill and items he starts with. Plus his ability has saved many an investigators.

Mandy Thompson: The Researcher - Good Attributes, her ability makes her such a useful team player.

Patrice Hathaway: The Violinist - Decent Attributes, incredibly useful ability.

Joe Diamond: The Private Eye - Great Attributes other than will, Good ability, great if paired with Hathaway.

Keep in mind i do not have Kingsport yet, so only IH and DH expansion characters.

Lovecraft said:

If I were actually playing against an Old One and the world was a stake:

1) Patrice. Lots of Clues and she can freely pass them around

2) Mandy: Can save us from lots of bad rolls.

3) Jacqueline: She can see into the future and stop it. Especially if playing Dunwich.

4) Wendy: She can get where she wants, stay low and even starts with an elder sign.

5) Daisy: She's nearly unstoppable at gate closing if she Summons Shantak.

If the Old One insists on Innsmouth only, I would change Jacqueline for Roland. The future's not that scary, is it?

If I'm playing for a good fun game and the five I might play with all the time if I could choose:

1) Roland: He's not quite broken, but close, but I Iike the flow of money and clues. Very relaxed if he's in the game.

2) Jenny Barnes: I know money is over valued in this game and her PS stinks, but shopping four 4-5 turns is just fun for me.

3) Lily the martial artists: I know she's not very Lovecraftian but ability to stay out of the hospitals and to take on anything and always keep moving makes her enjoyable.

4) Wilson Richards: Fantasic movement, good weapon, great sneaker, very flexible: I always have a good time with Wilson.

5) Minh Thi Phan: I think she's too good. No one else seems to think so. Until they do, I can play her for fun and amaze my friends and astound others.

mageith said:

Hey, Minty Fun is in my "Dam's Angels". Okay, so those aren't really chosen from the best-of-the-best, but from a favourite POV, but still. Minh is very solid indeed.

Thanks guys. It seems we're pretty much on the same page with the Investigator choices.

My top 5 is...

Roland Banks - I love pulling off his Personal Story and his Unique abilities are pretty good.

Tommy Muldoon - Who doesnt love a hero?

Patrice Hathaway - Endlessly useful ability.

Daisy Walker - I just love tomes and spell casting.

Mandy Thompson - kind of a given already.

Patrice. Godawful number of clues. Easy distribution.

Wendy. Great evasion&speed, Elder Sign, and three clues.

Mandy. Turns die probabilities into a joke.

Daisy. Get alchemy turn one. Loads of money/equipment. No spell sanity cost, no difficulty reading tomes.

Darrell. On the Kingsport Board he can camp at the location that removes doom tokens. On the Dunwich board he can camp on the location that gets alchemies. Not to mention his general utility ;')

Interesting. I love Daisy's ability. I just can decide which spell to get. Summon Shandak and Alchemical Process are my normal choices. Any other suggestions?

Lovecraft said:

If not using IH and Kate Winthrop is in the game, Arcane Insight, declare win and re-set for a new game .

Dam said:

Hahaha... Nice.

What about the Calling the Azure Flame and Open the Third Eye spells?

Lovecraft said:

No love for Summon the Beast Within ?

"Bonus:

* +1 Maximum Stamina
* -2 Maximum Sanity
* +2 to Combat checks

Movement: You receive 1 extra movement point. "

Of course, not sure Daisy needs this, but if you have a slow San 7/Sta 3 (Harvey comes to mind for one) investigator in the mix, trading would benefit the team.

Dam said:

I forgot about that. Weirdly enough, it's the one I like.

Perhaps ironically, I got that Spell today, as reward of passing Cursed Relics Rumor. Plenty of money to go around, so passed it by tossing 5 Unique Items at it. Tommy Muldoon made good use of it.

Love Tommy Muldoon. He's awesome. But Daisy is my fave char ever.

Lovecraft said:

Heh... Honestly, no (alchemical process is going to get you at *least* thirty dollars, more really if you think about what you can get with the items it can buy). In special cases I might consider find gate, arcane insight, or shrivelling (although I'm always tempted by Voice of Ra, if you can get Daisy two of them, she really becomes a killing machine). When I'm playing Daisy with a couple of support characters, I like to try and get her the Necronomicon and transform her into God :')

The "Best Five", while certainly a topic for debate, will inevtiably come down to Joe Diamond, Mandy Thompson, Patrice Hathaway and 2 others. I think anyone leaving out Joe, Mandy or Patrice from the "BEST five" is clearly smoking something. :-)

So the debate comes down to just the remaining two to round out the numbers. For me, it would be Daisy Walker and Michael McGlen. Daisy to go get Arcane Insight and Michael to kill any monsters that Joe can't handle. The only possible exception to this is if the only expansions being used are Innsmouth and/or Kingsport - possibly with one or two small box expansions, too - then I'd replace Michael McGlen with Silas Marsh. However if there aren't a decent number of aquatic locations in play then Michael over Silas.

Far more interesting a debate, I feel, would be about people's five *favourite* investigators. This would create a far less unified response and woudl therefore be more entertaining.

So, with that in mind, here are my five *favourite* investigators. :-)

1) Lily Chen. Starting with Martial Arts is pretty **** good, imo, but her adjustable Sanity and Stamina just make her an absolute joy to use. Her spell and common item are usually superfluous, she doesn't even need them most of the time! Taking on a Colour Out Of Space with two empty hands is just ... awesome *happy sigh*.

2) Rex Murphy. Yes, he starts with a crippling negative point. But in a 4-or-more player game, there are enough Investigators to pick up the slack while Rex works on getting rid of his Curse. And with his Personal Story, it's not only easier to do but you get an amazingly good bonus for doing so, too.

3) Tony Morgan. One of the few Investigators with whom I actually try and FAIL his Personal Story. The $15 he gets for passing are far outweighed by the negative part of having to discard all his Clues, let alone the bonus he actually gets for Failing - a clue token every time he gains a monster trophy. Not to mention the increased worth of his monster trophies. I still remember the time he got Basil Elton (possiblt the best ally?) from five Cultists. :-)

4) Zoey Samaras. Purely for her special power. Just makes it so much easier to kill things.

5) Dexter Drake. He used to be somewhat unloved on these boards but I always had a fondness for him. I like the idea of a battle-mage for Arkham Horror and Dexter Drake was the closest. And then he got his Personal Story and he is now *definitely* a battle-mage.

Stenun said:

#4: I wouldn't put her up there on my list yet, but then, only one game with her so far. Still, she's off to good start. With me, if an investigator starts off poor, they'll have hell to pay to even get a sniff at getting out of the doghouse. Which I suppose is a good segway into...

#5: Okay Stenun, you just made THE LIST ! Dexter "Douchebag" Drake started poorly and has never even tried to redeem himself in any way. So he's in the house, along with Vincent, Amanda and new arrival George (who actually booted Jim Culver out of there). Dexter's skill sliders just piss me off. First is the 5/5 split, meaning he most likely can't cast a Spell and survive a Horror check, or at least now do two of that combo in a row without popping into the Asylum. Speed/Sneak is the only pair I like with him. Fight/Will is what it is, but Lore/Luck is my biggest gripe. If you want him to cast Spells, he's SOL with all Luck checks, if you want him to have Luck, good luck with those Spells. And I want Luck when hitting the OWs (Great Hall and City of the Great Race are the only ones I tend to want some Lore).

#1 - I love Silas Marsh. Without a doubt, hands down my favorite character. He is absolutely amazing in every game I've played with him. The last game I played with him I killed about 20 toughness worth of monsters with my bare hands without going insane. Granted, I never, ever, leave an aquatic location when I'm playing as him, but hey, that's like a quarter of the board when you're playing with innsmouth. And when the streets flood, who else can get from anywhere on the board to anywhere else without any items?

#2 - Joe Diamond. Der.

#3 - Finn Edwards. Keep all my items without an Injury/Madness? Sounds good. Move past monsters on moon (+circle) for free? Where do I sign...

#4 - Wilson Richards. Best starting equipment out of anyone. Guaranteed to be awesome from the get go.

#5 - Tony Morgan - Extra toughness. That's it. Combined with spirit vessel from CotDP he gets two clues per Dark Young. Fun times.

EvilAmarant7x said:

Gotta ask, how do you figure that last bit?

EDIT: Ah, you mean when you trade in a DY at Science Building + Fail PS.

Daisy Walker is now my fave Investigator ever. My friends were in a mad dash to give me whatever tomes they may have so I can get everyone suited up with Alchemical Process (I was using her personal story).

Our group tracks the stats for Investigators, so I can give you the actual top investigators (for my group)

Investigator Played Win%
Darrell Simmons 5 100%
Lily Chen 5 100%
Harvey Walters 4 100%
Mandy Thompson 4 100%

there are 5 others tied with 3 plays and a 100% win record... so that 5th man spot is still up for grabs.

These are my five favorite investigators.

"Ashcan" Pete- I love when I can occasionally exploit his ability to recycle a high powered tome, but even if I can't, he's a great all fighter. I like the homeless hero, kin to Oscar the Grouch, even though he eats garbage.

Darrell Simmons- when I play him I don't use his exploits, but I do really enjoy filtering the best of two encounters, he makes exploration easy and rewarding, like being blessed without being blessed.

Harvey Walters- ahhh, the professor. I love him even more now that he has his personal story, but the truth is I like him so much because he plays oddly. If you want to use him as a fighter, you need to pump up his fight to max, and just soak up sanity hits with his ability. Brute harvey, brute.

Jenny Barnes- is she more of a Katherine Hepburn, a Lauren Bacall, or some other dame from a Bogart film? I don't know. I do know that I love playing her with Joe Diamond (even though I dislike his character for the couple of built in exploits it is). Oh yeah, I love being able to buy stuff ;') it's not just her theme that does it for me.

Wendy Adams- moving from riches to rags, how can I not love Wendy Adams (and not just because of her Addams Family associations)? I was one of her insane partisans when she was the new girl in town, and I still love her for her ninja skills as a monster dodger and gate assassin. Wonderful little girl, wonderful.

Avi_dreader said:

I always knew you were a weirdo, now I finally have proof !

Just as a random reference to the "best 5" investigators from the beginning of the topic, if you check the AH stats page, you get these 5:

Mandy Thompson 78%
Patrice Hathaway 76%
Jacqueline Fine 71%
Carolyn Fern 71%
Joe Diamond 70%

Note: Daisy is indeed NOT at the top of this list. The only one on here which is a bit of a surprise to me is Carolyn Fern. I guess the sanity restoring power she has is a bit more beneficial than the blocking power of Leo Anderson.

johnwatersfan said:

Yeah, Carolyn's rating surprises me as well. I do she's a very solid investigator, whose only knockback is the Speed/Sneak slider. She trumps "Mr Magic" with her Lore/Luck and Sanity abilities. Really, Dexter should be her errand boy . Of course, last time out Carolyn started with Lamp of Alhazred and Flamethrower. Now that's a Psychologist ! If had had her today, I would've easily passed her PS early on. Not that failing it is a big deal really, just saying.