2 hours ago, Khudzlin said:

Mark Harrigan, Minh Thi Phan, Sefina Rousseau, Akachi Onyele (she's shown in the article) and William Yorick.

Alas, poor Yorick!

I knew him: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! My gorge rims at it.

2 hours ago, Radix2309 said:

Why doesn't she fit?

It's a personal thing I guess, I just have a hard time imagining her in Arkham.

Most of the other investigators have this pulp fiction vibe to them that make them fit the setting.

How Lovecraftian the investigators are in general is a whole other discussion.

6 hours ago, cheapmate said:

It's a personal thing I guess, I just have a hard time imagining her in Arkham.

Most of the other investigators have this pulp fiction vibe to them that make them fit the setting.

How Lovecraftian the investigators are in general is a whole other discussion.

She is an African shaman who travels to Arkham due to a spiritual quest. Seems somewhat pulpy.

14 hours ago, Hawkstrike said:

Alas, poor Yorick!

I knew him: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! My gorge rims at it.

He does have a thing for the Bard.

@Veve7 They are indeed in order of classes. I won't go into details on this forum, which is owned by FFG, though.

On 22-4-2017 at 8:10 PM, Meretrix said:

About 90% of the investigators don't fit into the Cthulhu mythos. FFGs biggest blunder with this universe imo.

I for one am glad FFG made their own version of the Cthulhu mythos. Playing Lovecraft by the books would be quite boring, in my opinion.

8 hours ago, TheFool said:

I for one am glad FFG made their own version of the Cthulhu mythos. Playing Lovecraft by the books would be quite boring, in my opinion.

Totally agree, Lovecraft wrote some amazing stories, but he was also very much of his time, including his attitudes to women and ethnic minorities. I'm very glad FFG decided to decouple the good stuff from the baggage. Plus Cthulhu games of all stripes are usually more pulp action than HPL to make it more fun and interesting.

Additionally, HPL always intended for other writers to build on what he'd written, there were many authors swapping ideas at the time. The Cthulhu Mythos is no longer just Lovecraft, and I think he'd approve of that!

Frankly as a Seeker and Mystic buff I'm eager to see what new Seeker cards I can use. Too bad that one card can oly do a max of 4 I guess with how Clue spam heavy Seekers are a no max damage on a '1hp per clue' be broken.

3 hours ago, CEOWolf said:

Too bad that one card can oly do a max of 4 I guess with how Clue spam heavy Seekers are a no max damage on a '1hp per clue' be broken.

With the exception of a multi-target Dynamite Blast, I believe it's still the single biggest damage strike in the game. Shotgun might theoretically do more, but needing to get to +5 on the test to accomplish that makes it unlikely, and it's a L4 card at that.

Nothing to complain about there. If anything, it should probably max at 3.

This looks great to me. Cant wait for new investigators.

On 4/25/2017 at 1:36 AM, General Zodd said:

Totally agree, Lovecraft wrote some amazing stories, but he was also very much of his time, including his attitudes to women and ethnic minorities. I'm very glad FFG decided to decouple the good stuff from the baggage. Plus Cthulhu games of all stripes are usually more pulp action than HPL to make it more fun and interesting.

Additionally, HPL always intended for other writers to build on what he'd written, there were many authors swapping ideas at the time. The Cthulhu Mythos is no longer just Lovecraft, and I think he'd approve of that!

How nice for you. You are obviously FFG's target audience and I am not. Just a Lovecraft fan with a passing interest in FFG's products. Would have been nice to see a game properly represent his stories but I guess people in this community are so overly sensitive it's impossible to mention Lovecraft without someone mentioning racism. Go ahead and pat yourselves on the back and enjoy your watered down family friendly Lovecraft game.

I don't know what you're so upset about, game companies change things from the source material all the time. A lot of the time the game is better for it. Heck, I just finished reading Robinson Crusoe because I like the game, the book is just awful! I'm glad the publisher in that case changed quite a lot to make it a more fun experience.


Comments like yours are the reason that there is such an awful stereotype about "gamers". If we want to be be an inclusive group then we need to realize when what we say is going to drive people away from us. People who share our interests, people who could be our friends. Anyway I sort of doubt that it's just the characters that are driving you away from the game -since there is so much that is changed besides that-. Ask yourself what it really is about Lovecraft that you like, and maybe start looking for a game with that in mind.

There's nothing necessarily wrong with wanting to play a game that is close to the source material, but it's probably not going to appeal to as broad of an audience. I wish you luck in finding such a game (maybe Call of Cthulu rpg? I dont know I've never played it, but just because it's an RPG you should be able to tailor it how you like), but to many of us we don't mind a bit of deviation in order to have a diverse and exciting game.

5 hours ago, Meretrix said:

Would have been nice to see a game properly represent his stories

I'm honestly not sure how you'd do that, at least in an interesting game. As awp says, an RPG can probably manage it, but the entire core of Lovecraft is fear of the unknown, slow discovery, and then run away and/or die and/or go insane. Discovery is hard to put into a game that isn't just a one-shot, and knowing you're doomed whatever you do just doesn't make for a terribly engaging experience for a lot of people.

5 hours ago, Meretrix said:

people in this community are so overly sensitive it's impossible to mention Lovecraft without someone mentioning racism.

I will actually agree with you on this. Was he racist? Yes, but come on, it was the '20s. He wasn't exactly unique. It's also not a central theme to his work - I think Howard's racism is far more central in the Conan works, personally... but when I remember reading "The Rats in the Walls" I don't remember that the cat had a racist name - I remember reading it in a vault on a mid shift, alone, and being totally freaked out for the rest of the night.

41 minutes ago, Buhallin said:

I'm honestly not sure how you'd do that, at least in an interesting game. As awp says, an RPG can probably manage it, but the entire core of Lovecraft is fear of the unknown, slow discovery, and then run away and/or die and/or go insane. Discovery is hard to put into a game that isn't just a one-shot, and knowing you're doomed whatever you do just doesn't make for a terribly engaging experience for a lot of people.

I will actually agree with you on this. Was he racist? Yes, but come on, it was the '20s. He wasn't exactly unique. It's also not a central theme to his work - I think Howard's racism is far more central in the Conan works, personally... but when I remember reading "The Rats in the Walls" I don't remember that the cat had a racist name - I remember reading it in a vault on a mid shift, alone, and being totally freaked out for the rest of the night.

I agree, the general attitudes towards women and ethnic minorities is very much of that time, see Max Rohmer's Fu Manchu stories for a more extreme example! I enjoy the stories anyway, you just take that as read, which is why I don't think Lovecraft's social attitudes, or his limited palette of protagonists, are what define Lovecraft's stories. As a result I don't think you lose much, if anything, of the flavour by having a wider set of archetypes to play as.

HPL wasn't just 'of his time'. He was staggeringly racist / antisemitic to an extreme when compared with broad attitudes of the age and region. His fiction writing actually showed surprisingly little of his bigotry as compared to personal writings and anecdotes about his attitudes and beliefs. I dig his writing, and I love the entire horror genre it spawned, but the dude was utterly reprehensible in his outlook on a LOT of things, and 'it was a different time' doesn't even begin to cover how extreme his issues were, nor excuse them.

I am very happy that the folks who are making games I enjoy based on Lovecraft's fiction have been making a conscious effort to steer their games directly away from the man's attitudes.

16 hours ago, Meretrix said:

How nice for you. You are obviously FFG's target audience and I am not. Just a Lovecraft fan with a passing interest in FFG's products. Would have been nice to see a game properly represent his stories but I guess people in this community are so overly sensitive it's impossible to mention Lovecraft without someone mentioning racism. Go ahead and pat yourselves on the back and enjoy your watered down family friendly Lovecraft game.

The person being overly sensitive here is you, by the way. Good job, sport!

5 hours ago, Aaron Foss said:

HPL wasn't just 'of his time'. He was staggeringly racist / antisemitic to an extreme when compared with broad attitudes of the age and region. His fiction writing actually showed surprisingly little of his bigotry as compared to personal writings and anecdotes about his attitudes and beliefs. I dig his writing, and I love the entire horror genre it spawned, but the dude was utterly reprehensible in his outlook on a LOT of things, and 'it was a different time' doesn't even begin to cover how extreme his issues were, nor excuse them.

It should be noted that Lovecraft did suffer what would nowadays be considered actionable and ongoing child abuse and horrifyingly major emotional trauma from his lunatic aunts who got control of him early in his life. Which is no more an excuse for his attitudes when he was an adult than anything else, but the man didn't grow up in anything close to a healthy environment. It's actually rather remarkable that he was able to form such strong and fierce friendships with his correspondence friends as he did.

18 hours ago, Aaron Foss said:

HPL wasn't just 'of his time'. He was staggeringly racist / antisemitic to an extreme when compared with broad attitudes of the age and region. His fiction writing actually showed surprisingly little of his bigotry as compared to personal writings and anecdotes about his attitudes and beliefs. I dig his writing, and I love the entire horror genre it spawned, but the dude was utterly reprehensible in his outlook on a LOT of things, and 'it was a different time' doesn't even begin to cover how extreme his issues were, nor excuse them.

I am very happy that the folks who are making games I enjoy based on Lovecraft's fiction have been making a conscious effort to steer their games directly away from the man's attitudes.

You may disagree with his views but calling them "utterly reprehensible" is quite bigoted in itself. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and you can politely disagree with them without resorting to this sort of intolerance. I am not going to get into another one of these discussions because I've heard it all before 1000 times.

1 hour ago, Meretrix said:

You may disagree with his views but calling them "utterly reprehensible" is quite bigoted in itself. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and you can politely disagree with them without resorting to this sort of intolerance. I am not going to get into another one of these discussions because I've heard it all before 1000 times.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/danthropology/2015/04/the-intolerance-of-bigotry-is-not-bigotry/

1 hour ago, Meretrix said:

You may disagree with his views but calling them "utterly reprehensible" is quite bigoted in itself. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and you can politely disagree with them without resorting to this sort of intolerance. I am not going to get into another one of these discussions because I've heard it all before 1000 times.

His views were that people of different ethnic backgrounds or who were immigrants are literally subhuman monsters. That is the definition of reprehensible. Your use of the classic "oh, you hate bigots? that makes YOU the bigot" is misguided at best, and a veritable flashing neon sign of the modern-day racist.

Today's Agenda: Meet the very high threshold for attracting an FFG forum mod! We're adding doom tokens fast...

Seriously - this is going to go nowhere good, and has been debated to death elsewhere. Maybe we should leave it alone?

Yes, can we talk about cool card games again, please?

1 hour ago, Meretrix said:

You may disagree with his views but calling them "utterly reprehensible" is quite bigoted in itself.

Your intolerance of our intolerance of your intolerance is the worst kind of intolerance! And down the rabbit hole we go. Opinions are not immune to judgment and comment. Lovecraft's racism (and others'), regardless of its source, is not an intolerance of opinions or deeds, but of people.

And now it's a hundred years later, and what we might tolerate in Lovecraft's work does not need to be preserved in modern takes on the subject matter. Even better when it's actively repudiated, but FFG's approach of simply being inclusive where Lovecraft was not is both positive and reflective of the culture in which it's being created and consumed.

Culture moves on. New works are responses to their inspirations, not just echoes. The originals are still there for you to read if you wish, and the Arkham Files has white people, men, and academics for you to play if that's what you prefer.

So... how about that art huh? I mean.. the cover is very beautiful. I don't mean to be that guy, but this is getting so off topic it's scary.

Besides, the King in Yellow isn't even Lovecraft, it's Robert Chambers. Lovecraft just borrowed some names from Chamber's book. It's a really good read too. The repairer of reputations is something else.

21 minutes ago, Buhallin said:

Today's Agenda: Meet the very high threshold for attracting an FFG forum mod! We're adding doom tokens fast...

Seriously - this is going to go nowhere good, and has been debated to death elsewhere. Maybe we should leave it alone?

I will never back down from fighting racism, sexism, etc., and I frankly don't care if the venue that has presented itself means that it temporarily interferes with discussing a game.

"Leaving it alone" means that things don't change, and I refuse to let that be.

22 minutes ago, Aaron Foss said:

I will never back down from fighting racism, sexism, etc., and I frankly don't care if the venue that has presented itself means that it temporarily interferes with discussing a game.

"Leaving it alone" means that things don't change, and I refuse to let that be.

What you're doing here means things don't change too, you know.