A group of three of us just finished the Core Set campaign "Night of the Zealot". So far, the game is pretty fun, but I have one reservation about it: player elimination. Twice during our campaign we drew an unexpected card (or combination of cards) which would have resulted in the elimination of one of the players in the first few rounds of the game. We didn't savor the idea of one player sitting out all night while the other two played on, so we decided to fudge things to keep that from happening ("Oh, you remember when you decided not to play that card you didn't really need so you still had it in hand and now you don't die?")

In the final quest of the campaign, we ended up losing someone towards the end of the game and decided to let it stand to see how it would play out. It still took us about a half hour to wrap up the game (with a catastrophic loss, I might add!) and during that time, the eliminated player just kind of found ways to busy themselves, cleaning up dinner and such.

I'm a longtime fan of the Lord of the Rings LCG, which also technically features player elimination (if someone loses all their heroes) but in practice if we suffer an early-game player elimination (or even just a really bad start) we just reset the game and try again, and even late-game players don't often need to sit out long since once one deck is eliminated, then the end of the game is generally nearby (we often concede at that point).

Because of the campaign nature of Arkham Horror, though, where losses matter as much as wins, it feels like we should play each game out even if that means having someone sit out for a long time.

My question is this:

After everyone gets better at the game, should we still expect to see early-game player elimination? If so, how do you typically handle it? What does that player do after being eliminated, and how long do they usually end up "sitting out"?

How are they getting eliminated?

I was going to ask the same, also, what difficulty are you playing on? Me and a friend have played through the Core campaign, Rougaroux and Dunwich campaign on standard (with different characters for each) and only had about 5-6 investigator eliminations that whole time. Only one of those was early game, during a scenario that is now somewhat notorious for it if you don't just do what the scenario tells you to...

So I suspect you're either doing something wrong with the rules somewhere, playing on Hard or Expert when you should be getting used to it on Standard, or even Easy if you're finding it tough, or it's just inexperience at deck building or playing. Rest assured, your Arkham experiences should not generally be that brutally short, it should get better!

spoiler for Essex county!!

the only terminate loss I have seen was here when a player decided to spend all their first turn actions in the first carriage and we managed to flip the agenda first turn.

it was very funny

But NB these are not Eliminations. They're defeat, which is different. They can still come back to the next scenario with added trauma.

11 minutes ago, Network57 said:

But NB these are not Eliminations. They're defeat, which is different. They can still come back to the next scenario with added trauma.

RR page 10, "A player is eliminated from a scenario any time his or her investigator is defeated, or if he or she resigns."

Excessive trauma can cause an investigator to be killed or driven insane (RR page 6).

Basically a defeat causes an elimination. I don't think that being eliminated through defeat or through resignation really changes the core issue we are discussing since the issue is player elimination (which is also a more generic game term).

I tend to have issues with games that feature payer elimination, its a bad mechanic overall (unless it ends the game in a short timeframe (no more than 10 mins)). Its one of the weakness of AHTCG. The difficulty level of the game goes up significantly when a player is eliminated, so much so that resigning may be the best course of action for the rest of the group unless you are in lunging distance of the end of the scenerio.

11 hours ago, Authraw said:

My question is this:

After everyone gets better at the game, should we still expect to see early-game player elimination? If so, how do you typically handle it? What does that player do after being eliminated, and how long do they usually end up "sitting out"?

My take is it will happen from time to time and sometimes a player will be out for a long time. If thats a deal breaker then, that's a deal breaker. I can see a situation in which a player is knocked out after 30 minutes and a game goes on for another hour, with overall defeat the most likely outcome.

The eliminated player can also do things like run the encounter deck and read the flavor text to keep occupied. Having a stiff drink is useful as well.

15 hours ago, Radix2309 said:

How are they getting eliminated?

11 hours ago, General Zodd said:

I was going to ask the same, also, what difficulty are you playing on? Me and a friend have played through the Core campaign, Rougaroux and Dunwich campaign on standard (with different characters for each) and only had about 5-6 investigator eliminations that whole time. Only one of those was early game, during a scenario that is now somewhat notorious for it if you don't just do what the scenario tells you to...

So I suspect you're either doing something wrong with the rules somewhere, playing on Hard or Expert when you should be getting used to it on Standard, or even Easy if you're finding it tough, or it's just inexperience at deck building or playing. Rest assured, your Arkham experiences should not generally be that brutally short, it should get better!

We were playing on Standard difficulty. I don't recall the exact circumstances of the first player elimination we experienced, but I believe it was during the second quest. Daisy Walker kept drawing mythos cards that did damage to her, and she ended up dying on round 2 or 3.

The second player elimination I recall more clearly because it happened to me. It was the third quest, and we had already lost some cards from hand per the setup instructions. I played the rest of my cards that turn (got an amazing opening hand). My player card draw was Unexpected Courage, and my first mythos card draw was Umordhoth's Wrath. Seemed like a pretty nasty encounter card, so I spent Unexpected Courage on the Will check in the hopes of mitigating the amount of damage I'd have to take--but it backfired when I drew the Tentacle token. I now had no cards in hand, which meant 5 damage. When combined with the one damage I had already taken (from entering a Location, I think?) it meant I was dead.

Our third player elimination happened around the time the boss came out in the final quest--that one seemed like a perfectly normal time for a player to get eliminated though.

5 hours ago, Jobu said:

I tend to have issues with games that feature payer elimination, its a bad mechanic overall (unless it ends the game in a short timeframe (no more than 10 mins)). Its one of the weakness of AHTCG. The difficulty level of the game goes up significantly when a player is eliminated, so much so that resigning may be the best course of action for the rest of the group unless you are in lunging distance of the end of the scenerio.

My take is it will happen from time to time and sometimes a player will be out for a long time. If thats a deal breaker then, that's a deal breaker. I can see a situation in which a player is knocked out after 30 minutes and a game goes on for another hour, with overall defeat the most likely outcome.

The eliminated player can also do things like run the encounter deck and read the flavor text to keep occupied. Having a stiff drink is useful as well.

That's pretty much what I suspected. Maybe we need to be more aggressive about resigning when this happens just to keep things fun for everyone, or maybe we'll institute a "freebie" restart-the-quest house rule in the event of player elimination during the first 4 rounds or so.

In any case, we'll keep playing to the end of Dunwich Legacy and see if our opinions change as we get more skilled at the game.

This'll become less frequent as you gain experience. For example:

50 minutes ago, Authraw said:

We were playing on Standard difficulty. I don't recall the exact circumstances of the first player elimination we experienced, but I believe it was during the second quest. Daisy Walker kept drawing mythos cards that did damage to her, and she ended up dying on round 2 or 3.

This treachery gives you the option to either take damage or spend a clue. Daisy should be able to grab clues pretty easily, and should basically always be carrying one around in case of Hunting Shadow.

That said, well, eliminations do happen. A half hour of downtime while the other players finish is probably not that unusual. It's usually not much longer than that, though, as since the per investigator elements of a scenario don't become any easier as players are eliminted, the remaining investigators are probably either close to the end of the game or should consider resigning themselves.

well, why don't you just do the same as with LotR and start the scenario over in case of player elimination?

but to answer your question it just sort of depends on how you make your deck. Some people are the type of folks who will refuse to put any defensive cards in their deck and insist on a 100% offensive build, which will make them look awesome about half the time and then the other half they will be dead.

that is to say, you can vastly reduce the chance at being eliminated by including a lot of allies, or other assets like Bulletproof Vest, Elder Sign Amulet, Smoking Pipe, and Painkillers.

1 hour ago, awp832 said:

well, why don't you just do the same as with LotR and start the scenario over in case of player elimination?

OP mentioned this as an idea a couple posts up, but to be clear, this is against the rules in campaign play.

It's certainly an option to go standalone mode, and play it like Mansions of Madness, where any investigator's elimination results in a loss at the end of the next investigator phase.

Eh.... technically. Who cares if you have more fun that way? Nobody wants to be eliminated in the 3rd round and then wait for their friends to play the game without them.

11 hours ago, awp832 said:

Eh.... technically. Who cares if you have more fun that way? Nobody wants to be eliminated in the 3rd round and then wait for their friends to play the game without them.

Indeed. I mention it mainly as a point of information. Obviously, the game police aren't going to knock on the door if you restart a scenario.

If you are going to go the restart route, maybe have the person take the point of trauma?

While I don't like player elimination, making player elimination have no consequences will influence deck building. Some cards (those that recover lost health and sanity) less valuable than they would be otherwise.

My plan is to keep going and try not to get eliminated.

2 hours ago, Jobu said:

If you are going to go the restart route, maybe have the person take the point of trauma?

I like that idea. Maintains some level of consequences without having someone sit out all evening.

I've had several losses due to trauma/madness but usually found it occurred near the end of a scenario and find the risk of this makes the game more exciting. You can mitigate by deck building (i.e more companions to 'soak' up trauma/madness points or items to increase/protect (leather coat, amulet etc etc) or by ensuring the invesitgators best placed to carry out actions do them. Another alternative is to adjust investigators and styles so if you cannot consistently fight monsters then switch to characters who can evade them. Sometimes having an aggressive clue finder can speed through an act deck faster than just having less clue focused peeps.

Basically there is a lot that can be done. You'll still get the odd 'you are screwed' card draw but that's the joy of random selection.

Rougarou seems to be where this happens to me early game a lot. That scenario is scary.

The difficulty you are playing in only tells half the story. You need to say what game cards you have. If you have 1 core and you are 3playing it, You should go on easy difficulty imo.

The core campaign poses a challenge on standard to even 2 core decks. With 3 characters one core you will have a hard time deckbuild something even.remotely decent

7 minutes ago, Yipikayey said:

With 3 characters one core you will have a hard time deckbuild something even.remotely decent

You can't make 3 legal decks out of a single core (each investigator uses the cards for 2 classes, so the 3rd investigator will clash with one of the others). To make decent decks, you need at least 2 cores for each pair of players.

That's what i am implying.