Julia said:

The vision describes my soul; however, I have a strong sense of irony and am self-aware enough to not do that to children ;') probably.

Feel better. If I keep telling you to feel better, I'll get to take credit when you eventually do, "You know, that Julia, she would have never felt better if I hadn't kept telling her to."

Julia said:

You're not afraid? ;'D ... You will be. You will be. (Once again, Yoda knows all!)

Anyway, pack your umbrella and a suitcase for Kingsport I see storm clouds ahead. It's about to get wet.

Avi_dreader said:

::laughter:: curious would be, if you stop saying that and I start feeling better. Anyway, I have to stay at home until Wednesday. Then, back to the doctor

Avi_dreader said:

Not afraid of the dark. Never been. And I won't start now. The only person that should be scared is you, because of my complaints ::laughter::

Jokes aside, a new board entering play? Cool! I love Kingsport!

I'm a little sad the League is about to be over. When I started playing, it seemed to me such a long road, and now... only 4 Scenarios left ::starting complaining::

Do not ask how on earth the quoting function messed the things in this way...

I love this forum mechanics.

I've seen entire post(with signature) was taken into quote.

Julia said:

::Laughter:: I'm sorry Julia ;') Actually, I'm sorry and pleased. On the one hand, I feel for your suffering re: not having something fresh and enjoyable in Arkham. On the other hand, I'm glad you enjoyed it enough to be disappointed that it's coming to an end.

Right now I'm a bit sad that I only have two seasons left of Peep Show left to watch (less than six hours).

Avi_dreader said:

::laughter:: said the guy who onced refused to merge into different kinds of pop culture because he needed time for his life and his books :-P

But anyway, who am I kidding? Let's move on with the easy part of the League, and then let's start considering the hard mode :-) There should be enough Arkham for the next two years ::party::

Anyway, iiiiiiiiiiif you have a little time, would you mind posting the next Scenario?

Julia said:

Wait, the next few scenarios are easy? ;'( I hope not! They're not supposed to be. Aaand, I hope scenario 21 proves that ;')

Avi_dreader said:

Just pointing out that "normal mode" most certainly is easier than "hard mode". My mind is already training for the utmost sufference!

(anyway, I have to drop you an extensive feed-back on the last segment of the League. Later on, by e-mail, I guess, let me finish an Abhoth + DH game)

Heh... Looking forward to feedback, as always. Not so much looking forward to doing a hard mode for the scenarios ;') but I said I'd do it, so I'll do it.

Avi_dreader said:

I see a masochistic mode coming... for masochistic players, and masochistic league designers ::laughter::

Julia said:

I don't know any masochistic league designers, do you? ;')

Avi_dreader said:

::shake:: noooooooooone comes to my mind ::laughter::

SCENARIO 21 - FRIED FISH SMELL GOOD

Innsmouth, Kingsport and Dunwich boards in play

Investigators: George, Ursula, Silas, Mary, Norman, Tommy

This one was a tough one. While studying the Scenario, I thought about Ursula starting at the Unvisited Isle since the first gate has to be opened there. But. A R'lyeh gate is a -3, her max sealing stat is 4. Even with Mary carrying over a gate to bless her, it's a 50% odd. Very low. Plus, as soon as the first stack moves, there is another one arriving, hence not so easy for she to find the gate "stack cleaned" as soon as she returns to Arkham from R'lyeh (what a nice place! how many wonderful memories!). So, I decided to have her starting at Independence Square.

Here we go. I had Norman carrying over the Mi-Go brain case (you do love me, Avi, don't you?), Mary a Find gate and Ursula the Healing stone. Plus, the new, random possession were totally kick-ass: George (one of the crappiest characters ever) had Plague of Locusts, and Ursula the Sledgehammer. So, Mythos zero, first stack moving, the Colour made my party lose some brains, ehm, Sanity, and that was it. They entered the River docks for to have a beer with Silas. My turn: George entered the Merchant districts streets (with Funnel Clouds in play ::shiver: and successfully casted Plague of Locusts. Ursula arrived from Independence square, but instead of entering the Docks to help Silas, she opted to go for the other stack on the Unvisited Isle: no strong monsters there, just mid-difficult or easy ones. She smashed all of them thanks to the Sledgehammer and thus passed her PS: draw 5 Unique Items and keep 2. Guess what? A magnificent Elder Sign appeared! Lovable, I thought, it's ideal to use the ES to seal this gate (poor, poor, poor Julia, unaware of the listening board). Silas smashed all 4 monsters in the first stack and had an encounter at the River Docks. Norm went to the Witch House to gather the fourth and the fifth clue, only to obtain 2 more clues because of a lucky encounter with the spirit of a dead Warlock. Mary remained at the South Church, buying a Blessing for Ursula.

What happened next is the reign of chaos.

Mythos one: an Underworld gate opened at Independence Square. Norman went in, and was LiTaS on the first OW encounter (R'lyeh instead of Underworld, of course!)

Mythos two: a gate opened at the Graveyard. Guess what? Double gate R'lyeh / Abyss. With a Leng Spider, who moved (fortunately).

New strategy: throwing the returning from LiTaS Norman into the double gate, have Ursula sealing hers with clues and then carrry Ursula's ES to Norm returning from the Abyss.

Mythos three: a gate opened at Gardners' Place. R'LYEH.

Now the poor Silas, forced to move towards R'lyeh gates, was spinning like a spinning top, feeling strange calls arriving from different places. Anyway, when the third R'lyeh gate opened, he was at the Hospital. So, final strategy:

Ursula moved from the Unvisited Isle after sealing the gate. Thanks to the Healing stone, she had been able to recover to 3 Sanity, 2 Stamina (the first journey through R'lyeh almost killed her), enough for fighting the Leng Spider in the streets. Norman used Find gate to return from the Abyss, got an explorer marker and remained with all his fingers crossed. Silas moved the first two steps towards the double gate, then passed by Ursula, grabbing her ES and her Sledgehammer, and moved against the stack: Spectral Hunter, Serpent People, Deep One, Deep One Hybrid. Shivers down my spine. I needed three kills in order to unstack the stack and being able to seal with Norm. Upon entering the Graveyard, he tossed the ES to Norm, and tried to enter fight with the Serpent People (the easieast one). Clearly, I failed the Evade check. Let's go with the Spectral Hunter. Sanity check failed. Thanks to Nodens, I had a Golden Trumpet. Then.. let's start the dance. Spectral Hunter cashed for 5 bucks. Then, the Deep one. Sanity failed, Golden trumpet discarded and Silas reduced to 1 Sanity. 8 dice to roll to score 5 successes. 6 successes scored. Deep one removed. 3 Innsmouth look cards: I had to draw 6 of them (I'm using the MH expanded deck), no Innsmouth look card drawn. Horror check against the Deep One Hybrid: check passed. Monster smashed. Another 5 IL cards later, Silas was still alive at the Graveyard. Norm thanked him profoundly by Elder Signing the gate. 2 seals on the board.
Tommy entered the R'lyeh gate in Dunwich

During the next turns

New Mythos, old story: monster surge from Independence Square: a Shan and a Nightgaunt arrived, while a Child of the Goat and a Formless Spawn emerged in Dunwich.

New round: Norm, still with five clues, swapped his position with the Shan, failed the Evade check against the Nightgaunt and entered the Underworld for the second time. All the other tried to do their best, but the streets were infested with aquatic monsters, and moving was a pain.

Another monster surge hit Independence Square. George tried to clean the Dunwich streets. Silas reached the station, bypassing a Moon Beast, while Ursula moved to Kingsport to keep the rift tracks under control. Then Tommy had this marvellous encounter: "pass a Sneak +3 check, or you find the source of the noise chasing you. You're devoured". I rolled 4 dice, scoring three successes. In the meantime Norm had an even better one (thx, Dark Pharaoh!): "pass a Sneak (-?) check. If you pass, a monster appears. If you fail, 2 monster appear". Just figured out this little old man, trying to move silently into the vast caves of the Underworld, fearing something evil. Then, suddently, two monsters! A DARK YOUNG AND THE SERVITOR OF THE OUTER GODS. Norm, I think you need better glasses if you've been ambushed by so tiny creatures... Norm obviously had no weapons with him. Just a military motorcycle and his hope in his good luck. And he was right. One dice to Evade the Dark Young: passed. Three dice to evade the Servitor. Passed. Phew.

Next Mythos: Intermission. Plus two terror, no gates opening, no monsters moving. I had two gates open, Tommy ready to return from R'lyeh, Norm still in the first area of the Underworld but with a Find Gate. The ideal condition for a closing victory. But clearly, today was not a lucky Arkham day: Norm failed his spell check, and stayed in the Underworld (I could have pushed this a little by forcing him to spend clues for the spell, but I preferred being not so confident in my luck with dice), and Tommy, returned to Arkham, was unable to seal the gate (2 dice rolled, zero successes scored)

Next Mythos: a gate opened at the Black Cave, just below Mary.

Next turn: Norm returned to Arkham and sealed Independence Square. Tommy failed again at closing R'lyeh. Mary had a lucky encounter in the Abyss (a R'lyeh card) giving her 4 clues for free (a Black Goat kinda stupid card, "gain clue tokens equal to the difference between your current and your max Sanity).

Next Mythos: monster surge from the Black Cave.

Tommy was able to clear two of the three monsters under him at Gardners' Place, while the other one was moved via Lure monster. Norm swapped his position with a monster on the Black Cave and entered the Abyss, clueless. And this was good, because Mary had another R'lyeh encounter, forcing her to roll a die and lose that much Sanity. She had one Sanity left, hence...
But Tommy... ah, Tommy... he sealed his gate.

Mythos: a gate bounced on the Gardners' Place seal Tommy had just put down. PHEW.

Next turn: Norm returned via Find gate. One gate open, three dice to roll, 2 successes scored.

Check & mate

Voctory by closing gates in 10 Mythos, while Cthulhu's doom track was still at 4 doomers.

CLARIFICATIONS NEEDED: what if Silas starts his movement on the main board, the R'lyeh gate is on an expansion board and he needs to take a train to move towards the R'lyeh gate? What if he reduces his speed in order not to have two movement points? What happens when you have a surging R'lyeh double gate? Can a stack enter a vortex? What happens to monster surging on a stack but the surge is centered on another open gate? Do the new monsters stack with the stack, o remain detatched?

Julia said:

First of all, that's not the scenario title ;') Second, the story of blind Norman was very funny, third, I don't understand what you're asking in the last two questions in the clarifications section. The other stuff... If you're playing dual gates, treat them just as if they are r'lyeh gates (even if you go into the abyss). I guess a stack can theoretically enter a vortex. Hmmm... I think dropping Silas's movement down will still require moving him. If it requires taking the train, he can move through the train path for free. Ohhhh, now I understand the question. No, stacks are what they are, new monsters don't join them.

So you won at doom four, huh? ;'D Geeze.

Avi_dreader said:

Yeah, the starting condition was the most difficult to handle. After that, if you work with Blessed characters, 6 or 7 toughness monsters aren't that impossible to beat, especially because you can kill one, and flew the other.

The forced max Sanity reduction seemed to push a little the game, but it was only one of your mental trap (I didn't fell into it this time): playing a large (6 investigators thanks to the Kingsport board entry) party offers you a wide buffer of turns (12) to seal the gates before being endangered, and anyway having 6 investigators means you have to put a seal on the table with each of them. Kinda easy.

Besides, no penalties for retiring or having investigators devoured: so you have even a greater time to finish your task. Not to mention that Ursula is a free seal, sacrificing Silas is a second free seal, so basically you need to put down four seals in 12 turns before fresh forces join the party. The only annoying thing is the first stack. But you can deal with it: sacrificing some valiant men, or using George stuck at a location to have the stack hitting on him (he has an amazing Sneak, so it's kinda easy for him to evade monsters in the first stack, in case none is able to kill them all).

The Scenario was kinda fun, but if you're able to control the psychological pressure, it's quite easy

Julia said:

Originally I was thinking about reducing *all* investigator's maximums by one every turn (but for obvious reasons, I did not end up going for that). I might use a modified version of that for the hard mode though (perhaps roll a die, on a 4-6, all investigators must reduce their maximum sanity or stamina by one, not reducing them lower than one however, or with the no lower than one clause, perhaps it will just be every turn, heh heh heh). Well Julia ;'D no one is forcing you to use a 6 investigator team, if you want to spice things up, try it with four :'D

I never said this scenario's that hard :') it all depends on how you want to play it. With six investigators, if you know what you're doing, clearly you managed everything nicely ;') You know, that's actually one way you might get more out of these scenarios after you finish, replaying them with four investigator teams. Perhaps allowing yourself five investigators for the *really* brutal ones. But most of them can be reasonably done with four.

I was also initially thinking about making the Cthulhu attack trigger doom track six, but you didn't even let the game get that far! ;.(

Anyhoo, closing statement, if you want a challenging version of that in the meanwhile, try it with four, and no carried over starting equipment :'D

;'D Anyway, don't worry, this is just the beginning of the nightmares from the sea. Not all the scenarios are designed to make you sweat ;') you kind of get to pick how challenging you'd like some of them to be. Personally, I like trying them with 4-5 investigators. Ideally four.

Avi_dreader said:

Just thinking about what you said. Counterproposal (just some random ideas):

Upkeep: investigators who at the start of the Upkeep phase are in an aquatic location / flooded street must roll a die; on a failure, reduce the max San or max Sta by one. In addition, the First player must reduce his max San by one.

All investigators (but Silas) must reduce their movement point by one for each flooded street they enter during Movement

The difficult to close / seal gates to R'lyeh is increased by one.

Monsters entering a space with a stack or in a space where a stack enters become part of the stack. Every time a monster enters a stack, raise the Terror level by one and spawn a new monster from a gate (FP choice)

As for your observation on the number of players... hmmm. somebody once told "Julia, the game starts before set-up. Think about the team. And the size of your team. Some Scenarios are easier with smaller teams, others with larger". Just listening to my master :-)

But I think I'll play again most of the Scenarios with four investigators. Out of the League, anyway, just for fun

And think about the Stack entering vortex thing. It's not that impossible to have a R'lyeh gate open at Devil reef, and a monsters surge. Is this a +4 DOR tokens?

Julia said:

Actually, all of your suggestions except the last one might not be a bad idea incorporating into the easy mode version since you did kick its butt pretty hard.

As for what I said ;'D you should know by now that just because I think something *can* be easier, doesn't mean I think it *should* be easier ;'D I tried to make most of the scenario beatable with thought, but personally I like risk as well, so when playing on my own, I'd rather push at the bare minimum necessary for victory (or a little below). That way it's more fun (I like death).

As for the stack into vortex... I don't mind that :'D In scenario 2, a risk of instadeath seemed inappropriate to me ;'D but not in scenario 21.

Hey guys, can't believe I haven't posted here since January 16... I did try Scenario #3 one time a short while after that, failed to win again and didn't really feel like talking about it. To be honest, when I saw that Julia was 70-0 in this game, I realized I really was in the wrong league. I think that was like my sixth straight loss at scenario #3. Avi, obviously you wrote your scenarios for people of that ability level, and that's not me, I have now sufficiently proven.

Anyway, I did set it up again last night, and frankly had forgotten just how much fun this game is, somehow. (It's in my Top Three, and I'm not sure if Arkham Horror, Descent or Twilight Imperium is my #1..).This scenario, specifically, is just spectacular, albeit too hard for me. It was a lot of fun, but in the end it was another disappointing finish. It really looked like I was going to be writing about a victory, finally. The doom track was being managed (like at 9 or so), and Wendy had just sent a boat to the Unvisited Isle to pick up Carolyn Fern and bring her to Falcon Point to head for the gate at Devil Reef which had just opened. Five gates were sealed. Carolyn had something like 8 or 9 clue tokens. (She was being followed by that point.) Actually the story that had been developing was almost like a novel. But somehow, Carolyn just kept losing Sanity, in spite of her special ability, and had picked up a couple of corruption cards (even those were especially well managed for most of the game...Wendy had handed off her starting common item drawn rifle to Jacqueline Fine - later devoured - who blew away the witch on the game's second turn with a perfect 6 for 6 successes on her combat roll!).

Unfortunately a corruption card activated (she had picked up 3 in an encounter with The Black Man where she got 1 success) that cost Carolyn 2 Sanity, and gave her 2 more clues.....but that drove her insane and sent her back to the Arkham Asylum. So instead of heading for the sixth gate seal, she was foundering in a straight-jacket in the asylum and Wendy was now broke, having spent her last $2. (While I had generally good luck with the game and dice overall, gates never seemed to open in particularly convenient locales, which is why investigators had to trek to Innsmouth to find open gates.)

Even then, it appeared to just be a temporary setback, albeit a very disappointing one. You don't usually expect Carolyn to be driven insane and it looked likely that the game was going to end in a win prior to that. (I did have pretty bad luck with Night Nuzzling and nobody ever stayed Blessed for long, otherwise the dice had been pretty kind.)

The real killing blow came a couple of turns later, when another gate opened at The Witch House, creating a monster surge. As I interpreted the scenario rules, from Walpurgis Night, that doubled the normal number of monsters placed, which meant 10! Two each ended up at Devil Reef and Y'ha-nthlei. And where Innsmouth had seemed largely benign for most of the game, now suddenly the Deep Ones Rising track (can't tell you how many games I've lost to that effect) stood at 5 with a Serpent People one space away from the vortex, at Y'ha-nthlei.

With both Norman (with Find Gate) and Carolyn in the first areas of Other Worlds, the crescent monster movement came up and pulled the Serpent People into the vortex, advancing the DOR track to 6....game over. Actually, the same card created a gate burst at Esoteric Order of Dagon, reducing the sealed gates to 4 (the doom track was at 11/13).

I'm not going to whine about 10 monsters at once being too many, or anything else about the scenario. It was a fun game, but really quite disappointing in the end, as it looked like a certain win, at long last.. It gets harder to summon up the enthusiasm for continuing to keep on trying, as I guess this would be my seventh consecutive loss at this scenario. With Julia's record at 70-0 and counting, it's become obvious these are not written for people of my ability level, but thank you for all the feedback and support!!

Schmiegel,

it seems like you're going in the right way. 5 seals on the board with 11 doomers on the doom track is the right pace to beat these Scenarios. You have still to improve, but I think you've gone through the steepest part. The League in general is designed to end in narrow victories or narrow losses. And this was the case of your latest game.

Do not be obsessed by my 70-0 record (generally speaking, I do win most of the games I play, regardless of whether it's Arkham or not; the complete log of my Arkham experience should read 132 victories, 9 losses, which means at the beginning I've lost many more games than now): it was a combination of good strategy, great luck (in some cases) but most of all training. When I started this League, I was strongly doubting to be able to pass the first of these Scenarios. Now I have to try the 22nd. I learned how to play properly the game by playing the League, so... you'll certainly improve along the way :-) As you've already done (try a normal AH game and see how more easily you smash the game).

If you need a little help, just add the Kingsport board and play 6 investigators. This means a seal for each investigator. It gives you some more time to finish the game.

But regardless of victories or losses, the most important thing (the only important thing) is havng fun playing :-) So, I'm glad you'vre tried again and shared your experience with us, thanks!

Schmiegel said:

Well... I have to admit, I was a bit surprised when you decided to take on the League, since you were relatively new to the game. I originally designed it for people who had been playing 2+ years.

I don't think that losing is such a horrible thing though. I remember waaaaay back when (when the game was young), I used to play two investigators, then Dunwich came out and I had to bump it up to four, because I couldn't even manage with three. Then as I learnt the game's patterns better, I cut it back down to three. And I tended to follow this pattern for each new expansion (at first I was overwhelmed by new elements in the game, but then I'd see the patterns again, sometimes actively reading through the decks to look for them).

Anyway... I'm sure your skill level has gone up quite a bit from playing these scenarios. If you need a bit of a break, take one, but generally I find that being in a challenging situation forces faster learning. I wouldn't fixate so much on whether you're winning or losing right now, as what you are learning.

While I know some of the other scenarios can be quite fun... If I were you, I'd keep replaying scenario 2 when you want a challenge. Once you are capable of beating that, you should be able to beat anything. More or less. It's a brutal brutal training scenario.

Play a bit of normal Arkham :') then come back for more pain.

Seriously though. Playing these scenarios requires you to have a good understanding of risk assessment and resource and time management vs. threat control. The regular game is more forgiving of mistakes than they are. Although some are more unforgiving than others.

Schmiegel said:

If you're losing due to DOR, I'd suggest not sealing high frequency locations early in the game (or perhaps only seal one of them at most). Make medium or low frequency locations your first targets. I remember when I first got Innsmouth, I had to make that adjustment. If you go after the high frequencies first now, the DOR track tends to get out of control.

Also, when you have a large team, don't be afraid to close a gate or two without sealing, just to keep the gate numbers under control (plus you'll get more tradeable trophies that way, especially if you break into the gate while there's still a monster on it). And in this scenario, with Norman and Find Gate, this'll also help you remove early corruptions.

Another way of getting a win on this scenario is deliberately picking up a few corruptions (slowly), while Norman is nearly out of a gate. That way if you don't like the corruption effect, you can dump it the next turn. Some of the green corruptions can be very beneficial, if you just use them a little bit, then remove them.