MrsGamura said:

If you go back to page 1 and look at jgt7771's post with the costs, you'll note he said $25 worth of swag + 1 free Skill (the one everyone gets). No counting the cost for something free for Mary.

I'm curious as to the wording on the Character Sheet...

It mentions, "if Sister Mary's Stamina is not at 0 or her Sanity is not at 0, she returns to the South Church"

As it may hapen in "Any Phase", may she leave a combat sequence, leave the Outer World, etc at anytime...?

I'm sure that I missed something here and I seek your guidance.

The Professor

The Professor said:

Her ability is tied to LiTaS in every way. There are encounters that cause you to be LiTaS even though you might not go unconscious/insane (IIRC, BGotW also added a Mythos card where one investigator get LiTaS'd), if Mary gets one of those encounters, instead of LiTaS, she'll pop back to South Church. Nice against Yog/Yig, unfortunate if trying to complete Join the Winning Team (which she currently can't finish AFAIK) .

Thank you! I get it ~ it automatically occurs in response to an outside action, not done of her own volition.

The Professor said:

Yep, stupid Angel won't take no for an answer !

You know a while back someone had an Idea that I thought sounded pretty cool. Custom character Missions. As in every investigator starts with a mission that they can try to complete if they wanted to.

This would acompish several things including giving all 32 characters a new way to be played thus making an old game more interesting. Also less desierable characters could be given better missions than more desireable ones to give more incentive to play all the characters.

I bought this up on the old forum but nobbody seemed to care or notice.

I actually got the idea from a set someone else made I forget where the set is now.

In my group we decided that thematically it was just fine for Mary to have few posessions and cash (she is a nun, after all). On the other hand.. we also decided that the upkeep for her blessing seemed a bit out of place - so we leave that completely optional, depending on how (potentially) difficult we'd like to make the game.

It just seems to make sense to have the blessing semi-permanent. I say semi-permanent because we did agree that if the original blessing is removed then any subsequent blessing on Mary requires upkeep. That argument being that anything that removed the original blessing had to have been sufficiently major/powerful as to have long-lasting consequences. Faith and/or sanity rattling.

That said.. I've also had blessings last nearly the whole game, even when rolling upkeep. Sometimes you just get lucky.

The whole missions for specific Investigators sounds like it will be done using the Personal Backstories that will be in the Innsmouth Expansion. Everyone is hoping that it will breath new life into subpar Investigators.

allstar64 said:

Was it this set?

http://ratdorg.blogspot.com/2008/05/individual-character-missions-for-extra.html

we also aren't fans of Sister Mary. She has no place to start, with bad stuff for killing monsters and no clues, and no money. The only equipment she gets that might give her a boost is her spells, but that forces her Lore to be as high as possible, which somewhat defeats her amazing luck. Her start location, while thematic, is horribly far from the places she might want to be (like Hibbs Roadhouse, or maybe the Police Station). Her not LITS ability rarely comes up, less so if she never gate dives, which is a problem because for the first half of the game she'll probably be gathering clues. With not especially high stats in Fight/Lore, she can have trouble closing the gates she gets into in the first place. LITS really isn't that bad, on the whole, it's basically lose a turn, which is more or less equivalent to being Delayed (delayed isn't as bad, for various reasons, admittedly, but it comes up much more frequently). Her Guardian Angel ability does have it's uses against Yig, and against Yog-Sototh, but against Yog-Sototh she has a very hard time closing gates, as even a +0 gate only nets her 4 dice for 2 successes.

The other hyper-annoying thing is that a blessing isn't generally useful in the beginning of the game.... you know... when the nun has no money, no clues, and no stuff. To make the most of it she has to gate dive or fight monsters, neither of which she is set up to do to start. By the time it would be useful, it's probably gone. We've occasionally played with the unoficial rule that she can spend a clue to keep her blessing, but that makes Mary even slightly *more* clue-screwed. If we play sister mary (we still usually don't) we usually play with the house rule that: Instead of starting with a Blessing, Sister Mary starts with the "Bless" spell. This makes her much more useful so she can call in the blessing when it's critical, or even bless another investigator.

awp832 said:

I've said this before (might've even done so in this thread, too lazy to check), but I love Mary's Lore/Luck slider. Even if you max Lore, you still have 3 Luck, which is enough to grant you at least a die in a check. Compared to Dexter "I really, really hate him" Drake, maxed Lore means 0 Luck. Luck is something I like to have when OW hopping (Lore I keep high for Celeano). Also, why would you want her (or anyone for that matter) to go to Hibb's or Police Station? Early Hibb's can cost you all your money and the only time I take an encounter at Police Station is if a task/mission requires a stop there. I always dread the lose all your weapons encounter I saw once.

awp832 said:

The two investigators whose special abilities only work in the OWs are in the same boat as Mary (namely Gloria Goldberg and Jim Culver). And Mary has the benefit of her Blessing. Then again, me and her have a deal where she really doesn't roll a 1 for the Blessing until very late into games (if at all).

Yes, well that's why I don't like Jim Culver either.... but Gloria is just *so* good in gates, that it makes up for it. Not so with Sister, or Jim. I mentioned Hibbs because there are lots of Luck checks and possible money gain. The police station was just thrown out there because it's a possible weapon and clues. I dunno if I would be too apt to take it myself, actually, just sort of thinking and typing at the same time, really.

awp832 said:

Bah, wait until you're against Yog, have Gloria enter a gate and draw 2 OW encounters that both will result her being LiTaS'd. That's why I don't like her . I mean what good is getting to choose from 2 encounters when both will kill you ?

Because if *one* encounter kills you and the other one doesn't, than you're still golden. Any anybody else would have died in that situation anyway.

Sadly, whenever Gloria hits OWs for me (as far as I recall from the most recent games, some 2.5 months ago now; hate remains strong though), she keeps getting horrible vs horrible choice, which isn't any better than 1x horrible for a normal investigator.

Dam said:

Then you're just really unlucky. Stick with her and you'll notice that she is generally better off at least having a choice.

Same concept behind Ms. Fine stopping a gate burst just to replace it with a different gate burst—better than not having Jackie and getting two back-to-back gate bursts.

Okay. People talk about Sister Mary a lot, and she's very polarizing, with most agreeing that she needs a slight boost. I've heard: Give her "Faith". Give her 3 clues. She never loses her blessing. She's just fine without help. Give her the Bless spell.

I'm wondering what people do with the other characters that might seem unplayable. Dexter, Jack, and Mark all have marked Sanity problems, and a lot of people don't like them for that reason. However, a lot of people like them anway. (Personally, I agree with Dam, and generally abhor Dexter. His ability does get more useful with expansions, though. For god's sake, keep him away from encounters.) One character, however, seems beyond help.

Vincent Lee. Not as "jinxed" as Dexter, but a primary spellcaster needs more than 5 sanity, especially if it comes to killing monsters. He starts with good stuff and money, but in a bad corner of the board, where the only big incentive is the Magic Shoppe, or perhaps Administration. He can't even get himself to the Asylum in a timely fashion. His ability is decent in its own right, but there's no call for it. It's great with Cloud Memory, of course, but then we're just using another step to make him as good as Carolyn Fern. If anybody needs a boost, I think it's him. Nobody seems to like him, and there seems to be almost no reason to play him if there's a choice. Am I wrong?

For some reason, it's easy to justify boosting Mary, and to play with some modification not on her character sheet. None of the other characters get this treatment. Should this instead be a question about how you use these "subpar" characters, instead of what else you give them?

I give Mary 3 clues to start, but I don't give any of the other characters any bonuses, because I feel that there aren't any who need a boost.

But there are a lot of characters that people feel are a little too overpowered. If I were to use house rules, I'd probably use them thus:

• Mandy Thompson: her re-roll only rolls failed dice when she uses it on herself; if used on another investigator, it re-rolls all the dice.
• Wendy Adams: She cannot become Deputized, as she is so inclined to do from starting a game with an Elder Sign. Why is the Sheriff giving a car and a gun to a kid? Leave it to the adults who are generally not viewed as game-winners.
• Daisy Walker: her sanity-spell ability is too powerful. I'd like it better if she could only use it once per turn, like having the 7 Cryptical Books. Two Shrivellings and she loses no sanity? Please.

Tibs said:

Avi probably has her casting 2-3 Voice of Ra (can't recall how many are in deck), Alchemy and couple of other choice ones each turn for total of 0 sanity cost.

BS-alert !

Tibs said:

Could very well be the case with Gloria. However, once you make "The List", it's really, really hard to make it off it. Dexter, Jim, Gloria, Vincent and Amanda have their name laminated already (and that's just from the investigators I've actually played, AH + DH).

As I draw characters at random, I try not to make any disctinction based on strength. I've seen idiot characters really pull through in areas you wouldn't have expected, and I've seen "the greats" fall on their faces.

That in mind, it was really satisfying to witness Dexter Drake win a fistfight against a Flying Polyp.

Tibs said:

Oh, random for me all the way as well. And only single-randoms, none of this deal 2-3, choose 1 from those. I agree that the worst can perform well and vice versa for the great ones, but my mood is normally set upon drawing investigators, even before seeing which GOO I'll be up against. If 2 or more from "The List" are drawn, I always feel it'll be an uphill battle regardless of the GOO. On the other hand, if I draw Mary, I feel like there is a stiff tail wind in my sails already, pushing me home.

Dam said:

Who needs any house rules and additions to Sister Mary when she gives the players confidence? That way they'll roll better!

:-D

avec said:

Yes that was the one. I really liked the concept and some of his ideas but I also felt that some were very off balanced.

For example, Michal Mcgleen has an obscene cost for virtually no benefit (or at least a benifit that is useful by the time you finish the mission) meanwhile Simmons can complete his on turn 4 (Almost definitely by turn 6) and then its game over for the AO.

Others broke some rule in the game. I believe the creator stated that one of his unspoken rules is nothing can lower the terror track but Walter's ability does just that.

I really like the concept though since I think it would make all the characters feel new again but the idea itself doesn't seem to get much notice.

Agreed, allstar64. I like the idea of investigator-specific missions, but most of those particular missions don't seem like they fit the game very well.