Hello! I'm a long time lurker on this and the previous forum, but first time poster. I've been playing Arkham Horror fairly constantly since September, and my group (typically four) loves the game. It's the perfect thing when we have a few hours to spare and we're tired of shooting each other senseless in Bang! or whatever. That said, we are wondering a few things. These are some of the murkier rules; let me know how you play them. We only play the base game right now; we're hoping for Dunwich and King in Yellow for Christmas.

1. For cards like the Mythos Card "Blood Magic": The card asks you to roll dice equal to your stamina. It drains stamina for failures and gives you clue tokens if you're still alive. If you fail all the dice, you're devoured. On the card it's phrased something like "lose one stamina for each failed die". If average Arkham girl Amanda Sharpe took on one such card at full stamina and failed all dice, do you play it: a) There are five instances of 1 point of stamina damage, or b) there is one instance of five stamina damage?

If a, Michael McGlenn is completely immune to the card. If b, it can all be Flesh Warded away. Both options are intriguing. This question goes for all such cards, like some OW encounters or "The Man in Black".

2. We've been playing that you can spend a clue on a Combat check with the Fight skill and get two dice rerolled, but we've recently been wondering if that is right. It seems to me like the skills that boost Fight, Will, Sneak and Lore might not allow you to use two clue tokens on a reroll for Combat Checks, Horror Checks, Evade Checks and Spell Checks. The reasoning for that is that those skills already exist, namely Marksman, Bravery, Stealth and Expert Occultist. The rulebooks are fairly ambiguous on this matter, except to say that combat checks are a special skill check using your Fight value - not, explicitly, a fight check. What are opinions on this?

These issues don't come up much, we're just curious. Let me know.

flamethrower49 said:

Actually, Michael McGlen survives regardless if it's a) or b). Even with 1 Stamina, if he fails the roll, he'll not lose that stamina. Hmm, I think I've always played it as X instances of 1 stamina loss. Though, Flesh Ward being the horribly useless piece of crap it is, it might get some use if you go with b). I normally don't go for these Mythos activities, unless I'm packing Food/Whiskey, Leo Anderson is in game or Michael McGlen/Harvey Walters are the ones doing it. OW encounters, well, just gotta hope you're up to the test.

flamethrower49 said:

Clue Tokens used for skill checks are NOT rerolls, they are added/extra dice. If you have both Fight and Marksman, you could first spend X Clues and get +2 dice for each Clue, then use Marksman (if you rolled horribly) to reroll ALL the dice you used, including those added by Clue use.

And of course, this is where Mandy's ability really kicks in, she allows you to reroll all the failed dice, keeping the successes.

1. I would consider it "b" - one source of X stamina loss. So Flesh Ward would erase the damage here. McGlen would reduce it to X-1 instead of 0.

2. As Dam pointed out, they are added dice, not re-rolls. But I am not sure he answered your main question.

Yes, anything that affects Fight will automatically adjust Combat. But not the other way around. The 4 special checks will be affected if the respective "basic" check is adjusted. But if something affects the special check, it won't affect the basic check.

Obviously, McGlen is not dying to the card either way, I just wished to know how much stamina he should lose. I once rolled seven dice against it for him, and he failed all of them. We've been playing it like one source of stamina loss, as opposed to several, which leads to my friend abusing it severely with Flesh Ward. In the base game, this only seems relevant to the cases of Michael, Harvey, or Flesh Ward. Any other opinions on this?

Incidentally, Flesh Ward seems very useful for low-stamina-high-lore characters to get another chance to kill or evade a bigger monster, or to let them avoid getting blindsided by a big loss. I used it recently in a game VS. Cthulhu as Carolyn Fern to stay alive over several turns through the barrage of two Cthonians.

I miswrote. I said rerolls because that's typically what they are. But we know that they are extra dice. It's nice. I recently saw the Joe/Mandy synergy in action.

I'm not sure I made my actual question clear enough. On the Fight Skill, it says that you may spend a clue token to add two dice to a fight check. In the rulebook, it says that a combat check is a skill check using your fight value. For the purposes of spending clue tokens then, is a combat check a fight check? There is a distinction between Fight and Combat. Obviously, you get all of the bonuses to combat from your fight. But in this case, you have a special little thing that's not explicitly a bonus added to your fight check. Does that add to your combat as well?

We've always played that you can spend a clue token to add two dice with that skill in combat. I imagine most of you have too. Is there any reason it should go differently?

Yeah, we're kind of rules lawyers.

flamethrower49 said:

The reason I hate FW is that it basically comes down to:

1) lose Sanity and take Injury card (stupid -2 casting mod)

2) take Injury card

So I usually just choose door #2.

flamethrower49 said:

P. 13:

"If an investigator receives a bonus to a skill, any special
checks based on that skill also receive this bonus."

and

"For example, Evade checks are a special type of Sneak
check. A Skill card that gives +1 Sneak is useful both
for Sneak and Evade checks."

also

"A player may spend Clue tokens, one at a time, after any skill check..."

flamethrower49 said:

Yes, a Combat check is a Fight check (but a Fight Check is not a Combat check). So if you have the Fight skill and burn a Clue to get 2 more dice, they can be used in Combat as well.

flamethrower49 said:

You are in good company.

flamethrower49 said:

Yes, a Combat check is a Fight check (but a Fight Check is not a Combat check). So if you have the Fight skill and burn a Clue to get 2 more dice, they can be used in Combat as well.

flamethrower49 said:

You are in good company.

ColtsFan76 said:

I've been playing it this way, too, and I'm pretty sure that's how it is intended.

Flesh Ward is useful against massive, one-hit knockouts, like the above case or the combat damage of a Gug or a Dhole. In other cases, it's usually better to just take the damage.

-Villain