https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2020/9/3/dark-revelations/

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planned for release this November

I mainly get these for the player cards...but nice to see another one on the way.

21 minutes ago, Dr Dee said:

I mainly get these for the player cards...but nice to see another one on the way.

The stories are actually really good. I highly recommend reading them. This may sound weird but for me I feel way more connected to the investigator I am playing with when I have read a book they have been in. Reading Blood of Baalshandor gives a whole new perspective and motivation as to why Dexter Drake would be investigating.

Has anyone informed Soakman yet?

OH MY GLOB IT'S GLORIA! ❤️

And she's encounter manipulation, just as I suspected. Super interesting and will be one of my favorite mystics for sure. I've been using a custom made encounter manipulating seeker lately and I love it.

26 minutes ago, Astrophil84 said:

Has anyone informed Soakman yet?

I was thinking the same thing!

15 minutes ago, Soakman said:

OH MY GLOB IT'S GLORIA! ❤️

I think that's new Gloria art. I've not seen it before. I really like it. Also this game needed Gloria. It went too long without her.

Also I agree the stories are pretty good for tie in fictions. Some better than others. So far Dexter's was my favorite, but Carolyn and Jenny's were also fun reads for me. I am definitely more excited about these than the novels they put out. I think there's something about the novella format that feels like it works a bit better IMO.

The art for Gloria here looks really nice, and it gives you a better sense of her actual age. I knew she and Harvey were the original 'old-timers' but her eldritch art seems to make her appear a bit younger imo. We have another strong candidate for alternatives to Rite of Seeking/Sixth Sense (like Marie). I am very interested to see her deck build requirements. Will they be trait based? Will she just be some Mystic/Seeker variant?

And she's paired with an interesting ally that looks an awful lot like a friend of Sefina's. I'm all about the mystical manipulations via the arts, so naturally my favorites Gloria, Sef, and Patrice are always exciting to see in any iteration. I've got a soft spot for Jim and (yes) Lola too.

Can. Not. Wait.

51 minutes ago, Soakman said:

...

Can. Not. Wait.

"November" 🤞

I love her art. All 3 pieces are great, but hers is dripping with theme and authenticity.

1 hour ago, Steeljaw said:

The stories are actually really good. I highly recommend reading them. This may sound weird but for me I feel way more connected to the investigator I am playing with when I have read a book they have been in. Reading Blood of Baalshandor gives a whole new perspective and motivation as to why Dexter Drake would be investigating.

I do read them and I just don't think I would if they hadn't come wrapped around a player card. I agree that the stories do give a nice backstory to some of the characters and even allies (Dexter Drake being a good example), so I am always pleased when one arrives. I just wish the writing and editing was a little better. However, it works for what it is.

3 minutes ago, Dr Dee said:

I do read them and I just don't think I would if they hadn't come wrapped around a player card. I agree that the stories do give a nice backstory to some of the characters and even allies (Dexter Drake being a good example), so I am always pleased when one arrives. I just wish the writing and editing was a little better. However, it works for what it is.

I am in the same camp as you. I have not picked any of these up to date but I like having the alternate cards and or alternate art (I really like the Jenny Barnes card) but am on the fence on the novellas themselves. I hear that some are quite good while others fall flat but I do like filling in backstory on some of my favorite investigators. I don't know too much about much about Gloria but from the blurb here I totally dig her backstory and she has an interesting investigator card. Oh decisions, decisions...

RM

2 hours ago, OC Architect said:

I am in the same camp as you. I have not picked any of these up to date but I like having the alternate cards and or alternate art (I really like the Jenny Barnes card) but am on the fence on the novellas themselves. I hear that some are quite good while others fall flat but I do like filling in backstory on some of my favorite investigators. I don't know too much about much about Gloria but from the blurb here I totally dig her backstory and she has an interesting investigator card. Oh decisions, decisions...

RM

Just give them a try. Some of them are really good reads (like Dexter and Silas's in particular) and, at worst, if you don't love them you've wasted an hour or two you probably would have spent watching something terrible on Netflix or posting on a random forum somewhere.

People get waaaaaaaay too hung up on whether these novellas are 'well written' or whatever (this whole forum turns into a bunch of freaking professional book critics every time one comes out). Some are, some aren't. So what? They're fun. That's sometimes (almost always, actually) enough.

I grew up on schlocky Sci-Fi and D&D novels and majored in Mechanical Engineering and Literature in college (yeah... it's weird... but I needed SOME classes with women in them!!!), so I've read pretty much the full range of 'literature' out there. Basically all of it can be enjoyable, if you allow yourself to enjoy the experience. These are pretty much the fast food of literature. They're not five-star, but they're generally consistent and hit the spot if it's what you're in the mood for, even if it wouldn't be great if the were the only thing you ever ate... er... read.

So, yeah... let's maybe not worry about whether the very short books by relatively unknown genre authors about indescribable space monsters can compare to Fitzgerald and Salinger, perhaps? There are things in this world to be... well... pretentious... about, and these ain't it.

^ Solid agreement. To each their own, but the only thing standing in the way of your enjoyment with reading something short, fun, and perhaps fluffy, is you. Nobody is pretending this is classic lit.

The more I look at Gloria, the more I want to know her deck requirements though. I was thinking that the fact that she has an ally signature as a mystic is a little odd. That ally slot is pretty precious for your standard mystic. I know that this (and Dexter's) hinge solidly on the fact that it makes the investigator ability more powerful, but you're denying yourself spell searching with arcane initiates and further int/will buffs. Alyssa Graham is also a solid choice for Gloria, and you can't take them both with charisma.

That being said, you can take the (usually) fairly useless Scroll of Secrets to great effect. And the Otherworldly Codex, of course, will be fun. I can't see her not having access to it. So potentially something standard such as seeker lvl 0-2 or Uses (Secrets). Secrets would also give her access to Mind's Eye [edit: she has access to this anyway], which could be useful if you're spending a lot of turns on mythos manipulation and hand items like fingerprint kits instead of arcane slots for casting, plus you can still leverage your will for event spells. The big issue is that if her build is trait based focused on charges (secrets) instead of generic seeker, she ironically wouldn't be able to take Truth from Fiction. And other than Grimm's Fairy Tales, I don't think we have secrets on anything other than Mystic or Seeker cards yet.

Semi-related, does anyone know if you can use the Ancient stone abilities when you draw encounter cards? They trigger while 'drawing' cards, but they don't say from where. (I know that's not the same as searching or looking at, so not specifically Gloria tuned, but something I just suddenly found myself wondering).

4 hours ago, Soakman said:

I am very interested to see her deck build requirements. Will they be trait based? Will she just be some Mystic/Seeker variant?

I was thinking cards that "look at" cards, similar to Carolyn's "heal horror". The current set of those is almost all Mystic, but there is one Seeker and one Guardian as well.

39 minutes ago, CSerpent said:

I was thinking cards that "look at" cards, similar to Carolyn's "heal horror". The current set of those is almost all Mystic, but there is one Seeker and one Guardian as well.

That would make sense. Unfortunately, it's a VERY small card pool at the moment (especially when compared to the massive number of cards Carolyn can use). However, they could certainly add a bunch more in upcoming packs!

Also... are we really not going to talk about the weird presence of the cute anthropomorphic fox/hedgehog 'playmat' in the article? Now THAT'S creepy.

I imagine she'll have some really interesting deckbuilding, I can't wait to see what it is!

Also that art is great, very fitting. Much like Carolyn and Norman, the alternative art is far more appealing than the "normal" art (shame about Roland...)

1 hour ago, KBlumhardt said:

Just give them a try. Some of them are really good reads (like Dexter and Silas's in particular) and, at worst, if you don't love them you've wasted an hour or two you probably would have spent watching something terrible on Netflix or posting on a random forum somewhere.

People get waaaaaaaay too hung up on whether these novellas are 'well written' or whatever (this whole forum turns into a bunch of freaking professional book critics every time one comes out). Some are, some aren't. So what? They're fun. That's sometimes (almost always, actually) enough.

I grew up on schlocky Sci-Fi and D&D novels and majored in Mechanical Engineering and Literature in college (yeah... it's weird... but I needed SOME classes with women in them!!!), so I've read pretty much the full range of 'literature' out there. Basically all of it can be enjoyable, if you allow yourself to enjoy the experience. These are pretty much the fast food of literature. They're not five-star, but they're generally consistent and hit the spot if it's what you're in the mood for, even if it wouldn't be great if the were the only thing you ever ate... er... read.

So, yeah... let's maybe not worry about whether the very short books by relatively unknown genre authors about indescribable space monsters can compare to Fitzgerald and Salinger, perhaps? There are things in this world to be... well... pretentious... about, and these ain't it.

It is not so much that I want high literature or anything like that it generally boils down to space. AHLCG takes up space, I am also a MTG player which takes up space, I am a nerd at heart and have a small collection of graphic novels (and comics), I work from home so I have a work office and all that entails needing space, and lastly I have a little one running around who needs space for his own things such as toys, books, and more recently home schooling. I suspect more of these books will be coming out and so if this is a case where the novels are so bad that I can't get through the first chapter then I don't want to check them out. If they are a fun read that will entertain me as I read at night before going to bed (or a second or third read in the future) then I can start to justify the time, space, and money to invest not to mention that there is an upside of some alt art cards and or replacement cards which is pretty cool and satisfies the collector in me.

53 minutes ago, KBlumhardt said:

That would make sense. Unfortunately, it's a VERY small card pool at the moment (especially when compared to the massive number of cards Carolyn can use). However, they could certainly add a bunch more in upcoming packs!

Also... are we really not going to talk about the weird presence of the cute anthropomorphic fox/hedgehog 'playmat' in the article? Now THAT'S creepy.

I did notice that too and thought it was a little strange. Perhaps she is a children's book author turning her mad visions into something that is more palatable in the form of children's stories. That would be sweet and would totally get me more invested in her as an investigator that I would want to play.

RM

7 hours ago, Soakman said:

OH MY GLOB IT'S GLORIA! ❤️

And she's encounter manipulation, just as I suspected. Super interesting and will be one of my favorite mystics for sure. I've been using a custom made encounter manipulating seeker lately and I love it.

So happy for you!! It’s like Christmas in September...or November.

Per the article it looks like she is finishing another author’s work who has the same publisher.

I know in prior Arkham files games, Gloria was a horror writer. It would be interesting if this Jamie Galbraith was a children’s writer and Gloria’s darker themes creep in.

She is interesting, with the whole author background. Hopefully a good author wrote her story!
We have Mystic Seekers and Seeker Mystics, so it does seem possible her secondary could be traits, although as Soakman says, not having access to Otherworld Codex would make no sense. It seems logical that she would have access to any cards that interact with the encounter deck.
She also doesn’t seem like a typical Spell Casting Mystic, so she could be more like Carolyn, who though a Guardian is atypical with her limited access to weapons and access to all cards that heal horror. Maybe she will be similar, and have no access to spell assets that use charges, but have access to all Insight cards. I don’t know, but it is sure nice to finally have stuff to hypothesize about again!!

5 hours ago, Soakman said:

Semi-related, does anyone know if you can use the Ancient stone abilities when you draw encounter cards? They trigger while 'drawing' cards, but they don't say from where

You cannot. It's mentioned in the FAQ for Dr. Henry Armitage:

Unless otherwise specified 'drawing a card' always refers to drawing a card from your investigator's deck. Armitage's ability cannot be used on encounter cards.

The same goes for pretty much anything that refers to drawing cards.

6 hours ago, KBlumhardt said:

That would make sense. Unfortunately, it's a VERY small card pool at the moment (especially when compared to the massive number of cards Carolyn can use). However, they could certainly add a bunch more in upcoming packs!

Also... are we really not going to talk about the weird presence of the cute anthropomorphic fox/hedgehog 'playmat' in the article? Now THAT'S creepy.

That does seem hilariously out of place. I kind of like it.

15 hours ago, Steeljaw said:

The stories are actually really good. I highly recommend reading them. This may sound weird but for me I feel way more connected to the investigator I am playing with when I have read a book they have been in. Reading Blood of Baalshandor gives a whole new perspective and motivation as to why Dexter Drake would be investigating.

100% this. I love Silas more because of his novella.

5 hours ago, GravyAnecdote said:

100% this. I love Silas more because of his novella.

Same. This has been true for me for the other 2 characters/novellas I've read (Norman & Roland) too.

I know I was glad to see one of the cards in Winifred's deck after reading Jenny's book.