Things in the Ground - Environment. Action: Exhaust Things in the Ground to discard the top two cards of each players deck. Any characters that would be discarded by this effect are instead put into play insane.

I had the pleasure of facing a new CoC player this weekend. Since my opponent only had the core set and the Arham expansion, I decided to use cards only from those sets too, so, not only could we have a game, but I could teach some of the mechanics of cards she had. I quick built a Yog/Syndicate deck for fun, cause I don't use these factions much. It was a fun game, but in hindsite Id like to reflect on the use of "Things in the Ground".

My first thought about this card is fairly obvious: Build a Yog/Hastur deck. Load it with Poltergeist and Veronica's Loft so when opponent's characters come into play insane, they stay that way. Other then that, how is another way to build a deck around this card? It seemed to hurt me more then help me in the game, because my opponent was bringing Cthuhlu, dagon, the hydra, all in w/out paying for them.

That experience gave me this idea on another way to build a deck around this card. Have lots of expensive characters. That way, your bringing them in at no cost. They may be insane, but in two turns you have these huge beasties in play.

Not only that, you dont have to stay in your faction. You can load your deck with characters from any faction because they just come into play insane. Your not paying for them

Thoughts about this card?

A deck filled with Ancient Ones is good with Things in the Ground. You are more likely to get a good character into play than your opponent. Then keep Dr. Carson, Dr. Carson's Treatment and Arkham Asylum around so that you can bring characters back quickly and rush to victory!

TheProfessor said:

Yeah thats what I was thinking, and theres really not much of a problem going outside Yog and getting big critters from other factions.

Another idea too is: Yog has a few cards that can bring back stuff from discard pile too. So, in that respect, Things in the Ground could actually be a way to scroll faster through your deck and get cards you need.

After trying, I have found that the best way to play Things in the Ground is to not play things in the ground.

It requires a whole lot of conditional setup that basically requires you to build a deck around a fairly weak card. You need to get some pretty awful characters in play to bring the insane characters into play immediately, which means you cannot afford to block with them... which leads to getting crushed by a deck with any speed at all. If you wait a few turns and get set up, chances are your opponent has some good removal that will make it not worth your while. We're just not ready for this card yet. There isn't enough support for it.

Chevee

Alternately, with things like Gathering At The Stones or Opener of the Gate + Chant of Thoth means getting cards into the discard pile is a great thing. I tried Things in the Ground + Victoria's Loft and found it lacking... so I'm currently working on Living Mummy + Yoggoth Contract which could work well to kill their insane characters before they can use them, but it's rather slow with Mummy a 4 drop......

Chevee

Try working in Shotgun Blast and Deep One Assault. Don't worry about resource matches; They can both destroy insane characters for free, should something too big for comfort show up. Arkham Asylum allows you to restore your characters faster too. Bloodthirsty Zealot (The Spawn of the Sleeper F13) stays ahead of the curve for a long time during these games.

miskatonic has some stuff that can restore/ready characters. wait until after they commit to stories on their turn set off things and restore/ready your new characters. hastur has thing from the stars which would take care of any AO brought into play this way too.