GrooveChamp said:

I don't think any ancient one is ridiculously difficult as long as you have four investigators (except possibly Atlach).

Atlach-Nacha is not that difficult, as long as the group have several allies.

zealot12 said:

I guess if you stockpile weapons and allies, maybe ::shrug:: I haven't tried yet. Still, I'd think a 13 doom track with -5 double resistances would be difficult to beat without gearing up, especially with a larger party. I'm not saying I think it's that hard to beat him in final combat (I'd think he'd be much easier than zhar, tsothoggua, or Quachil), but... Basically I was just referring to pre-final battle sealing.

Avi_dreader said:

Sealing is possible with Atlach, but it requires a bit of luck and a change of strategy. Instead of "seal high frequency gates" it becomes "seal low frequency gates". Hence the luck to have enough of the right type of gate open.

ricedwlit said:

I would go a bit farther and say that it requires a multi-seal coordination strategy (i.e. four+ investigators sealing gates simultaneously). And yes, obviously the 1-2 gates you'd seal prior to that you'd ideally want to be low or at best medium frequency (though I'd much prefer low). And then of course you'd need to do a bit of closing without sealing just to keep the gate limit from killing you. Still, if it's possible to get a sealing win vs Hastur (18 extra clues required, minus 3 for every Elder Sign), it's possible to get the win vs. Atlach, even if it requires sealing an extra gate or two, and if it's down to the wire :'/ guh...

I guess Atlach Nacha can be difficult after all. I think I just got lucky with the allies in the game against him: managed to score two from encounters, then got another two from the Boarding House and one investigator already started with an ally, and none of the five had to be discarded before final battle, so we had it easy in that session.

Alas, when using Epic Battle, those allies may be gone:

I lost eight investigators to this card on the first turn of final combat due to this coming up.

Do any of you mix the red battle cards with the green ones? I think it makes final battle even more challenging.

Zealot, you may appreciate Tibs' variant (or whomever he got it from):

Shuffle the 8 red Epic Battle cards, then put "The End of Everything" card on the bottom and put the green "Sinister Plot" card on top. Shuffle the remaining 7 green cards and deal one face down on top of that stack for every Elder Sign seal on the board. Finally, instead of drawing the top card, roll a die and count down from the top to that numbered card. (Tibs, did I get that right?)

The better you did placing Seals, the bigger the "buffer" between you and the red cards. But every round and new die roll will increase your chances of getting either color card. Plus, no early Azathothian "Game Over"...which, sorry, just isn't any fun at all. Not when the Ancient One can scratch you to pieces slowly, individually, lovingly.

Yep, you got it right. It should be obvious to everyone but I'll say it anyway: if you roll higher than the number of cards remaining, you get the bottom card. Which, of course, is End of Everything and a game over.

I enjoy this variant because:

1. It's less predictable. After having seen all eight green cards, I used to always know what the 8th one is in a game. That's no fun. Here, there is guaranteed to be one green card removed. It could be "Touch of Evil" but it could also be "Catching Their Breath." Who wants to take a chance?
2. See more red cards! Instead of going all green to all red, your chances of red increases as the battle goes on.
3. More Sinister Plots! These cards are the most thematic ones of the battle, because they're designed specifically for each AO. Well the green one is always guaranteed to be included in the deck, making them more likely.
4. Discourages early gearing! Rules like these are some of my favorites. If you ignore sealing for too long and gear up too early, you could wind up paying for it.

ricedwlit said:

I haven't got Lurker yet (Only have AH and DH atm ) but the rules PDF says about the new Gate Markers, and some of them seem a bit harsh, i.e. a devouring gate? I was wondering though, do you play them into the pile of already existing Gate Markers or do you replace them completely?

You replace them. Things get pretty intense.

subochre said:

Awh, I'm gonna miss the old ones then

zealot12 said:

I think I might do that in the future when playing with newbies (I hate final battle wins) :')

There's nothing preventing players from mixing in the new gates with the old ones.

GrooveChamp said:

Nothing, aside from the fact that the backs are different.

Besides, Ebonrook, there's not much to miss. There new ones are pretty much like the old ones except with added penalties for failure. Just about the only thing you could truly miss would be that you'll never see two gates that lead to the same other world without one of them being a split gate. But I do prefer the new ones over the old.

I like to mix in 1 old Gate Marker for each Other World in play. (For the expansion board OWs, I use the Gate Marker that matches the symbol on its Dual Gate.) I find there is a bit more psychological "clench" drawing a Gate when your brain is aware that some Gates are "safe". (I'm still calling this the "Ghatanothoa Effect"). I know there is a statistical change in gameplay, but it isn't noticeable, whereas the Ghatanothoa Effect is definitely felt , so I'm calling it a win.

I put all my Gate Markers in a "Gate Cup" (dice bag), so the graphics on the back don't matter.

jgt7771 said:

That's what I'm planning when I finally get my own copy of Lurker in about an hour from now.

jgt7771 said:

Oooo... Clever. I'll consider it... But... I have no bag :'/

I got a dice bag at the same game store I buy my Arkham expansions at. I was my monster cup until recently, but with all the expansion monsters included the monsters don't mix, which means I was always just pulling from the top layer. Now it's my gate bag, and I got a bigger cloth bag for the monsters.