I received the King in Yellow Expansion as a Christmas present. I haven’t got any other expansions nor played them, so it is all new for me. I just wonder which ”play style” you recommend for the first play with the expansion.

Our group aren’t really experienced Arkham Horror players, only played it a few times (5-10 times), but generally think the base game is a little too easy. My own thought is to play with Permanent Performance style (just shuffle in the cards) and ”The Herald” variant described in the rule book with a random GOO chosen.

The thought behind this is I want to try out the new stuff in the expansion, but playing with touring performance style seems to shorten the game making it more of a game to beef up for the fight (if we are not facing Azathoth). My general thought is that winning by closing gates is more rewarding.

What do you recommend for the first game with the expansion?

I think most people prefer the Permanent style of the 2 small box expansions. The temporary/visiting one is just a bit too much flavor.

Mixing in the KiY Mythos cards won't make the game much harder. There's a few cards that raise the terror level, so your score will be lower. Other than that, Terror Level usually doesn't enter in your game, does it? The encounter cards don't change much either, but I'd put them on top like the touring version suggests.

However, the herald will take advantage of the terror level in that they offer negative tweaks to game play (or more doom tokens). Many of the people I play with actually find them fidgety and annoying, however.

Mixing in the The Act Begins...will probably actually make the game easier! There's six of them and you'll now have 94 cards so there will be one in every 15-16 mythos. If you see two, I'll be surprised. (Though there is a very, very slight chance you'll get three.) So the Act begin cards will only move the monsters and give the First player a clue token.

Your interpretation that the touring edition makes the game shorter is accurate. However bringing out the Third act (which will be likely unless you turn them back over to add doom tokens) will not result in a final battle, just defeat. I always turn back the First Act Begins card for two doom tokens in the touring version and sometimes the second if it comes really early. Adding 2 or 4 doom tokens will definitely make the game shorter. So if you choose to risk Act III by not turning over the Act Begins card, the game may end suddenly with no final battle.

Perhaps if you want a lot of the flavor without all the danger, you could draw every other card from the KiY. Other expansions use this mechanic.

Thanks for your replies. No, just adding them won't make it hard, but maybe in combination with the herald it will make the game even more interesting (I think it is interesting as it is though). Terror level haven't been an issue in my games. In the games I have played I have had at most 1 or 2 in Terror Level.

The reason behind adding the expansion is to make it more interesting and I like your suggestion of having them enter regulary, but just less so. It sounds fine for me and my play group. Do you think it is too fiddly to do it with the rest of the cards. I guess it is easiest to have two mythos decks, one (smaller) for KIY and one for the base game.

Godfeather wrote: The reason behind adding the expansion is to make it more interesting and I like your suggestion of having them enter regulary, but just less so. It sounds fine for me and my play group. Do you think it is too fiddly to do it with the rest of the cards. I guess it is easiest to have two mythos decks, one (smaller) for KIY and one for the base game.

Mageith: I don't think its too fiddly, but I might be in a minority there. I build my Mythos deck fresh for each game based on the flavor I want to portray. All other encounter, monsters and investigator cards are permanently mixed in however.

Having two Mythos decks and Two Other World decks works fine with our group.

We roll a die at the Upkeep phase. 1 to 3 Base cards 4 to 6 expansion cards are used that turn.

We also use the Herald if playing KIY or Black Goat.

Heh... You should've gotten Dunwich or Black Goat ;'D If you're just going for base and KiY, I'd recommend permanent exhibit.

Avi_dreader said:

Well, in time I will probably get both (first Dunwich, then Black Goat and then Kingsport and lastly Curse of the dark Pharao). I think I will like it still as it should be more interesting than the base game at least. Now I am even more interested in what I am missing.

godfeather said:

If money is an issue, you should probably get Black Goat first, it'll ramp up the difficulty a *lot* if you play with the herald. Walking Dark Young ;') fun.

Avi_dreader said:

Money is a matter of priority mostly. I don't have that much money to spend, but on the other hand I don't feel the need to spend as much on board games as I used to do and are more selective in what I buy.

We have all the expansions, and are having difficulty with the complexity of all the layers of rules.

I suggest starting with the easiest and least complex format.

Even then, it may get so complex at times that you almost have to discuss between the players and come to a consensus.

Trying to faithfully follow every rule would be very, very hard.

Glasgow Scotland said:

But this isn't an issue really, because the complex rules are in the main rule book. I haven't read the rules for other expansions, but I don't find the new rules added in KiY to be hard, not the Herald and the blight cards nor the Acts or Magical effects.

This is a tricky game though and one of the hardest rule books I have read (I don't say it is bad, just there are many rules for many situations).

Having tried both ways, I disagree with ALL "Touring" styles of play. My primary reason for that is that "Touring" tends to spoil too much too fast. With new content kinda spread out, I REALLY like it when a card pops up that I haven't yet seen. Right now, I'm milking the Black Goat (ewww!) for all its worth; coupled with a little bit of Kingsport left to see, my games still surprise me.

The King in Yellow combined with just the Base Game should increase the difficulty enough so you'll stop saying phrases with "easy" in them, but not so hard that it will ruin anything. Using the Herald will do the same. Both together, who knows? You may actually start losing a few games.

So just shuffle it all together, and enjoy the surprises.

As far as expansions go, get Dunwich. Forget about the Black Goat for now; yes, it's cheaper, but it's just more cards. If your games are still "a bit too easy", you need harder Ancient Ones, nastier cards, and another town to panic about. Eight new Investigators. Nifty new monsters for your cup. And you NEED a Madness/Injury deck. So just save up for the Black Goat twice, and buy Dunwich instead.

Well, here is an update when we played it the new years day. I didn't take your advices. We where seven players who wanted to play a game, preferably a little longer game and the choice was between Arkham Horror, Twilight Imperium and WoW: the Board Game. WoW isn't suited for seven and TI was voted down, so we played Arkham Horror.

We played with the permanent style and the herald with Ithaqua (random GOO). There is a reason behind this and it is that I wanted a little faster game of it, when we are seven players. It is definately more smooth with fewer players. The doom tokens where filled up pretty quickly and there wasn't many gates open at all in the game, which made it very hard. We tried to prepare for the final battle, but most of the combat items where discarded and the combat spells that were used was mostly used by those who had little in stamina. We were chanceless and had 20 life points left to kill off when it finally beat us.