My group has just finished a VERY unlucky and extremely fast game against Rhan-Tegoth. By the time he awoke, there were five Cultist corpses on his sheet. Is this a record, or is there a player out there who has drawn even more cultists in a game against Rhan?

I don't remember if I drew that many or more, but I do remember once that the first monster of the game was THREE CULTISTS IN A ROW. That set the mood for the entire disaster—I mean, game.

As if his special attack isn't enough. How many cultists are there in the game?-8+three children of the goat+dark druid+any others I'm forgetting that count as cultists.In a game against him, I've drawn two cultists, I I think. Having monsters from all expansions helps. We've recently defeated Rhan Tegoth in a somewhat rare closing victory.The probability of closing all gates is higher though with all the non-gate Mythos cards from every expansion.

My "total" record is 5 over the course of the whole game. One of them was a Child of the Goat. It was a spectacular loss.

My "consecutive draw" record remains a meager 2, and I'm still a bit shocked I even have that. That Tibs could pull THREE...I am thoroughly impressed or terrified, I forget which.

Even with one 0 Cultist game against R-T, I still have something like 2.5 Cultist average in the games with R-T .

I've never played against R-T. Is there any strategy to playing against him, or is it just finger crossing? Like, is it a good idea to close without sealing to prevent monster surges? Doesn't seem like it would pay off.

I can't recall if I've ever beaten Rhan-Tegoth. Trying to keep monster surges down certainly helps, in a kind of "delaying the inevitable" way. It seems to me like I stabilize the board, control doom, and watch everything closely, and then some schmuck draws an encounter where you get to take a monster trophy. And a cultist comes out. And another. And everybody dies in the ensuing bloodbath.

God forbid you start William against him.

And yeah, a closing strategy actually seems much more viable against Rhan-Tegoth, as you panic and hope that everything turns out alright before you draw more cultists.

Dam said:

When Dam cries, Avi laughs ;'D

flamethrower49 said:

Tibs, should this be in the FAQ?

I don't think so. If you ever draw a Cultist out of the cup, Rhan takes it and you draw another. William is just a Liability against this AO. Same way that Dark Pharaoh/Cthulhu can drive Monterey or Zoey insane, or that Dark Pharaoh on its own can whittle Rex down to nothing.

Tibs said:

That's what I was thinking (re: ruling rationale). But I'm not sure if they'd go the same path with an AO as they would with a self-printed herald. Maybe they would. If you think that question's enough precedent and this one shouldn't be included, fine. But I think that the question is as legitimate as the DP questions. Although technically it's a bit rarer since it would only affect William (potentially). Then again, sometimes FFG makes tiny errata (like one dollar for bob, which is, in my opinion, completely bizarre now that he has his personal story).

Well Bob's errata wasn't as bizarre back in the day when they wanted to make everyone's starting funds balanced. I noticed t hat nothing was ever said about Tony Morgan's $1 deficiency.

However, while I did make sure that the AO is drawn before the Investigators are (making William's trophies a liability), the instructions do say that Investigators are fully set up and dealt their starting possessions before the monster cup is formed! Not that anyone with half a brain couldn't figure out that the cup needs to be made before giving Bill his trophies, but still, it was an interesting discovery.

zealot12 said:

And we scored another closing victory today, this time against Ghatanothoa. Come to think of it, they're even easier than sealing victories, if you get lucky with the Mythos draws. We were,however a hair away from losing the game by the Act III card-I checked the Mythos deck after playing, and there it was waiting to be drawn, the third in line.

Oh, and William is great, though not against Rhan-Tegoth, especially if you draw him as a replacement investigator when the devoured player had several monster trophies already. And so it happened in this game. Carolyn Fern was devoured, with 6 monster trophies and one gate trophy, so William started the game with a whopping 9 monster trophies, 4 of which had 3 toughness. That's a **** fine way to remove many strong monsters in the game, and get good stuff in return. Not to mention, he can spend them as clue tokens, which is even better.

Tibs said:

How are William Yorrick's starting monster trophies handled in a game with the Black Goat of the Woods herald? Is the hexagon cup formed before or after he draws his starting possessions?

I've been playing that anytime you're asked to draw from the cup for whatever reason, you choose the non-hex cup. I'll add this to the FAQ.

In a somewhat related question, what happens when you start a new investigator against Y'Golonac, and they proceed to draw a tome or two? I figure somebody already asked the question, but it's good to be sure. I played that Y'Golonac only counts after an investigator's starting equipment has been delivered. I based this on the "starting equipment" phrasing on his sheet. However, this could also be a hidden cost of getting devoured against this guy.

Man, this thread got hijacked quickly.

I like Cheetos.

Do you? I've sworn off them myself, but to each his own.

flamethrower49 said:

This should be FAQed, but I think,everything that pertains to investigators' setup regardless of when the new investigators are drawn is unaffected by Y'Golonac's slumber ability. So if you draw a tome as a starting possession for a replacement investigator, doom tokens are not added to Y'Golonac's doom track.

zealot12 said:

I don't remember if the language in the Kingsport manual addresses this situation, if it doesn't, you might want to include this in the FAQ thread.