Dear fellow Arkham Horror players,

I am new to the forums, I bought Arkham Horror a few weeks ago and I enjoy it every single time! It's one of the best games I've ever played and I actually like it so much I bought the Dunwich expansion and the Curse of the Dark Pharaoh expansion.

Sometimes a rule or something in the manual isn't clear to me, so far I managed to find the answers on my own (thanks to google, this forum and BGG). But there is still one thing that isn't 100% clear to me.

In the rulebook:

The encounters in CURSE OF THE DARK PHARAOH introduce one new term: surprise. When a monster surprises your investigator, you may
not evade it; you must fight the monster.

I completely understand what happens if a monster surprises you, you can't evade it during the first round of combat. BUT... when and how does a monster surprise you? Is it when a ''monster'' appears at your location, for example by drawing a gate card in the other world (you have to fight / evade it before it resolves, or in this case fight it during the first round and flee / fight in later rounds). That's the rule I used so far... I hope I am right. Are there any other ways a monster can surprise you?

I hope some of you can help me, sorry if it's a noob question or if the answer is to obvious. Thanks in advance!

Golivier

It's based on the wording on the card. IIRC, "surprise" is in italics in the CotDP AE and OW Encounter cards where surprise happens.

As an example: www.arkhamhorrorwiki.com/Image:Gate132.png

Thanks for the quick reply! I was thinking way too difficult...

Welcome to the board.

I actually overlooked the surprise factor-I thought it's just flavor text, and not something integral to the game. Hmm..So, this means that any monsters you draw as a a result of such encounters will have the Ambush ability.

zealot12 said:

No. Ambush means you can't Flee at all, with Suprise you just need to fight the first round, then you can try to flee normally (unless surprised by an Ambush monster ). Also, with Surprise you can't Evade the monster before the fight begins like you can with Ambush.

Thanks for the welcome committee!

It's a bit different...

Ambush: Once combat has begun with this creature, the investigator no longer has the option to flee it, but must instead fight until one or the other is defeated.

Wich means, if you fail a combat check first turn, you have to fight it again and you're not able to flee it. You have to fight it untill you (investigator) or the monster is defeated.

If a monster surprises you, you can't evade it the first round. BUT if you fail a combat check, you can flee it the next round.

Ah, got it. Thanks for clarifying.