First Miskatonic Horror Game

By Solan, in Arkham Horror Second Edition

For my first game with Miskatonic Horror I wanted to use Nyarlathotep and the Dark Pharoah Herald. We also used our usual three big box expansions and the new CotDP.

We drew six Investigators and picked four, and wound up with Bob, Mark, Lily, and WENDY! My brother was absolutely thrilled to get Wendy, since as long as she had her Elder Sign she was immune to the Blood Boiling Curse and could thus collect Exhibit Items from the Ancient Whispers token without fear. As was very thematically appropriate for the Crawling Chaos, however, the game was continually one step ahead of my bro. Four times he ended his move on the AW token, and each time he was unable to procure an Exhibit Item! One of the encounters, however, did gain him the Anointed Benefit. Finally he gave up and got two Clue tokens at Independence Square.

A new Other World counter cursed Lily, however, and when the Mythos card which revives Monster trophies came up Bob reslew a Zombie and picked up the Book of the Dead, which now allows you to claim Endless monsters and return monster trophies you spend to the box instead of the cup if you wish. So now two of our Investigators were Cursed and were losing a Stamina a turn. With a bad Encounter that cost two Stamina this eventually led to Lily hitting 0 Stamina and failing her Personal Story. Her Injury was the new Dizzy Spells, which delays her whenever she fails a Skill check during an Encounter. Bob similarly took an Injury. Eventually Lily was able to roll a 1 and discard the Curse, and thanks to Wendy's Anointed Benefit, Bob was able to as well!

We were sealing as fast as we could, but the situation was rapidly spinning out of control. Three gates opened in Dunwich and at one point we had a Moon Beast, the Dark Pharoah Mask, the Beast Mask, a Witch, two Shoggoths and a Proto-Shoggoth all in that little town. That was in addition to the God of the Bloody Tongue and Bloated Woman Masks on the main board! With those four Masks out and the DP Herald, Nyralathotep would have been unbeatable had he awakened, and he was at nine Doom tokens. Bob sealed the Devil's Hopyard gate, but the Shoggoth drove him mad and the Insanity card he got was one of the new ones that matched his Injury. With only one Injury and one Madness card, Bob was Devoured, giving rise to Agnes.

Lily used the Mi-Go Brain Case to hit the Esoteric Order gate and try for our sixth seal, but she was failed a trivial encounter check in her first OW encounter and was delayed. When she did emerge one of our seals blew and she was arrested by the Innsmouth cops before she could seal. Fortunately she was able to free herself immediately, and she and Agnes both got into gates as soon as possible.

In the meantime, Wendy had been Injured and after using her Elder Sign collected a couple of the Exhibit Items that the River Levees burst Mythos card had deposited on the board. The Blood Boiling curse actually eneded up killing her, when her Injury turned out to the twin to the one she already had. Exit Wendy, enter Hank.

A Greater Banishment allowed us to dispose of the Shoggoths and Proto from Dunwich, but the Dunwich Horror had already awoken and the Terror Track was steadily climbing. As Agnes and Lily struggled to get through the Other Worlds, we had the Terror Track at 10, two Rifts open and the Dunwich Horror out. Believe it or not, we were actually about to seal the fifth and sixth gates when the Dunwich Horror awoke Nyralathotep.

Mark was Blessed, and the rest of us had decent items. Only one Mask was still out, the Bloated Woman, but her presence gave Nyarathotep an extra minus one on the combat check and an extra Doom token, which would prove vital.

We were hacking Nyralathotep down until around the fourth turn, when Nyarlathotep unleashed his most deadly Sinister Plot, Tricked, taking away all but one of each Investigator's Clue tokens. Hank and Mark soon perished, but Lily and Agnes fought on. A certain new battle condition essentially linked the two in a way which would kill Agnes if Lily died, but my luck with Lily's Lore rolls held out until we got to Catching our Breath, when Angnes was able to gain enough Stamina so that Lily's death wouldn't kill her.

Then Lily did die and Agnes, with her six dice, had Nyarlathotep down to one Doom token. He drew the first Red card and got Sinister Plot. It was "Join Me!" Nyralathotep offered my brother the chance to join him and rule by his side, thus winning the game. But the Ancient One was so weak, so close to being defeated! Never has the choice been so stark, so difficult! My brother has never liked the idea of giving in to evil and so he renounced Nyarlathotep's offer, deciding it was probably a bluff anyway.

The next turn he drew a terrifically fitting card to follow his refusal, the Red Battle Event card "You will share Arkham's Fate!", which brought the Crawling Chaos back up to seven Doom tokens. Since it was a Battle Event my brother drew another Red card and the End of Everything came to pass . . .

So close! So very, very close! If Lily's Injury hadn't delayed her, she could have sealed the last gate before our sixth seal burst. If we hadn't rolled a four for the Dunwich Horror we would have had a chance to seal both gates. If Lily hadn't been knocked unconscious by the Curse and encounter, her passing of her Personal Story would have netted us victory against Nyarlathotep. If the one Mask hadn't still been on the board, we would have won. And even with all of that, we were only four successes from victory!

It was a great game, a most enjoyable nail-biter right up until the end. I was impressed with the Mistkatonic cards I saw, but a word of warning: so far I've come across two Miskatonic Mythos cards that are stunningly nasty! The one from this game was Weather Environment: Snow Drifts. While it is in play, each Investigator must stop and end his movement when he enters a street space :)

Solan said:

It was a great game, a most enjoyable nail-biter right up until the end. I was impressed with the Mistkatonic cards I saw, but a word of warning: so far I've come across two Miskatonic Mythos cards that are stunningly nasty! The one from this game was Weather Environment: Snow Drifts. While it is in play, each Investigator must stop and end his movement when he enters a street space :)



Book of the Dead is an interesting Exhibit item.

Snow Drifts sounds awful. Remember when "Clothing Drive" and then "Mirage of Lakes" were the nasty movement environments? Good times...

Great post and great report, thanks!

Question: I noticed you rolled for Martial Law while staying on a location with a gate. Is this official? I've always thought that since gates replace the location, you don't have to roll for Martial Law until the gate is closed and you're still there during Phase II

Julia said:

Great post and great report, thanks!

Question: I noticed you rolled for Martial Law while staying on a location with a gate. Is this official? I've always thought that since gates replace the location, you don't have to roll for Martial Law until the gate is closed and you're still there during Phase II

Hopefully someone can confirm or deny this, but I always thought you still had to roll for Martial Law when you come out of a Gate in Marsh Refinery or the Esoteric Order of Dagon. I thought that the gate replaced the encounters, but did NOT prevent the cops from coming and arresting you.

Avi, the severity of the other Mythos card is actually a bit dependent on what expansions you use. For those like me, who use all expansion boards, it is absolutely devastating and we drew it on the first turn of the next game. "Strange Creatures in the Water" places one monster at EACH ACQUATIC LOCATION! Just like that, eleven monsters appear spread across three boards! It makes "Innsmouth Invasion" look like a minor difficulty!

Fantastic report! Some cool cards, some nasty cards, even a little preview of the new Epic Final Battles. (No one puts the Great Meddler in a corner!) Did you feel that the Miskatonic cards offered a greater blending of your all-boards game? (I don't see how you couldn't, once that environment invaded sleepy Kingsport.)

Solan said:

Hopefully someone can confirm or deny this, but I always thought you still had to roll for Martial Law when you come out of a Gate in Marsh Refinery or the Esoteric Order of Dagon. I thought that the gate replaced the encounters, but did NOT prevent the cops from coming and arresting you.

www.boardgamegeek.com/article/3583647#3583647

There is no Law on gates.

Solan said:

Avi, the severity of the other Mythos card is actually a bit dependent on what expansions you use. For those like me, who use all expansion boards, it is absolutely devastating and we drew it on the first turn of the next game. "Strange Creatures in the Water" places one monster at EACH ACQUATIC LOCATION! Just like that, eleven monsters appear spread across three boards! It makes "Innsmouth Invasion" look like a minor difficulty!

Oh wow, that sounds awesome! Much more fun than drawing remove all clue tokens (two games in a row). I mean, it's really threatening, but potentially beatable. Very cool.

Avi_dreader said:

Much more fun than drawing remove all clue tokens (two games in a row).

All those games played and still your shuffle-fu is lacking gui%C3%B1o.gif ?

I've had Evidence Destroyed as my first Mythos card before. That was super sweet.

Glad you enjoyed it, JGT! Yes, I did think that the new combo made for a greater blending of the four boards; Dunwich in particular is more active than I've seen it in quite a while.

Thanks, Dam! I've been getting that one wrong forever! I've posted Kevin's ruling on Martial and open gates on the Official Answers thread.

Brine said:

I've had Evidence Destroyed as my first Mythos card before. That was super sweet.

I had that too, when introducing a player to Innsmouth. It was followed by Innsmouth Invasion, Rails Are Washed Out, and No One Can Help You Now.

Tibs said:

Brine said:

I've had Evidence Destroyed as my first Mythos card before. That was super sweet.

I had that too, when introducing a player to Innsmouth. It was followed by Innsmouth Invasion, Rails Are Washed Out, and No One Can Help You Now.

If that doesn't introduce him to Innsmouth, I don't know what will.

It was perfect. We were murdered.

I was doing my training regimen, so this is how we've fared:

  1. Base game: Yig (lost)
  2. CotDP: Nyarlathotep (sealed)
  3. Kiy: Hastur/KiY (lost HARD. Zero seals, terror 10... yow!)
  4. BGotW: Shub (lost)
  5. KH: Ithaqua (sealed)
  6. DH: Yog-Sothoth (lost)
  7. DH+LatT: Yog-Sothoth/Lurker (lost)
  8. IH: Revised Cthulhu (lost)
  9. All+anti-dilution: Azathoth (sealed)

Good times.

Hastur must have gotten tuckered out because when I played that scenario later with another person he lay down and took a beating.

Dam said:

Avi_dreader said:

Much more fun than drawing remove all clue tokens (two games in a row).

All those games played and still your shuffle-fu is lacking gui%C3%B1o.gif ?

Hey, I shuffled, it's just the Stars Were Right ;.( God **** Elder Gods...

Dam said:

Solan said:

Hopefully someone can confirm or deny this, but I always thought you still had to roll for Martial Law when you come out of a Gate in Marsh Refinery or the Esoteric Order of Dagon. I thought that the gate replaced the encounters, but did NOT prevent the cops from coming and arresting you.

www.boardgamegeek.com/article/3583647#3583647

There is no Law on gates.

Thx, Dam

Tibs said:

Brine said:

I've had Evidence Destroyed as my first Mythos card before. That was super sweet.

I had that too, when introducing a player to Innsmouth. It was followed by Innsmouth Invasion, Rails Are Washed Out, and No One Can Help You Now.

::laugher:: did he ask you to play again?

Immediately afterward we played the all-expansion Scenario 9 (Azathoth). He loves the game—and for good reason.

Tibs said:

Immediately afterward we played the all-expansion Scenario 9 (Azathoth). He loves the game—and for good reason.

::laughter:: that's good. If you love the game when it kicks your bum, then you'll love it even in not-so-mind shattering games :-)