We played a game yesterday and one of us drew an encounter card that read 'A monster and gate appear'. This is with the AH base game.

Now my understanding is that if a gate opens on an investigator, they are immediately pulled through the gate and delayed in the other world, and we played it that way. But, it would seem that the intent of the card was for the investigator to have to deal both with getting pulled through a gate unexpectedly AND an unexpected monster. By the letter of the rules, the monster is avoided by the investigator by virtue of the investigator being pulled through the gate. Anyone got any thoughts on this, or do most all of you play it that way?

I play that the investigator goes in immediately, without fighting the monster. If you play it the other way, what happens if the monster knocks you out? You won't even go into the Other World (technically, a player could refuse to fight the monster by not using weapons).

From the FAQ that was included with Dunwich Horror (p. 10)

Q: When a location card says “a gate and a monster appear,” which appearance is resolved first?

A: The gate appears first, and any investigators at the location are drawn through the gate. Then the monster appears. Monsters that appear as a result of these encounters stay on the board, count against the monster limit, can go to the Outskirts, etc., as normal.

Yeah, monsters that appear with a gate stick around. Monsters that appear w/o accompanying a gate either vanish after eating the investigator or being evaded or they are taken as a trophy. Because your monster appeared with a gate, the investigator avoiding it makes sense ... 'cause it sticks around ... but you might have to deal with it on your way out.

ricedwlit said:

Right, clearly the investigator is supposed to get pulled through the gate, it just seems like they dodge a monster encounter that way. I was just soliciting opinions on that.

Dr. Jay said:

Gate = revolving door, investigator entering the gate and exiting Arkham rotates it, causing the monster on the other side to enter Arkham .

The encounter could just as easily read "a gate appears" because a monster appears when a gate opens anyway!

Think of the encounter as a Mythos exchange program.

The encounter could just as easily read "a gate appears" because a monster appears when a gate opens anyway!

Think of the encounter as a Mythos exchange program.

Krawhitham said:

I've argued this for years. There is a single Independence Square encounter, from the base game, that says, "a gate appears," and it's my assumption that this was a typo.

But of course, that begs the question: do two monsters appear with five or more players (or the equivalent thereof)? Presumably, the encounter would mention this, since it mentions the one monster appearing.

The "two monsters appear" rule was not in the first edition, so the encounters will not reflect that.

Whenever a gate opens, no matter the trigger, a doom token is added, and a monster (or two for 5+ players) emerges.

But even the most recent encounters say "a gate and a monster," right?

Yes. I think they're being paradoxically redundant and concise. It would take too much room to write "A gate and monster appears! If there are 5+ players (or more, when using the appropriate amount of expansion boards), a second monster emerges. Add a doom token to the doom track. If there is an elder sign here, nothing happens (but a Deep One token is added to the track on the Innsmouth board)."

It is expected that the players are aware of all the related consequences of a gate opening. For consistency's sake, the same wording has carried over to expansions.

Dunwich still uses the obsolete "stay here next turn" wording in a couple encounters, even though it was supposed to have been dropped after the base game's release.

Hmm, I suppose you're right, one cannot rely on encounter text (I recall the controversy over cards that say "you are arrested and go to the police station"). Of course, rules text often isn't terribly clear either. Because of the way it's phrased, I used to think that gates opened by encounters did not add doom tokens.

Welcome to the circle of Hell known as Intent/Interpretation.

Dr. Jay said:

Each of the locations where a gate CAN open represent fairly big areas of land. At least an entire building, usually. If a gate large enough to "overwrite" an entire building opens, I don't have too much trouble accepting that the monster came out on one side while the investigator went in somewhere else. I don't see anything explicitly making a gate the size of a regular door, where one might question how the investigator and monster pass each other without seeing one another.

I'm sure there are a large number of other perfectly plausible reasons for the "ships passing in the night" effect within the genre of mystic horror, if that one doesn't strike your fancy.

Plus, there's the whole "sucked into an opening gate" effect. The investigator doesn't CHOOSE to enter, he's PULLED through as it opens. Apparently the same effect PULLS a monster through from the other side. Perhaps the cosmic forces involved in opening a gate are too strong for either party to resist, even if one or both of them WERE aware of the other and WANTED to stop and fight.

Thanks for all the discussion!

Steve-O said:

pleeeease, the image on the gate tokens and cards!?

Tibs said:

I'm not sure why you say this. "a" = one. Perhaps this is an error and it should say, "A gate and monster (s) appear." But it doesn't, so I think the text governs and only a single monster appears during encounters. Two appear during the Mythos phase as per the "exception" that is in the core rules page 10.

Because, as I said, when that text was written there was no exception. The text was written that way to remind the players that a monster will emerge from the gate (although they could have done without that part). If you want to read it literally then you might as well add a monster in addition to the monster(s) spawned by the gates. But that's silly, and the intent is clear: it's a gate opening, just like any other. A monster, or two, is added; a doom token is added; and the investigator on the space is drawn through and delayed.

Take a look at the player reference sheets from Miskatonic. Each of those sheets has a section called "monsters drawn." They don't say "monsters drawn during the Mythos phase."

Tibs said:

I must agree with the old man on this matter:

I assume the two-monster-spawn-rule was introduced, because there is always only one mythos phase, no matter how many investigators play. It makes therfore sense to increase the bad effects of the mythos phase, if there are more investigators to deal with them. Encounters on the the other hand will occur more often with more investigators, so i do not see why the same should apply there.

Secondly, I don't think we can assume "A gate appears" to be a mere typo (even if it only exisits on a single card, I'm not going to confirm that, feels like I had it happen a few times), since it even is explicitly mentioned in the current FAQ (page 1, "Arkham Encounters") - also they would have had plenty of chances to publish a corrected card in any of their expansions, as they did with other cards. So if in a 5+ player game a gate without a monster can appear, surely it can also appear with only a single monster. The revised rulebook and corresponding FAQ entry only mention the two-monster-spawn-rule during the mythos phase.

As for the reference sheet: you dont draw two monsters if "A monster appears" or the headline on a mythos card instructs you to draw additional monsters, it's just reference not rule.

On the other hand the revised rules don't support, that a doom token is to be placed, but the FAQ says it does. And they don't mention "A Gate appears", though they do mention "A monster appears" and "A gate and a monster appears" (revised rulebook p.22, "Monsters in Encounters"), so who knows, maybe it was indeed a typo...

Anyway, the appearance of a gate thru an encounter is pretty much the worst encounter possible (except maybe getting devoured, depends on the situation), so I see no need to increase the pain, if it's not supported by the rules.

Tibs said:

I assume the Black Goat herald affects the 'gate and a monster appear' as well? A hex monster appears as well as a normal monster correct?

Right, a hex monster and a normal monster will emerge from any opening gate.