Hi everyone,

I am kind of confused and kind of "disappointed" about how many rules clarifications exist in the official FAQs 1.0 ... Also I am impressed about the facts of the City of Arkham, because things simply are different ...

Now with the FAQs the time-unit of "a day" has been introduced - especially with regards to certain Investagtors' abilities which may be used once per day ...

And now here is the thing - first of the quotes from the FAQ, then my question/ remark/ comment:

pg 2

"Once per day..." is a new condition for the abilities of Carolyn Fern's, Mandy Thompson's, and Vincent Lee's.
Note: The phrase “Once per day” is further clarified later
in this FAQ.

pg 4

"Finally, Mandy Thompson, Carolyn Fern, and Vincent
Lee have had their abilities changed to function “ Once
per day .” This means that they may use their ability
once per clock rotation , always resetting to be used
again at midnight."

and

pg 4

What does “Once per day” mean?
Several investigators have been errata’ed so that their
abilities function “once per day.” This means that once
the investigator has used his ability, he cannot use it again
until after midnight has occurred. Once per day abilities
can be used during other investigators’ turns. Exactly when
is detailed in the ability itself.

Is this true then, that the time-unit of a day in Arkham is only 12 hours long? Then it would be no wonder that people freak out and get insane all the time in the City of Arkham ...

But now seriously: How do you handle this extended time-concept of the game. Is a day in ES one or two clock rotations? And if you decide it to be 2 rotations, do you start the game at midnight or at noon?

All the best!

Mad

MaddockKrug said:

Are you now waiting for someone to give you a serious answer so you can then jump out and say "April Fool"?

xris said:

Yes. I expect a serious answer. Because...

*surprise*

... this is a serious question.

Yesterday I bought the game; today I played it for the first time. Ergo: I am new to the game and not thoroughly used to the mechanics of this game.

The only rule-issues I had were basically covered by the FAQ; but the FAQ also raises the question above. I would not think so hard about it; but I watched the ES-series on the YouTube Channel of BlackBeltGame, and there the YouTube member distinguishes between two halves of the day. Therefore he has "midnight" and the midnight rules only each 8 turns of the clock, and not all 4 as being mentioned in the FAQ ... Actually I am "confused" about this situation ...

So thank you in advance for a serious answer about a serious and honest question! (How much I start hating this bull ... Not the first time today I received such a remark in a forum ...)

All the best!

Mad

MaddockKrug said:

Could you give a pointer to the reference. I watched ep 1 and 2 of the BlackBeltGame Elder Sign play through and as yet haven't really noticed what you are referring to (don't really want to watch all 15 episodes.

But I suspect you are overthinking things. Every four turns, Midnight strikes, this is clear from the rules.

Advance the Clock
Then the active player advances the Clock. To do this, he turns
the clock hand clockwise 3 hours. So, if the hand was on the XII,
the active player would turn it until it reached the III. Note that
the clock hand will only ever be on III, VI, IX, or XII.

If the active player advances the Clock to XII (midnight) (or if he
advanced the Clock to midnight at any point during his turn), he
now resolves all game effects in play that say “At Midnight.”

There is no mention in the rules of there being "day" or "night". Midnight occurs then clock reaches XII, end of story. Every four turns you will have a Midnight.

The BlackBeltGame YouTube play through seems quite good. I suspect you have just incorrectly assumed something he said. For example at the end of turn 1 (ep 2) @ 7:30 he says "depending how you look at it". He just means if you want to think of "III" (Three in the morning) as being "early in the morning" or "late at night".

Hi.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, well... 22 Episodes are a lot. True. Especially since each episode is about a single turn. And each ends with rotating the clock. And here the YouTube-dude makes a difference. While in the one episodes it is all about 3am, 6am, 9am, he then speaks of 3pm, 6pm, 9pm after 12 am and vice versa.

But - my fault - each time the clock strikes 12 he also procedes through the midnight rules, although from the "realistic"point of view he would have a noon-mechanism ... .

Maybe this confused me - especially with the newly introduced scheme of "once per day" being described in the FAQ ... Maybe I should think more in terms of game-mechanics of a rotating time-instrument and less in "immersion" and "reality" of a clock ... Speaking of: Your quote of the rules makes it crystal clear. Thank you so much. And really: This was not intended to be an "April's Fool" thing ...

All the best!

Mad