If your +1 Luck skill was the one from the basic set, in addition to the +1 Luck which it always provides (and may be negated by a modifier), it gives you a bonus die whenever you spend a clue token (which like the clue tokens die is not negated by modifiers). Combined with the PI's ability, every time the PI spends a clue token on a Luck check, he would get 3 dice to roll!

Hastur also has Physical Resistance which means any physical weapons give 1/2 their dice. (EDIT: Looks like you took this into account.)

As pointed out, sounds like Harvey had the Sword of Glory, which means he can't also cast a spell. So he should have been rolling only 6, if my math is right. The Spell sounds like Whither which requires one hand dedicated to it.

Gangster only gets +6, not +8 for tommy gun. (Maybe this was a typo)

Enjoy your victory while you can -- Have you tried the Kingsport Horror "Epic Battle" cards?

And has anyone won against Hastur with the sealed or closed gates victory condition? I actually did with a group of roleplayers who drew the Blight cards. I was impressed!

I'm still surprised he hang on to a blessing for so long, did you roll for it at the beggining of each round.

also might you enlighten us on:

how many players? (4 from what I understand)

how did the AO awake ?

About the tommy gun..... Ya He probably had it right at the time.... I recalled the detail incorrectley.

Im not sure what the spell was, but I dont seem to remember it being called Whither... but I cant be sure.

Ya know about the blessing... I kept it for like 8 turns through almost the entire second half of the game, but completley forgot to roll it durring the big fight.

There were 4 players... but one got lost when Hastur came..

Hastur came when a gate opened up in the Mythos phase raising his doom track to 13

We are only playing the core game at the moment.

ced1106 said:

2 out of my 5 games vs Hastur have ended with seal-wins. They are a drag, but if you can somehow manage an Elder Sign or 2, you should be pretty solid. 13 doom track gives you time to get those Clues.

I played the core game up till 3 weeks ago as well. I'm still waiting dunwich to arive ...customer service is horrible around here.

Next time be sure to check for belessings ,and also check the back of the manual its helpfull, I almost always keep it close.

I have once managed to beat hastur + king in yellow exp + king in yellow herald solo with the Close gates win.

It was hard and I have found it hard to redo.

Generally when fighting hastur, my group accelerates his awakening (putting yellow signs on doom track, and putting the ACT 1 card back for 2 doom tokens) so he wakes up with a lower combat rating so he is alot easier to beat.

Gallagen said:

This sort of stuff is the main thing I frown upon, and the main reason I count "Victory by Final Combat" as draw.

Dam said:

Nah -- it's yet another reason to buy Kingsport Horror for the Epic Battle cards!

I have managed to defeat him via sealed gates (this was pre-King in Yellow expansion). But don't worry...you didn't kill him: you just put him down for a while. He'll be back soon enough to haunt your town!

Played my 3rd game of AH since I got it last week. Have been playing it solo getting a hang of the rules until Games Club Night this coming Saturday.

Drew Hastur as our GOO and had 3 Investigators (Psychologist, Drifter & Private Eye) The combination was working really well throughout the game until the gates started opening up real fast and was already upto Gate #6 (7 Limit) and had 2 investigators re-entering Arkham and a really big dose of bad luck and both of them failed their rolls to close the gates and the next Mythos phase and lo and behold a new gate opens and Hastur is awoken.

Tweaking their stats before combat and Hastur sitting at -2 Combat Modifier (Due to Terror Level) The Psychologist was doing really well and survived most of her attacks from Hastur. The Drifter was the first to go and was devoured after failing his Luck roll at -2 penalty. Then the Private Eye was next which was unfortunate as he was a lethal combination with 4 Fight, .45 Automatic +4 (-2 Penalty due to Hastur's Physical Resistance) and Cavalry Sabre +2 (-1 Penalty to Physical Resistance) and the -2 modifier he was still rolling 6 die.

With the psychologist's ability to replenish sanity each upkeep phase came in big help and with her sitting on luck 5 was very well fortunate. Hastur was sitting on only 3 doom counters left when the Private Eye was devoured and with her trusty Rifle kept plinking off shots and having marvelous luck and with the Whiskey and her Sanity Replenish ability kept her in the fight a little longer and it was only 1 more doom counter left on Hastur and she was down to 1 Sanity marker with no chance at all at suceeding the next roll that she managed to pull it off and downed Hastur with her trusty rifle.

It was a close call and a surprising and fantastic ending. I'm hoping to actually play a few games with some friends this Saturday.

In regards to expansions: What do people suggest in buying first?

Valentha said:

General consensus is Dunwich. If you don't want a big box, nex tin line is King in Yellow.

This was all done very scientiifcally: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/37812

ced1106 said:

We played him last night and sealed 6 gates. We were four players and we used 4 elder signs and at one point I was up to 20 clue tokens, it wasn't even a close call (he was like on his 9th "evil eye") but I guess we were pretty lucky with the card draws as well as the dice rolls. (And we only scored 15 points I think).