JeR said:

Wait, what?

That's not actually in the rules, so what do we do when we run out of clue tokens? Can we keep Rumors from going to completion by hogging all the Clue tokens? Are tasks no longer finishable when the clue tokens run dry? If you experience a major windfall of simultaneous clue placements (such as with Professor Rice), what decides where the clues do and do not go?

This ruling, as it is very much not supported in the rule book needs a lot of clarification. It's totally not cool to introduce that as a "remember that..."

-Frank

JeR said:

Is that an official ruling? Because I actually posted this very question in the F.A.Q. recently.

How many clue tokens are in the set? I fear that our dear Mysterious Whisper of the Fluffy Tufted Paws (a.k.a. our rescued border collie, Whisper) has eaten a few of our clues.

fwiw: we played 2 investigator game last night with McGlenn & Lee, and won by closing 6 gates - score of 22, eh. It was a gossip-y town - we killed three rumors - Terrible Experiment came up second turn, McGlenn & Lee took it out that turn, then we had Good Work Undone up and down in the next turn (we had the clues after clearing terrible experiment), and then we drew Southside Strangler - which we ignored for several turns as McGlenn ran around trying to keep the terror level down, and Lee hopped through gates. Lee had drawn "Find Gate," which is extraordinarily helpful. We played super quickly - I think we're getting good at this game. There were at least 14 turns - I know we had 4 monster surges at least, & the terror track ended at 10 - but it took us only an hour and twenty minutes. McGlenn had Calvin. It was a fun quick game, but we may try again for a better score. Then again, maybe not - we really need to rock out that 4 investigator team, and try it with 8 as well. We are so geeking out on this!

Just curious - how could you have a score of 22 with 2 investigators and the terror track at 10? That would mean you only earned 1 point for ithaqua (11-10=1) 6 for the gates =7, 2 for the sane investigators, which brings it to 9. So you killed 39 creatures between the two of you in 14 rounds?

We played this scenario 5 times scoring 16,17,19,16 and then finally 21.

There are 48 Clue tokens in the base set.

However, I didn't find any reference to what to do if you run out of tokens.

As the other half of SylvanEve's team:

It was Doom Track at 10, not Terror Track at 10. The Terror Track was at 2, I believe. The extra 8 points help a lot. (And it would have been more if that stupid family hadn't let itself get slaughtered. Can they just reprint that card as "bad luck: -1 point")

It sounds like for the league at least, we have an official ruling on clue tokens. I don't have much of a problem with the limit. The game has other things which run out (monsters, gates, barred from neighborhood). I kind of like the clue limit, as it does make you think about who is going to seal the gates.

That being said, as has been sort of brought up before:

Do mechanics that use clues as counters (rumors, possibly unique items) really count as using clues, or are these cards just using the clue as a generic counter, and anything else will work in its place (money, stamina, unused characters)?

Can we have a mechanic like the one with gates and monsters: "When you run out of clues, the ancient one immediately awakens?" Now that would make this scenario a little more challenging!

TroySterling said:

'Doh. DT = 10 of 11, TT = 3 My bad, I always misspeak that. Doom does not = terror. Sorry.

Michael McGlenn 14 M, 0G, 9Cl

Vincent Lee 5M, 6G, 0 Cl

11 - 3 + 6 + 6 + 2 -0 -0 = 22

Rumors: Terrible experiment. Good work undone. Southside strangler.

I would really like to see the clue token ruling in print by someone from FFG. That is no where in the rule book. The book does state what to do if you run out of monsters and gates, but nothing on tokens of any kind. This would not have effected our score, but it could have if we had drawn certain rumor cards or environment cards (and I have stated previously that we kept track of clue tokens owed to us with a die, so our final clue token retention number is effected by this). I don't want to post any score that does not reflect the observance of the rules, but the rules are not a living document.

On a side note, I have been reading over a lot of threads about your scores. I truely forgot how crippling some of the rumor cards can be to a score. I really think a score in the mid 20's is a solid score. Our first two scores reflect some really great luck with the mythos phase. I do believe character chemistry is important, so you can multi task, but in the end it is a game of chance as soon as you draw cards and roll dice!

- Dr.V and the Women

Ozzy said:

It's not a game of chance, not really (not to the extent where I would characterize it as a game of chance). If you can control factors to the point where you have a 90+ % chance of winning, welllll, I'd say there's a bit more than chance involved in the game. And lets face it, while chance might have alot to do in this scenario with where your score is in the 20s or high 30s (if you're playing well), its role is overrated ;') and would be even less if the unique item deck and spell deck weren't effectively removed from the game.

Avi_dreader said:

Hm. I'd characterize it as a game of maximizing your odds - a big old puzzle with tons of moving parts and a great backstory.... A game of remembering details and chosing the highest probability options.... Chance does play a big roll, but as you say, I agree, it's not a "game of chance."

OK, have there been high 30 scores with 4 investigators in this one? We're gonna' have to get back to the game table if thats the case! We have yet to run the 8 investigator scenario, and the 2 character - well, hm. we may keep our 22.

SylvanEve said:

I think there were actually a few low thirties actually :') sorry.

We got in the 20s for our score and I don't think we could have got more points with a 2 player team for this one. The doom track was at 10 we killed double digits of monsters. Maybe with a couple more monster surges, but not by much.

I would not say you have a 90% strategy factor when you begin the game with random items, random cards determine the game turn in multiple encounters and you roll dice to determine the final impact of these random events. With the best game plan in place your odds are controlable by 60% at best. I can certainly attest to going 0 for 14 on a roll before, and you can't plan for that.

Ozzy

Ozzy said:

Sure you can :') if your strategy is conservative (but strong) you can get screwed a couple times and still keep going (granted, this is easier with madness and injury cards, and even in the case of getting those you can get screwed), but it's not like you can't retire an investigator if they get screwed up too badly. Personally, I try to make one or two investigators into tanks (I'm more inclined to get a strong investigator a strong ally rather than 4 clue tokens at the science building). While the other characters tend to do more shopping and support (although support characters will usually seal one gate too, sometimes two depending on circumstances). ::Shrug:: and if you change your battle strategy depending on the AO (i.e. some you seal, some you fight), you really should be able to get higher than 60% wins. (Well, actually a part of that depends on how many investigators you use). Hmmm... As for the 90% remark. That was in response to this particular scenario, not in general. I think with a well coordinated 3-4 player team you can get somewhere in the 60s or 70s in terms of win percentile, even with random team drawing. Granted, this percentile will go down if you're one of the players who thinks a final battle victory is invalid ;')

Heh... There's almost nothing I hate more than zero successes on a 14 die roll ;') has that even happened to you while blessed?

As for starting with random items... You need to know what you need... You may start with random items, but you don't start with random cash, and lets say you have 20 bucks total (or 50 if you're willing to take out loans— intending to default or not), you can get what you need, if you need it badly enough.

Waaah! Scores are up for scenario 2, and we haven't done our 8 investigator game, and we wanna' redo our 4 investigator one....

wah! too slow! wah! too whiny!