Just curious what people you would ideally have in a 4 person group.

When we play, each person pulls 3 random investigators and gets to choose one to use from those three… We seldom get our ideal party of Mandy Thompson, Harvey Walters, Gloria Goldberg and Leo Anderson. Gloria closes gates. Harvey keeps the streets clean and Mandy and Leo make sure ill never befalls anybody.

Well my favorite team is one that's drawn at random. However, the team that I believe would bust the most heads need to at least involve Joe Diamond, Mandy Thompson, and Daisy Walker.

The team I had for the first leage was Mandy, Joe, Pete, and Diana.

For power, Wendy, Mandy, Daisy, and Darrell. But I play random characters.

Depends.

If you mean the take the Allstars and make a team then its Joe, Mandy, Daisy with one of the other power investigators ex

Lily, Darrel, Wendy, Leo, Bob, Michael

If you Mean the investigators that work together to pull off the strongest combo then its Daisy, Kate and Pete. The forth character can be either Joe or Mandy.

allstar64 said:

Hmmm, that's true, I forgot about the Daisy/Kate Combo. Heh... And using Pete to get the alchemies I suppose?

Avi_dreader said:

Bingo. And not just the alchemies but find gate and any other Spells Daisy might want. After that you can have Daisy (holding onto her tome) search the unique item deck with her $6 a turn. Meanwhile (if you want to pilfer 3 decks at once) Pete can look for a crowbar or any other good common items (with no money). When he finds one just get a donation from daisy and pilfer it back. Meanwhile Kate can stop all gates while either Joe or Mandy can take care of early monsters or start closting gates alread on the board.

If you do manage to get a crowbar with Pete Try to get the +2 sneaking ally, a blessing and then max his sneak and draw every item from the common item deck.

Every time I play the "best" characters together I die horribly, but when I play a group that looks terrible I win. But if I had to pick it would be

Carolyn Fern (my favorite)

Daisy Walker

Diana Stanley

Monterey Jack (unless Y'Golonac then Mandy Thompson)

Daisy gets Find Gate or Alchemic Process, Diana explores gates, Carolyn kills monsters, Monterey shops the unique deck for elder signs and weapons. And they switch as needed.

allstar64 said:

::laughter:: I think that's a bit of a hassle— the Pete combo, after all, you'll be controlling the gates with Daisy and Kate, who cares what Pete can get beyond the initial recycled tomes?

If I had to pick a four player team for fun *and* power. I'd probably go for Rita, Darrell, Jenny, and Daisy. I'd call the team, Friends of the Library.

Daisy only gets one shot at reading the Necronomicon a turn. Having Pete around is basically pointless. Heck, you'd be better off just getter Monty for shopping, because ideally you aren't going to have to worry about discarding tomes very often. For Arcane Insight, you need moar Tomes, not recycling Tomes. If you're going to do the Arcane Insight cheese loop, you want Mandy, Kate, Daisy, and either Leo, Bob, or Joe. You're more concerned about the speed of the 4th character than you are about their shopping ability. Daisy can shop her own self. Indeed when she eventually gets Lure Monster, she'll probably just camp the Curiosity Shop regardless. Heck, to make this combo work properly, you'd be better off with Wilson than Pete, because Wilson comes with a Motorcycle that he can give to Kate so that you can get the Arcane Insight combo working better and faster.

Now if you aren't pulling Arcane Insight cheese, either because you are not playing with King in Yellow or because you fear that you might still have a soul and/or want a challenge, then the allstar team is simply Mandy, Leo, Joe, and Daisy. It's simple, it's awesome, and everyone provides total asskickery on all levels. You should be able to follow any normal strategy and probably win against any Ancient One.

-Frank

I think there's a different ideal team for every Ancient One.

I don't think I could narrow my choice down to just four investigators that are ideal for every game.

While one spell a turn with the Necronomicon is great there is no guarantee that you'll get the Necronomicon or that you'll get a useful spell with the Necronomicon. With Pete and Daisy you can get both Alchemic Prosesses, and Arcane Insight 100% of the time. After that Daisy is free to shop every turn with her $6 per turn while casting Arcane Insight but with Pete's help she can continue to reuse her tome to get any other spell she might want.

I threw out the Pete/Crowbar combo because we were talking IDEAL. After he's done helping Daisy reget her tome again and again (and again and again) it's just something else he can go and do. You know assuming that they didn't find an Eldowe Shards, Dole Chants or KiY. As nice as one unique item a turn is I think that having EVERY SINGLE FREAKING COMMON ITEM is pretty darn sweet and something that is well worth the effort if his services aren't needed anywhere else.

Note that this combo is (in my opinion) the most powerful, game breaking combo in Arkham. I have and will probably never use it in a serious game. In fact I only suggest it if hell opens up and you need to take on about 10 AOs at once (and NEVER EVER USE against Y'gorek) or if someone puts a gun to your head (in RL not the game) and says "One chance win or else".

allstar64 said:

Yes. Because the crazy Arkham Horror players are everywhere. I know. I hear them. In the night I hear them scuttling in the walls.

Also :') the Pete/Crowbar combo isn't ideal, because you're better off just buying items at the unique item store rather than wasting turns until you can find a crowbar. There's just not enough good stuff in the common item deck to justify digging for a crowbar if you only have four players on your team. In the gun to your head example, the most important thing to do is get the Kate/Daisy combo set up properly ASAP and then bring the game to a conclusion as fast as you can (btw, I'd probably make my 4th character Wendy— if I was at all worried I'd have problems keeping the gates under control), or Jenny (if I wanted to be 100% sure money wouldn't be an issue— I'd have her get a bank loan on turn one too). Hmmm, I'd say go with the money. Finance the main combo, after all it's Daisy Kate who'll save your life. Pete's just there to ensure that you can use the searchtome multiple times. :') g'luck hiding from the Arkham Horror Perfectionist Gunmen though.

Pete with a Crowbar doesn't get every common item, he gains zero common items on one hit, one common item on two hits, and gets arrested and loses the crowbar on zero hits. He rolls until he gets zero hits, then stops. It's good, but it's not an infinite loop.

The fact is that getting both alchemical processes, or inded any alchemical processes is pretty much meaningless. The goal with the Arcane Insight combo is to paralyze the Anciet One as quickly and relably as possible. Once that has been done, you can get all the money, items, and clues you want just by wandering around safe locations like the Newspaper and having encounters. So the first, and indeed only spell you give a **** about hunting for is Arcane Insight. Once you keep gates from opening, nothing else matters.

Therefore the super best team for that strategy is Kate, Mandy, Daisy, and Wilson. The first thing people do is Daisy goes for Arcane Insight, Wlson gives Kate the motorcycle, then everyone buys books for Daisy until the team runs out of cash. Kate bikes around town intercepting gates that Daisy predicts, and Wilson picks up clues from dangerous locations like The Woods that aren't going to get gates and takes Odd Jobs to prevent Gate and Monster cards from coming up.

You should be able to stabilize the Doom Track at about four. Which is convenient because when you've closed all four of those gates with Mandy or Wilson you win the game. You're looking at a 10 turn game with a Doom Track of 4 and a win by gate closing. And it basically doesn't even matter who the Ancient One is or what cards you draw, because all the key ingredients start in play. That is the best team. One can predict the how and why of victory against any opposition with just starting fixed equipment and special abilities. You won't drain the ally deck or do any of the other possible crazy - but you'll win. And that's the first and last criteria for "best team."

-Frank

I've had the Arcane Insight + Kate Winthrop combo in a game once and boy was it boring . Only worry in the game was if Kate would draw an encounter that resulted her being moved to the street (or delayed might also do the trick for the gate following this one), which could mess things up, though only a little.

I agree with Tibs; my ideal team is a one picked at random.

I had not given much thought to a custom developed team actually. I've truly enjoyed the random teams that have been cobbled together. Sometimes they work great and others are an unmitigated disaster. That's a large part of the fun for me anyway. I think certain combos would work particularly well against certain Ancient Ones, but largely I want the game to be as difficult as possible. One of the best aspects of the game is how frequently I lose it. If I won it all the time I doubt I'd find much reason to keep it set up.

I already have a topic somewhere where I argue about the Pete Crowbar issue so I'm not going to touch it though I will say that I already conceded that he needs maybe a sneak plus and a blessing for it to work really well. I only threw it out there cause if he's not recycling items and if he's not needed anywhere else at the moment then its something he can do though it's probably not necessary so I really don't want to argue it. Either way give him a good weapon and he makes a great street sweeper.

Seeing how getting seals is priority I believe being able to hunt the Unique item deck constantly for good weapons and items is well worth the 2/3 turns you delay getting the Arcane insight. I mean if you get KiY or Eldown Shards while hunting either one of these items more or less gives you the game in combination with Arcane insight if recycled many times. Also if you find Dole Chants you can make Daisy a super character more or less able to do anything. If you want the motorcycle so badly we have an extra character slot that can be used for Wilson.

I'll admit that the top priority is Probably the Arcane Insight/Kate but it cost so little to set yourself up to crush the rest of the game that when talking IDEAL I think this is worth it. Either way Pete is not eactly a bad character. He has the best great fight will split in the game as well as above average stamina+sanity. With Daisy hunting constantly he will prolly have a good weapon so right there he can be a street sweeper. (though I know speed hurts) Or if things are getting dicey he starts with 3 clue tokens so maybe he's not the best for an early seal but he's still pretty good.

I repete that I never actually use any of the combos I think of. Nowadays I pick random investigators and run with it.

The thing is that in an Arcane Insight game, seals are not a priority. Kate will stop all the gate openings. All of them. There won't ever be a fifth or sixth gate opening for you to have a 5th or 6th seal on. You will win the game when you close the 4th gate. You would have won the game at the 3rd gate, except that you need 4 Gate trophies in hand to win by gate closing.

Are you seriously suggesting a 3 Speed character with no weapons as the team's street sweeper? Don't be silly. That job is held by Wilson, because he has a Speed of 4 and comes with a Shotgun. Ashcan Pete can pull off some strange and cool combos. Like the thing where you dumpster dive for Dhole Chants and have Daisy go into crazy town. That's a good one if you want to get a lot of personal character power. But that's all irrelevant to the Arcane Insight + Kate combo where instead of fumbling around for turn after turn getter uber powers for an eventual confrontation with the GOO you "win the game."

Daisy and Kate are required for the combo. Mandy is the only character who meaningfully contributes directly to the Daisy side of the combo by allowing you to reroll the Arcane Insight, the book reading, or other key combo-related skill checks. Wilson Richards happens to be very safe for collecting up clues and he provides a key piece of equipment for the Kate end of the combo - the motocycle that gets her across town. So yeah, Daisy, Kate, Mandy, Wilson. Perfect team. So perfect that it's boring to even contemplate such a game plan and if I randomly drew that team I'd probably just count it a win and redraw new investigators to have an actual game.

-Frank

Dam said:

We had it too. At least once. And yeah that actually happened to us. The Science Building I think. It was kind of funny, but it didn't throw it off too bad. It did make the game pretty long though.

Frank said:

Hmmm... That's actually a pretty good strat. Your team is less likely to get you shot ;')

You know I fail to understand what your arguing. You seem to be implying that the Pete combo is unneccesary in which case you'd be 100% right. Arcane insight Kate is really all you need. But we're not arguing the ideal 2 invesigator team we're arguing the Ideal 4 investigator team in which case there are tons of untapped combos which can be pulled off by adding Pete to the team. Yes they're totally unneccesary but that's not the point of this topic.

As for your comment about the 3 speed street sweeper I personally don't see much difference between a 3 speed sweeper and a 4 speed one. Especially in a game where very few gates are opening chances are there aren't a ton of monsters. I do however see a very big difference in a street sweeper with a 3/4 will fight split vs a 5/5 fight will split. Also having an extra stamina is nice. As for the lack of weapon if Wilson is in and giving his motercycle to Kate its not a stretch for Pete to beg a shotgun off him and if Wilson is not in Daisy is shoping every turn. Not bad odds on getting something useful to stab monsters with. Furthermore since he starts with 3 clues and has a gate sealing stat of 5 Its not hard for Pete to Switch to closing/sealing gates.

Bottom line is both our teams hit the IDEAL TEAM very well. You just had a slightly stronger stress on speed by letting everything happen faster. I on the other hand completly stress reliability and security. Your team would probably win in 2/3s the time mine does on average since you jump into the combo sooner and don't spend time getting items. My team on the other hand bounces back from a freak accident (and I mean something realy really freaky like losing Arkane insight for some reasons or Kate being devoured) better than yours by being able to fall back on powerful reusable tomes and tons of unique items, That's really the only difference between the teams we both are suggesting.

allstar64 said:

Any plan that does not involve Mandy is one that stresses neither reliability nor security.

-Frank

All this makes me wonder what the group from hell would be. That is, the sorriest gang of misfits imaginable. Vincent, Mark, Amanda, and Jim, maybe?