Please can you help. We have been looking at the scores for the second scenario and are going insane trying to get close to the top score for 2 player teams. Therefore I feel we must be missing something and need help before we go to the asylum.

Our thinking goes as such: If the scenario ends after closing 6 gates then you can only have a max of 6 gate trophies right? 6 points. 2 for surviving. 11 max for the doom track. So we are on 19. To get a score of over 30 you would need to then kill 33 monsters to kill before he wakes up. Or you could seal them and reduce the doom track to get some more time, but still.

What are we missing? Or could you do this? We've tried and failed.

tamsyn said:

I have to admit to being very interested in any answers other players have to this question. I know the scores are very much dependant on the trust factor but Iwould love to know how some of the scores are achieved as well.

tamsyn said:

I'm starting to question whether people are totalling the total toughness of the monsters they've killed as opposed to the total number of monster trophies .

tamsyn said:

Actually this wouldn't help either. The only way the Doom Track goes down when sealing a gate is by using an Elder Sign and the scoring rules state –1 per elder sign played during the game so that would actually reduce the score.

Also, these scores have to take in to account the Terror Track as well.

I think it is possible, but it seems difficult. We tried going for a higher score on the 4 player, and we ran into a couple of problems. Late in the game we had absolutely nothing to kill. Some of it was bad luck with Mythos cards. We kept getting mystic environments and the gates kept being at locations we already sealed.

That being said, I think you can add the following to boost the score (if you get lucky):

If you get "The Terrible Experiment" early, it can add a monster a turn. If you play 13-14 turns, you can get an extra 18 monsters if you slow play it. That being said, if you randomly get the rumor in the middle of the game, it is probably only good for an extra 5-9 monsters.

If you leave a few high frequency gates open, you will get more monster surges. Monster surges are definitely your friend in this scenario. with two players, gate management is harder... but I think you could seal a couple of gates but leave a high frequency gate open. The extra two monsters + no doom token helps a lot.

Otherwise, I think luck comes into play as well. If you get a lot of those two monsters in the streets mythos cards, you can get a lot of points over the length of the game.

Another option: Use Gloria to find monsters in the Other worlds (a little risky, but she can probably get a little less than one monster per gate if she visits both other world locations for each gate.)

Leave McGlen in the streets to lure down flyers helps as well.

Or, you can just make a scoring error: Counting monster toughness instead of just the number of monster trophys is usually a good way to pump up the score...

Dear Tamsyn,

I think you will agree that scenario 2 was practically impossible to lose and the only real challenge was maximising a score.

We used Michael McGlen and Bob Jenkins.

Since I was the big guy I'll talk about strategy from his point of view. His 'Strong Body' made him a perfect Street fighter in the face of Ithaqua's 'Icy Winds' and I paired him with Calvin so he was sanity immune to HD 1 monsters. Fist turn he picked up all 4 banked clue tokens from scenario 1 with the plan to kill a suitable monster take its clues and seal one of the hyperactive gate locations as soon as possible. Tried to impose ourselves on the board as early as possible, looking to seal the active locations and get a bit of breathing space. Once McGlen got a few clues behind him I just maxed his fight and used clues to see off any terrifying monsters (also tried to pick up Legrasse if I had any time on my hands). In the end the challenge of the scenario became seeing how many monsters we could collect, whilst keeping the terror level down. In the end we got down to the dregs of the monster cup which is something that we haven't done before. If it looked like Ithaqua might awaken and spoil our monster hunting fun we went to the Church to seek divine intervention and remove a doom token, but instead tended to be chased out by a cross wielding maniac or stripped of half our items or cash so this was a endgame last resort.

We played this scenario a fair bit generally scoring in the mid to high 20s and a couple at 30+. Luck was never with us 100% as we always drew that butchered family mythos card which knocked a point off, but for a score of 30+ we found that skill is not enough and a little luck is needed since drawing the wrong rumour card in a 2 player game can really screw you up. I think you already know that you were at a disadvantage in not having any banked clues and I am sure that we would not have fared as well in your situation. We generally score fairly similarly so I am putting the difference this time down to having played this one more times and having a starting advantage.

Also, it didn't come up for us but that I thought the Terrible Experiment rumour would have been a useful one to have in play in this scenario, keeping the other rumours at bay and effectively acting as a monster/clue farm.

Best of luck for the third scenario.

The English

The rules are crystal clear. 3 unspent monster trophies are worth +1 point regardless of their total toughness. I can't see how anyone would mix that up. As I have said a score of 30+ takes you to to the dregs of the monster cup, a fair propotion being monsters you can't take as trophies like the warlock and mi-go. I again reiterate that this isn't chess, it's a game using radomly drawn cards and dice. A decent strategy and some knowledge goes a long way, but in the end fates decide the extent of the triumph in a win/win scenario like this. Play it enough times and you'll get a high score. Either that or I'm an Arkham genius which I doubt.

I know how you feel though as I instinctively dismissed (pehaphs unfairly) the incredibly high scores of the 8 player Japanese team as being creative or in error and posted ironically on the subject. Karma.

I don't know if you remember my thread on scoring suggestions for this season (penalties on replays etc.). I still think that what I said has merit as repeatedly playing a scenario for points can't be good for the Soul, but when they are as easy as these first two have been going for a high score is the only real challenge available isn't it, so what can you do.

You'd be surprised how often people have gotten confused on the monster trophy scoring. I think it's an easy fall back question when someone scores higher than you do...

My guess is that any time a team gets a really high score, people will question it.

There really is only one solution: all scored games must be video taped and submitted for review...

Twilight said:

A little video documentation would be nice. We could have a contest for the worst roll.

My recent one probably doesn't even rank in the top 10 - missing with all 5 combat dice against a dimensional shambler with Gloria, who was camping on an explored gate and got hit by a monster surge. She then starts rolling her 6 clues: 1, 1, 1, 1, 1 . On the last clue I summon a little precognition and state, "There is no way I am rolling another 1." So I get a 2, and Gloria is lost in time and space.

You don't think JR wants to watch a couple hundred hours of footage like that?

On the topic of seeing bad luck happen: There is this Mythos card that sends all investigators in other worlds back to Arkham. We have gotten it a couple of times, but it only seems to appear under one set of conditions. First, at least 2 investigators must have just returned from other worlds the turn before. Second, there can not be any investigators in other worlds. Is this really how it works, or does someone keep stacking the deck when I leave the room to get a drink?

There's plenty of worse ways for that to turn out. Somebody could be returned right when they were going to come out anyway, so that they have to sit there a turn without doing anything. Or worse, there could be a difficult monster or three, so that instead of finding safe passage to seal a gate by coming back the normal way, they have to fight/evade all of them. They could be Gloria with crappy stuff, looking for an easy seal, but a few monsters showed up in her absence, where she would have been safer in the other world. Or there could be a TIME BOMB set to GO OFF on the square THAT TURN because SOMEBODY said it was a GOOD IDEA. "Oh, no, you're Gloria! You won't be returned unless you want to be!"

(Okay, so that string of particular events has never happened to me, but parts of it certainly have.)

Sometimes, returning to Arkham isn't necessarily good.

admittedly, 2-p teams kind of get the shaft when it comes to scoreing in league games. Each extra investigator you add gives you another potential 2 pts. 1 for having a surviving investigator, and the second for being able to get an extra gate trophy before winning. If you really wanted to max out your score with 2 players, I'd suggest each of you play a second investigator, which could increase your score by 4 pts.

There are 50 monsters in the base game that players can keep as monster trophies, so if the players are fortunate enough to collect them all that is 16 points. Ithaqa's Doom Track is 11, and if we assume that all investigators survive, between them have all 6 gate trophies, and the Terror Track never advances the maximum score would be 35. So that score of 32 is very impressive, and obtainable.

Of course, this is coming from the "leader" of an 8 player/investigator team that had a best score of 0 in Scenario 1 (so bad, JR won't even post it in the results). Technically, we actually got 1 point, but I don't think you can score positive in a scenario you lost. 4 times. We did manage 28 points in Scenario 2, and we're happy with that.

Please don't think I was calling anyone a cheat. It was more a case of seeing such a high score and trying to replicate it ourselves, failing miserably and trying to work out how it was done.

I guess in the end we don't have the time or inclination to keep replaying the scenario until we max out our score based on the luck of the mythos draw.

If people however wish to do that then we might stop playing, as we are no longer playing on an equal field, so what is the point of comparing scores? Of course that would be our choice and we wouldn't hold it against anyone else.

tamsyn said:

Tamsyn - no need to stop!

I kinda' feel the same way about some of the strategies that seem contrary to the spirit of the game. We played our main team of 4 investigators twice - with moderately good scores. We could try again to maximize, but I kind of like playing it straight up, for fun, and seeing how our general game stacks up against a munchkin's game.....

That being said: My husband and I played last night with 8 investigators and had great luck - we have a really good score, but might have chanced another couple of turns because we were ready to seal our last gate and there was not too much else going on. I was tired, and the game was dragging, and the terror track was still at 0, so it would've been a chancy move to keep on going. We had the Terrible Experiment up and running. The game got really boring towards the end with many of the characters running around simply exploring while we picked up a few points here and there by McGlenn killing the experimental monster and hoping for monsters released into the streets.... I think we did great on the score, but we need to submit it to find out for sure.

Keep playing! It's fun to talk with you!

Last season survival as a two investigator team (Odin's eyes) was all we wanted out of the scenarios and we generally played until that was achieved and then moved on. This season we have just found it ridiculously easy and have enjoyed the welcome relief of for the first time truly dominating the game. As the scenarios become more difficult, gate bursts rear their ugly head and in particular as soon as the unstable locations of Dunwich enter play I fully expect as a 2 player team to be shafted as it is impossible with such a small group to control the game regardless of the benign hand of fate. Make hay while the Sun shines I figure.

We found the games for this scenario quick and easy and played it around half a dozen times (maybe 7). That is a lot I know, but we got carried away by the novelty of being in control and seeing how far we could push it. First play we scored 30, we then got a run of scores between 24 and 29 and finally 32 which we thought was pretty good and lost interest. I do think that your honourable decision to start without any banked clue tokens is the main cause of your frustration.

Personally it would be a real shame to see you withdraw from the League. I have to admit that after your comment about the English your's are the only results other than our own that I look out for.

sulphurea said:

Oh no, the Japanese team scores were probably legitimate. I was able to get near perfect scores with an eight player team. It's hard, and a bit of a pain in the ass, but it's doable— breaking the game with eight players that you can select is *very* doable.

Thanks for your nice comments guys.

We're going to try Sc3 today and see how we feel afterwards.

I think what some of you are missing is the bottom line "FUN". It is not about the score and it never should be. It is a chance to break the mold and try an investigator that you normally wouldn't use........like maybe Jim Culver. It is also fun to use the expansions in a way that creates a fresh challenge, especially for those of us who play Arkham a lot! I am not saying I don't pay attention to the scores, but it shouldn't be the driving force for enjoying the league or quiting. Some people get lucky on a few cards and get a great score. I played in the last league and I gotta say, most of those scores were total BS, but who really cares. Play your game, post your scores and have fun! That should be the first rule you are questioning if your following correctly or not, "am I having fun playing this game". If you are then great, your high score will come....as well as some bad scores! If you are not having fun, then you should stop playing!

Ozzy

Normal service has been resumed. Just played scenario 3 and felt under pressure pretty much the whole game, perhaps I was too greedy at the bank. On reflection, fun though it was in scenario 2, toughness for clues does have the potential to really unbalance the game and I guess with fewer investigators clues build up more rapidly for each player, soon providing a buffer against disaster. I know We were very aggressive, happily throwing ourselves into battle with monsters that we would never usually take on, spending clues in the knowledge that they would likely be replenished on defeating the monster.

Character selection probably did have more of an influence than I realised. The first and last plays were the Jenkins/McGlen combo scoring 30+, whereas flirting with Pete,Jenny, Gloria and Sister Mary (heaven help us) definitely weakened us.

I agree with Ozzy's outlook and I have to say that I am sorry that the fun we had with the last scenario has ended up leeching the fun out for you. Knowing that I can honestly say that I'm not enjoying myself as much.

Hope you stay on and beat us.

Tom

Well, The Infrequents have finally got under way with a six investigator set-up this season. We've just completed Scenario 1 and will be playing Scenario 2 next weekend.

Having scored 33 points in the first scenario I can now see how some of the high scores were achieved. Well done to everyone that achieved good scores and to those that didn't - do not give up! As has been said the whole idea is to have fun.

We tend to only run each scenario once and live with the score; the only exception to this rule is if we lose a scenario - in that case we'll keep playing it until we win.

Last season our first two scenarios were pretty low scores and things picked up towards the end. We try to get high scores but just getting together and having fun is the most important thing. We actually got a player back to our table that we haven't seen for over two years! That in itself made it all worthwhile - I must thank FFG for hosting these leagues and giving us the chance to see an old friend again!

We play the league for fun and the challenge to see how well we can do. Scores don't really mean much to our team, but we like it when we score well. We're just feeling the hose pinch from Scenarios 1 and 3. We've played scenario 1 four times, and lost every time and I think we may have just given up on it (not enough time to play again). Also, we really, really don't want to play the meta-game. We almost always have 8 players (and they are not always the same 8 players) so having someone sit at the General Store milling for the best items or staking out the South Church hoping to attend mass (which we have to do in the first scenario, pretty much) can be rather...unfun. Argonel himself asked me today if I felt that the scenarios were not scaled well for larger teams. I think that the idea is that the larger teams find themselves having to meta-game more often to win, but then again any team that is trying to maximize points is also, in its own way, meta-gaming as well.

We'll keep playing the way we are, and meta-game only as much as we have to. The league is more about fun to us, and that's the way we want it.

JerusalemJones said:

When we ran scenario 2 with 8 characters on Thursday, my husband reminded me that well, with 8 characters - some of them would be more boring than others, and some would not score as high. I tend to whine when one of my players looks like they are being useless...... It was true - my monster killer really wasn't (Joe Diamond). His Ashcan Pete had the lions share of kills, and hopee through a couple of gates. (He had great items - took on a stack of 8 monster surge monsters all by his lonesome and defeated 'em one by one.) I agree, it is more fun if you don't spend all your time camping for the good encounters - I also love exploring places where bad stuff happens frequently, but husband cautions me on such recklessness in league games. The meta-gaming helps scores, but not fun levels.

I guess with two players and eight characters, it is a "puzzle" rather than a role playing game-like thing. Unfortunately, I tend to be rather obsessive about puzzle-like things, and can get caught up in score, etc. I guess that is "metagaming."

Even my perinatal specialist knows I can be a hypercompetitive monsterface. He keeps cautioning me that pregnancy results in loosening ligaments and start-stop exercise puts me at greater risk of injury. I am in a tennis league and play every Monday and Wednesday, and have not yet given this up (24 weeks, all is well). At our last ultrasound, the guy mentioned that he knew my ob/gyn would be getting a call from me saying "ok, contractions are 10 minutes apart.... can i play one more set?" (He's kinda' right.)

Meta-gaming is when you play the game because you are familiar with the rules, rather than just playing the game. Now, don't get me wrong. We meta game. In fact, often we have to meta-game. In Scenario One we are forced to go to the South Church and try to attend mass because we have to remove Doom Tokens from the Doom Track to even have a chance of winning the game outside of a final battle. We're starting to remember where the ally pop up, and what we need to get them, so when can collect them faster. We put our cash heavy characters at the General Store in order to buy the best equipment. But when there are 8 players, noone really wants to spend all their time moving back and forth from a clue location to the Church , or whatever might need to be done. But the worst in when one player decided to no work with the group and just does their own thing.

In the last league, the scenarios were less about meta-gaming in order to complete, but this time around we find ourselves having to meta-game more and more often. We are still having fun, but sometimes wish it wasn't necessary to have to do a particular encounter in the hopes of even having a chacne to win. These new scenarios -- and don't get me wrong, we are enjoing them and having fun -- are less forgiving, so we have to make sacrifices in order to complete them. We are having fun, and intend to keep playing, but we just may not do as well this time around.

well we played sc3 (and I will post about that seperately) and will need to do it again, so I guess we are still in. It is about the fun, but as soon as you slap a score on it, you are into comparisons which can sometimes help or hinder your wellbeing. Anyhooo...

I think it is great news that you got an old gamer back to the table, the stuff that dreams are made of! Our gaming group is an ever fluctuating thing. We have 3 games running just so we can accomodate who can turn up that session!

tamsyn said: