I'm answering here to this post made by Dj in a different thread:

Did Kevin ever get his other Cthulhu game off the ground, the one where the cultists of different players are trying to awaken their GOO?

I havent played ES, but atm I am loving Elder Sign:Omens, the Dark Pharoah expansion, which I play on my tablet. Do you guys know it?

Never heard anything about the other Kevin's Cthulhu game; in the last month a project about Mythos destroying the world was kickstarted by Sandy Petersen ( here ). I must say that, even if graphics are cool and the minis rock, I hated the project with all my heart: in order to have any of the stretch goals, you have to load another money in the project, turning the game in a really huge cash cow, without any true reason for this (I understand why The Professor asked for a contribution for his stretch goals, the project raised 14K bucks, but a project collecting 1.4 million dollars? Hey, c'mon...). Additionally, the base game was expensive per se, and I hardly doubt you'll play it that often. But it implemented something similar to what you said: cultists opening gates to summon the Mythos forces.

Elder Sign: Omens is quite a different experience from the tabletop version: the boardgame is much easier, and does not implement any campaign. The expansion, Unseen Forces, fixes somehow the game: first of all, it's huge, you almost double all the decks, granting a great replayability. Additionally, Blessings and Curses make the game vary a lot more, and Master Mythos and new Ancient Ones provide a greater challenge (best game expansion for me in 2013 and maybe in the last three years).

Hi, and thanks! Yeah I saw that KS. Personally I was sickened really...just as you say. The production values are so high and in a time of great strain ...it sort of has me worried for people really! Also, I really think we are on the verge of a technical revolution in board games that will make plastic minis look like the things you used to get in cereal boxes as a kid, no matter how detailed they are - they wont be able to compare to animated graphics. Granted that kind of thing will be expensive at first, but once the standard hardware is up and running and game boards become chips an investment in hunks of plastic is likely to look short sighted.

And all this love of 'realistic' visuals...whats wrong with the third eye these days? Has it completely closed?

Also, I was struck by how similar this idea was to the one Kevin was touting years ago. I wonder if he sold it/ handed it over to Sandy?

Aye, that's a good question. Not so sure we will ever find out; point is - IIRC - that you cannot copyright an idea (nor a game mechanics; we had quite a long debate long time ago about this point, and it resulted that technically there is no law in the US forbidding you to create games - whatever - based on ideas already developed by others)

Agreed on the plastic revolution. Now I want to have every morning my Kellog's Special K cereals with Kthulhu in! Umpf...

As for the realistic stuff... agreed again. Especially because too realistic can be a turn off (Basil Elton ally card looks too much as a picture taken with a camera, for instance)

I'd be curious to hear your take on the Blood Bound art...

I'd be curious to hear your take on the Blood Bound art...

hmm, did I miss something, what is that?

Thanks for the plug, my dear! For you and Andrea, the labels are being moistened this week...we should have FedEx packages out the door very soon...thank you again for your patience!

I'd be curious to hear your take on the Blood Bound art...

hmm, did I miss something, what is that?

Here . pure photoshop-on-picture style.

Thanks for the plug, my dear! For you and Andrea, the labels are being moistened this week...we should have FedEx packages out the door very soon...thank you again for your patience!

Wow! Great news, Joe!

What patience? If it weren't for you, we'd never have displays and stuff! I'd have waited another couple of years without troubles!

You're very kind, my friend.

Ciao!

*goes to check the art for Blood Bound and comes back*

I hate it. Actually, I find it embarrassing, and some of the more sexualized imagery is just tacky. It would be the main reason why I dont find the game interesting. I dig vampires - I am a VtM storyteller for the last 20 years - and the cut throat concept of play sounds fun (with a few beers, exceptionally so) - but that look is not my style.

EDIT: It looks like it is aimed at LARPers. So that would not be me.

*goes to check the art for Blood Bound and comes back*

I hate it. Actually, I find it embarrassing, and some of the more sexualized imagery is just tacky. It would be the main reason why I dont find the game interesting. I dig vampires - I am a VtM storyteller for the last 20 years - and the cut throat concept of play sounds fun (with a few beers, exceptionally so) - but that look is not my style.

EDIT: It looks like it is aimed at LARPers. So that would not be me.

Yeah, I think the same. It's quite surprisingly bad, considering the glorious tradition of FFG good artwork.

Uh, Dj, the other big thing you could have missed is that Avi quit (both playing Arkham and writing on this board)

Uh-wha!!?! ... crud. Why? Did he say? Is his farewell still around? Did anyone else vanish?

Man, i will miss him. He gave so much to this community.

Simply he said he wasn't getting anything from a game he had mastered. He remained until I finished playing the Advanced Players League he designed, and then nothing. There is no farewell posted. I still hear from him via e-mail, but I don't know if he remained in touch with someone else here. Probably Tibs, dunno.

Anyway, Avi's unofficial answer arrived via e-mail ten seconds ago:

So, the Lurking One remains....lurking. Waiting for the next aeon to dawn so that he can slide free of the festering seaweed and engulf the minds of young initiates once more.

Well I can understand that he felt he had mastered the game. I would disagree, though. I have been playing the game avidly and posting here since it came out which is nearly 10 years. That makes this my fourth AH forum I think. The game has too many variables and is too creative to be truly mastered. Having said that, my win rate on games has been very very high for a long time, especially when I play solo. I have had to stack the odds against success fairly high to get a god tussle out of it but that is really easy to do, not just with the published components but with all the fan made adds. The possibilities for keeping this game challenging are pretty impressive for a board game.

My guess is he felt bored of the basic strategy, which *is* repetitive. But that is really more us than the game itself, which gives us 2 ways to legitimately win (I never counted Final Battle as a win but as a draw or lose). A relatively easy (seal) and a relatively hard (close). One of my house rules in later years has been: no victory from seals. It has forced me to look for new strategies beyond gathering clues and laying down strategic seals. That is just part of a closing strategy. The other part is the hard part.

So I think what happens is we naturally want to win and so we choose the easy path and the easy path is ultimately never the most fun path.

Agreed. Nonetheless, I can understand that after years of playing the game solo, he's looking for greener pastures. Not so sure Avi plays any boardgame right now, like this part of his life is done. No probs with this, clearly, I'm just happy if my friend is happy.

I agree on your points about the game being always challenging, even if your winning ratio is consistently high. At the moment, I'm on lucky streak - 41 victories in a row - but most of them are incredibly close (I'm playing a complete rotation of AOs with Ghroth as a Herald, you can imagine how short the doom tracks are) and it's really a blast. Miskatonic is a superb expansion and makes everything a lot more complex. And the new Arkham Nights AOs are an addition nice indeed.

Dunno. I think Arkham is the game of my life. Most of the fun is reading the encounters, and deciding how to go. Even if the structure is boring, it's almost hidden among a huge variety of other stuff, which are amazing. And there are a lot of Scenarios screwing up the basic concepts of the game that are certainly worth playin' ( here you have some examples, if you're able to read French.

Just out of the blue: have you considered joining the Advanced Players League?

41 in a row!! Major Congratulations!! Most of my games end up whisker thin too. The last row of the track is nearly always heading in an uncertain direction. You are right, MH did wonders for the game. There are some bits that did not work as they should have (the Black Goat 'fix' comes immediately to mind) but the Mythos cards...nasty!

Being away from the game so long I have still got the Arkham Nights AOs to play with and am looking forward to that, I just need to get them on good card stock. There is just such a huge bunch of great stuff for this game that I dont think I will ever exhaust it. Not that I would not buy more from FFG mind

My French is rusty (20 years since I used it) but I have a good enough memory and enough knowledge of Arkham to make out much of the gist of things at the end of that link - thanks! More to add to the list of future games.

As for the advanced players league, I am afraid it passed me by. Can you elaborate please?

Thanks Career's best was a little higher, so I'm working on improving my personal record. Even if in max 5 games I'll have to play Ghroth + Rhan with random investigators, and I'm afraid they will reduce me to a bloody pulp :laughter:

I have not integrated yet MH Black Goat stuff, so I can't really have an opinion on this, but encounters (both Arkham and OW) and Mythos are awesome, both thematically and in the way they affect the game in general.

Agreed, there's so much stuff (most of which brilliant) we'll never run out of options. Still, I'd love to see some more small boxes adding stuff coming from FFG. A good Nyarlathotep themed expansion, and a good Yig one above all.

As for the French stuff, indeed, a knowledge of good Arkhamese and in case Google Translator should be enough; if you have the basics, all the better

Advanced Players League: it was designed by Avi some years ago. A run of 24 scenarios spread over 4 different segments, with special rules and a restricted investigator pool for each segment, designed for *experienced* player who wants a serious challenge (read: even if you play the perfect game, there is a chance you'll lose it nonetheless) and are ok with implementing custom material (AO and Heralds; no custom investigators and no custom cards of any other type). It was intended to be played with everything from AH to IH (no Lurker - double gate Mythos will screw quickly everything up - and no Miskatonic - really, Scenarios are tough enough as they are). I'm running the League for Avi right now; if you are interested, you can download all the Scenarios from the BGG ( here ) and post comments and questions directly here . I know I'll sound like a baker sayin' my bread is the best in town, but really, this series of Scenarios is probably the best things that was ever done for Arkham

I believe it. An ongoing campaign like this was something the game always seemed to call out for. It might take me some time to get organised but once everything is ready I will be aiming to get through one game every Friday or Saturday night. Many of those games will be solo but some might involve the Berlin gang here depending on whether they can bust free of their schedules.

I have not had time to read through the entire thread discussing the league. Some of it seems apt to skip until I have played through. So I am a little confused because the instructions by Avi on page 1 talk about not including KH, but above you only exclude Lurker and MH. Am I missing something? Or are the instructions you gave me above the up to date ones?

Uh, sorry, officially KH is not to be included, but I played the whole League with KH in, and Avi was totally fine with this. So, feel free to play the way you like the most (KH gives you some extra stuff to care about, but allows you technically a free investigator)! Just if you add KH, don't start searching for encounters removing doomers from the doom track (this was the main reason why Avi removed KH)

Lovely to hear you're in I hope you (and your friends) will have a great ride!

And uh, not so sure you want to read all the discussion thread: we often talk about tactics, spoiling a little the scenarios, so maybe you'd like to solve the puzzle on your own before reading those. Anyway, as you wish, clearly!

Uh, sorry, officially KH is not to be included, but I played the whole League with KH in, and Avi was totally fine with this. So, feel free to play the way you like the most (KH gives you some extra stuff to care about, but allows you technically a free investigator)! Just if you add KH, don't start searching for encounters removing doomers from the doom track (this was the main reason why Avi removed KH)

Lovely to hear you're in I hope you (and your friends) will have a great ride!

And uh, not so sure you want to read all the discussion thread: we often talk about tactics, spoiling a little the scenarios, so maybe you'd like to solve the puzzle on your own before reading those. Anyway, as you wish, clearly!

Well, I also didn't really want the dilution on the boards with gates, but I don't really care as long as the doom token removal exploit is not taken advantage of (it's just too easy, and tempting, to do in Kingsport). I would play without Kingsport (until the Kingsport scenarios), or, if you insist, with ;'D

One warning. I don't know how large your group is. Some of these scenarios are very hard depending on group size (it was designed so you could grow or shrink your group). But they should all be winnable regardless of team size. In theory ;')

I played all scenarios with the same team size, and won... :devil:

(oh, how I missed pulling your tentacled legs, you, evil lurker of the rulebooks)

I played all scenarios with the same team size, and won... :devil:

(oh, how I missed pulling your tentacled legs, you, evil lurker of the rulebooks)

True, but you played, what, 5? 6? Very large teams and very small teams can have problems. Plus you were bumping your investigator number down by playing an extra board :'P

Tentacles are for slithering, not pulling!

:pulling harder:

:something stumbling on the floor:

really? oooops...

(c'mon, Kingsport rumors are *awesome*)

:pulling harder:

:something stumbling on the floor:

really? oooops...

(c'mon, Kingsport rumors are *awesome*)

So leave in the rumors and take out all the other cards and the board :'D I'd be okay with that.