So (continuing from another thread), I set up Yog-Sothoth and the Lurker against the randomly selected Skids, Minh, Ursula and Darrell, watched over by Nodens and the Miskatonic University, with Lurker gates and the DH, LatT and MH expansions in play. With the soundtracks of the games Demon's Soul and Dark Souls in my headphones, I drew the first Mythos card.
This is the account of what transpired next.
I realized what a strong team this was when I started playing. They were helped a lot during the random item distribution: one Press Pass and a Healing Stone for Skids, one Press Pass for Darrell, the Book Club relationship card between Minh and Ursula, Ibn-Ghazi's powder (never used), a map of Arkham that got passed around a lot, a Time Bomb and a Milk of Niggurath that also got passed around a lot (and on the second to last turn of the game, Skids placed the Time Bomb at the Police Station, then drank the Milk. Only a Maniac and a Deep One escaped the blast). By the end of turn one (a gate opened in Independence Square but no one tackled it yet), I was afraid I was going to run out of clues for the first time: Minh and Ursula got 4 clues each from reading the KiY, they both passed it, so Ursula had 4 starting clues, plus one for starting at Hibb's, plus 4 from the KiY, plus the one she picked up at the Cemetary. Minh was likewise stacked with clues, and Skids had around 7-8 by the end of the second turn. The first few turns were amazing, I managed to seal the Cemetary and the Science Department, Minh found an Elder Sign (the only one that was used during the game) and everything was going pretty darn amazingly. Unfortunately Ursula lost her big pile of clues trying to fight/sneak past/close a gate at the Devil's Hopyard, and was driven insane
. Minh was also saddled with a Curse since around turn 3, and i never managed to roll a 1 to remove it (although later Darrell spent a gate trophy to Bless her and nullify the Curse). And then the To Conquer Death rumor was drawn. In retrospect, it was a mistake to ever try to pass it, but I decided I could use the extra Stamina for everybody and the removal of Ursula's injury (-1 max Stamina). Also, everyone had passed their personal stories and on account of that Ursula kept a Mi-Go Case and Purify the City. I geared all my strategy towards trying to execute Purify the City, since To Conquer Death managed to prove impossible to pass (the most I managed was 5 on it, and it needed 9 to pass. But I managed to maintain it around 1-2 tokens for quite a few turns, with some devious planning and the strategic use of the Mi-Go Case
). Needless to say, the rumor failed the turn the 3rd token was placed on Purify the City. At that point Yog-Sothoth had around 9 doom tokens, and with the opening of a gate he reached 10. The same gate moved a lot of monsters around, including the last 2 needed to awaken the Dunwich Horror. Thus Skids, in a desperate last move, decided to place his Time Bomb at the Police Station and gulp down the Milk of Niggurath, trying to prevent more monsters from moving into the vortexes, keeping the Curiosity Shoppe open so that the rest of the team could browse for a desperately needed Elder Sign
The plan worked perfectly, but the Mythos turn opened a gate (11), moved the Dunwich Horror and I rolled a....6 (12).
With 4 Elder Signs on the board, the investigators were defeated in Epic Final Battle, managing to whittle Yog-Sothoth down to 9 doom tokens before succumbing. The first to go down was Ursula at the Start of Battle (she had spent all her gate trophies), the second and third were simultaneously Darrell and Skids, the last one to go down, guns blazing, was Minh, the Last Deputy of Arkham. They never succumbed to the dark temptations of the Lurker, even when he showed them a glimpse of his Power (they all received 1 Power token at some point). None had clues left to use during the battle.
All in all, a *very* fun game, with lots of strategies to pursue, but I chose the wrong one. I must say, I wasn't too hindered by the [2] difficulty, maybe because of the abundance of clue tokens. I also came very close to winning by closing all the gates at one point, but the match was atypical because gates opened in lots of low frequency locations, the Lodge, Devil's Hopyard, the Science Department...always eluding my maneuvers.
I will surely repeat the experience soon, and this time I won't be afraid to use the Lurker, Reckoning be damned
Also, check out the soundtracks I mentioned, they're a perfect fit for Arkham
The possibility was there, I chose to avoid it as much as possible for the first turn. Plus, she may have been sucked in a gate that she couldn't seal (a -4 [2] or -3 [2] modifier), so I wanted to have control over where she went. Lastly, she had to switch some items with some other investigators, and try her luck when Minh read the King in Yellow during the first turn (and she was lucky indeed, with Lore 3 and a -2 check to pass).