Prospective Player

By ilovelcgs, in Call of Cthulhu LCG

Hi all - I am avid player of Star Wars & Netrunner and am very interested in this game as it looks fun to play and has a great theme. However I have reservations about purchasing once my local store gets more copies the core as it seems like this game seems to be the forgotten amoung the other great lcg. I am wondering if i missed the boat and can't enjoy this game as much as all the asylum packs are out of print and FFG has little news on reprints. What are your thoughts on the future of this game?

There is a whole pile of reprints on the way for this game.

With some faction specific expansions already out and more on the way, deck building just got a lot easier for new players. I continue to struggle finding a CoC community where I live (Olympia, WA), but it's an amazing game and if you have other people that are interested in playing it will be well worth your time.

Call of Cthulhu is such a great game - my favourite of all the LCGs (and I've played all except Warhammer: Invasion).

Fantasy Flight Games are making the effort to bring all the expansions in to the now-standard 3x format, which I don't think they'd bother with if the game was on the way out. (In the early days of the LCG - and Call of Cthulhu was the first - they created fixed-distribution packs, but didn't give you a full playset. The early asylum packs did have 3x copies of 10 cards, but only 1x copy of the other 10 cards; while a deluxe expansion contained 2x copies of most cards.) FFG have recently announced the Secrets of Arkham deluxe expansion will be getting this revised edition treatment. Then there's just one more set of six asylum packs to be updated - the Dreamlands cycle - which are listed as being reprinted this first quarter of 2014, and should also be revised to include full 3x playsets of each card.

They're also reprinting the sold-out core sets, and other packs, to fill the demand.

On top of that, FFG have been releasing one deluxe expansion for each faction, at a rate of one every eight months or so (plus another themed deluxe expansion inbetween). So far they've released deluxe expansions for three of the eight factions, with the fourth dropping in just over a week. At this rate, Call of Cthulhu should still be receiving new products for at least two more years, if not beyond.

If you can find someone to play with, it's definitely worth the investment.

Edited by jasonconlon

Thank you very much for the reassurance that this game is not gone. I look forward to picking up a core set once my store gets more copies. Are two core sets required to play this game competitively? Will the cards that are in the asylum packs be included in the deluxe expansions?

First off, welcome to Call of Cthulhu! It's a great game, my favorite of the LCGs (and I currently play them all save SW). If you want more advice or info, you may try the forums at GardGameDB . They also have some good articles for beginners.

On the Core set/Asylum Packs being out of stock:

This is a common occurrence with all of FFG's games. They rotate their games through a printing schedule, and then reprint them when stock runs low (or is out completely). It's not an indicator that the game is being canceled or unsupported. It's probably because, in the scheme of things, FFG is a relatively small company with a big catalog and they just can't keep everything in print all the time.

I would definitely recommend a second Core set if you want to play competitively. It contains cards that are still key elements in many competitive decks, and is the best bang for your buck. After that, I would pick up the revised Secerts of Arkham (when it's released next month) and then go from there.

I haven't heard that FFG intends to include cards from the old Asylum Packs in any future deluxe expansions. It seems highly unlikely, though that's just speculation on my part. Could they combine an AP cycle into a 2-part deluxe expansion later on? I guess, but again, it's doubtful.

The current deluxe expansions contain different cards to those in the asylum packs and core set (excepting one card that I know of - The Greatest Fear - which was present in both the Secrets of Arkham deluxe set and the Spawn of Madness asylum pack, for some reason).

Torch the Joint and Bootleg Whiskey Cover-Up were also printed twice, but along with the Greatest Fear I think those are the only 3 cards to be reprinted. Everything else in the Core set, deluxe expansions, and Asylum Packs are unique.