kroen said:

Hey, you're right. It's impossible for X to be greater than his current sanity, and the damage he takes off it will always be 1 less than that. Sorry, I didn't think that through.

Tibs: surely this expansion will include Epic Battle rules, as well as the cards for its own AOs? It would mean that people without Kingsport wouldn't have cards for any non-Innsmouth AOs, but it still wouldn't be that unreasonable for Innsmouth to just cater to its own AOs.

According to FFG, there are exactly 3 plot cards per the new AO's. No epic battle cards. Meaning the plots would be useless if you don't have Kingsport.

I trust the rulebook has a footnote for how McGlen's (and progably Walters's) abilities work during final battle.

Hey guys! Did anyone else realize that Tulzscha doesn't do anything with this AO, and unlike with Abhoth, I can't think of a clean rule to get it to work?

Just thought I'd throw it out there. Kingsport didn't get enough playtesting for some things. Black Goat didn't get enough playtesting for a lot of its things. I don't mean to alam, but is Innsmouth going to take another step down in airtight "suppose-if" quality control that apparently began after King in Yellow? Especially consider that there are twice as many AOs and Investigators, and 48 individual personal stories—can we expect there to be a huge leap in broken, unfair, or thoroughly untested components?

For most highly anticipated expansion since Arkham was even released, I sincerely hope not :(

But since I do use the epic battle cards, McGlenn is actually bad against this Ancient One. Not broken, not even good. While McGlenn does not lose any Stamina, this actually means that he keeps rolling a large number of dice every round. On average he's going to be negating 4 successes each round. That's making things pretty difficult, each round things extend brings the deadly epic battles and sinister plots closer. So while this final battle isn't Cthulhu-difficult, he awakens much faster.

-Frank

Frank said:

I don't understand what you are suggesting. He loses stamina down to 1, and then does not lose any more. And this boss gains hits from the stamina it "drains"—I don't imagine the boss gains stamina that isn't actually taken from the player.

I have two problems with this GOO

1) The aforementioend rules conflicts that will have to be explained away.

2) Don't Gnoph-Kehs worship Itahqua, or at least have some kind of relation to him? I read all I could about Gnoph-Kehs but I didn't see a mention of this GOO

McGlen / Leo (and potentially Fern). It's dead simple. Just house rule that their ability cannot prevent the loss of the final stamina (sanity) point during a final Battle.

Tibs said:

Tibs is right - the loss is negated, which I assumed means that the Stamina (which McGlen still has) wasn't "drained", so Ranty Goth (or whatever it is) gets nothing.

It's FFG's own damned fault for using colourful words like 'drained' which have no rules meaning.

Acebob said:

I can't do anything about your first problem, but I can solve the second one for you.  In the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game rulebook it notes that while the Gnoph-Keh are associated with Ithaqua, they may also have some relation with Rhan-Tegoth.  I don't know which story gave that impression, but there you go.

I too wish for an answer to your first point and while I think this AO might be a bit too hard, I am impressed with the whole notion of the blood-draining attack and the way he takes Investigators' Stamina for himself.  That is cool, you must admit.   

thecorinthian said:

Well, I like their use of the word "drained." It conjures up images of the AO's attack, and is pretty clear from a mechanics standpoint (no loss—no heal). The problem lies only with McGlen.

Man you lot really get your knickers in a twist don't you. Nobody is forcing you to use Leo or McGlen with this AO. Winning with one of these investigators on a permanent 1 stamina with everyone else devoured would be a hollow victory anyway, one that ranks as near as dammit to a loss. Also wait for EB cards before passing final judgement.

sulphurea said:

Except people (like me for example), take random investigators then draw random GOO. Combinations are bound to happen.

For the green flame, a simple house would apply it's effects to anything that worships the particular GOO or AO. So in this particular case, it is Gnoph-Keh that would wander the map, destroying seals as they move about. And seing as they are boosted up, they dont even have to be Elusive but can just rampage.

As for the McGlen problem, I am surprised it would slip past the radar. Then again, like someone already mentioned, a lot of things seem to have aquired some sort of stealth technology. The Milk In the Other worlds topic and TheCorinthian's Infinity+1 Gun exploit come to mind. Maybe thats why Innsmouth doesnt contain new items. But yeah, the rulebooks have little passages about each Goo or AO, without a doubt McGlen will be mentioned in there.

sulphurea said:

My knickers are fine! I'm just wryly amused by the fact that there's a playtesting oversight in the preview. It's particularly daft since the preview itself actually mentions Michael McGlen by name, but still the loophole wasn't spotted. On the other hand, maybe it was spotted and they just don't care as much as we do. :)

I reckon there's a good chance it'll be cleared up in the final release, and even if it isn't, it's not that big a deal. Isn't there already an AO that the Martial Artist can't lose against? Or did I imagine that?

I apologise. My headache is making me cranky. Why not use a house rule that McGlen or Leo can't use their ability when stamina has reached 1. This still makes them useful, but keeps things interesting.