Black Goat of the Woods at GenCon.

Color me shocked when I walked up to the FFG booth at GenCon and saw the Black Goat of the Woods expansion sitting there in a huge pile, along with some other upcoming games like Descent: The Tomb of Ice. I mean, they haven't even officially announced it yet on their site and it's already for sale.

I picked it up, have not had a chance to look at it yet. I will report back when I do.

We eagerly await thy wordsss...

That's great news! the only mini-expansion I currently own is CotDP, and I'm happy to have a choice now between KiY and BGotW!

Edit: Here's the BGG link - not much information yet, but this will change soon:
http://boardgamegeek.com/game/37008

Victimizer wrote:sss...

Gotcha!

Sserpent people are my specialty, I own nearly all fiction that refersss to them.

*edit* damnit, now I can't sleep without knowing moooorrreee...sssssss

I wish I could go to cool conventions like GenCon and see awsome stuff like this! I guess I will just have to patiently wait while everyone else has all the fun

Interesting. Any word on when the expansion will hit the stores?

Wow! Give us some juicy spoilers/pics would you please?

Can't take any pictures.

Some quick stuff - comes with 90 investigator cards, including yet more new card types: "One of the Thousand" Cult Membership cards, Green Corruption Cards, Red Corruption Cards, Cult Encounter Cards. 88 Ancient One Cards (Mythos, Gate, etc), including 5 Difficulty Cards. There is an included variant where you can increase or decrease the difficulty level of the game, playing off of the settings on each card, which range from "Discomforting" to "Ultimate Cosmic Evil".

Also includes 9 new "hexagon" monsters that work with the new herald, the Black Goat of the Woods, which has a host of new rules that I'm not going to go into here, except that they seem interesting and have a neat interaction with the new monsters.

Basically the new mechanic in the set simulates your investigator infiltrating the cult of the Black Goat. Once a member of the cult, during certain instances you are forced to draw from the Corruption deck. The Corruption cards correspond to monster movement dimension symbols on the Mythos cards - when the two line up, the active Corruption effect occurs. There can also be passive Corruption effects that are "always on" as well. You can remove Corruption cards by sealing Gates with the corresponding dimension symbol. If you cycle through the whole Corruption deck (it does not reshuffle) the Ancient One immediately awakens if you can't draw a Corruption card.

That's basically most of it. This is from a quick perusal of the rules and the cards, so I may have miffed a few of the finer points.

Looks like a solid small expansion. I wanted to corner one of the FFG head guys and ask if we were finally going to see Innsmouth Horror next, but did not get an opportunity to talk to anyone.

Darke wrote:The Corruption cards correspond to monster movement dimension symbols on the Mythos cards - when the two line up, the active Corruption effect occurs. There can also be passive Corruption effects that are "always on" as well.

Using the Mythos card like that is an AWESOME game mechanic idea. I'm certainly looking forward to this one.

Forgot to mention an additional point - the Corruption cards have the dimension symbols on both white and black backgrounds. In order to trigger, both the symbols and backgrounds have to match up to the Mythos card.

FFG also gives you two rubber bands to use on your new cards. I'm not joking.

OOOoooOOoooOoohhh I want it!!!

Now our game set up will be roughly the size of the entire living room floor. Cards everywhere! YAY!

Wow.

So my guess is that will see this in our FLGS at the end of September, because that's when the GoT LCG will hit the shelves.

Course I wouldn't mind it sooner....... like right about now sounds good.

Victimizer wrote:Sserpent people are my specialty, I own nearly all fiction that refersss to them.

Do you perchance own the rare-ish Tales from Tethedril? I picked it up because the world the stories are set in was created by R. A. Salvatore, but I think the anthology of short fiction is listed under the editor's name (Scott Siegel).

If you include newts/salamanders in your quest for fiction, you might find War with the Newts by Karel Capek worthwhile if you haven't already read that.

Darke wrote:Can't take any pictures.

Some quick stuff - comes with 90 investigator cards, including yet more new card types: "One of the Thousand" Cult Membership cards, Green Corruption Cards, Red Corruption Cards, Cult Encounter Cards. 88 Ancient One Cards (Mythos, Gate, etc), including 5 Difficulty Cards. There is an included variant where you can increase or decrease the difficulty level of the game, playing off of the settings on each card, which range from "Discomforting" to "Ultimate Cosmic Evil".

Also includes 9 new "hexagon" monsters that work with the new herald, the Black Goat of the Woods, which has a host of new rules that I'm not going to go into here, except that they seem interesting and have a neat interaction with the new monsters.

Basically the new mechanic in the set simulates your investigator infiltrating the cult of the Black Goat. Once a member of the cult, during certain instances you are forced to draw from the Corruption deck. The Corruption cards correspond to monster movement dimension symbols on the Mythos cards - when the two line up, the active Corruption effect occurs. There can also be passive Corruption effects that are "always on" as well. You can remove Corruption cards by sealing Gates with the corresponding dimension symbol. If you cycle through the whole Corruption deck (it does not reshuffle) the Ancient One immediately awakens if you can't draw a Corruption card.

That's basically most of it. This is from a quick perusal of the rules and the cards, so I may have miffed a few of the finer points.

Looks like a solid small expansion. I wanted to corner one of the FFG head guys and ask if we were finally going to see Innsmouth Horror next, but did not get an opportunity to talk to anyone.

Thanks for posting this, it sounds great, very inventive.

- Mariana the ex-nun cultist

Darke wrote:FFG also gives you two rubber bands to use on your new cards. I'm not joking.

HOLY F'ING A-CRACKERS!! RUBBER BANDS?!! Must... have... game...

Kaz Necro wrote:

Darke wrote:FFG also gives you two rubber bands to use on your new cards. I'm not joking.

HOLY F'ING A-CRACKERS!! RUBBER BANDS?!! Must... have... game...

Haha I missed that part of the original post.

Is this for storage purposes, or so we can catapult them across the room when we're annoyed?

They really should have included one with Dunwich for the gate bursts.

- mariana the ex-nun cultist

@Darke
Thanks for the information - are the cult cards linked to the new herald, or are they something which will always be in play, even if another herald is used? I assume the Mythos cards only have Arkham gate locations on them?
I've seen a pic of the monsters - 3 Goat Spawn, 3 Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath...but failed to identify the other three. What are they called? Are they Shub-Niggurathian Cultists/High Priests?

@Nijay
I suppose I should've mentioned that I meant the Serpent People of Valusia, i.e. those from the Cthulhu Mythos; story examples being "The Shadow Kingdom" by Robert E. Howard, "The Snake God of Shonhi" by James Ambuehl, "The Shining Pyramid" by Arthur Machen, "The Dwellers in Darkness" by John S. Glasby, etc., etc....
I know of "War with the Newts", and though it sounds interesting, I don't really intend to read it. Though I've heard of Drizzt Do'Urden, I never heard of his inventor, proably because my knowledge in the realm of fantasy/DnD fiction isn't that great. Is "Tales of Tethedril" about the Serpent people from Clark Ashton Smith's and Robert E. Howard's works? The description seems to point towards it being its own thing. If it's valusian, I will have to pick it up.

rubber bands? eh?

I'm looking forward to the cult encounters at the Woods, Cave or Isle - presumably similar to the Inner Sanctum.

"The Sheldon Gang roughs you up for wearing a stupid cowl. Lose 3 Stamina and move to the street."

I would find it supremely cathartic if you participate in a ritual sacrifice of one of those guys at the woods. Damn Sheldon Gang.

tamsyn wrote:rubber bands? eh?

Elastic bands.

Best, squidnibble.

Around here we call 'em gumbands.

Victimizer: No, they are their own thing. Thought it was a more general snake love you had goin'

squidnibble wrote:

tamsyn wrote:rubber bands? eh?

Elastic bands.

Best, squidnibble.

Thanks, it was more a question of what they would be used for?

tamsyn wrote:Thanks, it was more a question of what they would be used for?

- Encounter X: "Make a Will (-2) check. If you fail, take a rubber band."

- Card Y: "If at least one player has a rubber band, he must try to hit the first player's investigator figure (distance: at least 2 meters). If one or more players hit, the first player is devoured. If none hits, the AO immediatley awakens, with twice the number of doom tokens than the doom track indicates."

Nice. I've always wanted a way to chastise other players when they fail to make their skill rolls.