Exploring Arkham

Although the one issue with this is that all investigators start in those stable locations. The precedent has been set that characters who start on locations with clues don't have clues on their starting location. Another issue is the number of players. A seven or eight player game would probably only give one clue to most investigators.

I guess I don't see this as a real problem... I admit that there will be more clues. If there are a large sum of investigators, then not all of them get free clues and it turns once more into a game of clue management, which is at the heart of any successful game of Arkham anyway.

As for the starting at a stable location issue, as far as I know in all of the expansions there are only two characters who don't start at stable locations: Luke Robinson (the Dreamer) and Kate Winthrop (the Scientist). Luke gets the disadvantage of only getting one "bonus" clue, which he normally would get anyway (from the second phase of the Dreamlands) while Kate ensures that an additional clue will be in play once the game "proper" starts, namely at the Science Building. However, if she opts to finish on a stable locations on the second freebie turn at the begining then she is also countering any possibility of keeping a gate from opening, and thus losing out on the clue that appeared at that location anyway. All in all the balance works out:
Normal investigators, up to seven players, get two additional clues (15 stable locations); if Kate is in the party, then potentially 16 (due to extra starting clue) and not a real problem for eight investigators; if Luke is in play then reduce the number by 1.

If you are figuring in custom investigators made with Strange Aeons, then I guess I have no means by which to address your concerns, as that adds in such a random element (decided by taste and style of the investigator author) that I would be incapable of possibly considering.

That math seems alright to me, I guess... a few extra starting clues and a legitimate chance to explore Arkham at the cost of one terror rating, which could be devastating with Tattered King if managed poorly.

mageith wrote:

geki wrote:we (house)rule that, before taking a "special" encounter in a location you MUST (and MAY) take a regular encounter. This doesn't seem to change the difficulty a lot, but gives us encounters at Church, Asylum, Hospital, Shops, usually never explored

Nothing is Free!

It probably shouldn't change the difficulty much because from what I can tell the the encounters are pretty much balanced among good, neutral and bad. What it probably will do is lengthen the game (but make it more fun).

thanks for this houserule, we played it with 3 investigators like this and it was very interesting, because it was not only "heal, get a bless, go for a gate" but like a real story behind it, with much more encounters than we had otherwise.

Gelvan wrote:...we played it with 3 investigators like this and it was very interesting, because it was not only "heal, get a bless, go for a gate" but like a real story behind it, with much more encounters than we had otherwise.

Did it lengthen the game? By how much do you think?

Apparently whatever it did it was worth it.

scotherns wrote:I would love it if the Kingsport 'Rifts' mechanic required you to visit stable locations in Arkham and Dunwhich (as well as in Kingsport) in order to control the rifts.

I suggested this on BGG when I noticed that Shudde M'ell rubble tokens are the *same* size as the rift progress markers...!

http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/319243

You'd still need to make rift progress markers for Dunwhich, tho.

Hmm. Even though you don't have Kingsport yet, nothing's stopping you from printing out the BGG files of the Kingsport rift track and rifts and making your own rift progress markers! Anyone have the color/symbols of the other two rifts?

http://boardgamegeek.com/image/342288?size=large

aka. Washu! ^O^

ced1106 wrote:Anyone have the color/symbols of the other two rifts?

Black star, black moon, white circle.

Cheers,
Chris

ced1106 wrote:

scotherns wrote:I would love it if the Kingsport 'Rifts' mechanic required you to visit stable locations in Arkham and Dunwhich (as well as in Kingsport) in order to control the rifts.

I suggested this on BGG when I noticed that Shudde M'ell rubble tokens are the *same* size as the rift progress markers...!

http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/319243

You'd still need to make rift progress markers for Dunwhich, tho.

Hmm. Even though you don't have Kingsport yet, nothing's stopping you from printing out the BGG files of the Kingsport rift track and rifts and making your own rift progress markers! Anyone have the color/symbols of the other two rifts?

This is great news! I think I will be making a full set of rift tokens ready for when I get Kingsport (hopefully this weekend!).

Thanks for the info!

Steve

mageith wrote:

Gelvan wrote:...we played it with 3 investigators like this and it was very interesting, because it was not only "heal, get a bless, go for a gate" but like a real story behind it, with much more encounters than we had otherwise.

Did it lengthen the game? By how much do you think?

Apparently whatever it did it was worth it.

Well I suppose it lengthen it by around 1,5 hours - and yes, it was worth it

I don't think it lenghtens the game!
Before the special ability it's definitively better, because it becomes risky and not ONLY benefical to the investigators

scotherns wrote:I would love it if the Kingsport 'Rifts' mechanic required you to visit stable locations in Arkham and Dunwhich (as well as in Kingsport) in order to control the rifts.

...

ced1106 wrote:
Hmm. Even though you don't have Kingsport yet, nothing's stopping you from printing out the BGG files of the Kingsport rift track and rifts and making your own rift progress markers!

Done! I have made rift progress markers for all stable locations - includes Arkham, Kingsport and Dunwich. They have a rift symbol on one side, and a colour coded stable location on the other. I used text, not pictures, as identifying so many stable locations from a tiny picture would be horrible. The colour coding should make it easier to show where the investigators need to go to remove the token (red for Arkham, green for Dunwich etc.) I made them octagonal, as the thought of cutting out so many circles was not appealing.

There are now enough tokens so that when one is placed on the progress track, you can place a spare one (rift side up) on the actual location that needs investigating (just like a clue token), so you can see at a glance where you need to go).

Now I just need to buy Kingsport to try it out

The file is uploaded to BGG: Rift markers for all stable locations.

Any suggestions for improvements would be welcome.

Cheers,

Steve

Thelric wrote:Black star, black moon, white circle.

There's something wrong with these Lucky Charms.

And I just realized that the Rifts correspond to R'lyeh (the Pacific), Earth, and Yuggoth (Pluto). Amusing that the Rifts are linked to places in THIS Time and Space.

So many good ideas... I like them.

Perhaps this way we will be able to see somebody having an encountr at the Docks, Ma's, Bank, Church, and other stable locations.

I'd swear that I've seen drawing no more than 10 encounters IN TOTAL out of such places, in 2 years of frequent games.

How About automatically raising the Doom Track by 1 each such turn (without gate openings and else)?
And allowing such option only when there are no monsters on the board.

Oh, I'm stupid

The Hypnos Guardian effectively encourages players to explore Arkham by placing Clue tokens at the less-visited stable locations, and allowing players visiting them to draw an extra encounter card. Temptation! And, of course, the rift tokens "force" you to visit various Kingsport locations.

However, Dunwich still has the "problem" of not drawing encounters at most stable locations. I'm working on a Herald that will fix that *and* the problem of gates not opening as often in Dunwich when you use additional expansion sets.

aka. Washu! ^O^

357magnum wrote:So many good ideas... I like them.

Perhaps this way we will be able to see somebody having an encountr at the Docks, Ma's, Bank, Church, and other stable locations.

I'd swear that I've seen drawing no more than 10 encounters IN TOTAL out of such places, in 2 years of frequent games.

How About automatically raising the Doom Track by 1 each such turn (without gate openings and else)?
And allowing such option only when there are no monsters on the board.

I see bank encounters all the time. Does your group never get the Saftey Deposit Key?

Also, do you never complete tasks? It's hard to complete many tasks without taking encounters.

I've been thinking about this since (recently) reading this thread and I suggest the following:

I played a partial solo test session with Darrell Simmons, Ashcan Pete, Sister Mary and Mandy Thompson. Darrell made straight for the Lodge and scored a membership. Pete's starting Unique Item was the King In Yellow, so Mandy headed for the River Docks to meet him and trade the Lucky Cigarette Case. She also started with the Cabola of Saboth and the Ancient Tome. The first turn, Soutside Strangler was drawn, resulting in a Ghost at the Woods and a Cultist and a Zombie in the South Side Streets. The latter two were taken out by Sister Mary. The second card was a Mythos card that resulted in a Maniac at the Unvisted Isle, handily dispatched by Pete. The card stayed in effect until the end of the third turn when Icy Conditions was drawn. By then, Darrell had scored Wither in the Library, Pete took Heal off the deck bottom at the Unvisited Isle and recycled Mandy's King In Yellow at The Unnameable. Mandy picked up an extra skill from the Cabala and Mary an extra skill from an encounter.

Sample size of one and characters deliberately chosen to take advantage of encounters, I'll admit, but I think this shows considerable promise. I was worried at first that bumping Terror Track two was too much, but it seems an adequate exchange for the grace period and keeps better with the card's theme than double doom tokens, which I also considered, as it would prevent the Doom Track from getting too far behind and dragging the game out. I also considered making this a Rumor instead, so that players could extend the grace period if they were willing to sacrifice in order to do so, but decided against it.

I'd be interested in any feedback any of you could provide me.

P.S. I should probably add to the final paragraph that all non-moon dimensional symbol monsters get restored to the monster cup when the card is no longer in effect.

That sounds very much like my standard House Rule of "three free turns".

For three turns, we don't open gates, but we do place monsters where a gate would have opened. The Monster Cup only contains lower-level creatures: almost like yours, but we add Ghouls, Witches, Warlocks, Byakees, Mi-Go, the High Priest, Wizard Whateley, and the Ghast as well. But we don't close any Locations, and we play with the GOO face-down (out of play). As Turn 4 begins, full Monster Cup and GOO in play, normal rules.

That should play almost like yours, except for the possible length of time it takes to remove an Environment Card, and the rise in Terror. It took several games to settle on "three turns" and it hasn't seemed to affect my win/loss ratios at all.

You might want to put a "time-delayed abort switch" on this card, just in case it takes too long to be relieved by an Environment. I can see you trying to hold off on shopping for (say) 3 turns, but 7 or more turns might just be MEAN.

Thanks, jgt, that is useful feedback. And of course, timeout mechanisms are the way Rumors work, so perhaps this is better as a rumor. The problem is setting the bar high enough on the "pass" criteria that players couldn't extend this out longer themselves. I suppose I could do a rumor with just a fail. And I'm still mulling doom tokens vs. terror track. While terror track fits the "feel" better, doom tokens would keep the game more "on schedule".

The location closures were based on thelric's suggestions much earlier in the thread. His rationale - which I quite liked, obviously - was that it would force people to have non-shopping Arkham encounters. I'm not sure not being able to shop was so bad - my test group of investigators racked stuff up. But maybe I should have another go with characters who are poor choices to excel at Arkham encounters to see how that would go. Off the top of my head, I'm thinking of characters like Gloria Goldberg and the Jazz Musician as they are optimized for Otherworld encounters. Maybe Luke Robinson, too, who I guess will end up LITAS on turn 4 if there are still no gates opened by then.

I myself considered a bigger pool of monsters in the cup initially - Witches, Warlocks, Ghouls and the High Priest were precisely the ones I had in mind. I hadn't looked at expansion monsters, but probably should. Edit: adding Whatley, Ghasts seems reasonable, too.

It might be better, too, to combine this with a scenario, so I don't have to cram quite so much text on to the card.

bill_andel wrote:And I'm still mulling doom tokens vs. terror track. While terror track fits the "feel" better, doom tokens would keep the game more "on schedule".

How about this (or something similar)? Assuming you have some kind of "abort" (or Fail) in place for some kind of control, during the Gate segment of the Mythos Phase, you add a Doom Token to the card. When the card is removed from play by whatever replacement Environment or Fail conditions you like, for every Doom Token on the card, the players must (a) add it to the Doom Track, or (b) raise the Terror Level by 1. (This is sort of in the same vein as the King in Yellow Herald, where the players must decide where to put Yellow Sign Tokens.) Your choice whether or not to allow Charlie to use his Special Ability during these actions. That should keep you "on schedule"?

But maybe I should have another go with characters who are poor choices to excel at Arkham encounters to see how that would go. Off the top of my head, I'm thinking of characters like Gloria Goldberg and the Jazz Musician as they are optimized for Otherworld encounters. Maybe Luke Robinson, too, who I guess will end up LITAS on turn 4 if there are still no gates opened by then.

Oh, ABSOLUTELY try as many Investigator combos as you can! And definitely try it out on a "Z Squad"! At the risk of upsetting their fans, might I suggest Sister Mary, Dexter, and Diana.

(By the way, when Luke is in play, we just allow him to return to Arkham to any of the Locations the Mythos Cards would have thrown a Gate on, if there are no Gates for him to return through. It's not perfect, but neither is Luke.)

I myself considered a bigger pool of monsters in the cup initially - Witches, Warlocks, Ghouls and the High Priest were precisely the ones I had in mind. I hadn't looked at expansion monsters, but probably should. Edit: adding Whatley, Ghasts seems reasonable, too.

I was trying to stick to "Humanoids", but Mi-Go and Byakhee both seem like the types of "scout" beasts that would make appearances before things really hit the fan (and they're not overly threatening). I'd have used Nightgaunts too if they weren't Gate-dependent. Goat Spawns and Rat Things may also be good candidates.

It might be better, too, to combine this with a scenario, so I don't have to cram quite so much text on to the card.

An excellent idea. Then you can add whatever removal conditions you want without getting boxed in by "Deck Rules".

Hi Bill,

Interesting ideas. If you wish to take a route like this to encourage exploration of stable locations then perhaps a line should be added to the effect that clues cannot be picked up until the first gate appears. Otherwise players may just shrug and spend the time sweeping the board of clues, ignoring the stable locations.

Also, whilst the shops see more visits than most stable locations I suspect that most players rarely take encounters there. As closing these locations eliminates the possibilty to take an encounter there, it might therefore be better to replace the "closed" with something banning the use of location special abilities for the duration. That way investigators can go to the shop locations for encounters, they just can't shop.

However, I think the best way to encourage players to visit stable locations for encounters is to provide a postive reason for them to do so, rather than putting the rest of the game on hold (as it were) i.e. make it seem like a good/necessary thing to do rather than a time filler. The Kingsport Rifts do this well, and the encouragement to explore stable locations is my favourite part of the Rifts mechanism. (I think the Kingsport rifts are I think, a recognition by FFG that stable locations are generally underexplored in the game).

Try writing a scenario where the players have to hunt for something (I'm not saying any of the following examples would be particulary good scenarios, they are mostly off the top of my head)e.g. a particular relic that is required before gates can be sealed &/or to allow participation in a final battle, e.g. maybe remove most clues from the game & only allow sealing by elder signs which can only be found by searching locations i.e. some skill check after taking an encounter . e.g. make the players hunt for hidden bad guys or the nest of a "queen" monster.

cheers -mariana the ex-nun cultist

EDIT to add: Or, and I'm sure this must have been suggested by someone before, rather than start with clues on unstable locations put them on stable locations & require completion of an encounter before taking a clue.

Those are good suggestions, Mariana. Thanks.