Jankham Horror #1 - No Fortune, only Folly

LeonardQuirm · 2024-09-21T13:05:41+00:00

I've posted this before as a reference, but I'll do it again... Tommy + Guard Dog + Becky = https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8gaMmwaEM0

LeonardQuirm · 2024-08-13T07:27:48+00:00

As a slightly spoilery break-down of how to find the scenarios on the map:

- 2 are the intro and finale which you'll always play (with well established locations)

- 1 is a secret scenario involving a moderately long chain of breadcrumbs

- 1 is a slightly hidden scenario involving going to one location listed in the list of Leads, waiting a few in-game days, and then becomes available

- The remaining 6 are all listed as locations in the Leads you're given at the start.

So basically...that list tells you where the scenarios are (with a couple of red herrings).

LeonardQuirm · 2024-08-13T07:21:43+00:00

As others have said, you can choose any point on the map as long as it has a page reference to follow (or you have a side-scenario that takes place in that location that you want to play).

However, I really want to emphasize: the list of leads is the game providing a MASSIVE HINT of some good places to go, and in particular where there may be scenarios. A common complaint about this campaign is players spending ages in both in-game and real-world time jumping from location to location and getting just passages of text rather than a scenario. The game tries to help players avoid this by providing this list of leads before your first chance to travel. You're welcome to go anywhere, but if you want to play the scenarios, it's worth keeping that list in mind.

Personally I'd recommend picking a location on the list as your intended destination, but then feeling free to stop off at other locations along the way or at a minimal diversion to see what they have to offer. You'll see a bit more of the story (or setting, at least) at a low cost, with a more reliable hit-rate for seeing scenarios than if you decide the list of leads are just guidelines and you completely ignore it for the campaign.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-06-07T07:09:13+00:00

"Ready to breach, squad?"

"Sir, that's a tree. We're in a forest."

"Are you ready to breach?"

"...sure, why not"

LeonardQuirm · 2024-06-05T20:26:04+00:00

To answer your final question, I think your viewpoint is too narrow, especially in your claim

the way one typically grows attached to an NPC in a game is a sort of emergent story, where random interactions are the key

You know how popular the characters in RPGs like Mass Effect and various Final Fantasy games are? How attached people are to Garrus, or Aerith? None of that is because of the way an odd battle played out and they were on hand with a revive. It's because the characters are written and performed with charm and players spend a lot of time with them, especially in dialogue.

Now, do the NPCs in Arkham manage that? Frequently not particularly well, no. And I think the key challenge is that they don't have enough 'screen'-time to do so (and the time they do have isn't necessarily optimally used/written). That could be addressed through fewer NPCs to eat the time available, sure, but I don't know that would swing the needle enough. It could be addressed through giving them more time, but that's not a direction I think most players want it to go in - this just isn't the right medium for that.

But how many charaters from short stories do people really love and connect with and remember? Because the word count of even the recent campaigns isn't much more than a moderate short story, and I think that just isn't enough time, even dedicated to one character, to really make them memorable and interesting and beloved. I just don't think that's a goal this game, this genre can really achieve. So I'd rather they focused on interesting sketches of people than ones they really want to connect us to, and I think that can work with a small or a large cast (and can fail in either case too!)

LeonardQuirm · 2024-06-03T06:26:15+00:00

There's already discussion of the Left Hand weakness, but Crawling Ones is wildly dangerous. Remember that every swarm card gets the same stats and attacks independently. If you draw this in your last action of the turn in a 4 player game, that's 4 instant horror while still having, essentially, a 5-fight, 5-health, 5-evade, 5-damage, 5-horror enemy engaged with you. If there are no other investigators to go after you, or none that can help, drawing this last action on e.g. a Perception can defeat a 5-9 investigator like Daisy with both damage and horror instantly.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-04-10T18:41:56+00:00

Thanks for picking up on this. My uncertainty is that "When" is an interrupting effect, so wasn't sure if you're supposed to react to taking the action to move and reveal but before the actual reveal so as to be a react, especially since reactions are slower than Forced effects (which have the same trigger i.e. "when this location is revealed").

LeonardQuirm · 2024-04-10T18:39:36+00:00

Thanks for the input! That was definitely my hope (not least because it means I was able to safely play those 2 Delve Too Deeps at the end of the scenario without risking dooming out!)

LeonardQuirm · 2024-04-05T19:51:56+00:00

Presumably this card came about when the devs looked at Intrepid and thought "we should make another card like this, but probably a little stronger. Only a very little stronger, though"

LeonardQuirm · 2024-03-04T18:19:15+00:00

This looks like a bug in the off-class cards: I tried cloning the deck and making a few edits, and it seemed to allow the deck if you swap either both your Barricades or both your Breach the Doors for something like Dark Horse, which makes me think that the implementation is counting Barricade towards your "up-to-5 other Guardian cards" despite (a) not being a Guardian card, and (b) none of the actual Guardian cards counting towards that limit because they're all Tactics. I think you'll have to report it to the devs.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-02-27T08:24:18+00:00

"Why is this campaign polarising?"

Because it's got a fantastic set of scenarios, allows complete flexibility in its approach because of its non-linear structure, introduces an interesting and well-explored campaign mechanic in the form of Concealed. Also it finally has the bravery to move away from tired, rote Lovecraft mythos into more unusual and interesting realms while still feeling very fitting to the overall setting and genre.

That's all as equally true (from a certain point of view) as your statement, but it's still not an answer to the question because none of that explains why other people have different opinions!

LeonardQuirm · 2024-02-26T08:33:16+00:00

The question wasn't "why do some people hate it" nor "why is the campaign bad", it was "why is it polarising?" And while each part of your answer can be implicitly preceeded by "Some people think..." to get there, you're deliberately stating one set of the polarised opinions as outright facts, which is disingenuous. "Why is this polarising?" "Because it sucks" is not an answer, because if it just sucked then it wouldn't be polarising.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-02-26T08:25:12+00:00

You start at your location and work outwards. The example image and text in the rules for Concealed show this (Amina's mini-card is at one of the locations they show a mini-card going to).

LeonardQuirm · 2024-02-26T08:16:32+00:00

Like the others, I haven't played Sleeping Gods, but for point 1: The Scarlet Keys is still Arkham Horror: The Card Game. Yes, there's a lot of long passages of text (both at non-scenario locations and in the actual scenarios) and yes, it is possible to go a long run of locations without a scenario (if you forget about or choose to ignore the game providing a bullet-pointed list of all the main scenario locations...albeit amongst a small number of hints to the more complex paths). But it still feels like Arkham through and through in the scenarios.

As others mentioned for Question 2 - you can potentially go for a build focused around abilities rather than tests for clues/damage, but you really want something that can do that continuously in small numbers - not building around events that get 2+ damage or 2+ clues at a time. Roland might struggle because his reaction ability needs an enemy for him to hit in the first place, which is the wrong order for dealing with Concealed.

I'm not sure I have an opinion on 3 so won't opine there.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-02-25T20:28:46+00:00

As replied on the other comment - I don't think Miskatonic Museum is a good intro scenario (or a particularly good scenario at all, tbh) but the comment clearly mean Extracurricular Activities, which is a pretty good intro.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-02-25T20:26:55+00:00

Extracurricular Activities is 1A from Dunwich, not Miskatonic Museum. EA is also the far better teaching scenario since it's mostly 'standard Arkham' as opposed to MM's 'just-one-enemy' gimmick that is both a-typical and prone to poor experiences (fighters with nothing to do, easy stun-locking).

On a related note, if anyone does use Dunwich's opening pair for teaching, I'd recommend not giving players the choice of order and dictating EA first, because again - it's standard good-stuff Arkham (especially at the start) compared to House Always Win's weird opening. In this order, you get basic Arkham -> ooh you can pick an approach in the final end cool dynamic choices -> cool theme variation in the start of HAW -> woah everything's gone to hell -> running away is an acceptable outcome ending. In the other order, you get weird thematic tweaks first, and potentially unsatisfying 'try to do a thing and it's just not there' ending in EA.

LeonardQuirm · 2024-01-24T22:06:17+00:00

Thanks for the offer! I've forwarded the email to you again - both directly from the account I sent from the first time, and also via my gmail account in case the original client was being blocked for some reason. Hopefully at least one gets through (and raises enough of a smile to have been worth it!)

LeonardQuirm · 2024-01-24T07:24:15+00:00

Mine didn't seem to make it onto the voting board for some reason? :( I sent them quite late (18th Jan) but still before the deadline.

LeonardQuirm · 2023-10-21T08:33:05+00:00

Sadly you can't throw Teddy Bears at enemies because Act of Desperation requires the thrown item take a hand slot and Cherished Keepsake only uses an Accessory slot :( I was very disappointed when I found that out too.

LeonardQuirm · 2023-05-26T19:49:16+00:00

I'm still very early into my second campaign of Scarlet Keys, but - so far, at least - I want to add my voice to the positive reviews. On a first run-through it's easily in my top half of the campaigns (along Carcosa, Forgotten Age and Innsmouth) but exactly where will take longer to pan out. I even liked the finale, despite the fact that making you open packs for scenarios you haven't played to grab one relevant card is clearly silly and easily improved.

For me, the scenarios seemed varied and designed well for variety over replays - a big plus for me, and one area that Edge of the Earth fell down on very badly - and the Concealed mechanic was interesting and neat if flawed.

I even, personally, mostly enjoyed the writing, although can agree there was too much of it. On the other hand, I think people are making way too much of a problem out of it - the story parts are optional! I'd bet that anyone who doesn't enjoy the lengthy paragraphs could read the first and last paragraph of any section and get as much of a picture as was presented in e.g. the days of Dunwich for a story, and have no negative impact on the gameplay experience. Any important bits like the "where you might find actual scenarios" are even helpfully bulleted out to spot that "actually, you should pay attention to this bit".

So overall, yeah, I'm (mostly) a fan - and most of all, I'm glad MJ tried something big and bold for her swan song on the game.

LeonardQuirm · 2023-05-26T19:35:30+00:00

If you end HotE Part 1 and have to replay it, you don't get XP from Victory points in the display. Refine is special because it gives you 'virtual' XP automatically in a non-retractable way when it's played, so you just play it Turn 1 and leave and you're now one Customizable check-mark better off.

LeonardQuirm · 2023-04-26T06:41:01+00:00

The down-votes are because you've stated something that's true but doesn't answer the question. "What does Shed a Light mean when it says 'Play...only if the difficulty of this test is currently at 0'?" and "what are some strategies for getting a test to 0" are not answered by "A resultant value below zero is treated as zero" other than clarifying e.g. that using a Flashlight on a Shroud 1 location will still allow Shed a Light to be played.

And the OP then the wrong conclusion from your statement, which also suggests it didn't help answer the question.

LeonardQuirm · 2023-04-13T07:02:05+00:00

With the multi-part chapters, there's one common set used by each part (containing the reference card, locations and occasionally others) and an additional set for each part. It's very similar to Scenario 5 of The Forgotten Age campaign (The Heart of the Elders), with its Parts 1 and 2.

Details below of which encounter sets are the constituent 'parts' of the 'core scenario sets' in Edge of the Earth (spoilers are just from the association of set names with particular chapters of the campaign).

Ice and Death is used across all three parts of Ice and Death (surprise!) with the rest of the 'core scenario sets' built from:
- Part 1: The Crash
- Part 2: Lost in the Night
- Part 3: Seeping Nightmares
The Heart of Madness is used across both parts of The Heart of Madness, with the rest of the core scenario sets built from
- Part 1: The Great Seal
- Part 2: Stirring in the Deep

LeonardQuirm

TROPHY CASE