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This board game has been on my list to try ever since Mofo Rising briefly mentioned it (http://www.badmovies.org/forum/index.php/topic,136268.msg444931.html#msg444931) some time ago.  It's a game where you play an investigator who has to stop one of the Great Old Ones from destroying the world, and not get devoured or go insane in the process.  Sounds like a fun game to me!  Anyway, I finally purchased a copy.  Now the hard part is finding a few people interested in playing a board game that will last 3 to 4 hours.

(http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51XXil0UeeL.jpg)

I've heard a few good things about this from other friends.  I'll have to check it out one day!

Wow!  People still play board games?  I'd play for 3 or 4 hours, but I'd need a primer for Arkham Horror... I love LOVECRAFT though.   :thumbup: :smile:

The game is amazing!

The trick is finding other people who are nerdy enough to spend time playing it. It takes almost an hour just to set the game up. The actual game usually takes three or four hours to play, and even when you do that you usually lose. But "losing is fun!"

Anyway, if you can find some friends who are willing to play, they "get it", you've got hours of enjoyment. If you can somehow get to a point where you can game the system and win, there are a ton of expansion packs which make the game more difficult.

Whose the other guy who loves these games? Oh, the Burgomaster.

If you're willing to spend the time, and can find some other people who are nerdy enough to love these games, there's a whole new world open to you. Arkham Horror is probably the sine qua non of these games.

I can't wait for my kids to get older so I can play stuff like this with them!  Right now we play board games, but the problem is that unless I keep them somewhere the kids don't know about pieces go missing.  I can't tell you how many decks of Uno I've purchased, I've bought three boxes of battle ship, and I'm about to buy a second Stratego, plus various other games that I didn't feel the need to replace.

Damn, now I want to see if I can find my Cthulhu RPG books.  I haven't seen those in years.

We have the same problem with games in our house:  pieces tend to end up MIA.  We've also been through multiple UNO decks.  There are three games that are inviolate.  Two are the wooden-boxed versions of Sorry and Scrabble, while the third is Mommy and Daddy's Yahtzee.  Luckily for the kids' Yahtzee, what usually goes missing is a dice and we can easily replace those.

My kids might be focuses and interested enough for Arkham Horror.  They are younger (10,8,6), but the oldest two can stay quite focused for long periods for games and reading.  Plus, a cooperative game might lead to less strife than other, less cooperative board games.  I'm looking at you, Monopoly:  destroyer of worlds.

Yup.  I have ARKHAM HORROR.  My boardgame collection is hovering around 300 right now.  I visit the Board Game Geek website quite often and my games are all listed under my profile on that website.  I really enjoy European strategy games, but I have a nice variety of other stuff, too.  For awhile, my wife and I were playing games at least 4 or 5 days per week.  We have cut down quite a bit, but we still play several times every month. 

For those of you who are familiar with games like CLUE, STRATEGO, MONOPOLY, and RISK, I assure you there is an entire universe of far superior games out there.  They might cost you $30 - $75 apiece (or more), but they are worth it.  I buy most of mine online from Cool Stuff Inc. 

Another good cooperative board game is PANDEMIC.  The players each assume a role as some sort of expert.  Each role has a different special ability.  The game is about outbreaks of 4 different diseases.  The board is a map of the world and the experts travel from city to city trying to stop the outbreaks and cure all the diseases.  The longer a disease exists in a city, the bigger the chance it will spread to other cities.  So, the players are always trying to stop the diseases from spreading.  If they are successful, they win (it is a cooperative victory).  Otherwise, the world basically gets wiped out and everyone loses.
(http://thegameon.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/pandemic-board.jpg)

DEFENDERS OF THE REALM is a sword-and-sorcery cooperative game.  It is similar to PANDEMIC, except the players use D&D type characters to try to prevent different types of monsters from multiplying and taking control of the realm.
(http://rivcoach.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/sl370674.jpg)

Another cooperative game is FORBIDDEN ISLAND.  In this one, players are on an island that is sinking.  The island is made up of square tiles and you remove the tiles from the board as parts of the island sink.  This gives the players fewer and fewer spaces to maneuver their characters on.  Eventually, there could be no place to go except into the ocean.
(http://www.wired.com/geekdad/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/ForbiddenIsland-board.jpg)

And now that I'm on a roll:

ECLIPSE is a good sci-fi game where you control a civilization in outer space and try to gain victory points by researching technologies and expanding your empire (peacefully or otherwise).

(http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4066/4654893249_141a149468_o.jpg)

(http://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic952898_md.jpg)



In TZOLKIN: THE MAYAN CALENDAR, you try to gather resources, construct buildings, and make offerings to the gods:

(http://blog.metagames.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/Tzolkin-game.jpg)


And if you are looking for a deep, historically based game, you might want to try TWILIGHT STRUGGLE.  One player controls the U.S., the other player controls the U.S.S.R., and it's a Cold War battle to influence other countries to become your allies.

(http://dicehateme.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Twilight-StruggleMap.jpg)

(http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CJHJhAID-xk/UGMkwoC0V8I/AAAAAAAAQv4/QzQyeXr3lhk/s1600/Twilight_Struggle_Board_Game.jpg)

Finished our 1st game and we did have fun. Even managed to win!  It definitely lends itself to planning and cooperation. By the end of the game we had figured out that some people should concentrate on killing monsters, others shutting gates, and still a 3rd class providing support (buying items, searching for items).

Andy and I ended up being monster killers, him being a bit tougher due to having a .45 and a magic blade. I had a serviceable rifle, along with lucking out on my skill letting me reroll failed combat checks.  The rest mostly worked on closing gates.  There is definitely some luck involved in getting useful items to the right people (or trading to make it happen).

I ended up in the asylum once following a mass of fighting. I like that aspect of the game - the erosion of sanity. We did have bad luck at 1st, managing to put a dark young, a shoggoth, and a flying polyp on the board in short order. We ended up dealing with the polyp by closing its gate, because that thing is mean.

I really want to get that game.  The reviews I've read and the comments here just make it sound like a lot of fun, even if everyone playing dies!  Plus it can be played as a single player game for those who are antisocial (although I guess it would help with learning the game).

Not to stray too far from Arkham, I got Talisman for under $30 on clearance at Barnes & Noble recently.  Can't decide if I should resell it or just get some people to play the darn thing.  Anyone else played it before?

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_JUwDKPSWmkI/S15q8QNlGAI/AAAAAAAAA10/tkmYK8NtPP0/s320/talisman.jpg)

We're having fun with it.  The kids asked us to start a another game, which we did.  So far everything is going wrong.  Nearly all of our skills and items started out mismatched, gates keep opening on top of each other and causing monster surges, and we keep drawing powerful monsters from the monster cup.  I am again, more of a monster hunter character but have only been able to obtain a calvary saber for a weapon.

I was able to clear a critical street intersection of the 3 monsters blocking it, but then was promptly jumped by three flying monsters that sent me screaming to the asylum.  Our best fighter ran into a monster that he could have beaten in combat, but it was so terrifying that he automatically failed his horror check, lost all his sanity, and joined me at the asylum.  We currently are in a position to seal one of four gates, but the investigator there needs to pass an evade check vs a Gug before attempting to seal the gate.  If she fails, the Gug is going to maul her and send her to the hospital.  We are getting our butts kicked!

We all also need to stop drawing "A horrible monster appears!" encounter cards.

We love Arkham horror, have played it a couple of years.

it is immensely complex, and it takes some real practice to play it right and by the rules.  The maxim that "if in doubt, the ruling that is adverse for the players is the correct ruling" is the way to do it.   

My wife and I usually play two investigators each, and we choose which Old One it will be depending on our mood.

It takes quite a while just to shuffle the decks and to set it all up, but it's worth it!   There are apps available for iOS that will do the card draws for you, but I can't quite get over just using the physical cards, myself.

The expansions add quite a variety to the game, and playing with multiple expansions in place makes the game even harder to play with good pace and accuracy to the rules.   If you consider the expansions at all, I'd be glad to comment on what I made of them.

I would love to hear about the expansions. We are already considering Innsmouth and Dunwich.

Another rainy day here, so we finished the game. Actually managed to pull it out and win by a lot of cooperation. Planning out the turn at the start of upkeep is critical.  I became a sacrificial lamb one turn, but went down swinging after taking out 4 out of 5 monsters that were blocking the street we needed cleared.

Arkham Horror is awesome.  I got it last year and have had a great time playing with my friends.  However, it seems to me that the optimum number of people to play with is probably 4.  Speaking of which, how do the expansions stack up?  I was considering getting Innsmouth Horror, mainly because I loved Shadow Over Innsmouth.  Killing fishmen seems like a good time.

I have never played a game like this.  I've gotta say...you dudes are making it sound mighty interesting.

We like to play Uno and Skipbo, occasionally Yahtzee.  Last night, we had a hysterical game of Apples to Apples.

The only big down side I see is the time commitment.  An hour to set up and another several to play?  Sounds pretty cool for a rainy weekend day, though.

I simply never dreamed there was a GAME based on Lovecraftian mythology!   :cheers:

Keep the cards organized and setup is about 10 minutes. We use a pair of extra hardware organizer bins that I had.  With people familiar with the game I am betting a full game could be 2-3 hours, and not feel rushed.

Look at the custom organizer this guy built.  I'm impressed.

(http://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic419226_md.jpg)

That thing is awesome, and would both help keep things organized and cut down on the space needed to play a game.  We have a big table in our dining room that we use, because all of the cards can quickly eat up table space.

I also own a copy of Arkham Horror. I can't find anybody to play it with though. I've only gotten to do one game.  :bluesad:

Designer board games have been an under-the-radar thing for quite a while. They've experienced an explosion in the last few years, the market now is amazing. Unfortunately, they're pretty expensive.

If you guys are cool with board games in general, I whole-heartedly recommend Burgomaster's suggestion of Pandemic. It takes no time to set-up, and the basic rules are about as simple as you can get. But in the 40 minutes or so that it takes to play a game is fantastic. Trust me, if you're a fan of family board game night, this game will quickly become a favorite.

If you can trick your friends to moving on to stuff like Arkham Horror, great! But Pandemic is just a fantastic game.

AH expansions (just my opinion):

These are in order of buy first to buy last.

Innsmouth:  worth buying the expo just for the personal story mechanic.  Basically each investigator gets a personal story card, which outlines conditions during which the character grows and realizes his destiny (sometimes not for the best!) or fails.  Winning or failing your personal story changes your stats, gives a bonus, or the like.   VERY fun mechanic.    The board is very good, and it's nightmarish (appropriately) to deal with -- dangerous, hard to keep clear of monsters, and pretty easy to get killed on.  You get an immense number of new investigators, and many of them are our favorite investigators to play (Hank the Farmhand, who is too stupid to be afraid of the unworldly, for example -- he does not do horror checks when he starts a fight, and Zoey Samaras the crazy cook, who can downgrade a monster's resistances).   Investigators and board and personal story mechanic make this our favorite.  The new ancient ones added are brutal (Uttaus, and Zhar, and others).  Uprising mechanic (the deep ones coming up out of the sea) is a generally fun mechanic, as I said hard to manage but a "good" kind of hard. 


Dunwich Horror:  Yeah!  You get injury and madness cards, which are a fun mechanic (to us).  You get the choice of drawing from one of these decks if you are unconscious or if you go insane.  The cards then allow you to avoid the asylum / hospital but you have a long-term disability that is potentially just amusing (and sometimes really crippling).   Useful skills, good items and spells.  5 allies, decent but not special.  Good spells.  The unique items are particularly good in this set.  New investigators, 8 of them and they are a pretty good group of investigators in general.  You get the new board which is moderately hard -- not as hard as Innsmouth, and not as easy as Kingsport, and the Horror itself, which is a nasty fight but a good reward if you can do it.  One of the best expansions, and one of the ones to consider first.

King in Yellow:  Adds a multiple Act mechanic, which is fun but can make a game brutally short.  Worth introducing after you've been playing AH for a while.  Blight mechanic represents prominent citizens in town going crazy and they introduce more adverse game effects.   Generally interesting common items and spells.    Some people really love the King in Yellow mechanics that are added -- I think they are okay, but not as fun to use every single time (for us).

Curse of the Dark Pharoah (revised):  Exhibit items are added, which are a type of unique item, some of them pretty strong.  There are also moving encounters in the streets, which add depth to the game (and more danger).  Generally interesting.  No new board.

Miskatonic Horror:  sort of a meta-expansion.  It is an expansion for all previous expansions.  It's least essential until you have quite a number of the other expansions, but it's of good quality.  No new board.

Kingsport:  The board itself is easy and feels like a bit of a thematic break.  There are more elements in this that are helpful to investigators, which is not exactly what I was looking for.  The blessings of Nodens cards, Changed cards, White Ship cards, Hypnos cards are all just out of place to me and I didn't like them, and we don't use them.  Others may disagree.  (Wussy AH players, that is!  :)  There is also a Rift Marker mechanic with this board, which is in general a headache to remember to do, and not very much fun to us either.  There are eleven allies, and unfortunately they are pretty good allies, which we did like.    Common items are so-so..   Spells were turkeys.   In general, not a great expansion.  Not bad (not as bad as Lurker) but not a great expansion.


Lurker at the Threshold:   Bleh.  The Lurker mechanic is something we were never interested in.  The Dark Pact and Relationship cards didn't add enough to the game, for us, that we really ever use them.  New spells added are so-so.  No new allies, no new investigators.  :(    So I would avoid this one.

Black Goat of the Woods:  do not own, haven't played.

I will add that I have been a Talisman player since college, too, and have all of the 4th revised edition -- Talisman and Arkham Horror are my two favorite board games.  Talisman is more accessible than AH, not as complex in general.  But decidedly not cooperative.  :)

Wow, that is a great summary of the AH expansions.  I'll have to pick up Innsmouth Horror when I get the chance.

Thank you! 

A good friend tells me that the black goat expo is "awful."

The injury cards do not let you skip the hospital but you do get your health back and you do avoid losing stuff.

Thank you for the information about the expansions!  We ended up adding both Innsmouth and Dunwich to the set, though so far we have only played with the Dunwich board added (and Innsmouth monsters, items).  I quite like the injury and madness cards for when an investigator ends up on the wrong side of a shoggoth.  We lost our 1st two games playing with the Dunwich board, but since then have managed to win twice. 

Oh, and we also had our 1st "devoured" result.  My poor rookie patrolman was devoured in R'lyeh, forcing me to draw a new investigator.  I have noticed that I usually end up with injury and madness cards, probably due to a tendency to be a bit risky.  However, the goal has to be to close those gates!  Remember, the enemy's gate is down (and the Outer Gods help you if it leads to R'lyeh)!

What investigators you play and the Great Old One you are up against can make a huge difference in a game.  The violinist is crazy good - my wife loves playing her.  The farmhand, once he has a decent weapon, is a fantastic monster killer.  The researcher is great.  Other very good investigators are the rookie patrolman, the grave digger, the scientist, and the gangster (the gangster especially against when playing against Ithaqua).

We typically play with one to two expansions -- often just one board.  Two boards can be a lot of ground to cover.
We tend to use all allies and items from all expansions, but I'm going to throttle the ally deck back to just base game + expansion for next I think.

King in Yellow really suffers if you have too many added mythos cards, so I'd keep that to just one of 1-2 expansions in play if you get and use it.

For investigators, my wife and I each play two (our kids are not old enough to play yet).  I typically deal eight investigators to each of us at random and we choose two each.  We choose the ancient one rather than drawing randomly, since choice of ancient one can greatly change the game length.

And by the way, Andrew, if you want to have a challenging game, play against this guy.  He is absolutely, totally horrid.

http://www.arkhamhorrorwiki.com/Quachil_Uttaus

That Great Old One looks absolutely horrible, even without going to the final battle.  The dust deck issue is either going to eat clue tokens or devour players.

We had a pretty good scrap with Tsathoggua today.  Four investigators, and we were never at any point particularly well moneyed nor armed.  No trancendently useful cards in terms of weapons/allies. 

He's a very tough AO to beat in final combat, so we focused completely on sealing gates, and did ultimately win by sealing.  Akachi the shaman was helpful for that.

We amassed 2 to 3 injury / madness cards apiece, though, for EACH investigator, which is a first for us.  We haven't been beaten down quite that badly before.   He's not the most fun AO, though, in that your strategy strips down to just sealing gates -- you really can't spend trophies in much of any way, which is disappointing.

Weird coincidence:  we also played a game against Tsathoggua yesterday, and with four investigators.  We had a bit easier time of it than you did, mostly due to Andy and Garrett being monster destroying fiends.  They both ended up with stacks of monster trophies that looked like poker chip towers.  Garrett had one run against the "Terrible Experiment" mythos card that saw him wipe out five monsters in a row, finishing up with a Star Spawn. 

Part of the boys having such powerful weapons and items for taking on monsters was two of us looking for eldar signs at the curiousity shoppe for multiple turns, but not finding any.  We did find a horde of other useful items, so everybody was carrying at least one really good magic weapon and a host of support items.  We also solved another rumor that rewarded everyone with a unique item.  Meanwhile, Katie and myself each closed three gates (and I managed to take out a Hound, Hunting Horror, Chthonian, and a few lesser monsters thanks to a sword of glory that I drew with my starting items).

Nobody took any injury cards, though both Andy and Garrett were whittled down to one or two sanity and stamina each.  We won by sealing, which is our normal strategy.  Have to agree with you that Tsathoggua's special power takes some flavor out of the game.

We continue to play this on a regular basis.  Games are about 2-3 hours, but our setup is usually just 10 minutes or less.  We're usually playing with a single big-box expansion (Innsmouth or Dunwich).

Innsmouth is a much harder expansion.  The added Deep One Rising dynamic and the movement difficulties around the town make it much worse.  We've found that having the sailor investigator helps a lot, and he's got solid stats to boot.

We're still winning about 75% of our games, even with going to random character drawing (draw 3, pick 1).  Some of the characters are incredibly good, like the violinist, the farm hand, the researcher, the handyman, and the photographer.  I'm a big fan of the photographer.

Our latest game was against Shub-Niggurath, and that was a tough game.  Its power of increasing every monster's toughness by 1 made keeping the board clear of tentacles and teeth a lot harder.  I had 2 injury and 2 madness cards at the end.  We were not able to seal the gates fast enough and the Ancient One awoke.  We did manage to defeat it in the final battle, though 2 out of 4 were devoured before it went down.

We started another game, and the Ancient One is Chaugnar Faugn.  Wish us luck!

Chaugnar Faughn is a pain, ya.

I've been working on printing off the promotional ancient ones via the internet... if I get a good set done I'll send you a set, Andrew.  When I get some product sent back to me if it turns out OK I'll PM you.

We threw down on Glaaki last time we played.  It ended up going to battle with him, but the terror level was only 3 to start the battle, so we had seven rounds to beat down on him, it wasn't too bad.   

Roger that, I'll have to look them up.  I think I have to register on their site to see the promo content.

We lost our 3rd game against Zhar the other night.  We're batting 0% against him.  I think it's a combination of a relatively short doom track and having to kill him twice.  Plus, with 5 players you have 10 rounds to kill him before everyone is devoured, and you always lose  one player every 2 rounds.  Oh, and you need both a good physical weapon and a good magical weapon to be effective for the entire battle.

I think we've beaten them all in final combat except, well Azathoth of course, and Quachil Uttaus. 

We've beaten Zhar I think twice in final combat.   It's really unpleasant though, you have to be ridiculously armed.

Andrew, check this thread to see the items.  I should have them from the print shop tomorrow; PM me the address to send 'em to.  (Do you have any friends who play who would want copies too?)

http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/39200-daoloth-and-other-promotional-items/?hl=promo

We played against revised Cthulhu tonight (the one you see in the first post in the thread that link shows).  We used the ridiculously OP Patrice, Silas Marsh (yay!), Carolyn Fern, and the author on standard board plus Innsmouth.   We won by gate sealing, which is fair and square against Great Cthulhu I would say.  Silas won it by sealing gate #6 with his personal story, and no one got knocked out or insane for the game (which is really important against the revised Cthulhu as you can see).  We actually didn't allow any terror level rises either.

Remember that in final battle you can trade items amongst investigators, and that includes spells.  Against Zhar that is key.  Not letting it wake up is, of course, preferred though.    :teddyr:

Down goes Yibb-Tstll.   We won by sealing -- played the photographer, waitress, psychic and entertainer.

Lambeau (the entertainer) has the equivalent of 3 spellcasting hands, and she had TWO wither spells, one shrivelling spell, and one dread curse of Azathoth.  Plus a couple of conventional weapons, very nice!

Innsmouth tried to get out of hand toward the end but we maintained discipline and Darrell (who was deputized) managed to get 5 clues together and sealed gate #6.   

First game against Daoloth.   I played McGlenn and Mark Harrigan... two 7 stamina 3 san characters, always feels like living dangerously.  Fawn played the almighty Patrice and the just about as almighty photographer.

We won by gate sealing, but innsmouth was getting utterly out of hand, monsters everywhere, and the Uprising track was at 4.  I looked at the mythos cards after we won, and we had two turns left before Daoloth would have awakened.  Would have been a nasty final battle.   We drew a foul mythos card that has a headline that gets rid of "all clue tokens" on the board... gaaah.  Didn't draw it early in the game at least.

Patrice drew a completely OP item (for her especially) called the Illuminated Manuscript.  Can exhaust it to do a skill check for a clue token each turn, at cost of 2 movement. 

We were subjected to I think three of those monster surge gate scrambles that Daoloth does.  Two of us were lost in time and space when our gates were scrambled out from under us in other worlds.    Had decent weaponry to fight back through to the gates, though.

All in all, nasty Ancient One.  Particularly if you are playing with Innsmouth because you really *have* to seal that gate on Devil's Reef and in the Esoteric Order of Dagon if they appear.

Zap, that game against Daoloth sounds like it was a good one.  Really enjoy games like that, and we've had two lately.  We still have not faced Daoloth.

We finally beat Zhar last night, and it was crazy at the end.  We had 5 characters:  Jim Culver, Hank Samson, Patrice Hathaway, Kate Winthrop, and Tommy Muldoon.  We were always short of money, but managed to luck out on obtaining weapons so that everybody had at least two.  In addition, Hank picked up Tom "Mountain" Williams as an ally, and was completely unstoppable in combat.  In one round he took out a huge stack of monsters.

Garrett, who was playing Hank, was ecstatic.  We were at 5 elder signs on the board, with two people down gates, and then all heck broke loose.  3 gate bursts later, Zhar woke up and we went to final combat.  He devoured 3 of us, but luckily Tommy and Hank were the last two in the rotation for first character.  They took him out.

The only reason we made it was all of the weapons, plus when the doom track got its last token Patrice had 17 (count them, 17) clue tokens that she gave to Kate (who had the shotgun and fight skill).  She took a hunk out of Zhar right away.

A thread box which can be purchased at your typical craft shop is an inexpensive option of organizing the fiddly bits.

For those times when you're in an Arkham Horror mood but don't feel like going through the set-up process, there's Elder Sign. In essence, it's a scaled-back, dice-based version of Arkham Horror. The action takes place in the Miskatonic University Exhibit Museum and the object is to complete adventures and collect enough Elder Signs to seal away the Ancient One. Direct combat with the Ancient One is far more difficult than in Arkham Horror, but sealing it away is somewhat easier.

And speaking of dice-based games (and because this is a forum on a B-movie site), I tried out King of Tokyo at the last Guns of August gaming convention. Basically you're kaiju duking it out with each other and causing property insurance premiums in Tokyo to skyrocket. The dice results on your turn can be used to inflict damage, score victory points, heal damage, and gain energy points to obtain new powers. One of my favorites among the powers is Friend of All Children. I can't recall what it does, but you've gotta love the Gamera reference.

And to close off, let's dip into one of the silly Lovecraft games. In this case, I'm thinking of Miskatonic Schools for Girls. When I saw that one at the Dealers' Room at Guns of August 2012, I knew I had to buy it, even without knowing what kind of game it was. As it happens, it's a deck builder. However, it's one where you can build your opponent's deck. The object is to recruit students into your house while inflicting faculty on other houses. The student cards have feminized versions of Lovecraft protagonist names like Hannah Armitage and Erica Zann, while the faculty consist of eldritch abominations and human minions from the same stories.