Arkham Horror Strategy Discussion

[Razaele]

Hello fellow Playgrounders! I just recently got myself a copy of the Arkham Horror base set, and I have to admit that I've been having a blast playing it! I have some general questions though, and I hope anyone out there who has any wisdom to share about this great game speaks up.

First of all, what strategies do you usually follow when playing the game? Since I've only begun playing 2 days ago, I mostly take a reactive stance. That means I just react to events as they happen, such as gates opening, bad rumors popping up, etc. Is there anything that I should focus on during the early parts of the game? How many gates can be safely ignored while I farm for better weapons/spells?

Secondly, which characters do you all feel are the most useful? Are there any that are imbalanced to the point wherein they should be banned? Are there any that should be avoided because they don't really bring anything to the table?

Thirdly, which common items/unique items/allies/spells are generally considered as the best? I know that Elder Signs are one of the most sought-after, since they let you close gates with the greatest of ease. Also, are there any places in Arkham where you can farm clues?

Lastly, I'm thinking about hosting a game wherein everyone but me has yet to play Arkham Horror. Which Ancient One is relatively the best one to use against newbies? Any tips on how I should help newbies understand the game better?

Whew! That was actually a pretty long post. Thanks in advance to anyone who even bothers to answer all of these questions!

[ninja_penguin]

First of all, what strategies do you usually follow when playing the game? Since I've only begun playing 2 days ago, I mostly take a reactive stance. That means I just react to events as they happen, such as gates opening, bad rumors popping up, etc. Is there anything that I should focus on during the early parts of the game? How many gates can be safely ignored while I farm for better weapons/spells?

As a caveat: I don't get to play Arkham horror much. Most of my advice will be anecdotal, and not tried and refined strategies.

That said, you want to start nabbing clue tokens early. Gates will suck them up when they appear, and that gets annoying. And generally if one person is on a gate, go take care of something else. If nobody is on a gate, dive on in. Unless you won't survive long enough to get out.


Thirdly, which common items/unique items/allies/spells are generally considered as the best? I know that Elder Signs are one of the most sought-after, since they let you close gates with the greatest of ease. Also, are there any places in Arkham where you can farm clues?

The...science building? I think you can trade gate tokens and/or monster tokens for clues. Elder signs can save games. Almost always seal gates instead of just closing them.


Lastly, I'm thinking about hosting a game wherein everyone but me has yet to play Arkham Horror. Which Ancient One is relatively the best one to use against newbies? Any tips on how I should help newbies understand the game better?

Not Cthulu? Past that, I can't remember.

[houlio]

Lastly, I'm thinking about hosting a game wherein everyone but me has yet to play Arkham Horror. Which Ancient One is relatively the best one to use against newbies? Any tips on how I should help newbies understand the game better?

I don't have anything for your other questions, but it was way easier to understand this game when I just started playing it instead of trying to figure out what the rules said. As long as you know how to play it, you can deal with anyone's questions as they come up in play. Also, Azathoth is the easiest one to beat.

[Dvil]

First of all, what strategies do you usually follow when playing the game? Since I've only begun playing 2 days ago, I mostly take a reactive stance. That means I just react to events as they happen, such as gates opening, bad rumors popping up, etc. Is there anything that I should focus on during the early parts of the game? How many gates can be safely ignored while I farm for better weapons/spells?

I tend to quickly determine which players will kill monsters, which will seal gates, etc, so that the players are all optimised for their roles and those who need more clues are the ones going to get clues.
I tend to find that those with high speed/sneak are best for killing monsters, while those with high lore/luck are good at sealing gates. High fight but low will is better at gates than monsters, especially with low focus, while someone with a large difference between lore and luck and low focus shouldn't head into the other world unless they have good fight.
You'll find that luck is really useful when drawing other world encounter cards, so unless you can quickly switch back to a high lore in order to seal a gate, someone who has to choose between those stats will struggle in the other world.


Secondly, which characters do you all feel are the most useful? Are there any that are imbalanced to the point wherein they should be banned? Are there any that should be avoided because they don't really bring anything to the table?

I've found Harvey Walters can be a real powerhouse if he draws the right spells, and the scientist with the flux capacitor is useful too. Jenny Barnes is nice if you need someone to buy things, what with starting right next to the Newspaper and having her Trust Fund.


Thirdly, which common items/unique items/allies/spells are generally considered as the best? I know that Elder Signs are one of the most sought-after, since they let you close gates with the greatest of ease. Also, are there any places in Arkham where you can farm clues?

Elder Signs are brilliant, yes. Game-winning, if you get more than one. Movement items are very nice, like the motorbike and the map of Arkham. A shotgun's a nice weapon, and if you combine that with the Shrivelling spell then you have a weapon for any monster you come up against, though I think you can't use both at once.
There's also a healing stone or something, I can't remember its exact name. Lets you regain a stamina/sanity as part of Upkeep.


Lastly, I'm thinking about hosting a game wherein everyone but me has yet to play Arkham Horror. Which Ancient One is relatively the best one to use against newbies? Any tips on how I should help newbies understand the game better?

I have no idea, I haven't looked at them in massive detail yet. Each one changes the nature of the game significantly though.

[Name_Here]

My strategy is a little boring but when the doom track starts getting a little high somebody should head on over to the church and start praying. There is an encounter in there that will reduce the doom track a simply awesome encounter.

Beyond that I don't really like the idea of farming items and equipment so I generally advocate a robust offensive game. With groups teaming up with a guy with weapons clearing a path for the guy with the eldar sign or 5 clues. And I think the best places to seal are the Witch's house and the woods. Don't ever just close those gates without a damn good reason. If you do they will reopen in a couple turns and up the doom track. The opposite side of that coin is that if you do seal those gates you suddenly have much less to worry about and those "breather" turns'll come pretty often.

[Dvil]

My strategy is a little boring but when the doom track starts getting a little high somebody should head on over to the church and start praying. There is an encounter in there that will reduce the doom track a simply awesome encounter.

Wow, really? I've never come across that before. Is that added by expansions or am I just unlucky?

EDIT- just looked it up on the AH wiki. Turns out, it's from the core game. Thanks for telling me about that, I used to neglect the church unless someone was cursed :smallbiggrin:

[houlio]

Oh, just remembered, some of the better characters are the researcher, who can let someone reroll all failures they get, the professor, who can ignore one point of sanity damage making some of the really fun spells freebies to cast, and the private eye, because his move is so good.

[CockroachTeaParty]

Azathoth's a decent ancient one for a game with beginners: he has little effect on the game world, his doom track is leisurely long, and should he wake up, there's no need to fiddle with a final battle, since the world just implodes.

That said, another excellent choice for beginners is Nyarlathotep. The mask monsters, though rare, are a nasty piece of work, and add some fun to the game. He's also pretty easy to defeat in battle should he wake up, assuming everyone has a decent supply of clue tokens.

As for items you want to keep an eye out for: the Healing Stone is incredibly powerful. Movement boosters, such as the motorcycle, maps of Arkham, or the Ruby of R'lyeh, are also excellent finds. Unless you have the healing stone or are playing the psychologist, you probably want to avoid relying on spells too heavily. Magic weapons are often a better solution. That said, the psychologist makes an excellent spell caster, as she can repair her own sanity damage, as can anyone lucky enough to nab the healing stone.

Don't totally disregard the spell deck, however. Spells such as Find Gate can be game winners, buying you precious time.

For mundane weaponry, the shotgun is an excellent choice, as is the .45 automatic.

As for strategy, always remember that the game itself is constantly trying to distract you. Mythos cards and rumors can provide little rewards or seemingly unpleasant problems, as can pursuing blessings, allies, or deputization, but ultimately you should always be trying to close and seal gates. Ignore those pesky distractions, gather your clues, and hop in those gates! All else is ultimately secondary, unless you're actively looking for a fight against the ancient one (inadvisable, barring certain circumstances).

[Razaele]

Awesome! Thanks for answering, everyone! I'm going to go on a couple of test games today. Hopefully, I can come up with some useful feedback.

[SuperMuldoon]

I think the biggest tip is to really never enter a gate unless you have enough clue tokens (or an elder sign) to seal it. The only time you really go in there without enough is if you are going to lose by too many gates being open.

My group used to run a team that included Mandy Tompson for her reroll (best power in the game, plus she starts with 4 clue tokens) and Jenny Barnes, who would get a bank loan and then sit on the magic item shop grabbing up magic weapons and elder signs. The rest of us would be fighter people who would run around and kill things/seal gates when we got clue tokens.

We eventually got the game on lockdown, so we started picking characters at random (pick 3 sheets choose 1) so we couldn't have the super team, and when you start getting expansions the game gets harder (Innsmouth makes the game SUPER HARD!)

[The Glyphstone]

Best lockdown team is the Librarian or Psychologist with the expansion spell that lets you rearrange the top cards of the Mythos deck, and the Scientist with her Flux Stabilizer.

[Elhann]

Oh, just remembered, some of the better characters are the researcher, who can let someone reroll all failures they get, the professor, who can ignore one point of sanity damage making some of the really fun spells freebies to cast, and the private eye, because his move is so good.
Harvey Walters ignores sanity damage, not sanity cost, and thus loses sanity when casting spells. If you want a caster, the best would be Carolyn Fern, seeing she recovers a point of sanity each upkeep. She is a little slow, though.

I also like Darrell Simmons (the photographer) a lot. Decent move, coupled with his power and his 2$ each upkeep until you roll a 1... move around Arkham, recruit allies, become a member of the Silver Twilight... (just for fun, I never found being a Silver Twilighter extremely useful)
I agree on the researcher and PI. Mandy's ability is probably the best in the game, and the PI has given us a couple of games, what with his "I can move picking items form other researchers, give them to others that are about to enter a gate, and stop a bad rumour, all in the same turn" speed.

Regarding Ancient Ones... as long as you can keep the terror level low, Hastur is not too bad, even if he awakens. If you're lucky with your items, Ithaqua is not too threatening, either. Azathoth takes a lot to awaken and Nyarlathotep makes an interesting game. Don't start with Cthulhu. Cthulhu is baaaad.

Some advice: Get clue tokens fast. If you don't know what to do, the newspaper is probably a good place to go. Allies (specially the expansion ones) are very nice to have. Kate Winthrop and her flux condenser should be at an unstable location unless she is forced to be anywhere else: Lend her money and let other researcher do the shopping for her.

[CockroachTeaParty]

Speaking of the core ancient ones, I'd say that the Big Four you want to watch out for are Hastur, Cthulhu, Shub-Niggurath, and Yog-Sothoth.

As mentioned, Hastur is a pushover if he wakes up when the terror is low, but his effects on the game are bad, bad times. Flying cultists can be surprisingly frustrating (even worse with Tulzcha as the herald, from Kingsport), and the 8 clues needed to seal rule makes trying to win by sealing an uphill battle.

You can try to kill monsters, buy weapons, and wait for the doom track to fill/hit the open gate limit, but that's still a risky prospect, especially when rumors or some of the nastier monsters hit the board. Some expansions have items or spells that allow you to wake Hastur prematurely, but you can't rely on finding them. Even if you fight Hastur at a 0 modifier, all sorts of things can still go wrong should the dice gods frown on you. Hastur is never an ancient one to sneeze at, and should be approached with caution and good tactics.

Cthulhu is just generally unpleasant. His hit to your stats sucks, and he becomes nightmarish if you add in the Innsmouth expansion; his one saving grace is his long doom track. In a core-only game, you should have enough time to seal him away. You never want to fight Cthulhu, as he will destroy you, pretty much guaranteed.

Shub is nasty for making all monsters tougher, and her Dark Young become a major pain. Still, she's nothing compared to Yog-Sothoth. I consider Yog to be the hardest core ancient one.

Yoggy makes closing gates more difficult, and outright kills you should you be lost in time and space. His doom track is a little on the short side, and should he wake up, you're pretty much doomed. It's hard to gather gate trophies to defend yourself with, and if you pump your Will to survive his attack, that leaves you with a low Fight to actually inflict damage. (He's not as bad as Tsothogua waking up, but then few ancient ones are...)