Duet Decks

Hello again dear readers! After discussing all currently available investigators I figured out it might make sense to share some of my thoughts about successfully pairing them¹ in (well) functioning duets. Not only it’s an interesting topic, but also I have seen the question popping up on different forums.

Usually the dilemma concerns only the choice of investigators. Sometimes, however, on top of a perfect choice of investigators you must also accordingly fine tune their decks. Obviously, some investigators are more flexible, while others have more limited scope. 

Generally speaking, playing in a team encourages specialization. Instead of taking less efficient neutral cards (or filing out-of-the-class slots) to somehow mitigate the weak sides, it’s better to focus on your strengths and allow the fellow investigator to cover your weak spots. This is obviously only a general statement and full specialization might not always be the best idea (more about it in the appropriate sections).

So back to the original question – what duets work best at uncovering the terrible truths, preventing mankind’s demise and dealing will physical, mental and emotional threats? The answer is not straightforward (if it was, what a shame it would be, we love the game for the complexity, don’t we?²), we should consider multiple factors when matching the characters.

       1. Area of focus

In other words – what would the investigator do in the game? There are two main specializations – dealing with monsters and discovering the clues. You can divide these tasks in different ways. You can pair a specialized fighter (like Zoey, or Jenny with a “fighter build”) with an investigator focused on clue collecting (like Rex or appropriately customized Pete). You can also divide the tasks more evenly (60:40 or so) and match for example an investigating-heavy deck of Jim (with just a couple of cards for fighting) with a combat-oriented Roland (still throwing in Evidence, Deduction and such). You might consider a fair split as well, for instance – Agnes paired with Jenny (in this situation consider using all the non-Green slots for investigation-related cards).

A specialized approach makes it easier to use character’s full strength and enables you to take as few suboptimal cards as possible. On the other hand, it also strongly discourages splitting the team, which might lead to suboptimal in-game choices. The more balanced team might on the other hand suffer, when a particularly tough task is to be performed. A high-shroud location or a boss enemy might prove to be a difficult task and for sure will require full focus of both team members.

Even if you decide to go with a heavily specialized approach, please leave some space in the deck for the other area. There’s barely anything more annoying than walking around with nothing to do, just because no enemy showed up. Well, actually there is – being eliminated because too many enemies showed up and your team mate didn’t manage them all.

As of now it's the only asset rogues can take to investigate better.
That's why they don't make strong clue collectors and probably never will.

One or both of the investigators can (and even should) stock on some support cards – healing, card drawing etc. I recommend to bear in mind the specific needs of the team partner when deciding what support cards to take. Is their deck slow? Old Book of Lore will come in handy! Is he/she in need of Sanity healing? Liquid Courage might prove to be very useful! Sometimes taking a card that only our partner benefit of is a very reasonable choice.

        2. Luck/draw dependency

Some of the investigators just need the correct card to properly do their job. When left without them, they are powerless. The card engine is essential for them and the player can be easily doomed by not getting the right set of cards. Prime example might be Rex, heavily relying on abusing Scavenging or Agnes, who needs spells to get any job done.

Meanwhile, there are some who can handle work properly just getting any help – whenever Zoey gets a Beat Cop, a weapon or just even a Cross, she’s ready to inflict God’s wrath on the enemies.

Similar situation applies to the Chaos Bag. Some investigators (particularly specialized ones) will regularly attempt skill checks being much over the difficulty level, while others try to gamble and play the odds. As an example of the latter category, Jim comes to the mind, as well as pretty much every Survivor character. Jenny, with her rather balanced skill values is also slightly tilted towards odds-playing.

The ultimate push-your-luck card. And what an awesome graphic!

You should try to have at least one risk-averse investigator in the duet. Otherwise you are just asking gods of (un)fortune to punish you for your recklessness. On the other hand the conservative approach, while potentially safer, might not provide good enough of an edge against the toughest scenarios, so a bit of daring is always welcome (and if it fails you can always blame the bad luck!).

 

3      3. Tempo

Another important (and easily overlooked) aspect is tempo. Some characters/decks are naturally slow – they need to play assets, generate some sort of economy, gather resources etc. before they ARE ready to face the supernatural threats. Prime examples of such investigators are Agnes and Jenny. The first one needs to get the spells (or at least the alternative assets, like Fire Axe), the second one needs to get the costly assets and hopefully talents, as well as resources to spend on the talents.

On the other end of the spectrum there is Pete, who is basically ready to go turn 0, as well as Jim, who can just equip Grotesque Statue or Ritual Candles and can already test his luck. As Jim’s example shows, being a “rush” investigator does not mean not being luck dependent.

In the middle of the spectrum we can find Daisy or Zoey, who need to get an asset or two, but not an entire library/arsenal.

This is arguably the iconic "slow" card.
Starts paying off in 3rd action.

I strongly advise to balance this aspect as well. Using two slow decks might lead to being overrun in the beginning. You might have more chances with 2 “aggro” decks, but if they do not clear the scenario quickly enough, you might find your characters unable to cope with the challenges and knocked down/driven insane.  

The Amulet gives Wendy some options
to transition into a decent end-game character.

 .      4. Class

It might strike some controversy, but I don’t believe it is a necessary thing to avoid “overlapping” classes. Obviously forming a team of two investigators of the same class might lead to breaking one of the above mentioned rules (particularly the first one, but two Survivors might easily be too “aggro”, while two Mystics too luck dependent etc.). However, you shouldn’t be afraid of having some cards of the same class (unless you simply hit the physical limitation) nor strive to include as many classes as possible for the sake of variety. The only thing you should be conscious about is the unique assets. I strongly recommend not using the same unique card in two decks.

5      5. Development

This is not really a separate criterion, but more of a thing to keep in mind when pairing the investigators. During the course of a campaign you will get high level cards, which will further shape your deck. It may shift the focus of the investigator, change deck’s tempo etc. Please bear it in mind during both character selection and the initial deck creation.

You might start bit unbalanced in some of the aforementioned factors, planning to make adjustments on the way. Obviously you must still be able to cope with first scenario(s). 

Adding extra copies of Fight spells can turn your Mystic
into the main fighter.

Same principle applies to choice of support card. As an example consider Zoey paired with Daisy. Zoey should plan to take Brother Xavier (or at least heavily consider it) to cover for Daisy’s fragile physique. Therefore knowing her Will is about to be boosted, she should consider taking Rite of Seeking for the clue-gathering (instead of taking Flashlights, for instance). In other words – team needs that will be addressed by upgraded cards should already be taken into account during creation of the starting deck. 

All images are courtesy of cardgamedb.com and fantasyflightgames.com 

¹Same approach should also work with future investigators, unless they will be too different. However the points I’m raising are abstract and high-level enough to (hopefully) cover the topic for good. Obviously, I am only using currently published investigators to illustrate my points.

 

²AH:TCG is a fairly complex game. While it might lack the depth of so called “euro” games, it provides the player with lots of options. The number of options will significantly grow with future releases – both due to the growing card pool and possibly new mechanics. I believe we can expect new ideas to be introduced, based on FFG past approach.

Obviously more complex does not mean better. There is a sweet spot and it’s different for every player. By complexity, I mean what BGG describes as “weight” https://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Weight).

Deckbuilding options Dunwich vs Core Set

At this point every investigator from the core set has been reviewed already. As you have probably noticed, a major part of investigators theme and capability is their deck-building options.

We have been presented with 2 patterns so far. Core Set investigators can include cards from 2 classes - all the cards from their "main" class and cards up to level 2 from their "secondary" class. They can also use all the neutral cards. Dunwich investigators can include all the cards from their class as well as all the neutral ones. On top of that, they can include up to 5 cards of ANY other class, albeit only 0 level.

In this article I'd like to convince you, that the "Dunwich approach" is slightly inferior. And in fact it seems, game designers agree with this notion. How comes? Well, the investigators from the expansion have higher total Sanity/Stamina and their special abilities also seem to be slightly stronger (the latter notion is debatable, I agree).

I might have spoiled the surprise a bit, by jumping to the conclusion. However, I'd like to take a fair approach here and still consider all the advantages and disadvantages of both options.

Marie's Deckbuilding options - bit too fancy for my taste

What is the biggest advantage of the Dunwich deck-building? Access to numerous alternative builds. You can try combining all sort of different cards for cool and strong combo effects or at a great synergy.

You can choose a card that matches the investigator, but does not belong to his class. Wouldn't you, after all, wish to equip Wendy with Shrivelling? That would solve her fight-related issues, or at least help with them by far. Daisy would benefit from Elusive tremendously - too bad, not her class.

You can decide to emphasise character's strengths (adding costly Assets to Jenny's deck, for instance) or mitigate their weakness (Rite of Seeking for Zoey), depending on the team (or lack of one) you're in and your personal preferences. You can also take assets, filling slots that are left free (often arcane or accessory) It all adds up to a great deal of customisation.

Regardless of the deck restrictions, pretty much an auto-include

Or does it?

Because in fact, you can only use 5 cards! To help Skids slay his foes you might use all the available Guardian arsenal. And you most definitely want to, as there are so many useful cards there! You can easily end up with 10 or more of them. In fact, I sometimes wish to just take multiple Guardian or Seeker (depending on the build I'm into) cards for Jenny, instead of having choice of 5 among all classes. And it's an open question, what constitutes more customisation - choosing up to 5 (most probably, exactly 5) out of circa 50 (100 if we consider 2 copies, although obviously card base will grow) or up to 25 from 25?

In other words, you are forced to take 25 cards out of one class and neutrals, once again damaging the possible customisation. Once we have access to more level 0 cards per class it will extend the deck-building window. However level 0 base will, hopefully, not grow that much - I'd strongly prefer to see more high level cards. And even once it does, it also increases options for Core Set guys in both classes they have access too, doesn't it?

While The Aficionado prefers Machete, I like GUNS

You also surprisingly often (or is it just me?) end up with using same cards over and over again, just because they are the strongest from their class. Cards like Machete, Lucky, Drawn to the Flame, Leo, Dr Milan etc. are used almost exclusively (see a very good post about staple cards to consider on Delve Too Deep). On top of it, some builds seem obviously superior and take almost all fun out of customisation away, anyway (Scavenging Rex is the best example).

 Dunwich characters take the biggest hit to their adjustability, once they gain some experience. They can only take upgraded cards from one class! Jenny won't ever include upgraded Beat Cop, nor will Pete take benefit of stronger Blinding Light (which is a solid card unlike its level 0 brother). This is the most painful disadvantage for me - in the long run (and it starts to show in core set campaign already at 3 scenarios!) core set characters' decks are stronger.

As I've already confessed in my previous post I favour the "playing" part of the game over the deck-building one. With this in mind, the old investigators also feel bit more comfortable for me - instead of looking at all the level 0 cards, I just take 2 sets of cards (or 3, if counting neutrals), having more time to run the same scenario for the 20th time (still fun!). I can easily understand, however, if someone enjoys looking at all the possible interactions between cards more.¹  

Despite my slight bias towards core set deck-building approach I enjoy playing (most of) the new investigators and building decks for all of them. In the end, deck is just a part of all the character's capabilities. As always, I am very keen to learn your opinion!

¹ I hope game designers will manage the most dreaded part of card games - avoiding creating cards that together create absurd combos. Most of the card games introduces rotation to avoid such interactions - not allowing to mix some card sets with others. Another solution is banning cards, that create too many combos (or are too strong on their own). I would be upset, if I couldn't mix all the cards (yes I know, I could o it at home, since it's a cooperative game... would still feel like cheating!) between the sets, just because an interaction or two slipped designers' attention. And having a card in collection, that ultimately will turn out game breaking would also be a negative experience.

All images are courtesy of cardgamedb.com and fantasyflightgames.com

Talent Cards and why they deserve our love

One of the biggest unknowns at this stage of AH:TCG’s lifecycle is – how well will designers handle the character development? Will we be excited, adding new, stronger card to our decks? Will we have interesting choices and dilemmas? Will we feel like the investigators we play are growing in strength as the campaign progresses and they gather experience?

I really like what I have seen in the preview of Blood on the Altar, featuring 2 out of 5 new Talent cards¹. Why? There are few reasons why!

I wouldn't draw a person in glasses for the Keen Eye card...

 The most important aspect of 2 new cards is their “Permanent” keyword. First of all, they do not count against the deck size. Thanks to that, you don’t need to remove a card from your deck in order to add one of them. In fact, they actually INCREASE size of your deck! How is it possible? It’s simple – if you decide to include them, you most probably can remove a level 0 talent card from your deck. I am aware, they do not provide a bonus to the same pair of skills, but still the chances are, you decide to remove the weaker talent from your deck.

This touches fundamental challenge of deck upgrading – many of the level 0 cards are of a great significance to a deck. Exchanging them for a new, high level card might not be a deck improvement at all. There are few ways of dealing with this issue. The easiest solution are higher level versions of a card with the same name (let’s say 0 and 2 level versions of Lucky!). While it works fairly well for some cards and is a way to deal with some of the upgrades, it’s not always the best key (bit more of a detailed explanation has been provided by me here). Another alternative is to replace a card with another one, playing a similar role (let’s say Shotgun instead of Machete).

Finally, the third option is a card with a “Permanent” keyword. The even more ingenious design of the “Talent” cards helps even further to deal with the deck size problem (creating the aforementioned slot). It’s therefore the only upgrade path, which enables you to add new cards with new roles to the deck (in place of the remove 0 level talents).

Bloodletting - a controversial treatment

There are also two minor reasons for me to like the previewed cards. They mitigate chance for a bad luck of a draw, providing you with means of dealing with the scenario from the very first action even if you happen not to get a strong hand. It is even more important in further scenarios (where you can use them) – if you get very unlucky in the first scenario, you can just start the campaign from scratch with minimum wasted time. If it happens in the middle, however, it is very often a strongly negative playing experience.²  

Lastly, they are more than just stronger versions of level 0 talents, they use a new design. Not only it’s fresh, which is good by itself. The new design is also encouraging more of an interesting planning than the 0 level talents do (and, as I've already mentioned, boost a different pair of skills!). Keen Eye encourages you to take advantage of the increased skill value for the entire phase, hence forcing a choice to either fight/investigate 3 times in one turn or waste part of its benefits. Blood Pact has even more of an interesting approach, as adding doom tokens is a very delicate matter (also note how incredibly thematic this card is!).

At the end of the article I’d like to make a prediction. I predict we’ll see higher level versions of signature cards in the far future (around 3^rd campaign cycle or so). Let’s see if I guessed correctly!

¹ The preview uses a bolded word “Talent” to describe them, which suggests it’s a trait, shared by all five of them. However, the Blood Pact card does not have the Talent trait printed on it. It might be just an unfinished version of a card, or maybe the article’s author made a minor mistake.

²I have briefly touched the subject of the luck in the board games in the introduction. The question, whether a sudden loss due to a string of unfortunate random events is a good playing experience in Lovecraftian universe has also been briefly mentioned there (towards the end of the article). It is worth noting, that in a recently published preview of “Investigators of Arkham” FFG designers openly admitted a major difference between purely Lovecraftian view on the world and the Arkham Files setting. In Lovecraft’s work Mythos beings are invincible. The doom is imminent and cannot be stopped by human hands. People, even humanity in general are powerless and meaningless in the cold, uncaring universe. Since it does not make a good background for a cooperative game, that is supposed to be won every now and then, Arkham Files characters are portrayed as willing and able to resist the otherworldly powers to a degree and to repel them at least for time being.

All images are courtesy of cardgamedb.com and fantasyflightgames.com

Undimensioned and Unseen Preview

When it comes to board games I am quite an addict. I read rules for fun, check for new games on regular basis and read forums related to all my favorite games. Some of them multiple times per day (I hope my manager does not read this blog ;) ).

I regularly open FFG main page to check for updates. I was very thrilled to see another expansion pack announced - Undimensioned and Unseen.

 

I don’t like to spoil myself even a tiniest bit of encounter deck. I love, however, to read preview of new player cards. This time we were presented with 2 new cards, which seems quite a standard practice of Fantasy flight Games.

"Turn left! I meant right!"

 

Quick Thinking is a very thematic card, which continues to build an interesting archetype of Rogue investigators as decisive, adaptive and versatile (all of their skill cards so far feature a Wild icon!). It also expands the idea of extra action, as well as succeeding by 2 or more (both being mostly related to the Rogue class). Its biggest strength is having multiple of possible uses, one of which (interrupting a turn of fellow investigator to help them with an enemy).

There is a slight drawback/cost. Technically speaking the card does help with passing the test. However to use it primarily for this purpose is a waste of card’s potential (although when it’s desperately needed, it’ll be used as poor man’s unexpected courage). In order to get the extra action you need to succeed by 2, which means, you need to overcommit to a test (and unless you have a way to control the draw of Chaos Token, overcommit by a wide margin). This means spending cards and/or resources. So in fact, it would mean it’s just a way of turning them into extra action through the use of Quick Thinking. Action is of course not equal an action, sometimes they are more valuable and Quick Thinking helps to get one, when it’s most urgently needed (bit like Shortcut, though both also feature tricks of their own). Another scenario is, where you actually want to succeed by a wide margin (.41 Derringer, for instance). Also note, that when used by the active investigator it nicely stacks with Opportunist.

This is exactly kind of design I’m looking for – thematic, encouraging team playing and presenting with multiple options, both for deckbuilding and playing. I am very keen to put it in my deck, just need to be patient.

I have mixed feelings for Rite of Seeking (Level 4). I wouldn’t like the character’s development to move in a direction, where simply the difficulty of skill checks grows and so does the skill value. Consider two scenarios. In the first scenario, you fight a monster with Fight value of 3, having combat of 5. In the second one monster with Fight value of 7 is faced by investigator with Combat of 9. They are not really different, are they? It does not create a new experience or any interesting choices.

On the other hand, such cards seem to be necessary and playing their role. First of all, they encourage specialization. You need the team fighter with high Combat, to take down the monster with fight value of 7 (to continue using my previous combat-related example), fragile Seeker can handle less and less enemies on his own. And specialization also contributes to importance of team work. Moreover, on the deck-building level you need to decide – do I take stronger Rite of Seeking or a stronger Shrivelling (not there yet, but kinda bound to happen)? Which side of my character should I boost? 

What do you think about the recent preview?

Investigators of Arkham

A very varied group of characters is faced against the madness of all sorts of horrors lurking beyond. Divers set of archetypes, offering multiple playing styles and ways to deal with the supernatural threats of all kinds. So far (core set and the spoilers we got from the first deluxe expansion) FFG is doing a good job individualizing them. It’s possible because designers started with multiple tools allowing for customizing investigators. Each investigator has not only different skill values or class. They also have a unique special ability and an individual effect resolving when an Elder Sign is drawn from the Chaos Bag during a skill check (Elder Sign effect). It does not stop here, though – every character has their own special cards being mandatory part of their deck, both for good and evil (signature cards). The deck-building requirements/options, unique for each character also contribute heavily to make every investigator feel special.

Let me share my views on all of the above aspects:

1.                Skill values

Arkham uses a different approach to skills than its 2 predecessors. First of all, the amount of skills is the lowest (4). It is definitely a good design choice due to the skill icon/skill check mechanic. If there were too many possible checks, the icons would be useful too rarely.

What is bit less obvious, though, is that each skill has a designated “specialized” test, even if not explicitly mentioned in the rules in case of Will (used for casting spells; Combat is used for the fight tests, Lore for investigating and Agility for evading). Both Arkham Horror and Eldritch Horror had a skill not directly linked to any purpose (Luck and Observation, respectively).   

In a way skill system supports some sort of specialization – since it is not possible to be good at every aspect of the game, it’s better to succeed at most of Fight tests, than at 20% of Fight and Evade, for instance. On the other hand, encounter cards or any other scenario related content can ask for a skill check of any kind. For this reason low value of a skill might cause trouble (“Grasping Hands” for low Agility character might be tough to deal with, even more if you draw it more than once etc.). On top of that, you are very often forced to investigate (as discovering clues drives the scenario’s progress) and sometimes to fight (not only evading forever is not always an option, but also scenario asks you to kill an enemy on occasions). Skill value of 1 might therefore really mess up with progress of your investigation. And since character will most probably excel in class-related skill(s), there might not be too many options to mitigate the weakness with cards available to them (unless neutral ones).

Despite what I've said about specialization, Jenny has an all-round set of skills

 

2.                Special ability/abilities

This particular point can either shape the whole playing style of a character, or easily just be a supportive thing, allowing for multiple ways of leading the character. Without going into much detail, consider these examples – while Agnes’ ability encourages you to find synergies like “Forbidden Knowledge”, Skids’ extra action allows for more of a versatile and adaptive approach, based on scenarios’ needs. Regardless of its nature, unique special ability truly adds distinctive feel to the character and makes each of them exceptional.

 

Elder Sign effect (I guess it’s the best way to call the other half of investigator’s ability) is a very nice touch from a design point of view. Even though you rarely draw the symbol, it’s a great feeling to actually see it in your hand and be able to apply the effect. I am therefore bit disappointed with the implementation. Why? Well, to answer this question we must make a very basic observation – most of tokens in the chaos bag have a negative modifier. Therefore, when attempting a skill check, one tries for the skill value to be higher than difficulty. As a result, all the Elder Sign effects boosting the skill value are not too useful, as skill value most probably was higher than the skill difficulty anyway. The exceptions are very rare and include some desperate long shots aimed specifically at drawing an Elder Sign, or a test forced by scenario/encounter deck. More creative ideas for the Elder Sign effect, like giving resources or allowing to draw cards are not only much more playable, but very often much more thematic as well. 

With an extra action every now and than, Skids can adjust to whatever is going on at the moment

3.                Signature cards.

FFG team did an excellent job coming up with idea of signature cards. You do feel so much like the character you’re playing, when you can use the very special effect granted by an individualized card. It creates an even greater playing experience (at least for me) to be faced with personalized character flaw. It not only widens the spectrum of possible results and choices, but also brings the game  one step closer to a role-playing experience. Signature cards can also interact in many interesting ways with each other and/or character’s abilities.

So far each investigator got 2 signature cards – one “good card” and one “bad card” (well, a weakness, technically speaking). The “good one” being an asset/event (though I could easily imagine a skill as well) . This approach will most probably be kept for most of the characters, but I wouldn’t be surprised if an investigator got more cards for some thematic/game-play reason.

Final note will include strength of the positive cards and drawback of negative ones; hence a character with a very good positive card might still only score a “3” if they also have a devastating weakness.

Weaknesses, relating to the stories origination from times of Arkham Horror
truly add another layer of story-telling to the game

4.                Deck-building options/Class

Each investigator has a limited pool of cards to choose from, when creating their own deck. The core set characters have access to 2 cards belonging to 2 classes (unlimited options in their primary class and limited selection of high level cards in their secondary class), as well as the neutral ones. The Dunwich investigators can use all the cards of their class and any 5 of other classes albeit only on 0 level. We can expect different deck-building options for other characters; I personally wouldn’t appreciate too sophisticated ones (like the one chosen for Marie), as it seems to mess too much with the class idea.

Class itself might only be a thematic description, indicator of investigator’s type, based on the fact that Marie cannot use all the Mystic cards (she might be one of a kind exception, but then again, she might not). I would, however, prefer it to be both a solid high-level archetype, shaping both basic idea of an investigator (his skill values, ability etc.) and their deck-building options – in my opinion character of a certain class should always be able to take any card of that class.

I strongly believe that card choice affects the investigator’s style the most, as AH:TCG is… well a card game. A player can choose almost 90% of cards in their deck, even with signature cards system in place. 2 different investigators with same deck would feel much more similar, than 2 completely different decks for the same investigator. Currently there are not too many options for a varied deck-building. Card pool will slowly, but steady grow in time, though. I hope we’ll get to see more high level cards, especially, allowing for a great character development (nice touch, mechanism similar to Mage Knight – deck-building seems to be able to nicely provide mechanic means for depicting character’s progress). And since the deck is limited in size, with many 0 level cards being a must have (to be replaced with their higher level copies, perhaps) cards with “Permanent” keyword will come in very handy. Not to mention, they provide a very strong RPG feel.

Limiting the card pool available to each investigator is a brilliant design choice. First of all, it makes each investigator different; it links playing cards with the investigator, with the archetype, with the class. This way it nicely presents how different means are open to an FBI Agent and a University Librarian, skilled in occult and magic. Second of all, it makes deck-building itself less important and puts the focus on actual playing. It might be matter of taste; I am not a big fun of deck-building and value the genuine game-play far higher. You spend less time creating perfect set of cards and more being your character.

Have you noticed the restriction "No Fortune card"? Nice touch!

 

I’m going to publish a post about every investigator, giving my opinion on each aspect of their design. As mentioned in the opening post, both game-play and theme aspect will be mentioned. I will try to throw in as much advice and ideas in the mix as I can– feel free to be inspired, even by the untested ones.

As a fan of Arkham Files I’m also planning to start each description with some sort of legacy, mentioning how the concept of the investigator developed through Arkham Files’ history. I enjoy using same characters over and over again and begun to like some of them through entire history of Arkham Files (I'm looking at you, Silas!)

Zoey's God-given mission has started back in Arkham Horror days and is still ongoing.

 All images are courtesy of cardgamedb.com and fantasyflightgames.com