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Chaosium Digest Volume 27 Number 01
Chaosium Digest Volume 27, Number 1
Date: Tuesday, December 29, 1998
Number: 1 of 4
Contents:
Setting the Standard: Corrupt Power (Shannon Appel) MYTHOS
Editor's Note:
Howdy all, and welcome to my last issue as editor of the Chaosium
Digest. I'm moving on to others things, but I expect you'll continue
to see my name in these parts, on occasion, as a contributor. As of
1/1/99, the new editor of the Chaosium Digest is John W. Thompson. His
email address is:
gobackstage@prodigy.net
All future submissions should go to him, and I hope you'll make him
feel welcome by sending him a whole batch of submissions for his first
issue.
In the meantime, this issue I have two articles. The first is a short
article on the Mythos MSGS that I wrote for Scrye magazine many aeons
ago, but was never published; now you can see it here. The second is a
three part Call of Cthulhu adventure, submitted by Paul Williams.
Before I go, I want to say thanks to everyone who's been around for my
run at the Chaosium Digest: to all the subscribers that made it
worthwhile to put this ezine together every few weeks and to all the
contributors who made it possible. I wish John the best, and hope that
the Chaosium Digest keeps going for many years to come.
Because I'm a numbers junkie, a few numbers from my run on the Digest:
Total Number of Issues: 316
Total Word Count: 1 million
Original Number of Subscribers: 56
Current Number of Subscribers: 1558
And here's a few counts on articles, arranged by game system:
Call of Cthulhu: 268
Cthulhu Now: 17
CoC Dreamlands: 10
CyberCthulhu: 4
Cthulhupunk: 4
End Time: 2
Cthulhu 1889: 1
Cthulhu 1890s: 1
Mythos: 121
Pendragon: 120
Elric!: 76
Hawkmoon: 4
Stormbringer: 6
Nephilim: 65
French Nephilim: 9
And finally, a special thanks to some of the most frequent
contributors during the last five years: Cedric Chin (53), Eric Rowe
(26), Guy Hail (17), Paul Williams (16), Heidi Kaye (14), Timothy
Ferguson (13), Stefan Matthias Aust (13), Frederic Moll (12), Eamon
Honan (11), Peter Corless (10), and Jason Corley (10). And, once more,
thanks to everyone who didn't make my arbitrary cut-off point of ten,
if they contributed 9 or 8 articles, or even 1--every single article
has gone to making the Digest better.
If you've stayed with me this long, 'lo and behold, there's an article
here, just below.
A happy new year to all,
Shannon
--------------------
From: Shannon Appel: <appel@erzo.org>
Subject: Setting the Standard: Corrupt Power
System: Mythos
SETTING THE STANDARD: CORRUPT POWER
How to Tune the Mythos Standard Corrupt Deck
by Shannon Appel
The Mythos Standard Game Set presents a pair of two pre-designed
decks--one Steadfast, one Corrupt--for use in the Mythos game. It's a
great way for newcomers to enjoy the game without having to worry
about the aspect of collectibility. However the decks were designed
with variety and a minimum of repetition in mind. As a result,
although they work great for enjoyable play, they're not Killer Decks.
This article runs through one option for optimizing a MSGS deck. It
follows the standard rules for a MSGS sealed deck tournament. In these
tournaments, each participant is given a sealed deck of MSGS
cards. They have a short time to make one optimized deck from the 104
cards in MSGS, mixing Steadfast and Corrupt willy-nilly. I've tried to
keep this deck slightly more coherent than a totally mixed deck by
just focusing on one of the decks, the Corrupt one.
This article discusses all the decisions made in optimizing this
deck. In the course, I hope to highlight many of the decisions
important for constructing any deck in the Mythos game.
Making decisions by card type seemed to be the most profitable, and
Adventure cards seemed the best place to start.
ADVENTURE CARDS
Each MSGS deck contains 4 Adventures totalling 27 points. This was
done so that an opponent would never know exactly what adventure you
were working on. Given that I'm constructing a tuned deck here, I've
decided to throw out that little extra insurance. The basic MSGS
Corrupt Deck has Adventures of the following values: +5, +7, +8, +8.
I could eliminate any one of them, but it will be most efficient to
eliminate a +7 or a +8, otherwise I'll have to work extra hard in
order to win.
In choosing Adventures for decks, there are three main criteria.
First, you want to have a number of cards that can satisfy each
Adventure requirement (e. g., if I have an Adventure requiring a
Corrupt Cultist, I want to make sure I have at least two Corrupt
Cultists). Second, you want to try and make the Adventures overlap as
much as possible (e. g., if one Adventure requires a Corrupt Cultist,
it's optimum for the others to require Corrupt Cultists also). Third,
you want to try and make sure that as many of the cards as possible
can stay out between Adventures (e. g., Monsters and Locations usually
get Buried in your Story Deck, and thus don't stay out).
There are four Adventures in the Corrupt Deck: Questionable Judgement,
Alone in the World, The Price, and Whispers in Darkness. After running
through my criteria, I find the Corrupt deck doesn't do a great job of
meeting my first requirement; there are a number of requirements in
the adventures which can each only be satisfied by one card. Whispers
in Darkness is the worst. It requires: Henry Akeley, Tome, Speech
Machine, Lonely Akeley Farmhouse, Car, N'gah-Kthun, and Government
Cover-Up. Though there are two Cars and two Tomes in the deck, there
is only one of each of the others. If I had a second Corrupt deck, I
could fix this pretty easily, by duplicating each of these cards,
except N'gah-Kthun, who's unique. However, given that I don't, this
Adventure is the most dificult in the set. I decide to remove it. The
other Adventure cards aren't quite optimal either. Alone in the World
requires Ambush, Servitor of the Outer Gods, and Forgotten Crypt,
while The Price requires N'Kai, Enchanted Knife, and Tulzscha. N'Kai
and the Servitor are unique, but not having duplicates of the others
hurts. Still, it's the best possible given this set of Adventures.
There's actually one more snag in Alone in the World: it requires two
cemetary Locations (besides the Forgotten Crypt) and there are only
three cemetary Locations (besides the Forgotten Crypt). That can be
fixed though, since it isn't a specifically named card.
Dropping Whispers in Darkness is going to allow me to also drop a
number of other formerly required cards as I move through the rest of
my deck.
LOCATIONS
In general, you should try and keep Locations to just a few different
subregions. Turns are very valuable commodities in Mythos, and since
walking takes a turn, you want to avoid it whenever possible. My
first thought is to drop Vermont.
Vermont is Country, and in general Country Locations are
time-wasters. Two of the Vermont Locations need to stay: Waterbury
(which is a Sanitarium) and Newburyport Public Library (which is a
Library, required for Questionable Judgement). The other two cards:
Loneley Akeley Farmhouse and Newburyport Historical Society can both
be dropped.
In exchange I add the following cards from the Steadfast deck, which
are all Kingsport, and thus make the deck quicker: Central Hill, Old
Congregational Church, and the Old Gibbet. These are all cemetaries,
which should strengthen the Alone in the World Adventure.
ALLIES
You don't want an Ally in a deck unless you have at least four or five
places to find him. Arkham only has two Locations. After my reduction,
there are only two Vermont Locations. Thus, the following three Allies
are dropped: Ray Stuckey (a Corrupt Arkham Police Detective), Henry
W. Akeley (a Corrupt Vermont Cultist & Scholar), and Miss Anna Tilton
(a Steadfast Vermont Friend).
They can be replaced with: Samuel Windsor (a Steadfast Priest), Granny
Orne (a Steadfast Kingsport Widow), and The Terrible Old Man (a
Corrupt Kingsport Cultist & Seaman).
This serves a number of purposes. It makes the deck faster by
concetrating Allies in the places you're most likely to be, and it
also makes the adventures slightly simpler. Corrupt Cultists are
required by all three of my Adventures, and a Steadfast Ally is needed
for the Price. However, Ray Stuckey, a Corrupt Police Detective, was
dead weight, useful for no particular Adventure. With my new Allies,
I've now got one Corrupt Cultist and two Steadfast Allies. They're all
useful for Adventure completion.
TOMES
Just as Allies are keyed off of Location subregion, Tomes are keyed
off of Ally language. You need the one card out before you can play
the other. This can be a serious limitation. Thus, you don't want a
Tome in your deck unless 4 or 5 Allies can speak its Language (or your
Investigator can). The Hutchinson Cipher is in Glyphs. Originally I
had two Allies who could speak that Language. After getting rid of
Akeley, I only have one. I decide to get rid of it and replace it with
Letter from a Friend, an English Tome from the Steadfast deck.
SPELLS
You usually don't want to have more Spells than you have spaces in
Tomes. Since I've just reduced my Tome capacity from 3 to 2, I'm going
to want to remove a Spell. I can no longer use Command of the Bloody
Tongue since it required a Water Tome, and the Cipher was my only
one. It's discarded. Petrify is only of marginal use, thus it's
discarded as well. I decide to add Blasphemous Obeisance from the
Steadfast Deck.
MONSTERS
When building a deck, you usually want your Monsters to work together
well. There's too much variety in the Corrupt deck for that to be the
case. Two Monsters in particular stand out: the Servant of Glaaki and
the Dark Young. They'd work great if I had others to Join with, but
only having one is an annoyance. In exchange I add the two Hunting
Horrors. I keep the other corrupt-deck Monsters.
ARTIFACTS
The corrupt-deck selection of Artifacts looks pretty good. I have
three Weapons, which will help my Allies, and will also help me
complete Alone in the World, which requires a Weapon. I also have the
Speech Machine, which makes my Mi-Go horde better. They all stay. I
also decide to add the Faithful Hounds from the Steadfast
Deck. They're another Weapon, and they're also a powerful defense
against Monsters.
EVENTS
I quickly exchange Midnight for High Noon. My Hunting Horrors get
better during the Day, so this is a natural choice.
Dysentery and Succumb to Temptation are both very useful if you want
to follow them up with a Monster attack. However, most games are won
by Adventures not by combat. This is especially true in Tournaments,
where you place depending on the number of Adventure points you
complete. Thus, I decide to get rid of both Dysentery and Succumb to
Temptation.
Now, there's a very powerful class of cards in Mythos called
discarders: they remove cards from play. And, discarded cards can't be
used in Adventures. The Corrupt deck already has one: Government
Cover-Up. I decide to keep it. I also choose another discarder from
the Steadfast deck: Cthulhu Rising.
Finally, since I need one more card, I add the Portaphobia from the
Steadfast Deck.
SUMMARY
At this point I've gone through all the cards. The most important
things I've done fall into two broad classifications: I've sped things
up by consolidating on certain cities, and I've also made the
Adventures easier by providing more duplication of required cards.
STRATEGIES
The toughest Adventure in this deck is The Price, because it involves
getting out a GOO. Play the Price as your first Adventure, and
opponents will be less inclined to stop you. If you summon Tulzscha at
N'Kai, an Exotic Location, you can't have your Location removed by
Events or Spells, which protects you a little. This also has the side
benefit of making it look like you're losing at the start of the game,
when you're really doing your hardest Adventure first.
Try and get a Corrupt Cultist out, and give him the Enchanted Knife.
If you can keep him out, he'll be useful for both Alone in the World
and Questionable Judgement.
Questionable Judgement is best to play last, since its the
quickest. Monsters required for Adventures can slow you down, since
you can't use them until they go from Threat to Story Deck. However,
you can overcome them when completing Questionable Judgement by using
Dust of Suleiman to get a Mi-Go straight to your Story Deck. This can
cause a surprise win. Be careful on the Two Gate Locations (in
Different Cities) requirement. There are only two Cities with gates in
this deck: Kingsport and Arkham. Make sure you hold on to an Arkham
gate.
Blasphemous Obeisance is a great spell, but expensive to cast. You
might want to give it to the Terrible Old Man or Dr. Allen, so that
you can cast it (once) for free.
Finally, don't play Government Cover-Up or Cthulhu Rising randomly. If
you're pretty sure they can harm someone's Adventure, use them.
Otherwise, be prepared to discard them so you can draw cards more
useful for your own Adventures.
SUMMARY: THE TUNED CORRUPT DECK
Investigator: Any
Adventures:
(C) Alone in the World
(C) The Price
(C) Questionable Judgement
Allies:
(C) Dr. Allen
(C) Gomes
(S) Granny Orne
(S) Samuel Winsor
(C) Squire Sawyer Whateley
(S) The Terrible Old Man
Artifacts:
(C) .32 Revolver
(C) Enchanted Knife
(S) Faithful Hounds
(C) Speech Machine
(C) The Two Scepters
Events:
(C) Ambush
(C) Car (x2)
(S) Cthulhu Rising
(C) Dawn of the Solstice
(C) Efficiophobia
(C) Government Cover-Up
(S) High Noon
(-) Portaphobia (x2)
Locations:
(C) Arkham Mystical Supply
(C) The Athenaeum
(C) Boston & Maine Train Station
(C) Caverns Beaneath the Old Church
(S) Central Hill
(C) Congregational Hospital
(C) The Forgotten Crypt
(C) King's Church Cemetery
(C) N'kai
(C) Namquit Point
(C) Newburyport Public Library
(S) Old Congregational Church
(S) The Old Gibbet
(C) Providence Historical Society
(C) Seventh House on the Left
(S) Waterbury State Hospital
Monsters:
(S) Hunting Horror (x2)
(C) Mi-Go (x2)
(C) N'gah-Kthun
(C) Servitor of the Outer Gods
(C) Tulzscha
(C) Yithian
Spells:
(S) Blasphemous Obeisance
(C) Dust of Suleiman
Tomes:
(S) Letter from a Friend
(C) Revelations of Glaaki
--
