u/krvsrnko

Spoilers lie ahead

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Preface

Our group is playing as a 4-player team, on Standard difficulty. Our team consisted of Father Mateo, Michael McGlen, Minh Ti Phan and Lucius Galloway (for the most part). Our party was heading East.

Story / campaign feel

We're going to R'lyeh in this one, and that is definitely the vibe as well: for most of the campaign we are effectively doing a campaign crawl inside of the ancient, crumbling, flooding city. This is both a positive and a negative - on one hand, the theme is very strong if you are into it, but if you're looking for variety, here ain't none of that. All of the R'lyeh scenarios are quite same-y, but I didn't mind this myself, their mechanics are distinct enough that I didn't feel like playing the same scenario over and over again.

Campaign mechanics

Tasks

Honestly, I loved the tasks. They give you something to work towards, even making you change your deck at points to make sure you can add that checkmark at the end of the scenario. I like that each of the tasks has a decision point where they can either progress the task for a bit of punishment, or erase checkmarks for in-scenario benefits. The payoff if just right, if a bit unbalanced, and there are weird synergies between the payoffs and punishments (read till the end to hear about what happened to us!).

One egregious thing is that from what I've heard if you get the secret ending the tasks don't resolve. This makes narrative sense, but from a game perspective it's very strange that if you're going for that ending, you are actively better off not caring about your task at all...

Western expedition / Eastern expedition

So this campaign does something unique: investigators can choose which side to approach R'lyeh from, which will change which order you play the scenarios, along with the setup of each scenario to some extent. In theory, this is a compelling feature, promising you a substantially different playthrough the second time, and I am looking forward to how a replay will go. However, there's a smaller and a bigger issue with the execution. First of all, there's only one scenario (The Apiary) where I felt like the difference between the East and the West routes is very different both setup and storywise, while for the others it seemed like the changes are minor tweaks instead.

And the big problem: the campaign feels like it was designed as a linear one, as the complexity of the scenarios has a clear progression - meaning if you head West you get simple scenarios first, with complexity building up, but if you're heading East, you get hit with the most mechanically complex scenario for scenario 2. I think this could've been solved by having a "worm" structure, where each side starts with a simple scenario, and the middle one is the most complex.

Flood tokens

Flood tokens are back! To be honest I don't mind them but I wasn't awed either (having played Innsmouth Conspiracy right before Drowned City). The tokens do their thing, interact with scenario mechanics, but I thing they're mostly just okay.

Glyphs

So one big thing of Drowned City is that simply finishing a scenario is generally easily manageable, while the real challenge comes from collecting the glyphs (and artifacts) found throughout the scenario. This "stretch goal" system is great, we enjoyed hunting for the alien hyeroglyphs, and managed to get all but one in the end.

Artifacts (and supplies)

The other things to collect - powerful (or at least useful) tools that help with fighting, movement, flood tokens, translating glyphs and a bunch of other stuff. Once you have collected the artifact of the scenario, they are added to a pool of items you can choose to start the next scenario with. The items themselves are cool, but I didn't really care for the way they were implemented. Just having them start in play was not particularly engaging for me, I'd rather have them included in my deck (even if that is objectively less powerful). The whole ordeal also didn't match the excitement of the supply mechanic in The Forgotten Age (I know, these are quite different things) or the EXCELLENT supply mechanic in Edge of the Earth, where you were bringing your stuff up the hill.

The Inescapable

The recurring (nigh-)unkillable monster of this campaign, which might be my favourite one. Not a freaking nuisance like the one in Circle Undone, provides a good challenge and has an interesting mechanic tied to it how it gets summoned. You also get a chance to banish it from the campaign at one point, which I found super cool (even if we didn't manage to achieve it).

Star Spawns

Not really a campaign mechanic, but I loved that there's a group of unique Elite enemies that are added to scenarios randomly (or not). Provides some variance and excitement when choosing which one will show up. Although I might have preferred if they were just a little bit stronger, it never felt like they had a massive impact.

Alien Machinery

FUCK Alien Machinery. Not a mechanic either, but I have to highlight them as they were the bane of our existence. A set of three enemies that spawn the ones that you have defeated - upon being defeated. I honestly think it's a great design, because it got us so mad and desperate when they showed up.

Scenarios

One Last Job

It's a normal intro scenario, set in Arkham. It's needed for setting up the narrative, but stands out form the theme of the campaign overall, like it was tacked on instead of a longer introductory reading. That being said, a small-scale gangster shootout is always welcome.

I have struggled to decide whether to add this part or not, but it's something I noticed so I feel like I need to add it: I found it a strange decision that the mafia almost seemed like a women-only organization. Both gang bosses were women, along with some of the henchman depicted as women (henchwomen?). I honestly am far from being against diversity, but it just felt weird for me, that's all.

Obsidian Canyons

Hey so this is quite complex for a first scenario, right? As I've already said, going East messes this aspect of the game up a bit. That being said, the Canyons is a complex and unique scenario, with winds blowing the locations left and right, and investigators ride monsters to get through the map. Once getting the hang of it, I really enjoyed this one, with the map expanding act after act.

Court of the Ancients

...or The One with the Elevator. A gimmick I am quite fond of, maybe my second most memorable one of the non-finale scenarios. I liked the big monster that chases us from level to level, and the different starting location of the elevator depending on your route really gives you the feeling that you're coming from and going to somewhere.

The Grand Vault

And this one is with the platform. It is definitely a decision to have the Court and this one next to each other, as they have a similar vibe (although manage to keep the moving location gimmick distinct enough for it not to feel like a repeat). Going East this is the first time you encounter those god-forsaken Machinery, luckily there's a way to isolate one of them to trick the way they work.

The Apiary

Easily the favourite scenario in the campaign: strong, disturbing vibes, BIG difference in narrative depending on where you're coming from, cool scenario mechanics. And did I mention how disturbing the whole thing is? 10/10, going by vibes alone it is in the Arkham Hall of Fame for me.

The Drowned Quarter

From this point on, scenarios start to become a little less memorable and exciting, unfortunately. Another nock against the "choose your own route" solution. This is the point where you interact the most with the Flood Tokens, and the scenario which we absolutely failed to complete - turning my Father Mateo into the Lost Homunculus for the rest of the campaign.

The Western Wall

Another scenario with great progression feeling (similar to the Grand Vault) - you're either ascending or descending the Wall, based on your direction. Otherwise, it doesn't have much else going for it, pretty run-of-the-mill Arkham scenario.

The Doom of Arkham, Part One

The first half of the last scenario, DoAPO sets the investigators (and the city of Arkham) up to fight the Big Boss. In order to do that, first we have to recover the artifacts from our trusty ex-employer Randall Thillinghast. Cool mechanics, and a good do-as-much-as-you-can challenge, Plus I really like how the locations that are flooded in this scenario get carried over to the finale.

It was after we have finished I watched a first impressions video by Justin from PlayingBoardGames where he mentioned that Thillinghast might be Nyarlathotep itself - which is a really cool twist, and makes sense in retrospect, but my Netflixpilled brain wishes this was hinted at juuuuust a wee bit stronger so I get the revelation during the game.

The Doom of Arkham, Part Two

And here is the finale, and what a finale it is! Cthulhu gets its own board and special cards, and he tramples all over the city of Arkham. The scenario has a great progression where at first our group was like -is that it? Are we doing something wrong, because that's just too easy??- but then it turns out that Cthulhu is indeed a formidable opponent. Our team, not being hyper-efficient had to give it our best to defeat him, although I can see how with a more optimised group this fight can be bit of a cakewalk. For us, only the power of two Gatling guns stood between Cthulhu and the real Doom that Begets Arkham. Really immersive and unique boss fight, I think the most iconic opponent got a worthy finale.

Also realising that Cthulhu can collapse the rooftops while three of us were standing on one of the rooftops is definitely an all-timer jumpscare from the game!

Also also I know why the Inescapable didn't appear here from a story perspective, but it was strange simply leaving behind the recurring miniboss while doing nothing against it felt a bit weird in retrospect.

Post scriptum: Father Mateo & storytime

So my investigator of choice was Father Mateo, with an Elder Sign fishing deck. It was bonkers, it felt amazing and was working really well. I would recommend everyone to try this deck, it's just pure fun. I also got the Task which needed an Elder Sign revealed four times, which was just the most trivial thing to do.

However!!!! As I've mentioned, our party got wiped in the Drowned Quarter, which procced The Great Work, turning me into The Lost Homunculus - and I was overjoyed. My game plan was ruined, as now I couldn't use Olive McBride to reveal a bunch of tokens, and not care about any of them as long as there was an autosucceed-Elder Sign among them. I was lucky that otherwise my deck was mostly complete, as by the end of the campaign I was left with like 20 XP I couldn't spend.

This experience left The Great Work a much beloved card for me, as it's a phenomenal, organic storybeat, multitudes more exciting than getting some other +XP Mystic card. It also led to an unintentionally hilarious moment, where I have resolved my task successfully, and it talking about how I returned from R'lyeh stronger in my faith, I -a Lost Homunculus- walked among my people like a prophet, and I am supposed to lead my people out from the shadow into the light.

Speaking of tasks - the successful resolution had me flip my task card, giving me an extra ability: whenever anyone flips and Elder Sign, I can heal one horror from an investigator at that location. There's just one problem: Lucius Galloway has failed his task, which led to us removing the very same Elder Sign token from the bag for the rest of the campaign... Another great narrative moment, I couldn't have asked for better! Not to mention that Lucius was killed like 3 rounds into The Doom of Arkham, Part 1, because he didn't deliver on the Offer He Couldn't Refuse... So his only purpose during the scenario was to take out the Elder Sign, not to be seen or hear from again.

Because of these little moments, narratively this has been my favourite Arkham campaign experience so far.

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Thank you for reading through my ramblings. Let me now how did YOU like The Drowned City!