So, i've binned Marvel Legendary and Mage Knights as too expensive and too complex respectively, and have now set my sights on Eldritch Horror for my co-op boardgame of choice.

Anyone have any experience with it and care to share any pros or cons of the game?

Quote from: One Horse Town;809518So, i've binned Marvel Legendary and Mage Knights as too expensive and too complex respectively, and have now set my sights on Eldritch Horror for my co-op boardgame of choice.

Anyone have any experience with it and care to share any pros or cons of the game?

It's a slightly stripped down version of Arkham Horror, so if you know AH, you'll get Eldritch Horror pretty easily.  A lot of the rough spots of the previous game have been ironed out, so it moves, IME, much faster than its predecessor.

On the other hand, even with a really experienced group -- and the people I play with are, like, Olympic-level Arkham Horror players -- it takes a fair bit to get through a game.  It's easily a 1-3 hour investment, which may be a lot for some people.  

I find a lot of my fun depends on the character I choose, so for your first game, I'd recommend just choosing characters rather than randomly drawing.

Never played Arkham Horror. I got the impression that it was hideously complicated. I figured that EH was a stripped down version and the reviews i've been reading seem to place it in the middle kind of area of rules fiddle/complexity.

Another thing in its favour is it looks like you can get a lot of mileage out of the base game and just the Forsaken Lore expansion, which puts it at the base cost of the Legendary set without expansions. Plus, it'll be easier to get a Cthulhu game played in my house than a supers one!

Quote from: One Horse Town;809529Never played Arkham Horror. I got the impression that it was hideously complicated. I figured that EH was a stripped down version and the reviews i've been reading seem to place it in the middle kind of area of rules fiddle/complexity.

Another thing in its favour is it looks like you can get a lot of mileage out of the base game and just the Forsaken Lore expansion, which puts it at the base cost of the Legendary set without expansions. Plus, it'll be easier to get a Cthulhu game played in my house than a supers one!

The only complaint I've heard about EH is that the limited number of starting Great Old Ones to play against means that there's limited replay value unless you buy a supplement.  My friends swear Forsaken Lore cleared up the problem for them, without adding anything like a whole new board, like At The Mountains of Madness does.  

Arkham Horror itself isn't that complicated, IMO, until you add in the additional sets.  My friends played a monster game with every set in play, and I just checked out, it was ridiculous how much was at work.  EH may eventually get that ungainly, but people tell me the Mountains of Madness set isn't really adding to the complexity overly much despite adding the additional Antarctica game board.  But if you're just sticking with the core game for now, you don't need to worry about any of that.

Also, AH and EH have incredibly dedicated fanbases that are happy to answer questions and produce extra stuff, so feel free to tap into that if you want some free advice/gewgaws.

Arkham Horror is less complicated than any given edition of D&D. You played Rolemaster, AH is Tetris compared to that. EH is, well...ultimately for me it feels like dwarven poker set in Lovecraft's universe, which means a rather short shelf life for that game.

I like AH a lot. Our trouble with the rules wasn't that they're complicated, but that the rules guide was so poorly organised. Now, every expansion so far adds in another mechanic to keep track of so stacking on expansions renders the game unplayable IME. I quit buying more of them and we just pick one or two expansions to include at a time. I do wish FFG would've produced card expansions without new rules; just extra events, ancient ones, monsters and/or investigators to add to the main game.

Quote from: One Horse Town;809529Never played Arkham Horror. I got the impression that it was hideously complicated. I figured that EH was a stripped down version and the reviews i've been reading seem to place it in the middle kind of area of rules fiddle/complexity.

Eldritch Horror and Arkham Horror are pretty much identical in terms of the number of rules they have. Neither is mechanically complicated. Both feature a lot of different components (most notably a bunch of different card decks).

The primary difference between the two games is that AH is more strategic and EH is more random.

The reason for this is relatively simple: Both games feature decks of random encounter cards with random skill checks on them. Generally speaking, when you draw an encounter you're hoping that the random skill check you get matches the skills you're good at. The difference is that in AH the encounters are things you're working to avoid; in EH the encounters are the only way to achieve victory.

The result is that, in AH, your victory is largely determined by your strategy. In EH your victory is largely determined by random chance.

Personally, I prefer AH. I don't mind games where the outcome is mostly determined by random chance, but I generally want them to be a lot shorter than 3-4 hours.

(You may also see reports that EH is a shorter game than AH. This does not match my experience. If anything, the time required to play EH actually scales horribly with additional players compared to AH.)

Arkham Horror looks more complicated than it really is, but it takes some time to get familiar with the game. Eldritch is a more streamlined version of the same game, and in many ways, the rules are more accessible, and in some parts a bit more elegant. The theme of the games are very similar and similarly present in the game. This theme is also the major appeal of both games, in my opinion (and I have played Arkham a lot. My wife has no interest in actual RPGs, but is a great board game enthusiast; so if I want to play with her, a cooperative board game is the next best thing).
However, Eldritch offers a lot less content and variation. There are fewer options in actual play. Despite the more global approach, the actual playing is effectively smaller. As a consequence, the game becomes repetitive a lot faster and doesn't offer nearly as much  replay value as Arkham (and yes, that is even true if you only compare the basic games, without any expansions). Eldritch becomes repretive and boring much faster than Arkham. So, if you are interested in a game that you can play with people who are completely new to the game, Eldritch is the better choice; if you want to play the same board game again and again, Arkham offers more input.
As a side note: Most events and background in Arkham Horror are based mostly or directly on actual stories by Lovecraft. Eldritch takes a lot more inspiration from Call of Cthulhu adventures, like the Orient Express or Masks of Nyarlatothep.

Quote from: Beagle;809665Arkham Horror looks more complicated than it really is, but it takes some time to get familiar with the game.

I've only played it once, with the base set, but it took us about an hour to have the GOO arrive, at which point we shot it in the face.

We had someone "running" the game for us, and were apparently very unlucky (Lots of portals opened up early on, which moved the doom track on really quickly).

I think it was fun. I'd play it again, to find out for sure.

Quote from: Future Villain Band;809524It's a slightly stripped down version of Arkham Horror, so if you know AH, you'll get Eldritch Horror pretty easily.  A lot of the rough spots of the previous game have been ironed out, so it moves, IME, much faster than its predecessor.

On the other hand, even with a really experienced group -- and the people I play with are, like, Olympic-level Arkham Horror players -- it takes a fair bit to get through a game.  It's easily a 1-3 hour investment, which may be a lot for some people.

So far, even games where we lost badly have lasted more than 3 hours. My main complaint is that some of the decks seem really small, so you've seen all of the possibilities from them before you've figured out other aspects. Do supplements help with this?

Thanks for the input. We've decided not to go for either. Instead, being masochists, we're going to plump for Ghost Stories, which has a shorter set up/play time, but i understand to be pretty challenging!

Quote from: One Horse Town;809908Thanks for the input. We've decided not to go for either. Instead, being masochists, we're going to plump for Ghost Stories, which has a shorter set up/play time, but i understand to be pretty challenging!

That game is going to smack you around!

I hear Ghost Stories *is*  a rather complicated game. Let us know what you think of it, OHT.

Quote from: 3rik;809923I hear Ghost Stories *is*  a rather complicated game. Let us know what you think of it, OHT.

It has about the same level of complexity as AH and EH, but significantly less components to shuffle around.

However, the rulebook is absolutely terrible. It appears to have been translated into English by someone with only a minimal grasp of the language.

EDIT: I should add that it's a great game. Easily the most challenging and exciting co-op I've played.

Ghost Stories is an excellent choice - much more tactical game than either EH or AH, and one that is very, very hard indeed. As Justin pointed out - see about getting a fanmade instruction, because it seems no matter the version, it is atrocious (Polish instruction wasn't well written at all neither).

Quote from: 3rik;809923I hear Ghost Stories *is*  a rather complicated game. Let us know what you think of it, OHT.

It's very easy actually. Everyone has a move and an action, in which they either activate the board or attack the monster next to them. Add to that special abilities of heroes, locations and monsters, and that's it (at least in basic game - I never played with expansion, despite our gaming club having it). The main difficulty is a very poorly written manual.

Quote from: rawma;809756So far, even games where we lost badly have lasted more than 3 hours. My main complaint is that some of the decks seem really small, so you've seen all of the possibilities from them before you've figured out other aspects. Do supplements help with this?

They do a lot, yes - one or two supplements should be enough that it'd be quite hard to see many possibilities soon. One exception could be Arkham random encounters.