Or; Bringing teams together over boardgames.

This is a sneaky peak behind the curtain into how we blow off some steam and have fun during our lunch hours at Domain Group.

A quick look at the past…

March 3, 2016 : #gaming Slack channel created by Zarah

: Slack channel created by Zarah August 25, 2016 : #boardgames Slack channel created

: #boardgames Slack channel created March 10, 2017 : Card & Board games become regular occurrences

: Card & Board games become regular occurrences May 19, 2017 : Eldritch Horror test run (abandoned due to underestimating time required)

: Eldritch Horror test run (abandoned due to underestimating time required) May 23, 2017 : Fully dedicated team assembles for a complete Eldritch Horror campaign

: Fully dedicated team assembles for a complete Eldritch Horror campaign May 26, 2017: The nail-biting rollercoaster of the first game wraps up.

Did our heroic investigators stop the Ancient One from devouring the world? Or were they pummelled into the dust by mythical beings from other dimensions? Read on to find out…

The setup

Eldritch Horror is a cooperative game. All players are on the same team and win or lose the game together. The investigators’ ultimate goal is to banish the Ancient One from this world by solving Mysteries. In addition, investigators need to deal with many threats and crises facing the world. These appear in the form of Gates (which spawn Monsters and can awaken the Ancient One) and Rumor Mythos cards (which harm investigators and can end the game prematurely). Investigators immediately win the game if they solve three of the Ancient One’s Mysteries. If the Ancient One awakens, investigators will also need to solve the Final Mystery in order to win the game

– Official Eldritch Horror rulebook

For those that don’t know the game, here’s an excellent 20 minute primer.

Our cast of unlikely heros came together from 4 different teams across the Tech space at Domain:

Nick Matenaar heads up the Web Platform team; building the tools that help all our other web devs be productive.

Sam Warner makes the magic happen on iOS.

Jess Telford leads the frontend & JS disciplines within Domain Group.

Alex Leon cranks out React components like no one’s business.

Geoff Chong throws a smile on every situation while impressing everyone with his Frontend & React skills

Being our first game, it took us most of our first lunch hour just to get setup and going with the rules. We chose to battle Azathoth, The Idiot God.

What follows is a blow-by-blow of our adventures into the world of Eldritch Horror.

Day 1

Our starting characters were: Jess as Mark Harrigan, Sam as Jacqueline Fine, Nick as Charlie Kane, and Alex as Norman Withers (Geoff joined us on Day 2). Let’s jump straight into the action:

Sam’s psychic abilities have already come in useful thrice; gaining 2 clues on an off-turn, trading those clues out to Jess, and also for checking Jess’s Dark Pact to see just how much trouble he’s really in. Sam drew first blood by killing the Cultist at San Francisco!

Alex is becoming a Lore Tank and slowly going insane to gain clues. Now with 2 clues, he’s headed for the Eldritch Token on space 14 to try and solve that first Mystery.

Jess’s special ability managed to keep him from being delayed, allowing moving toward the Clue Token in Sydney. But, thanks to a trade with Sam, he’s now got 2 clues, so can aim for the Eldritch Token in The Himalayas. Sadly for everyone except Jess, he’s gained a Dark Pact which will result in someone dying if he rolls a 1 during a Reckoning (sorry everyone!)

Nick was running support, giving extra actions to Sam, gaining items, and devouring the rule book!

Day 2

Now that we’ve got the hang of it, we can start moving a little quicker, and managed to fit in a further 3 rounds today, with a hive of activity:

We defeated another 2 monsters (only cultists, but a kill is a kill, right!?)

With no reckoning effects in any rounds, Jess successfully avoided having to kill anyone

Suddenly a new challenger appears! Geoff joined as Akachi Onyele to help us out defeating some of the big baddies… Then promptly died in the next round after failing to sneakily close a gate with his spell.

We accidentally spawned an epic monster (I hate it when that happens), so Jess is headed up north to go kill it. If he fails, and we get a couple of reckonings, then everyone gets hit with -6 health 😱

Meanwhile, our trading partners Sam + Nick have been running huge levels of support with Clues and Assets, which led us to…

Our first solved Mystery! 🎉

Day 3

Day 3 saw lots of highs and lows!

We started with the reincarnation of Geoff as the Sydney Sailor Silas Marsh (G’day, and welcome back from the dead, mate!)

Jess continued his quest up toward the epic monster with the aim of killing him before the Mythos card activates and everyone gets hit with -6 ❤️ ! (😱)

! (😱) Nick ran support again, gaining and instantly trading assets for everyone else, really helping keep our players buffed. With his help, Jess was able to get +5 💪 (giving 9 total!)

Our second mystery was solved thanks to Alex’s assault on the mystery token, spending clues after each encounter to stack on the Mystery. At the end of the Mythos, we had the required amount and were able to flip the next one! 🎉

Our third mystery requires encountering clues, meaning Sam’s gain-a-clue ability becomes less helpful. So he started making his way toward some on-board clues.

We got lucky with a Mythos card that triggered reckoning only on other Mythos cards in play, meaning we were able to rest again! 😴 ❤️ !

! Jess’s encounter with the Epic monster took two rounds, but was successful thanks to the 💪 buffs. That means no worries about an impending health bomb. That Mythos card went out of play 👍

While Jess and Alex were busy, things really heated up: Another 4 monsters were spawned on the already crowded gates. After a quick strategy briefing, we decided to go after the final mystery and risk the Doom tracker sliding toward zero while the monsters have om nom nom noms in their respective cities.

So the goal now is to encounter clues. If we can get 5 of them onto the Mystery, it’s solved, and we win. If not, in the next couple of rounds, we’re probably dead.

We left the game on a cliff-hanger: A Mythos card with a reckoning effect (after first spawning two more monsters)! With Jess being both cursed, and holding a Dark Pact condition, his dark side really shone when he accidentally rolled a 1, triggering the dark pact. The result; Nick’s character Charlie Kane took a dagger right to the ❤️ . Thankfully the worst of the other reckoning effects were to lose a health and or sanity, but we’re all still hanging in there!

Day 4’s game is shaping up to be a nail-biter! Will the investigators encounter enough clues to solve the final mystery, forever closing the gates on Azathoth? Or will their daring gamble backfire, awakening the Ancient One, and meaning death and destruction for everyone?

Day 4: A conclusion

Our mission was clear: We need to encounter that last clue. With that, the 3rd and final mystery would be solved, and we’d defeat the Ancient One Azathoth 😈 !

! We started the day off on a happy note with Nick getting his zen back and re-joining the investigative team as Lily Chen; the Martial Artist.

In the action phase, Jess took the option to rest and have a quick nap, so was immediately able to get rid of a pesky curse holding him back from rolling high numbers (“5″s once again counted as a success!).

Geoff the sailor stuck around on his current clue somewhere in the ocean between Sydney and Antarctica, hoping to encounter it this round.

Finally, Sam & Alex converged on a single clue to maximise chances of a successful encounter (you know what they always say; two monster fighting investigators are better than one!)

But, with just one clue to go, the RNG wasn’t in Alex’s favour – not passing the encounter test meant NO CLUE FOR YOU!

Sam had Alex’s back with a lucky draw: an automatic clue without a dice roll! That’s the mystery solved! 🎉

We wi … Wait, did someone check the rules? Did we win? … No 😱 Turns out; we have to keep playing to the end of the mythos phase! Uh-oh. There’s a lot of monsters on the board. And gates for more to come through. And reckoning. Worst case is if we have a reckoning and the doom token gets pushed to zero! Double 😱!

… Wait, did someone check the rules? Did we win? … No 😱 Turns out; we have to keep playing to the end of the mythos phase! Uh-oh. There’s a lot of monsters on the board. And gates for more to come through. And reckoning. Worst case is if we have a reckoning and the doom token gets pushed to zero! Double 😱! So we continue! 😠

Rounding out the encounters, Nick got himself cursed, reducing his effective rolls, and Geoff was able to gain that clue to put toward the mystery (plus a bonus one for himself), “just in case”

Now the Mythos phase!

Doom moved up by 4 in total(!), leaving us just 6 away from the final position zero, and Azathoth’s awakening!

And a reckoning! ⚡ 💥 Thankfully we mostly dodged the bullets. The biggest effect; all players lost 2 health, bringing Jess & Alex down to the wire with just 1 health remaining.

Thankfully we mostly dodged the bullets. The biggest effect; all players lost 2 health, bringing Jess & Alex down to the wire with just 1 health remaining. A quick spawning of some new gates, and the Mythos phase is over.

… A double check of the rules, and …

*We won!*

Azathoth isn’t awakening today. With the help of our merry band of investigators, we were able to keep our world safe for another day. 🎉 🎆 👍