Trashdome - Arkham Horror VS Tales Arabian Nights

Somebody get Launius' attention...

TotAN. It's simply the "cleaner" game, and I actually like the minimalist rules that don't get in the way of the storyteling. But it's not so much that it's lame drama student shit like ONCE UPON A TIME, it's still definitely a board game. And really, the revised ARKHAM HORROR has an _awful_ lot of debt to TotAN- AH is a paragraph game, but with all the paragraphs on cards and the skill checks changed from absolutes to die rolls.

Both are great games. But AH can't win 'em all.

You can go shopping in Arkham, and it has shot/tommy/elephant guns. And cavalry sabers. And forbidden tomes of magicks and things best left unthought. 'Nough said.

Vote: Arkham Horror.

I like Tales of the Arabian Nights, and I don't mean this to look down my nose and what was obviously exceptionally hard work, but there's a lot of places where the context in the storyline just really conflicts with itself. I imagine it was extremely hard to make everything work well together.

Were I to run this game with family and friends I would absolutely positively insist on acting as the narrator for everyone in order to smooth out situations where characters are climbing trees at sea or encountering whirlpools in the desert. Talented storytellers are needed to make the game work properly. If you have a few of those lying around you're set. If you don't . . .

At times the characters become tortured beyond recognition which can be amusing, but can also be disheartening for someone that really invests themselves in their little cardboard alter-ego. A friend was turned into a transgendered snake and it nearly broke her heart. At that point the game became a lesson in mechanical execution which, due to the way the big book works is just a shade clunkier than it needs to be.

Uba indicates that knowing the stories means you can be more strategic, but when I did that with my admittedly limited experience I got completely hosed -- couldn't score a story point to save my life. I now pick 10/10 and just play for fun.

Arkham seems more unified. I like Tales' theme better, but Arkham makes it easier to suspend the disbelief for me in spite of being in less adventurous territory. If it's not your thing move on, but Arkham delivers a more digestible message.

S.

Michael Barnes wrote:

Both are great games. But AH can't win 'em all.

Yes it can.

Vote: Arkham Horror

I enjoyed my one game of Tales of Arabian Nights, but AH has fire vampires, motorcycles, tommy guns, shotguns and Joe Diamond the private eye.

Story decisions don't score story points. Sounds crazy, but I'll work with it.

S.

Columbob wrote:

You can go shopping in Arkham, and it has shot/tommy/elephant guns. And cavalry sabers. And forbidden tomes of magicks and things best left unthought. 'Nough said.

Vote: Arkham Horror.

If we're just talking "which game's got crazier shit", then TOTAN wins hands down. Last time I played a female ghoul chased my friend across the world until she finally caught up and expressed that she was chasing him for a night of sweet sweet love. I hid myself inside an animal carcass to hid from giant Rocs. There's this recurring barber who talks your ear off until you're so annoyed that you become grief-stricken.

Nuff said.

You forgot transexuals, dragonstout.

mjl1783 wrote:

You forgot transexuals, dragonstout.

Vote: Tales of the Arabian Nights

dragonstout wrote:

Columbob wrote:

You can go shopping in Arkham, and it has shot/tommy/elephant guns. And cavalry sabers. And forbidden tomes of magicks and things best left unthought. 'Nough said.

Vote: Arkham Horror.

If we're just talking "which game's got crazier shit", then TOTAN wins hands down. Last time I played a female ghoul chased my friend across the world until she finally caught up and expressed that she was chasing him for a night of sweet sweet love. I hid myself inside an animal carcass to hid from giant Rocs. There's this recurring barber who talks your ear off until you're so annoyed that you become grief-stricken.

Nuff said.

QFT.

Last game I was married, joined a small tribe with my wife where it was custom to be buried alive with your dead spouse. I was thrown in the pit, ate my spouse to survive until they lowered the next body into the pit. After regaining my strength from eating several corpses, I escaped from the pit as a transformed ghoul. I began to waylay travelers, eating them on the side of the road. Becoming more and more ghoulish, I was of no longer interest to the "story of adventurers" and became removed from the game.

mj is probably right about the fact that the decisions may relate to the original stories, but you still don't have much control over the scoring outcome. For me, the storytelling of Arkham is where it shines -- that is what you remember. Tales just does it a little better because more care was taken to tie the stories together.

Both games have crazy shit. Sure being a transgendered diseased ape with a stalker is crazy, but so is a nun and a hobo running around a New England town fighting zombies and giant worms and crustacean-like aliens from Pluto, travelling through other dimensions to prevent a gigantic octopus-headed monster from destroying the world.

Last time I played a female ghoul chased my friend across the world until she finally caught up and expressed that she was chasing him for a night of sweet sweet love. I hid myself inside an animal carcass to hid from giant Rocs.

Last game I was married, joined a small tribe with my wife where it was custom to be buried alive with your dead spouse. I was thrown in the pit, ate my spouse to survive until they lowered the next body into the pit. After regaining my strength from eating several corpses, I escaped from the pit as a transformed ghoul. I began to waylay travelers, eating them on the side of the road. Becoming more and more ghoulish, I was of no longer interest to the "story of adventurers" and became removed from the game.

This is why ToTAN deserves to win. Best Metagame ever.

mjl1783 wrote:

You forgot transexuals, dragonstout.

Of course I had a sex-change in that game, too, because a genie decided I was too ugly of a woman and would make a more attractive man. But everyone always talks about the sex-changing in TOTAN.

How often are we going to have to vote for Arkham Horror on this site ?

All hail Cthulhu !

vote: ToTAN Arkham Horror

Last time I played a female ghoul chased my friend across the world until she finally caught up and expressed that she was chasing him for a night of sweet sweet love. I hid myself inside an animal carcass to hid from giant Rocs.

Last game I was married, joined a small tribe with my wife where it was custom to be buried alive with your dead spouse. I was thrown in the pit, ate my spouse to survive until they lowered the next body into the pit. After regaining my strength from eating several corpses, I escaped from the pit as a transformed ghoul. I began to waylay travelers, eating them on the side of the road. Becoming more and more ghoulish, I was of no longer interest to the "story of adventurers" and became removed from the game.

It's true when you read this it may seem ToAN generates crazy and unique stories, but in reality the game's stories are all already in the book. There's nothing really for players to create. A game like AH although it uses "paragraphs" (in the form of cards) generates its story from the actual gameplay actions from the players and how they interact with the game system.

The monsters you encounter and where, the objects you find, the actions of each character, etc... all mesh to tell a unique tale that is not written in any book. And the encounter cards are just a small part of that story. That's why the end result in AH is a more coherent story, because a big part of it comes from the actions of players and re-actions of the board.