With the release of Mythos at the end of March, we know many of you are keen to look at the Character cards that accompany the various gorgeous miniatures that are being released. Chris from our studio has all the details!
Mythos is a game of cosmic horror where characters both mortal and mythological battle in the secretive Shadow War to determine the fate of humanity. The four factions waging war at launch are: The Priory, Custos Crypta, Wyldborn and the Hidden Ones. The character cards for those factions are now available here. In this article, we are going to take a closer look at how you use them.
As you would expect the cards show all the statistics for the Characters in the game, but each card is also double-sided! The front of the card presents the Character’s normal side, whilst the reverse shows their Altered side. Each Character will either flip to their Altered side when they hit their Madness Threshold or when another condition is met. Characters aren’t just removed from play when they run out of wounds, they can also be removed when their sanity fractures. Succumbing to Madness is a real threat in this game and one of the ways to gain Madness is by using powerful Mythos Abilities. Playing with dark powers can be dangerous apparently...who knew?
Professor Lazarus flips when he hits 6 Madness. This will keep the effects of insanity at bay for some time but as soon as he flips he is in danger of losing his mind entirely.
Some other Characters have more control over when and how they flip. For Example, the Dunsmouth Witch doesn’t have a Madness threshold as she is too close to the strange energies at her control for them to affect her any longer. However, if either of her ‘children’ are slain she loses control and will seek vengeance on those who harmed her precious ones. She can return to her Ready side when the Character who killed her child is defeated.
”So what changes on the Altered side of the cards?” I hear you ask. Well, that varies depending on the Character. In some cases, a Character’s statistics get worse and others improve. Some Characters become more reckless when they start to lose their grip on reality, while others just can’t cope with the raw power they are tapping into or the strange and disturbing things they are witnessing. Others just stop doing anything entirely until they can become re-activated…
We have found that this Madness flipping ability really mixes the game up and allows each faction to have varied and interesting play styles. That makes for hours of gaming fun and ways to tell some really interesting stories, which is always a good thing!
Finally the cards are Tarot sized making it easy to find sleeves to fit them and giving us enough room on the cards to pack in all the rules. The character cards for the initial four factions are available here. The coming months will see the remaining four factions released, starting with the Path of Chronozon…
Until next time - sleep with the lights on…
Chris
