I posted this on BGG originally but thought it would also be appreciated here.
Many feel Gloomweaver is not deserving of his 3 difficulty rating. Why? He's only really a threat when he flips, and if you get just one Relic into his trash he will almost certainly not flip. The only way to pull them out of the Villain trash is the mostly impotent Vast Following or a reshuffle.
My goals in this fix are the following:
- Increase the threat of all three Relics being in play at the same time
- Make Gloomweaver's flip side so horrible that you absolutely want to prevent him from flipping to win the game
- Encourage the destruction of his Relics as the way to defeat him rather than just pounding his own HP
- Keep the changes as simple as possible
Thematically, I like the idea of Gloomweaver being the SotM equivalent of a Lovecraftian Elder God. You don't actually destroy Gloomweaver, you need to prevent him from coming into the world in the first place. Your main obstacles are his cult of followers that are trying to bring his Relics together. Destroying the Relics should be the most reliable way of winning.
All that in mind, here is my new proposed Variant Gloomweaver (changes underlined):
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New Set-up
Remove all Voodoo Pins from the villain deck. Shuffle them into a separate Voodoo Pin deck.
New Gloomweaver Game Play text (start side)
At the End of the Villain turn, if there are 3 Villain Relics in play, draw H+1 Voodoo Pins and put them into play. Then flip Gloomweaver's Villain Character Card.
New text for Vast Following
One-Shot
Shuffle the Villain Trash and reveal cards until H Cultists/Relics have been revealed. Put them into play. Put the other revealed cards back in the trash.
Play the top card of the Villain Deck
New text for all Relics
This card may never be anywhere other than in the Villain Deck, Villain Trash, or in play
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The changes are primarily to Set-up and Flip text on Gloomweaver himself. Vast Following is the only card with a substantial change, and is easy to remember. The change to the Relics is only to prevent Haka's Savage Mana from breaking Gloomweaver, though it may come up infrequently enough that it's not necessary.
What this does:
Gloomweaver is now a ticking-timebomb. Removing the Voodoo Pins from the villain deck thins the deck down to 14-16 cards depending on the number of Heroes. Three of those cards cause another card to be played. This makes Relics come out much faster faster. Having Vast Following always work drastically increases the presence of the Cultists, giving the Heroes constant threats to deal with, and makes it more likely that Relics will come out. If the heroes take too long in destroying the Relics they will soon all be in play simultaneously.
Once all three are in play, Gloomweaver's flip side is far deadly. First, all those Voodoo Pins come out all at once, creating huge problems for the Heroes stuck with them. As Gloomweaver flips at the end of his turn instead of the start, he will also immediately hit most of the heroes for H+3 damage, and will continue hitting that hard unless the pins are dealt with. And of course dealing with the pins distracts from dealing with Gloomweaver.
The net effect is a keener focus on destroying the Relics, and making Relic destruction the quicker path to victory as a result. Preventing him from flipping is of utmost importance as the Demon Incarnate is so nightmarish. If you've played Arkham Horror, this should provide a similar narrative arc - don't let the Elder God into the world in the first place or else you'll have a desperate fight on your hands that is not likely to go well for the heroes.
Interested to hear thoughts and feedback.
