Mythos (card game)
| Designer(s) | Charlie Krank |
|---|---|
| Publisher(s) | Chaosium |
| Players | 2+ |
| Age range | 10+ |
| Playing time | Approx 45 min |
| Random chance | Some |
| Skill(s) required |
Card playing Arithmetic Basic Reading Ability |
Mythos is a collectible card game (CCG) published by Chaosium. It is based on the Cthulhu Mythos stories of the horror author H. P. Lovecraft, as well as on Chaosium's own Call of Cthulhu role-playing game.
In 1996, Chaosium decided to join the on-going CCG-boom and published Mythos, designed by Charlie Krank. It received critical acclaim, winning the 1996 Best Card Game award at Origins and initially sold well. Later expansions however, most notably the non-collectible Standard Game Set, did much more poorly and forced Chaosium to discontinue Mythos. The production was stopped after the release of New Aeon in 1997, only a year after the game's initial release.
In 1999 Pyramid magazine named Mythos as one of The Millennium's Best Card Games. Editor Scott Haring said "Mythos was a very deserving game, with great art and gameplay that involved more than just monsters fighting each other."
Mythos was designed to include a high level of player interaction, in the vein of some traditional card games like rummy. Game play borrowed concepts from previous CCG titles, but also introduced new, innovative mechanics.
The game is playable by two players, but is really intended to be played by a larger number. Increasing the number of players makes completing adventures more important, and encourages development of other strategies than disrupting your opponent's game. Mythos tournament games are conducted with four players.
Like most collectible card games, a Mythos player constructs a deck from available cards within certain restrictions. A player chooses an investigator card to represent his character. Each investigator has special abilities and numerical attributes, most notably "sanity". Some cards can lower an investigator's sanity score, and when it reaches zero the investigator is eliminated from the game.
The main objective of the game is to collect points by completing "adventures". Adventures are cards that include keywords derived from different card names and types. Once the required cards are in the player's story deck or on the table, the player can play the adventure and receive its points. When a player reaches the number of adventure points previously agreed upon (usually 20), the game ends after the current round and the winner is determined.
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