Eldritch Horror: Under the Pyramids
Ancient secrets, sandblasted ruins, and unprecedented horrors await in Under the Pyramids! This side board expansion opens up six new locations throughout Egypt, including bustling Cairo, ancient Tel El-Amarna, and the shining, snaking, Nile River. Yet the Egypt of the 1920s is hardly a safe tourist destination. Amid the cultural tumult and political instability of this modernizing African nation, countless Cultists are working to bring about the return of an ancient and powerful evil known as the Dark Pharaoh. If he should rise up to rule Egypt once more with his iron will, he would doom all humankind to wretched, cruel slavery.
Fighting this battle against terrible evil are eight more investigators, aided by invaluable Relics, powerful Glamour spells, and legendary allies. The Museum Heist Adventure cards lead you on a hunt for stolen antiquities, and six more preludes that can transform your games of Eldritch Horror in innovative and thematic ways.
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The second “big box” expansion for Eldritch Horror takes investigators to a new side board: Egypt. The Egypt side board can be accessed through different points in the main board, differing somewhat from the Antarctica side board from “The Mountains of Madness.” Also, unlike Antarctica, Egypt’s locations are categorized (city, wilderness). Like the previous side board, there are two ways for Egypt to be introduced to the game: either through the Prelude card “Under the Pyramids” or through choosing the Nephren-Ka Ancient One. While not as directly connected to the Lovecraft story “Under the Pyramids” (also known as “Imprisoned with the Pharaohs) the way that Mountains of Madness was, this expansion adds a lot of thematic elements that fans of the Mythos will recognize from stories such as “The Haunter of the Dark.”
Nephren-Ka, the Dark Pharaoh, is one of the two new Ancient Ones included in this expansion, the other being Abhoth, the source of uncleanliness. Both have distinctive elements–when facing Nephren-Ka, investigators must unravel the secrets of the pharaoh’s rule, much of which has been stricken out of history, while also contending with the possible threat of one or more of the many Masks of Nyarlathotep. Abhoth, meanwhile, has what is perhaps the most unique Cultists to date for Eldritch Horror. They aren’t really cultists at all, but rather the Spawn of Abhoth, so when investigators meet a Cultist monster during an Abhoth game they have a card encounter against one of the Spawn in place of a standard combat encounter. This can be especially interesting and challenging, as unlike a traditional Cultist the investigators may have to resort to different skill rolls to overcome the encounter, which comes in the form of a complex (pass/fail effect) encounter.
This expansion also brings with it some fun new investigators like the perpetually-Cursed Rex Murphy (who gets some pretty solid benefits to offset the fact that he’s always Cursed) and Monteray Jack, who is geared towards acquiring ancient treasures and using them to push back the danger of the Ancient One. As always with Eldritch Horror expansions, there are also new cards for the various desks, including a selection of Glamour spells that provide some sort of standing effect but require a Lore roll during Reckonings to control the magic.
Overall, I really liked this expansion. It introduces some great new elements and characters to the Eldritch Horror game, and also expands on the existing decks and game play. It also seems to indicate that the game designers are learning as they go, building on what they did with Mountains of Madness and finding ways to keep the game evolving and changing.