About the expansion:
Well, well, well…you just couldn’t get enough of The Plum Island Horror, could you? And now you went and asked for more “stuff.” Well, to quote AC/DC, “if you want blood, you got it.” Despite my better judgment, the GMT bigwigs have harassed, cudgeled, and shamed me into emerging from my quiet, peaceful retirement and designing more pain and agony for you to enjoy. Bang the drums and sound the trumpets! The More of a Bad Thing expansion is here.
And this time, we’re not taking it easy on you. We’ve asked our elite research team to dig even farther into the historic archives regarding this event, and they’ve uncovered some interesting elements to the story of Plum Island that are not included in the original game (P.S. They’ve all since been fired for not uncovering this stuff for the game in the first place).
NEW FACTIONS
We’ve discovered additional anecdotes and accounts of other groups that were present at the catastrophe and who have their own unique (and quite exciting) stories. To honor them, we’re adding three new Factions for players to choose from:
Oceanside Construction Company: This faction has a personal connection to our developer, Ken Kuhn. Digging deep (pun intended) into his family history, Ken realized that his family owned a construction company on Plum Island during the event! What a coinkydink! So, he has taken the time from his busy schedule and designed this faction for the game.
Rarely does one’s line of work prepare them for an apocalyptic disaster, but once Oceanside’s Supervisor, Becky, got wind of the chaos ensuing on the Island, she steeled her nerves, channeled her favorite actor Ven Dresel, and quoted “YYY” (her favorite movie of his)—”I was born for this sh…”
As a Faction, the Oceanside Construction Company has a “control” style of play. In other words, they focus on controlling the movement of Horrors units and tend to excel in dealing with those really big Murder of Horrors stacks. As can be seen in the Faction Spoiler graphic, Ty “Tuff” Murray’s special ability fully activates when in Close Combat with a Murder of Horrors Stack that is at least seven Tiles tall.
Monkey Island Cult: Secluded on the nearby islet of Monkey Island, the Monkey Monk Cult has been living there for years in preparation for the apocalypse. Their banana-fevered brains initially convinced them that, yes, the arrival of the super-storm and resulting chaos on nearby Plum Island was the sign for which they had been waiting. Jumping aboard their numerous Gilligan’s Island-style rafts, while being escorted by their specially-trained Rhesus monkeys riding even more specially-trained dolphins, they landed on Plum Island to partake in the festivities. Unfortunately, their definition of “partaking” became somewhat fuzzy when the first monk to land on Plum Island was eviscerated by a wandering Horror. Thus, they decided instead to assist the Plum Islanders in fighting off the oncoming hordes. Unfortunately for the islanders, the cultist monks and their entourage were not very well practiced in their preferred method of fighting—the summoning of demons from the Old World.
The sample unit from the Monkey Monk faction is their intrepid leader, Elon Monk. A former billionaire entrepreneur and inventor, he personally trained the monkeys and dolphins on the island (but he had nothing to do with those silly novice cultist monks). And his power of precognition is demonstrated by his “X-Factor” Leader Ability, which allows him to re-draw a Fate Card if adjacent to a faction unit during the Monkey Monk Cult’s Follow action. Pretty cool!
Z.Z.’s Big Top Circus: Hey, who wouldn’t welcome some friendly clowns into their boardgame, right? They’re not scary at all. Our researchers found out that the circus was in town during the catastrophe! We missed it the first time around because, well, frankly, very few people attended this rather dismal and low-budget circus (for example, they only had two rings instead of three). The Z.Z.’s Big Top Circus faction has an interesting variety of characters who will each perform their specialty acts in an effort to rid Plum Island of the Horrors as quickly as possible, so they can re-open the Big Top…to almost no one.
NIGHTMARE MODE
Believe it or not, some of you will claim that you have won this game. Ha! (No one believes you, by the way) But if you insist on keeping up appearances that you’re this amazing game player…well, here you go, Sparky. Try Nightmare Mode. I won’t reveal all the details of this mode, other than we take no responsibility for any physical or mental injuries that may occur while trying to play the game using it. But be warned—you will hurt yourself if you are not careful! For example, we are going to have you remove all five “3 EP” Civilians units from the mix before the game. Again…Ha!…now try to evacuate 26+ of Evacuation Points. You’ll have to go searching for some VIP Civilians to hit that threshold. You want more nightmares? How about you now must draw to check for an Event BEFORE you do your Follow Action? If there’s an Event, you must resolve it and you never get to Follow. Tee-hee-hee. And those examples only scratch the surface of the pure evil of this mode. The running list is six adjustments, but we’re still channeling our inner Morpheus, so…Good Luck!
MORE BAD STUFF…BUT SOME GOOD STUFF SPRINKLED IN, TOO, BECAUSE THEY MADE ME DO IT
Aside from the two specific additions mentioned above, we have a plethora of other goodies being added to the game. Most of it is bad…really bad…and that makes me happy. But the “powers that be” have twisted my arm and forced me, against my will, to add some positive stuff as well. Without going into too many details, we have:
- More Search Cards (good)
- More Event Cards (bad)
- A new type of Fate Card result (the dreaded “H.O.V. Lane” tied to everyone’s favorite Route 41)
- More VIP Civilians (like the Civil War Reenactors, the Ancient Aliens guy, and more)
- A semi-cooperative mode of play (in case you and your friends really don’t like cooperating with one another all that much)
- More Mutations (like the Reanimated Grizzly Bear, who you can see in the sample image, and Frenzied Cockroaches—yuck!)
- The new Alpha Horror Tiles (extremely bad tiles that supercharge a Murder of Horrors stack)
- More Civilians (so there’s plenty of nourishment for the Horrors)
- The new “Booby Trap” Special Combat Marker (very good—if your timing is right)
- New short scenarios (for those of you who actually have lives and can’t spend all day playing silly boardgames)
- And more!…I just added that because every promotional ad does it
So, there you have it—the More of a Bad Thing expansion for The Plum Island Horror. I hope you like what you see, and if you don’t, we’re doing it anyway. We’re hoping that these additions will make the game an even richer experience for you and your gaming group. And yes, it does irk me to the extreme to hear that people are actually winning the game. This is unacceptable, and honestly, it’s the only reason that I have agreed to emerge from my cave of solitude to design more stuff. I hope, with all my heart, that the game becomes more difficult and annoying for you to play. Good gaming! ~ Hermann Luttmann
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