Preview the Antarctic Locations of Eldritch Horror: Mountains of Madness

The effect was that of a Cyclopean city of no architecture known to man or to human imagination, with vast aggregations of night-black masonry embodying monstrous perversions of geometrical laws and attaining the most grotesque extremes of sinister bizarrerie.
–H. P. Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness

Uncover Antarctica’s nightmarish secrets in Mountains of Madness, a side board expansion for Eldritch Horror. In Mountains of Madness, players follow the path of an ill-fated Antarctic expedition that encountered magnificent ruins and unspeakable horrors.You and your fellow investigators must find out what happened to that expedition and prevent the savage creatures stirring in the ice from growing strong enough to enslave– or annihilate– humanity.

Today’s preview will prepare you for your exploration of Antarctica by providing a glimpse of the locations you can visit in Antarctica and the terrifying things, from mutilated human bodies to horrific prehistoric carvings, you may find there. The new Outpost, Mountain, and Antarctic Research Encounter cards featured in Mountains of Madness bring to life the gory trail of the previous Miskatonic expedition, the mind-blowing remains of a previous civilization and the harsh conditions of the Antarctic climate. We’ll also introduce some of the human and material Unique Assets that can help you survive in that brutal, frozen land.

The Miskatonic Outpost and Professor Lake’s Camp

Your gateway to the farthest reaches of Antarctica is the Miskatonic University outpost, where your expedition will come together and you’ll be equipped with provisions and transportation as you acclimate to the cold. You can reach the outpost from any coastal city by ship or from the Antarctica space on the main game board. Once there, you can use an action to purchase a ship ticket, securing your passage back to Arkham, or attempt to persuade an Antarctic Guide to help you survive the trials that lie ahead. Or, you may meet the only two survivors of the previous Miskatonic expedition, the geologist William Dyer and the graduate student Danforth, and gain their assistance.

Lake Camp is the last known location of the group who first explored the region beyond the Snowy Mountains. Moreover, it is the only place in Antarctica where you can Acquire Assets, and the only place where you can find a sled and the dogs to pull it. There, Professor Lake and his colleagues found the frozen remains of ghastly, prehistoric creatures, the Elder Things,whom they – incorrectly – assumed to be dead. There Professor Lake and many others were brutally killed, and the camp has not been altered since their deaths. Inside any tent you may find his dissected corpse preserved by the cold. Any mound of snow may conceal a clue. Any track through the snow may signal where the Elder Things that ravaged the camp went. Be careful, however: it is likely that the creatures, so recently awakened from thousands of years of hibernation, did not go far. They may return from their hiding places to attack– or they may still be in the camp, waiting beneath the snow.

Snowy Mountains and Frozen Waste

From Lake Camp you may follow those mysterious tracks through the snow into the lonely Frozen Waste, where the isolation can drive you insane faster than the cold can freeze your blood. But although you and your company may be the only humans for miles in any direction, you are certainly not alone. Vicious monsters who thrive in the cold have inhabited this desolation for millennia, feeding off each other. And now the ghastly and sapient Elder Things roam the expanses in search of tools, information, and prey. By watching one as it forages, you may learn valuable information about their species– or it may sense your presence and attack.

If you prefer to avoid an arduous trek through the Frozen Waste, you can go directly from the Miskatonic Outpost over the so-called mountains of madness themselves, the Snowy Mountains which surpass the Himalayas in height. During your flight over the peaks, you may test your will in order to improve one of your skills. It is not wise to bypass this opportunity. What you find on the other side of the mountains is certain to push you to the limits of your abilities.

The City of the Elder Things and Beyond

As you pass over the Snowy Mountains or through the Frozen Waste, strange, dark, non-Euclidean shapes slowly come into view. It is not until you are in the midst of them that you understand that they are immense buildings, the remains of the Elder Things’ vast city. Among the ruins are stunning murals that tell the story of the Elder Things’ rise and fall, aeons ago. If you can comprehend them, the murals may reveal how to stop these ruthless creatures from rising again. Although the majority of Elder Things have abandoned their city, it is not necessarily uninhabited. A few Elder Things may have lingered along with their shadow-like Shoggoth slaves, ravenous and ready to attack any living thing.

Beyond the city is a plateau, higher and even colder than the Frozen Waste. The moment you set foot into it, your consciousness becomes troubled, as if time and space no longer quite cohere. This place is the Plateau of Leng, a transdimensional space connected to the Dreamlands, where all Other Worlds come together. From the Plateau of Leng you could walk into earth’s distant future, or the Lake Camp as it was a week ago, or Arkham as it is in the present. By testing your knowledge of lore, or spending a Clue, you can use the plateau’s uncanny physics to leave Antarctica, move into an Other World, and through a gate back to the earthly region where that gate opened. Or you may choose to linger in the plateau and learn more about the ancient civilization that engineered it.

The Answers Are in the Ice

Learning the secrets concealed in the Antarctic ice is well worth the risk of being attacked by a monster, losing your sanity, or catching hypothermia. Only by venturing into the remotest parts of that continent can you find out what happened to Professor Lake’s expedition and how to subdue the evil that they awoke.

In future previews, we will take a closer look at the new investigators who may join your expedition and at the bizarre, ferocious Elder Things themselves. We will also be demoing Eldritch Horror and Mountains of Madness at Arkham Nights, a celebration of Lovecraftian games that will take place October 17-18 in Roseville, MN.

Pre-order Mountains of Madness from your local retailer today!

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