Check out this house rule for Arkham Horror:
. . . just prior to drawing the first Mythos cards, all players set their skill sliders and we run an Arkham Encounter Phase (and, if necessary, an Other Worlds Encounter Phase) with Investigators at their starting locations. (They must draw an Encounter, rather than using any special abilities of their Investigator or the location). This has allowed us over the last few dozen games to get some idea of the Encounters available on green diamond locations. We still only visit them when we cannot reach our objective for the turn, but we like the added atmosphere and better sense of what our options are.
Next time I get to play Arkham Horror, I will suggest we try that. Thanks, Bern!
