I rolled this weakness as Daniela Reyes and my deck was pretty much unable to handle this guy save for committing Vicious Blows with my Survival Knife or waiting for enemy phase. I think it's a mistake that the dealt damage reduction isn't reduced to a minimum of 1 - I had to versatile into some tactics into the deck to be able to deal with this guy.
Double unfortunate for me is that I have this weakness in a campaign with Mark Harrigan who also randomly rolled into this weakness as well, which has led to rather amusing moments of killing each other's Lurker in the Darks when they spawn on top of the other investigator.
Bonus points for this enemy not doing horror though - we love having sanity.
To me, this thing represents the worst that Trait-specific damage mechanics like this can give us: an enemy that is barely interesting if you do use the Trait it requires, and almost impossible to handle if you don't. Lurker is even worse than Poltergeist from Carcosa because the majority of Guardians already use Weapons, meaning that there's no real change in tactics necessary to deal with it; all it does is force you to keep doing what you're already doing. And, like in your example, if you're one of the few Guardians who doesn't use Weapons to deal damage (Carolyn Fern, Nathaniel Cho), you're in for a bad time, both in terms of difficulty (what exactly are you supposed to do against an enemy who you can barely damage?) and in terms of fun (uninteractivity is not fun). Personally, I would change Lurker almost entirely, giving it 3 health (maybe) and replacing its text box with "As an additional cost to trigger a Fight action targeting Lurker in the Dark on an asset, spend an additional action." Forces adaptation, but in a way that should be doable for most investigators (Beat Cop (2), Fight events, other direct damage would all help you bypass the extra action cost).
—
NightgauntTaxiService
· 391