Tommy's Take on Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game

A couple of years ago, I became a big fan of The Dresden Files, in turn turning my wife into a fan of The Dresden Files. I own the RPG (though I have never ran it), but when Evil Hat announced a cooperative card game, I was intrigued.


I was so intrigued, in fact, that I spent almost as much as I'm pledging on the Kickstarter in order to have the Print and Play core game printed up to try it out.

100 Days of Halloween Tabletop Horror Recommendations

Hey guys, for those that don't follow me on social media (or who have long since tuned me out), I was guest blogging on The Monster Guys blog, posting 10 games I think you should consider this Halloween.

Two swell dudes.

Without further ado:

Tabletop Horror 1: Zombies!
Tabletop Horror 2: Fantastic Horror
Tabletop Horror 3: Camp & Circumstance
Tabletop Horror 4: Fresh Meat!
Tabletop Horror 5: The Call of Evil
Tabletop Horror: Honorable Mentions (Michael's, not mine)

Enjoy!

Tommy's Take on EPOCH: War Stories

Earlier this week, I tackled the Frontier of Fear scenario book for EPOCH...so today, let's take a look at War Stories, which aims to make war even more horrific.

Tommy's Take on EPOCH: Frontier of Fear

At the beginning of the year, I reviewed EPOCH: Experimental Paradigm Of Cinematic Horror, an RPG that attempts to replicate, well, cinematic horror. This week, I'm tackling the first two scenario books for EPOCH: Frontier of Fear (sci-fi horror) and War Stories (er, war stories).

Tommy's Take on Firefly: Out to the Black

You’re probably heard of Firefly. Cult classic show on Fox, cancelled without airing all of the episodes, made by Joss Whedon, had a follow-up movie called Serenity? It now has a couple of tabletop games available: A board game by Gale Force Nine and this game, a card game by Toy Vault.

DISCLAIMER: I received no compensation for this review in any way. This is based off of playing a store copy of the Firefly card game, via Kryptic Comics & Games.

Tommy's Take on Legendary

I've played a few Marvel card games over the years, but last year when I picked up Sentinels of the Multiverse, I also picked up the DC Deck Building Game and the newest Marvel card game: Legendary. Let's take a look at that one.

Tommy's Take on Castle, Baronica & Murder on the Hellstromme Express

Castle: The Detective Card Game

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Published by Cryptozoic Entertainment, Castle: The Detective Card Game is a fast-playing card game designed for more casual gamers looking to dabble in some good, card gaming fun. Retailing for $30, Castle is a whodunit card game, in which everyone selects an investigator from the show (Castle, Beckett, Det. Ryan, Det. Esposito, Capt. Gates or Dr. Parish). Each investigator has a special ability, like Beckett being able to discard two cards of the same name and drawing five more, or Capt. Gates being able to take the top card from the Discard pile into her hand. Once everyone has a character, five suspects are dealt, and poker chips dealt out onto them. One chip says Guilty, the rest are Not Guilty and have a special effect (like forcing you to pass a card to the person on the right, or picking a player and allowing them to draw two cards). If at any point in the game you get the three cards listed on each suspect, you can Confront them, flipping over their poker chip. If they are guilty, you win! If not, follow the text on the chip. The gameplay is fast (each person only has one of five actions each turn) and simple (you are trying to find the three cards listed on the suspect cards to confront them), but has some nice trappings. For instance, the suspects are the murder mystery archetypes, like The Ignored Mistress, The Spiteful Sister and The Vengeful Spouse. In order to confront, say, The Loyal Brother, you need to Search the Victim's Home, have a Poker Game Consult (a Castle tradition) and perform an Autopsy. Other cards have special effects, like Killing By The Book, which has the killer following the MO of a killer from Castle's book (and letting you draw three cards and keep one), while another allows you to add an additional suspect (and maybe even changing up who the guilty party actually is). Some variants include using more suspects, as well as a "Season Mode", which ends when one player has three Solved Tokens.

WHAT WORKS: Good production values, especially the box, oversized character cards and poker chips (which are a thing of beauty indeed). Gameplay is fast and fun for a casual setting, and all of the major Detective Show tropes are in full effect with the suspects. Surprisingly, for a licensed product, the price isn't overly inflated.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Not a very deep game, if that's what you're looking for.

CONCLUSION: My wife is a casual gamer who is a fan of Castle, and when I read that this was basically a light, casual card game, I decided to pick it up for her for Christmas. Not a surprise at all, she really likes it. There's nothing deep or in-depth here, and there is a decent sized luck factor, but there's enough gameplay to keep me happy and fast enough play to keep my wife happy. It may not be what some were hoping for from a Castle card game, but it's pretty much exactly what Cryptozoic was actually trying for.

BARONICA: A Dungeon World Campaign Front

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Released by Three Sages Games, Baronica is a campaign front for Dungeon World, which I reviewed recently. Baronica is based on the author's old fantasy campaign, with some details left out. In keeping with the Dungeon World mindset, Baronica is left pretty open for the GMs and players to fill in, maps included. It's a fairly typical fantasy setting, in which the High King has fallen and the people are trying to determine who can take the crown. In the meanwhile, goblins are getting violent, and a dark force is rising to consume everyone (because that's what dark forces DO). A number of important NPCs are provided, as well as questions relevant to the campaign for the players to answer, and Special Moves for certain parts of the setting (my favorite being the move that details what happens when the PCs encounter The Azure Unicorn). Of course, Dangers are present, and a few Fronts are provided to help you guide the escalation of the threat level (such as the Rise of the Dark Lord).

WHAT WORKS: If you read the advice on creating Campaign Fronts and Dangers in the Dungeon World book, and it didn't quite click, then this might well be worth reading. I liked that the maps are left open enough for you to add your own elements and features that appear in gameplay, and I particularly enjoyed the encounter with the Azure Unicorn.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: If you already have a sense of what you are doing with Dungeon World, world-building-wise, then there's not enough new and unique stuff here to make it worthwhile. The author admits that it's going to feel a little familiar to some people, so if you're already on that path, you are probably better served to keep going in that direction.

CONCLUSION: Recommended for people who are pretty sure they have the mechanics of Dungeon World down, but are not sure just how they are actually going to get the game going (the front suggests that the PCs begin in media res), but folks who have already started to work on their own Dungeon World setting aren't going to find a lot here to compel them to scrap their work and introduce Baronica in its stead.

MURDER ON THE HELLSTROMME EXPRESS

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Murder on the Hellstromme Express is packed in with the Deadlands Reloaded GM screen, but is also available separately in PDF. It is perfectly suitable for use as an introductory adventure, but can also be dropped into any campaign in which the posse has a need to take jobs for money. The adventure is designed to run from Chicago to Dodge City, with the PCs serving as escorts for a Mad Scientist on a train full of 'em, each trying to impress a Hellstromme Industries auditor and earn points for the big Kansas Scientific Symposium. Wackiness ensues as the agendas of the various scientists bubble to the forefront, intersecting with a raid by a vicious Indian War Party. Assuming everyone makes it to the Symposium itself intact, one of the scientists has a final surprise for the posse...and the amount of help they have in that final battle relates directly to how well they managed the personalities on the train.

WHAT WORKS: All of the scientists on the train are interesting and were a blast to play as GM. Having the posse's interaction with them factor into the end game was a great touch. It makes for a good introductory adventure due to the mundane beginnings that help introduce more arcane elements of the setting.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Might not be enough action for some posse members in the early going. When I ran it, I did have one player get very restless waiting on a fight. It is, literally, a railroady adventure, what with most of it taking place on a train.

CONCLUSION: I wouldn't recommend buying the PDF unless you are completely unable to find the GM screen. Buy that and take this as the extra included with it instead. When I ran the adventure, the mad scientists thoroughly exhausted my players, and - as noted above - one of them got really restless with the lack of action, though that was due in part to the posse averting one issue with intimidation, and another through the well timed use of explosives. Definitely recommended if you need an excuse to get your PCs to Dodge City, or if you just want to show off the mad science in the setting.

Sunday Night News - Interface Zero, Heaven's Shadow, Accursed, Warage and Werewolf!

Just a few items to toss out there for your Sunday night news reading:

1. The Birthday Blog Giveaway Ends January 15th! - On January 1st, I unveiled my Top Six of 2013, and gave ya'll a chance to win five of the six products listed on the Top Six. You have just over two days left in which to get your entries in and win some great games. Don't miss out!
2. Interface Zero 2.0 now available! - The second edition of Interface Zero 2.0 has hit in PDF format, and it's bigger and badder. Unfortunately, a review won't be coming...but that's because I worked on this one, pitching in on the editing! I've been a supporter of Gun Metal Games in the past, and I was all too happy to help out in the process of getting this book finished. Pretty much the final word in Savage Worlds Cyberpunk as far as I'm concerned.
3. Heaven's Shadow is on sale! - Heaven's Shadow is on sale for 50% off as part of the New Year's, New Game sale in PDF format, but Bedroom Wall Press has also discounted the print version by 25% until the end of the month in honor of being named one of Tommy's Top Six! Obviously, I would recommend that you not pass on this.
4. Accursed is available in print! - Accursed is a game I've spoken of pretty highly as well, a Savage Setting in which you play a monster fighting in a world overwhelmed by monsters. At the time of my review, the print version was not available...now it's available in softcover, hardcover standard and hardcover premium formats.
5. Warage on Kickstarter - The folks at District Games got ahold of me earlier this month about their game Warage, which is a deckbuilding game that professes to have some RPG elements, and is playable for up to four players out of the box. The publisher says it's already been released in the European Union, and the Kickstarter is to get it printed and released in the US. You "create" your character by combining Race and Class cards for different combinations. Sounds pretty promising, especially as my son and I have been playing more and more card games. The Kickstarter still has a day left to go, and you can get the game for $40 (expected retail is going to be $49). They do have the full rules available on the website, which is always promising for a game Kickstarter. Currently, Elves, Humans, Angels and Orcs are available in the base set, with Warriors, Paladins and Mages available as Classes (no Rogues or Clerics? Interesting). Add ons and Stretch Goals add other options, including Dwarves and Goblins.
6. Ultimate Werewolf Deluxe Edition on Kickstarter - I got to play a version of Werewolf at GlitchCon last year, and had a blast. For those who don't know, everyone has a "role" in the "village", but there's a werewolf (or werewolves) roaming around, killing people. (A version called Mafia is pretty popular on message boards, or so I'm told). The villagers have to figure out who the werewolf is before he eliminates the town, helping sow seeds of dissent as the game goes on. It was a very, very fun party game. Bezier Games launched a Kickstarter for Ultimate Werewolf Deluxe Edition, attempting to make their version of the game bigger and badder. They blew past their initial goal and are blowing past their stretch goals like crazy, already at $30,000+, of a $5,000 goal. Don't like the art on the card sets? That's okay, they have craptons of artist variants for you to choose from. Want to shake it up even more? There's cards for Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, Nostradamus, Sorcerers, Ghosts, it goes on and on. There's a loooooooot of variations available, and buy in for one art set only costs you $25...it's a great looking set to be used for a great looking game...my only problem is I'm lucky to have four people at my table...I can't imagine ever having enough players to play a proper game of this...but if you have lots of friends who are into this sort of thing, this is looking like a Holy Grail kinda deal.

I'm trying to stay on a "twice a week" schedule of reviews, full reviews on Tuesdays and a trifecta of small reviews on Fridays. Is that working out for ya'll? Is the extra focus on board and card games helpful? Or do I have anyone reading this that even cares about that sorta thing? Inquiring minds want to know!

Keep the dice dizzy, and the proof is in the fun!
T.

Tommy's Take on Revolver 1.1, 1.2 and By The Gun They Died

So I recently reviewed the card game Revolver...so now I thought I'd shed a little light on three of the expansions for the game!

Revolver 1.1: Ambush on Gunshot Trail

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Ambush on Gunshot Trail is not required to play Revolver...however, Revolver 1.2 and By The Gun They Died both assume that you are also using Ambush on Gunshot Trail. This small card expansion runs for about $15 retail, and includes cards for both Colonel McReady and Jack Colty, as well as introducing 2 new bandits for Colty (one being Sister Sarah and her Mule), as well as a new mechanic: Ambushes. With Ambushes, McReady was planning ahead, and an Ambush is dealt to each battlefield, sometimes giving McReady more firepower, sometimes killing one of Colty's men, but occasionally it's a false alarm and the Colty gang beats them to the punch. Other new Colty cards include the Cherokee Freedmen and Dragged Behind The Horse (which forcibly moves a Law Dog back one battlefield), while McReady gains Pinkerton Agents, a new Bounty Hunter and even a card that can derail (pun intended) Colty's desperation tactic aboard the train. The new cards are intended to be swapped out of the existing decks, providing a deck tuning mechanic.

WHAT WORKS: More backstory for the new characters (including two that are actually in the promo pack). The Ambush Mechanic adds a new dimension to gameplay without speeding up gameplay, and Colty gains more cannon fodder.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: The price might be a tad high if you can't get a discount somewhere. The gratuitous cleavage from the bounty hunter is, well, gratuitous. I'm not a fan of the deck tuning mechanic, as it slows down an otherwise quick set-up and quick moving game.

CONCLUSION: My son and I have just been integrating the cards into the decks, as all it does is increase the random element, which proves to be more of an equalizer for the two of us. The set exudes a ton of personality, with unique, named characters who are all heroes of their own story. Strong recommendation for this expansion if you're digging Revolver.

Revolver 1.2: Hunt the Man Down

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: This expansion follows on the back of 1.1, going so far as to include an additional ambush card (and a violent one), as well as a new, optional battlefield holding the sadistic Santiago, a prisoner with a mad-on for Colonel McReady. It also introduces a new winning condition for McReady, in the form of bullet tokens Colty can gain over the course of the game. McReady gains more Pinkertons (who now actually draw the fire when on the field), while Colty gains more cards that can circumvent the 3 row limit, if only temporarily. More references to classic westerns abound, and an undertaker is added who can put the newly deceases to rest AND score you more cards.

WHAT WORKS: Impressively, the prison raid adds almost no time to the game, even with Ambushes from 1.1 in full effect, while also adding an additional strategic element, as the Colty player decides if Santiago is worth risking his men over.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Price is still going to be an issue for some, and 1.1 being required for fans wanting to pick this up is going to be annoying for some.

CONCLUSION: So far, so good. The truth about McReady gets a little seedier with each set, while the lines just get greyer and greyer. Major props to the designers for creating a whole new battlefield that adds to the game, but never really slows it down. The continued shout outs to classic westerns is also cool, going above and beyond just abusing common western tropes.

REVOLVER: BY THE GUN THEY DIED

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: This one is completely playable without 1.1 or 1.2, though there are some icons you aren't going to understand at first. Also, this set includes Elias Hooker and Brady Logan, two promo characters released for the game. Again, this set assumes you are going to be deck building/tuning, giving McReady options like Apache Warriors, a Pinkerton Sharpshooter who is made for Whiskey Canyon (the nastiest battlefield for the Colty gang to hide in) and the very thuggish Wriggler Hooley and the Swain Boys. Colty isn't left short handed, adding in the multiplying Bandidos, as well as an alternate version of Bullet (much meaner, as he will take someone with him now), and Turkey Joe (who also pops up in Revolve 2), as well as a card that implies a much deeper relationship was going on between Poppy McReady and Colty.

WHAT WORKS: No new mechanics to learn (aside from the deck tuning), and more cards with personality, both people and events.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: The price, again, seems high, especially since it's not wrapped in any kind of real packaging, either. That said, there are some viable options in this set for fans of the game who like to build decks, as well as some cool cards for guys like me who don't mind piling them all on. Get 1.1 if you can only get one expansion, but the others are worth it if you like the game.

Tommy's Take on EPOCH: Experimental Paradigm Of Cinematic Horror

EPOCH is a very interesting, ambitious horror RPG by Imaginary Empire in which your goal is as much to be the most interesting character as it is to survive the "Horror Movie" you are in.

Tommy's Take on Card of the Dead, Cardstock Cowboys and Horrors of the Weird West

Card of the Dead

You don't have to be the fastest...just faster than the person next to you.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Card of the Dead is a small, light card game (56 cards) from AEG, in which you play people attempting to survive a zombie apocalypse. You have three kinds of cards you can draw: Action cards (which you can play for Movement Points to try to escape the city, or to perform the action listed on the card, like using Lure to sic a zombie on someone else, or Chainsaw to mow down the zombies in front of you), Zombie cards (which are trying to kill you), or Event cards (which come into play immediately, often to your detriment, like Fog which disperses the zombies in play among the players or Swarm, which causes everyone to draw two cards a turn going forward). If you get a certain amount of zombies surrounding you, you can no longer "run"...too many more on top of that, and you're dead. The round ends when a) there's one survivor, b) one person gets enough movement points to escape the city or c) no cards remain in the deck. From there, you get a number of Survival Points based off of how the round ended (but if you have the Bitten card, you don't survive, period). After 3 rounds, the player with the most Survival Points wins.

WHAT WORKS: It's a fun, light card game that a family can play. My wife, my son and I cracked it open and busted through the game with little problem. The cards all feel pretty thematic (like having a Slugger card to fend off Ruffians who want to take your stuff, or Hide, which forces a Zombie in front of you to wander to the next player). Affordable price point (retailing for $10).

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: Some complain that the art's a bit too cartoony. For a simple game, we made a couple of minor rules mistakes due to rough translation of the rules.

CONCLUSION: It's good, light fun that the whole family can play and play quickly, great for a quick, casual game setting. My son (Geek in Training), my wife (very casual gamer) and I (pretty hardcore, as I'm writing a blog about the game) all enjoyed it (even though my wife was a magnet for the Bitten card). A silly time filler for folks that don't take their zombies too seriously.

Deadlands: Cardstock Cowboys

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: This is a printable PDF ($7.49) for figure flats covering most of the major Deadlands needs: Gunslingers, Texas Rangers, Men in Black Dusters, Blessed, Hucksters, Natives of all stripes, shysters, bandits, desperadoes, cultists, most of the previous also on horseback, walkin' dead, Hangin' Judges, wendigos, devil bats, Los Diablos, Mojave Rattlers and even Maze Dragons.

WHAT WORKS: This'll cover most of your Deadlands stand-ups needs. One of the biggest pains we've had is one PC that is a Native who has been Deputized...we managed to find a standup that did a pretty decent impression of him as well. It's cool getting different varieties of the same archetypes. Especially so I don't have to resort to, say, using Necessary Evil figure flats in a Deadlands game. You get 16 PAGES of printable flats, of various sizes as needed (the Prairie Ticks are tiny...the Maze Dragons are massive).

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: This was originally a print product, and the first page has a large trade dress/sidebar that you can't work around if you want to print that first page off. A lot of the art is good, but a bit too small, especially with the color, and it loses something. I've seen smaller images on printable figures that were just line art that printed better because of it. No Harrowed.

CONCLUSION: A really good purchase for a Deadlands fan that uses minis but needs something cheap and easy to fill up his battlefields (i.e. me). I would love a more fully featured product with clearer art and customized printing (like being able to select the figures you want to print off, instead of printing off three separate pages to get to the three figures my players were using, as I had to). I probably would have LOVED this in print, but working with a cheap printer, it is a less than optimal product...still a good purchase, just not a GREAT one.

Deadlands: Horrors of the Weird West

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: The companion product to Cardstock Cowboys, this 8 page document covers pretty much everything from Rascals, Varmints & Critters 1 & 2, including nosferatu, Dracula, demons, the five unique Hangin' Judges, automatons, Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill, John Henry and more.

WHAT WORKS: A really good selection, covering the bulk of the remaining official monsters.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: The same limitations of being designed for a print product hinder the PDF of this as well. Running Night Train and want a legion of Nosferatu? Get ready to print page 1 - including trade dress that covers a quarter of the page, as well as a bunch of creatures you don't have an immediate use for - over and over again. You're also going to get a lot of dead space on some of the pages, which is doubly annoying when it's your ink and paper going into printing these.

CONCLUSION: A more specialized selection than the first set, combined with a sub optimal set-up for home printing, and my recommendation for this set is even more lukewarm than for Cardstock Cowboys. Right now, this is as good as it gets for Deadlands fans, but I would love to have newer sets that took advantage of the advances in technology. It wasn't a waste of money, but it wasn't my wisest purchase, either.

DISCLAIMER: Affiliate links used in the reviews may provide me with store credit to the given stores. None of these products were review products. They were all purchased by me for my personal use.

Tommy's Top Six of 2013 and Birthday Blog Giveaway

As you will recall, my blog very nearly didn't make it through the year after a horrible computer crash last January. Luckily, I was able to acquire a new computer and return to work. Unfortunately, I hit a record low on blog output, though I did have six reviews that particularly stood out to me, and - as is tradition - the first day of the year (and the fourth anniversary of my blog's founding) will be used to recognize those six games.

First, the rules: The Top Six can only feature one product per publisher. Second, my primary exposure, as well as the resulting review, had to have happened over the last year (from December 1st to December 1st). So if I had a product sitting on a my bookshelf that I thumbed through once, put down, and finally realized how great it was later? It qualifies. Actual publication date is irrelevant to me. Finally, I had to have had no involvement in the production of the book.

For those new to the party:
Tommy's Top Six 2010
Tommy's Top Six 2011
Tommy's Top Six 2012

And now, the Top Six, in alphabetical order.

Dragon Age Set 1 (Green Ronin)

Why You should Buy It: A great introductory RPG, I used it for exactly that purpose earlier this year, shortly after watching the now infamous Dragon Age Tabletop video. The boxed set is affordable, with sweet production values and a fast character creation system that provides a good amount of variety in character creation, as well as a cool stunt system that people mention trying to adapt to Savage Worlds about every couple of months. It gets even better when you add in Set 2 (the player aids are a thing of beauty when combined with the stunt system), and set 3 is presumably out later this year (it's been in open playtest for a while, and I kind of imagine that it is being set up now to be released at or near Dragon Age III, for synergy's sake). A fun fantasy RPG with the cinematic swings you get from later versions of D&D, combined with the simplicity on par with Advanced D&D. And if you find that it's been simplified a tad too much, the wonderful blog Dragon Age Oracle has you covered with the Esoterica of Thedas.

Dresden Files: Your Story (Evil Hat Games)

Why You Should Buy It: It is the first Fate RPG that ever SCREAMED "Run me!". This was helped out, noOur World in order to use Your Story, especially if you are going to decouple your game from Dresden's Chicago, though it certainly helps.
doubt, by the fact that I discovered the Dresden Files books last summer and completely and totally fell in love. The magic system covers all of the cool and fun intricacies of Dresden Files magic, and having knowledge of Dresden Files to compare the Fate writeups with did a wonderful job of helping me wrap my head around the intricacies of Fate, which has led to me taking a second look at other Fate books I had dismissed in the past, as well as looking closer at new Fate books. The setting is a great Kitchen Sink urban fantasy setting and, since it's all told from Harry Dresden's perspective, there's a lot of room for flexibility (due to unreliable narrator and lack of knowledge and so forth). The book itself is a thing of beauty, with great production values and the best "informal" writing I've read in an RPG since the Buffy and Angel RPGs. Despite being a two book series, you don't NEED

Heaven's Shadow (Bedroom Wall Press)

Why You Should Buy It: Easily the most unique product in my Top Six, Heaven's Shadow is lean, mean, self-published RPG using a streamlined version of the D6 system to power a game about assassins for Heaven who are waging a war against the demonic Nephilim who are walking amongst humanity. The price has gone up since the game's release, but I still recommend this without reservation...how many RPGs let you play assassins working for God, planning out assassinations against demonic entities wearing human faces...oh, and you can use Faith to enact Miracles (as simple as vanishing from sight, to plunging a building into darkness, to raising the dead). It's cool. Yeah, it's 84 pages, but it's no frills at all, meaning it is all gameable content. As a guy who ISN'T a huge fan of the D6 system (I generally find it to be overrated), this book makes great use of Mini Six. The first two releases on this list are fairly big name items, but products like Heaven's Shadow are a big part of the reason why I keep doing this blog: To make sure you know about the games you are missing out on.

Monster of the Week (Generic Games)

Why You Should Buy It: I have never played or read Apocalypse World, but it brought us tremulus, which
has been a huge hit for me and my group. Monster of the Week is another fruit off of the Apocalypse World tree, emulating things like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Hellboy, Blade, Supernatural and even X-Files, all in the Apocalypse World "fiction first" style. The Playbooks cover a LOT of ground in the genre, especially with the additional Playbooks that have been released. We've had fun with the World Engine thus far, and Monster of the Week is a pretty kick-ass rendition of that Engine, geared towards...um...kicking monster butt. It can be set up for one shots, but where it is really going to shine is in a campaign, as your Monster Hunter's Luck runs out and his story comes to an end (maybe he hangs up his Hellfire Shotgun once and for all...or maybe he dives through a portal to another dimension in order to seal it from the other side). Can't you just feel the drama now?

Sentinels of the Multiverse (Greater Than Games)

Why You Should Buy It: I wrestled long and hard with this one, because it would be the first non-RPG to make this list, but at the end of the day, I would be lying if I didn't put it on here. Why? Because I have logged a ton of hours with this game, I have snapped up the expansions for it, and I will continue to log tons of hours with this game. It is the most fun I have ever had with a card game. It is not uncommon for a rough day at work to be followed up by Netflix and Sentinels of the Multiverse for a little combo I like to call "Geek Solitaire". I only bought it because of the hoopla surrounding the DC Deck Building Game and Marvel Legendary, both of which are fine games in their own right, but both of which pale next to Sentinels of the Multiverse. Just a great, great game, and the expansions (Rook City, Infernal Relics and Shattered Timelines) just make it better. I'm not saying it's not possible to make a better superhero board or card game, but I am saying I haven't seen it yet, and Greater Than Games set a pretty big bar to clear.

Volant - Kingdoms of Air and Stone (Flying Mice Games)

Why You Should Buy It: Like fantasy, but you're tired of the same old, same old? Volant has a solution for
you: It places the entire setting on flying stone kingdoms, with characters riding airships and giant birds as their primary methods of transportation. It gets even better as dogfighting rules are included (not surprising, given some of the author's previous games), and no less than four resolution methods are provided, from gritty to cinematic to turning the game into one of player negotiation. It's not really an "out of the box" game, but Volant includes tools for you to customize your own Volant setting for your adventures. It's the best StarCluster game yet, both in concept and implementation, in my opinion, and it's well worth checking out, especially for "Do It Yourself" gamers and folks who like to play around with fun subsystems (like Volant's Alchemy system).


As is customary, I like to give all of you present for my blog's birthday...as we start the fifth year of this blog's existence, let's get on with the Birthday Blog Giveaway!

Five of the selected publishers were kind enough and generous enough to allow me to offer PDFs of their books as prizes this year, as a way to let me once again say THANK YOU to everyone reading this blog!

From now until 12:01 AM, January 15th, if you email me (tommybrownell(a)gmail(dot)com) with the subject "2013 Top Six" and your choice, in order, of the products you would like to win, you will be entered in the random drawing I'll hold. The first person selected will win their first choice, the second person selected will then win THEIR first choice, unless that choice has already been taken, and so on until all four prizes have been awarded. The winners will be notified via email, and the publishers will be contacted to deliver the electronic prizes to the winners! Here are the prizes:

- One (1) PDF of Dragon Age Set 1
- One (1) PDF of Dresden Files: Our Story.
- One (1) PDF of Heaven's Shadow
- One (1) PDF of Monster of the Week
- One (1) PDF of Volant - Kingdoms of Air and Stone

Good luck to anyone that enters, thank you to the wonderful publishers for providing prize support, and thanks again to everyone that is still reading this blog. Hopefully 2014 is a much bigger and better year for The Most Unread Blog on the Internet. Ever.!

Tommy

Tommy's Take on Revolver 2

So....yesterday, I reviewed Revolver. Today, I review its completely standalone sister (not really sequel) game, Revolver 2.

DISCLAIMER: This review does contain an affiliate link to Amazon.com. Purchasing the game through that link may provide me with referral credit to Amazon. No review copy was provided by the publisher. I acquired this game on my own.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Revolver 2 has the same mechanical base as Revolver, and includes a number of references to the characters in Revolver, but is designed to be completely standalone, from both a a story and a gameplay perspective. Revolver 2 comes in an impressive green tin, setting it apart from Revolver's red tin. The game retails for $30, though Amazon has it deeply discounted as of the time of this review.

The story is the first major change in Revolver 2: Instead of a gang on the run from a Colonel's posse, one player plays a Padre who is hiring gunslingers to defend a Mexican town sitting near a silver mine as a corrupt Mexican warlord is trying to take it over. Yeah, it's got a little bit of Magnificent Seven to it...and if you're a fan of westerns, that's probably a good thing. The winning conditions are similar to Revolver: General Mapache wins if he guns down all of the town's defenders, for instance, and the Padre's men can win if the Padre survives the battle in the silver mine, or if the Mexican army arrives to put an end to the General (mechanically functioning the same as removing the Mexican border tokens in Revolver).

Thematically, the "surviving four rounds in the Silver Mine" doesn't work as well as Jack Colty's "survive four rounds on the 3:15" from Revolver, but it is what it is.

With that base in place, however, we get a number of changes: First, the two players play a poker minigame, three hands worth, and the side that wins 2 out of 3 gets to set a more favorable battlefield layout for the game. In addition, some of the poker hands have over benefits, independent of winning or losing, such as extra Firepower tokens on battlefield spaces, adding or subtracting tokens from the Mexican Army card, or adding cards to your starting hand when the game begins.

The next big change comes at the beginning of the Padre's turn. See, the Padre starts off with seven guardians (counting himself), and can recruit another guardian or two on each turn (an icon on the battlefield tells you how many guardians you can recruit). Well, the Padre has the choice on some battlefields to forgo recruitment and instead skip turns there, moving the clock up faster at the expense of recruiting more people. This can be beneficial at times, because the General has a very powerful secret weapon at the silver mine, but it requires stockpiling cards in order to use properly, and if you can catch him flat footed at the mine, it can make the Padre's endgame easier. Of course, if you miscalculate, it can lead to you just being outgunned in the endgame.

One of the battlefields is called The Los Quantos Bridge, and it brings up another tactic for the Padre: If he has enough cards with TNT icons on them, he can blow the bridge, wiping out anyone or anything that the General has placed on the bridge to stop him. He can use a similar tactic in the Silver Mine, to counter the General's use of the Gatling Gun.

That's where another layer of complexity and strategy comes in: Every card has an effect in its own right, but many of the General's cards include ammo icons, to be used with the Gatling Gun in the endgame, while many of the Padre's cards have TNT icons, to be used at the Bridge or Silver Mine...so a card may be worth more to you in your hand, using it at the right battlefield, rather than just dumping it off in play.

The Padre has two decks of cards to draw from, the first being his regular card deck and the second being his Guardians. The Guardians have a survival rating, like Colty's men in the first game do, indicating just how important they are to the plot and what order they'll die in. Padre Estaban is the hero of this story, and will either see it through, or be the last one gunned down. Some Guardians let you draw a card when they come into play, some force you to discard when they die, some hasten the arrival of the Mexican Army and some stymy it. Zachary McReady, kin to the Colonel from the first game, makes an appearance here as a recruitable gunslinger. There's also a mysterious man named Jim Colt who carries a crow on his shoulder, and who may or may not resemble a certain gang leader from Revolver. There's also Kid Lightning, who has a Survival Rating of 0, but also has TWO Grit Tokens, meaning he can take a licking before he goes down.

As for the Padre's card deck itself, he has cards like Telegrams which remove tokens from the Mexican Army card, speeding their arrival along. Of course, he has different weapons he can drop on the battlefield for his men, as well as cards like "Get Ready For War!" that cause him to sacrifice two of his men in order to take out everyone the General has at a given battlefield. There's also a Kiowa Guide who will help the Mexican Army make better time to the town, bags of rattlesnakes that can take out one of the General's men and even a Stove Plate Jacket (ala Eastwood) that saves one of the Guardians from death.

The General is not without resources, using Swift Horses to move his men from battlefield to battlefield, Sodden Terrain to slow down the approach of the Mexican Army, Alligator Attacks to kill Guardians, powerful gunfighters like Gian Volonte (who is so powerful that the Padre gets to draw a card in order to balance out how scary he is) and Pancho Flores (who also forces the opponent to discard a card when he comes into play). The Las Cuchillos are also frightening, giving the General the option of discarding a card when they come into play and destroying one of the Padre's assets.

Like with Revolver, Revolver 2 will be bloody, with casualties mounting on both sides, and not even killing the General will be enough to stop his men.

WHAT WORKS: The Magnificent Seven with a dash of The Good, The Bad & The Ugly in a card game? Yes, please. The extra bits of strategy are a nice touch without over complicating anything. The connections to the first set are also nice, as easter eggs for players of both sets, without forcing continuity lockout.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: The creeping complexity may bode ill for those that love the simplicity of the first game. The backstory isn't quite as thrilling in this one, being painted as more of a straight, black and white, Good vs Evil tale...though, your mileage may certainly vary on whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. The win condition of waiting out the general in the Silver Mine doesn't work as well, thematically.

CONCLUSION: The backstories and the characters "pop" better in Revolver, but Magnificent Seven is my favorite western of all time, so essentially putting that in card game format is just AWESOME to me. The two Revolver games are just both so very cool to me, impulse purchases that I'm glad I indulged in. Absolutely worth it if you love westerns and you're cool with a 2 player only game. Highly recommended.

Tommy's Take on Revolver

I do primarily review RPGs around here, but I also occasionally venture into other areas, like board and card games. Well, A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across a couple of western-themed card games called Revolver and Revolver 2, which I've since played a few times with my kid.

DISCLAIMER: This review does include an affiliate link to Amazon.com. Purchasing this title from Amazon may result in me receiving a referral credit. A review copy was not provided to me by the publisher, however. I acquired this game on my own.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Revolver is a card based by White Goblin Games & Stronghold Games, featuring a fairly standard western theme: Jack "The Crow" Colty and his gang robbed a bank and are on the run from Col. Ned McReady's posse, trying desperately to make it to the 3:15 Express from Rattlesnake Station, or cross the Mexican border, before Colty and his right hand man Cortez are gunned down.

Retailing for $30, Revolver comes in a sweet, sweet metal tin, with two included card decks (one for each side of the conflict) and a number of extra cards which serve as the battlefields for the conflict (beginning at the bank and running to the train). A bag of wooden pieces are included to count down the Mexican border, as well as a piece to serve as the time tracker in each battlefield.

The Colty gang begins with all of their people on the playing field, rushing together from the bank to the train station. The McReady player will unleash assets at each field, from deputies and bounty hunters to named characters like Deputy Weathers and McReady himself. Characters can get Grit tokens, which can allow them to survive the first attempt at killing them, and Firepower tokens, which boosts their effectiveness in combat.

If the Colty gang loses a fight on the McReady player's turn, one of The Crow's men dies, selected by the Colty player based on his men's Survival Rating (some guys are doomed to die before the others). Some folks just die, others cause different effects. For instance, killing Bruno "Hen House" Caple cuts off Colty's access to Peacemaker .45s. If Manolito dies, The Crow finds out Manolito was a traitor and this cuts off two of the tokens blocking access to the Mexican border. If you kill Kittens McKenzie before the gang reaches the 3:15, it gives the posse more time to hunt the gang through Rattlesnake Creek as Kittens presumably knows that area better than the rest.

Stronger cards, on both sides, are played by discarding other cards...and some cards get cheaper to play as the game goes on. For instance, Col. McReady is expensive to deploy at the bank, but he won't miss the gunfight at the train for anything. The McReady player can play as many cards to a battlefield as he likes, but the Colty gang can only play three cards per battlefield...and McReady can drop cards like Narrow Bridge and Cactus Field which cuts those available slots down further.

Colty's deck also includes cards that move up the clock, putting the gang on the road in order to keep from getting trapped, cards like "Fire At Will" that lets his men gun down some of McReady's men, Sandstorm (which imposes a two card limit on McReady's side of the field) and Saddlebags (which let you snap up a card from a battlefield to take to another, as cards normally stay behind as the gang runs).

McReady's deck also has time management cards which force the Colty gang to stay on the battlefield an extra turn, "Get The Rope, Boys" (which lets you lynch a Colty gang member), Rattlesnake Bite (which will kill a gang member if they don't discard a card), a card indicating the gang has been betrayed (which kills two people unless the Colty player discards two cards), a Buffalo Stampede which inflicts a ton of damage and more.

Each battlefield has a defensive modifier for the Colty gang, ranging from +0 to +3, as they use the terrain for natural defense. The Colty player also has one more, last ditch tactic they can use at the train, derailing it in order to inflict death and chaos. This will kill every one of Colty's remaining men, but the player can discard cards in order to keep his men alive.

As swell as all this sounds, it's the little things that really sell the game: The book includes character bios for every character in the game, unveiling layers to the backstory that twist it on its ear. Is Crow a criminal? Well, yeah...but he's also been wronged, as his father had his farm stolen out from under him. One of his gang members is Poppy McReady...daughter of the Colonel...and all kinds of hints and outright statements in the backstory that the Colonel is one shady bastard. None of it DIRECTLY affects gameplay, especially in this first set, but the attention to story is very admirable.

There is a fair bit of strategy to the game, as the McReady side has to recognize which battles to fight and which to let go of, while the Colty player can focus on either surviving the full gauntlet and escaping on the train or focusing on running out the Mexican border (a token comes off of the Mexican border card for each turn McReady has in which he fails to kill a Colty member).

No matter what, the game WILL be very bloody, with a lot of casualties. This isn't a Roy Rogers western.

WHAT WORKS: The production values are excellent. The gameplay is fun and simple, and feels very "western". The gameplay is surprisingly deep in the core set, while still playing quickly. Despite the recommended age of 12+, my 10 year old both enjoys and understands the game perfectly fine.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK: The fact that a lot of the cards on both sides are either re-skinned, or merely opposite numbers of a card on the other side. Some complaints have been made about the art, as some of the women are fairly scantily clad and some parents may not be suitable with 12 year olds (the recommended age) playing it.

CONCLUSION: A very awesome two player card game that I've already played a fair bit and plan on playing more of. The expansions are largely designed to swap in and out with the existing card decks, rather than adding to them, so the game should avoid a lot of bloat that games with expansions tend to have. As mentioned above, the game is awesome and thematic out of the box, but adding in the backstory makes it doubly cool. Very highly recommended if you are a fan of westerns and card games, especially if you're not so much into the Deadlands or Shadows of Brimstone style of supernatural western.

Tommy's Take on Sentinels of the Multiverse

So, for those who follow me on Facebook and Google+, you know that I have recently become obsessed with Sentinels of the Multiverse. With that said, this review is gonna be a bit fanboyish because, well, the game has turned me into a Fanboy.

The box art to the first edition of the game.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: First off, this review is of the first edition of the game, which is no longer in print and has been replaced with the Enhanced Edition. I picked up the first edition on clearance for $10 at an area game store, and I’m glad I did. But I suppose I should tell you just what Sentinels of the Multiverse IS. Sentinels is a cooperative Superhero card game for 2-5 players (officially…if you are willing to run multiple heroes, you can play solo), designed to emulate a team of heroes battling a villain in a comic book environment. Each hero is represented by a character card that features their hitpoints, base power and card effects if incapacitated (more on that in a bit), as well a deck of cards that represent their tactics and abilities. Each villain is represented by two cards (one showing hit points and one showing any relevant powers, set-up requirements or alternate win conditions) and a deck of cards featuring their minions, powers and tactics. Lastly, each environment has a deck of cards that represents the perils and pitfalls of the environment.

Each game begins by selecting a hero for each player, a villain to face and the environment. For solo games, I use this very handy randomizer (which allows you to filter out cards that you don’t have). Each hero, villain and environment feels very, very different, making each game a unique experience. The base game has ten heroes, four villains and four environments, and expansions are available that include more heroes, villains and environments.

While the game doesn’t include established, licensed characters, the heroes and villains all feel familiar to classic characters, while having some quirks that help them stand alone. Each character comes with a bio in the rulebook, and many of the heroes and villains share symbols on their cards, marking them as archenemies (meaning they do more damage to each other).

Gameplay is simple at its core. All heroes draw four cards, while you set up any relevant set-up requirements for the villains. From there, each round consists of multiple turns, beginning with the Villain Turn. Draw the top card of the Villain Deck, resolve it and move on to the heroes. Each hero can play a card, then use a power, then draw a new card. When every hero has a chance to go, then you play and resolve an Environment card. Play continues until all the heroes are beaten, the villain is reduced to 0 hit points, or any alternate win conditions are met. The list of heroes include:

• Legacy – A hybrid of Captain America and Superman, Legacy is a heroic leader who is capable of absorbing and inflicting damage, while also inspiring his team to greater feats.
• The Wraith – A young, female vigilante who uses equipment and martial arts to fight crime, while using stealth to avoid damage.
• Haka – A savage, tribal warrior. Haka is capable of inflicting great damage.
• Bunker – A soldier in an armored suit, Bunker can shift between multiple “Modes” that allow him to manipulate his card deck and can command an impressive arsenal.
• Tachyon – The Quickest Woman on Earth can keep enemies off-balance and inflict crazy damage if she speeds through her card deck.
• Ra, The Sun God – A damage dealing powerhouse if he gets going, Ra can even boost his teammates’ damage output.
• Tempest – A weather manipulating alien who can harm as well as heal.
• Visionary – A psychic who has returned from the future to keep her horrible reality from coming to pass, she can manipulate not only her deck, but other decks in the game, as well as turning minions on their masters!
• Fanatic – An angel on a righteous crusade. Can sacrifice her health to give the heroes an advantage.
• Absolute Zero – One of the more complicated heroes in the game to play, Absolute Zero is kinda like a heroic Mr. Freeze, with all the pros and cons you might expect from that.

The four included villains are a motley crew of enemies.

• Baron Blade hates Legacy with a passion. He’s intent on destroying the Earth by pulling the moon into it, and if enough cards make it into the discard pile, he succeeds.
• Grand Warlord Voss tried to enslave Tempest, and he brings his army of slaves to Earth to take it over. If he ever gets enough minions into play, Earth is overran.
• Omnitron is a sentient robot factory who can go on a horrible rampage. Even if you destroy him, he can still live on if you don’t shut down his other devices.
• Citizen Dawn, leader of RISE, is a superhuman supremacist who will make you battle her followers in addition to her.

The four environments add their own personality to the mix.

• Megalopolis has derailed monorails, traffic jams, innocent bystanders and more to deal with.
• Wagner Mars Base can turn its automated defenses on you, and the red dust of Mars can be brutal on those that rely on equipment.
• The Ruins of Atlantis has leaky rooms (that conduct electricity), fonts of power (that anyone can tap into) and even the every present threat of The Kraken!
• Insula Primalis is essentially the Savage Land, complete with dinosaur attacks!

One cool and interesting effect is that the Hero character cards get flipped over if the heroes get reduced to 0 hit points…opening up three options that the player can pick from for their fallen hero, typically based off of the Powers and Cards from that hero’s card and deck. This is meant to emulate the idea of the remaining heroes fighting harder after their teammates go down. It’s a thematically awesome mechanic that keeps a player in the game after their hero goes down (albeit in a diminished role).

Many of the card decks can feed off of each other, and some heroes will have an easier time against some villains, while the environments can make all the difference in the world in some games. The game does have more complexity than your average card game, and I’ve taken to tracking hit points with dice, because you can have a lot of them to manage in a given game. The Enhanced Edition includes counters that you can use for that, as well as updated game mechanics meant to balance out some of the cards a bit better.

WHAT WORKS: Well, this is the most fun I’ve ever had with a superhero board or card game. At times, it rivals the fun I’ve had with superhero RPGs. Every card deck stands out, making their mark on a given game. The basic flow of the game is simple to learn, while the strategy of the card decks can take a bit to master.

WHAT DOESN’T WORK: Tracking all of the modifiers, hit points and card-induced conditions can get cumbersome and it can become easy to miss something. Also, the game is becoming a time sink because I’m playing it too much.

CONCLUSION: The proof is in the fun. I picked this up the same day I got Legendary and the DC Deck Building game. I’ve played the latter once and the former a handful of times, while I have latched onto this on and played it like crazy, even ordering the Rook City and Infernal Relics expansion (and just ordering Shattered Timelines, the Unity, Ambuscade, Scholar and Miss Information hero and villain decks and The Final Wasteland and Silver Gulch environment decks). There is a good chunk of strategy to the game (whole guides are available for each character on the internet), as well as a little luck of the draw, which helps boost the replayability, in my opinion.

The Enhanced Edition. Buy this unless you hate fun.

Just a fantastic, well-made game that is not only a fun playthrough, but a love letter to the superhero genre. This has quickly moved into position as my favorite card game, and I recommend it to anyone that loves superheroes and card games, but doesn’t mind a bit of book keeping. If I could do it all over, I would skip the $10 first edition purchase and go straight to the Enhanced Edition.

DISCLAIMER: While this was a purchase freely acquired with my own money, an affiliate link is provided above, which could result in me gaining a portion of any sales made through that link.