Tag: Variable Player Powers

Circadians: Chaos Order

| T3d-1978

The initial quakes were only minor tremors, but as the land began to unravel, so did our sense of security. We watched the cliffs of Hytazch fall into the sea. Mighty trees of old, swallowed up by the caverns below. As the waters rose, a great roar was heard across the plains. This was no cry of disbelief or heartache, but of jubilance. Songs began to fill the air as our once peaceful hosts, now readied themselves for war. Suddenly on the horizon, what appeared as huge bolts of energy shoot out into the depths of space, before disappearing again. Despite the inevitable shock wave heading our way, the clans continued to cheer as they made haste towards the origin of the blaze. What could cause such elation? Why abandon caution in favour of chaos? Had we missed something – some crucial misunderstanding of this planet and its inhabitants? Upon reaching the site, we were immediately plunged into combat. Across the landscape lay six massive structures, towering over the forces fighting below. They seemed to pulse and flicker with a golden haze. Could these be the ancient relics the Oxataya spoke of? There is so much we still do not understand, but we cannot concede to indecision. Will we stay and fight, or retreat back to Moontide?

In Circadians: Chaos Order, players take on the role of 1 of 6 asymmetric factions. Each faction has their own means of winning the game, unique leaders, attribute cards and other abilities.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Drafting
  • Area Majority / Influence
  • Hand Management
  • Variable Player Powers
  • Wargame

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • 120 – 240 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.84

Black Rose Wars

| T3d-1978

Black Rose Wars is a competitive fantasy game of deck-building, strategy, and combat set in the hectic universe of Nova Aetas in Italy. Each player is one of powerful mages of the Black Rose Order who aspires to become the new Supreme Magister in order to acquire the mighty power of the Black Rose Artifact and the Forgotten Magic. Mages must fight, fulfill Black Rose desires, and gain strength with their spells until their power reaches the containment threshold of the prison where they are exiled, finally freeing themselves. Each mage has at their disposal six schools of magic, each one with its own strategy to annihilate their opponents and increase their power.

At the start of the battle, mages start with a grimoire of six cards; as mages study more spells during play, their grimoire will increase. Every spell in Black Rose Wars has two different effects, increasing a player’s adaptability during a fight.

Mages fight each other in a modular arena of hexagons called “rooms”. They summon powerful creatures, cast destructive spells, or devise dark deceptions with their enchantments. The game system is divided into different phases. Each turn, after choosing new spells from the six schools of magic, players plan their strategy in advance, placing cards face down. Later, they reveal the played cards to kill each other, solve missions, summon creatures, or destroy the prison rooms, one against each other and against the Black Rose (the playing system).
After being killed, mages are reborn immediately, allowing them to re-enter the fight without delay — although their death still fed energy to those mages who caused it.
The mage with the most power at the end of the battle will be crowned Supreme Magister of the Order by the Black Rose itself.

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Majority / Influence
  • Bluffing
  • Campaign
  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Modular Board
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.47

Best of the West

| T3d-1978

Best of the West is an open-world game set in the Wild West! It features asymmetrical gameplay where you can go it alone as a Pioneer or join up with the co-op Bandit Gang. Since the game is heavily player vs player, it requires both Pioneers and Bandits in similar numbers. A single Round consists of the Pioneer turns (rotating player order) and then Bandit Gang’s turn (any order). Either the Bandit Gang team or the Pioneer with the highest Reputation at the end of 25 Rounds wins the game.

For Pioneers, Reputation is mostly earned by doing a job (Panning or Mining for Gold, Herding Livestock, Trapping for Furs). For Bandits, Reputation is primarily gained by robbing the Pioneers. Additional cash and Reputation can be earned by robbing the Train, Saloon, and Bank or by performing a Jailbreak. Cash allows you to load up with Weapons, Items, and Pets. Power Cards that grant extra abilities, upgrades, and utility bonuses can be collected around the map at the Indian Village, Saloon, and Ghost Town.

Pioneers move using Movement Cards and can also ride the Train that travels around the map every Round. Bandits move either by using Movement Cards or Ambush Cards. Ambush Cards allow a Bandit to secretly hide on a space on the board. Battling is primarily dice-based, but also includes Power Cards and character abilities.

Game Mechanics:

  • Bribery
  • Dice Rolling
  • Hidden Movement
  • Team Based
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 6 Players
  • 120 – 180 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 4.00

Barrage

| T3d-1978

In the dystopic 1930s, the industrial revolution pushed the exploitation of fossil-based resources to the limit, and now the only thing powerful enough to quench the thirst for power of the massive machines and of the unstoppable engineering progress is the unlimited hydroelectric energy provided by the rivers.

Barrage is a resource management strategic game in which players compete to build their majestic dams, raise them to increase their storing capacity, and deliver all the potential power through pressure tunnels connected to the energy turbines of their powerhouses.

Each player represents one of the four international companies who are gathering machinery, innovative patents and brilliant engineers to claim the best locations to collect and exploit the water of a contested Alpine region crossed by rivers.

Barrage includes two innovative and challenging mechanisms. First, the players must carefully plan their actions and handle their machinery, since both their action tokens and resources are stored on a Construction Wheel and will only be available after a full turn of the wheel. The better you manage your wheel, the earlier your resources and actions come back to you.

Second, the water flow on the rivers depicted on the board is a shared and contested resource. Players have to intercept and store as much of the water as they can, build dams (upstream dams are expensive but can block part of the water before it reaches the downstream dams), raise the dams to increase their capacity, and build long tunnels to channel the water to their powerhouses. Water is never consumed — its flow is just used to produce energy —, it is instead released back to the rivers, so you have to strategically place your dams to recover the water diverted by you and the other players.

Over five rounds, the players must fulfill power requirements represented by a common competitive power track and meet specific requests of personal contracts. At the same time, by placing a limited number of engineers, they attempt to enhance their machinery to acquire new and more efficient construction actions and to build and activate special unique-effect buildings to forward their own developing strategy.

Game Mechanics:

  • Economic
  • Network Building
  • Solo / Solitaire Game
  • Variable Player Powers
  • Worker Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 60 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 4.12

Arkham Horror: The Card Game

| T3d-1978

Something evil stirs in Arkham, and only you can stop it. Blurring the traditional lines between role-playing and card game experiences, Arkham Horror: The Card Game is a Living Card Game of Lovecraftian mystery, monsters, and madness!

In the game, you and your friend (or up to three friends with two Core Sets) become characters within the quiet New England town of Arkham. You have your talents, sure, but you also have your flaws. Perhaps you’ve dabbled a little too much in the writings of the Necronomicon, and its words continue to haunt you. Perhaps you feel compelled to cover up any signs of otherworldly evils, hampering your own investigations in order to protect the quiet confidence of the greater population. Perhaps you’ll be scarred by your encounters with a ghoulish cult.

No matter what compels you, no matter what haunts you, you’ll find both your strengths and weaknesses reflected in your custom deck of cards, and these cards will be your resources as you work with your friends to unravel the world’s most terrifying mysteries.

Each of your adventures in Arkham Horror LCG carries you deeper into mystery. You’ll find cultists and foul rituals. You’ll find haunted houses and strange creatures. And you may find signs of the Ancient Ones straining against the barriers to our world…

The basic mode of play in Arkham LCG is not the adventure, but the campaign. You might be scarred by your adventures, your sanity may be strained, and you may alter Arkham’s landscape, burning buildings to the ground. All your choices and actions have consequences that reach far beyond the immediate resolution of the scenario at hand—and your actions may earn you valuable experience with which you can better prepare yourself for the adventures that still lie before you.

Game Mechanics:

  • Campaign
  • Cooperative
  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Limited Communication
  • Push Your Luck
  • Role Playing
  • Solo / Solitaire Game
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 60 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.55

Arkham Horror

| T3d-1978

The year is 1926, and it is the height of the Roaring Twenties. Flappers dance till dawn in smoke-filled speakeasies, drinking alcohol supplied by rum runners and the mob. It’s a celebration to end all celebrations in the aftermath of the War to End All Wars.

Yet a dark shadow grows in the city of Arkham. Alien entities known as Ancient Ones lurk in the emptiness beyond space and time, writhing at the thresholds between worlds. Occult rituals must be stopped and alien creatures destroyed before the Ancient Ones make our world their ruined dominion.

Only a handful of investigators stand against the Arkham Horror. Will they prevail?

Arkham Horror (Third Edition) is a cooperative board game for one to six players who take on the roles of investigators trying to rid the world of eldritch beings known as Ancient Ones. Based on the works of H.P. Lovecraft, players will have to gather clues, defeat terrifying monsters, and find tools and allies if they are to stand any chance of defeating the creatures that dwell just beyond the veil of our reality.

Game Mechanics:

  • Cooperative
  • Dice Rolling
  • Modular Board
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 6 Players
  • 120 – 180 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.36

Descent: Journeys in the Dark (Second Edition)

| T3d-1978

In Descent: Journeys in the Dark (Second Edition), one player takes on the role of the treacherous overlord, and up to four other players take on the roles of courageous heroes. During each game, the heroes embark on quests and venture into dangerous caves, ancient ruins, dark dungeons, and cursed forests to battle monsters, earn riches, and attempt to stop the overlord from carrying out his vile plot.

With danger lurking in every shadow, combat is a necessity. For such times, Descent: Journeys in the Dark (Second Edition) uses a unique dice-based system. Players build their dice pools according to their character’s abilities and weapons, and each die in the pool contributes to an attack in different ways. Surges, special symbols that appear on most dice, also let you trigger special effects to make the most of your attacks. And with the horrors awaiting you beneath the surface, you’ll need every advantage you can take…

Featuring double-sided modular board pieces, countless hero and skill combinations, and an immersive story-driven campaign, Descent: Journeys in the Dark (Second Edition) transports heroes to a vibrant fantasy realm where they must stand together against an ancient evil.

Compared to the first edition of Descent: Journeys in the Dark, this game features:

  • Simpler rules for determining line of sight
  • Faster setup of each encounter
  • Defense dice to mitigate the tendency to “math out” attacks
  • Shorter quests with plenty of natural stopping points
  • Cards that list necessary statistics, conditions, and effects
  • A new mechanism for controlling the overlord powers
  • Enhanced hero selection and creation process
  • Experience system to allow for hero growth and development
  • Out-of-the-box campaign system

Game Mechanics:

  • Hand Management
  • Modular Board
  • Role Playing
  • Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
  • Solo / Solitaire Game
  • Team-Based Game
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 5 Players
  • ~120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.21

Defenders of the Realm

| T3d-1978

“Our Liege is in desperate hour! From what grievous cause have these accursed races arisen? Orcs, Dragons, Demons and the Dead make haste towards Monarch City. The King and Countryside of Monarch City is in need of valiant Heroes!”

Will you answer the King’s call?

In the ancient Citadel of Monarch City, the King calls to arms the finest Heroes to defend against a Darkness that engulfs the land. You and your allies must embark on a journey to defend the countryside, repair the tainted lands, and defeat the four creature factions before any of them enter the City. And they approach from all sides! Fast populating Orcs! Fierce Dragons! Undead that bring Fear! And Demons! All tainting the land in their wake. There are several paths to defeat, but only one path to victory, and only the most valiant Hero will be named King’s Champion.

Defenders of the Realm is a co-operative fantasy board game in which 1-4 players take a role as one of the King’s Champions (Choose from Cleric, Dwarf, Eagle Rider, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer and Wizard). You, as one of the King’s Heroes, make use of strategy, special abilities, cooperation, card play and a little luck in Defenders of the Realm for a unique experience every adventure. But be forewarned! There is never time to rest. As each Enemy General is struck down in battle, the remaining dark forces only grow more difficult to vanquish and their march to Monarch City gets faster with each Hero victory!

Game Mechanics:

  • Cooperative Game
  • Hand Management
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • ~90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.69

Dead of Winter

| T3d-1978

“Crossroads” is a game series from Plaid Hat Games that tests a group of survivors’ ability to work together and stay alive while facing crises and challenges from both outside and inside. Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game, the first title in this series, puts 2-5 players in a small, weakened colony of survivors in a world in which most of humanity is either dead or diseased, flesh-craving monsters. Each player leads a faction of survivors, with dozens of different characters in the game.

Dead of Winter is a meta-cooperative psychological survival game. This means players are working together toward one common victory condition, but for each individual player to achieve victory, they must also complete their personal secret objective, which could relate to a psychological tick that’s fairly harmless to most others in the colony, a dangerous obsession that could put the main objective at risk, a desire for sabotage of the main mission, or (worst of all) vengeance against the colony! Games could end with all players winning, some winning and some losing, or all players losing. Work toward the group’s goal, but don’t get walked all over by a loudmouth who’s looking out only for their own interests!

Dead of Winter is an experience that can be accomplished only through the medium of tabletop games, a story-centric game about surviving through a harsh winter in an apocalyptic world. The survivors are all dealing with their own psychological imperatives, but must still find a way to work together to fight off outside threats, resolve crises, find food and supplies, and keep the colony’s morale up.

Dead of Winter has players making frequent, difficult, heavily-thematic, wildly-varying decisions that often have them deciding between what’s best for the colony and what’s best for themselves. The rulebook also includes a fully co-operative variant in which all players work toward the group objective with no personal goals.

Game Mechanics:

  • Hand Management
  • Push Your Luck
  • Scenario / Mission / Campaign Game
  • Semi-Cooperative Game
  • Storytelling
  • Trading
  • Traitor Game
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • 60 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.01

Cult of the Deep

| T3d-1978

You are a cultist, trying to establish your faction’s rise to power. Fight over rituals and mythical monsters as you seek victory and control of the cult.

Roles

Each player is given a role that will remain hidden throughout the game, except the High Priest. This role will determine your win condition:

  • High Priest – Root out corruption in the cult. Kill all Cabalists, the Heretic, and survive.
  • Cabalists – Seek to take control of the cult. Kill the High Priest.
  • Faithful – Protect the High Priest from threats to their power. Kill all Cabalists, the Heretic, and the High Priest must survive.
  • Heretic – Burn the whole cult to the ground. Kill the entire cult, yourself included if necessary.

Extra abilities

Each player will also be given a:

  • Character card that determines their starting health, special ability, and a power symbol that provides an additional way to gain life from the dice.
  • Secret sigil card, which gives each cultist a once per game power, will also be given to each player.

Mechanics

A player will take a turn by first rolling their dice up to 3 times. They then decide where to commit their dice: to rituals to gain altar effects to temporarily empower themselves, finish a ritual in order to gain its powerful effects permanently, stab other cultists, gain life, or give life to other cultists.

If a player is killed, they are not eliminated. Instead, they become a wraith. They will roll dice on their turn still, just less. They cannot commit dice like normal but instead haunt the dice of enemies and allies by giving, replacing, or discarding dice.

Game Mechanics:

  • Bribery
  • Deduction
  • Hidden Roles
  • Push Your Luck
  • Re-rolling and Locking
  • Team-Based Game
  • Variable Player Powers

Game Specifications:

  • 4 – 8 Players
  • 45 – 75 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.71