FFG Announces New Expansions & Games

@charlest

Did that come out yet? I thought about backing it back in the day when you reviewed it.

Not yet, but I believe the version I played was final. I think it's almost through production.

If you want good chinese food, go to Chinatown. If you want good RPG . . .

Boardgames are designed to be structured. It’s their strength.

This one does seem to be entirely up my alley but I think my concerns stem from them leaning too much into the tactical mini's game from the terrain.

I am really intrigued by the new mechanics, I like the two sided cards and spending a ready to flip (want to swap between daggers and a bow, gotta use up either an action or invest in that somehow else). Those types of choices feel impactful (room full of skeletons, worth spending the action to swap the spear for the mace).

I am ok with positioning being important. It looks like every hero is forced to take movement every turn. The previewed weapons also look like they push and pull enemies frequently. I actually liked this in Imperial Assault. One of my favorite missions was at the Saarlac pit. I had a sub-par hero who had high health but no armor die at all. The one thing he did was push small figures. I loved throwing all the imperials into the Saarlac.

Not interested in the terrain. Either all the terrain is generic (a well and a barricade are identical, they block LoS and movement) or they are all unique. I am not interested in all the terrain being unique. In the battle map missions in Journeys in Middle Earth they had all sorts of terrain effects; interact with a table to gain one inspiration and a positive status, interact with stones to make a weak ranged attack, interact with a log for x. Blah! I never used a single one once even on the highest difficulty. Interacting with the terrain was never, ever, ever worth the opportunity cost of an action unless for some reason the board was momentarily cleared and then it became a win more moment.

Frankly if we have a DM/GM there is no reason not to go for a version of D&D. It would be cheaper, have more customization, we could crib minis from any number of games, etc.

I think the terrain is a mistake. I will probably still bite the bullet and buy it eventually. I think time will tell how well the app performs.

I just read the blurb on the FFG website. First word is Terrinoth.....I couldn't stop laughing.

Descent: Moria should have been a thing by now.

ChristopherMD wrote: Descent: Moria should have been a thing by now.

The expansion for JOURNEYS IN MIDDLE EARTH has some alleged Moria content, but the overall game lacks the flavor to make you believe you’re in Middle Earth.

ChristopherMD wrote: Descent: Moria should have been a thing by now.

Anyone else ever read those 80's era LOTR homage novels by Dennis L Mckiernan? He did one (Silver Call duologu IIRC) that was basically the dwarves retaking Moria after the fall of Mordor. They needed some Hobb... err Warrows because they were the descendants of not-Frodo and not-Samwise who had recorded the path through. Anyway, it would be a pretty cool subject for a tactical level LOTR game if anyone could ever progress the timeline.

ubarose wrote: To be fair, typically in traditional DnD very little of the "story telling" happens in the Dungeon. Once the party hits that part of the game, it's mostly just navigating the maze, fighting and picking up loot. The majority of the story happens in the adventure leading up to entering the dungeon.

This is exactly why the system never really worked for me. I want RPGs to sent me to another dimension, give me an out-of-person experience, that sort of thing. To be part of a bigger story than one single person can conceive.
Rules lawyering and power gaming made me feel like playing a Euro with the wrong crowd. The direction FFG went in the last years has puzzled me. Probably makes sense from a market analysis data perspective of optimised predicted returns in joint with pushing own established brands like Terrinoth. *cough*
Most of these these recent dungeon crawlers look to me like Ameritrash for Eurogamers. But there surely is a reason why Knizia never did a crawler.

ubarose wrote: To be fair, typically in traditional DnD very little of the "story telling" happens in the Dungeon. Once the party hits that part of the game, it's mostly just navigating the maze, fighting and picking up loot.

That's a point, and likely why most of the adventuring I do in my group of players (this is traditional D&D) is driven by travel via boat, overland on horses, and very little time in "dungeons". In fact my map book is the size of a paperback and the maps in it are generally six or eight rooms in size. This is a little more attached to reality, and keeps the getting-dirty part of the adventure delivered in small enough doses.

As often as not there's a fair chunk of figuring out mysteries in our stuff, more oriented to investigative or political intrigue aspects.

I appreciate the bulk of the young audience (let's say under 25 for that) is more interested in the hack and slash aspects and the loot. So there's a market there. But if you could imagine a game that began with something like Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective that for some locations said "go to the app and type code 3375" that resulted in a Descent scenario then you could greatly expand the breadth of play without requiring very much if any additional components.

If Descent was providing me with that I'd be a little more interested in having a look. As it stands there isn't much there. Granted, none of what I just described is role-playing, but at least it's a little more interesting than killing spiders.

How do you challenge your D&D players with small dungeons? My usual experience with D&D is that the healing magic turns the game into a slow war of attrition unless you can lure the players into a remote and dangerous location where resting and healing is not reliably safe. Otherwise, it's too easy for players to pull back and take frequent breaks whenever they get a little scuffed up.

I once tried to run a murder mystery for a D&D group that was around 10th level. The cleric ruined the mystery by casting Raise Dead on the victim and asking him who killed him. A lower level party might accomplish a similar workaround with Speak With Dead.

One dragon can ruin your whole day dude.

I'm a big fan of putting something in that is way over the team's head and forcing them to think creatively on how to get through it. I'm as happy with them finding an innovative way of getting the magic book out from under Puff's butt without killing him as I am with them killing him and taking it afterwards. Typically I award experience points equally for either.

And frankly, it's because of what you just said. If the team has time to recharge they're more or less indestructible. It's a lot harder to heal your buddies when they're neck-deep in combat.

The BARROWMAZE megadungeon has a bunch of little mausoleums all around it that are 2-6 rooms. Suitable for quick delves. Ghouls are particularly nasty, since if they get surprise, that’s a free attack for all of them, and if they get initiative, then that’s two attacks in a row. (It’s written for Labyrinth Lord, which uses group initiative instead of individual initiative.) If even one or two PCs fail to save vs. paralysis, then what looked like a fair fight easily spirals into a potential TPK.