Anniversarydome - Descent: JitD VS DOOM: TBG

In celebration of Trashdome having started in mid-February 2009 so now being over a year old I thought it would be cool to do a one-time rematch between the two games that started it all. I have to admit I honestly didn't expect that I would stick with doing these for a full year with more to come. I'd like to thank all the people who've commented they liked reading Trashdome each week as that is what has kept me interested in continuing to post them.


Previous Scores

Descent: Journeys In The Dark = 6
metalface13
Michael Barnes
Space Ghost
Octavian
timeLESS
Columbob

DOOM: The Board Game = 10
Schweig!
Shellhead
dysjunct
Juniper
Aarontu
Ken B.
jeb
Beisaic
KingPut
caradoc


A year later will anyone vote differently? Will Descent get enough new votes to win? Will Mr Skeletor finally vote? Will more people participate this time?

DESCENT!

doom!

Some really good arguments for both games so far...

*yawn*

reminds me of some of the early trashdomes.

I haven't played descent and eventually I will. but what i've read, makes it seems like just tons of stuff. throwing tons of stuff in a box doesn't necessarily make it better. Doom just seems like a tighter design. there aren't any weapons that will simply be bypassed. everything is picked up and everything is used.

Mad Dog wrote:

Some really good arguments for both games so far...

*yawn*

Says the guy who didn't even fucking vote .......

My vote for Doom stays. I could copy and paste my original comment here, but I'm lazy and IIRC it was something along the lines of Descent sucks and I'd rather play D&D.

It's been a year and I still haven't tried Doom, but I stick with my Descent vote. I also haven't played it in a year but its still probably my favorite game in my closet. It's big and bulky but epic and awesome.

I love the variety of heroes, items, treasure, abilities and monsters. If I had more people to play with Descent would be coming out a lot more often.

Vote: Descent

Doom. Descent is a bit over-wrought. it's a decent game, which i am generally happy to play, but Doom is a bit more nuts.

Descent, I have both but I find the game in Descent to be a little more fun, besides, my wife will play Descent, I doubt she would play Doom

We've been playing "Descent" quite a bit more lately, and I must say we're having lots of fun. It'll probably pass in a bit, since you can't have too much Descent as it can get really boring and tedious sometimes. I've played the Descent Quest mod (using the Vassal module) and it's pretty damn fun. I rarely get to play as the heroes and this is great.

Oh, I said "Descent" because we've houseruled the hell out of the game as we don't like a lot of the design decisions made for it. The one-hit bosses, the focus on fatigue and the lack of a real time pressure for the heroes are just some of the few problems we "fixed".

Bottomline is, I like fantasy better and the theme of Doom is just off for me.

kookoobah wrote:

We've been playing "Descent" quite a bit more lately, and I must say we're having lots of fun. It'll probably pass in a bit, since you can't have too much Descent as it can get really boring and tedious sometimes. I've played the Descent Quest mod (using the Vassal module) and it's pretty damn fun. I rarely get to play as the heroes and this is great.

You should write up a review of Descent Quest, I've seen it but haven't tried it out yet.

Doom!

Because Octavian did not vote for it!

Vote: DOOM

-It has the cooler and more unique theme.

-It plays faster than Descent. Descent seems to just drag on and on, and when I play I keep thinking how this encounter would already be over if we were playing D&D, and I think D&D drags on and on in large battles!

-Descent has a bunch of extra cool stuff that doesn't really add much to the game. It's just "feature bloat" in a board game.

-The mechanics of the game were made for DOOM, not a fantasy dungeoncrawl. Monster spawning makes sense in DOOM because the monsters are actually spawning out of thin air. In Descent, it feels mechanical and gamey. I can forgive player respawning in a game based on a video game, but in Descent you get to buy stuff when you die and then warp back in on the next turn? It feels more like a trip to the mall than anything like dying.

-Did I mention that marines blowing up demons from Hell with rocket launchers and chainsaws in a Martian outpost is cooler than whacking skeleton archers with your magical sword in a generic fantasy dungeon?

Aarontu wrote:

The mechanics of the game were made for DOOM, not a fantasy dungeoncrawl. Monster spawning makes sense in DOOM because the monsters are actually spawning out of thin air. In Descent, it feels mechanical and gamey. I can forgive player respawning in a game based on a video game, but in Descent you get to buy stuff when you die and then warp back in on the next turn? It feels more like a trip to the mall than anything like dying.

So it's OK to feel gamey if it's based on a video game? There's all kinds of self-contradiction in there. Shouldn't the video game not feel gamey?

metalface13 wrote:

Aarontu wrote:

The mechanics of the game were made for DOOM, not a fantasy dungeoncrawl. Monster spawning makes sense in DOOM because the monsters are actually spawning out of thin air. In Descent, it feels mechanical and gamey. I can forgive player respawning in a game based on a video game, but in Descent you get to buy stuff when you die and then warp back in on the next turn? It feels more like a trip to the mall than anything like dying.

So it's OK to feel gamey if it's based on a video game? There's all kinds of self-contradiction in there. Shouldn't the video game not feel gamey?

There's not any so-called "self-contradiction". Sure, I would prefer if DOOM had no player respawning at all; it is a bit gamey, and I don't really like it too much. It's even worse in DESCENT because not only are you not dead when you die, but you can go shopping and stuff. Also, video games themselves have many "gamey" elements. I find respawning in DOOM somewhat forgivable because the game is trying to emulate a video game. I find it out of place in Descent because that game is not.

Monster spawning isn't gamey in DOOM because monsters actually spawn out of dimensional rifts and stuff. In Descent, it's gamey when a monster attacks you from a room you just cleared because you don't have LOS in it anymore.