16

March 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk

RISING SUN
RISING SUN | PANDEMIC ANNIVERSARY | CIVILIZATION

Blood Rage creator Eric Lang

tells all about his legendary
spiritual successor

THE STORY
OF CIVILIZATION
Before Through the Ages and
Sid Meier came the historical
epic that started it all

LEGEND OF KORRA:
PRO-BENDING ARENA
Mastering the elements in the
action-packed sports game

HOW WE MADE
SPLENDOR
Inside Marc André’s
gem of a card game

10 YEARS OF PANDEMIC
MARCH 2018

Display until 28/3/18

£5.25

Matt Leacock and pals look back on a decade of the infectious co-op hit

001_Cover_v5 MJ.indd 2 14/02/2018 14:12

 C O M I N G F E B R U A R Y 2018

Every year the Emperor walks through

the Imperial Gardens to greet the spring,
every year he stops beneath the sakura
trees, and every year you try to paint his
picture. This will be your year.
Sakura is a light tactical game of pushing
your luck, and pushing your friends. Each
player will simultaneously decide how
far to move both their character and the
Emperor. The player closest to the Emperor
2-6 20-40
MINUTES
when the cherry blossoms are reached
PLAYERS PLAY TIME will gain a huge amount of prestige, but if

“
you push too far you risk bumping into the
Emperor and walking away in disgrace.

“
Jostle to the front of the crowd
ready for your opportunity
to shine, or keep yourself in
the background only to leap
forward at the right moment.
But beware! The emperor has
a mind of his own.

TIPS FROM CREATOR

REINER KNIZIA

p002.indd 1 05/02/2018 11:27

 EDITORIAL
EDITOR Matt Jarvis
01778 392 400

Welcome
matt.jarvis@warnersgroup.co.uk

CONTRIBUTORS Sam Desatoff,

John Dodd, Owen Duffy,
Holly Gramazio, Robert Florence,
Sam Illingworth, Richard Jansen-
Parkes, Dan Jolin, Joshua King,
Andy Leighton, Phil Robinson,

I
Alex Sonechkina, Charlie Theel,
Paul Wake, James Wallis
s there a greater marker of how far tabletop gaming
HEAD OF DESIGN & PRODUCTION has come in the last decade than the rise (and rise) of
Lynn Wright Pandemic? Initially rejected because of its apparently
DESIGNER Richard Hallam
off-putting name and co-op gameplay, Matt Leacock’s
masterpiece is now heralded as a modern classic that
COVER IMAGE FROM RISING SUN helped to spur board games into a new golden age – and
ADVERTISING
has continued to revolutionise things further with the
TO ADVERTISE PLEASE CALL Legacy series. Leacock tells us the full story on page 26.
GROUP ADVERTISING MANAGER Speaking of smash hits, our cover feature takes a trip
Claire Ingram 01778 391 179
claire.ingram@warnersgroup.co.uk
back to feudal Japan as we do battle for honour and glory
in Eric Lang’s Rising Sun, the hotly-anticipated follow-up to
GROUP TELESALES EXECUTIVE
Ben Jackson 01778 391 129
Now Playing... his Norse knockout Blood Rage. You won’t want to miss
ben.jackson@warnersgroup.co.uk Dinosaur Island our behind-the-scenes look on page 18.
Elsewhere, there’s a rare interview with the godfather of
ADVERTISING DESIGN the empire-building genre, Francis Tresham, who recounts
AND PRODUCTION
the creation of the original gaming epic: Civilization.
Nicola Lock 01778 392 420
nicola.lock@warnersgroup.co.uk Get in touch We’re also talking to Marc André about his polished
gem Splendor, picking out the best gaming retreats to
MARKETING tabletopgaming.co.uk
consider for your next hobby holiday, reviewing the latest
MARKETING BRAND MANAGER
Nicola Lumb tabletopmag games you should be playing and much more. Plus, there’s
the latest news about our upcoming Tabletop Gaming Live
MARKETING ASSISTANT tabletopgamingmagazine
convention in London’s Alexandra Palace on page six.
Katherine Brown 01778 395 092
katherine.brown@warnersgroup.co.uk tabletop_gaming_magazine With so much to look forward to, 2018 could be the
best year for tabletop gaming yet.

Matt
PUBLISHED BY
ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER
Claire Ingram
Warners Group Publications PLC
The Maltings, West Street, Matt Jarvis Editor
Bourne, Lincolnshire, PE10 9PH matt.jarvis@warnersgroup.co.uk | @liquidmatt
01778 391 000
www.warnersgroup.co.uk
Q U I C K S TA R T
NEWSTRADE DISTRIBUTION
Warners Group Publications PLC I’ll be He said, ‘Was Such games
01778 391 150
blunt – it Pandemic are unsuitable
PRINTING
historical or Ants, I can’t for Aunt Flossy
This publication is
printed by Warners games bore remember to play with the
01778 395111 me senseless. which one was brats while the
The views expressed by contributors are not necessarily
those of the publishers. Every care is taken to ensure that
the hit of parents are
the content of this magazine is accurate, but we assume no
responsibility for any effect from errors or omissions. While
every care is taken with unsolicited material submitted for
the crowd?’ clearing up.
publication, we cannot be responsible for loss or damage. Eric Lang isn’t sticking to the Pandemic wasn’t always a sure- Civilization inventor Francis
While every care is taken when accepting advertisements, we facts with Rising Sun, p18 fire hit, says Matt Leacock, p26 Tresham has some thoughts, p52
are not responsible for the quality and/or the performance
of goods and/or services advertised in this magazine. The
Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) exists to regulate the
content of advertisements. Tel: 020 7429 2222

© Warners Group Publications Plc, 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 3

003_Welcome_v3 MJ.indd 3 14/02/2018 10:55

 In this issue
06 AT A GLANCE
A 30-second guide to the latest in gaming
09 FIRST TURN
Century: Spice Road creator Emerson
Matsuuchi digs into his bag of Tricks & Treats
10 10 OF THE BEST
A marvellous selection of miniatures games
13 ROLE CALL
The latest RPGs worth exploring
14 ALL THE JAHRES
Klaus Teuber’s third win – before Catan –
combines toilets and Snake. Need we say more?
17 MY FAVOURITE GAME
Gloomhaven creator Isaac Childres falls in
love with the charms of Terra Mystica
ON THE COVER
37 KICKSTARTING
FROM SCRATCH
Art Deck grapples with what to offer backers
38 HOW WE MADE
Marc André explains what makes Splendor splendid
44 OUTPOST
The challenging survival series heads from
Siberia to the Amazon for a new beginning
47 THE INDEPENDENT SHELF
We kick off a regular celebration of indie gems
with the gloriously metal Dungeon Degenerates
48 GAMING RETREATS
Where to head on a jolly hobby holiday
51 THROUGH THE AGES
Our new column follows mechanics from
92 CLUB DIRECTORY
invention to today. First up: worker placement
61 UNEARTHED ARTEFACTS
Digging into DungeonQuest – in the year 3121
62 PRO-BENDING ARENA
Legend of Korra’s action-packed sport hits the table
65 PLAYED
Find out what you should be playing this month
83 PAINTING GUIDE
Doctor Who’s regenerations get a timely
makeover as we head Into the Time Vortex
88 DUNGEON MASTER’S
GUIDE TO ROLEPLAYING
When to fudge rolls, and when to let them be
91 EVENT REPORT
The growth and growth of AireCon

18 RISING SUN 52 THE STORY OF CIVILIZATION 95 SHOP SPOTLIGHT

Eric Lang takes us on a tour through his mighty
spiritual successor to Blood Rage
26 PANDEMIC ANNIVERSARY
We look back on 10 years of the seminal co-op
series with Matt Leacock and friends
34 HAVE YOU PLAYED?
Accessing the mainframe of Android: Netrunner
Francis Tresham tells the tale of the original We pop into Frome Model Centre
historical empire-building epic
98 TABLETOP TIME MACHINE
57 PLAY IT SMART Calculating the positives of multiplayer
Play by the rules – and then break them altogether mahjong card game, Mhing
58 TRISTAN HALL
The man behind the adventurous Gloom of
Kilforth reveals his plans to shake up history

4 March 2018

004_005_contents_v3 MJ.indd 4 14/02/2018 10:58

 THE GAMES
1066, Tears to 58
Many Mothers
1829 52
Advanced Civilization 52
Agricola 51
Altiplano 66
Android: Netrunner 34
Art Deck 37
Blank 76
Caylus 51
Century: Spice Road 09
Civilization 52
Coal Baron 51
Coaster Park 81
Cobra Paw 76
Dinosaur Island 69
Doctor Who: 83
Into the Time Vortex
38 Dungeon Degenerates 47
Dungeon Draft 73
DungeonQuest 61
Dungeons & Dragons 88
Escape from the 71
Dark Castle
Elite Dangerous RPG 75
Empires 78
Favelas 70
Fluxx 57
The Football Game 48
Gloom of Kilforth 58
Gloomhaven 17
26 58 Goodwill 77
Infinity: The RPG 68

52 Keydom
Kitchen Rush
51
74
Legend of Korra: 62
Pro-Bending Arena
Majesty: For the Realm 38
Mhing 98
Nusfjord 79
Outpost: Siberia 44
Pandemic 26
Rising Sun 18
Scythe 57
Splendor 38
Terra Mystica 17
Time Barons 80
Transatlantic 67
Tricks & Treats 09
Troyes 51
Tzolk’in 51
Vengeance 72

tabletopgaming.co.uk 5

004_005_contents_v3 MJ.indd 5 14/02/2018 14:14

 AT A GLANCE
‘TOP CLASS
Roleplaying, miniatures and board game studios join the growing line-up for Tabletop Gaming Live
The list of big names making their way to Warcradle, Warbanner, Anvil Industry, Rubicon and creators behind your favourite titles, such
London’s Alexandra Palace this September for Models – to name just a few. as Ralph Horsley, the veteran Dungeons &
our Tabletop Gaming Live convention continues Of course, we’re not forgetting about the Dragons, Magic: The Gathering, Hearthstone
to get longer and longer! board games side of things, either. Among and Warhammer illustrator who’ll be on the
We’ve already announced that there will the latest publishers to jump on board are show floor throughout the weekend.
be the latest releases from the makers of Superhot Card Game, InBetween and Pocket Tabletop Gaming Live takes place on
games including Pandemic, Ticket to Ride, Mars outlet Board & Dice and family-friendly Saturday, September 29th and Sunday,
Catan, X-Wing, Arkham Horror, Android: outlet Tactic Games, joining already-confirmed September 30th 2018 at Alexandra Palace in
Netrunner, Legend of the Five Rings, The exhibitors including Fantasy Flight, Asmodee, London. Tickets are on sale now and start from
Walking Dead: All Out War, Wild West Z-Man Games, Days of Wonder, Catan Studio, as little as £10, with discounts available for
Exodus, Dystopian Wars and more, but that’s Thames & Kosmos and more. families and weekend passes.
far from all there’ll be to see and play on the As well as seeing the latest releases, you’ll Visit The Ticket Factory and search for
show floor. be able to meet some of the artists, designers “Tabletop Gaming Live” to secure your place!
If you’re a roleplaying fan, you won’t want
to miss the chance to see what’s in store
from Cubicle 7, the British roleplaying firm
behind Tolkien titles The One Ring RPG and
Adventures in Middle-earth, as well as the
Doctor Who RPG – not to mention the
upcoming fourth edition of Warhammer
Fantasy Roleplay and the Age of Sigmar
Roleplaying Game, both based on Games
Workshop’s miniatures universe.
Speaking of miniatures, we’ll also be joined
by Osprey, the wargaming and board game
outlet responsible for Frostgrave, plus board
and card games from The Lost Expedition
and Escape from the Aliens in Outer Space to

ADVANCE TICKE
Reiner Knizia’s Sakura and the latest edition of

NOW ON SALTES
Martin Wallace’s London.
Further bolstering the miniatures showing
is GCT Studios, the studio behind samurai
skirmish title Bushido. It adds to a line-up
of miniatures makers including Mantic, Book and save today: theticketfactory
.com

KNOW YOUR NUMBERS

21 18 4
Dice didn’t use the current
1450

The president of Wizards of A quartet

‘sevens’ layout until the the Coast has hinted Axis &
mid-15th century and were of Talisman
Allies may come to mobile in spin-offs
unfair for centuries, a the next year and a half
recent study has suggested have been

3 1993
teased, including an
After more than two decades, The team behind RPG, expandable
Forbidden Sky is the
Reiner Knizia has revealed a Harry Potter: card game and kids’
third entry in Matt
sequel to his 1997 classic Tigris Hogwarts Battle title, which is due for
Leacock’s other co-op
& Euphrates; Yellow & Yangtze has revealed it’s working on an adaptation of release later in 2018
series, out this summer
is due for release later this year classic ‘90s movie Jurassic Park

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6 January 2018

006_007_atAGlance_v4 MJ.indd 6 14/02/2018 12:12

 We asked…
Show us your pets playing
your favourite games!

SO LONG, MAYFAIR-WELL
The studio that changed the tabletop forever with Settlers of Catan is no more You said…
Mayfair Games, the German publisher that turned rechristening the game as just ‘Catan’. Asmodee Lucy wearing
Settlers of Catan into a tabletop phenomenon, has shut subsequently opened the dedicated Catan Studio, the crown
its doors after almost four decades in the business. which has focused on putting out various spin-offs and from Monopoly
Best known for being the original home of Klaus expansions for the series since. (Game of
Teuber’s revolutionary Spiel des Jahres winner, Mayfair Not content with absorbing one of the tabletop’s Thrones edition).
announced that its entire catalogue of IP has been best-known publishers, as part of the same deal Stephanie Davies
purchased by Asmodee, resulting in the studio’s 36-year Asmodee has also acquired Lookout Games, the
history coming to an end. label responsible for putting out a host of beloved Dexter the pug
Mayfair previously sold the rights to its flagship Eurogames from revered German designer coaching Kyle
franchise to Asmodee in 2016, a year after Uwe Rosenberg, including Agricola, Caverna on the finer
and Patchwork, as well as 2015 points of Magic:
Kennerspiel des Jahres winner The Gathering.
Isle of Skye. Mayfair bought the Jimmy Page
company in 2013.
Lookout will remain an Recently played
‘independent studio within Asmodee’, Munchkin and
its new owner confirmed. Ash couldn’t
Asmodee’s purchase of Mayfair’s resist joining
library and Lookout follows hot the group..
on the heels of its acquisition of Katryna Brown
Dream Home outlet Rebel and
marks another major bump for the Eddie the
mega-publisher’s already heaving turtle playing
line-up of studios, which now Ticket to Ride.
includes Fantasy Flight, Z-Man, Plaid Nicola Aldren
Hat, Pretzel, Catan Studio, Days of
Wonder and more.

JUST KEEP HOLDING ON Sampson

Rory’s Story Cubes creator will grapple with a serious subject in his next game
The upcoming next project from
Rory O’Connor – he of Rory’s Story
Cubes fame – is tackling a much
more mature topic than you might
expect from his kids’ storytelling
dice game.
Holding On: The Troubled Life
of Billy Kerr, which O’Connor
co-designed with Michael Fox,
is a worker placement game
that challenges players to work
together to recover the memories
of the titular Billy Kerr, a 60-year-
old man given days to live in
hospital after suffering a massive
For the latest news from the world of gaming visit tabletopgaming.co.uk/news
declaring his
allegiance to
the Omnissiah.
heart attack on a flight out of Matt Hill
Sydney, Australia.
Billy is left hanging onto life
by three key memories from My cat Missy
his troubled life, which must be (sadly no more)
uncovered before he passes away. critiquing
There’s no details on exactly my choice of
how the sombre theme will fit with colour scheme.
the gameplay, but each playthrough Cathy Winton
of Holding On will apparently take
around half an hour to complete,
with multiple playthroughs needed
to reveal the entire story.
Get in touch tabletopmag
Holding On is due out in the last
quarter of this year. tabletopgamingmagazine
tabletop_gaming_magazine
S TA R T R E K A D V E N T U R E S

PAINTS & TECHNIQUES UNDERSHIRT

PAINTS USED STAGES

Abaddon Black Ceramite White Liberator Gold Slaanesh Grey Since there is a large amount
Agrax Earthshade Dark Reaper Lugganath Orange Sotek Green of variety in the crew of the
Alaitoc Blue Dawnstone Martian Ironearth Steel Legion Drab Enterprise, combined with
Altdorf Guard Blue Doombull Brown Mephiston Red Temple Guard Blue matching uniforms, this guide is
Averland Sunset Dorn Yellow Pallid Wych Flesh Warplock Bronze split into general sections covering
Baneblade Brown Drakenhof Nightshade Reikland Fleshshade Wild Rider Red the uniforms and tech, but splitting
Blue Horror Khorne Red Rhinox Hide Zamesi Desert the skin, hair and other details into
Bugman’s Glow Kislev Flesh Runefang Steel different sections. This will allow
Cadian Fleshtone Krieg Khaki Screaming Skull us to cover every element of each
Celestra Grey Leadbelcher Squig Orange crew member, giving you a guide
STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a highlight of STAGE 3 Apply a line highlight of
for the full boxset contents.
Steel Legion Drab. Dawnstone, focusing on the hard Celestra Grey, focusing on the
edges and folds. hard edges and raised folds.

MEDICAL JACKET

UNIFORMS

Turn to page 82 to find out more

BODYSUIT COMMAND AND HELM

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a layer of Alaitoc STAGE 3 Apply a fine highlight
Altdorf Guard Blue. Blue, leaving the recesses the of Blue Horror to the edges and
base colour. raised folds.
DARK SKIN

SKIN
STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a layer of STAGE 3 Add a line highlight of STAGE 4 Apply a dot highlight of
Khorne Red. Mephiston Red, leaving the Wild Rider Red, focusing on the Lugganath Orange, focusing on
recesses the basecoat colour. hard edges. the corners.

ENGINEERING, SECURITY AND OPERATIONS LIGHT SKIN

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of

STAGE 1 Add a highlight of Dark Rhinox Hide.
Reaper across the hard edges, corners
and raised folds of the bodysuit.

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a wash of STAGE 3 Apply a layer of Averland STAGE 4 Apply a line highlight of STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a layer of Cadian STAGE 3 Apply a highlight of Kislev STAGE 4 Apply a final fine highlight of
Averland Sunset. Reikland Fleshshade. Sunset, leaving the recesses the Krieg Khaki. Bugman’s Glow. Fleshtone, leaving the recesses Flesh, focusing down the centre Pallid Wych Flesh, only adding small
original colour. the base colour. and top of the head. lines and dots over the previous coat.

STAGE 2 Apply a highlight of

SCIENCE AND MEDICAL ANDROID SKIN Doombull Brown, focusing on the
top edges of the features.

or subscribe today from as little

STAGE 2 Add a dot highlight of STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a highlight of STAGE 3 Apply a line highlight STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a layer of STAGE 3 Apply a glaze of Zamesi STAGE 4 Apply a final fine highlight of STAGE 3 Apply a final fine highlight
Slaanesh Grey, focusing on the corners Sotek Green. Temple Guard Blue, focusing on of Blue Horror, focusing on the Zamesi Desert. Screaming Skull, leaving the Desert over all the skin. Dorn Yellow, only adding small lines of Krieg Khaki.
and the top of the raised folds. the hard edges and folds. corners and raised folds. recesses the base colour. and dots over the previous coat.

84 February 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 85

20 of 132 pages
P L AY E D

BATTLE FOR ROKUGAN

Legend of the Five Rings expands with
an excellent
area control spin-off. Or are we just
bluffing?

as £14.99
Designer: Molly Glover, Tom Jolly |
Artist: Mathias Kollros, Francesca
Baerald, Nele Diel, ShenFei
90m 2-5 14+ £40
safeguarding it from future attacks
but potentially sacrificing a tactical
advantage during future battles.
Taking over an entire territory
can grant a huge advantage, as each
collection of lands unlocks a single-use
power for the controlling player to use.
The abilities feel fittingly formidable
ED

IT
CE

O R' I and satisfying to execute, but are only

S CHO held onto as long as that player has total
control – meaning waiting to use them
to
their full advantage can be very risky.
Each player also starts with a very
limited supply of scouts and shugenja
that let them spy on some of their
opponents’ tokens, plus a secret
objective that’s revealed during end-

H
ot on the heels of its recent living
card game revival, Legend of the
Five Rings’ next major franchise
instalment is Battle for Rokugan – a
taut
area control board game that stands
alone as a truly fantastic experience.
If you’re already a fan of Legend of the
Five Rings, you’ll find rough sketches
game scoring for a potential last twist
WHAT’S IN crucially, when – you put your tokens
in the final standings. Funnily enough
THE BOX? down becomes a tense standoff and
for a spin-off to a living card game, the
◗ Game board cardplay is kept to a bare minimum,
◗ 22 territory cards
clash of wits between players. Could
leaving the focus on the placement of
◗ 10 initiative cards the token attacking your province be
a tokens, but the small number, restricted
◗ Seven daimyō screens powerful army needing to be fought
off use and great power of the cards means
◗ 12 secret with ample defence? Or could it simply
that every one lands with a huge impact.
objective cards be a distraction to draw your forces
The combination of straightforward

LEARNI
of the seven competing clans’ broad ◗ First player card away from a surprise attack elsewhere
◗ 189 combat tokens basics, the chance for deceptive mind

EVOLVENG
strategies in their slightly asymmetrical during the final placement? You’ll need
◗ Five shugenja cards games, and just a smidge of luck and
special abilities and pools of combat to constantly guess and second-guess
◗ 10 scout cards asymmetry works an absolute charm:
tokens used for wresting control of your rivals, especially as every player
◗ 210 control tokens Battle for Rokugan is 90 or so minutes

D
the map’s various provinces – and the ◗ Four honour
always has a blank bluffing token hidden
of exhilarating Oh My God!-ness,
victory-sealing honour that comes bonus tokens with the rest of their ‘hand’ behind
air-punching triumph and head-in-
with them. It’s just enough to root the ◗ Four defence their screen, presenting a constant Games aren’t
hands regret (with laughter) as traps just fun – they can
conflict in a wider world that feels more bonus tokens opportunity to mislead and deceive.
are sprung, plans go astrayhelp you also
believable and vibrant, without throwing ◗ Shrine token It’s a tight, thrilling experience that and bigboost your brainpower.
◗ Harbour token
moments pop off in everyProfessorsround. and students
off the careful gameplay balance or keeps up the pressure throughout its the cranium-crammi tell us about
◗ Battlefield token That’s no bluff.
leaving total newcomers feeling lost. very reasonable running time and gets
MATT JARVIS Darwinian delight ng benefits of
◗ 15 peace tokens especially explosive during the fifth Evolution
Learning the ropes is easy, with ◗ 15 scorched Words by Anna
Blackwell
combat largely coming down to a earth tokens
and final round, as players unleash WE SAY
a last-ditch effort to take over entire

tabletopgaming.co.uk/subscribe
straight battle of numbers – attack with
more strength than your opponent has
defence, and you’ll claim that province.
Each type of combat token has slightly
different rules – armies must attack
over land, naval tokens operate only
along coasts, the rarer shinobi can strike
anywhere and so on – and is placed
facedown to signify its intent, before
all players’ tokens are revealed and
resolved simultaneously.
This is where Battle for Rokugan’s
real joy comes into play, as where – and,
◗ Round track token There’s no need to already be a Legend
territories or block their rivals’ control. of the Five Rings fan to enjoy Battle
Particularly brutal are the rare raid for Rokugan as a brilliant game of
tokens, which completely decimate planning, deception and strategy. The
an area for the rest of the game easy-to-grasp gameplay means the
and remove all combat and control riveting showdowns between players
tokens, while the equally uncommon get to shine, while the tight play time
diplomacy tokens permanently forbid and differences between the clans and
territory powers leave plenty of reasons
all combat in – or out – of a region,
to come back time and time again.
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED…
GAME OF THRONES: THE BOARD
Want a game that lets you conquer GAME
the world as you trick and outwit your
friends? Battle for Rokugan lets you
do it all in under a couple of hours.

64 February 2018

44 February 2018

tabletopgaming.co.uk 7

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p008.indd 1 05/02/2018 15:46
 FIRST TURN
EMERSON
MATSUUCHI
Before trading seasonings and sneaking about, the
Century: Spice Road and Specter Ops designer
was snatching sweeties in 2012’s Tricks & Treats
Interview by Dan Jolin
BACKGROUND
“I was a software developer at Merrill Lynch in downtown
New York, before I became a freelance consultant. But
there was always a niggling feeling in the back of my
head that I wanted to do something other than this, so
when I got home, I’d work on a 3D game engine based on
Microsoft’s Managed DirectX. In 2009 I was introduced
to The Dice Tower, and because of that I bought Settlers of
Catan, which I loved. So then I bought Ticket to Ride,
Carcassonne; all the staples for today’s collection. And
because I’d always had the desire to develop games, I
thought, ‘What if I work on an analogue game?’”
COMPONENTS
“With Tricks & Treats I actually tried not to take
mechanisms from any other games I knew. Those
mechanisms totally exist elsewhere but, at that time in
my naïvety, I didn’t know they existed. I wanted to come
up with something new, something innovative, and see
how creative I could get with just a simple deck of cards.”
OBJECT
“One of the mantras I always tried to enforce when I was
leading a technology team was: start small. So I followed
the same philosophy here. I had no idea how to design
a game. I tried to make an RPG based on giant robots
when I was eight or nine years old, but that wasn’t an
earnest attempt. My target audience was families; Tricks
& Treats is not exactly a children’s game, but it is a game
parents could play with their children.”
SETUP
“I thought about how it would be interesting to combine
bluffing and hidden roles in a game, and Halloween
just seemed like a good family-friendly theme to go
along with this mechanism. I playtested it with some
friends: casual gamers, people who didn’t have big
game libraries but who’ve played, like, Monopoly. And
they enjoyed it, so I thought it might have enough merit
to be worth producing. It was self-published, because
I also wanted to have my own games company and
understand the process of how to not just design a
game, but also how to work with a manufacturer, how to
work with a distributor and get it out, and so forth.”
March 2018
009_firstTurn_v2 MJ.indd 9
There’s a lot more logic and
math and science involved with
the development of a game than
I had originally realised.
HOW TO PLAY
“It’s a heavily disguised hidden role game where you
play kids who are trying to get the most candy in their Tricks & Treats sees players
basket. But each basket is numbered and you have to do trying to gather the most
so without letting the other players know which basket sweets on Halloween, but
is actually yours. If they call you out and they’re right, without giving away which
you can get eliminated from the game. Also, to throw basket is theirs – or they
a wrench in the whole mix, there are special abilities. could end up eliminated
Some of ‘em will allow you to shift candies from one
basket to another, or swap the places of two baskets.”
END OF THE GAME
“Sales are still trickling, but usually I see a spike just
before Halloween. It’s a lesson I learned that if you
make a game based on a holiday, you’re kind of limiting
the window in which you can sell it. [Laughs] I feel like
I could take the mechanisms of Tricks & Treats and,
instead of making a family-friendly game, put, let’s say,
a Game of Thrones theme on it. The king has died and
you’re trying to secretly vie for control, using subtlety
to try to gain influence. But if someone can catch onto
your plot, they could actually stop you from completing
your plans. I have playtested Tricks & Treats so many
times, it’s now part of my toolkit of mechanisms. I can
definitely see how it would work in a game like that.”
STRATEGY TIPS
“My advice to anyone starting out in game design is
to think of it not just as a creative endeavour. There’s a
lot more logic and math and science involved with the
development of a game than I had originally realised
myself. Because a lot of it is really obfuscated. There’s a
whole mathematical model underneath every game.”
tabletopgaming.co.uk 9
13/02/2018 14:55
 1 GUILD BALL
A spiritual successor to the brutal American football matches

2
of Blood Bowl, Guild Ball is a distinctly British take on the fantasy
sports genre. Two opponents each control a team of six players
competing in a football (that’s proper football) match, with the
game’s fluid momentum system building up the action as players
pass the ball around before unleashing special plays, such as taking a
shot on goal. The guilds that make up each side are twisted versions of
traditional vocations – butchers, brewers, engineers and fishermen, to
name a few – who put a unique spin on the typical fantasy factions, with

distinct play styles and characters. Backed up by slick gameplay driven
by d6 rolls and a highly active community, there’s no shortage of ways to
learn the ropes quickly and get involved.
For fans of: Blood Bowl, proper football, unique fantasy
TEST OF HONOUR
A swift samurai skirmish game, Test of Honour uses only a few handfuls
of models – a hero, their companions and some soldiers – to recreate
fierce battles between rival clans. The core box includes a series of six
scenarios that can be played as a connected campaign, with warriors
gaining skills or even choosing to take a more dishonourable route to
claim victory over their foes. Each scenario has a different objective,
from defeating all of the rival warriors to defending an outpost or offering
protection to a spy, giving the narrative thrust of the game even more
impact. Matches can play out in as little as half an hour and are dictated
by drawing tokens from a bag, making the action unpredictable and tense.

10
For fans of: Story-driven games, fast action, Akira Kurosawa films

OF THE BEST
MINIATURES
GAMES
If plastic people and deep tactical gameplay is to your tastes, there’s a glut
of miniatures games to gorge yourself on. Whether you’re just starting out
or already a seasoned fan, our selection should have something for you
Chosen by Matt Jarvis

3 INFINITY
One of the most promising heirs to the throne of
Warhammer 40,000, Infinity is a quick-playing sci-fi
combat game partially inspired by the future tech and
style of Japanese manga. Set almost two centuries from
now, Infinity centres around squads of human and alien
soldiers conducting combat missions. The feeling of controlling a squad
is heightened with the ‘automatic reaction

4
order’ system, which lets players take
actions with their figures to respond
to their opponent’s moves – such as firing
off shots at units moving from behind cover.
The fast-moving, smooth feel means that
MALIFAUX
Malifaux has one of the most distinct visual styles in our
matches feel cinematic and play out list, with a horror-steampunk vibe infused with elements
quickly. The immersive universe has of the Wild West and Victorian gothic. Crews of between
since been expanded with spin- seven and ten models, led by a single master supported
off sports board game Aristeia! by their minions, battle for control of precious soulstones.
and a roleplaying game that Every figure has an individual power and, instead of dice, decks of fate
delves into the wider lore of cards decide the outcome of attacks, spells and more. Players can
the galaxy. manipulate these decks by cheating fate to gain an advantage, leading to
a dynamic, atmospheric fight.
For fans of: XCOM, manga,
tactical combat For fans of: Weirdness, Tim Burton, hating dice

10 March 2018

010_011_tenOfTheBest_v2 MJ.indd 10 13/02/2018 14:56

 5
DYSTOPIAN
WARS
Bringing its steampunk world of
the 1870s to life with some
fantastic models, Dystopian
Wars is a warfare game unlike
any other and a delightfully
original entry in the crowded
genre. The rules – based on
the d6-powered gameplay
of Firestorm Armada and
Uncharted Seas – are designed
to allow huge squadrons of
planes, land ships, boats,
balloons to battle across land, sea and air in a reasonable amount
of time, and also support the use of a deck of 52 cards for added
unpredictability and tension. You can choose to fight in a single
environment, or combine all three for an epic conflict, customising
your fleet to ensure victory.
For fans of: Total domination, vehicular combat, steampunk tech
7
WARHAMMER/
WARHAMMER
40,000
The D&D of the miniatures world, Warhammer and
Warhammer 40,000 continue to sit in the top echelons of miniatures
thanks to their outstanding models, deep lore and gameplay that’s been
refined – and completely revised at points – over decades. Both Age of
Sigmar (which replaced classic Warhammer Fantasy Battle) and the new
eighth edition of Warhammer 40,000 are fantastic games, and the newly
streamlined rules mean they’ve never been easier to learn.
The 40,000 universe is especially rich with plenty
of detailed characters, factions and stories to
uncover – not to mention the awesome and
enormous vehicles that stomp and blast their
way through the grimdark landscape. As easily
the biggest miniatures games around, there’s
no shortage of help for beginners and a huge
community to get involved with.
For fans of: Space Marines, the populist
choice, the Emperor
9 THE WALKING
DEAD: ALL
OUT WAR
Based on the original comic book series rather than
the hugely popular TV show that followed, All Out War pits two factions
of humans against each other with the brain-hungry zombies of the title
serving as a danger to both groups. (There’s also the option to play
solo or in co-op.) The gameplay is a streamlined version of traditional
wargaming tropes, combined with elements
such as an events deck that can raise the
overall threat level and bring more walkers
shambling into the battlefield. Certain actions
generate noise and attract the attention of the
undead, which often occurs as the competing
groups race to collect the most supplies or
dispatch their opponents first to claim victory.
It’s dead good.
For fans of: Big risks, comics, braaaaains
010_011_tenOfTheBest_v2 MJ.indd 11
6
dogfighting.
WINGS
OF GLORY
Taking to the skies of World War I and II, Wings of Glory is
a fast and thrilling aerial miniatures game that recreates
the twists, turns and inevitable crashes of historical
dogfighting. Plane cards and a deck of manoeuvre cards give each aircraft
a unique style of flying, while a shared damage deck for each type of plane
makes exchanging fire quick and dramatic. Players plan their plane’s move
with a series of cards, combining moves to pull off dramatic
stunts and outmanoeuvring their opponents. As well as
simple dogfights, the game includes
the chance to take on a variety of
scenarios and objectives, from strafing
runs to bombing runs. A spin-off mashup
with sci-fi classic The War of the Worlds is
due out this summer and will be fully
compatible with the WWI planes,
while introducing Martian tripods.
For fans of: Historical combat, high
fliers, fast and furious dogfighting
8 X-WING
MINIATURES
GAME
One of the most accessible minis titles on this list, X-Wing
does away with the pressure of gluing together models and painting them
with gorgeous ready-to-fly figures of some of the most famous spaceships
in history. The gameplay, too, is very easy to pick up, consisting of a
straightforward dial system that lets the various Star Wars pilots
zoom around space, barrel-roll, open fire and stay on target. In
the years since it debuted, the series has put out a huge variety
of ships from the sci-fi movies and their various spin-offs,
meaning there are plenty of customisation options. A
number of small and major tournaments are held every
year and often dictate which ships are the ones to be
using, but you can have just as much fun using a handful
of ships on your dining room table.
For fans of: Characters you already
know the names of; fast-paced,
easy-to-learn gameplay; not having
to paint or glue anything
10 WARMACHINE/
HORDES
Two different games, but fully compatible with
each other, Warmachine and Hordes are
miniatures games for those uninterested in
playing it safe. The games’ dice-based combat rewards aggressive play,
with Warmachine’s ‘focus’ and Hordes’ ‘fury’ systems allowing units
to boost their attacks and fire off spells – but unrestrained fury risks
Warbeasts entering a frenzy and potentially turning on their allies, making
managing your points key to wiping out the enemy. The fantasy-meets-
steampunk setting of the Iron Kingdoms
provides plenty of unique models and
varying factions to explore; with troops
inspired by classic fantasy as well as
powerful metal machines, the world is
one of the most distinctive around.
For fans of: Pent-up rage,
head-on action, metal
and magic
tabletopgaming.co.uk 11
13/02/2018 14:56
p012.indd 1 07/02/2018 09:15
 Role Call
Whether you’re used to waking up with no idea of how you
got there or looking to return to a classic roleplaying land,
this month’s releases are full of adventures waiting to be had
Words by John Dodd

TINY HEROQUEST ALAS VEGAS THE SEVENTH

DUNGEON: GLORANTHA Long overdue, but MYSTERIOUS SEA: THE
SECOND A setting book that worth the wait. Alas HAPPENINGS NEW WORLD
EDITION allows HeroQuest Vegas is the RPG that AT FURLONG The latest of the world books
Using the TinyD6 players to adventure combines Sin City and DOWN for Seventh Sea, The New
engine, this is the in the popular world of The Hangover, where the Following his success World covers the peoples
latest iteration of the Glorantha, a world that players wake up without with The Jack Hack and and traditions of what was
popular minimalist has seen many different any memory of who they Last Prayer of the Dying, once the Aztlan Empire,
roleplaying game versions over the are and what they were John R. Davis returns now divided into the three
originally designed by years, from the original doing before they got with a D&D: Fifth Edition nation states of Nahuacan,
Smoking Salamander. RuneQuest to the there, but with flashbacks adventure that takes the Tzak K’an and Kuraq, all
This version has over a computer game King of revealing a part of the players from second to bound together in feuds of
dozen settings to run Dragon Pass. This book game at a time. With a fifth level. Including several blood and death. With new
the players through contains everything number of articles from maps and more than 30 rules for environmental
and is useful as a game needed to begin the award-winning games separate encounters to hazards, new backgrounds,
in itself or as a quick adventure, and there writers to help you run work through, it makes an duelling styles and sorcery,
jumping off point for an are more expansions scenarios, it’s superb for excellent entry point into this opens up another new
existing campaign. planned in the future. isolated game nights. the RPG. frontier for the bold players.
Gallant Knight Games | £15 Chaosium | £17.50 Magnum Opus Press | £13 John R Davis | £5 John Wick | £30

March 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 13

013_roleCall_v3 MJ.indd 13 14/02/2018 11:09

 All the
Jahres
Replaying the winners of the Spiel des Jahres so you don’t have to
Words and pictures by James Wallis

DRUNTER & DRÜBER

F
or most designers, winning the but he may have come across one of its
world’s biggest award for board Year of win: 1991 home computer predecessors. Imagine
games three times would be the Designer: Klaus Teuber Snake without the reaction-time mechanics,
highlight of a long and distinguished Number of players: 2-4 with four snakes trying to eat certain pellets
career. Winning it three times in four years Playing time: 30-60 mins and protect other ones, and you’ve got the
would crown them as the pre-eminent Worthy winner? At the time, sure gist of Drunter & Drüber.
designer in the industry. But for Klaus Worth playing now? Feels a bit dated The backstory for the game is too stupid to
Teuber, the creator of 1991 winner Drunter Availability: Re-released as Wacky bother retelling here. All you need to know is
& Drüber, it was just the end of Act One. Wacky West in 2010 the players aren’t snakes but citizens of the
He was still warming up. Price: Under £20 town of Schilda. Their job is to build walls,
Drunter & Drüber is as different from roads and rivers to traverse the town, and
Adel Verpflichtet (Teuber’s 1990 winner) as along the way guiding them to (a) demolish
that game was from Barbarossa (his 1988 OPPOSITE Players must vote to demolish opponents’ buildings while (b) preventing
winner). Barbarossa is a social shape- loos without giving away their colour anyone demolishing their own. Twistily, you
guessing game; Adel Verpflichtet is an elegant don’t know which player owns which set of
exercise in social deception in pursuit of the BELOW It was Teuber’s third – but not final – win buildings, and part of the fun of the game is
perfect antiques collection. And Drunter working out who’s which colour.
& Drüber (meaning On your turn you place a
‘under and over’ or tile from your hand – either
‘haywire’ but not, as the a road, wall or river, one,
2010 Mayfair edition two or three squares long
Wacky
translated it, ‘Wacky – to extend any of the four
Wacky West’,, and not to constructions snaking out
be confused with that across the board. New tiles
other D&D)) is a game of have to go at the end of the
insane town planners. last tile played, so you’re
To put it another way: making a line rather than
it’s multiplayer Snake. forking paths. You can also
You know Snake, block off one of the other
the once-ubiquitous lines of constructions,
mobile phone game though some walls have
of ever-lengthening bridges you can employ to
reptiles turning at make the paths cross over.
right angles to avoid The problem, however,
their own tails. Teuber is the loos. Schilda has
almost certainly didn’t an abundance of public
know it because this loos, and every time you
was 1991 and mobile want to build anything
gaming still meant over one of them there
portable chess sets, has to be a public vote.

14 March 2018

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This is the main way you can guess what
colours people are playing: by watching
how they vote for dunny-demolition close
to precious high-value buildings. Do they
vote an emphatic ‘JAAA!!’ or ‘NEEE!!’ or
a more cautious ‘ja,’ or even ‘jeeinn!’ if
they want to have their jakes and beat it?
Vowels are votes, and each voting card
can only be played once. So the process is
tactical and revealing, and probably the
reason that Drunter & Drüber won the
Spiel des Jahres because it’s the cleverest
part of the game.
Once none of the four paths can go any
further everyone reveals which building type
they were supposed to be protecting, scores
are totalled and that’s it. It plays fast, scoring
014_015_allTheJahres_v2 MJ.indd 15
is easy and it doesn’t outstay its welcome.
Tactics are mostly about protecting your
buildings without letting on which ones they
are, squashing other players’ ones, analysing
and manipulating the voting, and watching
what tiles players have left in their hands to
work out what moves they can’t make and
therefore can’t stop you from making.
There’s a small expansion included in the
box, where players draw two building types
and get to choose one of them halfway
through the game, which adds a little extra
in the way of tactical play, but it’s not a
huge difference.
There isn’t a lot of depth to Drunter &
Drüber but it’s one of those games where
working out the limits of the mechanics
Imagine
Snake without
the reaction-time
mechanics and
you’ve got the gist
of Drunter
& Drüber.
and how to optimise them is entertaining
enough for a couple of playthroughs.
Judging from old reviews back in 1991 this
was cutting-edge design but, although
there’s nothing quite like it on the market
now, it feels old-hat and even a little
primitive by today’s standards. Games
historians and designers will find elements
of interest here, and it still works as a good
family game, but the tastes of the general
games audience have moved on.
Not much of 1991’s Spiel des Jahres
shortlist has stood the test of time, to be
honest. Wolfgang Kramer picked up the
Kennerspiel des Jahres (Children’s Game
of the Year) special prize for the pirate-
themed Corsaro – his 1986 Spiel des
Jahres winner Heimlich & Co. may well
have inspired Drunter & Drüber’s hidden-
identity mechanic. The prize for Most
Beautiful Game went to Master Labyrinth, a
reworking of the Ravensburger tile-sliding
classic that had been shortlisted a few years
earlier. Both nice games but neither of them
outstanding. Not a vintage year.
It’s a sign of the size of the games
industry in 1991 that even after three Spiel
des Jahres wins, Klaus Teuber hadn’t given
up his day job and was still working as a
dental technician. He wouldn’t go full time
until 1999, after his fourth win had changed
the face of board games forever. But there’s
still a lot of ground to cover before we reach
that moment.
Next month: Cycling team-management
game Um Reifenbreite takes the yellow
jersey. Can it keep pace with younger
competitors like Flamme Rouge?
tabletopgaming.co.uk 15
13/02/2018 14:57
 P resented by the South London
Warlords, Salute 2018 is the biggest,
independent, one-day wargaming and
gaming event in the UK. Once again,
we have a huge number of traders
from the UK and around the world
attending the show at ExCel London
as well as plenty of demonstration
and participation games to enjoy. We
will also, of course, be running our
renowned painting competition. Every
year, we aim to provide a fantastic
showcase, whether you are thinking of
starting this great hobby or are already
a ‘veteran’ wargamer/gamer.

SALUTE is held at
ExCel London, which Tickets
is very easy to get to. £10.00 via eticket or £20.00 (cash
Here is a simplified
transport link map. only) at the door.
Under 16s FREE with a paying
adult.
Again this year there will be
several ‘golden ticket’ prizes.
Tickets are now on sale from our
Facebook page and website:
www.salute.co.uk
NB: there is no bring and buy at
Salute 2018.

SATURDAY, 14TH APRIL

DOORS OPEN 10.00-17.00

p016.indd
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09/12/2017 11:32
 my favourite game
ISAAC
CHILDRES
The master of Gloomhaven falls head
over heels for Terra Mystica’s magic

I
f you’re going to put me in a head lock and force
me to choose my favourite game (you really
shouldn’t though – violence is not cool), then I
would probably scream in a panic and then blurt
out, “AH! Terra Mystica,, okay? Now let go of me!”
It’s a reluctant choice, though, because, given our
present reality of 2018, there is a reimplementation of
Terra Mystica, Gaia Project,, which on paper just seems
better in almost every way. If someone is walking around
saying their favourite game is Terra Mystica,, then they are
probably just not hip to this new 2018 reality.
But the simple fact of the matter is that I am a
sentimental person, and Terra Mystica has a special
place in my heart. I’m not just going to trade that space
away to the younger, hotter model. What kind of person
would that make me?
A bad person.
Terra Mystica has been there with me throughout
most of my time as a board gamer, coddling me like a
warm blanket. “Oh, you don’t like this game you are
playing? Don’t worry about it. I will always be here shooting zombies in the head, and that’s perfectly fine,
to comfort you and give you a wonderful gaming but nothing gets me going quite like the formulation
experience when you are done playing that garbage.” and execution of a good plan. “Oh, man, did you see
Terra Mystica never judged me when I went off to play how I spent two rounds building up resources and then
Machi Koro, and then came back crying
like a fool, blubbering about
built six settlements with the Fakirs, earning eight points
for each one? I am high on my own sense of self worth,
Terra Mystica
how terrible of a time
I had. Terra Mystica
because that was a great plan!”
For me, Terra Mystica just has that perfect level
has that
just accepted me,
unfolding its
of complexity that allows for plans to come together
without too much downtime – unlike its newer, hotter
perfect level
many races and
nuances to be
version, which, dare I say, might just be too complex for
me. I find myself staring at the Gaia Project board for
of complexity
explored. Every
game was just as
way too long, trying to figure a way out of the mess I got
myself into, much to the annoyance of my opponents.
that allows
good as the last.
It never got stale.
Terra Mystica, on the other hand, is nice and familiar,
and it goes along at a nice clip.
for plans
Its wonders let
me quickly forget
Plus you’ve got that player interaction! I love the
balance between wanting to build next to other players
to come
that awful game of
Dungeon Roll.
and not wanting them to take your lands. It adds the
perfect amount of tension to the game, where you’re
together
So what makes
Terra Mystica and me
never quite sure whether your carefully designed plan
will actually work, because you’re never quite sure what
without
such a perfect fit? Why
are we destined to grow
your opponent will do to mess it up.
Yes, if I could marry a board game, I would propose to
too much
old together and die in each
other’s arms? Well, you
Terra right away. She’s proven herself to be a dependable
and loving companion, and that’s all I can really ask for. I’m
downtime.
see, I’m a planner. sorry this whole thing got a little weird, but, all right, look –
Some people like just don’t tell my wife we had this conversation, okay?

March 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 17

017_myFavGame_v2 MJ.indd 17 14/02/2018 11:20

 HONOUR & GLORY
After the Norse fury of Blood Rage, Eric Lang’s next mythical extravaganza puts
players in command of the samurai, gods and monsters of feudal Japan.
He tell us why he finds sticking to history boring, his musical approach to drawing
from classic games and where his childhood love of folklore might take him next

W
Words by Matt Jarvis

hen he was Rage encouraged fierce, relentless battles between

young, Eric Lang
would sit with his
grandmother during
family trips to
Germany and look
at picture books
recounting folktales,
legends and myths from around the world. Unable
to read the stories himself, the boy’s imagination was
sparked by the pure sensation of the worlds conjured
up by the imagery and emotions. Those feelings would
stay with him into adulthood and eventually resurface
through his work as a game designer, most explicitly
in Blood Rage, Lang’s 2015 board game set during the
Norse world-ending event Ragnarök.
Inspired by the Viking belief that a glorious death
would earn a place alongside Odin in Valhalla, Blood
players’ clans of warriors as they pillaged the land
around the legendary tree of Yggdrasil in pursuit of the
might required to vanquish their enemies. The clans
could call upon the power of gods and creatures from
Norse mythology to aid them, appeasing the wants of
deities from Thor and Loki to Heimdall and Tyr. The
combination of furiously competitive card-drafting
and the bloody, evocative setting landed like a swing
from Mjölnir, earning widespread critical plaudits and a
thunderous response from backers on Kickstarter.
While working on Blood Rage, Lang began to put
together other concepts for further games steeped
in his lifelong obsession with folklore and legends.
(“I have lots of ideas,” he admits.) While the designer
would find most to be “not publishable”, he eventually
hit upon the idea of a spiritual successor to the area
control gameplay showcased in Blood Rage, but

18 March 2018

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 tabletopgaming.co.uk 19

018_025_risingSun_v2 MJ.indd 19 13/02/2018 15:01

 RISING SUN

instead taking the mythology of ancient Japan as

its foundation. LEFT Players can
“I challenged myself with, ‘How different appease kami spirits
can I make a game that shares a similar set of with prayer, or opt to
components and exists within the same genre?’” attract the favour of
Lang recalls. “I wanted to make a game that came the demon-like oni
in a box similar to Blood Rage but offered very
different gameplay, and earned its own place on a BELOW Legendary
gamer’s shelf.” creatures and
At first glance, Rising Sun’s similarities to Blood monsters can help
Rage are evident. There are dozens of miniatures – one clan dominate
both human-sized warriors and towering monsters their enemies
– splayed across the regions of a map board, and
card-like tiles play a key role in dictating the pace of
the action. The illustrations and models reflect the
cultural relocation, but have an air of familiarity –
little surprise, given the return of artist Adrian Smith
and the sculpting team at Studio McVey. But, despite
some echoes of its predecessor, Rising Sun is very
much a game all of its own.
“At its core, I would say Blood Rage is a game of
kinetic combat management: when to fight, when to

I wanted a game where

‘face’ – the social ledger
of your honourable deeds
and loyalty – is indistinguishable
from reality.

20 March 2018

018_025_risingSun_v2 MJ.indd 20 13/02/2018 15:40

 win, when to lose, and anticipating your opponents’
risk profiles at the same time,” Lang explains.
“With Rising Sun, it’s more about co-ordination.
Actions are more indirect in this game, and often
require piggybacking on the actions of other players,
and subtly try to control the flow. I wanted to create a
vehicle for players to discuss how to destroy each other
in a war like honourable statesmen.”
A NEW ALTAR
A large part of why Blood Rage and Rising Sun feel so
distinct comes down to the distinct differences between
the beliefs of Norse Vikings and the inhabitants of
feudal Japan. Each game attempts to capture the sense
of their era’s unique social foundations, be it a staunch
commitment to going down in a blaze of glory or
upholding an unimpeachable code of honour.
“My guiding principle for both games was pretty
simple: what do I think is the fun part of being a clan
leader in this mythology?” Lang says. “I did my best
to make sure that all viable player strategies spring
from one of those fun elements.”
018_025_risingSun_v2 MJ.indd 21
Sometimes finding this sense of fun meant
departing from the true-to-life elements players BELOW Able to manipulate
might expect from games rooted in history. There mandates, the Lotus clan
is no A Feast for Odin-style almanac here, nor any makes for a good ally
attempt to dig into the minutiae of life in centuries
gone by. Make no mistake: these are action BELOW LEFT
blockbusters, not documentaries. Each clan has
“With both of these games, theme is everything. individual
I threw away countless clever mechanics or entire miniatures
iterations that distracted from the theme,” Lang reveals. and a
“To be clear, by theme I don’t mean simulation. Neither unique
game is remotely historically accurate. With each, I ability
wanted to capture a specific immersion; to put you in
the headspace of a Viking or dynasty clan leader.”
This heightened feel is felt most strongly in the
presence of Rising Sun’s kami – the spirits worshipped
as part of the Shinto religion that have returned to
reclaim the land and anoint a new emperor. Players
can send their Shinto warriors into the mountains to
pray to four kami, which will then bestow a blessing on
the clan that best pleases them. Each grants a different
benefit, from wealth and honour to additional units,
tabletopgaming.co.uk 21
13/02/2018 15:01
 RISING SUN
and can help swing the standing of the clans – making
ABOVE The Bonsai clan the competition to receive their favour heated.
is able to buy resources Also present are the supernatural oni, demon-like
without spending money beings responsible for causing evil in the world. While
the kami reward clans that uphold their honour,
BELOW Knowing when the oni prefer those who stray into dishonourable
to form alliances – and behaviour, granting upgrades and advantages at the
when to break them – is risk of a faction’s integrity.
key to victory Players can even attract the support of legendary
monsters to lend their might to their forces. Being able
to summon and commune with the mystical evokes the
same sense of awe and wonder that Lang experienced
as a child reading fantastical stories – as well as being
downright cool to do.
22 March 2018
018_025_risingSun_v2 MJ.indd 22
“I’ll be blunt – historical games bore me senseless,”
Lang says. “I love history and absolutely appreciate
its value, but when it comes to games I am all about
selfish motivations. I want to feel powerful, clever
or cool. The folktale element of these games elevates
them beyond anything resembling simulation. I want
to capture the heightened feeling we in pop culture
understand about these mythologies.
“In my opinion, a good story requires that realism
yields to drama; in a fun game simulation must yield
to sustainable and replayable interaction. Fantasy – or
mythology, in this case – is a wonderful shortcut to
that; it’s an intuitive declaration of fun first, everything
else distant second.”
NEW CLASSICS
Just as their settings are folklores retold for a modern,
interactive audience, Blood Rage and Rising Sun look
somewhat to the past for their gameplay.
“One early goal I had with Blood Rage was to solve
an old problem I had with Risk: why is the fun thing
to do – combat – so costly and punishing to initiate?”
Lang explains. “How about a game where fighting is
something you wanted to do, win or lose?”
For Rising Sun, Lang turned to another wargaming
classic: Allan B. Calhamer’s Diplomacy, the infamously
lengthy and knives-out game of negotiation, wobbly
alliances and ruthless betrayals from 1959.
13/02/2018 15:02
 “Rising Sun is only distantly related to Diplomacy,”
Lang details. “I wanted a ‘gentleman’s wargame’
with lots of deal-making, required co-ordination
between players and even betrayal. But one of
the problems I wanted to solve was to take the
sting out of inevitable betrayal, and even weave
it into the essential fabric of the game.
“Risk and Diplomacy are iconic
games. I wasn’t looking so much to
update the games themselves, but
drew very loose inspiration from
their basic play patterns, the way a
musician is influenced by the music
they grew up with.”
As in Diplomacy, forming
alliances is crucial to Rising Sun. Each
of the game’s four seasons opens with
a tea ceremony, allowing clans to discuss
and negotiate working with their former
opponents for shared benefit – while the alliance
holds, at least. Inking an agreement stops
friendly clans from hurting each other during
battles and grants various other bonuses as the
factions build up their forces and reposition units
around the board.
“Traditional Blood Rage strategies don’t apply in
Rising Sun,” Lang says. “You have to balance province
control with an upgrade card strategy and your clan
power; the three combine to give you a game plan.
“Combat in particular is an element where timing
is very important. You won’t win every battle alone,
no matter how much plastic you have. Choose wisely
what your tactical goals are for each battle, and don’t
be afraid to negotiate with opponents even during
[the war] phase.”
Players’ strategies begin to take hold as they
execute actions and bonuses during each season’s
political phase. Clans choose from five restricted
mandates, recruiting units, marshaling them
between regions, upgrading warriors, harvesting held
provinces or – vitally – betraying their ally. Each is
picked one at a time and used by all of the players, but
has different effects for the player that picked it and
the rest of the group.
018_025_risingSun_v2 MJ.indd 23
Managing diplomacy with rival clans is most
important during the final phase of each season, as
units in contested regions go to war. Each side of the
battle secretly bids coins on different war advantages,
hiring wandering ronin warriors, taking hostages,
earning honour for killed figures by writing poems
and even committing seppuku, the ritual suicide
traditionally used by samurai to die with honour
rather than being captured by the enemy. The
need to save money (secretly stashed behind
each player’s screen) to fund inevitable conflict
makes a combination of forward planning and
judging your rivals’ moves key.
“I took a lot of pains to balance the negotiable
elements of strategy – navigating the map – with
personal play: upgrades and combos,” Lang
says. “Combat, the tactical element, is neither
deterministic nor random. The
variance is pure anticipation and
reading of your
opponents. You
can only negotiate
so far, but clever play
can manoeuvre you out of a
bad deal if necessary.
“Also, by codifying alliances and making
sure they remain temporary, players’ ‘motivations’
are more on the surface, which dovetails with
honour, both conceptually and mechanically.”
Honour in Rising Sun is more than just a word.
It’s a tangible asset tracked alongside the side of
the board and adjusted as clans either remain
upstanding in their actions or give into the
temptation of turning on their allies in order
to claim some of their forces for their
own with the betray mandate. Being
the most honourable clan can give the
upper hand to a faction when competing for the
blessing of a kami or even resolving wars, resolving
ABOVE The Koi clan can ties in the favour of the more upstanding side.
use coins as hired ronin “Honour is the single mechanic that never changed
in any iteration of the game,” Lang reveals. “It is the
BELOW Battles never backbone by which I judged all other moving parts.
come down to simple luck “Philosophically, I wanted a game where
‘face’ – the social ledger of your honourable deeds
and loyalty – is indistinguishable
from reality. And a game where
the actions of others, based
on timing, could affect
your standing. This really
puts players into the
mindset of the era; your
honour standing is not
100% in your control, and
it subtly unlocks other
avenues of negotiation.”
tabletopgaming.co.uk 23
13/02/2018 15:03
 RISING SUN

IMPRESSIVE ‘START
LEFT Honour is Just as he couldn’t get enough of the stuff of legend
one path to victory, as a child, Lang’s mythical creations have enraptured
but dishonourable players. Blood Rage’s ’s 2015 Kickstarter campaign raised
strategies can have just over $900,000 from almost 10,000 backers – an
their own advantages impressive feat at the time. Still, it pales in comparison
to the $4.2 million that Rising Sun brought in from over
BELOW The Turtle three times that number of people a year ago, making it
clan is able to build one of the highest-funded tabletop projects of all time
fortresses on the back on the crowdfunding site.
of giant turtles, which As with other projects from CMON – the Zombicide,
can then transport the Arcadia Quest and Massive Darkness studio that Lang
strongholds around joined as director of game design midway through
Rising Sun
Sun’s Kickstarter run – Rising Sun’s ’s campaign
wasn’t met with universal approval by players. Criticism
was levelled at the decision to make a number of the
models and add-ons for the game exclusive to backers
of the Kickstarter, stopping those who find the game in
shops from experiencing all there is to see.
“My opinion on this topic continues to evolve
over time,” Lang responds to the question of holding
certain elements back from a retail release. “From a
gameplay perspective, I try to keep the elements with
the broadest appeal in the core set and/or the primary

With this series

of games, I wait
until I’m so in love
with a concept
that I can’t sleep
until getting
it prototyped.

24 March 2018

018_025_risingSun_v2 MJ.indd 24 13/02/2018 15:41

 expansion. Exclusives tend to be elements that some
players will love, but some will hate. There’s a lot more
nuance to this, but that’s the clearest demarcation I
can vocalise without writing a full thesis.”
The Kickstarter saw the confirmation of three
planned expansions, adding support for an extra
player, expanded rules for the kami and extra
monsters, among other things, to the game. Lang
suggests that the collection marks the completion of
Rising Sun – at least for the time being, that is.
“We unlocked all of the expansion content I was
comfortable releasing for the game, thanks to the
thunderous success of the Kickstarter,” he says. “I have
more ideas, but there is so much gameplay in these
sets that I don’t think players are going to beg for more
expansions any time soon.”
Having already expressed his desire to create
an ongoing series of games based on folklores that
inspired him while growing up, it’s little surprise that
Lang is already working on a follow-up to both Blood
Rage and Rising Sun alongside his various other
designs and CMON projects.
“I am working on a third game literally while
answering these questions,” he tells us.
Although the proposed run of games is described as
being “very loose” in connection and based on a wide
variety of cultures, Lang says the series likely won’t
grow to include a large number of titles. In fact, despite
the critical acclaim and adoring audiences certain to
clamour for more, the designer is keen to ensure that
the passion and care partly responsible for his success
so far remains at the front of his mind.
“Like with Rising Sun,, I had the core concept for a
while now, but allowed it a lot of time to percolate,”
he says of his third entry in the series. “With
this series of games, I wait until I’m so in
love with a concept
that I can’t sleep until
getting it prototyped.
The current game is
something that feels
fresh and familiar and,
even with the pattern
we’ve established so
far, should defy
many expectations.
“There’s no rush. It’s
done when it’s done.”

ABOVE Players command

an army of Daimyo,
Shinto and Bushi
warriors, alongside hired
ronin and monsters

LEFT The agile Dragonfly

clan can move around
the main map with
little restriction

tabletopgaming.co.uk 25

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 A DECADE OF DISEASE
It’s hard to imagine board gaming today without Pandemic, Matt Leacock’s
radical infection-fighting smash hit. As the first game in the series turns ten,
the designer and his collaborators reveal how they changed the world forever
Words by Matt Jarvis

26 March 2018

026_033_pandemicAnniversary_v3 MJ.indd 26 14/02/2018 11:23

 I
n 2004, Matt Leacock was a user experience
designer working for Silicon Valley tech company
Yahoo. At least, that’s what he was doing by
day. At night and during the weekend, he was
beginning to put together a board game that
would permanently change the face of the
tabletop and propel him to game design stardom.
That game was Pandemic.
“I’ve been making games since I was a little kid,
really,” Leacock says. “I gradually just kind of refined
my ability to do so by making lots and lots of really
bad games. I was applying a lot of the things I learned
at work, whether it was graphic design or the process
used for developing user experience: videotaping,
lots of observing of people and not interrupting
them, seeing what kind of mistakes and decisions
they make. So I applied a lot of that to the game as I
developed it.”
Leacock’s first published game was Borderlands,
a kingdom-expanding card game put out by his own
Locust Games label with little fanfare in 1995. A second,
lightweight racing game Lunatix Loop, followed five years
later. It would be nearly a decade before his next release.
“Games took me a lot longer back then to develop,”
Leacock says. “[Pandemic] had a long gestation period.
But I was also a new father and, y’know, I was refining
my craft and so on.”
Leacock started designing what would become
Pandemic in 2004, developing it alongside a project he
been working on for even longer, loosely titled Ants.
“I brought [Pandemic] to a convention every year to
show off in its rough state,” Leacock says. “I brought it to a
lot of different meet-ups – there’s a game group at Yahoo
and Silicon Valley Boardgamers – and just bounced it
off lots and lots of people over about three years.”
Over the course of a couple of years, he would show
Pandemic and Ants to publishers together – at one
026_033_pandemicAnniversary_v3 MJ.indd 27
point retitling Pandemic in an effort to make the theme
of curing disease more palatable.
“In 2006, a publisher remarked to me, ‘I have no
idea how I’d market a game called Pandemic,” Leacock
reveals. “So I changed the name to Global Outbreak for
my next round of pitches.
“Ultimately I ended up pitching it to about five or six
publishers in April of 2007.”
Among the publishers who saw Pandemic in early 2007
was Zev Shlasinger, founder of Z-Man Games, who met
Leacock at The Gathering of Friends, an invitation-only
gaming event hosted by Ticket to Ride creator Alan R. Moon.
“There, he showed me an ant-themed game,” Shlasinger
recalls. “We were just about to do scoring but I had to run
to catch a plane. As I was leaving he said he had another
game, a co-operative one, and I told him to send it to me.”
Leacock laughs: “I was looking through some of
my old emails and saw Zev had written back and
said: ‘Hey, you know, was it Pandemic or Ants, I can’t
remember which one was the hit of the crowd?’”
“I received it soon after,” continues Shlasinger. “It wasn’t
like anything I played before; when the first epidemic
card came up and we had to see where it would spread,
all the players got up away from the table with bated
breath. At that moment I knew I had to do the game.”
“He was the first to really write back and say he was
interested in publishing it,” Leacock confirms. “After he
agreed to do the game, the first thing we agreed to was
that we’d keep the original name, Pandemic.”
GOING VIRAL
Co-operative games are widespread today, but at the
time of Pandemic’s release few tabletop experiences
allowed players to work together. Reiner Knizia’s
celebrated Lord of the Rings adaptation had broken the
competitive mould in 2000, but failed to spark a trend of
collaborative titles in the near-decade afterwards.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 27
14/02/2018 11:23
 T EN YE ARS OF PANDEMIC
“People told me I shouldn’t do [Pandemic] as there was
no market for co-op games,” Shlasinger says. “But that great
feeling of trepidation on where the epidemic was going to
strike, the talking about what needs to be done, the game
itself, kept my resolve to pursue publication.”
Leacock was inspired to make Pandemic co-op by
his career working in tech. The board itself became the
opponent, with players taking on uniquely-skilled roles
– whether a medic, scientist, researcher or operations expert
– and travelling around the globe, removing disease cubes
and collecting sets of cards to ultimately cure four infections.
“One thing I really enjoy about designing co-op games
is that you get to basically create an artificial intelligence
algorithm that fights against the players,” he explains.
PANDECADE E V ERY PANDEMIC GAME, E XPANSION AND SPIN- OFF
F R O M T H E N U N T I L N O W. H O W M A N Y H AV E Y O U P L AY E D ?
2008
28 March 2018
026_033_pandemicAnniversary_v3 MJ.indd 28
“You’ve only got cardboard and chips and some very
OPPOSITE Matt Leacock simple components to do it. I find that challenge very
started work on Pandemic interesting, because I don’t want to repeat myself, I don’t
while working at Yahoo in want the games to be the same, so I’ve gotta figure out
2004 (Douglas Morse) new ways to challenge the players. Y’know, basically
make it worthy of five adults or kids’ attention for an
BELOW Each player’s hour repeatedly. That’s no small thing.”
role has a unique ability The collaborative setup was propelled by Pandemic’s
that come together to inventive game-changer: a mechanic that simulated
help stop the plague a snowballing contagion by reshuffling cities that had
previously been infected and replacing them on top of
the deck after an epidemic card was revealed.
“That was one of the first things that I found when I was
sketching on just some newsprint with some Sharpies,”
Leacock recalls. “I was just playing with the way the cubes
might appear on the board and when it came time, at some
point, I decided when I needed to reset to make things
worse, what I could do with this discard pile. I ended up
putting it on top of the deck and saying, ‘Oh this would
be really diabolical.’ That’s actually what hooked me into
the design and got me going; that was the core loop or
mechanism that I hung most of the game on.”
The tension triggered by revealing an epidemic was
ratcheted up further by a second rule that required
players to draw a card from the bottom of the deck,
which would suffer an instant eruption of three plague
cubes. Behind the idea was Tom Lehmann, the designer
of Race for the Galaxy who would later collaborate with
Leacock on all three of Pandemic’s expansions to date.
“Tom was really great in developing [Pandemic]; he
played it at The Gathering of Friends multiple years,”
Leacock says. “One year he brought it just to show when
I couldn’t make it and got a lot of testing feedback and
helped out with refining that mechanism – the idea that
the cubes come from the bottom, you pull a card from
the bottom of the deck and make one city in particular
even worse, was a way to keep the tension maintained.
So I owe him a lot for helping to develop that idea.”
The infection cards that relentlessly spread disease across
the globe and the player cards needed to discover a cure,
but could also offer up helpful events or spark epidemics,
are two separate – but interlocked – decks in the game,
driving home the feeling of racing against time. Initially,
2009
13/02/2018 15:07
 Leacock combined the two together. A
painful testing session with his Yahoo
co-workers at lunch led to an epiphany.
Initially when I was
“They kept making mistakes, they
kept putting cards into the wrong
asked to expand it I
piles and I kept correcting them,” he
says. “This drove one of the design
was a little sceptical because
researchers absolutely crazy and
she said: ‘You are going to sit in the
I thought the design was
corner and you’re going to shut up!
You’re not going to say anything
actually quite fragile.
else, you’re just going to watch what
we do.’ And I did that and it was
torturous because they really had an extremely difficult exciting, but it was a fairly small print run. I was going to
time playing the game. It was very rocky and at that be happy if we went to a second print run, that was my
point I realised that I needed to make a change because expectation. But, yeah, it just kept building and building.”
people just didn’t know how to make this thing work. Even with the success of Pandemic, Leacock wouldn’t
“It opened up all sorts of possibilities for the inclusion make the leap to becoming a full-time game designer until
of event cards and using the deck as a timer. That was a big 2014, by which time Pandemic and Leacock had become
moment because it unlocked the structure of the game widely known both inside and out of the gaming world.
and has been the structure for it and all the expansions.” “The popularity of Pandemic was brought home to me
With its gameplay polished to a sheen over three years during the 2014 Ebola crisis,” says Lehmann. “Matt and
of playtesting – “I really felt good about the entire product Jocelyn Becker had organised Pandemic Parties to
when it went out,” Leacock says. “There wasn’t anything raise money for Doctors Without Borders to help
I wanted to apologise for.” – Pandemic launched in early fight Ebola. Those parties raised over $50,000
2008. Like one of its diseases, it soon caught on. worldwide. It was great to be able
“We released in January/early February to no fanfare: to give something back and see
no shows, no real marketing,” Shlasinger says. “By the how supportive the Pandemic
third week of February, I was at a show and I took a fans were all over the world.”
phone call from a distributor asking to buy Pandemic.
Afterwards I turned to my friend and told him, ‘I think BREAKING OUT
we are sold out!’ That was the fastest-selling game for us Pandemic’s status as a near-instant hit quickly
and I knew we had something special.” led to an expansion, 2009’s On the Brink, which
Leacock, meanwhile, says “it was hard to know early introduced extra roles, challenges and support
on” just how big his breakthrough hit was becoming. for a fifth player, among other additions
“Actually, I felt like I was kinda one of the later ones – including plastic petri dishes to store
to know,” he says. “Because you put the game out there, the disease cubes in, a ‘wow factor’
people are buying it or not – you don’t really know. I was requested by Shlasinger. It was the first
hearing– I think it was first the game was getting big in LA expansion Leacock had ever worked on,
of all places; it was a convention called Orccon and I guess and he was wary of altering his finely-tuned creation.
everybody was playing it. So I started to hear about it being “Initially when I was asked to expand it I was a little
really popular then, and also I heard that the first print run sceptical because I thought the design was actually quite
had sold out in the first month. Which was of course very fragile,” he admits. “I didn’t know if we were going to be able

2013

2012

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 T EN YE ARS OF PANDEMIC
Pandemic was briefly
renamed to Global
Outbreak in an effort to
make the game more
appealing while pitching
to publishers. The
change didn’t stick
(Matt Leacock)
2014
30 March 2018
026_033_pandemicAnniversary_v3 MJ.indd 30
to maintain the balance as well as we had in the base
game.” He laughs. “But now, y’know, three expansions
and how many standalones later, I know what kind of
knobs to turn in order to keep making the world a little
bit bigger. It seems like a pretty robust system.”
On the Brink was followed by two further expansions
– 2013’s In the Lab and 2015’s State of Emergency – with
Lehmann contributing to all three.
“Matt came up with the structure of a base expansion
core with optional challenges,” Lehmann says. “New
roles and events became the core stuff in each expansion,
while ideas such as a harder disease, a mutant disease,
a bio-terrorist, a lab extension, infections jumping from
animals to humans, an untreatable disease, etc., became the
inspirations for the various challenges.”
In the Lab added a completely new side board, with
players simulating pawns in a laboratory as they searched
for the cures dispensed on a macro scale on the main map.
“The lab challenge was probably the hardest,” Lehmann
says. “Matt’s original version didn’t work and was rejected
by Zev. Matt had no time to redo it from scratch and turned
it over to me. I had several friends who worked in biotech
give me crash courses and tours of their workplaces, then
revised everything to its current form.”
Some of the optional modes took Pandemic beyond
its co-operative origins, with On the Brink introducing an
asymmetric mode where one player controls a bio-terrorist
attempting to spread disease and In the Lab introducing
support for competing teams racing to cure the plagues first.
“The bio-terrorist challenge was a requirement from Zev,”
Lehmann reveals. “A small but vocal group of players really
wanted it. Matt and I knew going in that most players were
happy with Pandemic as a fully co-op game. One of the bio-
terrorist challenge’s underappreciated features is that it can
be used by one experienced player to teach a bunch of new
players by being the bio-terrorist. This way, there’s no worry
about the experienced player being too dominant.
“The team game was something I wanted to explore
after a publisher had pitched the idea that team games
were going to be the future of gaming. I’m pretty happy
with how it turned out, especially when it is played
six-player, with three teams of two. Sitting next to your
teammate and communicating via pointing at cards and
the board and cryptic comments, so as to not give away
info to your competitors, is a lot of fun!”
Lehmann also took the lead when it came to a second
edition of the original game, released in late 2012 ahead of
the fifth anniversary celebrations for Pandemic.
“When Z-Man had been bought by Filosofia and they
were going to relaunch Pandemic, they wanted to rewrite
the rules and add two more roles to the base game,” the
designer says. “Throughout this period, Matt had
very little spare time to work on games: he was
married, had two young kids, and was working
long hours at a Silicon Valley startup!”
The second edition established a new look for
the game, devised by illustrator Chris Quilliams
and graphic designer and art director Philippe
Guérin, that would go on to define the visuals of
the series from that point on.
“Pandemic had a lot of potential for a very
cinematic universe and we wanted to focus on the
hero aspect of the game rather than what could
have been a scary horror-like approach with the
viruses, like a great drama,” Quilliams says.
2015
13/02/2018 15:08
 “Josh [Cappel, artist for the first edition] had placed the
game’s theme in a very real-world setting, so we wanted to
keep that idea. This tone for the new edition was extremely
important and is one of the reasons the theme works so
well. But if we look at departures we made from the original,
I think the biggest difference would have been the low-key
sci-fi elements we incorporated, placing the game slightly
further into a digital future. The game’s new design revolved
around this idea and really reflected the new style.”
Among the key inspirations for the refreshed visuals
was iconic Indiana Jones, Back to the Future and Star Wars
movie poster artist Drew Struzan, Guérin reveals.
“The mandate was clear: make it more actual and
contemporary,” he explains. “We wanted medical science
to look ‘cool’ or exciting. Floating faces with the idea of
integrating multiple scenes into one composition. The
concept of the triptych also came from Drew’s work. It was
also very important to put as much if not more emphasis
on female characters and try to be as much inclusive as
possible on the covers. I think we did a good job there.
Looking at it now, we might have gone a little too ‘Michael
Bay’ on the whole making science exciting idea, but I’m
glad most people enjoyed what we did.”
2014 saw the release of two distinctly different takes on
the series. Pandemic: Contagion was a card game by Carey had just gotten married and used all sorts of other games
Grayson that recast players as diseases competing to wipe out The need to reshuffle in his wedding receptions, and they’d decorated the
humanity, while Leacock translated the original game’s co-op and replace infected tables with them. He had, like, hundreds and hundreds of
set collecting to dice rolling in The Cure. (The Cure would cities when an epidemic these six-sided dice and he gifted quite a few of them to me.
get its own expansion, Experimental Meds, two years later.) is revealed was one of It was a wonderful, wonderful gift. So I got to work stickering
“That came out of a conversation with Sophie Gravel, the first ideas Leacock all those dice and putting my kids to work; my wife was
who was the head of Filosofia at the time,” Leacock reveals. came up with stickering dice, because we ended up making six prototypes
“She had purchased Z-Man [in 2011] and really wanted to to send out to remote testers and really did a lot of refinement
breathe a lot of life into the Pandemic line, make it into a along the way. I found that really, really fun; the whole idea of
new Carcassonne or Catan or so on. I was excited about that abstracting it and making it faster was quite a challenge.”
idea, so we brainstormed a lot of different ideas for ways we
could take the product, whether we could make a Pandemic CO-OPERATION
dice game or Pandemic card game. Then we laughed and In recent years, Leacock has taken the Pandemic
said maybe we could make a Pandemic legacy game.” He universe even further afield.
laughs. “I think The Cure took a couple of years to develop. One of the most drastic departures is 2016’s Reign of
That one I spent quite a bit of development time on. Cthulhu, a Lovecraftian overhaul co-created by Chuck D.
“The design brief was take Pandemic, turn it into a dice Yager that swaps disease cubes for cultists and portals,
game and make it simpler to set up and faster to play. That and epidemics for the monstrous Old Ones. (Despite the
makes me really excited, I love tasks like that. A friend of mine done-to-death theme, it’s well worth a play.)

2016

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 T EN YE ARS OF PANDEMIC

More ambitious, though, is the Survival Series: an ongoing

collection of annual limited-edition Pandemic reimaginings
set in the host countries for the touring Pandemic Survival
world championships and co-designed by a local designer.
The set began in 2016 with the historical Spanish-set Iberia,
developed with Jesús Torres Castro, and was followed the
following year by the Dutch Rising Tide, co-designed by
Food Chain Magnate co-creator Jeroen Doumen. This
year’s world championships will be held in Italy, with the
next Survival Series entry set in the Italian countryside.
“It’s just so fun to be able to work with other people
that can bring in fresh ideas,” Leacock says. “Because I
have limits to how many new ideas I can bring in. It was
wonderful to worth with Jesús because he can bring this
authenticity to it that I would not be able to just have – I’d
have to read all these books about the Iberian peninsula in
the 19th century! I kind of feel like I’ve made my reputation
on the base game and I don’t really have to defend it at all,
so working with co-designers is just a great way to go for me.”
Pandemic’s best-known spin-off has arguably eclipsed the
original game, with Leacock’s collaboration with Rob Daviau
on Pandemic Legacy spawning two acclaimed seasons.
In many respects, Legacy is a culmination of the entire
Pandemic series so far, evolving its gameplay over the Pandemic and slight variations on it. So let’s look at what
course of a year-long story that aims to establish the world Player cards and we can do,’ Daviau says. “We just tried to turn everything
as more than just a generic backdrop. infection cards were inside-out and start building from there.”
“In Season One, we started with Pandemic and then went originally combined in Leacock and Daviau have already confirmed they
from there,” says Daviau. “A lot of the things that we did a single deck – until a are working on a third season in the Legacy series, with
relied on, pulled from or were inspired by expansions that painful testing session suggestions of a possible release date next year, but say that
were already out. So we had this sort of built-in toolbox that convinced Leacock to it will bring a close to the story – for the time being, anyway.
we could go to if we came up with a similar idea.” make them separate “We’re not going to do a Season Four anytime soon
Set 70 years after its predecessor, Season Two is an even after Season Three is done because I couldn’t see starting
more radical remoulding of Pandemic’s framework, forcing Season Four and thinking: ‘We don’t have a story or
players to reveal the now-hidden map section by section mechanics for where to start here,’” Daviau says. “We’d
and, most drastically, making the disease impossible to cure. be just sort of repeating ourselves.”
Instead, cubes represent supplies that must be transported The Survival Series and Legacy have showed there
around the board, aiming to protect against the plague before is still a limitless amount of experimentation left in
it hits rather than reacting to the spreading infection – pushing Pandemic – so who would Pandemic’s creator like to see
a system Leacock once believed to be ‘fragile’ to the extreme. put their own spin on the series next?
“When we got to Season Two, we both thought, ‘Okay, “There’s so many great designers out there I don’t know
we just asked people to play about 15 games of Pandemic where to begin!” Leacock exclaims. “Then there’s other
and slight variations of it; I don’t know how many people people who I’ve never met before. There’s the big names
are going to want to sit down and play about 15 games of and then all these other indie designers who have things

2017

32 March 2018

026_033_pandemicAnniversary_v3 MJ.indd 32 13/02/2018 15:07

 PLAGUE PICKS
The designers and artists behind Pandemic’s many
iterations tell us their favourite way to play
to say and bring to the table, as well. The Survival Series is
fun because I’ve been trying to find people in each of the
different host countries and sometimes that means calling
out a designer like Jesús that no-one’s ever met before.”
INCURABLE ENTHUSIASM
Like few other games on the tabletop, Pandemic has
continued to mutate over the last decade, evolving into
new forms that have kept the game a revolutionary force.
Leacock is keen to keep pushing the series as far as it will go.
“There’s a lot of different things that could be explored,”
he acknowledges. “Some of them are more intriguing
than others. I think we’re seeing a lot of games use story in
them now. There may be some sort of story-driven game
for Pandemic. I’d love to see it in a card game somehow,
although I really have no idea what that would look like.”
As the Legacy series fleshes out Pandemic’s world
as something more than just another generic disease-
ridden post-apocalypse, the designer voices his desire to
tell more stories in the expanding universe.
“That’s something that Rob and I are talking actively about
quite a bit,” Leacock confirms. “We want [Season Three] to
be coherent and to continue on and form this world. It’s
been interesting to develop that sort of thing because it’s this
journey of exploration; we start with kind of a rough outline
and have some idea of where we’re going, but as we’re
meeting day to day it just takes on new life, a life of its own.”
“I have a great fondness for this sort of alternate
Pandemic world that we’ve created,” agrees Daviau.
“That’s one thing that Matt and I and, to some extent,
[publisher] Asmodee are trying to figure out: can we give
this world a separate name or brand so that either we or
someone else could make a game within this world?”
As another new era dawns for one of gaming’s most
infectious creations, there’s no sign of its world domination
coming to an end anytime soon.
“What’s important to me is that people are really
interested in seeking it out and the key to that is keeping
the products fresh and not repeating and trying to break
new ground and try new experiments and so on,” Leacock
says. “As long as there’s demand for it and I’ve got ideas
for bringing it further and other people are willing to work
on it with me, I can see it going for another 10 years.”
026_033_pandemicAnniversary_v3 MJ.indd 33
Matt Leacock, series creator: “I do like Iberia in particular
because you get to create things as you’re playing. My
favourite types of games have a lot of creative problem-
solving, when you’re putting unexpected things together
in order to come up with solutions that were surprises to
you, but just happen to work. Iberia features railroads that
you can kind of design as you’re playing, so it’s got this kind
of strategic arc to it in addition to all that tactical decision-
making. I think that’s why it’s appealing to me.”
Tom Lehmann, co-designer of Second Edition, On the Brink,
In the Lab and State of Emergency: “I enjoy and like them
all. I tend to prefer Pandemic at five epidemics, though. With
six-plus epidemics, for me, it starts to feel a bit like being
on a treadmill. I prefer to add challenges, rather than more
epidemics, to increase difficulty. With four experienced
players, I like to play the Superbug challenge, along with
Emergency Event – which make the game a lot more
unpredictable – from the State of Emergency expansion.”
Chris Quilliams, illustrator: “I really enjoyed working
on both Reign of Cthulhu and Legacy: Season Two; I love
conceptualising and designing characters and worlds, and
these two games in the franchise lent themselves the most
to creating concepts from imagination. These games take
place in a more removed alternative reality than our own. I
just find these types of themes are so much fun. I also loved
working on the two styles we chose for the illustrations, more
so than any of the other Pandemic styles in the series.”
Rob Daviau, Pandemic Legacy co-creator: “If I was going to
play a Pandemic game and spend a lot of time with it, I would
play the standard game because I’d be playing with people
who had never played before. I would take joy out of teaching
it and let them make decisions and not alpha-game them. I
don’t need to push myself to have virulent strains and seven
epidemics – I’m just not that good at it. I did enjoy playing
The Cure a couple of years ago with some friends and would
like to play that again because I found it interesting.”
Zev Shlasinger, founder of publisher Z-Man Games:
“The base game is fine for me. But I like anything that
more events and more actions that can take place to
shake things up a bit.”
Philippe Guérin, graphic designer and art director:
”My personal favorite is Reign of Cthulhu. I like horror
and my friends do, too. Don’t know if it’s the best one
in terms of mechanisms and balance, but I love the
figurines and the colours of the game. Legacy: Season
Two is also freaking awesome. It’s one of the projects
I’ve had the most fun on and one that I am the most
proud of. But, of course, I didn’t experience it the way
it was meant to be… Damn, I really don’t know!”
tabletopgaming.co.uk 33
14/02/2018 11:33
 H AV E Y O U P L AY E D ?

ANDROID:
NETRUNNER

‘runner’ and the megacorporation attempting

The ultimate cyberpunk showdown is a tense duel of to defend against their cyber attacks – each
hacker against corporation, and continues to be one of with completely different pools of cards and
even gameplay systems. The runner would
the most exhilarating card games around more than two build up ‘icebreakers’ – essentially viruses
– and eventually make runs against the
decades after it first jacked in. Let yourself be ensnared corp’s servers, protected by layers of ICE – or
firewalls. Each side raced to achieve a different
Words by Matt Jarvis objective first: the corp attempted to complete

I
f anyone doubted the game design
genius of Richard Garfield after he
invented the most influential card game
in the world, Magic: The Gathering,
in 1993, by the end of 1996 it was
impossible to deny.
While Magic would go on to be Garfield’s
most iconic creation, almost instantly
spawning an entire genre of collectible
card games, including the hugely popular
Pokémon TCG, and defining playgrounds and
conventions for decades to come, Netrunner
would take a little longer to come into its own.
(Gaming magazine Pyramid would go on to
declare it as one of the millennium’s most
underrated games in 1999.)
Released three years after Magic, Netrunner
was another two-player collectible card
game, but was distinctly unlike anything
that had come before. In Magic, players
could construct and customise their decks,
but otherwise had identical options. In
Netrunner, the two opponents took on
distinctly separate roles – that of a hacking
secret agendas, while the runner tried to break
through and steal valuable data.
Despite being critically hailed at the time
for its innovative design and finely-crafted
gameplay, Netrunner eventually fell out of
print, leaving Magic to dominate as Garfield’s
crowning glory. Then, in 2012 – 16 years after it
debuted – the game was fired back into life as
Android: Netrunner, a revamped and refreshed
reboot that did away with the original CCG’s
random booster packs in favour of new
publisher Fantasy Flight’s fixed living card
game expansion sets. Finally, Netrunner had
jacked in for good.

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034_035_haveYouPlayed_v3 MJ.indd 34 13/02/2018 15:09


WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT?
The original Netrunner was set in the world of
Cyberpunk 2020
2020, Mike Pondsmith’s influential
‘80s roleplaying game that helped solidify the sub-
genre of rebellious sci-fi alongside seminal works
such as William Gibson’s Neuromancer.
Netrunner’s taut head-to-head action
Netrunner
particularly focuses on the conflict between
capitalist entities – the corp – and low-life
radicals – the runner – as each fights to
undermine and eliminate their rival. While all of
the combat plays out in cyberspace, the runner’s
need to ‘jack in’ means they can risk suffering
devastating brain damage if the corp’s security
measures are especially nasty. On the other
hand, a corp can be directly damaged with the
unthinkable: bad publicity.
Android: Netrunner relocated the game’s
social battles to the universe of Android, the 2008
murder-mystery board game set in a dystopian
version of Los Angeles where humanity has
colonised the moon and clones and robots have
become part of everyday life. Computers are
034_035_haveYouPlayed_v3 MJ.indd 35
operated directly by connecting your brain to the
network, allowing solo runners to pit themselves
against the barriers of corporations, upgrading
their hardware and software before making an
attempt to break through and pilfer protected
data – if they can find it.
HOW DO YOU PLAY?
Both the corp and the runner have unique
gameplay elements, but the basics of Netrunner
are familiar: drawing and playing cards. The corp
gets to draw a card each turn, representing their
limitless resources and wealth, while the runner
must use one of their actions (known as ‘clicks’) to
restock their hand, but is nimble enough as a lone
insurgent to have one extra action each round.
Each side gradually builds up their software
and hardware. The corp is able to create new
servers, keeping their contents hidden from the
hacker. In front of each server is one or more
layers of ICE, which also remain secret
until the runner attempts to access a
server, at which point the corp can choose
to ‘rez’ each layer of ICE to try and stop
the run.
The runner’s icebreakers can stop the
abilities of the ICE – which often force the
run to end, or cause more powerful
effects – allowing the runner
to make their way deeper
into the network. If they make
it all the way through to a
server, the runner can see what
the firewalls were protecting,
potentially stealing data for the
points needed to win or trashing
some of the corp’s other resources.
In a fourth wall-breaking twist, the
corp’s hand, deck and discard pile
also count as servers (referred to in-
game as HQ, R&D and archives), meaning that
the runner can hack into those cards – everything
must be protected.
MAIN Runners must
attempt to hack into the
servers of megacorps and
steal their data before
they achieve agendas
MAIN INSET Each
player has a completely
unique deck of cards and
pool of actions to use
RIGHT Android:
Netrunner was recently
rotated for the first
time, changing the cards
legal for tournament play
In order to beat the runner, the corp must keep
agendas protected in their servers, which they
can then advance by spending clicks and credits.
Each agenda is worth points to either played
depending on whether it’s advanced or stolen,
making winning a careful and tense game of
bluffing, strategy and luck.
WHY SHOULD YOU TRY IT?
Android: Netrunner is a game that stands alone
when it comes to recreating the frantic feeling of
breaking into a heavily protected network – or
trying to fend off constant attacks from a tooled-
up hacker.
The asymmetric setup means that playing
on each side of the match requires a completely
different play style and strategy, with a huge
amount of complexity and depth to be found in
kitting out your corp or runner’s deck with the
right equipment and abilities, as well as picking
the right overall character identity to determine
your special abilities, deck size and more.
The layers of bluffing and deception mean that
it’s incredibly tense to be a runner facing a wall
of unrezzed ICE – with no promise of valuable
data at the end – or the corp attempting to hide an
agenda behind your safeguards.
While there’s plenty to be learnt when it
comes to optimising your personal deck and
discovering the best way to chain together cards
to achieve victory, Netrunner’s straightforward
basics means that it’s surprisingly easy to pick
up and get started. If you can play Magic, you
can play Netrunner.
Now’s a great time to jump in for the first
time, too, as Android: Netrunner recently saw its
core set revised with a brand new box of cards,
refreshing the selection of cards for beginners (but
not introducing anything completely new) and
rotating the expansions legal for tournament play.
With a fresh leaping-off point for newcomers,
there’s no excuse to miss out on one of the most
inventive and thrilling games on the tabletop.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 35
14/02/2018 12:25
p036.indd 1 07/02/2018 09:16
 KICKSTARTING
F R O M S C R A T C H
To back, or not to back? Holly Gramazio wrestles with the
A
make-or-break question facing Art Deck’s campaign
s our Kickstarter launch gets ever closer,
we’re grappling with perhaps the most
important decision of all: what do we
Offer one offer our backers?
Okay, sure, we offer them a copy
big, splashy of the game. Fine. Maybe it wasn’t such a difficult
question after all. But there are a lot of other
reward. questions that follow rapidly after...
Like: how much do we charge? Art Deck has a lot
Just in of cards, around 110 – so it’s expensive to print. We
probably have to look at around £20 a deck. Our only
case a other option would be to print a LOT of copies to get
the price per unit down. But the more we print, the
millionaire more backers we need...
Twenty pounds isn’t out-of-line with other
stumbles Kickstarter rewards, but nor is it cheap. So is there
something we can offer backers at a lower price
across point? A lot of card games on Kickstarter offer a
print-and-play incarnation, usually at a reward level
your game of around £5 or £7. Would that be a good idea for
us, or would it just discourage people from getting
idea and the actual game? Well, realistically, printing and
cutting 110 cards is super annoying. A cheap-ish
loves it. print-and-play option might tempt a few backers
to downsize from the full game, but it should more
March 2018
037_kickstartingFromScratch_v2 MJ.indd 37
than make up for that by bringing in people who do
want to support the game but were never going to
spend £20.
What about expansions? Art Deck actually works
really well with expansions, but we’re trying to keep
it simple. Two expansions, then: ‘party’ and ‘arty’.
The party deck will be full of cards that are a lot of
fun to play with, but which might be a bit too weird
for schools and families. And the arty deck will give
us a home for cards which aren’t the funniest or
most sociable, but which refocus the game from
the interactions between players and onto the work
they’re creating together. This also lets us hedge our
bets a bit on the audience we’re focusing on – we
don’t have to decide between “funny parlour game”
and “drawing generation tool”.
What about fancier rewards? For some games
that means T-shirts or posters; for us, we’re
thinking of a deluxe set with art supplies included.
And beyond that? A piece of Kickstarter advice
we’ve heard a few times is: offer one big, splashy
reward. Just in case a millionaire stumbles across
your game idea and loves it. Make this reward
something genuinely great that you’re sure you
can deliver as a one-off, since you probably won’t
get more than one or two people backing at this
level. For us, since we run games for a living, the
obvious option is a huge game of Art Deck, run by
us, with paints and vast pieces of paper and some
custom cards and everything we can do to make a
fun night. Maybe this reward is something nobody
will want – but it’s good to have it as an option, just
in case.
We’ve pulled this list together by focusing on
three key pieces of advice that we’ve heard over
and over:
1. Focus on the game itself, rather than adding a
ton of unrelated rewards.
2. Keep the number of rewards under control,
so that potential backers can get their head
around the options easily – and so you can
actually fulfil them if the Kickstarter succeeds.
3. Make sure that however much support
someone might be looking to give, from a few
pounds to a few hundred, there’s a reward
level that’s right for them. Kickstarters are
hard, and you’re gonna need all the help you
can get.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 37
13/02/2018 15:09
 I
n 2014, French studio Space Cowboys
released Splendor. A game of rival medieval
jewel merchants, it challenged players to
build an empire of mines, trade routes and
showrooms, attracting the patronage of
wealthy nobles and carving out a reputation as
Europe’s most prestigious gemstone traders.
It’s the kind of theme that might seem
to lend itself to a long, complex, economic
game. But Splendor took exactly the opposite
approach, avoiding clunkiness and complexity
in favour of a slick, simple and fast-playing
design. While its minimalist ruleset meant
new players could pick it up in minutes, it
offered a constant stream of tricky decisions,
rewarding careful planning and sharp-
elbowed opportunism in equal measures.
In the relatively short time since its release,
it’s been recognised alongside the likes of
Catan and Ticket to Ride as an ideal gateway
game, perfect for introducing new players to
the tabletop hobby. I spoke to its designer,
Marc André, to find out how Splendor came
into being, and how it earned its reputation as
a modern classic.
GEM OF AN IDEA
Marc André had a typical introduction to
gaming. The third of four children, he spent
countless rainy days playing mass-market
games with his family.
“Of course, I was subject to the curse of
Monopoly,” he says. “We played it, and other
mainstream games. I started playing so young
that I never read or understood the rules, but
what really mattered was having fun, and the
atmosphere around the table. Those are my
earliest memories, so really I’d say that I was
born a gamer, and I still am.”
While his first recollections of gaming are
lighthearted, André soon entered into the
more serious and competitive world of chess.
“My father founded a chess club, so I
learned to play at a very early age, at four,” he
says. “I had to play intensively from the age of
seven, and that went on for 10 or 11 years. It
meant I ended up hating this amazing game.
It left a durable mark on me, and I guess that
sometimes shows in my designs.”
It was in high school, though, that André
discovered a strand of gaming that was to have
a profound effect on him.
“I started playing roleplaying games,”
he says, “and it was a revelation, a kind of
epiphany. I converted my friends to it, and we
just played and played so much. We mostly
played Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, and
playing RPGs gave me so many friendships
038_042_howWeMade_v2 MJ.indd 39
and opportunities to meet people. They
unleashed my creativity.
“My favourite RPG was Call of Cthulhu.
I liked it because it went further than just
playing a role. You could actually ‘win’ the
game. Or you could ‘lose’ if you didn’t collect
enough information while you learned
about the overall intrigue and delved into a
scenario’s mysteries.”
Like many roleplayers, André enjoyed
tweaking the rules of the games he and
his friends played, adapting them to suit
different styles of play. Eventually it led him to
experiment with creating games of his own.
“What I loved most were the mechanisms
behind the game,” he says. “I didn’t care
as much about the stories or the setting. I
bought games compulsively, but I was never
completely happy with the rules. Most of the
games I played were very simulation-oriented,
things like Chivalry & Sorcery, Space Opera
or the French RPGs Celtic Legends or Arabian
Nights. In these games, character creation
alone took about two hours. It was a game
within a game. My brother and I would have
fun min-maxing characters to the utmost, and
we could do that because some of the rules we
were using really weren’t balanced.
“I realised that players’ actions could just
become absurd because of badly written or
poorly thought-out rules. For example, in
AD&D, every gold piece you earned gained you
one experience point. It meant that characters
stopped being heroes and just become tomb
robbers. I ended up altering the rules to improve
the collective experience and the overall
narrative. I found that I loved doing it, and I’ve
been creating my own games ever since.”
From roleplaying games, André progressed
to miniature wargaming, and from there to
board games. His first published title, 2011’s
Bonbons, was a family-friendly memory game
with a theme revolving around different types
of sweets. But it was his next release that was to
make his reputation as an emerging designer.
COLD AS ICE
Splendor had a simple premise. Players started
with nothing, aiming to become wealthy
and prestigious jewel magnates through a
combination of cunning, cleverness and a
tiny bit of luck. On each turn they’d choose
whether to acquire new gems to add to their
collection – different varieties represented
by coloured discs – or spend some of their
accumulated jewels to grow their burgeoning
empire, snapping up mines, shipping lanes
and shops represented by rows of cards.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 39
13/02/2018 15:16
 ABOVE There are three levels of cards,
each offering up a different combination
of jewels, to use for purchasing more
expensive cards, and victory points

LEFT The prototype was an abstract

game with a lot more score-keeping

With players taking a single action per turn,

it was streamlined, simple and quick to play.
But it also came with some clever touches that
rewarded tactical thinking. Players picking up
gems could choose to gain three of different
colours, or two that matched. It meant
choosing between collecting a variety of
jewels, keeping their options open, or focusing
on particular types, stockpiling them and
denying them to opponents.
“The idea for Splendor occurred to me when
I had a sleepless night,” says André. “It came
up very suddenly, and it seemed so clear.
Basically you had this system reminiscent of a
maths problem. The core concept was simple:
either take three different resources, or two
of the same. The overall architecture of the
game is rooted in maths, and it gives it a cold,
calculating feel that I find very pleasing.”
Gathering resources was only one part of
Splendor’s formula, though. As players raced

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038_042_howWeMade_v2 MJ.indd 40 13/02/2018 15:16

 HOW WE MADE S P L E N D O R

to snatch upgrades, they became wealthier
and more powerful, gaining access to cards
that were more expensive, but also more
lucrative, simultaneously gaining their owners
new resources and valuable victory points. It
meant that while a typical game lasted only
20 to 30 minutes, it still managed to capture a
powerful sense of progression and growth.
“The whole idea of the game was that you’d
spend resources to get cards, getting prestige
[victory points] and a permanent resource. So
you were building an engine,” says André.
“To make that happen, there needed to be
cards which were easy to buy, but which got
you no points, or just a few. And there needed
to be costly cards worth a lot of points. So the
game has three levels of cards, and it avoids
the cards gave you points from two to 25, and
you needed 100 to win. It was a real weakness,
because you had to keep score with rather big
numbers during the game.
“The publisher divided all of the scoring
values by five, and they set the target score to
15, which shortened the average play time.
I approved the changes, but I was worried
because I’d put a lot of work into classifying
all of the card values, and they’d just trashed
it all. My precise evaluation of each card was
simply obliterated, and I worried that players
might not understand why a card needing
many resources would give them fewer points
than a less expensive one.
“It still feels like a mathematical
aberration to me, but when I tried
ALL THAT GLITTERS
The team’s work paid off, and Splendor met
with a positive reaction on its release. While
it missed the eligibility window for 2013’s
Spiel des Jahres award, it was nominated
the following year, narrowly losing out to the
racing and betting game Camel Up. While
André was excited to be nominated, he says
the accolade also brought a lot of pressure.
“The publisher’s enthusiasm was bordering
on excessive, so I felt like it was a heavy
burden,” he says. The ‘Spiel des Jahres 2013’
thing had become kind of a joke, because by
this point it was 2014. But Croc and the Space
Cowboys team held onto it.”

The overall
putting any roadblocks in players’ paths. playing the final version I had
“With Splendor, everything is about finding exactly the same feelings and the

architecture
the tipping point. Either get fewer cards and same kind of pleasure I had when
make more points, or go for a higher quantity playing the original design. The

of the game is rooted

and build a big engine. Either way, the game only issue was that there were
becomes a race. And that’s what Splendor is many ties happening, so I had to

in maths, and it gives

about. It’s a race, it really is.” devise some tie-breaking rules,
André realised he had a compelling design particularly for tournaments.”

it a cold, calculating
on his hands, and he rushed to prepare a Space Cowboys’ other big
working prototype for the 2012 Toulouse contribution was to the game’s

feel that I find

Game Show, where he introduced Splendor theme. Where André’s initial
to multiple publishers. Among them was design was largely abstract, the

Christophe Réaux – better known by his
nickname of ‘Croc’ – one of the co-founders of
French studio Space Cowboys, who instantly
concluded that the game had the potential to
win the industry’s highest accolade.
“Croc sat down to play,” André recalls, “and
when the game ended he said: ‘This is Spiel des
Jahres 2013!’ And I was like: ‘You’re right!’ It
might seem pretentious, but I’d rather call it a
kind of mutual, irrepressible enthusiasm. I knew
then that the game would be in good hands.”
The Space Cowboys team worked to
develop the game and, while André says the
published version was largely unchanged
from his initial design, it underwent a number
of tweaks at the hands of its publishers.
“If I sent you the original prototype, it
would play almost exactly the same way as the
finished version of Splendor,” he says. “There
are a few differences, of course. The biggest
change was that in the original game, all of
very pleasing.
publishers worked to inject it
with a dose of atmosphere and
aesthetic appeal.
“I didn’t choose the final
theme, Space Cowboys did,” says
André. “I gave them the key elements of the
theme, though. I told the editor the tokens
were meant to represent raw goods, like wool,
wheat – a Catan set of resources, if you like.
“Level one cards represented the extraction
and exploitation of those raw materials. Level
two cards were the transformation of the
materials; things like bakers and potters. And
the level three cards, where the big points
were, were fairs and markets.
“Space Cowboys wanted to avoid a
Middle Ages theme, so they went for the
Renaissance. They chose gems because they
wanted raw materials to be considered as a
kind of currency, too: something with value
associated with it.”

tabletopgaming.co.uk 41

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 HOW WE MADE S P L E N D O R
His solution to the feeling of stress was to
throw himself into work on new ideas. Among
them was Majesty: For The Realm, which cast
players as rival nobles battling to build thriving
realms by recruiting different types of citizens.
Like Splendor, it was quick, simple and came
with a pronounced engine-building element,
but also incorporated more interaction
between players, with rulers’ decisions having
positive or negative effects on their rivals.
“In summer of 2014 my mind was so set on
the Spiel nomination that I needed to work a lot,”
he says. “So the first Majesty prototype was born.
“Creating Majesty was much harder than
designing Splendor. After a full year working
on it, I finally ended up with the finished
game. I like it as much as Splendor, and I think
it aims at the same audience. Maybe Majesty
is more family-oriented and easier to access
than Splendor. I really love creating games that
allow new players to discover our hobby and
make them use their minds a lot.”
With Majesty now on shelves, André has
moved on to other projects – including an
intriguing design that looks back on his
roleplaying past.
“I’ve been working on a very exciting project
for years,” he says. “I’m done with the rules,
but I don’t think I can go any further with it by
myself. It’s an adventure game with a narrative
component using cards. It’s quite different
Splendor’s first expansion, Cities of
Splendor,, includes four different modules
that can be used to modify the game
42 March 2018
038_042_howWeMade_v2 MJ.indd 42
from all existing games, even if it belongs
to the ‘board games with a roleplaying feel’
category. That’s the project I’m most keen on,
but I can’t write a good scenario, I just need to
find the right partner to work with me.
“Some abstract games meet great success,
but I think board gamers, especially the
veterans and the most involved players, are
looking for strong themes and immersion. I’d
say there’s a pressure, even a diktat in modern
board gaming to immerse players deeply into
themes. RPGs are by far the most immersive
games of all, so it’s no surprise that many board
games claim to mimic the RPG experience.
“You have ‘role-oriented’ games like Fog of
Love, in-character investigations like Sherlock
Holmes: Consulting Detective, adventure games
like Robinson Crusoe, TIME Stories or Legacy
of Dragonholt. There are scenario-based
games like Zombicide or Conan, or games
like Pandemic Legacy where each play leaves
a mark on the game itself. But to be honest,
I’m not a big fan of any of these, even if I
appreciate their qualities. To me, they don’t
fully recreate the RPG experience, and that’s
why I feel the need to create my own game.”
While he has plenty of plans lined up for future
releases, André isn’t finished with Splendor
Splendor.
The game has had a digital adaptation,
becoming a smartphone and
tablet app. It’s also received a set
of expansions, adding a variety of new twists to its
elegant original formula. But while the designer
hints that fans of the game have more to look
forward to, he’s tight-lipped about specific details.
“I’m not short of ideas,” he says, “but I can’t
tell you anything about Splendor’s future.”
For now, André is pleased with the reaction
the game has received. In a gaming market
where trendy new titles come and go at a
bewildering rate, it’s shown itself to have
staying power, retaining its popularity years
after its release. And he’s particularly happy
with Splendor’s status as a game used to
introduce new players to the hobby.
“I’m still amazed with Splendor’s success,
and with the overwhelmingly positive reaction
to the game,” he says. “Each year, really strong
new games appear, and Splendor keeps on
selling very well.
“What I’m most proud of, though, is that people
play Splendor a lot. A good ‘gateway’ game must
be played a lot, or it’s a failure. To me, Catan,
Carcassonne and Ticket to Ride are the epitome of
gateway games, and Spiel des Jahres winners.
“If you feel like you’ve created a good
gateway game, you really can’t be selfish and
keep it to yourself.”
Many thanks to François
Doucet for his assistance
as an interpreter for
this interview.
13/02/2018 15:16
 There is no sunlight, there is no hope.
Beware the shadows of the Chem-Zone. 

Chem-Zone Walls System contains 60 pieces of resin walls. Product is sold painted and
assembled. Ready straight out of the box.
Chem-Zone battle mat can be purchased separately.
We ship worldwide. Purchases can be made in GBP, USD or EUR at www.gamemat.eu

p043.indd 1 01/02/2018 11:31

 FIGHTING TO SURVIVE
Leaving the frozen wastes of Outpost: Siberia behind, Jon Gilmour and Daryl
Andrews are heading into the rainforest with the second chapter in their gruelling
survival series of co-op card games. But will they make it out the other side?

O
Words by Matt Jarvis

utpost pits its players against
harsh circumstances,
challenging them to endure
and persist despite the
odds. The card game has
had quite the survival tale
of its own, starting life as
a comic book spin-off before evolving into a
series of globetrotting adventures, with its
divisive debut last year calling its very future
into question.
Outpost started as a challenge laid down
to Daryl Andrews, the co-creator of Sagrada.
Andrews quickly brought on board Jon
Gilmour, the designer behind games such
as Dead of Winter, Dinosaur Island and
Wasteland Express Delivery Service, to help
him create a game that captured the tension,
difficulty and drama of surviving in just a few
dozen cards.
“The inspiration for Outpost came when
Daryl was presented [with] the challenge
of designing a 54-card survival game,” says
Gilmour. “We both thought this would be an
interesting challenge, so we started working
on it right away.”
LEFT In Outpost: Amazon, players aren’t
just trying to survive attacks from
creatures – they must also capture them
OPPOSITE TOP Outpost: Siberia began
life as a 30 Days of Night spin-off
“One question I asked Jon was about
the original influences of Dead of Winter,”
Andrews recalls. “In chatting he mentioned
one source of influence was 30 Days of Night.
I pitched the idea to Jon about making a
30 Days of Night card game where we were
restrained to only using a deck of cards. It
was a crazy idea – but I think designers love
restraints and challenges.”
Gilmour and Andrews pitched their project
to IDW, the game and comic book publisher
responsible for putting out Steve Niles and
Ben Templesmith’s influential 2002 mini-
series about Alaskan vampires.
“They seemed open to a game in the world,”
Andrews recalls. “However, before signing the
game, IDW had some internal meetings and
determined they were not ready for this game
to be set in that universe. However, they still
really liked the core and asked us to make it
similar in feel.”
Ditching the 30 Days of Night setting
and transplanting the action from one
snowy tundra to another, Siberia, the game
transformed from a fight for survival against
bloodthirsty vampires to a trilogy of titles
about enduring against twisted versions of the
local fauna in three harsh environments.
“Quickly we realised it was a fun, affordable
and compact system we had come up with,”
Andrews describes. “However, some of our
ideas were making the game too complex.
So we clearly identified it would be cool if
we could do a series and introduce in the
different adventures a few of the different
complex rules, instead of layering them
all in the one game. This gave us space
to tell more stories and play in different
environments, too.
“It almost feels like a collection of short stories.”
“Each game would have different
mechanical and thematic elements,” Gilmour
adds. “We didn’t have a cohesive vision at first,
but working with IDW, we were able to come
up with the outpost theme.”

44 March 2018

044_046_outpost_v4 MJ.indd 44 13/02/2018 15:17

 “The biggest challenge we had with the
Outpost series was adjusting difficulty
without adding components to the game.
When you have a more limited palette
to work with, it’s much harder to adjust
difficulty in a thematic way.”
True to its theme, Outpost: Siberia’s foes
were highly deadly and tough to take down,
often wiping out players’ fragile characters in
a matter of rounds as the humans scrambled
to find flamethrowers, ice axes and flares in
the deck.
“Personally, I loved how difficult Outpost:
Siberia was,” Andrews says. “Too many co-
operative games I played when I was younger
were too easy to win.
“When I experienced the game The
Grizzled, designed by Fabien Riffaud and Juan
Rodriquez, I finally experienced a game that
I thought was near-impossible to win and
matched the theme/atmosphere perfectly.”
Despite its creators’ assurance, it was a level
of difficulty that a number of players found to
be overly punishing, attracting a hail of mixed
and negative reviews upon release and leading
the team to release an online ‘survival guide’

CHILLY RECEPTION
Last year’s debut for the series, Outpost:
Siberia, was a co-op challenge in the vein
It almost
of John Carpenter’s The Thing, with players
trying to gather resources to endure the
feels like a
winter cold while fighting off attacks from
mutated bears, wolves and even infected
collection of
human researchers.
One of the game’s most interesting features
short stories.
was its double-ended cards that could surface
as a threat during one round but, if defeated,
might return as vital food, water, weapons or
equipment later on.
“With only having a deck of cards to work
with, it became clear to us that we needed
multi-use cards to have enough variables to
play with,” says Andrews. “I think it is fair to
say Jon and I love multi-use cards so that was a
fun challenge.
“The difficult part was figuring out what
information to put where, and how best
to present that information to the player,”
Gilmour adds. “Another interesting hurdle
was how to balance the difficulty and allow
the players to adjust that difficulty to their
experience levels.

tabletopgaming.co.uk 45

044_046_outpost_v4 MJ.indd 45 14/02/2018 11:38

 OUTPOST
RIGHT Outpost:
Amazon
introduces a
scoring system
that encourages
more replayability
to better balance the odds with gameplay
tweaks. As they prepared to follow up with a
second instalment, the designers were faced
with their own challenge of needing to ease
up the pressure without detoothing the core
tension of the gith for survival.
“The people have spoken and we would be
foolish not to listen,” Andrews acknowledges
frankly. “We are thankful people enjoyed
the game, in spite of the difficulty being so
hard. So we made sure to adjust the difficulty
down. The game is still hard, but the focus of
this adventure is about how many points the
players can score together.”
“With three separate games, we are
able to look at what fans of the games are
saying and tailor the future experiences to
what players enjoy most about the series,”
Gilmour says.
AMAZON GRACE
These fruits come to bear in Outpost:
Amazon, the sequel to Siberia that takes
the series in a new direction beyond its
relocation across the Pacific.
Players are no longer simply trying to
survive, but must also attempt to capture
cryptids – mythical creatures – to further
their characters’ research and maximise their
score. It’s a small but significant change that
Gilmour and Andrews hope will keep players
returning to the rainforest, rather than just
trying to escape.
46 March 2018
044_046_outpost_v4 MJ.indd 46
“I’m very excited about people experiencing
the new tension in the Amazon,” Andrews
enthuses. “At the end of the game, although it
might be slightly easier to survive, the players
have the new challenge of comparing their
total score. So let a good arcade game, you
have a chance to top your high score. Also, I
personally really like the balance of choosing
which cages you construct and how players
manage the public area because you are on a
boat with limited space.”
While Amazon sticks to the vision of the
series introduced with Siberia, the drastically
different scenery and expanded focus beyond
simply enduring means that, in some ways, it
feels like a fresh start.
“[There are] lots of ties to the original
game,” Andrews says. “I think the core flow
of the game is the same. Also, we have the
same graphic design and illustration team
involved – so we are excited to be reunited.
I was really impressed with how Outpost:
Siberia looked. I think the second game
looks better. We have even more unique
illustrations in Outpost: Amazon.”
“The setting is no longer a frozen tundra
but a lush amazon jungle, which comes
out in the fantastic art and graphic design,”
Gilmour agrees.
“Coming up with ideas for crazy monsters
was a lot of fun. In Outpost: Amazon, I
wanted to focus on one of my passions,
which are cryptids.”
GOAL ‘POST
Gilmour and Andrews are clearly confident
that Amazon delivers on their promise of a
bigger, better chapter for Outpost. After Siberia
offered plenty of encouraging ideas but fell
short for many when it came to execution, its
sequel could potentially have the future of the
entire series in its hands.
“The largest determiner for that will be the
fans’ reactions,” Gilmour says of the potential
for further instalments. “If the response
continues to be positive, we will look at
continuing to expand the Outpost universe
and come up with more exciting games.”
“Honestly, this comes down to the fans,”
echoes Andrews. “If people enjoy Outpost:
Amazon then we get to keep making the rest
of the series. However, it all comes down to
demand first. Hopefully people enjoy the
second game in the series.”
If that demand is there, the pair aren’t
short of thoughts as to where they’d like to put
players in peril next.
“Jon and I have lots of ideas waiting for
future games in the series if we get to make
them,” Andrews reveals. “Our third location is
Area 51 if we get the chance. We think we have
got some fun ideas with aliens.
“If we get a chance to make the fourth
game in the series, it will be set in Chernobyl
– where players need to be concerned with
not only the monsters outside, but not
mutating yourself.”
13/02/2018 15:17
 the independent shelf

the independent shelf

DUNGEON DEGENERATES: HAND OF DOOM
Raise those devil horns and take a technicolour trip to the Würstreich in an
adventure that’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before
Words by Charlie Theel

O
ne look at Dungeon Degenerates: You can go it alone or stick together in a the party’s witch smeller. Typically resolution
Hand of Doom and either your single party, hopping around the blasted is fast and loose but it can occasionally draw
eyes are bleeding or your head is wasteland on the edge of civilisation. When out with repeated rolls, particularly when
banging. For the latter, this flashy visiting locations you will draw encounters taking on an armoured foe or the annoying
number is nothing short of a brass knuckle and enemies from one of the many decks ethereal creeps. The combat also highlights
punch to the mouth. Those scouring the of cards corresponding to the region you’re the main challenge of this design in that it is
depths of the internet for design talent travelling. Combat and skill resolution is surprisingly weighty with a number of sub-
wouldn’t typically place their hope behind dice-based as players toss a couple of six- processes and rule snippets one must juggle.
publisher Goblinko, a company whose siders attempting to roll below a stat value Fortunately the rulebook is very well-written
webstore stocks such oddities as Pork such as constitution or agility. The system and everything conveyed with utmost clarity.
Magazine and ‘weirdo club leggings’; and is interesting as you want to roll low to be Those momentary hiccups are not
yet here we are. successful but as high as possible to achieve enough to break this flamboyant gem.
Designers Sean Äaberg and Eric Radey the most effectiveness. Everything comes together with superb
are virtually unheard of, boasting a track There’s a great deal of necessary abstraction as precision and quickly wins you over. This is
record that starts and stops with this gem enemies are paired with individual protagonists a one-of-a-kind adventure title that owns
of a co-operative adventure game. It’s a during the fight. You must trade blows with the its aesthetic with an oddball story fit for a
fantasy romp where a group of escaped ratman you’re engaging with before you can stab hallucinogenic trip.
convicts burn up the countryside and the mold mummy in the back that’s terrorising
hack their way through plague conscripts
and megarats – yes, they’re as hideous as
they sound. Every inch of printed material Dungeon Degenerates has an
is covered in blasting neon and pink undeniably individual style, pairing
juxtaposed with soulless black. It’s metal to eye-melting visuals with a metal
its sickly core and, in the setting’s land of attitude and world that evolves
Würstreich, the only crime more appalling permanently over the course of
than heresy is selling out. the campaign
Dungeon Degenerates is a bloody tale
of a group of escapees that begins with
the transport of a soothsayer’s head,
and culminates at the terminus in one
of several paths. It can be played in the
format of this narrative campaign with
outcomes forking into new scenarios, or
you can approach it in the more traditional
one-off environment.
The campaign structure allows
for permanent changes to the
environment and a continuing
narrative of character
progression. The land itself
takes on this ever-changing
dynamic atmosphere as
you permanently upgrade
towns and fight back the
nebulous entity at the
dark heart of the
story – the floating
Hand of Doom.

tabletopgaming.co.uk 47

047_theIndependentShelf_v2 MJ.indd 47 13/02/2018 15:18

 BED AND BOARD:
GAMING RETREATS
As more people than ever take up tabletop gaming, the way we play is evolving.
How can we escape it all and get away with a jolly hobby holiday?
Words by Joshua King
T
he renaissance of tabletop gaming has
swelled club membership across the
country. Be it for Friday Night Magic
or regular Eurogame sessions at their
local store, people are gathering to play more
than ever before.
Dungeons & Dragons’ cameos in Stranger
Things and Community piqued the interest of
another generation in after-school roleplaying.
Pandemic Legacy demands gamers pencil in
upwards of a dozen sessions into their diary.
But what is on offer for those gamers for
whom weekly club play either isn’t practical or
appealing? As the popularity of gaming spreads
48 March 2018
048_049_gamingRetreats_v3 MJ.indd 48
beyond traditional fan groups, so the traditional
ways in which we play are changing.
An often overlooked option is the gaming
retreat. Picture a holiday dedicated to the
hobby: a weekend at the races with Camel
Up and Formula D, or a week exploring the
French charms of Carcassonne and The Castles
of Burgundy with all the comforts of home. In
the US, the team behind The Dice Tower even
runs an annual tabletop gaming cruise which
is part convention, part seaborne retreat.
Here at home there is a wealth of campsites,
cottages and even remote islands to escape to
with boxes of meeples and beer. In fact, many
self-catering holiday homes already come with
battered boxes of board games as standard.
Weekly game nights have never been
possible among my friends – we are too
scattered across the country – so instead
we decamped to a tiny island off Scotland’s
Ardnamurchan peninsula.
Over the course of a week we jousted over
perennial Days of Wonder favourite Ticket
to Ride as well as Tokaido and dice bluffer
Perudo. The length of the holiday also gave
a chance to share new games and mix in co-
operative experiences like Flash Point: Fire
Rescue with the inescapable Exploding Kittens.
13/02/2018 15:19

PLAY-CATION
A gaming retreat is not just one for the
players. It can also prove a hotbed of
creativity, as the family team behind The
Football Game found out.
Mark Pearson and his family have been
visiting a forest campsite near Exmoor for
the past 20 years.
“Treborough used to be a family and friends
get-together,” Pearson says. “We’ve had about 20
but, as we’ve grown up, each family’s own love of
board games has changed what it’s about.
“It was never set up as a board game retreat
but because of our interest and love of board
games it became one. It’s a week or two in a forest
with friends and games.”
The holiday includes an annual Ticket to Ride
tournament – engraved trophy and all – as well as
regular sessions of Dominion.
It was also at Treborough that the Pearsons
unveiled the mechanics and pieces that
eventually became The Football Game.
“Between myself and my brothers, it’s our
10th or 20th attempt to make a football board
game,” Pearson says. “We grew up playing
Championship Manager and Football Manager
on the computer.
“But when we were around 16, a night
staring at the screen started to pale in
comparison to spending a night laughing
around a table with friends.
“At three Treboroughs we took what we had
and played it with the families. It’s vital to get
the balance, to weed out dominant strategies.
Playtesting is king and Treborough was a
testing ground.
“We had to make it mechanically playable.
Once we had that down, that’s when we had
fun adding the theme. It’s the game I wanted
to play when I was a young football fan.”
Some of the Pearsons’ fellow campers have
even made their way into the box, credited in
the rulebook or in the shape of manager and
player character cards.
048_049_gamingRetreats_v3 MJ.indd 49
Pearson adds: “Our family grew up playing
board games, things that have survived from
our dad’s generation.
“We’ve got a holiday let in the south west of
England and whenever it’s available we get our
friends and family down for three or four days
of heavy games like Mega Civilization.”
PLAYS IN THE SUN
The Football Game is one of many Kickstarter
success stories. In America the current
trend for crowdfunded gaming has actually
extended beyond the board to organised
game retreats.
Set in a mountaintop mansion in Utah’s
Heber City, Valhalla in the Fall is advertised as a
luxurious, “non-competitive environment” for
gamers to get together to play.
The event was originally conceived by
miniature wargaming studio Blue Table Painting
and has since been commandeered by YouTuber
Miranda Bourke, also known as WarGamerGirl.
“Imagine spending five or so days in a faraway
retreat up in the mountains,” Bourke says. “You
sleep on site or in a cabin nearby, every meal is
fully catered by an expert chef and you just live
with other gamers and play games.
“You have something in common with
everyone there so it’s easy to pick up a
conversation, or stay up late into the night
grabbing games of Munchkin or Coup and
sharing stories and forging new friendships.”
To date, gamers have travelled from as far afield
as Germany, Australia and the UK to attend the
event. Should they need a break from the dice, the
retreat also has a hot tub and hiking trails.
Valhalla in the Fall began as a celebration of
miniature wargaming – Warhammer 40,000 and
Warmachine still play a big part in the week – but
as new gamers join in, Dungeons & Dragons and
board games are becoming more popular.
Bourke says that the whole thing has a
‘familial’ atmosphere and that she has no
intention of scaling it up from the 50 or so guests
they had in 2017. She intends to launch the
Kickstarter for 2018’s event in March.
She adds, “It’s not a wargaming convention;
Valhalla is a wargaming retreat.”
There is more than one way to enjoy
tabletop gaming – beyond the worlds of weekly
club nights and friendly get-togethers is the
opportunity to spend days or even weeks away
with your favourite meeples.
Ultimately there is no right or wrong way to
enjoy games; retreats just give us all another
opportunity to scratch the itch to roll the dice. So
why not pack a bag, turn off your phone and set
off in search of tabletop adventure?
TOP The Pearson
family and friends
at Treborough in
1997 (main) and
2017 (inset)
LEFT Getaways
can be as simple
as camping or fully
catered luxury
OPPOSITE Valhalla
in the Fall is held in
the largest private
log cabin in the US
tabletopgaming.co.uk 49
13/02/2018 15:19
 Over 400 Miniatures for $120!

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and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse!
Time of Legends: Joan of Arc is a game of dark Medieval fantasy set
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Pledge manager open January 22nd to March 23rd.

p050.indd 1 01/02/2018 11:32
 THROUGH THE AGES
WORKER PLACEMENT
Our new series tracing mechanics from their origins to modern-day spiritual
successors kicks off with one of the most popular gameplay types on the table
Words by Sam Desatoff
W
hen introducing new players to
designer board games I tend to
default to worker placement, or
‘action drafting’ titles. Explaining
the gameplay is fairly simple: place your pawn
on a space and take the associated action. The
easy-to-understand concept combined with a
tactile feedback loop makes worker placement
a very accessible genre. The combination also
makes worker placement one of the most
replicated mechanics in board games.
The genre has roots in the late 1990s when
Richard Breese’s Keydom became one of
the first games to use worker placement as
a gameplay element. Keydom is very basic
by today’s standards, but there is no doubt it
helped to put worker placement on the map
even if it wasn’t the central mechanic.
The relative ease with which worker
placement can be explained might make it feel
limited in the ways it can be implemented, but
the genre stretches across hundreds – perhaps
thousands – of titles. So how do designers
manage to keep the concept fresh? It’s not
always easy to stave off litany, and not every
worker placement game can be a hit, but there
have been a number of important titles over
the years that have introduced enough new
ideas to keep the genre relevant.
1998 2005
March 2018
051_throughTheAges_v2 MJ.indd 51
One early game that helped establish the
worker placement genre is 2005’s Caylus,
a game about building a castle in 13th-
century France. In Caylus, action spaces
are activated in descending order after all
players have placed their workers, which
means that there is a hefty amount of
planning required in order to optimise your
actions. Another wrinkle is the existence
of the provost, who gives players a way to
prevent their opponents from taking actions
at all.
It’s impossible to talk about worker
placement without mentioning Agricola,
designer Uwe Rosenberg’s 2007 masterpiece.
Game setup requires a fair bit of
randomisation, making the available actions
different each game, but the inclusion of
occupation cards ensures that there are
always many paths to victory.
In 2010, a trio of talented designers released
Troyes, a game about building and improving
the titular French city. In other worker
placement games, your workers exclusively
belong to you. This is not the case in Troyes.
One option players have is to pay other players
to use their workers, whether or not they
approve. It can be rather cut-throat, especially
given the semi-co-operative nature of the
2010
game, but there is no denying how clever the
mechanic is.
2012’s Tzolk’in: The Mayan Calendar added
an element of time to the standard worker
placement formula. Action spaces are a part of
large functioning gear that, each round, moves
clockwise. Leaving your pawns on the board
for longer amounts of time sees a higher yield
of rewards, but it also limits the amount of
options you have until you choose to collect.
A generally accepted stipulation of worker
placement is that there should be a limit to
how many times a single action can be used in
a turn. 2013’s Coal Baron flips this convention
on its head by allowing players to use an
already occupied space by using one more
worker than are already there. In this way,
resource management becomes integral to
gameplay as players must weigh the benefits
of paying extra precious workers.
The accessibility of worker placement
makes it a hotbed for creativity. At its most
basic, it may be an easy-to-understand
mechanic, but the variety in games available
is rather impressive. Designers have, and
will continue to, found ways to twist the
genre into new and interesting forms, which
makes players the beneficiaries of decades
of iteration.
2013
tabletopgaming.co.uk 51
14/02/2018 11:35
 THE STORY OF
CIVILIZATION
In a rare interview, designer Francis Tresham reveals
how one of the most revolutionary, influential and
celebrated board games of all time came to be
Words by Matt Jarvis
I
n 1980, a board game called Civilization
was published in the UK by a company
called Hartland Trefoil. Created by the
company’s founder, Francis Tresham,
Civilization was the whole of recorded
human history packed into a box; each
player controlled a single nation from the
invention of agriculture in around 8000 BC
until the arrival of the Roman Empire in
middle of the third century, expanding and
advancing their people as they discovered
new technology. Civilization was a
revolution in gaming, introducing a level of
depth and complexity never seen before and
pioneering the civilisation-building genre
that would go on to flourish and is today
populated by games as diverse as Through
the Ages, Twilight Imperium and 7 Wonders.
Civilization wasn’t Tresham’s first
published game. In 1974 he had invented
an entirely different genre with 1829,
a lengthy simulation of operating and
trading stock in railway companies that
gave rise to the niche but cherished 18xx
series. The following year saw the release
of a lesser-known abstract strategy game,
Kingdoms. His interest in designing more
complex games for older players was
sparked by a combination of encountering
1964’s Acquire, Sid Sackson’s classic game
about investing in hotel chains, and being
unimpressed by the ‘unbalanced’ gameplay
of mainstream offerings of the time.
52 March 2018
052_055_civilization_v3 MJ.indd 52
“We should not forget that there were
precursors, including honourable ones, [such
as] Dover Patrol, that hinted strongly at the
glories that could be, but you needed eyes to
see and the mindset that could detach itself
from established custom,” Tresham recalls
today. “Some were prejudicial, such as ‘real
boys play rugger not board games’.
“Sid Sackson had already devised an excellent
game based on building hotel chains and this
became a flagship in 3M’s range of bookcase
games – most of which were very good apart from
a few duds. Then Monarch Avalon came along in
the wake of SPI, both of whose growing ranges
were heavily cantered on combat simulations
of various types. These were wargames and this
nullified their appeal to ‘peaceful’ players and,
of course, they were strictly two-player creations.
Before this we had Monopoly, technically
a ghastly invention because it became
unbalanced long before its official conclusion.
Give that game its due, though. Many a family
survived the blitz by playing Monopoly in
blacked out air raid shelters.”
It was a Monopoly spin-off, horse-racing
auction and betting game Totopoly, that
served as the blueprint for one of Tresham’s
earliest designs, reworking the original 1938
edition’s bizarre scoring system – a flaw fixed
in later iterations.
“During my senior teens a small group
of us, rarely more than six, used to meet
together to play board games,” he says.
“Each year just before Christmas the latest
Waddingtons offering had a high reputation
with Monopoly followed by Cluedo, which
is brilliantly original – and eternally unique
– then Totopoly and Buccaneer. Other
companies, notably with Scrabble, provided
variety. Otherwise there was little choice
or inspiration beyond the ‘throw the die,
move your pawn, pick up the card and act
accordingly’. Somewhere or other ‘marketing
men’ appeared to penetrate boardrooms and
the annual offerings became increasingly
banal and were soon just damn silly.
“Totopoly attempted to cash in on
[Monopoly’s] popularity and was interesting
and more complex but was strategically
disappointing because of its limited range
of meaningful opportunities. It did, though,
‘accidentally’ start something because the
‘gang’ got hold of it, led by a certain F.G.
Tresham who turned the scoring method inside
13/02/2018 15:20
 out with amazing results. Risk arrived at about
this time and we serious players suddenly had
a standard issue proprietary game that was
totally asymmetric and also ‘fair’.
“We took refuge in tuning old classics and
then concocting new ones. Two of these
became remarkably good, a motor-racing and
then a railway construction game. I still have
Waddingtons’ letter about what they thought
about a game of running railways for profit.”
RAIL AGAINST
The mid-‘60s saw a boom in the number of
American-made board games finding their way
over to the UK, as a wave of innovative designs
began to forge an audience outside of families.
“Import duties that had been penal were
seen as worth paying because the ‘bookcase’
games that replaced our notorious ‘flat-packs’
were a revelation in variety and depth of
content,” Tresham says.
052_055_civilization_v3 MJ.indd 53
Among the most inventive releases was
Allan B. Calhamer’s influential strategy
wargame Diplomacy, which had been
commercially available in US shops from
1959 and is notorious for its encouragement
of deceit and betrayal among players as they
attempt to conquer pre-World War I Europe.
“On a rising tide of determined
skulduggery Diplomacy surged to
prominence,” Tresham recollects. “I hate
that game. I am not by nature either a liar
or a swindler and would rather watch those
who are appear at the quarter sessions [local
courts held four times a year in the UK,
replaced in 1972 by the Crown Court].”
Although Diplomacy wasn’t to Tresham’s
taste, a chance (and begrudging) encounter
with the game of wartime treachery solidified
his own beliefs in what games could achieve
on a grander scale, laying the foundation for
his own ambitious simulations.
“I enjoy the company of serious-minded
game players and had been invited to join a
Diplomacy meeting who could not muster
more than five otherwise,” he recounts. “My
job was to swell the cast to six.
“I took an untested full-country 1829 [the
1974 edition’s map featured only the lower
half of Britain] with me to show my friend
Maurice. This version of the game had been
treated with some reluctance by hardcore
‘1829ers’ because it dabbled in shares as the
only apparent method for allowing people
to play realistic competitive games featuring
more independent railway companies than
there were players. The resultant edifice had
already staggered under the onslaught of
some participants, only three of whom would
be rated as ‘good’ all-round gamers, whereas
the others had been attracted to this soiree by
the presence of a barrel in the next room. The
barrel was the sole obvious survivor.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 53
13/02/2018 15:20
 C I V I L I Z AT I O N
“At this Diplomacy meet a brief visit to the
bog followed and then into the games room.
Here hexagonal benzene chemistry-inspired
tiles were now everywhere and so was a map
of Britain, cards depicting trains – actually,
railway engines – play money and shares,
shares, shares. We none of us needed telling.
The world had become a different place to
what it had been just previously. Asymmetry
spells realism, which means variety, which
is conviction. It took ages to block the Great
Western from getting into Liverpool. Such
games are unsuitable for Aunt Flossy to play
with the brats while the parents are clearing
up after Christmas lunch and should carry
health warnings to that effect.”
DAWN OF A NEW AGE
The idea for a board game that would
simulate the whole of human development
over the course of millennia came to Tresham
during his time perusing the library of the
Royal Air Force’s No.4 School of Technical
Training, based in St Athan near Cardiff,
where the nascent designer was stationed as
a radio instructor during the 1970s.
“Here I came across the Pergamon
General Historical Atlas,” he reveals. “This
was a wonderful primary reference work on
historic geography, simple, concise, clear and
immensely stimulating to someone’s interest
in history and whose schooling had been
abysmal on this subject.
“I now saw territories, tribes and major
cities as entities, marvelled at how they
co-existed along natural frontiers and could
speculate on how their natural characteristics
differed according to their environments.
I had long been excited by board game
design and a Mensa couple got me into Risk.
I admired its simplicity and multiplayer
combat system. Uniting these two stimulants
came automatically.”
The designer began to consider a game that,
like the historical atlas, chart the evolution
of civilisations as they expanded across the
globe. As he worked on the project, it seemed
that the sheer number of geographical,
political, cultural and economic factors that
could lead to a nation’s growth or downfall
would make creating a board game that
remained fair and fun an insurmountable task.
Tresham persisted and, eventually, it clicked:
that previously daunting diversity was the
beating heart of the game.
“I was into board games design as a hobby,”
he continues. “Could this be the basis for a
board game? Perhaps unlikely for the obvious
54 March 2018
052_055_civilization_v3 MJ.indd 54
reason that nations that survived for long
Unlike games such as
enough to get into the Pergamon General
Diplomacy and Risk,
Historical Atlas, which typically needed many
players don’t have to wage
hundred years of evolution, had to develop
war against each other
specialised national characteristics to suit
and can claim a victory
them for the various disparate environments
with cultural supremacy
that their perpetrators needed. Assyria is not
Crete. Some would find drama and poetry
more valuable to advancement than skill
at arms. Next question: what is meant by
‘advancement?’ – and in what direction? – all
the same or – if not – why not? Gor blimey – is
this in itself a game? A real game? And almost
by definition a highly distinctive one. Get
out the felt tips and a large sheet of blank but
tinted cardboard.”
With the game’s action driven by the
progression of civilisations over the centuries,
Tresham opted to have each playthrough
take place over the course of human history
during an almost 8,000-year stretch of
time, beginning with the first farmers and
concluding with the emergence of Rome.
“8000 BC is widely accepted as the dawn
of recorded history,” the designer articulates.
“It isn’t, of course, and teams of ‘experts’ will
instantly start pontificating through their
beards and calling Tresham all manner of
derogatory things. But it will do. It is simple,
concise, cost-effective. Don’t forget this is
a board game, not a moon shot. 250 BC is
about the time that various pundits with
various shaped beards began to make some
meaningful attempt at correlating historic
events in different cultures. Once again: it
isn’t, but it will do.”
A CIVIL WAR
Aside from its scale, part of what made different player groups enjoyed picking up and
Civilization so individual at the time was kicking about,” Tresham says of the decision
its avoidance of warmongering. Whereas to move away from explicit hostility. “Unlike
games such as Risk and Diplomacy relied armies, cities which provide a reasonable
upon the constant conflict of players, veneer of stability can’t just get up and start
victory in Civilization came as a result of running around the board. If they are not to be
overall advancement in culture, technology, ‘merely’ defensive perhaps they might trade
economy and politics. War could still be with each other. The method that evolved
waged when necessary over land or specific for this appears to be the work of a genius
disputes, but co-operation between factions but I believe it was accidental. Anyway, it is
was often far more valuable in the long-term. simple – well, fairly simple – concise and cost-
Trade cards representing commodities can effective. And it works. If they hadn’t enjoyed
be passed between players in an effort to this process do you really believe we would be
collect increasing amounts of points for a set, discussing its finer points 50 years later?”
but also present the chance to secretly offload Cementing this alternative stance away
calamity cards, which depict disasters such as from combat was a concentration instead
civil war, volcanic eruptions and famine, and on managing workers and resources, and
cause the loss of cities and population. investing in the development of major
“I and some brilliant assistants had knocked technological advancements, such as literacy
together a modus operandi that all sorts of or metalworking, which could then increase
13/02/2018 15:20
 a nation’s growth and lead them to future
breakthroughs. This aided their progression
along the ‘archaeological succession table’
by achieving specific conditions each turn,
with the first player to reach the 15th and final
space winning the game.
“I deliberately kept the combat mechanism as
simple as possible,” Tresham says. “Risk pointed
the way. It was the size of the various playing
zones, their stated resource limitations and the
number and inherent strengths of the adjacent
zones that spelt that fresh word to gamers:
‘Civilization’, spelt with a ‘z’ and a capital ‘C’. This
could get completely out of hand and, left to the
combat resolution table and hexag grid fanatics
undoubtedly would do so. Drastic action at the
primeval stage was essential – and little could be
more drastic than using the same font of identical
counters for population or wealth depending on
which way up the player saw fit to deploy them.
052_055_civilization_v3 MJ.indd 55
Hang on! Is that realistic? No. Of course it isn’t. It
just happens to work. And is also cost-effective.
“Time and again in the Tresham family
archives one comes across that same
sentiment, ‘It just happens to work.’ A
long-standing friend of mine who is very
intelligent says that a vital stage in evolving
any new simulation masterpiece is ‘abandon
unwanted realism’.”
At the centre of the gameplay was
Civilization’s most radical feature: a
technology tree along which players could
advance a number of different branches, with
each new discovery unlocking the ability to
research more sophisticated breakthroughs.
It’s a simple yet groundbreaking concept
that has since been used in countless other
tabletop games, as well as dozens of video
games, becoming a modern staple. Despite the
enormous impact the system has had in the
decades since, Tresham says its invention took
very little time.
“I now believe this was largely
spontaneous,” he says. “I designed this as a
novel game and the whole show just took off.”
Despite Civilization’s hugely ambitious
gameplay and vast scope – games can take six
hours or more to finish – Tresham maintains
the game changed “very little” from his
original concept to its first published release.
“[The design process] had dumped us
recreational game meddlers into a sort of
operating regime that we could persuade
ourselves was realistic and also fun,” he says. “It
only needed a ready hand with the sandpaper or
perhaps the blowlamp and the angle grinder.”
READY TO ADVANCE
After Hartland Trefoil published Civilization
independently in the UK in 1980, the game
tabletopgaming.co.uk 55
13/02/2018 15:21
 C I V I L I Z AT I O N
quickly attracted interest and was subsequently
republished in the US by wargame giant Avalon
Hill, which also released the first computer
game adaptation of the title: 1984’s Incunabula.
A pair of small expansions followed, expanding
the map and adding additional trade cards, but it
would take a decade for the arrival of Advanced
Civilization, the major 1991 overhaul developed
by Avalon Hill without input from Tresham that
restructured the trading and scoring systems, and
included more options for players to advance
their nation. A combination of simplified
gameplay features and more complex aspects
of the original game, Advanced Civilization
often divides Civilization fans on whether the
changes make it the superior way to play.
“I don’t think much of Advanced
Civilization because of its unnecessary
complications,” Tresham retorts.
“Advanced Civilization is frequently billed
as being an easier game to understand and a
quicker one to play. I am totally unconvinced
on both points. It is a routine example of the
American philosophy of find something that
is very good, mess it about, add complications
and then try and market the result. For profit.”
Tresham reveals that he began to create his
own follow-up to Civilization, which remains
unpublished – at least for the moment.
56 March 2018
052_055_civilization_v3 MJ.indd 56
“Civilization might end up as Civilization
I. It is my ‘Opus 26’,” he says, seemingly
referring to the first of composer Frédéric
Chopin’s polonaises, which pioneered an
unconventional new style of classical music.
“Civilization II could be my ‘Opus 71’,” he
continues, referencing a trio of polonaises
only published after Chopin’s death, but
quickly tempers expectations with: “A test
session for Civi II ended as the most stupid I
have ever attended.”
MAKING HISTORY
Easily Civilization’s best-known spiritual
successor is Sid Meier’s Civilization, the
long-running series of best-selling PC
games that also debuted in 1991 and
happened to be co-developed by one of the
team that had adapted Tresham’s 1829 for
Avalon Hill as 1830: The Game of Railroads
and Robber Barons.
While Meier admitted the influence
of Civilization on the empire-building
gameplay, and studio MicroProse licensed
the rights to the name from Avalon Hill (a
legal legal battle over rights to the name
would ensue in the late 1990s), he would
ultimately claim that Tresham’s title didn’t
have as great an influence as other games.
Come
back in
200 years’ time
and you will find,
somewhere,
somehow,
people playing
this game.
Civilization inventor Francis Tresham also
pioneered the 18xx genre with hardcore
railway stock-trading sim 1829
Meier’s Civilization would go on to sell more
than 1.5 million copies, with the series as a
whole shifting over 40 million units.
“I am sure that all sorts of people like to
think that they had far more to do with the
origination of this game system than I did,”
Tresham says of the game’s legacy. “They can
think what they like. Before 1950 there wasn’t
a game called Civilization, and now there is.”
Meanwhile, the original Civilization
eventually went out of print, but its influence
lived on in various tabletop successors,
including Mega Civilization, an even bigger
version of the game that supports up to 18
players and takes roughly 12 hours to complete.
There have been various board game spin-offs
of Meier’s own Civilization series, bringing the
loop full circle, while Tresham’s version – or
Advanced Civilization – occasionally surfaces in
convention tournaments.
A new edition of the original Civilization
republished this spring marks the first time the
game has been widely available for a number
of years. While the visuals were updated for a
modern audience, the gameplay itself – archaic,
complex and lengthy as it may be – remained
untouched. Tresham himself expresses a desire
to see his original creation preserved.
“Yes, yes, yes,” he replies when asked if the
game should be considered a relic. “It takes
ages to play. Very few of the pundits who rile
about this seem to be aware that the original
Hartland Trefoil Ltd. rulebook contains a
selection of suggested limitations that may,
by agreement, be implemented in any game
and can shorten the playing time as desired
without messing about with the game itself
beyond accommodating those who require a
shorter playing time because they haven’t got
all day for the experience. It is just possible
that Hartland Trefoil Ltd. may know what they
are talking about. And, come to that, so do I.”
Civilization’s story will continue, whether
in the discovery of the original game by a new
generation or the countless games that owe a
debt to the once singular experience that has
now become the template for an entire way
of playing. Much like the power it hands to
its players, Civilization changed the course
of history and propelled culture in a brand
new direction: exploring a fresh branch of the
technology tree.
“Come back in 200 years’ time and you will
find, somewhere, somehow, people playing
this game far better than either of us can now,”
Tresham says. “It really is a super game and I
am enormously pleased that I have given so
many ordinary people so much fun.”
tabletopgaming.co.uk
13/02/2018 15:21

Play it smart
A game’s rulebook might tell you how to play, but there are plenty of
unwritten rules worth learning that you won’t find inside the box
and Sam Illi ngw orth
Doctors Paul Wake
T
his month we’re taking it back to
basics (in other words: the difficult
stuff) and asking, “What does it
mean to play by the rules?” and
“What are rules in the first place?”
They certainly seem essential in determining the
nature of a game’s challenge and in providing
a means to test a player’s mettle. But are rules
more than that? Let’s examine these questions
by looking at two very different games: Jamey
Stegmaier’s Scythe and Andrew Looney’s Fluxx.
Stegmaier’s Scythe, an alternate-history
“dieselpunk” strategy game, comes with
a comparatively complex ruleset which
BoardGameGeek rankings place somewhere
between “medium” and “medium-heavy”.
However, to regular tabletop gamers, comfortable
with the fact that they’re going to be “running”
the game (unlike digital gamers who can pass that
duty on to their console of choice) there’s nothing
to fear here. Once the game’s rules, presented
over 31 pages, have been mastered play becomes
streamlined and the challenge of achieving
victory as defined by the ruleset can begin.
By way of contrast, Fluxx is a lighthearted
card game that apparently has very few rules.
Fluxx has basic rules to begin with, but they quickly change
March 2018
057_playItSmart_v2 MJ.indd 57
√z
a+b
With a “rulebook” that can be summarised
on a single playing card, its emergent ruleset
solves the issues of explaining rules to new
players by being reducible to just six words.
All of which makes it a great icebreaker at
impromptu gatherings and particularly
suitable for non-gamers. The game’s opening
rules are that all players: (i) start with three
cards; (ii) play clockwise; (iii) draw one
card; (iv) play one card; and (v) adapt to all
additional new rules as they are played.
The idea behind all of this is that chaos
ensues, and it often does, but in reality the
underlying mechanics change very little –
even as the rules do. The majority of ‘new
rule’ cards simply alter the draw/play rate
or the maximum hand size, with goal cards
specifying the conditions that are required to
win. In effect then, the challenge of Fluxx lies
in keeping abreast of a few shifting variables
and some of its pleasures lie in adapting to
the rules more rapidly than your opponents,
thereby giving the impression of your greater
mastery of the game.
Of course, this is all pretty obvious stuff but
these aren’t the only rules at play. So far, we’ve
been talking about what Katie Salen and Eric
Zimmerman call “operational rules”. In their
seminal book Rules of Play they go on to identify
two additional types of rules: “constitutive rules”,
the formal and mathematical structures that
exist “below the surface” of the rules presented
to players; and “implicit rules”, the unwritten
rules of a game that cover in-game etiquette and
good sportsmanship. Suddenly understanding
what’s at stake when we propose to “play by
the rules” becomes rather more complex.
The constitutive rules of Fluxx, then, are
fairly simple: it’s a matching game in which
players must play cards with values matching
those specified on the current goal card.
Scythe is more complex but its mechanics are
suggestive of its underlying “If…Then…” logic.
(a) 2
+
6 (b)
Y
P
La
Ga
Am
Es
Ultimately, summarising the constitutive rules
of both games in terms of formal logic would
be possible, though it would rob both of their
charm. Thankfully, however, this is the job of
the games designer rather than the player (with
the exception perhaps of tournament players)
who will rarely encounter games in this raw form.
It’s the implicit rules that we can’t avoid,
though they’re rarely written down. Some are
obvious (don’t play in the middle of a busy road)
or uncontentious (make sure everyone can reach
the board), others are more difficult to qualify.
While “don’t cheat” may seem like a reasonable
instruction, and one most players would support,
different gaming groups take differing positions
on issues such as kingmaking, kibitzing and
in-game deception. Are these examples of
appropriate gamesmanship, or simply poor
behaviour? Whether we choose to embrace
or ignore these implicit rules, there is perhaps
one that we can all agree to follow – no matter
the game we are playing or the company with
which we are playing it. (Wil) Wheaton’s Law,
i.e.: “Don’t be a dick.”
Paul Wake and Sam Illingworth are
Manchester Metropolitan University
academics and co-directors of the
Games Research Network
tabletopgaming.co.uk 57
13/02/2018 15:22
1066 AND HALL THAT
After triumphing with last year’s epic
fantasy Gloom of Kilforth, indie designer
Tristan Hall returns to re-make history
Words by Dan Jolin

I
t all started in one evening in April 2000, with a rant on “Because of the
Have I Got News for You. The satirical current affairs show Domesday Book, we know
did a bit on the Pokémon collectible card craze, which the names of so many of
made headlines in the UK after some schools banned kids the people who were at
from trading their gengars and magikarps. Panellist Ian Hislop the Battle of Hastings,
went off into a glorious rant, bemoaning the fact that modern and we’ve got so much
sprogs “can’t remember five countries and their capital cities, information about it,”
but just about every child can tell you that charmeleon evolves explains Hall. “So I was
into charmander”. He concluded by announcing an idea for a able to take the names of
CCG of his own: “These medieval history cards that I think are all William’s and Harold’s
going to be a big hit in the playground.” vassals and translate them
Tristan Hall, then a 21-year-old “graduate layabout” with into the game. But it also tells
dreams of becoming a film-maker, was watching at the time. you how many ships they brought across from Normandy,
A light bulb flashed in his mind. so, for example, if I knew one knight brought 100 ships over, ABOVE The
“I laughed, but I also thought, ‘Actually that’s a really good he was gonna have a higher strength in the game than a Domesday
idea’,” he says. “Imagine if two people played Magic: The character who only brought over a couple.” Book provided
Gathering, but every single card was based on a real person In studying how the battle played out – digging far deeper inspiration on
or a real event, and then afterwards took away a little bit of than his memories of medieval history A-level (“I wish I’d paid what strength
history with them.” more attention in class!”) – he realised it had all the makings of each character
It’s an idea that grew quietly within Hall for a good 16 a well-balanced back-and-forth card game, similar to Magic. should have
years until, on completing his debut game Gloom of Kilforth “It involved two armies, almost perfectly matched. Over
(a gothic fantasy co-op card game rooted in his love for the course of that one day [October 14th, 1066], the battle OPPOSITE, TOP
D&D), he started turning Hislop’s gag into gaming reality. swung backwards and forward and could have gone either 1066 is not a
“It was really important for me to prove I wasn’t a way. It might not have the same reach and scope as Magic: The collectible card
one-trick pony with only fantasy-adventure games,” the Gathering, but in the idea of taking out your opponent with game like Magic
Mancunian designer says. “I was very insistent that I get a fast, interrupting actions as people are summoning creatures or Pokémon
completely separate game out there straightaway.” – or people – to the battlefield, the similarities are there.”
That game is 1066, Tears to Many Mothers, a one-to-two-player Aside from the fact that it has, Hall admits, “an extremely OPPOSITE Tristan
asymmetric card game based on the Battle of Hastings, when niche” theme, the significant difference between 1066 and Hall with his debut
Norman duke William the Conqueror invaded England and Magic (and, indeed, Pokémon) is that it’s not collectible. game, fantasy
seized power from Anglo-Saxon monarch Harold Godwinson. “Everything you need is in the box, and that was adventure Gloom
That pivotal event proved ideal material for a number of reasons, important to me because deck construction is all well and of Kilforth
not least of which was the wealth of evidence provided by good for people who’ve got the time, but the games I find get
William’s extensive 1086 survey of his nation, the Domesday Book. more table time with our group are the ones that are ready

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 TEARS IN
HEAVEN
Why ‘Tears to
Many Mothers’?
Creator Tristan
Hall explains…
“Eilmer of Malmesbury
was a monk who lived
through the events of
1066, and he was a
character in himself.
This was a guy who tried
to learn how to fly. He
created a pair of wooden
to go. So with 1066 there’s no having to sift through and work “It’s ostensibly the Alien movie in a board game, but wings and jumped off the
out which cards are better than others. The decks are pre- without the licence,” Hall laughs. “I’m really excited about monastery and broke
made, you open the box and shuffle and off you go.” Lifeform. It’s very different from the two games that I’ve both of his legs. But he
As shown by the success of Gloom of Kilforth (voted the done, so it will hopefully capture the imagination of people was writing about Halley’s
sixth best game of 2017 by this very magazine), Hall has an who are already on board for our existing games, or maybe Comet appearing in 1066,
at which point it was in its
instinctive feel for gamers’ needs and wants, drawn from his people who haven’t heard of us yet.”
perihelion orbit and was
own lifelong passion for the pastime, which he fits around a Hall’s own design future isn’t entirely historical. He’s working a quarter of the size of
day job as a freelance video producer. This is why, for example, on an anticipated expansion for the demon-harassed Kilforth, the moon. All the subjects
he designed Kilforth from the ground up to work as a solo and is in no way finished unleashing the hideous, warped around the land were like,
experience. After all, he himself loves playing a favourite title monsters that have stalked his subconscious ever since his ‘What the heck is this!?’
– like Scythe, say, or Agricola – between game nights. brother showed him John Carpenter’s The Thing at five years old. They thought it was an ill
When we speak, Hall reveals he’s currently finessing 1066’s solo “I’ve got a horror game I’m working on, too, called Sublime omen, or the end of the
ruleset ahead of its planned release this summer, reworking it a little Dark,” he reveals. “The horror games that are available on the world. Eilmer, who was old
so it doesn’t mean solitaire players are denied using certain cards. market tend to be a bit neutered when it comes to delivering enough to have seen the
comet before as a child,
“I didn’t want them to feel like they were missing out, the goods. So we’re going for a really nasty, dark look for this
said, ‘You’ve come, have
so each card that wouldn’t be as strong in the solo game is one. Some of the stuff the artist sent through, I was like, ‘Oh you? I’ve seen you before,
getting a line of text that says, ‘in solo play do this’. Just so my god, that’s too much, we’re gonna have to rein that in a you source of tears to
that every card has a purpose and you’re not faffing around if bit.’ But I’m thinking now, ‘Well, no. As long as it’s legal...’” many mothers. I’ve seen
you’re setting up the solo game.” Perhaps, by the time Hall’s 18-certificate horror show you brandishing the
arrives, 1066 might have realised Ian Hislop’s dream and downfall of my country and
I WANT IT HALL proven a wholesome hit among school kids, teaching them all I hate you’. And of course
Hall is also already planning his next historical pivotal-battle they ever wanted to know about the Battle of Hastings through the events that transpired
duel, St. Elmo’s Pay, which has the same engine as 1066, but a two-deck showdown. Hall’s delighted by the prospect. did effectively end the
world as they knew it
focuses on the 1565 Siege of Malta by the Ottoman Empire. “It wasn’t a conscious part of the design, but the idea of getting
in medieval England. So
“The Battle of Hastings was fought over three wedges of it into schools is really exciting to me. If we could get people reading this quote, the
troops, so in the game you’re competing for these wedges. And interested in history through gaming, that would be a result. What hairs on the back of my
that basic layout really suits similar battles. The Siege of Malta a brilliant knock-on effect from designing a geeky card game!” neck stood up and I was
was fought over the four forts, which were taken one at a time by like, ‘Right, that’s a title
the Ottomans. So again you have that same thing of competing right here!’”
for these objectives and then toppling them one by one.”
Intriguingly, 1565 will be entirely compatible with 1066,
enabling players to enact their own history mash-ups. “You
could take the Normans and have them pitch off against the
Ottomans,” chuckles Hall, “and see who’s the winner.”
Before then, his company Hall or Nothing Productions will be
Kickstarting a game by another designer, Mark Chaplin’s Lifeform,
which pits a team of players as a spaceship crew against another
player in the role of a malicious, stowaway alien. Sound familiar?

tabletopgaming.co.uk 59

058_059_tristanHall_v2 MJ.indd 59 13/02/2018 15:23

 Take your positions at the
iconic Alexandra Palace
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concept.indd 1 14/02/2018 11:56
 BENDING THE RULES
“Though the sport was only really showcased
in season one, the rich lore from over four
seasons gave us plenty of source material to
flesh out the game with.”
The Legend of Korra’s exhilarating sport of pro-bending is Pro-bending Arena sticks closely to the
coming to the tabletop as a fast and furious showdown format of pro-bending matches seen on the
small screen, with two players controlling each
of luck, skill and mastery of the elements. Designers controlling three benders – water, fire and earth
– as they attempt to push their opponents out
Jessey Wright and Sen-Foong Lim enter the arena of a stretched hexagonal arena with ropes on its
long sides; think sumo wrestling meets MMA.
Words by Matt Jarvis “It started with a vision of how the game should
look on the table,” Wright recalls. “We wanted

S
people to see it being played and say: ‘Hey, that
ix people with the power to control Lim, who co-created the game with Jessey Wright. looks like Korra and pro-bending!’ So we started
the elements step into an arena. Each “We were just the lucky ones who got to design it!” with a board that looked like the arena, some wood
side has just three minutes to use the Pro-bending Arena takes most of its cues pawns and cubes. It was remarkable how many
combined forces of fire, water and earth from the first few episodes of the first season of of our friends who knew the show recognised the
wielded by them and their teammates to force their Korra, which sees the titular hero competing in arena map just from the distinctive shape!”
opponents as far back across the ring as possible. the pro-bending league, but the sport remains “We divided the board into zones, as per the
It’s a frantic, intense battle of skill and endurance in the background of the entire TV series. sporting arena,” Lim adds. “From there, we split
unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. “We’re both huge fans of Korra, so we devoured each zone into enough space that the individual
This is pro-bending, the fictional sport of more of that media, specifically the episodes that benders on a team would have freedom to move,
the world of The Legend of Korra, the sequel were focused on pro-bending,” reveals Lim. but not so much so that escaping an attack was
to acclaimed TV animation Avatar: The Last
Airbender. Even in a universe where a select
group of people can manipulate the elements
using the martial arts-like talent of ‘bending’,
The community gets
pro-bending is the ultimate display of ability and
teamwork – the perfect fit for a board game.
to breathe life into
The biggest surprise about Pro-bending Arena,
then, is that it’s take this long to arrive, almost four
the game through
years after the final episode of Korra was broadcast.
“Pro-bending Arena was a game that was
their creativity.
destined to happen sometime,” insists Sen-Foong

62 March 2018

062_063_korraProBending_v2 MJ.indd 62 13/02/2018 15:25

 easy. That was the trick – we wanted the game to
push towards a decisive victory and it wouldn’t if
people could avoid elemental attacks on a whim.”
SPORTING BEHAVIOUR
Because the rules of pro-bending had been so
comprehensively established in Korra, Lim and
Wright say there were few gaps to fill when it came
to translating the sport to the tabletop.
“We didn’t necessarily invent new rules; we just
had to create a logical flow of how the rules would be
executed step by step,” Lim details. “We actually left
some rules out because they so rarely happened.
“Like sudden death!” Wright adds. “We struck
a balance in the design so that ties rarely, if ever,
happened. It’s much more satisfying to end a game
with a winner than in a tie.”
In pro-bending’s official rules, tie-breakers are
resolved by a single bender from each team going
one-on-one on a raised platform in the centre of
the ring. Exciting to watch on screen, but less so
when it came to a board game.
“We felt it was less satisfying to have to play a mini-
game to determine the winner,” Wright reiterates.
Fans will be fans, though, and the pair ultimately
decided to reintroduce the option to have a lore-
accurate showdown following the response to
Pro-bending Arena’s Kickstarter last year.
“Some of the backers were disappointed, so we
created sudden death rules for people who want to
use them and for tournament play,” Lim says.
Breaking the rules in other ways is part of the
game itself, inspired by the less than compliant
behaviour of some of the teams in the TV series.
Some of the technique cards used to unleash
the elements on opponents are more powerful
than others, but risk benders being caught by the
referees – and even ejected from the match.
“In the show, some teams are called on cheating
and others are not,” Wright says. “The referees in
the show only seemed to make errors when they
were ‘bought out’, though that was never confirmed!
While we didn’t capture bribing, specifically, we
introduced the referee die to determine if cheating
gets noticed. This added that delicious bit of tension
to each incident of cheating as you never knew if the
referee was going to give you a yellow fan penalty.”
Harder to nail was delivering on the fantasy
of controlling the elemental building blocks of
the world. While the concept of bending made
it relatively easy to outline basics of Pro-bending
MAIN Players
try to force their
opponents out of
the arena
RIGHT Characters
can cheat – if
they’re lucky
062_063_korraProBending_v2 MJ.indd 63
The pro-bending
concept screamed
to be adapted to
the tabletop.
Arena’s gameplay, having players really feel they
were master benders would take a little longer.
“It wasn’t until we repeatedly watched a specific
animated gif of the Fire Ferrets working as a team that
the design goal really clicked: we needed to make a
game in which people felt like they were clever and
powerful when they protected their friends and were
still able to attack in the same move,” Lim recalls.
The final game involves players placing
elemental tokens to attack and defend, mimicking
the fast and furious speed of pro-bending, with
each team able to pull off various different tricks.
“Game mechanics really needed to be
continually informed by the theme and it was
theme – the animated gif – that really helped
us figure out what the design and gameplay
needed to feel like to provide the experience
promised on the box,” says Wright. “That led us
to develop a gameplay experience that was fast,
high-energy and high-impact.”
BEND FRIEND
Despite pro-bending being a team sport, Pro-
bending Arena limits the player count to just two
people. Its designers insist that attempting to scale
the game to the point where a player could control
a bender each left the action lacking.
“Either the two-player game would be great and
the six-player game would leave each player feeling
like they didn’t really need to be in the game, or the
six-player game would be a fun team experience
and the two-player game would feel like a tacked-
on approximation of it,” Wright explains.
“We felt that a two-player head-to-head duel
game had the design space that would give us the
most room to create something really unique, and
also provide the truest pro-bending experience.”
“The interesting part of managing the whole
team is the hard decisions about which cards to
buy and which to sacrifice,” Lim adds. “If each
player controlled only a single bender each, those
choices would be fewer and farther between.”
Players can control one of the various teams
from the Avatar-verse, each with a distinct feel
and playbook – from the cheating, risk-reward
Wolfbats to the rapid-combo Rabaroos – but rules
are included to combine different characters from
the opposing sides, opening up the potential for
committed fans to fine-tune their squad.
“I love to experiment with the custom team
rules,” Wright says. “I’m also really excited to see
what teams the players dream up. That’s a really
exciting thing with designing customisable games:
the community gets to breathe life into the game
through their creativity.”
THE LEGEND CONTINUES
Pro-bending is just one small part of the Avatar
and Korra saga, and it’s not hard to imagine
that fans will jump at the chance to immerse
themselves further in the enchanting world. Lim
says that, given the chance, he and Wright would
be willing to return to the universe and explore life,
bending and everything outside of the arena.
“While we would love to develop a game
focused on adventuring throughout the Avatar-
verse, the pro-bending concept just screamed to
be adapted to the tabletop,” he says.
There’s still plenty of action left inside the
ring, too.
“I’d love to include mascots like Pabu and
maybe even alternate arenas,” Lim suggests.
“I’d absolutely love to see a full bracketed
tournament in action.”
“I’m ready to do anything,” Wright enthuses.
“More teams, of course, and more rules or
scenarios – the system we designed has a lot
of flexibility and possibility built into it, and I’d
love for the opportunity to explore the limits of
what we’ve created.”
tabletopgaming.co.uk 63
13/02/2018 15:26
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p064.indd 1 08/02/2018 15:25

PLAYED
69

66 68 79

66 ALTIPLANO 74 KITCHEN RUSH

67 TRANSATLANTIC 75 ELITE: DANGEROUS RPG
68 INFINITY: THE RPG 76 BLANK | COBRA PAW
69 DINOSAUR ISLAND 77 GOODWILL
70 FAVELAS 78 EMPIRES
71 ESCAPE THE DARK CASTLE 79 NUSFJORD
72 VENGEANCE 80 TIME BARONS
73 DUNGEON DRAFT 81 COASTER PARK

March 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 65

065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 65 13/02/2018 15:26

 P L AY E D
ALTIPLANO
If you ever wanted to pack a sack with alpacas, this is the
sack alpaca-packing game for you
Designer: Reiner Stockhausen | Artist: Klemens Frans
I
t’s a tough life at the top of the
world. Not only is the air thin, but
resources are limited and whether
you’re a woodcutter, fisherman,
framer or stonemason, scratching out
a successful living requires careful
resource management and trading
strategies. Not to mention alpacas.
For his spiritual sequel-slash-
remake of beloved Euro title
Orléans, German designer Reiner
Stockhausen has moved from
medieval France to the South
American highlands of Bolivia and
Peru, around 3,000 metres above
sea level. The result is a gorgeously
colourful and component-rich game
that’s also smoothly complex.
As in Orléans, each player has
an action board, on which they
simultaneously place circular tokens
to plan out a limited number of
66 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 66
1-2h 2-5
CE
ED
IT
O R'S C H OI
location-dependent actions, which
are then executed in clockwise, turn-
based fashion. And, as in Orléans,
each player also gets a cloth bag, into
which they deposit their gradually
increasing token stash, to be randomly
drawn at the start of the planning
phase. But in Altiplano you’re
planning actions with resources like
food, cloth, cacao and (yes) alpacas
rather than followers, essentially
trading them up for new acquisitions.
So at the farm, for example, you can
use a combo of alpacas and food to
earn wool.
The catch is, there’s a limited, ever-
dwindling stack of each resource (plus
VP-earning houses, boats and orders,
represented by small decks of cards)
on each location tile: the market, the
forest, the harbour and so on. The
resources you spend go back into
your supply along with the ones you
gain, eventually winding up in your
bag once it’s emptied of its current
contents. So nothing returns to a
central supply (except money) and,
as with all pool-building games, the
12+ £50 more you personally accrue, the more
random your bag draws become,
complicating each subsequent
planning phase.
Which is why diversifying is
so important, and why there are
numerous routes to success. The
number of actions you can take
increases with the acquisition of
extensions – necessarily, if you want to
start gathering the most valuable and
useful resources – and you can also
mitigate your bag bulking out with
WHAT’S IN less valuable things (food, fish, corn
THE BOX? and those poor old alpacas are worth
◗ Five action boards zilch on the score sheet) by stashing
◗ Five warehouses stuff in your warehouse, filling rows
◗ Five wooden
with matching goods to earn further
game figures
victory points.
◗ Five wooden markers
◗ Five cardboard A further difference to Orléans
containers is the central ‘board’, which is
◗ Five VP overviews here a randomly-placed circular
◗ Five cloth bags arrangement of location tiles, around
◗ Seven role tiles which your lone figure can move up
◗ 15 cart markers to a maximum of three places per
◗ 28 extension tiles turn – unless you pay for extra moves
◗ Extension strip
with food and/or additional carts. This
◗ 209 goods tiles
means your actions are dependent
◗ 50 coins
◗ 10 house cards on how you plan your moves, too;
◗ 10 boat cards it’s all too easy to mess up your own
◗ 16 order cards planning by miscalculating your
◗ 20 mission cards figure’s movement.
◗ Scorepad There is a lot to take in, especially if
◗ Starting player alpaca you’ve never played Orléans, and the
first few games of Altiplano will likely
make your head spin. Rather like
altitude sickness, in fact. But once you
acclimatise, there’s plenty to enjoy in
Stockhausen’s vibrant, busy, alpaca-
packed world.
DAN JOLIN
WE SAY
An attractively-presented pool-building
game with a grabby theme and
impressive – if initially confusing –
tactical depth.
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED…
ORLÉANS
There are more similarities to
Stockhausen’s 2014 title than there
are differences, and while Altiplano
lacks its bag-building novelty value, it
is a far prettier game.
13/02/2018 15:27
 WHAT’S IN
THE BOX?
◗ 40 captain tokens
◗ 28 trade post tokens
◗ 40 coal cubes
◗ Five sea regions
◗ Five player boards
◗ Ship market board
◗ Victory point track
◗ Objective tokens
◗ 50 ship cards
◗ 54 action cards
◗ 80 banknotes
◗ Historical ships booklet

TRANSATLANTIC
All aboard for a ruthless high-seas
economic adventure
WE SAY
Designer: Mac Gerdts | Artist: Dominik Mayer 60-90m 2-4 13+ £50 Transatlantic brilliantly

I
n the 19th century, steamships
began to replace the sailing
clippers that had long carried
cargo across the world’s oceans.
Faster and more reliable than their
predecessors, they revolutionised
world trade and, along the way, made
their owners seriously rich.
Transatlantic casts you and your
opponents as aspiring shipping
magnates in this steam-powered
revolution. Starting with a single,
ageing sailing ship, you’ll aim to
establish a mighty fleet, set up a
worldwide network of trading posts
and build your reputation as the
most prestigious company on the
Seven Seas.
It’s a tall order, and to pull it off
you’ll need to make some shrewd
decisions. Should you buy the ships
you can afford right now, or save your
money for better ones in the future?
Should you spread your fleet across
the globe, or focus on dominating a
single region? Do you have a steady
supply of coal, or do you need to find
new reserves to keep your engines
running and your profits rolling in?
It’s enough to leave anybody
hopelessly at sea, but Transatlantic
does a fantastic job of streamlining
its decision-making process. You’ll
start the game with a hand of cards
which let you take various actions:
purchasing vessels, stocking up on
fuel, dispatching ships on lucrative
voyages. You’ll choose one to play on
every turn, enacting its effects before
discarding it.
It’s a setup that will be familiar
to anyone who’s played Concordia,
designer Mac Gerdts’ 2013 game of
trading in the Roman Empire, and it
works to great effect here. There are
plenty of tough choices to chew over but,
with players only ever taking a single
action at a time, the game plays at an
impressively snappy pace. It also means
that it’s crucial to think ahead, because
once you’ve played an action, you won’t
be able to use it again until you spend a
turn to refresh your hand of cards.
Getting it right feels instantly
rewarding, but what’s really
impressive about Transatlantic is the
way it combines a pile of individual
elements into a unified whole.
captures the feeling
There’s the almost deckbuilder-ish of being a ruthless
way you can upgrade your available shipping tycoon,
actions over the course of the game, mixing elements
becoming more powerful and gaining of engine-building,
new ways to score points. There’s a area control and
light deckbuilding to
hint of area control, where owning
wonderful effect. It’s
trading stations in different oceans just a shame that
makes your voyages there more its pace sometimes
profitable. And there’s the way that falters so badly
new ships entering regions can render towards the end.
older ones obsolete, allowing you
to force opponents’ vessels out of
service in a kind of gloriously passive- TRY THIS IF
aggressive arms race. YOU LIKED…
It’s let down by the closing stages, CONCORDIA
though. The game doesn’t end until Transatlantic takes
its Roman-themed
someone purchases the last available
older sibling’s core in
ship, and effectively that means some new and very
that it doesn’t end until somebody engaging directions.
wants it to. The result is jarring
slowdown from a feeding frenzy of
raw capitalism to a far less interesting
attempt to squeeze just a few more
victory points out of the final turns.
Coming after such a compelling,
challenging, competitive experience,
it’s like throwing an iceberg in the
path of a steaming behemoth.
OWEN DUFFY

tabletopgaming.co.uk 67

065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 67 13/02/2018 15:27

 P L AY E D
INFINITY: THE ROLEPLAYING GAME
Find your character in the Human Sphere
Designer: Justin Alexander, Jay Little and others | Artist: Pierre Droal, Corvus Belli, Linggar Bramanty
W
hen you pick up an RPG
set in a well-established
universe, it can be a little
intimidating to find that the core
rulebook is packed with around 200
pages of lore. In this case the universe
is Infinity, home to a long-running
sci-fi wargaming series from Spanish
developer Corvus Belli, and whether the
prospect of sifting through the solid slab
of setting fills you with joy or dread is
probably a good indication of how you’ll
feel about the game itself.
Appropriately enough for a game that
bills itself as unashamedly cinematic, the
setting is a manga-flavoured mishmash
of pulpy action and hard sci-fi. It sets up
a universe where humanity has spread
across the stars but found itself pressed
by conflict on every side, both from
hostile aliens and good old-fashioned
factionalism. Across a dozen worlds
mech suits level battlefields with volleys
of missile fire, while corporate-backed
hackers battle with robotic guards to
splice their way into computer systems.
There’s plenty of room for GMs to
drop their players into their favourite
parts of Infinity, and the scope of
missions and adventures open to the
68 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 68
players is impressive. As you would
expect, this is reflected in the rules
themselves, which are both broad-
ranging and incredibly dense.
The core mechanics are based on
the 2d20 system that will be familiar
to those who have played Modiphius-
published RPGs such as Star Trek
Adventures and is simple enough to
wrap your head around.
When a player attempts to achieve
something tricky, whether shooting a
particle cannon or hacking a military
firewall, they attempt to roll beneath
a target number determined by their
innate physical and mental attributes
as well as their learned skills. Tougher
challenges require more successful rolls,
with particularly good results being able
to generate ‘momentum’ that can be
used to activate various bonuses that
range from critical hits to extra dice for
a future check. Conversely, particularly
terrible failures give the GM a point of
‘threat’ that can be used to make things
even trickier for the party down the line.
While the basic interactions aren’t
too complicated, Infinity isn’t shy about
adding in layers of complexity. Different
attacks have varying damage types and
2+ £20
defence reactions and cause different WE SAY
sorts of harm and stress. While this
The Infinity universe
becomes more fluid and intuitive over is appropriately vast,
time, most gamers are going to spend a and long-term fans of
fair bit of their first few sessions flicking the setting will love
through the rulebook in search of the the depth of both
appropriate tables to consult. its story and the
This is a game that isn’t shy about rules. Getting a solid
its wargaming roots and delights in grip can be hard for
random effects and results. Some newcomers, but if
they dig deep enough
players will love seeing the world build
you might hit gold.
itself around them without relying
on the GM’s quick thinking, but if the
idea of rolling on a table in order to
determine which sub-table you need
to roll on next fills you with horror you
should stay well clear.
There is perhaps no better example
of this than the character creation
process. Unlike most RPGs, Infinity
isn’t designed around each player
creating their own character exactly
the way they imagine them. Rather,
it requires you to roll randomly
to determine everything from
their home life as a child to which
languages they speak.
You can nudge things here and there,
but your capacity to do so is severely
limited and for the most part the
character you’ll be inhabiting throughout
the campaign is decided by the roll of a
die – or, rather, about 20 of them.
The process of seeing your
character’s life develop before your TRY THIS IF
eyes can be surprisingly rewarding and YOU LIKED...
a great storytelling exercise – why did WARHAMMER
they run away from their happy home 40,000
as a teenager? What was it that led
ROLEPLAY
If you can find room
them to join the police? – but it can also in your hearts for
be frustrating if you have a preferred two sci-fi universes
play style or an archetype in mind that spawned from a
is wrenched away by the hand of fate. popular tabletop
If you’re already a fan of the Infinity wargame, this could
wargame then this might be exactly be something you
the dense and uncompromising learn to love.
RPG you’re looking for. But there’s
so much that the GM needs to have
at their fingertips (as a side note, it’s
irritating that a rulebook released in
2018 uses exclusively male pronouns
when discussing players) that it’s hard to
recommend to the casual gamer looking
for something new to pick up.
RICHARD JANSENPARKES
13/02/2018 15:27
 DINOSAUR ISLAND
Clever girl – or one big pile of shit?
Designer: Jonathan Gilmour, Brian Lewis | Artist: Kwanchai Moriya, Peter Wocken, Anthony Wocken
M
ake no (dino) bones about
it: Dinosaur Island is Jurassic
Park: The Board Game in
everything but name and Jeff Goldblum.
The rulebook is replete with winking
references to Steven Spielberg’s 1993
movie – the introduction even ends with
the line “Welcome to Dinosaur Island” –
and the rides and attractions with which
players fill their own why-didn’t-we-
learn-the-first-time theme parks offer
gags a plenty: we laughed every time
the Clever Grill restaurant appeared. It’s
no shock that a game about building a
dinosaur theme park can’t resist playing
to the crowd, but what is such a surprise is
just how bloody good Dinosaur Island is.
Yes, part of the game’s winning
combination comes down to its singular
look; a distinctive blend of ‘90s neon
colours, beautiful illustrations, dinosaur-
shaped meeples and a fetching layout of
boards that both catches the eye and does
a fantastic job of making it easy to keep
track of your options during each phase.
Yet, inside the shiny amber lurks the DNA
of a winning worker-placement game
revolving around the need for players to
attract ever-increasing crowds to their
park without accidentally allowing the
dinosaurs to break free and eat the visitors.
It’s just not great for PR, you know?
Boosting the excitement level of a
park involves harvesting the right DNA
to cook up certain dino ‘recipes’, ranging
from relatively safe (but dull) herbivores
to thrilling (but deadly) carnivores. A
pool of dice provides a randomised
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 69
CE
ED
IT
O R'S C H OI
WHAT’S IN element to each opening phase, with
THE BOX? players competing to gather the right
◗ 22 specialist cards DNA and recipes first using their team of
◗ 81 income tokens scientists – each of whom has a different
◗ 39 objective cards
research level, making it a tricky decision
◗ 80 visitor meeples
◗ 36 worker meeples
of when, where and whom to deploy. The
◗ 10 DNA dice head-to-head feeling of being competing
◗ 11 plot twist cards park managers trying to outpace your
◗ 20 corporation tokens opponents continues into the market
◗ 12 modifier tokens phase, which provides the chance to
◗ 12 scientist tokens upgrade labs, add attractions and hire a
◗ Research centre board variety of experts (with special abilities).
◗ Track board After the heated first half of each
◗ Marketplace board
round, the game takes a breather (of
◗ Four park boards
◗ 40 marker cubes
sorts) with the placing of workers inside
◗ 24 limit cubes each individual park. With no direct
◗ 33 lab upgrade tiles player interaction, it’s a simultaneous
◗ Four lab boards affair as each park mixes up their DNA,
◗ 29 paddock tiles fills up their paddocks with new dinos
◗ 50 dinosaurs and – crucially – invests in boosting
◗ 30 attraction tiles their security level to account for the
◗ 17 dino recipe tiles growing threat posed by more and
◗ Cloth bag
more giant reptiles. The theme may
◗ First player token
◗ 17 solo play cards
be flashy, but the core here is that of
a classic Euro; actions make sense
in the logic of being a park manager,
sprinkling enough spice to make the
dry, strategic meat (hopefully not that
of your guests) easy to chew on.
Then comes the big day. Your
park opens, visitors flock in and
hand over their money (except some
pesky hooligans that can randomly
sneak in without paying), and you
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED… STONE AGE
Looking for another easy-to-grasp worker placement game with prehistoric
roots? Get yourself out of the Stone Age and buy a ticket to Dinosaur Island.
60-150m 1-4 10+ £70
get the satisfaction of seeing those
Pachycephalosaurus you cooked up
accelerate your park to victory. Only,
what’s that? An unused die from the first
round pushed your threat level over your
security level? Oh no! Now the dinosaurs
are loose and eating all the visitors!
Down your VP goes. It’s alright; it turns
out that the chance of seeing dinosaurs
in person is worth the risk, so you’ll be
sure to attract more guests next round.
At least they pay at the entrance.
Dinosaur Island gets a long way on its
concept and look, but the greatest joy is
still to be found in its immensely pleasing
gameplay. Building up a dinosaur theme
park is as rewarding as it sounds, with
the DNA of classic Eurogames giving
this modern descendant enough to dig
into for a long time to come. You can
see why those visitors keep coming
back – it’s a pleasure to let yourself be
utterly consumed.
MATT JARVIS
WE SAY
Classic worker placement gameplay
given a few smart modern twists
and applied to an irresistible and
attractive concept, Dinosaur Island
is the meaty Jurassic Park board
game you’ve been dreaming of. After
careful consideration, we’ve decided to
endorse this park.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 69
13/02/2018 15:27
 P L AY E D
FAVELAS
It’s a riot of colour, but does it do justice to its theme?
Designer: Chris Bryan | Artist: Brigette Indelicato, Kwanchai Moriya
T
he favelas of Rio de Janeiro
are some of the world’s most
notorious slums. For decades,
residents have been forced to contend
with poverty, violent crime and police
brutality. In 2005, Dutch artists Dre
Urhahn and Jeroen Koolhaas embarked
on an ambitious project to improve
conditions, working with locals to paint
run-down buildings, turning them into
massive, vibrant works of art.
The pair argued that as well as
beautifying areas, the scheme would
provide education opportunities for local
youth. Now their efforts have inspired a
board game that lets players try their hand
at a bit of colourful civic regeneration.
Favelas sees you and your friends start
the game with hex grids of differently-
coloured houses. As you play you’ll draft
building tiles from a random selection,
laying them on top of your existing grid
and changing the composition of your
neighbourhood. You’ll splash some
purple here, some green there, covering
up existing shades as you go. At the end
of each round you’ll get points for any
colours you have a majority in. But you’ll
also be able to shift the value of colours
as you play, increasing or decreasing
their potential reward in scoring phases.
It’s an engaging enough puzzle, and it
forces you to pay close attention to what
your opponents are doing. If they’ve
70 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 70
WHAT’S IN neglected to include a particular colour,
THE BOX? you can aggressively add it to your own
◗ 59 building hex tiles pile. If they’ve built an unassailable lead
◗ Four hex-grid in a shade, you can deliberately crash its
player boards value to ensure they don’t get a massive
◗ Six coloured dice
stack of points. It’s mechanically simple,
◗ Scoreboard
and markers but it takes some careful analysis, and
◗ Rulebook the unpredictable flow of shuffled tiles
means you’re always trying to work out
the best use of the resources available
to you. It’s not incredibly deep, but
with games clocking in at around 20
minutes, it doesn’t outstay its welcome.
In some respects, though, Favelas falls
short. With three or four players, there’s
plenty of competition for dominance
in different colours. With two, there’s a
tendency to grab early majorities and
stick with them for the duration of the
game. It makes the building process
feel secondary to nudging the values of
different colours up or down, and it’s
not nearly as satisfying as playing with
a higher player count.
And then it’s difficult to know how
to feel about the theme. Is it a positive
depiction of a poor community? An
antidote to the kind of poverty porn
that’s often produced about the favelas?
Not really. It’s an abstract tile-laying
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED… SAGRADA
Its combination of drafting with an evolving spatial puzzle scratches a similar itch,
and the ability to influence scoring adds a new twist to get your head around.
30-45m 2-4 14+ £35
game, and there’s no reason it couldn’t
be about farming or transport networks.
In most cases, a compelling enough
game can make up for a pasted-on theme.
But here, it amounts to a dismissal of some
very real issues. Rio’s slums have suffered
from poor sanitation, forced evictions and
violent incursions by police death squads.
The only hint at any of this in Favelas
is a one-line sentence in the rulebook
about vague ‘socio-economic’ issues.
Playing this game, you’d be forgiven
for thinking that the region’s biggest
problem is finding the optimum ratio of
red to yellow houses, and its take on the
neighbourhoods seems heavily sanitised
for European and American audiences.
Ostensibly, Favelas is all about
colours. In reality, it feels more
like whitewashing.
OWEN DUFFY
WE SAY
Favelas is undeniably pretty, and as a
competitive puzzle it does a decent job
of producing some head-scratching
moments. But you could say the same
thing about plenty of other games, and
its theme doesn’t sit comfortably with
its jolly presentation.
13/02/2018 15:27
 ESCAPE THE DARK CASTLE
Failing to escape the feeling that something's missing
Designer: Alex Crispin, Thomas Pike, James Shelton | Artist: Alex Crispin 30m 1-4 14+ £30

T
here’s a wave of nostalgia
sweeping through parts of
gaming. Roleplay has the Old
School Revival and retro-clones of
early RPGs, and that anti-trend is
spreading to other parts of the hobby.
Escape the Dark Castle isn’t an RPG
but it is a narrative card game that
aims to make you nostalgic for British
games of the early 1980s, particularly
gamebooks like the Fighting Fantasy
series. You can tell because it’s all
black and white, the title uses the
same font as the Citadel logo, and
your characters are going to die a lot.
Escape the Dark Castle is a co-op
game that works equally well solo
or with multiple players. Everyone
gets a card showing a character
imprisoned within the Dark Castle,
plus that character’s unique dice and
a random item. The castle escape
route is a pile of 15 random chapter
cards, bracketed by the start card
on the top and one of three possible
bosses on the bottom. You turn these
over like the pages of a book, read the
text on them and make any choices
or fight any fights they describe.
The six characters aren’t standard
fantasy archetypes. Instead of fighters
and wizards these are tailors, abbots,
millers and cooks. The game doesn’t
explain why they’ve been imprisoned
here (‘wrongfully’ is all), or anything
about them or the castle. You might
hope the cards would work together
to create the story of their escape,
with twists and turns, callbacks and
foreshadowing. You might.
Instead the encounters are a mishmash
of fantasy clichés: drunk guards,
hideous fiends, cursed mirrors, flooded
caverns, giant bats, demonic warriors
and wandering traders to name a few.
This could be okay if the cards gave
you interesting choices for what to do
with them, but mostly they don’t.
If the chapter card reveals an
enemy then they can only be fought
or fled from. Most obstacles force you
straight to a dice roll, and only a few
encounters have an actual decision
to be made. This is a real shame: what
could have been a game of interesting
choices turns into a series of random
encounters, which the players can
only resolve by rolling dice.
Thankfully the combat system is fun WHAT’S IN
and, in the multiplayer version, brings THE BOX?
some tactics to the fore. Things get ◗ 45 chapter cards
hazardous fast, because if even one ◗ 35 item cards
of your team is killed it’s game over ◗ Six character cards
◗ Three boss cards
for everyone. Special items introduce
◗ Start card
new variables, and fighting monsters ◗ Nine chapter dice
can be tense and enjoyable – and ◗ Six character dice
repetitive, unfortunately, because ◗ Scorepad
the majority of the chapter cards are ◗ Four pencils
random baddies to fight.
Escape the Dark Castle calls itself TRY THIS
‘the game of atmospheric adventure’ IF YOU
and that’s not wrong: it gets the tone LIKED… THE
of early adventure-gaming spot on. WARLOCK
What it doesn’t capture is a sense of OF FIRETOP
narrative or storytelling. The chapter MOUNTAIN
cards don’t combine to make a Escape the Dark
Castle emulates the
story, they’re a disjointed sequence
look and feel of classic
of reasons to roll some dice. It’s solo gamebooks: if
enjoyable once, and is perfect for you’re nostalgic for
game cafés, but even its expansion the 1980s this will
Cult of the Death Knight is only more keep you happy.
of the same. With so many great
narrative games out there, this is a
missed opportunity.
JAMES WALLIS
WE SAY
A bold attempt to do a solo gamebook
with cards but, as Sid Meier said, a
game is a series of interesting choices,
and there simply aren’t enough in here.

tabletopgaming.co.uk 71

065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 71 13/02/2018 15:27

 P L AY E D
VENGEANCE
Before you embark on a journey of revenge, montage!
Designer: Gordon Calleja | Artist: Axel Torvenius, Fabrizio Cali
I
n the style of traditional revenge
movies, Vengeance sees a tortured hero
– literally – go out on a bloody path to set
the score straight with those who wronged
them. Crushed knees, waterboarding,
nail removal or knifing are just some
of the ‘delightful’ souvenirs that gang
members left the hero with. However,
the story is far from over. Cue a training
montage sequence; load up on guns and
katanas. Then walk straight into the gang’s
den, leaving no one alive to tell the tale;
perform a five-point palm exploding heart
technique-type move on a boss, making
your sweet retribution complete.
The theme and the gameplay
of Vengeance constantly reinforce one
another throughout the game, making
it feel as close as a board game could get
to a cinematic storytelling experience. It’s
not just because the game uses words like
‘montage’, manages to easily occupy a big
table with boards and miniatures, or takes
advantage of the revenge genre staples,
although these do contribute. It is because
everything a player does within the game
– getting abilities, finding relevant bosses,
fighting – feeds back into a larger narrative,
while leaving enough blanks to be filled
in by imagination. One can be creative
with the story or simply enjoy the fight.
At the beginning of the game, every
player starts at a disadvantage, suffering
damage from the gang members, limiting
their health and number of dice at their
disposal. They proceed into the montage
72 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 72
CE
ED
IT
O R'S C H OI
WHAT’S IN phase, to heal some of the damage, pick
THE BOX? up new abilities or items, and search for
◗ 13 montage dice the gang leaders that wronged them.
◗ Five fight dice Then, one by one, players enter a gang
◗ 28 upgrade ability tiles den and attempt to defeat the boss.
◗ 16 upgrade items tiles
Most of the game mechanically relies
◗ 45 montage cards
on dice rolls – however, Vengeance does
◗ Four gang cards
◗ Four reference cards something really clever with its luck
◗ 40 vengeance cards elements; it leaves just enough to raise
◗ 20 boss cards the stakes of the fight and keep the
◗ Five mission cards tension going, but gives players the
◗ Five solo mission cards tools to approach combat tactically.
◗ 15 achievement cards Even before getting into the fight,
◗ 12 double-sided players rely on dice to get their upgrades.
den boards This is bolstered by montage cards,
◗ Shop board
guaranteeing them something they
◗ Turn tracker board
◗ Victory point want. Going into the fight, players
tracker board once again roll dice to attack minions
◗ 80 coloured bases and bosses. Yet they also have abilities
◗ 45 red damage cubes (purchased during the montage phase)
◗ Turn marker that, depending on their powers, can
◗ Fight timer change dice outcomes during the combat
◗ 12 player markers round. With a good ability engine going,
◗ 24 wild tokens
the fight becomes primarily tactical,
◗ 24 recon tokens
rather than luck-based, allowing players
◗ 20 objective tokens
◗ 15 black severe to dash in and out of rooms and giving
damage cubes them powers to avoid damage or change
◗ Five hero boards weapons, adapting to the layout of the
battlefield. This takes the game beyond
the standard basic approach to combat
in miniatures games, making fights
dynamic and the most exciting part of the
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED… ZOMBICIDE
If you like board games with plenty of miniatures to play with, Vengeance
offers a nice spin on combat, while retaining the essence of the genre.
30m (pp) 1-4 14+ £90
game. For added adrenaline, players can
add a three-minute timer; exceeding the
time limit counts as an automatic loss,
leaving no place for second-guessing.
Even though the timer feels slightly
gimmicky, it is nice to have the option.
Combat is an entirely solitary
experience. The montage phase attempts
to bring in more player interaction
through contention for resources but,
with a variety of options at a player’s
disposal, the confrontation is never
overly tense. The solo mode, however, is
where Vengeance is at its best. Rather
than ‘the most points wins’ approach
of the multiplayer experience, in solo
mode characters have specific objectives
and a unique backstory, making the
gameplay more layered and engaging.
Stylistically beautiful and component-
rich, Vengeance, unfortunately, proves
that quantity does not, once again, mean
quality. Putting aside some leaning
figurines and cardboard tiles that crease
almost instantly, the game’s biggest
problem is that all the miniatures look too
much alike. Some of this issue is avoided
by giving them bases of different colours;
however, all henchmen and bosses have
a red base. For pedantic types, who want
the correct henchmen to correspond to
a respective boss, the search for the right
miniatures breaks the flow of the game,
putting it effectively on pause. This
problem could have been avoided by
providing a larger spectrum of bases.
Among the armies of miniatures-
based games, Vengeance brings
enough character and mechanical
twists to confidently stand out. While
the road of Vengeance is better alone,
the robust combat mechanics are
enticing and different enough to make
this a hero’s journey worth taking.
ALEX SONECHKINA
WE SAY
Vengeance will have no trouble appealing
to the lovers of the revenge genre,
however even the uninitiated will get a lot
out of its clever tactical combat gameplay.
14/02/2018 12:26
 DUNGEON DRAFT
Not to be confused with Dungeon Draught,
which is all about underground ventilation
Designer: Justin Gary | Artist: Various
W WHAT’S IN
hen it comes to fantasy-
based card games,
designer Justin Gary is
a safe pair of gauntleted hands. A
Magic: The Gathering US national
champion who’s also behind epic
deckbuilder Ascension and digital card
game SolForge, Gary has now turned
his goblin-slaying attention to the
humble single-decker. Comprising a
generous pile of cards and a scattering
of circular cardboard tokens, Gary’s
Upper Deck offering folds fantasy
adventure into a fun, quick-to-absorb
drafting game (the clue is in the title).
As a prologue, each player picks
a trilogy of missions from five dealt
quests, which require you to collect sets
of cards formed from different combos
of classes. So 'mastering botany' needs
three druids to complete it, whereas
the far more ambitious 'save the world'
requires three each of all four classes
(warriors, rogues, mages and druids).
Completing quests isn’t mandatory,
but always worth it – either in terms
of rewarding extra XP (victory points
by another name – earn the most over
four rounds to win), or a bonus ability.
The tree-huggy 'mastering botany', for
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 73
example, means druid cards are cheaper
to play from that point onwards.
The core of the game is in the draft
deck, from which you build a hand
of seven cards through (you guessed
it) drafting – a hand which will then
contribute towards a rapidly growing
set of tabled cards that stacks up attack
power, XP and gold production. Each
class includes a variety of heroes
and weapons, with which you aim to
establish synergies via one-off powers,
contribute towards quest completion
and, hopefully, defeat any monsters
you’ve also taken into your hand for
extra gold, XP or one-time bonuses.
It’s tough letting a great hand go, to
be scattered among your opponents,
but also a relief to send a bunch of
high-powered monsters rampaging
off clockwise (or, on alternate rounds,
anti-clockwise) when you know you
don’t have enough attack power to
dispatch them.
Once the hands are created, each
player takes it in turn to lay their
cards. Heroes and weapons always
cost gold (you begin with nine), so
if you plan your turn badly and mis-
order the card-laying, you can end
20-30m 2-5 14+ £25
up with empty coffers and a bunch
of unplayable cards, whether they’re THE BOX?
heroes you wanted to add to your ◗ 173 draft cards
set but now can’t afford, or monsters ◗ 25 quest cards
you wanted to slay but don’t have ◗ 40 gold tokens
◗ 40 XP tokens
the required attack value. These get
thrown into the horrible black void
that is the discard pile, never to be
seen again. (Well, unless you gain an TRY THIS IF
ability to raid the discard pile, that is.) YOU LIKED…
With everyone using their turn to SUSHI GO!
lay all their cards (or as many as they The theme and style
can), it does make for relatively long couldn’t be more
different, and the
periods of downtime. But it’s just a
tactics of Dungeon
minor complaint – as is the less-than- Draft are far more
inspiring cartoony art that owes a thoughtful, but it’s
Deathwing-sized debt to World of another game that
Warcraft. Like the very-differently- has great fun with the
themed but similarly engaging card- drafting mechanism,
drafter Sushi Go!, this is a warm-up and proves
‘starter course’ that may well take over similarly moreish.
your entire gaming evening.
DAN JOLIN
WE SAY
Dungeon Draft packs a lot of
complexity and variety into its single
deck and straightforward rules. Very
likely to earn an 'encore' or two after
you first slap it on the table.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 73
13/02/2018 15:27
 P L AY E D
KITCHEN RUSH
Hell’s Kitchen is other people
Designer: Dávid Turczi | Artist: Gong Studios
A
new order’s just come in. Quick,
get to the storage room and find
the ingredients! Wait, we’re out
of pasta – you’ll need to go shopping!
But don’t forget to put that pulled pork
in the oven before you go, otherwise
it won’t be done in time. Hold on, the
dishes need doing first. Add that spice!
Best hire another chef if you can. Too
late, we’re out of time! That customer’s
not going to be pleased.
This is Kitchen Rush: a real-time
co-op game that captures the hectic,
chaotic, non-stop tension of working in
a restaurant kitchen so well you’ll feel
like you’ve worked a ten-hour shift at
the end of each four-minute round.
The game’s ingenious trick is that it
turns the static, ponderous meeples of
other worker-placement titles into sand
timers that must be hurriedly relocated
around the kitchen, collecting and
cooking ingredients to fulfill orders
while also finding time to juggle
various other chores. The roughly
30-second hourglasses are flipped
when placed on a space at each station
and must remain there until they run
out, leaving their controlling player
to quickly pick up diddly ingredients,
order cards and general micromanage
in the ensuing seconds-long gaps.
Putting together a plate of food is
relatively simple: you take the order at the
door, grab the right-sized plate, head to
74 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 74
30-45m 1-4 12+ £50
storage to collect the combination of
meat, veg, cheese and whatever else,
add any spice that might be required
to bring the flavour up to scratch and
finally pop the whole thing in the oven
for however long might be required,
from a single quick heat to a minute and
a half of real-time roasting. Along the
WHAT’S IN way, though, there’s plenty to screw up.
THE BOX? You might accidentally add meat to that
◗ 60 order cards veggie burger, cram an entire roast dinner
◗ 24 event cards on a side plate or burn that beef carpaccio
◗ 14 objective cards
to a crisp. These things happen under
◗ Eight prestige bonuses
pressure, but they’ll cost your restaurant
◗ Four upgrades
◗ Prestige track mat prestige, making it harder to achieve
◗ Four player mats the objectives required to immortalise
◗ 108 ingredient tokens you as a master chef. Meanwhile, your
◗ 56 spice cubes workers will need paying, so don’t expect
◗ Two marker cubes to hang onto that money for long – fail to
◗ Cloth bag pay them and they’ll quit, making future
◗ Game board rounds even tougher. Gather enough
◗ 10 worker hourglasses
prestige, though, and you’ll unlock
◗ 28 money tokens
bonuses that accelerate your restaurant
◗ 22 plate tokens
◗ Four locked tokens into the echelons of culinary excellence.
◗ Seven unavailable There’s a lot happening in Kitchen
action tokens Rush – this is not a game for those
◗ Five malfunction tokens unable to think fast – and even the
lower difficulties can be punishing,
but the streamlined loop of preparing
dishes makes for a lot of fun moments,
even when you’re failing miserably.
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED… SPACE ALERT
If you'd prefer to Bake Off than blast off, it might be worth following up a round
of the real-time sci-fi co-op hit by booking a table at Kitchen Rush.
Optional event cards make things even
more chaotic by causing equipment to
malfunction or workers to come down
sick, and help to stop the tight pool
of actions becoming too repetitive.
At under 20 minutes for an entire
playthrough, the momentum is so quick
you’ll probably too focused on peppering
that Moroccan lamb tagine anyway.
With such delicious gameplay to chow
down, it’s a shame that Kitchen Rush’s
visuals are so naff. Parts of the game still
resemble an unfinished prototype with
boring and even downright ugly design
aspects, and there’s none of the diverse
glee of the recipe cards – which list
specific meals and their accompanying
side dishes – in the identical player
chef boards, stopping the game’s
charm and character leaving as much
of an expression as they should. There’s
generally a low level of quality across the
components, such as thin boards that
feature plain black backs, adding to the
feeling of being an amateur project. Most
disappointingly, this includes the sand
timers key to the game’s wild urgency,
which include varying amounts of sand
– publisher Artipia has said that this is
to account for differently-sized holes,
and that all timers should take between
25 and 35 seconds to finish (10 seconds
can be an age here), but the varying sand
levels and cheap production means that
it’s often inconsistent and hard to judge
during the bustle. (You’ll need to provide
your own phone or timer to count down
the four-minute rounds.)
Even with these flaws, Kitchen
Rush’s go-for-broke pace and manic
co-op cook up a feast of laughs, gasps
and final-second cheers. Rather
than a refined Michelin-star plate of
immaculate morsels, this is a fast-food
guilty pleasure: messy, uneven and
probably not all that good for you, but
undeniably hard to resist.
MATT JARVIS
WE SAY
Presentation and production problems
hamper the overall experience of playing
Kitchen Rush, but it’s hard to care when
you’re in the middle of the fray, trying to
cook up a delectable meal as plates go
flying, workers quit, ovens break down
and you can’t find any bloody cheese.
14/02/2018 12:26

ELITE: DANGEROUS RPG
A galaxy of gaming awaits
Designer: Spidermind Games team | Artist: Various
E
ven allowing for rose-tinted
view-ports it’s safe to say that
few games have come as close to
truly recreating the vastness of space
quite as well as Elite, and Spidermind
Games has done an admirable job
of translating this to the tabletop
with EDRPG. The game offers a huge
sandbox that shines when players
are free to tread their own path,
though it’s let down by a lack of truly
compelling fiction and an occasional
lack of focus to the rules.
Perhaps it’s unfair to criticise them
on that last point, though. The original
game is the granddaddy of open-
world video games, after all, and was
founded upon the premise of forging
your own path in a hostile galaxy,
whether that was as a soldier, a trader,
a miner or any one of a thousand
professions you dreamed up yourself.
Appropriately enough then, EDRPG
avoids tying you to any particular
play style from the very beginning
of a campaign. Character creation is
hugely flexible and completely avoids
anything like traditional classes or
even archetypes, with each pilot
picking four options from a long list
of backgrounds that reflect their life
before heading into the void. For
example, you could decide that your
character used to be an engineer so
they get a nice bonus to their repair
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 75
2+ £40
skill, and that they worked as a ship
hand for a while to round out their
technical abilities.
The range of backgrounds is
astronomical, spanning everything from
mercenary work to cheerleading, and
how you react to it will probably go a
long way to defining how you feel about
EDRPG as a whole. While some players
may love being able to pick and choose
their ideal character and have the rules
to back it up, others can easily find
themselves overwhelmed by choice.
This need to pick and choose
is a thread that runs throughout
the game and applies not just to
character creation, but also to
weapons, cybernetic enhancements
and starships. If you want to, and can
spare the credits, you can even take a
look at the ‘rare cosmetics’ table and
grab yourself some anti-grav hairspray
to help out with your social checks.
While it may sound as though all
these options would make the game
incredibly complicated, in practice
it works out surprisingly smoothly.
As long as the players are the kind to
be excited by working out the exact
upgrades they want for their ship,
you’ll find that while there are plenty of
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED... STARFINDER
Sure, you can’t play as space goblins in EDRPG, but the actual gameplay is a
little simpler and you still get to go wild with customisation.
choices out there none are so complex
that they bog things down too much.
It probably helps that the core
mechanics for EDRPG are incredibly
simple. Checks involve rolling a single
d10 and adding a bonus determined
by your skills. with a moderately
difficult task – say, sneaking past a
guard post without being spotted –
requiring a total of nine or ten. Things
can be tough for new characters, who
will be getting at very most a +4 bonus
from their specialised skills, though
this climbs at a decent pace as they
complete adventures.
The flexibility of the ruleset means
that these adventures could consist
of dogfighting pirates one week and
sneaking into a corporate HQ the next
but, appropriately enough, EDRPG
excels when you use it to create a
sandbox for the players rather than
pushing them into a more linear story.
Not only does this feel much closer
in tone to the original video game,
it also appeals to the kind of player
who would enjoy tinkering with ship
systems and planning out equipment
to buy.
Another reason to stick to the
sandbox is that while the Elite
franchise is beloved for its scope
and gameplay, it’s not particularly
famed for its deep fiction. The
developers have done an admirable
job of presenting what’s there, but
in all honesty it’ll probably feel
rather generic for anybody with
even a passing interest in sci-fi. The
advantage to this, perhaps, is that it
creates an easy canvas on which the
players and GM can paint their own
tales as they campaign.
After all, the best stories are
undoubtedly those created at the
table. And should you stick round
long enough to hit the fabled rank of
‘elite’, you’ll certainly have plenty of
your own to share.
RICHARD JANSENPARKES
WE SAY
It’s not the tightest of games, but if
you want to grab some friends, pick a
spaceship and set off into the void for
a few hours then EDRPG is a great way
to spend an evening.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 75
13/02/2018 15:28
 P L AY E D
BLANK
Designer: Henri Kermarrec | Artist: Rob Dalton, Winnie Shek
H
ow you feel about Blank as
a game will likely depend
on your feelings about the
Monopoly of card games, Uno. If Uno
for you is a simple, light card game
that’s enjoyable with the right tweaks,
Blank makes for an interesting next
rung on the ladder – at the very least,
fewer people are likely to have heard
of it, so it might be easier to convince
folks to play. As perfectly servicable
as it might be as just a game, though,
where it shines brightest is as a launching
pad for wannabe games designers.
The concept is a fascinating one:
Blank is both a game and an exercise
in game design. The basic gameplay is
just that: discard a card that matches
either the colour or number of the last
card on the pile (multiple matching
cards can be played at once). There
are also a few Fluxx-style rule cards
in play, which introduce very simple
‘if/then’ reactions: if you play a 3, the
next player skips a turn. And so on.
The game begins to come into its
own after a few rounds. You see, the
COBRA PAW
Designer: Derek Weston | Artist: Laura Catasciato
76 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 76
10m 2-6 6+ £12
winner of a match gets to create a which won’t be to everyone’s taste.
new rule card or customise one of But for makey-doey kids or anyone
the number cards with an ability. who’s ever had an interest in fiddling
There are some suggestions, but it’s with their own design, reckoned they
essentially carte blanche. (A more know how to improve an unbalanced
structured version of 1000 Blank mechanic or just likes to get creative
White Cards, for you fans of ‘90s for a few minutes, Blank can make for
public domain curiosities.) As such, an easy first step into understanding
the game gradually how games tick. Don’t be surprised
evolves depending on when a future game designer says this
whom you’re playing is where it all started.
with – you could go MATT JARVIS
full-on with effects,
or simply layer in
some slightly more
complex mechanics.
And nothing stops
you using the cards to
just make your own
unique game from
the off, of course.
While there’s
certainly the room to
get wild and weird,
nothing will change the MATT JARVIS
very straightforward
heart of the game,
5-10m 2-6 5+ £15
H
aving about as much to do with nabbing them out of their owner’s
cats as Bananagrams has to do pile before they can protect them. It’s
with plantains, Cobra Paw is a oh so simple, but oh so fun – it’s easy
blazingly quick reaction game about to see this becoming a favourite of
grabbing dominos. families looking for a five-minute filler
The components are few, but they (or those after a ridiculous drinking
are absolutely lovely. The dominos game). A few optional variants
are delightfully weighty and engraved provide some variety, but there’s
with abstract symbols that match a little need to overegg what is at heart
pair of equally chunky dice that clunk a very basic but simply enjoyable
along the table with a gleeful heft. crowdpleaser. No wonder they put a
Once the dice stop, everyone tries to cat on the front.
snatch the matching domino – helped The game’s fast playing time and
by the addition of a dimple in the fantastic components are only let
middle of each piece. down by the fact the dominos and
That’s about it, but dice come in a box that is both overly
things quickly big and pretty rubbish, with an egg
become a hectic box-style insert. In a nice fabric bag
scramble to or the right compact travel case, this
hunt down could be an essential travel game for a
each domino frantic few minutes. For us, it’s worth
– especially as already the extra bit of effort.
claimed pieces can be stolen by MATT JARVIS
14/02/2018 11:42

GOODWILL
Feels like work, but pays off
Designer: Julien Dauxert | Artist: Vincent Burger
R
emember the excitement of
doing taxes? Or maybe the
fun challenge of solving a
ponderous math percentage problem?
Oh, right, these things are not fun.
Yet, Goodwill’s rulebook lives in an
alternative universe where words
like ‘net profit’ and ‘optimise processes’,
along with other dry, convoluted
language apparently entices players
to try the game. While this may be in
line with the theme, there is always a
place and a time to get out of character.
When the subject you are broaching
is confusing and dry, perhaps a better
approach would be to figure out how
to make the investment and finances
fun, rather than perpetuate these
qualities, leading players to want to
give up on the game halfway through
the rulebook.
As for Goodwill itself, the game
is a delight. It is by no means a
realsitic simulation of the world of
investment, getting a few principles
backwards, but nor does it strive to
be accurate. Instead, Goodwill keeps
the overall spirit of investing, mixing
it with bidding and auctioneering
mechanics that are influenced by
a bit of guesswork, probability
and misinformation.
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 77
90m 2-6 14+ £40
WHAT’S IN Players are investors with shares
THE BOX? of three different companies at their
◗ Three company boards disposal. The goal is as old as time:
◗ Play/resources enrich your coppers by making sure
prices board
that you have stocks of the highest
◗ Chalkboards
◗ 30 share cards
value. However, events can influence
◗ 25 event cards the value of the company; a scandal
◗ 11 percentage cards might push the CEO to resign, the
◗ Nine derivatives cards prices of goods may fall or rise, or
◗ 10 boss cards a great feature in the newspaper
◗ 23 resource may bolster the business’ prestige.
prices markers The main trick of Goodwill is that
◗ 18 resource tokens no player has access to all of the
◗ Three market
information. Out of four events that
share arrows
◗ Year marker
will happen in the game’s year, each
◗ 18 gold bar tiles player is allowed to look only at two,
◗ 90 bank notes and not all events may come to pass.
The rest depends on how trustworthy
their fellow investors are and if
they are willing to engage in a bit of
insider trading.
Armed with some idea of things
to come, players proceed to secretly
bid on the companies, buying and
selling shares. While this could have
been a stale affair, a lot of strategies
come into this bidding round. Why
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED… RA
While a game set in ancient Egypt may sound more appealing than
a game of financial investments, Goodwill lives up to its name with a
nuanced bidding phase and a great twist on set collecting.
is someone selling the shares of the
Amber Company? Do they know
that something is about to happen
that you don’t? Or did they realise
that others are overbidding, buying
a share for much more than it is
actually worth? Maybe they just
need some cash? Like in any game
where players have a secret agenda
or information, the most satisfying
part is figuring it out. Goodwill leaves
enough clues to piece some of the
wider picture together – everyone’s
capital and a number of shares
are visible – while retaining
just enough ambiguity to
add a twinge of uncertainty for a
more competitive edge. Shares are
essentially Goodwill’s take on set
collecting, except the value of each
card may change on a round-to-
round basis. At the end of the game,
it is not so much about who has the
most money, although winning is
always nice, but whether you have
been successful at predicting your
opponents’ moves while masking
your own.
Goodwill adds up the concepts of
risk, bluffing and betting from the
real financial world, but subtracts
all the boring paperwork and
complicated graphs. It might be
hard to approach at first – it’s mostly
hindered by the ponderous rulebook
– but, after playing a round or two,
the most complicated part of the
game is remembering the meaning
of all the symbols on the event cards;
the designers could have really
included a cheat sheet. The rest of
the gameplay plays out logically
and, despite the theme’s subject,
feels easygoing. Goodwill may not
be the Wolf of Wall Street of board
games, but it can make you feel The
Big Short-like clever.
ALEX SONECHKINA
WE SAY
Don’t let the looks and the rulebook
fool you; Goodwill is worth a try. A
sociable game of bidding and set-
collecting, with the stakes always
changing; Goodwill’s sum total is a
good investment of your time.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 77
14/02/2018 11:42
 P L AY E D
EMPIRES
Tussle for European supremacy in the age of
feathery helmets and big moustaches
Designer: David Y. Stephenson, Daniel G. Stephenson | Artist: Scott Hartman, Nate Abell
I
n this golden age of designer-
powered board gaming, we players
have come to reasonably expect
tabletop experiences which are
rigorously calibrated and playtested
to scale effortlessly between different
numbers of players. A duel – or
solitaire bout, even – should yield just
as much enjoyment as a six-player
scrum. With Empires, however, that is
not the case. It really is a matter of ‘the
more the meatier’.
The first and biggest clue is in the
potential player count. Yes, that’s
right: up to ten people can join in the
historical fun, assuming you’ve got a
large-enough table. The second is in the
setting. Similar to the pre-World War I
setting of old-school classic Diplomacy,
78 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 78
we’re in 19th-century Europe,
where a whole heap of nations are
bickering and vying for new colonies.
France, Portugal, Prussia, Britain, the
Ottomans and more are posturing,
negotiating and sabre-rattling for the
sake of territorial acquisition.
The third clue is in the rules’ also-
Diplomacy-ish emphasis on trading
and negotiation. At any time during
any of the five rounds’ three phases
(develop, market and war), any player
can pretty much trade anything with
anyone. And not just their people,
territories, goods, gold or bonds. Even
your nation’s unique ability – such as
Prussia’s reward for raising the most
armies during the war phase, or the
Netherlands’ gold-earning bonus for
30-60m 2-10 14+ £55
having the most goods at the close of
the market phase – can be swapped for
something. When playing Empires, you
mustn’t be shy. Designers David and WHAT’S IN
Daniel Stephenson have made it clear: THE BOX?
anything goes, however and whenever ◗ 275 support cards
anyone likes. ◗ 121 selection cards
◗ 11 nation tiles
This free-for-all tone is further
◗ 11 national flag tokens
encouraged by the simultaneous play ◗ Two market boards
style, whereby players use the develop ◗ 14 war tiles
phase to organise their nation’s debts ◗ Diplomacy token
(represented by bonds) and assets into ◗ 100 goods tokens
institutions – by, for example, placing ◗ 150 territories tokens
people onto territories to create ◗ 50 bonds tokens
goods-yielding industries – without ◗ 103 gold coin tokens
needing to wait for a turn to do so. ◗ 150 people figures
Sending goods to market is executed
by simultaneously and secretly
committing to a number sold, with the
risk of the market being flooded by too
many goods. And war is a matter of
simultaneously and secretly assigning
a number of armies (each of which
must be paid for with gold, hopefully
raised during the market phase), with
WE SAY
the highest winning first choice of the A modern spin on a
available conflicts – the Carnatic Wars, familiar old theme,
but with its reliance
perhaps, or Dominion of the Seas –
on negotiating
and reaping the benefits. Any ties are strategies to provide
resolved by the player holding the the gaming flavour,
diplomacy token, a useful thing to it’s definitely one for
have. Oh, and that can be traded larger groups only.
at any time, too.
So, as we said, the more
players gathered, the better TRY THIS IF
Empires is. With just two, YOU LIKED…
there’s little need for SIDEREAL
trade, and all you have is
CONFLUENCE
In some ways, it’s
a straightforward, rather like a boiled-down
bland and uninspiringly Diplomacy. But
presented little engine- with its emphasis
building game that’s on trading and
hardly worth bothering simultaneous play,
with. But go six-plus and Empires feels
things get interesting as closer to TauCeti
deals are made, deceptions Deichmann’s recent
sci-fi epic.
play out, bluffs are called
and factions are formed. Of
course, things can also get fractious,
too, depending on the personalities
gathered. A little like Europe before the
Great War era, in fact…
DAN JOLIN
13/02/2018 15:28

NUSFJORD
A worker placement game about the Norwegian
fishing industry? Good cod
Designer: Uwe Rosenberg | Artist: Patrick Soeder
I
f you play many games, you’ll
know by now whether you like Uwe
Rosenberg’s designs, and if you don’t
then Nusfjord isn’t going to change
your mind. Move on: there’s probably
something about dragons or zombies
on the next page.
For the rest of us, Nusfjord is
Rosenberg combining the pastoral
themes of his recent tile-laying games
with the intricate worker-placement
mechanics he’s known for. The back
of the box offers exciting times in
the heyday of the fishing industry
in Nusfjord, a picturesque village in
northern Norway. Thrilling it isn’t, but
don’t be put off.
On the table, Nusfjord is a mix of
different boards, together representing
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 79
20-100m
the village and the players’ small fishing
companies. You have seven turns to
transform yours into the largest fishing
company, by cleverly managing all the
various resources the game offers you.
And there are a lot. This is a big box full
of cardboard and fish.
Each turn breaks down into three
phases. In the first, your fleet goes out
and returns with fish. In the second,
you place three workers to acquire
resources – gold most importantly, but
also more and bigger boats, buildings
with different functions, village elders
with their various skills, wood, more
fish, and even shares in other players’
companies. In the third, there’s jiggery-
pokery with special events and moving
the first-player marker, which goes
WHAT’S IN
THE BOX?
◗ Five harbour boards
◗ Four assorted
other boards
◗ Five elder
council boards
◗ Five personal
supply boards
◗ Banquet table
◗ 132 building cards
◗ 18 elder cards
◗ 100 fish tokens
◗ 50 wood tokens
◗ 30 forest tiles
◗ 25 share tiles
◗ 15 first player tiles
◗ Nine multiplication tiles
◗ 15 worker discs
◗ 41 gold coins
◗ First player ship
◗ Appendix book
1-5 12+ £54
counter-clockwise – counter-intuitive,
but it means that the person who finishes
one round starts the next, and so has an
advantage for that round. It’s clever.
The whole game is clever. As you’d
expect from a designer of Rosenberg’s
calibre, Nusfjord combines complexity
and intricacy with mechanics that
are easily grasped but demand to be
explored with repeated plays.
Nusfjord is designed for longevity.
It comes with three 32-card decks of
buildings (every building has a special
ability or bonus), and each play only uses
a subset of one deck. It’s not a legacy
game but it almost feels like one: you’ll
master a set of components and systems,
only for the ground to shift under you.
As with Rosenberg’s puzzle trilogy,
there are things in here that will make
game designers coo with delight. Forest
management is a comparatively minor
part of the game but implemented
so well; every turn you’ll be deciding
whether to thin your forests, cut part of
it down, or plant more, depending on
whether you’re after short-term or long-
term advantage.
My favourite is the banquet table. You
can recruit elders to use their abilities,
but you have to feed them fish from the
village’s communal table first. No fish,
and the elders won’t work. So someone
– anyone – has to put fish onto the plates
on the table, and hope nobody else
plays an elder before their turn comes
round again. It’s a lovely combination of
resource management, push-your-luck
and the tragedy of the commons.
Nusfjord is not a hard game to
succeed at: you will catch fish, your
company and the village will grow,
and you’ll feel you’re doing well. This is
not Agricola: it’s not a fight for survival
and the systems don’t punish you.
But learning how to out-fish the other
players is a journey that will keep you
entertained for many sessions.
JAMES WALLIS
WE SAY
A high-quality game in all senses,
Nusfjord combines breadth and depth
with elegance and charm.
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED…
TERRAFORMING MARS
Swap card drafting for worker
placement, and Nusfjord provides the
same fun of combining resources to
build an engine to power you to victory.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 79
13/02/2018 15:28
 P L AY E D
TIME BARONS
Strap in for a good time
Designer: Jon Perry, Derek Yu | Artist: Derek Yu
I
n the current political world
climate, seeing a game that uses
instantly recognisable mushroom
clouds as part of its artwork may hit
just a little too close to home. Add to
that gameplay that is inherently and
purposefully aggressive, and Time
Barons may have a hard time
appealing to some players. If and
when you manage to get over the grim
premise, though, you might discover
a quick and clever card game with
plenty to master.
Previously a two-player print-and-
play game, this Time Barons is a fresh
release with updated components as
well as an additional expansion to the
number of players supported, which
now goes up to four. It has a loose
theme of Illuminati and shady 'time
barons' who manipulate the world
and gather followers. It is nice to see
the theme subtly weave itself into the
game; for example, in the epoch cards,
which show the development of tools
and weaponry. In the first epoch, you
might draw a catapult, whereas the
fourth epoch, much harder to reach,
offers a futuristic and more powerful
doomsday laser. However, the theme
is not intrusive, making sure to keep
players focused on the key parts of
the game, building a solid engine that
sustains itself with capabilities to deal
damage to opponents.
All players begin the game on an
even battlefield, with a capitol or a
homeland, depending on a number
80 March 2018
065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 80
30m 2-4 14+ £25
of players, and ten followers. Using
their three actions per turn, they will
aim to destroy all of the opponent
followers to win the game. This is
done by acquiring building cards
and relocating followers to active
the abilities on those cards. Like in
any game that uses engine building
as part of its mechanic, knowing
the types of cards on offer and their
abilities is crucial.
Even then, winning in Time
WHAT’S IN Barons is not an easy task. Three
THE BOX? actions per turn may seem like a
◗ Six starting site cards
lot, but soon become a precious
◗ 100 gameplay cards
commodity and no upgrade comes
◗ Five free-for-all cards
◗ Four reference cards without its price. A higher epoch
◗ Four level markers might offer more powerful cards, but
◗ 55 blue follower tokens to get there players need sacrifice
◗ 30 red their action points, leaving themselves
damage counters exposed on that turn. Powerful
◗ 24 weapon tokens weapons or abilities may require
◗ 20 boss cards discarding a card or a follower, again
putting a player at a disadvantage.
There is a constant push and pull
within the game, where players need
to weigh the effectiveness of their
possible action against its cost to their
own engine.
Derek Yu, one of the creators
of Time Barons, is also a video
game designer, best known
for the dungeon-delving
platformer Spelunky. This is possibly
TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED… STAR REALMS
Equally fast-paced and feisty in its combat, Time Barons adds
more players in a single box and different gaming modes.
one of the reasons behind a certain
video game-like feel to the game that
is evident in how it plays: turn-based,
snappy, with a variety of modes
including free-for-all, team-versus-
team and even two players against
one. With small adjustments to
the rules for each mode, it scales
beautifully, retaining its overall
nature, but offering new challenges.
The two-versus-one mode is particularly
hard, requiring a deep knowledge of the
game and its strategies.
Time Barons strikes a tricky
balance between providing depth
and complexity, while not sacrificing
the fast pace of the game. The rounds
play out quickly and the gameplay
encourages you to be almost instantly
aggressive, creating immediate
interaction between players. It is
brutal and, if you fall behind, catching
up may be impossible. However,
what is gratifying in every loss is
that it is less due to the luck of the
circumstance, but rather a mistake
in a move or a decision. It is part of
the learning curve of the game and,
when the next session comes, there is
a pleasant reassurance that this time
you will do better.
ALEX SONECHKINA
WE SAY
Time Barons is a great evolution of
the print-and-play game, with a tight
combat mechanic that scales up
nicely for a different number of players
and modes. Its gameplay is easy to
grasp, while the variety of powers and
strategies ensure replayability.
13/02/2018 15:28
 COASTER PARK
A good idea flies off the rails
Designer: Scott Almes | Artist: Kwanchai Moriya, Peter Wocken 30-60m 2-4 8+ £48

WHAT’S IN
THE BOX?
◗ 12 launch hills
◗ 24 standard hills
◗ 116 coaster supports
◗ Eight marbles
◗ Seven secret
bonus cards
◗ One global bonus card
◗ 12 launch cards
◗ 24 standard cards
◗ 48 gold coins
◗ 81 silver coins
◗ Active player marker

I WE SAY
n the classic computer game
RollerCoaster Tycoon, the player can
remove a section of track while a train
is hurtling around a ride, launching
the virtual carriages into open space
before they plunge towards the ground.
Coaster Park’s madcap physics-based
coaster construction captures some of
the same entertainment of watching
things fly off the rails, but everything
inevitably comes crashing down.
The game’s main attraction is its
3D pieces of track, which are slotted
together to form tracks for a marble to
travel along. It’s delightfully original
and a lot of fun to actually see your
creations take form, before having
to test the combination of steep
launch hills, curving bumps and more
extravagant features – including jumps,
plateaus and even a show-stopping
loop recommended for ‘extreme’
players. Track sections only score
points if the marble successfully makes
it over them at the end of the game, so
real-world physics plays a big part in
scoring the win.
Coaster Park’s inventiveness in
relying on tracks actually working is its
defining feature, but it’s also one of its
major flaws. The cardboard pieces are
wildly inconsistent – even with three
attempts to score a successful run,
marbles can end up flying off relatively
unadventurous tracks or simply
encounter a combination of hills that
instantly kills the momentum, giving
players with multiple matches under
their belt a notable advantage. Putting
together the pieces is often fiddly and
awkward – the rules even suggest
bedding in the loop a few days ahead
of time – which further detracts from
the tangible joy of sending marbles
whizzing down the ramps.
All of this is attached to simple
auction gameplay that cements the
feeling that Coaster Park is better as
a curio than as a game to be played.
A single section of track is given a set
price and each player is given a chance
to accept that price, pass or pay a
coin to test their track instead. That’s
it. The ‘take it or leave it’ format falls
flat – especially with fewer than the
maximum four players – and fails to
inject any excitement into what should
be an exciting theme by default. It’s
rollercoasters, for Chrissakes!
Outside of their physical shapes,
the sections of coaster being
auctioned also lack the flamboyant
presentation you’d hope for from a
game about theme parks, consisting
solely of plain wooden and steel Coaster Park is
certainly unique, so it
tracks – there’s none of the gleeful
does have something
mashing up of pirates, ninjas and to offer to those after
whatnot seen in lively park-builder an original easygoing,
Unfair, for instance. From the studio unpredictable
behind the ballsy style of Wasteland dexterity game.
Express Delivery Service and two of Beyond the novelty of
the artists responsible for the eye- its often frustrating
melting visuals of Dinosaur Island, it 3D tracks, though,
feels like a major missed opportunity. there’s little to keep
those seeking a true
In fact, the most eye-catching feature
thrill ride coming back.
in the box is the seven-inch-tall
crane model used as an active player
marker, which is both clumsy in its
loose multi-part assembly and so big
as to look utterly ridiculous.
Secret scoring objectives for each
player and the chance to hire experts
with ongoing or one-off abilities
attempt to dress up the basic TRY THIS IF
auction action, but it’s not enough YOU LIKED…
to distract from the impression that
ROLLER
COASTER
Coaster Park is more gimmick than CHALLENGE
game. There’s certainly some fun Coaster Park is best
to be had as marbles go flying, and when you’re able to
reward to be found in finally finding sit back and watch
the right mix of slopes and ramps, physics do its thing,
but the shallow gameplay and without having to
frustration that follows the initial think about the
amusement doesn’t offer enough game part.
to invest in a return ticket – unless
you’re simply after an expensive box
of cardboard tracks for kids to play
with. Forget the Big Dipper – this is
just a big disappointment.
MATT JARVIS

tabletopgaming.co.uk 81

065_081_played_v4 MJ.indd 81 13/02/2018 15:29

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Kislev Flesh
Krieg Khaki
Leadbelcher
Liberator Gold
Lugganath Orange
Martian Ironearth
Mephiston Red
Pallid Wych Flesh
Reikland Fleshshade
Rhinox Hide
Runefang Steel
Screaming Skull
Squig Orange

COMMAND AND HELM

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of

Khorne Red.
Slaanesh Grey
Sotek Green
Steel Legion Drab
Temple Guard Blue
Warplock Bronze
Wild Rider Red
Zamesi Desert
STAGES
Since there is a large amount
of variety in the crew of the
Enterprise, combined with
matching uniforms, this guide is
split into general sections covering
the uniforms and tech, but splitting
the skin, hair and other details into
different sections. This will allow
us to cover every element of each
crew member, giving you a guide
for the full boxset contents.

STAGE 2 Apply a layer of

Mephiston Red, leaving the
recesses the basecoat colour.
STAGE 3 Add a line highlight of
Wild Rider Red, focusing on the
hard edges.
STAGE 4 Apply a dot highlight of
Lugganath Orange, focusing on
the corners.
UNDERSHIRT

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of

Steel Legion Drab.

MEDICAL JACKET

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of

Altdorf Guard Blue.

SKIN
STAGE 2 Apply a highlight of
Dawnstone, focusing on the hard
edges and folds.

STAGE 2 Apply a layer of Alaitoc

Blue, leaving the recesses the
base colour.
STAGE 3 Apply a line highlight of
Celestra Grey, focusing on the
hard edges and raised folds.

STAGE 3 Apply a fine highlight

of Blue Horror to the edges and
raised folds.
DARK SKIN

DESIGNERS ABOUT THE BIGGEST UPCOMING

ENGINEERING, SECURITY AND OPERATIONS LIGHT SKIN

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of

STAGE 1 Add a highlight of Dark Rhinox Hide.
Reaper across the hard edges, corners
and raised folds of the bodysuit.

STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a wash of STAGE 3 Apply a layer of Averland STAGE 4 Apply a line highlight of STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a layer of Cadian STAGE 3 Apply a highlight of Kislev STAGE 4 Apply a final fine highlight of
Averland Sunset. Reikland Fleshshade. Sunset, leaving the recesses the Krieg Khaki. Bugman’s Glow. Fleshtone, leaving the recesses Flesh, focusing down the centre Pallid Wych Flesh, only adding small

GAMES, WITH UNPARALLELED

original colour. the base colour. and top of the head. lines and dots over the previous coat.

STAGE 2 Apply a highlight of

SCIENCE AND MEDICAL ANDROID SKIN Doombull Brown, focusing on the
top edges of the features.

STAGE 2 Add a dot highlight of STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a highlight of STAGE 3 Apply a line highlight STAGE 1 Apply a basecoat of STAGE 2 Apply a layer of STAGE 3 Apply a glaze of Zamesi STAGE 4 Apply a final fine highlight of STAGE 3 Apply a final fine highlight
Slaanesh Grey, focusing on the corners Sotek Green. Temple Guard Blue, focusing on of Blue Horror, focusing on the Zamesi Desert. Screaming Skull, leaving the Desert over all the skin. Dorn Yellow, only adding small lines of Krieg Khaki.

BEHIND-THE-SCENES ACCESS
and the top of the raised folds. the hard edges and folds. corners and raised folds. recesses the base colour. and dots over the previous coat.

84 February 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 85

20 of 132 pages P L AY E D

BATTLE FOR ROKUGAN

Legend of the Five Rings expands with
an excellent
area control spin-off. Or are we just
Designer: Molly Glover, Tom Jolly |
bluffing?
Artist: Mathias Kollros, Francesca
Baerald, Nele Diel, ShenFei
90m 2-5 14+ £40
safeguarding it from future attacks
but potentially sacrificing a tactical
advantage during future battles.
Taking over an entire territory
can grant a huge advantage, as each
collection of lands unlocks a single-use
power for the controlling player to use.
The abilities feel fittingly formidable
ED

IT
CE

O R' I and satisfying to execute, but are only

S CHO held onto as long as that player has total
control – meaning waiting to use them
to
their full advantage can be very risky.
Each player also starts with a very
limited supply of scouts and shugenja
that let them spy on some of their
opponents’ tokens, plus a secret

SUBSCRIBE PRINT OR
objective that’s revealed during end-

H
ot on the heels of its recent living
card game revival, Legend of the
Five Rings’ next major franchise
instalment is Battle for Rokugan – a
taut
area control board game that stands
alone as a truly fantastic experience.
If you’re already a fan of Legend of the
Five Rings, you’ll find rough sketches
game scoring for a potential last twist
WHAT’S IN crucially, when – you put your tokens
in the final standings. Funnily enough
THE BOX? down becomes a tense standoff and
for a spin-off to a living card game, the
◗ Game board cardplay is kept to a bare minimum,
◗ 22 territory cards
clash of wits between players. Could
leaving the focus on the placement of
◗ 10 initiative cards the token attacking your province be
a tokens, but the small number, restricted
◗ Seven daimyō screens powerful army needing to be fought
off use and great power of the cards means
◗ 12 secret with ample defence? Or could it simply
that every one lands with a huge impact.
objective cards be a distraction to draw your forces
The combination of straightforward

LEARNI
of the seven competing clans’ broad ◗ First player card away from a surprise attack elsewhere
◗ 189 combat tokens basics, the chance for deceptive mind
during the final placement? You’ll need

strategies in their slightly asymmetrical
special abilities and pools of combat
tokens used for wresting control of
◗ Five shugenja cards
◗ 10 scout cards
◗ 210 control tokens
EVOLVENG
games, and just a smidge of luck and
to constantly guess and second-guess
asymmetry works an absolute charm:
your rivals, especially as every player
Battle for Rokugan is 90 or so minutes
always has a blank bluffing token hidden

D
the map’s various provinces – and the ◗ Four honour of exhilarating Oh My God!-ness,
victory-sealing honour that comes bonus tokens with the rest of their ‘hand’ behind

DIGITAL FROM JUST

air-punching triumph and head-in-
with them. It’s just enough to root the ◗ Four defence their screen, presenting a constant
hands regret (with laughter) as traps
conflict in a wider world that feels more bonus tokens opportunity to mislead and deceive. Games
are sprung, plans go astray and bigaren’t just fun –
◗ Shrine token It’s a tight, thrilling experience that they can also
believable and vibrant, without throwing
◗ Harbour token
moments pop off in every help you
round. boost your brainpowe
off the careful gameplay balance or keeps up the pressure throughout its Professors r.
◗ Battlefield token That’s no bluff. and students
leaving total newcomers feeling lost. very reasonable running time and gets the cranium-c tell us about
◗ 15 peace tokens MATT JARVIS ramming
Learning the ropes is easy, with especially explosive during the fifth benefits of
◗ 15 scorched Darwinian delight
combat largely coming down to a earth tokens
and final round, as players unleash WE SAY Words by Anna
Evolution
straight battle of numbers – attack with ◗ Round track token
a last-ditch effort to take over entire There’s no need to already be a Legend
Blackwell

more strength than your opponent has territories or block their rivals’ control. of the Five Rings fan to enjoy Battle
defence, and you’ll claim that province. Particularly brutal are the rare raid for Rokugan as a brilliant game of

£14.99
Each type of combat token has slightly tokens, which completely decimate planning, deception and strategy. The
different rules – armies must attack an area for the rest of the game easy-to-grasp gameplay means the
over land, naval tokens operate only and remove all combat and control riveting showdowns between players
tokens, while the equally uncommon get to shine, while the tight play time
along coasts, the rarer shinobi can strike
diplomacy tokens permanently forbid and differences between the clans and
anywhere and so on – and is placed territory powers leave plenty of reasons
facedown to signify its intent, before all combat in – or out – of a region,
to come back time and time again.
all players’ tokens are revealed and
resolved simultaneously. TRY THIS IF YOU LIKED…
GAME OF THRONES: THE BOARD
This is where Battle for Rokugan’s
Want a game that lets you conquer GAME
real joy comes into play, as where – and, the world as you trick and outwit your
friends? Battle for Rokugan lets you
do it all in under a couple of hours.

64 February 2018

44 February 2018

tabletopgaming.co.uk/subscribe
Prices displayed are all direct debit deals – UK only. Ends 31 December 2018. *Promo and cover gifts only available with print copies.

ttgSubsx.indd 4 13/02/2018 14:34

 DOCTOR WHO
INTO THE TIME VORTEX
Grab your sonic screwdriver and hop in
the TARDIS as we take a trip through
time to revisit some of the British sci-fi
legend’s most popular regenerations
Words and photographs by Andy Leighton

F
or this month’s guide we’ll be taking a look at various Timelords
from Doctor Who miniatures game Into the Time Vortex. The figures
are one-piece plastic, similar to board game plastics, making them
ready to go out of the box. Each of the Doctors I managed to get my mitts
on is excellently detailed and embodies the character in a great way. Each
outfit showcases their particular Doctor’s distinct style, such as David
Tennant’s trainers or Tom Baker’s iconic scarf. Not only this, but the poses
really strengthen their individual personality, from the dynamism of Matt
Smith (fez not included) to the sternness of William Hartnell – something
a lot of Whovians will be happy about.

PAINTS & TECHNIQUES

PAINTS USED
Abaddon Black Castellan Green Gauss Blaster Green Mephiston Red Sybarite Green
Agrax Earthshade Celestra Grey Incubi Darkness Nuln Oil Temple Guard Blue
Alaitoc Blue Ceramite White Karak Stone Nurgling Green The Fang
Altdorf Guard Blue Dark Reaper Khorne Red Pallid Wych Flesh Thunderhawk Blue
Averland Sunset Dawnstone Kislev Flesh Rhinox Hide Ulthuan Grey
Baneblade Brown Deathworld Forest Krieg Khaki Russ Grey Wild Rider Red
Blue Horror Doombull Brown Loren Forest Screaming Skull XV-88
Bugmans Glow Dorn Yellow Lugganath Orange Seraphim Sepia Zamesi Desert
Cadian Fleshtone Evil Suns Scarlet Macragge Blue Squig Orange
Caledor Sky Fenrisian Grey Mechanicus Standard Grey Steel Legion Drab

STAGES
Each model is split up into five stages, each with a list of colours and the corresponding paint
that was used for it. Each stage uses a different technique to achieve a similar effect on each
element but with different colours.
Stage 1 is base colours. Base colours are applied using a mix of glazes and flat colours.
Stage 2 is applying shading. In this stage we use various washes and glazes to add an
element of shading to the models.
Stage 3 iss highlighting. This stage involves applying a line of your colour along the hard
edges and ridges of the area. I would recommend using a fine brush and adding a tiny dash
of water to your paints.
Stage 4 is final highlight. This involves adding a small dot or dash of a colour, generally
in the same area as the previous highlight, but focusing on corners or where folds in
cloth meet. For hair or fur it involves adding a dot to the tip of each strand.
If you find yourself unsure of where to apply the highlights or spot highlights, look over
the images alongside the guide and compare that stage to the last.
Stage 5 is the final details. This stage involves cleaning up and adding a few spot
highlights. This stage also includes painting the base of the model.

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 DOCTOR WHO: INTO THE TIME VORTEX
FIRST DOCTOR
WILLIAM HARTNELL
BASE
COLOURS
Incubi Darkness: Apply several
thin coats to the jacket until you
have a flat, even colour.
Zamesi Desert: Apply several
thin coats to the trousers until
you have a flat, even colour.
Cadian Fleshtone: Apply several
thin coats to the skin until you
have a flat, even colour.
Altdorf Guard Blue: Apply
several thin coats to the
waistcoat until you have a flat,
even colour.
Celestra Grey: Apply several
thin coats to the hair until you
have a flat, even colour.
SHADING
& LAYERING
Seraphim Sepia: Apply a light
wash over the trousers.
Dark Reaper: Add a layer to
the jacket, focusing towards the
top of the previously painted
colour on the raised ridges and
hard edges.
Kislev Flesh: Apply a layer over
the skin, leaving the recesses
the original colour.
Ulthuan Grey: Apply a layer
over the hair, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
HIGHLIGHTING
Russ Grey: Apply a highlight to
the jacket, focusing on the hard
edges and corners.
Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a
highlight to the skin, focusing
towards the centre of the face.
Abaddon Black: Add a touch of
water to the paint and, with very
little on the brush, apply fine lines
down and across the waistcoat,
whilst also adding the thick
border around the edges.
Ceramite White: Add a line
highlight to the hair, focusing
towards the roots.
Temple Guard Blue: Apply a
layer to the waistcoat, leaving
only the recesses showing
the original colour. Also add a
small circle to the eyepiece.
84 March 2018
083_087_paintingGuide_v2 MJ.indd 84
FOURTH DOCTOR
TOM BAKER
FINAL HIGHLIGHT BASE
Ceramite White & Abaddon Black: Paint the eyes first COLOURS
with a base of Abaddon Black in an oval shape. This Doombull Brown: Apply
is followed by a very slightly smaller oval of Ceramite several thin coats to the
White and finished with a dot of Abaddon Black towards jacket and shoes until you
the top centre. have a flat, even colour.
Blue Horror: Apply a light touch to the top left of the eyepiece. Bugmans Glow: Apply several
Fenrisian Grey: Apply a dot highlight to the jacket. Only apply thin coats to the skin until you
this highlight to corners, or where two or more folds meet. have a flat, even colour.
Abaddon Black, Squig Orange & Zamesi Desert: Apply lines The Fang: Apply several thin
up and across the trousers to create a check pattern. Apply coats to the trousers until you
lines of Squig Orange in between the black lines. Once dry, have a flat, even colour.
apply a thin glaze of Zamesi Desert over the trousers. Rhinox Hide: Apply a coat to
the hat.
Thunderhawk Blue, Nurgling
Green, Loren Forest, Doombull
Brown & Wild Rider Red:
Apply each colour as a band to
the scarf.
XV-88: Apply several thin
coats to the waistcoat until
you have a flat, even colour.
SHADING
& LAYERING
Agrax Earthshade:
Apply a wash over the
jacket and waistcoat.
Cadian Fleshtone: Apply a layer
to the skin, leaving the recesses
the base colour.
Russ Grey: Apply a layer
over the trousers, leaving the
recesses the base colour.
Castellan Green: Apply a
layer over the hat, leaving the
recesses the base colour.
XV-88: Apply a layer to the front
of the shoes.
Nurgling Green, Wild Rider
Red, Gauss Blaster Green,
Dorn Yellow, Krieg Khaki:
Apply a line highlight to the
edges of each section on
the scarf.
HIGHLIGHTING
Mephiston Red: Apply a line
highlight to the coat, focusing on
the raised edges and folds.
Kislev Flesh: Apply a highlight to
the skin, focusing towards the
centre of the facial features.
Wazdakka Red: Add fine lines
to create a check pattern on
the waistcoat.
Steel Legion Drab: Apply a layer
to the hair, leaving the recesses
the original colour.
Dawnstone: Add a line highlight
to the hard edges of the hat.
Ulthuan Grey: Add a coat to the
shirt cuffs.
Gauss Blaster Green, Blue
Horror & Lugganath Orange:
Add a dot highlight to the
corners of each of the sections
of the scarf.
13/02/2018 15:30
 FIFTH DOCTOR
PETER DAVISON
FINAL HIGHLIGHT BASE FINAL HIGHLIGHT
Ceramite White & Abaddon Black: Paint the eyes first with a COLOURS Ceramite White & Abaddon Black: Paint the eyes first with a
base of Abaddon Black in an oval shape. This is followed by a Baneblade Brown: Apply base of Abaddon Black in an oval shape. This is followed by a
very slightly smaller oval of Ceramite White and finished with several thin coats to the jacket, very slightly smaller oval of Ceramite White and finished with
a dot of abaddon black towards the top centre. cricket bat and hair until you a dot of abaddon black towards the top centre.
Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a light highlight to the skin, focusing have a flat, even colour. Wild Rider Red: Apply a dot highlight to red sections. Apply
on the top edges of the defined facial features. Screaming Skull: Apply only a very fine line to the top edges.
Fenrisian Grey: Apply a line highlight to the trousers. several thin coats to Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a light highlight to the skin, focusing
Abaddon Black: Add a touch of water and apply thin lines to the trousers, hat and on the top edges of the defined facial features.
the waistcoat to complete the check pattern. jumper until you have a Sybarite Green: Apply a light highlight to the lapel flower.
Krieg Khaki: Add a line highlight to the front of the shoes and flat, even colour.
the edges of the waistcoat. Celestra Grey: Add a cost to
Ceramite White: Apply a line highlight to the edges of the the shoes.
shirt cuff. Khorne Red: Apply a coat
over the banded edges
moulded onto the model.
Bugmans Glow: Apply a layer
to the skin.

SHADING
& LAYERING
Karak Stone: Apply a layer
over the jacket and cricket
bat, leaving the recesses
showing the original colour.
Cadian Fleshtone: Apply a
layer over the skin, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a layer over
trousers, hat and jumper, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
Ulthuan Grey: Apply a layer over the
front of the shoes.
Rhinox Hide: Mix with one part water
and apply lines down the trousers.
Averland Sunset: Apply a layer
over the hair, following the
sculpted strands.
Mephiston Red: Add
a layer over the red
sections, leaving the
recesses the base colour.

HIGHLIGHTING
Dorn Yellow: Apply a fine line
highlight to the hair.
Evil Suns Scarlet: Line highlight
the top edges of the red sections.
Ceramite White: Apply a line
highlight to the front edge of the
shoes and the hard edges of the
hat and jumper.
Steel Legion Drab: Add a fine
line down the centre of the
stripes on the trousers.
Khorne Red: Add a line down the
centre of every second stripe on
the trousers.
Kislev Flesh: Apply a highlight to
the skin, focusing towards the
centre of the facial features.
Screaming Skull: Apply a line
highlight to the jacket, focusing
on the hard edges and folds.
Loren Forest: Apply a coat over
the flower on the lapel.

tabletopgaming.co.uk 85

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 DOCTOR WHO: INTO THE TIME VORTEX
TENTH DOCTOR
DAVID TENNANT
BASE
COLOURS
Incubi Darkness: Apply several
thin coats to the trousers and
sonic screwdriver until you have
a flat, even colour.
XV-88: Apply several thin coats
to the jacket until you have a
flat, even colour.
Karak Stone: Apply several thin
coats to the shirt until you have
a flat, even colour.
Khorne Red: Apply a coat to
the bow tie.
Rhinox Hide: Apply a coat to the
boots, belt and hair.
Cadian Fleshtone: Apply a layer
to the skin.
SHADING &
LAYERING
Zamesi Desert: Apply a layer
over the jacket, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
Kislev Flesh: Apply a layer over
the skin, leaving the recesses
the original colour.
XV-88: Apply a line highlight of
the boots and hair.
Mephiston Red: Apply a layer
to the bow tie.
Screaming Skull: Apply a
layer over the shirt.
Alaitoc Blue: Apply line
highlights to the trousers,
focusing on the ridges and folds.
Dawnstone: Apply a layer
over the sonic screwdriver,
leaving the recesses the
original colour.
HIGHLIGHTING
Zamesi Desert: Dot highlight
the shoes and the hair.
Evil Sun Scarlet: Line highlight
the edges of the bow tie.
Russ Grey: Apply a further
line highlight to the trousers.
Focus on the areas previously
highlighted, but leave a little of
the previous coat showing.
Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a highlight
to the skin, focusing towards
the centre of the facial features.
Celestra Grey: Apply a layer
over the sonic screwdriver,
leaving the recesses the
original colour.
Karak Stone: Apply a line highlight
to the hard edges of the shirt.
Wild Rider Red: Apply thin lines
to the jacket: horizontally
on the main body and
vertically on the sleeves.
86 March 2018
083_087_paintingGuide_v2 MJ.indd 86
ELEVENTH DOCTOR
MATT SMITH
FINAL HIGHLIGHT BASE
Ceramite White & Abaddon Black: Paint the eyes first COLOURS
with a base of Abaddon Black in an oval shape. Incubi Darkness:
This is followed by a very slightly smaller oval Apply several thin
of Ceramite White and finished with a dot of coats to the trousers and sonic
Abaddon Black towards the top centre. screwdriver until you have a flat,
Rhinox Hide: Apply lines to the jacket: horizontally even colour.
down the sleeves and vertically down on the main XV-88: Apply several thin coats
body. Once dry, apply a glaze of Zamesi Desert. to the jacket until you have a
Wild Rider Red: Apply a dot highlight to the bow tie. flat, even colour.
Agrax Earthshade: Apply a wash to the hair. Karak Stone: Apply several thin
Ceramite White: Apply a light highlight to the skin, focusing coats to the shirt until you have
on the top edges of the defined facial features. a flat, even colour.
Khorne Red: Apply a coat to
the bow tie.
Rhinox Hide: Apply a coat to the
boots, belt and hair.
Cadian Fleshtone: Apply a
layer to the skin.
SHADING &
LAYERING
Zamesi Desert: Apply a layer over
the jacket, leaving
the recesses the
original colour.
Kislev Flesh: Apply
a layer over the
skin, leaving the recesses the original colour.
XV-88: Apply a line highlight to the boots
and hair.
Mephiston Red: Apply a layer to the
bow tie.
Screaming Skull: Apply a layer over
the shirt.
Alaitoc Blue: Apply line highlights to
the trousers, focusing on the
ridges and folds.
Dawnstone: Apply a layer
over the sonic screwdriver,
leaving the recesses the
original colour.
HIGHLIGHTING
Zamesi Desert: Apply
a dot highlight to the
shoes and the hair.
Evil Sun Scarlet: Line
highlight the edges of the bow tie.
Russ Grey: Apply a further
line highlight to the trousers.
Focus on the areas previously
highlighted, but leave a little of
the previous coat showing.
Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a highlight
to the skin, focusing towards the
centre of the facial features.
Celestra Grey: Apply a layer over
the sonic screwdriver, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
Karak Stone: Apply a line highlight
to the hard edges of the shirt.
Wild Rider Red: Apply thin
lines to the jacket: horizontally
on the main body and
vertically on the sleeves.
13/02/2018 15:30
 TWELTH DOCTOR
H PETER CAPALDI
FINAL HIGHLIGHT BASE FINAL HIGHLIGHT
Ceramite White & Abaddon Black: Paint the
eyes first with a base of Abaddon Black in an
COLOURS Ceramite White & Abaddon Black: Paint the eyes first with a
base of Abaddon Black in an oval shape. This is followed by a
Incubi Darkness: Apply several
oval shape. This is followed by a very slightly thin coats to the suit until you very slightly smaller oval of Ceramite White and finished with
smaller oval of Ceramite White and finished have a flat, even colour. a dot of Abaddon Black towards the top centre.
with a dot of Abaddon Black towards the top centre. Celestra Grey: Apply several Blue Horror: Apply a final line highlight to the suit. Focus
Rhinox Hide: Apply lines to the jacket: horizontally down thin coats to the shirt over the areas previously highlighted, but leave a little of the
the sleeves and vertically down on the main body. Once until you have a flat, previous coat showing.
dry, apply a glaze of Zamesi Desert. even colour. Pallid Wych Flesh: Apply a light highlight to the skin, focusing
Wild Rider Red: Apply a dot highlight to the bow tie. Mechanicus Standard Grey: on the top edges of the defined facial features. Also, apply a
Agrax Earthshade: Apply a wash to the hair. Apply a coat to the hair. dot highlight to the hair.
Ceramite White: Apply a light highlight to the skin, focusing Bugmans Glow: Apply a layer
on the top edges of the defined facial features. to the skin.
Khorne Red: Apply a coat of the
jacket’s lining.

SHADING
& LAYERING
Macragge
Blue: Apply a
layer over the
suit, focusing
on the edges and folds.
Ulthuan Grey: Apply a layer
over the shirt, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
Cadian Fleshtone: Apply a
layer over the skin, leaving the
recesses the original colour.
Dawnstone: Apply a light
drybrush to the hair.
The Fang: Apply a highlight to
the front edge of the shoes.
Mephiston Red: Apply a
layer over the jacket lining,
leaving the recesses the
original colour.

HIGHLIGHTING
Caledor Sky: Apply a line
highlight to the suit, focusing on
the folds, ridges and edges of
the cloth.
Wild Rider Red: Apply a line
highlight to the edges of the
jacket lining.
Celestra Grey: Apply a
line highlight of the hair,
focusing on the front of
the hairline.
Kislev Flesh: Apply a highlight to
the skin, focusing towards the
centre of the facial features.
Ceramite White: Apply a line
highlight to the shirt.
Russ Grey: Apply a highlight to
the front of the shoes.

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 T H E D U N G E O N M A S T E R ’ S G U I D E T O R O L E P L AY I N G

BENDING AND
BREAKING
Rules are there to be broken, and massaging dice throws
can weave a more satisfying story for your players. Do it too
much, though, and you risk taking away the surprise and
tension of a campaign. So when is it right to play by the rolls?
Words by Richard Jansen-Parkes

88 March 2018

088_089_dMGuideToRPGs_v2 MJ.indd 88 14/02/2018 12:13


T
here are few things more satisfying
than having the dice rolls play
nicely with your narrative. In fact,
it’s so good that sometimes you feel
the urge to give luck a helping hand.
I thought fate had my back at a recent
session, when it just so happened that the
party’s normally jovial and generous fighter
happened to be next in line to act after a flame-
wreathed Demon of Vengeance struck down his
helpless father. The creature had been barely
clinging on to its physical form when it decided
to commit its final act of spite, so it was fitting
that the suddenly-furious Ellstrom would be
the one to deliver the killing blow.
The possibilities for future plot threads were
running through my mind as he rolled his dice,
and the entire room cheered when he the attack
struck home. We had spent weeks building to
this moment and I couldn’t have planned a more
fitting conclusion to the story arc if I’d wanted
to – after all, it had been Ellstrom’s own brother
who had accidentally summoned the beast
through an act of murder, so it made sense that
he would be the one to send it back to the abyss.
088_089_dMGuideToRPGs_v2 MJ.indd 89
Half a dozen people held their breath as he
rolled a final time to see how much damage his
blow would cause. Only I knew that anything but
a one would be enough to take the demon out.
And then fate decided to rip up the script.
The dice tumbled and span across the
tabletop, and came down showing just one
pip. Not quite enough.
Suddenly I was faced with a decision –
would I fudge the numbers for the sake of the
story, or would I let things play out as the dice
had decreed?
WHAT HAPPENS BEHIND
THE SCREEN...
This dilemma is one that’s probably unique
to tabletop RPGs. I can’t think of any other
medium where bending or even outright
breaking the rules is so routine that many
consider it to be just another part of the game.
There can’t be too many chess games where
rooks have suddenly developed the ability to
move diagonally because one player decided
that it would make things more exciting.
In part this is probably due to the non-
competitive nature of modern RPGs – the aim of
the game is for everybody to have fun rather than
to win. Indeed, from what I’ve gathered from
my fellow GMs the vast majority of nudged dice
and bent rules go firmly in favour of the players
rather than the monsters they control.
One of the most common examples is
rounding out unexpected spikes of bad luck
that would derail the story the group is trying
to tell, such as when a one-in-a-million shot
from a nameless guard somehow vaporises
the heroine’s skull just before the climactic
scene with her old commander. In that case
it’s tempting to ignore the critical hit and have
the blow simply scorch her helmet instead,
leaving room for your upcoming revelations to
go off without a hitch.
Everybody walks away from the table
happy, and nobody needs to know what
happened behind the screen. Surely that’s
for the best, right?
THERE TO BE BROKEN?
There’s a reason why rolling dice and flipping
cards are so important in tabletop gaming. They
allow us to simulate the roiling randomness of
reality – they add the unexpected element that
can surprise even the most experienced player.
Choosing to ignore them when they spit out
a result you don’t want is always a little risky. Do
it too much and that vein of surprise and shock
gets chipped away, little by little. We all know
that sometimes reality throws up unexpected
bumps and dips, and if you smooth those out
entirely the game you’re playing becomes too
predictable. An adventure isn’t half as exciting
if you know the good guys are going to win no
matter what.
Does this mean a DM should never, ever
fudge a roll? Well, not really. Different gaming
groups want different things from their
experience and if a totally unexpected wobble of
probability would send the story off in the deep
end you probably shouldn’t suffer too many
pangs of guilt about nudging a dice here or there.
The late, great Sir Terry Pratchett once wrote
that the reason why we have rules is “so that you
think before you break ‘em,” and that applies
to tinkering with results behind the safety of
your GM screen. If you’re going to do it, then
make sure you’re doing it for the right reasons
and don’t let it become a habit.
In fact, the best advice I’ve been given on
this is that if you do decide that you decide
that something is so important that you’ll
need to skew the result if it comes up wrong,
just don’t roll in the first place. If you’re going
to break the rules, commit to it and save your
troubled conscience from late-night doubts.
LETTING THE DICE FALL
As it happens, I decided to let fate have its day
with Ellstrom and the demon. The killing – or
possibly ‘banishing’ – blow ended up falling
to the party’s bard Eustacia, who was mostly
along for a chance to flirt with a baroness, and
the creature laughed at its furious foe as it
faded away to smoke, urging him to seek it out
for round two.
As I write, that was almost a week ago and
I’ll admit that I’m still not sure whether I made
the right call. If real life was playing along with
the narrative then it would probably turn out
that throwing things to the whims of random
chance had paid unexpected dividends, and
that a new, unexpected trove of story threads
had been unearthed.
But it isn’t, and though there are plenty of
developments to work with it’s hard not to
feel that it would have been more satisfying
if Ellstrom had been the one to take the
monster out.
Perhaps that’s appropriate, however. It
shows that sometimes the world – whether
real or imagined – refuses to warp itself to
fit the story. If nothing else it has shown my
players that sometimes they don’t get the win
just because it’s what would feel right.
Plus, it gives me some room to fudge a little
down the line and get away with it. If I want to,
that is.
tabletopgaming.co.uk 89
14/02/2018 12:14
 READ TABLETOP GAMING
ON ANY DEVICE ANYTIME!

F
or the first time since Arnie punned his way through
Batman & Robin as Mr. Freeze, the worlds of
Conan and the Caped Crusader are colliding. And
this time, it promises to do the Dark Knight justice.
Behind the unlikely reunion is Monolith, the
French games studio that made a splash in early
2015 with its Kickstarter for a tabletop adaptation
of Robert E. Howard’s barbarian warrior.
Monolith’s debut game, Conan ended up making
more than $3 million on the crowdfunding site
and quickly found an audience with its fluid translation of Howard’s
action-packed short stories to a innovative gameplay style dubbed the
Tactical Homeostatic System – or THS for short.
Central to THS was a pool of energy gems for each character that
could be spent to perform a variety of actions, from moving and
fighting to using special abilities or granting a reroll. Characters only
recovered a certain amount of gems each turn until they rested,
giving a sense of fatigue and encouraging the group of players to work
closely together to optimise their moves.
The next evolution of this framework powers Batman: Gotham
City Chronicles,, Monolith’s upcoming take on the legendary
comic-book superhero. But there’s a world of difference between
Conan’s bruising battles and Bruce Wayne’s riddle-solving,
shadow-skulking alter-ego, which the team has been keen to

THE
get across in the gameplay.
“Let’s say that it’s 80% to 90% close to Conan in the
fact that the gem system is the same,” says Gotham City
Chronicles project manager Adnane Badi. “But we’ve made

DARK KNIGHT
a lot of improvements to the system. First of all, to match

50+ GAMES
it to the Batman universe, because you cannot tell stories

HOW MINIS ARE MADE

about a hacking, slashing Cimmerian and a Dark Knight

RETURNS
in Gotham City – you have to adjust your mechanisms to 15
match this. So we have a sixth characteristic that appeared,
which is intelligence, which will allow us to play more with F E AT U R E D I N S I D E T H E U N S E E N W O R L D O F M O D E L- M A K I N G
solving riddles, finding clues; things like this
which are more in the Batman universe. February 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk
“What makes the game cool is that
After hacking and slashing its way when you have those cool miniatures on
a nice board it really feels like a hack ‘n’
through Conan, Monolith is taking slash game, but it’s also really a resource-

INCLUDES
management game. You have to allocate
on the Caped Crusader and pals in your gems and energy wisely and try to work
efficiently to get to your objective.”
Batman: Gotham City Chronicles. As in Conan, Gotham City Chronicles
features asymmetrical multiplayer, with one
It’s going to be Batfantastic…
BATMAN: GOTHAM CITY CHRONICLES | HOW MINIS ARE MADE | MASKS OF NYARLATHOTEP

player taking control of a main villain and all of

their minions in each of the objective-focused
Words by Matt Jarvis scenarios while the remaining players
Main illustration by Anthony Jean play as Batman and his companions Gotham City
All components shown attempting to foil their evil plans. Chronicles is
are work in progress “The hero boards have also based on the Batman
evolved a lot [from Conan]; we’ve created comics rather than the

MOBILE-FRIENDLY
a lot of new skills, again to match the Dark Knight’s film outings
Batman universe,” says Badi. “We
have arranged the skills according
to the action that you perform, so
if the skill is relating to a melee
attack it’s now in front of the

18 February 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 19

EDITION –
018_025_batman_v4 MJ.indd 18 16/01/2018 11:27

20
018_025_batman_v4 MJ.indd 19

of 132 pages
tabletop
16/01/2018 11:31

GAMING

THE CREATORS OF CONAN TAKE ON THE DARK KNIGHT

LEARNING
EVOLVED
Games aren’t just fun – they can also
help you boost your brainpower.
Professors and students tell us about
the cranium-cramming benefits of
Darwinian delight Evolution SAY GOODBYE TO
ZOOMING!
Words by Anna Blackwell
FEBRUARY 2018

THE 7TH CONTINENT HEARTHSTONE MASKS OF NYARLATHOTEP Display until 27/2/18

The end of the adventure? Making the digital CCG real An RPG horror classic returns £5.25

001_Cover_v2 MJ.indd 2 19/01/2018 14:18

44 February 2018

044_045_evolution_v3 MJ.indd 44 15/01/2018 14:10

VISIT POCKETMAGS.COM

p090.indd 1 13/02/2018 15:17


EVENT REPORT
AIRECON
Mark Cooke looks back on the explosive success of the
convention that started as a get-together in his own home
Interview by Matt Jarvis
AireCon started in your house just a few years
ago! How has it changed since it began?
The main thing that has changed is the size! When
I organised that very first AireCon at my house, it
was based around creating a relaxed atmosphere,
being welcoming, playing games and running
some fun events. Those same things are still core
of what we’re about, even though we’re expecting
35 times the number of people than were at
that first event. Everything is on a bigger scale,
but we still promote a relaxed and welcoming
environment with a focus on having fun.
You’re a very inclusive and welcoming show.
How do you encourage groups of strangers to
become friends?
Our GameSeekers area has a host of ways to
meet people; you can just turn up and see if
others are waiting for games, you can also use
our GameSeekers postcards to pre-arrange
games or sign up to other games. Or you can just
wander around the hall looking for AireFlags –
these indicate that more players are welcome in a
game that’s ready to start. In the RPG Zone we’ll
be running short one-shot adventures that allow
people to get a taste of roleplaying or try out a new
system. All of the events we run are designed for
people to be able to just drop in and join a team or
a table, so there’s always a way to meet new people.
You team up with local shop Travelling Man to
offer a library of games. What are some of your
top picks for this year’s show?
I’m looking forward to trying some of the recent
releases that I’ve not had a chance to yet, mainly
Whistle Stop, Photosynthesis, the Fable games and
the new Scythe: The Wind Gambit expansion.
This is your second year in Harrogate’s
Convention Centre. How did the relocation
March 2018
091_eventReport_v3 MJ.indd 91
go last year, and how does it compare to the
Jubilee Centre in Bradford?
We were really please with the move, we loved
being at Jubilee Centre, but were quickly
outgrowing it, and there were some accessibility
issues with it being quite an old building, so it
felt right to look for somewhere new.
Harrogate Convention Centre was ideal for
what we were looking for; they have a number
of different sized halls, meaning there’s plenty
of space for us to grown in to, it’s got great
transport links, being only five minutes from
the train station and close to Leeds/Bradford
Airport, and it’s situated in the lovely spa town
of Harrogate, so there’s plenty to see outside of
the convention centre, too.
Do you have any special guests attending?
We’ll be welcoming a lot of homegrown talent
and, for the first time, we’ll be bringing in an
international guest – Rodney Smith from Watch
It Played will be in the UK for the first time ever,
flying in especially for AireCon.
There will be a whole host of other people
from YouTube channels, podcasts, blogs and
even some well-known games designers.
What have you got planned for 2019’s event?
We’ll be looking to build on what we’ve
already established, but we will only continue
to grow the event if we can also make sure
we stick to what we set out to do. We will
not compromise on being a welcoming and
friendly event.
We started AireCon because we thought
it’d be a fun thing to do, but the response has
been overwhelming and we get so much out of
running it. We absolutely love the hobby and
we’re so privileged to be able to give something
back in this way.
UPCOMING EVENTS
CONVERGENCE
Friday March 9th to Sunday 11th
Northwest Gaming Centre, Stockport
Held in the home of local retailer Element
Games, ConVergence boasts a healthy line-up
of roleplaying sessions, as well as miniatures
and board games galore, across its three days.
convergenceuk.co.uk
CONCRETE COW
Saturday March 17th
The Old Bath House, Wolverton
A day of roleplaying held by Milton Keynes
RPG Club, Concrete Cow is open to all sorts
of RPGs, with a few board games and traders
also popping up at the get-together.
mk-rpg.org.uk/concrete_cow
SEVEN HILLS
Saturday March 24th to Sunday 25th
Garrison Hotel, Sheffield
With this year’s get-together based on the
theme of ‘far frontiers’ – and therefore
most of the games aiming to reflect that
subject – Seven Hills returns for a weekend of
roleplaying in the ever-popular Garrison Hotel.
7hills.org.uk
RAIDERS OF THE GAME
CUPBOARD
Saturday March 24th
Waterside Community Centre,
Burton upon Trent
Back for another in its quarterly run of friendly
meet-ups, Raiders is a day-long gaming event
running for ten hours from 10am to 8pm.
raidersofthegamecupboard.co.uk
STABCON SOUTH
Friday March 30th to Sunday April 1st
Jury’s Inn, Southampton
Running for its longest time yet – a whopping
60 hours of gaming – there’s no need to
bring your own games to this well-stocked and
welcoming show down south.
stabconsouth.com
CONPULSION
Friday April 13th to Sunday 15th
Edinburgh
After raising over £2,000 for charity last
year, this year’s Conpulsion ‘Conspiracy’
comes back with another three days of RPGs,
LARPing, wargaming and more.
conpulsion.org
UNCON
Saturday April 21st to Sunday 22nd
St George’s School, Broadstairs
Version 3.0 of the Unconventional Convention
includes plenty to see and play, including
support from the makers of Sub Terra, In a
Bind, Ominoes and more.
facebook.com/events/172571260006899
tabletopgaming.co.uk 91
13/02/2018 15:31
 CLUB DIRECTORY

ABERDEENSHIRE THE CHATTERIS WARLORDS COUNTY TYRONE ESSEX HAMPSHIRE NORTH HERTFORDSHIRE
ABERDEEN WARGAMES CLUB GAMES CLUB OMAGH WARGAMES CLUB BASILDON WARBOYZ ARBBL WARGAMES CLUB
Aberdeen, AB15 4YQ Chatteris, PE16 6NA Omagh, BT78 1HL Basildon, SS16 4NW Andover, SP10 1DQ Hitchin, SG5 1XL

OLDMELDRUM THE GAMES TABLE DERBYSHIRE COLCHESTER BLACK HOLE WARGAMERS NORTH LONDON
WARGAMES GROUP Cambridge, CB24 4RP DERBY ON BOARD GAMES WARGAMES ASSOCIATION Petersfield, GU32 3HS WARGAMES CLUB
Inverurie, AB51 0AA Derby, DE1 1QH Colchester, CO3 5RH Waltham Cross, EN8 9AJ
CARMARTHENSHIRE CHINEHAM BOARD GAMERS
ANGUS CARMARTHEN OLD GUARD SUNDAY NIGHT BOARD ESSEX WARRIORS Basingstoke, RG24 8LT POTTERS BAR GAMES CLUB
KIRRIEMUIR WARGAMES CLUB Carmarthen, SA31 3AD GAMING AT THE OLD Chelmsford, CM1 3DU Potters Bar, EN6 5BT
Kirriemuir, DD8 4HN KINGS HEAD BELPER DARK WORLDS
TOWY VALLEY TYRANTS (TVT) Belper, DE56 1NP GBCON QUARTERLY GAMING SOCIETY ST. ALBANS BOARD GAME CLUB
AYRSHIRE Carmarthen, SA31 2JE GAMING DAY Fareham, PO15 6TL St. Albans, AL3 5PE
NORTH AYRSHIRE DEVON Loughton, IG10 4LF
WARGAMES CLUB CHESHIRE BARNSTAPLE SLAYERS FIRESTORM CARDS OPEN THOR’S HAMMER
Irvine, KA12 0BA ALTRINCHAM WARGAMING CLUB GAMING CLUB LOUGHTON STRIKE FORCE GAMING NIGHT GAMING CLUB
Altrincham, WA14 4PG Barnstaple, EX32 8LS Loughton, IG10 1LH Basingstoke, RG24 8FB Borehamwood, WD6 5PR
BEDFORDSHIRE
BASEMENT GAMING CLUB CHESHIRE GAMERS CULLOMPTON BOARD SOUTHEND-ON-SEA FORDINGBRIDGE GAMING CLUB TRING WARGAMES CLUB
Luton, LU3 3AN Crewe, CW1 2DF GAMES GROUP ROLEPLAYING SOCIETY Fordingbridge, SP6 1AS Tring, HP23 6BA
Cullompton, EX15 1JX Southend-on-Sea, SS1 1BD
BEDFORD BOARD GAMING CONGLETON AND DISTRICT GARY DONALDSON WARLORDS WARGAMING
Bedford, MK40 2SX LIGHT BOARD GAMES GROUP DARK STAR GAMING THE HORNCHURCH Waterlooville, PO8 8RG ST. ALBANS
Congleton, CW12 1AH Plymouth, PL4 0AL WARGAMES CLUB St. Albans, AL3 4DJ
BOARD GAMES IN BEDFORD Romford, RM3 9LB PORTSMOUTH ON BOARD
Bedford, MK41 0TU ELEMENT GAMES NORTH EAST DEVON TABLETOP Portsmouth, PO1 1PT WATFORD WARGAMES CLUB
WEST GAMING CENTRE & RPG GROUP THE OVERLORDS Watford, WD17 4PN
LEIGHTON BUZZARD Stockport, SK2 6PT Honiton, EX14 1HR Dagenham, RM8 2HQ RINGWOOD ASSOCIATION
GAMING CLUB OF WARGAMERS WELWYN WARGAMERS
Leighton Buzzard, LU7 1ES GUARDIANS OF THE GAMES EXMOUTH IMPERIAL THE PHOENIX GAMES CLUB Ringwood, BH24 1DW Welwyn Garden City, AL8 6PS
(TABLETOP GROUP) WARGAMES CLUB London, E13 0AD
SAXON GAMES & CRAFTS Macclesfield, SK11 6UB Exmouth, EX8 4SW SOLENT WARGAMERS CLUB ISLE OF MAN
Bedford, MK40 4FU FIFE Portsmouth, PO1 1PT KB TABLETOP GAMING
MUG AND GAME GAME NIGHT @ CARPE DUNFERMLINE WARGAMING - ISLE OF MAN
BERKSHIRE Congleton, CW12 1PG Plymouth, PL4 8EU AND ROLEPLAYING FELLOWSHIP SOUTHAMPTON SLUGGAZ Isle of Man, IM4 4LA
BROAD STREET GAMERS Dunfermline, KY12 7DS Southampton, SO17 2JZ
Wokingham, RG40 3AQ POYNTON BOARD GAME DAY PLYMOUTH ASSOCIATION KENT
Stockport, SK12 1RB OF WARGAMERS EAST NEUK TABLETOP GAMES THE SOUTHAMPTON GUILD ALL AROUND THE BOARD
NEWBURY & READING Plymouth, PL3 5TB Anstruther, KY10 3DJ OF ROLEPLAYERS Westgate-on-Sea, CT8 8RE
WARGAMES ASSOCIATION VARIABLE MAGERS Southampton, SO14 0LH
Newbury, RG14 2RA Stockport, SK4 3BS TORQUAY BOARD GAME CLUB KIRKCALDY MEEPLE CLUB ASHFORD (KENT)
Torquay, TQ2 7AD Kirkcaldy, KY2 6LF THE THIRD COALITION BOARDGAMES CLUB
NEWBURY & READING WARRINGTON BOARD GAMES CLUB WARGAMES CLUB Ashford, TN24 9AJ
WARGAMES ASSOCIATION Warrington, WA1 2SX DORSET FLINTSHIRE New Milton, BH25 5BT
Newbury, RG1 4PS SOUTHBOURNE TABLETOP DEESIDE DEFENDERS BEXLEY REAPERS
WINSFORD WARHAWKS & BOARDGAMERS Chester, CH4 0DR WATERLOO TABLE TOP GAMERS WARGAMING CLUB
WARFIELD BOARD GAMERS WARGAMING CLUB Bournemouth, BH6 3AA Waterlooville, PO8 8RG Bexley, DA5 1AA
Bracknell, RG42 2DD Winsford, CW7 4AT FGC FLINTSHIRE GAMING CLUB
WESSEX WYVERNS Mold, CH7 6SZ WESSEX WARGAMES CANTERBURY CRUSADERS
WARGAMES ASSOCIATION CLEVELAND WARGAMES CLUB WINCHESTER Canterbury, CT1 1RT
OF READING REDCAR IRONBEARDS Ferndown, BH22 9AN GLASGOW Winchester, SO22 4QB
Wokingham, RG41 5DU Redcar, TS10 1RH ANTONINE BOARD GAMERS GRAVESHAM WARGAMING
WORLDS AWAY Glasgow, G64 4EN WESSEX WYVERNS AND TABLETOP
BRISTOL CO ANTRIM Bournemouth, BH2 5RQ GAMING CLUB GAMING CLUB
HALL OF HEROES GAMING CLUB DRAGONSLAYERS GLASGOW GAMES ROOM Ringwood, BH24 2NP Gravesend, DA11 9EU
Bristol, BS16 1NU Belfast, BT7 1NN DUMFRIESSHIRE Glasgow, G20 7QE
ANNAN GAMING CLUB HEREFORDSHIRE GREENWICH & BLACKHEATH
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE QUB DRAGONSLAYERS Annan, DG12 6EF UNPLUGGED GAMES CLUB DICE AND DECKS BOARD GAMES AND BEER CLUB
MILTON KEYNES Belfast, BT7 1NN Glasgow, G41 3AB Ross-on-Wye, HR9 5HR London, SE3 7JQ
WARGAMES SOCIETY THE FIVE ARCHES GAMING CLUB
Milton Keynes, MK11 1JQ CO CORK Dumfries, DG1 3JR GLOUCESTERSHIRE HEREFORDSHIRE BOARDGAMERS MAIDSTONE WARGAMES SOCIETY
BRETHREN WARGAMING CLUB GLOUCESTERSHIRE Hereford, HR4 9EA Maidstone, ME17 4AW
NEWPORT PAGNELL West Cork, T23 F577 DUNBARTONSHIRE GAMES BUNKER
BOARD GAMES CLUB DUMBARTON Cheltenham, GL51 4XA HERTFORDSHIRE MEDWAY AREA BOARDGAMERS
Newport Pagnell, MK16 8AN CO DURHAM WARGAMES CLUB BISHOP’S STORTFORD Maidstone, ME14 1ED
DARLINGTON’S DOGS OF WAR Dumbarton, G82 1QQ IWARPUK TABLETOP
WYCOMBE WARBAND Darlington, DL3 7LX Gloucester, GL2 9EB Bishop’s Stortford, CM23 3BQ MERRYCHEST CAFE
Beaconsfield, HP9 1LG DURHAM GAMING CLUB
DURHAM RAIDERS DWG LINCOMBE BARN BLACK WOLF Dartford, DA2 8AH
CAITHNESS Croxdale, DH6 5HJ Durham, DH1 1QG WARGAMES SOCIETY WARGAMES CLUB
NORTHERN KNIGHTS Bristol, BS16 2RW Hitchin, SG5 1XL MILTON HUNDRED
WARGAMES GAMERS@HART DYFED WARGAMES CLUB
Thurso, KW14 8HN Hartlepool, TS26 9DE WELSH WEYR GAMING GROUP PORK CHOP GAMING CALAMITY COMICS HATFIELD Sittingbourne, ME10 4BX
Ammanford, SA18 1DX Cheltenham, GL50 3HA Hatfield, AL10 0JJ
CAMBRIDGESHIRE CO LONDONDERRY SEVENOAKS & TONBRIDGE
2D6 LODGE THE SIEGE BUNKER EAST SUSSEX GREATER FINCHLEY GAMES CLUB ASSOCIATION OF
Cambridge, CB1 8NN Londonderry, BT48 7JL 1066 WARGAMING CLUB MANCHESTER London, N12 7JE GAMERS (STAG)
St. Leonards-on-Sea, TN38 8BL TABLETOP MANCHESTER Sevenoaks, TN15 9HA
NEWMARKET KNIGHTS CORNWALL Cheadle Hulme, M15 4ST HEMEL HEMPSTEAD
GAMES CLUB SMIPHEES GAMES CLUB EASTBOURNE ELEMENTAL WARGAMING CLUB TUNBRIDGE WELLS
Ely, CB7 5HS Callington, PL17 7AN Eastbourne, BN21 3XQ GWENT Hemel Hempstead, HP1 1LD WARGAMES SOCIETY
GWENT REAVERS TABLETOP Tunbridge Wells, TN3 0PR
PETERBOROUGH THE DICE AND DAGGER FAMOUS COLLECTABLES GAMING CLUB HERTFORD BEER WHITSTABLETOP
WARGAMES CLUB GAMING CLUB Bexhill-on-Sea, TN40 1DU Abertillery, NP13 3DJ & BOARDGAMES Whitstable, CT5 1DA
Peterborough, PE1 1NA Bude, EX23 9BL Hertford, SG14 1HH
EAST YORKSHIRE GWYNEDD LANARKSHIRE
ROLL WITH IT! WEDNESDAY NIGHT GAMING WOLDS WARGAMERS CONWY WARGAMES CLUB HITCHIN HERETICS LANARKSHIRE GAMERS
Huntingdon, PE29 3TF Redruth, TR15 3QY Driffield, YO25 6SS Llandudno, LL30 3LB Hitchin, SG5 1XL Motherwell, ML1 1BS

92 March 2018

92_93_clubDirectory_v3 MJ.indd 92 14/02/2018 12:09

 ,

ML2 GAMERS LONDON NOTTINGHAMSHIRE ZONE OUT GAMES CLUB WARWICKSHIRE WEDNESDAY
Hamilton, ML3 6BU CROSS GAMING CLUB K.I.A GAMES CLUB Doncaster, DN1 2PX AFTERNOON PLAY KNIGHT GAMERS
LANCASHIRE London, SE1 1DX Nottingham, NG17 8LA Birmingham, B15 1AY Salisbury, SP1 3TA
BLACK TOWER WARGAMING STAFFORDSHIRE
Blackpool, FY4 4ND SELWG NOTTINGHAM BOARD & CHASE WARGAMES CLUB BOARD GAME CAFE WORCESTERSHIRE
London, SE6 2TS WARGAMES CLUB Burntwood, WS7 0JL SUMMERFIELD BROMSGROVE BOARD GAMERS
BURNLEY BOARD GAMERS Nottingham, NG2 1NB Birmingham, B16 0EZ Bromsgrove, B60 2DZ
Burnley, BB10 3LF TANELORN WAR GAMING CLUB LICHFIELD GAMERS AND RPG
London, E11 3DB THE CLUB WITH NO NAME Lichfield, WS13 6EB BRAVO ONE GAMING PERSHORE GAMING
BURNLEY WARGAMES CLUB Nottingham, NG2 1NB Birmingham, B1 1QP Pershore, WR10 1EQ
Burnley, BB10 3EU THE ROLE PLAY HAVEN STAFFORDSHIRE
London, E15 2HU WAR & PEACE GAMES CLUB WARGAMING GUILD DREAMDEALERS GAMING CLUB POSTAL ORDER GEEK MEET
DICED TEA Nottingham, NG10 5BD Stone, ST15 8TG Coventry, CV6 4FE Worcester, WR1 1DN
Oldham, OL1 2DB THE ROLE PLAY HAVEN
London, SE13 6LH WILDSIDE GAMING TAMWORTH GAMES CLUB GRANGE LIVE GAMING REDDITCH
DUNGEONS & FLAGONS Newark, NG24 1ER Tamworth, B79 7DJ Birmingham, B1 1QP WARGAMING SOCIETY
Manchester, M1 7HL MERSEYSIDE Redditch, B97 5YE
FORGEMASTERS GAMING CLUB OXFORDSHIRE TAMWORTH LIBERATORS NUNEATON ALTERNATIVE
ELWA: EAST LANCASHIRE Wirral, CH63 6HD ABINGDON WARGAMES CLUB GAMING CLUB GAMES ASSOCIATION WORCESTER BOARD
WARGAMES ASSOCIATION Abingdon, OX14 5AG Tamworth, B77 3AE Nuneaton, CV10 8LJ GAMERS (WOBOG)
Blackburn, BB6 7DD LIVERPOOL LION BOARDGAMERS Worcester, WR1 2DP
Liverpool, L3 9NS AMBROSDEN GAMING CLUB THE VINE INN GAMERS OCTOBER WARGAMES
FAN BOY THREE Bicester, OX25 2LZ Rugeley, WS15 2AT ASSOCIATION WYRE FOREST GAMERS
BOARDGAME NIGHT SOUTHPORT BOARD Birmingham, B16 8SY Kidderminster, DY10 1RP
Manchester, M1 1EL GAMES GROUP BICESTER BOARD GAMERS STIRLINGSHIRE
Southport, PR8 1NH Bicester, OX26 3HA FALKIRK DISTRICT SCIMITAR WARGAMES GROUP YORKSHIRE
HARLEQUINS BLACKPOOL WARGAMES CLUB Coventry, CV3 5GT AIREBOROUGH
Blackpool, FY1 3QA MID GLAMORGAN NORTH OXFORDSHIRE Grangemouth, FK3 8QR COMMUNITY GAMERS
CASTLE GAMERS BRIDGEND WARGAMING CLUB WEST MIDLANDS Leeds, LS19 6AS
HOUSE LANCASTER Bridgend, CF35 6AU Banbury, OX16 9AF SUFFOLK BIRMINGHAM WARGAMES
GAMING GROUP BURY ST EDMUNDS AND BOARDGAMES CLUB BEYOND MONOPOLY
Lancaster, LA1 1EE MIDDLESEX OXFORD GAMING CLUB BOARD GAMING GROUP AKA DRAGOON’S DEN York, YO24 1AQ
BATTLEUX WARGAMES CLUB Oxford, OX2 7DP Bury St. Edmunds, IP30 9LH Birmingham, B13 9EA
PRESTON’S GAMERS GUILD Uxbridge, UB10 0RY HEADINGLEY GAMES CLUB
Preston, PR1 7DP OXFORD ON BOARD HAVERHILL WAR GAMES CLUB PLAY MORE GAMES! Leeds, LS6 3HN
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tabletopgaming.co.uk 93

92_93_clubDirectory_v3 MJ.indd 93 14/02/2018 12:09

 Boardgames, Figurines & Collectables

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 As a committee member of one of our local
gaming clubs, I run various campaigns, events
and organised play through the store.

What advice would you give to board gamers

looking to pick up miniatures for the first time?
For all of those looking to make the transition
from board games and card games into miniature
games there are so many fantastic options out
there it’s sometimes hard to know where to start.
SHOP SPOTLIGHT There are plenty of games out there to start

FROME MODEL
with, such as Warhammer Underworlds:
Shadespire, which incorporates fixed-grid
movement and cards similar to that of a

CENTRE
board game with the playable mechanics of
a wargame, as well as the X-Wing Miniatures
Game which uses templates and character
cards. But the first and most important rule is
to go for the game that you think looks cool!
Charlie Francis tells us about growing the Somerset
What’s the local gaming scene like?
model shop during the board game boom, the We are very lucky to have such a vast and ever
thriving local gaming scene and what miniatures growing wargaming, board game and trading
card game community. Whether you are into
newcomers should be on the lookout for wargames, board games or popular TCGs,
there is normally a group of players nearby
Interview by Matt Jarvis who share your love of the hobby and will
always fancy a game.
What makes your shop one-of-a-kind? Warhammer 40,000 and Age of Sigmar, as well as
We are one of the largest independent family- Battlefront’s Flames of War and Team Yankee. What are your future plans for the store?
run model shops in the UK and are very much In the past two to three years in particular, The future of these hobbies is looking very
a one-stop shop for all of your modelling and the resurgence in popularity of unique bright for us! We look forward to running
gaming needs, providing everything from tabletop games and board games has been increasing numbers of events and tournaments
scratch-build materials to dice and paints. substantial, with new clubs growing in the in the local area.
area – and we have continued to grow our
Outside of models, range accordingly.
what games do We now carry most popular board games
you sell? and roleplaying games, such as Dungeons
Being a model & Dragons, the Eldritch Horror series and
shop we have Ticket to Ride, to name just a few, as well as
always kept tabletop miniature games such as the X-Wing
plastic kits of all Miniatures Game and Wild West Exodus.
shapes and sizes,
including the Which games have been proving particularly
likes of Games popular lately?
Workshop’s Certain games have continued to grow
in popularity. For example, the launch of
Warhammer 40,000’s eighth edition – the
popular game has, as predicted, gone from
strength to strength since its release.
One that has proven popular beyond
expectation is Wild West Exodus, which I was
very pleased with as I am an avid fan of the
setting and mechanics of this game.

Is there anything else you offer for gamers?

Locally we support a variety of clubs with member
discounts, as well as prize support and donations.

March 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk 95

095_shopSpotlight_v3 MJ.indd 95 13/02/2018 15:32

 ONLINE GUERNSEY
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 ONLINE WALES
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p096_097.indd 97 14/02/2018 10:58

 12
1 11
2

10
9
3

8
4

5 7
6

MHING

M
hing is mahjong but as a multiplayer
card game. Making a card game
from a classic such as mahjong
does sound like it might be a little
redundant but Mhing adds to the
game in several ways. Mahjong is a four-player game
whereas Mhing’s rules allow you to play with two to six
players. Mhing is also much more portable allowing
you to play a game on the go. It is a little easier to
play than full-blown mahjong and this is in no short
measure due to the easy to follow rules and excellent
shore sheets included. The whole thing works very well
thanks to good game design from its inventor Robert
Sun, and his mathematics skills show in the well
balanced scoring system.
Robert Sun was born in Shanghai and is now the
chairman, president and chief executive of Suntex
International Inc. He’s achieved great success both
through his inventions and his community work and
social housing programmes. Sun’s greater success
in the games world came in 1988 by combining deliver their learning
mathematics education with play. He designed and objective if the game
published another card-based game called the 24 if fun to play and
Game. The 24 Game is still produced today in many engaging enough
different formats and is used in many schools in the US to make people
and around the globe as a teaching aid. actually want to
Mhing was a slightly earlier game, first published play. Forced gaming
in 1982 and repeatedly published by many different never delivers good
companies across different territories. The version educational results.
shown here was published by Spears Games in 1984. Mhing provides
The game is presented in an oriental-styled some stealth
box, black with red and gold framework. The cards maths education
themselves are of high quality with dragon scale through the medium of gaming by
patterns on their reverse and nice artwork that rewarding players for being aware of the scoring
continues the theme from the box. The production and chasing higher value scores. At a basic level,
values are all high quality in the Spears edition and Mhing isolates some of the positive elements of
there are 150 cards set in a thick plastic insert. The gambling such as calculating odds and strategically Words Phil Robinson
Phil Robinson is a game
game is played in rounds, which means you can set thinking about the value of your hand. This is historian and the founder
the length of play, making it good for casual play or indicative of the designer’s later intentions and of the Museum of Gaming,
longer games. The urge to play “just one more round” educational game development. an organisation that
is strong. It’s certainly a game worth playing and you can explores and documents
Mhing has elements of the rummy style of card usually find Mhing for a reasonable price second- the history of gaming
through its collections,
games but with the added strategy of mahjong. It’s not hand. If you are a fan of mahjong you should definitely
exhibitions and research.
designed as an educational game – but games only add this to your collection.

98 March 2018 tabletopgaming.co.uk

098_tabletopTimeMachine_v2 MJ.indd 98 13/02/2018 15:34

 I N A P R I L’ S I S S U E
ON S A L E M A R C H 2 9 T H

We step into the arena

with the fierce legacy
miniatures game from
the creators of Guild Ball

CRITICAL ROLE
Dungeon master Matthew Mercer
and his gang of celebrity roleplayers
tell us about the D&D campaign
that has millions tuning in

HELLBOY
Having a hell of a time in the
co-op comic book adventure

EXCLUSIVE
TO TABLETOP FREE KING OF TOKYO PROMO CARD
ZOMBIF Y YOUR MONSTER IN THE DICE-ROLLING SMASH HIT!
GAMING

099_nextMonth_v4 MJ.indd 99 13/02/2018 15:35

Star Wars Destiny Legacies - Tabletop Gaming.indd 1 09/01/2018 10:12:31
p100.indd 1 07/02/2018 09:21