What I have heard is that the minis look good given that they are softer plastic, but the Adventures Companion has misprints that go so far a duplicated entry replacing another (Update Misprints are missing page references and a mistake with Flavor text so annoying but not critical. Errata is already included for the page references). So people were talking about missing Hero cards for the expansion heroes who are in the base pledge but the cards are in their specific expansions. The reused heroes between the base game and the extra purchased expansions sometimes appear to be different with different names and changed feats.
This will be all old news by the time mine shows up and I am still in negotiations with the wife about what I can have right away and what is hold for another month for Christmas. If you are lucky enough to have gotten yours let me know what you think.
Still waiting on my pledge currently but I've been trying to find info into what the Compendium actually includes, though I'm hugely doubtful it will actually contain Advanced rules beyond the scope of Character Generation. I did a break down of the table of contents when it was finally released on Board game geek and came to the conclusion that there's about 2 additional pages of rules between it and the core game.
ReplyDeleteI guess I should have learnt following Deadzone promising so much and producing so little but I really believed they were going to pull out all the stops on this product, especially after seeing the massive improvements between DBX (beyond delays - which I'm less concerned with though communication still sucked) and Deadzone.
You brought up the Mini quests as being missing, the Hero AI was sidestepped and question redirected or as was in the Q&E answered in a way to confuse quite deliberately I believe anyone not paying attention or to whom English is not there first language.
They failed to deliver on a meaningful backer driven rules set, tons of feedback was given but we didn't get the beta until the files were in the final stages of layout so the only changes possible by this stage would be superficial ones. Key concerns regarding the fact that you could move or fight and that's it, or that the Overlords role which is supposedly competitive is woefully lacking on just about every level to make it work. I've seen nothing to suggest that a fraction of the support is in place for having a truly competitive Overlord and even Jake went silent on the topic every time I've broached in, in fact he either didn't understand the actual part of the question or he'd got some lessons from the team about misdirection as when replying to a comment I made asking how Overlord bosses could work and gain XP his answer was simply in the same way as heroes do providing zero insight into the actual question which was how the hell do bosses gain experience being as dungeon structure tends to be heroes turn up, heroes kill monsters and get treasure where and how does a levelling competitive overlord fit into that. Right now I'm not even sure bosses levelling and the overlord having down time actions exists unless running a evil party which isn't even close to the say time.
DeleteEnd result I'm expecting a game with very little going on (I've got the basic rulebook, quest book and Valandor expansion books I found them on a hidden part of google documents months ago) and there's nothing going on that leads me to believe anything requested or much of what was promised is going to be there. I really think this games going to need some heavy house ruling to provide a solid dungeon Crawler (I'm not looking for a RPG either I've got tons).
Have you seen the pictures of the Resin Traps and Markers? I really hope that just poor photography because these luxury 'exclusive' upgrades look shit. I'm also annoyed they changed the Skull wound tokens to crappy looking gem effect hearts - Again they look like shit and I'd not have pledged for them, though I'm more hopeful regarding the piles of bones - Traps though less said the better.
Overall from what I've seen the minis look alright, the boards look solid, the furnitures fine and the cards/art etc work well enough but the rules are going to be lacking and substantial substance, we have half the AI promised, About half the Scenarios, no advanced rules, a some counters that aren't even close to the concepts, and a Overlord that's supposed to be competitive but the game punishes rather than rewards the overlord for winning. So overall much better than Deadzone but far from the product that could put them on peoples radar for al the right reasons.
DeleteBacked KoW2, DZ2 and Warpath for a Dollar but I'm doubtful I'll do anything with them despite there being things I'd like I'm just fed up of Mantics ability to be in a position to produce something with so much potential and finish with fail.
To compare I got my Shieldwolf pledge this week; the emailed me personally to say it was shipping, this is following there team actively engaging with me with 20 emails via kickstarter and another 20 or so via my in box telling me what they are doing, planning and where the aim to be. The pledge turned up (ok it was relatively small a couple of units and characters) but the packaging was exceptional, the quality of the Minis of GW standard (different and pretty unique in style however), everything was there and I got two follow up emails thanking me for my support and keeping me in the loop of the progress/activities. You know what's the amazing part... Sheildwolf are a Greek Company, who in the middle of there production phase couldn't access there accounts and kickstarter funds at all. They had to beg borrow and scrounge to survive from what I know of how the country was, so the fact that they had to source resin from various sources and were unable to pay there sculptors, casters or do anything the requires money. Yet my delivery turned up (due date was December 2015), in perfect condition with packaging that is a hobbyists dream (plastic fishing tackle boxes is the best way I can describe it). People often say I should cut Mantic some slack they are a small company, but these guys are a fraction of mantics size and look what they did because they have stayed focused on what they promised there backers they would despite having easily the best ever excuse that no one could argue and dispute to hide failure behind.
I don't have Kickstarter fatigue I'm just fed up of giving money for goods that fail to meet the standards and content that was promised, instead taking customers for granted and basically being no better than the company they are supposedly against.
Enough ranting from me, but in fairness I've been quite for a while, apologies for the split post my reply was too long. opps
Thanks for the really long comments there crimson sun. I am still hopeful for the game but I think that they left a lot of great stuff not done because they have to rush development for a kickstarter and ship everything at once. The adventures companion was sold as the advanced rules but they are not that but more just continuing and creating adventures. It will be interesting to see all the feats, that will probably get as advanced as it will get. Once I got the news that the time art was just art and did not matter to the game(except the magma) I knew the game was not going to be what it could have been. I will be doing a serious a posts on my content and discontent once my stuff arrives in december.
ReplyDeleteMy current goal is to find something that I can play with my 9 year old that my 4 year old can touch "ie he moves the guys where I tell him and rolls the dice". I think it will work fine there. Then I will see if I can enlist some Blood Bowl League members to give it a go.