@Infested_terran has stated some of the gameplay differences that I feel took out a lot of flavours and enjoyment from first edition. I’d also add that instead of a point to point movement subjected to geographical area restrictions, second edition spots an abstracted map in which your agents only travel in two ways–clockwise or counter clockwise 😒
Assassination has been streamlined a lot too. There’s no longer the distinction of Agent/Royalty assassination ability for each agent. Every agent recruited can kill any agent/royalty so long you can pay the cost. For example, in first edition, Sherlock Holmes can only be recruited to kill royalties (as befitting to the short story). In second edition it’s possibly not the case though i.e. Sherlock could kill any agent/royalty as long the assassination cost is met. On top of this, double agent tokens were removed so there’s no “a-ha take that!” surprise move present in first edition.
These changes resulted in streamlined gameplay and ease of teaching but at the expense, IMO, losing thematic flavours and the opportunity to pulling off clever tactical combos that could only be found in first edition. Some people, from I’ve read, would prefer the shorter and directness in second edition. But I’m blessed with a gaming group that enjoy heavier games with more openess and sandboxy nature and don’t mind the learning curve.
Price wise my friend paid $100 for a near mint copy. It looked exactly like it was just out of its shrink and everything was taken good care by ex owner. Since the launch price was $80-85 5 years ago I thought this was reasonable with inflation accounted and the game totally worth the $15 premium, if your gaming group willing to invest time in it.
The change I definitely remember seeing is the removal of permanent effect cards. Now, there aren’t a lot of them, so this may seem minor, but they all had big, cool effects on the game and taking them out… no, thank you.
If anyone else was part of the original Kingdom Death Monster kickstarter and still has their promo stuff, be aware that some of those figures are worth decent money right now. The Adam/Anna sprue and the Paul/Aya/Snow/Twilight Knight sprue are especially good.
What I have been able to get out of the online rulebook so far is the framework for combat and some suggestions for handling multiple planes. There do seem to be a few very light campaigns. Compared to Wild Blue Yonder it’s very light. But they aren’t mutually exclusive. The rules are different enough where I worry that using Locked On as a light stepping stone to bring someone into Wild Blue Yonder will just confuse them. It’s probably best just to tell them that they are similarly structured but distinct games and just work up from a simple element versus element dogfight in Wild Blue Yonder. What is appealing about Locked on is the introduction of the missile system. You have to decide whether you spend your time avoiding tone or let the missile fly and spend your energy dodging that. I’m curious to see how that plays out.
Agreed. I played it last year at GenCon and marched right to their booth and bought one of the leftover Kickstarter editions. So great. We play it frequently. If you don’t have the expansions, they both work extremely well and make the game just have more options of stuff to do.
I am really thinking of buying a copy of First Martians. This looks like a boardgame version of Tharsis in some way, managing failing systems all the time. Anyone here want to talk me out of it or into it? I checked several rules book versions, it looks OK to me, without digging into the details too much …
and also, which are must have space games? I have Leaving Earth and SOL … Theseus is OK, but it is an Euro game (with this Mancala mechanic).
It’s a super dry set of systems with a glommed on narrative, pretty bare theming, and an annoying companion app presiding over everything. As much as I had a problem with Robinson Crusoe, I’d rather play that any day of the week over First Martians. And twice on Fridays.
For the space game, we are looking at High Frontier. That is space exploration and exploitation (and some other kooky stuff) in a box. Leaving Earth is great and I am glad you have that one. There is an old tabletop game about the early space program called Liftoff! It was made into a PC game, Buzz Aldrin’s Race into Space, and an open source version of the game is out there. Watch out for Space Project Manager though, it was kind of a heartbreaker. Well now that I’ve wandered off into the digital world I’ll wrap this up. Back on tabletop, I am eagerly awaiting GMTs Spacecorp it’s a broader more abstract look at space but its got a great designer behind it.
