Playing solo is definitely more difficult. The game seems to be best balanced for 2 players and certain quests are (see: the third quest in the core) flat out impossible for a solo player to beat. That said, I’ve beat the first two quests in the core box solo, so it’s possible to do.
Also, of course, there’s a certain element of luck involved. Just because it’s soloable doesn’t mean the game won’t beat you with better draws sometimes.
Will building my own deck solve these problems?
Yes, probably. I beat it with both a Tactics/Spirit deck and a Lore/Spirit deck.
However, it seems like the game should be balanced and simple with only the core decks and rules, and that hasn’t been my experience so far.
The developers seem to have an expectation that new players will buy two core sets to start off with, since you don’t have enough of many of the best cards in just one box. It’s really unfortunate because it’s a pretty cool game with this one near-fatal flaw, and it’s hard to understand why they haven’t fixed it.
sclpls
6402
The gods of Christmas presents handed me a fate of H.P. Lovecraft themed board games. I played Eldritch Horror which is Fantasy Flight’s new attempt at Arkham Horror on a global scale. You are doing much of the same thing as AH, but every change they made is a good one, and makes for a more interesting game with slightly less fiddliness (still fiddly though). The introduction of mystery cards that you solve adds a lot of variability to what you’re doing each game which is nice because even if it still isn’t a difficult game strategically, it at least seems like it will stay interesting for awhile.
I also received A Study in Emerald by Martin Wallace. Of the two games I’m much more excited about this one, but I haven’t gotten it to the table yet because the rule book is, quite frankly, garbage. It is definitely one of those games where you read the rules, read them again, read them one more time, scour the rules forum section of boardgamegeek to get more clarifications, read the rule book again, and still feel uncertain about how important parts of the game work. The game design looks fantastic though, and the secret identity of the two teams seems like great fun.
If there was anyone waiting to buy any of the games from Victory Point Games you can use the promo code NEWS_2014 to get 15 percent off of your order. I naturally ordered dawn of the zeds a week ago so while I didn’t save any money all of you can! While waiting to Zeds have played three games of Legions of Darkness and have lost all three so far. Tempted to pick up Empires in America, the under appreciated impact of the French and Indian War calls my history nerd side.
Mark_L
6404
I fully endorse Dawn of the Zeds and Legions of Darkness! A cautionary note about Empires in America, though- the endgame is a bit bullshit. I mean, I know the British won in real life, but it gets kinda ridiculous.
Did you get the expansion for Legions? It’s terrific, totally worth it.
I received Sentinels of the Multiverse from Santa, watched a couple of videos to learn the basics, and then had one terrible attempt at a solo play. Terrible because:
a) I was constantly confused/uncertain about how and when to apply certain card effects.
b) Other than choosing which of four cards in a hero’s hand to play, I felt like there was little to do other than to manage the turns
c) The cumulative effect of multiple concurrent card effects as the game wore on made my brain hurt
I’d imagine (b) will go away as I learn the card and hero strategies. But do (a) and © get easier?
This is why I won’t play Sentinels unless there’s a Complete Nerd in the group. Unfortunately, a C.N. also tends to tell everyone what to do.
I am playing my first game of A Few Acres Of Snow via yucata.de and I’m loving it. Anyone fancy a go with me? I mean asynchronously, not all at once.
Ananab_Tilps is my login.
Edit: I posted this 15 minutes ago and still no takers. THIS IS NOT FAST ENOUGH.
Tyler, did you get the enhanced edition? The tokens help a lot ( or the ipad sidekick app.). Play a card, activate a power, draw a card. I think a and c will become second nature as you learn the various hero decks. Legacy is downright boring to play, but he provides a lot of tank and team support. Each deck has its own style. You may just have to play with the same heroes for a bit to get used to them.
I did get the enhanced edition and was using the Sidekick app to track things, but on my phone, so everything was small. I might try again with the tokens and the app. I was playing (in this order) Wraith, Ra, Tempest and Legacy against Baron Blade in Megalopolis. I guess in retrospect it makes no sense to have Legacy go last, if I understand his galvanize power correctly (“until the start of your next turn” I take to mean the heroes I control, not just Legacy?).
I will try again, and maybe make a list of the fiddly questions to post here for your help. Thanks.
Trying to run four heroes at once by yourself is a recipe for madness. Even three is a lot to keep track of, in my experience, since you also have to keep track of the environment and villain decks, but the game isn’t designed to run with fewer than three heroes. It’s much easier to play when you have other folks running heroes and helping with the non-player decks.
Legacy’s power lasts from when it’s activated until the start of Legacy’s next turn. But you’d typically want him to take the first turn so that that applies to the other heroes on that round, rather than the subsequent round.
But then how do you play solo? On BGG I’ve read that fewer than four heroes is certain defeat. But yet the game I thought can be played fairly well solo. Perhaps I’m wrong.
Whoever said that was making shit up. Three heroes is perfectly playable and I’ve won most of the three hero games I’ve played. It’s also what I would recommend if you’re going to play solo because the heroes are all individually fairly complex mechanisms (some more than others, granted), and even that many is a lot to handle by yourself. It’s certainly possible - I’ve played and enjoyed a few solo games that way - but I much prefer playing with at least one other person. (Two heroes per person with a split load on the nonplayer decks is a massive decrease in overhead per person.)
Thanks. No one else to play it with here unfortunately. I will try it with three heroes. Who do you recommend?
Mellowman, The Arbitrary Constant, and Shitstorm.
geewhiz
6414
There are some useful gameaids on BGG that you can download to make it easier to track items. There is also an iOS app for it as well (though I am not convinced it is better than some of the physical items players have created on BGG).
Why not try playing it in the forum when they get another game going? That seemed to work well.
I agree with Dave that it is easier to learn from someone who knows the game because they tend to be very organized and one can learn how to both play and track eventhing (I was lucky to play with someone who actually made one of the gameaids and he did not try to tell new players what to do unless asked for suggestions).
I am glad to hear three heroes do work, I have lost both if my solo games with three hero players but that I am sure it can be chalked up to just learning the heroes and I don’t think the decks were all that well shuffled esp. My first game. Mark, I don’t have the expansion yet for Legions, if it were easily obtainable at my local board game store I would pick it up in a heartbeat but I will likely wait until I decide on empires in America or some other VPG game and just throw it in the cart then.
As mentioned above I have the app but its hard to use on the iPhone. What gameaids do you recommend? Which one did your friend create?
Bump because fun.
Edit: Who killed the child in you people.
geewhiz
6418
Here is a hitpoints track that made it a lot easier (instead of having to constantly ask everyone their score to determine who is highest or lowest). This worked well to just look at it and do everyone’s hit points at the same time. we just had it in the center of the table.
He had another he used when he was teaching people at a convention but I do not see it listed there but it basically had all the effects on one sheet that also sat in he center of the table.
I wrote him a note to see if he can tell me where the others are located.
BTW, do you like the app? I have it on the iPad but I feel like it is almost harder to update things than the phyiscal gameaids. The people who produced the iOS aid are supposed to be working on an actual iOS port of the game. That would be cool.
Is it playable on an ipad through that site?
I don’t see why not, RR. It’s just a website, nothing to install.
