Thanks for sharing your excitement and your concerns, Mike. I wanted to comment about your concerns regarding the difficulty of the game. I think you make a wonderful point that very casual gamers might find this game extremely difficult to beat on their first couple of play-throughs and that they might have to re-do the level 1 scenario numerous times in order to finally beat a boss. I'm concerned that people will see this as a negative, because from what I've seen this is what will give the campaign its legs. I want to loot the dungeon and flee and I want to have to build up my powers before I can envision fighting a level 2 boss. The game has so much variability for just this purpose - there are numerous level 1 set-up cards so that when you lose and re-set you don't REALLY re-do the same scenario in any way. It keeps being unique. As you go through your second play through, you might not come across a single tile or minion that you uncovered in the first round. To me... that's what makes it exciting, and there really is no penalty for losing. You still gain loot. You never lose anything. You can try again as soon as you want. If you could just play well and beat the whole campaign in 4 straight sessions, we'd be done playing it way sooner than I'd like. But... with all that said, I do think your suggestions of some lighter-fare, single-session DTA to show the game off would be a fun variant. This really could be accomplished quite easily off the top of my head by increasing the starting health and letting players add a number of loot cards to their deck as part of the 1-off session set-up. I'm sure there are other ways you could do it as well.
joelface Thanks for the detailed thoughts. They illustrate how varied the expectations for the game experience can be. If the designers give a few ways to play, the game should hopefully satisfy just about anyone. And if not, as you mentioned, these are not difficult house rules to design and implement :)
interesting list of concerns. Even though I haven't played it yet, I can see what you meant by watching the run-through. I hope the designers can add specific items for each character for the loot system. That would make the play-through more interesting and exciting as you want to find loot for your character much like Diablo that this game is inspired by. Mentioned this in the KS comments and Nate responded to keep your eye on the campaign with ;) emoji. Perhaps something that coincides with Rosella's gifts? I hope so.
Fighterfan69 What I would love, riffing on your idea, is for the legacy packs that are unlocked to have card replacements for characters. Would make it feel awesome, and make you strong for the next level campaign.
Great review. I am interested in this game, but I am even more interested when we will know if your suggestions/concerns were addressed or we are stuck with them?
Sadly, I don't think we will know until KS pledges go out. My plan is to do a review/update when I get the official production copy, so if you don't mind waiting I'll let you know for sure.
I have! In fact, we already did a podcast on it this past Sunday - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/189-dice-throne-adventures-and-design-dicsussion/id1239195238?i=1000507162615 Short answer is yes, they basically fixed all of my main problems. It doesn't mean the game is flawless, but it doesn't have those glaring errors anymore. My video review is coming, by the way, but I was waiting for Colin to do a full playthrough to coincide with its publication.
Great video! I appreciate hearing what’s looking good and what might need some work. Any thoughts on the loot mechanics? I’m interested in how loot is earned and if it’s actually interesting/useful. Is there any excitement or anticipation when revealing or earning rewards?
rpcnuwm I mentioned this in the video, enjoying the upgrade system. I especially like equipment, since it stays in play and gives you a bonus every turn. Definitely exciting. As for the loot rolls, I find them fun. Sure, it’s a d20 roll, but that’s part of the wacky fun of it, at least for me.
One Stop Co-op Shop gotcha! I didn’t make the connection between “upgrade system” being the loot...my bad there. Glad to hear it’s fun, and for me at least the d20 roll on the loot table sounds good. Thanks for the reply!
Would you say it's worth getting Season 1 and Adventures for a couple that only plays coop? It's kinda hard to justify the price tag when we will not play the main game mode.
Peter Grün A good question. I would not go all-in on characters if you only plan to play co-op. But you can get a few characters fairly cheaply and play a lot that way. Two-packs from season 2 are on Coolstuffinc for $18, for example.
Are the boss characters usable as player characters in the PvP game? It seems like the board/cards/etc are designed similarly to the regular characters.
PurpleMoose23 They have hinted at the possibility. As is, you could play the bosses against each other, but not against a regular character 1v1. Bosses are much too strong.
I made the same question on BGG forum, and this is the answer I got: "Nate and Manny have both said that the bosses have not been balanced to play 1v1 against standard characters as they were developed specifically as an end of campaign challenge, but could be used in a '1 v Many' format or possibly boss vs boss outside the Adventure setup."
Thanks for sharing your excitement and your concerns, Mike. I wanted to comment about your concerns regarding the difficulty of the game. I think you make a wonderful point that very casual gamers might find this game extremely difficult to beat on their first couple of play-throughs and that they might have to re-do the level 1 scenario numerous times in order to finally beat a boss.
I'm concerned that people will see this as a negative, because from what I've seen this is what will give the campaign its legs. I want to loot the dungeon and flee and I want to have to build up my powers before I can envision fighting a level 2 boss. The game has so much variability for just this purpose - there are numerous level 1 set-up cards so that when you lose and re-set you don't REALLY re-do the same scenario in any way. It keeps being unique. As you go through your second play through, you might not come across a single tile or minion that you uncovered in the first round.
To me... that's what makes it exciting, and there really is no penalty for losing. You still gain loot. You never lose anything. You can try again as soon as you want. If you could just play well and beat the whole campaign in 4 straight sessions, we'd be done playing it way sooner than I'd like.
But... with all that said, I do think your suggestions of some lighter-fare, single-session DTA to show the game off would be a fun variant. This really could be accomplished quite easily off the top of my head by increasing the starting health and letting players add a number of loot cards to their deck as part of the 1-off session set-up. I'm sure there are other ways you could do it as well.
joelface Thanks for the detailed thoughts. They illustrate how varied the expectations for the game experience can be. If the designers give a few ways to play, the game should hopefully satisfy just about anyone.
And if not, as you mentioned, these are not difficult house rules to design and implement :)
interesting list of concerns. Even though I haven't played it yet, I can see what you meant by watching the run-through. I hope the designers can add specific items for each character for the loot system. That would make the play-through more interesting and exciting as you want to find loot for your character much like Diablo that this game is inspired by. Mentioned this in the KS comments and Nate responded to keep your eye on the campaign with ;) emoji. Perhaps something that coincides with Rosella's gifts? I hope so.
Fighterfan69 What I would love, riffing on your idea, is for the legacy packs that are unlocked to have card replacements for characters. Would make it feel awesome, and make you strong for the next level campaign.
Great review. I am interested in this game, but I am even more interested when we will know if your suggestions/concerns were addressed or we are stuck with them?
Sadly, I don't think we will know until KS pledges go out. My plan is to do a review/update when I get the official production copy, so if you don't mind waiting I'll let you know for sure.
Have you played the final version? Do you know if they scaled the difficulty level at all compared to this demo?
I have! In fact, we already did a podcast on it this past Sunday - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/189-dice-throne-adventures-and-design-dicsussion/id1239195238?i=1000507162615
Short answer is yes, they basically fixed all of my main problems. It doesn't mean the game is flawless, but it doesn't have those glaring errors anymore.
My video review is coming, by the way, but I was waiting for Colin to do a full playthrough to coincide with its publication.
Great video! I appreciate hearing what’s looking good and what might need some work.
Any thoughts on the loot mechanics? I’m interested in how loot is earned and if it’s actually interesting/useful. Is there any excitement or anticipation when revealing or earning rewards?
rpcnuwm I mentioned this in the video, enjoying the upgrade system. I especially like equipment, since it stays in play and gives you a bonus every turn. Definitely exciting.
As for the loot rolls, I find them fun. Sure, it’s a d20 roll, but that’s part of the wacky fun of it, at least for me.
One Stop Co-op Shop gotcha! I didn’t make the connection between “upgrade system” being the loot...my bad there. Glad to hear it’s fun, and for me at least the d20 roll on the loot table sounds good. Thanks for the reply!
Would you say it's worth getting Season 1 and Adventures for a couple that only plays coop? It's kinda hard to justify the price tag when we will not play the main game mode.
Peter Grün A good question. I would not go all-in on characters if you only plan to play co-op. But you can get a few characters fairly cheaply and play a lot that way. Two-packs from season 2 are on Coolstuffinc for $18, for example.
Are the boss characters usable as player characters in the PvP game? It seems like the board/cards/etc are designed similarly to the regular characters.
PurpleMoose23 They have hinted at the possibility. As is, you could play the bosses against each other, but not against a regular character 1v1. Bosses are much too strong.
I made the same question on BGG forum, and this is the answer I got:
"Nate and Manny have both said that the bosses have not been balanced to play 1v1 against standard characters as they were developed specifically as an end of campaign challenge, but could be used in a '1 v Many' format or possibly boss vs boss outside the Adventure setup."
@@OneStopCoopShop well, we still need to see Rosella's next gift... i mean it could be anything... cough cough cough imayormaynothavesolvedit cough
@@TheRoseCat6_11 I just saw it, and yes... yes... excited!
@@OneStopCoopShop me too!
Great video brother !
I appreciate that, Chester! I had a lot of fun playing this one (clearly) :)
How can I get my own copy od Dice Throne Adventures ? Is it only via Kickstarter? :x it's pretty expensive :
wicek3d Kickstarter for now, but Roxley is good about retail availability afterwards.
If only Road to Legend was as fun😑
Leeroy Porkins I enjoy it okay :)
@@OneStopCoopShop Have you tried Altar Quest or Trudvang Legends?
Altar quest we did two videos for. I love it!
Haven’t played trudvang. No demo for us :)
@@OneStopCoopShop I found them right after asking 🤣 Altar Quest looks really good.
Oh yeah, one of my most anticipated for sure. But I already enjoyed Street Masters.