The Best Game You Will Ever Play!

Still unsure about Flames of War Version 4? Shot you bolt in Bolt Action? Not warming up to Star Wars based games? Then I have just the game for you! In a few months we will all playing a great new game and I want to tell you about it before it hits Kickstarter. The folks who developed it provided me with an advanced copy and I have been playing non-stop ever since. The other day they asked me to send it back so another reviewer can play it and I said “no way, it’s mine”. The beauty of this game is how you can use components from other games to augment the core set. So I now have a use for those command and staff teams that will no longer be used in FoW. I may even throw in some unpainted Napoleonic figures I have lying about!

The beauty of the game is how the two players create a lot of the game in real time. The mechanics are very simple; during your turn you can move, take an action, or do nothing at all. The core box that will be offered on Kickstarter features old Dir Cast Metal tanks from Corgi. These were the bomb of toys back in the 1970’s and are now reproduced for this great game. The other playing pieces that come with this set are Yoga-Joe’s, and will offer the most seasoned Grognard a tough time when using or facing these guys. Also included in this box are the rules, which are about 500 pages long (without punctuation) however they explain every situation you can get yourself into when you play. Also included and which is key are the related books Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Persig and The Art of the Deal by Donald Trump, two life changing literary classics.

The Unboxing
The great thing about the game is that it is ready to play right from the box! Well ready to play after you read the rule book. The beauty of the rules is that you retain none of them and if you do not like a rule you can change or ignore it at any time. So after spending a month going over the readings, I was ready for my first game. The models look great and they add so much flavor to the game.

The Key Mechanic
The most important aspect of the game is how the player deals with both the rules and their opponent. It is important to have an opinion on everything, no matter your expertise or sense of importance, and communicate that opinion in the most passive aggressive way possible. This style of play came about during the first turn as my opponent started to move. They went for the tactic to ignore all movement rules and kept looking for me to object. I said “Stop your tank” a few times and they kept going, and crushed my Zen-Lotus Warrior. What I should have said is “don’t you think you have moved far enough?” which would have stopped the tank in its tracks. Same thing happened in the shooting step, but I remembered my lesson from before and said “haven’t you shot up enough stuff?”

For combat, players have the choice of using a dice of any type, a coin flip, pulling cards from a deck, or even rock paper scissors (lizard, Spock for advanced players) with the winner being the player who scores the highest or lowest (as agreed upon) winning. Want a challenge, play this game with D20’s!

Like all other games, it comes down to the tanks. Tanks can shoot any of the opponents pieces, except for a Yoga-Joe, but it can run over the Yoga-Joe by accident thus killing it.  Unused playing pieces brought in from other games cannot attack, but can be attacked at any time. The defender can suggest that a player shoots at a piece like the Mid-Late War German Artillery Staff team by stating “OK fine, how about shooting at this guy?”.
 

What I love about the game is how during the course of play create an experience which is unique and rewarding. Unlike all other games, the rules state upfront that this game was written for you and you only and it will be perfect, just like yourself.
Another great aspect of the game is that during play your opponent takes notes in a note pad and you do the same when they play. These notes have no bearing on the game, however they are slipped into your game box for you to read later. It is best to wait until 3-4 players have dropped notes in your box so you do not know who wrote it.

Special Characters
The game revolves around using your tanks and special characters. The box comes with its own unique set of special characters; the Yoga-Joe’s. Each Yoga-Joe model has a unique pose witch correlates to a special power. Players can use the special powers as stated in the rule book or make them up as they go. Normally a Yoga-Joe can use their power only once, however they can try to use it again and if your opponent does not say “didn’t you use that model already?” then you are free to use it again.
Other special characters can be brought in as long as they are anthropomorphic and retain the qualities they historically had.
So on turn two I played the Giant Gunny which stopped a tank!

Later on I used the Churchill creamer to persuade a Yoga-Joe to surrender. Being from India and staunchly anti-empire it didn’t work at first; until I found out the Yoga-Joe was lactose intolerant.

The game was tight until we had a huge standoff between two major religions, and following the “agree to disagree” rule the game ended. I learned my lesson and for my next game I used the "Peace is our Profession" rule and called in an Arc-Light strike!

I loved this game and so will you. If you win it’s because you are the best and if you lose it’s because of the fact the opponent cheated or that the game was flawed. I also noticed that when I didn’t play the game for a long time, I became a bigger expert at it.

I recommend this game to everyone and I know it will be a huge hit!


Twitter @MitchWWPD
WWPDMitch@gmail.com

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Review: Frostgrave

Frostgrave, published by Osprey, is a small scale fantasy skirmish game built around a campaign setting. The game reminds me a lot of the old GW Mordheim, although it appears to be a lot more streamlined and simpler. You build a warband of around 6-10 models, which is lead by a wizard and his apprentice. As you play games, you'll collect treasure, gain experience, and over time, your wizard and his warband will become stronger and stronger. While it can be played as a standalone one-off pickup game, it will truly shine in a campaign setting.

The book clocks in at 130ish pages of full color, hardback goodness. In the table of contents below, you can see the exact breakdown, but you're looking at about 20 pages of game play rules, 20 pages of campaign rules, and a whooping 30 pages of detailed spells to choose from.

As mentioned earlier, the game is all about your wizard, and to a lesser extent, his apprentice. The wizard represents the player on the tabletop. There are ten different classes of wizards, each aligned to a unique type of magic:  Chronomancer, Elementalist, Enchanter, Illusionist, Necromancer, Sigilist, Soothsayer, Summoner, Thaumatuge, and the Witch. Each magic type has three aligned schools of magic, one opposed school, and five neutral schools. Any wizard can (with time) learn any spell, but  the further away from their class's basic school they get, the harder it is to use that magic.

Gameplay goes as follows:

• Initiative: Warbands roll for initiative to see who goes first this turn.
• Wizard phase: The wizard, and up to three mercenaries within 3", activate. An activation consists of moving, and then taking some kind of action, such as casting a spell or attacking in combat, or you can take the action and move afterwards.
• Apprentice phase: The apprentice, and up to three mercenaries within 3", activate here.
• Soldier phase: All remaining mercenaries activate.
• Creature phase: Any creatures on the board not belonging to either warband activate using specified rules for AI.

All combat outcomes in the game are decided with a simple roll of a d20. For attacks, each player rolls a D20, adds any appropiate modifiers, and the highest result wins. You then take the winner's die result, subtract the loser's armor value, and the remainder is the damage the victim takes. Pretty simple, right?

There are only six basic stats to remember for each character, and every wizard starts with the same stat line.

• Move is how far the model moves in inches
• Fight is a modifier added to their combat die rolls
• Shooting is a modifier to ranged attack rolls
• Armor reduces the damage you take
• Willpower provides a defensive modifier against spells and trickery
• Health is how much damage a character can take before falling unconscious

In addition to the wizard and apprentice, you can also hire mercenaries to join your warband. These will be non-magic users and in comparison, fairly cheap and dispensable. In addition, they will not gain experience or improve as the campaign goes on, and will probably die often and need to be replaced. Examples of these hired hands include thieves, archers, knights, and apothecaries.

When your wizard or apprentice wants to cast a spell, simply consult the spell description for the casing value, and roll a D20. You need to meet or exceed the casting value for the spell to go off. For example, in the Elemental Ball spell below, you would need a 12 on a D20 for the spell to cast - a slightly more difficult than average spell, but it yields a ball of area affect +5 shooting strength havoc. Now that's what I call a fireball! This roll is modified by the alignment of the spell to your wizard's class - For example, an Elementalist only needs the 12, but if you are a neutrally aligned Necromancer as seen in the graphic above, it'd take a +4 penalty for a total of 16+ required!

Each wizard starts with eight spells - three from their own school, one from each of the three aligned schools, and two spells chosen from any of the neutral schools. Additional spells will have to be learned later through the campaign system.

In addition to the warbands fighting each other on the tabletop, there are rules for a wide variety of neutral monsters that will attack both players with their own scripted AI. You can place them before the game starts, or some of the scenarios in the book will specific which types, where, and when they appear. I can't wait to lead my opponent into a trap of freshly raised zombies!

The campaign system is pretty expansive, but still fairly simple. It's very reminiscent of role-playing campaigns with lots of charts to see what treasure and such you find. Your wizard (and by extension, apprentice) gain experience by casting spells, vanquishing foes, and collecting treasure. You can trade the experience in for increasing base stats, making spells easier to cast, or learning new spells. After each game, you roll on various charts to see what happens to any troops knocked unconscious. Hired mercenaries will often outright die, where as the wizard and apprentice have a better chance of surviving, albeit possibly with some long-lasting injury effects. In the event your wizard outright dies, you can choose to either start fresh with a new one, or have the apprentice step in and assume the wizards role, and hire a new apprentice. There are also rules for building up your base of operations, which gives some small benefits throughout the campaign.

I've gotten a chance to play four games thus far to try out the campaign system. I took Grey Seer Skitterscratch and his yet-to-be-named apprentice out vs Mike's Dark Elf warband.

I built the following warband:

• Grey Seer Skitterscratch, the Summoner
• Started with spells Summon Demon, Control Animal, Brew Potion, Leap, Summon Imp, Steal Health, Destructive Sphere, Crumble
• Apprentice
• Giant Rat (Warhound)
• Clanrat (Infantryman)
• Stormvermin (Man at Arms)
• Jezzail Team (Crossbowman)
• Jezzail Team (Crossbowman)
• Jezzail Team (Crossbowman)

Clanrat (Infantryman) and a Giant Rat (Warhound) team up against his Squig (Warhound)

Stormvermin charges up the ladder to hit a Night Goblin Slave (Thug) and a Knight

My apprentice stealing some treasure, attempting to prove his worth to earn a name

The opposing caster coming up to rescue the knight

After our series of four games, I was able to bring Skitterscratch up to a level six. He can now summon demons on a 9+ (from a 12+) and skitterleap around the board on a 6+. I did manage to get the unnamed apprentice completely killed off, but Skaven lives are cheap, and it was a mere 210g to purchase a new one. Skitterscratch also managed to learn Mind Control, although its at a whooping 16+ to cast currently, purchased some magic gloves that help him cast better, and found a magic "crossbow" for one of the Jezzail Teams.

Frostgrave releases mid-July. A "Kickstarter-styled" preorder program going on over at Northstar just ended today, and expect to see it at Historicon as well for anyone who wants to get it earlier.

Want to join the conversation? Want to give Skitterscratch's Apprentice a name? Please sound off in the comments below, or let us know on our forum!

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