Product-Codex of Heroes

Producer-Paradigm Concepts

Cost– ~$30

Pages- 192

TL;DR-Simply a must have if you play Arcanis 93%

 

Summary– This is the first hard cover splat book for the Arcanis Role Playing game.  The book starts off with a long narrative detailing how the first arc of Living Arcanis ended.  From this, the book details some of the many different secret societies active in Arcanis.  After these secret societies, the book moves into its true splat book nature by adding several options for each character spanning new races, traits, spells, etc all the way to using old skills in new ways.  The book ends with a chapter detailed how each faith in general worships its gods.

 

Story or “Fluff”– This book is exactly what Arcanis needs.  Arcanis has spanned the 3.x era of DnD and moved to its own RPG, winning an award at Origins for its debut.  However, lots of its old history is in unpublished, inaccessible modules, and newcomers might be lost.  This book greatly adds to the story and helps newer plays quickly become accumulated with the world.  In addition, Arcanis has always had a strong story component, and this book really helps those who haven’t played through five years of living games get a leg up on understanding what is going.  5/5

 

Mechanics or Crunch– Again, this is exactly what Arcanis needs.  Arcanis has not had many extra rule books published for the game, and this is a glorious addition to the system.  It provides an impressive amount of crunch in fewer than 200 pages.  And the book ads rules all the way through the game system.  The book comes with an improved character creations sheets that help you walk through the hardest part of the Arcanis RPG all the way through to high level character options.  Hands down awesome! 5/5

 

Art/Layout-The book is easy to read and well laid out.  The art is all Arcanis in style helping me draw pictures in my mind with ease.  However, a major problem with the art is that some of it is recycled art.  Not all, but enough.  I’m in the world because of the art; but when I can play spot the reprint, it takes away from the book. 3.5/5

 

Final Thoughts-If you play Arcanis, you need this.  There is no question.  It’s pretty cheap at $30 for ~200 pages, and well worth its price.  I love the Arcanis System, and this book is a welcomed addition to the game.  90%

Product-Pathfinder Adventure Card Game- The Skinsaw Murders

Producer– Paizo

Cost– ~$19

Set-up/play/clean-up– 1 hour per scenario

TL;DR-Good second offering, but I feel a little less engaged 68%

 

Summary– It’s the second installment of the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game and this time it’s a plague of undead!  Players must defend Sandpoint from the horrors of the second part of the Rise of the Runelords adventure path-The Skinsaw Murders.  First the undead attack in mass in Undead Uprising.  Next, the heroes make their way to the outskirts of town to defend the farmers in Crow Bait.  With the undead somewhat quieted, the heroes go to the source and attack the Skinsaw Man himself in Foul Misgivings in a haunted house.  With the main source put down, you then move to putting down the cult supporting him in The Cult Exposed.  The climax of the quest is Angel in the Tower!

 

Theme– This adventure has a strong undead theme, and it’s fairly well done.  I did feel that the undead were nipping at my heels.  However due to the nature of the random monster draw, not all the monsters were undead.  It takes away a bit form the theme of an undead horde when I have to put down a goblin raid.  Also, I only get minimal story from the cards; there is not much written on the cards, so I don’t get the feeling of a coherent story between the adventures.  What would make this much better would be a deeper delve into the story.  Having not played the adventure path, I kind of feel lost in the fiction behind the card game. 3.5/5

 

Mechanics– The mechanics are fairly well done, but somewhat repetitive.  The basic mechanics of the intro game are how most of the scenarios play out. Explore, find henchmen, kill guy, close place, continue till all closed and fight villain.  It’s not bad, but it does get somewhat monotonous.  The real shining star of the game is the scenario Foul Misgivings.  This one has a crazy haunt mechanic that makes fights happen and made me really enjoy this game.  However, since the game doesn’t have any included instructions, the cool new mechanic that is introduced becomes somewhat hard to implement.  This led to my wife and I scrambling to several internet forums to find how to resolve an important issue midgame.  Again, I really want a single sheet explaining the scenario a little bit.  All and all, nothing is bad. It’s just not great. 3.5/5

 

Instructions– This pack came with no instructions whatsoever except for what’s on the cards.  I don’t really like how the base instructions explain the game, so now that we are adding several decks to the game, I’m not sure I’m playing the game right.  I don’t like mid-game having to scramble to boardgamegeek or paizo.com to figure out if I’m doing things right. 2/5

 

Art/Construction– The Art is good and well done.  Some of it comes directly from Paizo’s other properties.  Since this is undead crazy, the art is the right amount of unsettling.  It even unnerved my wife sitting at our kitchen table.  The cards are of decent stock, but after a few plays you will expect some corners to tear. 4.5/5

 

Summary-Not a bad second effort.  I like the core mechanic of exploration, but I feel it gets old fast.  I really enjoyed Foul Misgivings; this scenario gives hints of just how far this card game can be stretched in both rules and theme.  I’d prefer a few tweaks to really help me feel like I’m playing the Rise of the Runelords adventure path, but I’m basically getting the experience of the table top RPG.  I think a few changed would really make this game top notch.  If you have the base game, this is a pretty good follow up. 68%

Product– Pathfinder Player Companion- Blood of the Moon

Producer– Paizo

Cost– ~$13

Page Count-32

 

Summary– This book focuses on the “in-between” creatures called skinwalkers.  These creatures are not quite were-creatures, but are not wholly human either.  This book presents eight separate skinwalker races giving an rundown on where each might come from in the world, the background on their psychology and physiology, as well as a suite of powers and abilities for each one.  In addition the book give ways to become a lycanthrope as well as some gear/items that each were-creature might need or you might need to combat them.

 

Art/Layout– This is the Pathfinder art we know and love.  It’s well laid out and every skinwalker has a picture to show what they look like when they change.  I thought the art was well done in this one. 5 /5

Story or “Fluff”–  This one is fluff-tastic!  Every skinwalker gets a full, well done rundown and their own section.  You can make an extremely well rounded skinwalker from this book, and that is the sign of an excellent source book.  Also the addition of how true were-creatures interact with the various skinwalker does give some surprising depth to the book.  2.25/2.5

 

Mechanics or “Crunch”– Each skinwalker gets a great section on its own mechanics and its own traits.  Also there is a large section of skinwalker feats that any skinwalker would want.  In addition, each skinwalker gets an associated class that gets its own powers.    Mind you not every class can have powers/abilities in a 32 page book, but what’s there is done well.  Even better, most of the class powers/abilities/features are not limited to skinwalkers!  2.25/2.5

 

Execution– This book was well executed.  As a reader, I learned about a whole new sector of society and its background.  It felt natural.  Also, the background filled me in quite well.  Each section is self contained, and nothing in the book feels like it was tacked on.  Even the sections of complete fluff feel like they were needed.  5 /5

 
Final Thoughts –This is an excellent book.  I enjoyed reading this from cover to cover.  I want to play one of these confused, misunderstood monsters!  And honestly, even if you don’t want to play a were-thing, the extra class options really make this a well done book on its own. 97%

Game-Trains

Publisher-AEG

Cost-~$60

Set-up/Play/Clean-up-~1.5 hours

TL;DR– Great mechanics that compensate for a slight lack of theme 83%

 

Basics-Think Thunderstone meets Ticket to Ride.  AEG brings all it learned from Thunderstone and combines it with area control.  Each turn players play cards that give them resources or abilities that they can use to buy more cards, place markers on a board, or do both.  Each card features icons indicating what you can do on your turn.  Players try to connect stations on the board and reach point spaces on the outskirts of the board.  When you get to a station you can use other cards to build stations on these spaces to score points.  Other players can enter any space you are in and vice versa.  This game features no player combat or destroying other player resources.  The lack of player combat and shared terrain makes interesting choices occur during the game.  Game ends when all station markers are on the board or a player runs out of trains.

 

Theme-This isn’t very theme heavy.  A theme is there, but it’s not necessary to enjoy the game you are playing.  You are playing cards with train pictures.  It’s not bad, but it’s not great.  I was felt like I wanted more. 3/5

 

Mechanics-Here the game absolutely shines.  AEG has absolutely learned from games like Dominion and Thunderstone.  The mechanics are crisp and the game moves fast.  There are lots of cards that interact in interesting ways making novel strategies emerge based on what random cards you pull at start up.  I had a blast, and I can’t wait for the expansion.  The combination of terrain control is pretty seamless, and it really adds a new level of depth the deck building genre was missing.  5/5

 

Instructions– The instructions are relatively well written, but do need a bit more.  I kind of wished for more to help me understand what I was doing in a few corner cases.  Once you know, the icons on the cards do a lot of heavy lifting while keeping the game moving fast.  However, some strange situations emerge that an extra page or two of the book would really help. 4.5/5

 

Construction/Art– Again good, but not great.  I would have wished for little train cars or something else besides cubes and columns for the board.  The use of standard game components like colored cubes kind of hurt the game because it doesn’t enhance the theme.  However, all the components and box are solid and well put together.  You can tell the AEG learned from Thunderstone and the box comes ready for the next expansions.  I will be buying those. 4/5

 

Summary-This is a good game that misses great by inches.  I loved what I played and want more, but I also want some more to make the theme come through.  The mechanics are fantastic, and the game plays pretty fast.   What keeps this from getting my game of the year is the lack of theme.  If I had plastic trains and train stations, I would have felt that much more “in” the game.  But the proof is in the pudding.  I can’t wait to buy the next expansion to this game or to play this game again! 83%

I think it’s time for a three-fer on game reviews.  This week I go through Lords of Waterdeep and its expansion which is really two different expansions

First the base game.

Ring Side Report-Lords of Waterdeep

Price-$50

Set-up/Play/Clean-up-2 Hours

Publisher-Wizards of the Coast

TL;DR-An OK intro eurogame with a bit of Forgotten Realms feel. 70%

Basics-Lords of Waterdeep is a eurostyle worker placement game set in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for Dungeons and Dragons.  Players take the roles of different lords and vie for control of the city.  Players win by having the most number of victory points at the end of the game.  Players typically win victory points by completing quests that require a number of fighters, wizards, clerics, or rogues to complete.  Each turn, players place a character on spaces that build more action spaces (buildings), give different cubes(fighters etc), give more quests, let you play intrigue/attack cards, grants the first player token, or give money.  Players may on their turn cash in cubes indicated on a quest to get the victory points for that quest.  Play continues like this until all units are played and then anyone who played intrigue cards gets to replay their tokens for more actions.  Once all the turns are done, players reveal their lords and get victory points based on who they were and what quests they completed.

Theme-The game isn’t bad, but I didn’t feel very lordly.  I liked the amount of back story that went into this game.  The back of the book give in-depth histories on all the lords that are in Waterdeep and the buildings.  But, I never felt like I was sending minions off to do my work.  I never really felt like I was vying for power.  I felt like I was a guy playing a game in my house moving cubes around.  It’s not “bad”, but it’s not great. 3/5

Mechanics-Again, nothing is “bad,” but it’s not amazing.  The mechanics felt like an easier to play version of way to many other eurogames out there.  I enjoyed myself, but there really isn’t anything new.  In fact, this game might be somewhat limited when compared to the other games out there.  In other games, you get to try to make more tokens to make more actions.  In this game, you automatically get one on turn five.  It feels a bit simplistic.  Also, some of the mechanics kind of conflict with the theme.  In Lords of Waterdeep, when you spend your fighters, wizards, clerics, and rogues, they go away forever when you complete a quest, and you then must get new ones to complete new quests.  Why?  Do all my characters go on suicide missions when I send them out?  In DnD, why would I never work with a quest giver again, but not kill they guy if he screwed me over?  It’s small things that kind of separate me from the theme.  3.5/5

Art/Construction– Here I have some real issues.  The art is good.  Good, old Forgotten Realms art.  There are nice touches like having the in-game money be Waterdeep coinage.  But the box is pretty flimsy.  My copy is beat to hell.  And, I don’t think I’ve done anything to specifically damage it, but it does get hurt pretty fast.  Also, I hate the plastic inlay that holds the game pieces and how it works with the box.  I have more than once had to pick up every piece of this game from my car.  When I spend as much time cleaning up the game from my car as I do playing it, something has gone horribly wrong. 2.5/5

Instructions– Honestly, these instructions are awesome.  Wizards of the Coast knows how to write manuals, and I felt like this one taught me how to play quickly with no real trouble. 5/5

Final Thoughts– This isn’t a bad game.  I’ve had my fun, but for two hours of my time, I typically vote for other games.  It’s easy to play, but any veteran eurostyle gamer out there; they will be a bit board.  If you want an ok intro game, this is it. If you want something with a lot of meat on its bones, you will end up looking elsewhere.  70%

Now there are two expansions that come in one box.  Let’s do them together

Game– Lords of Waterdeep-Scoundrels of Skullport

Producer– Wizards of the Coast

Price-$40

Set-up/play/take-down-2 1/2 hours (with base game)

TL;DR– This makes an ok game into a good game. 80%

Basics– The first expansion to Lords of Waterdeep is a two part expansion.  One part is Undermountain, the largest dungeon in the Forgotten Realms. The second is Skullport, a town within Undermountain and under Waterdeep.  Both expansions come with new buildings, lords, intrigue cards, quests, and a separate board with new actions.  The Skullport expansion also comes with a corruption board.  Corruption is a new mechanic that only is part of the Skullport expansion.  On the Skullport board, buildings, and intrigue cards, players have the options of getting much higher rewards, but at the coast of losing points at the end of the game.  The more corruption that is used, the more each corruption point costs later.

Mechanics-Now we’ve gotten somewhere.  The Undermountain board and game is ok.  Again, nothing really stands out.  It’s got three new actions spots and some new cards.  Ok for an expansion, but not enough for the price of the set.  However, the Skullport side of the box really makes this stand out!  The corruption mechanic is pure awesome.  Now you have to make some intelligent choices on what you think you can get away with.  In addition, both expansions now allow you to really build engines to make your game truly move.  Instead of only choosing the highest point quests for your faction, you might choice lower point ones that give you constant rewards.  The game isn’t perfect.  The religions quests tend to get rid of corruption, so it’s easier to win that route if that’s one of your lords extra victory point conditions is religion.  Also, some of the newer lords are not as useful as the standard set.  The beholder stands out as its power is corruption points are worth +4 victory points in addition to their normal value.  So you don’t really get extra points like all the other players, but you can still get hurt by corruption. 4.5/5

Theme– This game is better than the normal, but it’s not a completely new game.  It does have the same theme breaking problems of the original (disappearing minions etc) that I mentioned before.  Skullport really helps with adding corruption by making me dread getting those little blue skulls, ramping up the tension along the way.  4/5

Instruction– Just like before, Wizards knows how to teach people to pay a game.  Well done 5/5

Art-Didn’t really fix much here.  It’s still a problem and now it almost gets a bit worse.  You put cubes/corruption on spaces.  The cubes get moved, stuff gets shuffled, and it gets to be a problem.  Also, I hate the inlay design! 2.5/5

Final Thoughts-I honestly won’t play this game without the expansion.  The expansion really makes this game a real euro game.  You get engine building and choice; both of which were sorely lacking before.  Lords of Waterdeep wasn’t bad, but now it’s good.  Mind you, good not great.  I’ve played better but nothing at the intro eurogame level. 80%

Last week Saturday was CritCon.  Let’s give this thing the rundown!

CritCon is a new con started by the Critical Glitch podcast(http://criticalglitch.com/ ).  Critical Glitch is a Shadowrun Podcast, and honestly, it’s a pretty good one.  The podcast loves Shadowrun.  But, the guys on the podcast do say when things are not up to snuff, so it’s a quality analysis of what Catalyst is up to.  CritCon started out as a pure Shadowrun convention, but over time new game groups moved in and at the con was a fair bit of Pathfinder and even a two full tables of World of Darkness.

Location:  CritCon was at the Northwest Masonic Temple in Columbus Ohio.  The location was great.  I had a four hour drive from Jackson, MI, but the con’s room was big enough for the crowd without being overlarge.  Based on this year, the con is sure to grow, and it might need a bigger location next year.

Time: CritCon was a one day thing.  It started~9AM and went till 7PM on November 2nd.  We had to be out the door at seven.  I wish we had more time, because I had a lot of fun and didn’t get to do all thing things I wanted.  The slots were well planned out as we got a good game slot then had a lunch break and finished with a second game slot.  Sadly this was the same day as “Extra Life” but the con ended early.  I’d play/run 25 hours of SR if given the chance.  Kind of a missed opportunity.

Atmosphere:  This thing was incredibly laid back.  At any given time, four or five MVP’s from the Catalyst demo team were sitting around and talking.  I always enjoy meeting with my betters, and it was good to learn from the best and to just shoot the breeze.  In addition, there was a bunch of different pick-up games going on.  It’s always good to see random gaming going on at a con.  To me, unscheduled gaming means new friendships.

Games: Since Critical Glitch is a Shadowrun Podcast and the two hosts are very important members of the Catalyst demo team, Shadowrun was the main commodity.  However, it was great to see some Pathfinder and World of Darkness going on during the con.  There was even a games library with two demo copies of Shadowrun: Crossfire.  I wished I had a chance to play, but there just wasn’t time!

Admission: FREE*  *=five+ non-perishable food items for the Mid-Ohio Food Bank.  With each can you gave away, you got tickets that you could use for bonus dice for your dice pool.  AND the creators of the Podcast and the con HANDMADE dice bags!  I wastched one guy walk in with a full box of Top Ramen, get a crap ton of free dice for the game and a free dicebag.  This is the best con deal I’ve seen in a while.

Final Thoughts: I had a blast.  I ran my first con game of Shadowrun, and as per usual, the runners did some completely crazy stuff that was nowhere near the standard, planed format.  I also got to meet some major players in the Shadowrun world.  Catalyst put some money into this, and when I see major companies putting money into a small con, it makes me want to give them more money (like I don’t already….).  I met some great players and saw some new ways to play Shadowrun.  I wish the con was longer.  I wanted to play some more games and get a chance to try Crossfire, but oh well.  As the con hit 50 people, I’m looking forward to the con, just not the four hours in the car, next year.

Module-The Assassin’s Primer

 

Game System-Shadowrun

 

Producer-Catalyst Game Labs

 

Cost-~$5

 

Page Count-17

 

TL;DR- Good story with a few rules.  A little pricey for the page count. 87%

 

Basics-The first player centered addition to the Shadowrun 5e RPG.  This focuses on a webpost by an assassin who is about to die.  He wants to help future assassins and give tips and tricks through this post.  Along the way, various other Shadowrun characters pop in to give their two nuyen.  At the end of the story, the book also gives stats for a new gun as well as few new qualities for your character.

 

Art– The book does have some art, but don’t expect much.  There are a few black and white pictures as well as a picture of the new gun with its stats and background story.  It’s all ok, but this is not an art heavy book.  I liked what I saw, but there isn’t much. 3/5

Story or “Fluff”– This is really a well done story.  The whole story and they way you read it really put you in the world.  I loved every minute of it.  I felt like I was sitting drinking a soyacaff in a crappy rundown house reading this in AR. 2.5/2.5

 

Mechanics or “Crunch”– Don’t go into this looking for crunch.  The book does have some mechanics, but if you are a living game person like me, most of the new qualities are parts of codes of honor which you can’t have in the living game. So, that is kind of a bummer.  The story does give some good hints on how to play an assassin.  All and all, it’s an ok book for crunch, but I wanted more. 1.5/2.5

 

Execution– The way this ways laid out initially left me a little put off, but once I got into it I liked it.  It’s worth a read, as it does get you into the head space of Shadowrun and some of the major players in the universe.  The rules part at the end was a bit short, but well executed.  However, I was a little disappointed with the price.  For a PDF that is mostly story, I felt the $5 price was a bit much as its pretty short and rules light.  I would have liked this a bit more at the $3 price point.  I’m quibbling over dollars, but this is Shadowrun!  What good would a run be if we didn’t negotiate the price? 4/5

 
Final Thoughts– All said and done, I’m pretty happy with this book.  It’s not up to the quality of the core book, but I’m glad I read this small part of the Shadowrun lore.  I really enjoyed what I read.  And think that for anyone out there who likes the Shadowrun world, it’s worth it.  Don’t go into this thinking it’s going to give you the metagame advantage you were hoping for as there are only two pages of real rules though! 87%

Game– The Manhattan Project

 

Publisher-Minion Games

 

Price-~$50

 

Set-up/play/clean-up– 2 hours

 

Basics-It’s time to build bombs!  Each player takes the role of a different nation building nuclear weapons.  On your turn you do one of two things: place workers on the main board and your board or recall your workers.  Yes, this is a worker placement game, but the main twist is your building and how you use them.  On the main board, players can buy buildings, repair, declare war, get money, get yellow cake, get bomb designs, get more workers, get more planes to attack, steal other player’s spaces, or refine your yellow cake to plutonium or uranium.  You also get buildings that do much of the same but these are on your board.  When you place workers, you get to place only ONE worker to the main board, but you can place as many workers as you want on your board.  This leads the start of the game to go slow as everyone builds their home boards or only place on worker on a turn, but later in the game, you will see people place well over 10 workers to several different places.  So, like some other euro style games, this is an engine building game.  The way you win is building different bombs.  Each bomb functions like a single use building that requires different types of workers to use as well as an amount of plutonium or uranium.  When you build a bomb, you score its points.  You can also load a bomb for five more points.  With plutonium bombs, you can actually test fire a bomb.  When you do this, you lose all that bombs points, BUT plutonium bombs are not worth that much more.

 

Theme-You play a nation trying to build bombs, and it’s fantastic.  The different worker types make the game fun and make you really think you are sending your scientists to develop better reactors while engineers are building buildings and the base workers are out there in the mines.  Espionage as an action is amazing.  It really does feel like the cold war where your agents are out there sneaking into different facilities and stealing for your country.  The fact you can declare war and attack really adds the feel of warring nations, and it’s a welcome addition to the euro game genre.  Honestly, I played this game at Gencon, and bought this the next day. 5/5

 

Mechanics– Again, this is a great game through and through.  It’s a euro, worker placement game; that’s a pretty crowded genre, but this game’s different spin on that really make the game.  The different actions and workers really enhance the theme.  And, the different actions complement one another.  As an example, when you take some actions, money goes to a bribe pile.  When you buy the cheapest building, you get the bribe pile.  This means that you don’t have building build-up that you see in other games where no one wants to take a specific group of locations.  This game might not be for everyone as there is direct player vs. player combat, but it was definitely for me!  My only real complaint was the location deck.  The game starts with a standard set of buildings, but after that, anything thing goes.  So the next five buildings could be the most powerful combination in the game.  The randomness in the building pile could hurt the game play and does take a bit from the game play.  Check below for my suggestion on how to fix that.  4.5/5

 

Art/Construction– The art of this game is great.  It’s got a retro, 50’s fib to it, so the art really enhances the theme.  The board looks like pieces from a 1950’s office hammering home the feel of the cold war.  The pieces are thick cardboard.  Since I’m crazy, I would have liked different colored meeples for the workers, but the cardboard works.  The boards use iconography instead of words, and that works well.  All and all, a well put together game. The tracks for fighters/bombers could use a bit of work, but I’m happy. 4.5/5

 

Instructions– The instructions are online at http://www.boardgamegeek.com.  They are written in well-written, readable English with different translations available.  It’s a beefy book (10+ pages), but it does explain how to play quite well.  5/5

 

Final Thoughts– I love this game.  I love the combat, the engine building, the theme, the mechanics, and almost every aspect of this game.  It’s one of my favorites.  I bring this game with me to every game day I go to.  If you want a great game, the easy to play, but has levels and levels, this is the game for you. 95%

 

Quick Fixes– The main problem at hand is too much randomness in the building deck.  To fix it, I look to Suburbia.  In that game, when the players set-up the game, they make three piles of tiles to play based on the tile backs.  These tiles are marked with an A, a B, or a C, and they tiles get more powerful as the letters go up.  If Minion games released a revamped set of building cards where the buildings were marked A, B, C so I could shuffle them appropriately, I would buy it in a heartbeat.  Heck, maybe this week, I’ll sit down and make a list of cards for each group!

Book– Pathfinder Player Companion: Demon Hunter’s Handbook

Publisher-Paizo

Price – ~$13

TL;DR– A must have if you fight demons 90%

Basics-The title says it all.  If you’re going to focus on hunting demons, this is the book for you.  This book focuses on the different aspects of hunting demons.  Special attention and class features are given to barbarians, inquisitors, paladins, rangers, and wizards, but every class gets something a little something out this book.  Besides the crunch in the book, the book has a lot of roleplaying/fluff to it focusing extensively on who you might meet when fighting demons and how to deal with demons and demon worshipers.  Last part of the book focuses on the new adevneture path Wrath of the Righteous and focuses on some of the major places you will visit while in that path.

Art– This is the standard Pathfinder style, but be warned!  Demons tend to be the crazier of the evil thing out there and they tend to push some peoples buttons on what passes for ok.  Some of the art might not make everybody comfortable.  It’s a thing that you have to get used to or don play with demons.  I didn’t find anything offensive, but this might not be for everybody. 5/5

Mechanics or “Crunch”– I wasn’t as impressed with some of the character options as I’ve been with other books.  The barbarian gets called out as a focus of the book, but only really gets two class features that focus on critical hits.  The ranger gets three and they are only traps.  If you don’t use traps or focus on critical hits, then the options are kind of useless. Also some of the other character options tend to be high level stuff.  The spells shine as they are a good mix of levels and casting classes.  I didn’t hate what I saw, but I was left wanting more.  1.5/2.5

Story or “Fluff”-Here is where the book really shines.  The fluff in this book is top notch.  Lots of focus on the different types of demons and how to fight them.  Sidebars to expand what you should know when fighting demons and how to fight them.  Heck as a DM, I learned a few things to use in my next demon encounter.  Only sad thing is the focus on the Wrath of the Righteous tends to lead to Pathfinder specific focus and less general demon focus.  But since this is a Pathfinder book, I expect that going in.  Again, this book is focused on the crazies of the Pathfinder world so keep that in mind when you read this. 2.5/2.5

Execution– I liked the set up and layout of this book, but a few things really set me off.  The book references lots of other books, and as a Pathfinder fan boy I have them all.  BUT, the book does not have page number for all of them.  WHY?  Why are some there and not others?  Please put this in.  It makes my life as a player and DM that much easier!  Also, I’m not sure I like everything about the roles.  I would like a few things in the future.  1) Give me levels for each feat they have.  It helps me as a DM make characters on the fly.  If you list feats with a number ahead of them, that’s all I need  2)  Give me some base, not racially modified, stats.  Again, nothing to fancy, but just base stats I can bolt on some race stuff to.  Heck, extra points if you give me a quick level guide for stats.  These things would really make these that much better. 4/5

Book Quality– This is a standard, well done Pathfinder player companion book.  I love this style as the ink doesn’t smear and the pages don’t tare easily.  Good print quality does count!  5/5

Final Thoughts– I liked this book.  The crunch might not be where I want it to be, but the rest was spot on.  A few tweaks in the execution will really make this thing shine and going forward will really help pull it all together.  If you’re going to fight lots of demons, then you should buy this book.  If your game doesn’t have any demons at all, then this book maybe not useful to your table.  90%

Game-Kingsburg

 

Producer-Fantasy Flight Games and others

 

Set-up/play/take-down-~1 hour

 

Price– ~$50

 

TL;DR–  Good game of Kingdom building-80%

 

Basics-In Kingsburg, each player takes the role of different governors in border territories to a large kingdom.  Each year the players roll three dice and spend dice to influence different patrons.  Patrons are influenced by spending dice that exactly total a patron’s value.  Theses patrons give the players gold, wood, stone, military support, surveillance, dice change values, or victory points.  Each patron can only be influenced once per season.  After each season, each player can build different structures for his town.  After each season, the king helps the leading or losing player, and the process repeats.  After three seasons, monsters attack all the towns and each player sees if they were able to fend off the hordes or if the hordes destroyed part of his or her town.

 

Mechanics-The game is somewhat a eurogame, but with some strong American style themes.  The dice can be somewhat swingy, but the fact that the king helps each player really does help balance the game.  No one really spends to much time far behind the other players, and that is excellent game design.  My only major problem with the game is the way the king helps each player.  One player each year rolls a d6 and that much military aid come to all the players for fighting the hordes.  This really makes this part of the game swingy and can lead some lucky players to victory instead of smart players.  Also, some buildings are completely useless and far to overpriced.  3/5

 

Theme-This game has some problems with theme.  I like it, but I don’t completely feel like I’m a governor at the edge of the known world.  It’s not a major problem, but I don’t feel taken away.  Also, since this is a eurogame, the game has to use small wooden cubes.  Now I know it’s not a large thing, but why not use small things that look like what they are?  You never have huge piles of the resources anyway; why not give me something that makes me feel a bit more in the game?  Another problem is the swingy nature of the game.  Since you roll for what you can play, it does take a bit away from the nature of smart play, but could be interpreted as you harvesting what you can, when you can.  While I am complaining, I did like this game and really liked the fact that only one player can influence a patron each season.  It really does add to the theme of working in a feudal government. 3/5

 

Instruction-They game is well written, and the board and player mats are built to execute these instructions well.  I had absolutely no problems playing the game as written. 5/5

 

Art and Construction-The art isn’t bad.  It has a distinctive style and nothing is too small to be visible.  Everything is written in icons on the main board, so the board reads fast.  I liked what I saw and think it’s built pretty strong. 5/5

 

Final Thoughts-This is a pretty decent game.  I’m glad my wife owns it.  It’s one of the game we play pretty regularly, and I’m not disappointed when we bust it out.  It does have its flaws, but those are usually something I can overlook.  Good game that you should give a try if it comes to the table.  80%