Monopoly Deal Review

A light little filler game that I tried recently was Monopoly Deal.

Don't let the name fool you - Monopoly Deal is about as much like normal Monopoly as having a tooth extracted (without even having anesthetic) is "major surgery". Here's how it works - each player starts the game with some cards. Each turn, you draw two cards, play up to three cards, and then discard to seven cards in your hand (rarely an issue). The object of the game is to get three complete property sets. Cards come in three main varieties: Money (ranging from $1 Million to $10 Million), Actions (that kick your friends in the teeth and steal from them while they're down), and Properties (that you then have stolen from you while you're on the ground after being kicked). The properties will be the old staples that you're used to, but there are also Wild properties that help you to more easily complete sets. Money is simply money - it's used to pay for things (and serves as a buffer before you have to pay in property). Actions range from forcing players to give you $2 Million as a birthday gift to stealing a complete property set, charging rent to drawing extra cards. Oh, and every action card has a monetary value and can be played as "Money" instead of as an action.  Once someone gets their three complete property sets, they are the winner.

The first thing that I like about Monopoly Deal is that it is a fast paced game. Now, don't get me wrong - I actually enjoy the original game of Monopoly. However, it's not for everyone, and I understand that. Monopoly Deal can be played in a fraction of the time of normal Monopoly. Theoretically, the entire game can be over in two rounds! (If you are able to complete the three 2-property color sets (Mediterranean/Baltic, Boardwalk/Park Place, Electric Company/Water Works.) However, fortunately it's not normally that fast. Either way, turns go very quickly, so there does not feel like very much down time in the game.

Not quite as drooled over as before.

The next thing that I like about the game is that you're never completely out of contention. Yes, if you have no property in front of you, the game can be much more challenging, but there are combinations of cards that can immediately get you right back into contention. If, for example, you had no properties and one of your opponent's had Boardwalk & Park Place, you could use "Deal Breaker" to steal their set, and then play "Double the Rent" with a Dark Blue "Rent" card to go from having nothing to having all of your opponents pay you $16 Million dollars, all on one turn! (Assuming that your opponent that you steal the property set from does not have a "Just Say No" card.) Think about normal Monopoly - when you're losing heavily, what are the chances of you winning? Approximately 0.0003%? That's not true with Monopoly Deal.

Third, I like that Monopoly Deal is a friendly back-stabby game. What I mean is that, yes, you are constantly stabbing the other players in the back. However, they probably won't grow too irritated because they are about to do the same thing. And, the backstabbing happens early enough and often enough in the game that it doesn't feel like you've worked towards something all game and then someone swooped in at the last second to mess up your whole plan. You get stabbed the whole time you try to execute your plan, and if your planning doesn't involve stealing things from your opponents, then it's destined for failure. Let me put it this way - you'll spend as much time looking at what your opponent's have in play (your "options") as you will what's in your hand.

Finally, Monopoly Deal is able to open doors with people who don't normally play many games. Ever had this conversation, "I like board games." "Oh, you mean like Monopoly and Scrabble?" (Mine normally is "I write about board games." "Oh, you mean like Monopoly and Scrabble?" Sometimes they mix in Risk.) You can now answer, "Sure. You should try Monopoly Deal with us. You might like it." Monopoly Deal is fun - they probably will enjoy it. And then, *BAM*, spring Dominion on them the next day!! Or something like that...

Let's make a deal...

Anyway, it's not all roses for Monopoly Deal. One thing that I'm not a huge fan of is how much luck is involved in the game. This luck is almost exclusively in what cards you draw. I've played at least one game of it where I never drew an action card! Not one!! What does this mean? It means that my cards are constantly being stolen by other players and my only response will be to glare at them - no chance to take anything back. Also, not all properties are equal - you have the same odds of drawing Boardwalk as you do Mediterranean. Or worse, Oriental (I like Oriental in normal Monopoly, but in Monopoly Deal, it requires two other cards to complete the set, and still doesn't get much rent). Also, you may draw $1 Million "Money" cards to play, or you might draw $5 or $10 Million. Obviously, the person who draws better cards will have a major advantage.

The second thing that I think I will list as a con is that I'm not a huge fan of how Rent works. Especially with houses and hotels. To play a house or hotel, you have to have a complete property set - and then it simply increases the rent that can be charged. But, to charge rent, you have to draw the appropriate "Rent" card (each basic Rent card allows you to pick between two color sets and charge all other players Rent. There is also one or two "wild" Rent cards that allow you to charge one player Rent in any color.) Rent seems to require too much setup for too little payoff - especially with the crummier color sets. If I play "It's My Birthday!" then every other player owes me $2 Million. However, if I play Oriental Avenue and then charge Rent on it, I believe each other player owes me $1 Million - for a two card setup! It makes you wonder what's the point in them even including the Rent cards for some of these colors.  Rent just feels a bit too castrated in this game.

The final thing that I will mention is that the instructions are not especially clear. Yes, the game is pretty simple, but when the instructions say something like "just start playing, and it'll make sense" (paraphrased), that's not really a good sign. I still don't know what happens in certain situations in the game - like if I have a house on a property set, and I have to break the set - what happens to the house? Or, if I have a wild property that is worth "no monetary value" and someone charges me more than I can pay, do I have to give them that card? That's like me being so broke that I pay someone all that I own and then give them the lint from my pocket or used candy wrappers and pretend that it increases the value.

Overall, I give Monopoly Deal a 8.0/10. It's a fun, light-weight filler game. And, you can probably pick it up for around $6 at most any big-box store. I would recommend you check it out.

If Monopoly Deal sounds fun, you might also check out Bang!, Hecho, and Jab: Real Time Boxing.

Risk Legacy Review

I have drooled over Risk: Legacy since I first saw that it was coming out. So, when I moved to Philadelphia and was offered a spot with a group just starting a campaign of it, I jumped at the chance to join them! Now, let me tell you that we have played 5 of the 15 games so far - so, I have a good feel for how the game is played, but have not opened every pack. However, I am also intending to write this review without spoilers: so if you're looking for spoilers, this may not be for you, but if you're looking for a good feel on how the game is played, you don't have to worry about me ruining anything - everything I tell you should be found in the rulebook or was at least known to us before we started playing our first game. (Note: I had a pretty picture of the board that we're using, but I realized that if you looked too closely, you might see a spoiler, so I removed it - I have checked all of the other pictures, and they are safe.  The Enclave of the Bear pictures shows only a starting power - which you select before your first game.) With that said, let's dig into Risk: Legacy!

Select your faction - with a starting power

Risk: Legacy is Risk; but with extra stuff. In Legacy, each player starts with a headquarters and a handful of troops; all of which are on the headquarters. He also starts with a faction from the game. The first time that you play, each player selects a faction, but also gets to select which of two abilities that faction will be able to use - and that faction (not necessarily that player) will use it the rest of the time that you play Legacy. Your goal is to capture four "stars." If a player has never won a game, then he starts the game with a star. Each headquarters is a star, and you can also turn in four "resource" cards to gain a star. When playing the game, you basically play with standard Risk rules. You add up your number of territories (and add population based on cities that you own - this part is new), and divide by three, rounding down. This is the number of armies that you collect each turn (minimum of three). You also get extra armies for each continent you control. From here, you can attack as many territories as you want. The attacker can roll with up to three dice, the defender with two, and the defender wins ties. If you take a contested territory on your turn (ie, you kill somebody else to do it), then at the end of the turn you get a card - when selecting a card, you can either select a card of a territory you control (territory cards can be worth anywhere from one to six resources), or you receive a standard resource card if you do not control any of the available countries. On future turns, you can trade in four cards for a star, or you can trade in cards for additional armies - if trading for armies, then the number of resources on the cards is added to determine how many you receive (with a bonus for having larger numbers). The only in-game change that I haven't mentioned are that you each will start the game with one "scar" card. These cards specify when they can be played, and to play them, you peel the sticker off of the card, place it on the appropriate territory, and then this affects that territory the rest of the time you play this copy of Risk: Legacy! Gameplay continues like this until one person has collected four stars. Then, they win the game, and sign the board (meaning they will get a "missile" instead of a star to start the next game; missiles let you change a single die roll to be a 6). After signing the board, they have the option of naming a continent (giving them a permanent one army bonus whenever they control that continent), place a major city (a city with a population of two that only they can start in), destroy a resource card (rip it in half and never use it again), or a few other things. Anyone that was still alive can either place a minor city (population of one, but nobody can start there), or add a resource icon to a territory.

Ok, that was one of my longer introductions, but now it's time to get to the pros and cons. The first pro is that Risk: Legacy is the most innovative game that I believe I have ever played. I was incredibly hesitant when I first heard that you write on the board, destroy cards, and generally make your game vastly different than when you bought it. However, this part of the game works incredibly well. You truly feel like you are in a campaign throughout the game, and in later games, you will remember what happened in the earlier ones. This will also affect how you play - for example, we had one time when a player had named Australia. He refused to play any negative scars in Australia, because he knew that it would negatively affect him if he controlled Australia in future games. This ever-changing game is an amazing concept, and I am really hoping that more games do something similar.  And, when I think about it from a financial perspective, if I pay $60 for a copy of Risk: Legacy, and I play it and enjoy it for the 15 games of the campaign, then I'm paying $4 per play - I have paid a lot more than that per play for many of my games!

I'm ready to open this!

Next, I think that it is awesome that not each game has the same cards. When I was first reading about the game, I thought to myself, "ok, that'll be neat, but once I've played it 15 times, I'll have to move on." I now realize that I was wrong. First of all, for those of you that really enjoy the basic game of Risk, there's no real need to stop playing the game after 15 games - just because the world is no longer changing does not mean that the game itself is no longer playable. You can continue to play the game, and it will really feel like it is "your" version of Risk; because you and your friends will be the ones that caused the board to be setup how it is. However, if you constantly want the game to change, you can also figure out how to tell which copies have the same cards (I believe this is by serial number) and get a new copy of the game - one with different contents, and play through it again! Now, I don't know what all is different in the games, but I have looked at spoilers for the "Do Not Open. Ever." pack (oh, don't give me that look - we are playing on a friend's copy, and he keeps refusing to open it; you know "do not open" means "open me immediately"), and this has confirmed to me that there are different variants.

Now, those are really my only two pros to Risk: Legacy. But they are huge pros! So, instead of me trying to make something else up, let's just acknowledge that they are gigantic pros and count them both twice. So, now we're at four pros, and I can move on to the cons. Oh, I just remembered another one - the game goes much faster since you only have to get four stars instead of eliminating everyone. There you go, five pros.

The first con is that there is really very little change in the gameplay. Whereas all of Risk 2210's changes are to the gameplay itself, in Risk: Legacy I found myself playing through the game in order to get to the post-game. I was ready to customize the board, open packs, etc., and the game itself was all secondary to this. If you enjoy Risk, you will have no problem here at all! However, I do not enjoy the standard Risk, so I would often find myself bored while waiting for the game to end.

The second con is really more of the same. I don't like how easily strategy is derailed by poor dice rolling. There are some scar cards that can modify dice (make them plus one or minus one), but most of the game will be spent seeing who is better at rolling six-sided dice. I am not good at this. So, this part is incredibly frustrating.

Next, Australia is still overpowered. Whoever controls Australia will probably win the game. Fortunately, this one has a caveat - you can fix this. Since the winner of a game can make a continent bonus plus one or minus one, you can make Australia only worth one extra army instead of two. Plus, one of the scar cards (ammo shortage) makes it harder to defend a country. In addition, players cannot start on "scarred" territories, so this also can prevent players from being allowed to even start in certain territories in Australia. However, in your first few games, this might be a problem.

What's in the box

Finally, because of the abbreviated timeframe in Risk: Legacy, I think that a player who is close to being knocked out (the difference between "knocked out" and "eliminated" is that if all of your armies are destroyed, you start your next turn with half of your initial armies on any valid starting territory; "eliminated" means there are no starting territories) has very little chance to come back in the game. Not only have you probably lost your own headquarters, but it is incredibly difficult to ever accumulate enough armies to actually challenge the other players that are still doing well - especially since they are collecting more armies than you each turn. Your only chance is to somehow stay alive (if you are knocked out, then they get to take all of your resource cards), gather enough resource cards to get a large amount of reinforcements, and hope that your opponents fight a lot in the meantime. And, if they see you gathering resource cards, they will probably only leave you alone if one of them is close to winning the game (since they will know that they can steal your cards, which will help them win).

Overall, I give Risk: Legacy an 8.0/10. I absolutely love the ever-changing game. However, the ever-changing game is all centered around Risk. I wish that they had started with Risk 2210 and had then added the changing board to it - having a combination of new gameplay and new outside the game effects. Either way, I love that Risk: Legacy has introduced an entirely new idea into board games - one that I am very excited to see if people will incorporate into future games!

If you like war games, you might also check out Summoner Wars, Test of Fire: Bull Run 1861, and Axis and Allies: Pacific. Or, if you want another opinion, check out this Risk Legacy Review on Play Board Games.

NOTE: I have been informed since writing this review that the only packet with variance is the "Do Not Open.  Ever." packet.

Heroscape Review

One of the games that I have lost the most money because of is Heroscape. (Note: Heroscape is at this point a game system more than a single product. The link is to one of the 4 master sets that was produced. Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast has discontinued the entire line, but it all started with Heroscape: Rise of the Valkyrie.)

Heroscape is a miniatures based war game. Before the game can be played, one (or several) of the players must build a map out of plastic interlocking hex-based terrain. The terrain pieces available include rock, sand, grass, ice, lava, water, trees, roads, ruins, castles, etc. After the map has been built, each of the players picks an army of approximately equal value (each hero or squadron is given a certain value in points for this purpose). Once the board is set and armies are made, at the start of each round all of the players place order markers on their army cards (ranging from 1-3 with an "X" for a decoy). Next, the players each role a 20-sided die to determine "initiative" (who goes first), and the first player starts by taking his turn using his "1" army card (an army card can represent either a single hero figure or a 2-4 unit squadron). For each figure on his army card, the player can move a designated number of hexes and then attack any figure(s) within range. This continues until whatever game objective is being used has been met. (You can play elimination, capture the flag, king of the mountain, or just about anything else.)

Now for the pros of Heroscape. First of all, Heroscape is incredibly replayable. With the sheer number of figures that Hasbro created, and the fact that the maps can be custom made each time through, the only reason that a game should feel the same way twice is due to a lack of imagination on the part of the people playing (or if they have favorite figures that they use too often).

The second aspect of Heroscape that counts definitively in its favor is that it is simple enough to play with and teach anybody, but deep enough to keep most people's interest. As opposed to most miniatures games, Heroscape has no measuring (with rulers). To determine whether a unit is in range, you count the number of hexes in between them for distance. To move a unit, you simply move a certain number of hexes. To go up to higher elevation, each extra hex of height costs a movement point. To attack, you roll a number of attack dice (and defend the same way). However, each unit has special abilities - some units fly, some get to attack twice, counter attack, scale walls, etc. This allows the basics of the game to be incredibly simple to teach, and new players only need to worry about special abilities that are on army cards that are in their current game.  However, since each army card has unique abilities, it gives the game enough flavor and diversity that it will keep even seasoned gamers interested in playing again.

The third pro for Heroscape is that the terrain can easily be adapted to many other miniatures games.  Whereas I do not really play other miniatures games (this is a pro that was pointed out to me by other gamers), it seems to be sized appropriately for figures from Heroclix, Warhammer, and possibly even Axis and Allies Miniatures and Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures.  This would allow you to have more three dimensional terrain in those games (and more easily measurable in Warhamer) if that is something in which you are interested.

Now that the pros have been highlighted, here's the biggest con: dice. This is one of the most frustrating games I have ever played when it comes to dice (along with The Settlers of Catan). All of your best laid plans and strategies can be destroyed when your figure with 9 dice for defense gets killed by a figure with 2 dice on attack. I cannot say how frustrating that is. (And yet, this has not deterred me from playing the game. Maybe I'm a glutton for punishment, and maybe I just really like the pros that much).

Now for the next con: dice. Yeah, I really hate that part, so it counts twice.

Now for the second (actual) con: setup time. This will not be a con to many people, and so I suppose I should've listed it more as a point of note. The setup of the map can take quite a long time. With that said, many people will enjoy setting up the map as much or more than they enjoy playing the game (the same kind of people who are attracted to Warhammer because they enjoy painting the miniatures). I personally enjoy the game more than the setup, but my wife seems to truly enjoy building maps. Either way, the time required to setup and tear down the maps for Heroscape have limited my ability to play it for the last couple of years, and so it is something that you should definitely be aware of.

Overall, I give Heroscape an 8.0/10. It is a very fun, very addictive game that (I think) I have played in excess of 100 times. Unfortunately, it will be pretty hard for new players to get in, as the game is no longer in production. If this is a title you're interested in, I recommend trying to pick it up as quickly as possibly, because I'm guessing that prices will go up before they go back down (if ever). Your best bet will probably be to try to pick it up on Craig's list or at a garage sale.