Has anyone played Gloomhaven solo or with a group? Was it worth the 120 they are asking?
the worst part of gloomhaven is table and board set up. It fuckin sucks and takes too long. Also there's very little narrative, but a lot of "story" if that makes sense
The actual dungeon crawling is top tier imo. the choices of top/bottom action on the cards (and the way the cards are your abilities AND stamina and you can do all sorts of cool shit with em) is so fun
I play it 2p. About 25 sessions in. A lot of game left in it too.Has anyone played Gloomhaven solo or with a group? Was it worth the 120 they are asking?
Has anyone played Gloomhaven solo or with a group? Was it worth the 120 they are asking?
I don't know how it is to set up solo, but with two people handling the set up it takes us about 3 minutes which isn't to bad.the worst part of gloomhaven is table and board set up. It fuckin sucks and takes too long. Also there's very little narrative, but a lot of "story" if that makes sense
Alright, here are my 2 cents about Gloomhaven:
I've very recently completed the main campaign (mostly) solo, and played a few sessions of the Forgotten Circles expansions.
While this is undoubtedly a great game and a lot of fun, it definitely is not the holy grail of board gaming that everybody on BGG wants you to believe. I think a lot of people are way more in love with the idea of the game than with the game itself.
First let me list a few points that I really enjoyed about Gloomhaven:
- The game is expensive, but it has A LOT of stuff in it. Cards, minis, unlockable boxes, cardboard monsters, campaign tracking board, more cards... And the quality of the components is good.- The card management system is unbelievably clever and fun. I've never seen something like this in any other games, and it works very well. It's definitely the main draw of the game.- The RPG elements, like the whole character development aspect, are nicely done. Unlocking new classes that suddenly become available to play never gets old.
Now for the parts of Gloomhaven that are not good:
- This is a "soft" negative as it can easily be rectified, but you absolutely need to spend a few more bucks for an organization system of some sort. With baggies and the small insert that is coming with the box, it takes way (WAY) too long to set up and take down the game. Long enough to discourage people from playing.- There are a lot of weird difficulty spikes throughout the campaign. Enough to sometime completely halt progression, especially if you play with only two characters (which is the recommended number of characters for solo play). I remember hitting such a wall at least five or six times during the campaign. Which leads to the following point:- The game plays very well solo, but I recommend playing with at least three characters instead of two. It's because the difficulty balance throughout the campaign is not good, and some scenarios are just impossible to clear with some classes combinations, which I found very frustrating. With three characters, at least there's the chance of having a class in play that is needed for some of those problematic scenarios...- The story throughout the campaign ranges from uninteresting to bad.- The character retirement mechanic is badly designed. Sometimes you can get retirement conditions that are impossible to meet depending on your progression in the campaign. That completely blocks the classes unlock process.- The reason I was personally playing Gloomhaven was for the RPG elements (such as character progression), the dungeon crawling, and the card management system. Yet, once in a while the game insists at throwing at you very badly designed puzzles. For me it was such a drag...- Unlocking character classes is so much fun! But unfortunately, every other unlocks in the game are a major disappointment. The game makes such a big deal of his locked boxes and envelopes! And working so hard to unlock an envelope to then only be greeted with something completely meaningless is very frustrating to say the least. Also:- One locked envelope in particular really left a bad taste in my mouth. Unlocking it gives you another very badly designed puzzle that you have to solve throughout the campaign. My copy of the game even had a typo at some point that completely prevented me to solve this puzzle without searching for the solution on the internet. But I think that the most disappointing part of it all was what solving it unlocked. After all this work, the solution gives you something that, if you actually want to use it, makes you spend more money because you need to print all the components yourself. This thing you just unlocked doesn't come in the box...
A note on the expansion:
- The expansion is not very good. It's very puzzle-heavy, and the puzzles are even worst that in the main game. And unforgiving too. It means that you'll need to play many scenarios at least twice: once to figure out the puzzle (and fail the scenario in the process), and a second time to actually clear it.- They also changed the way the scenarios are presented to the players. The map is now revealed room by room instead of having the whole layout accessible from the beginning. A good idea on paper, but what it ends up doing is creating huge downtime moments during play each time you open a door because you need to stop the game, search for the components, and do the setup for the room.
So this was my experience with Gloomhaven. I feel the need to mention (especially for this game...) that what I just wrote represents my own opinion that was formed after my own experience with the game.
For me the nature of the negative points were enough to make me stop playing after a few sessions in the expansion. I shouldn't have bought it to be honest, I doubt I'll play again.
Thank you very much. You just saved me 120 dollar's.
That was a great review. It covered everything. Thanks again
I would have been happy if Gloomhaven was a smaller more manageable game that had simply kept the core hand management.Keep in mind that a lot of people really like Gloomhaven! I guess it depends on what you like, and what you consider being a deal breaker for your enjoyment in a game. For me, the things I found to be negative in Gloomhaven were very major points.
They maybe don't contain as many components as Gloomhaven, but I think there are better games out there. Especially for solo play, whether you like puzzle solving, or theme-heavy games.
I would have been happy if Gloomhaven was a smaller more manageable game that had simply kept the core hand management.
Has anyone played Gloomhaven solo or with a group? Was it worth the 120 they are asking?
I still absolutely love the game (though setup is a slog), but I do admit I house-rule whenever I find things unfair or unfun (especially personal goals).I think that would have been awesome! I hope it could actually happen someday.
There are so much stuff and so many mechanics in this game... And unfortunately, the more I played Gloomhaven, the more all of this stuff kind of began falling apart. I'm really standing by my statement saying that many people are way more in love with the idea of this game than with the actual game itself. After playing the campaign for a while, a lot of bad design flaws become very obvious.
Oh wow. Thank you for the info. I'll definitely give it a whirl at 80.You can regularly find it in the $80 range FYI if you are interested just not 120 interested
It's 99 at cool stuff right now too
As someone who's played Troyes more times than most other games in my collection, I was really interested in Black Angel. Those three designers have done some great work. This one just seems weird and like you said, a bunch of concepts thrown together without much connecting them.
Troyes is not exactly a "simple" game, either (although much less of a pain than a lot of popular games nowadays). But it does have a clarity to what you're doing and the goals you're going for. There is something really interesting about its central dice mechanic, and tensiob in figuring out your different options with the dice, and the order you resolve in.
I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since.
Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
For me it's mostly thanks to both space, cost and time limitation, so I don't have a choice ^ ^. I have a hard time selling things I already own, so I limit myself when it comes to buying new stuff ( that's how I pretty much stoped my manga collection from growing too much after it got to ~600 volumes ).Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
I have a single bookcase for my games. Anything that doesn't fit on the bookcase has to go. So I've reduced the collection down to only games I love.Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
If it's been over a year and you haven't even thought about playing a game, would you really miss? Put some post-its on games with some dates on it (6 months, 1 year, 2 years, whatever you want). If the deadline passes and you still haven't bothered getting them played, get rid of them.Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
Here's one thing I noticed different between Troyes and Black Angel in the dice selection.
In Troyes you can use multiple dice, which is really interesting given you can use opponents dice but have to pay for it and each coloured die represents one of the three different types of cards. It's layers upon layers of options to calculate the best move, until you give up and just go with your gut.
In Black Angel it looks like only one dice gets chosen. Perhaps they streamlined it but the choice there is limited. The complexity i suppose is in how to manage all the different systems as best as possible. I'm still trying to work out the game though.
As bad as I've heard it is, my copy of Time Stories Madame is coming tomorrow and I'm playing it next weekend
Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
Have you played all up to that? My crew try to do 2 a year and we are bad at it, our last one was the dragon one and we sadly hated it. I own them all to be ready though. I hope next one in line is better
Yeah I've played them all of them up to this point
Here is how I'd rank the expansions I've played
Asylum
Expedition Endurance
Lumen Fidei
Brotherhood of the Coast
Marcy Case
Under the Mask
Prophecy of Dragons
Estella Drive
Of which I'd say the top 4 are all excellent, Marcy is good, Mask and Prophecy are meh, and Estella was terrible
Do you think we should skip the awful ones ? Or man up and just do them all? I already bought them haha
It's hard to say since I have no idea how they plan to have season 2 call back to season 1.
Institute a "one in, one out" policy. Get to a number you feel comfortable with and then go from there. I would also recommend adding up exactly how much you've spent over the last 6 months or year. If it makes you uncomfortable, you're probably spending too much and having statistics and actual figures can hopefully help you curtail the high we all get from the promise of a new experience.Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
Institute a "one in, one out" policy. Get to a number you feel comfortable with and then go from there. I would also recommend adding up exactly how much you've spent over the last 6 months or year. If it makes you uncomfortable, you're probably spending too much and having statistics and actual figures can hopefully help you curtail the high we all get from the promise of a new experience.
This is my first and probably only CMON Kickstarter pledge. Something about the game really appeals to me. I'm going to get all the gameplay stuff except for the plastic tokens. That new Thorn Beast companion/add on is impossible for me to say no to, lol. I've never painted mini's but I really want to give it a shot with this one.Talk about not being true to your word.
I may back Trudvang Legends after all and for all game content addons to boot, now that they've introduced the daily stretch goals to at the very least give backers the plastic/content they're paying for with the 100$ base pledge. But they could've really reacted earlier, been less tone deaf with their campaign and greedily spaced stretch goals and not entirely rely on KS exclusivity for actual game content.
Thing is, I don't like CMON's approach to KS campaigns one bit, but their minis are pretty impeccable for boardgame standards and I'd really like to paint a set. While I don't feel the need to own any mini heavy area control game or a Zombie survival tabletop of theirs, being a narrative, seemingly pretty relaxed game with the token pulling mechanic I might like quiet a bit (could elegantly combine character progression and RNG into a pretty streamlined and fun mechanic) , Trudvang is the game I'd say hamight have very good chance of getting played for me. Not being a 200h campaign affair helps the game more than it hurts it. I'm fine with spending 180h painting and 20h playing. 😝
And lastly, while their Zombicide games and Massive Darkness have the comic style characters I don't like as much and I'm not too interested in Blood Rage or Rising Sun (or Ankh), Trudvang's minis are very faithful to the fantastic artwork and its style.
Still it's going to be the first and last KS game I'm getting from them. It's just the one game in their portfolio that I'd say really speaks to me n terms of what game it is and its style. Not that TL and Altar Quest aren't fixing my mini painting itch for about the next five years anyway...
Did anyone play Oathsworn at GenCon? It hits Kickstarter in October.
What board games have really good fan made content? I know custom scenarios exist for time stories and arkham horror tcg but I've mostly seen pretty bad reviews for them. Not exactly looking for examples of great house rules, but actual new content.
Looking for some advice here:
How do some of you manage to not be absolute hoarders of board games? I have ~350 games in my collection, and I really need to make space for more, but I'm having a hard time getting over the "Oh, we played that once and really liked it." thoughts that pop into my mind. I know it isn't totally rational, because that one time we played it was 4 years ago and we haven't played it since. It's just really hard for me to let go of some stuff that I really should be OK letting go of. Anyone else ever dealt with this? How did you break out of it?
Descent has quite a lot fanmade content. Since I haven't tried any of it, I can't say anything about its quality. But I recently saw that some people designed a complete addon (Sands of the Past). There seems to be quite a lot dedication at least.What board games have really good fan made content? I know custom scenarios exist for time stories and arkham horror tcg but I've mostly seen pretty bad reviews for them. Not exactly looking for examples of great house rules, but actual new content.
That thing is sick! I'd get it for painting alone. But also the newer stretch goal minis were rather good sculpts imo.That new Thorn Beast companion/add on is impossible for me to say no to, lol. I've never painted mini's but I really want to give it a shot with this one.