by Morph Mode
I've been trying to think of reasons why the Descent box needs to be so gigantic. It looked comparable to the Thunderstone Quest box which is so monstrous because there are thousands of cards in it. And because there is a good chance there is an app for the game it seems like you'd need even fewer components (quest books, monster AI cards) if you are using an app.
(Image credit Heath Smith from the FFG in-flight report)
Let's face it, the dungeon crawler genre is much more crowded than in 2012. Their product needs to stand up against Oathsworn, Tanares, Middara, Massive Darkness (kickstarter 2 starts just days from now!), Stormsunder, big dogs Gloomhaven and Frosthaven. And that's just scratching the surface.
So this is sort of what I came up with:
1: It's mostly empty. The space will be used by future expansions and this is just a preemptive big-box solution. But then why would the box say "Act I" on it? Will Act II be just as huge?
2: There is an enormous number of terrain tiles. This is one of the reasons Gloomhaven's box is so huge. I would actually be in favor of this - if they overstuffed it with tiles then they would get more flexibility designing maps as expansions come out. By putting so many tiles in expansions it means you can only use those tiles with scenarios from that expansion. Like in the current Descent app it would be cool to be able to have a swamp in any map, not just if you were playing a Trollfens campaign.
3: Some of the minis are enormous. Maybe there are some figures that compete with some of the big feature creatures CMoN (dragon from zombicide) or Oathsworn (boss creatures) has you fight against.
4: Lots of terrain? They could have decided to have lots of wall terrain for the dungeons or some of them could be on different 3d levels. Or maybe there are just giant trees, columns or statues.
5: It's less of a typical dungeon crawl game and more of a 'world crawl' with overland travel, questing, etc. This would make it more like a co-op version of Runebound 3ed or the older Runewars game.
6: It really is stuffed with content. I left this for last because it's not typical of FFG. They usually give you the bare minimum number of heroes, monsters, tiles, DICE, and even make the bosses just tokens unless you buy the separate miniature packs. But maybe they are stepping up the game knowing they are competing with kickstarters (listed above) that come with 40 heroes, 30 monster groups, 2 extra full campaigns, etc.
Anyway, that's the big brain dump. Please share your thoughts on any and all of those possibilities as well as other options I didn't think of!