by Teeka
Hello all,I've been lurking this forum for months ever since this game was announced, and I'm still on the fence about buying this game. In 2010, I posted a thread about looking for a new/better version of my beloved but very flawed HeroQuest. This is said thread:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/557417/also-looking-for-...
Since then, I tried Descent 1 (at a friend's house, didn't buy it myself) but didn't like. Amongst other things the game length and the spawning thing ruined it for me. Did like the theme and overall feel though. But that wasn't enough to go for it.
After that, unfortunately 'life happened' and I didn't get to try any of the other recommendations I got back then. So this year D2E comes along, and I just can't decide if I want it. It's starting to get annoying.
I hope you guys can help. You can read in the above thread what I would love to get (but maybe never will). I haven't been able to play D2E anywhere yet, so all my impressions are from reading this forum. I've tried to read those as neutrally as possible, and found 3 things that are keeping me from buying it:
1. No death, just unconsciousness. Now, I understand that from a design viewpoint, character death is troublesome if you don't want 'kill em all' to become a better strategy for the OL than reaching the objective. But I do think that although hard to do, death should be possible, or there's no real danger/suspense/heroic-theme. (I have lots to say on many opinions already voiced on this, but I'll put those points in later posts as this one is already getting long.)
2. No actual exploring. AFAIK (I haven't seen the whole questbook) the board is always laid out right away. Part of the fun in HQ was walking round a corner into a trap, dead ends, finding secret rooms etc. D2E seems just a tactical field with walls as obstacles.
3. LOS. I really don't want to start another 200-post thread, so let's just say I'm in the group that finds the chosen rules to be counter-intuitive. If points 1 and 2 weren't there though, I would be able to live with this one. But right now, it's part of the fence-sitting.
Plus-points for D2E from my current POV:
1. Character classes with their own abilities, equipment, etc. Love it.
2. Component design. Even though for my taste the character sheets are too cartooney and almost ruin the medieval-fantasy feel, I really like what I see.
3. Objectives. Even though from what I've read it might be too often a race than anything else, it's real cool to have a goal and a time limit instead of taking your time walking around.
4. Campaign/linking quests. Totally awesome. Back in the day I loved the HQ expansions Kellar's Keep and With Lord, because all quests were part of a larger story with a climax at the end. I also very much love how there's ways that the same campaign can unfold differently based on succeeding/failing objectives.
5. Expansions. Oh god I love expansions.
6. In HQ, it was possible to clean the board early and leave the OL with nothing to use, taking your time to take every secret and treasure. Not so much here.
So. Please read that old thread and this one, and share any views you may have. I really just want to decide one way or the other and move on.
Thanks so much, beforehand.