Dead Man’s Doubloons Review

Land Ahoy! Grab your shovels and cutlasses boys, there’s treasure to be a digging and throats to be a cuttin’! I’ll lead a party ashore to pillage, explore and return with all the booty I can carry, you lads on the ship, follow the code and keep those filthy pirates at bay! Dead Man’s Doubloons from Thundergryph Games is a pirate adventure game of island exploration, naval battles of action programming and a doubloon-laden trove of take-that style mechanics.

Game: Dead Man’s Doubloons

Designer: Jason Miceli

Publisher: Thundergryph Games

Artists: Matthew Mizak

Player count: 2 - 6

Runtime: 40 - 60 mins

Doubloons and cannon balls will fly back and forth as easily and as frequently as the curses and name-calling. Each player will be desperately racing for the treasure buried at the peak of mount Zotétmon, once it has been claimed it’s all hands on deck as you either try and sail away as quickly as possible or send the wretch with all the gems down to Davy Jones’ Locker!

Right out of the docks I’m going to tell you some straight up facts about this game.

1. The artwork and components (especially the deluxe versions photographed here) are flippin brilliant.

2. The gameplay is ruthlessly take-that: sensitive souls beware!

3. The rulebook and insert are worse than a rum-infused hangover where you spent the night in a hammock in a cramped and smelly boat on rough seas.

[caption id="attachment_2713" align="alignnone" width="1600"] It's a manic and dangerous time on both land and sea[/caption]

Dead Man’s Doubloons tells a story over two game phases, the first; finding the treasure, followed by getting away with it. Using your rather lovely captain meeple you’ll slowly explore the unnamed island, judging and picking your route to spot marked “X”. There are various routes to the top, some more perilous than others, and some more rewarding. You’ll have to choose your way according to your needs and desperation; the blue coastal path is by far the longest but the safest, in contrast, the most direct route, red route, has a steep cost but will let you play catch up to the other captains.

[caption id="attachment_2716" align="alignnone" width="1600"] Losing two crew means your ship's special ability is lost, and for the Razzias this means doubloons could soon go missing too[/caption]

You see, you’re not alone looking for the treasure, in fact, your not the only pirate with that piece of the map. At the beginning of the game the map fragments are dished out to each player, and over the first few turns when taking the Quest action you’ll find additional fragments to better aid you in uncovering the treasure. Now, whenever you take a quest action to advance along a route on the island, any pirate who also has the same type of fragment you have declare you are following, well, they also get a free move. This quickly becomes an interesting choice, as you desperately try to keep your opponents back but advance yourself, send them blindly forward to suffer a cost you then don’t have to. It’s perfectly possible, you just need to pull off the right action at the right time against the right opponent. Which is about as easy as getting a bunch of sailors to clean up their language.

[caption id="attachment_2710" align="alignnone" width="1600"] With the right three cards, played at the right time you can quest and sail to victory...hopefully[/caption]

All the actions are managed using a programming mechanic with a slight variability via the multi-use cards. You’ll start the game with five cards and providing your crew doesn’t get pinched or killed you’ll stick with five cards, three of which you’ll use each turn, placing them face down in front of you. These cards present a simple set of actions, you’ll perform. The top of the card is your ship movement, and then you have a range of choices such as questing, attacking, repairing your ship or boarding one of your opponents. Each player, in turn, will complete a card’s action choice before play moves onto the next player, so you have those scant few moments of having a quick look around the table, mainly at the pirate you’re hoping to attack, trying to work out if, how and when you will launch your attack.

[caption id="attachment_2714" align="alignnone" width="1600"] The dreaded ghost ship prowls the waters, dishing out extra damage and carrying cursed doubloons, it's also immune to taking any further damage which makes them something to avoid[/caption]

This tandem play keeps engagement up, since one phase of the game is not reliant on the other, however, neither can be ignored. Once a route on the island is mostly explored playing catch up can be very safe, likewise if your ship is sunk it returns as a ghost ship, unable to take any more damage, but able to dish out extra - further to this it means that any doubloons or gems are cursed, but it turns out un-cursing yourself is “easy” it just requires five of those fateful coins.

Once the treasure is found, all players who are at the big X or even near it get to dig for some gems, then its all back to the ships and off you go. At this point the Captain Cards are shuffled into the deck, these when used advance the game end condition. All those landmark tiles that previously marked the route on the island, well they are now ‘exploits’ throwing them at your opponents, or should you need a little boost keeping them for yourself. It’s in this second stage of the game that there is quite a dramatic shift of pace. The player who thinks they’re in the lead just needs to stay away and stay afloat until they can cause the game end. For everyone else, it's a free for all.

[caption id="attachment_2712" align="alignnone" width="1600"] With a heap of diamonds each captain returns to their ship hoping to escape intact[/caption]

As is fitting for the theme, this is a cut-throat game from the off you’ll be firing, boarding, stealing, pillaging and it won’t stop. In fact, it gets worse. So, player beware, if you don’t like this style of game this isn’t for you. I had a blast, and thoroughly enjoyed my second and subsequent playthroughs of this game.

I didn’t enjoy my first game though, and if this were a “First Thoughts” style review it would read very differently. The rulebook is utter shite. I could sugar coat it, but I’d be doing you, dear reader, a disservice. My first playthrough was more or less out of the box with the rulebook open - because I was excited to play it - that excitement faded quicker than a wotsit when a sailor realises too late that that mermaid is actually a manatee. There is no anatomy of a player board, no indication as to what separates a Captain card from the seemingly identical action cards, the two-player variant is hidden at the back of the book as the third possible game variant - with no previous clue as to it even being there (making this game very flat in a two player game in my humble opinion).

Regarding my other irk about this game, the insert...well it’s clear the good folks at Thundergryph games tried really, really hard, but they missed the mark by a clear margin. Yes, it holds everything nice and safe. Too safe, getting those delicate looking ships out of the plastic insert...well, you know that feeling when you tear a cardboard counter when punching it? Now imagine it is a unique fragile plastic pirate ship. Removing this from the insert and putting them back is also an exercise in holdings one’s breath.

[caption id="attachment_2717" align="alignnone" width="1600"] There is a beautiful, tense moment before the first card is flipped, where all your plans and schemes could still work![/caption]

But, these “problems” are easily passed once you’ve dealt with them once, so you can get on enjoying this game, preferably at the higher player count, with a gaming group that is going to enjoy dishing out and taking damage. At two and three players though this game does suffer somewhat. You see as you lose crew, and you will, often and frequently, your hand size is reduced, from five to four, and then shortly after to three. At this point you are really on the back foot, you have no choice over how your ship moves, which, means the multi-use aspect of the programming become moot. With fewer ships on the board, you can often find yourself just sailing around not doing anything. Which, is pretty rubbish, because you’re still in the game but your role is perfunctory, not something you want in a game.

There are a number of modes of play, which in some ways feels a little like there is too much going on, as if designer and/or publisher couldn’t decide what should be cut, or kept having cool ideas that just bolted on to the game, but few of them feel truly at home. The Curse of the Black Gem feels a little unbalanced, and the “advanced” alternate Island board is a hot mess which might be fun if you can decrypt the rules for it - I gave up halfway through and house ruled it because I was sick of trying to figure it out.

[caption id="attachment_2715" align="alignnone" width="1600"] A fabulously colourful game with plenty of character and great take-that action[/caption]

All that being said, however, Dead Man’s Doubloons can tell an exciting story, and it does so in a very fun way. It is very easy to fall behind in this game, so providing you are ready for that type of game and know that when you start sliding down that slope you have to immediately claw it back. Dead Man’s Doubloons is simply (once you’ve figured out how to play), pretty and a lot of fun. Refreshingly this game comes in around the £40 mark, which is absolutely bang-on for this type of game.

Also: Pirates!

Disclaimer:

This review was based on a full priced Deluxe Kickstarter edition paid for out of my own money from my own pocket.  As such, some of the contents may vary from retail editions of the game.

Review: enDANGERed Orphans of Condyle Cove

Game Name:	enDANGERed Orphans of Condyle Cove	Published Year:	2016
Game Publisher:	Certifiable Studios	Player Scale:	2 – 4
Game Designer:	Jesse Labbe	Run Time:	5 – 40 mins

Condyle Cove is a dark and dreary place.  Stark and devoid of both colour and life.  It’s even more desperate if you are an orphan.  Alone, tired, dirty and afraid, struggling to survive and the odds of that…well, they weren’t great to begin with and they just keep getting worse.

 

 



In enDANGERed Orphans each player is a nameless orphan struggling to survive, you’ll wonder through Condyle Cove seeking refuge and safety where you can, using up your limited Options to try and stay afloat.  When you’re out of Options, the shadows part and the Bogeyman gets you.  If you find yourself running low on Options and truly desperate, you can always visit the menacingly named Kiddie Corner (or cul-de-sac) at the centre of the map and try an Act of Desperation, to breathe some limited life back into your game, but even that isn’t guaranteed.  As you could always uncover the Bogeyman him/her/itself and be lost to the void forever.  Mwahahahahahaha!

Okay, so this game may sound a little morbid and depressing thematically, and you would be kind of right, but let me put it this way:

Imagine Tim Burton had a nightmare and turned it into a board game with a Peanuts-esque artwork.



Interested now I bet, and now you’ve got the right feel for this game.

Playing the game

There are three types of cards in the game. Options – cards that you can play to give you bonuses or be detrimental to your opponents, these also form your life-deck.  Cove cards form the map of Condyle Cove, each card has a special ability which will affect any player on the card, and you’ll use these to map out the game area each time you play.  Acts of Desperation – as the name suggests these are last ditch attempt cards to stay in the game, most of these are “good” cards, and at least one of them is the Bogeyman.  Which is bad.  Very bad.



With that all in mind, the rules are very, very simple.  Move (if you want to), up to two spaces.  Play a card (if you want to), and you can play as many as you like in any order.  Draw two cards (either Cove Cards or Option Cards).  If you get to the Draw phase and are unable to draw two cards then it is game over for you and you always, always have to Draw two cards.  This means that after turn one, you will have to play a card.

Kiddie Corner and the Acts of Desperation (AOD) bring an exciting, and terrifying mini-game of chance into endangered Orphans.  You could argue that they are a little swingy, and you’d be right, but a gamble should be swingy.  If a player ever starts their turn at Kiddie Corner, they must pick one of the six Acts of Desperation cards.  Five of these will reinvigorate their Options deck to varying degrees.  One will end their game.  The next player to end up here, well, their odds just got a little steeper.



That’s it.  That’s the game.  This is a player exclusion game, with the last Orphan standing (alone, oh so very alone) being the winner.  enDANGERed Orphans is a quick, light game, that is full of player interaction and most importantly; fun.  It is simple, slick and doesn’t get in its own way with too many rules (I’ll discuss the rulebook a little later on) or limitations.  Simply play a card, do what it says.  Make a friend cry perhaps. And move along.

It is all Take-That though, and the game is very competitive, which may not appeal to everyone.  You can very clearly see you opponents Options deck deplete like a cardboard hour glass, and you’ll see them grin from ear to ear when they have that one card they need to ruin you (having a good poker-face will really help you out in this game).  You’ll start each turn with the seemingly innocuous yet difficult decision about moving.  Since many of the Cove cards grants an ability based on where you are, or are not, but you don’t want to stay put for too long.  Sure being in the Creek is handy for a while that is until someone plays Swept Away and makes you discard everything.  And as much as it is a risk, you don’t want to get too far away from Kiddie Corner, just in case…



The start of your first game, you might play nice.  You might start adding to the map instead of immediately causing problems for your fellow orphans.  But that won’t last.  Soon you’ll be causing cards to be discarded, you’ll be stealing and shuffling other pawns around the board with near reckless abandon. When you play your second game you’ll be a top–class, A-Grade d*ck with a capital “D”, straight out of the gate.  What’s more, you’ll have even more fun.



There may come a point in this game that a loss can fall a little flat, when you’re running low-ish on Options, and then, through a series of unfortunate events (read as ‘Dick moves’) you can find yourself without any viable options, no way to get to Kiddie Corner and nothing left in your Options deck.  This could just be because the people I play against much prefer watching me figuratively bleed-out, rather than just putting me out of my misery, but I do often feel robbed of a Game End when this comes about.

Now, about the components. 

I will start by saying: enDANGERed Orphans has my favourite board game components to date.  Not only is the artwork great in its dreary horridness but the pawns are utterly brilliant – painted or not these look and feel great.  The neoprene play mats: amazing.  The cards themselves are of the highest quality linen finished stock.  The box insert fits everything – including the expansions, with fully sleeved cards – all comfortably, perfectly.  Even the flippin’ box looks great with its spot UV cover art.  I could keep writing words, but you’re better off just looking at this stuff.  Really.



Fundamentally, enDANGERed Orphans is a card game.  In a basic two or three player game, you can strip the game down to around sixty cards and the standees – which you’ll be able to fit into a deck box.   I went with a Flip ‘n’ Tray to fit the expansions and pawns in to make easier to transport, which also adds it to my #LunchBreakGames series.



Bizarrely, it comes with both standees and pawns.  This is only bizarre because the pawns are so awesome.  I can’t see much use in the standees unless players particularly want to something more specific (since the pawns are both ethnic and gender neutral), like a cat.



There are a few expansions also available; Mr Coleman’s Carnival of Captivating Curiosities, Somewhere Down Lexington Drive, these add a new Cul-de-sac artwork card and different and new Acts of Desperation and some additional standees.  Do you need these to expand the game, or get a fuller game experience? No, they just add some more flavour and character.  The one expansion that mixes things up significantly is the Last Winter of Benny Harris which comes with the game which includes a new Cove and ability to draw a different type of card Last Winter, which are bonus actions, some of which are very bad against your opponents, some are very bad for you.  It’s another mini game, big gamble deck which can make the games a bit longer and a little more fun.



…a little later on

One thing about this game that seems to have caused quite a bit of fuss is the rule book.  Is it a very funny, laid-back, jocular and flippant rule book?  Yes, yes it is, there is a very good chance you laugh if not smirk when reading it.  Is it obtuse, vague and occasionally unhelpful, yeah, it kind of is that too.  Yet, as an intelligent, well humoured gamer you’ll get it.  The rules are very, very simple:

Move.

Play.

Draw.

When you’re out of Options you’re out!



Certifiable Studios have gone with the less is more system here and on the whole it works.  If you are a Rule Hound type of gamer…fix yourself a cup of chai tea and find your happy place before opening this rule book.  If you can play a game comfortably by playing logically, sensibly then you’ll be fine.  This lack of clarity extends to some of the cards too, unfortunately with mixed terminology that again, will upset the thoroughbred rule hounds.  Certain Cove card prohibit cards being “Taken” from your hand, but the language on the Options cards uses “Steal” .  Another location stops your pawn being moved – but is that moved as in “Moved one/two/three spaces” like the movement phase, or does it include being taken from one cove location and placed on another.  As a personal bugbear I would have preferred that the term orphan was used in place of ‘anybody’, or ‘pawn’ or ‘player’ to keep the theme and mechanic more interlocked.  A future edition of this game would tighten a lot of these “issues” up quickly and simply, in doing so it making this game more immediately accessible to newer/less experienced or younger gamers.

So…

enDANGERed Orphans is a very completive game, with lots and lots of Take That, which could very easily make you fall out with your friends. It looks utterly amazing, and has set the bar very high for any subsequent games from Certifiable Studios.  Ironically, considering the theme of the game, it oozes love and affection from its creators and they have wanted to deliver the very best, most fun product they could.  I feel they have succeeded in this.  Yes, it is a glorified card game, but, oh.  The glory of it!



The Good:

Great player interaction

Brilliant components

Amazing artwork

Quick and easy rule set

Exciting elements of luck mixed with light strategy/hand management

Funny rulebook

The Bad:

Full on Take-That game – which some may not like

Player Exclusion –which again, some might not like

The theme may put you off, but stop being a sissy and play it

Obtuse rulebook

Occasionally ambiguous card wording

Semi-pointless standees (they still look ace though)

This game was purchased/ backed on Kickstarter at The "GREEDY BASTARDS" Level

 

Review: Boss Monster

Game Name:	Boss Monster	Published Year:	2013
Game Publisher:	Brotherwise Games	Player Scale:	2 - 4
Game Designer:	Johnny O'Neal & Chris O'Neal	Run Time:	20 – 40 mins

Boss Monster flips the typical and clichéd narrative of heroes vanquishing monster at the end of a perilous dungeons and makes YOU the Boss Monster.  You’ll be building trap rooms, monster hatcheries, and haunted libraries etc. in an attempt to save your scaly and monstrous hide from a range of would-be heroes.  If that doesn’t already sound like fun, you’ll be playing this game in a wonderfully retro homage to the 8-bit computer games of the eighties and nineties.

Your mission is simple, lure fabled heroes into your ever growing, and increasingly dangerous dungeon to destroy them.  The Boss Monster who collects ten hero’s souls first is declared the winner, and boss amongst bosses.  Alternatively, the last Boss left standing wins if any Heroes are able to penetrate you’re almost death-trap and score five wounds.

Boss Monster presents a wonderful merging of theme and mechanics in this quick and light game of tableau and pattern building, harking back to the late eighties and early nineties video games like Super Mario Brothers, with its replication of side scrolling dungeon exploration, and monster crushing.  Dungeons are made up of a maximum of five Dungeon room cards, and each of which will carry with it a damage value, a treasure type and special rule.



 

Each turn players may add another room to their dungeon that can be at the end of the tableau of cards or layering a card over an existing one, in this way players can adjust the damage and special effects of cards, chaining them together for maximum effect.  This will also allow players to attract (or repel) the various Heroes that appear in town each turn.  With four different types of hero with their own treasure preference; fighters like fighting, thieves like gold and so on

 

On the surface, Boss Monster is a very simple game, you have only one build action per turn, and your choice of that action extends as far as your hand of dungeon room cards.  Equally, your dungeon is built with a very tight construct: only placing cards to the leftmost space or over an existing card.  Spell cards are another action that you can take, and you can play any as many of these in a turn as you can afford to, with the simple limitation of being played during the build phase, or whilst an adventurer is in a dungeon (Adventurer Phase).  Unlike Dungeon room cards, Spell cards aren’t drawn each round, getting more of these very useful cards will require particular room effects.



All of this makes Boss Monster very, very easy to teach but it takes a lot longer to master.  You don’t want to attract too many heroes too early, as there is a very good chance you’ll end up taking wounds and getting knocked out of the game, but you also need to start building up your dungeon and this needs to be relative to your opponents.  If players are tied for the most gold, the Thieves wait in town until there is a clear leader, and since you can build over existing rooms you can use this ability to force bottle-necked heroes into you opponents dungeon when they are ill-equipped to deal with the onslaught – even better if you have a few nasty spells up your sleeve.

The limited actions do sometimes feel very limited, every now and then you can end up with a hand of dross particularly in the later stages of the game or spells that won’t have any worthwhile effects, so your hand becomes cluttered and full.  This stagnation can be more frustrating if an opponent is running away with the lead.  The obvious solution to this comes in the form of expansions, of which there are many, adding more and new flavours and jokes to your games.

 

[caption id="attachment_1735" align="alignnone" width="4032"] One can't help but notice the likeness of a young bespectacled wizard facing off for the Counter Spell[/caption]

There is, I feel a very fine balance between direct and indirect player interaction that Boss Monster strikes.  The Spell cards introduce a clear Take-That aspect to the game yet none of them have a particularly nasty sting, so no-one’s fun is ruined solely by a spell.  Indirectly, good or experienced players will monitor and be aware of the dungeons around them, which heroes are being attracted, the room combinations that are particularly effective and so that you can plan and scheme your machinations of destruction by building your dungeon to conflict or contract with theirs.

Boss Monster is made up of a few simple decks of cards, Heroes, Dungeon Rooms, Bosses, and Spells and the art work, and iconography throughout is all simple and totally on theme; capturing the tone and feel of those 8-bit games.  When playing Boss Monster you cannot possibly forget you are playing a table top adaptation of those games and for many gamers who grew up with and loved that era of gaming Boss Monster will resonate with you immediately, and there is a fair chance you in fact already own this game.  Younger games will still be impressed by its charm and the small flourishes and nods to fantasy works such as Jonny of the Evening Watch.



This game looks great on the table it even looks great on the shelf with the loving recreated pixelated art, theme and box.  It is super quick and easy to pick up and play and understanding the finer points to the game’s strategy all evolve at a good steady pace when you’re all new to the game.  The luck of the draw can limit your choices when only playing with the core set, which also means that more experienced gamers may fatigue of this game after a few playthroughs.  It is a very charming, fun small box game, one which you are unlikely to ever forget playing.

 

The Good:

Balance Take-That and indirect player interaction

Loving homage theme and art

Very simple and easy to learn

The Bad:

Luck of the draw can limit player’s hand and thus choices

Expansions are “needed” to keep the game fresh and challenging for higher replayability

 

If you like Boss Monster you may also like Quadropolis – which is also a tableau/pattern building game which is very reminiscing of classic city building computer games of the eighties and nineties.