Uprising: Curse of the last Emperor - cooperative 4 for 2-4 participants. Players must defeat both the legions of the Empire and the hordes of Chaos to win freedom for their peoples. FILLING THE BOX  The quality of Uprising's components is impressive. All the illustrations are great. The plastic stands look great, as does the playing field. It is very large and divided into hexes. The game laid out on the table looks impressive. The playing field simultaneously serves as a very convenient landmark, where a rather complex structure of the move is written in detail, and in two directions; no matter where you sit, it will be easy to reach the attraction. In addition to the main playing field, there are also two tablets: one for quests and items, the other for the bad ones. A pleasant, but completely optional supplement. If they are not placed on your table, you can simply not use them. As for the players' tablets, they are also good quality and thick and also clutter the field. The cards are made of high-quality material, although they tend to stick together, which makes it difficult to shuffle them. Protectors are highly desirable. I liked that garrisons are marked with plastic tokens that are placed on top of each other, as well as walls and towers that you can surround your shelters with. There's a lot of stuff on the playing field, and it's nice that three garrisons take up as much space as one garrison. Thank God, the game has a built-in organizer, and a very good one at that. It is far from ideal: cubes do not fit in there, and there is no compartment for some items. But in general, it is quite convenient and speeds up the layout of the game. I also really liked the rule book: small, square format, spring-bound - just the thing to lay open during the game. It looks bright, there are a lot of examples, everything is clear, except for a few points that would not hurt to describe in more detail. There is also a table of contents and an index, thanks to which it is easiest to find the necessary rule. I really appreciate that the authors clearly worked on the rulebook, unlike many other companies. 4X IN CUT DOWN VIEW  In Uprising 2–4, the tribes decide to take advantage of the conflict between Chaos and the Empire to regain their independence. Players will have to explore new lands (eXploration), collect resources (eXploitation), build units and new shelters (eXpansion), and, if everything goes well, destroy the forces of the Empire and Chaos (eXtermination - whoever destroys whom is a big question). Players score joint victory if they have more victory points than the Empire and Chaos by the end of the game. At the start, players have almost nothing: only one shelter (village) in the corner of the map, some resources, a few starting specialties and a hero. Most of the land is unexplored, so the hexes lie shirt-side up — except for the imperial capital in the center of the map and its surrounding garrisons. The party is divided into 4 chapters. Although the turn structure is quite complex, the basics are clear from the turn: in the event phase, enemies are placed on the map, in the construction phase, players build armies and fortify shelters, in the action phase, players act by spending their 8 action points, in the nemesis phase, enemies move, and in the set of points, everyone gets their software. At first glance, everything looks standard: at the beginning of the game, your hero explores several new lands, revealing the hexes and enemies placed on them. Your armies go out to fight them (and win if you're lucky). You build a new shelter in new territories, which will bring you resources to build new armies, etc. However, Uprising has a number of significant differences from the classic formula. The mechanics are closely interconnected, the difficulty is very high, and you need to cooperate so that you have at least a chance to win.  The process of exploring the surrounding area is dangerous: there is an enemy on each opened hex (and if it is empty, then one of the enemies in the game receives reinforcements). And these enemies will help the goblins if you don't exterminate them right away: Imperial Garrisons bring Imperial OP, and Chaos Skeletons... Well, they are quite passive on their own, but if you have to place three Skeletons on one hex, then a Chaos Horde will appear, and the appearance of the horde is very bad news. You get nowhere without research, but at the same time, research makes your opponents stronger. You have your own army to fight the garrisons and skeletons. Initially, only basic units are available to you, but later you will have access to advanced units. Each unit rolls one die. The color of the cube depends on its chances of throwing a hit, shield (which cancels enemy hits) or lightning (allows you to activate special abilities); different units have different dice. Additionally, archers roll their dice before combat, potentially giving them a chance to shoot an opponent on approach. Although enemies can also have archers... The main problem is that you can't have more than 5 units in one hex, and therefore in one skirmish. The world of Uprising is a cold wasteland that simply does not have the resources to feed a large army. Therefore, you will always have to carefully plan in advance with whom and when to enter into battle. A couple of skeletons or level 1 garrisons are usually easy pickings, but more serious opponents present problems. Both garrisons and skeletons are mere flowers compared to... LEGIONS OF DEATH  Your main opponents are the legions of the Empire and the hordes of Chaos. Although each of them is represented by one stand, in fact there is a whole cluster of unpleasant units. Horde/Legion characteristics and the dice they roll are listed on a separate card, with their hazard level (basically HP difference) ranging from 1 to 7. And they roll lots and lots of dice. Moreover, they are not only big and scary, but they will make you dirty in every way: they make you dirty when they are displayed on the field, they make you dirty every time they throw lightning. They will teleport you to unpleasant locations, steal one of your 8 actions until their death, steal one of your actions forever, destroy your units before the battle begins. Legions will literally chase you. Each legion has its own objective token, which is awarded to the player with the fewest troops. The Legion will move towards that player until it destroys their shelter. Then it will move to the next shelter of that player... In short, you get a personal nemesis.  Hordes of Chaos are not so dangerous at first glance, but only at first. They don't have a specific goal, although they will definitely prioritize the player's shelter if it comes their way. The main thing is that they curse the lands they pass through. Cursed lands are of no benefit to the players, and even worse, bring OP to Chaos. This creates an interesting dichotomy: The Empire is trying to intercept and destroy you, so you have to play defensively. Chaos is not as focused, but you will have to intercept his hordes yourself - otherwise Chaos will easily win. Battles with hordes and legions are the most epic part of the game. These are formidable opponents, and you have a maximum of 5 units in one battle. So an undamaged horde/legion cannot be defeated in one battle; will have to attack multiple times, often by multiple players. In Uprising, your armies will be decimated repeatedly (but you'll rebuild them just as often if you're lucky). PLAYER OPPORTUNITIES  However, the players are far from defenseless. Actually, they have so many different tools at their disposal that it is easy to forget about any possibility. To begin with, each hero has their own special ability deck (and each faction has two heroes to choose from), and you'll get a new one in each chapter. Some are useful in combat (effects vary from rolling dice to all kinds of bonuses), others allow you to manipulate the map, others provide mobility, etc. Most combat special abilities work only if there is a hero on that hex. If you attack yourself, it is not difficult to plan everything. If you are attacked by several enemies, it becomes much more difficult. There is also a market in the game where you can buy useful items. And druid cards, which are revealed in each chapter and give bonuses when discarding monsters. And quests are cards that give useful buns if you roll a certain result on the dice (by the way, this is the only way to remove the curse). And varied terrain that can help or hinder. In short, there are a lot of all kinds of factors here. It's a good idea to read the rules carefully before matches to know what can affect the outcome of the fight if you want to have a chance of winning. But the main tool in your arsenal is the conflict between Chaos and the Empire. They treat each other no more kindly than they treat you. When Horde and Legion converge on the same hex, they engage in battle. Such moments are especially gratifying. Moreover, these are random clashes; The placement and movement mechanics of the hordes/legions are well known, so with some effort you can manipulate them by pitting them against each other. This is an important component of the game that is critical to success. FLEXIBILITY The parties in Uprising are difficult, especially for beginners. While players aren't permanently out of the game—if a player gets rid of all shelters, they place new ones for free in the next chapter—they can find themselves in a very unenviable position. But after a while you will gain experience, start winning and probably want more challenges. Fortunately, Uprising is a flexible game. The duration of the games is adjustable: you can play in 3 sections, you can also play in 2. I do not recommend the latter (the layout takes too much..

 "The Thing" is an excellent game: exciting, with tension that builds as the game progresses, just like in the movie. The weight category is medium. The replayability is very decent. COMPONENTS  I bought the kickstarter Super Deluxe. The components in it are gorgeous. Excellent miniatures, and the characters are recognizable (which cannot be said about Western Legends, for example). Thick, pleasant to the touch plastic tokens. The cards are also thick. My only gripe is that the text on the tokens used in the contact phase is white on white. It's a little hard to read. Also, when playing alien-human interactions, dog tokens are used, which was a little confusing to us until we realized that this was for economy: to not produce an extra set of tokens for humans. In general, this is a trifle. BOOK OF RULES The rulebook doesn't miss a beat, but it does feel confusing in places, especially when it comes to the layout process. Technically everything is correct, but to understand, you have to read the whole section carefully. There is a lot of commotion with decks, bags, etc. depending on the number of players. An example of a confused description is the instructions for mixing location maps in the dogs section. In general, it's a good idea to read the rules sections carefully before doing anything. GAME PROCESS  The game is good in many ways because it borrows a lot of mechanics from other games: we found references to Avalon, "Dead of Winter", Ultimate Werewolf Extreme and even "Secret Hitler". However, the mechanics did not stupidly copy, but modified. Almost all changes benefited the game. In essence, this is a game about the secret placement of workers (each character can go to one location per turn), in which there are interesting, difficult solutions. Here is one of our "favorite" points: when repairing the base (which is a critical part of the game), if 2 characters are in the same location, then you get great bonuses. For example, if 1 character repairs a radio station, you will repair one token, if 2, you will repair three tokens, and if 3, then as many as six. So there is a good reason to go around the locations not alone.  However, when two or more characters appear in the same location, contact occurs. If one of the participants participating in the contact is an alien (at the start, one of the players becomes an alien, that is, a bad guy), then with a 50% chance he will infect others, and they will also become aliens. Thus, for the sake of bonuses, you have to take risks every time. And this is just one of many situations where a difficult decision must be made.  Another interesting aspect of the worker placement mechanic is that on your turn you place your character in the chosen location and place the action card face down. Available actions are activation, repair and sabotage; the effect of each differs depending on the selected location. When everyone goes, the leader shuffles the deck, turns the card over and chooses which character to assign it to. Then, if desired, he can reveal the next card from the stack, and so on, until each character gets one. It reminds me a lot of the mechanics of Avalon, only with new interesting nuances. There are many different victory conditions for both humans and aliens, and with the addition of Norwegian Station (based on the 2011 film), there are even more. I will not go into further details of the rules. I will only say that all the mechanics of the game are designed to generate tension, annoyance and force you to make difficult decisions. CONS OF THE GAME Personally, there are almost no flaws in "The Thing". The only complaint is that the characters have asymmetric abilities, most of which boil down to "Your character gets a bonus at location X." The problem is that because of this, players often go to the same location every turn to get a bonus. Maybe it's not that bad, since the leader shuffles the deck anyway, and deciding which card to put in the stack is just as important as deciding where to go.  Another drawback is the rules. If you read the rules cover to cover before the start, it will be difficult to digest them. Before the first game, it is better to familiarize yourself with how the phases of the game are arranged, and then make the first move, explaining the rules of the current phase as you go. Rarely applicable rules (such as dissecting an alien) can be explained as follows: “If an alien is revealed, it receives powerful buns. On your turn, you can open into Phase X if you're an alien, and then we'll run through the rules." True, hardcore fans who prefer to know all the rules in advance will have a hard time. I also want to emphasize an interesting point: when people are infected, only the infected player will know about it; even the alien who infected has no idea if he succeeded. In our party, when about half way through the party, EVERYONE became aliens, but we didn't know it. When the game ended (with the aliens winning, unsurprisingly) and we revealed the cards, we spent 20 minutes trying to trace who infected whom.  The Thing will definitely remain in my collection and I'll be putting the game down regularly. Especially in winter...

 Karаk, Voices in My Head, Mansions of Madness and other novelties await you on our shelves. New projects with different mechanics and gameplay will be a great addition to your collection of board games. Also, already well-known world hits have returned to our shop...

REVIEW I've read a lot of reviews on ATO, and often they start with the disclaimer that "I have played / not played Kingdom Death: Monster". Not sure how helpful this will be, but I thought I'd write my ATO review as someone who is very familiar with KDM. I've gone through so many KDM campaigns (both successful and not so successful) that I've lost count of them. I have all the expansions from the first kickstarter and went all-in on the second kickstarter. KDM is still my favorite game and I'm looking forward to the Gambler's Chest and everything else (it's just a shame I have to wait so long).  As for ATO, I initially invested in it to keep me occupied while waiting for the second KDM kickstarter to arrive, as I already knew Poots would be developing KDM for a long time (although I had no idea it would be that long). I ordered just the base, thinking it would just be a KDM in an ancient Greek setting; practically a reskin. I'm now 30 days into the ATO campaign and I'm happy to report that I was wrong.  The key difference lies in the names of the games themselves. Kingdom Death: Monster focuses on monsters. Every year you choose which of the available monsters to fight, prepare for the battle with all your might and then fight. After the battle (if you won, of course), you process the carcass, take the resources obtained by sweat and blood back to the settlement, and next year everything is repeated. The plot here is gloomy, dark, scattered with crumbs throughout the campaign. The story consists of events and situations that you remember; For example, how one survivor died a terrible death and the other survived against all odds. You yourself shape the plot during the game, create the history of your settlement and your survivors. Rando Calrissian was sent to the company of 3 other newcomers to certain death as cannon fodder, but he acquired acid palms and tore monster after monster to pieces with his bare hands and teeth. Athena Topless refused to wear the breastplate, but still endured blow after blow, year after year. Of all the games I know of, Kingdom Death is the best at generating stories like this.  And Aeon Trespass: Odyssey is a long, painstakingly crafted journey with a great story and plenty of adventure. There's a complete story waiting for you and as much art as you can find in almost any interpreter, including even other games with long campaigns. While there are elements of choose-your-own-adventure to the story, overall the narrative is fixed. Yes, you'll be fighting Primal monsters on a regular basis, but the fights are just a means to an end, and they mostly happen at intervals. They are needed to test your readiness for the troubles ahead and to provide you with resources for ship and equipment upgrades. In general, everything is focused on the plot. We spent about 60% of our time exploring the world around us and doing storybook adventures.  Of course, ATO's mechanics are heavily inspired by KDM - especially the AI decks and Primordial body parts - but these mechanics are applied in a very different way than in KDM. All the KDM mechanics help you prepare for the next battle with the monster, and all the ATO mechanics (at least the ones I've seen so far) help the plot. So these two games do not compete with each other, but occupy different niches in my collection. ATO is clearly inspired by KDM, but it's a different game at the same time. However, in terms of difficulty of mastering and amount of fiddling, ATO even surpasses KDM. For me, this is not a minus, just a statement of fact. Overall, KDM is a game that encourages you to create your own stories and memorable moments, while ATO is an adventure that awaits you (and a great adventure, in my opinion). In KDM, you're fascinated by crafting new gear, settlement development, and stories from the lives (and deaths) of your people. In ATO, you are fascinated by adventure, exploration of the surrounding world, and story progression. It can be said that in KDM the plot unfolds mainly on a micro level, while in ATO it is mainly on a macro level: an epic narrative that tells a ready-made story (however, during the campaign you will have to make decisions, so that your story will differ from that of other players).  If you haven't played either and are thinking of getting one, I hope you found my review helpful. The decision should be made based on what kind of plot you are interested in, but you can also choose based on the attractiveness of the setting; both games are great and deserve places in the collection.  I will not consider what I would choose if I could only choose one thing; KDM is still my favorite game of all time, but I'm so glad I owned ATO and was wrong to assume it was going to be a KDM clone. My only disappointment with ATO so far is that I didn't order cycles 4 and 5 during the kickstarter campaign and now I have to spend more on them...

 Note: Review is based on 8 games with a friend. We decided to play co-op because the rules are not that easy to get used to and because my friend doesn't like to compete. We won twice (and jokingly noted that we had just watched "Alien" and "Alien 2", because in the first game the aliens appeared only at the end, when we were already in the cryocapsules, and in the second game, after waking up, we immediately started shooting the aliens by the end my soldier had 5 frags, maybe more), three times we lost in a tight fight by a hair of victory (due to a bunch of bad rolls), and three times the game crushed us without a chance (with some coincidence the ship can explode at the end of the first turn, also, with a certain coincidence of circumstances, the character can die at the end of the first turn, both of which happened to us). In general, I love "Nemesis" because the game is very thematic and because it will not be possible to plan ahead and optimize all actions, unlike many other decks; all that remains is to do as the circumstances suggest and enjoy the unfolding story. 2 players is clearly not an optimal lineup for Nemesis, so in the future we plan to use 2 characters each, because when there are only 2 characters in the game, you just don't have enough time for a lot of interesting things. The size of the map does not change, and the actions to explore it are much less. If you're unlucky with the layout of the rooms, 2 characters barely have enough time to complete the objectives and reach the escape pods before the timer runs out, provided they're not interrupted (in our winning and near-winning games, the timer was 1 - 2 moves). In conditions of acute lack of actions, it is impossible to be distracted by something extra.  The co-op mode is generally not bad, but the game was clearly not designed to be co-op; some cards and items are completely useless in this mode. If we had more players, I would definitely prefer standard mode. It's officially called semi-co-op, but in practice it can go from "co-op just called something else" to "I'd rather burn the ship to the ground than let anyone but me win" depending on your group and is much more interesting. It also seems more difficult, but on the other hand, it is enough for one player to win. Co-op is generally easier, but everyone has to win. In my opinion, standard mode should be played with 4 or more players, so that there is as much chaos as possible on the field.  Here's my ranking of the characters for the two-player co-op mode by fandom. 1. SOLDIER  This brute has exactly one goal in life - to kill aliens. I am very happy when I get a soldier in the draft. It's durable enough to roam the corridors alone - just don't expect it to be effective at anything other than grinding aliens. However, his ability to effectively dispose of aliens with ammo is invaluable in a game where other characters can barely kill even one adult alien. Oddly enough, I consider a soldier to be a supporter. He supports you by covering your ass and killing everything that gets in the way of an important goal. And if it doesn't kill, then at least it will give you an opportunity to escape. A very fan character with great weapons and decent quest items. You might think that the support role makes him less valuable in a two-player game, since he has almost no one to go with in a team, but he also shows himself well as a scout, opening the map and leaving behind corpses of aliens. He copes well with this role, he is very much a fan. 2. SCOUT An interesting character; the complete opposite of a soldier. If the soldier covers the others, the scout tries to be as far away from the other characters as possible. Her action deck is generally very impressive, but the ability to move without making noise is priceless. The weapon is not great, but there are a lot of cartridges, and it is not bad for suppressing fire with subsequent escape; it is not necessary to kill the alien that got out. I think it's best for the scouts to explore the key rooms as soon as possible and let the rest know where to go. Moreover, the game rewards for this, since one of its quest items is given in the cabin, where you should go anyway. Both of her quest items are very good. The security key allows you to manipulate the door, helping your friends (or hindering them in standard mode) from anywhere on the map, and the motion scanner is even nicer. Probably the most pumped item in the game. You can lose quickly due to random events if you're very unlucky, but a misplaced noise is much more likely to ruin your game, creating a sort of time spiral, with noise dropping much more often. The ability to roll noise cubes allows you to be cheeky and get out of the water dry. 3. MECHANIC  In general, I like him more than anyone, but he has a bad habit of wandering around alone, unable to stand up for himself. Despite all his utility, he is extremely vulnerable and unable to recover from a series of failures, so he is not as fun to play as the characters listed above. His quest items and weapons are mediocre, but that doesn't really matter because he has an extremely powerful action deck. He has two simple ways to repair rooms, the ability to use room actions for free, and the only available default way to get rid of fires without a fire extinguisher, which is just cool: fire is a very dangerous thing (he's also the only character who can easily start a fire, which in co-op is much less useful, but won us a game once when we set fire to a nest full of eggs and went on to another objective). And the map of movement along the technical corridor makes him apparently a mobile character in the game. The mechanic's role is to get to the engines, repair them, then fix broken rooms or put out fires. Unfortunately, my mechanic often went to certain death in the last third of the game in order for the escape pods to unlock. This character lives brightly, but not for long. 4-5. PILOT/SCIENTIST  I only played with the scientist once, but with the pilot quite a lot. In my opinion, these are equal characters. Maybe we were just unlucky, but both didn't seem very helpful. They are not good at standing up for themselves, just like a mechanic, but the actions available to them are not as powerful as a mechanic. Both appear to be background characters whose job it is to stay in the safe zone and activate room actions or unlock tiles, speeding up the exploration process. Unfortunately, none of this is very useful in a two-player game, as you have few actions and are running headlong around the map. Both characters have a lot of interesting things, but there was no time to implement them.  It is worth noting that the pilot can extract the key to the escape pod, and the scientist can start the self-destruct mechanism of the ship from any point. Both of them open access to escape pods, which allows you to quickly escape from the ship after completing the objectives, but the mechanic can do the same by killing himself, and bringing much more benefit (in co-op, you need to complete all the objectives, but one character is enough to survive ). 6. CAPTAIN  The pilot and the scientist can be useful and fan characters in a large team, but I'm not sure about the captain. In any case, not in the cooperative for sure. I'm even considering removing his card from the draft. He doesn't look like a ship's captain at all; it is the pilot who knows the ship like the back of his hand and can control it as he wishes. "Captain" is more like an official who happened to be on board. He is a pure support and only useful in a party, but the effect of his support is very questionable, and only works on the same room as him, which makes party cooperation with him a nightmare, given the order of the round (unless he gets a quest item , which allows you to command those who are in certain rooms... provided you're lucky and someone is there). The captain wants to be your partner, just like a soldier, but unlike a soldier, he is completely independent and there is little point in him even as a partner. His second quest item allows you to look at another player's objective card, which is useless in co-op, since objectives are public information. But in standard mode, the captain is most likely one of the best characters, because he is the best at scheming. Find out who you can trust by looking at their objective card, go in their company and help out when needed... and when they're no longer useful, use the action cards, which are great for saving by feeding your rivals to the aliens. In general, not a captain, but a real politician...

BRIEF OVERVIEW  Rating - 7.5/10.  Buy DD if: You liked the PC version OR if you are a fan of dark fantasy like Lovecraft. You want a rectilinear cube metal dungeon crawler. You like nice miniatures and/or you like to paint them. You have nothing against games that are not very difficult or tactically deep. You have a lot of money (for replayability, it is recommended to have at least 1 add-on; currently only Crimson Court can be bought). Do not buy DD if: You would rather buy 3-4 good board games for the same price, even if they have fewer miniatures in total. You are not interested in a dungeon crawler. You don't care about thumbnails. You prefer complex decks with tactical depth. You don't like randomness (there are dice rolls when attacking, random dungeon exploration in corridors, random tile layout). You do not like the idea that you can lose due to randomness. You don't want to play the campaign (you can't play outside the campaign mode in DD). You don't have much free space on your desk. DETAILED REVIEW  Darkest Dungeon: The Board Game is a dungeon crawler based on the computer game of the same name. Four heroes (always four - i.e. designed for 1-4 players) go into dungeons, fight monsters, gain experience and gold, and also often die or receive terrible injuries and disorders (both in battle and while wandering around long) corridors connecting rooms filled with monsters). The campaign consists of 4 acts. Acts 1–3 each have three dungeons; in the first two you gain gold and experience, and in the third you fight the boss. After completing 3 bosses (that is, 9 dungeons), you are presented with the final creepy act with the most terrifying part of the Dark Dungeon. I will not spoil; let me just say that this is definitely my favorite act. After each trip to the dungeon, heroes can heal, recover and upgrade skills in the town of Hamlet. Each character also has their own unique skill that can be used in Hamlet. Some treat, others give supplements. supplies or some bonuses for the next campaign. Completing each dungeon takes 60-120 minutes, and each visit to Hamlet takes 10-30 minutes. If everyone in your group understands quickly, then the passage may take even less time (and vice versa), but since the options for each individual player, as a rule, are few, analysis paralysis is unlikely.  It is based on 11 characters, each with its own parameters and characteristics. Many have the same skills, and some have the same roles, but they all feel different and quite close to the computer originals. There are no traditional roles (tank, healer and damager), but there are combat positions that are well known to those who played computer DD: aggressive, defensive, long-range and support. Most characters are optimal in a certain position, but some are equally good in several positions. Obviously, some characters tank better or heal better than others, but the effect of combat stances is more important. Most of the skills of heroes and monsters only work in certain positions, so their position is very important. Moreover, there can be only one monster and one hero in each rack. There are also 4 bosses in the base (except act 4), a bunch of different monsters and a lot of all kinds of content (temperament traits, items, diseases, rooms, etc. ed.). Taken together, all this provides good regrabability. GAME PROCESS  You spend most of the game in combat. You activate heroes (previously monsters, if you're lucky - the initiative (i.e., turn order) is determined randomly) and decide which skills to use. What's better: healing an ally or stabbing a monster? Or maybe stun him so he misses a move? Is it just a matter of buffing an ally to increase the critical hit chance? In combat, the player has two actions that can be spent moving, interacting with loot, changing positions, or using skills. The first and fourth are most often used. The tactic in battle is primarily to move correctly so that you can use 2 skills at once on the next turn (at least that's how I played). In complex battles, there is not enough action, so you may not even have enough time to open the desired loot chest. But you usually have time to discover them during combat. After the fight, they disappear perfectly. When applying experience, you roll a D10 to hit. If you roll a low enough value, you can land a critical hit. Monsters also use D10, so both sides have chances to smear and critical hits. Depending on the level of the character, players have a choice of 3-5 skills in battle (there are 7 skills in total, you can take 3-5 per battle), which is quite a lot. However, sometimes there will be only one or two optimal options. Some characters have clearly useful and useless skills, so if you want to always have a lot of options to choose from, choose your character and skills wisely. Which skills are available for use depends both on the position of the character and on the range of the skill: some can be used only against the enemy in the same position as the character, others - in the adjacent position, the third - in 2 positions from him. Fortunately, there are also relatively flexible skills. Battles take up most of the game time. Between battles, there is an exploration phase: the heroes wander through the corridors of the dungeon, roll dice and get some effects. Periodically as you explore, you'll come across rooms full of monsters, and that's when the battle begins. The dungeon is represented by a separate field on which room tiles are randomly laid out (depending on the current mission), and exploration is simply moving a group token/miniature from one room to another. Usually you have a choice in which order you go through the dungeons, but sometimes you just go straight ahead. Dungeon exploration is very atmospheric in my opinion. This is a fairly quick process, especially considering the mechanics of intelligence, which in 90% of cases are mandatory to use. During exploration, each player gets a stress unit (more on that below), then you reveal all the nearby rooms. Also, you'll only roll 1 research die on your next research instead of 2. Since (depending on the current act) you almost always get at least 1 stress and some damage on the die roll, scouting is simply necessary. And it's boring. Not all rooms have monsters, but in the ones without monsters, negative effects await you, so it makes sense to spend most of your time fighting.  Now about stress. In addition to health, you also have a stress score. It's basically a second HP strip. Stress accumulates during exploration, from some monster abilities, when receiving a critical hit due to the features of some dungeon rooms, and even from some hero abilities. If you accumulate 10 stress points, you must make a resolve check by rolling a D10. If you somehow avoid it or throw out 1-2, you get a serious buff, if you throw out 3+, you get psychosis - a serious debuff. If you accumulate 20 stress points, you die of a heart attack. It should be noted that the stress counters are made simply terribly. They should not be considered properly, but the level of stress is marked with an ordinary token, which can easily be accidentally moved to the wrong position. I recommend marking your stress level with a separate die or tokens from some other board (the brain-shaped tokens from Arkham Horror are the same). In addition to death from a heart attack, characters can also die after receiving the fourth negative character trait (most often in the process of research) or when health reaches zero. However, what is unusual, at zero health the character does not die instantly, but reaches the so-called the threshold of death. As a reward/penalty, you get an extra die to roll every time you take damage. When the skull is thrown, the character finally dies. It is possible to acquire a new character in Hamlet after the party returns from the dungeon, if of course there are adventurers in town willing to join the party. If you can't get 4 characters, you lose the campaign and have to start over.  You will also lose the campaign if all 4 characters die in the dungeon, which is unlikely, but possible with extreme bad luck. I won't go into much detail about Hamlet's phase. It takes only 10-15 minutes. Players spend the gold they find in the dungeon to heal stress and damage, as well as all kinds of bonuses for the next dungeon trip. Even in Hamlet, you can improve skills and level up characters. By the way, there is an important bug in the game: the location "Guild" allows you to increase the level of a character or skill by 1, and not to increase a skill or character of level 1 to level 2 (otherwise you would not be able to level above level 2). EXPERIENCE FROM THE GAME APPEARANCE AND QUALITY OF COMPONENTS + Gorgeous thumbnails. If you like to paint them, then it's even ++ for you. - Unfortunately, the game does not have the red enemy miniatures promised at the start of the Kickstarter campaign. It's a pity that it didn't work out. I would be happy to paint them. + The quality of other components ranges from decent to excellent. - Cards in protectors do not fit into boxes. Sad, but expected. You will have to make your organizer from cardboard and electrical tape, as usual. PRINTS AND RULES - The game has a lot of typographical errors, including on the cards and on the playing field. - There is no description of many possible situations in the rule book, which forces people to ask "stupid" questions in Discord and Facebook. Not that dumb actually, as the rulebook only explains the basics of gameplay. FAN + The game is fan-made. Destroying monsters is especially nice. Players cringe when critically hit, and cheer loudly when critically hit. + It is interesting to choose skills, as well as to think of skill combinations of different characters. LEVEL-UPS AND LOOT + Playing RPG-like games, including dungeon..

 I have been waiting for King of Monster Island for a long time. This is a co-op dice-rolling game in the Lord of Tokyo setting. My box arrived about a week ago. I played solo and co-op. BOOK OF RULES  The authors of the game have a sense of humor. It's funny how the rulebook starts with the heading "Breaking News" and it looks ridiculously silly.  Overall, the rulebook is very nice: gorgeous illustrations and titles. It is written quite clearly. First, there is a list of components with a brief description of each.  The layout is described in detail with a huge illustration on two pages. The rest is fine. Sometimes I did not immediately find the right rule in the book (there is no alphabetical index or glossary), but in general everything is simple and clear. It's a shame, though, that there isn't anything useful in the back of the rulebook. And it is quite wide. You can't put it on a chair - only on the table. COMPONENTS  The King of Monster Island box is somewhat strange, of non-standard dimensions. For clarity, a comparison with a can of cola.  There are quite a few tokens here: minions (left), crystals (top right), support tiles (bottom right).  The field looks luxurious. Also in the box is a prefab volcano that is a tower for the boss action dice. You collect it and put it in the center of the field; looks great  There are also health and glory counters — for both the good guys and the bad guys — as well as ability cards and a volcano.  Black dice belong to players, and red dice belong to the boss.  Energy cards are player ability cards that are purchased for energy. In the same deck are event cards that add an element of surprise.  There are also maps of allies and bosses in the game. All the components are of excellent quality and the game looks great. GAME PROCESS Basically, King of Monster Island is Yahtzee (dice poker). You roll a handful of dice, keep the results you like, then reroll the others, after which you can reroll them one last time. Just like Lord of Tokyo, Yahtzee and many other dice games. And the most interesting thing is actions on cubes. 1. Heart: Gain 1 health. 2. Star: get 1 glory (spent on buying allies). 3. Tool: 3-4 tools can buy support tiles. 4. Leg: Move yourself, move an ally in the same zone as you, or deal 1 damage to a minion. 5. Paw: Deal 2 damage to a minion or boss. 6. Energy: Get 1 cube of energy (spent on buying capabilities). As you can see, the game already looks significantly more difficult than Lord of Tokyo.  Players choose their monsters. Interestingly, the monsters themselves do not have any special features. The difference between the two is which ally you choose. X+1 cards of allies are offered to choose from, where X is the number of players.  In the solo game, I randomly chose monkeys and medbots. Once you accumulate 1 glory, you can use your ally's first attribute, and as the game progresses, you will activate their other attributes.  To win, players need to defeat the boss together.  As you can see, with the growth of fame, the boss has new abilities. The players have 10 black dice for everyone (you usually roll 6, but sometimes some of the dice are blocked for a while), and the boss has his own red dice. They throw themselves into the mouth of the volcano and scatter over the island. And activate kapos effects: summon minions, bring glory to the boss, build crystals. As with most co-op, the gameplay consists of phases of bad (the effects of minions and boss dice) and good (the effects of player dice, ability cards and support tokens) events. There is also the concept of movement in the game: as a rule, players can only affect objects in the same zone as them.  The order of moves is boss-player-boss-player. And so for now the monsters will not defeat the boss together. If the boss defeats one of the monsters, if he builds 3 pylons or if there are no minions left in the bag, then you lose. SOLO MODE  Not entirely sure why, but it wasn't until the third game that I managed to play by the rules. The first time I soloed, I thought all the minions activated on the boss's turn (actually only the minions in the same area as the boss activated) and I lost without a chance. The second time I thought that after activating the dice in the boss zone, you reroll them at the beginning of the next turn (they are actually removed from the field). Finally got it right on the third try, even though I've played a bunch of co-op before. I guess I was just expecting to see a much simpler game, no more than a co-op version of Lord of Tokyo.  In general, I liked the game: it is fan-made, with a lot of interesting solutions. However, situations when the wrong dice fall out every time are very annoying. I liked playing solo and I don't mind playing it again. Compared to other cube metal co-ops, King of Monster Island is easier than, for example, Reckoners, but not by much. COMPARISON WITH KING OF TOKYO  From the components, design and characters, it is immediately clear that the action of King of Monster Island takes place in the same setting as "Lord of Tokyo". However, these games are not compatible. I'm one of the few who didn't like Lord of Tokyo. It's just a lightweight cube shooter where you hit each other, flip the dice... and that's it. For me, there is too much randomness and downtime in it - these impressions were formed after a game for six. One player was quickly out of the game and had to wait for the rest to play, and I had to wait for the other 4-5 people to come. In addition, you have no idea what will fall on the dice; the gameplay boils down to "roll the dice and manage the results better." There is almost no strategy.  However, I liked King of Monster Island. A little because it's co-op, a little because there's a lot more strategy here than in Lord of Tokyo. However, the difficulty has also increased significantly. So if you prefer simple mindless dice throwing, I must warn you that this game is much more complex. This is not just a co-op Lord of Tokyo, but a middleweight co-op in a Lord of Tokyo setting. Despite the appearance, King of Monster Island has a lot more mechanics and actions: block dice, grow crystals, buy support tiles, ability cards, cube tower, bad dice activation, minion activation, boss moves, boss abilities and upgrades, moves and upgrades monsters, pulling minions out of a bag, tracking abilities, etc. CONCLUSIONS  Both my friends and I liked King of Monster Island. We rate it 7/10. The components are excellent, the gameplay is quite fan-made and slick. The optimal composition is 1-3 players. However, Reckoners is, in my opinion, a much more refined co-op cube shooter. It has much more player cooperation (since you roll the dice and plan moves together) and less randomness (since you can always do something useful with the results that have fallen or help your friends), and the players choose their own turn order. In King of Monster Island, you sometimes have to wait a long time for your turn, which makes the game much worse with 4-5 players. I think King of Monster Island might well appeal to newcomers unfamiliar with co-op; although it has less co-op than Reckoners, each player is more independent. It is colorful, fun and with excellent components. If you like the setting of "Lord of Tokyo", King of Monster Island may well be for you. Just keep in mind that this is not just a co-op Lord of Tokyo, but a much more complex game...

INTRODUCTION I've been playing board games for about 5 years now, and before that I was really into miniatures wargames. I'm most drawn to kickstarter games with lots of miniatures and elaborate plot/lore. I prefer atmospheric decks that have a bit of depth, over-engineered but dry mechanics. I also play tabletop RPGs like Pathfinder 2nd Edition, mostly as a Game Master. I don't have a permanently active desktop cell, but I occasionally play in the company of friends and relatives. Most often, I play solo in the evenings, having sent the monster (baby) to bed. My favorite genre is dungeon crawlers. Now I have and regularly play the following: Middara; Gloomhaven; Etherfields; Swords and Sorcery: Ancient Chronicles; Altarquest. Listed in order from most favorite to least favorite. I don't have boss battlers like KDM, so I don't have anything to compare it to, although I've seen a few KDM letplays online. So the comparisons will only be with the above games, not KDM. EXPECTATIONS AND COMPONENTS  To be honest, I expected a lot from Oathsworn (around 9/10) based on the known information, art and lore. On top of that, Shadowborne Games ran an exemplary Kickstarter campaign, which further raised my expectations. And when the game arrived, it turned out that it even exceeded my expectations. Before moving on to the rules and gameplay, I want to draw your attention to the components. I'm pretty picky about it because I buy the deluxe versions of the kickstarters for three times the price of the standard kit, complete with an organizer and other premium components. However, Oathsworn's components are the best of the Kickstarter games I've invested in. Let's start with the fact that the art and drawing style here are great; on cards, on the box and even organizers. Even the playing field is a detailed work of art that makes you want to use it in an RPG. The only games I've played that come close to Oathsworn in terms of art quality are Etherfields and to a lesser extent Middara (there's stunning artwork, but not on every component), but neither is as polished and epic looking as Oathsworn . Art Oathsworn should rather be compared with AAA computer games; the local eerie landscapes would look great in the Elden Ring. In a word, the local maps are simply masterpieces.  As for the miniatures, they are great too. As a former wargamer, I'm very familiar with GW who, for all their faults, produce models of excellent quality. Compared to them, most board games are mediocre at best or just plain lousy. And the Oathsworn miniatures look on par with the best GW miniatures. They are large, beautiful and pleasant to the touch. Better than the Etherfields miniatures, which is a compliment in itself. In addition, due to the large scale of the models, they look more atmospheric and epic on the table.  The quality of the cards and cardboard ranges from good to excellent. Actually, the Oathsworn box is so heavy because of the many decks of thick, quality cards inside. Let them be inferior to MTG, but they are more than decent quality and do not need protectors. The cardboard is solid and, in my opinion, will last a long time. Yes, the cardboard card holders look very sturdy, and none of the character tablets have bent or crumpled. In short, all components look durable. The only thing of mediocre quality is the rather gloomy-looking cubes, which do not impress against the background of other components. However, they are pleasant to the touch and perform their function. Considering the price of Oathsworn, the level of components is simply amazing. For me, it has become a new standard against which I will compare all other boards.  Compared to Middara, Oathsworn's playfield doesn't look as epic as Middara's luxury tiles, and the storybook/journal isn't as impressive as Middara's thick tome, but otherwise the art and components are comparable or superior. The closest to Oathsworn are the components of Etherfields, but there are much thinner cards. Gloomy Harbor doesn't look bad to say the least, but against Oathsworn it just seems like a badass. No Harbor components were lying around with Oathsworn components. Just heaven and earth. In terms of component functionality, Oathsworn is also a champion. The box comes with card holders, a token tray and a plastic organizer to keep everything neatly organized. A very well-thought-out design. As a result, this monster decomposes quite quickly, unlike its counterparts in scale. And to worry about the purchase of an organizer, it is not necessary to say that it does not happen often. Yes, for those who are interested in "Grey Haven", a special organizer is essential if you want the game to unfold in an acceptable time frame, because there are so many components that an organizer is indispensable. It is even rarer to find games in which miniatures are also competently packaged: they do not break and do not take up a lot of space. It's such a well-thought-out system that I'm not going to change anything in it. Each enemy lies in a plastic housing and box only slightly larger than the model itself, so the space is used extremely efficiently. How often have you had to find in the box practically useless mannequin tabs, turning the layout and storage of the game into a real hemorrhoid, which you had to throw away and replace with normal ones? How often in CMON game add-ons was 80% of the space occupied by the insert, 18% by the miniature, and 2% by the card? They say that the novelty arouses the most interest immediately after its arrival, but during the first game some uncomfortable moments appear that noticeably overshadow the overall impression - whether it is a poorly compiled rule book (about it below), a tedious layout, a useless organizer or lousy components. Oathsworn is not your typical Kickstarter; not only has it exceeded my expectations, but it also values the player's time by not wasting it fighting components. There are no perfect components, but Oathsworn is as close to ideal as possible for the price. RULES It's probably not fair to judge the rules after only three games, so keep it short. As far as I can tell, the rules are generally well laid out and clear. There are two rule books, an encounter book, and rule summary cards; combined, it provides all the information you need in a convenient way. The only thing that bugs me is the decision to split the rules into two books. Separately, they are read quite normally. There is an alphabetical index, but most often it refers to a page in another rulebook and vice versa, which can be confusing. On the other hand, there is a very clear reminder in the back of both rulebooks, and two reminders are better than one. In general, dividing them into two seems to be a conscious decision of the authors, and I will not consider it a drawback. It should also be noted that there is a great series of tutorial videos on Youtube that make learning the game a lot easier. There are links to them in the Oathsworn app. Rating of the rules - 8/10. The rules are clear and generally well structured. There is nothing to complain about. STORY MODE  Story Mode is exactly what you thought it would be: a "choose your own adventure" in the spirit of a game book with periodic quizzes and challenges. The mode is interactive, but all you are required to do is decide where to go/what to do and take tests when needed. What is it practically? An awesome mod if you're even remotely interested in the game's lore, plot, or atmosphere. The plot is very elaborate, better than all plots of board games I have played. Not surprising, considering that Oathsworn was worked on by the bestselling author of the grimdark genre. The voice acting is also amazing, done at the highest level. Maps of the area are very beautiful and atmospheric. A high-quality plot, beautiful maps and the voice of James Cosmo together create an exciting adventure in the spirit of a book-game that does not let go until the very end. I even felt frustrated when the story cut off and I had to switch to another mode. Never before have I encountered such an interesting lore and atmosphere among the tables. As for the duration, it is within reasonable limits. The story adventure does not take too long - and you do not get the feeling that there is too much text or that it interferes with enjoying the battles, unlike the same Middara, where reading many paragraphs of text can take a long time. In short, there was a good balance between the plot and the battles. It is also worth noting that all chapters (so far) are interesting individually and at the same time are part of the overall storyline, making you want to know what will happen next. I'm not sure if the story will continue on the same level, but so far it's very interesting. How does it compare to other mobs? Honestly, there is nothing to compare it to. The quality of Oathsworn's narrative and voice acting take the game to an unsurpassed level. Perhaps the closest to it is Middara in that it pays a lot of attention not only to battles, but also to the plot. However, the plot of Oathsworn is better developed and noticeably more interesting. Also, the story mode is a bit similar to "Crime Scene" and "Sherlock Holmes". Detective-consultant" in the sense that you follow the storyline, trying to achieve maximum efficiency - only here there is less mechanics, and the visual part is better. Rating of narrative mode - 10/10. As you may have noticed, I did not compare this narrative masterpiece with the plot of "Grey Harbor", because "Grey Harbor" has almost no plot. "Havana" is played for the sake of battles, not a cardboard plot. BRIGHT MODE  Oathsworn avoids the trap of tiring players out of monotonous regular monster fights in a very simple way: jumping right into the boss fight. As far as I can tell,..

GAME PROCESS Before a game in Street Masters, each player chooses one of the six fighter decks and places his character card. You then choose one of four enemy decks (each with its own boss, minions, and other cards) and finally choose one of eight scenario decks (each with its own layout instructions, special objectives, and event cards). When you place the heroes, boss, objective tokens and crates on the field, the game begins.  A round consists of a fighter phase, an enemy phase, and a scenario phase. In the fighter phase, each player takes a turn - in any order. At the beginning of your turn, you draw a card from the enemy deck (as a result, a new enemy may appear on the field in your zone), and then you can take 3 actions in any order: move, play one card from your hand, and take one action ( this could be activating an ability with one of your played cards, moving extra, interacting with cards or the field, gaining defense tokens). At the end of your turn, all enemies in your zone are activated, after which you draw a card and it's the next player's turn. In the enemy phase, you activate all cards in the enemy zone. In the scenario phase, all cards are in the scenario zone, after which you draw a new scenario card.  Most of the party, not surprisingly, will be taken up by the fight with the enemies on the field. When attacking, you roll the dice indicated on the card and add modifiers. Each die may drop a hit and/or block symbol. The dice here are "explosive": if a critical symbol falls out, you not only count it as a hit, but also roll the dice again. There are three main types of attacks: punch, kick and grab. When a character is attacked, he can place a block if he has the corresponding token. Then you flip your token over: it's now a power token that helps charge up your character's special ability. To win, you need to defeat the boss. Defeat occurs if one of the heroes is disabled or if the corresponding scenario card is activated.  In addition to the standard "Arcade" mode, you can also play in the story mode, that is, in the campaign. In this mode, new maps appear: allies, rivals and upgrades for both heroes and enemies. They can also be used in the Arcade to make the game easier, more difficult, or just for variety. There are also story decks for each hero that can also be included in the game. PROS OF THE GAME Even in one base there is a lot of variety. Enemy decks and scenarios can be shuffled around to create different parties, and different combinations of heroes force drastic changes in strategy. In addition, you can play in the campaign mode or simply add allies and opponents to the game. There is a lot of regrab here. All fighters are unique and all have their cool combos. For example, Gabriel has a lot of abilities that allow you to play additional attack cards and deal huge damage, while Yin Hua knows how to manipulate the enemy deck. In addition, all decks are delivered already assembled, and each has its own synergies, which makes learning a new character very interesting. Flipping defense tokens to charge your character's most powerful ability is both thematic and cool. Adds interesting tactical dilemmas to the game and also means you'll almost never waste. The game looks very attractive, especially the map artwork, but the field and miniatures are also nice. It's surprisingly easy to get the hang of, thanks in large part to the beautifully structured rulebook and helpful reminders for each player, as well as the fact that Street Masters is generally an easy game to play. All the newbies got involved after a few rounds. CONS OF THE GAME What I don't like the most is that the difficulty is too low. In my games, there were a couple of tight contests until the finals, but overall the score is now 5-0, and this is despite the fact that I played with a different composition of participants. In the last game of three, we even added three opponents and still won. As I mentioned, I really like exploding cubes and block/charge tokens, but these mechanics give heroes too much of an advantage. There are a lot of details to keep an eye on. You can easily forget to do this and that in your turn. Also, it makes the game too slow for a tabletop fighting game. And sometimes very annoying; if you forget an active ability or miss one of the turn phases - in my experience everyone forgets to draw an enemy card at least once per game - then you will probably have to cancel the move and rethink your actions. Inserting miniature rubber stands is not easy. Although this is not a problem for minechki dyes. CONCLUSION Although Street Masters is less challenging than I expected, I still really enjoyed playing it. Each character has their own style, card decks and scenarios make each game unique and the game looks great. In my opinion, Street Masters is a very good deck; it is not for nothing that many adore her. But I'm not likely to play it often because I prefer other bad-guy-beating games. Beatdown: Streets of Justice or Marvel Champions are similar but more difficult games that are generally superior to Street Masters. So for my collection Street Masters will not work. However, I am very interested in other games with this wonderful modular deck system from the Sadler brothers. Yes, I'm looking forward to playing Altar Quest...

COMPONENTS The miniatures of the ships are elegantly worked out. The field - a large piece of fabric with an image of the ocean - also looks great and may be useful in other games. But the elements of the landscape are very thin and light and easily turn over if they are caught. The rulebook had a broken binding (although it was replaced), but otherwise there are no complaints about it. I like John Blanche's art, and the book has just a lot of his illustrations. The rules are clearly laid out, with one or two spreads under each section of the rules. Under the description of each ship and captain and the scenario too. The book has a table of contents, so it is not difficult to find the right place. The rules themselves take up about half of the book; the rest — lor and other. A ship's rudder helps turn ships around. The ruler is also very useful; it can be bent and fixed at an angle of 45 degrees. The white and one red die look kind of cheap compared to the other components. However, these are ordinary six-sided cubes, nothing more is required of them. There are several decks of cards in the game, as well as a card for each ship and for each order for each player. Apart from ships and orders, all the cards are quite small. They feel a bit subtle. Given their regular use, it is not a fact that they will last long... BRIEFLY ABOUT THE RULES The rules are quite simple. There are no unusual innovations here that could surprise or surprise - which, in my opinion, is not lacking at all. The gameplay is based on cubes and several decks of cards. Very random, which balances the players in a sense: a less experienced player has a good chance of beating a more experienced one. On the other hand, depth suffers from this. If you're looking for a serious game, then Dreadfleet is not for you; if you're looking for a fun random battle, then the game might work for you.  The move is divided into several phases: 1) Status phase: for each long-playing effect (as a rule, one or more such effects are constantly present in the game, usually these are fate cards) dice are rolled. Depending on the result, something can happen. 2) Fate phase: both players draw fates on the card, which are played immediately. Again, random effects, some with very serious consequences. In this phase, the direction and strength of the wind changes. 3) Action phase: players take turns walking the ships - first I walk this, then you this, then I that, etc. 4) Final phase: verification of winning conditions. The statuses phase at the beginning of the game is allowed quickly, but the longer the game lasts, the more cards accumulate, which must be checked each turn by rolling dice and activating the effects that have fallen. The fate phase activates random events that usually hurt one of the ships, but sometimes help.   The main action takes place in the action phase. On your turn, you choose a ship, and then perform the following actions in order: 1) Orders: large ships with named captains (5 on each side) can give orders. In this case, it is necessary to pass a command check (discard a result above a certain value on one D6). 3 of the 5 orders modify your movement, the 4th repairs the ship, and the 5th is a lookout of sorts (allows you to fire back if you're attacked). 2) Movement: movements and turns. If the wind is in your face, you swim slower; if in the back, then faster. You can only return after moving a certain distance or more, depending on the type of ship. In general, the mechanics are typical of naval battle games. 3) Volley: you can shoot from both sides in an arc of 90 degrees. You can continue firing even during boarding. Each ship has a specific shooting rate. During the shot, the corresponding number of dice is rolled. Depending on the distance to the target, successes can be considered 4+, 5+ or 6. +1 is also given for the first volley of the ship in the game and +1 for a shot to the nose or stern. Here are all the modifiers, except for the rare events on the fate cards. On a success, the target rolls dice for an armor save. For each failure, the map of losses is drawn. Usually they mean a small decrease in crew, speed, hull strength, and sometimes more unpleasant special or status effects hang over them. Damage cards remain under the ship until it is repaired or sunk. 4) Boarding: upon collision with an enemy ship, the movement stops and you have to engage in a boarding skirmish. It begins with a duel between the captains: both roll dice in a number equal to their swordsmanship rating; 5+ is considered a success. Whoever has more successes wounds the opponent (or both are wounded in the event of a tie). After 4 wounds, the captain goes to the hospital bed. His ship will continue to operate, but he himself will cease to participate in the game. After the captains have had fun, it is the turn of their crews. The skirmish proceeds similarly, only instead of fencing - the number of the remaining crew. Moreover, the one who lost does not receive 1 loss card, but cards in the amount equal to the difference in results. HOW WAS OUR FIRST PARTY In the first duel scenario, your ships start at opposite corners of the map, with islands in the middle. I immediately drew a sea monster fate card and placed it directly in front of my opponent's ship so that it could not avoid collision. Since he plays as Count Noctilis, he has a special ability to try to take control of the monster instead of giving orders. He passed the test and didn't have to fight the monster, but he couldn't do anything with it either. Small boats and all monsters are considered "support vessels": they have some special rules - in particular, they cannot break contact on their own in the event of a collision. As a result, the monster could not move, and the Reaver could not swim past or through it. He could try to break contact, but in that case I would move him close again because I could control him. In the end, the "Robber" got rid of him, killing him in the course of several boardings. Here, on the map of fate, another sea monster fell to me, which, naturally, took the place of the previous one. As my opponent dealt with them, moving an inch within a few moves, I had to cross the entire field to get within shooting range. Ah, the hard life of a sailor... As a result, the fight started almost at its starting location. I managed to successfully open fire on the nose and deal additional damage to his slightly monster-ridden ship. The Rogue killed the second monster and was finally ready to face me, but the forces were already clearly unequal: he had 7 damage cards, mine had 0. This scenario ends when one of the enemy ships has 8 damage. Although many fate cards rained down on me, all the damage was prevented by rescuers or repaired. The "robber" stayed only slightly above the waterline... After completing the scenario objective, we continued the game anyway: there's no point in cleaning up ships when you're just learning how to play. I got in his nose a few more times, but the main thing was that the fate card drawn allowed the support boat to be converted into a brander! Just a gift of some kind. I was preparing to lower her from the anchor, when the Robber crashed into my side, after which the boarding began. It was not possible to break contact before the end of the game for several reasons. In particular, because at first we got carried away with the boarding skirmish, and then there was not enough crew left. Now the Rogue was getting lucky, avoiding almost all the damage it should have received from fires and damage down to the waterline. My ship, on the other hand, was cracking before my eyes, and more than once there was only one loss card missing from sinking. The skirmish continued, both captains were disabled. In the end, I managed to sink the Rogue. By then we were so battered that both ships had what seemed to be 33 damage cards out of 55 in the game. I wonder if there will be enough loss cards for a full scale battle involving 8 ships. IMPRESSION +Quite an interesting process. +Nice ship miniatures, especially if painted. +The box contains all the necessary components, nothing extraneous is needed. Even a plastic ruler came in handy. -The game takes up a lot of space. The map of the field in the unfolded form is 180 x 120 cm. Obviously, there is little space left for the rest - and this is despite the fact that they played with 2 ships out of 10. With 10, it will clearly be a tight fight. Moreover, the map cannot be laid out only partially, since the yellow fields along the borders determine the direction of the wind. - The wind is so changeable that it is almost impossible to plan ahead. Yes, this is another element of randomness. -Random events quickly get boring. The decks are small, and soon the cards will start repeating themselves over and over again. - The cards are quite fragile, and it is not a fact that they will not flutter if you play for a long time. Especially considering that according to the rules the decks will be scrolled and shuffled regularly. The more ships, the more often. +/- Basically, this is a wargame with miniatures (albeit contained in one box), and not a normal board. +/- Lots and lots of randomness. Experience is of some importance, but very often you will win and lose at the will of fate, which is a minus for some, and not for someone. CONCLUSIONS In general, the game is not bad, but nothing more. Not sure if it's worth the price, and unlikely to attract collectors in the future. Whether it is worth painting the models is a controversial issue. This is not an easy job; given that all ships are different, painting them will take more time and effort than painting an entire fleet. On the other hand, a painted Dreadfleet will look many times better, and the process is probably..