It may be my imagination, but it seems to me that the backers of the Dungeon Sagas Kickstarter are a chattier bunch than normal. Or, if not chattier, perhaps more wordy. Now I’m the last person to suggest that this is a bad thing: my posts are routinely long blocks of text. However, it’s interesting to see the difference in you guys.
In theory, I would expect there to be differences in the audience for, say, Deadzone and Kings of War, so it’s not surprising. However, I’d have been hard pressed to guess how that difference might have manifested itself in terms of comments. This morning though, I’ve been going through the last couple of week’s posts , trying to catch up on answering all the comments (I’ll be doing that for a little while longer too). The amount of people who have written long and well-considered suggestions and thoughts just seemed pleasingly and unusually high 🙂
Like I said, maybe it’s all in my imagination. Maybe I’ve just been staring at a screen too long and I’m hallucinating. What does anyone else think? Different crowd? Different tone?
Quirkworthy 
Morning Jake, 2 major differences with this crowd (in my opinion).
Because dungeon saga is set to be the spiritual successor to heroquest, many people are starting out much more invested in this project, this attachment also brings with it some strong opinions
Next is mantic, most of us now have supported at least one other mantic project on kickstarter, we know that the comments we make are read and actually thought about by yourself and mantic, to some degree if we ask (sometimes continuously) we just might get!
Feed the two points together and we get a lot of enthusiastic posters (with very different wishlist!)
Both of those sound reasonable. And you’re right about the differing wish lists 😉
This is summer, we have more time to spend on games ^^
I think lots a gamers want to have a game that blends strengths from odler games that never got a valuable remake/reedition/copy. We really put all our hopes in this project.
Mantic is able to provide minis for a correct price… and you are able to create rules that make it fun to play, not too fiddly. Ai modes will satisfy players that can’t alaways have friends to play their favourite game.
I think all this make people want to buy this game, or at least talk about it because they have some desire about it (I saw people trying to convince themselves not to buy because there isn’t enough value for now in the basic pledge level, and it’s harder and harder because lots have been added for free since the beginning !).
Summer is another good thought, as is the blend of nostalgia and value.
What’s the current thinking on value? Is the basic pledge worth it yet? Does more need to be added? Are the KS exclusives no good? Great? just about OK? What’s the feeling?
We’ve still got a way to go yet ad I’d be surprised if nothing more was added to the basic set. No idea what though 😉
In terms of the base boxed set, the $100 value is nowhere near reached – we’ve been told that the retail version will only have 2 monsters of each type, and obviously won’t include the Kickstarter exclusives, which currently doesn’t add up to a very impressive total. We also don’t know things like the number of tiles, tokens etc., so it’s harder to quantify. But for comparison, Zombicide season 2 has 90 models for $100, Descent 2 has 40 models for $70-80 (of variable size like DS).
That said, I’d expect the retail version of the game to sell for much less than $100, and so what we’re really quantifying is how much value to attribute to the various extras & exclusives that the $100 level is getting. $50 base game + $50 extras? We’re getting there, but have some way to go before it becomes a massive bargain.
One additional thing to evaluate is the length of time before delivery – a year. Kickstarter is sealing your money in a box and hoping something good comes out the other side, but it’s more palatable to sink large amounts of money into something if you can play with it in 6 months rather than a year!
True, but many, many KS promise you something in 6 months and get it to you in 9 or 18. Mantic have been pretty good at getting stuff out when they estimated on the KS, so if they said they needed this time then I expect they do. I also have a feeling that they’ve built in a month or two extra to allow for suppliers/shipping/customs/etc doing weird things without compromising their promised delivery schedule. That means that things shouldn’t get rushed and so will be of a higher quality 🙂
I’m on the fence about the value. I haven’t backed yet, but am watching the direction of the kickstarter closely. My wife and I are looking at the game as a way to get the kids involved in playing (they’re eleven, seven, and two), something to fill the gap of the no-longer-published Heroquest. At the same time, we don’t want to dump hundreds of dollars on something the kids may or may not end up playing. My wife, especially, isn’t keen on add-ons, but wants a solid core game for the $100.
For us, when the zombie troll shaman was unlocked we felt like the contents of the game finally caught up with the buy-in price (the spot where we felt the kickstarter should have started), and were looking forward to seeing where it went from there. It went to optional add-ons, which made my wife groan. She watched me pour cast amounts of cash into Deadzone, and doesn’t want to do the same for a family game.
As an aside, the loss of the female wizard didn’t help. Our two oldest are girls, and already complain that the heroes in our borrowed copy of Heroquest aren’t girls. Now we’re back to having only one female option in the core game, which is going to cause fights.
Well we’re a ways from finished so we shall have to wait and see what they come up with. The female wizard may yet return and I would expect to see more Heroes at some stage.
The Kickstarter is doing well, not far off $400K and over 3000 backers now with still 16+ days to go. The mad frenzy of the last 2-3 days will drag in a heap more backers and cash if the base sets and add ons are looking like super value, which in my opinion they will be (I feel they are already good value). Until those last 2-3 days it’ll still trundle along nicely gaining a slow but steady amount of backers and cash.
KS exclusives maybe is not the good way to go (at least here in France, game shops have problems with KS products if there have KS-only goodies that calssic market won’t have –> people will buy only through KS and the shops won’t be able to sell their games).
I think KS must help make the basic product better and make it the same that will be sold later. KS backers get the product before anybody and may get add-ons they paid for plus some parts in higher quantity but nothing a lambda buyer won’t be able to have. That’s my view of what KS should be though ^^ !
Talking about DS KS, in my opinion the basic pledge is good in term of quantity, now it would be good to upgrade components (tiles, furniture if any, rulers).
It would be great to have the choice to get unmounted minis for those who mant to.
Talking about rules, I hope we’ll have your mods after all feedback you got. I think people want a game that is streamlined but not too much, we need some complex things to deal with, this gives more options.
KS exclusives are a way of rewarding people for having faith and being early adopters. if we look at Mars Attacks then it doesn’t look like the KS hurt the French retail market at all. Certainly French distributors seem to have been happy to take the game. After all, if you weren’t on the KS then you can’t get on it by the time that the game arrives in retail. It’s not a choice. And as we plan for DS to be around for many years, the bulk of its life will be long after the KS. If someone doesn’t buy a game because he isn’t getting as good a deal as he would have done if he’d ben on the Kickstarter then that’s his choice. I can’t see that it really hurts anyone more than him though.
I was thinking about unmounted models too as I’d like to put them on clear bases. The stuff they are made from is easily cut with a sharp blade though, so I don’t think this will be any challenge to someone who is used to cleaning and assembling models. There’s no real need for a separate listing. Unmounting the models yourself is no harder than detaching a plastic figure from a tab.
I’m planning on updating the Alpha when I’ve caught up with answering the comments.
You’re right, Mars Attacks will be sold by Edge, they sell Zomicide too, so I hope they will make good advert of it (Zombicide never had problems to sell even if it was a KS, but that’s not the case of most KS games).
I was talking with a shop owner last week, he told me he wasn’t confident in selling KS games (apart from Zombicide) as he tried to sell some but consumers already had it through KS or they wouldn’t buy as there weren’t goodies in the retail version.
I fully undertand the need to give something special to thank backers, but I think this could be anything else than an exclusive mini or exclusive-whatever that fits in the game.
Personnaly I hate not to be able to have it all ^^ (and that could be a deal breaker depending on the goodie I can’t have). There should always be a way to obtain stuff ^^
Mantic have a similar view and their KS exclusives are also available via their Mantic points scheme (check the KS FAQ).
I think Drew and Pika have picked some of the main reasons there, and I would agree wholeheartedly with those. Also, having you respond so fully and so often Jake, certainly encourages the engagement of those interested in this game 🙂
I think the current value of the basic pledge is worthwhile, and each add on is very well worth the asking price. I don’t think more *needs* to be added to the basic pledge, as there is a lot of unseen content hiding in there as well (advanced rules and AI cards are just words written on the home page, yet there is an incredible amount of content there people will be getting).
In my opinion, some of the Kickstarter exclusives are good while others just don’t kickstart my kickstarter, but you can’t please everybody 100% and that’s to be expected.
My hope is that the advanced rules are loaded with content and the expansions keep coming, we need some Orcs I think. I’m currently in at $300 to cover the basic pledge and some of the current and/or future add ons, my wallet will remain open with things like 3D furniture and doors, expansions and cool model add ons.
As I note below I disagree about the contents of the basic set. Either Descent or the D&D Coop games have similar component levels at between 40-60 dollars shipped currently. Those companies are also known to have excellent card components which is not mantics reputation. Mini quality might vary between them but given we do not even know if what the kickstarter is showing is the actually mini from the mass production process or some other process. Reaper in their first Bones kickstarter used the metal or resin versions to show the models and while some details were expected to be lost certainly models suffered horribly and where not even released to retail but were still provided to backers.
Just a note on card components. The card tiles in DS has been specced as the same as that in Descent, and is likely to be made at the same factory…
The miniatures shown are test production models because the actual production run will take tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars and many months to get right. However, if you compare the equivalent models for Mars Attacks there is not a lot of difference. AFAIK DS will use the same material and techniques as Mars Attacks.
“Either Descent or the D&D Coop games have similar component levels at between 40-60 dollars shipped currently.”
I must say I agree with this statement.
I can accept the quality of components will be equal to Descent’s, if Mantic says so.
However, the value of the base set still isn’t there for me. And I own Descent 2nd Ed. plus several big box expansions and have bought 2 D&D board games plus several Dungeon Command sets.
The current “Warlord of Galahir” expansion is what I would have expected to find in the base set (minus the extra tiles). That would’ve made the $100 asking price for the base set totally worth it.
But now (it seems to me, but that’s just a personal perception) we are bring asked to fund the production of Warlord of Galahir… which will then be sold to us. Hmmmm…
The only thing that keeps me invested in this game right now (quite frankly) are the A.I. solo modes where I can play either the bad guy or the heroes.
That’s just my 2 cents. Others YMMV. Thanks for listening.
Well I’ve said my 2c on value already so I won’t repeat myself. I’ve also mentioned these concerns to the guys at Mantic, so we’ll see what they can find up their sleeves to sweeten the deal 🙂
I think that some of the comments do have to do with the genre. It is a pretty well worn genre not just heroquest, but so many other games from the original TSR Dungeon game up to FFG Descent. Mantic and you have already released and essentially let go out of print the 3 Dwarfs Hold game/expansions. People feel like they have played this game before so have lots of thoughts on the rules.
I personally have not backed the kickstarter at this point because I do not see a ton of value yet for 100 dollars in the components provided. One can currently go out and get 2 of the D&D Coop games with like 40 minis each and solid (2 mm thick) interlocking tiles and tons of counters and still have lunch money but those games have a some noticable play issues. The first of the games is current available on Amazon for like 37 dollars in the states and is not really very far removed in contents from the entire Dungeon Master Pledge ignoring things like the poster or KOW mini rules. The contents of the box also compare to Descent which is available at significantly less than 100 dollars. I think honestly a lot of the first day people were backing potential of what they might get compared to what was actually there. Sort of reminds me of the second Reaper Bones kickstarter where the number of minis in the start was not worth even the starting pledge amount at retail. A ton of people backed it though but Reaper went the expansion route with the second kickstarter so a noticeable number of people dropped out as the kickstarter progressed.
Since Mantic has also decided to already go the expansion route with the game it does not appear to me that the set contents are likely to double where it is a no brainer based on components value for the gaming hoarder side of me. The rules and scenarios provided will have to make up the difference for gaming side and hence I am here trying to interface with you about them as they are vague on the kickstarter. I am not even sure if it lists te basic number of scenarios that game initial 50K goal started with. It mentions that the Dead Rising game had like 6 but that game was closer to 50-60 dollars so one would assume this one would start with significantly more. I was interested in the alpha rules and like what I saw in terms of fast play but definitely want to see more of what was even in the basic game.
How is that for long winded?
Just right 🙂
Value is something you have to decide for yourself. Personally I don’t compare things in terms of raw price as much as I used to. As I get older the actual cash cost of a model or game is of less importance than whether I want it and play it or not. I’ve spent a great deal on various games over the years. The ones I consider poor value were the ones I seldom played, not the ones that actually cost me a larger sum of money. Of course, that’s just me and you’re free to use whatever measuring stick for value that makes sense to you. For me, a cheap alternative that I don’t like is less value than a more costly game I play loads.
I’m writing some articles to expand on various aspects of the rules, so stay tuned 🙂
I think the value is hard to judge at this point. From a personal point of view a lot of it will depend on the contents of the advanced book which will in turn effect the replay ability of the game. As a base game retailing at around £55-£60 we are getting near the value for money tipping point, we have 40 – 50 odd minis, 23 individual sculpts and what looks like high quality card components, at this cost and component comparison we are now getting closer to physical parity with games like descent.
But of course we (the greedy kickstarter community) will always want more and I think there is a lot of confidence that mantic will deliver.
I think the box set without the kickstarter extras will be a harder sell if the price ticket remains at around £55-£60 though I expect this will go down (after all the $100 is our pledge value, not the value of the base game)
The stretch goals we are seeing are great and I like the way we had an undead themed week to begin with, now we’re onto greenskins., with any hope we may get another two races in before close. The way undead has been done is praiseworthy as well. We have a good selection of characters, minions and missions that is broad without being complete, this way we are all getting a good look at the undead that we can further explore through the KoW if we wish. I hope the other races are given a similar treatment.
Post kickstarter and into the pledge manager I hope we see the option to buy discounted KoW minis, perhaps by the sprue so we can pick up say the half dozen basilean crossbowmen, spearmen and swordsmen we need to use as guards in a scenario.
Community wise I would love to see blank .pdf’s of the cards / sheets that are used for the planning / running the adventure so our home brew efforts can fit in, encourage people to write and submit their own quests and campaigns online and perhaps select one a month to publish (.pdf) on the site and have a yearly annual printed (on demand?) with the best quests or even whole submitted campaigns. selected contributors can be rewarded with a KoW mini (or mantic points or some such other) and such constant feedback will really help you determine where the community wants the game to go (if more people download, play and favourably review one style of adventure over another etc.).
Perhaps blank pdfs could even be included as part of the Beta rules release, to tide the community over, post kickstarter, until delivery day (which seems soooo far away!)
Never mind delivery day, “post-KS” seems like a way off to me 🙂
I’d love to see the community building and sharing dungeons, heroes and suchlike. Hopefully we can get something sorted to help that along. Happy to put pdfs up here if that would help.
Yup, sharing dungeons and heroes could be the great value of this game !
We’ll need rules to have it balanced 😀
All part of the Advanced rules.
Yes please, May just be the designer in me but having the ‘official’ blanks to fill in and use at the table seems infinitely better somehow.
On a personal note, there is a world of 3rd party printable tiles out there, how would you feel if we ‘submitted’ adventures using such 3rd party products?
Would it be helpfully to know what directions the game us being taken in or should we aim to keep it official to help everyone play from the same box?
I ask as I have in mind a sewer adventure pitting the heroes against an army trying to invade the city from below!
Rats! Except Mantica doesn’t have rat-people 😦 But rats-in-sewers expansion sounds very nice ^^
@ Drew – I would suggest sticking to the tile set in the box (or multiples thereof). There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, I spent ages making this as flexible a set as I could, and you can create a very wide variety of dungeon shapes and styles. It’s more a matter of how many tiles you have rather than their shapes. Secondly, the other people who may potentially play this will all have the core set. If you pick something they don’t have then you’re just adding a big hurdle between them and getting it on the table. Yes they could print it out, but then they’d have to mount it to make it sit right, and then the art wouldn’t match… you know how particular folk can be.
@ Torkel – yes they have rats… in space!
I think it you would do an sewer expansion it would be better to flip the script and have like 5 monster heroes (party of rat adventures) who have pitch fork townsfolk, town guards with swords and shields, pikes, and crossbows as the monsters and use the basic game heroes as the villians. This would allow some new narrative type goals for the adventures as you could come up with the nefarious things the elite monsters would do. Kidnap townsfolks, sneak past guards, steal weapons from armory, diversion attack, rear guard action.
Sounds like we have our first community dungeon planned already 😉
Oh, I think the value for money level is working out nicely and with plenty of time left to go it will become excellent. I was in for the legendary heros but now the expansion will take priority for me I imagine.
Glad to read that it will be supported for years going forward.
Dungeon crawlers have always been the games my mates and I play as they love them but would never venture into tabletop wargames… so they are dead excited for DS.
No idea what i’d like to see in there next
Its an interesting point though I’ve not noticed excessive posting, beyond my own :p. From a personal prospective I have been hunting for a Rpg board game table top crossover for years, I nearly invested in decent 1.0 a few years ago it was only due to the furniture and the cost of FFG’s games in the UK why I didnt, then we had the Heroquest up’s and downs, I missed Kingdom Death Kickstarter by 2 days by having my head in the clouds.. So when I heard it announced I was straight in.
Now regarding value many people on the kickstarter comments people are comparing it to decent, which is giving a poor guide for people because its Vastly cheaper in the USA than Europe, on the other hand the contents of a FFG boxed game will always be of excellent quality so it is a good comparison for the broader market. There has also been a lot of people talking about they felt the Kickstarter should have had a far higher funding value and include a large amount of what was put in via stretch goals, this is not something I personally feel was needed but a lot of people said they felt it was a false set of contents and the initial box value was way to high for its contents.
Now what took my interest from the start was Mantics completely new approach to the Kickstarter in terms of pledges, add ons and its structure. So much so I went off and did so research into Tabletop Kickstarters, from last year up until present as well as looking at all Mantics Kickstarters, because as I saw it , for Mantic to change there project plan so drastically from the previous ones (which were massively successful) there had to be a lot of reasoning behind it. The data though proves this new project model to be vastly more successful, as the initial two weeks build on backer numbers very quickly, then in the final splurge you have a huge volume of backers to tempt into buying more add ons as well as the media/social volume for increased time they produce. Now my original calculations from just 36 hours in with current backer growth showed that this project should be a all time record for mantic and reach between 1.5-1.7mill now Ive not updated the maths since but will do today as a point of interest but even still the way your pulling backers in by the simple low costs (comparatively) pledge system would make me surprised if they numbers were different now.
Anyway to conclude the likely increased volume of traffic you are experiencing is because of the vastly increased rate of new backers, combined with the huge nostalgia of dungeon crawlers of which I imagine the majority of Kickstarter backers have a lot of experience, opinions and wants from…
The single pledge level also worked really well for SDE: Forgotten King. Amazingly, with a single pledge level and zero KS exclusives, they nearly pulled in $1.2 million with over 6500 backers.
The rate of new backers is quite high, so that’s another good point. I was more thinking of their individual wordiness, though perhaps your posts are simply upping the average ;P
if we can make anything like those totals I’ll be very pleasantly surprised. I’ve seen so many odd things happen on Kickstarters that I simply don’t guess any more. It would mean that we’d be able to create a brilliant game and several expansions, plus the size of the online community that would generate would be amazing. We shall see…
As to individual wordiness, you taught us that you listen, Jake. If we say something (especially on this blog), you respond. Because of that, we’ve realized that we have the opportunity to shape the final form of this game, and thus an opportunity to get the game we want.
Aha! So it’s all my fault. I must be more careful in future 😛
Hey Jake
Firstly, let me take this opportunity to say that I am a great fan of your rules – especially the “less is more” ethos. As a long time RPGer and Wargamer i can tell you one thing for free – bloated rules cause some severe problems and ruin great ideas.
With regards to the KS – I backed DZ with a friend and have backed this one solo – i firstly think that minis should cost ABOUT £1 each – so currently i am getting a game i want, tiles, rules and loads of other bits id like for FREE. the Kickstarter extras make it worth buying as i am on a constrained budget.
If anyone complains about value – consider, i play 40k. I can go to GW and pay roughly £5 per mini, i can go through my local shop and pay roughly £4 a mini. What i actually do is go through Ebay, respray/repair minis and pay about £2 per mini. In DZ and DS i get around £1 a mini for brand new ones!
I personally will be taking the advanced rules to be the “combat” side of a RPG and fleshing out social/adventuring aspects. Also, i will almost certainly be running normal DS and my own dodgy hybrid version at UKGE if we get it in time 🙂
On the original question – Mantic have a much greater reputation than they did to begin with, DS targets a wordy audience and you have a good rep for rules now i think Jake.
Cheers
Alex.
Thanks Alex. Look forward to seeing the dodgy hybrid in action 🙂
I think one thing that would push people over the edge on this one who have been hesitating on the value and thinking about what HeroQuest had in its box is some interesting plastic dungeon accessories. I know the boxed set at the moment will feature some card stock accessories, but getting some little treasure chests, chairs, doors, and other nice details that make a dungeon pop out is both really cool AND doesn’t even require intensely detailed models. A single slick “Dungeon Decor” sprue would be amazing (plus that’s an easy separate add-on that folks would be eager to pick up more of).
And yes, keeping on topic, the folks have been very enthusiastic about this and have been contributing a good bit to what they would really like to see in the game – the core of this hits on something that a LOT of us have desired for a long time.
I’m sure that 3D versions of the furniture is on the list of stuff to come. More than that I couldn’t say, but it’s coming…
Some plastic doors to hold the dungeon tiles together would be great.
Lots of comments does mean lots of interest which is good. I wish my blog posts would get anywhere near this level of commenting. The comments have all seemed pretty civil compared to some other sites. I do not think anyone wants to over load and you do not really want the comments section to turn into a forum. Probably just a helpful reminder at the end of posts for people to read existing comments to avoid duplication and to stay on topic.
As you say, lots of interest is a good thing. I am happy to say that people usually manage to be very civil here, which is as I prefer. There have been a couple of “incidents” in the past, but nothing that could not be contained. I run this site to have conversations and listen to other folk’s thoughts, not watch flame wars and abuse. The net has plenty of sites where that’s the norm and doesn’t need another.
Drifting off topic isn’t the end of the world, and I often use it as a signal that a post on the new topic is in order. In other words, it serves as a useful flag that it’s a topic of concern.
You could use nonbinding polls to allow interest parties to vote on character options and such to allow more feel of involvement to blog readers and hopefully game buyers.
I haven’t looked at polls recently. I did try ages ago, and discovered a wealth of technical fiddle which wasn’t to my liking. However, I think WordPress has changed some bits since then, so perhaps I should look again.
Uhuu! More stuff! 😀 hope AI works w new expansion ? And what about that random dungeon-adventure generation advanced rules that im hearing about? Will it work w goblins expansion? Mantic your awesome 🙂
I’ve asked Mantic to check that we’ll be getting an AI deck for the goblins so it all works with them too. I think the latest KS update confirms this.
People keep asking Mantic on the KS comments if Warlord and Infernal expansions will have new AI decks or if the base game AI deck will suffice. No clear answer has been given, yet, to put this question/concern to rest.
See my latest post: https://quirkworthy.com/2014/08/25/bad-guy-ai-in-dungeon-sagas/
If the kickstarter soars, you should create a social/adventuring engine for RPG play with the Advanced Rules. Or if you’re not into that, Mantic should hire someone. Because there aren’t enough game modes, I tell you!
Do you want me to use all my toes to count on as well?
Jake, loving the direction the game is taking so far. Just one thing still bothering me – I had the impression that the Advanced Rules are supposed to cover “roll-your-own” / “homebrew” hero builds, but the info in the Kickstarter doesn’t really address or confirm that. Will the ability to create your own heroes be in the Advanced Rules? If not, is it something being looked at for a stretch goal? Thanks!
We discussed this before the KS started. It is, however, a very large amount of extra work, so I suspect that it will be a stretch goal at some point. It’s something I really want to include though.
Really hope you do, it would open up essentially limitless replayability. Would also help tie in other systems/the main world, I would think!
Well if I could wish list a bit, I’d like to two different colors for the dice included in the game. The BoW demo really drove that home for me seeing the way the dice are compared on each side. I’d also like to see a deck of cards used to randommize the dungeon, so as you move to the next room you flip a card, on this card would be a picture of one of the dungeon tiles which would connect to the room you were leaving, that way even playing with out an overlord you just wouldn’t know what would be around the corner. Some talk was made in the last update about forest tiles possibly with a cave enchance on one, the more I think about this the more I love the idea, the heroes could fight their way through the forest to the cave leading to the dungeon, or maybe they got captured and now must fight their way to freedom and out of the dungeon to the safety of the forest.
I think you are right about being chatty, I can’t believe I just wrote that wall of text and still not done
Last thing (for now lol), I’d really like to see both genders for each of the base game heroes, such as a female barbarian, dwarf, and wizard and a male elf. If nothing else a female dwarf would make my wife very happy and less likely to make me sleep on the couch when she sees the bill for this kickstarter 🙂
Good point on the dice. We’ve done it before so I don’t see that it would be impossible.
Random dungeons like that are never as interesting as properly planned ones (whether “official” or community) because they haven’t got an intelligence, plan, character or structure behind them. This was one of the main problems my group had with WHQ in this mode. It was, in effect, like playing D&D when all you did was roll random encounters. Fun for a while, but lacking.
Even so, with AI for the Necro player some sort of random dungeon generator may end up being required, depending on how many scenarios are in there already. I’ll have to see how much more interest I can lever into it.
Interesting you should say that about genders. It’s something I emailed Mantic about yesterday, so we’ll see what they say.
Morning 😉
This advenced rules for random dungeon or adventure generator is awesome idea. Think of it this way, when you finish of main plot and all great adventures included if you want to play again somebody have to create new dungeon and write new scenario wheather its a new expansion from mantic, game master or community. So why not make it easier and fully solo and co-op vs AI ? In WHQ there was simple cards mechanic driven by objective rooms. With this Kickstarter Mantic could do it much better w more replayability and more fun.
It would make pick-up games quick, though not really any quicker than playing one of the pre-made and balanced scenarios.
For me it’s not really about picking-up game quickly but rather ability to create something unexpected everytime i play. I would rather play simple random objective dungeon and let my Hero live for some time after i finish up with Necromancer. Personally i would love to see in advanced game rules to a) Creating a Hero b) Upkeep phase so leveling up, healing, buying stuff, traveling to villages and so on c) random dungeon generator to play apart from main Necromancer scheme. d) some events in the dungeons could be random deck of pure menace collapsing corridors, crumbling walls, pits, creepy crawlies e) dungeon monsters with AI. I think that this Kickstarter is going into the right direction. Can’t wait for more news 🙂 cheers
That sounds pretty good to me too 🙂
Hi Jake
There’s no denying there is the WQ/HQ element here. Geeks are getting older 🙂 they remember these games fondly and and more than keen to see another dungeon crawler like that (and much better no doubt) the time is absolutely right for this sort of game to reemerge not least because it’s a classic but it’s also a gateway game for new and young players. You have also opened the floodgates by involving folks in the rules and Mantic encouraging feedback so your going to get a lot of buzz from this one . Good luck and well done .
That added sprinkle of nostalgia makes everything rosy…
We are a lot who want to get a HQ for grown-ups ^^ (the euro version of the original one was a shame in my opinion with its modified rules, but I had good time back in the years)
Lots of us may have children at home and that’s a good way to transmit our gamer way of life with a good game !
I concur
🙂
It’s been a bit slow for the KS and info in general. ANd as Gen-con is here I am sure there will be next to no interaction on Mantic’s part unless we hit SG’s. Can you spill some more beans? Maybe some stuff about the Advanced Book? Also I saw that Secret Weapon Miniatures will be releasing some Resin terrain. Any chance that you all will partner with them?
I’m working on an article about that now (among other things).
No idea what SW is up to. Mind you, Mantic have teamed up with them before (Deadzone), so it’s very possible.
Good to hear!
Jake will there be dragons or other big or exotic monsters?
A tentative possibly, though really big stuff is only going to work in limited circumstances, perhaps as end boss mobs. If it’s wider than 2 squares then it’s going to struggle to get through almost every layout so they’re not going to be chasing folk down tunnels.
Yeah, I remember some games like Descent, where I encountered our first Dragon. ‘How’d that even get in here… How does it get any exercise… Who FEEDS this thing?’
‘Shut up and kill it, we’ve a quest to complete.’
‘But it makes no sense!!!’
Easy, there’s a hole in the roof leading to the surface, only way in or out of there is by flying
Dragon could be 2 squares wide and 3+ long 😉 so i imagine it could bite, but i wouldn’t bother, chaseing is good for scraggy necromancers,dragons just breathe fire or use magic 😉
I would love to see some boss mobs, should be popular with the KoW crowd too
Maybe in a second expansion ^^
there are still 2 weeks to fill in !
Hi Jake. I already feel the value is good for my hundred bucks, and we’ve still got quite a ways to go. I’d also just like to add my two cents regarding female heroes. I’d like more please. And not alt sex for the ones already there, but with a few fun differences if possible. Thanks.
I mentioned this to the Mantic guys.
wow, you actually do respond! I feel honored. so, I had some follow-up questions. I had mentioned my concern that the scenarios you generate will not be balanced for advanced. To quote you here is the response: “The idea is to have a value for the dungeon when you build your own, and then have the Heroes take models and buffs to balance that. Once this is worked out then all I need to do is rate the Core scenarios as a specific value. The challenge lies in balancing the process and costing the various elements. Nothing strange about that.”
So does that imply that every item will have an “advanced” points cost attached, like items etc? (i say advanced points cost because an item that lets you move after your action is brillliant for basic but rubbish for advanced).. So then each scenario to scale to advanced will have a dungeon points level and then we just equip our heroes to match? that could really work, and that really would double the number of scenarios provided.
my secondary question then becomes, are there going to be any changes to the dungeon master rules for advanced?
anyway, glad to know I am heard. I really want this game to truly offer what I feel you offered, and I feel this could be the missing piece for me.
Oh, and since others have been asking, will the Mortibris AI deck work for the warlord expansion? if not, there has been no mention of a warlord expansion AI deck, but will there be one?
Thanks. I will poke back in a day or two to see what precious morsels you leave me.
Yes to your first question. The Heroes kit themselves out to the value of the dungeon, so everything needs to be costed.
Yes to your second question. Mainly this is a case of the level of detail, like the Heroes. They will also be able to gain experience, again, like the Heroes. Basically, the advanced rules are there to expand on the Necromancer player’s fun as much as that of the Heroes.
Yes, the Warlord will need a different AI deck.
oh it’s rather unfortunate to hear that. don’t you think that it’s a little awkward to buy all those wonderful addons with minis from DKH and KNoW and not be allowed to play solo ? will you consider to extend necromancer’s deck that it could fit all baddies or perhaps different decks for other factions?
If I can work out a way to make the AI deck both highly characterful and usable with anyone then I’ll be very happy doing so. My concern with a blanket promise that the AI deck will work for everyone is that it is very likely to lose a lot of character that way. Bland AI is a bad idea.
I do have a few thoughts about how I may be able to do a generic yet characterful AI system, but I haven’t tried it with live ammo yet so I’m not entirely sure it will work in practice. What I’m basically doing is telling you want the minimum will be: different AI decks for different factions.
I think a AI deck for any expansions is pretty reasonable but a AI decks for all the possible KOW models for all possible adventure types seems sort of unreasonable. They are providing rules for the additional models to help people build their own adventures and such. I would much rather see the designer worrying about creating interesting mechanics and adventures than trying to tune AI decks for the difference between Elves and Undead.
Good AI is hard for a game where 2d placement, mission goals, and complex terrain. If they enemies are always just trying to kill the heroes it is not so bad but that makes for bland adventures. Looking at the Blood Bowl PC game from a few years ago, the AI was just dreadful using the same tactics regardless of what team they were and what team you were.
this is all wonderful news. I would pass along that the warlord expansion will come with AI cards if needed to the KS crew to update the graphic and to explain. many backers were concerned the expansion would not support coop.
about items, what is the goal? will items be interchangable between all characters? are some class/race specific? what variety will there be? will there always be one ‘ultimate’ weapon?
also, shameless plug for henchmen!
I believe this was mentioned in the update about the thing. The graphic shows new cards too.
There will definitely be an ultimate weapon, and it will definitely belong to my Hero. Absolutely.
For additonal verbose commentary my take on the current value and detailed wishlisting of additons can be found here:
http://twilight40k.blogspot.com/2014/08/dungeon-saga-kickstarter-half-way.html
The advanced rules are where the value is for me. I’m backing the KS as I’ve been looking for a dungeon crawler for ages and the ones currently on the market haven’t grabbed me, this is partly due to nostalgia for HQ, the game that started me on the gaming/wargames road in the first place. The two tier approach means I get, in essence, HQ and AHQ in the same box-the scope to make my own quests to play with my friends is a huge draw.
I agree Englishred, I find many people in their attempt to value Dungeon Saga, are entirely missing taking the Advanced Rules into account, some which will add huge value and replayability to the game.
Yup.
As we can create custom heroes, does the advantage system also support custom skills? For example, skills for talking (would help getting information), trading (get better bargains) etc.?
Regarding pre-build scenarios are those completely linear (point-to-point) or non-linear (decisions or path choices matter how story evolves)?
Pre-built scenarios are linear. That’s the best way to get a very closely balanced set (which is one of the aims of the Core style of play).
If I understand your question on skills correctly, you’re talking about a more RPG approach. I’m sure you could add this if you really wanted to. There are likely to be a small number of skills that allow you to interact with the between-adventure game, but not many.
Thank you for the reply!
Jake, would it be possible to include a Mimic among normal chests to give looting some risks ?
I’ve already asked.
Reaper has a Bones Mimic for like 2.29 for people who were not in their first kickstarter. It is not a bad model if people want to add something this in after market.
Mimics are great. Door and Chest mimics would be a great inclusion. It delves deep into and touches on the instinctive fears in the human mind, its horrifying to think you’ve discovered something worthwhile and/or friendly/non threatening, only to be horribly tricked and realising you’ve been lured by an ambush predator all along and that in the space of a heartbeat, you’ve gone from a mildly euphoric feeling, to one of sheer terror with your life in immediate peril. Its great atmosphere and great adventuring…
When I initially commented I clicked the “Notify me when new comments are added” checkbox and now each time a comment is added I get three e-mails with the same
comment. Is there any way you can remove me from that service?
Thanks!
Not that I know of. I had a look at the dashboard and couldn’t see anything remotely like that. I’d guess that setting is only at your end. There must be some way for you to turn it off.
I do not understand these complaints of value for money at all. This is a giant box of awesome
with support behind it. if it was $200 i would still back it instantly.
The Zombicide Kickstarter ended with 114 minis for that game in the 100 dollar pledge. Most of these types of soft plastic miniature driven boardgames average out to about 1-1.30 per figure for the online discounter price. The current 1.80 is high for an available now price and is much closer to retail pricing as opposed to pay now and get in a year for a kickstarter.
People might question the value since the number of scenarios and tiles are pretty vague.
People might question the value since Mantic does not have a great reputation for cardstock components:
http://thefrontlinegamer.blogspot.com/2011/11/review-dwarf-kings-hold-green-manance.html
Or their Minis:
http://theback40k.blogspot.com/2013/01/review-mantic-enforcers.html
Neither of which are we actually seeing what we would be getting in the box because if the molds are already tooled than having a kickstarter to fund the game would be pretty dishonest.
Another issue people could have is that if they just want to play the basic game and not design their own scenarios and such the extra minis which make up about 40% of the kickstarter would not be used for most scenarios as those will probably be written to work directly with what is in the basic game or basic expansion box as people who buy board games generally expect the included rules are usable with what is in the box.
Or you could not like that the minimum pledge is more like 125 since 20% of the base pledge is for the expansion.
There are also plenty of reasons to think it is a good value. It looks like a run game and I have heard good things about the rules designers games. There appears to be a lot of replay value with different heros and game modes. Ofcourse many of these are intanglibles that are hard to evaluate for something still in development so people general base it on weight of models which is fair currently but not a huge deal.
A few points here.
The enforcers come with known issues. They are not representative of the rest of the range.
More important, these are miniatures you need to assemble.
DS miniatures are the board game standard, no assembly needed. If you want to get a better idea on what to expect, pics of the content of Mars Attack float around. They are closer to what to expect from DS.
It will help to make up your mind in one way or another.
If they manage to get the Zombicide quality, that will be good. Not a given when you’ve taken a look at the Mars Attack minis.
I have reaper bones models and the the D&D coop games so no about what to expect from these types of models. The Bones monsters for example generally look pretty reasonable but the pcs general fall behind in the face region since people intrinsically know what faces should look like.
I swear I wrote out a long winded reply to this. Must have forgotten to post it.
I see it got caught in moderation for having links to reviews of other mantic products that I had encountered in the past that make me not jump straight into the kickstarter.
Yup. Found it lurking in the spam. The filter doesn’t like multiple links (to anything) in a single comment. Looking at the bulk of the stuff it does reject (dozens a day) you can see why.
I agree. I think the value is great. The expansion on top is crazy good value.
I dont understand the complaints on questioning the value.
The content is generic in a way that fantasy miniatures overcrowd the market, so far it introduces only one rare type: zombie troll. The rest is very common.
Do people buy things only because they come as a bargain?
I prefer to consider if they come to fill a need.
As it stands, I could field the necessary miniatures to play the game except the zombi trolls.
Minis’ resine masters look nice but what about the quality of the end result? (see Mars Attack)
What is up about the gameplay?
Etc
I got a set of Dwarf Kings Hold tiles yesterday so started going through just my reaper bones to fill out the 3 alpha missions. I could fill out the skeletons, archer skeletons, and zombies are no problem. Do not have anything like the armored zombies but could fill them in with more wight type monsters. For the dwarf revenant I probably have to find the chainmail bin to get skeletal dwarves. None of the base heros are any problems to fill in. I even have 4 plastic doors from dungeonbowl and some bones dungeon dressings.
Tonight I will give the alpha rules a run through to see what they play like. I would also love to see more stuff on the rules going forward. I personally have been looking at a good fantasy skirmish game to put my extensive fantasy model collection to use. If the rules of this game can be deep enough you could prehaps set up a mordheim underground style game with both players controlling a mix of heroes and monsters.
I’m writing a brief update to the Alpha now. That should help 🙂
Mantic is currently at a decision point for the kickstarter. They can do another expansion which will probably bring in another 75K from the current backers which if they follow their pattern could put about 10 more models in the basic pledge or they can go back and open up the base game and try to get more into that box. I was disappointed to see that the plastic furniture was not going into the box. Right now it seem similar in content to the dwarf kings hold games in terms of number of models so maybe they are targeting a 35 pound retail level. I am not sure that the box game stands out at that level currently compared to the competition. While I am all for giving the backers a good discount, I also worry that giving to much to backers while not expanding the game will essentially limit the legs of the game outside the kickstarter. Right now you pretty much have an even divide between game and bonus minis. A couple more core undead monster groups would probably help this.
After playing with your buddies you get a response like, ” I would like to get a copy of this game but you got all this stuff for 100 dollars at the kickstarter, now they want X for so much less. I guess I will pass.” Mantic is already got a reputation as a kickstarter company. I do not think I can even buy anything at retail within a one hour drive of me and about 4M people live in that distance so I am not totally in the middle of no where.
I sit naked at home on my PC and buy things and have them delivered to my door, sometimes with free postage if I save up and buy lots…
Funny, I just ordered something from Mantic online and here I wait 10 days later for it. I am hoping it makes it here before the kickstarter ends as I will be using the contents to help evaluate mantic as a company.
Stuff actually arrived the day I wrote this. Funny how that happens. Will get more chance to look at it tonight.
Sounds like a great way to summon things 🙂
Disappointed by the teased demons expansion. Hoping for something more different than Hero’s vs Monster Type X. Maybe you guys can surprise me.
Different? Such as?
On this very blog, I suggested a flipped scripted version with Monster “Heros” and Human and Demi-Human “Monsters” and “Villians”. Elite charactered monster races fighting against angry villagers, towns guardsmen, and adventurers. Such a system would also follow well into an underground skirmish game.
Right now the game progression feels like it was pulled out of Diablo so something.
I was also hoping that they might look to add a little more to the original game since it has not seen a new monster in over 2 weeks. Makes it seem way to much like they had long since decided what was in that box(as seen by paint prototype minis for 90% of the minis included) so what are people really kickstarting here.
And as I also said, I like the idea of inverting the Hero/Monster and I’m sure we’ll get to it at some point.
I am not really against it. Just sort of meh.
It just sort of feeds into a general iffyness I feel about the kickstarter. Mantic is a very polished kickstarting company. While they listed the goal as 50K, it seems more like what was planned to go in the box was really at the 250K level. The paladin in the center of the cover art was a 275K goal. Things like calling the Throne room a bonus tile when it is part of the basic DKH:DR set seems strange. Little things like this just makes it feel a little dirty.
While certain things that might not have been in the box might get in there due to the feedback to the kickstarter, it still seems much more like a marketing process than a real funding of the creative effort. People are just diminishing the risk of Mantic not making a profit on the project that they had well planned than really making the project happened. The success level of the kickstarter might be driving the expansions development as opposed to the core game.
I know that you are doing your best work to make a great game and expansions but two expansion into a kickstarter for a game no one has played. If you get the game it is sort of hard to turn them down as they will clearly be more later but if the game turns out not to be someones taste it is more good money after bad.
“good money after bad”?
That would only be true if both models and game were complete rubbish and you couldn’t sell it on ebay 🙂
Every time Mantic does a KS someone says it’s not a “real” one. Well, all I say to that is try producing a game yourself and see how easy it is. Without the KS, the stuff backers will get would not be doable in the same format within the same timeframe. If you think that statement is untrue then you have to imagine that Mantic has $460,000+ lying about in an account doing nothing. Does that sound likely? Would that be an efficient way to run a business?
At the end of the day this and every other KS has to appeal to their backers, and the backers have to believe they’ll get the product. If you’re not comfortable with the KS for whatever reason then don’t back it. That’s exactly what I do if I don’t think one is worth it or I’m not sure it’ll really happen. I look at and reject far more KS than I back.
Dungeon Sagas will come out in retail too, and you could choose to wait till you’ve see reviews and whatnot if that makes you feel happier. Again, that makes perfect sense to me. You’d miss the KS exclusives and probably pay more, but that’s the trade off.
I am sorry if I offended you. The business side of kickstarter is very complicated and I will table any further discussion of that here. Mantic has definitely be able to release games at a faster rate than they would have been able to without using but there are certainly non financial costs associated with it in terms of community.
I must say while I can understand why people are put off slightly by Mantics Kickstarter Marketing plan, where they start with a total that is for a product that has a far lower amount of content than that they intend to include in the base game, I can understand why they do so and at the end of the day its actually not harming anyone and I assume the issue with say having a 275k-300k starting goal is it puts people off before you start, and it makes for a very dull Kickstarter at least until this level is reached (I think it was 4-5days).
Now as I see it regardless of what they planned to include as the initial retail release, the campaign has exceeded this now and we are without a doubt Kickstarting new parts of the game. I also am less sure they should be increasing the Retail box set (though I was expecting the plastic furniture to be included in honesty), for as long as they continue to increase the Backer rewards for the basic pledge I feel that as a backer I am being appropriately rewarded for my advancing money to them for the project. If they go back and start adding new aspects to the core boxed set, people will once again start questioning why they should back this rather than wait for the retail release and while there is still some extra Undead bits I would like to see produced I also see no reason why they would need to be part of the core set and not an expansion boosters (unless they were critical to a quest – though you could easily counteract that by producing Kickstarter exclusive quests).
Regardless of how well prepared Mantic were in advance for large aspects of this Kickstarters production and direction if they did not have painted pre-production versions of many of the core creatures included they would not be looking at any where close to the current pledge total so this prep is extremely vital. I will also say that while they were ready for at least the first 300k in terms of models and I would hazard a guess they have sketches and a (rough) plan ready for the first million they could not prepare for hitting beyond say 300k in terms of pre-production sculpts because if something goes wrong and the kickstarter is by there terms a flop they will have wasted money I do not feel they can easily absorb.
Now where Mantic take this Kickstarter from here is still very much anyones guess, honestly I am still shocked by the speed its moving currently especially since we are in the middle of the campaign which is the slump point. So while I have lots of things on my wish list I hope they include I also feel that anything that would require bigger stretch goals (which would be anything included in the basic retail version as the multiplier goes up vastly) should be held back until the last 2 days when not only will the backers who were on the fence start to pledge (or not) but the current backers will address there pledge amount to include what they want and can afford at this time, this normally (but not always) has the effect of sending that pledge total spiralling upwards, sometimes to the point where mantic cannot release stretch goals as fast as they are getting knocked down (Deadzone & Dreadball), which I feel other than at the campaigns beginning is the best time to include such goals without risking the campaign slowing down to much because if that happens people begin to lose interest or get distracted by what’s new and shiny elsewhere and can cause a Kickstarter to fail to meet its potential.
Personally however I am pleased they are looking at the Abyss next (I am hoping it will be Abyssals, Abyssal Dwarfs and Twilight Kin – Even at the requirement of a far most costly expansion than the previous one) as this provides us far more varied content and enemies for the game as a whole especially with included rules for Kings of war models. After this has been done however in a good amount of detail and depth (I am thinking 800K would be needed to cover these properly) they can then start looking at the game from different angles, putting in stretch goals for models that are far from essential (I would love but dont expect, a Undead Angel, A Cockatrice living or dead, a Medusa, a Bone Hydra, and a Ethereal spirit dragon boss), as well as including other dungeon extras (such as plastic range rulers and Doors), as the stretches until the campaign meets its conclusion.
@eriochrome – I’m not offended, just a bit bored with seeing (and answering) the same comment time and time again. A comment which, in my view, is basically without logical merit in the first place. However, this isn’t about this KS or even just about Mantic, it’s about KS in general and who and what that is for. I’ll think about an article on this when the current KS is over. That would be a better time for this topic, I think.
I am, however, intrigued by your suggestion that this is a bad thing for the community. All I’m seeing is upsides.
I look at the base box and compare it to my Castle Ravenloft game which ran 50 dollars shipped when I got it when it was released.
Heroes: 5 for CR vs 8 for DS but each CR hero has a small deck of power cards to fill in their 3 feats and 2 general attacks plus a special ability. These allow each hero to be configured either 27 or 54 ways. Leading to 27.8M different configuration for the heroes if all 5 are in the game.
Villians: 8 for CR (7 Minis as one mini is used as different villian level in different adventures) vs 4 for DS
Monsters: 10 Types in groups of 3 for CR and 7 Types in group of 4 or 2 for DS.
Scenarios: 13 for CR vs ? (Maybe 6 since that is the mantic standard) + Couple of Bonus (Troll Boss, Dwarf Boss, I see to recall others but do not see them explicitly listed in the stretch goal graphics)
Tiles: 42 Interlocking 4 by 4 moderately thick tiles(thicker than DKH but thinner than X-wing counters) with like 462 open spaces for CR vs Unknown, The DKH set was 28 pieces with 221 spaces. The DKH set is more configurable without the interlocking but also very vulnerable to dice, sleeves, and especially cats.
Cards and Counters: CR has 200 card set and more counters than you can shake a stick at so it is not short there. Not that so many is great it is a lot to layout and access during the game.
For the game play, I found that the villian side of DS is much more interesting and indepth than the chain condition and macro movement for the villians AI in CR but found the fighter Heroes very bland in DS. The single attack type and single feat really did not provide many meaningful choices even for a basic game. First Training Mission discussed here:
http://twilight40k.blogspot.com/2014/08/dungeon-saga-journey-from-west.html
In that comparison it does not look like DS would be hurt by a few more monsters or villians in the basic game.
For information purposes, I would love to here more about the tiles, and the scenarios for the DS box. More information about the numbers, sizes, and thickness of the proposed tiles. For the scenarios numbers would be helpful but also how the campaign is structured. How do the scenarios adjust to different numbers of heroes? If the heroes are supposed to collect treasure for new abilities and such to be able to handle the later scenarios, is there going to be a prescribe system if you just want to play mission say 4 today with a new group of heroes. As Jake said it is the game that really matters but since the contents of the base box are not overpowering I would really like to know more about the game. I might be able to extract some of this information by digging through 7 pages of updates but seems like it might be helpful to have some more links in the introduction of the kickstarter (which you do not want to fill with all this info). The categories are already there so links to new pages could easily be added.
For the expansions, I would like to see some basic description on how the new monster faction makes the game play different. Looking at the Alpha rules the undead are mainly characterized by the Bone piles and being very slow. Obviously the greenskins cannot rise from the dead and will not be slow making a more straight up fight? Anything else planned there to make for a different experience. Similarly demons can be summoned but you never know what you will get and I would not expect them to be slow. Maybe they talked about this already stuff in the updates and I missed it.
I pass on comments like this about box contents, though Mantic are the ones who decide all that. I try not to get involved in all the costs, margins and whatnot (as it’s dull). All I need to know is what I can have in the box so I know what I’ve got to work with in terms of design 🙂
One thing I can be very specific about is card thickness. DS will use an identical card weight to Descent (even printed at the same factory).
The scenarios in the Core game are fixed. That’s a central feature of the Core game: it’s all pre-defined so you can just pick up and play. If you play the whole campaign then they go in a set order and the Heroes gain experience and equipment in a pre-defined way. That allows me to carefully balance all the scenarios. A side-effect of this is that you can choose to play any individual scenario as a pick-up game and it will be balanced with the forces provided.
Playing through the scenarios with the Advanced rules will inherently be less balanced, though they are starting from a solid base so they shouldn’t be far out.
As Kickstarters have a habit of adding scenarios I can’t give you a final total till it’s finished. My guess is that the campaign will be somewhere between 8-12 in total.
Greenskins play differently partly because of the Green Rage of the Orcs, but also because of the weedy cowardliness of the gobbos. I don’t know what the Abyssal pack’s got in so your guess is as good as mine 😉
Regardless of the faction, a lot of the difference is actually in the scenario design rather than the models. That’s where a lot of the character comes from.
Thanks for the info. If the card stock is set then they should just add something like. “The tiles and counters will come on heavy guage X card stock. These high durability components are about twice the thickness of the components in the original Dwarf Kings Hold series.” As you note there is always some intentional vagueness in kickstarters due to stretch goals and such but if they have concrete information it would be helpful to provided it for those potential customers who care so they do not waste your time asking about it repeatedly.
I thought they said already, but I’ll mention it to them.
They might have been more specific than:
“Just some of the different examples of the tiles you will get. Each modular dungeon tile is made of durable thick card to withstand the rigors of gaming and the fury of battle.”
in one of the updates but there are now 7 pages of those to try to extract information from which is not ideally helpful to people who are not so dedicated at seeking out info.
Since the Orcs have this rage which I remember correctly happens when they are hurt (got green menace like 2 days ago but have not read the rules yet), does that mean they will have a new combat table. One hit might due nothing to undead since killing what is already dead is a challenge but 1 hit kills gobbos but only activates Rage in the Orcs. If each expansion has its own combat table that might need to be a cardstock reference piece.
Yes, new beasties may well need new damage tables. The Green rage is pretty easy though: do any damage and they get cross. Damage the cross ones and they get dead: easy!
I did find info in the update where they add the tile set to the add ons where they describe the tiles as the same as descent. Of course that is one line in like 8 pages of updates. I also tried to really figure out what in terms of rules and scenarios is promised so far and made up this list and where I think it will be found as you said that the important part in measing value is getting lots of use out of the game as opposed to having a big pile of never used miniatures which I cannot argue with as I already have more than enough of the later:
Dwarf Kings Quest Base Game: ?+2 Scenarios
Initial Scenarios: Unknown
Grund Bonus Scenario
Hoggar Bonus Scenario
Adventures Companion:
Advanced Rules
Solo and Fully Coop Rules
Kings of War Undead Model Rules
Kapoka Hero Rules
Kings of War Goblin Model Rules
Kings of War Orc Model Rules
Dwarf King’s Hold Elf and Dwarf Model Rules
Arianya Hero Rules
Kings of War Abyssal Model Rules
Dungeon Journal: 7+ Dungeon Saga And 12 Dwarf Kings Hold Scenarios
Keldan Hero Rules
Keldan Bonus Scenario
Dead Rising 6 Scenarios
Logan Hero Rules
Logan Bonus Scenario
Blaine Hero/Villian Rules
Blaine Scenarios
Hordin and Gnasher Rules
Hordin and Gnasher Scenarios
Venitia Scenario
Green Menace 6 Scenarios
Warlord of Galahor: ?+2 Scenarios
Unknown Base Scenarios
Great Axe+Skulk Bonus Scenario
Thrundak Bonus Scenario
Infernal Crypts: 6 Scenarios
6 Base Scenarios
Just seems strange though that I had to dig through 8 pages of updates as opposed to just following a link from the kickstarter page to a page about the Dungeon Journal on the Dungeon Saga website. Lots of eye candy on the front page but information about the game is actually work to find.
Thanks erio, that’s very useful. If you don’t mind I’ll send this on to the Mantic lot. It wouldn’t hurt for them to flag it up.
Replay value rules 🙂
Sure, No Problem. I did it as part of my final week check in:
http://twilight40k.blogspot.com/2014/08/dungeon-saga-kickstarter-final-week.html
I was also thinking that the kickstarter exclusive missions would be great ones to put those extra third undead monster minis to use or use the orc or demon bonus minis that come with the base pledge. That way people who just pledge for the basic game will have a few missions that uses those models even without investing in the expansions.
Yup. Using the extra KS stuff in at least some of the missions was my plan.
Seeing the new backer goal, it almost makes it seem like someone out there is listening. Probably chance like when my green menace box showed up the day I mentioned I was waiting on it here.
Now if we can just get a few more monster types and an additional villian into that retail box. 😉
They updated the graphics to give more detail on scenarios and such. Looks like they are now listing the base game as 10 scenarios with 12+ kickstarter exclusive ones in Dungeon Journal to go with the 12 DKH. Nothing on the number in the warlord expansion but I am guessing 6+2 for 8 as the second expansion started with 6.
They still are not listing the rules for the Elves and Dwarves from the DKH games though.
If mantic didn’t have this Kickstarter planned well from start to finish, I’d be disappointed. I couldn’t care less if they used the first bunch of easily reached stretch goals to fill what was already expected to be a part of the main box, and I don’t care that they are using it as an advanced order platform…couldn’t care less!!! What I do care about is getting what I believe to be a game in a genre I love and a game that is shaping up to have fantastic potential. I’m more than happy to fund this, on any premise, so that I can get the base game, plus extra stuff, quicker and more easily than what I would’ve if I had to wait for Mantic to fund and develop the game in-house. I’m also extremely happy that we have had the opportunity to give feedback and help guide in both rules and physical content, however little, a game that will be ours.
I don’t care for some of the things we are getting, like the Salamander Hero and Fish Girl Hero etc, however I’m more than willing to take that hit when I consider what else I am getting.
Mantic have a demonstrated ability to develop good games from concept to completion both in-house and by way of Kickstarter. I like what I’ve seen of the game so far, they’ve shared the basic Alpha rules so people can kind of get an idea of what they’re getting and they’ve shared as much info as possible to date, and will be sharing more before the Kickstarter ends. Pledge up people, keep that cash rolling in, let’s see if we can manage a third expansion 🙂
@Crimsonsun – Yeah, I was also very surprised to see that the Dungeon Furniture is not going into the main box set…that and doors should be a given in the base box set.
You don’t like the salamander? He’s one of my faves 🙂
I love GW Lizardmen, they are a fantastic looking army, and if Mantic ever did a KoW Salamander army, I’d no doubt feel the same way about them. I like Lizard-type-folk so much that I’m currently half way through commissioning 10mm sculpts of a number of Lizardfolk units for my games of 10mm KoW.
So I absolutely don’t have anything against the Salamander concept at all, in fact I’d love to see some Salamander enemies in an expansion for Dungeon Saga. It’s just when I think of an adventuring party…a Salamander Hero (or a Fish Hero) just doesn’t sit well in my minds eye as a member of a Dungeon Delving party 🙂
Least they are more unique and less generic fantasy minis. I did not really struggle to fill in the minis for the heroes in the released missions. I often had several choices without even getting to the my metal collection.
@Danny – Which is why there are more Heroes than you need to choose from 🙂
I think people might be agreeing with you about heros and such. It seems to be like I saw a -1K change to the total.
Really? Looks happy enough to me. These things do fluctuate though. increasingly so, I think, as more backers realise they can manipulate things by raising and lowering their pledges.
I am sure mantic much perfers the current funding and backer rates of this one to the mars attacks one which was in a multiday negative phase at this point. This one seems much closer to dz which had a big closing day.
I think with the two new pledges being made available later on this arvo (your time), we should see a well above daily average jump in pledge levels which will shoot us straight passed the 500K expansion and possibly even into the next stretch goal (which I assume will be an addition to the Abyssal expansion and base pledge)
Just quietly, I’m half temtped to have myself immortalised as a Barbarian Warrior from the far North, a Slayer, a Reaver with sword in hand and a lust for women, adventure and riches…
Just remember, always pillage before you burn…
Wondering with the discussion of random map generator/missions if I can make an ipad app that generates a layout, doors and objectives and you can click to unveil the next section as you open doors in ai mode, gives the opertunity to build in a little coherency and theme to a random mission generator.
Not sure what you’re asking here. Do you want to know if you can do an official one, whether you have the skill to code it, or what?
I don’t have the skill do official one of appropriate quality, but I wanted to know if there was either plans for some one to do an official one and/or if I will be infringing ip if I do a free one of lesser quality for people to use.
It’s been discussed, though I don’t know what plans were finalised for an official one – if any have been.
You’d need to ask Mantic themselves about IP use. However, the last time I heard Ronnie talking about this sort of thing his take was that people who intended selling stuff needed to sign a licensing agreement. People who were just running fan sites didn’t. Worth checking though. They won’t bite 🙂