Watch your Back: Week March 12 to 18
This week's selection includes a roll 'n' write, a dungeon crawler, card games and an expansion, so check it out and see if anything tickles your fancy.
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Let's start with Dice Cards: a 1-99 player roll 'n' write game which comes with 50 mini games that the players can choose from.
At the beginning of a session, a player is given 9 cards and picks 6 to keep. Each of these cards shows a different r'n'w game. Then two dice are rolled, and players decide where to assign the result of one of the dice. It is soloable but relevant information is not out yet. It is launching on Kickstarter on March 14.
Personal opinion: I gotta say this one looks appealing. I'm not usually a fan of roll 'n' writes but the different mini games make it stand out.
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Moving on to Drums of War: Enclave. This is a 1-2 player card game in which two armies clash on the battlefield. You deploy your units by paying their cost (discarding other cards from your hand), and try to kill the opponent's leader before running out of cards. Solo rules haven't been revealed yet. It is launching on Kickstarter on March 14.
Personal opinion: I'm guessing it is better as a duel instead of solo.
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Then we have Point City: a 1-4 player card drafting game in which you add building cards to your tableau to create a city and earn points.
You set up a grid of resource cards, and draw two each turn, either getting resources or flipping the cards over to reveal a building. If you have the required resources, you can take a building card. No information on the solo mode at this point. It is launching on Kickstarter on March 14.
Personal opinion: I can't really tell if this is a good solo option.
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If you are familiar with Core Space, then you will recognize the premise behind Maladum: Dungeons of Enveron. This is a 1-6 player cooperative dungeon crawler the components of which are made of cardboard paper. It is scenario-based with objectives your heroes have to achieve by using their weapons and magic. It is launching on Kickstarter on March 15.
Personal opinion: When Core Space was first released, I was fascinated by the terrain as shown in pictures online. Then I got the chance to see it from up close at the UKGE, and was disappointed: it looked like a cheap paper toy, even though it's not. It may be a good game but its main selling point is not for me.
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For last I left Townsfolk Tussle: this is a 2-5 player cooperative adventure game with a vintage cartoon theme that can be soloed by controlling 3 characters. It will receive two expansions: Odd Jobs and Foul Neighbors on Kickstarter on March 14.
I didn't know Dice Cards was published by Card Lords. I really like this publisher. Unfortunately, it's indie, so the shipping fees are rather high ($19); I would have backed it otherwise.
If you grab it, I recommend you to add Battle Goats if available in the Pledge Manager. It's not soloable, but it's a silly fun game that I have consistently enjoyed every time I played it (3 players minimum though, and always play the drafting variant!). It's the best elaboration on the War card game that I can think of. One of the shiniest hidden indie gem in my board game collection.
I'll look at Deep Dive (as Zerbique mentioned, it's still on my watchlist), but as time went on, not sure I'll get it. I have Open Ocean, which I actually tweaked a bit for solo to make it more enjoyable for me and it has some of the "knowledge" thrown in (the goals are based on real coral reef interactions, which I adore and why I took the time to tweak the solo to my liking). This is why I do watchlists that feature games that are far from being crowdfunded/released... hindsight gives me very much needed perspective and if I watch the games as they grow into revealing more and more, it gives me more time to ponder their…
Deep Dive, which I had featured in a Freshly Added post (a push-your-luck game about fishing penguins) will be offered alongside Point City. I think I will back it, if the shipping fees are decent (I fear they won't be).
Dice Cards is probably too themeless for me, even though it should be something I would have lots of fun with.
Drums of War is something I may get. It looks cheap at least, but as Athena said, I fear it's better geared for dueling than for solo play. And really, I should realize at some point that, in the end, I don't really enjoy card games. I have always wanted to like Magic, but truth is, this kind of…