Game: HeroCard Nightmare

Thread: Re: Two, Two, Two Games in One

Neil Thomson — 2008-11-03T06:20:56+00:00

Thanks for the review Matt.

I received HeroCard: Rise of the Shogun as my Secret Santa gift last year and I know it's cool as I did the research into it..........

I just haven't played it yet. On the strength of your review though I pledge to get it learnt and played before this Christmas.

To my Secret Santa 2007...please don't feel down about this. I really do love your gift. I just collect to many damn games each year.

Thread: Two, Two, Two Games in One

VixenTorGames — 2008-11-03T02:37:14+00:00

I've talked about how Red Juggernaut is putting every game in the same game world, which is a cool idea, but way before Red Juggernaut was giving funny names to awesome games, TableStar Games had a different cool concept for a game company.

TableStar Games makes the HeroCard line of games. Every one of these games is actually two games in one. Each HeroCard game combines a sort of dueling card game mechanic with a board game. The dueling thing is the same every time, but every board game is totally different. The dueling part can be used in every other game, so you could take a character deck from Cyberspace, mix in some cards from Rise of the Shogun, and use that deck in Nightmare. I'm not sure why you would do that - it would be mighty odd to have a hacker using samurai moves to escape a bad dream - but the point is, you can do it.

Before I get into the Nightmare part of this game, I'll go into a little more depth about the HeroCard mechanic. Each player in a HeroCard game plays a different character with three attributes - body, mind and X. Yeah, the last one is called X, because it changes for every game. The label is irrelevant, though. What matters is the score for each attribute, because when you play cards to attack or block, their cost can't add up past their associated attribute score.

It's a little complicated to explain, but if you play it you'll see that it's really not that hard. Each duel is essentially attacks and blocks, and the player with the higher total wins that duel. What that means changes for every game. Basically, the HeroCard duel just determines winners and losers, with varying consequences for winning or losing.

The HeroCard part of the game has considerably more depth than you might imagine at first. Once you play a card, it stays in play (but inactive) until you clear it. You can only clear three cards, and even then it has to be your turn, so if you fill up all your slots attacking, you won't have room for any defense. And different decks specialize in different things - you might have a deck with a decent number of tough nut-kick attacks, or you might have weak base attacks and devastatingly tricky modifiers. You might be able to clear cards out of turn, or you might be able to force opponents to put out worthless cards that clog up their attribute scores. There's a lot of strategy and forethought that goes into playing a decent deck.

So now I'll switch topics like a schizophrenic off his meds, and discuss Nightmare. In this game, everyone is trapped inside the same dream, and a magic camera has shown everybody what dream stuff is going to kill them. Like a dream zombie might take you out in the dream lake, or a dream cultist might kill you in the dream cabin. You can't be killed by the dream coyote in a dream desert, but then, neither could Dream Road Runner.

The trick is that only one dreamer gets to wake up. If you want to be the dreamer that wakes up, you have to make sure the other dreamers get killed. But to do that, you have to find out what killer is going to get each player, and where. You do this by finding out what scares the other dreamers.

So what ends up happening is that you rearrange the dream to set up test scenarios by moving the dreamer, the killers and the scenes, then see if you can make everyone reveal what frightens them. If you can win a HeroCard duel, everyone who is scared of the killer at the current location has to admit to being frightened. If you know what scares a particular dreamer, you can attack them directly, and if you win, they die.

There are four different character decks in Nightmare, and I would like to have a talk with whoever thought these were a good idea. In order to win, you have to make sure the other dreamers die, but these dreamers are some cutthroat sons of bitches if they can go through with this. For instance, one of the dreamers is a girl, one is her boyfriend, and one is her dad. Now, as a father myself, I can completely understand why the dad wants to see a zombie eat the boyfriend's face, but I'm a little unclear on why the daughter wants to kill her dad, and why the dad wants to kill his little girl. I guess I'm reading too much into the game, but it seems to me that the person they should all want to kill is the crazy witch who owns the camera who trapped them all in the first place. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned, but if it comes down to me killing my daughter to survive, I'm throwing in the towel.

Plus some of the card art is downright goofy. The boyfriend, Deon, has more than one card where his eyes are open so wide he looks like he's been freebasing cocaine all night long. Will, the dad, is wearing mirrored shades and sporting a beard straight out of the WWF. Aisling, the daughter, has a card called Malice, which shows her tearing up a picture of her old man. Maybe Will is a real dick, and that's why she wants a leviathan to eat him. Of course, they all have good reason to hate Isis, especially because she looks like she just jumped off the set of a silent porn movie from 1920.

OK, so I'm a little hard on the art and the theme. Maybe I'm just bitter because my own daughter said she wouldn't play when she found out she had to kill her dad (and maybe I'm grateful, and should quit complaining before she changes her mind and pays me a midnight vision with a Menendez-brother shotgun). In all honesty, the game is pretty cool. It's a little like Clue, because you're trying to figure out who is scared of what without revealing your own weakness. There's bluffing, deception and deduction, plus some handy card play. Then it's a little like a CCG, with good hand management and deck-building. Then it's a little like a Nightmare on Elm Street movie, but instead of getting sucked through your bed in a spray of blood that repaints the ceiling, you just put down your cards and walk away from the table.

The best thing I can say about HeroCard: Nightmare is not to praise its cool plastic figures, smooth game play or brilliant graphic design. I could tell you how it gets all tricky and tense, but that's not the best thing I could say, either. The best thing I could tell you about Nightmare is that I would very much like to play it again, and the best thing I can tell you about the HeroCard mechanic is that Nightmare made me want to try all the other games in the series. In fact, I'll be emailing the guys at TableStar for more games right after I post this review. Hopefully they won't be too mad at the fact that I thought Deon kind of looked like he should be wearing a padded helmet and a spit cup, or that Will looks like somebody Hulk Hogan beat up in 1986, or that Isis looks like she got kicked out of a Charlie Chaplin movie.

Summary

Pros:
Really cool interchanging duel mechanic
Tricky and strategic game play
Groovy theme

Cons:
Card art makes all the characters look like they have Down's Syndrome
Odd character relationships (which happily have nothing to do with the game itself)

Thread: Nightmare Poker

ethankennerly — 2008-10-19T04:13:26+00:00

Hope you have fun on Halloween...

NIGHTMARE POKER

A variant to HeroCard Nightmare by TableStar Games
Variant by Ethan Kennerly, December 2007 to June 2008

After playing with several casual players, and catering to my son's fondness for Texas Hold'em, I now play with a simpler variant, which is quicker to learn, quicker to play, and focuses on the synergy of deduction and bluffing.

This is not the complete rules and you still need HeroCard Nightmare to play. Refer to HeroCard Nightmare to augment these variants. Assume simplest interpretation of base rules. HeroCard Nightmare Rules are listed at the TableStar website: http://www.tablestargames.com/Games/G_NM_Main.html

Summary of variant is:
* Play with Poker cards in place of HeroCards. No attribute stacks, so no clearing.
* Randomize starting tile locations.
* You can move to ANY adjacent tile. Do not move scene tiles. Move two instead of three.

QUICK INTRODUCTION

Only one will awaken...

You've just looked at a cursed scene photograph of where you will die, and cursed killer photograph of who will kill you. Going to sleep, you share a dream with your friends, in which the only way to survive is to make sure everybody else meets their fate first.

You try to discover other players' Killer and Scene cards, and since you know they are doing the same, you try to hide your own Killer and Scene cards. When your Killer and Scene card is deduced, another player can eliminate you from play.

The board represents a dream that all players share. Killers and the collective Dreamer are moved around, testing who is afraid of some Killer or Scene. You can then deduce the combination of Killer cards and Scene cards another player. But can you do it before they deduce your Killer and Scene?

Components
1 Dreamer Figure
5 Killer Figures
5 Killer Cards
7 Death Scene Cards
7 Scene Tiles
52 card Poker Deck
4 Reference Cards
1 Rule Booklet

Game Setup
Shuffle and deal scene cards normally.

Turn all tiles face down and shuffle them. Place them face down as a hexagon in the center and six tiles around it, all touching the center. In this simpler variant, you can move from any tile to a touching tile, regardless of image on that side of the tile.

Have an experienced player start, or randomly determine who starts. Player to left of starting player places a killer on an empty tile. Continue counter-clockwise, until all killers are placed. Then starting player places Dreamer on an empty tile.

Playing the Game
Avoid revealing your Scene and Killer while deducing the Scene and Killer of other players.

The starting player takes the first turn. Afterward, turns proceed clockwise. On each turn, you have the following phases:
1. Discard any Poker cards, face up to central pile.
2. Draw up to 3 Poker cards not to exceed max hand size of 7 cards.
3. Move two times. Each move may shift a Dreamer figure or Killer figure to an adjacent tile.
4. Play Poker cards to: Scare all players, or Kill a single player.

Scaring a Player
To discover killer or scene, test which players are afraid of any killers or scene where the dreamer is.

Start a poker hand for the attack, with at least one card. Higher ranked hand of attackers (collectively) or defenders wins. In this variant, poker hands are compared:
Royal flush
Straight flush
Four of a kind
Full house
Flush
Straight
Three of a kind
Two pair
One pair
High card
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poker_hands

Only 5 cards are compared. Players may not state cards they have in hand.

Killing also uses Poker cards. After scare/kill attempt is concluded, discard those played cards.

If a player is scared, then scared player discards Poker hand and draw a new Poker hand of seven cards. When deck is exhausted, recycle discard pile.

With three or four players, players may join in either attack, but there is no 'Relief'.

When no one is afraid, eliminate tile as usual, if dream becomes disconnected, then reconnect as usual.

THEORETICAL NOTE

In this variant, Nightmare's roots to Clue and roots to Poker's bluffing strategies (to induce false higher-order beliefs) are cleaner. Nightmare Poker was demo'd at AISB 2008, because this variant of HeroCard Nightmare focuses on the knowledge game (as described for Cluedo by Hans p. van Ditmarsch).
http://dissertations.ub.rug.nl/faculties/science/2000/h.p.va...

Thread: Re: Layout photo

Jamos — 2008-07-07T15:08:43+00:00

TableStar_Games wrote:
Some players seem to like using that "tapping" system to denote "inactive" cards. Less shuffling around.

Monte Lin
Volunteer Coordinator
TableStar Games

Wouldnt that get you confused with cards that twist??

Thread: Re: [Review] Herocard: Nightmare

Peteloaf — 2008-04-25T16:24:35+00:00

Greetings and thanks for the comprehensive review. I wanted to make a few comments on your comments.

TomVasel wrote:
My only problem with the game is that the artwork seems excessively dark. Now that may seem like an obvious addition to a game with a horror theme, but I personally prefer horror games to be a bit campy, and this one is too gritty and morose for my tastes. The art on the cards is composed of two-toned pictures of doleful looking folk;
I think you aptly described the artwork. We were going for a dark scary nightmare and not a campy one so I think we hit the mark. As one of the doleful people (Will) I have to say it was a real hoot dressing up and shooting all the scenes. Can you see me smiling under the costume?

TomVasel wrote:

2.) ...When teaching the game, I find it easiest to simply play a duel with new players first

Yes - we always start newbies off with a few rounds of dueling before jumping into any HeroCard game.

TomVasel wrote:

3.) Duels: Since the duels are an integral part of the game, they better be good; and I'm happy to report that they are quite fun.

One facet that you did not really elaborate on was the bluffing aspect of the duels. If, for example, the dreamer is on the Farm tile, and I am not vulnerable there because my scene is the Cabin, I might still join in the blocking side. If the blocking side wins then my opponents will hopefully think I am holding the Cabin card. This confusion will aid in my staying alive a little longer. Good players of Nightmare are very good at keeping their information secrect through these types of strategies.

TomVasel wrote:

4.) Decks: I'm very pleased that TableStar finally included four decks with the basic game (something they likely should have done from the start).
Because this game did not include 4 pawns for the 4 Heroes we could not use our standard packaging scheme. -> All decks use the same dreamer figure as the pawn in the game. This forced us to put them all in the single box. We were hoping that having smaller base games with sepearate hero decks would lead to customers exploring with mixing and matching heroes and games.

We put all 4 decks in the Cyberspace box and shipped it as a 2-4 player game. This made the game more expensive and it really did not sell as well as some of the others that had only 2 decks. This could be completely unrelated to the deck choice but it did make the game more expensive for the consumer.

Thanks again for taking the time to post such an extensive review. Peter

Thread: Re: [Review] Herocard: Nightmare

TomVasel — 2008-04-23T12:02:51+00:00

I don't know. Maybe a more lighthearted nightmare theme? That does sound odd, and I suspect this may just be my dislike of the graphics. They remind me of the artwork in Lunch Money, which I also didn't like.

Thread: Re: [Review] Herocard: Nightmare

Robrob — 2008-04-22T16:40:11+00:00

Tom,

Great review as always. Here's an idle thought. Given that you weren't comfortable with the artwork (and probably the subject matter to a degree), what sort of "re-theme" could you see for this game/mechanics?

Thread: [Review] Herocard: Nightmare

TomVasel — 2008-04-22T09:58:25+00:00

TableStar continues to put out games that are compatible with their HeroCard system. I like the combat system that forms the core of each of these games and enjoy it most when it is combined with a strategic game with a bit of minor complexity. HeroCard: Nightmare (TableStar Games, 2007 – Nico Carroll) has a completely different look from the other games in the series, as it is a dark game with a nightmare theme. It's the first game to come ready-to-play with four characters and has a modular hexagonal board.

It's really hard for me to quantify exactly how I feel about Nightmare. The actual game mechanics are that of a deduction game mixed with combat. This works well - the game is probably the best designed game of the series so far - and it really does a great job at presenting a tense feeling; as players move through dreams, attempting to be the only player that survives. This is wonderful; but the artwork, which is done in a very foreboding photographical way, really isn't my style. The game comes across as too dark; and while we can use humor to belay that, I just have a hard time getting folks to play this version. Folks who like ghoulish themes will be absolutely thrilled, though - the game is aptly named!

Before I talk about the game, let me explain the HeroCard engine. Each player takes a deck of cards to represent their character. Interestingly, players can use decks from the other games (i.e. I can use a Shogun deck in the Nightmare game); and other than some theme clashing, they work fairly well. Three Attribute cards are included with each deck to represent the player's Body, Mind, and Attribute "X". These cards have a number on them that ranges from "3" to "10", showing the character's strength in those skills. The rest of the cards in a deck are "Action" cards and are associated with one of the three types of skills. Cards are Fast (play whenever you want); Restricted (play on your own turn); and Exclusive (play on your turn - limit of one). Players arrange their attribute cards on the table.
In a duel, a player has four phases. They first discard as many cards as they want to from their hand, then draw up to three more - not exceeding seven. After this, players "clear" up to three cards that they've played on the table, placing them in their discard pile. At this point, the player takes their one exclusive action and as many restricted actions as they can.

Most exclusive actions are attacks. The player must play one "Base" attack card and as many attack modifiers as they wish. However, each card played has a cost in one of the three attribute types. As a player plays a card, they place it on the table, where it stays until cleared. The total cost of all cards on the table cannot exceed the number of the attribute. Therefore, players who play many cards have fewer options available to them on turns. The player being attacked then may play one "Base" block and as many Block modifiers as they have room for, still making sure they stay within their attribute limits. Both players may continue to add modifiers, until they have no more or decide to play no more. If the attacker's total is higher, then they "hit" the opponent; otherwise, play passes to the next player.

The complete game adds a bit more. Each player chooses their nightmare "hero" and then each player is dealt one of seven death scene cards (joy!) and one killer card (out of five). This is the killer and scene that will finish off the player, and they are kept secret from the other players. Seven scene tiles are placed by the players in some manner, so that they are connected. The five killer figures are then placed on different tiles, and then the "dreamer" piece on one of the empty tiles. One player is chosen to go first, and play proceeds clockwise.

On a player's turn, they will follow the normal HeroCard rules, but they also can perform three moves. They may move the dreamer figure, one of the killers, or even move one of the scene tiles to a new spot (although following a few placement rules). Players are attempting to move the dreamer to a scene and/or with a killer that will hurt another player. Players perform an attack to "scare" other players. If the attack succeeds, any player that is scared of the killer and/or scene must discard their hand and redraw, alerting the other players as to whether they are scared or not. If no one is scared, the killer and/or scene tile is removed from the game, moving the dreamer figure to a new spot.

Once a player has figured out the combo to kill another player, they must move the dreamer to the scene along with the killer and announce a kill attack on that player. Players have a duel; and if the defender loses, and the combo matches the cards they have, they are out of the game. If they defend successfully, they can either draw three cards or "clear" three cards. This only applies when three or four players are in the game; when only two players are left, no one gets relief. When a player is eliminated, their scene and killer is also. The game continues until only one player is left alive, at which point they win the game!

Some comments on the game...

1.) Components: The plastic figures are great; I especially liked the figure in the bed for the dreamer piece, and everything else was of the highest quality. The box is small and sturdy; the cards have a good feel (despite the black borders); and the hexagonal tiles are large and thick. My only problem with the game is that the artwork seems excessively dark. Now that may seem like an obvious addition to a game with a horror theme, but I personally prefer horror games to be a bit campy, and this one is too gritty and morose for my tastes. The art on the cards is composed of two-toned pictures of doleful looking folk; and while the game is interesting, the theme almost seems to clash - especially as the plastic pawns are brightly colored.

2.) Rules: The rulebook once again is split into three sections: a Quick start section, the rules for the actual board game, and a section that simply goes over the Duel rules. There are several examples and full color illustrations, and I thought the entire thing was rather well laid out. When teaching the game, I find it easiest to simply play a duel with new players first - just so they understand that - then move onto the board game. Duels are very easy, and the game is just a step up above that - easy for teenagers and adults alike.

3.) Duels: Since the duels are an integral part of the game, they better be good; and I'm happy to report that they are quite fun. If a player overextends themselves on an attack, they will have little leeway to defend against an attack; so one must be careful. You can clear three cards each turn, which is a great number, because it's useful; but a player isn't always able to get rid of the cards they want to. The decks seem to be extremely well balanced, although I haven't tried the space, orc, or other games in the series' decks in this game (it would be too big of a breach of theme for me- although not as much as the other games, since I can live with superheroes having nightmares).

4.) Decks: I'm very pleased that TableStar finally included four decks with the basic game (something they likely should have done from the start). Each of the decks is certainly different in feel, although they aren't as complex as some of the decks. In this game, duels are almost secondary to the basic deduction features of the games.

5.) Deduction: Please realize that the deduction element here is nothing that difficult. I would rank it perhaps even below Clue in its complexity. At the same time, both the duel system and the fact that players have a good amount of control add to the enjoyment of the game. I enjoy how the dream gets smaller, and how different monsters disappear as they are eliminated. And though this deduction actually results in player elimination, the game is short enough that this doesn't matter.

6.) Fun Factor, Time, Players: Unlike most of the HeroCard games, I think this one plays best with a full complement of four players (which means that it's a good thing they included all four decks!) But even still, the game is an enjoyable one with dashes of luck (the cards one draw) and a slight feel of a simple deduction system. The combat is fun, and the duel system is quick and well balanced. This, along with the guesswork as to which monster/location other players are afraid of, brings a high level of satisfaction and fun to the game.

So who to recommend this to? I'm not a big fan of it myself, but I must stress that this is ONLY because I don't enjoy the artwork. The game itself is one of light deduction and combat; and while the theme of the dream and monsters works, it's still too much of a clash for me. If this doesn't bother you (and I would recommend going to www.boardgamegeek.com for pictures of the game to find out for yourself), then this is a contender for the best game in the series so far. It's more board game than HeroCard Duels, and that may not be a bad thing.

Tom Vasel
"Real men play board games"
www.thedicetower.com

Thread: Re: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

Zelgadas — 2007-12-02T00:26:13+00:00

David Kennerly: Poker Nightmare sounds interesting, and I might try something like that out. Like I said, I felt like the deduction side of the game was solid, and had a lot of promise, but I wasn't satisfied with the implementation of the HeroCard system. This may be just the thing to get me to play this game again.

Brian Newman: Yes, those two issues are still in the game.

Thread: Re: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

DavidKennerly — 2007-11-29T07:39:59+00:00

Zelgadas wrote:
The game could be a quick-playing, light deduction game if a different resolution system were used, or if the existing system were simplified somewhat (perhaps by making attacks to scare more like standard HeroCard duels, and by eliminating Relief). As it is, though, it just wasn’t that much fun to play. I really, really hate to say this, but I just can’t recommend this game.

As one of the designers, I commend your astute analysis of the problems! Because I'm most interested in the deduction and bluffing, I've encountered a problem like yours. Over Thanksgiving I found and tested a fun variant, for lack of a more clever title, called "Poker Nightmare":

Instead of any HeroCards, a deck of playing cards is used (52 cards). On a turn, each player still has 7 cards, may discard up to 3 cards, yet draws until 7 cards in hand (even if that requires more than 3). As in HeroCard, to attack, one plays a set of cards. But the strength of the attack is its poker ranking (highest card, one pair, two pair, etc.). As in HeroCard, a defender only needs to match the attack to block. Also as before, anyone may contribute cards to either attacker or defender's played cards. When attacker or defender cannot exceed the current play, the attack is over. If someone is scared, that player discards their hand and draws a new one. If someone gets relief, they may draw 3 cards (up to a maximum of 7 in hand). When the attack is over, all attacking and blocking cards are discarded. When the deck is exhausted, the discard pile is turned over and shuffled.

Since poker is ubitquitous, this variant is easier to learn and play. And, as in poker, this variant suggests a synergistic deduction of cards that the other player might or might not have in hand. But it lacks the character art and attribute administration of HeroCard.

Thread: Re: Creepy Fun for the Whole (Dead) Family

DavidKennerly — 2007-11-29T07:24:52+00:00

Hm. As the designer of that mechanism and as a player, I've assumed when scared, all that is revealed is that one is scared, unless deduction can conclude the exact cause of the fear.

By the way, over Thanksgiving, I played a variant that was quick and fun for those not familiar with HeroCard. For lack of a clever name, call it Poker Nightmare.

Instead of any HeroCards, a deck of playing cards is used (52 cards). On a turn, each player still has 7 cards, may discard up to 3 cards, yet draws until 7 cards in hand (even if that requires more than 3). As in HeroCard, to attack, one plays a set of cards. But the strength of the attack is its poker ranking (highest card, one pair, two pair, etc.). As in HeroCard, a defender only needs to match the attack to block. Also as before, anyone may contribute cards to either attacker or defender's played cards. When attacker or defender cannot exceed the current play, the attack is over. If someone is scared, that player discards their hand and draws a new one. If someone gets relief, they may draw 3 cards (up to a maximum of 7 in hand).

Since poker is ubitquitous, this variant is easier to learn and play. And, as in poker, this variant suggests a synergistic deduction of cards that the other player might or might not have in hand. But it lacks the character art and attribute administration of HeroCard.

Thread: Re: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

Kazar — 2007-11-28T18:16:17+00:00

I played this game at Origins, and I liked the new take on your average ghouls and ghosts game.

It did go a little long so I agree the game could stand to lose the relief tatic, which might have made it go faster.

Overall I most liked the world concept kinda H.P. Lovecraft...

Thread: Re: More Interesting

whopican — 2007-11-27T00:35:34+00:00

It's killing folks in their sleep, we can't make cooler stuff than that. But Wealth of Nations is close...

Thread: Re: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

adel10 — 2007-11-15T16:47:41+00:00

personnaly it's my favorite herocard game
and the relief it's for me a good idea
i have just one conplain, i also find the deck are not balanced the sherif seems too strong
in a 2 player game you could only use 2 deck otherwise the game it's unfair

but if you had the whole collection of herocard game or even just one other game
don't forget you can create your own deck and your own hero

but if you don't want to spend time to create your deck and want a fair 4 player game try
the 4 galaxy deck ( it seem the best for this game) , the 4 orcwars deck or the 4 cyberspace game

have a nice day
alain

Thread: Re: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

Blackberry — 2007-11-08T14:11:10+00:00

When my group playtested this, there were two main problems:

1) the Sheriff had such powerful cards that he was undefeatable and won every conflict he was in, which game him Relief, which gave him even more of his awesome cards in his hand.

2) the whole idea of the game was that you and your other family members are trapped in a dream world, and in order to make it out, you must arrange the brutal deaths of your family members.

Are those both still the case?

Thread: Re: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

rick63hughes — 2007-11-08T11:19:35+00:00

Good review. I was looking at buying this game because it sounded interesting, but having read your review I think I will pass.
Thanks for the information.

Rick

Thread: Review: HeroCard Nightmare

Zelgadas — 2007-11-08T01:28:54+00:00

This review was originally posted on my blog, The Gamecrafters' Guild .

For those who have been reading this blog with any regularity, it should be no secret that I’m a fan of the HeroCard series of games that TableStar Games publishes. I enjoy the basic card battle system mechanics, and I’ve liked each of the five HeroCard games that have come out so far. It is with some trepidation, therefore, that I write this review, for their latest game, HeroCard Nightmare.

Nightmare is a bit of a departure from previous HeroCard games in a number of different ways. Like Cyberspace, there are no expansion packs; all four Hero decks come in the core box, and it’s playable for one to four players right out of the box. It’s also a deduction game at heart. The premise of the game is that you and your fellow players have been trapped inside somebody’s nightmare by a magic camera, along with five killers. Each player knows which killer will be his killer, and in which scene of the dream he will die. The goal is to find out who’s going to kill everyone else and where they’ll die, then arrange things so that their deaths come to pass. The last one standing gets to escape from the dream (though, thematically, it’s never really clear why this is).

The mechanics of the board game, itself, are fairly simple and, I think, fairly solid. There are seven scene tiles and five killer figures, along with a Dreamer figure which represents all of the players. During your turn you can move any of these things, reshaping the dream, moving the Dreamer, and moving the killers so that you can create the combination you want. When the Dreamer occupies the scene you want to know about, and is with any killers you want to know about, you can attack to scare. This is resolved using the basic HeroCard rules, with a twist: your attack is not directed at anyone in particular. As such, anyone can choose to defend, and the other players can choose to join in on either the attacking side or the defending side, provided they choose the side currently losing. If your attack succeeds, if anyone has either the scene card for the appropriate scene or an appropriate killer card, those players have to announce that they are scared. By paying attention to who is scared when, and who blocks or attacks when, you can use process of elimination to figure out what combinations will prove lethal for your fellow players. At this point you can attack to kill–a more straightforward HeroCard duel–with success removing the other player from the game. Last man standing wins.

As I’ve said, I think that the basic mechanics are sound. I like the theme and the way you re-arrange the dream to your liking, and I like the cutthroat deduction mechanic. My main problem is with the way the HeroCard system is implemented in the game, particularly in regards to attacking to scare.

Problem number one: attacks to scare tend to take a while, as each player deliberates on whether or not they want to contribute, and how much. Each player has to pass in succession for an attack to end and, in my experience, attacks can take as long as five minutes (as compared to the speedy, forty-second affairs of other HeroCard games). When each player’s turn takes five minutes (and players will be attacking to scare a lot), the game tends to drag.

Problem number two: Relief. There is a mechanic in this game when there are three or more players termed ‘Relief’. In effect, after an attack sequence is resolved, the winning side gets to either draw three cards or clear three cards. I understand why this mechanic is in place; since there’s a chance that everyone will be either attacking or blocking on everyone else’s turn, players need lots of cards and need to keep their Attribute Stacks fairly clear. The problem is that this mechanic destroys the balance of the system. Each HeroCard game has had at least one ‘basic deck’, a Hero who has few complicated abilities and relies primarily on one or two high-value attacks and blocks that use up an entire Attribute Stack (or nearly that, at least). As the system is designed this is balanced, because throwing yourself wholly into an attack like that leaves you open to an opponent’s attack, and using a high-cost block could make it more difficult to attack. There are trade-offs. In Nightmare, the Relief mechanic allows you to disregard these trade-offs. Will, the basic deck of Nightmare can spend his entire allotment of Body on a single, 9-point base attack, and add on some attack mods, and it’s very difficult for any of the other characters to block. When Will blocks, the same is true in reverse; nobody can get through his defenses. Because he’s likely to win most battles, assuming clear attribute stacks and at least one of these cards (or one of his lesser, but still potent, cards), he’ll almost always get Relief after attacking or blocking, meaning that he can simply clear those cards away (which is easier, since he’s playing only a couple of large cards, rather than several smaller ones like the other characters). Within the Nightmare game, Heroes like Will (or To’a King from Champion of New Olympia, or the Paladin from Orc Wars) are far more powerful than most other characters.

What I Liked: The basic mechanics of the game seem sound, and I like the idea of the game. The tiles and pieces are also of good quality and, viewed in isolation, the characters seem well-designed.

What I Didn’t Like: The HeroCard system just doesn’t work that well in this game. The game feels long and bloated, and not that much fun. I also wasn’t that crazy about the artwork on the cards; they look suspiciously like people from the office were photographed in costume, and then the photographs were Photoshopped later.

The Bottom Line:As I mentioned all the way at the top, I like the HeroCard system. I also like the premise of this game, and the core mechanics. The problem is that they just don’t fit together that well, as written. I’ve liked every HeroCard game that came my way up until this point, but I just can’t get behind this one. The game could be a quick-playing, light deduction game if a different resolution system were used, or if the existing system were simplified somewhat (perhaps by making attacks to scare more like standard HeroCard duels, and by eliminating Relief). As it is, though, it just wasn’t that much fun to play. I really, really hate to say this, but I just can’t recommend this game.

Thread: Re: Creepy Fun for the Whole (Dead) Family

nyhotep — 2007-10-31T10:15:55+00:00

Checking the online rules, it doesn't specifically state this, but your statement makes a whole lot of sense (yes, I too say "I thought it was too easy").

Thread: Re: Layout photo

TableStar_Games — 2007-10-23T20:38:34+00:00

Some players seem to like using that "tapping" system to denote "inactive" cards. Less shuffling around.

Monte Lin
Volunteer Coordinator
TableStar Games

Thread: Re: 3-4 player game

kakupacal — 2007-10-23T19:02:49+00:00

awesomely groovy... thanks!

Thread: Re: 3-4 player game

Loggy — 2007-10-23T13:58:06+00:00

As soon as there are only 2 players left (in a 3 or 4 player game), no relief is given. For the very reason you stated (it would drag the game out way too long).

Page 20 of the rulebook states:

Remember, if the game is down to the last two players, no player ever gets Relief. However, you do get Relief when you Kill the third player, after which point the game has only two players.

Thread: 3-4 player game

kakupacal — 2007-10-23T12:01:16+00:00

I was curious. When playing with 2 players, there is no relief given (for the obvious reason that it would drag out the game to ridiculous lengths) but I can't recall seeing anything in the rules that states that when there are only 2 players remaining in a 3-4 player game that relief should no longer be awarded to the winner of conflicts.

Can somebody set me straight on this?

Thread: Re: Layout photo

Cinnibar — 2007-10-21T17:04:31+00:00

My group doesn't find it very confusing to keep track of the active battle cards for the combat (a common activity in all HeroCard games).

However, for greater clarity, play the active cards to the right of the stacks, but not touching the previously played 'in play' cards. At the resolution of combat, slide the cards over onto the 'in play' stacks for eventual clearing.

Thread: Layout photo

kakupacal — 2007-10-21T15:21:31+00:00

I find the rules of this thing to be a little cryptic in places, particularly the layout of "in play" vs. "active" cards - since both are to be set in the appropriate attribute stacks. A diagram in the rules would have been very helpful in this regard.

Anybody have a decent system for keeping thing clear while playing?

Thread: Re: Very clever bluffing and deduction game

cdwalkley — 2007-10-08T11:10:12+00:00

sdonohue wrote:
There is a slight hiccup because two of the characters are supposed to be in love, but have to kill each other to survive.

Hiccup? That sounds like the stuff of real nightmares to me... Made me shiver to think about being put in that situation...

Loved your review. Think I might pick this one up for Halloween.

Thread: Very clever bluffing and deduction game

sdonohue — 2007-10-07T23:52:45+00:00

HeroCard Nightmare is the sixth release in the HeroCard_series. The series uses the same card-based mechanism to create individual characters for each player. The rules for the card portion of the game remain the same, but the board portion of the game adds new rules.

In HeroCard Nightmare, the players take on the role of one of four people caught in a potentially lethal dream. The winner is the player who is able to identify the fears of the other players and use them to eliminate them from the dream.

Components
The game comes with 4 hero decks with 33 cards each, 1 plastic dreamer figures, 5 plastic killer figures, 7 death scene tiles, 5 killer cards, 7 scene cards, 4 reference cards, and a rule book. All the components are well-produced.

The rulebook is 28 pages and includes instructions for the HeroCard game, plus the instructions for this particular boardgame. It is color throughout with plenty of illustrations and examples. The cards are of good stock and the scene tiles are thick with nice art. Overall the game components are excellent.

Setting/Theme
The idea is that your character is trapped in a dream and the only way for you to escape is to kill the other characters. This works out pretty well and the artwork of the cards and scenes as well as the game rules neatly support that idea. There is a slight hiccup because two of the characters are supposed to be in love, but have to kill each other to survive. Other than that, the theme is excellent and is well-supported by the rules and the components.

Rules
The object of the game is to manipulate the dream to determine which scene and killer frightens each player and then to use that knowledge to kill them. The determination of who is affected by which scene and killer is similar to Clue or other deduction games, although the addition of the HeroCard rules makes it something more.

The game basically has two sets of rules. The first section of the rulebook details the HeroCard system, which basically governs how you can use your hero deck. The second part explains how the card game rules interact with the boardgame to create a complete game.

The HeroCard system is not particularly complex. Each hero begins with his three attributes, Body, Mind, and X. X varies by genre – in the case of HeroCard Nighmare X is Soul. These three attributes are used to govern the kinds of cards you can bring to play each turn. Each attribute has a numeric value that determines the “strength” of your body, mind or soul.

Every other card in the game has a cost in either Body, Mind or Soul. If you have a Body of 4, for example, you can only have 4 points worth of Body cards on the table at any time.

Three of the cards in your deck are attributes, the remaining cards are actions you can take. The basic card types are attacks, attack mods, special attacks, blocks, block mods, special blocks and miscellaneous cards. The cards are further broken into one of three types, Fast, meaning you can play as many as you want on any action phase (subject to attribute limits), restricted cards which can be played only on your turn but up to the limit of your attribute and Exclusive cards which are the only card you can play on your turn.

The card phase has four basic sections:
Discard as many cards as you like.
Draw up to three cards to fill your hand to its maximum size of seven.
Clear three older cards off the attribute stack.
Play cards.

When you play a card, it is “active” and “in play”. Once the attack made by that card is resolved, it is still “in play” but no longer active. The cost of the cards still counts against your attribute, but it doesn’t provide you any benefit. This can be a powerful factor if you have many cards in play. In addition, some cards derive their power from cards already in play by either the attacker of the defenders.
In the end, the attacking player has an attack strength (combined values of base attack and attack mods) which is compared to the defending player(s) defense strength (combined value of base blocks and block mods). If the attack is greater than the defense, the attacker is the victor otherwise the defender wins.

In the basic HeroCard Duelling game, the players take turns as attacker and defender until someone accumulates a number of victory points based on the number of players.

The other half of the system is a boardgame which uses the dueling system for conflict resolution. The game starts with each player choosing a hero. They are then randomly given a scene card and a killer card. The player to the dealers left then places one scene on the board and each player follows suit. The scenes are hexagonal with three entrances. At least one entrance must point to an existing tile as they are played. Once all the scenes are out the killers are placed and finally the dreamer is placed. The game is now ready to begin.

In Nightmare, the turn order is slightly changed:
Discard cards.
Draw up to three cards to fill your hand with 7 cards.
Move the dreamer, monsters or scenes.
Attack to scare or attack to kill.

Basically you use the dueling system as conflict resolution. During the move section, you are able to move the dreamer (which represents all the players), the killers and the scene tiles for one action each. You get three actions (moves) each turn.. Players and killers may move one square for each move action and must use doors. Scenes can be moved as long as they have 3 contiguous sides which aren’t touching another scene.

To find out what people have as killers and scenes, you must make an attack to scare. An attack to scare affects all the players at once. The active player plays an attack and the other players may join either side (attack or defense). If the attack succeeds, any players who are afraid (because the dreamer is in their scene or their killer is in the scene, they have to reveal that they are afraid (but not what of) and discard their entire hand and draw a new one.

Eventually, you should be able to narrow down each players killer and scene. Once you think you know what someone’s scene and killer are, you can move the dreamer and killer to their scene and make an attack to kill using the HeroCard resolution system. If you succeed and are right, then that player is eliminated. The killer and scene are also removed from play. If your attack doesn’t succeed or you are wrong, then there is no effect.

The game continues until only one player remains.

Observations
The game combines the deductive elements of Clue with some interesting bluffing mechanics. For instance, if someone attacks to scare with a scene and killer that doesn’t matter to you, you could choose not to block which might reveal some information or you could choose to block in order to mislead them. There is a fair amount of psychology in blocking and attacking. The deductive elements are still there, since you need to gradually eliminate choices until you can make a guess about which scene and killer will affect a particular player.

It can also lead to some interesting strategies, since it may be that you only know which scene or killer they are afraid of because it’s not that one that you are afraid of. Attacking to kill may eliminate them, but it may also help another player isolate your scene and killer as well.

In our three games, it appeared that Will was a bit more powerful than the other three characters, but that might have been partly caused by inexperience with the HeroCard system. It could be that with more time other characters would have been more effective. Luckily for us, the player who used Will was not a particularly astute detective, so he tended to provide more information to us than he gathered for himself.

Player elimination can be a fairly brutal mechanic, but usually by the time you are able to start eliminating players, you have a pretty good idea how to eliminate all of them, so the downtime typically isn't very long for the eliminated player.

Recommendation
Overall, I think this is a great game. It combines pretty decent card play with a neat deductive mechanism and some cool bluffing elements. If you like bluffing or deduction games, I think this one could be a lot of fun and it’s out just in time for Halloween, where it could be the surprise hit of a horror-themed game night.

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tablestar_rob — 2007-08-22T20:25:16+00:00

Leviathan Concept art

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tablestar_rob — 2007-08-22T20:24:07+00:00

Nightmare artwork

Thread: Re: Creepy Fun for the Whole (Dead) Family

The Schaef — 2007-07-20T01:44:44+00:00

Cinnibar wrote:
Just a clarification on the rules: those who are 'scared' only reveal they are scared, not if the killer or scene (or both!) was responsible. My group gave a collective 'Oooooh!' at that, with asides of 'I thought it was too easy...'.

Ooooh indeed!

The review will be corrected with the proper explanation of scaring by this time tomorrow, when I have taken a look at the rulebook. Not because I disbelieve you, but because I want to verify that I change it to something that doesn't need to be corrected yet again.

Thank you for catching this!

Thread: Re: Creepy Fun for the Whole (Dead) Family

Cinnibar — 2007-07-20T01:35:10+00:00

Just a clarification on the rules: those who are 'scared' only reveal they are scared, not if the killer or scene (or both!) was responsible. My group gave a collective 'Oooooh!' at that, with asides of 'I thought it was too easy...'.

Thread: Re: More Interesting

The Schaef — 2007-07-14T19:46:53+00:00

It's certainly a different form of gameplay than the others, and I would say it's deeper than any of their stuff from last year, except maybe Shogun. Definitely give this a try if you get an opportunity.

Thread: Re: Creepy Fun for the Whole (Dead) Family

Hugh_G_Rection — 2007-07-09T21:49:45+00:00

I'm looking forward to this one to be released. It's got a great theme for the HeroCard system. Thanks for the review!

Thread: Creepy Fun for the Whole (Dead) Family

The Schaef — 2007-07-09T17:16:05+00:00

Nightmare is one of Tablestar Games' offering in their HeroCard line of board games for 2007. While it will not be available for wide release until later in the summer, there was a demo at Origins, as well as a small handful of advance copies of the game. So I actually had a chance to see this game, up close and personal.

First, a quick recap of the HeroCard dueling system, which is the core mechanic of each of the HeroCard board games. The characters are typically represented by a sculpted plastic figure and three attribute cards. These cards have values for (B)ody, (M)ind, and (X), which tell the player how many points he can spend playing his action cards. Action cards come in three varieties: Exclusive (only one per the player's turn), Restricted (as many as the player can afford during his own turn), and Fast (as many as the player can afford, during any player's turn). Each card displays an attribute and cost which, when played, subtracts from the available points on that attribute.

During a turn, the player discards from his hand if he wishes, draws up to 3 cards (not to exceed the hand limit of 7), "clears" up to 3 cards from his attribute stack by placing them in the discard pile (last on, first off if there is more than one card played on a certain attribute) to make more attribute points available, then takes his "Action Phase", which is when action cards are played, and when most of the gameplay takes place. Aside from card duels between players, this is also when pieces are moved around the board and other various in-game actions take place.

Nightmare plays a bit differently from the other HeroCard games (in truth, they all have their own quirks), in that rather than each player controlling their own character, they all control a single common avatar: The Dreamer. The Dreamer moves about a fractured dreamscape, where each hex shows a different "scene" (e.g. Farm, Forest, Lake). There are also several "killers", both human and monstrous, that move about the board. During each Action Phase, the player has three movement points to spend, either moving The Dreamer, moving a killer, or moving a hex to another position on the periphery of the board. Hex movement in particular can radically alter the flow of the game, especially if it moves with a Dreamer or killer in that scene, because only three of the six sides are "open" for movement; the other three sides are walled off. Once that is done, the player can then opt to "Attack to Scare" or "Attack to Kill".

At the beginning of the game, each player is given a scene card and a killer card, which they keep hidden. Their character is scared of the scene and the killer they hold. When a player "Attacks to Scare", he initiates a Herocard battle by playing a Base Attack. If this attack succeeds, then if someone is scared of that scene, or of a killer that happens to be located in that scene, he must reveal that to the other players. If no one is scared of the scene or killer(s), they are eliminated from the game board. This serves to reduce the number of possible combinations for scaring opponents. Eventually, when a player is able to reveal (or deduce) the correct combination of scene and killer for an opponent, and is able to get The Dreamer and those two elements together, he can then "Attack to Kill". A successful Attack to Kill will eliminate that opponent from the game, and the scene and killer used to kill them. Last man standing wins the game.

Two other elements make this game unique among other iterations of the dueling system. The first is that when one player Attacks to Scare, each of the other players in turn may decide if they wish to join the battle on one side or the other. Going clockwise from the attacker, a player has the option to play a blocking card. Once a block is played, then the next player has the option to join the side currently losing. Example: Player A attacks for 3, Player B blocks for 5, Player C has the option of joining the battle on the attacking side only, because the attacker is currently losing. If he adds 3 more to the battle, Player D has the option to join the battle on the blocking side only, because the blocker is currently losing. And so it goes until the battle is resolved. In this manner, players can cooperate or they can really screw each other. They can block to keep from being scared, or they can bluff with a block, to make it harder to deduce who is hiding what.

The other significant difference is that when an attack is resolved, two things happen. The winning side (attacker or blocker) gets "Relief", the option to draw three additional cards, or clear three cards from their stack. Any player that is "scared" as the result of a successful attack must discard all the cards in their hand and draw an equal number of cards (e.g. discard 5, draw 5).

Nightmare ships with all 4 decks in the box (only Cyberspace shares this quality; the others ship with 2 decks and are expandable to 4), which are not as complicated as some of the advanced decks found in games like Rise of the Shogun or Orc Wars. This is probably just as well, because with so many options to jump in on other attacks, and with the game board itself varying so wildly, and with the potential to have your entire hand wasted, a more intricate in-deck strategy might bog down the game. As with most HeroCard titles, the average play time is about an hour, although it could certainly skew in one direction or the other given the right set of circumstances.

The moving hexes provide an added layer of strategy to gameplay, and present a very vivid picture of a fractured, shifting dreamscape. The artwork is great in that it is very creepy: washed-out sepia tones, off-kilter lettering, stark imagery at extreme angles... it almost looks like somebody took Resident Evil or Silent Hill and made a board game out of it.

All told, I thought this game was a lot of fun, with gameplay that strongly supports the theme and carries a moderate level of strategy, especially with the Clue-like deduction and the cooperative/competitive hybrid battle style. Easily as good as Rise of the Shogun, their strongest 2006 offering.

(7.5/10)

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Kevin C — 2007-06-21T11:55:18+00:00

Thread: More Interesting

firstfletch — 2007-06-11T18:39:34+00:00

I am a fan of the HeroCard games (I have played Champions of New Olympia, Galaxy and Rise of the Shogun) and after reading the rules and watching the online Demo for this one, I think it looks like it may be one of the more interesting ones.

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:49:55+00:00

Will Hero

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:49:38+00:00

Stalker killer

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:49:13+00:00

Nightmare game bits

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:48:27+00:00

Nightmare

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:47:44+00:00

Isis Hero

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:47:18+00:00

Nightmare game box

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tablestar_rob — 2007-05-01T20:46:45+00:00

Deon Hero