Fear the Dark: A Fury of Dracula Review


Year Released: 2006
Designed by: Kevin Wilson & Stephen Hand
Published by: Fantasy Flight Games
Number of Players: 2-5

QUICK EVALUATION
Before I bought the game I read quite a lot about it on BGG, both positive and negative opinions (there are of a few of the latter) and was uncertain whether or not this was a game for me. However, after reading the rules and seeing images of the game, it seemed like fun so I decided to take a chance and buy it.
I can honestly say now that I am really glad I did as I have come to really enjoy this game - I only have one gripe with it as you’ll see later.

OVERVIEW OF THE GAME
In Fury of Dracula(FoD), one player assumes the role of Count Dracula himself while 1-4 other players play cooperatively as the Hunters from Bram Stoker’s novel and must hunt and destroy the evil Count.
Only one side - either Dracula or the group of Hunters - can win the game.

MY EXPERIENCE WITH THIS GAME
I’ve played this game some 6 or 7 times now, most of them as Dracula, although I enjoy playing as a Hunter a bit more. I like the thrill of figuring out and hunting Dracula down - but the game is fun to play on both sides.

GAME COMPONENTS
The components on FoD are great.
The main board depicts Western and Eastern Europe with the major cities and the connections between them. The art is made so that is reminds of old documents and maps. Cities can be connected through roads and/or rail, and there are also sea regions that players can travel through.

Image by kiffist

The game comes with plastic 5 miniatures: one for Dracula and one for each Hunter - Van Helsing, Mina Harker, Dr.Seward and Lord Godalming. The miniatures have good details and nice poses although Dracula’s pose is more dramatic than practical. All Hunter minis are holding weapons and look ready for action, which adds to the theme and immersion of the game.

Image by kilroy_locke

There are 4 dice that come with the game: 1 red custom dice for rail traveling, 1 black six-sided die for the Dracula player and 2 white six-sided dice for the Hunters to use in combat and to resolve a few events.

Image by Ciaran

There are 5 characters sheets that players use to track their health points, bite tokens and keep their weapons and events. I really like these sheets! They feature great illustrations and I think it greatly adds to the game to have your character sheet in front of you loaded with weapons and items.

Image by clyx

Image by kilroy_locke

There are decks of cards for combat, locations (for Dracula), items and events. They are all of good quality and it’s pretty intuitive how to use them. The Event cards have clear text describing the effects of the events and when to use them and the item/weapon cards have icons that determine the result of their use.

Image by manko
This is a customized version!


GAMEPLAY
FoD plays in about 90-120 minutes although it can vary depending on how cunning and/or experienced the Dracula player is. Here is a basic overview of how the game plays:

In each turn, all players get a Movement followed by an Action. Dracula moves in secret around the board and his action is to leave Encounters in the cities he passes through, creating a trail of cities he’s been to. Hunters go around searching for the trail, resolving the encounters Dracula left behind and trying to deduce from these findings where Dracula could be. When a Hunter doesn’t find an Encounter in a city, he may still rest, re-supply or trade with other Hunters if they are on the same city.

To win the game, the Dracula player must try to create 6 new vampires, which work like victory points. For each new day that dawns (usually 6 full rounds), he creates one new vampire, also every time Dracula defeats a Hunter he wins 2 victory points advancing his vampire track in 2 spaces or when he leaves a 'new vampire' encounter behind him that is not found by the players before it 'drops off' his trail.
The Hunters, on the other hand only have one way to win: destroying Count Dracula.
So as you can see, the Hunters must find and kill Dracula before it’s too late, as they only have, at most, 6 days before Dracula creates his vampires.

The Hunters can freely discuss and show their hand of cards to other Hunters and can plan and talk freely to choose the best options available. There is a good amount of variety in range of weapons and special combat conditions that the Hunters need to plan in order to maximize their chances to fight the Count as he himself can be very powerful in combat, especially during nighttime.

In this cat-and-mouse pursuit, the Dracula player is challenged to outsmart the Hunters, moving as unpredictably as possible and using his powers to avoid or fight Hunters in the best options. If he can keep himself alive long enough, that might be enough for him to win. Meanwhile, the Hunters are trying to deduce where Dracula could be by looking at what they have already found of his Trails and trying to figure where he could be. "All right, Drac was in Berlin 2 cities ago, so he could be here, here or here. Now, see, if I was him..." is a very typical discussion among Hunters.

Some mechanics of the game change those basic rules: Dracula has Powers that allow him to move in different ways among other things, while Hunters can benefit from Resolve points which they earn, as a group, for each new day (usually 6 full rounds).

Another way to change the basic rules are the Event cards, which both Dracula and the Hunters use and while they are fun and very thematic, one of them really unbalances the game. The Dracula "Evasion" card allows him to freely move from where he is to any other city in the board (without a Hunter) - so he basically teleports, well, anywhere. This can potentially destroy the game, especially if used near the end, when the Hunters are closing in, after a long and hard-earned chase, just to see Dracula vanish. I’ve seen games where people would just leave the game after such a move and in our group everyone agrees with our variant: remove this card from the game and enjoy. Obviously, Hunters have a few very strong cards as well, like Hypnosis and Sense of Emergency, but none of them can break the game like Evasion does.

Combat in FoD is light, simple and dice-based. Basically attacker and defender will choose a combat card to play, like a weapon or maneuver, roll a dice and compare results. Combat is not really the focus of the game and I think it’s simple enough to add the necessity of finding good weapons and light enough not to make the game tiring. I was skeptical at first, seeing so much depend on dice, but after playing it, I’ve seen that the combat is not the heart of this game and still just enough to keep things flowing.


MY THOUGHTS AND CONCLUSION
I really like Fury of Dracula. It’s a great game to play with gamers and friends and it provides good challenges to both sides of the game. The theme is very richly added to the game and people will come out of the game talking about particular moments of the pursuit that were exciting.

On the other hand, I can see where many people can be put off by the luck factor that the combat system provides - so if you really don’t like dice-based results, this might not be for you. Personally, I don’t think it’s a problem in this game, since it helps to keep the game moving and emphasize the focus of the game on the deduction and pursuit of the Dracula. I’m also not a fan of the 'Evasion' card as it is. I understand that Dracula can use an Event that allows him to get out of tight spots, but I just wish it would be limited somehow.


I rate Fury of Dracula 9/10.


PS: If you plan to play this game, I cannot suggest enough that you get something to hide Dracula's minimap from view and track positions. I use something like this (with wooden cubes to mark Hunters, Drac's position, trail and catacombs):

Image by UniversalHead

This is where you can get the file:
http://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/17420(thumb him up!)

I do not see the Evasion card as such a big problem.

Dracula has to use it immediately, he cannot save it till a later time, so it might arrive at an inopportune time.

An inopportune time would be at the start of the game, the card is nearly useless then.

An opportune time would be near the game's end. But by that time the hunters have had a chance to collect useful interrupts, such as the one that cancels any Dracula event (I forget the name). There are several of those available, and thus, as long as the hunters remember to keep one of them for the event of Dracula getting the evasion, they are OK.

Furthermore, any Dracula event can mess with the hunters' plans near the end of the game. Therefore, tactical hunters will not draw events when they are closing in on Dracula. Remember, Dracula cannot draw events himself: the hunters have to do that for him.

In conclusion: Evasion is not a problem as long as the hunters are aware that it is in the deck. I always give new players this information when I play FoD with them.

Taking Evasion out of the deck would actually make drawing events much safer for the hunters. Perhaps even making the game too easy for them.

Thank you for your feedback, it's great to be see to see both sides of an argument.

When the "Evasion" card first appeared, I was playing as Dracula and the Hunters and I were very surprised, since I had not read all the cards before playing and we were learning new events as they came up. When I told them what was about to happen some of them became very frustrated as it came in the end of the game and would surely have been a weak ending to the game-long chase. I just decided to discard the card without effect and the game continued. As it was, I still won the game but just by a little much - I was able to mature a new vampire but the Hunters had found me and I was almost done. We all thought it was a fun game and that if I had vanished back then it would have been much worse. To be honest, that is how most of our games are ending: with one side almost just barely winning and Dracula winning a little more frequently then the Hunters.

So far, from our experience, we feel that we have not unbalanced the game by removing the card and for now, at least, it's working well. Like I said, I just think that the Evasion card should have some sort of limitation - maybe if there was a limit to number of cities he can evade to - like say "Dracula may move up to three cities distant by road" - and working like Wolf Form, so that he can pass through Hunters but not by Consecrated Ground or Heavenly Host. Maybe a longer distance, I don't know. I'll try this idea in our group and see how it works.

Thank you for the feedback and I hope you enjoyed the review!

edit: spelling

Hunter players usually don't see Dracula's major movement limitation: He can not double back on to his own trail without help from ONE card: the "Double Back" power card. Dracula only gets to use this card, at most, every six turns of play. All other times, he's waiting for the card to drop off his trail and back into his power card pool.

"Evasion" gives Dracula more movement flexibility. As for the "teleport" effect, the rules state that Dracula can not travel to any location on the board unless the corresponding location card is available to him. "Evasion" doesn't allow him to break that rule. Thus, you have the teleport effect.

Of course, even the game's maker are aware of the Evasion card's power. Page 26 of the FoD rule book suggests variants that make the game harder for Dracula and removing "Evasion" is one of them.

My personal suggestion for those that don't like "Evasion" is to not remove the card from the game entirely but to allow the card to duplicate the effects of "Double Back" and then discard it once it drops off Dracula's trail. Alternately, like it suggests on page 26 of the FoD rule book, you could beef up the hunters "Newspaper Reports" cards to make it easier to find locations on Dracula's trail.

Thank you for adding pictures to your review. This is always appreciated.