Tom Vasel
United States
Homestead
Unspecified
Top 100 Games of all Time
Dice Tower Convention, July 2012!!!!
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My favorite part of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure was when Ghengas Khan was skateboarding around with a football helmet on, wielding a baseball bat. I found humor in the situation, and remember thinking that if Khan was around today, that's probably exactly what he'd do. Now there is a game that accurately simulates that same feeling.
I first heard of Duel of Ages (DOA) when perusing the Gathering of Friends reports. I saw that their was a game that was playable from 2-16 players. This is a rare thing in games, so it immediately caught my attention. I searched for it here on boardgamegeek, and then found the official site. One thing led to another, and soon I purchased the game, and have read quite a bit of it.
It's gotten a lot of loud hype, but is it worth it?
The short answer is YES! YES!, OH YES!
And now for the longer answer. If someone asked me to describe DOA, I would describe it as a cross between Mageknight, Cosmic Encounter, Frag, Squad Leader, Warhammer, MTG, and an RPG. That may make it seem as if DOA has spread itself across too many genres to be good at any of them. Quite the contrary is true.
A short description of the game: The players are split into two teams (don't have to be even): black and white. Each team controls several characters. These characters range from four different eras (ancient, colonial, modern, future) and real life (Buffalo Bill Cody, Geronimo, Willaim Wallace, etc.) to fantasy (Joshua the superhero, Grok, etc.) Each character has a set of stats for health, damage, speed, wits, aim, etc. They also have special abilities that make them unique. The teams then maneuver these characters through challenges and adventures, while fighting off the characters of the opposing team. After a predetermined time limit, the game ends. Victory points are determined by how many characters are remaining on each team and how many adventures have been completed.
Now for some points in the game:
1). Variety: This is the true scope of the game. If you just buy the basic set (which should satisfy most people) you get enough characters and equipment that I'd think you'd have to play the game scores of times to ever run across a duplicate situation. If you buy 1 expansion (or even all of them) the combinations are so many that I don't think you will ever have the same game twice.
2). Balance Issues: According to the designers, every character in the game is very balanced (with the exception of one weak character - who I haven't figured out yet). Some characters come across as weak or useless, but all characters have moments where they shine! It's amazing how you can use each character differently - and almost none of them feel as if they are carbon copies of other characters. As you play the game, you will feel yourself growing attached to your characters, and will hate to have one killed, stolen, or imprisoned.
3). Fun: Many, many games are considered great by the gaming public. Some games are really, truly great games - but just don't have that "Wow" - fun factor. Frag is a good example of a game that has the fun factor, but is not a very well balanced game. DOA, however, not only has the fun factor down - it is a very well balanced, smooth playing game. There is almost no downtime, and you are drawn into the story of your characters. After games, instead of talking about the mechanics, I'll say things like - "Remember when Geronimo unleased the tiger on the Bladed Terror and the Bladed Terror shreaded him? It's a good thing that Jedadiah Smith was able to take his helicopter to the top of the ridge and draw a bead on the Bladed Terror with his pistol!" You find that each game becomes a story, an adventure, one that you will immediately play again. And every character might have that moment to shine: Where the mountaineer climbs up the cliff to escape the raging monster, where the kung fu master was mind-warped by Jolie, where several players tried to get through the insane dungeon of Geoff and failed, where Tex was able to raid the enemy base of all their valueables. It's just that fun. You'll be talking about the game afterwards for days - and it won't be hard to get players to try it again.
3) Genres: I think this game will appeal to people of many gaming genres. CCG players and Cosmic Encounter fans will like the diversity of the characters and equipment. Strategy and War gamers will like the tactics used on the battlefields. Theme enthusiasts will like the excellent background story and the story that each game becomes. Board gamers will be enamored by a solid game system that seems to have no gaping flaws or is "broken".
4) Support: The author and producer of the game are very involved in the community. They have the best board game site I have seen for a specific game, ever. It has all the rules for the game and its expansions so that you can read them before purchasing. It has the statistics for EVERY character, and pictures of many. They are quick to respond to emails, and will help with questions and ideas. They encourage people to send in their own artwork and ideas, that might even get used in the game!
5) Artwork and Bits: Contrary to what Cheapass games says - most people love beautiful bits and artwork. I have pulled the Cannes game out many times, only to continually put it away because the artwork is so bad. I like to see nice bits and artwork. It helps immerse one into the world of the game, and makes it generally more fun to play over all. This game does not disappoint. The boards (platters and keys) are beautiful, with many different scenary items and "cookies" scattered across them. Each card has stunning artwork - especially the item cards. You might catch yourself staring at the weapons and animals, because they look that good. The labyrinth cards, the hero cards, the backgrounds - all are exceptionally done. The method used to do the artwork is fantastic. As for the cardboard counters for the heroes - they are nice, but I wish that they had been two sided, as it takes a good bit searching through them to find your characters for each game. I helped by writing the characters' names on the backs, and you only do this once a game, as you set up - so it's a minor quibble. The boards were bent a little, also - but the publishers have apologized for this mistake (at the printers) and have corrected it for future editions.
6) Luck and Strategy: I'm not a huge fan of games with no luck (Chess, etc.) because in life, strange things can happen. I'm also not a huge fan of games with all luck (Yahtzee, etc.) because I want to have a lot of control over the game. DOA fits well between the two. There is a lot of dice-rolling, but you control the events surrounding the dice rolling. For example, Grok is a very strong character - good at fighting. However, he is as dumb as a brick. I could send him on a wits challenge, hoping against hope that I'll roll a "12" - the only thing that would work - but it would frankly be stupidity (just like Grok!) on my part. He's much better used on the field, whacking away on other characters. Each character has a use, and a good commander will stick them all in the right place.
7) Expansions: This immediately turns many people off to games - its why many of us boardgamers stopped collecting CCGs. Set after set would come out, with better and bigger characters, etc. But with DOA, all you need to have fun is to buy the original set. Then, after that, you can pick which one of the 7 expansions (more to come, I think) to buy. Each one is different and adds a lot to the game. Set two adds some more maps, characters, and team bases. If you buy any expansion - this is it! Set three adds so many maps I doubt you'd ever want to buy more. Sets 4-7 each add a pile of characters and weapons and equipment. Each expansion also adds a "key" - a small board piece with special rules. You can mix and match these as you please - all are very well balanced, and nothing really throws off the game that much.
8). Money: The game is a bit expensive - but it is good quality, and you'll certainly get your money's worth playing it. And it's not expensive at all when compared to other games with similar components.
9). Rulebook: Not only are the rules available online, but the rulebook itself is well-written, well designed, and easy to use. There are some small reference cards to help remember the charts, but the charts are so easy to memorize that you probably won't use them after one or two games. The rulebook is short, funny, and not confusing at all (like many other rulebooks). I was able to teach the game in fifteen minutes, and during the game - we consulted the rulebook twice - pretty good for a ninety minute game.
10). Time: Time is variable in the game - the game ends when you want it to. We played a 90 minute game last night, and it went quickly. We could have easily played for 2 or three hours. You could play a 60 minute game, but I don't think it would be as much fun. This may detract it for some people, with a time reference of 2 - 3 hours, but the time went fast, and we enjoyed every minute of it.
11). Humor: I'm not always a fan of Cheapass or Steve Jackson components, but I love their humor. DOA has great components, and is saturated with humor. We laughed many, many times while playing.
I could talk at great lengths more about the game - but I want to go play now! I'll close by saying this - check out the games that I rank highly here on boardgamegeek, and compare your ratings to them. I rank this game a "10" because I'll play it anytime, any day, anywhere. If I had to descibe this game in one word, I'd say "fun". Do yourself a favor - play this game, and you'll have fun too.
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Jesse Miller
United States
Gettysburg
Pennsylvania
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Re:User Review
TomVasel (#8513),
Woohoo!! Go Tom Go! Great review, and some excellent points.
I really like your note that each game is like a story--this seems very true. I'd like to point out that the books/movie/tv show that DoA reminds me most of is the Phillip Jose Farmer "Riverworld" series, and the Heros in Hell stories. Both have great characters from history faced with unusual situations and combinations of time periods, I'd recommend them both to fans of this game.
I'm not sure I totally agree about the artwork: I like the platters and most of the cards, but sometimes I'm annoyed by the CGI graphics (mostly a matter of personal taste I suppose).
I also totally agree about the website -- it's grate!
Jesse
"Be careful who you make fun of, you might turn out just like them"
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David Hahn
United States
San Diego
California
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Re:User Review
TomVasel (#8513),
OUTSTANDING review, my friend. Every questions I could possibly want answered WAS. In fact, shortly after reading your glowing review, I went out and picked up the first two sets in the series (and I plan to pick up another couple this afternoon). Thanks so much for putting all that thought into your review. It just may be the best one I've read here yet...
David Hahn (Midian2000)
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John Armstrong
United States
Cleveland Heights
Ohio
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Re:User Review
TomVasel (#8513),
Excellent review!
I would also like to chime in on the length.
This game does not drag at all! Even the beginning 45 minutes goes by rather quickly, with the adventures and generally plotting of strategy with your teammate(s). Most of games have been 2 hours long. One was 3 hours. And we are all trying to arrange our schedules so that we can play a no time limit game because we feel that 2-3 hours is too much like a quick filler game 
That being said even with the 2 hour games we still feel a sense of closure, just that there is a tease of more pleasure if we could just play longer.
Great game!
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kevin long
United States
Vancouver
Washington
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Re:User Review
DanogNellows (#17370),
Totally agree - this game can't be long enough - it is so fun - i think the only thing holding this game back is that it takes 2 games to learn it and it seems like the only game people want to play these days have to be learned before the first game starts - i like tom's comment that each game is a story - the characters drive unique situations and events that are either on agenda or stumble into - its that rich of a game - its the most exciting game i have ever played!
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Douglas Painter
Canada
Florenceville
New Brunswick
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Re:User Review
TomVasel (#8513),
Tom, you've become a very trusted adviser. After looking at your WotR review I looked at your top 10's and saw this. My initial responce was "O crap another expansion upon expansion game, no thanks!" But I must say that I am so keen after this review, and the website, that I'm ready to order. For some reason it looks like "Titan." I was also thinking of getting the color version of SJG's Illuminati... now that I see this, it looks like all is here. Thanks and keep up the reviews.
Douglas+
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Snooze Festival
United States
Hillsborough
North Carolina
We love our pups!! Misu, RIP 28 Nov 2010. Tikka, RIP 11 Aug 2011.
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I just recently played this game - first, a few turns with my wife to learn the rules (she didn't like it: too much dice-rolling), then a full game with me vs. 2 newbies, 6 characters per team. I don't know if those are good numbers - I wish the rule book had better recommendations (maybe the website? will have to check that out) - but it worked OK.
I found myself thinking that this is a mix of Runebound (move around the board completing adventures, gathering equipment and improving your character) and Heroscape (run around killing people) - I'd love it if DoA had a 3-D board like Heroscape. It was fun, but I think it will be much better next time: we were not very strict about the 2-min time limit, and parts of the game kind of dragged (they spent a LONG time trading equipment, for example). Also, I could not roll low pretty much the entire game - I finished several labyrinth challenges, but never did better than PASS; the entire game, I managed to inflict 2 wounds (I did hit more, but would then flub the damage roll), while they killed off 2 of my characters and wounded others - and that was pretty frustrating.
Overall, I think this likely could be a fun game. But it seems like it might be difficult getting past the first step: teaching/learning the rules takes a while, even though they are fairly straightforward ... I'm not sure how often I'll be able to try this game out with people who all know how to play it already. Maybe play a game after die Macher at Origins  ?
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snoozefest wrote: I just recently played this game - first, a few turns with my wife to learn the rules (she didn't like it: too much dice-rolling), then a full game with me vs. 2 newbies, 6 characters per team. I don't know if those are good numbers - I wish the rule book had better recommendations (maybe the website? will have to check that out) - but it worked OK.
Well..I'm with you on this one. The original rulebook from Set #1 doesn't do a good job of stressing the importance that the set-up parameters have on one's enjoyment of the game. Maybe the designers wanted the game to be "flexible" so that people could play it how they wanted. However, if people try the game with horrible set-up parameters, they might get a negative impression of the game and never play it again.
For what ir's worth, I love the game. Here's the set-up paramers that I use and find works well:
1) Number of characters to platters ratio: this is critical because a low ratio will mean little player interaction, while a very high ratio will mean melee combat could dominate the game. I think a good rule-of-thumb would be a 2:1 ratio. So, 3 platters would mean 6 characters per team, 4 platters - 8 characters per team, etc. I generally will only play with 3 or 4 platters.
2) Sets/expansions to use: I realize that you may not have any of the expansions, but I feel that the 2nd expasion is almost 100% necessary. It adds team bases, more characters, platters, weapons, equipment, guardian challenges. I wouldn't want to play without it, as I feel the team bases are necessary as they provide equipment at the start of the game and another way to score a point. For me, the more characters, weapons & equipment the better (though I would admit that there are a bunch of fairly useless weapons & equipment in the entire expansion sets). I don't use the "special" keys from the expansions except for the Lith Alliance in larger games. I do use all of the characters, weapons, items, platters etc.
3) Character/Team selection & composition. A real weakness in the first rule set. DOA pureists may argue, but I feel that randomly dealing out characters to the teams with no slection whatsoever is crazy. You can really end up with an unbalanced team this way, and it can ruin the game fairly easily. For instance, there's nothing worse than getting a team of all "slow" characters - you're in for a very long game if you do. I would suggest dealing out at least 2X the number of characters to each team to select from. Alternatively, you could use some sort of drafting system. I beleive that you need to have a good mix of characters to be successful in this game. Meaning, some good melee fighters, some good "adventuring" characters, and some character with good point/aim/throw skills. Also, as mentioned before, I tend to lean towards using "faster" characters as slow characters aren't real useful unless you can get them a mount or vehicle of some sort. It takes some time to learn the strenghts/weaknesses of the characters, but aiming for a "balanced" team should help new players. New players should be reminded that there is only 1 point awarded for "combat" (unless you kill-off the entire other team - which is rare against an experienced player) and many more points for guardian challenges, etc. This is an important point as new players often focus too much on combat when selecting characters.
4) Time limit - for a three or four platter game, I wouldn't want to play for less than three hours. If both players are experienced and play quickly, maybe 2.5 hours. By design, the game "heats up" as time passes since players gain access to more weapons and equipment. A key part of the game is trying to get an advantage in weapons & equipment while proventing the other side from doing the same. Playing for too short of a time will limit the number of cool weapons & items that you will be able to use.
These are off the top of my head. If you have any other questions or need other suggesions, drop me some geek-mail.
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David desJardins
United States
Burlingame
California
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jim.brooks10 wrote: DOA pureists may argue, but I feel that randomly dealing out characters to the teams with no slection whatsoever is crazy. You can really end up with an unbalanced team this way, and it can ruin the game fairly easily. For instance, there's nothing worse than getting a team of all "slow" characters - you're in for a very long game if you do. I would suggest dealing out at least 2X the number of characters to each team to select from.
To me, your suggestion would ruin the game. The interest of the game comes from the variety of characters; why would you want to introduce a system where half of them (the half that are less good) will never get played?
Why not just throw out all of the slow ones in the first place and be done with it?
I can see that it's not quite the same, there are certain characters that will sometimes seem better or worse depending on who else is on the team, but really, most experienced players are pretty much going to prefer the same characters every time.
I would have no problem with a draft where you deal out 2X characters and then each side picks one at a time until they are all gone. That will give you more balanced teams without excluding all of the less-good characters. But, the map construction is going to be less interesting/strategic if you already know what characters the other side has.
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DaviddesJ wrote: jim.brooks10 wrote: DOA pureists may argue, but I feel that randomly dealing out characters to the teams with no slection whatsoever is crazy. You can really end up with an unbalanced team this way, and it can ruin the game fairly easily. For instance, there's nothing worse than getting a team of all "slow" characters - you're in for a very long game if you do. I would suggest dealing out at least 2X the number of characters to each team to select from. To me, your suggestion would ruin the game. The interest of the game comes from the variety of characters; why would you want to introduce a system where half of them (the half that are less good) will never get played? Why not just throw out all of the slow ones in the first place and be done with it? I can see that it's not quite the same, there are certain characters that will sometimes seem better or worse depending on who else is on the team, but really, most experienced players are pretty much going to prefer the same characters every time. I would have no problem with a draft where you deal out 2X characters and then each side picks one at a time until they are all gone. That will give you more balanced teams without excluding all of the less-good characters. But, the map construction is going to be less interesting/strategic if you already know what characters the other side has.
My method doesn't ruin the game. It does, however, prevent it from being ruined sometimes as one side draws a lopsided set of characters. Using my method, a player has to know how to choose characters and build a good team. You don't just get to choose the characters that you want. You're still stuck making trade-offs. Also, knowing the other teams characters doesn't ruin platter selection. It just adds a piece of known data to factor into the decision-making.
My methods add known data and take away some of the randomness of the game. For me, that's welcome as the game has a bunch of randomness already.
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Tom Vasel
United States
Homestead
Unspecified
Top 100 Games of all Time
Dice Tower Convention, July 2012!!!!
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I run a strict draft when I play. We decide how many characters to use (say, 10 for each side), then draw that many characters, plus a few extra - maybe one or two. Then players pick their teams in turn order. This gives players characters that they want, and allows them to build a team that works together. At the same time, players have to use the characters in the draft - so all the characters (except the one that perhaps nobody likes) are used.
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Jeff
United States
Lakeland
Florida
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Great review and very helpful as always Tom. I think you have sold me on another game. As that was written over two years ago I would be interested in your hindsight opinion. Would you change your review/score at all now?
Thanks
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David desJardins
United States
Burlingame
California
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TomVasel wrote: I run a strict draft when I play. We decide how many characters to use (say, 10 for each side), then draw that many characters, plus a few extra - maybe one or two. Then players pick their teams in turn order. This gives players characters that they want, and allows them to build a team that works together. At the same time, players have to use the characters in the draft - so all the characters (except the one that perhaps nobody likes) are used.
That sounds fine to me, but it does make the map construction phase significantly different (because you know what characters your opponent has, which is very important). It also occurs to me that you may be less likely to end up with one side having a monopoly on characters of a particular era, because the other side may consciously draft to prevent that---which actually seems like a good thing (because if the two sides have characters of different eras then you tend to get less interaction as they just independently visit the labyrinths of their respective eras).
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Top 100 Games of all Time
