Table of contents for Issue 68 in Tabletop Gaming

NOW PLAYING… Apawthecaria Welcome to our very hobbity issue of Tabletop Gaming. We’ve got a huge celebration of Middle-earth, Tolkien and everything it’s given us on the tabletop. There’s been few writers that have contributed so much to a single genre as Tolkien has to fantasy, and there’s few genres better represented across decades of cardboard and dice than fantasy gaming. It’s even possible we wouldn’t have Dungeons & Dragons (in quite the same way) without it. We check in on War of the Ring on its 10th birthday, send a love letter to the newly re-released Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, and round up a timeline of (nearly) every Tolkien-adjacent game ever. And we’ve even got a Shire themed Rainy Day Games – for all of your…

I’ve spent more than my fair share of time alone in budget hotels for work. But while this may sound like the start of a depressing stand-up routine, it’s actually an introduction to a genre of games I’ve found invaluable in this over the years: small box solo card games. All but the tiniest of rooms have a table and chair. And an easily packed game with a small footprint easily trumps watching a tiny TV in grainy-vision. Some obvious examples are the wonderful Onirim and (not a card game) Under Falling Skies. But as they’ve been covered in previous issues, I’ve decided to go a little off piste with an oldie-but-goodie, plus a couple of recently released small publisher offerings. Friday was released in 2011. Designed by Mr Power…

War of the Ring is a very special game. In fact, it is a very special work of art. Art has had a tricky time jumping between media. From interminable novelisations of rip roaring films and films ripping the guts out of much loved books. So often the gap between forms is so big that it’s impossible to leap. Then something special comes along. Something that is able to retain all of the magic of its former form while acquiring everything it needs to fulfil the needs of the new iteration. This is War of the Ring. A meticulously crafted paean to Tolkien and a relentlessly immersive ludological experience. It retains all of the wonder and tension of the story while achieving something that games do better than any other…

The Hunt for Gollum: First of the long line of small box expansions, this meaty and enjoyable quest adds a roster of new baddies and game effects to offer a healthy taste of what’s to come whilst showcasing the huge variability between different scenarios. The Black Riders: Follow the official narrative: this ‘Saga’ expansion lets you enjoy the story and events of The Lord of the Rings, embarking on the Hobbits’ quest to take the ring to Mount Doom. It’s the first of six Saga expansions though, so prepare to get sucked in. Khazad-dûm: Explore the Mines of Moria and build Dwarf decks with truly epic combos. Make Dáin Ironfoot your lead hero and watch those goblins crumble before you… The Massing at Osgiliath: My favourite small box adventure, this…

Q. Dear Ben, I want you to know that I’m a pretty cool dude. I haven’t worn a suit in nearly a week. I have a tie with some cats on it and when I go to the Toby Carvery I have horseradish and mustard. I’m cool, alright. I just like things to be orderly and the gravitas of the situation to be appropriately recognised. I have a friend, let’s call him João (he’s not Portuguese but I went there once and thought the name was delightful), who, a couple of months ago asked if he could come to game night. Of course I said yes and, as he’s a dashing fellow with a brisk and genial personality, he fit in straight away. The problem is that he, how can…

Designer: Paweł Dziemski | Publisher: Other Worlds Gamebooks Storm Weavers is an odd beast. A hardback book with choose your own path passages, a character sheet with stats, and combat maps and standees put it in a weird place between a solo roleplaying game and a tactical skirmish game. Oh, and it comes in a classic Eurogame shoebox. We take the role of a dwarven warrior off on an adventure, and to save your trapped friend, as you might expect. The player moves through the adventure book from passage to passage making choices – with the occasional roll thrown in for (in my case) bad luck. When combat occurs players are instructed to whip out a specific combat map and pop the various standee figures for monsters and the hero. From…

Designer: Steven Aramini | Publisher: Alley Cat Games Eternal Palace is a familiar game, with a pleasing artistic twist. For the most part, you are rolling, grouping and placing dice on a board to trigger a variety of effects, primarily collecting resources and building with them. The idea being, you’re competing Japanese nobles vying to contribute the most to the reconstruction of the Emperor’s palace monuments. So far, so Euro. But you’re also artists, it turns out, each with a blank canvas you’re aiming to fill with painterly detail, to best impress your regal boss. Most of the board locations, then, have a twofold function. One is to trigger the effect when you place your dice there, having openly rolled, then secretly grouped them at the start of each round…

Designer: Shannon Kelly | Publisher: Renegade Game Studios Everyone knows that sleep is brilliant, but what if simply by going to bed you could absorb power from your nightmares and wake stronger than before? This is the – not entirely comprehensibly fleshed-out – premise behind Lucidity – risk dipping into dangerous dreams to gain power, but encounter too many shadows and you become a nightmare yourself, hunting the other players. The winner is the dreamer with the most power at the end. In practical terms, this is a push-your-luck dice drafting game, where you pull dice from a bag, pick which you want to roll, and either press your luck – risking losing all the power you’ve accumulated – or end your turn and pass to the next player. The…

Designer: Stephen Avery & Eugene Bryant | Publisher: WizKids When in 1964 Nikolai Kardashev devised a hypothesis for measuring the technological advancement of civilization on a cosmic scale, he could hardly have imagined that this concept could be packed in a modest-sized board game box and explored through the mechanics of rock-paper-scissors. Yet here it is, in Kardashev scale, neatly presented in three rows of cards, one for each stage of advancement: planetary, stellar and galactic. In Kardashev Scale, players will be building their civilisations by purchasing cards from the central pool until all their cards come to or above the 25-victory point value. It is not dissimilar to how you build up your civilisations – although less galactic and more ancient – in 7 Wonders. The first planetary level,…

Designer: Kane Klenko | Publisher: Renegade Game Studios Release The Kraken! As if there aren’t already enough balls to juggle in Dead Men Tell No Tales, this expansion demands you slash tentacles too. A sixth action token acknowledges the increased workload, although a seventh wouldn’t feel excessive. The creature in question is gruesomely detailed and has all the open-mouthed attractiveness of a Sarlacc – ready to be meticulously painted into a neon nightmare. Interestingly, his role in the game isn’t all bad; he’ll splash water everywhere when lashing the boat, helpfully reducing fire levels, for example. His presence also introduces adrenaline tokens that have excellent benefits, like eliminating six deckhands in one swoop or lowering fire levels by four. Players just need to triumph in battling him beforehand. Dinky canons…

Designer: Tim Eisner, Ben Eisner, Ian Moss | Publisher: Druid City Games Aristotle famously said “No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness,” – a quote perfectly befitting, perhaps even underselling, Lewis Carroll and his work of literary nonsense. But, the premise of Wonderland’s War threatens this sentiment. In this bag-building area control game from Druid City Games, the looking glass has shattered, draining the land’s inhabitants of madness and ushering in completely sane tea parties and cleanly calculated warfare. Regardless of Wonderland’s fate, only one will emerge as the realm’s new leader. Wonderland’s War follows a clean two act structure for each of its three rounds. First players will attend the tea party, securing the help of allies, Wonderlandians, and various other abilities, with the general…

Designer: Frank Brooks, Bill Eberle, Peter Olotka, Greg Olotka | Publisher: Fantasy Flight Games Of all the games I was expecting a ‘two-player only’ adaptation of, Cosmic Encounter was not high on my list. A game known for its insane special powers and madcap possibilities, it strikes a perfect unbalance that thrives on having lots of people passionately planning and pleading as they race for galactic conquest. Just how on earth do you being to capture that same emotion with only a pair of players? Well according to Frank Brooks and the team, you do it by making it madder, yet somehow more straightforward. Cosmic Encounter Duel pits two players as alien races battling for their place on the Cosmic Citizenship Council, as they race to be the first with…

Designer: Mary Flanagan & Max Seidman | Publisher: Resonym There certainly are a few party games with spooky themes, aren’t there? I’m not complaining, goodness knows I love a farcical séance or werewolf hunt as much as the next gothic geek, though eventually we must surely reach a critical mass of ‘games that have you speaking to dead teammates’. Thankfully that day isn’t today, as Phantom Ink delivers a fun word association game without needing to spell it ou-. Phantom Ink is a Party Game for 4-8 players split into two teams, with two spirits (one for each team) trying to get their teammates (known as ‘mediums’) to guess a shared mystery object, like “Orange” or “Umbrella.” Each turn, mediums can either send two question cards from their hand to…

PAINTS & TECHNIQUES » Abaddon Black » Agrax Earthshade » Alaitoc Blue » Averland Sunset » Blue Horror » Bugman’s Glow » Cadian Fleshtone » Caledor Sky » Caliban Green » Celestra Grey » Dark Reaper » Dawnstone » Doombull Brown » Dorn Yellow » Evil Sunz Scarlet » Fenrisian Grey » Flash Gitz Yellow » Incubi Darkness » Jokaero Orange » Kabalite Green » Karak Stone » Khorne Red » Kislev Flesh » Knight-questor Flesh » Lothern Blue » Mournfang Brown » Night Lords Blue » Pallid Wych Flesh » Rhinox Hide » Russ Grey » Skarsnik Green » Skavenblight Dinge » Squig Orange » Steel Legion Drab » Sybarite Green » Teclis Blue » Thondia Brown » Thunderhawk Blue » Ulthuan Grey » Ushabti Bone » Warpstone Glow…

Can you tell us a little bit about how the store first got started, and its journey? Black Dragon Miniatures, based in Hinckley, Leicestershire, has been supplying the needs of local gamers in the Midlands since first opening its doors in December 2014. Initially, owner our owner decided the community deserved a local well stocked friendly place to game and meet. That escalated rapidly into the opening of the store we now operate, stocking a huge range of products from suppliers like Warlord, Games Workshop, Mantic, Perry Miniatures, Steamforged Games, Avatars of War… The list (and product range) continues to grow on an almost daily basis. Not content with just stocking, selling and playing games, we also run regular tournaments for a multitude of systems in store, where we have…

FIND NEW FAVOURITES AND INDIE GEMS AT TABLETOP GAMING LIVE 2022 With less than 100 days until Tabletop Gaming Live 2022 kicks off at Manchester’s historic Victoria Warehouse it’s time to talk about the indie gems you might pick up at the show. With tons of smaller publishers and retailers set to attend, offering you the chance to pick up games you might never have known existed. Rook’s Press, Sealed Library and Loot The Room will be offering a range of indie RPGs, hot off the presses and full of adventure. Blackwell Games will be showing off the beautiful Apawthecaria, while Leyline Press will be in attendance with their rules light, mech heavy game, Salvage Union. Board game fans will be pleased to hear the Surprised Stare Games will be…

FRIDAY In each turn of Friday, you’ll battle a hazard by revealing two ‘fighting’ cards and choosing one to face. You have an initially poor deck of ‘Robinson’ cards, which you flip over to try to beat the fight’s strength number. A win sees you add the beaten card to your hand. These cards are double-ended, so once collected they flip to become new Robinson cards for your deck. Stronger cards have all kinds of tempting abilities, from giving life to destroying your rubbish cards – or simply having a high fight value. But if you don’t win the fight, you lose precious life points and get no new card at all. In the final battle, you must defeat both pirates to win. MAESHOWE You start each turn of Maeshowe…

To celebrate the anniversary of the films, we thought we’d take a look back at the long history of The Lord of the Rings in tabletop gaming. Whilst many of its most beloved adaptations were released in the 21st century, the sheer quantity of games that explore Middle Earth reveal a tapestry that covers every aspect of tabletop gaming. So fasten your cloak and make sure to pack plenty of Lembas bread, as we encapsulate The Lord of the Rings! THE FIRST AGE - THE SHAMS OF THE PAST THE TOLKIEN ESTATE & TSR (1970) The Tolkien Estate had the thankless task of trying to enforce copyright over anything related to Middle-earth, famously getting TSR (the company who first created D&D) to change several creature names to avoid a lawsuit…

It’s hard to imagine quite what roleplaying games would look like without the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Of course, there were fantasy stories before Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, but in the space of a handful of volumes – relatively thick ones – he laid down so many of the tropes that shaped tabletop gaming from its very beginning. Without Aragorn, we wouldn’t have bowand-blade-wielding rangers. Without Bilbo Baggins, no table would have ever been graced by a podgy, light-fingered halfling rogue. Without The Fellowship, we wouldn’t have a standard template for the culturally diverse, astonishingly well-armed adventuring parties that have formed the basis of so many campaigns over the past 50 years. Though it has grown into its own beast over the decades, Dungeons & Dragons undoubtedly…

This month, Tabletop Gaming heads Haitian to the Caribbean for a brief look at the history, culture, and products of the gaming scene in Haiti. Furthermore, we’ll examine how the hobby, on a global scale, has helped a country historically and recently plagued by political instability, disease, and natural disasters. Sat to the east of Cuba and Jamaica is the island of Hispaniola; a tropical, mountainous land home to both the Dominican Republic in the east, and Haiti in the west. Here, a number of traditional games have remained popular to this day, with the most notable trio being Warri, Kay, and Osselets. Warri and Kay both belong to the mancala family of games. Typically this involves the cyclical ‘sowing’ of pieces (seeds from the warri bush in this case)…

Designer: Daryl Andrews & Adrian Adamescu | Publisher: Alley Cat Games In the high-octane world of Alley Cat Games, dice like to live dangerously. First, they were at death’s door in Dice Hospital, now they are screaming in a good way at Dice Theme Park – possibly because there’s no morgue. Employing a similar dice-management mechanic as before, the thrill seeking takes place across five rounds that each contain six phases. This generously affords players time to puzzle together their hexagon-based small, small worlds, all in the aim of creating the most exciting park – wryly tracked on a car-park scoreboard. Along the way is a host of actions and decisions to enjoy, whether it’s acquiring new attractions, upgrading existing ones, hiring mitigating mascots (more on those later) or flogging…

Designer: Jamie Stegmaier | Publisher: Stonemaier Games Your aim is to earn the most stars by playing nine different mini-games over three rounds. Each player has their own set of eleven mini-games on cards, with one player selecting three at random each turn for everyone to play. The variability is huge as there are over 15,000 possible combinations of mini-games. As optimum dice rolls vary for every mini-game, each combination of three selected will provide different challenges and synergies. All mini-games are named after one of Stonemaiers big release games and there’s a nod to the theme or mechanics of each game, though some nods are more subtle than others. In Wingspan, for example, you’re filling squares with numbers and scoring bonus points if the sum matches the target wingspan…

Designer: Gabriele Ausiello & Virginio Gigli | Publisher: Pegasus Spiele In First Rat, junkyard rodents are racing to build a rocket bound for the moon where they will gorge on cheese. While the premise is at times holier than a chunk of Emmental (isn’t it mice that love cheese?), this game has real charm. The cover box suggests a family affair with lightweight gameplay. In actuality, it’s loaded with easy-to-learn strategy that tests all ages, and any patronising thoughts about “letting the kids win” soon vanish. First Rat is anyone’s for the taking. Unlike in traditional family games, there isn’t a clear way to triumph. Using multiple score trackers, points can be earnt in a variety of ways from collecting cheese for the journey to building the most rocket parts.…

Designer: Slime Life Games LLC | Publisher: Paizo In Pathfinder Goblin Firework Fight you are one of a gang of goblins raiding the long-suffering town of Sandpoint to pinch fireworks the locals had set aside for an upcoming festival. Why? Because goblins love fire and explosions. Each turn, you and your fellow goblins are going to divvy up loot and then scrap over what’s left. You do this through a refreshingly simple process of flipping tokens and choosing one each in turn. There are different values of firework, pickles – which make you first in the picking order next round – goblin swords (they call them ‘dogslicers’, because goblins are terrified of dogs and horses) – which let you steal from the other players – shields – which give you…

Designer: Sid Sackson | Publisher: Restoration Games This is the fourth version of a game originally published in 1962 and it really shows its age. The new strange-animals-grabbingpie theme adds nothing, other than an air of slight bewilderment, and the game is far too lucky for players to feel invested in the outcome. On your turn you take a pie from the end of one of the four lines of overlapping cards. If the card shows some grabby paws, you can steal cards of the same colour from another player. If the card has ‘Moar’ on it, you can take another card of the same colour, if one is available at the end of a line. Why ‘Moar’? Who knows? There are choices in the game but few that are…

Designer: Roberta Taylor | Publisher: KTBG Adecade ago, when I first got into tabletop gaming, I remember getting overly excited upon discovering the animal meeples nestled inside Agricola’s intimidating box. This was new. I’d already met Carcassonne’s chunky little fellows, and an abundance of faceless, formless cubes in other games, but this ligneous livestock had character. Fast-forward to today and we have games like Creature Comforts spoiling us with screen-printed, anthropomorphic animal meeples. Now that’s what I call progress. Of course, there’s more to Creature Comforts than its tactile and generally pleasing meeple aesthetics. Designed by the folks at Kids Table BG, this is a medium-light dice and worker placement game of woodland critters diligently preparing their cosy burrows for the approaching winter months. Players will be tending to the…

Designer: Francois Rouze | Publisher: Matagot Game shows are a unique, weird creation of the 20th Century. They all share a common DNA – contestants playing a game for some kind of reward. As we all know, the best possible prize? The opportunity to survive. This upping-the-stakes concept has been demonstrated in Hollywood in shows such as The Hunger Games and Squid Game. Room 25 Ultimate joins their ranks as a fictional game show where contestants compete to avoid a gruesome end. Characters are placed in a five by five grid of rooms, each filled with difficult, dangerous or deadly challenges. Think The Crystal Maze, but with chainsaws. The win condition for each scenario? Find the final room – Room 25 – and escape. Each time you play, the layout…

Designer: Cole Medeiros | Publisher: ConcernedApe When I think back to my (pre-fatherhood) hours spent playing Stardew Valley, my main thoughts are ‘how did I have the time?’ Nowadays it’s harder for me to pour this precious resource into these wondrous, digital time-sinks, instead opting for the more contained experiences of the tabletop. So, imagine my elation upon learning of Stardew Valley: The Board Game. For Stardew Valley: The Board Game, original creator Eric Barone teamed up with designer Cole Medeiros, lending his talent and art assets to create a cooperative simulacrum of his one man labour of love. Taking a more structured and rigid approach to the loose plot of its digital counterpart, the game sees one to four players striving to fulfil four of ‘Grandpa’s Goals’ and restore…

Designer: Daniel Solis & Drew Hicks | Publisher: Than Games, LLC An alien ship has crashed in the desert and government agencies are hard at trying to reconstruct it. In The Cube: Area 51 you’ll assume the roles of the heads of various agency departments as you compete to fix the alien tech and take control of the AI it houses, no doubt guaranteeing your funding for years to come. Sadly once you put the rule book down, this rather fun theme all but vanishes. Instead you’re left with a rather dry and number crunching experience. Players take it in turns to place rhombus shaped tiles into the titular Cube. Each tile placed then scores points depending on the tiles around it, either looking at all the tiles in the…

There’s a good reason why origin stories continue to be so popular. We’re all fascinated by what makes people who they are, and what specific circumstances led them to their current vocation, whether they’re Average Joes/Janes imbued with improbable super-abilities in the latest Marvel blockbuster, Dungeons & Dragons characters arriving fresh at the table, or just someone you’ve met who has a really cool job… Like being a tabletop game designer. That’s why I started this magazine’s First Turn feature all the way back in Issue 8. I wanted to dig into the creative process that transforms somebody from, say, a banker (Reiner Knizia), chemistry teacher (Jacob Fryxelius) or hotel receptionist (Inka Brand) into a professional game creator. And along the way, of course, discover what kinds of games –…

I’ll lay my cards on the table upfront – The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game is the best card game in history. There are giants who came before, and to whom it owes a huge debt, but LotR:TCG sees off all the competition. Calling forth up to three heroes from Tolkien’s lore – hailing from the time of The Hobbit up to The Lord of the Rings – each player deploys a carefully assembled deck of cards to cooperatively (or single-handedly) tackle one of many deadly missions in Middle-earth whilst Sauron’s evil forces range against them from a deck of imaginatively cruel enemy encounter cards. I love fantasy, and Tolkien started it all. I could blame my mum for reading The Hobbit to me at bedtime, or Ralph…

In a hobby filled with no shortage of Lord of the Rings themed games, Reina Knizia’s 2000 co-operative contribution – simply called The Lord of the Rings – stands out as a design in much the same way as its name doesn’t. Even as the books on which it is based proved foundational for a whole ongoing genre of writing, the game’s position as one of the earliest ‘modern’ cooperative games and an early example of many elements that are now standard of the category. As might be suggested by the name lift, Knizia’s The Lord of the Rings directly retells the story from Tolkein’s trilogy, with the players each controlling an individual Hobbit on their journey from Bag End to Mordor with the goal of destroying the One Ring.…

This might seem like a ridiculous question – after all, most of us have hundreds, maybe thousands of conversational exchanges every day. But stop to examine these exchanges for a moment and you’ll realise something astonishing. Each one – and each segment of each one – requires an intricate sense of timing. Like a squirrel weaving across a six-lane motorway we’re required to weave in and out of split-second gaps, spot openings and predict the intentions of multiple people. Yet, somehow, we manage to pull off this strange ritual, part-dance, part-mindreading trick, many many times a day, without even thinking about it. We seem to know instinctively what’s expected of us in conversation, so – in most situations, at least – we speak almost automatically, without wondering: is it my…

Designer: Saashi | Publisher: Iello Aroute building game with the spirit of a roll and write at its heart, Get On Board does a couple of clever things. And the fact that it’s only a couple really is one of its strengths, it’s one of the most pleasant family-weight games I’ve played in a long time. Unusually, in this outing for Saashi, the art has been paired with Monsieur Z, instead of the other Saashi. If you want that version you’ll need to pick up the charmingly titled Let’s Make A Bus Route which Get On Board is a reimplementation of. It’s a light and charming enough approach to the look of the game, and once the streets start filling with route markers, there’s a presence on the board that…

Designer: Mike Richie | Publisher: Redshift Games I imagine it can be difficult applying a theme to the abstract mechanical workings of a card game, but I’d have thought mutant, carnivorous Mexican food wouldn’t typically be the first thing springing to mind. Yet, here we are. Tacopocalypse is a simple drafting game for three to six players set in a post-nuclear wasteland, rendered just about bearable thanks to the arrival of the last remaining taco truck. Despite everything on the menu appearing somewhat violently sentient, players will be hurriedly gathering up combo plates of either identical or unique dishes before scoring them based on their size. Finished plates range between two and six cards, with identical combo plates being the most valuable, albeit the most difficult to assemble. If ever…

Designer: Michael Boggs & Caleb Grace | Publisher: Fantasy Flight Games In the fourth expansion to the living card game Marvel Champions, the Sinister Motives, new heroes are swinging in to save the day: Ghost-Spider (Gwen Stacy) and Spider-Man (Miles Morales), joined by other spideys from across the Multiverse. Following them in tow are also new villains – Sandman, Venom, Mysterio, the Sinister Six and Venom Goblin. Lessons learnt from designing The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game and Android: Netrunner, were all incorporated by Caleb Grace and Michael Boggs into Marvel Champions, creating gameplay that is both incredibly slick and adaptable. The main loop remains simple. All villains have a main scheme that they are trying to complete. Villain decks are filled with minions, abilities and side schemes.…

Designer: Kane Klenko | Publisher: Renegade Game Studios Dead Men Tell No Tales returns from the misty waters of 2015 – handy for those of us who missed the boat first time round. The box’s Aivazovsky-esque painting succinctly tells you what the dead men can’t: players belong to a pirate gang hell-bent on looting treasure from Skelit’s Revenge, the most feared and haunted ship on all the seven seas. Captain Fromm’s (literal) skeleton crew has other ideas, however, and is rather rudely blocking the way. As are fires, which blaze from bow to stern. The instruction book gleefully states there is only one way to win this seafaring co-op, yet multiple ways to lose. And it’s a very valid boast. Play starts with each player drawing and laying room tiles…

Designer: Ryan Laukat | Publisher: Red Raven Games The very first impression you pick up from this game, isn’t necessarily the gorgeous looking front cover, or the promise of adventure set by its predecessors. Instead, there’s a good chance it’s the sheer weight of the box, a true door stop, and one which means you can skip arm day at the gym completely guilt free. Of course, with a £50 price, if price per piece were a metric, it does at immediately seem reasonable. Brick like weight aside, this is not the game I was expecting. Having not played the games that went before it, I was under the illusion it was ‘merely’ a story led adventure, which often comes with specific features – cooperative, slow to medium paced, fluffy…

Designer: Inka & Markus Brand | Publisher: Kosmos The Exit series is a workhorse. Grab a little box and you’re guaranteed to have a good time, as long as you like getting stuck on puzzles. For those of us who quite like that feeling – they’re great. This time we’ve got something a little special though, which might expand that appeal – a Lord of the Rings flavoured outing, and it manages to put an interesting spin on the series, even if the basics are the same. This time you’re not stuck in a temple, laboratory or jungle. Instead you’re working from the wings, the silent partner in a story we all know quite well. You’ve been sent ahead of Frodo Baggins and the rest of the fellowship to, more…

Designer: Jimmy Ellerth | Publisher: Jimmy Ellerth Entertainment If you’ve ever found yourself tempted by Magic: The Gathering – and in particular its multiplayer ‘Commander’ format – but the idea of tossing bales of cash into a woodchipper puts you off, fret no longer. Hero: Tales of the Tomes steps forth to offer an alternative – a means for you and up to four friends to indulge in a Fantasy brawl with spells, summoned creatures, equipment and special abilities. Each player picks a hero who comes with their own stats and their own suite of bonus abilities you get when you level up. Levels tick up automatically with each round, providing you with stat boosts on alternate rounds, and bonus abilities on the remainder. The abilities for each character are…

Designer: Mat Hart, Sherwin Matthews, Fraser McFetridge | Publisher: Steamforged Games Bardsung is a game of two sides. The first is a game designed by dungeon crawler fans for dungeon crawler fans. It feels like every game in the genre ever released was meticulously studied, analysed, taken apart and then reassembled into what is meant to be the ultimate dungeon crawler experience. Although there are plenty of familiar elements – even the combat system is rooted into the Fifth Edition ruleset – when they are put together, it doesn’t feel derivative because every element is a puzzle piece that when fitted together forms a complete picture. Bardsung is also unafraid to add its own flavour into the mix. It, for example, has a roster of all female characters. While their…

Most GMs absolutely love running games. We love plotting story arcs, crafting cunning NPCs, and working through our extensive library of evil voices. We revel in luring heroes into clever traps, forcing them into moral quandaries, and rolling an absolute mountain of dice in a single turn. We often pay the price for this enjoyment, however. For some reason, which has never quite been made clear to me, everybody seems to have agreed that the GM is responsible for running the game, preparing maps, organising miniatures, arranging the venue, setting up the schedule, buying snacks, making sure everyone has something to write with, making sure that everyone has something to roll with, buying the rulebooks, reading the rulebooks, teaching the players the rules, teaching the players the rules again, printing…