Gaming Notes: Monsterpocalypse

I have been chomping at the bit for quite awhile to try out Monsterpocalypse but I never had the opportunity until recently. Elliott recently taught me how to play and I liked it.

I played the Defender X Guard Protectors and Elliott played the Gorgahydra Destroyer Planet Eaters. The goal of the game is to destroy your enemy's big bad monster. 

Elliott and I quickly swarmed one another killing off some of our more minor monster units. I saw a window of opportunity and struck at his Gorgahydra Destroyer with a small army of minions. In response, his big monster had to transform into its second, more powerful form. Elliott went on the offensive and my own monster had to fall back to its second form as well. Ultimately, my swarm of smaller units overwhelmed Gorgahydra Destroyer and I was victorious!

I liked the gameplay. The resolution system is easy and it works. The game pieces are brilliant! They look really awesome! Still, I'd like to try it out just doing one giant vs another like in the old Godzilla movies.

Geek Gear: Cardboard Figures - Cheap Genius!

Let me set the record straight: I strongly dislike using miniatures in role playing games. I'd much rather see the action in my head and ask the DM, "Am I able to..." than move my six squares trying not to give combat advantage and take any opportunity attacks. In my opinion, miniatures slow combat down to a crawl and are no fun.

I don't care about painting miniatures or how cool they look. If you MUST have miniatures, broken piece of glass, bottle cap, or a soggy pretzel would be just fine with me. After all, it's simply a token representing my character's location on a grid. Who cares what it looks like?

All of this is to say that I am happy about several developments: Wizards has been packaging double sided token in with some of their recent releases (Gamma World, DnD4e), Printable PDF markers have been increasing in number and quality, and cardboard stand-up miniatures are making a comeback.

Want a legion of durable, 3D, full color miniatures on the cheap? Cardboard Heroes are for you. I still have my complete classic Marvel RPG cardboard miniature collection. Those were triangular prisms that were fairly easy to knock over. The new line of cardboard miniatures is flat (showing the front and the back of the character) and is affixed to a plastic base or glued onto a penny. This makes for a much more stable miniature.

They make them for every genre you can imagine AND they make cool prop scenery as well. Need a dungeon? How about a castle? Cardboard miniatures are the way to go.

Catan Historical Cultures

Catan Cultures set... or random lumps of lead?

Wow... you've got to give those folks over at Silver Fox Productions credit for being creative. With Catan being wildly popular across the country, fans might just be willing to pay $29.95 for one robber, four cities, five settlements, and 15 roads (that's a complete set for one player) crafted in pewter and designed to reflect historical Earth cultures.

Sets are available in Bavarian, Chinese, Egyptian, and Viking sets. There are also Seafarer expansions planned.

I've got to say... for me, what I'm seeing is NOT worth $30, especially the roads. These don't looked colored at all - I'm guessing you could paint them but that seems like an awful lot of work when you could just play with the easy to identify, brightly colored gaming pieces that come with the game. I would say these gaming pieces would be for the Catan fan that just has to have EVERYTHING Catan (you probably have a complete herd of sheep Catanimals). 

Marvel RPGs #4 - D100 Cardboard Heroes

Most of the time, I an opposed to miniatures and being "on the grid" in RPGs. I think it slows down combat and makes it more unrealistic.

I think if you've GOT to use minis, why not use the cheapest ones possible? Why spend hundreds of dollars on paints and minis and waste all that time and effort? But that's just my preference.

The Classic Marvel RPG is "on the grid" and to play fully by the rules you must use minis. But it is very flexible and I actually like it! Instead of "five foot squares" the map is broken into "areas." Depending on the surroundings, areas can be large or smallIn a crowded building with hallways, doors, rooms, etc. areas will be quite small (ten feet or so). . In an open field, areas will be quite large (as big as 44 yards). This adds a great deal of flexibility to movement - you're simply moving through and to areas. Want to stop behind the corner of the building? No problem if it is in the area you are moving to.

But the best part are the miniatures.

 Every set came with tons of cardboard miniatures. These miniatures were three sided. Cut them out, fold each miniature, and glue them. Done! Instant miniatures!

What's really cool about these miniatures is they have a "front" and the three sides are the three different perspectives of the same character - rear, profile left, and profile front right. Instead of having a "facing forward" stance on all three sides, this was a very nice touch. You can see they had fun with it - the Invisible Woman is actually invisible in one angle and Mr. Fantastic is stretched across all three angles.

These miniatures were an extra added bonus with almost all of the boxed sets. I believe at this point I have all of them and there are literally hundreds - even very obscure characters. They also gave you miniatures of bystanders, common thugs, Hydra agents, generic shield agents, cops, crowds, scenery, etc. etc. etc.

Not having to spend any extra money to populate my game with dozens of cool miniatures? What a brilliant idea. Another great reason why the classic D100 Marvel system was so brilliant.