Steve Jackson Games Forums - View Single Post - Gloomhaven (cross-pollinatable with GURPS etc.)

SolemnGolem · 12-26-2018, 06:57 AM

That is good news indeed! Any new Dungeon Fantasy material is a welcome addition to the market, and I look forward to getting myself a copy and supporting SJG.

I've played a few more scenarios of the Gloomhaven campaign, and I have decided that I'm not a big fan of the main mechanic of the game - exhaustion. Each character has a set of cards and must place two facedown at start of each turn - these cards are discarded or trashed after use, and once all cards are gone, you rest to recover discarded cards (after trashing a further one). This means that each scenario has only a limited amount of moves, and in many cases the time limit is pretty tight. You'll have multiple instances of dropped loot unclaimed, and tempting treasure chests left alone, just because your characters would run out of steam and sink to the floor in exhaustion after a set number of turns. This applies even if you eliminated all the enemies in the area.

I can imagine many scenarios requiring multiple playthroughs to complete successfully. However, on a Xmas Day dedicated gaming full-day session, we managed to only play through 2 scenarios and then quit a 3rd due to evident futility a few turns in. I don't see this game hitting the table very often.

The blurb text in the journal is well written and the maps, standies, and room tiles are conveniently hex-based (although the actual plastic stands for the standies are on a rectangular base, so cosmetically slightly different from the DF hex bases).

I can see myself plundering Gloomhaven for materials for DF games. But with a board game of that cumbersome size (and the offputting exhaustion mechanic), each time I pull the box off the shelf for a game, I find myself wondering "why not just play a PnP roleplaying game while we're at it?"

12-26-2018, 06:57 AM	#3
SolemnGolem Join Date: Apr 2010 Location: The Hall of Fallen Columns	Re: Gloomhaven (cross-pollinatable with GURPS etc.) That is good news indeed! Any new Dungeon Fantasy material is a welcome addition to the market, and I look forward to getting myself a copy and supporting SJG. I've played a few more scenarios of the Gloomhaven campaign, and I have decided that I'm not a big fan of the main mechanic of the game - exhaustion. Each character has a set of cards and must place two facedown at start of each turn - these cards are discarded or trashed after use, and once all cards are gone, you rest to recover discarded cards (after trashing a further one). This means that each scenario has only a limited amount of moves, and in many cases the time limit is pretty tight. You'll have multiple instances of dropped loot unclaimed, and tempting treasure chests left alone, just because your characters would run out of steam and sink to the floor in exhaustion after a set number of turns. This applies even if you eliminated all the enemies in the area. I can imagine many scenarios requiring multiple playthroughs to complete successfully. However, on a Xmas Day dedicated gaming full-day session, we managed to only play through 2 scenarios and then quit a 3rd due to evident futility a few turns in. I don't see this game hitting the table very often. The blurb text in the journal is well written and the maps, standies, and room tiles are conveniently hex-based (although the actual plastic stands for the standies are on a rectangular base, so cosmetically slightly different from the DF hex bases). I can see myself plundering Gloomhaven for materials for DF games. But with a board game of that cumbersome size (and the offputting exhaustion mechanic), each time I pull the box off the shelf for a game, I find myself wondering "why not just play a PnP roleplaying game while we're at it?"