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 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Don't you guys have phones?

I'm sure some of them have wives, too.

Lessee... FFG's laid off their RPG and videogame adaptation departments. (Asmodee is consolidating their RPGs, not dropping them. Dunno about the videogames.) FFG has a history of dropping support for "lifestyle" games, last one being Runewars, and maybe L5R card game as well.

Meanwhile, FFG games has a history of apps, introduced with Descent 2nd edition. I'm not seeing a thread on BGG about MoM2's app support being dropped, but didn't look closely.

BGG has a high demand for coops, but app interest is mixed. A common complaint about 2nd edition is that the owner always ended playing the Overlord. With KS crowding the dungeoncrawl market, an app-driven boardgame at least stands out, sorta. Also, with the Cult of the New, boardgames don't stay long on the tabletop, anyway. Descent 2nd edition was around for eight years, Descent 1st edition seven.

No hurry to pick up another dc, myself.

https://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/2526352/confirmed-new-descent-game-coop-and-solely-app

https://www.enworld.org/threads/fantasy-flight-games-discontinuing-rpgs.670385/
https://www.pcgamer.com/digital-tabletop-game-studio-fantasy-flight-interactive-is-closing/
https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/311650-is-this-game-worth-getting-into/

> Seen a lot of nay saying around the app driven nature of the game but having played a LOT of mansions of madness 2nd edition, i absolutely loved that game and the app made it for me.

See? FFG no doubt has the sales figures of Middle Earth, and download and possibly usage stats for IA and D2E to justify an app.

> Personally when I am playing a board game the last thing I want to do is get the digital sphere involved. I want to get AWAY from that for at least a few hours.

Okay. Fine. Go play one of too many other non-app generic fantasy dice-chucking dungeon crawlers on the market. I think there's at least two on KS right now.

BTW, A deck of cards won't replace an app when it's revealing quest-specific rooms -- although a table will. Advanced Heroquest used a table that increased the chances of finding the boss room as you explored more random rooms. Even then, an app does a better job creating a room, including a quest room, with multiple random elements (eg. monster, treasure, terrain features, etc.). Whether or not that is all that necessary is YMMV, but it still increases replay value, when two boss rooms may play differently.

That said, the Cult of the New was around even before KS, and games didn't last on the table for very long. Gloomhaven cut down setup time with a scenario booklet which had the maps printed on them (and this allowed both unique one-use maps and quest-specific art), rather than use generic tiles (a holdover from RPG generic tile sets, I presume). Sure, some BGG'ers *say* they want replay value, but I'd like to see some guy with only five games in his gaming closet.

D2E still works. While Sea of Blood wasn't received as well on BGG, with Road to Legend, that's still two campaign's worth of content on top of everything else.

> Moreover, I completely agree about keeping digital things away from the game. I'm okay with it for post-game admin or occasionally quickly looking up rules in a digital document (simply because it can be faster, and thus interrupts the game less), but other than that I'll take tactile physical elements every time.

Yahbut, is there any reason why THIS game has to accommodate non-app players??? Does EVERY dungeoncrawler has to fit YOUR needs when OTHERS want something else???

Again, it's not like we don't have other dungeoncrawlers to choose from.

Reminds me of how, on BGG, you'll find someone who wants EVERY game solo-playable. This, despite that solo and coop rules were once bolt-on rulesets that were inferior play to an actual opponent.

> Finally, to borrow your argument, there are plenty of app driven or app integrated dungeon crawlers out there now, do we really need another one?

Ask me this question again, but replace it with "dice" and "skill checks".

> I'll be honest--setup and teardown time are what keeps me away from some games. I love gloomhaven but without the 3rd party apps I would have played it much less.

IIRC, Descent 1E was one of the first dungeoncrawlers where the map was set up before gameplay, so, no, you are quite right. If setup before a game deterred gamers, just think how setup *during* gameplay slowed down things. Advanced HeroQuest had a random map generator that build the map as you played, and it did take time to find the map tile.

Gloomhaven's map books are increasingly popular. Most scenarios are double-spread pages, and some scenarios span two books. Not only are the maps pre-set, but the maps show where the monsters start, and have the scenario rules on the same page as the maps. Since the maps aren't generic tiles, the maps can have special features printed on them, different shapes, different art, etc. and less, well, generic, than GH maps. The designer said that GH has tiles because he wanted gamers the ability to make custom maps, but I think most gamers have enough content in the box.

HeroQuest's board, I think, also was good map design. Sure, you had the rooms printed on the board, but by placing a door on a different room or terrain feature in a different part of the room, the scenario could change quite a bit. Also, the board gave an illusion of hugeness, since, as a young child, you could imagine every room occupied with a terrain feature and group of monsters. The quests only used maybe 1/4 of the rooms, effectively still keeping the map unknown. In the picture, give it a good look to see how few rooms were actually used, yet the board still gives a sense of being quite large.






> When I see Kickstarters now that advertise 600+ cards of many different types as a feature, it actually turns me off.

Even before KS, we had FFG's Arkham Horror. No, you didn't have to have all of these decks on the board at the same time, but many a BGG'er were put off by the decks they did have to play with!

Well, let's not forget those of us who have about ten or twenty years of unplayed game sessions in the gaming closet. I think I have an used copy of Chainsaw Warrior I haven't played yet.

Wonder if a fan will make a D3E downgrade kit in eight years...!

> Bet no fan will make a D3E downgrade in eight years...

No, a downgrade would just be statting the D3E monsters and heroes to a D2E version. I've seen someone take the entire Reaper Bones I core line and generate Savage World stats for them. Several BGG'ers have created Gloomhaven campaigns and character classes, including graphic design. I've also seen rewrites of Advanced Heroquest. Myself, I've written 1000 Cosmic Encounter powers and 500 Wiz-War cards, not to mention a CCG website. Not that hard to generate fan content, although playtesting may be a different matter. (I heard that, at least at one time, WizKids doesn't do that with HeroClix.)

> Another thing I'm weary with app dependant boardgames is that I'm not sure if the game will ask me to be constantly "online" with the app...or if it will ask me to make a registered account with a fee to use it. Or what happens if there are bugs in the app keeping you from playing the game ?

Good points. I just watched a YouTube video how smart televisions take your viewing data and send it to various companies. Youtube itself already tracks what videos you watch on each device you own.

FFG, btw, had an updgrade kit from 1E to 2E for all its 1E content, including promotional figures. So it's still possible that 3E components will have an upgrade to 4E. (Only possible, since, so far, no mention of 2E to not-3E-but-it-is.)

Oh, and after losing -- er, misplacing -- my tablet three times today, I'm not sure about that $275 price tag.

EDIT: Clayton on BGG. "Also, one reason why Asmodee started their own digital studio, rather than license projects out to unreliable 3rd parties, was because of all the shovelware mobile adaptations being dropped from the stores due to lack of support from the author. You can still get (and buy DLC) for Road to Legend, MoM, and even XCOM long after the physical board games are no longer in print, because this company understands what it would mean to kill the software and spoil the product for everyone who did buy it. As a result, the reality is that the opposite "problem" exists - there are several free apps floating around that require a board game to use, but the physical components are no longer for sale."

EDIT: Another BGG'er posted how he's getting tired of doing the research for yet another $150+ game. Same here. I think there are quite a few assumptions what the app will do, without actual knowledge of what it will do. We won't know until the reviews -- and we won't know how much support Asmodee / FFG will provide -- until months from now. Of course, I doubt reviews will overcome app-requirement and sticker shock, not to mention conventional deal-breakers such as theme, game mechanics, etc. For myself, any high-priced dungeoncrawler that uses a dice pool *really* has to stand out before I'll get off the fence (and not make a purchase).