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looking for an easy dungeon crawler.
is there anything out there that doesn't require a "bad guy" and is quick and easy to pick up?

I bought myth thinking that might be it but while being fun its a little more complicated than I'd like.

I've teeter tottered over descent for a long time, is that the standard to go by?

silver tower sounds fun but it also sounds highly scripted. do you have to run missions or can you just dice in and let the carnage begin?

zombicide is fun but I'd like a little more variety on the monsters.

dungeon saga sounded fun but I quit reading after I saw some stuff talking about facing bonuses, it seemed a little too in depth.

any thoughts?

Silver Tower - Highly Scripted? The adventure book has about 8 or 9 I think. It says "goto page blah blah" you go there and it tells you what cards make the adventure deck and in what random order its placed. You place the stack down set up then flip. It is narrative driven by stories. They don't have to be played in order. Each adventure has a good story. But its very fast and brutal.

Dungeon Saga was good also, but it did seem like it had a bit more downtime then silver tower. It is also d6 dice based

Zombiecide is fun, but it has a million boxes now. Not sure whats what. I did hear Black Plague, the fantasy version fixed a lot of issues though with original and is fun.

Not sure what you like. It seems like you want a super basic kids dungeon crawl. Not to be offensive, but you make it sound like you want kids to play if you have em?

no offense taken.
youre not far off the mark.
id like to be able to just throw it down and go.
to be honest I haven't seen silver tower yet so may check that out some more.
I also like shadows of brimstone but that game has so many dang cards to fiddle with its crazy.

didn't super dungeon explore go full co-op? I wonder how that one plays without the dungeon keeper?

You could try the D&D Adventure System games. There are currently four of them. They are Castle Ravenloft, Wrath of Ashardalon, Legend of Drizzit, and Temple of Elemental Evil. They are purely co-op for up to four players. I own three of them. They are pretty fun. There is also Claustrophobia. I have not played it, but I heard it is pretty good. Outside of that, I am not sure.

I found I had to run it a couple times and setup some gaming aids and it ran pretty quick.
I found keeping organized what few equipment cards you have helps.

It is evil and the monsters can wander.
There is no "bad-guy" per-se but the other players can get pretty evil since you are all scrounging for loot and being a Munchkin, jealousy is a fine motivator.
The map builds itself as you play.
The monster variety is large enough to be interesting.

What you described earlier I was thinking "Like Space Hulk" but a dungeon crawl... hmmmm.... I could make that.

If your looking for a simple dungeon crawl with easy mechanics but a good story you can't go wrong with Hero Quest. It's an old game (late 80's) and it's been out of print for a long time but you can always try eBay and it's pretty easy to find PDFs of the expansion quests on line.

 usernamesareannoying wrote:
zombicide is fun but I'd like a little more variety on the monsters.

If you liked Zombicide but want more monster variety, Guillotine Games are about to launch the kickstarter for Massive Darkness. It's using a lot of zombicide mechanics but has all different types of monster enemies.

HeroQuest.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cx8sl2uC46A



Modern? I'm enjoying Dungeon Saga by Mantic and Zombicide:Black Plague by Guillotine Games.... Massive Darkness looks interesting.

thanks guys, some great ideas here.
im actually pretty interested in massive darkness but am not looking forward to the roughly year wait.

For $ value, fast play, great minis, coop, and fun, I suggest the following:

Zombicide black plague
Zombicide
Descent
Warhammer quest silver tower
Gears of war
Descent
Myth
Warhammer quest (origional)

All have as much or as little content as you want to modify the game (except silver tower which was just released). Zombicide also has regular, toxic, skinny, and berzerker zombies in 4 types each. They also have dogs and crows. There is a ton of variety when you mix everything (but not yet in black plague)

I would vote against Super Dungeon Explore. The wife and I went into it hard, investing more than we should have, and it ended up just such a clunky, unsatisfying game.

Maybe the upcoming 2.0 rules will change everything, but for now, its a shame.

We've been playing a ton of Warhammer Quest, and actually fell in love with each-other playing the DnD Adventure games... and having extensive experience with both, Quest is the far and away superior game.

Is anyone able to comment on what the new Warhammer Quest is like? Is it very similar to the original? (I'm hoping so!)

Dungeon Saga definitely isn't too in depth. It's actually very fast/simple with the main set and good fun. I haven't played the Adventurer's companion yet but apparently that adds more meat to it if you want it. Also like that Mantic are continuing to support the game with new campaigns.

Descent is the one that's more complex. Still good fun, but can be a bit 'gamey' if you have people in your group that really want to win, and some of the builds (the Necromancer with exploding zombies comes to mind) seem unbalanced.

Zombiecide Black Plague is an absolute riot - really good fun with friends, almost feels like those old 3-4 player games you used to sit round a console and play with your mates. Can't recommend it enough.

Having collected and played many games in this genre the best option for as new collector is Dungeon Saga.

It has good components decent ruleset for what it does and offers a tactical challenge.

I've not played Descent, but if it's anything like Imperial Assault (I understand they share the same core rules) then it's not the game you're looking for. It's highly scripted and difficult to just pick up and play. Missions have to be played as part of an ongoing campaign. Don't get me wrong, it a brilliant game but may not be for you.

Dungeon Saga may be more up your alley.

 Pacific wrote:
Is anyone able to comment on what the new Warhammer Quest is like? Is it very similar to the original? (I'm hoping so!)

I don't have it, but what I have heard hasn't been good if you were expecting the old Warhammer Quest to make a return. The combat mechanics are entirely different (unsurprising, since they've moved to AoS's style of combat) and the campaign system is largely gone. I've heard good things about the game itself, but if you're looking for old Warhammer Quest, this isn't it.

Dungeon Saga is really quick to play, I did demos and could explain the bulk of the rules in under a minute. Really fun game with lots of content.

The whole "facing bonus" thing just means that the defender loses a dice if being attacked in the back.

I own Super Dungeon Explore and couldn't get past reading/ understanding the rules for co-op mode. There is apparently a 6-part 90-minute long youtube video series that is really good at explaining it. :(

I am waiting for Massive Darkness, myself. KS launches in a couple weeks.

There's also the D&D board games - Castle Ravenloft, Wrath of Ashadarlon, Legend of Drizzt and Temple of Elemental Evil. Personally, I'm not too fond of them, but other folks seem to like it quite well.

If you don't mind a miniless game, there is also Dungeon!

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
I am waiting for Massive Darkness, myself. KS launches in a couple weeks.

I hope they do a minis only option. I want them.

 Orlanth wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
I am waiting for Massive Darkness, myself. KS launches in a couple weeks.

I hope they do a minis only option. I want them.

Brought up in the news and rumours thread. Not happening.

Fortunately, Massive Darkness sounds like it should be a fun game, first, so minis-only isn't on my wish list.

 LuciusAR wrote:
I've not played Descent, but if it's anything like Imperial Assault (I understand they share the same core rules) then it's not the game you're looking for. It's highly scripted and difficult to just pick up and play. Missions have to be played as part of an ongoing campaign. Don't get me wrong, it a brilliant game but may not be for you.

Dungeon Saga may be more up your alley.

Descent can be played as a campaign, which is where you get the most out of it, or you can play single missions. If by scripted, you are referring to the trigger events that occur in Imperial Assault at certain points in the mission, Descent does not really have many of them. Unless you include things like monster or character A showing up after the heroes have uncovered item B type of thing. But those type of things are more like the random search token items in Zombicide. Personally I would say that Descent is no more scripted than Zombicide. Descent's quests are usually broken into two encounters. And winning the first encounter usually results in some type of advantage for them in the next encounter as well as extra XP to spend. One advantage I feel Descent definitely has over Imperial Assault is that you can mix and match the heroes and classes. In Imperial Assault, each hero has a set deck of skills they can choose from when they advance. In Descent, if you are not playing a campaign, a hero can switch classes within their grouping each time they are played.

BGG's reception to apps is usually lukewarm to negative, but they've been going ga-ga over the Descent 2 app. Take a look a the comments.

OP wants a dungeoncrawler that has no GM, so that limits the dungeoncrawlers he can play.

Massive darkness is sounding cool, I just wish it wasn't so far out.
I'm thinking of trying to come up with a myth shadows of brimstone crossover to get the sob mechanics in a fantasy setting.

Massive Darkness sounds intriguing - what are the main things people are looking forward to with that one ?

 -Loki- wrote:

 Pacific wrote:
Is anyone able to comment on what the new Warhammer Quest is like? Is it very similar to the original? (I'm hoping so!)

I don't have it, but what I have heard hasn't been good if you were expecting the old Warhammer Quest to make a return. The combat mechanics are entirely different (unsurprising, since they've moved to AoS's style of combat) and the campaign system is largely gone. I've heard good things about the game itself, but if you're looking for old Warhammer Quest, this isn't it.

Many thanks mate. Might check it out and see what kind of game it is, at least my expectations are pretty low so might be surprised !

 Pacific wrote:
Massive Darkness sounds intriguing - what are the main things people are looking forward to with that one ?

simple mechanics with a campaign system.
I like the sound of actually looting creatures for the item they use against you. that sounds fun.
this plus loads of minis
evil garden gnomes look wicked too...lol

 Pacific wrote:
Massive Darkness sounds intriguing - what are the main things people are looking forward to with that one ?

1. streamlined, kid-friendly mechanics and duration
2. well-varied, distinctive Hero classes
3. non-Zombie monsters

Also, lots and lots of characterful models.

Many thanks guys.

Have just looked it up and it does indeed look awesome! Looks like the artist's work from one of the Zombiecide games if I'm not mistaken? Looks so characterful.

Looks like my no-KS rule for myself for the rest of the year isn't going to last very long!

 Pacific wrote:
Many thanks guys.

Have just looked it up and it does indeed look awesome! Looks like the artist's work from one of the Zombiecide games if I'm not mistaken? Looks so characterful.

Looks like my no-KS rule for myself for the rest of the year isn't going to last very long!

It's being made by Guillotine Games, the same people who made the Zombicide games. It's also largely using the same mechanics.

I wonder if they're going to add a roll to hit element for the bad guys or if they'll just auto hit like zombicide?