Masters of the Night

I just finished reading the rules pdf, and this looks like a decent co-op/solo game. I really love the retro look of the game, like a gothic filter on a hardboiled detective show from the 1940s. I'm not looking for more minis to paint, but these sculpts are really nice and might look good enough even without paint. So I'm going to back it at the basic level.

My better judgement won out and I realized that I really don't need another game clogging the shelves. Hopefully, it ends up being a good game.

So I read through the rulebook and I have a much better understanding of it now. It has a few neat things going on, might actually throw in on that basic level.

$39 sounds too cheap. There must be something wrong with it, so I'll hold off.

Ares has about $1000 of my dollars, so I'll also hold off on knifing the company.

Actually sounds pretty intriguing. Worth a look at the rule book.

What they’re carefully dodging in the headline-level text is that it’s essentially a card game. That’s why it’s only $39.

I threw in for $39, not seeing much so far to justify the extra $10.

I just got a message about the game because I backed Master of the Galaxy. Turns out it’s the the same design studio doing Masters of the Night.

This gives me even more pause than Ares doing the publishing. Master of the Galaxy was really disappointing, underdeveloped and a confusing mess. Needless to say, I’m out.

Was Master of Galaxy supposed to be a board game version of Master of Orion? I was always curious about that -- sounds like I don't need to be anymore.

It was a space 4X that ran on a bag building system not dissimilar to Hyperborea but more abstracted and, as I said, very underdeveloped. The core gameplay was fine, but the combat was fiddly, broken combos were pretty common, it had quite a few rules that deviated from the norm enough to be confusing or easily forgotten, and had the worst case of victory out of nowhere I've ever seen. I'd love to see a game take the Hyperborea structure and take it to the next level, but this game really needed a lot more time and refinement.

There are some strange comments here - too cheap, must be something wrong with it! Battle of the Five Armies - it's pointless! And a surprising amount of criticism for Ares - WOTR is my favourite game, the 2nd edition is for the most part completely clear, and if you still have problems, download my summary. BTW I also have summaries for BOFA, Age of Conan, Hunt for the Ring, Inkognito (which I also redesigned), and Aztlan (did that one too). All good games, with rulebooks no worse than any others in the industry, and often better.

For the record, I didn't write the Masters of the Night rulebook, but I did the graphic design. Ares had an existing design they weren't happy with, and I came in to redo the whole thing and bring it all together, giving it the 40s film noir look. The rules look clear and staightforward to me. I'm looking forward to playing it.

UniversalHead wrote: There are some strange comments here - too cheap, must be something wrong with it!

For the record I'll mention that my "sounds too cheap" comment was 100% sarcasm. Bring on the sub-$50 games!

I've gotten some great stuff from Ares, so I'm confused that everyone called them a crap-shoot.

Oh good,! Sorry, missed it. Doh.