Today’s Spiel update is going to be a short one until I get a chance to fill it up with more content. I spent considerably longer there than I had planned because today I Had A Plan going in, which was subsequently thrown out of the window after 2 hours because I started playing games instead of looking for content… it happens.
I spent considerably longer there than I had planned because today I Had A Plan going in, which was subsequently thrown out of the window after 2 hours because I started playing games instead of looking for content… it happens.
I also got back late to the hotel because I was so dead tired after the 6 hours at Spiel that I took the train in the wrong direction (north towards Munster instead of south towards Dusseldorf) and spent the next hour catching the train back to where I came from… this also happens.
I used miniature-based games in the title because there are really two types of miniatures games at Spiel. The first is the true blue wargame like Warhammer, Kings of War, A Song of Ice and Fire, Bolt Action etc. For these types of games, the miniatures are the focus of the game. Sure, there are rules and lore and whatnot, but without the minis, the game doesn’t exist in this form factor. These are also the very very small minority of miniature-based games at Spiel.
The second type of miniature-based games are board games where carefully sculpted miniatures represent player tokens on the board. The minis are there to make the game look better (think of early games like Monopoly, with the metal dog, iron, train etc., and later games like Zombicide, Blood Rage). These form the vast majority of miniature-based games at Spiel. For many of these games, they are designed with custom play areas, event tiles and mechanisms that make the game 100% playable even if you replaced every single miniature with different colored circles.
Enough explanation. On to my highlights of miniature-based games.
Conquest – the last argument of Kings by Parabellum games.
Conquest is the latest in massed fantasy battle games to come out of the mind of Alessio Cavatore, designer/consultant to other fantasy battle games like Warhammer Fantasy Battle, Kings of War and so on. The minis are absolutely gorgeous, based on what looks like 32-36mm scale (thus bigger than GW minis, each human is the size of a stormcast). I like bigger, chunkier minis because they hold more detail and honestly with my aging eyes and shaking fingers, they’re easier to paint.
The lore is also somewhat refreshingly new, with the usual boring human faction (The Hundred Kingdoms) to serve as some familiar protagonist to players, but with two non-traditional factions in print. The first is called the Spire, futuristic geneticists/biomancers who use living flesh as constructs in their armies (think necromancers but they prefer building/summoning living weapons). The second are Dwarves like GW’s fyreslayers with a fire and metal theme, and their ancestors killed all the dragons and stole their land and powers. Clearly, all studios have to think hard now about creating their own IP without reverting to Tolkien’s clueless humans, gruff dwarves and poncy pointy earned Elves. You can check out more of the game at https://www.para-bellum.com/conquest/.
Village Attacks by Grimlord Games.
I didn’t intend to play this game, but there was a spare seat and I thought oh well, why not. I also told the Grimlord Games ambassador that I’d just play a round or two, and he sniggered and said “you say that now…”. And I finished the scenario with two German colleagues in 40 minutes… So much for plans and willpower.
Village Attacks is a tower defense board game where you play the Monsters defending your castle against those pesky villagers and heroes who think you’re a bother to the land. Time to put those peasants in their place!
The game plays similar to Zombicide, where villagers, hunters and heroes spawn randomly from spawn points based on card draws, and move following a set algorithm towards the Evil Castle’s heart in a bid to destroy it and the Monsters. What sets this game apart from CMON’s Zombicide are the dice rolling mechanics, where players roll 6 dice and choose actions based on the dice rolled. The sides can randomly allow players to either attack, range attack, defend, retaliate or use magic. This adds the element of randomness and chance to the game, as players always automatically hit and kill villagers if they spend the correct dice.
Each Player Monster also has unique characteristics of health, movement and special abilities, which makes the game a lot more cooperative than Zombicide where survivors don’t really need to help each other much. This game is not yet at retail, so I bought it at Spiel and will be looking for players to join me in the quest to humble the peasants.
So that’s it from Spiel Day 2. There’s lots of other things I wanted to write about but I’m really out of brain juice now.
Till tomorrow!
