The good folks at Evil Hat Productions are currently running a Kickstarter for a new card game: The Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game.
There is ((At the time I’m writing this.)) five days to go on the Kickstarter, and around $38,000 dollars to hit the last stretch goal. I really want them to hit that last stretch goal, which will give folks free expansions and variant cards in the app version of the game that they’re going to develop. So, I’m trying to get the word out a little wider.
As a backer of the campaign, I was able to download the print-and-play version of the game and give it a try. I’ve played several solo games ((Yes, there are solo rules.)), and a couple of multi-person games. Short version: it’s a good game – challenging and flavourful and just a lot of fun.
First, the basics.
Players take the roles of various characters from the Dresden Files book series. Each character has a small deck of cards that represent their abilities. The group faces off against a deck of cards based on one of the Dresden Files books, which presents a series of cases, foes, obstacles, and advantages. The group must use the cards in their hands to solve the cases, defeat the foes, overcome the obstacles, and gain the advantages. To win, the group must have more solved cases than there are undefeated foes when the game ends.
As with a lot of cooperative games, the core of the game is resource management. The initial hands the players draw for their characters are pretty much the only cards they’ll have for the entire game – opportunities to draw more cards are uncommon, and players may only have one or two opportunities to draw a new card over the course of the game, so using the cards for best opportunity is key.
In addition, all the cards have a Fate Point value. There’s a pool of Fate Points that the group shares ((The size of the pool is based on the difficulty the group has chosen to play at. The lower the difficulty, the more Fate Points available at the start of the game.)), and playing a card requires spending Fate Points from that pool. Players can also discard a card to gain that card’s Fate Point value into the pool ((This also triggers a special ability that each character has, called a Talent.)). So, deciding when to spend Fate to play a card and when to discard a card to gain Fate for later use is another key decision point in the game.
The Book cards are dealt out in two rows, and the position of the cards along a range band tell you which cards can be affected by cards with different ranges. The layout of these cards changes with every game, and that means the optimal strategy changes with each game, too. There are interrelationships between the Book cards, as well, so that dealing with the cards in a certain order can make dealing with other cards easier. For example, you may need to solve a case before attacking a given foe.
The game ends in a showdown, where there is a final hail Mary chance to solve outstanding cases and defeat outstanding foes. You enter the showdown when you play a card that has more Fate Points than you have available, or when the players are all out of cards, or when all the players agree that they should go to showdown because they don’t have anything useful they can do. At the end of the showdown, which is a series of rolls ((Using Fate dice.)) against the various outstanding cards. These rolls can have their odds improved by spending Fate Points, so it’s good to have a few left in the pool when the showdown starts.
At the end of the showdown, you total the number of case cards you’ve solved, and compare it to the number of foe cards still on the board. If you have more case cards, you win. If you don’t you lose.
So far, I have yet to win a game. But every game has felt like I’ve had a chance right up to the showdown, and my immediate reaction after each loss has been, “Wow. I better try that again.” The game is challenging and a little bit frustrating and highly addictive.
The base game comes with five character decks: Harry Dresden, Karrin Murphy, Michael Carpenter, Susan Rodriguez, and Billy and Georgia of the Alphas. Two more decks have been unlocked as freebies by the stretch goals: Mouse, and a crossover from Sentinels of the Multiverse, Ra.
There are five book decks in the base game: Storm Front, Fool Moon, Grave Peril, Summer Knight, and Death Masks. There’s also a deck called Side Jobs that you can use to generate a random scenario for play.
Stretch goals have also unlocked three expansions, each of which features two more character decks, two more book decks, and a few more cards for Side Jobs. Stretch goals have also generated a $10 discount on shipping charges, so shipping in the US is free, and it’s just $10 for shipping up here to Canada. And the stretch goals have increased the art budget, so you’ll see a lot more variety in the art than is currently presented in the print-and-play version ((The art currently in the game is great, but there is only one image for case cards, one for foe cards, one for obstacles, etc. The increased budget means different images for different cards.)).
You also get a play board, some Fate dice, and chits for tracking clues, hits, and Fate Points in the base game.
So, if you get all three expansions with the base game, you wind up with 13 character decks, 11 book decks, and about 45 Side Jobs cards, enough for a lot of replay value.
The Kickstarter is almost over. Right now, you can get the base game for $39, and the base game plus the three expansions for $69. And if the campaign hits $450,000, there will be free expansions and variant cards when they release the app for the game. If the game sounds good, jump in quick.
Harry needs your help.