Kickstarter Corner

[Bix Conners]

Shite. There goes my pledge to say OFF of Kickstarter. Thanks Nicole.

[NeikeDjour]

It made me laugh. I had to post it.
Also, it looks like it could be a interesting game. 

I assume Matt is the 250 pledge...

If not, there's only 1 spot left... 

[RockBane]

Looks like Cthulhu Wars onslaught Two is ending in 5 days.

[NeikeDjour]

The Banner Saga: Warbands is a fully cooperative game for 2-4 players. Players take up the role of the leaders in a warband tasked with keeping the warband together and alive.

There are four roles in the warband: Quartermaster, Keeper of Names, Warmaster, and Thane. Each role must aggressively push for resolutions that help out themselves, while being open to compromise for the good of the warband. It is this conflict and compromise that is the heart of Warbands. The Banner Saga: Warbands is about making hard choices and those choices manifesting in resolutions that are unexpected and ramifications that reach far into the warband's journey. The double-sided cards provide a choice with no hint to what resolution awaits. The game exists in this space of making a decision without knowing the consequences. Combat is fast. Each skirmish takes about 10 minutes. It is completely tactical. There is no luck involved. There are no dice, no random cards being played. It relies entirely on the warband's ability to look at the board and defeat the enemies while taking as little damage as possible. Even in combat there are hard decisions to make. Not everyone will survive.

The Banner Saga is a PC, Mac, Linux and mobile video game that launched in 2014. A Kickstarter success, itself, The Banner Saga quickly became a fan favorite winning several awards and receiving critical success. It will be coming to consoles soon.

[NeikeDjour]

With more than 40 awards and over a million copies sold, Wits & Wagers is one of the most beloved party games ever. Now we've made it better. Wits & Wagers Epic Geek is the be-all, end-all version of our most popular game. Those who've never played before can jump right in with ease, and long-time players of the original game will discover a whole new experience.

All new questions about the epic stories we love such as Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Batman, Harry Potter, etc. Stunning artwork: The back of each player board will feature gorgeous original art celebrating a geek genre. These illustrations are by some of the best artists in the industry. Special in-game powers: Each player has a unique in-game power that adds a layer of social interaction to the game. This is what makes this edition EPICALLY fun to play! We've commissioned six of the industry's best artists to paint beautiful illustrations for the back of each HUGE 8" x 5" player board.  These illustrations commemorate geek genres that have grown large enough to break into the mainstream. Each player board comes with a unique in-game power that is thematic, balanced, and fun to play. NOTE: The questions in this game are not limited to the genres.  These are just the genres of the player boards and the in-game powers.

[NeikeDjour]

Arcadia Quest: Inferno builds upon the same basic gameplay as the original game, with each player controlling a Guild of 3 unique heroes as they go through the multiple branching scenarios of the campaign. Each scenario presents different quests that must be fulfilled in order to be victorious, and various monsters the heroes will need to defeat on their way. The monsters react to the heroes' actions, so no one is stuck playing the role of game master.

As the heroes defeat their enemies and accomplish quests, their guilds rake in the coins, which will then allow them to acquire all sorts of powerful loot! From legendary weapons and armor, to new abilities and magic items. The combination of each hero's unique ability with all the different upgrades they earn through the campaign allows players to create amazing and unexpected combos!

Inferno is a standalone box, but also fully compatible with previous Arcadia Quest boxes. It contains a full campaign with 12 scenarios for players to explore. As players progress through the circles of Inferno, deeper and deeper into the Underworld, the campaign branches into two distinct paths. The path not taken results in quests the players will not fulfill, and therefore consequences that will come back to haunt them towards the end of the campaign.

One such key choice are the Angels. These secret protectors of Arcadia have been imprisoned by the Underlord, who is trying to corrupt them. If players rescue these Angels, they become powerful additions to their Guilds. But beware, the Angels that are abandoned to their fate will be consumed and come back as monsters to seek revenge on the heroes!

Going down into the infernal depths presents the heroes of Arcadia with a new set of challenges and opportunities, in the form of Damnation! This dark power permeates everything in Inferno, and daring heroes may want to use it to their advantage (and face the consequences). Weapons and equipment found in Inferno may become more powerful if a hero takes Damnation, monsters may offer the choice of taking Damnation instead of wounds (or flat out dealing Damnation to their target). However, accumulating Damnation may come at a high price. Some Upgrades are more effective against heroes with Damnation, some monsters more powerful against them, and specially Brimstone cards scattered through the scenarios may activate monsters to attack heroes who dabble too much in the dark powers!

[NeikeDjour]

Set sail in a mythical archipelago filled with bustling towns, sea monsters, pirates, and gold!

Command your own ship and compete to build the best sea-faring nation.
Collect treasure and hire crew.
Conquer or befriend island towns.

In Islebound, you take command of a ship and crew. You sail to island towns, collecting resources, hiring crew, and commissioning buildings for your capital city. Each building has a unique ability, and your combination of buildings can greatly enhance your strength as a trader, builder, or invader. You also recruit pirates and sea monsters to conquer towns, which, once conquered, allow you to complete the town action for free, and charge a fee to opponents if they want to use it. Alternatively, you can complete events that give influence, which can be used to befriend towns. Will you be a ruthless conqueror, careful diplomat, or shrewd merchant?The player with the most the most wealth and most-impressive capital city will win the game!

[RockBane]

Simurgh + Expansion!

[NeikeDjour]

Secret Hitler is a dramatic game of political intrigue and betrayal set in 1930's Germany. Players are secretly divided into two teams - liberals and fascists. Known only to each other, the Fascists coordinate to sow distrust and install their cold-blooded leader. The liberals must find and stop the Secret Hitler before it's too late.

Each round, players elect a President and a Chancellor who will work together to enact a law from a random deck. If the government passes a fascist law, players must try to figure out if they were betrayed or simply unlucky. Secret Hitler also features government powers that come into play as fascism advances. The fascists will use those powers to create chaos unless liberals can pull the nation back from the brink of war.

In Secret Hitler, each player is randomly assigned to be a liberal or a fascist, and one player is Secret Hitler. The liberal team always has a majority. At the beginning of the game, players close their eyes, and the fascists reveal themselves to one another. Secret Hitler keeps his eyes closed, but puts his thumb up so the fascists can see who he is. The fascists learn who Hitler is, but Hitler doesn't know who his fellow fascists are, and the liberals don't know who anyone is.

The objective of the liberal team is to pass 5 liberal policies or assassinate Secret Hitler. The objective of the fascist team is to pass 6 fascist policies or elect Secret Hitler chancellor after 3 fascist policies have passed.

Each round, the President selects a Chancellor. The whole table votes "Ja!" or "Nein!" on their ticket; if a majority of players vote "Ja!," the elected President and Chancellor take the following actions to pass a new policy:

The President draws 3 policies from a random deck.
The President discards 1 policy and passes 2 to the Chancellor.
The Chancellor discards 1 policy and enacts the final one as law.
If a fascist policy passes, the President gains a new power that she must use immediately. These include:

If Hitler is executed, the game ends immediately in a Liberal Victory.

Secret Hitler introduces new mechanics to the hidden-identity game genre.

The first is the element of randomness. When laws are passed, the President draws three policies, passes two to the Chancellor, and the Chancellor enacts one. Only the enacted policy is revealed, so players have to rely on the President and Chancellor's word to know what got discarded. The deck has a known initial composition (11 Fascist policies, 6 Liberal policies), and players can roughly track deck contents based on what the President and Chancellor report, though someone might have lied about what was discarded. That means players can form reasonable expectations and plan around probability, but they can also manipulate future probabilities and expectations in a way that benefits their team.

The second new mechanic is the "Hitler" identity: If Hitler is elected as Chancellor after the third fascist policy has already been enacted, the game ends immediately and the fascists win. This means Hitler will spend most of the game playing as a liberal to gain players' trust. Once the third fascist policy is enacted, anyone who has helped the group becomes immediately suspect; if the liberals make a wrong move at this point, they lose immediately. This creates incredible moments of tension and relief in the game.

Secret Hitler is a love letter to hidden identity games like Werewolf/Mafia, The Resistance, and Avalon, but it's also a new design that fixes some of our biggest problems with those games.

• No moderator: Secret Hitler doesn't require a moderator - everyone can join in the game.
• No early player elimination: We love the suspense of player elimination, but Secret Hitler saves that drama for the very end - assassinated players will rarely have to wait more than ten minutes before the game ends.
• In games like Werewolf, you can only act on your gut feeling. Secret Hitler creates a much more heady experience - there's almost enough information that you can solve the game like a puzzle, but not quite enough. Players always have enough information to make meaningful choices, but we've simplified the decisions to avoid analysis paralysis; each round the President nominates a Chancellor, and the table votes yes or no to that ticket.

Secret Hitler is enormously replayable because the ways the presidential powers are used and the table position of the players is never the same twice. We've played hundreds of rounds of Secret Hitler, and the metagame is still evolving in very exciting ways.

[NeikeDjour]

GG is a fast-paced card battle game that pits player against player in an epic 15 minute battle of strategy, memory and deception. Every game is different, you'll want to play over and over again and with each game, you'll discover new moves and strategies. Besides, there is no limit to the number of players. You can enjoy outsmarting your opponents whether you have one, two, ten or more!

Expandable to large team or free-for-all games. 2 Players/set.
Suitable for ages 7+
Relies on memory in addition to strategy and deception.
Infinite replay value.
No luck involved!

Goal: The goal is to eliminate the rivals by attaining their GG cards.

Setup: Before starting a game, each player reviews his/her cards and forms 4 separate piles of 8 cards strategically. Each player gets 2 random strategy cards before starting a game. Players play rock-paper-scissors to choose the player who goes first.

Gameplay:

The first player flips one card from the top of any of his 4 piles and flips another card from the top of any of his/her rival's 4 piles. This is called challenging. If the challenger wins, s/he continues to play after the losing card is discarded. If s/he loses, the losing card is discarded and the next player in clockwise direction takes the turn. When identical cards are faced up, both cards are discarded and the next player takes the turn.

Instead of challenging an opponent, strategy cards can be played. In that case, it is the next player's turn unless it is stated otherwise on the strategy card.
When a player eliminates the last card of a pile of his/her opponent, s/he draws a strategy card from the strategy cards deck.