Just subscribed. I watch a lot of board game content and just found your channel. Your reviews are great! I play a lot of solo games because it's hard to get together with my gaming friends. I have Gloomhaven and Jaws of the Lion, but definitely want to check out Buttons and Bugs. Thanks for the info!
I can't stand by that price tag. Gloomhaven is definitely super expensive, but you get what you pay for. $50 for that tiny box and minis you can barely see would be a no for me. I also would like gaming to be a social experience, but solo is the way I have to go most times. (Coincidentally, I'm in the middle of a solo game of big box Gloomhaven as we speak.) But thanks for the video! I've been remiss about checking boardgamegeek recently, so I had no idea this mini game actually existed!
Very good explanation of what the game is and how it plays. But you payed too much for your copy and I would recommend you try and flog it before it gets to retail. :) I think people shouldn't bother with this game to be honest. While the minis are cute and the double sided ability cards are interesting, the rest of the game has nothing on big Gloomhaven. Speaking as a hard core "Gloomer" I wanted to like this game, but due to some design choices it left me underwhelmed and I would advice people to spend a little more money and get Jaws of the Lion if they wanna get into Gloomhaven. I completely agree with you regarding the rulebook. It should have been included in the box and the fact that it wasn't was something Cephalofair weren't up front with during the crowdfunding campaign. The design choice to use a die instead of a combat deck was also a bad decision in my opinion. There are only three faces on the die and it can get quite frustrating when you keep rolling poorly. With a combat deck at least you know there will be better cards coming. Also, the HP dials you mentioned. Even to a person who isn't colourblind they are very difficult to tell apart due to the poor choice of colour. It seems the designer realised this and decided to put a number on each of the dials. The problem is that the universal cubes which are used to represent the monsters you fight don't have any printed numbers on them. And as the colour on the dials look nothing like the colour on the cubes it can get a bit ridiculous trying to keep track on which monster belongs to each dial. It would had been a better design choice to go with little round cardboard markers with numbers on them instead of the plastic cubes. The final wrong designer choice I would bring up is that the game, with regards to the setting, doesn't stand on its own legs. In the introduction it makes references to what has happened in the town of Gloomhaven during the 95 scenario long original campaign in the base game plus the 50 or so scenarios in it's expansion "Forgotten Circles". In other words the game primarily caters to those who've already finished Gloomhaven and GHFC and still want to play a pocket sized intro level game set in the same world and with the original six characters from GH. From a product strategy point of view those players are far more likely to pick up Frosthaven. The whole thing is a bit weird.
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Just subscribed. I watch a lot of board game content and just found your channel. Your reviews are great! I play a lot of solo games because it's hard to get together with my gaming friends. I have Gloomhaven and Jaws of the Lion, but definitely want to check out Buttons and Bugs. Thanks for the info!
Cool looking game. Gaming for me is also about the group
It's a good game! But yeah, it's all about the people for me too.
I can't stand by that price tag. Gloomhaven is definitely super expensive, but you get what you pay for. $50 for that tiny box and minis you can barely see would be a no for me. I also would like gaming to be a social experience, but solo is the way I have to go most times. (Coincidentally, I'm in the middle of a solo game of big box Gloomhaven as we speak.) But thanks for the video! I've been remiss about checking boardgamegeek recently, so I had no idea this mini game actually existed!
Very good explanation of what the game is and how it plays. But you payed too much for your copy and I would recommend you try and flog it before it gets to retail. :)
I think people shouldn't bother with this game to be honest. While the minis are cute and the double sided ability cards are interesting, the rest of the game has nothing on big Gloomhaven. Speaking as a hard core "Gloomer" I wanted to like this game, but due to some design choices it left me underwhelmed and I would advice people to spend a little more money and get Jaws of the Lion if they wanna get into Gloomhaven.
I completely agree with you regarding the rulebook. It should have been included in the box and the fact that it wasn't was something Cephalofair weren't up front with during the crowdfunding campaign. The design choice to use a die instead of a combat deck was also a bad decision in my opinion. There are only three faces on the die and it can get quite frustrating when you keep rolling poorly. With a combat deck at least you know there will be better cards coming.
Also, the HP dials you mentioned. Even to a person who isn't colourblind they are very difficult to tell apart due to the poor choice of colour. It seems the designer realised this and decided to put a number on each of the dials. The problem is that the universal cubes which are used to represent the monsters you fight don't have any printed numbers on them. And as the colour on the dials look nothing like the colour on the cubes it can get a bit ridiculous trying to keep track on which monster belongs to each dial. It would had been a better design choice to go with little round cardboard markers with numbers on them instead of the plastic cubes.
The final wrong designer choice I would bring up is that the game, with regards to the setting, doesn't stand on its own legs. In the introduction it makes references to what has happened in the town of Gloomhaven during the 95 scenario long original campaign in the base game plus the 50 or so scenarios in it's expansion "Forgotten Circles". In other words the game primarily caters to those who've already finished Gloomhaven and GHFC and still want to play a pocket sized intro level game set in the same world and with the original six characters from GH. From a product strategy point of view those players are far more likely to pick up Frosthaven. The whole thing is a bit weird.
50 bucks? Is this an accent thing? I paid 15 euros (plus shipping) fot it, via the kickstarter.