I absolutely agree with Sword and Sorcery being an amazing dungeon crawler, my absolute favorite. All the tactics, the variantion in classes and soon even a pvp system. It's absolute amazing. I chose 1 wave shipment so have to wait for season 2 but love to see these teasers :D I love how your passion for the game truly shines through your video.
Christian, I only recently received my Ancient Chronicles 2nd Wave Kickstarter shipment, which includes the Northwind Tales content as well! (went for 1 wave shipping). You are right, an absolutely 'insane' amount of content for what I paid, (almost 2.5 years ago now...LOL!) Well worth it, and a build on a great system, which as you said once you get over the steep learning curve re: the Rules, you are introduced to a gaming system which offers a great level of immersiveness that is unsurpassed
I love sword & sorcery but I live in Brasil, I need to pay 5.5x times more due to weak currency then pay double for shipping then add 70% of the price+shipping in taxes. Gloomhaven costs 3-4 minimum salaries here. Would love to buy this kickstarter pack but it would cost a fortune
I’m not sure if anyone will see this comment, but for those who made positive comments about the game, I’m curious about how your opinion of it has held up over the past year. Is it still worth tracking down the KS version and content?
Great review. It’s July 22 and my Kickstarter Bundle has just arrived (wave 1 & 2). The issue I’ve got is where to store the thing! There is so much content.
Wow man Iv been playing this game on TTS and its amazing, just ordered the new core set and can't wait, you're right, it does give me that WOW MMORPG feel I love, I wish I could play WOW but the game has changed so much and don't have time for the grind, I'm kinda new to boardgaming specially to Dungeon crawlers, Iv played Gloomheaven and enjoyed it, but Sword and Sorcery is in another level, crazy good. Thanks for the awesome content man.
Awesome review! I've played a lot of different games with my friends, and we tend to like co-op games. I played D&D back in the day, so always liked the co-op feel. Our group is 5 players, and you're right that it can take some time to get through S&S adventures. I find myself acting as a kind of "Dungeon Master" in the game - reading the passages in the Book of Secrets and handling the monster A.I. This seems to work well for our group, and we're having a blast. Have played all of Immortal souls plus expansions, and are now on Northwind Tales. We never finish an adventure in one sitting, so have gotten good at breaking at a pre-agreed time, taking pictures of the set-up, and then continuing on next session. There is a lot of set-up and take-down, but it all seems worth it. If you want something simple, this game isn't for you. However, if you're willing to put the effort in, this game is the best co-op dungeon crawler experience you can have.
I recently started and after quest 2 I have to say I'm not sure about the game anymore. I like the system but I feel like there is so many little things just kicking you down all the time. You just learned the game and you have to keep track of 2 minions that dont activate like the normal, then you are poisoned, then ko'ed. Ho there some loot, ho no its a trap. Ho a pitfill. A boss with another rule that activate outside normal timing. We are playing Jeanne and Artemis and I just keep healing every turn and we even have the 1hp item from quest 1. I did not try but I dont understand how you can get throught if you dont have a healer. Edit spoiler : I forgot the earthquake i ignored that would have wiped us after finaly escaping the boss room.
It's hard! The flow of the game and managing the rules is something you just develop a process for, and I found that I steadily sped up round after round. The difficulty of the actual game is increased.... But I replayed each quest and that really does help things too...
@@severngamingnetworkI was a bit sour yesterday lol. Reading some comments I went from 2 heroes to 3 and I did quest 2 again. Knowing what to expect and with the added firepower of the dwarf it went much better.
Thanks Bheowulf! Playing S&S is a great choice full stop! Let me know how you get on with the rules... I'm sure there are at least some of those of us who can cope with the additional complexity of AC to start playing S&S with!
Cheers Alan! Much appreciated :) If you're interested, I did review the Immortal Souls set too while back, if you're checking out S&S products! Do subscribe; lots of cool looking kickstarter game reviews coming in next few months!
Why call it an "MMORPG"? It's an RPG all right, it has features heavily inspired from computer RPG implementations (cooldowns, special effects and so forth), but "massively muti-player" it is not. Neither is it "online" in any way.
All good points! Just using the existing coined phrase to get across the flavour of S&S's party tactics and character interaction... I'm presuming most people watching will know it's not actually online and not actually massively multiplayer 😆
@@daniel.u.thibault Well, that's just a bit too broad for me: then people might think of Skyrim for instance, which this really DOESN'T evoke. Making comparisons to WoW and Everquest (old school MMORPG) party dynamics captures the feel of S&S a little more accurately than just general computer RPG for me.
@@severngamingnetwork Never played it, but you said MMO and I was looking for something for my newphew/neice. It seems complicated but I feel hooked to it :) Thanks for review, was very helpful and clear
If you feel confident learning rule sets and diving into deeper games, then I'd go Chronicles for sure. If you're unsure, start with Immortal Souls; if you love it like I have done then Ancient Chronicles is an easy next buy!!
@@severngamingnetwork Awesome thanks, one more question, what other games you recommend that are similar to S&S? As an old school wow fan this game feels very similar I enjoy mmorpg style games, gloomhaven is cool but doesn't give that feel I enjoy. Thanks again, Carlos
@@carlosancinez9116 There's not any that spring to mind with this sort of "mmorpg", ability cooldown feel to it....S&S has that as a defining feature as far as i can see. It IS a bit of book keeping, but once you get it all down its smooth and actually adds to the experience i think. Other's just dont have that crunchiness!
@@severngamingnetwork Nice, Maybe you can help me with a Rule question, I understand that if you move and perform an attack that ends your move, but if you end up killing the enemy can you move now? Basically let's say the hero has 3 movement points, he moves 1 into an enemy space, performs and attack which kills it can the hero now move the remaining 2 movement points left? Thanks for your help,
I think you'll find the first one, Immortal Souls, a little easier, both in terms of getting your head around the system and then in terms of the difficulty of the quests. Ancient Chronicles is a superb upgrade to IS, but the extra complexity and difficulty isn't to be underestimated....but if you enjoy a crunchy game system and have experience in these sorts of games, you may be ok to start with AC. Is that the case with you T PA?
@@severngamingnetwork Hmm I have experience with a lot of heavy games (mage knight, terra mystica, gloomhaven meh for me btw, etc), but not a lot of dungeon crawlers. The heavy rules dont botter me IF they are clear and most questions can be answered by the rulebook, I'm a bit of a rule lawyer. I don't like having to google things every 5 minutes. I'm on the fence about the 2 versions, this one seems to have more longetivity with the numbers of quests and the more complex ennemy AI. I could see it just with the difference between the Gremlins and the Spiders in the first quests I watched. So a more complete game without expansion is definatly a plus for this one, maybe even the more hybrid classes as we will probably play just 2 characters with my grilfriend, maybe you feel less like you're missing some archetype vs IC with 2 characters. We played a lot of Guild Wars 2 with my girlfriend and the classes in this one reminds me of that, in GW2 every class can do a bit more of everything vs a typical mmorpg. And in Guild Wars you have the Mesmer which is an illusionist just like in this game, litteraly the same type of mechanics with your illusions. Is there a way in the retail version to adjust difficulty?
@@alvaroneto9214 check on Ares Games website, or the Kickstarter campaign page for Ancient Chronicles... Maybe you can late pledge? However, will be hard now, might just have to wait until it hits the shops.
I agree that just about everything is better, but oh man, the combat is still sooooo boring and frustrating. I'm struggling to enjoy myself, which was the same for Immortal Souls.
@@severngamingnetwork Yeah, it's the repetition and lack of meaningful decisions, I think. Combat tends to be roll dice, inflict small amount of damage, draw encounter card, spend 5-10 minutes doing all the monster activations, roll dice for another hero, do a small amount of damage, draw encounter card... And combat is like 80% of the game. Wave after wave after wave... I played all the way through Immortal Souls and didn't enjoy it very much but kept at it, and I'm having only a slightly better experience with Ancient Chronicles. I'll finish the campaign, play through Wave 2 when it comes, and then try to offload the whole lot. For contrast, I absolutely love Gloomhaven and Middara, and enjoy most games in this genre pretty well. This and Sine Tempore have been the absolute lows for me.
@@coffeespoonman7931 Fascinating! To press on through what you make sound like a bad experience for you is interesting. I have found the opposite to your experience to be my experience however! I find the decisions between which powers, abilities or weapons to use each turn, and in what combination, considering what each party member can do too, creates a variety of meaningful decisions one can ponder over, even at lower levels when you have relatively less abilities available, not to mention that once the dice are rolled you then have triggers and procs and all sorts to decide how to utilise. The array of possible tactics you can develop as a party, responding to the challenges each monster poses, creates an unparalleled tactical combat experience as far as I'm concerned. I'm amazed to hear someone has found the game I've had this sort of experience in to be "grindy"!
@@severngamingnetwork Yes, well, there are moments where the game shines, and I keep playing for that. I'm currently on quest 4 and actually enjoying this one. My party composition is a bit better (Artemis, Jeanne and Thorgren) than I was running, and now that we're starting to hit rank III, it's getting a bit better, but I find it interesting that you find the combat full of decisions. I find most of the decisions are already made for me, leaving just little things like do I focus my attack or do I make the critical proc.
@@coffeespoonman7931 maybe it's the characters I've used? I remember as early on as SR II I had characters with 3 different attacking options (Xantares could use his weapon, Wild Missile (or something) and his Confusion for his combat action, and then had Thunder Strike as a Normal action too, so deciding between all the possible effects and triggers on those attack options ("hmmm, do I need to KO monsters here, or go mega damage? Ah, can't KO Serpents, need to proc stuns here then"....etc), then actually seeing what I get to use as a result of the roll ("Am I using these bolts for rerolls or that stun effect?" for example) and having to decide there.....THEN taking into account what the other characters could pull off on THEIR turns and how we might coordinate.....SOO many factors interacting and thus interesting decisions I found I had!
I absolutely agree with Sword and Sorcery being an amazing dungeon crawler, my absolute favorite. All the tactics, the variantion in classes and soon even a pvp system. It's absolute amazing. I chose 1 wave shipment so have to wait for season 2 but love to see these teasers :D I love how your passion for the game truly shines through your video.
Same here, still awaiting on Wave 2. Any updates around when this is going to happen?
Christian, I only recently received my Ancient Chronicles 2nd Wave Kickstarter shipment, which includes the Northwind Tales content as well! (went for 1 wave shipping). You are right, an absolutely 'insane' amount of content for what I paid, (almost 2.5 years ago now...LOL!) Well worth it, and a build on a great system, which as you said once you get over the steep learning curve re: the Rules, you are introduced to a gaming system which offers a great level of immersiveness that is unsurpassed
It's so very good; deep, engaging, and so very epic feeling. Looking forward to getting the expansion content!
I love sword & sorcery but I live in Brasil, I need to pay 5.5x times more due to weak currency then pay double for shipping then add 70% of the price+shipping in taxes. Gloomhaven costs 3-4 minimum salaries here. Would love to buy this kickstarter pack but it would cost a fortune
Sheesh, that's huge, I'm sorry Alvaro :(
Living in Turkey here its 10x ;(
OFC it's not the same experience, but S&S and Gloomhaven are also available on the TableTop Simulator on Steam.
@@derHINDU thats amazing to know, will check It out.
I’m not sure if anyone will see this comment, but for those who made positive comments about the game, I’m curious about how your opinion of it has held up over the past year. Is it still worth tracking down the KS version and content?
It's a very good game system still if you like crunchiness, with lots of content to explore! Still recommended!
@@severngamingnetwork Awesome! I’ll definitely check it out. Thanks for the reply!
100% Agree that behind the rule complexity to play once learned it opens up a very rich gameplay experienced without a dedicated GM.
Great review. It’s July 22 and my Kickstarter Bundle has just arrived (wave 1 & 2). The issue I’ve got is where to store the thing! There is so much content.
I'm looking forward to playing through the Northwind Tales too!
Wow man Iv been playing this game on TTS and its amazing, just ordered the new core set and can't wait, you're right, it does give me that WOW MMORPG feel I love, I wish I could play WOW but the game has changed so much and don't have time for the grind, I'm kinda new to boardgaming specially to Dungeon crawlers, Iv played Gloomheaven and enjoyed it, but Sword and Sorcery is in another level, crazy good. Thanks for the awesome content man.
My pleasure! Such a solid game! Welcome to the wonderful world of proper board game :)
Waiting for mine. I opted to get everything at once. Anyone hear when?
Awesome review! I've played a lot of different games with my friends, and we tend to like co-op games. I played D&D back in the day, so always liked the co-op feel. Our group is 5 players, and you're right that it can take some time to get through S&S adventures. I find myself acting as a kind of "Dungeon Master" in the game - reading the passages in the Book of Secrets and handling the monster A.I. This seems to work well for our group, and we're having a blast. Have played all of Immortal souls plus expansions, and are now on Northwind Tales. We never finish an adventure in one sitting, so have gotten good at breaking at a pre-agreed time, taking pictures of the set-up, and then continuing on next session. There is a lot of set-up and take-down, but it all seems worth it. If you want something simple, this game isn't for you. However, if you're willing to put the effort in, this game is the best co-op dungeon crawler experience you can have.
I recently started and after quest 2 I have to say I'm not sure about the game anymore. I like the system but I feel like there is so many little things just kicking you down all the time. You just learned the game and you have to keep track of 2 minions that dont activate like the normal, then you are poisoned, then ko'ed. Ho there some loot, ho no its a trap. Ho a pitfill. A boss with another rule that activate outside normal timing. We are playing Jeanne and Artemis and I just keep healing every turn and we even have the 1hp item from quest 1. I did not try but I dont understand how you can get throught if you dont have a healer.
Edit spoiler : I forgot the earthquake i ignored that would have wiped us after finaly escaping the boss room.
It's hard! The flow of the game and managing the rules is something you just develop a process for, and I found that I steadily sped up round after round. The difficulty of the actual game is increased.... But I replayed each quest and that really does help things too...
@@severngamingnetworkI was a bit sour yesterday lol. Reading some comments I went from 2 heroes to 3 and I did quest 2 again. Knowing what to expect and with the added firepower of the dwarf it went much better.
@@tpa3437 Hah! Yes 3 heroes is a nice spot to play at! Glad you recaptured the enjoyment it can bring!
Your review is great! I decided to head into S&S AC recently. After watching I am more confident as before that starting with AC is a great choice
Thanks Bheowulf! Playing S&S is a great choice full stop! Let me know how you get on with the rules... I'm sure there are at least some of those of us who can cope with the additional complexity of AC to start playing S&S with!
Great video, explanation and enthusiasm. I really liked your presentation.
Cheers Alan! Much appreciated :) If you're interested, I did review the Immortal Souls set too while back, if you're checking out S&S products! Do subscribe; lots of cool looking kickstarter game reviews coming in next few months!
Why call it an "MMORPG"? It's an RPG all right, it has features heavily inspired from computer RPG implementations (cooldowns, special effects and so forth), but "massively muti-player" it is not. Neither is it "online" in any way.
All good points! Just using the existing coined phrase to get across the flavour of S&S's party tactics and character interaction... I'm presuming most people watching will know it's not actually online and not actually massively multiplayer 😆
I think simply saying "Computer RPG" would have been enough. :-)
@@daniel.u.thibault Well, that's just a bit too broad for me: then people might think of Skyrim for instance, which this really DOESN'T evoke. Making comparisons to WoW and Everquest (old school MMORPG) party dynamics captures the feel of S&S a little more accurately than just general computer RPG for me.
Thanks mate, ever going to review Tainted Grail?
nice thorough review, thank you
Cheers Ayman! Have you played it? What did you think? Or just played Immortal Souls?
@@severngamingnetwork Never played it, but you said MMO and I was looking for something for my newphew/neice. It seems complicated but I feel hooked to it :) Thanks for review, was very helpful and clear
@@user-aymanzone If you get it, DO let me know how you get on with it!!
@@severngamingnetwork Will do :)
Hello, nice video!! How many quest does it have?
Awesome stuff as always Christian.
Cheers Cory my man! Maybe we'll get to game together again soon!
Really liked the video! Do you use any content from IS in your games of AC?
Thank you Mikolaj! Have you played it?I haven't used IS stuff; first time through the AC campaign I wanted to see as much of the new stuff as I could!
@@severngamingnetwork for now I have only played IS but I thinking about getting AC, your video is very helpful there.
@@mikolajwitkowski8093 well if you enjoyed IS, AC is more of the same but all just... better! The extra stuff with the settlements really adds
I can't seem to grasp the rules of this game. I wish there was a how-to-play video on it for beginners (total noobs) like me.
This is a really good one: ruclips.net/video/YN5ceo-1kCc/видео.html
Thanks for the review, so you think I should get this core set or the previews one? Carlos
If you feel confident learning rule sets and diving into deeper games, then I'd go Chronicles for sure. If you're unsure, start with Immortal Souls; if you love it like I have done then Ancient Chronicles is an easy next buy!!
@@severngamingnetwork Awesome thanks, one more question, what other games you recommend that are similar to S&S? As an old school wow fan this game feels very similar I enjoy mmorpg style games, gloomhaven is cool but doesn't give that feel I enjoy.
Thanks again,
Carlos
@@carlosancinez9116 There's not any that spring to mind with this sort of "mmorpg", ability cooldown feel to it....S&S has that as a defining feature as far as i can see. It IS a bit of book keeping, but once you get it all down its smooth and actually adds to the experience i think. Other's just dont have that crunchiness!
@@severngamingnetwork Nice, Maybe you can help me with a Rule question, I understand that if you move and perform an attack that ends your move, but if you end up killing the enemy can you move now? Basically let's say the hero has 3 movement points, he moves 1 into an enemy space, performs and attack which kills it can the hero now move the remaining 2 movement points left?
Thanks for your help,
@@carlosancinez9116 you can't, no! Move them combat, or vice versa
For someone new to this game, would you recommend this one or starting with the first one?
I think you'll find the first one, Immortal Souls, a little easier, both in terms of getting your head around the system and then in terms of the difficulty of the quests. Ancient Chronicles is a superb upgrade to IS, but the extra complexity and difficulty isn't to be underestimated....but if you enjoy a crunchy game system and have experience in these sorts of games, you may be ok to start with AC. Is that the case with you T PA?
@@severngamingnetwork Hmm I have experience with a lot of heavy games (mage knight, terra mystica, gloomhaven meh for me btw, etc), but not a lot of dungeon crawlers. The heavy rules dont botter me IF they are clear and most questions can be answered by the rulebook, I'm a bit of a rule lawyer. I don't like having to google things every 5 minutes. I'm on the fence about the 2 versions, this one seems to have more longetivity with the numbers of quests and the more complex ennemy AI. I could see it just with the difference between the Gremlins and the Spiders in the first quests I watched. So a more complete game without expansion is definatly a plus for this one, maybe even the more hybrid classes as we will probably play just 2 characters with my grilfriend, maybe you feel less like you're missing some archetype vs IC with 2 characters. We played a lot of Guild Wars 2 with my girlfriend and the classes in this one reminds me of that, in GW2 every class can do a bit more of everything vs a typical mmorpg. And in Guild Wars you have the Mesmer which is an illusionist just like in this game, litteraly the same type of mechanics with your illusions.
Is there a way in the retail version to adjust difficulty?
@@tpa3437 I might suggest you go AC then; it's the more complete, fuller experience for sure!
Can I use my immortal souls characters in this game?
You sure can!
@@severngamingnetwork You mentioned in the video there is a second wave of this kickstarter, where can we sign up for it?
@@alvaroneto9214 check on Ares Games website, or the Kickstarter campaign page for Ancient Chronicles... Maybe you can late pledge? However, will be hard now, might just have to wait until it hits the shops.
Nice review, well done
Thank you! Have you played S&S? What did you think Cersei?
@@severngamingnetwork Diving straight into this without original game, as per NOT recommended haha
@@chewiewins Hah! The minions are a bit unusual, might be the sticking point! See how you go!!
Is this harder to get into than Gloomhaven for example?
I'd say similar to perhaps a touch more; this is a "crunchier" system with more granularity to the goings on!
Great review!
Thanks Mortikar! Is this one you've got or looking to buy?
@@severngamingnetwork I had kickstarted right away, as my brother and I feel it is the best adventure dungeon crawler out there as well.
@@Mortikar Then you have good taste!! 😁
Thank man. Do they still have that cringe modern dialog in the quest?
I'm not sure exactly what you mean! Such as?
Great review, even if I reckon you ain’t never had any WoW characters :P
Hah! Played WoW for a week way before you did, cheeky! Everquest was where it was at for me...I'll see you soon buddy :)
I agree that just about everything is better, but oh man, the combat is still sooooo boring and frustrating. I'm struggling to enjoy myself, which was the same for Immortal Souls.
Oh no! Any particular aspect that you find a struggle?
@@severngamingnetwork Yeah, it's the repetition and lack of meaningful decisions, I think. Combat tends to be roll dice, inflict small amount of damage, draw encounter card, spend 5-10 minutes doing all the monster activations, roll dice for another hero, do a small amount of damage, draw encounter card... And combat is like 80% of the game. Wave after wave after wave... I played all the way through Immortal Souls and didn't enjoy it very much but kept at it, and I'm having only a slightly better experience with Ancient Chronicles. I'll finish the campaign, play through Wave 2 when it comes, and then try to offload the whole lot.
For contrast, I absolutely love Gloomhaven and Middara, and enjoy most games in this genre pretty well. This and Sine Tempore have been the absolute lows for me.
@@coffeespoonman7931 Fascinating! To press on through what you make sound like a bad experience for you is interesting. I have found the opposite to your experience to be my experience however! I find the decisions between which powers, abilities or weapons to use each turn, and in what combination, considering what each party member can do too, creates a variety of meaningful decisions one can ponder over, even at lower levels when you have relatively less abilities available, not to mention that once the dice are rolled you then have triggers and procs and all sorts to decide how to utilise. The array of possible tactics you can develop as a party, responding to the challenges each monster poses, creates an unparalleled tactical combat experience as far as I'm concerned. I'm amazed to hear someone has found the game I've had this sort of experience in to be "grindy"!
@@severngamingnetwork Yes, well, there are moments where the game shines, and I keep playing for that. I'm currently on quest 4 and actually enjoying this one. My party composition is a bit better (Artemis, Jeanne and Thorgren) than I was running, and now that we're starting to hit rank III, it's getting a bit better, but I find it interesting that you find the combat full of decisions. I find most of the decisions are already made for me, leaving just little things like do I focus my attack or do I make the critical proc.
@@coffeespoonman7931 maybe it's the characters I've used? I remember as early on as SR II I had characters with 3 different attacking options (Xantares could use his weapon, Wild Missile (or something) and his Confusion for his combat action, and then had Thunder Strike as a Normal action too, so deciding between all the possible effects and triggers on those attack options ("hmmm, do I need to KO monsters here, or go mega damage? Ah, can't KO Serpents, need to proc stuns here then"....etc), then actually seeing what I get to use as a result of the roll ("Am I using these bolts for rerolls or that stun effect?" for example) and having to decide there.....THEN taking into account what the other characters could pull off on THEIR turns and how we might coordinate.....SOO many factors interacting and thus interesting decisions I found I had!