You like rolling dice? Exploring dungeons and fighting dragons and collecting treasure? Ok, yeah, dumb question. Of course you do.
Tasty Minstrel Games just launched a Kickstarter campaign this week for Dungeon Roll, a light press-your-luck game designed by Chris Darden. Players take turns rolling up a party of heroes (and maybe some scrolls), and then explore as deep into the dungeon as they dare, facing off against skeletons, goblins, and oozes for a chance at treasure and the valuable potions that revive your heroes. And, as promised, here there be dragons.
I got a chance to try out a prototype demo copy — here are my impressions.
Players: 1 to 4
Ages: 8 and up
Playing Time: 15-30 minutes
Retail: $15 through Kickstarter (higher for Canada and international shipping)
Rating: Delv-icious: quick, light, a good deal of luck.
Who Will Like It? This is for players who enjoy the dungeon crawl theme and press-your-luck mechanics. It's not Castle Ravenloft — there's not a ton of strategy — but if you're looking for a casual game (and comes in a treasure chest box!) then Dungeon Roll is worth checking out.
Theme:
You're familiar with this already: it's a dungeon crawl. The heroes are champions, fighters, clerics, mages, and thieves. The monsters are goblins, skeletons, and oozes, and the big boss is the dragon. The deeper you go into the dungeon the higher your score, and the more monsters — and treasure — you may find.
Since the game is fairly light, you won't necessarily feel like you're really in a dungeon. The heroes are one-time-use dice, and sometimes when you open a treasure you get a new hero, which is thematically weird. But in this type of game that's not terrible.
Components:
The Kickstarter page lists these components:
- 7 Dungeon Dice - Custom Molded Dice
- 7 Party Dice - Custom Molded Dice
- 4 Hero Characters - Commander, Paladin, Battlemage, and Necromancer
- 30 Treasure Tokens
- Experience Tokens
- 1 10-sided die - For tracking the current dungeon level
- 1 Rulebook
- 1 Book of Heroes
The demo prototype I got just had stickered dice rather than the custom-molded dice. I do like the fact that the dungeon dice are black and the party dice are white — it makes them a lot easier to tell apart. One nice feature is that the heroes and monsters are color-coded, so you can tell which heroes are strongest against which enemies. (That's not reflected in the Dungeon Roll logo for some reason, but you can see that in the photo at the top.)
I don't know what the "Book of Heroes" entails. The demo copy I had also had several different hero characters, though I know some of those were not final and were still being playtested. I do think it would be nice if they hit stretch goals to add more of the hero characters, since those can change up the game from play to play.
And, as gimmicky as it is, I really love the look of the treasure chest box. I know, it's going to be a pain to put on my shelf because it's small and it has a rounded top, but look at it! I want an extra one to store all of my Penny Gems!
The 10-sided die is simply there to keep track of what level of the dungeon you're on, which also determines your score (in Experience Points). But although it's fun and thematic to have a d10 in a dungeon crawl game, it's not the best solution. Going from level to level, you have to pick up the die and find the right face — and then hope that nobody bumps it in the course of the game.
Gameplay:
You can get the prototype rulebook here or watch the gameplay video on the Kickstarter page, but here's a brief summary.
Players take turns entering the dungeon and trying to get as far as they can without being defeated. You'll score a point for each level of the dungeon you successfully survive (plus earn bonus points for some treasures) and the winner is the player with the highest score after three rounds. For a solo game, there are target scores to aim for, plus achievements like surviving a level with only one surviving hero going into it.
The 10-sided die starts at number 1. The active player takes all seven party dice and rolls them. The next player acts as Dungeon Lord and will roll three dungeon dice. (You roll the number of dice equal to the level, with a minimum of three, and maxing out with however many dice are available.)
Then the player uses their party dice to deal with the dungeon dice. Scrolls let you re-roll dice, both party dice and dungeon dice. Any hero can kill any one monster, but getting matching colors (like the green fighter and green goblins) lets you kill all of a single type of monster with one die. Once monsters are defeated, you also see if you have to face the dragon, which comes out if three dragons appear on the dice. Defeating a dragon requires three different heroes. Finally, opening up treasure chests requires heroes: thieves and champions can open any number of chests, but other heroes can only open one each.
Any dice you've used are discarded to the graveyard, but if there are potions in the dungeon they can be used to bring dice back to life — you re-roll them when they rejoin your party. Any dragon dice that were rolled remain in play, and the rest of the dungeon dice go back into the pool for the next level.
After each successful level, you get to decide whether to take your points and get out, or go for the next level of the dungeon. If you continue, you go in with whatever party members you have left; you don't get to re-roll anything. If you're ever defeated because you don't have enough heroes to fight all the monsters, then you don't get any points this round and it's the next player's turn.
That's basically it. Treasures include extra one-time-use heroes, Town Portals that let you jump back to town (and get points) instead of facing defeat, dragon scales that are worth more points, and potions and scrolls.
The hero characters give each player a special ability; earning experience points can allow you to level up, which makes the ability more powerful.
Conclusion:
The first time I tried Dungeon Roll, I actually thought the game might be broken, because in the first round the first player ended up getting to level 10 of the dungeon and still had all of his party dice. Other players scored 7 or 8 points, and then I got to level 10 as well, and it just seemed like you could go on forever without busting. We quit playing, I took some notes, and I wrote to the game designer Chris Darden to make sure I was playing it right, and he said it was rare for somebody to reach level 10.
So I tried it again, and this time found that it was indeed much harder. I played several solo games just to see how things shook out — one time I managed to get to level 13, but another time I busted on level 4 because I didn't have enough heroes left but went for it anyway. It appears that the first time I played, we were just getting really good rolls from the party and really poor rolls from the dungeon.
Obviously, the game does involve a good deal of luck: having dragons show up can reduce the number of monsters you have to face — as long as there aren't three of them so you have to fight the dragon. Some treasures are worth more points, while others can get you out of a sticky situation. The game does involve more choices than, say, Zombie Dice, but that's probably a better comparison than something like Castle Ravenloft. That said, there are some ways to mitigate the luck factor for players who want a bit more strategy, using some optional rules with the way potions and scrolls work.
I did enjoy the game, though. It's small and portable, and easy enough to teach young kids. It's not completely brainless, as it does involve figuring the odds and making a bet on whether you can survive another round, and I really like press-your-luck games in general. When the Kickstarter project launched yesterday, I didn't hesitate to back it myself — for $15, it seems like a great value, and it'll get even better if the project reaches stretch goals because more cards will be added without increasing the price.
If you're looking for a fun, light, dice-rolling dungeon game, take a look at Dungeon Roll and consider backing it.
Wired: Cool treasure chest box! Dungeon crawl with a light press-your-luck mechanic.
Tired: Scores can vary wildly because of luck. Dungeon level die isn't ideal.
Disclosure: GeekDad received a review copy of this game.
