NinjaDorg's Dungeon Command Review
Prelude:
Wizards of the Coast
cash in on their Dungeons and Dragons miniatures product line by producing this
compartmentalised collectible board game series, the first two sets in this
series are: Sting of Lolth (a Drow Elf themed Underdark set) and Heart of
Cormyr (a bog standard Forgotten Realms D&D Heroes set), which this review
concerns. Each box gives a player enough
components to play half of a game of Dungeon Command, and whilst there are
rules for breaking the game down into quarters and playing a slim line version
of the rule set using only one box, the game is best served when two players
have access to and battle using one box set each.
Every box also
contains monster cards for the Dungeons & Dragons Adventure System games
which allows you to use the included miniatures in Legend of Drizzt, Castle
Ravenloft and/or Wrath of Ashardalon.
Also the Dungeon Command tiles are jigsaw fit compatible with the
D&D Adventure System game tiles, and whilst there are no specific rules
supplied to use these in your ‘AS’ games if you have any vested interest in
those games, the cross compatibility possibilities between both sets of games
are indeed very tantalising.
Biases - I love the D&D
Adventure System games! They are great
little dungeon crawlers with cool components which are easy to set up and play
and deliver great cooperative play. The
fact that Dungeon Command’s components work in tandem with the AS games was the
driving force behind my interest in Dungeon Command.
What is it?
Dungeon Command is a
straight up miniatures battle game.
There is no particular driving narrative or theme, no asymmetrical
victory objectives, just straight up war.
Each player chooses a leader character for his misfit war band who
provides certain in game benefits and bonuses and determines the starting key
characteristics which will win or lose the game: Leadership and Morale.
A player’s
Leadership increases by one each turn and represents the total number of
levels’ worth of figures he can have in play, e.g. Leadership 6 means a player
could have 3 x Level 2 minis, 6 x Level 1 minis, etc, or any combination
thereof.
The object of the
game is to reduce your opponent’s Morale to 0 by destroying his creatures. Each time a creature is destroyed, its owner
loses Morale equal to its level.
How does it play?
A diceless cross
over between Magic the Gathering and any standard miniatures battle game with a
stripped down rule set that allows fast and clean play. There are deeper strategies to be pursued
over time through devious card play and careful positioning and defence, but on
the surface the game is very easy to just pick up and play and get into in a
short amount of time.
Each player deploys
troops into his sort of ’end zone’ and then takes turns to activate all of his
creatures one by one. At the end of each
of his turns a player can then deploy more reinforcements if his Leadership
allows.
Activating a
creature allows you to move up to its speed and then perform an action, which
is usually an attack, but which can be boosted or altered using Order Cards.
There are simple and
easy to grasp line of sight and movement rules, and built in terrain on the
tiles (some dangerous, some just blocking) which can hinder vision and movement,
all of which deepen the strategic placement and advancement of your miniatures.
Each player starts
with a hand of special Order Cards and gains another one every turn, which
allow him to play sneak attacks, special moves, spells and various other cool
effects that will help his war band or hinder or attack his enemies. After you finish a turn you untap all your
‘used’ creatures and may use them again during your opponent’s turn to try and
defend themselves with defensive Order cards you might have, or you can also
tap them to take advantage of terrain cover shown on the tiles to try to block
attacks.
Some of the order
cards are very cool and some even quite thematic for a Forgotten Realms-set war
band battle. One card in particular
comes to mind: “Behind Enemy Lines” – the Heart of Cormyr player can play this
to put a hero into play in his opponent’s play area. He must then race this hero back to his own
‘end zone’ and if he is successful he can boost his Morale by 4 points. The chances are that his enemies will hunt
this hero down and exact bloody revenge before this is all possible but the
morale boost reward can be awesome if timed correctly! There are many other cards with similar game
changing effects and abilities.
There are Treasure
Chests strewn about the map which act as a great potential distraction for
players. If you detour to go and grab
them you can boost the morale of your warband, but you need to balance this
with actively making attempts to defeat your enemies. Going out of your way to collect Chests
whilst neglecting your opponent can prove disastrous.
Every creature has
its own attack set and some even have their own cool special abilities such as
different types of movement like flying over or burrowing under tricky terrain. Some units can heal or summon other units.
And every unit has
the fun ability to Cower! If one of your
dudes is about to take fatal damage you can have him Cower and take the damage
to your warband’s overall Morale instead.
Whilst this can occasionally be useful for keeping a crucial unit in
play, more often than not it can prove a false economy because if you let your
unit go, it allows you to bring in more, bigger units instead on your next
turn. This provides a nice, tricky
balancing act.
What are the bits like?
Some good:
Each set comes with
12 pre-painted D&D minis which are mostly reprints from the old line of the
Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures games, 2 big 8x8 jigsaw fit tiles and 2 little 8x4
end tiles, a bunch of little tokens representing Hit Points for the figures,
and some tokens to differentiate between duplicate minis.
The tile art is
fantastic, some of the best in fact – by the very talented Jason Engle, and the
tiles are double sided to allow for indoor dungeon and outdoor grassland
arenas. But you only get four tiles in
each set, which means you’ll play through the variability of these setups in
short order.
Full colour art on
all the cards! WOTC dropped the ball
with this big time on the D&D AS games, and up until those games released
it kind of became the standard to get decent looking cards in fantasy adventure
board games. With expectations duly
lowered with monochrome decks and single colour hero cards it was nice to see
them step it back up for Dungeon Command (and Lords of Waterdeep). Some of the art is really nice, some not as
good, but on the whole pretty impressive stuff, and nicely thematic for the
D&D setting.
The minis are pretty
good quality with wildly varying quality paint jobs. From a non-painter’s point of view it has to
be said that some paint jobs are pretty shocking in fact. One wonders how much WOTC would have saved
had they simply included unpainted models, without seriously impacting the
overall quality of the product.
And there are no
dice – but this is D&D heresy! I
actually think this is a really good thing.
Having the characters deal out a set amount of damage with each attack
allows the designers room to develop boosts for these attacks through play of
order cards and by making attacks Sneaky or Poisonous or whatever. So yes, a dice-less D&D combat board game
– but it works.
Some not so good:
The rulebook is coarse
but paper thin and feels like a homemade print out more than an official glossy
manual – a big step down from the Adventure System games. As is the game box itself, which is made from
flimsy card which does not feel like it will last the test of time at all.
Hit Points and
damage, etc are in tens instead of units.
This adds an extra layer of maths (well, an extra zero anyway) to the
proceedings, but is supposedly designed to make you feel like characters have
lots of health and are inflicting tons of damage. It’s unnecessary, but hardly game breaking.
The plastic insert housing the minis takes up most of the box and was
the first thing to go. Whilst it serves
a purpose in preserving the minis from damage players should take extra care to
prise the minis from their homes as the various bending appendages or pointy
swords and weapons can undergo undue stress if one is not careful.
And there are
no.... umm.... dice - D&D heresy for sure!
How does it compare to the Dungeons and
Dragons Adventure System games?
The comparison isn’t
really fair because the AS games are cooperative dungeon exploration games, but
if you imagine them more abstractly as a sort of minis skirmish game where one
side is the players’ heroes and the other side is the game’s AI monsters, you’d
actually get a fairly close approximation.
Mainly because the order cards in Dungeon Command add so much variance
to the proceedings. Whereas in the AS
games you could draw traps and encounters and use hero powers to attack, in
Dungeon Command you’ll actively be playing these cards from your hand against
your opponent instead.
As it is, the games
stand side by side nicely – one for a cooperative dungeon crawl fix and one as
a competitive tactical skirmish game.
The cards supplied in Dungeon Command to allow you to use your figures
in the AS games are a really nice touch, and it wouldn’t be difficult to
convert other D&D minis into the existing Dungeon Command system. In fact, many fans are already doing this as
we speak.
Is it any good?
Yes.
There’s a deceptive
amount things happening at once in this game, and it feels like there is always
something to be doing, even during your opponent’s turn. Because of the nature of the card play, you
can play some effects during your opponent’s attacks, deflecting blows or
escaping from attack, or Cowering. The
upshot of this is that the downtime feels very minimal once you both have a
handle on the game, although some decisions can be appropriately agonising.
Considering that
this was purchased primarily as in expansion addition to the cooperative
D&D board games it has been an absolutely pleasant surprise to find a
wholly playable and intensive skirmish battle game in Dungeon Command.
Summary
Whether or not you
have a vested interest in the D&D franchise Dungeon Command makes for a
great, light skirmish game, with deeper tactics emerging through devious card
play and positioning, and which can be played in under an hour with a little
experience under your belt. With a ton
of new expansion material in the works too, there should be a wealth of further
replayability and variability beyond what is already in the box.
If you can find a
decent deal on the first two sets and you’re looking for a lighter fantasy
skirmish game, jump on in.
Pros:
• Fun, tense game!
• Beautiful tile art with varying
terrain effects
• Interesting order cards with colour
art and cool, thematic in-game effects
• 12 cool minis with varying quality
paint jobs
• Lots of replayability in the Order card
decks, less so in the creatures available (unless you buy more boxed sets...)
• Fast paced – actions are resolved
quickly and easily with no dice rolls!
• Simple, easy to learn rules
• Tons of expansion material in the
works (this could be a Con if you’re a completist)
• No dice!
Cons:
• Price – make sure you get a deal, as
this can be over-priced for what it is (your country’s price may vary)
• Space-consuming plastic insert – be
careful popping out your minis!
• Crappy paper rulebook
• Crappy paper box
• No dice! (just kidding – this is a big bonus in this
game)
Tristan Hall is a board game player and
designer, avid video gamer and movie lover who juggles life as a writer,
producer and Dad with his insatiable appetite to crowbar playtime into an
otherwise prematurely grown up existence.
Forum username: ninjadorg
