Dungeons and Dragons: Castle Ravenloft Board Game

This is what fourth edition DND is about - if it were fit into a self-contained, sufficient box without any extra sourcebooks to read, rulebooks to peruse, or additional props to buy, like miniatures or tiles. Wizards hits this one out of the park.Inside the box, thirteen adventures await. At least two are solo adventures: one at the beginning to serve as a tutorial, and another about midway through the book. Each adventure has a goal, and employs a special mechanic or boss. This keeps the hack-and-slash experience fresh. One adventure has the party acquiring an artifact; another has the party raiding Strahd's treasure hoard! Thirteen in all.With two players (cleric and fighter), we find ourselves challenged to nearly overwhelmed. We've gone through seven adventures so far, and we've lived to tell it. The balance in the game is very good. The mechanic of this board game is that monsters spawn virtually every turn in some fashion; coupled with the random encounter cards, the characters are guaranteed to get regularly damaged. Let's just say the healing surges - two by default - have been used up in a few adventures! The cleric "carries" (wins in a pinch) often. :)(I imagine it's even more difficult with four people, as random events and "target nearest hero" rules cause the party wizard to spend all the surges!)The level cap is two, though with house-ruling you can extend it to three or even four. From one to the other, you gain +2 hp, +1 AC, and so forth, so you can extrapolate. No need to dig out your 4e PHB. :PThe deck of monster cards contains the "AI" that a specific monster will use. Just follow the directions, and kobold skirmishers will be hurling javelins at your heroes in no time. The game is cooperative, so your friend can make the to-hit roll on your guy.The miniatures are color-coded according to type, like undead (bone beige), powerful undead (transparent blue plastic!) or monstrous/vermin (maroon). Heroes are dark blue. I like the solid coloring rather than individual paint schemes because the miniatures can be easily retrieved from a pile and placed onto a tile.The tiles are heavy cardboard stock, much like the Dungeon Tiles series. They interlock in only one way and are very durable. You'll wonder how other game companies can get away with more flimsy stock. Wizards doesn't fool around here.The rules are simple and you will learn it in no time. There are no rules for flanking or cover, but you can easily house-rule it.I pre-ordered Ashardalon's Wrath on the strength of Castle Ravenloft.I like to think this is how 4e DND was ideally meant to be played, with clear objectives, original adventures, miniatures and tiles. There's no character development or role-playing; often, what we enjoy most is surviving to move our figures another day. :) For a game to do that without a DM is impressive.I have rated "Educational Value" as five stars because the game uses a specific sequence of "phases" during each player's turn, and tracking what's been done while resolving an encounter card, and remembering that some effect ends at the end of a hero's action phase, while also thinking about how you're going to survive with your dailies gone, requires memory and attention.

Who am I:Middle aged married guy who loves Sci fi, video games and fantasy novels. Used to play D&D and then AD&D around twenty years ago. Haven't been involved with any serious groups since then so I have no experience with any editions of D&D that cause such a rift in the community. This means that I am not hopelessly in love with any specific Edition of D&D.-Note for various D&D Edition FanGirls and FanBoys- If you are a 4th Edition Hater and can't get past that, you most likely will not enjoy these games as they are based, in general, on the 4th Edition rule set. If you don't know what that statement means, or if you are capable of enjoying what each Edition has to offer, you should have no problems.Why I love the D&D Adventure Systems:Castle Ravenloft(CR), Wrath of Ashardalon(WoA) and Legend of Drizzt(LoD): They work as a stand alone product and offer a dungeon crawling, limited leveling, monster slaying experience with no previous knowledge of how D&D works. And all in sessions that can be finished in an hour or two. The minimal time commitment involved is fantastic.Or, if you find yourself filled with nostalgia and desire a fuller, longer campaign with further leveling options or new characters, these games can be tweaked to allow for that. Especially with some of the user created content online, the photoshop templates on boardgamegeek.com in particular are wonderful. Also this [....]address has a plethora of new content. The extra leveling options are definitely my favorite. The truth is that I screamed in happiness when I ran across them. I sounded like a ten year old girl getting a pony. A unicorn pony. with wings. A Unicorn Pegasus Pony that appeared in a shimmer of rainbow colors. And now I am deeply ashamed...........*sigh* I am such a nerd.The game system totally allows for expandability in many ways. It's kind of a gateway drug for D&D honestly. I find myself consistently wanting just a bit more of the actual RPG experience. We tweak the game a bit and suddenly our experience is just a bit fuller and more satisfying. Not nearly as detailed and time intensive as an actual D&D or Pathfinder game though. Such a great balance for us.They don't have to be expanded upon though, to be immensely enjoyable. Any of the three games are enough in and of themselves to be hugely gratifying and offer much re-playability. The expandability is just something that makes them extra cool and versatile in my opinion.All three systems use totally interchangeable materials. Some of the cards may be context sensitive and not seem to fit in a particular environment but other than that you can use everything in each of the games. This provides Awesomeness Bonus of +2.The map tiles and figurines both are an unbeatable value and can be easily incorporated into a "real" D&D session.Everything in the box, other than the manuals, is of superb quality. The figurines alone would easily cost you double what you pay for the set here. And if you paint figurines, which I do, you will have just gained around forty new minis to paint. Joy in and of itself there.Possible Cons:I saw in the review for one of the three games that some dude was just totally disgusted with how these games "punish" the players for almost every activity they engage in. The guy was totally a Hater. However, he wasn't necessarily wrong. The game does seem to be constantly throwing things at you that often don't feel fair. Notably, the Encounter cards. Which brings me to the next con and a solution to the "punishment" issue....The instruction manual will not answer every question that will come up. It is left up to the players to decide how certain things should work. Which is how a "real" D&D game works. Your group plays the game the way they want to play it. If you simply cannot function without every rule spelled out for you, this may be a problem. Otherwise you'll be fine. And in terms of rule tweaking and the punishment issue- we decided to change how often we draw encounter cards as well as a couple other minor aspects of the game. This has served to make our sessions a lot more fun. Don't be afraid to tweak the rules in order to play the game how you want to play it.The manuals are pretty cheaply put together. They may not hold up well to use by younger players or spilled drinks. I took ours apart and put the pages in plastic binder inserts. We now have all the material for all the games in a single, sturdy, custom decorated notebook. Which is awesome btw. (Disclaimer for claim of awesomeness: I created the custom artwork:)Space. With all the cards and map tiles and bags of monsters and tokens that get used in a typical session, you may find you need a bit more space than an average board game. All of the aforementioned items can quickly end up being a mess. As a solution we have everything securely contained in varying sizes of ziplock bags. Including the map tiles in a 1 Gallon size bag. Perfect for storage and during play.There is no actual role playing or in town scenarios. If you want to get into a brawl over the serving wench's honor at The Yawning Portal Inn in the city of Waterdeep, then you should just find a gaming group and play Pathfinder or D&D(any Edition). Or perhaps, after stumbling into a gathering of Dirty Orcs in the Gloomy Forest of Gloom and Terror, you want to attempt to use an illusion to convince them you are a deity and sell them into slavery in the Land of Thay. As opposed to just killing them. Again, just go find a full-on game of D&D. These systems can be worked to allow for things like that to some degree, but they aren't designed to be open world or allow for anything other than a dungeon crawl with combat and a final, combat based, objective.So:If you want "real" D&D, then you may be more satisfied finding a group and getting involved.If you want a game that allows you to engage in D20 based combat, with figurines, that represent a character with minimal leveling capacity. And that can be played by anyone. These systems may be just the thing for you.Also of note: The Dungeon Command games have interchangeable map tiles, monster cards and figurines that can be used seamlessly with the Adventure Systems. I love this as it ads even more expansion options.