Title says it all, is there more to this game than a roll-and-move game? Can someone rate the strategic element for it? I saw this game in my fav game store and I was wondering if it's more than a roll-and-move game
Is there more to this than just a roll-and-move game?
At its heart, it is a roll and move. However. It is not just roll the dice and go with it. You must decide if you keep the roll or flip the dice to accelerate or brake. So typically, every roll of the dice gives you 4 options. Say you roll 2 and a 6, you can keep the 8, accelrate the two to its opposite side of 5 and move 11. Brake the 6 to its opposite side of 1 and move 3. Or do both and get a 6.
The reason being is that if you play the standard and expert versions (which would be highly recommended), position on the track can mean something. You may want to slow down to get behind another bike so you can slipstream - which is take his dice roll as well but get a +1 movement. Or you may want to avoid ending up next to a bike before a curve because if you both roll the same, there is the potential for contact.
In addition, the different curves prevent you from flipping dice depending on the difficulty. So you may want to adjust so you aren't penalized. Rolling and using doubles can cause other things to go wrong so decisions have to be made on wha tyou keep and use.
Finally, there are points to spend that can add to or subtract from your dice results. But this will damage your bike. If you go in the red on any item - front tire, rear tire, or engine - your bike breaks and you are out of the race.
I demoed this game at GenCon and it was a lot of fun. I have never played Formula D which most want to compare it to. But the players all had fun and the race remained extremely close throughout. In fact, the lead change a few times and it seemed to follow a real race where on player managed to take the same turn (there were 4 laps to the race) perfectly and flew threw it while the other 4 struggled to negotiate it. But then she would get tied up in the next major curve every lap and the rest would catch up.