Velhart said:

SOLUTION: Training.

Any character can level up their Strength, Craft or Life by returning to their starting location and trading in 7 gold coins.

Benefits:

-Makes gold a hellava lot more valuable

-Gives more purpose to the starting place

-may force a player in a middle region to trek out to the outer region, thereby slowing down his advancement

-Inspires more PvP as players will try to jump an opponent who is going back to level up

-Makes the merchant a little more viable since he'll have a head start on the next level up

-Prevents dropped items from clogging up the spaces later in the game, because players are more likely to trade it in at the alchemist

Concerns:

-Players who start in the city or village have the minor advantage of being able to trade in their items and train in the same turn, but most the characters that start in the village and the city are weak to begin with, so it works out.

-Characters who have an alignment change might not be able to visit their starting position without getting harmed (Ghoul, Cleric etc)

When this thread was posted I thought I would make the first post. Looks like I was too late and there has already been some interesting first impressions posted on other threads as well. My first impressions are similar to most of the comments already posted so instead of repeating them here I will explain my impressions that differ from other postings.

NEW EVENTS

The new cards in the Frostmarch tend to impact all players, instead of just the person who drew the card. All of the new events directly impact every player except for the planeswalker, and even the planeswalker stays in play so other players can try to use him too. The loremaster stranger is interesting because you don't want someone with high craft to get 3 spells and discard her. The goblin bomber is a fantastic card because you can get rid of annoying cards like the marsh and shiver nymph. You can also blow up cards that help other people like having the troll blow up the loremaster because he can't cast spells anyway. I love cards like this.

NEW OBJECTS

The new objects and magic objects are fun but not super powerful. The most powerful is the ancient artefact but this is nicely balanced because if you roll low it could blow up in your face. Other objects that are the most powerful like the book of wizardry and celestial bauble can only be used once and then go to the discard deck.

NEW SPELLS

Many of the new spells also tend to impact other players. The hydra spell is like a fork from MtG and gives you the power to hit eveyone with a spell. I can't wait for someone to cast the hydra spell on toadify! More spells that can screw with other players include vortex, time steal, path of destiny, toadify, black ice, metamorph, syphon strength, and of course the ultimate hydra spell.

NEW ENEMIES

The list of enemies from the Frostmarch have the same range as enemies from revised 4th and can be as low as 1 craft to as high as 7 strength. Many of the enemies have special effects that make them more risky to fight. The basilisk can even kill you with one hit if you are unlucky.

Now this is where my opinion differs from other postings. Some people claimed that they want more powerful enemies in the mix. I don't disagree with this in general but I think it would have been a really bad idea to include more powerful enemies in the Frostmarch. The new spells, events, and adventure decks give players plenty of ways for players to hurt each other. If you combined this with a bunch of other powerful enemies people would keep dying before they can even finish a game. In our last game 2 out of 4 players died and we didn't even play with the dungeon.

The main board should be safe enough that players don't have to constantly worry about healing. If you want draw a bunch of powerful enemies you should go into the dungeon.

This is the way I look at it. Powerful enemies like the lord of the pits card from the reaper are cool, but if the adventure deck gets too many of these cards players will just worry about healing to the point that the game isn't even fun anymore. This is what I hated the most about the dragons expansion. Sure it was cool to look through the deck and see all the terrifying dragons but actually playing with them was a real nightmare. The expansion added more powerful enemies to the point all players did was worry about healing instead of having fun adventuring and drawing cards. If you lost one life your main priority was trying to reach a healer because chances were a few dragons would fight and kill you before you reached the city or village. The forest and crags became the safest spaces on the board which is a shame because they are also the most boring.

Just to be clear, I think adding a few powerful enemies is good but not to the point that it upsets the balance of the game. Just be careful what you wish for or you'll get an unbalanced expansion like the dragons!

Carrion Prince said:

It's good to hear that most events will effects all players.

I don't know yet, what most events will do, but i was not happy when i say that the Howl of Wendigo was changed

Carrion Prince said:

I really hope that those special effects will do something nasty, and that the enemies have a huge change to use the special effect, due because they have low power..

Carrion Prince said:

It don't have to be so difficult as the dungeon, but it can't hurt to add some dangerous events or enemies to the main board.

If the main board gets to safe, then it will become very boring. And that means no fun..

Carrion Prince said:

Dragon expansion from 2th was indeed not in balance.

Some people love it, others not..

On top of that, Talisman revised from FFG, has more cards than other expansions, so.. if they would make the Dragon expansion, then it will not hurt to add a lot of powerful dragons to the game i think, with a better balance.

It's more difficult to draw them from a deck of 290cards and more..

As long as the mainboard will not become too easy, and adds some dangerous adventure and excitement, then i am happy

First game done. Thanks to the "Fate Bound" Event, everyone was running without Fate from the mid-game onward. Combo that with Witch in Hidden Valley, Talismonger at Portal of Power and Ice Queen's Palace at Runes (next to Cursed Glade) and you get 3 Toadings. Minstrel twice, on the second occasion losing 10 Followers and 10+ Objects, Necromancer once. With no Fate, Leprechaun got Reapered, replaced by the Swashbuckler, who was killed during the "Howl of the Wendigo" by the Necromancer and finally stuck around as Monk.

So why were people hanging around the Middle Region with all those going on? "Mystic Portal" (I think that's the name, roll a die + add Craft, if you the result is 7+, you can hit the Temple. That meant there was pretty someone praying at the Temple every turn, sometimes more than one char. Movement rolls just hit perfect for everyone and there was another pray location at the Runes two spaces from Temple, one from Frostmarch as well, where you could each an extra turn among other things.

Necromancer hit the Crown first, then got Transferenced by the Minstrel, but with 12 Lives (he got the Runesword early), Necromancer calmly made his way back to the Crown and trumped the Minstrel in battle (Str 9 vs Str 15 with Mercenary). Minstrel failed his Toadify Spell. Necromancer finished with 15 Gold unspent (that's after spending 1 Gold per turn in the final combat that took 5 turns). Early on it looked like the Leprechaun might run away with it, his first move was to Woods, then on Minstrel's turn, the Academy showed up.

Longer game overall, Adventure deck went pretty much halfway, only 1 Dungeon card was ever drawn. Necromancer, just before he was Toaded was thinking about challenging the LoD, he had 8 points of Craft Spirits as Followers and there was a Crypt Keeper (Craft 5) on the board, that would've put the Necromancer at Craft 23 vs LoD's 12.

Overkill events do not thrill me; I'm not necessarily talking about simple count of them, since that's not all there is to the issue of balance. There is difference between making the game difficult and challenging and making it overwhelming.

It is one thing to face a powerful Enemy when there is still a slim chance to overcome it, evade it, hold it off (and there are - have been - mechanics that have and could be used in a game like Talisman for this). It is another thing to constantly throw overwhelming amounts of effects where the game is playing the characters instead of the players. So far, from some descriptions, I am seeing another lack of balance in Frostmarch that goes beyond Enemies. Balance is also not just making everyone suffer the same such effects... that's a lazy definition (and approach) to a sense of balance.

One good measure / test of this is a game played where if you die you are out, period. This also tests whether the characters are truly being played or if they are just an excuse or tool for players to access the game "world" mechanics. (There's little point to calling them characters if that's the case.) The latter has always been part of Talisman; it is how the game was partially structured from the beginning. But sometimes I see the former dwindling even more. I doubt many players now would have the stomach to play "you only die once." They would think it futile, boring, no fun at all... because one could die soon and have nothing to do for the night but sit and watch. But how do those characters go down... by doing something or by having something done to them? And in the mix of the two, which is... was more predominant?

I think this is one place where I split off from you, V. I don't consider event effects applied to everyone to be automatically "balanced."

I shall see more once a chum gets to come around with his copy of it for the rest of us to test. We share out buying a test copy of any game add-on before everyone else throws down to buy their own copy.

And Dam... thanks for the read out on the game.

JCHendee said:

Hi JC,

Wait a minute..

I am not saying that adding events will balance the game, but i only want to make the mainboard a little more dangerous, so that it's not too easy.But events can create interesting situations on talisman, and it's something else than only fighting and losing lives or winning battles..

If there are only events that will effect all characters, then it would be boring too..( so we need different sort of effects..

I have the feeling that we want the same somehow..

Velhart said:

I see... and yes, I may have misread you.

I still think "global" effects that cover the Land or a Region/Realm should most be impediments or challenges (turn loss for some, slowed movement, exchanges of spells, etc., that we've seen) and not automated loses (continuous obliteration of spells, elimination of lives, etc.) The former makes the game tougher and challenging, the latter used to much quickly becomes the game playing the players' characters for them... too much like things like the game of Life and others that lean too purely random. Some of the events like Pestilence are pretty much in that second category, and too many like them aren't really about making the game more challenging.

ASIDE: I don't remember off hand... but is there an official Event yet that causes Land or Region reduction (not loss) of movement, penalties in Battle or Psychic Combat, etc. over a defined period of time? These would be ones that I would say fall into your "dangerous" category, where there's a chance to ride them out or even overcome them... vs. just sudden automatic losses of what a character has earned in gains (though I don't consider loss of turn as a loss of character gains).

Ugh, just one game with the Warlock and already disliking him. He pretty much single-handedly cycled through half the Spell deck (90 cards currently), this even after not cycling toward the end, as he was holding Transference, Weakness and another combat spell IIRC. Getting +1 Craft early made him pretty much rummage through the Spell deck at minimum of 2 Spells drawn per turn, as he wasn't too particular about waiting for the optimal time. Gaining Familiar made things even nastier, now he could draw, decide if he liked the spell or not and possible re-draw. Middle Region start offers Temple and gives him free avoidance of the Events others draw on the Outer Region (if they only affect "this Region") and he also avoids a lot of conflicts with the other chars until they come up or he drops down.

Frostmarch certainly hasn't done anything to reduce the amount of Gold in the game, yesterday, Necromancer finished with 15, today, Thief ended with 14.

Yikes! On all counts mentioned! I haven't even gotten to try Frostmarch... and I'm still trying real hard to wait and see, but... yikes again! And obviously there either isn't need or isn't any place or just flat out wasn't any time to spend that Gold.

How many characters in play and how long did the game take? Roughly, at a guess, how much gold was actually spent?

Dam said:

Hey Dam, no wonder you were burning through the spell deck, you screwed up his special ability!

The warlock only draws spells at the start of HIS turn, not at the start of every player's turn. The most spells the warlock could draw PER ROUND is 3, and then he has to wait until his next turn to charge up again.

If you think something is out of wack that much just read the card over again and see if you missed something.

I didn't see any mention that he was cycling spells on every players turn.

JCHendee said:

Dam's comment "at minimum of 2 Spells drawn per turn" sounded like per turn meant per every player's turn instead of per round which is how the warlock is supposed to work. If Dam really meant 2 spells per round then I really don't see what the problem is because the other wizards can cast even more than that. The wizard always has a spell so he could cast cast at least one spell per turn. During an eight player game the wiszard could cast eight spells per ROUND compared to Dam's warlock who was only (if he played him legally) casting 2 spells per round. Wizards get more powerful the more players while the warlock is automatically capped out because he only gets spells during HIS turn.

Ah ha, all right, I see the math now. So Dam, what was it... per turn... per round?

I played another round of the Frostmarch expansion yesterday. We had to call it a night early so we left the game set up and will finish it this weekend. Session report coming next week!

One thing we all agreed on was that the black ice spell is one of the best or at least the most amusing spells in the game!

Early in the game the cerebus was drawn and the card gets placed on the portal of power automatically. Later in the game the sorceress of all people draws the black unicorn. She can't take white unicorns as followers but she has no problem taking black ones if she can defeat them first. After 2 failed attacks she is down to only 2 life left. She calls it a lost cause and casts displacement and moves it off the hidden valley onto....the portal of power! The black unicorn and cerebus joined forces into a monster that rivals the lord of darkness himself!

Anyway, the sorceress is jumping around trying to land on the castle to heal without hitting the black knight or the monster of death sitting on the portal of power. She breathes a sign of relief when she finally rolls a number to reach the castle. She hits the castle and right before she is about to heal up Rick playing the warlock says hold up honey! It's pretty creepy when people refer to guys as their female characters but anyway here is the best part...

Rick the warlock has been holding on to the black ice spell and casts it on the castle. This forces the sorceress to slide one space down right into the salivating jaws of the black cerebus unicorn. Blacerecornus?

It's moments like this that makes Talisman so great. Anything can happen even when you think you're safe.

We can't wait to finish the game, even the almost dead sorceress!

JCHendee said:

3-chars, down to a more standard 75-minutes, despite the Warlock having his only Talisman Shattered at the Pits and having to find another one. Total of 3 Warlock Quests were completed in this game. 2 Mules were bought, 2 Porters were paid, some Healing (mainly at City) and Warlock actually bought a Water Bottle when the Market Day hit early, so in the neighborhood of 10 Gold spent.

Yeah, bad terminology on the Warlock, he got his spells on his turn of course, so start of round. That was still the most I've seen the deck cycled by one character in soon 70 games. All the "always have 1 Spell" character can get stuck with 1 Spell they can't get rid of (Counter Spell), but Warlock at Craft 6 needs 3 uncastable Spells to be unable to cycle.

Carrion Prince said:

She has no restriction on taking the Unicorn (white variety), if she draws it herself or uses Mesmerism to take it from another char. She can't take the Unicorn from another char with her ability.

Guess she could mate them for Grey Unicorns ?

Carrion Prince said:

Except, Cerberus has an encounter number of 1 (Event) and Black Unicorn 3 (Spirits), so they won't combo. Now, Lord of the Pit + Cerberus...

Dam said:

Thanks for spotting the that Dam. We knew about the encounter number rule but in the excitment and horror forgot to check them and assumed the cerberus and unicorn teamed up if you fight them with the same attribute. The cerberus doesn't seem that bad now.

Even if they did team up I had a plan when I hit the middle region. I was going to fight the cerebus in strength and the unicorn in craft so that they wouldn't team up. I would lose against the unicorn but then next time I would switch and kill it with my strength when I encountered it again.

Carrion Prince said:

I know I've comboed Lord of the Pit with another 5+ Str Enemy at one time . I think maybe the reason Cerberus and LotP are numbered 1 is that the character gets to choose which stat to use, so they could avoid the ganging up by choosing first, then the other. Too lazy to look for it, but what encounter number does the Eastern Dragon have? In case someone has it handier, not mixed in with 288 Adventure cards, sleeved even, so can't spot the color difference as well as without the sleeves.

Though, what do you mean by "switch and kill it with my strength" when you say the Black Unicorn? BU is a Spirit, only has Craft. Or did you mean Cerberus and just mistyped?

Eastern Dragon is an Enemy Dragon with an Encounter Number of 1.

talismanisland said:

So no comboing with other Enemies then. Unless you pack Cerberus, Eastern Dragon and Lord of the Pit in the same space .

I think I would rather not...

Ice Queen got melted today by the Ogre Chieftain. So far IQ and WQ endings have been as expected, they end the game the same turn someone reaches the Crown space. Of course, without the Ice Queen, today's game would've ended a lot sooner than the 70 minutes it took, as the Ogre drew the Sword of Light early on and hit the Dungeon, where he met, funnily enough the Colossal Ogre among other monsters. I think the Ogre would've won in like 20 minutes since he could've trashed the Lord of Darkness like so (snaps fingers) with Colossal Ogre (Str 8) and a couple of more monster followers. And if not the Ogre, then the Necromancer would've done it, he was lugging around a Nightmare, Ice Elemental and Death Knight (that's Craft 21 total in case someone is counting). He was hoping to collect 4 big Spirit Followers, so he'd have one for each combat with the Ice Queen.

Still liking the Warlock Quests ending idea, though will use the Replacing Quests Variant with it.

2 days ago, i have bought my Talisman Frostmarch copy at my local shop here in the Netherlands.

As i have expect to be, my Impression is not so good about the Frostmarch expansion

Oke, here comes my plus, and minus ratings

----------------------------

+For the Ice Queen and the Warlock Ending

+ For the Artwork

+ More chance to get spells

+ More chance to get toaded

+ Cool spells

+ For the Characters

-----------------------------------

- Too much weak enemies

- Too less events

- No dangerous events(except Fate Bound)

- Snow drifts should be changed from 1 die, to 2 die's

-Apparition and Barrow Wight have been decrease in Craft ( no reason for it ! )

- Too many Objects

My rating for the Frostmarch expansion is:

4,9/10

Conclusion:

Talisman the Frostmarch expansion is not as it should be.

You expect dangers and exciting adventures, but it is not included in this expansion.

Greetings

~Velhart~

Dam said:

Well... If you meet two or three of those at one time, can you choose to make some of them Craft monsters, and the rest Strength monsters? And do all of them let you choose, or do any of them choose for you? I don't have the game at hand, so I can't check. Anyway, even if you can choose for all of them, the single encounter number might mean that you have to choose the same attribute for all, since it is the same encounter? Or what? A bit confused here...

Lubricus said:

You can't choose for the Chinese Dragon, he attacks you by your weakest strength or Craft

But you can choose for the Lord of the Pit and Cerberus.

So at least, you fight two of the enemies, but you can also choose to fight all three of them !