I played the new DQ at GenCon and came away trying to find reasons why it is better than my old GW copy. Other than the nicer cards, I could not really find a reason to buy the new version while I have the original. Do not get me wrong, I wanted to find good reasons.

What factors for those of you who own the original (with the expansions like me) find to make this purchase? I would be interested to know and feel more comfortable with my decision to pass on this newer version.

BTW, I did buy FFG version of Fury of Dracula and the new Space Hulk. Fury was definitely a great purchase compared to the old, but SH left me feeling a little questionable.

I had very high hopes for the new version of Dungeonquest. Unfortunately, the new combat rules are just too complicated for my casual gamer friends so I won't be getting this.

If you have the Swedish version, then definitely stick with it. It looks much more wicked then this version.

The Games Workshop version looks pretty similar.

I've had the GW version with both expansions since they were first released. The combat system is not great but at least it's fairly simple. Was hoping the new version would keep what is good in the old version and improve the combat system. Overall, FFG have done a great job - except for the combat. I've been looking for years for a fantasy-themed game that casual gamers would take to, and which is quick to play. I had hoped the new DQ would do this. (Talisman is my favourite, but my casual gamer friends don't like marathon games.)

I have the original - and will get the new version for a few reasons:

1. Descent characters - I know - kinda lame, but hey - I want em.

2. I only have the original base game - so to get the catacombs and some of the potential future content will be cool.

3. I LOVE that the effects of the cards are printed on the card themselves. I don't play DQ terribly often - so I forget some of the specifics between plays... I like that the effects and how to resolve the cards are printed right on them and I don't have to look in a manual.

4. Preservation of the original. Mine is in EXCELLENT EXCELLENT quality - and I'd like to keep it that way.

SoylentGreen said:

These are very good reasons indeed, and they all count for me. Especially No. 3

I'm very much looking forward to this game, and would like to hear more reports from GenCon.

GrumpyBatman said:

I've played a lot with the GW version, but the game isn't mine so I'll buy it. The most important difference is the combat system, that seems a bit hard to understand at the beginning, but that was necessary to improve the game (the only negative point of the original DQ, IMO, was the combat system). Other changes are not so deep, and I think that with one or two expansions the number of dungeon cards and treasures will be the same of the older version (with expansions), We'll have other characters and maybe snotlings (or other enemirs working the same way) and sneak attack. So it will become the same game, but more beautiful (cards, treasures and characters look great) and with a better combat system.

Did you played it, right?what about the combat mechanics?did you like it?

So I have been waiting for this for a while. I had played the old DQ once and bought the new game at GenCon without waiting to demo it. I am very please with the purchase. I love random games. I love strategic games too. I like having a variety. My first play through was a solo game as I was reviewing the rules. I died one the first turn. AWESOME! Next game, made it to the center treasure tile. First card was Dragon Rage. I died again. Next game was with my wife. She died and I let her use the variant where she played a monster. I died shortly there after. She (my wife) likened the fun of this game to Tracy Hickman's Killer Breakfast (an event a GenCon) in which the fun is in how you lose.

Obviously I can't compare it to the old version having only played it once and buying the new one on nostalgia alone. I did find the rules to be very very light and intuitive. Yes, except for combat. I wish there was an easier way to denote which tiles has special abilities then those two pages in the back of the instructions. A small symbol (like the search torch) would have been nice. As for combat, I actually want more. I wanted something based on attributes. It is my biggest issue with Runewars, that attributes matter so little. I wanted the same in DQ.

Anyways, combat is isolated enough that variants will arise and I am sure I will use one of the more detailed ones. Though, I do agree that when playing with casual gamers a lighter and more simple combat system would be nice. Overall, I think it is a great game and worth getting. If you have the old and the rules don't seem much different, why spend the money?

I keep thinking that FFG decided early on that a 15% survival rate was just way too low for a game they were going to be remaking, so they thought they tack on a bunch of handicaps on the player cards to make it not so hard. It looks like combat was too brutal in the old version, so they had to tweak it and make it so the player could lay the smack down after a turn or two and beat the monster. Determination tokens are the handicap they tacked on because DQ has incredibly brutal attribute ranges and it's entirely possible that you could be stuck in a room for 20 minutes just trying to get that porticullis up. "I can't open the door!" "It's ok, you just keep at it and eventually that door will just fall over because you're so determined" "Yay!" Everything FFG makes now has to wirk with Runebound and Descent, so we have to shoehorn in melee, ranged and magic, so we'll give them all power cards now that do even more stuff to help you survive.

Finally, it looks like after they'd finished tweaking it and ran it through playtesting, they found out that people are winning too easily, so let's just throw in the option to force the game to end early and we can bring back the 15% survival rate by screwing all the players over at the last 3 turns. Hero is 2 tiles away from the exit, he'll make it on the turn just before the doors lock and the monsters eat him, but in a bizarre twist, Johnny on the end rolled a 1 at the start of the turn and the doors closed early, killing everyone inside. Am I the only one who has a problem with this? That's not pushing your luck, that's getting pwned because the idiot at the end of the table made a crappy die roll. I've always had to house rule *into* DungeonQuest, not carve rules out of it like a deranged OB/GYN doing a c-section.

Granted, these are just my opinion, and we all know who has those and what they all smell like, but it just doesn't seem like they really thought this through and are hoping we'll buy it for nostalgia and not notice that it doesn't exactly stir up all those squishy feelings.

Stirs up my squishy feelings. I guess I'm just more forgiving in my nostalgia than most.

I find overthinking games like these ruins their fun value.

DemonNiko said:

If that were true then the DQ hero cards would be interchangeable with Descent and Runebound. Considering Descent and Runebound don't even work with each other, I don't see how this logic flows. The decision to use Melee, Range and Magic traits is a design philosophy for FFG, it does nothing to make DQ any more or less compatible with the other Terrinoth games. The fact that they had to include separate hero cards for the other games sort of proves that the DQ hero cards - and their related mechanics - do NOT work with Descent or Runebound.

Although, I have been thinking lately that it would be pretty cool if all the Terrinoth games could run on the same hero sheets. Then FFG wouldn't need to worry about issuing new hero cards for every Terrinoth game with a new release like they did with DQ. Each hero would be ready to go in every game with one sheet. Of course, it's really not possible to do that without making new editions of everything since the gameemchanics of each are already radically different from one another. Also, I would imagine trying to make all the games run off the same stats would cause it's own problems for the different game play each game is meant to have, not to mention those fancy hero abilities that are geared to the mechanics of the specific game. So I guess that's my personal pipe dream.

Aaaaaaaand you did your best to shoot past my point, but hit it tangentially. I don't remember saying that all the games were interchangable or particularly compatible. I said that the game re-designers forced in crap that is proprietary, and while useful in other games they make, is unnecessarily forcing their design elements on a game that already existed and while needed a few small house rules (can't search more than twice in a row) and not a complete overhaul of the game's engine just to make them feel like they contributed something to the design process.

"The decision to use Melee, Range and Magic traits is a design philosophy for FFG, it does nothing to make DQ any more or less compatible with the other Terrinoth games." Here, let me bold it for you: " The decision to use Melee, Range and Magic traits is a design philosophy for FFG , it does nothing to make DQ any more or less compatible with the other Terrinoth games." It doesn't need to be there, it's a design philosophy that correlates into their terrinoth settings. For a game like DungeonQuest, it has to be shoehorned in because it doesn't frakkin' belong there, thus making combat and other elements of the game far more complicated than they should be because FFG needs to make sure it belongs to them now. Another design philosophy of theirs is that if you're going to put in some arbitrary attribute, well then you have to give the PC's power cards or what's the point? Works great in Descent, Works great for Arkham Horror (and before you start in, I know they don't call it melee, ranged and magic in arkham horror, too bad they basically mean the same thing in terms of gameplay in that you get spiffy powers and gimmicks based on your charater's affinity in whatever the attributes *are* called), but it has to be forced into DQ, because as the guy who's been stalking me around this board pointed out, it's a "re-imagining". So was Battlestar Galactica.

You know what I got out of watching BG all the way through? Baltar is Jesus, and 6 is Mary friggin' Magdalene. (ok, so that's not *exactly* how it went down, but it might as well have been and it's also not my point and I don't wanna get bumped for going off-topic)

I'm used to having to put in little house rules to make a game work better, not chop them out like a butcher going at a side of beef. If I bought this game, I'll have people asking me every time "What are the numbers for on that sun track thingy?" and I'll have to tell them every time to just ignore them, they're a crappy rule idea that isn't fair to anyone playing the game, because one die roll should not completely ruin everyone's enjoyment of the game. If I wanted to play a game where 3 turns before it's over someone can basically say "Rock Falls, everyone dies." I'd be playing a lot more games of FATAL You know what else they'd be asking me? "Why is there 4 pages of combat rules?" "What do you mean I have to go on the forums for rule clarifications?" "What's Deathblow and why can't we do it every turn?" and I'm going to have to stop the game for a half an hour while I pull cards out of the combat deck, show them what the little symbols and numbers on the cards mean, look at their confused and now very bored faces, and give up and tell them this sucks and they should play Rock-Paper-Scissors and see who wins. I have players who can happily understand why they should roll a d12 and roll under an attribute. They didn't need Determination counters, probably because they aren't kids with Down's Syndrome.

I'm done ranting now, now keltheos can stop following me around from thread to thread to tell me I should just deal with it, because he's right, if I don't like it, I shouldn't have to buy a game I think is bad. This, however, was a thread about why old and new are different, and not necessarily in a positive light. Pretty much everyone who tries to argue misses the point i'm trying to get across in their fanatical fanboyism instead of looking at it with a critical eye. I was right up there with them in how badly I wanted this game but then FFG put the rulebook online and I actually read the **** thing... *twice* I showed it to my wife, even she thinks the new rules suck. I didn't go to GenCon, I didn't drink the kool-aid, I just looked at it from what I've played and from a game theory angle and it's just plain bad.

Ok, point made in your wall of text. I don't really appreciate being labeled as you did in the wall, but whatever.

I find it counterproductive to rail about how a company reworked a product when its clear that this is the path they took and won't be changing things any time soon. Is it the same as old DQ? No. Is it still fun? Yes.

You're 100% right about FFG's design model, its a theme they carry through many of their boardgames, at least its not a surprise when it comes up. It might mess with the holy original DQ, but I doubt FFG would have picked up the license if they couldn't tweak with it (and as a result leave a fun game languishing in OOP-land for all time). I had some different perspectives on your 4th paragraph observations, but its clear that you don't want to have anyone refute your comments or have any sort of dialogue about them. I'll move along and fanboi elsewhere. Feel free to reply and name call me further at your leisure.

To be honest, I haven't been 'following' you around threads. I've been reading them without paying much attention to who the post came from and replying however I felt appropriate. It just so happens that we wind up in the same thread, you stating your dislike for some things in the game, me stating that they aren't bothering me.

It is holy, just not in the way you think, and I certainly don't mind the discourse, when it actually says something about what I'm saying instead of trying to argue something else or tell me that it's basically me being a luddite for feeling that this game should have been completely renamed and not trying to underhandedly try to push my nostalgia button. By saying it is DungeonQuest, you expect some sort of consistency between the two games. Descent is basically HeroQuest with more rules and FFG character fluff. You didn't see them trying to get the license from Milton Bradley and brand the **** thing Hero Quest, now did you? And I apologize for thinking you were following me around, just seems like after I post you were right behind me. It's a lil' stalker creepy.

The original game is most definately not perfect. That game needed limits. My favorite example is something not in the rulebook that FFG put in and makes a lot of sense. I know because I house-ruled it years ago and it works. 2 searches max, then move. Otherwise lil johnny knows-no-better sits one room away from the exit and searches all day till he gets bored and leaves the game taking every last bit of treasure in the room pile with him. Here's another problem with both games. Rules for tiles. You want complicated? try going to the rulebook every 5 minutes because you don't have all the rules for the **** tiles memorized.

It's holy in that several elements of the game were sheer simplistic perfection, and they let you wrap your head around the concept of going to the rulebook for tile and card clarification. Combat. I keep harping on about it but it's my beef. It only came with 6 cards, not a deck, 6. Those cards had a diagram based on what you played vs what the opponent played, repeat until one of you dies. Now you want me to take this deck of cards, look at three seperate stacks of cards, move them around a bit and hope that he dies before I do, and that's not even counting power cards on both sides which add another layer of rules onto that particular combat. Now maybe the guys at the FFG booth do a better job than me at teaching people to play games, but I can't help but look at the glazed over look on my fellow player's faces when I have to explain all that hokum to them. For criminy's sake it even took me more lines to explain the summerized version of those rules than it did for me to explain old DQ. That's not fun! That's Magic: The Gathering! Part of me wants to scream "yo dawg, i heard you like games so i put a card game in your board game so you can play cards while you play your board game."

You can keep telling me it's not that big a deal, but to a lot of players, both old and new, it's going to be. I actually *like* playing with other people, and I don't see this ever being a part of my group like the old one is. I have players who will sneak and plot against each other just to play a game of the old version. I'm constantly showing the old one to groups of people who had never played it before on the east coast. I could never see doing the same with this version. To use the same analogy, It's like taking the words of Jesus himself and handing them to Anton LeVay.

Lol DemonNiko, you completely ruin the fun for me reading these threads where you post. way too long to make your point imho

For what i've read you're only negative (perhaps you are possitive in some points, but that would have been after the 200 words mark?), anyways we're all entitled to our opinion, and it appears you like to enlighten us all on the "negative" side. Thanks for that!

No kidding ... Wall of Frickin' Rant.

Don't like the combat rules? Play the old version, then. Or house-rule it. Whatever.

Personally, I would not buy a game with a RPS combat system, so FFG will be getting my business because they changed the DQ system. It's 2010; we can do a little bit better than RPS.

YMMV, of course.

There are other explainations for for "shoe horning" the character attributes and whatnot into DQ. I believe one of the primary reasons was to try and make some elements of the game familiar to the younger generation that have not seen it before? Accessability. That, and it creates a recognizable brand, which is more or less what the wall'o'rant was getting at. But, it is not likely the only reason, and accessability is a good reason, IMO.

As for one bad roll ruining the game for everyone. The whole frak'n game comes down to one roll or one card or one totally random element that kills you. This game is 99% luck and 1% more luck. I do see your point though, and if the rest of the game wasn't the same way I would agree with you.

Now to the "shoe horning", well yes I agree here. I disagree in that it makes the game bad or unenjoyable though. I do not mind it. RW is one of the favorite games and it is another re-implemented game that was show-horned into this setting. Again, with RW the attributes are barely used and scream for meaning - what really makes it feel show-horned (IMO) is that attributes are used or skill checks only, in both games, but not for combat which just seems weird.

For me I think combat (old or new) takes to long. I much prefer to use the current system with a house rule to allow the character to run away mid away after any round they lost, if they they are able. It keeps you from having to die against a foe you cannot beat for whatever reason, and it lets it end earlier.

Looking at it thematically, the random time limit actually makes sense.

You are underground, there are no windows to look out of to see exactly how close it is to sunset. With no accurate way to measure the passage of time (no wristwatches), and death lurking around every corner, it is easy to loose track. Sure you know it’s getting late, but how late? Do you only have a few minutes, or is sunset not for another half an hour? (Do you feel lucky?)

sound like you're looking at the end of the sun track as the end of the game....shouldn't you be looking at the last unnumbered track as the end and the last five numbered ones as extra time. if you do that then you have a 5 turn variable end, which i presume should add a level of suspense and allow for the no one wins end or the 'victory was within in our grasp' defeat. quite often in board games the guy whos ahead is usually ahead and goes on to win, this way even the winning guy has something to worry about... i think it sound cool when you look at it like that.

incidently there are twenty five sun slots before you have to start rolling so that means a twenty five turn game. giving you 25 -30 turns (you could house rule that the first player only moves the sun counter along on a roll of 4,5,or 6) thereby slowing down the passage of time.

and whats with all the angst all over the forums? i walked into an argument on the LOTR card game forum the other day. if you don't like a game don't waste your time with it. it's not for you.

ffg are successfull and they know games. they are expanding their range so people must love what they're doing to them and be buying them. Me i'm happy to buy and play this game having read the rules, sure i didn't like everything i saw in there but when i saw all of the variable extra rules at the end and everything kinda fell into place for me i understood what ffg was doing with the game.

sometimes you gotta take a leap of faith and try it, sometimes the worst games can be the most fun with the right people.

All this talk about earlier DQ sent me to ebay and Amazon and I was suprised to see it easy to get and not that expensive for the base game. The simpler combat model in the earlier game may be better for me to get my non-gaming wife and 8 year old into the game.

My question is about the catacombs in new DQ versus the Catcombs expansion in the old one. Does the new DQ catacombs model accurately reflect how the old DQ handled the catacombs or does the original expansion add different/additional content than what is present in the new game? Or am I out to lunch here and the concepts are totally different.....

Cheers

gforce200 said:

Catacombs in the old DQ are similar to the new one. it works the same way (you enter, draw catacombs cards etc.) and the number of catacombs cards are similar (32 cards in the old DQ, 40 cards in the new one). FFG changes the way to determine where you exit (old version: you go straight from the direction you have chosen for the number of catacombs cards you have drawn, then roll 1d10 dice, and see in the chart on the rulebook how you deviate on the right or left -max 4 spaces-. New version: you go straight from the direction you have chosen for the number of catacombs cards you have drawn, then decide if you want to go left or right, then roll 1d6 dice and move your hero in the direction how many space as rolled. There is a big thread in the forum about this change, because someone like it and someone not.) BUT in the old expansions there were also things that there aren't (i think) in the new version: snotlings and amulets, plus 20 new tiles and few cards.

IMO, if you wanna the best experience with DQ you have 2 choice: or you can find the older DQ with at least catacombs expansion (hero exp. isn't so important, but catacombs is) or is better for you buying the new one, 'cause the base game is still complete enough to have great fun.and I believe that with the first expansion we'll have more cards for the dungeon deck, more characters and something new (snotlings and amulets, maybe?)

last thing, in the old catacombs there weren't sneak attacks cause they were in the room deck; in the new versions sneak attacs SEEM to be in the catacombs deck.

One advantage of getting the new edition especially if playing with non-gaming wife and kids is that all the rules needed (except for the tiles) are on the cards and character sheets and are some what simpler. Having too constantly ask what a card does or what their character special rules (and tables) are might be off putting.

Thanks for the replies. I didn't think about the instructions on the cards...that will help. I would hope expansions will follow so that new DQ will have lots of content soon enough.

Thanks all

there is a simple reason why the old dq (the extensions included) will always have an edge over the new one - snotlings!