Here's to hoping the game will be adjustable in some way to make it possible to solo. I absolutely love everything about the concept of this game other than having to play with no less than two...and even then the two would be pitted against each other. Great if you have a big, regular gaming group. Terrible if you generally play alone. When i saw the announcement on the front page my jaw dropped, and then as I read the description my joy slowly subsided.

But hey, maybe there will be a way to randomize the mansion crawling experience so we don't need to have a "keeper" player. Any ideas on how that might be possible. Like is that possible with Descent?

This will be an immediate buy if that is the case. *fingers crossed*

We'll have to see when the Rules come out.Solo rules are always a plus,you would think they would be more comon as I imagine that a lot of Gaming is Solo.

OD

Rumorgod, I hear thou!

Every game should have Solo rules. I know, it sounds bad, but I mainly play Solo. Lately we, the solo players, were royally spoiled: DungeonQuest, Castle Ravenloft, Defenders of the Realm and let's not forget about the amazing The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, which also support solo play.

I am VERY excited about Mansions of Madness and I will buy it as soon as it is out but lord HOW I WISH this can be played solo!!!

well to be honest first thing i thought of when seeing the news was: a dungeon crawl (light role playing) in different setting. which is something ive been looking for.

the 1-4 co-op vs 1 antagonist is the same as others like Ravenloft & Descent, but more like Descent as the antagonist is being played by a human (better imo). It definitely sounds like this game was designed to work best at full capacity, getting the most out of both co-op play & struggle against antagonist.

I wouldn't be surprised if FFG listened to common complaints of playing the role of dungeonmaster in Descent, and will make that role in this game more appealing, so it doesn't always end up being the same person playing the keeper every game.

But consequently & unfortunately that will make soloing more work to realize then since you have to automate that antagonist, and of course you're losing that co-op aspect when playing solo.

That being said, there are solo variants for Descent on BGG, so i'm sure one will come up for this

I disagree with all these solo movements around the world. I don't mean solo as in being locked away. I mean using chat sites, forums, and video to talk to people rather than talking face to face. No face to face interaction is a horrible thing, and because of blogs and personal pages humans are becoming more and more distant. This distance is leading to people hiding behind forums and blogs and spewing hateful or hurtful comments while a 24/7 pessimistic news network carries on in the background.

I design local board games for my area. I love to design board games. But before I got into designing them I did a personal study on human interaction and how gaming (both board and video) affect the human mind. My studies included nearly every game that has made it to that icon status. Zelda, Mario, Chess, RISK, Magic: The Gathering, Poker, Pool...etc. I also studied stories, because I was trying to figure out what makes a book last like DUNE, IT, Lord of the Rings.

I had no real experience making games so I turned to my instructor Mr. Arneson (co founder of DND) and we worked together to figure this out. He was intrigued that I wanted to do more than just design games. (I think we both were just as curious to be honest)

What we discovered is that the human body depends on face to face interaction. When one can see the emotional details in the face and pick up messages subconsciously. And although Mario was a single player at release. the reason it lived on was not due to the hype of the NES, but the simple fact that at the end of each level a score was calculated for an observer to try and beat. For Zelda is was the fact that it hit the right elements to cause a player to talk about it with friends at school or work the next day. Eventually as more people purchased it because of word of mouth reviews, they ended up discovering a common interest that they could share and talk about, forgetting their differences. The same reason for Zelda's popularity is why certain authors and books stand out above the others; be it fire side chats to classroom discussion. Try to imagine if Shakespeare was a loner that never had anyone to share his stories with or produce plays for. I even wonder how many tales more epic than Beowulf were drafted through the minds of a loner but never became as big because they had few to share them with.

I could go on and on about how comics, RPGs, and even solo based games like Dragon Age and Mass Effect depend on the interaction between people for them to last. Take Avatar, whether you liked Avatar or not, the reason for the success was not so much the "3D experience"as it was actually because of people talking and sharing the experience. Avatar only made 77 mil opening weekend in the US. Same goes for World of Warcraft which only made $250, 000 release day in America. (That means on release WoW only had 50,000 players). Word of mouth made that game big (which now has 15 million players).

I guess what I am trying to say is that IF you want a solo based gameplay, please make sure you post the experience int he forums or share it with other gamers. There is only one game that broke our theory and denied a possible conclusion. Solitaire. We couldn't figure out how it has lasted, thus breaking our experiment. I can tell you this though. Arkham Horror did not last this long because of solo playability. Arkham Horror was crafted back in the days of old Games Workshop when shared gaming through table top games and RPGs was huge. It was the co-op and player interaction around the table to work against the game that made it a success along with Talisman (which was basically a non co-op Arkham Horror). The reason Arkham Horror is doing so well to this day is because of how reviewers talk about the teamwork aspect and the ability to craft custom works like the GOOs and Heralds in the Arkham Horror forums.

@ Curator

Interesting study...but at 2 in the afternoon on a Wednesday day off I'm still gonna need a solo game to play. I'd kinda like it to be this one some day.

Plus in Solo....all the Beer is yours.

OD

Oh my, Curator!

Your study is very pertinent, in a fantasy kind of way. A lot of truisms there too. So all those who play Solo are potential malevolent human beings simply because they don't have another human player to play with in their neck of the woods? Is there yet a League or a Party dedicated to the eradication of the solo-players? It should be. Oh la la.

In the immortal words of Sam: "You are clearly over-reacting, Pippin!".

Still, an awesome message.

I can't wait until the rules are released so I can see what kind of solo possibilities might be inherent in the normal rules...or if they might have a solo variant built in. I know that last bit is probably too much to ask, but a loner can hope.

The idea of solo (or co-op) Descent has been raised a few times over in the Descent forum. I have yet to see any kind of concrete effort to make such a thing, though. Admittedly I haven't gone looking on the web or anything. In theory it's possible, but it would involve a lot of work and ultimately it would lose something in not having an intelligent opponent behind the villain.

As much as I sometimes hate being the Overlord because I feel ganged up on, the game wouldn't be half as much fun if there weren't a genuine sinister mind reacting to what the heroes do. I rather suspect this game will be similar in that regard - ie: a lot of the challenge and the fun will be provided by the Evil Player's strategy and tactics.

Ho there, hold up.

People DON'T like being the Overlord? What wackery is that? I admit I wish the monsters were tougher but there's nothing like throwing mob after mob of critters at the players. Gang up if you want; I'll still win.

Magic Pink said:

I agree. I'm totally about being in charge of all the terrible things that go down with the hero characters. I can't wait.

Hey I'd happily take on the role of the Keeper...if you guys could just convince my lame-o friends to like board games. They get all uppity sittin in their tower, playin their newfangled video games while I'm stuck playing board games by myself.

Oh, now, don't be dissin' my vidjima games.

But yes, board games are fun. Hold your friends at knifepoint and make them play once; eventually you'll find some that like them.

Rumorgod said:

I played the base Descent game for 100 hours solo. It was not that hard really, you just keep the heroes seperate etc. As the Overlord, I always played the worst possible thing on the weakest character and actively tried to kill myself.

Decent has dice driven combat so I think it is pretty easy. It is also pretty easy to do it with Hero Quest.

If this game has dice-driven combat, then I am sure you can solo it...and probably much easier than Descent because you could likely use one investigator. (Descent is really only balanced for 4 heroes).

If this game has card-combat, then I don't think it will work well at all. That is my biggest complaint about Middle Earth Quest...the usage of cards for combat, life-pool etc. because it really makes it hard to solo. (plus I'm an ameritrasher so I love dice)

With that said, unless this game plays fast and looks soloable I will likely not get it. My friends will probably get it though so I can play it with them as they are huge Arkham Horror fans.

Frog said:

So you're saying you almost finished up an entire quest! ::rimshot::

DoomTurtle said:

rofl,

*tears in eyes! The game does take some serious time! Even just setting it up!

I enjoy face to face gaming, but much of the time I can't find other players, or at least not those interested in the kinds of games I enjoylike this one. So having either solo rules (which would be awesome) or the capacity to play this solo would be a huge plus. And sometimes, because I work with people, I just want to hang out with myself and not have to interact; then playing solo is a relaxing way of working through a puzzle.

Amen to that David. As a teacher I find that having a game to play by myself without interacting with other people is a welcome retreat from having to speak

in most games there is always somehow you can make it solo, you just need to be fair and sort of play both sides, like in arkham horror.

really looking forward to this, as sometimes its a bit of a choir setting up a game of a.h for yourself to play, this beeing board/tile driven will be easier

darknight said:

I'm not sure that this game could be played solo. A big part of the game is that the Keeper knows something the Investigators don't. I suppose you could play it in the sense that you could just act everything out, but I'm not sure you could call it playing the "game". It would be more like just playing with the figures. That's fine, if that's what you dig, but I'd rather play the game using the mechanics provided.

causeitwasfunny said:

I think you could probably randomly set cards around the house and uncover them as you go to see what the "keeper" is up to.

The only problem with this is you wouldn't be able to try and accomplish anything as the keeper since you don't know what you're doing yet! Also, some clues may only match with some plans, which could create problems.

KingTut said:

My point.

From what we've heard, particular clues have to go in specific rooms. So you can't place them randomly, and if you know where they are it destroys half the point of the game.

Not to mention if you truly randomize the clues, there won't be any flavor to the game. You'll making up the keeper's "objective" at that point, and probably unsuccessfully. You would have to forgo the clues altogether and couldn't play any of the Keeper's cards (maybe randomly, but then what about threat?). This game really isn't suited for solo-play.