Love the game! But why are all the stats the same....? I'm hoping it's a mis-print from the printers. There is no point to all of the characters having the same stats. You may as well have said "when in combat, all players role two dice". Or "when attepting to open a locked chest, roll a four or less". "All players move four spaces or less". Why the stats? I would be fine with one of my four characters moving 3 spaces, or one moving 5. I'd be okay with one weak fighter and another strong one getting 3 dice. The extra strategy would be in trying to plan which character does what, base on each of them having various strenghts. The special abilities are great, and make the characters somewhat unique, but you could have done more.

FF, you missed a golden opportunity if you planned for them all to have the same stats. Please tell us it's a printing issue and you will mail us all new character cards with varying statistics before Xmas!

Paladin9

Owner of countless FF board games.

Its not a printing error. Its intentional.

I am not the designer so I cant list the exact reasons why this decision was made, but hoping that FFG will send you new cards will be hope in vain.

You can always contact Laurent Pouchain on BoardGameGeek and ask him exactly why this design decision was made.

If you do find out please print the answer here , id like to know for sure.

If I recall - not going to go look (cause I could care less that the stats are the same...) - I believe the designer has already spoken to that point on the BGG forums.

I understand it was completely intentional - to help streamline the game. It doesn't impact the play of the game either way essentially. It was meant to be a fast and easily accessible game - not all "heavy gamers" will be a fan of that decision - personally - I can't wait to get my copy this next week - finally a game that isn't so stat heavy and hopefully easily played. I have many gamer friends who find many titles out there too "rulsy" - I think this will be really refreshing.

I'm looking forward to it.

Out of curiosity - why is it such a big deal to you that the stats are all the same? Why do you think it was a golden opportunity that was missed?

I agree, I was even surprised...

they've made beautiful figures but there's no difference in style between them...

you would expect that there was a fast (not so strong) thief, a strong (slower) thief, ... in every team.

but maybe that's the way gamers think

and i have the feeling this game is made for kids age 10-14/beginners...

that's the reason i bought this game: to play it with my son (in a few more years :-D )

I also thought that they differ in more then just their stats.

maybe differences in stats comes with addons.

SoylentGreen said:

Yeah, I am going to second this question since it never seems to be adequately answered. I would love to hear a well reasoned response.

Lots of gnashing of teeth over a lack of different stats and yet, no good reasons given why they should be included.

Why put in the rule book that each character gets x stat when its just as easy to put it on the card as a constant reminder? Vets hate it for some unknown reason while it helps everyone, especially new players. Think of it as merely a reminder placed on the card which is predominantly filled with artwork. Gives more of a reason to have a character card in the first place. Why have a further headache of design balance with varying stats when the variance is already in the special rules of the character? There is a lot to be said for simplicity. Being simple doesn't necessarily mean stupid or even ill-conceived. In fact, some of the simpler things are often the best things since it allows human creativity to rise in importance without further restrictions and variables.

The military has an old adage/acronym. K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple, Stupid)

There is no reason for variable stats other than the preconceived expectations of players from experience with other games. This isn't Confrontation. This isn't Hybrid. Its a board game set within the Cadwallon IP that is accessible to a myriad of player types.

Seems like a lot of heartache and negativity over absolutely nothing to me.

Hellfury said:

Couldn't agree more with your whole post - but here is the culmination. I am worried that some of the negative reactions to the game might in fact be from preconceived notions of what a game should be when it has mini's. How many games have you played with mini's where the character stats are different from character to character... pretty much every single one.

So a game comes along and may not need the different stats - decides to keep it simple - keep it accessible - and people kinda moan about it.

I am looking forward to this game immensely. (I don't get it until Friday - big game sale at the FLGS I cannot pass up the opportunity to get a few games I have been looking to get. (They are running buy 2 get 1 free... plus 20% off if they needed to order it in for you - so not only did I have to have them order all the games in that I wanted - at 20% off... but I still get the buy 2 get 1 free deal... come now... really? How can I pass that one up!)

Anyway - I've read the rules. I've watched some video on it - I get the gist of it. I am looking forward to playing this game with both my casual and veteran gamer friends. I really believe that for once the approachability of this game will be welcoming.,

I personally think all this whining and moaning over the stats being the same is of the nitpickers kind. The game is great for what it is. Enjoy it and people need to stop expecting it to be something it is not. It oozes theme and character. I love it how the 9 times out of 10 the people who ***** the most are the ones who have NEVER played the game but just read the rules online. Get a copy or find a friend who has it and play instead of causing hearsay and lies.

SoylentGreen said:

sigh I wish there was a FLGS in Tampa, FL. Coming from Phoenix, AZ, in which there were many FLGSs, I was disappointed to find not a single one here in Tampa.

i loved the game. though it could have used 2 sets... the "everyone is the same" set and the "min-max" set

because i find it silly every character has a special move to make it differ from others... but makes it identical statswise.

i guess its more of a reminder than anything else.

if you guys ever finds a link to a tested and balanced homemade pack of values, i'd love to try them.

How does this game NOT have different stats on different characters?

Each guild character has a different special ability, none of these is repeated on any other character though some are copied in Arcana cards…

Effectively this gives them a different fighting power, different mobility and different misc uses during game.

Then the grey (special) and black (guard) characters have their own things that keep them different from the guild characters.

How are people missing this?

LivinItUp said:

I hear you on that one! I finally gave up on the FLGS dream for Tampa. Me and my friends just play at my house every saturday for our B&B (Boardgames & Beer) night.

When we do get a FLGS here in town they always seem to move 90% MTG or 40k and forget the other games.