For those of you like me, who do enjoy silly games from time to time, but don't want to waste $125 just to make stupid GW-themed farting noises, there's a much better game out there than Age of Sigmar. It's called "Monkeys Need Love Too" from Topwise Games, which I supported on Kickstarter.
For $20 (or less), you get a nice portable (and kid-friendly) card game that's about you, an animal rights activist, trying to free more monkeys from a perfume research lab than your opponents.
There's 3 phases to the game:
1) The Draw Phase
You keep drawing cards until you have 5 in your hand. If you draw a banana card you lay it down in front of you and keep drawing. Some people will draw 10+ banana cards until they get 5 monkey or action cards in their hand.
2) The Action Phase
You can put down a monkey (don't forget to feed it), and lay down as many action cards as you like. Stuff like giving opponent monkeys diseases, luring them away, or setting off the lab alarm to end the game. The last of which can be countered by a card where you're required to scream out a strange phrase in German that makes all the monkeys stop what they're doing and stand at attention.
3) The Flinging Poo Phase
After feeding your monkeys, you can "eat" two bananas and fling poo at another player, which might make them do something awful. You can do this as often as you like.
Game balance? There is none. Monkeys will be killed, lured away, redistributed evenly, or die of starvation (from you not feeding them).
Monkeys that cost 3 bananas to feed will do nothing, while those that cost only 1 or 2 bananas per turn will have extra abilities.
And when that lab alarm does finally go off? Well then you draw a random card from a special deck that might give you monkeys, take them away, and/or send you to jail. Meaning that the game is about as random as Candyland. No wait, it's more random.
But hey! You get to laugh with your friends, fling some poo, and it won't cost you $125 and several hours of your life assembling and painting little miniatures!
Then, when Exploding Kittens (another Kickstarter I supported) finally ships in late July, you can move on to the new awesomeness and still have spent less on your LOL-play than you would have on the by-then-stale Age of Sigmar.
There's 3 phases to the game:
1) The Draw Phase
You keep drawing cards until you have 5 in your hand. If you draw a banana card you lay it down in front of you and keep drawing. Some people will draw 10+ banana cards until they get 5 monkey or action cards in their hand.
2) The Action Phase
You can put down a monkey (don't forget to feed it), and lay down as many action cards as you like. Stuff like giving opponent monkeys diseases, luring them away, or setting off the lab alarm to end the game. The last of which can be countered by a card where you're required to scream out a strange phrase in German that makes all the monkeys stop what they're doing and stand at attention.
3) The Flinging Poo Phase
After feeding your monkeys, you can "eat" two bananas and fling poo at another player, which might make them do something awful. You can do this as often as you like.
Game balance? There is none. Monkeys will be killed, lured away, redistributed evenly, or die of starvation (from you not feeding them).
Monkeys that cost 3 bananas to feed will do nothing, while those that cost only 1 or 2 bananas per turn will have extra abilities.
And when that lab alarm does finally go off? Well then you draw a random card from a special deck that might give you monkeys, take them away, and/or send you to jail. Meaning that the game is about as random as Candyland. No wait, it's more random.
But hey! You get to laugh with your friends, fling some poo, and it won't cost you $125 and several hours of your life assembling and painting little miniatures!
Then, when Exploding Kittens (another Kickstarter I supported) finally ships in late July, you can move on to the new awesomeness and still have spent less on your LOL-play than you would have on the by-then-stale Age of Sigmar.
Hater much?
ReplyDeleteNope, I really like the Monkey Game!
DeleteYes, its best not to bad mouth AoS.
DeleteThose of us in the 'vocal minority of players' (it amuses me to no end that that's already been determined 3 days after its release) will be verbally berated on all fronts by legions of GW's faithful fanbois.
Yes, it's near-impossible to convince a fanboy to keep their wallet in their pants, but I feel compelled to point out the idiocy of buying shitty half-baked products like this at least once.
DeleteWe'll see how many of the guys who are swearing that AoS is "fun" are actually still playing in 3 months once the shine wears off and they get screwed over a few times by the WAAC players. Who are supposed to hate random half-baked nonsense, but who actually thrive in that kind of environment.
Age of Sigmar is free.
ReplyDeleteThere Ain't no such thing as a free lunch. They'll get theirs.
Deleteand on Friday, Kings of War II will be free to download.
DeleteIf you want a wacky, bring what you own skirmish game with 4 pages of rules, and free for now unit cards... AoS is your Beer and Pretzels game of choice. Because you're playing just for funzies.
If you want tactical company level game with units doing most of the heavy lifting, and minimal amounts of a single Hero slaying half of the opposing army, I recommend Kings of War II.
both free.
There's a $75 dollar book on the way that will presumably include must-have additions to the game. And... just because the current warscrolls are free doesn't mean that future ones will be.
DeleteDon't get me wrong, they've reduced the buy-in cost for WFB/AoS significantly. But crappy rules so bad/random that even Rick Priestly is taking pot-shots at them are not what the community needs. This release will do more for Mantic than it will for GW.