Darkest Night Beta

[Manxome]

Once upon a time, I was inspired by Arkham Horror and an adventure seed from Races of War to design my own cooperative board game. The result was Darkest Night, a game about a band of heroes fighting a guerilla war against an invading necromancer. You may recall me posting print-and-play versions of this game a long time ago.

I am now pleased to announce that Darkest Night is being published!



And I think the timing has actually worked out great, because Victory Point Games has just recently upgraded their manufacturing equipment and hired a full-time artist, so the game is bigger and better than I'd hoped, with nine playable characters (each with a unique power deck) and some gorgeous artwork.

There's a preview article, and more information on the product page.

The publisher is currently seeking external playtesters to put the game through its paces before release. I would also be highly appreciative if people want to read through the rulebook (available from the product page) and tell me if anything seems confusing or unclear.

Release will probably be in about 6-8 weeks.

[Maxus]

That...is actually really damn cool. I'll take a look over when I get home from work.

[ishy]

So it's 11 pm here, and I just had some wine to drink too, so I might miss something obvious.
But as I'm reading the rules (long read for a board game btw (yes I haven't played that many lately)) I do have some questions, guessing they might be answered further along in the document but hey:

Section 5.0: power cards that have targets
If the prince targets the Knight to inspire courage on, then they split up and only then the knight uses the power card. Does the card return to the prince?
Or does it stay with the knight, so the knight can activate it?
If it returns to the prince, if you have many of those type of cards, how do you keep track of whose card it was?

Section 6.0: Items: relics:
You appear to lose 1 secrecy if you start your turn with a relic
What if you keep switching who has the relic, so that no-one starts their turn with it?
Granted you can't do this if you use the relic, but it does bypass the cost
- Edit : Or does each turn mean, every heroes's turn? So you lose 4 a round?

Section 7.0: tactics:

Regardless, the hero may also choose to use an appropriate tactic from one of his powers (see 5.0). Only one tactic may be used in each combat.

So lets see what 5.0 says :

Tactics, which can be used during a combat (see 7.0).

Well that isn't very helpful (yay for recursive loops though)
You'd probably be better off if you removed the "see 5.0" part, since it doesn't anything useful at all.

- Edit: That is as far as I've gotten right now, might edit later.
Ps. I assume playtesting as usual only works if you live in the USA?

- Edit 2 & 3:
7.1.2 : Death of a hero :

When a hero receives a , he either spends a to negate the  or he dies.
Technically, you can choose to let a  kill you even if you have grace remaining, but this is generally not recommended.

I'm not sure what this technically adds, seeing as you've already stated the hero can do both and after that, that dying caries hefty penalties.

the new hero begins with one fewer power cards than normal, and his default grace and secrecy are both reduced by 1 for the entire game

Does this have a lower limit? Or can you end up with 0 power cards?
And what exactly does default reduced for the entire game mean? Start with 1 less and have a maximum of one less? Reading 8.0, there is no maximum, so why not just say, you start with 1 less grace and secrecy? That sounds shorter and clearer. - Aha, this is relevant for praying.

And why say that heroes get <wounds> if a wound is instant death (or spend 1 grace) anyway? Why not say, the hero dies unless you spend 1 grace, instead of the, your hero receives 1 wound. 1 wound will kill the hero unless she spends 1 grace?

[Manxome]

I assume playtesting as usual only works if you live in the USA?

Actually, I'm pretty sure VPG accepts international playtesters. I certainly don't see anything in the sign-up instructions that would limit it to USA, and I think there were international playtesters on both of my previous two published games.

Section 5.0: power cards that have targets
If the prince targets the Knight to inspire courage on, then they split up and only then the knight uses the power card. Does the card return to the prince?
Or does it stay with the knight, so the knight can activate it?
If it returns to the prince, if you have many of those type of cards, how do you keep track of whose card it was?

The paragraph after the second example in 5.1 was meant to address this, but in retrospect I could see how it might be confusing since the Prince targeted himself in the example.

The way this is meant to work is that the Prince never loses the power; he always has the option to spend an action to place the card on anyone at his location, even if it's already active on someone else (but doing so only moves it; it doesn't create a copy).

Keeping track of the owner shouldn't be a problem, since each hero draws from their own private deck of powers: every power card has the name of the owner printed on the back, and the artwork is also color-coded by character.

Section 6.0: Items: relics:
You appear to lose 1 secrecy if you start your turn with a relic
What if you keep switching who has the relic, so that no-one starts their turn with it?
Granted you can't do this if you use the relic, but it does bypass the cost
- Edit : Or does each turn mean, every heroes's turn? So you lose 4 a round?

Just on your own turn.

Good catch! I believe I created an additional rule to address this loophole at some point, but it looks like it never made it into the official rulebook. I'd better fix that...

Section 7.0: tactics:

Regardless, the hero may also choose to use an appropriate tactic from one of his powers (see 5.0). Only one tactic may be used in each combat.

So lets see what 5.0 says :

Tactics, which can be used during a combat (see 7.0).

The cross-reference to 5.0 is intended to explain the concept of a power, not specifically the concept of a tactic.

the new hero begins with one fewer power cards than normal, and his default grace and secrecy are both reduced by 1 for the entire game

Does this have a lower limit? Or can you end up with 0 power cards?

I don't think I follow. You normally start with 3 power cards, so "one fewer than normal" will always equal 2.

I guess it would be clearer if I just said two...

And why say that heroes get <wounds> if a wound is instant death (or spend 1 grace) anyway? Why not say, the hero dies unless you spend 1 grace, instead of the, your hero receives 1 wound. 1 wound will kill the hero unless she spends 1 grace?

Because there are dozens of different cards and tokens in the game that can cause a hero to suffer a wound, and by specifically defining the term "wound" (and a shorthand symbol for it), all of those cards and tokens can be printed with just a single symbol in place of the words "spend 1 grace or die".

Also, there are cards where you can spend grace for other effects. Defining "wound" opens up the possibility to have power cards that react to taking wounds but not to other situations where you spend grace (there are no powers like this in the initial release, but I could always add some in expansions).



Thanks for the feedback! I want to do everything I can to make the rules as clear as possible.

[Starmaker]

The publisher is currently seeking external playtesters to put the game through its paces before release. I would also be highly appreciative if people want to read through the rulebook (available from the product page) and tell me if anything seems confusing or unclear.

How do I sign up for the playtest? I'd be happy to pay for any necessary electronic or physical materials.

[ishy]

Just below the article there is this:

If you are interested in becoming a Victory Point Games playtester for any of these games, you need to read this article and follow its directions about contacting us. Thanks for your consideration!

including this link:
http://victorypointgames.com/articleDet ... D=6&page=1

[ishy]

Actually, I'm pretty sure VPG accepts international playtesters. I certainly don't see anything in the sign-up instructions that would limit it to USA, and I think there were international playtesters on both of my previous two published games.

Ah that sounds nice, I just often had the experience that somewhere hidden in the terms, only people from certain countries are allowed. So I figured I'd ask before spending 15 minutes reading the exact terms (though I guess I came off as a bit hostile)

Keeping track of the owner shouldn't be a problem, since each hero draws from their own private deck of powers: every power card has the name of the owner printed on the back, and the artwork is also color-coded by character.

Ah yeah, that would have been instantly clear if I'd had looked at the cards while reading the rules. Though it could be annoying if you construct your own deck? But then again you do have the brilliant text: "Therefore, you are only eligible for bragging rights if you play with the standard heroes."

Because there are dozens of different cards and tokens in the game that can cause a hero to suffer a wound, and by specifically defining the term "wound" (and a shorthand symbol for it), all of those cards and tokens can be printed with just a single symbol in place of the words "spend 1 grace or die".

Also, there are cards where you can spend grace for other effects. Defining "wound" opens up the possibility to have power cards that react to taking wounds but not to other situations where you spend grace (there are no powers like this in the initial release, but I could always add some in expansions).

Seeing as one wound means death, I'm still not sure why you couldn't just call that wound death (with same symbol and everything), unless you can take multiple wounds in expansions or something. But this is a minor thing.

Thanks for the feedback! I want to do everything I can to make the rules as clear as possible.

No problem, was just looking through it, trying to misunderstand as much as I could. Rules do look pretty good, really like some of the examples given too.

Two minor things though:
11.2

Note: All die rolls in the game favor the heroes in the event of a tie.

It feels wrong to have this hidden in the necromancer section, wouldn't it fit better on the first page or something? (yes it really is minor)

15.2.2:
I'm saying this without having seen the map etc. So I don't know if this is accurate or not.
It feels like stacking blight on one square is the easiest way for the necromancer to quickly win. So if you give movement control to a player, won't she keep on going to that one square?
And the amount of forced actions (to keep the game balanced) for the necromancer player makes me think it might not be fun to actually play the necromancer (but like I said I haven't played it, so I could be wrong)

[Manxome]

I'm told that all of the playtester positions have now been filled.

11.2

Note: All die rolls in the game favor the heroes in the event of a tie.

It feels wrong to have this hidden in the necromancer section, wouldn't it fit better on the first page or something? (yes it really is minor)

This is the only place in the game where someone other than a hero makes a die roll, so it's the only exception to the other generalization that players have intuitively tried to make (i.e. that ties always favor the roller).

I also thought about just letting the necromancer detect heroes on a tie, but then there's no difference in detection chance between 0 secrecy and 1 secrecy, so instead I invented a mnemonic to justify the current mechanic.

15.2.2:
I'm saying this without having seen the map etc. So I don't know if this is accurate or not.
It feels like stacking blight on one square is the easiest way for the necromancer to quickly win. So if you give movement control to a player, won't she keep on going to that one square?
And the amount of forced actions (to keep the game balanced) for the necromancer player makes me think it might not be fun to actually play the necromancer (but like I said I haven't played it, so I could be wrong)

If you'd like to see the map, there's a picture of it you can download from the game's product page or the BoardGameGeek page.

Stacking up blights in one space is definitely something that happens, but the heroes still have several ways to influence necromancer movement and/or destroy blights, and if you stay away from the heroes then there's a whole bunch of nasty effects you're not subjecting them to.

The necromancer definitely has fewer choices to make than the heroes do, though. The main game mode is full co-op; the play-the-necro variant is just a side thing.