by Tekkor
Just as a followup to my original First Impressions comments....
I have had the chance to play 3 more games of Darkest Night. My opinion still holds and we really like the game. Once you get the rules down the game is actually quite fast. The setup is quick and the gameplay moves along nicely without anyone getting bored and everyone feeling like they are working towards the goal of winning.
One thing I really like from the game now after playing it more is unlike some coop style games...players can to a certain degree sorta make their own decisions at least early on with what they are doing. By this I mean its not like some games like AH or Defenders of the Realm where even early on weaker players can get a bit "bossed" around on what "NEEDS" to be done and where they should be going.
On Darkest Night Ive played 4 games now with my sons. Early on for the first 5 turns or so everyone can really do just about whatever they want. Go knocks some Blights out..try to get a spell or two...work on some keys etc. It only really towards the midgame to endgame that everyone really needs to buckle down and get on the same page. I personally think this is a good thing.
In our 4 games...the first game we won (but had a couple rule corrections that were needed). The second game we won but it was close. The third game we lost but it was also close to a win if a roll or two were different. The fourth game me and my 16 year old son played tonight....we LOST. Badly! We were just starting to think the game was maybe a bit too easy and then it punished us. Of course....part of it was we had a run of HORRIBLE rolls. We couldnt kill anything for the first 5-6 rounds. Everything worked against us.
Even so...we still got one chance to kill the Necromancer with a single die roll that needed a 5 or 6. We didnt get it..then people started dying.
Anyway...again great game guys if you happen to see this. Look forward to the Nemo Gold Banner edition now. =)