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I gave some brief initial impressions of this game a little while ago, and regular readers have probably gotten the impression that I like this game quite a bit. I just got done playing a few more games yesterday and I thought, with about twelve games under my belt (since last Tuesday, by the way), ranging from solo games to games with a full compliment of five players, it was about time I actually reviewed Castle Ravenloft.
For those who are unfamiliar, Castle Ravenloft is a D&D-based board game that draws its inspiration from the original D&D module. The rules of the game incorporate elements of 4th Edition D&D, but the combat is streamlined and simplified so that it goes quickly and keeps the game moving. The whole affair is more-or-less a dungeon crawl, albeit one that can have interesting and varied goals and mechanics depending on the scenario you’re playing. It can be played in about an hour (though times can vary from that mean by about thirty minutes, depending on events within the game and the number of players at the table), and it can be played with one to five players.
Overall, I like this game quite a bit. It scratches the D&D itch, it reinforces cooperative play, and it even plays well solo. There are thirteen scenarios in the game (two of them designed for solo play), plus two additional scenarios that Wizards of the Coast have released for free on their web site. Monsters, encounters, treasures, and even the dungeon itself are all randomized in the game, meaning that playing the same adventure twice in a row elicits different play experiences. This leads to a lot of variability in play, which in turn leads to a high degree of replay value. In addition, the game is extremely modular; it would be easy to build your own adventures, characters, monsters, villains, and so forth for the game, leading to even more replay value. In time, I fully expect the online to community to rally around this game and create some really cool stuff.
It’s not all great, though; there are a few issues with the game. First and foremost, the rules can be a little unclear at times. They don’t always spell things out in a comprehensive and unambiguous fashion, and while most of the time this can be mitigated by interpreting rules as strictly as possible, sometimes that just isn’t enough. Furthermore, some cards interact with each other, and with scenario rules, in strange ways that require some interpretation. It would be nice of WotC would create and maintain an official FAQ for the game, so that people can get official answers to some of the questions presented.
There have also been reports of people missing components from their boxes, or having components misprinted, or even having extra components. I didn’t experience any of those problems personally, but the possibility exists (I even heard an account of someone’s game missing all of the cards in the game, rendering it effectively unplayable). Luckily, WotC will replace any lost or damaged components, so if this problem troubles you, contact them.
Finally, there have been complaints about the quality of the components. Specifically, some people think that the cards and tiles are bland and uninteresting. I can definitely see where these people are coming from, even if I don’t agree. The artwork on the monster cards is black and white line art, and there is no artwork aside from a simple design on any of the other cards. The tiles are mostly lacking in any kinds of features or dungeon dressing, whit the exception of the named tiles. As I said, none of this bothers me. Artwork on treasure cards and encounter cards would be nice, but would likely drive up the price, and at $65 the game is already expensive enough. I’m also not convinced that such artwork would really enhance the experience past the first few games; it would cause the game to make a better first impression, but after while you’d probably stop noticing the artwork and paying attention to the rules. As for the artwork on the monster cards, I find it to be clear and communicative, as the depictions of the monsters exactly match their miniatures, leaving little room for guesswork. The tiles are similarly functional; there have already been quite a few questions as to whether things like altars and coffins block movement, and if there were more of these kinds of features on the tiles, those questions would be even more present (of course, this might have prompted WotC to address such a thing in the rulebook).
At this point I’d like to talk about a few of the highlights in the adventure book. I’ve played most of the adventures at this point, and enjoyed them all, but a few really stand out and deserve specific mention.
The game features two introductory adventures, one for solo play and one for group play (“Escape from the Tomb” and “Find the Icon of Ravenloft”, respectively). These are easily the two simplest adventures in the game, using straightforward goals and very few modifications to the core rules. They work well for their intended purpose: to introduce new players to the mechanics of the game. Once you’ve played them a few times, though, there are much more interesting (and complex) adventures to play, and you’ll likely only use them to introduce more new players.
“The Final Transformation” is a fairly complex scenario that sees the players escorting a townsperson, Kavan, into the crypt to find the fountain that can cure his impending vampirism. The catch is that, if he’s left alone or if monsters get too close to him, he turns into a vampire and attacks (temporarily). It’s a tense scenario, and probably one of the more difficult scenarios in the game. It is, however, extremely memorable, and even has a finale sequence that sees a large number of monsters spawning and attacking the party while they defend poor Kavan.
Perhaps my favorite scenario so far is “Horror of the Howling Hag”. This one stretches the mechanics of the game more than any other scenario, using an alternate setup for the board, a specific subset of tiles, and different spawning rules for monsters. The players start the adventure apart, in opposite corners of the crypt, and must find each other and the arcane circle that the hag is using to keep them there. Being isolated is a little scary, especially since the alternate spawning rules allow up to two monsters to spawn on a single tile simultaneously. The hag, herself, is an interesting villain; she doesn’t do a lot of damage, but she continues to keep the heroes separate by teleporting them around the dungeon. It’s a very interesting and challenging experience.
Finally, let me talk about the difficulty of the game. This is a hard game. I’ve lost more games than I’ve won. That said, I’m itching to play more. In Castle Ravenloft, when you lose you’re usually on the verge of winning, which makes you want to try again and do it right. Further, when you win you’re usually on the verge of losing, which makes your victory all the sweeter. I should mention, though, that there are some minor scaling issues in the game. The game scales probably about as well as it can be expected to; monsters, encounters, and villain actions all scale with the number of players in an appropriate way, and keep a fairly consistent level of challenge across numbers of players. There is one thing that the game really can’t account for in scaling, though: diversity of abilities. With one player, you have only a single character’s abilities to pull from, meaning that certain monsters or types of encounters will always be very difficult for you to handle. With five, you have everyone’s abilities to draw on, allowing you to react to events within the dungeon much more effectively. I think that the sweet spot for the game is probably three or four players; there’s enough diversity to allow you to react to a lot, but not so much that you’re prepared for everything. That said, the game is still a lot of fun with one or five, and it does scale much better than many other cooperative games that I’ve played. The scenario that you choose will also affect the difficulty, so with five players, it’s probably best to choose one of the more complex and difficult scenarios.
What I Liked: Almost everything. The game is quick-playing and fun, scratches the D&D itch, plays will with multiple players or in solo play, had a wide variety of adventures to choose from, and has a high degree of modibility and replay value.
What I Didn’t Like: The rules could be a little clearer in places. Hopefully WotC will post a FAQ at some point to mitigate this problem.
The Bottom Line: If you like D&D, you’ll probably like Castle Ravenloft. Even if you have no interest in playing D&D, Castle Ravenloft is a very well-designed cooperative dungeon crawl with a much shorter playing time than other cooperative games (like Arkham Horror) or dungeon crawls (like Descent). I highly recommend it.
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