Hello!
I really like the concept for this game! I’ve been playing it a bit and had a bit of feedback as well as some questions which I was hoping could be clarified? Some of these questions might be a bit silly but it would be good to make sure. This is everything I could think of so far since playing.
GAMEPLAY QUESTIONS
- How many cards can you play a turn?
- Is there a limit to how many action cards you can play a turn?
- Is there a hand limit?
- When flipping a card, must you choose between generating power/ money or attacking? Do you get both when flipping?
- When flipping to use a cards ability, can you also attack in the same turn with that card?
- When flipping to use a cards ability (e.g., ASSASSIN ANNA), is the way it’s written mean that you must pay a power to use her ability or that you also generate a power when using it?
- Must you flip a card to defend against an attack?
- When being attacked, can you flip your own cards during your opponent’s turn or play action cards? For example: DR CLEAVER allows you to flip him to give a henchman +0/+1. What if you wanted to flip Dr Cleaver to bolster the defences of one of your other henchmen being attacked? Or what if you wanted to play LOAD UP when being attacked to increase the strength/ defence of one of your cards to surprise your opponent?
- If you don’t need to flip to defend, can a henchman be attacked twice? Does damage accumulate or start fresh with every attack?
- Are you able to target flipped henchmen with action cards or henchmen abilities? For example: Could you use SNITCH to send a flipped card back to its owners’ hand?
- If card’s ability doesn’t have the flip symbol next to it but just a money/ power sign, does that mean you don’t need to flip it to use that ability?
- When reading card abilities such as THE SUPPLIER’s, does the money and flip sign together mean pay one money and flip; or receive one money and flip?
- When damage is ‘cancelled’ at end of turn, does that mean henchman’s defence returns to full again?
- Can henchmen abilities target themselves?
SPECIFIC CARD QUESTIONS
- PUSHERS: Do PUSHERS stay on the table after they are used?
- ASSASSIN ANNA: When used, is only Anna unblockable or all my henchmen?
- BAD SONJA: Can she be unflipped every turn or only the first turn she comes into play?
- BETRAYAL: When taking an opponent’s henchman, do you receive the henchman flipped if it was flipped, or do you receive it unflipped so you can use it immediately? Do you receive it in whatever state it is was taken?
- HIT: Can an opponent defended against this with a henchman if available? Or does the player using the card get to choose the target regardless of whether there are cards able to defend?
RULE PAGE
- Which way is flipped? Cards facing towards me or away from me? It’s hard to tell with the depiction used for the rules. It would be clearer if it was shown using an actual card from the game.
- TEACH ME TURNS: RULE 3. PLAY – states that ‘cards cannot be played in ANY OTHER phase’. What about step 5. PLAY which says that more cards can be played? That doesn’t really make sense.
- We were a bit confused by the follow paragraph: ‘If taking damage directly, the HENCHMAN’s power will be deducted from their total life. The HENCHMAN will remain flipped until the next unflip phase and will take no damage back.’. What does this mean by power? Is this referring to the attack damage? Which henchman remains flipped? The one doing the attacking or the one defending?
- There are a number of spelling errors in the rules.
SUGGESTIONS
- Have something to distinguish the two decks. A mark? Colour? It gets hard to remember which cards belong to whom, especially when taking cards from other players. Since both decks are exactly the same, we sometimes accidentally got cards mixed when storing away and had to recount both decks to make sure they were the same.
- Flipping the cards was a bit of a hassle, especially when you had a lot of PUSHERS and cards in play, so we ended up just tilting the cards 45 degrees. Wasn’t the most aesthetically pleasing but did the trick. Not sure if money and power markers would help or something like that?
- Having health markers might be a nice touch to keep track of health.
- EXPLOSIVE VEST: might be a bit too powerful at +3? We were able to end the game quite quickly a few times with a combination of this card and some more powerful henchmen. Might be a bit more even at a +2?
- GENERAL ROTT: could +1/+1 be a bit too powerful? We had a few instances where we were able to end the game quite quickly when we had some PUSHERS/ ENFORCERS in play. What if instead it was +1/-1? From a story standpoint, maybe he sends his fellow henchmen into a frenzy, so they rampage into attack but let their defences down because they’re so bloody thirsty?
- STARTING WITH PUSHERS/PROSPECTS: one of the big problems is that the game can be quite uneven depending on how many PUSHERS/ PROSPECTS you start with and how many you draw. One player can get a big advantage if they start with more PUSHERS/ PROSPECTS than the other. We found that you can be left drawing for PUSHERS/ PROSPECTS/ ENFORCERS for a number of turns while your opponent is already building up their field and then it’s too late. What if when you start the game, both players start with a certain number of PUSHERS/ PROSPECTS, so it evens the playing field? Then the rest of the starting hand is made from drawn cards? This might help both players to get a start. From a story standpoint, if you’re a drug king surely you already have a few people under your employment?
I think this game has a lot of potential and I hope you decide to continue to develop it. I hope some of this helps and I look forward to clarifying some of the questions we had!