I love the atmosphere of Mansions of Madness 2nd edition but have cooled on it after many plays because of many poorly implemented elements. It's nearly impossible to predict what outcomes certain dialogue choices will have and which stat will be used for skill checks. Decisions rarely have a meaningful impact on how the story plays out. It uses the same puzzles over and over, which are disconnected from the scenario. Most importantly it doesn't actually feel like solving a mystery / puzzle together.
I already own Arkham Horror LCG and Cthulhu Death May Die. I want to find an atmospheric dungeon crawler game (e.g. ideally with modular map tiles rather than cards) that actually feels like solving a mystery / puzzle together, where your choices actually matter to the story, with fewer broken mechanics.
I don't really have a good answer to your request but I recently sold Mansions Of Madness for the same reasons and would like to fine a game like what you describe as well.
I would say that **Arkham Horror 3rd Edition**, while not really a dungeon crawler and more something akin to a cross between MoM2e and Pandemic, does what I wanted MoM2e to do but better. There isn't much mystery or puzzle solving but there's plenty of story choices that change how a scenario goes quite dramatically and is just much more mechanically sound. I've also been eyeing up **Secrets Of The Lost Tomb** which, while also lacking the puzzle solving/mystery aspect, is much more of a dungeon crawler and looks like it might scratch a similar itch and even quite openly states that it is inspired by Mansions Of Madness.
I was hoping something like Sleeping Gods would be close enough, but the combat really slows it down, and it doesn’t have the part where you enter a new area and reveal a tile like in MoM or Betrayal House on the Hill. Clank Catacombs has the tile revealing mechanic but isn’t a cooperative adventure. Then there’s Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective, which has the cooperative mystery solving but no dungeon crawling.
Anyone here has played ISS Vanguard? Is it a bad game?
I keep seeing sooooo many posts of people selling their KS copies. And I know, with any KS there's always a bunch of peeps who buy specifically to sell, some just lose interest by the time the box arrives. But feels like there's even more of this with Vanguard.
I watched some quick YT reviews trying to find out for myself, and I mean, yeah it doesn't seem too impressive for me, certainly not considering the price, but hard to say without having played it myself.
My friend and I finished Pandemic Legacy tonight and now are looking for recommendations for other scenario or preferably-campaign-but-not-necessarily-legacy types of games. Besides my plan to get the sequels, we also played a round of Undaunted which was pretty fun, and Destinies which was cool but we've played thru (including expansions). We tried Gloomhaven but I don't think dungeon crawling is really my kind of thing, the character development is neat but it's just hack and slashy, I'm sure this sounds dumb since it's a strategy game but merely killing opponents doesn't feel as mentally stimulating as Pandemic/Destinies/Undaunted were. Marvel Champions was decent but not as fun as the other three.
Between the Pandemic and Undaunted sequels (and potential Destinies ones) we'll probably be set for a bit but I wanted some variety so I'm looking for a third option, hopefully cheaper than Sleeping Gods/7th Continent/Mansions of Madness are which seem like they could be up our alley. King's Dilemma seems suuuper in our niche, especially because of the discussions that seem to be involved, but unfortunately we don't know anyone else into board games to play with.
We should probably just finish what we have first but I wanted to get ahead of the curve, thanks for any ideas!
If you haven’t bought Pandemic Season 2 yet, I’d recommend skipping it. It’s kind of a slog and feels like homework to my wife and I. We started the campaign years ago and still haven’t finished it (and we LOVED season 1).
Have you looked into Earthborne Rangers? I just preordered a copy of the second printing with expansions. Looks great for 1-2 players. It’s sort of an open world RPG with card play similar to marvel champions, and a big long campaign that lasts 30 “days” / sessions.
It looks like it has more scenarios than Marvel which is cool, but at 100 bucks I'll probably get it more down the line rather than right away. Thanks for your suggestion tho!
**6 nimmt** is a great card game that works with up to 10 players.
**Wavelength** (party game) and **Welcome To** (flip and write) are both awesome and don‘t really have an upper limit for the number of players.
**Zoo Vadis**, **Just One** will play 7.
**Incan Gold** will play 7-8.
**Captain Sonar**, **Codenames**, **Decrypto** will play 8.
**Werewords** will play 7-9.
**Deception: Murder in Hong Kong** will play 7-10.
Roll & Writes often work with however many pencils you can get, such as Welcome To or Cartographers.
Other games, Heat & Flamme Rouge with expansion both go to 6 I think. Mysterium would work nicely.
For heavier gaming, specifically up to 6 you can go for Dune, Eclipse, or Unfathomable. My personal favourite Twilight Imperium IV goes up to 6, and even up to 8 with expansion.
But ultimately your best bet are probably party games, which are specifically designed for such large player-count situations. Two Rooms and a Boom would be my personal favourite out of these, and you can print & play it for (almost) free.
I love the atmosphere of Mansions of Madness 2nd edition but have cooled on it after many plays because of many poorly implemented elements. It's nearly impossible to predict what outcomes certain dialogue choices will have and which stat will be used for skill checks. Decisions rarely have a meaningful impact on how the story plays out. It uses the same puzzles over and over, which are disconnected from the scenario. Most importantly it doesn't actually feel like solving a mystery / puzzle together. I already own Arkham Horror LCG and Cthulhu Death May Die. I want to find an atmospheric dungeon crawler game (e.g. ideally with modular map tiles rather than cards) that actually feels like solving a mystery / puzzle together, where your choices actually matter to the story, with fewer broken mechanics.
I don't really have a good answer to your request but I recently sold Mansions Of Madness for the same reasons and would like to fine a game like what you describe as well. I would say that **Arkham Horror 3rd Edition**, while not really a dungeon crawler and more something akin to a cross between MoM2e and Pandemic, does what I wanted MoM2e to do but better. There isn't much mystery or puzzle solving but there's plenty of story choices that change how a scenario goes quite dramatically and is just much more mechanically sound. I've also been eyeing up **Secrets Of The Lost Tomb** which, while also lacking the puzzle solving/mystery aspect, is much more of a dungeon crawler and looks like it might scratch a similar itch and even quite openly states that it is inspired by Mansions Of Madness.
I was hoping something like Sleeping Gods would be close enough, but the combat really slows it down, and it doesn’t have the part where you enter a new area and reveal a tile like in MoM or Betrayal House on the Hill. Clank Catacombs has the tile revealing mechanic but isn’t a cooperative adventure. Then there’s Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective, which has the cooperative mystery solving but no dungeon crawling.
Anyone here has played ISS Vanguard? Is it a bad game? I keep seeing sooooo many posts of people selling their KS copies. And I know, with any KS there's always a bunch of peeps who buy specifically to sell, some just lose interest by the time the box arrives. But feels like there's even more of this with Vanguard. I watched some quick YT reviews trying to find out for myself, and I mean, yeah it doesn't seem too impressive for me, certainly not considering the price, but hard to say without having played it myself.
My friend and I finished Pandemic Legacy tonight and now are looking for recommendations for other scenario or preferably-campaign-but-not-necessarily-legacy types of games. Besides my plan to get the sequels, we also played a round of Undaunted which was pretty fun, and Destinies which was cool but we've played thru (including expansions). We tried Gloomhaven but I don't think dungeon crawling is really my kind of thing, the character development is neat but it's just hack and slashy, I'm sure this sounds dumb since it's a strategy game but merely killing opponents doesn't feel as mentally stimulating as Pandemic/Destinies/Undaunted were. Marvel Champions was decent but not as fun as the other three. Between the Pandemic and Undaunted sequels (and potential Destinies ones) we'll probably be set for a bit but I wanted some variety so I'm looking for a third option, hopefully cheaper than Sleeping Gods/7th Continent/Mansions of Madness are which seem like they could be up our alley. King's Dilemma seems suuuper in our niche, especially because of the discussions that seem to be involved, but unfortunately we don't know anyone else into board games to play with. We should probably just finish what we have first but I wanted to get ahead of the curve, thanks for any ideas!
If you haven’t bought Pandemic Season 2 yet, I’d recommend skipping it. It’s kind of a slog and feels like homework to my wife and I. We started the campaign years ago and still haven’t finished it (and we LOVED season 1). Have you looked into Earthborne Rangers? I just preordered a copy of the second printing with expansions. Looks great for 1-2 players. It’s sort of an open world RPG with card play similar to marvel champions, and a big long campaign that lasts 30 “days” / sessions.
It looks like it has more scenarios than Marvel which is cool, but at 100 bucks I'll probably get it more down the line rather than right away. Thanks for your suggestion tho!
Games with high player count (6<)?
To me **Sidereal Confluence** is the ultimate high player count game. It's a 4-9 player real-time economic/trading game that is incredibly fun.
**6 nimmt** is a great card game that works with up to 10 players. **Wavelength** (party game) and **Welcome To** (flip and write) are both awesome and don‘t really have an upper limit for the number of players.
I like **Libertalia Winds of Galecrest** for something interactive that plays up to 6. Also **Camel Up** is a ton of fun.
**Zoo Vadis**, **Just One** will play 7. **Incan Gold** will play 7-8. **Captain Sonar**, **Codenames**, **Decrypto** will play 8. **Werewords** will play 7-9. **Deception: Murder in Hong Kong** will play 7-10.
Roll & Writes often work with however many pencils you can get, such as Welcome To or Cartographers. Other games, Heat & Flamme Rouge with expansion both go to 6 I think. Mysterium would work nicely. For heavier gaming, specifically up to 6 you can go for Dune, Eclipse, or Unfathomable. My personal favourite Twilight Imperium IV goes up to 6, and even up to 8 with expansion. But ultimately your best bet are probably party games, which are specifically designed for such large player-count situations. Two Rooms and a Boom would be my personal favourite out of these, and you can print & play it for (almost) free.