Review of DUNGEON! Fantasy Board Game by Wizards of the Coast

Neuroglyph · Dec 7, 2012

Just a few months ago, while at GenCon 2012 this year, I happened to attend the Wizards of the Coast seminar on “Board Games, Miniatures and More”. One of the guests on the panel was none other than David Magerry, well-known for his design of the first DUNGEON! board game back in 1975. And was present at the panel to give some great news.

It seems the WotC developers had been working on a new rendition of the famed D&D-inspired board game, and had actually called Mr. Magerry to consult on their new design. From what Mr. Magerry revealed on the panel, the original DUNGEON! was created to give harried early edition Dungeon Masters a needed gaming break, and let them play a fantasy adventure now and then without the need of a referee. According to the game’s original creator, the first version of the game was put together rather quickly - in about 3 days – and offered as an alternative as something to play with Dave Arneson other than massive Napolionics battle. From there, the game became a part of the legacy of TSR and D&D…

WotC’s new version of DUNGEON! has been in the works now for a bit longer than three days, but is now out on store shelves, and released early enough to be poised as a potential “must have” on fantasy gamers’ gift lists this holiday season. So exactly how good is this new version of a nearly 40 year old game? Step into the DUNGEON! and find out…

DUNGEON! Fantasy Board Game

Original Design: David R. Megarry
Development: Chris Dupuis, Jeff Grubb, Steve Winter, Michael Gray, Gary Gygax
Cover Illustrator: Michael Komarck
Game Board Illustrator: Franz Vohwinkel
Card Illustrators: Mike Faille, Wayne England, Lee Moyer, Julie Dillon, Warren Mahey, Eva Widermann, Mike Schley, Anne Stokes, Daarken, Michael Komarck, Chris Seaman, Ben Wootten, Wayne O’Connor, Howard Lyon, Lee Prescott, Dave Allsop, Lars Grant West, Craig J. Spearing, Sarah Strong, Chippy, Lucio Parrillo, Tyler Jacobson, Miguel Columbra, Sam Wood, Ron Spears, Jesper Esjing, Andrew Silver, David Griffith, Carl Frank
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
Year: 2011
Media: Board Game (box)
Retail Price: $19.99 (Available from [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Wizards-of-the-Coast-A12900000WOC/dp/0786962984/ref=as_li_tf_mfw?&linkCode=wey&tag=neurogames-20"]Amazon.com[/ame])

DUNGEON! is a new fantasy adventure board game from Wizards of the Coast, and is an updated version of the board game by the same name released in 1975 by TSR, Inc. The game is designed for up to 8 players, ages 8 years old and up, and includes variant rules to allow even a solo player to have a fantasy adventure gaming experience. The game comes boxed with a fold-out game board, eight card-board Hero standee tokens, 164 treasure, spell, and monster cards, two six-sided dice, and 139 other tokens used in game play. The rules come on a four panel folded sheet, with the instructions and illustrations of game play printed on the front and back sides.

Production Quality

The production quality of DUNGEON! is really quite impressive. Right from the point of unwrapping the gorgeously illustrated box and delving inside, there is the feeling of a high quality board game in there.

The game board, hero standees, cards, and other tokens look great, and have a good feel to them. The tokens and standees are made of a solid cardboard, and printed with vivid colors which really stand out against a very “busy” game board. The game cards for treasures and monsters are printed on a light stiff cardstock, but have been finished with a nice slick texture for easy handling.

The artwork is top notch, from the board to the tokens, and the cards actually have the artists name printed at the bottom so you know who did the work. I thought that was a nice touch, and a great way to give credit where credit was due.

The Game

In many respects, this version of DUNGEON! is a lot like the original game put out in 1975, and as discussed previously, David Magerry was consulted during the development process for this new rendition.

Play is handled very simply, with heroes moving around and exploring the six “levels” of the dungeon, encountering monsters and traps, and recovering treasures. There are four character classes – Fighter, Cleric, Rogue, and Wizard – which have four corresponding races: Humans are Fighters, Dwarves are Clerics, Halflings are Rogues, and Elves are Wizards. Each class comes with a male and female character type, so there is no gender bias among Heroes when they go DUNGEON! delving.

Each of the four classes has a different power level of fighting ability to overcome a particular monster. The Fighter can overcome most monsters easily, while Rogues and Clerics have a slightly more difficult time of battling the denizens of the dungeon – although Clerics are given a noticeable edge against undead. Wizards have the easiest time battling monsters as have Lightning Bolt and Fireball spells which do well against strong monsters. But while Fighters and Wizards do well in combat, they require more treasure to win the game – 20,000 and 30,000 gold pieces worth respectively – while the Cleric and Rogue only require 10,000 gold worth in treasure emerge victorious.

Combat is simple as well, with each monster having a target number that a particular class needs to hit or exceed on 2d6 in order to kill it. Heroes encounter monsters when entering a room or chamber, and a card is pulled from the appropriate Level stack to reveal the creature that must be fought. Heroes get first strike, and only get attacked if they fail to kill the monster. If they do not hit, the monster gets a counter attack, missing about 28% of the time and killing a Hero about 1 in 36 times (6s on 2d6). Other results cause a non-fatal hit which cause the Hero to drop one or more of his treasures! Of course, a dropped treasure is them guarded by the monster until it is killed – meaning another Hero could get your dropped booty! In the event of death, a player starts a new character in the starting chamber, and starts adventuring again.

So how tough are the monsters? Well, for example, an Orc (found in Level 2) can be hit on a 4 or better by a Fighter, a 5 or better by a Wizard, and a 6 or better by the Cleric or Rogue – easy pickings for any of the classes really. Not so when encountering higher level monsters like a Fire Giant (found in Level 5), where target numbers to kill are in the 9,10, or 11 range! Magic swords of +1 or +2 variety can be found among the treasures, and add to the dice rolls of the Fighter, Cleric, and Rogue to kill their foes.

However, Wizards cannot use magic swords, but have access to the aforementioned Lightning Bolt and Fireball spells which can be used to take out higher level monsters – and spells can be fired off from an adjacent area to the room where the monster lurks, allowing the Wizard to kill it without risk of reprisal. Wizards also have a Teleport spell which allows them to move to another part of the dungeon, possibly escaping a tough encounter. Spells are replenished by returning to the Great Hall, and regaining them one spell per turn.

Treasures are obviously better in high level areas of the dungeon, but the monsters guarding those treasures are also tougher. So Fighter and Wizard players are encouraged to go into higher levels of the dungeon in order to meet their victory requirements, although nothing stops them from tearing through lower level rooms, although it will take them far longer to get their victory that way. Here is a break-down of the treasure value ranges found in the various areas of the dungeon:

Level 1 Treasures range from 250gp to 1,000gp, and includes a magic sword and secret door cards
Level 2 Treasures range from 500gp to 2,000gp, and includes a magic sword and secret door cards
Level 3 Treasures range from 500gp to 3,000gp, and includes an ESP medallion and secret door cards
Level 4 Treasures range from 500gp to 6,000gp, and includes a magic sword, crystal ball, and secret door cards
Level 5 Treasures range from 1,500gp to 8,000gp, and includes an ESP medallion and secret door cards
Level 6 Treasures range from 2,000gp to 10,000gp, and includes a magic sword card

Obviously, there are also traps in the dungeon, which cause Heroes to lose turns, or fling them to deeper levels into the realm of tougher monsters! This can be really dicey, especially if you are playing a Rogue or Cleric, and get flung into an encounter with a monster that is way tougher than you can fight.

Sadly, I was unable to get to play a session of the game with friends before my review, but I was able to give the Solo game rules a nice playtest. The developers of this version of DUNGEON! did a good job creating some nice variant rules for playing the game solo, allowing a fun fantasy gaming experience without a DM – just as Mr. Magerry intended when he made the first version! One can play a challenging solo game by adding a time limit, selecting a single specific treasure that must be recovered in order to win, or a “hunted” variant – this latter version is the one I used for my playtest.

In the Hunter vs. Hunted variant, a random Level 6 monster is selected and placed over in the Level 6 part of the dungeon. But it does not stay there! It moves after the Hero does each turn, “pathing” closer and closer to the solo player’s Hero. When it reaches the Hero, it must be fought, and has a very strong chance of overwhelming all but Wizard Heroes. If it is defeated, it drops no treasure, and a new Level 6 monster emerges to hunt down the Hero! In my own playtest, I chose a Fighter, and ended up being chased down by a Red Dragon, a Purple Worm, and finally a Blue Dragon before I amassed my 20,000 gold worth of treasure. I did die once to the Blue Dragon, and had to run back to gather the loot from my previous incarnation before I had any chance of winning. The game was fun, fast-paced, and exciting, even in solo play, and I imagine folks will likely come up with some interesting variants on their own to add more spice and excitement to a DUNGEON! session!

Overall Score: 4.17 out of 5.0

Conclusions

DUNGEON! is one of those board games that has always been fun to play, and this new rendition of the game is no exception. It’s easy to learn, fast-paced, and just a darned good time to play - even solo. It is very much a family style game, and both children and adults can enjoy a good DUNGEON! delve anytime they have time to play. And it is definitely one of those games that makes a good “litmus test” to see if a friend or family member might make a good recruit into a Dungeons & Dragons game group!
And the pricing for DUNGEON! is really great for a modern board game, coming in at or below 20 bucks depending on where you buy. I definitely will be buying copies of DUNGEON! this year at Christmastime for my nieces and nephews, being a perfectly good family game for the long winter months ahead!

So until next review… I wish you Happy Gaming!

Grade Card (Ratings 1 to 5)

Presentation: 4.25
- Design: 4.5 (Great game design; easy to learn)
- Illustrations: 4.0 (Cool board design; excellent illustrations on game components)
Play: 4.0
- Strategy: 3.5 (Simple strategy but fast paced; good solo play; better with more players)
- Fun: 4.5 (Very enjoyable gameplay!)
Value: 4.0 (Great price for a quality board game!)

Reviewer’s Note: This Reviewer received a complimentary copy of the board game from which the review was written.

jffdougan · Oct 22, 2012

A quick question - will standard 1" minis fit onto the spaces? (Really hoping the answer is yes, since I've already picked up most of the party favors for my son's upcoming birthday party.)

mach1.9pants · Oct 22, 2012

Morrus said:
It's damnably cheap! Just £12 here in England.

$24 delivered her in NZ from bookdepository, picking it up for playing with the kids!

EDIT: Which is 12 quid at today's ridiculously high NZ dollar exchange rate (not that I am complaining!)

thewok · Oct 22, 2012

jffdougan said:
A quick question - will standard 1" minis fit onto the spaces? (Really hoping the answer is yes, since I've already picked up most of the party favors for my son's upcoming birthday party.)

No, they won't. The hallway spaces are flagstones of various sizes, some of which are downright small. a 1" mini may not even fit in most of the rooms. Chambers are larger, but they tend to get filled with Cleared tokens as the monsters are killed.

I'll post here what I posted on the WotC forum regarding the game.

I just got done playing my first game of Dungeon! (Nice job putting that exclamation point there. It looks like I'm incredibly excited about that.) Overall, it played well enough. The rules were simple and straight-forward, but I discovered one concern while playing.

Due to the way the game is designed, the rogue has a 67% chance of finding a secret door. The problem is that the rogue is the "weakest" class, as it's meant to stay in levels 1-3, and it needs only 10,000 gp in treasure to win. As a fighter, I spent numerous turns trying to spot a secret door with my piddly 33% chance. Why? Because I'm meant for levels 3-5, and the way into the higher levels is rife with secret doors. The wizard also had trouble, but that may be because he got the minimum number of spells for the game.

Results of the game: Rogue wins with 14,250 gp in treasure. Fighter barely gets into level 4, and has 10,000 gp in treasure. Wizard has about 14,000 gp in treasure.

For some reason, the character that's really good at finding secret doors really has no need to do so, while the characters that do need to spot secret doors to take shortcuts to the parts of the dungeon they're meant to be in fail 2/3 of the time to do so.

Like I said, I enjoyed playing it, but it seems that the rogue just has it pretty easy.

I guess my strategy for next time will be to hang around in level 1 or 2 until I get a Secret Door card (and maybe a Magic Sword), then move on to where I need to go.

darjr · Oct 22, 2012

Dungeon! | Image | BoardGameGeek

but at one point there were miniatures.

Whizbang Dustyboots · Oct 23, 2012

I like that they revised the classes from the original ones. (I've got the earliest version, with the fold-out vinyl board.) It does seem like they're missing out on a good bet by not having squares big enough for miniatures that they can then sell as an add-on to the game.

SCREW IT! We're using minis anyway! Or maybe Lego mini-figs.

jydog1 · Nov 11, 2012

Just got this and ran a 4 player solo game in order to get familiar with the rules, using one of each class and basic strategies. At first it looked like the rogue was going to walk away with it as she looted all the 1st and 2nd level rooms with little problem. The fighter was slogging along on 4th level, the wizard at the other 4th level (and getting crushed by slimes). the cleric seemed hopeless, losing battle after battle in 3rd level and having zero treasure. The rogue was 500gp from victory but had mined all the easily accessible areas when the fighter started to make a serious run. Then he lost an easy battle and the cleric swooped in to pick up his dropped loot, which included a 6000gp gem. The monster dropped a Secret Door free pass and suddenly the cleric was in business. meanwhile the Wizard had moved to 5/6 and had cracked 20k in treasure.

The rogue was forced to clear a chamber on Level 2, and as she did the cleric swooped through the next turn and hopped into a room - losing the battle but not being pushed out of the room. The rogue had no choice but to push on to a 3rd level room further down the corridor. the fighter was now 1000gp from goal but had no rooms close and was tearing across the map to find something open. The cleric won the battle and hit his goal as the wizard cracked 25K but lost the next battle and took an 11, which effectively finished him off. The rogue made her goal but not in time as the cleric, who spent 3/4s of the game without any treasure and seemed the weakest of the characters, grabbed the victory.

Overall it was a great deal of fun and I'm looking forward to playing ti with kids and my friends. I read somewhere else that a reviewer felt that the rogue had way too much of an advantage with the secret door skills, but that was pretty quickly mitigated when two other characters found the Secret door EZPasses. Considering how cheap this game is and how well-produced it is it's a great buy. Highly recommended froma roll-playing night.