D&D 4E 4ereviews opens with review of new DDM Starter Set

[BradfordFerguson]

Right, Dungeons of Dread is for the new miniatures ruleset. So you have the 5 exclusive, non-random minis that come with the Starter Set and the 60 random minis that come in the Booster Packs.

I'm not super clear on what is different between the old miniature rules and the new. Never was an expert on the old minis game. The rules changes were a couple steps forward. I think that they could have taken one more step forward if they want to ensnare the casual gamer.

 

[BradfordFerguson]

edit: (deleted double post)

 

[Xorn]

Yup. Flip the cards over and the RPG stats are there. I read somewhere that every creature in the monster manual will have a corresponding mini. Kind of cool, really. And brings up the whole chicken versus egg thing. Which list was first? I'm guessing they just used the same list.

 

[BradfordFerguson]

That's cool.

Let's say the MM is 320 pages and there are 160 creatures. I'd gladly pay $80 for all the monsters in the MM. Maybe even $160. But alas that would be too easy and remove the "collectible" aspect. I know that wasn't quite what you were saying, just day-dreaming a little here at the day job

Edit: I do want to say as far as credibility that what I'm NOT doing is giving everything a great 5-star review and then telling them to go buy it. I'm not even giving review scores. If people don't own the product, they can make their purchase decision based upon what is important to them: price, quality, whether or not something is self-contained, etc. In general, I'm going to do reviews of stuff that interests or excites me as a gamer, and going to avoid stuff that is "just OK" or crap. So, in general, my reviews will be favorable.

The site isn't in place to make money. All profits above hosting costs will go to Folding@Home. I created the site to share my passion of RPGs with y'all.

 

[BradfordFerguson]

Hey Phil,

I did a little playtest for you. The Dragon + Yuan-Ti is 58 points and the other three figures are 56 points. My first run-through was VERY close. The dwarf was the last of the civ'lized folk at the end against the dragon. The dragon had 5 HP left, but the dwarf missed a couple of times in a row and was downed by an ongoing poison effect from the dragon's bite (nasty indeed). It was actually kinda fun though I played both sides.

Combat--at least in the minis game--is a bit "stickier" since any normal movement out of a adjacent space is an opportunity attack. So folks can't double move to get out of a bad spot. They can shift 1 square, but that doesn't help a whole lot when things are going south quickly.

If you check out the rules for the female dwarf fighter for D&D XP, she has quite a bit of sticky-ness (not in the non-showering sense, oh yeah, that too) since she can do opportunity attacks against opponents that shift (shift is same as "5-foot step"), and she is a 1st-level fighter [unless the demo characters are buffed more than regular 1st level characters?].

 

[srn]

Combat--at least in the minis game--is a bit "stickier" since any normal movement out of a adjacent space is an opportunity attack. So folks can't double move to get out of a bad spot. They can shift 1 square, but that doesn't help a whole lot when things are going south quickly.

If you check out the rules for the female dwarf fighter for D&D XP, she has quite a bit of sticky-ness (not in the non-showering sense, oh yeah, that too) since she can do opportunity attacks against opponents that shift (shift is same as "5-foot step"), and she is a 1st-level fighter [unless the demo characters are buffed more than regular 1st level characters?].

Sounds like Kathra from the DDXP pretty much to the detail. Moving near a 4E fighter is dangerous these days.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

Well, based on your review I just ordered it from Amazon (I have Amazon vouchers to spend and I'm based in the UK, so it makes more sense to order from them).

I'll be sure to let you know if I'm disappointed.

 

[BradfordFerguson]

Tallarn,

Cool! That totally validated made my Sunday afternoon & evening (time spent "designing" the site and writing the review). What aspects of the product are you looking forwards (a little British English for you) to getting your hands on?

 

[Cirex]

I like the miniatures and the battlegrid. I think I will order them from amazon, since no store at my city has miniatures (anymore).

Thanks for the review!

 

[BradfordFerguson]

If you are looking to patronize a local store, I know that Borders carries D&D miniatures. That's where I got my hands on the product that I reviewed. I'd be shocked if you have game stores in the area that do not sell D&D minis. D&D minis are a fairly good "profit margin" for stores; similar to Heroclix and Collectible Card Games.

So maybe local book stores if you don't have a game store (or a game store w/o its head up its arse).