Zombicide

[jbbnbsmith]

If you backed this game you already know this, but the rules have finally been posted!!! http://guillotinegames.com/en/gamestuff

Looks like a fun and easy-to-teach game. Can't wait.

[B:T:L Matt]

I was skimming through the pages earlier today at work. I'm hoping things can still work out for the August release to backers... I'd like to try this out before Zpocalypse arrives. I know they are two totally different beasts, but I already played a demo of Zpocalypse at a gaming shop in NH. Looking to see how Zombicide feels in gameplay and feel.

[Eclipse]

My copy is scheduled to arrive tomorrow. Quite excited to give it a go!

[Snappleman]

Just got my super deluxe copy tonight. I plan on giving it a solo go just to see how it feels. I'll report back tomorrow.

Super excited!

[Jormi_Boced]

Mine is supposed to come tomorrow too

[Snappleman]

Holy hell, I'm addicted to this game. I went through the tutorial and then immediately had to try scenario 01. Got my arse handed to me. Tried it again with, what I felt like, was a much more thought out strategy. I'm pretty sure I did worse than the first time. It's not an easy game by any means. It definitely feels like those zombie video games in board game form which I love, but there's a lot more strategy and social interaction (well, I can only speculate on that last part) than just shooting zombies in a video game.

So much fun. I'll probably play it again tonight, and then tomorrow it's epic nerd night with the neighborhood guys.

[Eclipse]

Gave it a try last night. First thing that stands out is that this is a big game. I'm not sure what I expected, but each tile is 9 3/4" with scenarios that can be 3x3 and 4x2 regularly, doing a pretty solid job of filling my 4' table. The people who bought the second set of tiles are probably a bit curious what to do with them. There are also a ton of miniatures. The kickstarter bonus set certainly helps, but even the base game loads up the table pretty well.



The cards are kind of hilariously tiny. This is actually kind of a problem. They're certainly readable, but they're more cramped than they should be. Player elimination is somewhat of a problem I suspect as death comes rather quickly if you're not careful. I think 3 players may be the sweet spot because of this, as having an extra guy tends to mitigate the issue.

Our starter games last night were pretty fun. The tutorial is sadly pretty boring, though we forgot to spawn zombies in the second building which made the win far too easy. It's primarily exactly what it says, a tutorial and not something you should waste a lot of time on. Oddly enough, Scenario 01 is probably too large. It's probably a pretty perfect basic game, focusing on all elements of the game, but its a pretty large jump from the tutorial.

You really need to arm yourself well before going all out in my experience. Oddly, the abomination spawns at blue level, which I guess keeps you from loading up for too long. The main thing to realize is that as soon as a player crosses to yellow, the game ramps up rather dramatically and you kind of need to have most of your searching done by then. The runners are absolutely lethal and mixed with a "runners activate again" card hiding in the deck, its very possible to get nabbed and die suddenly if you're not prepared. At Orange, you're essentially on the clock, as the game can quickly overrun you from here, particularly if a player dies.

What's really impressed me is that trading and "designing" a character seems far more important than I'd expect. Weapons are fairly plentiful, but its important to trade around and give players matching sets to focus on melee or range or use the non paired weapons to make all rounder melee/range hybrids. The annoying target priority rule certainly makes melee important. How you design your team through searches has a lot to do with their success.

So, first impressions seem good, though I'm not certain our 2 player experience will scale particularly well to 4-6 player ranges. It feels like a game that people will want to tweak with houserules, but not too substantially. If it gets well supported with additional scenarios it should be well worth the purchase.

[Jormi_Boced]

I have enjoyed my first two plays as well.

[Hahma]

Nice review Eclipse. When are we going to see some painted minis?


When we going to see some painted minis Jormi ?

[Eclipse]

So, last night we conquered the first real scenario, but its certainly not easy. Fighting as a team becomes rather crucial and a lot of our success had to do with periodically realizing the waves had gotten out of hand, gathering as a group in one spot, and spending a couple turns back to back killing huge waves of zombies. A lot of the difficulties in the game's turn order and targeting rules go away when you're all on the same square, as the range guys can shoot out at things nearby while the melee guys can focus on the immediate threats. We had about 4 groups of 7-10 zombies coming our way, but together they went down.

One thing I think is a bit disappointing is the character advancement. The main problem is that you don't get any choices at all until the orange level, and you can't really take advantage of the red level at all. As soon as you hit red, you need to be a round or 2 away from victory, as zombies hit the table in so many numbers that nothing you get at red level makes you able to really deal with them. This is particularly true due to the "if you don't have enough figures, its a zombies take another turn" card. Even with the extra tray, 75 of my 98 zombie figures were on the board when we won. Zombies take another turn is the most brutal and honestly unfair card in the deck and will regularly outright kill characters with no recourse. Honestly, that's kind of cool and thematic, but a little unfair. We actually lost another game earlier simply because this card took out 2 of our characters early on and the game doesn't let up just because you're handicapped.

On the characters themselves, they can be judged mostly on their blue and orange skills I believe, and while certain powers are unbelievably useful, I don't think there's many duds in the set. Slippery is, probably without question, the best ability in the game. It becomes extremely important as the game progresses, so any character that has it is probably pretty good. Tough is also extremely helpful, but harder to use late game. With these two preferences in mind, John McClane is probably the best character, and honestly, I'm ok with that. Sheldon's ability to make extra molotov's is also extremely powerful, though the weapons themselves can be quite dangerous, simply because it allows one character to get so many kills its easy to accidentally spike red and bring about the apocalypse.

Of the first 9 characters, I think there's probably 2 duds. Doug is sadly underwhelming. Matching Set should be awesome, but more often than not he pulls a can of beans or a non dual wield weapon and has to trade around just like any other schmuck down an ability. He gets to choose from 3 great abilities at red level, but that's too little too late. If he got Ambidextrous at Orange he'd probably be a better choice. The other underwhelming option in my mind is Phil. The pistol just isn't a very impressive weapon and starting with one gives you no real advantage (someone else always has one as well). Generally turn 1 someone will find something better and Phil will be left out. He also gains little at the Orange level and again, has all the interesting abilities in the red zone. Moving Sniper to orange would make a huge difference on the guy.

[Jormi_Boced]

Been playing some Zombicide and will be painting it soon.



I think the great thing about Phil is he can either grab the other starting pistol or give his to the person that drew it to have someone duel wielding them at the beginning of the game.

[IndustrialOkie]

I'm shocked this game + expansions is going for over 300 bucks on eBay right now..