Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress Review

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Mr. B. is laying it on pretty thick here!

best Warhammer Quest game released to date!
thoughtful refinement of the mechanisms!
masterful Silver Tower!
hack and slash action!
capricious twists!
strong narrative!
production once again hits a new high!
sprues of all-new models that will dazzle and inspire!
with their quality and detail!
packed with great things!
beautifully illustrated tiles!
lots of shadowy artwork to capture its singular atmosphere!

And that's just excerpts from the first paragraph!
!!!

I’m really trying hard for the box quote there.

Also, I freakin’ love this game.

If a 4 out of 5 is love, what's a 5 out of 5?

Shoot, I meant that to be a 5...need to fix that.

Hmm, while I get the enthusiasm, I'm hardly getting any clear picture of the game.

So it's going to be a very, very long campaign? Getting clues, then four Stronghold (need how many clue per Stronghold), and then the Hidden Vault?

"Every Combat is a mini-scenario that plays out in classic Warhammer Quest fashion- with a slightly more skirmish-y feel." What? What's that supposed to mean?

The campaign is pretty long...a single expedition is 4 challenges and 4 combats- that’s about 2-3 hours. But you can go back to Precipice (town) earlier if you need to, and you can “pause” the campaign there.

The length may be an issue, as noted...I haven’t finished the “full” game, I’ve only gotten through three strongholds so there is one more and a hidden vault left...and it actually kind of doesn’t end. There is a sealed finale, but even that is not really an endpoint. Hence the Roguelike comment.

You get the clues primarily during the expedition. A few challenges and other effects let you fish the Discovery deck for them. You may get lucky and find four on the first expedition and the second run is a Stronghold. Or you may have to do another run to find them. Each Stronghold assault “costs” four clues. So yeah, you have to farm in between.

Combat feels more skirmish-y in that the dungeon part has no exploration or anything like that. The maps are set up as fixed battlefields, not as missions or scenarios. There are not really scenario goals or special features that come into play outside of the strongholds. It’s a straight fight, not so much a dungeon crawl feel. The emphasis on cover, positioning, and ranged weapons makes it feel closer to Betrayal at Calth in some ways. I suppose that is a pretty fine distinction, but I think it’s there.

Thanks Michael!

I'll probably like it better with the emphasis on cover, etc. At least more thing to consider than just picking targets.

How do a combat connect with the next one? Is this the maglev thingy?

This looks so cool and the miniatures sculpts are so dynamic, somehow capturing movement and action in a static pose, especially the rogue trader.

What is a good price?

As Christmas advances, I do remember in the past that both Silver Tower and Necromunda went as low as $99 shipped. What's a good price on this one?

Also, what's with the news on the upcoming Warhammer 40k: Speed Freeks, the Orc racing game?

GW is really knocking it out of the park on all of their latest releases.

I think $125-$135 will be about the going rate/ it’s $150 retail.

What I really like about the new models they are doing is that they are monopose but they capture a strong sense of charcacter...I don’t really care that I can’t turn some guy’s torso or cock their head to the side- these models have such a strong identity all that doesn’t matter.

The Traitor Guardsmen are just awesome.

Re: Speed Freeks- I really want it but I didn’t get comped on it so I gotta wait until after Christmas on it. I won’t be running an Ork 40k army so it is really down to if the Speed Freeks game is good. The models are so much fun though.

Re: Sevej’s question- think of the Maglevs like stairs in a Roguelike. The connectivity is in the exploration cards.

How does a review copy work for a game like Blackstone Fortress? Did you have to assemble all the figures first, or did your copy come pre-assembled? I assume that you are playing an unpainted set, because that looks like a lot of figures to paint. From the pictures that I have seen, the new models look amazing, but I will probably still search out a stripped copy because I just don't have the time or the skill to do justice to painting the figures.

GW just sends the retail box, in shrink and all. I haven’t painted anything on it yet. It’s all push-fit and the explorers are red, hostiles are gray so it’s more accommodating for board gamers.

I almost pulled the trigger on a stripped set on eBay, for $20 plus shipping. But the description says just tokens and tiles, and I am pretty sure that I want the rulebook. When I bought stripped versions of Silver Tower and Hammerhal, I got _everything_ except for the box and the miniatures.

I negotiated a stripped Blackstone Fortress on eBay, for $57.50 for shipping plus everything except the minis and the box. Got it on Saturday. Around the same time, Delobius of F:AT picked up a brand new set with everything in it, for retail price. He hasn't even had time to prime the figures yet, but at least they are assembled. We played a four-player game yesterday, and I brought my stripped copy over to verify that I got everything except the minis.

Delobius played the chick with the flamer. Nate played the bigass robot with the huge gun. Ben played the ranger, and I played the navigator, with a pimp cane and some kind of Third Eye mental attacks. We played one mission, and it took over four hours, though there was some learning curve during the first hour or so.

Blackstone plays like a refined version of Silver Tower, though the rules are not compatible. Based on the mission, you stock a short deck of encounters or challenges. You work your way through the stack, racking up clues and money to spend in between missions. Each character has a spaceship, and each ship has an ability that can be used once during each adventure, plus another ability that can be used in between missions. After a mission, three random items are put up for sale in each ship. You choose one ship to visit, and you can use that ship's special ability and buy items available on that ship. The items are often single-use in nature.

Encounters are big map layouts that are a bit of a puzzle to set up, with two or three random groups of enemies poised to attack. Initiative cards for each character and each enemy group are shuffled each round, then laid down in an initiative track that is followed in combat. You can potentially switch places with allies or enemies on the track. The enemies have better AI than in Silver Tower, with different columns for different tactical situations, plus a d20 roll to select a tactic within that column. Unlike Silver Tower, there is cover and overwatch, so combat offers more interesting choices, while still feeling similar to Silver Tower.

Challenges are similar to some of the whackier non-combat situations in Silver Tower, only not quite as interesting or fun, based on what I saw in one mission. One example: deal out four Discover (clues or money) cards face-up and put two tokens on each card. Starting with the current mission leader, each player must either remove a token or pick up a card. If there are any tokens still on a card, take that much damage when picking up a card. After one card has been picked up, discard the rest.

Overall, the combat encounters are more dangerous in Blackstone Fortress than in Silver Tower, but the challenges seem easier. You don't level up like in an rpg, but you can become temporarily inspired (like leveling up) for just the remainder of the current mission. The minis look nice, even unpainted. The tiles are appealing, though not as visually striking as Silver Tower or textured like in Space Hulk. If you were trying to decide between Silver Tower, Hammerhal, and Blackstone Fortress, I would recommend Blackstone Fortress.

Ha - sounds like Descent 2E with spacemen :-P