Essen 2012 is done. Was amazing. So many of you visited our booth. So many of you said nice things about my blog, about our videos, about our games. These were 4 days of pure joy - meeting all you geeks and chat with you.

I post about Essen on my blog Boardgames That Tell Stories. In the next issue of STORYonBO-ARD we will cover Essen, we will show some pic-tures and write few words about this amazing fair.

Robinson did well in Essen. 11th place in BUZZ ranking, great sales, now great reviews and ra-tings on BGG. One year of hard work is now pay-ing off. We are happy. We have short vacations. And then we are back to work. New games are wa-iting to be designed ;)

Editor: Ignacy Trzewiczek Translation: Marcin ’Joker’ Karbowski, Danai ’Smoczyca’ Chondrokouki Front cover illustration: Matuesz LenartDesign, layout and DTP: Maciej ’Scorn’ Mutwil

PORTAL PUBLISHING, ul. Św. Urbana 15, 44-100 Gliwice, POLANDportal@wydawnictwoportal.pl, www.portalpublishing.eu

Robinson Crusoe 5 Are you designing game? 11 Why co-ops suck? 15 Choices are better than gun 17 Test game session 23 Designing the game is not 8 hours job 25 Discovery tokens in Robinson Crusoe 27 Creating Robinson

Neuroshima Hex 35 Outpost faction in Neuroshima Hex

Neuroshima Tactics 39 Creating an army

We are happy to announce that in Z-Man Games, Filosofia Games and Pegasus Spiele will publish their own editions of Robinson Crusoe.Join the adventure! This is a really great game!

There is another review of Convoy. Enjoy!

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/video/22022/the-convoy/drivethrureview-134-hex-killer

Robinson is doing well!

www.zmangames.com

www.filosofiagames.com

www.pegasus.de

Editor: Ignacy Trzewiczek Translation: Marcin ’Joker’ Karbowski, Danai ’Smoczyca’ Chondrokouki Front cover illustration: Matuesz LenartDesign, layout and DTP: Maciej ’Scorn’ Mutwil

PART I

Czech Republic is close, so when friend of mine recommended me this small Czech convention that took place 3 hours car drive from Gliwice I didn’t think too long. I took my wife, my daughter, I took Robinson and o� we go! It was March or April, spring time, great time for nice weekend in Czech. �is is a beautiful co-untry as I heard!

Certainly, I didn’t see much of Czech co-untry. I didn’t see Czech at all. I spent two days in games room playing Robinson Crusoe and Convoy. But my wife said co-untry was nice. She went for a small trip when I was playing...

Anyway, at some point when I was looking for new players to play test Robinson, Vla-ada Chvatil appeared in the room. One of players asked him to join test game. Vla-ada looked at me, looked at Robinson and said: „OK, let’s play.” We began.

�e game was hard. Players quickly got wounded. Few times they were very unlucky. Because of wounds they star-ted to loose their character’s skills (when you got some level of wounds, you were loosing skills) and they looked like in despair. Since 4th turn Vlaada started to complain.

‚We are going to die. We won’t make it’

I was in good mood. �e game was tough, they really needed to �ght hard to survive on the island. I liked it. ‚Stop complaining, �ght. Do your best!’ I told Vlaada.

5th round. �ey got another couple of wounds and again lost some of characte-r’s skills. ‚We gonna die next round’ said Vlaada.‚Stop doing that!’ I said. ‚You need to �-ght. You need to do your best. You need to survive. �ink, try to �nd solution.’ I insisted.

‚I do. But there is no solution. Game will kill us next round.’

Other players weren’t demotivated as much as Vlaada, they saw chances, they tried. Vlaada gave up. He saw that the end is close.

6th round. �ey are dead. Vlaada is right. �ey didn’t make it.

***

‚You should try harder.’ I said.

‚Game has bad construction. We had no chances.’ Vlaada answered. He was thin-king, watching cards, character boards, dices. ‚If I may suggest... Well, in my opinion you have problem here Ignacy. When players got wounded, they loose skills. �is is bad.’ he said.

‚Are you kidding? �is is awesome! It’s like Die hard! You got wounded, you are bleeding, you have broken leg, you feel pain all over your body, but you can not give up, you need to �ght!’ �at was exac-tly what I wanted. You got wounded, you loose skills, you have to try harder. ‚It is like Bruce Willis, right? Wounded, ble-eding but still �ghting back!’

‚Ignacy, it ain’t a movie. It is a boardgame.’ Vlaada replied. I don’t know if Vlaada li-kes Die Hard, but at that very moment, he didn’t look like he was a big fan of John McClane.

‚Vlaada, c’mon! It’s like in Die Hard movie! You know, Bruce Willis in torn shirt, lots of blood and �ght till the very end. Bruce Willis never gives up. �at is the feeling I want to have here in Robinson. I want you bleeding, su�ering but still �ghting for survive!’

‚It’s a boardgame. You are designer. Not director. Remember?’

***

‚�ere is a serious problem here.’ Vlaada said. ‚When you get few wounds, you lo-ose level of wounds and you loose skills of your character.’

‚Yes, this represent that you are tired, hurt and you loose your abilities...’

‚Take the story aside for a moment. Focus on problem. You get wounds when you are in troubles. When situation gets tough. Whey you have problem. But the game is not helping. It is knocking you down. You got wound, you are in troubles and what is more, game takes your skill away. It is do-uble hit. You need tools to get away from problems. But here in Robinson when you are in troubles, game takes away your to-ols. You get the point?’

‚Yep.’ I may be John’s McClane’s fan, but I am not an idiot... ‚But if character gets wound and there are no consequences, getting wound will not be problem! I need players to be afraid of wounds!’

‚It doesn’t work. �is mechanism is bad.

You are in troubles. You get wound and at the same moment you loose tools to scramble out of this shit. �is is bad.’

He was right. He just took whole ‚wound mechanism’ and throw it to the bin.

I hate when people are right.I took my prototype. I went to the room.

No, I was not crying. True John McClane’s fans don’t cry.

***

�at night I didn’t sleep well. To be honest I didn’t sleep at all. Well, maybe two or three hours. Let’s face it - if Vlaada Chva-til says that your game has a problem, you don’t sleep. Right?

I spent few hours rewriting rules. Tried to �nd solution. I wanted players to be afraid of getting wounds but on the other hand I understood what Vlaada said abo-ut taking skills away. I changed levels of wounds that take away character’s skills. I changed skills, now when you loose them you don’t su�er as much. A�er few hours I had new set of skills, new levels and I was sure that now, when players got wounded, they will still have chance to �ght back. But still, getting wound was bad, was so-mething that players will try to avoid.

I caught Vlaada on breakfast. ‚Got minute for me a�er breakfast?’ I asked. ‚Yes. Actu-ally I wanted to talk with you. I was thin-king about the game last night.’

I showed him my notes. I showed him how I changed levels and skills. I showed him how I changed wound rules and con-sequences of wounds.

‚Is it ok? �is is what you were talkin’

yesterday?’ I asked.‚Well... It is step in right direction’ he said.

For all of you who don’t get it – ‚step in good direction’ is polite way of saying ‚Man, it sucks. Try harder.’

We talked about other problems of Robin-son for an hour. �en I packed Robinson, Convoy, my wife Merry and my daughter and we drove back to Poland. My prototy-pe was devastated.

So here is my advice for all of you - think twice when you decide to take prototype to Czech next time...

PART II

I gave Merry car keys. ‚You drive. I work.’ I say and I sit in the back seat. I have Robin-son prototype all in blood and tears a�er Vlaada’s comments. My beloved game was hurt and wounded. I had it right next to

illustrations: Mateusz Bielski

me. I also had sheets of paper and pencil. And I had three hours of car drive to Poland.

I came to Czech to present my great game. I going back with game torn into pieces. Oh, yes, I am pis-sed o�.

So we are going home. Merry is driving. My daugh-ter Lena is singing. I am working.

***

�e problem – if player gets wound and as a conse-quence he looses skill, he is unable to �ght back and get out of troubles. But on the other hand, if player gets wound and there are no consequences, he is not afraid of getting wounds. And this sucks.

I look at the notes from last night, new rules I desi-gned in the hotel room. ‚It is step in good direction...’ said Vlaada. ‚Good direction’... I’ll show you ‚step in good direction’...

I torn it all into pieces. I don’t want good direction. I want: ‚Ignacy, this is brillant’.

Did I mention I may be a little bit angry that day? Just a little.

I took clean sheet of paper. I wrote: WOUNDS. CO-NEQENCES. LOOSING SKILLS.

I crossed out LOOSING SKILLS.

WOUNDS. CONSEQUENCES. I need new approach. I need new point of view. Merry is driving. Lena is sin-ging. I am working. And I am really pissed o�.

***

It always starts from a story. So I am sitting in the car and I am trying to imagine myself on the Island. I am trying to imagine that I got hurt. I am trying to imagine what is happening...

I am unhappy. I am scared. I am complaining. I want rest of team mates know that I got wounded so they know I won’t be able to work as hard as I wish. �ey are sad, de-motivated, morale drops down. I am complaining...

Morale drops down. Hmm... Interesting. When player gets wound morale drops down. �at is a new point of view.

�ere may be track of morale. It would show if players are motivated or not. It is one track for all. If one player gets wound, it a�ects this track. All group su�ers. He is com-plaining. He is crying. He is hurt and wounded. Morale of team goes down...

Oh, yes! I got it! Merry is driving. Lena is singing. I am pissed o� but I am getting close to start being happy.

***

So what we have here? Solution �ts the story – which is always very important for me – if player gets wound and another wound and another one at some point he starts to complain demotivating the whole group. I can imagine it. It works with the the-me, with group of people on deserted Island. Spirit of the team. One for all, all for one.

What else we have? If player gets wounded, he do-esn’t loose any skills. I disconnected skills and wo-unds. You have skills till the very end, no matter how wounded you are. So when player is in trouble, if he gets wounded, game is not kicking him down. He is still capable to �ght back.

What else? If player gets wounded whole group suf-fers. It means that he doesn’t want to be hurt because all players will have troubles but on the other hand if he su�ers, he can still play and act and don’t feel like being next to the game. He is not having this bad feeling of being excluded from the group. He is in the game till the very end.

�e problem solved. Certainly, at that moment in the car I did have no idea how morale of team would work, but it was just small detail, right? �e thing – shi�ing wound penalty from one player to whole gro-up was the most important.

***

Few hours later I found something more. I can di�e-rentiate characters. Explorer will have only one level of complaining. He can gets six wounds in a row and he will say no single complain. He is explorer. He used to be in much worse shit. �e cook? My dear, cook is mo-aning pig, he complains a�er he gets three wounds, and then he complains a�er two wounds and then again, two wounds and again he is grumbling. You better have food for cook, if he is hungry, he will get 2 wounds and then will lament like a slaughtered calf.

It is fun. It – in very simple way – help diverse charac-ters. And it help feel the character, feel the theme, feel the story. One characters will decrease morale o�en, other not. Ones are moaning pigs, other are tough like John McClane. �is is simple and this is fun. �is is good.

***

When we arrived home I was relaxed. My game was re-paired. Vlaada pointed problems in my game, I managed to solve some of them during way home and now my game was much better than 3 days before. When I re-ached home I turn my laptop, open BGG and sent geek mail to Vlaada. I was eager to once again thank him for his help. And very eager to tell him that problem is alre-ady solved.

Well, what can I say... I may not look like Bruce Willis. But when I am pissed of I am getting better. Just like John McClane...

PART III

�e game ended badly. One of characters is dead. It is game over and it is game over in bad style. �ey had no chances. �ey weren’t even close. It wasn’t a good game.

‚You were unlucky. Too many bad events. It’s adventure game, sometimes you have luck, sometimes you don’t...’ I say. Vlaada is searching throught decks of cards. ‚�ere are good and bad events in all of those decks?’ he asks pointing four decks of cards.

‚Yep.’

‚You can’t have good events, here, Ignacy’ he says.

Did I just hear him saying the thing he just said?

‚Are you kidding?! You’ve just lost because of lack of good events!’

‚�ere can not be good events in those decks. You have to get rid of them. You don’t control the game at this mo-ment. Ignacy, you – as an author – have to have control over your game.’

OK, I have to admit it - at that very moment I wasn’t sure what he was talkin’ about. Remove good events? Why? Have control? How?!

I have, however, courage to ask. So I asked Vlaada to explain me. And he did.

‚How many good and bad events you designed in that deck?’ he asked pointing Event deck.

‚�ere are 40 good events and 60 bad events.’ I answered. ‚Robinson Crusoe: Adventure on the Cursed IslandSta-tistically you will have 3 bad and 2 good events in �rst part of the game and then again 3 bad and 2 good events in the second part of the game.’

‚You have to get rid of all good events. Ignacy you don’t control it. �is is bad. You can’t design game that you don’t control.’

Still no idea what he is talkin’ about. And still have co-urage to ask and learn.

‚Vlaada I don’t get it.’

He took one of my sheets of paper and my pen. ‚Look’ he said. ‚During set up you take �ve cards from this deck, right? You say that statisticaly there should be 3 bad and 2 good cards and that this is an avarage di�culty level, but...’ and he starter to write.

‚�ere may be:

5 bad, 0 good4 bad, 1 good3 bad, 2 good2 bad, 1 good1 bad, 0...’

‚I get it.’ I said.

‚You want game to be di�cult, you want game to throw at players 3 bad events and you want the game to help them twice. �at is your dream con�guration. But math is cruel. �ere will be games like ours today, with 4 bad events and only one good. �ere will be even games with 0 bad and 5 good events. Players will play it, will have 5 good events, �nish the game without smallest e�ort and then they will write on BGG that game is easy like piece of cake and bo-ring and they don’t recommend it.’

‚You are right.’

‚You need to control the game. Now it is rollercoaster. You have no idea what will happen. It may be extremely easy. It may be extremely hard. Your intended con�guration of 3/2 is only one of many possibilities. What about others? You have to remove all good events. You have to make it 5 bad events, 0 good events and then set di�culty of the game.’

‚Math sucks’ I said.

If I were Vlaada, I’d say that Robinson sucks but Vlaada is a nice person. He didn’t say that.

Conclusion? I had to take some about 120 events from 5 di�erent decks and throw them to the bin. I needed to take control over my game and to do so, I had to trash 40% of cards I was designing over last 4 months.

I did it. Without a blink of an eye.

�e Lesson? Few, actually.

Vlaada knows math.

Math is a bitch.

Game designers need to have courage to throw ideas to the bin and start right from the beginnig.

�at what game design is - no mercy.

I hate co-ops. I played countless number of di�erent cooperative games looking for the one I �nally �nd interesting. I played and played and it always was the same. Co-ops suck. Most of them at least. �ey suck, be-cause you can’t become winner. �ey suck because they don’t react for your actions and they act like moron. �ey suck becau-se your friend John drives you mad eve-rytime you play co-op by telling you what you should do this turn.Missed something? Oh, yes, I hate co-ops.I’d like to discuss this three issues here on Boardgames �at Tell Stories. Today I start with „I can’t win issue.” In next posts I will cover ‚Leader issue’ and ‚Dumb player is-sue’.

I can’t win issueSome players �nd it di�cult to not be an ultimate winner. To not crash opponents. To not be the best at the table. To not win against everybody. �ey just want win. Pure win.

When playing co-op game you win as a team. �ere is no one winner. In most ca-ses of course...

TraitorAt some point designers introduced traitor rule. You �nd it in Shadows over Camelot, you �nd it in Battlestar Galactica, you �nd it in plenty of other co-ops. Oh, yeah, this is fun. One player against others. He wins and is happy dancing in front of them and they are mad. Or the opposite. �ey won and are laughting and make fun of him and he is sad. Or mad. Or, let’s face it – he is pissed o�.

Aren’t games supposed to be fun?Right, I am not big fan of traitor in ga-mes. Either traitor or rest of players will be mad. I don’t �nd it fun. I don’t want my games make so-meone mad.

also against each other. You have to cooperate at

some level so the game doesn’t win, but on other

levels you all �ght – only one of you will win.

�is looks like great solution..

I have to admit – I haven’t played many of semi

co-ops. But my experience is bad – we play pi-

rate semi co-op. At some point of the game Mi-

chał Oracz sees that he will not win. He just lost

some resources and there is no way he can win

the game.

What does he do?

He does mess. He starts to destroy the game. He

does everything he can to make it hard for us. He

is drawning and he is taking all of us with him.

30 minutes later we all loose.

Was it legal? Yes, it was.

Was it fun? Try a guess.

One loser at the table and we all su�er. He can’t

play but he is not just loosing but he is also de-

stroying all fun we could have. Brillant.

Aren’t games supposed to be fun?

I know, Republic of Rome is known as one of the

best games on the planet. I know, Defenders of

the Realms are great too. But... I don’t know. Per-

haps I wasn’t lucky enough.

Anyway, semi co-ops have their fans. De gusti-

bus...

Role Playing roots

I play Role Playing Games since 1993. Will be

20 years soon. In high school I played twice

a week. In college I had less time, more things

However I know that Traitor solution is very popular. I know many players love it. So, what the hell, I don’t like it, I don’t think it is a good cure for ‚I can’t win’ issue, but de gustibus non est disputandum...Semi co-opAt some point designers found di�erent solution for „I can’t win is-sue”. �ey created semi co-ops. Semi co-ops have an intere-sting concept – you all play against the game, but

text: Ignacy Trzewiczwkillustration: Mateusz Bielski

also against each other. You have to cooperate at

some level so the game doesn’t win, but on other

levels you all �ght – only one of you will win.

�is looks like great solution..

I have to admit – I haven’t played many of semi

co-ops. But my experience is bad – we play pi-

rate semi co-op. At some point of the game Mi-

chał Oracz sees that he will not win. He just lost

some resources and there is no way he can win

the game.

What does he do?

He does mess. He starts to destroy the game. He

does everything he can to make it hard for us. He

is drawning and he is taking all of us with him.

30 minutes later we all loose.

Was it legal? Yes, it was.

Was it fun? Try a guess.

One loser at the table and we all su�er. He can’t

play but he is not just loosing but he is also de-

stroying all fun we could have. Brillant.

Aren’t games supposed to be fun?

I know, Republic of Rome is known as one of the

best games on the planet. I know, Defenders of

the Realms are great too. But... I don’t know. Per-

haps I wasn’t lucky enough.

Anyway, semi co-ops have their fans. De gusti-

bus...

Role Playing roots

I play Role Playing Games since 1993. Will be

20 years soon. In high school I played twice

a week. In college I had less time, more things

on my head but... Yep, played RPG twice a week again.

�en I founded Portal and had time only for one game

per week. �ese days I play once or twice a month. Too

much work on boardgames...

Anyway, for past two decades I was learning that team

play is fun. We played as a group of adventurers or inve-

stigators or samurai warriors or whatever – one for all all

for one. �is is how I played for 20 years.

I can’t win issue? I don’t �nd it issue. I �nd it fun. I �nd it

a big advantage of co-ops. I like the concept. I like sitting

with my friends and discussing what to do, helping each

other, trying to �ght against the game. In Ro-

binson I didn’t introduce traitor nor semi co-op

solutions. I like co-ops in their base format – we

all play. We all win or we all loose. �ats most

sigini�cent trait of co-ops.

For many of you this may be issue. For me this

is a great feature of co-ops games. �is is why

they are worth playing. �is is why they are

worth working on and trying to make them

better. I was trying to �x ‚Dumb player issue’

in Robinson. I was trying to �x ‚Leader issue’

in Robinson. But ‚I can’t be a winner issue’?

I didn’t touch it. For me this is feature, not pro-

blem.

Last time I talked about ‚I can’t win’ issue. �is was a

minor problem. I wouldn’t even call it a problem. �e

big one? �e big problem of co-ops? Leader problem!

Oh, yes, this is the reason why most of you don’t want to

hear about playing co-op, right?

Leader problemLeader problem is a situation when you play cooperative

game and one of players, let’s call him John, tells you

what you should do in your turn. You play as a team.

You all want to win, you all want to do your best, you

all have ideas what to do. But John is trying to convince

you that his idea is the best. He tells you that you should

follow his plan and all of you should listen to him. His is

forcing you to play his way.

It drives you mad. It makes you pissed o�. You feel fru-

stration and anger. It has nothing to do with having fun.

When you are �nished, you are no longer interested in

playing with John. No longer interested in playing that

game. No longer interested in playing any co-op ever.

Never ever.

In some cases it may be John’s fault. It is matter of that

– he is asshole. He ruins the game, he doesn’t care about

your ideas, he is forcing everybody to play as he wants

because he is sel�sh jerk. As long as publishing compa-

nies won’t decide to put a gun into box, you will have

to deal with John and problem won’t be �xed. No game

designer can handle with dunderhead player.

But...

In most cases it is not John’s fault. �is is not due to the

fact that he is asshole. �is is due to the fact that coope-

rative games suck. As simple as that.

Tic Tac ToeHere is an exercise – we will play Tic Tac Toe. We are in

the middle of the game. We play circles. Situation on the

board looks like that:

I played plenty of games of Tic Tac Toe, but today I have an awesome idea. ‚Let’s put it here, it will be just aweso-me, look!’ I say pointing space where I want us to put third circle.

Ann is not convinced. She has other idea. She wants to create this upside down L shape which she �nds cool. She wants us to put our third circle here:

John is looking at us and I think he doesn’t believe what he’s just heard. ‚Are you fuckin’ mad?’ he starts to yell at me and Ann. ‚We have to put circle here! We put it here or we loose! Are you with me or not?’ He points space where we should put our third circle.

Me and Ann grumble for a moment. We think that he is dunderhead but �nally we agree. It turns that he was

right. Blah. Damn jerk.

So here is the question: Is John a jerk or just Tic Tac Toe is not a cooperative game?

Tic Tac Toe is One Answer Game. �ere is no space for discussion. �ere is no room for debate. �ere is no chan-ce to cooperate and work together to �nd great plan. It is One Answer Game. �ere is only one good answer and all other have to go to trash.

�at is why cooperative games suck. �at is why Leader problem arises. Leader - John knows right answer. He played few times, he has experience in that game, he looks at the board and he sees it as a Tic Tac Toe. He forces you to play his way. Not because he is sel�sh jerk. It is because he knows Answer. It is because co-ops are One Answer Games. �ey are just like Tic Tac Toe. �ey have better artwork. �ey have interesting theme. �ey have a little bit more sophisticated rules.

But at their roots they are just Tic Tac Toe. �ey are just puzzle.

So...

Well, I was not brave enough to put a gun into box of Ro-binson Crusoe so you could solve Leader problem. To be honest I was never ever convinced that Leader problem is John’s fault anyway. I believe that problem lies here – co--ops are just One Answer Games.

And knowing that I started to work on Robinson Crusoe...

text: Ignacy Trzewiczwkillustration: Mateusz Bielski

As I explained in previous article I don’t blame John. I don’t think it is his fault. He sees best move on the board, he sees One Answer and he tells other players that they should make that one best move. What do you expect from John? Do you expect him staying silent and seeing other players making wrong choices and loosing the game? Nope. He wants to win. He tells what they should do. That’s the case.

When I sat down to work on Ro-binson I knew I have to get rid of One Answer issue. I knew I have to give players choices. I have to give them fuel for discussion. I have to give them this awesome feeling that it is so much to do and they have to decide what to do. And „decide” is the key word. I need players to de-cide. I need them to have different options, different possible moves.

Long term goalFirst thing was to make sure that there is a long term goal. Players have to build pile of wood (first

scenario) and they have 12 rounds to do it. It is long term. They know that during this 12 rounds they will have to remember about gathering wood and putting it on pile.

What is the aim of the scenario? It is simple - gather wood.How we can achieve it? Not so simple. You have so many different ways.

Find mountains and build axe so you will produce more Wood every single round.Find plains, make rope and build mast on the pile.Find mud, make bricks and furna-ce so you won’t loose Wood during winter time.Build weapon, hunt animals. Use Fur to build roof and saved that way Wood use on pile.Care about determination tokens for Carpenter so you will save Wood pieces.Gather Wood, every round go and bring Wood.Find river, draw map and make shortcut to produce more Wood...

And that’s – certainly – not all. These are just a few examples. Dif-ferent strategies. Different appro-ach. Fuel for discussion. Fuel for debate. This is what co-op should be. All players together discussing what to do. Making choices. Argue. Having fun. No room for Leader who has One Right Answer.

Short blanketDifferent strategy for a long time goal is not enough. It is a good beginning but still, it is just begin-ning. I needed to put more choices so I put a lot of short time goals. Weather is deadly, so you have to build roof. Animals are deadly so you have to build palisade. Sources are in short supply so you have to explore the island. Morale drops down every few minutes so you have to fight back and move it up. In a moment it turns out that this Wood gathering goal is a really long time goal. At this very mo-ment you have to think about all the other stuff...

Yes, you need roof.

text: Ignacy Trzewiczwk

illustration: Mateusz Bielski

Yes, you need palisade.Yes, you need weapon.Yes, you need high morale.Yes, you need to �nd River and Pla-ins...

You can’t do everything. You have

not enough action pawns. You have to choose. You have to make decision. You will discuss. You will decide to do roof not palisade. You will decide to go for Exploration not for gathering Wood. You will decide to not build Weapon but go for Morale. So many choices, so many consequences. �ere is no room for One Right Answer provi-ded to you but Wise Leader...

�reat actionsAnd then I put �reat actions into Robinson. Every single round the-re is a new action appearing on board. You make it or it will get discarded and you will have nasty consequences. It is on board and is shouting: ‚You need to make this action or it gonna hurt you!’

You have two rounds to get rid of �reat action. You do it now, next round or never. So you again di-scuss. So you again debate. Do we ignore it? Do we resolve it? Now or later? What to do?! Anyone?

Choices are better than gunIt turned out that putting many choices is far better than putting a gun into a box. Choices kill ‚John’. With so many decisions Leader problem is getting low. �ere is no ‚we have to’. �ere is only ‚we need to...’

We need to make roof. We need to make palisade. We need to gather wood. We need to get rid of this stupid threat...

So what are you going to do? I do-n’t know. I don’t know the answer. Because there is no One good An-swer for this question.

Robinson is co-op game where co-operation and discussion matters. You discuss. You choose. You have fun.

I will not tell you that Leader pro-blem doesn’t exist in Robinson. But a�er these all test games I have to say – it is much lower than in many co-ops I’ve seen. Choices and di�e-rent strategies are better than gun. �ey kill Leaders.

Hey all. �is is my „short” report from my session in Robinson Crusoe. I hope You will enjoy reading this as much as i enjoyed making it for You. A�er several games I’ve played at Por-tal o�ce Ignacy prepared an extra copy of Robinson’ prototype for me so I could test it at home. My �rst co-player was my wife. I thought it will be more like a single player version with 2 characters and a nice company of my wife asking from time to time ‘Are we still winning?’ but the game was so nail-biter that Gosia (my wife) fell into it totally. My wife is a newbie in board gaming world and she was shocked with the num-bers of cards, tokens and markers in Ro-binson. It took few minutes to shu�e all decks, put initial Items on the board and prepare characters to play. I thought it would be best to play starting scenario – Castaways - so we wouldn’t have to bother about an extra stu� coming on the event cards and land tiles. For the starting event we have chosen ‚Captains Chest’ to get the advantage of additional starting item. In 2 players variant we have little help of ‚Fri-day’ – extra character. All other cards are randomly chosen. We got: Characters: Explorer and Carpenter.With Explorer we can take a look at 3 land tiles and select one and put it on top – this way we can easily �nd required resources. Carpenter will give us great advantage in building items so we will have nice infra-structure. Random items: Drum, Basket, Shield, Sack, Lantern.

With Bakset and Sack we will be able to strengthen Gathering action. It will be possible to bring 3 Wood pieces in one action! Starting items: Pipe & Tobacco and Revolver �at was cool – twice per game we can get 2 determination tokens from Tobacco and with Revolver we were able to make one or two hunting’s. Lukcy draw!

LET THE GAME BEGIN

Turn 1Event phase In the �rst turn you don’t draw event card. �ere is a starting event - “Captain’s Chest”.Morale phase We do not get any Determination tokes because at the beginning of the game Mo-rale is 0.Production phase During production phase we get 1 Wood and 1 Food.Action phase From my experience most important thing is to get high Morale so you bene-�t from free Determination Tokens and possible healing later in the game. So we sent 2 meeples (1 explorer and 1 Carpen-ter) went for Arrange camp action to raise Morale by 2. We cleaned our camp, Mo-

rale goes up!

We also decided to use Pipe & Tobacco for Explorer special skill to look at land tiles and we have chosen tile with River (with production of 1 Wood and 1 Food and with one treasure on it). �en we as-signed 1 Explorer meeple for Exploration action. He succeeded but with an adven-ture. It was a windy day and he get ‘Flu’ (discard 1 Food or shu�e Flu into event deck!). As we had only 1 Food we decided to shu�e Flu into event deck. Sooner or later this �u will make problems and we all get fever and illness... Treasure we fo-und was “Big leaves’ - they will be great aid when we get to many rain clouds. 1 Carpenter meeple with a little help of ‘Friday’ went to build Shelter (we use Pipe & Tobacco to get 2 Determinations tokens

possible to bring 3 Wood

Starting items: Pipe &

�at was cool – twice per game we can get 2

We also decided to use Pipe & Tobacco

text: Roman Sadownikillustrations: Mateusz Bielski, Mateusz Lenart, Michał Zieliński

to activate Carpenter’s special skill to pro-duce 1 Wood).Weather phase None at this moment.Night phase We had only 1 Food so Carpenter did not eat and received 2 wounds because of hunger. We had shelter so slept in peace (ah and we moved camp to river tile).

2nd TurnEvent phase We draw Rapid River event! Next Explo-ration action will go with an adventure no matter if we go with 2 meeples or only one. Terrain around us is dangerous be-cause of this river �ood...Morale phase Carpenter gets 2 Determination tokens and he got 4 now.Production phase We get 1 Wood 1 Food. To win scenario we have to build big big big wood pile so we should start already. We put 1 Wood on the pile.Action phase We had already discovered a River tile so we could make a Map (it gives an extra meeple for Explore action!) but what is

more important with a Map we could build Shortcut to get an extra resource during Production phase! �ere was no pla-ce for risk - we had to build it for sure! Carpenter used his skill to get extra help in Building action to make a Map with no roll. We also had to sent 2 people to re-solve ‘Captains

chest’ event or it will be discar-ded! Di�cult situation. We have assigned 1 Explorer with ‘Friday’ to complete the event. On the ‘Capta-ins chest” we get 1 Wood and ran-dom Starting item – ‘Hammer and few nails’ – this was good! We have 2 additional workers for build action. �is is really useful! Second Explorer meeple was sent on Exploration (checked tiles with Explorer skill and we have chosen Mountain tile with 1 Food 1 Wood and one treasure – this way we could make Fire and Knife). Explorer had combo-roll, he rolled suc-cess and wound and adventure! Adventu-re is ‘Empty Forest’ which we shu�ed into

event deck. We see that there are not too many small animals in forest. Sooner or later predators will turn to attack us... Last meeple was sent to Arrange the camp and increase Morale to maximum.Weather phase None at this moment.Night phase Once again we had only 1 Food – this time Explorer had nothing to eat – 2 wo-unds.

3rd TurnEvent phase We draw Earthquake event. We had to turn face down beach tile and from this moment it was inaccessible. To discard this event we need Shovel which we can’t build now as we have no access to shells! Damn! It was an extremely unlucky.Morale phase Explorer heals 1 wound.Production phase We received 1 Wood and 1 Food.Action phase Explorer used his skill to reveal next land tile – hills with wood and beast and 2 tre-asures. He sent his meeple with Map and went to Explore hills. We sent also 1 Explorer (plus extra aid from ‘Hammer and nails’) to build Short-cut. 1 Carpenter with second ‘Hammer and nails’ builds Roof level 1 – we had to prepare for rainy season. Friday with se-cond Carpenter make Fire. It was a good round. Our shelter has a Roof, we have Fire and we’ve made Shortcut, so we will be able to produce more resources since now. It looked really nice. We were proud.Weather phase None at this moment.

Night phase We had place to sleep (with awesome Roof!) but again Explorer had nothing to eat! We had a constant problem with Food...

4th Turn 4th round represents beginning of au-tumn. �is is when weather die comes into play.Event phase In event phase card Rapid River goes o� the board (as we did not manage to di-scard it previously!) and this is bad, really really bad. Its threat e�ect is deadly – we have no production phase this turn. River steals everything... Gosia said that we are going to die now. Well it’s not that bad but yes – weather is on and we have no Food and no Wood. It will be harsh times. Time to use Carpenter’s special skill and take a look at invention cards to �nd so-mething useful! We took 5 cards and we found..... Furnace! Yes, we will not have to worry about winter anymore! Hope is back. �anks to Carpenter we will bu-ild Furnace! But �rst, we have to build Bricks... Still we are in event phase, so it is time to take a new event: Hurricane! Arrange the camp action requires additional meeple this turn. Sweet.Morale phase Explorer gets 2 Determination tokens and he takes a look at new land tiles. We found last resource – Plains with Wood and Food production and with 1 Treasure.Production phase Nope.

so we could make a Map (it gives an extra meeple for Explore action!) but what is

more important with a

to build it for sure! Carpenter used his skill to get extra help in Building action to make a Map with no roll. We also had to sent 2 people to re

Action phase One Explorer went to discard Hurricane event. We need to clean the mess a�er this deadly blows. Second Explorer with Map went for Explore action. We had to Gather resources for the Wood pile so ‘Friday’ went on Gather ac-tion. Gosia rolls for him... – no Success but with Wound and Adventure so it gives him overall 2 wounds (it was so lousy!)! It looks like sabotage! We sent him for Wood, and he comes back wounded, with no Wood at all... Carpenter (with extra meeple from Can-dle) builds Bricks and second Carpenter builds Pot but with adventure – ‘Con-struction is weak’ – we shu�e into deck – when comes back we will have to lower roof level by half. I have no doubt – it will collapse when winter comes, in worst mo-ment that is...Weather phase It is �rst time to roll Weather dice – as I am unlucky I asked Gosia to roll. It was

a good decision. We got only one cloud icon! With Roof level 1 we are safe!Night phase Again, we have nothing to eat – both Explorer and Carpenter gets 2 wo-unds. We use Herbs founded on one of tiles to heal 2 wounds on ‘Friday’

5th TurnEvent phase Wrecked balloon – we hear catastrophe of balloon and our Morale is decreased by 1.Morale phase We decided to heal 1 wound on Explorer.Production phase We get 1 Wood and 1 Food and additio-nally 1 Wood from a Shortcut! U�! We put 2 Wood pieces on the pile.

Action phase It’s time for hunting! �ere is only one beast in beast deck. We have 1 strength of Weapon but we also have Revolver with two bullets (our starting item!). We need Furs for Roof and for Sack so yes, we need to kill animal. Two Explorers went for Hunting action. We crossed �ngers for some big animal as we had only 2 ammo in the Revolver and we could not a�ord to waste these bullets for small animal! We reveal the card and... It is Goat! It has 5 Strength, so we �red twice! We received 3 Food, 2 Fur but we also dropped 1 in Strength. It was tough �ght.

I am unlucky I asked Gosia to roll. It was

safe!Night phase Again, we have nothing to eat – both Explorer and Carpenter gets 2 wounds. We use Herbs founded on one of tiles to heal 2 wounds on ‘Friday’

5th TurnEvent phase Wrecked balloon – we hear catastrophe of balloon and our Morale is decreased by 1.Morale phase We decided to heal 1 wound on Explorer.Production phase We get 1 Wood and 1 Food and additionally 1 Wood from a Shortcut! U�! We put 2 Wood pieces on the pile.

strength of Weapon but we also have Revolver with two bullets (our starting item!). We need Furs for Roof and for Sack so yes, we need to kill animal. Two Explorers went for Hunting action. We crossed �ngers for some big animal as we had only 2 ammo in the Revolver and we could not a�ord to waste these bullets for small animal! We reveal the card and... It is Goat! It has 5 Strength, so we �red twice! We received 3 Food, 2 Fur but we also dropped 1 in Strength. It was tough �ght.

the pile.

One Carpenter with ‘Friday’ make Knife. Second Carpenter went to make Basket. I roll die – I have success and wound. Car-penter dropped 1 level down and Morale went down as well. �is is bad.Weather phase Gosia rolled 2 Rainy clouds. We had Roof level 1 so we had to use Big leaves token to deal with this heavy rain. Lucky we had it.Night phase We ate 2 foods. We used 1 Food in Pot to heal Carpenter. 1 Food was wasted.

6th TurnEvent phase Earthquake goes out of the board and be-ach tile is lost for ever... New event – Unusually cold night. It me-ans that night was very cold and we have to discard 2 wood pieces. We have only 1 wood so everyone gets 1 wound. It was cold night, indeed...Morale phase Carpenter gets 2 Determination tokens. As we are not going to explore any more land tiles we decide to use Explorer special skill – he picks 2 treasures and keeps one. He found Goat – yeah – food and fur!Production phase We get 1 food and 1 wood and we decide to take 1 Food from Shortcut.Action phase 1 Explorer goes to discard Wrecked balloon event. He searched what rema-ins and found Old Rapier - yeah – I always wanted to be a soldier. (Old rapier will raise our strength by 2 up to 3 now). Second explorer goes to Gather Wood with Basket. Unfor-tunately, he rolls adventure and this is end of the source. No more wood from this tile... 1 Carpenter with 3 Determination tokens (to generate an extra aid) bu-ilds Furnace. It was hard work and some may say not necessary as we had �re but believe me, on cold win-ter nights it’s really nice to sleep next to nice warm furnace. Second Carpenter goes to raise Morale by 1. Friday builds Sack. I was afraid that he will get hurt with the needle but luckily, he got suc-cess and no wound/adventure.. I’ve just noticed that we should build Snare already to get Food from it and use Shortcut to get more Wood! So I said we have to build it next turn. Gosia asked how to do it without a Rope and this was good point. It’s really shame on us that we had no Rope on turn 6th. Have to �x it asap.Weather phase We had one cloud. With our brand new

Furnace it was piece of cake.Night phase We ate 2 Food.

7th TurnEvent phase We draw new event, Frost and we have to put snow token on weather space. I never thought that nights on Tropic Island could be so so cold. Good we have Furnace!Morale phase Explorer heals 1 wound. When You see things going good and You got faith that You will soon leave this forgotten by Gods island You get stronger.Production phase We get 1 wood and 1 food. And we take 1 Food from the Shortcut. We put 3 woods on the pile.Action phase Frost is not good for my old bones. We need to get rid of it so Carpenter takes 1 Fur and goes to discard Frost card – he made a carpet I think. Second Carpen-ter builds Rope (with little help from ‘Friday’). Two Explorer meeples we send to Gather Wood (with Basket and Sack). �ey bring 3 Wood. �at is a good num-ber!Weather phase Weather roll was going to kill us... Well not that bad, but it was hard. We had 1 Snow cloud from Frost event and Gosia rolled 2 Rain clouds – typically early win-ter. We ignored Snow cloud with Furnace. 2 Rain clouds le�... As our Roof was only 1, we lack one c l o -ud... We had to discard 1 Wood and 1 Food.Night phase Oh. It’s time to kill Goat! �anks for that! Both of us have some-thing to eat but what we will do next? No Food s u p p l i e s , we can’t go hunting we really need that snare build asap. I really miss Cook character….

8th TurnEvent phase Raging River is a de-adly one! We have only

1, we lack one c l o -ud... We had to discard 1 Wood

Oh. It’s time to kill Goat! �anks for that! Both of

-thing to eat but what we

asap. I really miss

Raging River is a de-adly one! We have only

half production this round! We can’t believe it...Morale phase We heal 1 wound.Production phase 2 Food and 1 Wood turns into 1 food. �is is a dramatic moment. It’s not like it will kill us but it really ruined our plans, and it looked so easy to complete…Action phase Carpenter with 1 Fur goes to discards Unusual Cold Night event. Ha. Carpet was not enough. We have to put some furs on the walls as well. Second Carpen-ter meeple is sent to build Snare. Explo-rer with Friday goes to build 2nd level of Roof. Second Explorer goes to Gather wood with Sack and Basket. Succeeded, but with adventure ‘Path of the Predator’. We have to shu�e it into event deck. So now we have all together 5 events and 4 adventures shu�ed into deck. Soon we will su�er...Weather phase Weather roll and 2 rainy clouds – nothing happens. Our Roof is strong enough.Night phase We have only 1 Food. Carpenter eats , Explorer gets 2 wounds. He passes morale level and Morale goes 1 down.

9th TurnEvent phase We draw a card, this is adventure card that we shu�ed to event deck few minutes ago... It is Empty forest. Now all beats are hungry and have +1 Strength. Not to scary for us as we didn’t seen any beast around for a while. Is the winter to cold ? We draw another card... Construction is weak! Roof goes down to 1. Damn you! We put so much e�ort to raise it to level 2. Gosia is bit depressed but we still have 3 more turns and lucky we have lots of wood in the stock and this is most important. We will succeed when we make wood pile big enough to make �re seen from the hori-zon. Even if we complete with last bre-ath… well this would be not good to build and die so not last but almost last. So we draw another card... What a surprise – we have commutation! Finally we draw event. �is is Predators! Source of food nearest our camp is cove-red with black marker. Predators killed small animals... And I was so happy few minutes ago that we didn’t seen any beast for a long time. Good we have a Shortcut...Morale phase Explorer gets 2 determination tokens.Production phase We have 1 Wood and 0 Food from our

tile, plus 1 Wood from shortcut, plus 1 Food from Snare... We put 1 Wood on the pile to complete the level.Action phase Carpenter with ‘Friday’ goes to discard Predators. We need our poor little animals for us. We can’t share this source. Second Carpenter with Explorer goes to build Mast (Carpenter uses 2 tokens to satisfy Wood cost). And we get 3 woods from this to put on pile! 1 Explorer goes to Ar-range the camp and move up Morale. Yes as I said at the start of our adventure. Mo-rale is most important not only at begging but all the time.Weather phase 2 rainy clouds. Roof is level one so we have to discard 1 Wood and 1 Food. We are going to starve again but it should not be a surprise on small island in the middle of nowhere. With only one desire – GET OUT OF HERE !!… so we have to build a pile – food is not important.Night phase Explorer eats last food, Carpenter have nothing to eat. Gets 2 wound and pass second condition. Morale drops down... Explorer can hold only 5 wounds and Carpenter only 4. We are in bad shape...

Turn 10Event phase �e only thing that can kill us now is the unlucky event draw as we will have eno-ugh wood to complete the pile and get help. I’ve crossed my �ngers and Gosia draws a card and it is…… Vertigo !! ( �rst player will have only 1 meeple available! )

Yes ! Yes! We did it. We will survive event phaseMorale phase Carpenter gets 2 determination to-kens.Production phase In production we get 2 woods and 1 food. We put 5 woods on the pile and it is done. We are saved! We won! It was the ‚easiest’ scenario. We did it in Turn 10 while this scenario have 12 turns! Good job. I have to admit we had lots of luck and lots of expe-rience in Robinson. In my opinion it’s crucial to build pile as soon as possi-ble. You could say we had two more turns forehead but it’s much easier to die in those two turns then to survi-ve. With our lousy Roof it would be hard... It’s my �rst game report... it’s not perfect i know but it’s really hard to make report from game where you have so much opportunities and so many actions you can take. You feel like it’s waste of time to notice each action in the note. And remember. Never say: ‘I’ll re-member this and notice this later. I’ll make update a�er this turn’.

Kind Regards.

I don’t know how other desi-gners work. I don’t know if I am a freak among designers or I am a clasical example. But I want to tell you how it looks. How it lo-oked with Robinson. I spent last year on the Island. Really... For me 2012 was year of Robin-son Crusoe because for the last 12 months I only read adventure books. I really mean it. I read a lot of Julius Verne novels. I read all novels I could find about ca-staways. I read all books about survival I could find. I read also comic books and I – certainly – watched all movies I could find that were about deserted Island or castaways. I read about tens of ways of making fire. I read about buil-ding shelter from almost nothing. I read how to find water, I read how to find north without com-pas, I read everything I could. I am – with no doubt – one of the most educated persons on this planet... in terms of castaways... If, by any chance, you are on the deserted Island, just call me. I will teach you how to survive. You don’t need to worry.

* For me 2012 was year of Ro-binson Crusoe because every single weekend of this year I had prototype of the game set up in our living room. Our home was literally paralyzed by Robinson. The game is big, it covered near-ly whole table in our living room (I have to say – we have a big table). Because of Robinson we had mess on that table for every single weekend of 2012. I played it all the time, every single week-end, I drove my wife crazy with this tokens, cards, notes, dice with all that stuff that was living with us this year. It was like part of our furniture. We had sofa, we had table, we

had chairs and we had Robin-son. It was part of our everyday life.

* 2012 was year of Robinson Crusoe for my whole family. Kids have grown – it is a year of time! - and they saw and hear all the time about Robinson. They di-scovered this story. They played prototype with me. They played live Robinson all the time. They built real shelter in our garden (ok, I helped them a little), they spent countless hours in our gar-den hunting imaginary beasts, strengthening the roof or sear-ching for treasures. With no do-ubt, if in 20 years I ask my kids about summer 2012, they will tell ’It was time of Robinson’.

* 2012 was year of Robinson Crusoe because it really touched our every day life. We spent holi-days this year by the sea and of course I had Robinson with me. Game was with us all the time. Sometimes it touched our life in a funny way. I remember one Sunday few weeks ago. I was a little bit late for a dinner, I entered the room, all kids were already eating and there was no plate for me on the table. I asked: ’Hey, what about me? I don’t eat?!’ And I heared answer from 10 years old Nina: ’You know, it is like in Robinson. There is never enought food... Today you get 2 wounds’ Woow. That was accurate...

* Next week I am in Essen. My adventure with Robinson ends. I finally leave the Island. I am final-ly free. I spent here whole year of my life. It was great but that’s enough. It is time for you to visit the Island. I strongly recommend it. This is a great adventure.

It’s Essen 2012. I am watching players playing Ro-

binson Crusoe. At some point one of the them draws

Discovery token with brown worker icon. „We found

a worker!” he says. They are happy. It will help them

build Roof. However I have to I interrupt them. „This

is a candle.’’I say.

They look at the token. Then they look at me with

their faces shouting „Candle?! WTF?”

Yes, this is candle...

It is always the same. First I design story, then I

adapt rules. So at the very beginning players were

finding Candles, Goats, Old machetes, Pirate chests

and other stuff. All the things you can find on the de-

serted Island. The story was most important.

Then all these items got their own rules. I look

at them and started creating rules. Candles let you

work longer in the night (so you may got additional

pawn), Goat can be killed and give you food and fur... Every single rule was connected with a par-ticular discovery token.

And then? And then it turned out that we can not put names of the discoveries on tokens. The-re is no space for name of discovery. Only space for icon. Tokens are too small.

That’s how my discoveries, born from the sto-ry, changed into „brown meeple”. And that’s how many of you may start think... „I went to jungle. I found something. I found brown meeple. WTF?” Here I am. Look at the genesis of tokens...

CandlesThese are old candles or lanterns. You find them and now you can work in the evening and night! You don’t need to hurry, you may work slowly and work for a long time. You have whole night ahead. That is why you gain Brown meeple. If you build for a long time, you finally do it. It will be a success.

GoatIn the forest you found a goat. You bring it to the camp. Later on you will be able to kill it (if you have 1 Strength of Weapon at least). If you kill Goat, you receive 1 Food and 1 Fur.

text: Ignacy Trzewiczek

illustrations: Mateusz Bielski

photos: Jakub Niedźwiedź, Tiago Duarte

CandlesThese are old candles or lanterns. You find them and now you can work in the evening and night! You don’t need to hurry, you may work slowly and work for a long

GoatIn the forest you found a goat. You bring it to the camp. Later on you will be able to kill it (if you have 1 Strength of Weapon at least). If you kill Goat, you receive 1 Food and 1 Fur.

Old macheteOld machete, probably left here by some fearsome pirate, arr, arr!

SpicesYou found glade with spices. Your soup and other food will finally taste good! If you have a Pot you will do a tremendous soup. Morale of all team mates will go up!

PoisonYou found glade with deadly plants. You can gather their fruits and if you have Pot, you can prepare poison from them! Your weapon will be much more deadly now...

VegetablesYou found glade with vegetables. If you have Pot, you can make a strong healing soup that will help you with illness and make you feel much better.

HerbsYou found glade with herbs. If you have Pot, you can make a different cures and medications.

Thorny bushesYou found an extremely thorny bushes. You bring it to the camp and you can use it as a great way to strengthen your fence and to make you more safe in your camp!

Big leavesYou found a really big and strong leaves, you can bring them to the camp and use them as a roof. They will not last long (only one use) but at some point they may be very handy.TobaccoYuppi! There is a tobacco on the Island! Morale in the team goes up!

Old macheteOld machete, probably left here by some fearsome pirate, arr, arr!

SpicesSpicesYou found glade with spices. Your soup and other food will finally taste good! If you have a Pot you will do a tremendous soup. Morale of all team mates will go up!

Spices

PoisonYou found glade with deadly plants. You can gather their fruits and if you have Pot, you can prepare poison from them! Your weapon will be much more deadly now...

HerbsYou found glade with herbs. If you have Pot, you can make a different cures and medications.

Thorny bushes

VegetablesYou found glade with vegetables. If you have Pot, you can make a strong healing soup that will help you with illness and make you feel much better.

weapon will be much more deadly now...

make you feel much better.

Thorny bushesYou found an extremely thorny bushes. You bring it to the camp and you can use it as a great way to strengthen your fence and to make you more safe in your camp!

Thorny bushes

Big leavesYou found a really big and strong leaves, you can bring them to the camp and use them as a roof. They will not last long (only one use) but at some point they may be very handy.

fence and to make you more safe in your camp!

TobaccoYuppi! There is a tobacco on the Island! Morale in the team goes up!

(only one use) but at some point they may be very handy.

text: Micha³ „Walec” Walczakillustrations: Jakub Jabłoński

It is by no means reassuring, that the last line of defense of humani-ty, the all bold and brave Outpost, numbers but a few souls (lowest number of soldiers compared with other factions). They’re not known for their toughness, and you will have a problem to find them war-ring a armor. And if that is not eno-ugh, they don’t use any nets to tie the enemy down. You won’t be able to play “push back” tile on your ad-versary. Yet, despite all this, Outpost tro-ops still hold their ground against all odds! Heartless Machines, cru-el Mutants, rough gangs from He-gemony, the whole lot. They still stand, undefeated, proud, with their back straight and their chins up high. And trust me boy, it`s not going to change easily, as it takes a lot more to break their spirit. Being able to survive despite all this disadvantages is intriguing. But so is the Outpost. It is by far the most interesting, agile and surprising faction of all. Get a good grasp of what it is like to play Outpost, di-scover what is has to offer, and see the enemy lying dead under your feet!

Outpost in numbers Out of 35 tiles in the game, six of them are battle orders, and an astonishing number of seven is devoted to movement. But there is a tradeoff for all this mobility. You will find only twelve soldiers under your command. Not enough? Well, think of it that way, as many as nine of them have “Ranged Attack” abili-ty. Combined together, and you can give a whole new meaning to what “Fire and Maneuvers” stands for. Still not convinced? Well here is how it looks in numbers. You will have a 43% chance to draw a Mo-vement tile, 37% for a battle order, 65% to draw a soldier tile and, bet-

ter still, a 52% chance to draw a soldier who is able to shoot. Now you got your numbers rights, let move on to tactics.

Entrenchment means bad luck

Back in the old days, soldiers valued shovels more than their rifles... Silly, right? Every game starts with the HQ placement. If you happen to be the first player to make a move, place your HQ right in the middle of the battle board. Do not dig in somewhere away from the center. There are four very good reasons for that. For one thing, if you are in the middle, you will have many more escape routes in case the things will turn ugly. Remember, flexibi-lity is the word. You have around 40% chance to draw a Movement card each turn! If your opponent gives your enough breathing space by not starting the battle, you can simply withdraw from the hex on which the whole hell will break lo-ose soon, into one, where you can enjoy battle view, from the distance. Yes, perhaps it is not what a hero would do, but it does not matter. It is cunning, it’s smart, and it works. Secondly, consider this. If you pla-ce your HQ in the middle of the bo-ard, you make it very hard for the opponent to keep it under the net for long. Enemy “Net Units” will be exposed and vulnerable without the safety provided by the edges of the board. Hunker down somewhere in the corner, and you will regret this decision all the way to the grave... On the top of that, remember that no matter where you opponent puts his or her HQ, you will always have at least one spot, behind your own HQ, from which you will be able to shoot at the enemy. And trust me, that counts.

Third important reason is as fol-lows: HQ supporting melee combat by increasing strength or initiative (mainly Borgo and Hegemony), will have to place their HQ in the middle ring. It will be much easier to run away from them, and what follows, move away from enemy unit that’s being supported by their HQ What if you are running low on good luck, an your adversary puts his HQ on the battlefield first? Well, remember, you are the Outpost, do what you do best: adjust! Put your HQ right on the middle ring. If the opponent’s HQ is placed somewhe-re in the remote corner (as happens mostly with Moloch army) you can act twofold. You can try to hide in the remote corner and engage in the exchange of fire over the long range ... or try to place your HQ in such a way, so that it touches the edge of the battle board on one side, and enemy’s HQ on the other. Thanks to that move, the perk from your HQ will always work (even for your melee units). At the same time, if your Moloch opponent wo-uld like to attack your HQ with his units boosted by the HQ perk, then they would have to be placed right next to your HQ. That means they will not stay there for long (one or two battles at the most, before they perish!). That also gives you rather

nice, easy to bunker place, from which you can inflict some range damage with your HQ bonus!.

Control the situation. During the game, you will have the highest chance to draw a battle tile, the catch is that you also stand the lowest chance to draw a soldier. That is why, it will be so crucial for you to adapt to the changing situ-ation on the battlefield. Remember: each gain is welcome, but if you are about to end the battle inflicting only one or two points of damage to your opponent, you will have to consider carefully pros and cons of this. Loss of a mutant, a thug or a machine is frankly nothing, compa-red to the loss of your soldier. My advice is: a good battle is the battle

after which there is at least one re-maining Outpost soldier, aiming at the opponent’s HQ. That will force your enemy to deal with this pro-blem first, before he or she can

move on to attacking your HQ.

Don`t hesitate. Fight!

Imagine that you draw a Anni-hilator tile and the order for bat-

tle. You can place the Annihilator right behind your HQ and start the battle. Four points of damage dealt easily to your opponent, isn’t it? But that is not just a straight luck. Outpost draw, usually provides you with precisely such a combination. Someone to do the shooting and a order for battle to trigger the fight. It is like a powder keg, all it takes is a little spark... In theory, if as a result of the bat-tle you are about to be hit for two damage (say, by a ganger who is receiving support from the Hege-mony HQ) and you in return, can shoot as him twice, there seems to be no gain at all. But, consider this, by the end of this battle this nasty Ganger will be dead, right? And your soldier will be still on the battlefield, reloading his gun, whit a grin on his face... You will find out that many en-gagements will end up dealing the

exact same amount of damage, but the impor-tant point is, that the Melee units are much more fragile and die

quicker. You must go beyond “here and now”

and adopt the long term perspective. Before you com-mence fighting, think which units will perish and what con-sequences it will bring in the future. But, hey, just because you have less soldiers, not neces-

sary means, that you have to moan about this. Sometimes, for outpost is more than enough to have move-ment to play a battle. You just move your HQ and use it to eliminate ene-my units or modules. If there is less board tile on your army, you need to learn using the instant tiles.

Adjust your tactics through the time.

Thing about number of bat-tles jet to came. It does not matter what the situation will look like at the end

of the game. It is important if you have more or less HP in your HQ. While playing Outpost you have to find a place to run. Slow tactics of Borgo, to place mutts on the edge of battleboard end fast by fact, that you have no place to run or place your soldier. Control battleboard in order to maintain most of if clean, and available for placing a tile. Use your HQ to eli-minate your opponent tiles. Despite Runners are not efficient in dealing dmg to your opponent HQ (because their moderate initiative), there are perfect, to “toss the trash”, like lo-nely modules, or separated units.

Ok, that’s the tactics in generally. Now, let’s look at the few tricks, you may find helpful.

Saboteur Trick Saboteur is a module that reduces initiative of enemy units. So, what does it do? As a name indicates… It simulate a net. Surprised? But in Outpost there is no net! Formally, not, but, if you lack of smth. you like,

you like what you got. Saboteur can mix

up a battle bo-ard, that`s for

sure, but i n

s o m e s i t u a t i o n

you can use it exactly to „slip” an

enemy initiative. Most common it works against Moloch, but others factions are good enough too.So, what`s that all about? Well, you need to place Saboteur in way, it die in higher initiative then initiative of unit we like to “slip initiative”. You need to attach Saboteur to both of that units (the “fastest” one kills Saboteur).I give you an example, ok? You pla-ce Saboteur next to Gladiator and some thug with 2 initiative. Both of them has reduced initiative, so thug

kills Saboteur in 1 initiative. When Saboteur leave the battle board, there is a 0 initiative If the Saboteur would be still alive, gladiator wo-uld fight just right now But, he is dead, so gladiator initiative “slip”. His time is long gone. He could fi-ght with our HQ, or kill our units, but he won`t deal any damage. Nice trick, huh?Some of you already know that trick. Some of you does not heard about it. It is nice thing to do, to get some practice, to see all of those situation, when you can use it like that. It is not popular trick, so, it is easy to surprise your opponent.

Scooper defenceHack someone’s module, and use that modules trait to attack enemy HQ. it is rarely successful mission… enemy modules has often just one side active, and it is occupied by enemy unit. More often it is better to use scooper as a long term inve-stment just blocking a place near to witch opponent would place a mo-dule. Such investment really often pay`s off, cause enemy has to sacri-fice time to remove scooper (inste-ad of dealing dmg to your HQ) or he let him be, and loss benefits from modules. So, it is easier to thing of scooper as a module “turning off” enemy units then try to use them.Brawler and Heavy armorThose two units are great material for suiciders. Brawler placed next to enemy HQ, without HQ trait, most often, before die, deals 4 dmg. Its 20% of ini-tial HP being ripped off by iron fist of Brawler.Heavy armor, in the other hand, place in the same way, deal 6 dmg. Why loos so fast such a powerful unit?

Because Heavy armor is like salt in eye of your opponent. It is way to easy to be killed, and if it die, before dealing 6 dmg… Well… then his potential is wasted. But, if you considering not to sacrifice a He-avy armor, best time for this is in beginning of game. But, still, if you hesitating, remember, it is better to have those 6 dmg, then risk then losing them.

BriefingThere is many other „god advices”, but you find them all out game, by game. For now, above any other thinks, just remember: Use move-ment, take care of units. Don`t be afraid for fight… for just another day in humanity survival.

Assembling your army So we start the most pleasant part of the setup - creating cha-racters and building your army. An army must work like a cloc-kwork, it’s only then that it beco-mes a destructive force. Get a feel of the setting, put up some music, see what comes to your mind and create your army. You start with choosing the faction - one of the sides of the conflict. There are four possible choices to begin with, so think how your he-roes should look like, what sho-uld they excel at? The first thing that springs to your mind is a big, strong mutant, that’ll knock any-one down in one punch? Or may-be you’re considering a perfectly trained Outpost sharpshooter or a Moloch Defender, armed up to its teeth? There’s also the mo-ustached Hegemony gangster, a dude with a crowbar, that’ll take no bullshit from anyone. It’s qu-ite an important decision, so take your time to make up your mind. Ready? So let’s move on.Four factions Let me tell you about Borgo. The Mutants, strong, fast, fear-less. They have been created by Moloch, for the purpose of wiping out humanity, but they rebelled against their maker, and now stri-ve for each breathing moment. That fight is what makes them so tough. Sounds good already, ain’t it? The mutant army units are fast and deadly in melee. If that other loser lets them come a tad too close, you can hand him a shovel. You have at your disposal the Claws, a unit made to snatch the enemy and tear him apart, there are mutts that swarm at the opponent and crush the enemy forces with sheer numbers, and then there are the most badass warriors, the Cyborgs. Never

Author: Artur BlokPhoto: Grzegorz Bobrowski

mind the whizzing bullets or explo-sions,they will get to the enemy and destroy them utterly. Think a bit if this team is to your taste.If you prefer something else, you can choose the perfectly trained, eli-te Outpost units, the remnants of the US army. They are hardened in the battles agains the machines, perfec-tly armed, but it’s their blazing spirit that aids them in the greatest perils. You want more? Become the leader of a team of Assault Troops, corner the enemy and shower them with bullets. Lead your fast, well-oriented Scouts into battle, or choose Light Infantry, the kind of units that is able to hide anywhere. Become their commander, and show the enemy what the US army still can pack a punch! Unless... Maybe you want to stand at the enemy lines? Take control of the di-sciplined, lethal armies of Moloch, the rutlhess robotic killers, spre-ading fear and destruction through the land. Are you ready to lead the mighty, heavily armed Defenders? Or maybe you’d rather have under your command the cunning, tough Hybrids? They are perfect in both melee and ranged combat. And if that’s not enough, you can have so-mething every Outpost soldier fears like death itself. The Spiders. They are the elite of sneak assasins. Are you in? There’s only one more army left - a very special one at that. Those du-des respect no rules. To command them you need to be the toughest, you need to overpower them and rule with an iron fist. The only thing the Hegemony gangers understand is brute force. And no wonder, sin-ce they are the most wanted felons, best gladiators, punks and Black Angels, which make even the Molo-ch’s robots weary. The gangers with their trusty crowbars are always first at the battlefield, always ready for a brawl. They will kill anyone who

crosses them. And don’t forget abo-ut the Punks. They might not be the brightest crayons in the box, but I’ve got to admit - I’ve never seen any-one shoot an MG like that. They’re real trigger virtuosos. Will you be able to control them?Unit types You probably already know all the armies, which means you know which one will be the best for you. Let’s now pick the abilities. Usually, the hero in RPGs has a unique set of abilities, that make up his soul, his experience. An army in minia-ture wargames also has its unique skills. Each unit and each squad is special, and constitutes a part of the army. You need to decide whether your hero is to be a quiet assassin, or maybe an preacher with a bible in one hand and a shotgun in the other. You’d rather feed the enemy a knuc-kle sandwich, or shoot him down before he even notices something’s wrong? Well, when you decide, you can start picking the units that will suit the character of your army. In Neuroshima the units are divided in three classes - squad units, special units and heroes.Army limit Whenever you arrange for a bat-tle with a buddy, or participate in a tournament there needs to be an army limit for the units partaking in battle. A small battle is about 600-700 points, a standard one 1250, the bigger ones start at 1500 pts. When you agree on the amount of points, the fun beings...Each squad has its cost. When buying a squad for your army, you also gain the po-ssibility of choosing special units - medics, lieutants, supermutants, moloch battle brains and many other models. They do cost a lot, but they give you a load of possibilities. When you assemble your army, you choose the squads that will be the soul of your tactics, you build a stra-tegy in your mind. Then you boost

it with the special units, and you’re half way there. There are also the heroes. You get one for free, he’ll be your avatar, your alter ego running among he ruins. He is you. Other heroes you can buy for points, all the Couriers, Cowboys, Preachers, Hitmen, Rats... It’s a lot of wonderful fun, all those squads, special units, heroes. And the best part is yet to come...Equipment Here’s the nicest part - the equip-ment. Of course, each unit has its default equipment, but what kind of fun would it be, if you couldn’t buy some extras? Maybe start small, with nice, little grenades, a chain-saw, or go big and get your boys a bazooka? You have a wide ar-ray of possibilities - it’s your crew! Get them Molotov cocktails, smoke grenades, get them some of those postapo toys! Each squad has their equipment listed. Special units and heroes also have a lot of freedom when it comes to the stuff they have with them. They’re walking surpri-ses, with really killer toys. It’s real-load of fun.Epilogue But a battle comes to an end, the same way a RPG session does. And now what? Is your wonderful hero bound to be forgotten? Never! In the Campaign mode your units get experience Points! Your army evolves, to get stronger and better. You can improve their skills and hone them to perfection. You dre-amed of your hero having some kind of a dwelling, a house, or perhaps a heavily forced base? You can make those dreams come true! Manage your base, improve it, expand your teritory. The Campaign rules have been made with particular attention to the fun you can have with having a base, some turf, intrastructure, with developing your characters, buying equipment, improving your stats. Sounds like fun?