CUTTHROAT CAVERNS™ Reviews

Reviews, Nominations and Awards. We couldn't be prouder.

REVIEW: TOM VASEL - THE DICE TOWER

Posted Wed Oct 17,2007 07:45 am.... I've talked in the past about games that have surprised me; because after reading the rules, I thought the game would be boring - only to find out later just how good the game actually was. Cutthroat Caverns (Smirk and Dagger Games, 2007 - Curt Covert) was different; because as soon as I read the concept and started going over the rules, I was sure that I was going to love this game. The idea of backstabbing fellow adventurers in a dungeon isn't anything new - especially those who play with "munchkin" players in roleplaying games, but this card game actually encourages folks to annoy one another.

The concept is simple; players are working together to beat monsters in a dungeon, but only one can win at the end. Players want each other to die, but not early in the game, as all players are needed to defeat the monsters. It's a hilariously fun game of both blatant and subtle backstabbing, and with the right group of players is one of the most enjoyable experiences I've ever played. It certainly isn't for the faint of heart - confrontation and shouting will likely be involved in a game, and fortunately it only lasts just over an hour - an intense time of high interaction.

Each player takes a character - each a stereotype of typical dungeon adventurers - with no discernable differences in the game other than the pictures. Each character has a card with a stone used to track their hit points, starting at one hundred. A deck of creature cards is shuffled, and nine of them are placed face down in the middle of the table, forming the dungeon for the game. A deck of ninety-four cards is shuffled and placed on the table, next to a pile of initiative cards (one for each player: 3-6). A monster life tracker card is placed on the table, and a marker is placed on a track to show which encounter the players are on. A pile of prestige point counters is also placed near the board, and the first encounter is ready to begin.

Each encounter begins with players drawing seven cards from the deck, and then the top encounter card is flipped over. The monster on the card is examined, and their hit points (according to the number of players who started the game) are marked on the monster life tracker card. Players draw random initiative cards and place them face up in front of them to show the order of their attacks. Players then select an attack card from their hand, placing it face down in front of them. Once all players have chosen their cards, they are revealed in the order of initiative. Attack cards are of several types:
- Most are simply a number that do a certain amount of damage, from "0" to the awesome "100".
- Others are a numbered attack that does double damage when played by the player whose picture matches the one on the card.
- Others give a bonus, such as "Focus Strength", which does zero damage but adds thirty to the attack value of the player's next attack card.
- Some allow the player to attack twice or have other various effects.
Some cards may cause the attack cards to be rotated, doubling or halving their damage (the numbers are printed on the sides of the card). As cards are flipped over, the hit points of the creature are checked; and if it is killed, the encounter is over, and all remaining attack cards are discarded. After all cards have been played, and the creature is still alive, then the cards are discarded; and the life points of the monster are adjusted accordingly.

The monster then attacks according to the information on the card. Each monster does different things. Examples include:
- Axe: Does 20 damage to player # 2, and ten to the person to their left and right.
- Basilicanth: Does about twenty damage to the player who hit it for the least amount of damage.
- Trolgg: Attacks four times, hitting player # 1 for ten points, and then each succeeding player, as long as "heads" is flipped on a coin.
- Anti-Paladin: Attacks the entire party for five points, adding the sum to his own life points.
Damages differ, depending on the number of players who started the game. If a monster hits a player based on their initiative, then that happens at the beginning of the next round, after initiative cards are redistributed.

If the monster stays alive, then all players draw one card and a new initiative card, and start the round again. The player who kills the monster takes the card and receives prestige points equal to those shown on the monster. In the seventh, eighth, and ninth rounds, players receive bonus prestige points, taking markers to show this. After the creature is killed, all players may discard any number of cards from their hand; and the next monster is turned over, starting another encounter.

Besides attack cards, players may draw item cards, which must be played in front of them. Some item cards are one use potions, others give a player a specific ability (like having more cards in their hand each turn.) Players also may get action cards that are played at different times during the game to help players or annoy opponents. Examples include:
- Edge Out: Play on another player before they reveal their attack card. Discard it, and they may not attack this turn.
- Human Shield: Play when damaged by a creature, picking a player on your right or left to take the damage instead.
- Plan "B": Play to switch any two initiative cards.

The game continues until all nine monsters are killed, or until the players are all killed, which ends the game in defeat. A player who is killed during the game loses, and their prestige points do not count. When (if) all nine monsters are killed, the player with the most points is the winner - with ties being broken by fighting another monster.

Some comments on the game…

1.) Components: The game comes with twenty-five large encounter cards, which easily show all the numbers on the cards. The artwork on everything is really good, although perhaps a little dark on some of the monsters. The art is done by multiple artists, which are done fairly well, although you can tell the difference in styles from card to card (my personal favorite is Tim Wollweber's artwork, who did the character cards). The characters cards themselves are large with an easy hit point track (counted down by fives), and glass stones are used for the markers on all tracks. The initiative cards and attack cards are of good quality and have simple, easy-to-read text on them. I am seriously considering putting the initiative cards in plastic sleeves, since they go through a lot of wear and tear. Piles of double-sided monster counters (some monsters are really a group of small monsters) and prestige tokens are included as well as a "coin" for use with some monsters. Everything fits well inside a nice plastic insert in a smallish black box.

2.) Rules: The eight pages of rules explain the rules fairly well, with some diagrams and examples of how all the different cards work. However, in a game like this with monsters of various types, you will invariably run into a decent amount of questions; and I have to say that the rules don't cover a lot of situations that I think would be obvious. Fortunately, on Smirk & Dagger's website, I was able to find a FAQ that answered everything we had a problem with but still expect to find some rules arguments in your games. People understand the game fairly easily, although you may have to pause when new items and/or monsters show up.

3.) Treachery: The motto of the game is "Without teamwork you'll never survive; without betrayal you'll never win"; and it's True with a capital "T". Some players may get all excited and play evil cards on other players right away; but the game is prepared for this, because a monster doesn't get easier just because someone died early on in the game. Players have to grudgingly help one another as they fight the monsters, because otherwise everyone will die. A player who earnestly backstabs everyone else without thought will find that the game ends quickly, with all other players upset with him. Rather, a player must seek to sneak in the killing blow (something that's just as upsetting here as it is in real role-playing games.) There are a few cards that help others, but many more that "help" others. Examples of this is a healing potion, which allows a player to heal another willing player, but it gives them prestige points to do so. This means you'll see people gladly offering to heal the wounds of others, with the wounded person flat out refusing. Other cards allow you to shout an insult at the monster then pick the player who gets damaged next. This can be funny stuff, unless it's aimed at you.

4.) Monsters: There are twenty-five monsters included with the game, which gives a good bit of variety, since only nine are used per playing. They certainly have a wide range, from the Boogens (which swarm all the players with small monsters) to the Necromancer (which brings back a former monster from the dead), to the Shift (which becomes super strong after two rounds) to the Clockwork Golem (which basically has to be killed in one round). Each monster has to be handled differently, depending on which encounter they are - with perhaps great care (of fervent fighting). A couple of odd encounter cards are in the deck: a trap room, which randomly hits players; and a riddle room, which causes a deadly game of "Memory Match" to be played (something I would never tolerate except in this setting - strangely). You never know who is lurking in the next room, and it certainly helps raise the tensions of the game.

5.) Strategy: Players are obviously stuck with the cards that they draw; however, players draw cards so many times during a game that they will likely get to play many good ones. What players have to do is hurt the monster, but not so much that it allows another player to land the killing blow. On the flip side, a player wants to land that blow themselves and must watch where they are in initiative. Players who kill too many monsters early on will find themselves the target of many critical misses and other problems from other players, and I'm not surprised to see an early leader die in the final rounds. Strategy is not so present in the game as tactics, however; since players must adjust themselves to the style of each enemy that they come across, as they are all different.

6.) Fun Factor: I certainly would steer people who don't like confrontation or who take things personally away from this game, as there is a lot of trashing done by other players. I found it a blast, and people who already enjoy role-playing games will find this one quite entertaining. It's like Munchkin, only fun - and with an actual game included. A few folks complained that it seemed long for what it is, but that can be handled by adjusting the amount of encounters (I personally like nine). I also enjoyed how differently each round felt and the interaction between all the players.

Cutthroat Caverns may cause some arguments between players, and that coupled with its theme will keep it from being played with some of my gaming groups. But with an adventure loving, easy-going group, this can be one of the most fun experiences I've ever had with a game. I like the fact that players are forced to be cooperative yet can stick the dagger into each other at the most inopportune moment. Shrieks of rage and shock and laughter mingle together in this game from Smirk and Dagger, their best work to date. I highly look forward to the multiple expansions promised, to see what new monsters and rules will be added. For me, one of the best games of 2007.

Tom Vasel
"Real men play board games"
www.thedicetower.com

REVIEW: LAWRENCE SPODE - BOOKSHELF GAMES

21 minute v ideo review - here's the link: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/263421.

REVIEW: TROLL - DIVERSIONS ONLINE

November 5, 2007 - 22:47... The setting – a series of caverns, from which your party has retrieved the Sacred Item of Unimaginable Marvel. The premise – survive the horrors of the caverns and escape with the treasure before the worst of the monsters in the caverns get you. And the worst monsters you’ll encounter? – your own dirty rotten greedy backstabbing party members. While this may sound like a standard fun role playing evening, the truth of the matter is – this is a non-collectible card game from the fine, twisted minds of Smirk And Dagger. Bringing together the best of cooperative and competitive play, Curt Covert is bringing us another game of good, old fashioned, backstabbing fun. Welcome to Cuththroat Caverns – where the dagger that’s helping you now, may be cutting your throats in the next few minutes.

Mechanics: Each player chooses a character card and a glass life bead. Each player will set their life total at a mere 100 life points, and hope they can hold on to their dwindling number. The twenty five card encounter deck is shuffled an a pile of nine is dealt face down. These will be the nine base encounters that will need to be defeated to escape the caverns. All other encounter cards are set aside as they are initially unused in the game. After placing the glass beads that will track the encounter number and the encounter’s life total on the monster board – the game may begin.

The game is played in a series of encounters. These represent the evils, monsters, and traps lurking in the caverns. To start an encounter, first each player draws up to seven cards from the action deck. There are three sorts of cards in the deck – attack cards, item cards, and action cards. Attack cards will be used to beat the snot out of the various encounters. Some attack cards are basic, having just a base attack value on them. Some attacks are special. These attacks allow you to enhance your later attacks, lay down mighty beating, or best of all – muck with your “friend’s” attacks. And a few attacks have character portraits on them. If used by the appropriate character, they may double the base attack on the cards and have the attack rendered immune to special effect, though use of this ability is not mandatory. Item cards, heralded by a green jewel on the top of the card, must be played when drawn. These cards represent amulets, potions, salves, and elixirs found in the cavern to aid the intrepid adventurers. With only a few exceptions, these cards must be used at the beginning of an encounter or remain unused – it’s hard to rub on soothing aloe when you are swinging a great sword. And then the action cards, designated by blue ovals, are there to aid you in your endeavors. Heck, let’s call a spade a spade, they are there to generally screw with your opponents. Make them critically miss, switch out their attacks, and have them heroically step in the way of a monster for you – it’s all in the action cards.

After the cards have been doled out, you must set the life points of your encounter (if necessary). This is as easy as checking the life/attack matrix at the bottom of the encounter. This matrix shows not only what the life total will be, but who the encounter will hit each round and how hard it will be. Why a matrix? Because Mr. Covert made the game scalable. The more people who play the game, the tougher the encounters. So the Bugaboo who is a measly 100 life points for 3 players beefs all the way up to 220 for six players. No wimpy monsters for a full party, nosirreebob. One thing to keep in mind, life points for an encounter are always determined by the number of players who started the game, not the number playing. Therefore, these encounters get no easier as people die – they just get more foreboding.

Then players may begin combat with the encounter. Each combat round consists of six phases:

Initiative – Each player draws a random initiative card from the initiative stack containing a number of cards equal to the players playing. This will be the order that cards resolve in this combat round.

Resolve Last Round’s Monster Attacks (if applicable) – If a monster attacks a specific player, say player #2, it attacks upon the drawing of the new initiative, not the previous one. This is where the whumpings happen.

Set Your Attack – Place your attack face down in front of you. Cards may be switched until all attacks are locked in. Keep in mind, attacks resolve in initiative order and only the killing blow gets prestige points. If for some odd reason you find yourself without an attack card, you may place an action card face down as a bluff but it will fail to resolve.

Take Turns In Initiative Order – Flip your attack card starting in numeric order. Assess the damage to the creature or otherwise carry out the instructions on the attack card in front of you. Place the cards in a line so that all of the damage done this round can be read. Check to see if the encounter has been bested. If so, begrudgingly slap the good adventurer on the back for a job well done (and to check for soft spots for dagger strikes later on.) That player collects the encounter card and the prestige points attacked to it. Encounters 7 and 8 are worth an additional 3 prestige points and the ninth encounter is worth an additional 5 prestige points. If not, the next initiative plays. Continue through all players until they have all completed their turn or the encounter has been vanquished. After all players have finished their turn this round, assess the damage to the life points of the monster, remove the attack cards to the discard pile (if applicable) and prepare to have the encounter do its job.

Creature Attacks – If the attack is not randomly based, this is where it will happen. These attacks will include “player who dealt the most damage” and “player who dealt the least damage”. Check the matrix out for details and hand out some pain.

Draw A Card – Feeble adventures! Draw another card from your bag of tricks and prepare to battle anew! Note – you do NOT draw back to seven, you only draw one card. We’d feel bad for you if you weren’t trying to jack some poor monster’s treasure.

Then the initiative cards are collect, reshuffled, and redistributed. These combat rounds continue until the encounter has been bested or the party is a pile of corpses.

When the encounter is over, the party may camp and lick their wounds. At this time, players may discard any unwanted cards from their hands and decide whether that healing salve the just “Stab & Grab”bed from his “friend” might come in useful. Then, if that wasn’t the last encounter. Refill your hand to seven (usually) and continue along – there’s a lot more cavern to come.

When the last encounter in the encounter deck has been defeated. The player with the highest prestige point total wins. Oh, and he has to be alive as well. Famous corpses are still corpses after all – the dead can’t brag. In case of a tie, draw a new encounter from the pile of unused encounters and continue until the tie is broken or there are nothing but smoldering bodies. And yes, if you don’t show some sort of party solidarity, it is possible for the caverns to claim another victory over squabbling adventures.

Presentation – Another beautifully presented game. The two piece box comes chock full of parts – You get the 94 card action deck, 25 oversized encounter cards for the encounter deck, a token sheet full of good, thick stout cardboard tokens, 6 initiative cards, the monster tracker cards, the 6 oversized character cards, 8 glass beads (in two colors), and the rules sheet. The cards are printed a good thick cardstock and read excellently. They are very well laid out, easy to read, and in fact have numbers around the edge which make it easy to figure out double and half strength attacks. Simply rotate the card the appropriate direction. Simple and easy. The cards are void of artwork but that’s a good thing. Not only because artwork on the cards would have cluttered the design, but the very best artwork was saved for all the oversized cards. The oversized cards feature a variety of artwork styles from a variety of artists – and all of them are jaw dropping. From the slightly more cartoonish stylings of Boogens and Spite to the more “realistic” feel of Iron Skin Gargoyle and Shift, the artists definitely give you reasons to put the “fan” back into fantasy. And what’s more – and I feel is a very nice touch by Curt Cover – he gives a full artist breakdown in the rules and contact info for those artists. Not only great exposure for these talented individuals, but a great way for the fans of the art to see more of what these artists have to offer. This is something I wish more games would find a way to do that use artwork like this. The tokens also feature this great artwork, where applicable, and are printed not on some flimsy stock, but on a good thick laminated stock that will last. Add to this a great plastic insert that stores all the pieces, the great tracking board, and a great rules booklet full of pictures and examples, and you have one fine presentation of a game. One note – and it’s the one a make for most non-collectible card game like this. Look to sleeve the cards. Not due to bad cardstock – but because the constant play this game is sure to see and the multiple shufflings will be sure to wear these cards down. Sleeves are a cheap, efficient way to add life to any card game.

Replayability: What can I say? The game is scalable – meaning the challenge doesn’t weaken with multiple players, an aspect I find highly admirable. The game starts with a twenty five card encounter deck of which you’ll only see nine at any time, and you’ll see them all in different orders. This makes in the base game for a myriad of encounter options. The action deck has just the right balance of normal cards, items, screw thy neighbor cards, and counter cards. A few thoughts on the game:

-Curt Covert must be the dean of Bitter Choad university, because this game will make you spiteful and resentful of your fellow players (and you’ll love it.) Temper the bitterness early in the game, however. There are nine encounters in the deck and trust me, you’re current object of ire will make a great meat shield for cards like “My Hero” and “Human Shield” later. Besides, “Edge Out” and “Trip” are good for wiping the smile off of his pompous face later in the game when at encounters seven and eight Captain Glory becomes expendable

-The item card “Alchemist’s Fire” is just THAT good. Usable any time during the encounter, the thirty points of damage this card deals to the encounter allows you to sneak it for a quick prestige grab. The bonus ten damage to all other players is an extra bit of icing as it allows you to burn an annoying, self serving, and most importantly winning player from your path.

-“Rally” and “Tougher Than He Looks/Not So Tough” can have multiple uses – especially if you’re sneaky. Remember, some monsters attack based on how much damage is done. Assist a fellow player with some extra “Rally” damage, especially when it won’t kill an encounter, and let them take the blow instead. Use “Tougher Than He Looks” to rotate an attack down and an opponent’s temper up as they not only not kill a monster, but will have to take damage too.

Overall: Curt Covert has teased us with this game for a good two years. Whispers, teases, flashes of an ankle entering a hansom cab. However, it was an incubation period well worth it. Smooth game play, fantastic visual presentation, and an easy to learn yet novel game concept make this game a must own. Cooperative games a hard nut to crack. Those games that turn competitive towards the ends – doubly so. But the master of the “screw thy neighbor” game has brought us a game with a good balance across the board. Easy yet strategic. Fun but a bit frantic. And often making you not sure whether you want to thank your opponent for his last move or slap him silly because it just ruined your plan. And not to be content sitting on his laurels, Smirk And Dagger already has released an expansion to this game called Deeper And Darker adding another fifteen encounters and one shot character abilities to the stack. Did I mention the free PDF encounter cards he has been regularly posting to the Smirk And Dagger website? And what about his new encounter contest he is currently running in his website? But we now come to the dreaded encounter in my review – the “there’s got to be something wrong” portion. Some players (those of a lawyerish bent) may find some holes or ambiguities in the rules. These are easily closed with a quick trip to the Smirk And Dagger website for the Cutthroat Caverns FAQ. And if my players have had any beef with this game, it’s that for a non-collectible card game – it plays a bit long. Yes, that’s it. And it hasn’t stopped any of them from playing multiple games of Cutthroat Caverns in an evening. Whether you are a role playing fan looking for something to spice up you pre or post game time, a game enthusiast looking for a great new product that won’t break you wallet or back (Yes, Eurogame companies, I am poking at you!), or just need to have the next big thing from the devious mind of one Curt Covert – this game will not send you wrong. Enter these caverns knowing you are leaving with a winner. The only problem I have now is that Smirk And Dagger games are a lot like Chinese Food – three hours after playing, I want to know what he’s working on next….

Final Score: 9 out of 10.

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