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Review: “Conquest of Nerath” D&D Boardgame

June 21, 2011 by Bartoneus

Today we see the release of Conquest of Nerath, the newest D&D board game from Wizards of the Coast. Unlike the last two D&D board games from WotC, Castle Ravenloft and Wrath of Ashardalon, which focused on heroes and dungeon crawling this new game is a take on large scale strategy board gaming along the lines of games like Risk or Axis & Allies. At the same time the game includes heroes that can fight alongside your larger armies and delve into dungeons to uncover powerful treasure that will help your armies attain victory over the other factions.

Filed Under: Board, Card, and Miniature Games, Featured, Reviews Tagged With: Axis & Allies, board game, boardgame, boardgames, castle ravenloft, conquest of nerath, D&D, dnd, Dungeons and Dragons, preview, Reviews, risk, roleplaying games, strategy, wrath of ashardalon

Unboxing – The Shadowfell: Gloomwrought and Beyond Boxed Set

April 25, 2011 by Bartoneus

We were extremely fortunate to get an early copy of the upcoming D&D boxed set called The Shadowfell: Gloomwrought and Beyond to unbox and show you all today. It comes packaged in a thin box the same size as the Red Box starter set and comes with a very sturdy 127 page paperback Campaign Guide, a 31 page Encounter Book, two sheets of cardboard tokens, one poster with a map of gloomwrought on one side and an encounter map on the other, and a Despair deck of 30 cards.

Filed Under: Featured, Reviews, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4th Edition, box set, boxed set, D&D, dnd, Dungeons and Dragons, game, gloomwrought and beyond, new, preview, Reviews, roleplaying, Shadowfell, the shadowfell, the shadowfell gloomwrought and beyond, unboxing

Review: Nightfall (Card Game)

April 21, 2011 by Bartoneus

Nightfall is a new deck-building card game from Alderac Entertainment Group that is set in a dark world of vampires and werewolves. The game supports between 2 and 5 players and takes roughly 45 minutes to an hour to play. The basic set for the game comes with over 300 cards that include minions you can recruit into your deck, actions that you can play during your turn and other player’s turn, several types of wound cards representing different types of damage taken (bite, burn, and bleed), and draft cards that are used during the game’s set up.

Filed Under: Board, Card, and Miniature Games, Featured, Reviews Tagged With: action, alderac entertainment group, card game, deck building, gothic, horror, modern, nightfall, preview, Reviews, vampires, werewolf, werewolves

Review: Heroes of Shadow

April 6, 2011 by Bartoneus

The book Player’s Option: Heroes of Shadow is the first real print product we have seen for 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons since the Essentials line and also marks what I hope is the end in what I perceived as a lag in print products for the game. Heroes of Shadow was delayed from March until April so that it could be printed as a hard cover book instead of a smaller format paperback, and I am very pleased with having a larger sized hardcover in my hands with 4E content in it after months without one. What this book contains is exactly what you would expect from a book focusing on player characters that tap into the shadow power source and draw their inspiration from the darker corners of your D&D universes. Its contents range from entirely new classes to new builds for existing classes to new races and more than a handful of new options for characters of all types that want to have a bit darker tilt to their abilities.

Filed Under: Featured, Reviews, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4th Edition, assassin, black guard, D&D, dnd, Dungeons and Dragons, essentials, heroes of shadow, opinion, player's option, preview, revenant, Reviews, roleplaying games, Roleplaying Games, shade, Vampire, vryloka

Battletech Introductory Box Set Preview & Review

March 28, 2011 by Bartoneus

I have been a die hard fan of Battletech since I first picked up a Technical Readout book and wondered what all of the information about awesome looking giant mechs was really used for. Three years ago when Catalyst Game Labs acquired the Battletech license and put out the Classic Battletech boxed set, I was excited but didn’t get a chance to pick one up before the print run completely sold out. That’s why I flipped out when I saw the new Battletech Introductory Boxed Set in a vendor’s stand at PAX East and quickly picked up a copy.

Filed Under: Board, Card, and Miniature Games, Featured, Reviews Tagged With: 25th anniversary, battletech, boxed set, catalyst game labs, classic battletech, introductory box set, new, preview, Reviews

Unboxing: Wrath of Ashardalon D&D Board Game

January 26, 2011 by Bartoneus

For those of us who have been playing and enjoying the game Castle Ravenloft, anticipation has been building for the quick release of the second D&D Adventure System board game Wrath of Ashardalon! We were fortunate enough to get an early preview copy and so what I’d like to provide for you today is a brief post about the box and its contents as well as a preview of what to expect from the game based on a preliminary look through the rules and components.

Filed Under: Featured, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: adventure system, D&D, dnd, preview, Reviews, roleplaying games, Roleplaying Games, unboxing, wrath of ashardalon

Movies I Want to See in 2011

December 16, 2010 by Bartoneus

Something you may not know about me if you come to Critical Hits mainly for the RPG content is that I’m a huge movie nerd. In April of this year I posted a look ahead at the big summer movies of 2010 that I was hoping to see, just as I have done for the last four years running. This year is a bit different from the last few because I am already excited to see a ton of movies in 2011 and we’re not even through December yet! Here’s a look at the movies of early 2011 that I’m most excited to see, and a quick description of why I’m excited about it:

Filed Under: Editorial, Featured, Movies Tagged With: 2011, battle: los angeles, movie, Movies, Newest Critical Hits, pirates of the caribbean 4, preview, previews, spring, sucker punch, super 8, winter

Review: New Dice from Q-Workshop!

August 2, 2010 by Bartoneus

At this point, if you haven’t heard of Q-Workshop, then you’re missing out on some of the best dice that are being produced today! We are lucky enough to have gotten a chance to look at, roll around, and generally admire three of their sets of dice – Celtic Dice (pictured right), Forest Dice, and Elven Dice.

Filed Under: Reviews, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: celtic, custom dice, dice, dwarven, elven, preview, q-workshop, qworkshop, Reviews, sets

Dark Sun Heats Up

July 30, 2010 by Bartoneus

We are fortunate enough to have received copies of the Dark Sun Campaign Setting and the Dark Sun Creature Catalog today, and as usual we’d love to share anything and everything that we can with you guys! Earlier today I offered to answer questions via twitter (@Bartoneus) and here are some of the questions I was asked and the answers I provided (names were removed for privacy and simplicity)

Filed Under: Featured, News, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4th Edition, campaign setting, creature catalog, D&D, dark sun, darksun, Dungeons and Dragons, preview, q&a, question and answer

D&D 4e: The New Player’s Option

June 16, 2010 by Bartoneus

I was actually very surprised while looking through the Wizards Spring 2011 catalog when I stumbled across a new book coming out in March, Player’s Option: Heroes of Shadow. There are a lot of aspects to this book that are interesting, for one it is supposedly going to be a 6″x9″ and 320 page book selling for $19.95 in trade paperback format. The description for the book mentions three specific classes that it will support – Assassins, Necromancers, and Hexblades.

Filed Under: Featured, News, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4th Edition, D&D, Dungeons and Dragons, heroes of shadow, new, player's option, preview, shadow power source

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About the Author

  • Bartoneus

    Danny works professionally as an architectural designer and serves as managing editor here at CH, which means he shares many of the duties of being an editor but without the fame and recognition. He also writes about RPGs, videogames, movies, and TV. He is married to Sucilaria, and has a personal blog at Incorrect Blitz Input. (Email Danny or follow him on Twitter).

    Email: bartoneus@critical-hits.comWeb: https://critical-hits.com//author/Bartoneus/

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