Dreadfleet Preview

So, there's this new GW thing. It's called 'Dreadfleet', and it looks pretty cool. There's a 10-minute video hosted by Phil 'Dank Budz' Kelly detailing all the ins and outs. Because it's GW, an over-acting pirate tells you in harsh pirate language how cool every ship is, and how super spooky it is that ships can be made of ghosts. The goods are about 9 minutes in though, as you'd expect. And if you're a gamer, you know 'the goods' are: What do we get?' We love our fluff, aye, but we'll not spill our purses unless you tell us how many models we get! I'll embed the video at the end, feel free to watch it, but be aware that your host is HIGH AS HELL.

HIGH AS HELL, BRO




Turns out you get 10 ships, and the prerequisite dice, cards, board, and gubbinz. It all looks really nice, honestly. The ship models are sublime and each is unique. The board and gubbinz look nice too, but being realistic, no board game player is wowed by that sort of thing. Pretty much all GW products are an excuse to play with toys, and a board gamer knows a toy when he sees one. The wooden houses in Catan aren't toys, they get filed in the same place as dice and game cards. My brain immediately translated the $115 price tag into 'That's $11.50 per model', and the rest is gravy. That's not a bad price, really, considering the source, and the game looks fun to play. The thing that concerns me is that it's self contained. It's not Blood Bowl or Necromunda, it's Risk.

But I suspect it's not even that. You see, what makes a truly classic board game is varied player interactions. Game companies over the years have been trying to impress people with gaudy, pre-pained game pieces and boards with molded-plastic volcanoes. They could be forgiven for thinking that's what we want, because that's what we think we want. We want toys, right? Of course we do. Then why are your pre-painted skeleton warriors fighting dust bunnies while you and your friends lose yourselves fighting over wooden cities? It's because games like Risk (or Catan, Monopoly, or Poker) force players to make complex decisions. They won't always be the same choices, and the outcomes will be different every time. Can I get Frank to trade me his railroads? Where will Chris put the dastardly robber of Catan? (And can I persuade him to have mercy with a lopsided trade?) These games are fun time and time again because we're not going through the motions, we're having a conversation with our friends. The game just provides structure.

Dreadfleet looks like more of an experience with little replay value. Sure, the presentation is fantastic, and it sounds like there's some very fun things that happen when players draw cards. The ships all have unique special abilities, and I think that's the downfall of the thing. Unless they've hired entirely new game developers, the ships will be wildly unbalanced. Some ships are simply going to be overpowered (and knowing GW, it'll be Chaos, the gits). Players will figure this out, and it'll just be a race to destroy the best ship without losing your own. Chess with all pawns and a queen, if you will. I'd be willing to wager that it'll be fun until players sort that out, but after they do, they'll move on. I'm sure I will. I'd rather re-monopolize 2D New Jersey or re-settle quaint Catan than play out a predestined naval war.

All in all, Dreadfleet looks like a blast to play. The models are superior quality, the fluff is sufficiently fluffy, and who doesn't want to be a pirate? I'm just withholding my excitement for a bit. I'd love to eat my words, and discover that the different pieces are so perfectly balanced that it's a new kind of chess. But chess variants pop up constantly, and most of them didn't have to take time out of their schedule to write novellas about spectral watercraft. And most of them stink anyway.