The master of Ravenloft is having guests for dinner… and you're invited. But evil lurks in the towers and dungeons of Castle Ravenloft, and only heroes of exceptional bravery can survive the horrors within! Designed for 1 to 5 players, this fantastic board game features multiple scenarios, challenging quests, and cooperative gameplay. Castle Ravenloft is fun for everyone, including D&D players and anyone who enjoys board games. Every contest has its own exciting challenges and outcomes, guaranteeing hours of replayability.
Castle Ravenloft includes the following components:
40 plastic heroes and monsters
13 sheets of interlocking cardstock dungeon tiles
200 encounter and treasure cards
Rulebook
Scenario book
20-sided die
A D&D Boardgame by Bill Slavicsek and Mike Mearls
Product Availability
Available now
Ships from our warehouse in 15 to 38 business days.
Are there errors or omissions in this product information? Got corrections? Let us know at
store@paizo.com.
1 rulebook
1 adventure book
1 double sized (4”x8”) dungeon “start” tile
40 (4”x4”) dungeon tiles
1 d20 die
5 sequence of play cards
=============================
5 blue hero figures: female human rogue (Sharn Cutthroat), female human ranger, male dragonborn fighter, male dwarf cleric, male eladrin wizard (Eladrin Pyromancer)
5 hero stat cards (4”x 4”)
50 power cards, 10 for each hero (at-wills, dailies, utilities)
=============================
8 villain figures: grey: vampire (Vampire Vizier), howling hag (Howling Hag), kobold sorcerer (Kobold Sorcerer), werewolf (Werewolf, GoL); white: huge dracolich (Dracolich), 2 large zombie dragons (Zombie White Dragon), Flesh Golem (Berserk Flesh Golem)
4 2-sided villain stat cards (3 4”x4”, 1 4”x 8”)
30 monster figures: white: 3 gargoyles (Earth Element Gargoyle), 3 zombies (Terror Wight), 3 skeletons (Warrior Skeleton); translucent blue: 3 blazing skeletons (Blazing Skeleton), 3 wraiths (Lurking Wraith); red: 3 kobold skirmishers (Kobold Soldier), 3 ghouls (Gravetouched Ghoul), 3 wolves, 3 spiders (Deathjump Spider), 3 rat swarms (Rat Swarm, SE)
=============================
60 encounter cards
30 monster cards
45 treasure cards
10 adventure treasure cards
10 condition tokens (5 slowed, 5 immobilized)
70 hit point tokens (60 1-hp tokens, 10 5-hp tokens)
5 healing surge tokens
10 monster damage tokens
12 trap and power markers 2”x2”
3 cloud tokens
1 sun token
1 character token (Kavan)
5 time tokens
6 reaction tokens
1 mistform token
1 dragon’s breath token
10 coffin tokens
17 item tokens
40 monster tokens 1”x1” (9 0-monster, 11 1-monster, 6 2-monster, 2 3-monster, 5 howling hag, 1 werewolf, 1 kobold sorcerer, 1 young vampire, 1 flesh golem, 1 zombie dragon, 1 dracolich, 1 count strahd
Got this game and played a few times with friends, the quote in the title was from one. The game is worth it just for the miniatures and tiles alone (dracolich is worth the price of the entire game).
Each player plays a hero and also acts like the DM, there are 3 phases to each player's turn. The Hero phase where the character acts, using powers similar to what 4e would use. Exploration phase occurs next, if the character is on an explored edge then a new tile appears which a monster appears on and an encounter (traps, random attack, change in environment, etc) may happen. The third phase is the foe phase, if a new tile wasn't explored then an encounter happens. The foes under the control of the player act as well. All foes have a set "AI" chain of actions that they follow. Players get some choice in how they act and can game the system a little (place the foe in a convenient position for example).
Players act as a team and for most adventures they either all win or all lose. Resources are shared (healing surges and experience points). Characters can level up to 2nd level by rolling a 20 on an attack or disarm. Due to the way each player acts as a PC and a DM, a person can actually play the adventures alone if they wished. In fact some of the adventures are designed to be single player.
Great game, great minis and tiles, and you can like it even if you are not a fan of 4e.
The possibilities, endless... the failure in execution, complete
I too played this game at Gen Con Indy this year. When I first looked at the game it had a lot of potential. I've been a big fan of castle Ravenloft since the original AD&D adventure came out, so suffice to say I was looking forward to testing the game out.
My expectations were apparently too high however. We played a beginner scenario in which the players have to retrieve the icon of ravenloft from the chapel. Everything was alright until the final chamber. The only issue I had was that the monsters could attack everyone on a tile (which was a square with a grid, I honestly can't remember how many squares are on a tile), while the PCs could only attack a single creature that they (for the most part) had to be adjacent to. The characters also have 2 healing tokens total to use for the entire group, and if a single player dies, the game is over. Keep this in mind when I talk about the chapel later on.
At first we figured that we could remedy this issue with a few house rules. But at the end it just simply became to impossible to overcome with such rules. In the final room each time a player took a turn the spawned a monster or triggered a trap. Bear in mind that the monsters can attack the entire party (since the room was about 1 tile in size) while the party can only attack a single creature. You win the game when all of the creatures are dead. Since it was very unlikely that a creature would be killed in a single hit, the monsters and traps just kept piling up until they overwhelmed the party. There simply was nothing you could do to conquer the scenario.
As the previous reviewer mentioned, I am making the assumption that what we played was the final version of the game. And keep in mind that this is only a single scenario out of the booklet, but we were told by the guy running it (who didn't have much more of a clue about the rules and game play as we did) recommended it as a good starting scenario. It is possible that the other scenarios are set up a bit better, and would thus be more fun to play. However, with the frustration the one I played left me with, I honestly have no intention of spending the money to find out.
Caveat: I played this game at GenCon (Indianapolis; August 4 – 8, 2010) however, as of this writing, the game is not yet available. At the time it was a complete shrink-wrapped game box and package as one would purchase and I am inclined to believe that it is the finished product, pending any severe issues that may have come up during the course of people playing it at the convention.
Now, on with the review:
The components of this game are many. There are several sheets of punch tiles that comprise the game boards, character cards, status modifiers, health pips, coffins, etc. The box, itself, makes for a poor means to store all of these bits and pieces and you may consider baggies, counter trays, or other means of keeping certain tokens from intermingling between sessions to make set-up go a little more smoothly. The parts themselves are very sturdy wood-stock bits (similar to those used by Fantasy Flight Games – for those familiar with their board game offerings) and are therefore quite robust and will last you many-many years without damage or loss from being blown aside by a mild cough. There are several plastic miniatures, of excellent quality (unpainted), that are conveniently color coded by type. Undead (skeletons, zombies, etc) are white, animals are brown, spectral undead (ghosts, specters, etc) are a translucent blue, notorious villains (Strahd, werewolf, etc) are a dark grey, and the heroes are alight grey. I found this distinction to be very helpful in taking quick glances of the board and seeing how monsters were grouped versus the distribution of the PCs as well as seeing where any allies were located and obstacles between without having to examine every mini on the grid. This also makes monster placement simpler in that you are now examining a smaller pool of minis to locate rats, versus having to search though all of them at once.
The game ‘board’ is crafted through the course of play. Several tiles represent rooms and corridors of the castle and as you and your fellow heroes move, more of the castle is revealed. This is similar to the Avalon Hill game “The Betrayal at the House on the Hill”. Unlike that game, heroes do not need to enter the tile/room to place it but simply be near the edge of a tile. With each tile enters a new monster, and possibly an encounter based on the mark on the tile, who goes under the control of the player that drew it and it will perform certain specific actions on the monster turn of the game. Defeating monsters gains the heroes equipment and experience points. The experience points go into a community pool and can be used to level up your hero or negate certain encounters.
Aside from the rule booklet, there is also a scenario booklet. The scenario you choose will determine the victory conditions for the game. The game itself is cooperative and either the entire group wins or all of the heroes lose. Some of the scenarios seemed capable of being linked together (the scenario we played was “Hunt for Strahd, part one”) and can become part of a larger and longer game played over several weekends. I should also think that one could also invent new scenarios not included with the original book.
While the hero cards are definitely crafted with the current Dungeons and Dragons rules set in mind (4th edition) they only seem to have a 1st level and 2nd level power set. This makes the bookkeeping minor and even someone (like myself) who has not played the fourth edition of the game is capable of comprehending and understanding their hero.
I found this game quite enjoyable and useful. It serves perfectly well as a board game by itself. For those Table-Top RPG gamers, its beautifully printed tiles, tokens, and the included minis, can very easily serve as dungeon mapping for your home campaigns. This game would also do well for those parents out there looking for a way to let their children experience RPG style play without delving into the morass of character sheets, race selection, statistic generation, and all of the bulk of the RPG system. Definately woth the price.
With an August release, I wonder if it will be available at GenCon. I hope so. That way I can drop the 65 bucks on it and not feel so guilty. Hey, its GenCon after all.
My gaming group loves boardgames, and while I dislike 4e D&D, I think I may have to get that. We love gothic horror/fantasy, and I think I could use those dungeons tiles for some fun, random Pathfinder adventures.
We had a 2 hour spot at GenCon to play the game and it filled the block. That time also included punching the tiles, opening the bags of minis, and reading the rules.
I got a chance to watch the Mike Mearles game demo where he opens up the box and lets you look at all the pieces. Geez I dunno'. I was really excited about this, but the minis are really so-so (some are really terrible--the rat swarms, ghouls, werewolf and spiders are particularly bad) and the maps just feel like pretty bland gray granite block hallways with a few statues and things. There's random treasure cards, trap cards, monster cards, and power cards for the pregen characters (which likewise are pretty cheap recasts of some not-great PC minis of the past). All of it just looks really bland and not worth getting. I'm not sure I couldn't just pick up most of the minis as singles (okay so not the dracolich...) and a pack of dungeon tiles and an old copy of the original Ravenloft adventure and get a much better game for half the cost.
Not too impressive, which is a real shame because I was SO pumped about this one. Ugh.
(edited)
Hmm. A lot of things Dhampire mentions in his review remind me of the third edition D&D board game: Different coloured monsters in broad 'types', piles of treasure cards, a book with scenarios...
Granted this seems to be slightly more random and looser a game from Dhampire's description than the third edition game - which needed a GM to set up rooms as per the scenario as the party explored, and to place and run the monsters.
I notice that they have another version of the board game coming out in November. Has anything been said as to wether or not it will be another complete version of the game or will be an expansion to Ravenloft.
Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
StanC wrote:
I notice that they have another version of the board game coming out in November. Has anything been said as to wether or not it will be another complete version of the game or will be an expansion to Ravenloft.
The other one is stand-alone, but the two will be compatible.
I picked this up today and am happy I did! I'm a huge nerd when it comes to games that have lots of tokens and minis and different decks of cards. I love the varying gameplay from day to day. It seems like a solidly designed game with good production values and I'm already geeking out over the upcoming expansion/compatible standalone!
That said, I am disappointed that the rules aren't more thorough or better organized. For example, they continually say to discard cards, but I'm not clear on how that works. Are discarded cards removed from the game entirely, etc? Also, there are a lot of tokens and markers that aren't described, so I've got a ton of pieces here and only a vague idea of how to put them together. Admittedly, I haven't looked online for any clarification on either WotC's site or BGG, but it would have been nice not to need to.
Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
hmm may have to think about this. I have a few of players that love older settings. So this may be something fun to run on off game days. Though I may get it for the figs themselves. Have a thing for dracoliches.
One thing... Tell me that ugly pink skinned thing on the box isn't supposed to be Count Strahd...
This is Strahd, or THIS (favorite)! Not that thing though
Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
yoda8myhead wrote:
Also, there are a lot of tokens and markers that aren't described, so I've got a ton of pieces here and only a vague idea of how to put them together.
I had this same problem. I looked around on BGG for awhile though and apparently most of those tokens are for different missions. For example the monster tokens are for an adventure that randomizes the number of monsters you encounter in each tile. I agree though, they really should have made that clear in the rulebook. I tried the solo mission first and it took me way longer to set-up because I thought I was missing what to do with all of those extra tokens.
Also, I thought we had seen the last of the Yoda alias now that you're all official and stuff.
Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Snorter wrote:
The review states that this is a cooperative game; that either all the players win, or all the players lose.
How does that work for players who get their characters killed during the game?
Do they get some posthumous Pyhhric victory?
If one character dies, it's game over. However, there are healing surge tokens that you can spend to let you go to like half or quarter HP once you've reached zero. You start off with two tokens and I think you can earn more somehow throughout the game.
Right; I was thinking there may be the possibility of a character sacrificing themselves for the overall team victory, something I'm very used to seeing in games like Space Hulk, where you can win some scenarios, even if everybody dies!
I've seen a few games of GW/Fantasy Flight 'Fury of Dracula' that went that way, too.
After running through the solo adventure last night, I found a few more spots where the rules could be a bit more robust, such as describing how monsters move from tile to tile. Do they move to any square on that tile or the bone pile? if you're adjacent to a monster that's on a different tile, can you not affect it with "on the same tile" powers?
These issues aside, I think I like this better than I liked 4e (despite the similarities in mechanics) because this one admits its a board game and takes the simplification attempted by the rpg to its logical conclusion instead of stopping somewhere between. I'm still eager for the expansions, though I'm more eager for an FAQ.
And I'm using my yoda handle because this is a product discussion and I'm participating in it as a gamer, not in an official Paizo employee capacity.
Mine shipped yesterday so I hope to play this soon myself. Personally I am going to treat this like I treat my RPG games, I'll house rule in anything I think makes the game better. People in the conventions around here house rule the heck out of games like DOOM! and Descent, so its not like I am starting a new movement among board gamers by doing so.
Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Robert Miller 55 wrote:
Mine shipped yesterday so I hope to play this soon myself. Personally I am going to treat this like I treat my RPG games, I'll house rule in anything I think makes the game better. People in the conventions around here house rule the heck out of games like DOOM! and Descent, so its not like I am starting a new movement among board gamers by doing so.
I don't think house ruling in this game will be a big deal at all. The rules just aren't complex enough to make it a problem. If you were able to house rule Descent without running into unforeseen problems then you shouldn't have any issues customizing this game.
We played the game this weekend and enjoyed it.
Have a question though. Does anyone know what the skulls on some of the tiles represent ? I do not remember seeing anything in the rules book. Have not read the whole adventure book yet so they may be mentioned there.
