Go On Board | Additional dice set: The Witcher: Old World | Accessory

Product Information

I have a profound bias to The Witcher universe having read and loved Sapkowski's novels and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt becoming my favourite game of all time, so naturally this game got me curious. Of course, the more you play, the easier set-up gets, and there is nothing inherently wrong with a game that requires a lot of set-up. It is, however, just a good thing to be aware of.

In The Witcher: Old World, you become a witcher — a professional monster slayer — and immerse yourself in the legendary universe of The Witcher franchise. If you enjoy rushing to buff up your combat prowess, and the combat focus of The Witcher: Old World, then this will add at least 7 additional games to the experience, but they can also be combined with the other expansions, providing a lot of extra replayability, if you enjoy the extra complexity of multiple expansions. What Are Our Final Thoughts On The Witcher: Old World Expansions?I could see the world they were trying to create, one of those fantasy ones where the women are merely accessories, and there are no people of colour due to “historical accuracy”. Some of the cards were wonderful and painted beautiful pictures of the land. Others made me hope that their office had a good HR department. Some of the cards caused me to raise an eyebrow at the slut-shaming, woman-objectifying, redhead-hating tone of it all. I do wish the flavour text on the exploration cards had been written by someone who had spent time with an actual human woman at least once. A lot of it feels like a relic from the late 80s. I got the vibe that at least one of the people who wrote these cards has unironically said the phrase “woke mind virus” multiple times.

Because The Witcher: Old World is set a few hundred years before the stories and tales involving Geralt, he's not a playable character in the game, but there is a Witcher from the School of the Wolf, along with the Bear, Cat, Griffin, and Viper, each with their own special ability. The Witcher: Old World standard edition comes with tokens for the monsters, whereas the Deluxe edition upgrades them to miniatures. What's The Difference Between The Witcher: Old World Standard And Deluxe Editions? There are some games you could play with anyone at any time. This is not one of those games. But, with the right group, you are in for such a good time. The Single-Player Experience To win a 5-player game, you need to be the first to four trophies. Trophies can be earned by being the first to max a skill by doing Witcher training or defeating a monster. These goals take a long time to achieve, but they’re easy to understand. In this competitive adventure board game, 1-5 players travel across a vast map, embarking on masterfully penned quests, encountering and making ambiguous moral choices, fighting monsters — and sometimes brawling with other witchers to defend their school's honor! The Witcher Old World is a really good game. It’s not as difficult as it looks, there are a lot of funny moments, and while the turns are unwieldy and can take forever, it gives you an opportunity to socialise with the other people at the table.Issues with the rulebook prevent me from being able to go quite so far as to call the game’s design elegant, but the fact that a board game with this many components and systems can bring that word even vaguely into the conversation is an accomplishment on creator Go on Board’s part, and is flat-out remarkable. Its solo mode is a disappointment, but Old World managed to keep five people wildly entertained for a long afternoon that ended with all of us expressing interest in its expansions, which is a truly impressive feat. Mages adds some interesting ways to experience the game, adding a little to the replayability of the game, but there's not the same depth that the Skellige expansion has. What Does The Witcher: Old World Legendary Hunt Add To The Game? Set years before the saga of Geralt of Rivia, The Witcher: Old World explores a time when monsters roamed the Continent in greater numbers, creating a constant peril that required the attention of expertly trained monsters slayers, known as witchers. Five competing schools trained their adepts through brutal regimes, and once fully prepared, these now-recognized witchers set off to explore the land, seeking trouble and adventures and helping others for coin. Witchers should be engaging in combat early and often. It should be a risky proposition, for waiting too long means you are giving ground in the race. Furthermore, you are awarded one of the four necessary trophies by besting another player in combat, establishing an underlying sense of tension whenever another combatant is nearby. The aim of The Witcher: Old World is to be the first player to collect 4 trophies, and trophies can be won in 3 different ways, either by defeating monsters or other Witchers or by reaching level 5 of an attribute. Raising attributes is done at Witcher school locations, where players need to pay to raise them and to do that, they'll need to explore and defeat monsters to gain gold.

A number of expansions are available alongside the main game. The best of the bunch is the Skellige addition, adding a sideboard of islands to visit. There is a real personality and identity to this new locale which adds texture to the overall narrative.You get to read (occasionally terrible) flavour text in dramatic voices. There are monsters to slay. Everyone gets to make decisions that make big changes. And I don’t feel like I’ve even scratched the surface of what can be done with the game. The Witcher: Old World Mages expansion adds 5 new Mage characters for all, or some of the players to use instead of Witchers. To use a Mage, players take the play board and miniature and use the Mage action cards rather than the Witcher ones. The main difference with Mages is that they have Wisdom instead of Defence and they have access to Energy, which they can use to activate additional effects on their cards, rather than the initial damage soak that Witchers have with their Shield stat.

In this competitive adventure board game, 2-5 players travel across a vast map, embarking on masterfully penned quests, encountering and making ambiguous moral choices, fighting monsters — and sometimes brawling with other witchers to defend their school's honor!The solo game really only works as a teaching tool or for people with the game as a hyperfixation. You play multiple turns to defeat monsters, and then the game ends. There is no way to lose the solo game, and your only aim is to win in as few turns as possible. It is unfortunately a long game. With four players it’s nearly unbearable, though it sits much more comfortably with two or three. With this reduced count, the naturally thin systems at work tend to yield their best results, allowing for an experience that is relatively fast and surprisingly satisfying. The Witcher: Old World Expansions The first player to acquire 4-6 trophies, with the number being set at the start of play, wins the game instantly. You can obtain trophies by killing monsters, instigating and winning chaotic tavern brawls against another witcher, training attributes to their highest level, and resolving certain quests throughout their adventure.