Clank!
Picked this up on deep discount because that bastard Ben Gerber posted a deal last week. It’s pretty fun! I played through a couple two-player games of it, which is probably not the ideal setup but it worked fine.
The basic hook is that you’re deckbuilding while moving around a map picking up goodies. The map has various constraints and costs, like it costs more move or you might get damaged or you need a key. And the whole time, you’re slowly generating “Clank!,” which is the noise you’re making that will convert into potential future damage.
The deckbuilding is super straightforward. There are three always-available cards in big stacks, and a river of six cards constantly on offer. Some of them are just effects you add to your deck, some are “equipment” you add to your tableau that can be spent and discarded, some are monsters that arrive that both offer goodies for defeating them, and make the dungeon overall more dangerous.
Those “Clank!” cubes you generate end up getting put into a black drawstring bag, along with black cubes. When a dragon attack is generated — usually by adding specific cards to the river — all the accumulated “Clank!” goes into the bag and then you draw, more cubes the later in the game you go.
It’s got cute press-your-luck stuff going on, some decent deckbuilder-y stuff like buying cards that let you cull other cards, and a leeeeetle bit of interaction because everyone’s stomping around on the same map chasing a shared set of goodies. Totally worth it at $30 as a long filler.
Glad I could help!
I thought this was much more fun than I expected it to be.
Hans Messersmith same!
It’s a solid game. The setup is a little fiddly but then the game plays pretty smoothly once you are up to speed. Experience has an advantage, but there is still enough random going around to help level the field. I think it’s also a good example of blending a deck builder with other mechanics. Also thematically it’s pretty friendly.