Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle Deckbuilding Game
About
A cooperative Harry Potter themed deck builder game with multiple scenarios.
That's a bit of a mouthful so let me simplify. This is a deck builder. Each game you start with a set of 10 cards. During the game you add more cards to your deck which give you more options. On each of your turns you play cards from your hand to defeat villains and then purchase more cards to add to your deck.
There are 7 different scenarios included which give a bit of flavor to the game based off of the events of the books. In the year 4 scenario you might get a card for the "Tri Wizard Cup" and in the year 1 you might face the villain Quirrell.
Note, this is not a campaign game where decisions and gameplay from a previous game effect future games. In each scenario you restart with the same set of basic spells.
Thoughts
Tim:
4/5* Variable
A fun and light game with good theming. It only went off the rails with too much dependency on luck for the seventh and final scenario. I would give the scenarios for years 1-6 four stars but, the year 7 scenario was a dismal 2.
I was incredible bummed to find that this was not a campaign game and that each scenario requires you to start from scratch. I think this would have been so much more fun to feel like you were getting better and better just as the characters do in the movies. It also leads to a predictable ebb and flow to each game that you start to recognize where you start off each game getting behind until you reach a certain point where you are now unstoppable and win the game.
The gameplay is pretty good and easy enough to learn if you have played any similar games. I do think they could have made a bit more effort to make sure the cards for "year 3" were actually items in year 3, but they get most of them and maybe this is only annoying to someone that has seen the movies far too many times.
Laura:
4/5
A fun game. Surprising in some facets where they did not allow the characters to increase their starter deck with better cards after a few games, and had to get used to the fact that you will be overpowered for several hands while you attempt to buy enough more powerful cards to inflict enough damage to defeat the villains. While the game introduced the rule of dice in adventure 5, it didn't become a necessity until 7, which meant the pile of cards to buy dice rolls were very diluted and difficult to attain. I would have rated this game as 4.5/5 but the change in direction of how to win with dice for adventure 7 bumps it down to a 4/5 for me. Still a fun game, but I would have preferred some dice requirements earlier on when they were introduced rather than the ability to ignore because they weren't a necessary part of the game in adventure 5 and 6.
Trivia
- Expansions include "Charms and Potions", "The Monster Box", and "Defense Against the Dark Arts"
6-21-2021