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Mantis Falls cardgame first impressions

I played two games of Mantis Falls yesterday. Those two games were good, and I wanna explore the game a li’l bit more to see if it’ll grow samey or if it’ll unveil new depth.

There’s a BSG-like system of a “maybe-traitor”.

On 2p, if you’re the witness there’s a 50% risk of the other player being your enemy, an assassin that’s trying to kill you, so the game becomes a 1v1 game. But you don’t know that for sure, since there’s a 50% chance of the game being a true co-op.

Of course, you could start as the assassin yourself, in which case you know straight up that it’s gonna be adversarial (but your opponent doesn’t know that).

There are a couple of flavor fails. For example, I had an umbrella to protect me from ricochet shots (wtf? Bullet proof umbrella?) and the permanent keeper cards are called “conditions” and the card that sweeps away conditions is punnily called “conditional release“ and depicts a thief being released from prison. I guess the thief steals the umbrella, gun, doctor’s bag etc?

The additional wound role system is also a whisky tango flavor. “I’m a mysterious femme fatale you met at a diner but doctor’s bags can’t heal me because I’m secretly a prize-fighting underground boxer, which was revealed as I lay dying with my last gasp.”

Or how it’s more night the further down the road you get. This would work great if the party moved as one, starting at the diner in the evening and then struggling versus the evil agents and thieves and… earthquakes?!?! throughout the night’s long journey towards dawn and escaping the town of Mantis Falls. Fantastic. But since you easily get separated, one player will be in the twilight while the other is in full dark no stars. I thought it was summer and no-one ever taught me to read a calendar.

In spite of all that, I had a good time and wanna try it some more.

Summary: hybrid of BSG, Dead of Winter, and Friday. You’re gonna shoot me and I, darling, loaded the gun.