After
2 weeks off, post GenCon and some family trips, we're back talking about the
games we have on the table.
With family obligations I have only been able to get in some light, quick games
and one of the ones that my young nieces adore is Dungeon Mayhem
by Wizards of the Coast. This 2-4 player game is
light on rules and plays in about 10 minutes.
Each player takes the role of one of 4 adventurers (Sutha the Barbarian, Oriax
the Rogue, Lia the Paladin, or Azzan the Wizard). Your goal is to beat (knock
out in my niece’s world) the other players and claim all the treasure in the
dungeon for yourself. This is not a think-y game in the least. With your cards
you deal damage to other players, heal yourself, put out defenses or draw more
cards.
This is a player elimination/king of the hill type game with each character
having 10 health and once it reaches 0, that player is out. But since the game
plays quickly, even with younger kids, no one is really sitting around for
long. As the oldest player at the table, I often faced the brunt of the attacks
and never lasted more than 2 turns. With damage cards that go up to 3 and
combos that could push it higher, I could have 9 damage before I even got to
play one card. If each game lasted more than 10-15 minutes, this would be
annoying, but as it is, I found it a fun and silly game to play with a 9 and 7
year old.
Though character decks are ostensibly different, there are only a couple of
cards within each that are truly unique to the character with most just being
the same but with different names. For example, the Magic Missile from the
Wizard is the same as the Thrown Daggers from the Rogue. They both do X amount
of damage to an opponent of your choice. Unique cards might attack all players
in a turn or force everyone to discard their hand or their Defense cards.
This is absolutely a gateway game for younger players. I probably would not
even use it as a filler with more experienced gamers as there is not quite
enough substance to keep them engaged. Think of this as like Munchkin-Lite. You
also may have to house rule some attack priorities if the youngest is being
unfairly targeted by older siblings.
There is also an expansion coming out this year that adds some more characters
(Minsc the Ranger and Jaheira the Druid) and therefore can expand the game to
more players. It probably will not unveil any new rules to the game, but with
the ranger having a giant space hamster named Boo, it might just be something I
get my nieces for Christmas.
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