LLC Barrage Battle

I bought this game for two reasons: it seemed kid-friendly and it was ultra-inexpensive. I thought I would give it a try. My family and I (including an eight-year-old boy, my wife, and me) played this game recently. It is a two-player game (my son and wife were playing as a team) where the object is to eliminate the opponent's king. The player accomplishes this goal by deploying melee and ranged units on the board. There is also a wizard who can cast various spells. The player throws dice of various types (d4, d6 [two varieties], and d12) to simulate attacks by archers and siege engines.We played the game yesterday. We did not end up finishing the game for reasons that will become obvious as I detail the session below. Still, I feel that our experience qualifies me to review Barrage Battle.The good:*Throwing dice is a blast! With enough practice, a player can get really accurate with this. This aspect of the game is clearly the best part.*If you love dice (and, as a role-playing gamer, I do), you will get a lot of them. The dice are probably worth the price of the game even if you just take them out of the box and use them for other games.*I like the art. It will not be to everyone's taste - it's not quite cartoonish, but it's not far from this genre.*The fights between units provide a reasonable amount of tension. I felt satisfaction when a tactic succeeded and was disappointed when my son shredded my best troops with a deluge of d4s.The not-so-good:*The game claims that it takes 30 to 60 minutes to finish. This is a wretched lie. We were playing this game for CLOSE TO FOUR HOURS before we pulled the plug. We were NOWHERE NEAR the end of the game. My king was surrounded by troops and siege engines, as was my opponent's. We had just finished eliminating each other's melee troops. Essentially, we would have had to start over with fresh troops at this point. It was a stalemate. I wandered off during the game, which is something I never do! I informed my wife that my king abdicated the throne, then promptly fell on his sword. Neither he nor I could take any more.*Strategy is limited. At the beginning of the game, you have the king, the wizard, and the castle. The castle grants immunity to missile and spell fire if a unit is behind it. That means you put your king behind the castle and keep him there until the castle falls, which will never happen. It takes ten artillery hits to destroy the castle.*Your hand of ten cards becomes clogged quickly with spell cards. You do not receive enough mana to cast them.*So much of the game depends on luck rather than strategy. For example, I had three dames (the troop name - I kept saying "dame" in the worst 1940s film noir voice you've ever heard) advancing on my opponent's tender underbelly (ranged troops with no melee support). A bunch of unlucky dice rolls later, all of my dames were gone without inflicting much damage at all. Then my opponent just spawned more troops to take their place...I am not sure if we will ever pull out this game again, but if we do, we will place strict time limits on how long a turn lasts. Three minutes should do it. Also, I would want to create several house rules to expedite the game, such as making the castle wimpier, giving each player more mana to cast spells, etc. We might be able to cut the game play time down to three hours - two if everything went absolutely right for a player.Let me be clear: we had fun with this game until approximately the two-hour mark. After that, it became a grim death march to the end. I will not play it again as it comes out of the box, though.

I took a risk on this game. It only had two reviews but I figured for $13 dollars it was worth it the risk. The game is a strategy game that adds some required skill. Your ranged units require you to throw the dice and the dice have to land on the opponents cards in order to get a hit. It took around 1 hour to play. Next time might be shorter the first time always takes awhile to learn the new rules. The games rules are fairly simple to learn but the game was very enjoyable. I played it with my 11 year old who liked it also. The game board and pieces are all goods quality and the art work is good. For $13, I feel like I stole it. Great game for a great price.

This is a great game. Most games don't require skill and thought, so it's nice to see a new game the really makes you think about you next move like chess but 10x more fun. This game is played weekly in my house and is used to solve conflicts like whose turn it is to walk the dog or do the dishes. I could go on and on but you really need to buy this. It's a must have if you love games.

Found the game for cheap and decided to try it. The game was just ok. It felt like neither player could gain an advantage. Pretty much a stalemate for two hours. We just called it a tie and packed it up.

I cannot express how cool this game is. It's a sharp learning curve, but it's completely worth it. My friend and I can't play this enough. It's surprisingly strategic. Get this game, it's an amazing price. Rolling the dice as ranged attacks is quite the novelty, but sounds silly until you try it.

Very exciting game that allows players to choose which battle tactics they prefer. Will definitely Recommend.Great Price at Only $8!

Great game, lots of fun. Only complaint is the rules were vaguely explained.

Cool concept for a boardgame! great transaction!