Re: Hyborian War -> Alamaze

From: chrisk@yogi.NoSubdomain.NoDomain (Chris Kessel)

Date: Fri, 14 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000

|> Hyperboria is Like Risk with modifiers to your die rolls in battle.
|> You struggle to give yourself the greatest modifiers with each battle
|> you fight.  If you like Risk you will like Hyperboria, Personally, I
|> found when I understood the mechanics of the game I became bored.
|> Also many of the minor failures became more apparent and annoying.
|> Therefore, I went from playing Hyperboria to Alamaze (another game
|> that RSI was monitoring).  In my opinion, Alamaze is a much better
|> game.

I know this isn't about Hyborian War anymore (which I played one
game of), but I had to comment on Alamaze.

I played Alamaze for 2 years in it's early days years ago, then for
another year or so maybe a little over a year ago.

The game is ok in concept, and it's alot of fun for, oh, about 10 turns.
Then you know everyone's abilities and what you have to do each turn
becomes very predictable.  Of the 15-25 orders most people have, maybe
4-5 are really a "choice", the rest are pretty much blatantly obvious.

Game balance is all but destroyed each game by drop outs or by
vetrans like myself who know what to do to man handle weak starting
positions.

A case in point, I was the Underworld in a 2nd cycle game.  The Warlock
starts very weak, lots of low level wizards, and I knew to kill him
you had to start early.  I assassinated 6 of 7 warlock wizards by
turn 3...he dropped (big suprise).  There was *nothing* he could
do to stop that attack.  He even had agents on counter espionage.
Outside of knowing my intentions and fleeing with teleports to the
opposite side of the board on turn 1, he was dead.  Even then, I was
spying for that and would have just bought or repositioned my agents.

And if you don't handle the warlock, he gets obscene.  I played the Warlock
in another second cycle game (that's why I knew the warlock's weak points
well).  A warlock, unstopped, becomes invincible.  Wizards cost no maintenance,
can do almost anything, and are all but infinitely mobile, and at high levels
are tough to kill with agents, very tough.

Several other positions are much the same.  Balance in the game is tenuous
at best and some of the holes (like my attack with the Underworld) mean even
the most competent player might, through actions totally out of his control,
have no chance at winning, and maybe little at even surviving.

Anyway, it's a neat game in concept, enough that it even sucked me into
playing a second time years later.  I have to say I regret it though.  I
really didn't enjoy the turns.  Usually it took all of 20 minutes to
figure out my orders.  At $8.50 a turn I could have spent my money
much more wisely (not to mention the phone bills, ouch...).

If you do play Alamaze, 2nd Cycle is much better than 1st Cycle.  I've
played both about the same length of time.

Just for reference, I did place 1st in status points as the Warlock, 3rd
as the Halfling.  As the Underworld I got bored and quit.
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Christopher Robin Kessel        Portland, Oregon | Yes, I was named
chrisk@protocol.com             Protocol Systems | after *that* Christopher
-------------------------------------------------| Robin.  Winnie the Pooh
Why, I have piglet pasted on my window!          | is my hero. :)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

References

Hyborian War
snake6283@aol.com (Snake6283)
Fri, 07 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
demigod98g@aol.com (Demigod98G)
Sun, 09 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
trip@netcom.com (Trip)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
baw@grebble.oau.org (Brett Wampner)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
baidins@stimpy.eecis.udel.edu (Juris Baidins)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
baw@grebble.oau.org (Brett Wampner)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
mgauthie@access.awinc.com (Marc L. Gauthier)
Tue, 11 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000

Referenced By

Hyborian War
snake6283@aol.com (Snake6283)
Fri, 07 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
demigod98g@aol.com (Demigod98G)
Sun, 09 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
trip@netcom.com (Trip)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
baw@grebble.oau.org (Brett Wampner)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
baidins@stimpy.eecis.udel.edu (Juris Baidins)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
baw@grebble.oau.org (Brett Wampner)
Mon, 10 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000
Re: Hyborian War
mgauthie@access.awinc.com (Marc L. Gauthier)
Tue, 11 Jul 1995 00:00:00 +0000