Frank Branham: Prophecy 2nd Edition Deep Dive

I was so very happy that a Through the Ages won the IGA award this year, even though it was not my favorite game from last year.

My fave is Prophecy, a game by the same designer, Vlaada Chvatil. It didn't garner enough nominations. This is not very suprising—the game looks exactly like yet another in a long line of Talisman clones. Almost invariably, Talisman clones are the worst of games. They last for many hours, stuff happens at random, and eventually somebody wins, which makes everyone happy because the game is finally over.

Prophecy was actually quite fun, with much cleaner rules, more control over movement, and wonderful synergistic character advancements. So I kept playing. And I'm now convinced that there is quite a bit of skill in this game, perhaps nearly as much as Through the Ages, but with more streamlined rules.

There are quite a few parallels. A turn in Through the Ages has you choose between opportunities for advancement based on action point cost from the available sliding rack; Prophecy allows you to choose from face-up opportunities scattered within a few turns travel.

In Through the Ages, you have to spend some of your actions managing food, ore, and workers; Prophecy makes you spend turns to deal with health, magic, experience, and gold. Eventually, you turn these into the basic and important Strength and Willpower that actually allow you to win.

Experience in Prophecy allows you to buy various technologies (Abilities) that sometimes work together to increase your movement (which is similar to having extra actions in TTA) or combat ability.

There are differences, of course. Through the Ages gives you a few actions per turn with varying costs. Prophecy requires you to spend one or more turns for an action, as travel is slow. You are accomplishing less, but turns fly by at great speed, and the game feels like it has a faster pace.

Prophecy also has the wonderful focus on acquiring five artifacts from particularly powerful bosses that are turned up slowly over the course of the game. This choice is actually fairly similar to the classic resource game decision of when to convert from building up your factories to starting to cash in for victory points.

Prophecy also has creatures you have to kill before claiming an opportunity. In practice, this means there is either a random delay of a few turns, or it allows another player a chance of claiming a particularly valuable card.

Prophecy also has the whole dice thing.

This is no doubt what turns off most Eurogamers. When I think about the situation, the combat in Prophecy is far less noxious than most of its forebears. You are allowed to choose your opponents, and an event deck replenishes your health and gold, which reduces the penalty for failure. I'm winning about 75% of the games I play, and experienced players are winning the remainder.

Changes in the second edition
Z-Man just put out the new edition. I dutifully bought it, hoping desperately that the changes would not ruin a game I am so fond of. They didn't. Changes are small, and universally for the better.

1. Components: The game has a smaller, but far denser box. The board is now much thicker. The cards are thicker. The player character cards are now small boards. The printed bits all have a linen finish. The tiny glass beads from the original have been replaced with oversized cubes and printed tokens. The components are pretty impressive at the $40 list.
   
   
2. Rules changes: The only change is that the original ending has been truncated. The original ending required players to chase each other over the board, fighting when they meet. If no one has acquired four artifacts by the time of a single pass through the event deck, no one wins. This can break just a bit, as a player with a few movement powers can avoid being caught fairly easily.
   
   The new rule still involves a fight, but it starts immediately without all that moving around and only lasts a couple of turns. The original rule is still a variant as is my house rule of first player to reach two artifacts wins. (I will still use this rule with new players. ) Both rules make the game ever so slightly shorter, chopping 15-30 minutes off the game length.
   
   The game is still about 30-45 minutes per player, which means it is best for 2 or 3. Anthony Rubbo claims to play it two-player at lunch in 45 minutes—which must involve Joe Huber or some other speed game freak.
   
   
3. Cards: Perhaps as many as a third of the cards have been changed. The changes are individually very small. Most are clarifications, to make the lengthy FAQ/Glossary at the end of the rulebook mostly unnecessary. Monsters now provide a little more gold, which makes it easier to buy the larger common item supply available in the village.

And a few changes correct abilities that are slightly too powerful, either adjusting their cost or reducing them in power.
© 2007 Frank Branham

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Comments:

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Cool Stuff Frank. Thanks for the article. I do enjoy adventure games and its heartening to see experience and skill win 75% of your games. By your description it seems that the game has lots of theme and chances for meaningful strategic decision making. Both elements which contribute heavily to the “fun” factor for me in games. Peace Posted by Brent Lloyd on Nov 16, 2007 at 05:56 AM | #

Great review, which well shows my own impression of it! I’ve played the old version once and loved it! When I got the new version in Essen and played it once, I still love it - and I’m a typical eurogamer! Posted by Carl Samuelsson on Nov 16, 2007 at 05:54 PM | #

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