Roll Breakers
Randomgard has finally found peace.
After a devastating cataclysm that nearly wiped out all life, kingdoms have risen from the ruins. Towns have been rebuilt, people have returned to their everyday lives, and the horrors of the past are slowly becoming distant memories.
But what if that hard-earned peace was never meant to last?
Deep within the shadows, remnants of the Dark Army still linger. And with them comes the possibility of yet another disaster. But this time, the kingdoms are aware of the threat. So they turn to a rather unusual group of adventurers: The Roll Breakers.
Blessed by the God of Luck, these warriors have made a living hunting monsters and taking on dangerous jobs. Not necessarily out of the goodness of their hearts, mind you. A little gold goes a long way.
And now, they’ve been hired for a mission unlike any other. To defeat Dragon Kaikoza, the last general of the Dark Army, before another catastrophe befalls Randomgard.
Can the Roll Breakers save the day before it’s too late?
Entry: before playing the game
First impression
Poker hands meet dice combinations meet character development is what I first got to know about Roll Breakers as Alexz introduced the game to me.
I am still relatively new to poker hands, my only experience with them being playing Centi, and I had a fun time with it. So I was excited to see how they gel with dice combos, while developing the hero that I’ll be- a Roll Breaker, so to speak.
To add more to my enthusiasm, Alexz mentioned how the game was inspired by a game he spent 200 hours playing: Balatro.
“I wanted a unique board game, a spiritual successor to Balatro that offered something new. Something I would enjoy playing, without being too complicated. A game for beginners and experienced players alike, with the best qualities of a roguelike: addictive gameplay and replayability.”
The quote above is an excerpt from the interview he gave me about the story behind creating Roll Breakers. Feel free to read it if you’re interested.
So, let’s see what we got here:
+ Roll-and-write: Totally my type
+ Poker hands: New to it, but I enjoyed my only experience with it
+ Inspired by Balatro: My previous experience with a PnP inspired by a digital game has been solid. Time to see if it will be, as Alexz pointed out, addictive and replayable!
A bit on the game
Roll Breakers: First Quest is a solo fantasy roll-and-write where you’ll take on ten increasingly powerful enemies, with the fearsome Dragon Kaikoza waiting at the very end.
You start by choosing one of six heroes, each with their own abilities, skills, and unique resources. Your goal? Survive all ten encounters by dealing enough damage to defeat each enemy. And this is where poker hands come into play.
Armed with five dice (four of the same color and a fifth of a different color), you’ll roll and form combinations such as pairs, straights, full houses, and four of a kind. These combinations determine your Break value. This, along with your weapon values and attack strength, determines how much damage you deal.
You’ll also need to manage your health, gold, and runes, with the latter allowing you to reroll dice in hopes of getting a better result.
Defeat an enemy, and you’ll get to learn a new skill and visit the shop to upgrade your weapons, improve your strikes, or stock up on resources. As you progress, your hero gradually grows stronger to face the increasingly difficult enemies ahead.
And with each character’s first victory at a difficulty level, you’ll earn XP that can be spent on permanent character upgrades.
All you need
There are 12 pages to print in total, consisting of 6 character sheets, 5 battle log sheets for different difficulty levels, and 1 progression sheet. I printed them all on laser cardstock, business as usual.
By the way, you only need two sheets to get started: a character sheet and a battle log sheet.
Considering I’m printing this on a working day, it’s a delight that Roll Breakers is a zero-assembly game. So I can jump straight into action. I’ve got a handful of zero-assembly print-and-plays that I really love. Let’s see if Roll Breakers gets to be one of them!
Besides the printed sheets, all you need are five D6 dice (ideally four of the same color and a fifth of a different color), a pencil/pen, and a calculator to keep track of the damage. I’ll be using my phone to calculate numbers that go beyond my brain’s capacity. And that’s pretty much it. Fairly minimal requirements.
Pretty curious about the black/uncommon die. Interested to see how it plays its part…
Alright, enough chit-chat. Time to take down the Dark Army. They have no idea how ruthless I can be on a workday!
Entry: after playing the game
Findings
A game of questions
I like a game that throws a lot of questions my way, and Roll Breakers definitely belongs in that mix.
Before you start the game: Which character do you pick? Which difficulty do you want to play the game with?
During the game: Which poker combos do you create? Which skills do you choose? Which weapons do you upgrade? When do you use the runes to re-roll? When do you spend the gold?
Every decision you make impacts the outcome. The poker combos you create determine the strength of your attack, and not planning them right means eventually a monster will get the better of you. The skills you choose are game-changers, and so are the skills you discard, so you better pick them strategically. Upgrading weapons will increase attack strength, but picking the right weapon is key, and you’ve got 6 of them to work with. Runes and gold coins are pivotal in this game, and knowing when to spend them can make the difference between victory and defeat.
If you have the right answers to these questions, you’re well on your way to winning Roll Breakers.
Skills and the odd one out
While printing out the game, I was quite curious about what the black/uncommon die’s purpose would be. I’m a sucker for cool dice mechanisms, and much to my joy, I’ve just experienced a super-fresh concept!
The black die ties in with the Skills of the game. After defeating an enemy, you roll the black die alongside a regular die to generate a skill option. You do this twice, giving you two skills to choose from. You get to learn one, while the other gets discarded.
This little inclusion of an odd die has to be my highlight for Roll Breakers. Why? Cause it makes the game more crunchy. There simply could have been 5 regular dice, and choosing Skills could simply be determined by rolling 2 of them, or rolling a die multiple times and increasing dice count progressively, or something along that line. But Alexz took an odd route, quite literally, by introducing the black die and making things so much more interesting. And it goes beyond just determining the Skills.
Case in point: there’s a skill for the Knight where if you play the black die, you increase Base Attack by 1. There’s also a skill where you increase Base Break by 2 if you don’t use the black die for an entire battle against a monster. So the presence/absence of the black die in your poker hands becomes pivotal. In between rolling and making those combinations, you are watchful of where the black die is allocated and how it impacts your attacks, adding another layer of strategy to the game.
Luck?
Rolling a die inevitably brings luck into the equation. But rolling 5 dice? That’s supposed to bring in the god of dice rolls onto the table, right? Not quite!
Whenever a game involves dice, I keep an eye out for ways it mitigates bad rolls, and in the case of Roll Breakers, that’s already in place via runes. And gold, since you can use that to purchase more runes. With the re-rolls available through runes, you can try to create better poker combos to generate more impactful attacks.
There’s another interesting thing at play here. As mentioned by Myrto (Tabletop for World) after playing Roll Breakers, the game involves tons of dice rolling, so the good rolls and bad rolls sort of even out. And I totally agree with this.
Take my first attempt at the game as an example. I had 30 rounds of attack and 29 re-rolls, summing to 59 instances of rolling dice. I’ve had my fair share of good and bad rolls, so luck sorta felt balanced out over the course of the game. So for a game with 5 dice, the re-rolls and the high volume of rolls help keep luck in check. But of course, feel free to blame luck when the dragon annihilates you in the 10th encounter, haha. 😛
Mathing!
You gotta be smart with numbers to ace Roll Breakers, and I’m not talking about calculating the attack power to note down on the battle log, but rather the math that comes right before it.
Throughout the game, you’ll be upgrading your weapons, which will increase their attack values. 3s become 4s. Playing as the Knight, I even managed to upgrade my 5s to a whopping 20! Same goes for strike types, where poker combos can increase in value. Base Attack and Base Break can also increase via Skills. So whether to launch a Two Pair attack or a Three of a Kind will hinge on the outcome of those attacks, and you gotta figure that out beforehand by doing the math.
The attack multiplies with the break, and that number grows progressively bigger as you go deeper into the game, so definitely keep a calculator/mobile nearby. Unless you’re some math whiz champion.
Scratching the surface
It’s amazing that all these findings I’m sharing with you are only based on one character sheet (Knight) and one battle log sheet (Normal).
The game has six characters, each with their own abilities, unique resources, and a whopping 36 skills to learn from. Their playstyles vary too. While the Knight is a fairly balanced character, the Rogue relies on quick, powerful attacks, the Summoner can bring an extra die into play, and the Engineer specializes in upgrading weapons.
Then there are five battle log sheets, each representing a different difficulty level. As you progress, enemies become tougher, with higher HP and additional effects to deal with.
And tying the entire experience together is the progression sheet. Your first victory with each character at each difficulty level earns you XP, which you can spend on permanent upgrades to your characters’ starting stats and abilities. So even though the skills and upgrades you earn during a run reset afterward, your characters can grow stronger between runs.
So what I’ve experienced is just a part of the whole. Roll Breakers has much more depth than meets the eye.
Is it for you?
While you’re reading my blog on this game, I’m sure this question is at the back of your head, if not the front. And yes, not every game will be your type. So let me put it out as simply as I can:
Do you like rolling dice, like A LOT? Do you like the sound of rolling a handful of dice on repeat? And the sound they make when they land on the table? Do you like it when a game has lots of decision-making space? Do you like crunching numbers to strategize in games? Do you like ticking and crossing off small boxes? Do you like repeated loops in games that tighten their grip over time?
Ask yourself these questions. If the majority is a yes, then Roll Breakers is your game!
As for me, it totally is. I got a fresh game with poker combos, a game that’s super catchy, introduced me to a fresh odd-die mechanism, and has progression that makes me want to give it multiple shots. And it doesn’t take much time to play either! Too many wins for me to say no to this.
The campaign is rollin’
Alexz launched the Kickstarter campaign for Roll Breakers roughly two weeks ago, and at its halfway point, it’s safe to say it’s rollin’!
Join the party if it’s your cup of tea.
– Tas.
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Game Overview
Designer: Alexz Martinez
Number of players: 1
Difficulty level: Easy to Medium
Rounds of gameplay needed to learn: 2/3 rounds
Game duration: 20-30 minutes
Available on: Kickstarter
Theme: Roll-and-write × Poker hands | Rolling out hordes of monsters
Number of pages and color: 12 pages (color print)
Assembling difficulty level: Super easy, ZERO assembly!
Lamination: Only if the glare doesn’t bug you
Additional elements required: 5 D6 dice (one black/uncommon) + 1 pen/pencil + 1 mobile/calculator
Time to learn: Within 20 minutes
Travel-friendly: 10/10
Shelving friendly: 10/10
Rating from PnP Time: 9/10
Tas is a game designer and blogger based in Bangladesh, with the dream of exploring the world of games and introducing it to anyone new to it.
