Oct 7, 2020
Welcome to our first official Solo edition of On The Table, I am Larry Neal Just a quick word on the format here, the bold section headers are the quicker TL:DR sections, reading them only will give you a gist of what I am saying or you can read everything and get a more complete picture from me. Either way, thank you for spending time, please don’t forget to drop us a line and let us know what you think about the game and with all of that out of the way let's get to it!
Warp’s Edge by Scott Almes Illustrated by Tyler Johnson Published by Renegade Game Studios With additional Content by Banana Chan Released in 2020
First up this is a solo only game set in space by who I think is one of the stronger designers out there today, that would be one Mr. Scott Almes of “Tiny Epic” fame. No this game does not follow that particular design paradigm but it is a uniquely Scott Almes design otherwise: Colorful components, smart set up that is more than just putting out a few piles of components, meaningful decisions to be had in game and a meatier, heavier experience that is altogether greater than the sum of its parts. Warp’s Edge is a bag builder at its heart, and all other mechanics hang neatly off of this; You get additional powers to soup up your ship, your ships initial build out of items to possibly go into the bag are varied based on your pre-game choice of ship, the strategy of when and what to attack, or just try to outmaneuver adds neatly to this mechanic as well. The real feeling of this is my ship preference and having a modicum of expertise in dispensing its abilities and functions is high in this game as a result.
Operationally the game flows fairly straight forward: Pick your ship, build out the powers that said ship has to draw from later in the game, pick your target and build its custom deck of baddies to fight through or avoid (more on this later) pick one of two drawn extra powers for your ship and get going. You lay out the targets four at a time that act as guardians to the mothership, some of the mother ships cannot be attacked OR attack until all of these are dealt with in a turn, however others can be attacked at any time, players choice.
From the first draw of your tokens the strategy starts, you have to engage or otherwise out maneuver a ship in order for it to NOT attack your lone fighter during this portion of the game round, placing a single attack token OR maneuver token against an enemy “stuns” it, keeping it from attacking you later in the round, this is crucial and will take up the bulk of your game planning both early and late game. Damage persists from attack to attack and is moved from below the ship to above it to denote this, while this helps you ultimately deal with an intended threat, it only stuns the target when it is first placed. This wrinkle helps you deal with otherwise more powerful ships and also helps you to plan when and where you take out foes, which is a welcome ability that has proven to be crucial and a lot of fun!
Making sure you are dealing out more damage than you are taking in is key as you have to work not only through the turned up foes, but the ENTIRE deck (otherwise face down) in order to attack some mother ships! The game promises some very powerful player turns in order to be able to do this and largely delivers. Keeping this from being a slower paced math affair, is the fact that when you need to draw tokens from the bag in the part of the turn that this comes up and there are not enough, the mother ship “Warps”. Which in game is a “soft” reset, but also moves an overall game tracker one slot closer to the end game, and your eventual loss! Post warp you recall all tokens, reshuffle ALL bad guys and set them back up again and essentially start all over, hopefully both wiser and stronger!
The player ship has many abilities depending on which one is selected. The game has standard attacks of varying levels of power from one to three maneuvers are the same, and so is energy, the latter used to buy new tokens for your bag. The Warp moves all tokens back to the bag EXCEPT those in your hold, this allows the player to keep some crucial powers over between warps, continuity is good here.
The game takes anywhere from 30-45 minutes and if you really take your time could last up to an hour. Learning the rules is as paramount as in any board game, slightly more important is making SURE you have the order in which things are done down pat. Knowing when to attack and gaining more tokens to help you through the cannon fodder is a crucial skill to master, and doing it in the wrong order will change the experience.
My overall package consists of the Kickstarter edition of the game with the upgrade pack, expansion and game mat included. Value for the paid price for me is outstanding here, there is a lot of content.
Component quality is what you should expect from Renegade: High quality cardboard, great color art and card-stock that is very nice as well. The upgrade pack, as such things are, is not essential to the game itself, either enjoying OR playing it. It consists of plastic tokens to replace the cardboard counters that are added to and drawn from the bag. So far they are quite a bit more satisfying to draw and shuffle in the bag, I have seen here where durability with the printing process may let them down in the long run. I have not had any issues with them yet, but can see some wear, which after only half a dozen games is not a welcome site, time will tell. The custom trays that come in every copy of the game are a touch that I will champion: They are functional right out of the box for storage AND playing the game. They look fantastic, while not being confusing, they are both in keeping with the games aesthetic while being straight forward: A space for the cleverly named special POWER tokens: each letter has a set of tokens assigned to it, but also the attack, maneuver and energy tokens in each of their three power levels. Practically speaking these stay in their assigned slots at all times, you store the special power tokens in each slot, removing the ones that are not applicable when you pick your ship, the ship's card tells you which ones to pick in your load out. The game's plastic blow molded bottom insert will happily hold the extras and I even have my punched Cardboard ones in there as well, all of them. It all buttons up neatly and stays in place when I am done, a huge plus. The draw bag itself is another welcome touch, it's a woven material and not velvet, it has embroidered game and publisher logos on it and looks fantastic, most importantly, it has a wide enough opening to accommodate my large (even for an adult) sized hands comfortably, and seems durable, the bag is a WIN.
One of the themes that rings out for me in this game is the fact that the player power set is specific and meaningful. Managing these various facets of your ship is engaging and rewarding, it's possible to engage with the game and just flow with what is going on, however it is also entirely possible to take a more specific hands on approach and actively manage damage output and targeting to effect the most damage, even calculating using the Warp to one's advantage. It is a very accomplished system that has clearly seen a great deal of turning and has resulted in a very extensible system out of the box, the current expansion adds more ships for the player and another mother ship as well as more cards for both the enemy row and the player power row, all welcome content.
The base game also includes a unique story book entitled Singularity written by Banana Chan and illustrated by Tyler Johnson that is highly recommended. The unique contribution this very well written book adds is a sort of “choose Your Own Adventure” system to setting up and playing the game. As you read through and make choices, the book instructs you on how to set up, what components to put in and enemies, you do not need it to play the game of course, but this is a welcome way to interact with the content. It's an idea I am thoroughly behind in the realm of Hobby Board gaming: it's a novel, new way of interacting with your purchase. In terms of the sports world, it’s a welcome way to get the ball in the hands of your playmakers, Banana’s narrative is really fantastic here, I cannot overstate this, Tyler’s illustrations only add to the affair and continuity of the game’s main artist illustrating here is both fitting and equally excellent. That and adds to the immersiveness in your one session or a campaign play through.
Warp’s Edge is a highly enjoyable romp through space for one player, that has been expertly produced and represents a unique value. If the science fiction theme appeals to you then I personally highly recommend it to all solo or even aspiring solo players, this is a great value and a fantastic jumping on point.