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In Machina Arcana, players take on the role of explorers who are investigating an ancient subterranean complex of unknown origin. They face monsters inspired by H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos in a steampunk setting. The adventurers collect equipment, interact and utilize their environment, fight monsters, and immerse themselves in the rich narrative elements.
The complete story is broken down into different scenarios that represent a self-contained game. All of these scenarios contain chapters, each with its own narration and specifics. The objective of the game is to progress through the tale and face the endgame at the finale of each scenario.
The main goal behind Machina Arcana is to provide players with a chilling game that can never be played the same way, mechanisms that enable varying strategies and approaches, and an extensive framework that combines everything smoothly. The game scales by default; there is no need for special conditions based on the player count. As the story progresses, so does your gear. But beware! If you are too slow, horror might very well prevail and devour you whole...
The 2nd edition has a lot of improvement to the rules; as well as a new manual, new illustrations, new graphic design, and additional content. The 3rd edition includes no rule changes aside from rewordings to make the game more easier to understand, and to help the new players with the learning curve. On the other hand, the 3rd edition is the first one to offer other languages than English: French, German, Polish, and Spanish.
For extensive list of changes check the changelog page:
http://machinaarcana.com/changelog.html
- Varied map tiles with tactical considerations.
- Exciting item system with powerful combos and builds.
- Good initial monster variety with distinct behaviors.
- Interesting tactical options for dealing with enemies (dodging, blocking, environmental traps).
- Engaging campaign structure with unique thematic backdrops.
- Game can be unbalanced across player counts, particularly solo.
- Randomness in monster spawning and combat can be frustrating.
- Campaigns can become repetitive once the core mechanic is understood.
- Long playtime (2+ hours per campaign session).
- Monster variety might feel less significant by the end of a long scenario.
- Characters themselves are not very distinct.
- Lovecraftian
- steampunk
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- campaign structure — The game features scenarios linked together in a campaign format with unique event cards.
- Character progression — Players can enhance their characters through items, leading to powerful builds and abilities.
- dice-based combat resolution — Combat outcomes are determined by rolling dice.
- Environmental interaction — Players can use elements on the map like doors, pits, and explosive barrels to their advantage or to hinder enemies.
- Objective Fulfillment — Players must complete specific objectives to progress through the game.
- Tile-based movement — Players move around a dungeon composed of modular tiles.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- And no disclaimer for this one, a kind BG user that I was selling a game to just gave me a copy for free.
References (from this video)
- Game is hard and punishing for those who enjoy it
- Blessings and curses add replayability
- Lots of equipment introduced in tiers
- Crafting system is satisfying
- Least casual friendly board game
- Gameplay is unforgiving and hard to teach
- Difficult if expecting a Descent-style dungeon crawler
- survival against dark cyclopean shapes and old ones
- deep underground in some lost and forsaken tunnels
- played in chapters, each requiring a task to be completed to advance the story
- Descent
- Darkest Dungeon
- Kingdom Death Monster
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Action points — each player gets a number of action points equal to their stamina
- Card drawing — the workshop which allows you to draw three cards and keep one. You can also discard items to keep additional cards drawn.
- Combat — all units have armor and will scores. In combat your roll dice shown on your attack and try to beat your opponents defence score whether it is will or armor.
- cooperative play — each player is working together to overcome the evils in this underground
- crafting — cobble together different components and build yourself unique custom kit
- Dice rolling — This game features a lot of dice rolls but the dice are designed with low variance.
- Essence collection — killing monsters and using locations gets you essence. essence can be used in the place of health or can be used to activate chapter spaces
- Location abilities — numerous different locations on each board that you can use with stamina they include: the chest, the recharge station, the event space, the workshop, the trap space, the exploding barrel.
- Monster spawning — once all players have acted you roll to spawn monsters for each player
- Movement — it costs one stamina per square moved on the board
- tile-based board — there can only ever be a 2x2 grid of tiles and play
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- Can you survive this dark place long enough to create the means to defend yourself? Or will you just be food for the old ones
- the game is hard and I mean really hard
- If you like games that are utterly remorseless and punish mistakes brutally you might enjoy this
- however this might be the least casual friendly board game I have ever played
- the rules are not incredibly complex but the gameplay is so unforgiving that it's hard to teach without telling other people exactly what to do
- if you pick this game up and expect it to be another descent style dungeon crawler where you fight the baddies and win you'll find the gameplay very difficult
- as standing and fighting normally means standing and dying