Clash of Clans: The Epic Raid Review: Barbarians at the Gate

0:15 Hey everybody, I'm Tom Vassal and today we're taking a look at Clash of Clans the epic raid. Clash of Clans of course being a very popular game on mobile devices where you make your little clans and you attack other people's bases and they attack yours and you build up and it's you know it's one of those games that is so thrived upon by trying to get you to spend money consistently but also like I said very popular to send your little army to attack others. Clash of Clans this is the a board game from Maestro Media. Eric Lang and Ken Gruhl designers of it. So it tries to simulate that and I think it's always difficult to simulate a a video game on a board game but maybe this one succeeded. Let's take a look at how it plays.

1:02 In this game each player is going to have their own board and they're going to have their own little area. You're going to start with a town hall, one gold collector and one elixir collector down here. You're going to be taking turns going through each round of the game until somebody reaches 30 points. That's going to trigger the end of the game. Now what players are doing on their turn is they're placing workers out on various spots on the board. When you place out these workers there are different things you can do. One you can build more things in your town. You can build new buildings which have a cost in gold coins. There are three resources in this game. There are gold coins, there is magic and there are gems which basically count as either one of those. Players will start with a gem in their treasury but you'll get more by building more of these different gold collectors and elixir collectors and as you build buildings you're going to be adding them to different spots in your town.

1:59 Not only can you build more Elixir Collectors and more Gold Collectors, but you can build other things. For example, I can build this Mighty Hero Statue. Some things that you build, like these are going to give you resources. Um but some are going to score. Now, your basic town hall is going to score every turn. It's going to give you one point per level. This Mighty Hero Statue is just going to give me three points every turn. While these barracks here just let me reroll a die once per turn. And as I build these things, I'm going to be filling out my camp. You can also buy more troops, like this dragon or a giant. To buy these cost magic rather than costing coins. And when you do that, you will go through this box and find the appropriate figure. This dragon or the giant. Everyone starts with a barbarian and archer, and there's no limit to the number of troops you can have. They can keep going off the side of the board. Players can also upgrade their town hall, which when you pick that, it also costs magic. You'll take whatever it gives you. This, for example, gives me a cannon and another level to the tower. This one gives me two walls and another level tower, an extra worker, and so on and so forth.

3:07 This allows you to increase your town hall and these pieces fit on there, so that I have another level, which will give me more points per round. Cannons will help me defend from enemies, as will walls, because when a player attacks, they have to attack a wall. Speaking of that, the next action here is raiding. Well, there's also taking the first player token, which gives you a gem. But rating, there's epic rating, which gives you some money, and rating, where you will be attacking your opponents. When you do that, you'll be bringing in a troop to fight, and then you're going to use the stats of that troop. So, for example, that's the barbarian, and so they have an attack of two and a defense of one. The defense of one is if I, for example, I had the barbarian attack here, this is next to a cannon, so the cannon gets to roll one die and shoot back first. And if it rolls enough hits to kill the barbarian, which requires only one, then the barbarian doesn't even get to do anything. Otherwise, the barbarian's going to roll their dice, which have these swords on them, and both defense and offensive dice have one side that if you roll it, you keep rolling, so you're never quite sure. And if they do enough damage to take out the object there, then you're going to put a fire on it, and it's burning. And what that means is your opponent's you're going to get some points for taking out your opponent, but also you if you take out, for example, their town hall or mighty hero statue, then that won't give score for them that round.

4:35 Players can also buy more defenses, getting more cannons, archers, which can target flying units most the cannons cannot do that, and wizards towers, which can do even more damage against the enemy. That's pretty much it. You're going to be going through the different phases of the game, collecting resources, taking actions with your building, scoring your villages, and removing the fires from other enemies. And then you'll discount the any the stuff no one bought in the middle of the board and start another round until someone reaches 30 points.

5:14 So, component-wise, the game is fine. The miniatures are good. The There's little cardboard standees for the fire and the wizards tower and the cannons and things like that. But, I mean, I don't need a box full of miniatures. I think that works pretty well the way that everything lines up. And and here's the thing, so much of this game is so easy to understand. At the bottom of your player board, it walks you through the phase. The worker placement spots, this is how they work. You go there. This gives you points at the end of a round. The only thing that's a little tricky, I think, for new players will be the attacking in general because you have to attack when there's a wall, you have to attack the wall first, and then go over the wall, but if there's no wall on this side, can I come underneath that, and this tower hits me first? There's just a little bit of few more niggley rules in that respect that I would not have uh I I think other than that, the game's like so easy for people to learn and play.

6:10 And it really is easy to to play. Uh the the box here says uh 60 to 90 minutes. That's very accurate. In fact, it might run a little, you know, closer to the 60 than it does to the 90. Because the game is just about hitting the other people. And that's what this game is, in a sense. You are attacking the other players, not to really injure them. You are temporarily stopping them from getting victory points. Sometimes, you know, if you attack a place with a resource, you'll get the resource of the place that you attacked. So, you might pick it for that reason. But as the game goes by, you look at who's out in the lead, and they're the people you attack. Or you might attack someone who has the lowest defense. And that's where the game can get a little tricky cuz someone might be scoring a lot of points, they build a big defense around those points, not a lot you can do. The attacks never ever feel epic.

6:57 You're attacking with You can attack with as many of the same type on an attack as you can, but that means that's still very rare. You have to get another archer or another warrior to make the attack with multiple people. It's possible they show up, but you're not really quite sure. The game plays very smoothly. It It feels like a very streamlined version of this kind of game. And I think it might be a little too streamlined in that regard because there's very few edges, and the battles are just roll dice, and the the battles often come down to who rolled better. Sometimes you have this epic roll, sometimes you don't. Uh you might have this giant You might have the dragon, and then suddenly the attacks don't work. It's It's a very simple game. You can decide to get a big victory point town protected or just upgrade your your town hall as quickly as you can or get a bunch of units who attack other people, but it's has snappy decisions. Overall, I think the game is is is good. It's well laid out, easy to play, very straightforward. Um I'm stopping shy of recommending it though because it feels a little empty. My rating for this one is a six out of 10. It's It's not It's I played it and I was like oh, okay. And And while everything works, there seems to be lacking a spark of wah. And I And I think that's the biggest issue. It's like, who do I attack? Is usually the person in the lead and that's this kind of game, but it's like I'm just It it struggles to

8:27 figure out, well, I guess I should hit hit Joe because Joe is winning or now Sally is ahead now, so maybe I should hit Sally. But building the town, that part I like, the fact that there's different places to go to. Although as everyone gets their third worker, the spot of the places and interesting there there's there's not more spots to put people then. And so it feels more constricted and sometimes you go, well, I guess I'll go here. There's also only so many attacks, so there's only so many attacks per turn and especially near the end of the game where it really matters and you don't really care if you build another gold generating thing unless you have a building that does that. It works. It works smoothly. And I played it and I was fine. I just don't know that I have the desire to go back and play more of it. Now, if you know someone who likes Clash of Clans, this might make it a superb gift for that person.

9:20 Um I It doesn't exactly feel like that game at all, but it gives the same kind of vibes, I think, and that might be all that they need. So, there you go. It's Clash of Clans: The Epic Raid. I'm Tom Vasel. We'll see you next time.

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