Firesiege: Tower Defense mit cleverem Kommunikations-Twist | Paid Kickstarter Preview
Transcript
Hello and welcome. It's great that you're watching my preview video for Fire Siege, which was paid for by the publisher. Fire Siege is a tower defense game, or rather a base defense game, that's cooperatively played by one to four players. If you decide to pick up the Ballot of Fire expansion as well, you are even able to play the entire game with up to five people, aren't you? That adds another hero. There's a new unit that we can use. These are archers. They definitely increase the tactical options that are available to you by a very significant margin. There are more modules and more enemies, so there is definitely more variety to be found. This game is essentially a base defense game; enemies spawn from these nests, which is a mechanic you can imagine as being somewhat comparable to a kind of fantasy version of Starship Troopers. They proceed along these paths toward the citadel; the moment that they have arrived at the citadel, we will have lost the situation immediately. We want to prevent that. One of four defeat conditions. They can also make holes in walls, or we can do that if we want to go through. This shortens the distances for our own units, but it does so for our opponents as well. We'll get to the gameplay in a bit more detail in a moment. What truly makes the game interesting is the fact that it is so incredibly accessible for all players.
We played it one evening at the Spieleburg with three people, then someone else came along and said, "I'm here right now, I'd like to play, is that okay?" And we said, "Oh, we just explained the rules, which is rather stupid." Then we were able to say, come sit down, that is your character, so let us get started now. It's super easy to explain while playing. Learning the rules isn't that time-consuming either, and if you watch a good video explaining the rules, you can basically start playing straight away. It is also quite interesting that it is not always just a matter of ensuring the opponents do not enter the base, while we must somehow manage to survive through a specific number of rounds. It is more the case that many things are working against us, and at some point the game will come to an end, but we have these goal cards laid out up here; if we are able to successfully complete them, we are then permitted to turn over these banners that are placed here. Our goal is to turn over all six banners, and that depends on which of the goal cards are lying here, wouldn't you agree? And if we manage to achieve all of the goals, then we can simply turn over a banner to finish it. Here is another banner, but there are also cards that serve to increase the level of difficulty, because the more banners that one is able to turn over, the harder the challenges usually tend to be as the game progresses further into the specific difficulty level. But depending on which cards are laid out here, your game always has a completely different character. Because there are blop cards here, where your starting units that you already have, which are super important, are simply swallowed up by blops, and you have to beat them free first, right? There is a great deal of variation involved, or you might need to bring a bar all the way to the top, which is quite important for you, and then you simply have to drop it back down to the bottom. That's actually not so good either. The character of each game changes because of that. That's nice. They say that the game is accessible, that the game is varied, yet the game remains challenging for all players. But it seems relatively easy at the beginning.
We lost a lot of games by the end. We often knew exactly what the reasons were and understood that, okay, the next time around we are going to have to play just a little bit better. However, these action sequences are also exciting, and they are what truly give the game its unique character, though some people might call them lousy. For that reason, I would like to take this moment to briefly introduce this specific element to you in greater detail. Namely, this is my character, right? This is the normal side, and provided that certain conditions are met, I am able to level him up exactly one single time. So with these new special abilities, he becomes a bit stronger or perhaps he will be granted some additional life points. But we also have action tiles here, right? For this, we have a little bag from which we simply draw three of them at random. And just as we pull them out, we then place them in exactly the same way here onto this display board. That is, I have drawn them like this. But they are always double-sided and that's how it is. From my perspective I see this side , while from the perspective of my fellow players, they see the other side . And when it is my turn, I am able to play one of these action pieces, and I just place it down in front of me and then I process it, which means that I perform all the actions that are listed on that piece. But once I am finished with handling the action, it is also always turned over, and then I proceed to work on the other side as well. It is always the case that the white side represents what are essentially the good and positive actions. The black side consists of the negative actions, where we end up doing something detrimental for the sake of our opponents. They do not simply act on their own accord; instead, they only function if we choose to activate them by using our specific components. And we are naturally allowed to communicate with one another now, although there are, of course, certain restrictions that apply as well. You have to tell your fellow players exactly what they have, right? Because I could say, for example: "Hey, I could play this thing here. That would be quite good for us
right now. With it, I could push us forward, take down opponents, and help us a bit," and then you could reply, " Ah, that is not such a great idea right now. Um, if you were to play something, would that other piece here not be much better?" From the other perspective, it appears significantly more harmless, and I just think that this does not provide me with any real benefit whatsoever, wouldn't you agree? It doesn't really help me progress in a group and you're supposed to communicate on that level and that's definitely something that I know will bother people because you're always developing codes for how to crack the whole thing. You have played the game a few times now, and we have been able to get it done in a manner that is quite successful. That's always the case with things like this, if it feels like cheating, it is cheating, even if that's not defined in any more detail here, but the instructions give you a good idea of how to do it. And we managed it in such a way that while we played the game, we were still saying: "Well, this one could be quite good, this one here is okay, and yes, for this one I do not know; if it is great from the other side, then you can do it , but ah, it would honestly be not so great." And of course, it is sometimes possible to draw conclusions from that regarding what it could be, but in our case, that has functioned in a way that was surprisingly effective for us. And of course, if you are among those brilliant minds with an exceptional memory who have played this character 20 times, then at some point you will have memorized these parts by heart, and you will know roughly what is on the back or, more likely, you will know exactly what is on the back, won't you?
We really have quite a handful, but it's still manageable. Personally, I definitely wouldn't be able to remember it, and I wouldn't want to. I wouldn't play the game often enough for that. For me, I believe that would take away a bit of the game's magic, but some people simply have a memory like that and there is absolutely nothing they can do about it. But that is the central element, that I also already have a hunch: Okay, this situation here might not be so great for us at the moment, but the back side will in all likelihood turn out to be quite good. And if the other players also happen to say, "Yeah, that is fine," then I simply go ahead and play the whole thing, while checking for myself: "Does this currently fit well into the given situation?" Do I get any tips from my fellow players? So we have already spoken with each other a great deal and said: "We have also managed to arrange the whole thing in such a way that we do not end up developing any kinds of codes." But I can certainly imagine that this is an element which some people find quite appealing, because that was also the moment for me when I realized: this is simply just a tower defense game. Okay, why should I play this one now? There are already a lot of them. That was the specific element that appealed to me, where I wanted to see how it actually functions. Does it actually work in practice? Well, in our own rounds, it has certainly worked. Of course, this varies from game group to game group. And how do these cards work ? The most important element is definitely this helmet here. Once you have it, you can simply perform an action, and it is also entirely possible that you might have that same element applied multiple times as well.
I do not have that here at the moment, but let's say I had a helmet like this on twice, then I would be able to simply perform a basic action two times in a row, which is quite useful for that. That means I could either move, I could attack or I could spawn units. And the level of success I can achieve always depends on this specific board. For here we can take a look: with every single action I could move three spaces , and this applies either to myself or to any friendly units located nearby. If I now say that I would like to spawn new units, new support units, because that would be really important for us, I look and see where this marker is here. This is also a marker for the entire group, right, where it is. This affects the action of every single player, and here I could always spawn one unit, here two, here three, and up here at the very top even as many as four. They then always come into the citadel. This is the combat track. Whenever I am engaged in combat, I always check to see exactly how many friendly units are located in an area. They always provide me with plus one strength, even when those are other allied heroes as well. Then I look at my own strength. Then I take the combat die and roll, and in this specific case , I have now dealt another two damage points extra, and over here I have dealt one point of damage extra. If I find that I need even more damage and we happen to be standing on such a sword symbol, I am able to make use of that one as well. If I add more combat strength, then it also decreases by the number of arrows that is indicated right here on the screen. That means the maximum number of swords I am able to receive is three. Then we are going to go back down one, two, or even three steps. You must recharge this repeatedly, and then you simply distribute the damage to all of the enemy units that are currently located within that particular area. I do not need to announce who I am attacking; I simply deal my damage and see what I can destroy with it. Usually, they then inflict some return damage upon me, which I would normally take, but since I have just rolled this shield, I am going to use it to simply prevent that damage from affecting me entirely.
That's essentially the fight, right? The fourth bar right here is essentially the energy track that we have available to us as a collective group. I can either choose to spend it to upgrade my character, or once I have upgraded him, I can also spend the energy in order to be able to perform his unique special action. I also find this element in particular, the fact that we have a tableau for the whole group where we set our values, to be quite cool, because you have to work with it more often; for instance, if I activate this part here, then I have to go down one step on this track. Of course, I'm not allowed to tell my fellow players that. I would say that it would not be all that beneficial for our recruitment process either, honestly. I have to assess whether this is good or not, right? Here, another card is revealed, which simply dictates the way in which the enemy units move, right? All those in the sector and segment would move. A new enemy would spawn there, and I wouldn't have any idea what might be located on the back side of it either. That means I would have to deal with this first, and then I see, oh, look, I can either move two steps up on this energy bar, I can heal myself or units that are with me, and I am also able to perform another action there as well, which is something that I should take into account for my next move. So, I would say that's pretty solid. This can be bad, because when enemies move, it's always not so good.
But you don't just have the mega-great parts, right? Of course, this part here , where I am simply able to move twice and then can make such a breach in the wall or, alternatively, take another shot at them instead of doing that. That's pretty good, of course. In return, this situation is absolutely devastating, and for that I am going to have to roll this die here. And if I happen to roll a mouth symbol—and there are also two mouths depicted here , as well as three mouths over here— then we are required to move forward; once we reach point A in the middle, we will have immediately lost the game entirely. That means, no, when rolling the dice, you can be lucky or unlucky. If you only move forward one step at a time, then it's okay. If you constantly keep rolling these threes, but it is of course only on the die one single time, then that is really quite a stupid situation. But no, you can of course also experiment with that by choosing not to activate these specific cards quite as often as you usually would. And when I have arrived here now, I would also reveal another one of these cards, upon which certain enemies will then move once again just as they did before. If you look at the other cards, it simply means, no, all enemies move on every lane. Enemies will spawn in this area, then enemies spawn in that area, and from there they will subsequently begin to move over to here . One knows that it is not at all a good thing when landing on a symbol like this, for that is when these big, fat critters come into the game. Then you simply draw a card from the corresponding stack, and afterwards we quickly take a look into the instructions to see what exactly this enemy does and where it is going to spawn. And then you can also see here how much life it has and how many banners you will be able to turn over once you have managed to defeat it, won't you? And in the basic version, they all come equipped with a banner.
Of course, it's also possible that later on there will be some that somehow bring more banners. If you look at the others, you will notice that they have quite different amounts of life points; they all possess unique special abilities, and generally speaking, every single one of them brings a banner along with them to the battlefield. And that's how this bar works. Nothing happens here. Here we reveal another movement card, another spawn card. Nothing happens here. Here's another enemy. And at some point we arrived here at Spirale and that was when we ended up losing the whole thing . So that also increases the pressure considerably. We have to really step on the gas. And what we also have featured here on this specific die are those distinct symbols of the traitor. There are one or two knives on it. On this tile here, we can also see that there are two knives depicted, and there is also a mouth shown on it as well. That means, no, the marker would continue to move in and, no, analogous to these knives, there are also these traitors here. They are either pushing this market in that traitorous direction— these are essentially mercenaries that we have hired, and here, well, they are inclined to defect to the enemy, for whatever reason one would want to defect to those insectoid creatures— or they are simply moving in this direction over here. And if there happens to be such a symbol on an enemy spawn activation card, then this is triggered right here, all depending on where it is currently located on the board. That means we then reveal a card here, and if the marker is located within this area, we trigger the white effect exactly as many times as is indicated here, which would be up to three times. Or if the marker arrives here, we would trigger it automatically , even if it is not a card of this specific type that is being utilized here. That's very good. But if, for example, the marker happens to be in this area at the very moment this card is drawn, then we trigger the bad effect as many times as it is indicated
right here. That's also something we want to avoid. Plus, if the marker moves into this space and ends up here, then this card will also be triggered, and that is something that we would also very much like to avoid. So, activating these kinds of tiles simply ensures that we have to move the corresponding marker, in this case right here, or perhaps down here, and consequently we are placed in a worse position than we were before. That means we hope that people will be able to activate tiles like these later on, because with them you can—as shown by this symbol here—simply move the marker up two spaces, which means either one marker by two spaces or two markers by one space, depending on how you choose to allocate those points. And as you can see, this is the side intended for one to three people; however, if you are playing the game with four people, then you simply turn it around. The values are just a little bit different, right? Here is another one; being able to perform three actions is something that is already super powerful. Awesome, right? Especially when the bars are really high up here, then of course you definitely want to trigger that. You already suspect that the back isn't so good. It's just a die, right? Of course , there is also the chance for you to roll three of these mouths here, which is quite possible, isn't it? Or taking two of those swords, I don't find that so bad, but it is the sort of thing that could end up breaking your neck around here. You must always react to that and then incorporate it into your communication with your fellow players by stating that the current situation is such and such; therefore, do not take that action if this marker were, for example, placed as it is here, because we would then simply trigger a negative card. Although that cannot necessarily be considered fatal, these are still the kinds of things that one would certainly prefer to try and prevent. I mentioned that we are still able to spawn some new units, and those units will always spawn up here in the citadel. Furthermore, whenever we decide to perform a movement action, we can either choose to move ourselves across the board or we can also move our friendly units as well by the
corresponding number of squares as dictated by the rules of the game. And why do we want to have them standing somewhere? Of course, because on the one hand they give us more combat strength, but they also hinder these creatures here. They can't move any further. Only if another person were to run in there right now, would that individual be able to pass straight through. But that's where we have the problem again, right? They might be getting blocked here now, and perhaps we also have three units that will initially block everything for a long time that happens to collect here. But whenever three of these simple enemy units occupy the same field, they join forces and then they basically mutate into such a large beast. And that is also not very good, because they simply inflict more damage, they move further, and they can certainly overrun such units or inflict damage upon them; furthermore, they can deal damage to us , and if we were to spawn figures here at some point but happen to have no more left, then we have immediately lost the game as well, which is why we must be careful with how we proceed with these units. They sometimes have to suffer as well when we roll these specific dice during an attack, as we are also required to inflict some damage upon our own friendly units in the process. We can do that ourselves too. We are able to do it, you see, if we are in the appropriate area, then we can of course also heal ourselves again once we are there. That's quite good.
If they take damage, they're usually out. And one must naturally coordinate quite a bit, because, as is the case here, the paths are also always relatively long to traverse. That is why it is possible to use certain actions to simply punch a hole through this wall; we could then pass through it more quickly. However, the enemies would naturally take this same path as well, and they would consequently reach the citadel in a much shorter amount of time. You always have to consider whether it's worth it, does it make sense, right? This allows us to reach certain locations more quickly, but since our own movement might be restricted, it means that our opponents are able to move much too far across the battlefield. This action will also definitely be well thought out. And if you decide to get the expansion, as I mentioned, you can play it one-on-one, and that is when these archers come into play. These archers provide their strength to adjacent areas as well, and that definitely makes it tactically very interesting to figure out where exactly you should move them, which creates a significant level of strategic depth during the course of the game. They only have a small, well, I usually place the figures because I stream them when you put them down.
They will stand upright if you place them properly, but if someone happens to bump into them, they can just as easily fall over again, which is why you have to be careful with them. I have already seen videos where people get quite upset about that matter, haven't I? You see it, it's, right? Depending on where you touch them, it's a bit of a problem, but for me the units are usually lying down anyway, then you can see them much better from all sides. And yes, as you can see, there are really quite a lot of these large enemies, and each of them has their own unique mechanics that I have to figure out in order to defeat them successfully. You have to constantly re-coordinate yourself. There are a great many of these objective cards here, and it follows that the more symbols they feature and the more emblems one can flip over, the more difficult and demanding they ultimately become. You can also increase the difficulty level by taking this marker right here and moving it forward by a few spaces on the board, if you would like to do so. And yes, a major point in the game's favor is, as I mentioned at the very beginning: It is incredibly accessible because the rule is quite simple: It is your turn, so you can activate one of the cards, move the corresponding markers down, reveal a card, move the enemies, resolve everything here, perhaps reveal another card, heal people, increase the energy meter, or perform an action. This straightforward structure ensures that the gameplay remains fluid and easy for everyone to understand during their turn. An action simply consists of moving, attacking friendly units, or always checking how much strength is required in order to defeat the specific opponents that you are intending to overcome. Especially if there are special opponents here, what can they do, how do you have to prepare for them, right? Then, somehow recruit new units that are standing in here, but also bring them back to where they are actually useful. Because here in the cell they serve no purpose, as they are no longer holding anyone back; and then, of course, have a look at what specific upgrade requirements my character currently needs to fulfill to progress further in the game. For example, here a bar simply has to be at the very top and then you can upgrade it. That is also a quite good synergy,
because the way that I understand the character, one does not actually have to spend it in this location. That means you bring the energy marker all the way to the top, for example, and then you turn it over. And another player might then say: "Okay, you have fulfilled that now, so I will turn mine around as well and we will spend our energy for that purpose," although one always needs that same energy in order to trigger the various special abilities during the course of the game . There's usually always a passive effect, right? This one here will be able to heal other characters in exchange for an action, and here he must spend energy in order to trigger this particular special action. Now, of course, it is also the case that a few people have already complained that the characters do not possess an ability by default right from the very beginning. I have to level them up first, so only when they have this, so to speak, can they do something special. Otherwise, they are defined primarily by the combat strength that they possess and their total amount of health points, would you not agree? While she may appear to be an archer here, she does not possess any specific archery abilities initially, whereas he, for instance, has significantly less strength, but on the other hand, he also possesses a greater amount of health. Of course, one also has to consider how to play it on one's own, as well as which character can be upgraded and which one might be best to prioritize. This is because the special ability provided by the character may work particularly well in conjunction with the current targeting or the state of the board. Furthermore, regarding these nests here, one needs to focus on moving toward the fields containing the nests so that one can subsequently destroy them. However, you could also find yourself in a situation where there are many enemies present, and as I run in there with the intention of destroying everything while accompanied by a few helpers, I simply cannot say: Oh, now that I am actually here in this sector, I will go ahead and destroy the nest first, just so that even more of them spawn. I can only destroy a nest like that if there are no more enemies left, or if I am able to deal enough damage that I would end up destroying
both the enemies and the nest itself in the process. Then it is simply turned over and sealed, and if you then draw a card here that activates the corresponding region, then from that point on, simply nothing at all will happen there anymore. At least there are no enemies sporing there, if they are still there, they will move of course. I also appreciate that the design is color-blind friendly, as it allows users to clearly identify the corresponding symbols that are featured on the surface, don't you think? Color blindness then of course works great by colors; they say things like: "In yellow, in green"–and then the color blindness thinks: "I don't know!" And then I just say: "Yeah, with a circle, right, with a square, with a pentagon, things happen there." And as you have already seen just now, we have exactly these same symbols here on the cards once again, just as we did before. As someone with severe red-green colorblindness, I definitely find it very nice that they thought about it. Yes, and that was essentially my quick overview regarding the firens from the bag; you can already tell exactly which side it is leaning towards. That means, if you would like to, you can say, okay , I will pull it out this way and simply place it right here, so that I am able to—because when I make a decision for myself, it is better if I am familiar with the side, and then I will just go ahead and do it. But you could also simply give it a good mix, reach inside, pull a piece out, and then you have it in your hand and place it over there where you want it to be.
This is, of course, a game that has not been perfectly designed, as it is completely round and uniform on all sides, meaning that you cannot control it in any way. I've played a few rounds already. It works well if you play it with the right kind of people. If you play it with the wrong people and you yourself also happen to enjoy playing in that specific manner, you can certainly do so, but I would not necessarily consider that to be a fundamental flaw of the game itself. And yes, now you've seen everything the game does. I mean, it's super accessible, right? So if someone can do that, they can get three people and play it with them right away without having to explain the rules too much. You could also say, let's just start the game. You reveal my piece, I'll tell you what happens. You might perhaps lose the very first game, but you will spend almost no time at all dealing with the explanation of the rules. I think that's good. It's crisp. Well, we really got a beating there. I think we lost all of the first three games, and we said, "Okay, we really underestimated this at the beginning."
And yes, if you decide that you would like to acquire Fire Seed, then I wish you a truly tremendous amount of fun while using it. If you've watched this far, feel free to drop a bug emoji, if there is one, in the comments or maybe a nest emoji. You can do whatever you want. Thank you very much for watching. That's it for Fire Seed from me. Take care. See you soon and bye.