Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle DBG

Arrived in good time well-packaged (from overseas!) this is a very well-made and presented cooperative deck-building board game which really appeals to Wizarding World fans (Expelliarmus! Accio Triwizard cup!) but the play and strategy is equally appealing to everyone. You don't have to be a mad-keen Potter fan to enjoy this but obviously that's the central theme and attraction. It is very lore-friendly but lore-masters may be concerned about chronological and context concerns when you're shuffling enemies, events and items randomly. I was particularly interested in this as I want to get more games the whole family can play together or for social events, but without the antagonism and angst of a competitive game (Monopoly PTSD...) this one also has the added advantage of modular advancement where you start as new students and work your way through 7 stages to finally face Lord Voldemort in an epic battle. There are also two expansions which add more challenges, features, complexities and strategy. These are not needed at all but add more replayability once you have completed game 7 and can do so reliably. It's a heap of fun! The game leads you into the mechanics gently and even non-CCG or young players will be able to get into it fairly quickly thanks to friendly and well-written instructions, while old hands will appreciate deep strategic play requiring synergistic teamplay and (limited) interrupt actions. Unlike other games there is constant engagement and communication, you don't just 'turn off' during other players turns as you will be affected and need to make decisions/plans during theirs. Eliminating resource management (land/mana) is a fantastic design choice, meaning turns are fast, action-based and exciting as you play out or discard your entire hand each turn. Deck tuning comes though how you expand (and optionally contract) your library which directly affects your capabilities, growth, power level and synergy. Novices can play any card with postive effect, while strategists can construct elaborate 'optimal plays' with rich feature and synergy calculations. The game scales easily to all players at all levels. The game has a strong physicality to it lacking in computer games and you'll soon be flipping cards, amassing tokens and tossing dice like nobody's business while cackling HP lore (Explulsio! Avada Kedavra!). The random nature of deck building and card draw means it is quite possible to wipe out, but that only adds incentive to work together and try harder next time. The staged nature of opening new boxes with new enemies (and treasure!) is like mini Christmas. The whole family gathers around to enjoy the unboxing experience, it's great. Overall build is great with evocative illustrations and design but the tokens are merely paper on cardboard, and the deck card stock is average and will be damaged in rough or long use playing it. (My friends copy has 'marked' cards now simply from picking them up). As these are not replaceable without buying a whole new copy your best bet is to sleeve all of the Hogwarts cards (spells, items and allies) which is easy and inexpensive. The Dark Arts and Enemy cards are a custom size though. There is a sleeve set for them but it is very expensive (~USD$25!). I am thinking of trying to use a craft finishing spray to harden the surface, as they don't need to be shuffled that much or held in hand. Replayability is great, friendly to house rules and the game can be easily scaled up or down for player skill. I do recommend cutting down the game later on as adding ALL the cards can result in both very long games (have played game 7 for 5 hours+ at times) as well as diluting must-have cards in the library. Play vanilla or to suit yourself. The game can be fairly easily 'reset' to any stage once you're experienced but it can be very overwhelming at first working out which cards should be or not be included. The straight line advancement through boxes/'school years' is very simple and well explained. The Monster Box of Monsters expansion adds a new character and a dramatic shift in challenge and systems. We went from clearing game 6-7 reliably to getting slammed 5-6 straight losses. If you think HP:HB is far too easy and for weaklings, try this. You will get pwned. Charms and potions: Owned but not tried yet, have not cleared all games from Monster Box yet. Overall I cannot recommend this highly enough for social and family play, with a strong Harry Potter theme. This is the first tabletop board game we've bought in some 30 years and an excellent example of modern gaming. I look forwards to building a collection of other games like this.

Quality: Good component quality, nice box and artwork (9/10) Shipment: Fast shipment, came a week earlier than promised (9/10) Price: Moderately expensive as international shipping makes game tad expensive (5/10) Gameplay: Game is divided into 7 parts just like the books. Game becomes progressively harder and harder as you progress. Involves cooperative element and deck building in the gameplay. However, the game does not include any options to discard cards and running through the hogwards deck is difficult as you end up acquiring cards with limited to no utility. However, the gameplay is fun and certainly will be appreciated by Harry Porter fans. (7/10)

We bought this game for the first time 4 years ago and just bought it again as a present. It is an excellent board game for the whole family. Due to the many levels in the game, there is a lot of variation each time it’s played and adjustments that can be made to fit different levels of players. As you play collectively as a team against Voldemort and his villains, there are few reasons for tears or fights among the players. The box says +11 years, but with adult participation to steer the game, players can easily join from around 5-6 years old. Along with Settlers of Catan, this is the best board game we own. Buy it for all the HP & board game lovers out there! Recently bought the two expansions for the game which add many dimensions. Great for variety but almost too many rules and options to steer through. I would not recommend the expansions before you are very comfortable with the basic game and its seven levels.

Excellent game even for beginners to the deck-building Genre. One of my favorite things about this game, especially as a HP fan, is that it contains 7 separate decks for each of the books/years. This grants excellent replay-ability at various difficulties and lets you feel in some way like you are progressing through the books again yourself. It has excellent-quality materials for all of the pieces - so you know it wont wear out quickly. This has become one of my favorite games to play with my family and friends, and it's really accessible even for non-HP fans. A cool thing is that by being a deck-building game it also allows you to play your own style; one game I was building more offensively and trying to take out as many Villains as I could, and the next I ended up playing more of a support character, granting allies attacks and extra money and healing others - and I did it with the same character, which means roles aren't imposed if you want to be a non-combative Harry. The balance is quite good too, and there is a very satisfying jump in difficulty once you pass the "tutorial years" (book 1/2). I've only successfully finished year 3 so far after 1 day, so I'll update my review later once I complete all the decks :), but honestly a must buy if you are a HP fan, and a great game even if you don't know anything about the HP universe. Update (6/14/17): I FINALLY beat the game, and so I am back as I promised. This game has exceeded my expectations. One of the best things about it is that every 2ish books there is a change to the mechanics in some way that fundamentally changes how the game plays - more than just adding more enemies at a time or adding new cards. These game-play mechanics make it feel like you are playing a new game with the same great fundamentals you loved in the previous chapters. There are also ways to make the game more challenging, which adds more replay-ability. I would definitely recommend this game to ANYONE who loves card/board-games regardless how they feel about Harry Potter, but fans of the series will squeal like little girls at how amazing this experience is and how well they tie the feeling of the books into this card game. The only critique for this game is that I wish there were more playable characters (I want the WHOLE gambit; Gimmie Luna, Ginny, Sirius, Lupin, Snape, Dumbledore, McGonnagle, Draco, The Twins (Fred and George - maybe a dual deck of mischief)), and also I'd love some variety of enemies to play against (right now you simply add the last book's enemies to the next one so you'll be seeing familiar faces often). And the last critique (more serious this time) is that there isn't a way to remove cards from your deck. Often you get a lot of filler cards that help you to build your deck, but then just take up too much room when you get a whole hand of Alohomoras rather than what you need later in the game. I would love a mechanic to discard permanently cards somehow. Also, we made a house rule I'd suggest you implement where you can "buy" cards out of the acquire area rather than adding them to your deck (this frees up a slot to add a new house card you might want to buy). Amazing game, 5/5 Stars

A very good game if you like the Harry Potter theme