Players: 2
Playing Time: 45-60 minutes
The Components
Claustrophobia comes with a huge set of sumptuous components:
Tiles: The game is played out on 36 linen-textured tiles which feature tunnels and rooms. Though they're dominated pretty simple features, they're still very attractively drawn. Some tiles also have icons to signal special abilities for the room; the icons are obvious and easy to read.
I'll offer a warning: these tiles are big and can require a lot of table space. I tried to play a first game on a square Bridge table, and the tiles threatened to run off the ends, so make sure you have plenty of room to play.
Miniatures: Each player is going to control several different miniatures. For the human player, that might include 1 redeemer, 2 condemned brutes, and 2 condemned blades for hire. For the demonic player that might include up to 11 troglodytes and 1 demon. The miniatures are quite large--at least 30mm scale if not more--and they're all fully painted. They look entirely gorgeous and are overall some of the nicest bits I've seen for a game.
I do have one minor qualm about the miniatures: it's hard to distinguish between the pair of condemned brutes or the pair of condemned blades for hire. Since my first play I've seen that the hair colors of the two different miniatures of each type are different, but that was too subtle for me in my first play. Hopefully I'll be able to better see who is who in future plays.
Human Cards: Each of the five human characters has an associated card (that's actually a sturdy, linen-textured piece of cardboard) and a plastic stand that you put the card in. This setup allows for recessed cavities below the card that you can place a die and plastic damage tokens in.
The cards also give all the info on the characters. That includes a name, a very helpful list of talents, and a chart of die results cross-referenced with movement, combat, and defense. I wish these latter values were a bit bigger, as they're hard to make out from across the tables and your opponent will sometimes need to know what you can do.
Board of Destiny: Meanwhile, the demonic player gets a big, linen-textured cardboard "Board of Destiny". This shows the stats for his troglodytes and also lists a number of special powers that he can use every turn.
There's too much text on this board (and, also, on many of the cards, which I'm going to describe momentarily). I wish more effort had been made to iconify special powers in this game.
Cards: There are a number of cards in the game, all printed on medium-heavy glossy cardstock. They generally have very attractive full-color artwork on them. Among the cards are gift and object cards (which may go to the human player at the start of the game), demon reference cards (which give the stats for a demon to the demonic player), advantage cards (which the human player may draw over the course of the game), and event cards (which the demonic player may draw over the course of the game).
As with the Board of Destiny, I wish an effort had been made to iconify these cards. As with most of the rest of the set, there's beautiful artwork on many of these cards.
Tokens: There are numerous linen-textured cardboard tokens in the game, including threat-point tokens, wound tokens, and several tokens which are related to certain cards or scenarios.
Dice: The game comes with a single black 10-sided die (for use in certain scenarios) and a dozen small, black six-sided dice.
Rulebook: The 24-page rulebook is full-color. It's very attractively laid out and contains numerous examples. Pages 6-15 actually contain the core of the rules. The latter part of the book includes six different scenarios. At least three more scenarios are already available online.
Overall, the components of Claustrophobia are entirely beautiful and great quality. I do feel that work could have been done to improve the usability of certain components, through larger print in some places and less text in others. Nonetheless, I unreservedly give Claustrophobia a full "5" out of "5" for Style. It's got great bits.
The Gameplay
Claustrophobia is an asymmetrical strategy game. In most of the scenarios, the human has a specific condition that will give him victory, and otherwise the demonic player wins.
Setup: The players choose sides (human or demon), then select a scenario.
The scenario tells the human player which 3-4 characters he gets, which gifts his redeemer gets, and which items his other characters have. It will also list how many advantage cards he starts with.
The scenario further tells the demon player how many threat points he starts with and which demon to use.
Finaly, the scenario shows how to set up the board, usually using just a single tile, though one scenario lays out an entire map. It also notes special rules and how the game is won.
Order of Play: A full round is divided into four phases:
- Human Initiative Phase
- Human Action Phase
- Demon Threat Phase
- Demon Threat Phase
Human Initiative Phase: The human player rolls a number of dice equal to his number of characters, then assigns one die to each of his characters, which determines their attributes for that round.
The Human Characters. Each character has six rows of possible attributes, which Movement, Combat, and Defense. For example row "1" for the redeemer has "1 Mvt / 3 Cbt / 3 Def"; row "3" has 2/1/3; and row "6" has 1/1/6. These rows serve two purposes.
First, when a die is chosen for a character, that sets the character's attributes for that round. Second, as a character is wounded, pegs are placed in his rows. If a row is marked as wounded and then chosen with a die, that character can't do anything.
Each of the character classes has a different attribute matrix. Each also has some special powers. For example the Redeemer is Blessed (which allows him to give a one-time bonus to a character) and also may have gifts (which are special talents associated with rows in his matrix, which trigger when that row is selected). Brutes are Bodyguards (meaning that can take damage for others) and Impressive (making it harder for opponents to leave). Blades for Hire are Elusive (making it easier for them to flee opponents).
Human Action Phase: Now the human player gets to activate each of his characters in turn. Each character can move then fight or vice-versa.
Move. A character can move a number of spaces equal to his Movement attribute. However he can't leave a tile unless there are at least the same number of characters on his side (e.g., human or demon) as there are on the other side, in that space. There is one other limitation to movement: a tile usually can't hold more than 3 characters from the same side.
The humans can also explore new tiles. They move off the board to do so, the human player picks a new tile, then the demonic player orients it so that the pathway continues, but otherwise as he sees fit.
(Some tiles also have special powers, such as giving more room for characters, slowing movement, giving the human player advantages, etc.)
Fight. A character can attack opponents in the same space as him. He throws a number of dice equal to his Combat and hits with any roll of his opponent's Defense or more. Usually a single hit kills a troglodyte--the main demonic force--while more hits are required to kill a demon.
Demon Threat Phase: Now it's the demonic player's turn! He starts out by rolling some six-sided dice too--three to be precise--but he uses them for a different purpose: placement on the Board of Destiny. The Board of Destiny lists a bunch of different dice results (such as "dice must be either all odd or all even", "two dice with odd scores", "7", 12+", etc). Each result is associated a special power, a few of which are one-use but most of which can be used multiple times.
After rolling his dice, the demon player assigns them to these dice-result spaces. Most importantly, this can give him threat points. But it can also pump up his troglodytes for the turn in various ways, make it easier for his critters to appear, or let him draw event cards (which he can turn in later for special effects).
Threat Points. Threat points (TP) are used to make critters appear on the board. 1 TP can be used to create a troglodyte while 5 TP can be used to summon a demon. These new critters are usually placed on tiles with at least one unexplored opening that are free of human characters. (There are "Board of Destiny" powers that allow each of these restrictions to be omitted, but those are both one-time powers).
Demon Action Phase: Now the demon player gets to move and attack with all his critters. Unlike the human characters, the demon characters have set stats. Troglodytes are 1 mvt, 1 cbt, 3 def, while the stats for a demon vary based on the precise scenario.
As already alluded to, when a demon hurts a human character, the human player must place peg on that character--reducing his options on future turns and putting him a step closer to death. When a human character takes 6 points of damage in this way (covering all of his die options), he dies.
Ending the Game: The game ends either when a human meets specific scenario conditions or the demon keeps him from doing so. For example in scenario #1, "The Survivors", the human player is trying to get at least 2 of his characters to the exit tile, while in scenario #2, "Holding Back the Invasion", the human player is trying to get to a "stash" tile, to blow it up.
Relationships to Other Games
Claustrophobia is an asymmetrical tactical wargame for two players. When I first looked at it, I thought it might be similar to Asmodee's own Dungeon Twister, but after playing Claustrophobia I came to the conclusion that they're pretty different. They both have a fantasy theme and are based on 2-player conflict, but Dungeon Twister is more "European", with an emphasis on very thoughtful tactics and with very little luck; conversely, Claustrophobia is more "American", with luck playing a larger roll and the game being a bit more thematic and experiential.
Claustrophobia shares a setting with the miniatures skirmish game, Hell Dorado.
The Game Design
Though I think that Claustrophobia offers a lot of enjoyment thanks to its theming, that's not to say that it's mechanics aren't clever too. Both demonic and human players must think about some very interesting tactics. Deciding which roll to use for each human character can be a bit maddening (in a good way) as you try to balance all of the possibilities. Similarly the demonic player has to decide how to allocate his dice roll; although the options might be a little more constrained, deciding which one-use powers to use now and which to save can be a very important element.
Overall, resource management is an important secondary mechanic for both players. The demonic player has to manage those aforementioned one-use powers and also threat points, event cards, and the limited number of demons he can summon (usually 2), while the human player has to manage his advantage cards, any one-use powers he has, and which wounds get applied to which characters.
Finally, I should make special note of the asymmetrical nature of the game, since I always think that's a real plus for a game (if done well), as it improves the replayability. Here, it's done quite well.
With all that said, Claustrophobia is a pretty simple game. It's easy to learn and the mechanics are easy to remember once you've played a game.
I've given Claustrophobia a "4" out of "5" for Substance.
Conclusion
Claustrophobia is a relatively simple 2-player wargame with great theming and good depth. The mechanics are elegant and the asymmetric nature just makes everything more interesting. It'll be most appealing to folks who enjoy well-themed game and don't mind some randomness amidst their wargaming.
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