Review of Orcs in the Hood

I had a chance to play this game with some friends at my birthday party/annual gaming marathon this past year, and it was a lot of fun. Orcs in the Hood is a simple but solid game that can be finished in under an hour – so it's perfect when you have some time to kill while you're waiting for a player or GM or after a gaming session.

Let's start with an overview of the game's components. Like most of the new wave of cheap-but-entertaining "beer and pretzels" games, Orcs in the Hood comes in a white envelope a little taller and wider than a paperback novel. Inside are thirty square tiles (representing the Human Alliance) and about 36 cards representing the Orcish Brotherhood. Two six-sided dice are required but not included. There's also a four-page rules booklet.

The story so far is simple: the Orcs and the Humans have been at war for years, with neither side ever gaining any real advantage. Recently, however, the Orcs got lucky and discovered the secret headquarters of the Human Alliance. The Humans have been surrounded. All the Orcs have to do now is make the kills and get the glory.

The system itself is equally simple. Each turn, you move one of your Orc cards to an adjacent space and flip over the Human Alliance card you find there (assuming there is one). You may then declare combat, calling for challengers at the same time. Any other player with a unit in the right spot may challenge and attack your unit. Both players roll a d6 and add the result to the number on their card (or just the one player does if there were no challengers). The high number wins. If the defending Orc wins, the player gets to add the challenging Orc to his "points pile" in addition to the Human card (assuming he defeated both). If the challenging Orc wins, he just gets the Human – the defending Orc goes to his player's "dead" pile. When all the Human cards are gone, the players add up the numerical value of the cards in their points piles, and the one with the most points wins.

To make things more interesting, five of the Human Alliance cards have special effects. For example, the one I encountered allowed me to bring back a "dead" card.

I did find the rules a bit confusing, but when I asked the folks at Placebo Press to clarify a few points for me, they were able to cite passages from the rules booklet which answered most of my questions – I guess I just missed those bits. Other aspects still confuse me, but it's easy enough to improvise if necessary.

All in all, this is a sweet little game. My friends were quite amused by it, as was I. Kudos to the Placebo Press team.