Wizard's Quest


Avalon Hill, 1979, 2-6 players, no age range specified but let's go with ages 12 and up. Wizard's Quest is an interesting Risk knock-off with a fantasy twist and a couple of interesting wrinkles. The basic Risk structure applies here- You receive armies based on the number of territories you control, and your armies are used to acquire more territory. Combat is handled with simple die rolling, with larger forces having better odds of scoring kills. Each player has a couple of special characters that they can bring into play (Hero and Sorceror) which can be used to alter the results of combat. There are a couple of loose cannon characters (The Dragon and The Wizard) which can help or hinder players' armies.

There are cards you can draw which have typical sort of random effects (good and bad). Each player has three treasures that the other players hide on the board. The goal of the game is to be the first player to recover your three treasures. Finally, there are orc armies on the board that must be dealt with (the longer they are ignored, the nastier they become - to the point where they could eliminate all of the "real" players). The game pieces are typical Avalon Hill - lots and lots of cardboard tiles. Not great, but not super cheap either. The rules are well written, short and well organized. We were able to get started playing after a few short minutes and didn't encounter any situations in the game that weren't covered by the rules. The game itself is reasonably entertaining. Good enough to keep in the collection, although honestly, I don't think it'll get a lot of play in the years ahead. I think this game will have more appeal to younger players. More sophisticated gamers may find it a little light (not much more in-depth than Risk itself).


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