Sneak Peak: Monster Cards
Today we will take a look at the Monster Cards. Monsters in Blood Throne run on an AI script. What that means is you follow a flow chart (as shown on the back of the Monster Card in the second picture) for each action a Monster has, going down the flowchart until you are instructed to take an action. This allows the Monsters to be dynamic, reacting to the situation as it develops. The Monster shown here, the Berserker, is a higher Tier Monster at 4, which is essentially a mini-boss. Thus, he has higher stats, more special abilities and powerful attacks. Lower Tier Monsters come in groups of 2-3, but have less HP, few Special Abilities and weaker attacks. As the Berserker is a Martial Monster, he is geared towards moving towards and engaging the Heroes in melee, so his script is relatively straightforward.
Monsters that have other archetypes will have more involved scripts that allow them to support other Monsters, attack specific Heroes, or appear on the board in unexpected locations to go after your backline Heroes that tend to be more vulnerable. Some Monsters will even try and steal your loot! We have found in practice that the system is very easy to understand and creates fun and dynamic games where the Monsters feel like they are working together.
On the front of the card we have key stats, special ability descriptions and lore for each Monster. We will have a full breakdown of all of the stats and symbols to come, but after a few times playing with the system it becomes extremely intuitive and often you do not even have to look at the AI chart once as you know what to do from experience. This allows you to have fun testing you Heroes in challenging encounters that will be different each playthrough!
