The Tao of Gaming

The Fury of Dracula showed up this week. I've never played the original, so the release didn't excite me, but I did glance at the rules. The basic mechanism reminds me of Scotland Yard, and then I read the combat section.

Oooh, it's a decision matrix. Chock full of game theory. But it gets better. The matrix is actually done with cards, and each player has a base number of cards. The hunters have 3, and Dracula has 3 during the day, but 8 at night. But the hunters (and possibly Drac, I'm not sure) may have some cards beyond what the started with, which means that your opponent may or may not be able to make some choices.

I think this is an innovation; it's certainly new to me. You also have a one-turn delay. Once you pick a tactic, you can't use it during the next round. Combat keeps going until one side escapes, dies or a certain number of stalemates occur in a row.

Unfortunately, Fury of Dracula adds dice as well. Each entry in the matrix has two outcomes depending on who wins the die roll, but ties are not re-rolled (the cards have an initiative number to break ties). There's also multiple combat if several hunters corner Drac ... they each play a card and Dracula picks his opponent. If Dracula wins, you resolve his card against his opponent. If the hunters win, they pick which card to use.

So you have a reasonable "find the villian" game, and then a decision matrix with hidden information.

Interesting, in theory. No idea if it works in practice ... but I hope to find out.

And yes, I realize the title plays on the Exorcist. I couldn't think of a good vampy quote.