I decided to buy this because I love American football. Firstly, the graphics are what I expected. Its a digital board game of American Football using cards to execute running, passing and kicking plays with die. No 3D just cards and a playing field but that's all you need. I like the layout. The sound could be more immersive. In my first game ever I won the toss elected to receive and executed some running and passing plays that got me a touchdown then I elected for a two point conversion and got that so lead 8-0. So from my 20 yard to touchdown with about 3-4 first downs. Too easy.
I personally didn't have the same luck. I'm still trying to figure out if this game has any real strategy though. It seems that it boils down to guess whether the other team will choose run or pass. If you guess right on defense, your chances are good. Likewise, on offense if you deceive - your chances are good. If this is it than I'm less than enthused. I do really like the customizing teams along with season play. I don't know...
Yes that's true but there's much more strategy under the hood. First you have to guess run or pass but then which run or pass makes a difference to how much ground will be made or lost. You have to double tap the cards to see the risks and rewards and choose one of them. There are fumbles and intercepts and penalties too so there are other randoms in the game apart from card selection and die and your choice. The run and pass cards are of varying degree. The cards that stop yardage also have a flip side of allowing great yardage so like the real game you take a chance and then it's up to the roll of the die. In real football they take chances with each play but if their opponents guess right then the play results in nothing. It's the same here. It depends on how great a risk you're willing to take hoping to get the right roll. If you play it safe you'll have a tight low scoring game but if you take huge risks you could end up with a huge win or huge defeat. No matter how good Tom Brady is if he chooses a play his opponents guess he can end up getting sacked. It's the same game only in board and card format and digital but I like it a lot. It not just run or pass. There's way more to it than that.
Unfortunately, That's pretty much the game play in a nutshell. I tried on several occasions to outwit the AI by calling a "bomb" on first down...a down typically defensed against the run. However, the defense "countered", again, several times, by calling a prevent defense. PREVENT. On FIRST DOWN. In the Second and Third quarters. Also, when I get a good string of plays, it's conveniently (for the AI) too often hampered by penalties and turnovers. Lastly, the opponents had countless "breakaway" runs for NEGATIVE yardage. Needless to say, I'm very disappointed with this purchase.
I'm enjoying this. You take calculated risks like in real football and it comes off or you get beat. But to say there's no strategy is incorrect. You may not win the dice roll but you limit your damage or increase your gain by selecting the right card. I think this is done very well.
Like the actual boardgame, the expansion teams really makes this one of the best football boardgames available. Sadly, few games capture sporting events well without becoming horribly convoluted (Blood Bowl - which I do like) or chance driven (a VCR college football game I played once comes to mind). I think the bugs really need to be worked out, and I agree with one review that said the expansions should be capable of being viewed outside of the store. As for the price? Compared to the actual $25 base game and $15 expansions, it's a steal once it works well.
Hey Guys, Please tell me I'm missing something obvious! I bought all the divisions and started a season, but now I can't find anything about the dice set I chose or my opponents' dice sets. I mean short of actually displaying the actual dice, where is that handy chart that showed each team's relative strengths and weaknesses like when purchasing the IAP to begin with?
If the dice packs are like the original, then I keep this handy PDF file on my device that could help: http://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/95695/1st-goal-expansion-team-info-sheets-color-and-bw This charts out not only each team in the pack, but also details every dice facing in a nice compact format. Hope this helps!
Cool! This will solve half the dilemma, but since they give these league teams odd names that DON'T match with the expansion teams, I'll then have to find out who's dice set my "Spacers" (one the the game's default team names) use.
I saw this pop up with an update... I like American football and understand the rules well but unclear how a board game with dice will work when football also needs to account for the strength and weakness of each team. No interested in arcade football Games so this seems intriguing but than appears to be to random with dice. Team players strengths and waeakness of positions drive the real outcome of football and not sure if this accounts for those factors and variables?
