Adventure Party – Rolling Role Playing!

I suspect almost every game-loving parent has had experiences similar to mine. I used to play Dungeons and Dragons with my friends when I was younger, but not anymore. In fact, it has become so difficult to schedule, it’s a meme. We just can’t find the time anymore.

Enter Adventure Party, a new title from Smirk and Dagger that dramatically compresses the role playing game to 30-60 minutes. How can a game manage to create a role playing experience in such a short period of time? What about that first meeting where everyone has to prep? Let’s look and see how its done.

Setup

Setup in Adventure Party consists of choosing a class screen and a D20. Each player takes two cards from the item deck. If everyone wants some more details, there are optional character sheets with some predefined skills to select. Grab a Valor token and discuss with the group how long you want to play. Choose a number of scenario cards to match this (a scenario generally takes around 10-20 minutes depending on player count). Finally, you’ll also want to pull one or more transition cards to move from scenario to scenario. That’s it!

Gameplay

Adventure Party draws influence from the style of some of the best professional DMs in the world. These masters of their craft encourage players to describe their actions instead of just announcing the results of their dice.

To start Adventure Party, everyone rolls, and the highest roller becomes the “Guess Master (GM)” for the round. That player reads out the first scenario card and places it on the scenario stand for all to see.

Then, the player to their left takes the first turn. They craft a plan for their turn using the attributes on their class screen, and may include an item from their hand. Their plan shouldn’t seek to end the scenario but progress the narrative in some way.

Then, behind their class screen, the player rolls their die. The left side of the class screen provides a guide for the result:

Players may spend their Valor token to reroll if they want, and choose whichever result they prefer. Then, they describe, without using the number, how their plan worked out. Often these result in hilarious misadventures, but sometimes ceremonious successes!

When the player finishes, the GM may ask a clarifying question, seeking to dial in the hidden die value. Then, everyone secretly turns their own d20 to the die face they think the active player rolled. Once everyone is done, they lift their screens to reveal their guesses.

The GM’s guess gains experience for the party: equal to five minus the difference between their guess and the actual rolled value. If they get it exactly, the party gets five Experience Points! Each other player gets two Glory Points for an exact guess, and one Glory Point if they are off by just one.

Then, the player who just completed their turn becomes the new Guess Master and turns circle the table. Each player continues where the last left off. The only rules for their plan and result are that no players can die, and they cannot end the scenario (unless they’re the last player).

If the group is playing multiple scenarios, choose a new Guess Master for the next round. That player replaces the old Adventure Card with a new one, then reads the transition card to begin the new adventure.

Carry on, Adventurers!

Game End

Once the group has finished all of their scenarios, tally the group’s Experience Points and refer to the chart on the back of the rules to see how you did. Was it a Legendary adventure or an Embarrassing one? Either way, I’m sure it was fun!

Finally, whoever has the most Glory Points is the individual winner.

Impressions

Adventure Party is a great option for a family where the weight of a traditional role-playing game is too much for one person to bear. Until a child in the family is old enough to understand the more complex rules of a Dungeon Master’s guide, running campaigns typically fall to the parents, who have the least amount of time available.

With Adventure Party, the preparation for a session takes less than five minutes, and you’re into the story telling soon after. Smirk and Dagger has done a fantastic job easing the burden of role playing setup, and even partnered with Pocket Bard for immersive soundscapes to add to the role playing experience.

The mechanics are simple enough for everyone to understand, to the youngest ages. The only thing players need to bring to the table are their imaginations. In fact, if your family has older family members who are great at telling stories, they can be wonderful additions to the playing experience!

Let’s face it, gamers are often prone to follow the rules so closely it can impact the gaming experience. By eliminating the vast majority of rules, Adventure Party helps you say “Yes!” to players more, resulting in a less burdensome experience.

Some players prefer the stat-driven dungeon crawl of a game like Gloomhaven, offloading the creativity to the game creators. But now, the rest of the game community has their title too: the narrative driven Adventure Party.

At its core Adventure Party is a deduction game, with players trying to infer the correct value for a die from the story they’re being told. In this way, it’s more like Wavelength or Just One, but with a fantasy storytelling backdrop. If you like these party-style deduction games, Adventure Party deserves a look.

You can get your copy directly from Smirk and Dagger, on Amazon, or at your friendly local game store!

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Smirk and Dagger provided The Family Gamers with a promotional copy of Adventure Party for this review.

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