Tiny Epic Cthulhu: Rapid Review
Information:
Mechanics: Cooperative, Bag Building, Push Your Luck, Set Collection Spin and MovePlayer Age: 14+ Player Count: 1 - 4 PlayersTime to Play: 30 - 45 Minutes
Game Designer: Scott Almes
Game Designer: Scott Almes
Rundown:
Tiny Epic has returned with one of their latest iterations filled with mystery and madness brought on by Cthulhu and the Elder Gods. Tiny Epic Cthulhu is a cooperative game that has two phases that players have to resolve. Phase one translates the Necronomicon, where players are filling the Necronomicon mat with collected pages. Phase two uses the collected material to defeat the elder god and close off their six seals/portals. Once both of these phases are completed the players win. The players can lose in the following ways; when the elder god strength track has reached the maximum value, any one player has gone completely mad and reached the top of their delirium track, or if all the shamblers are placed in the towns.
On a turn, a player will spin the wheel of madness. Make sure to give this wheel a good push as it has to make two full rotations in order to count. The pointer side (as shown below) will show the action to be resolved. This could be spawning shamblers, activating the elder gods abilities, drawing additional tentacles, or adding chaos tentacles to the discarded tentacle pile.
Tentacles are now drawn equal to the first revealed value on the strength track of the elder god.
Depending on which tentacles are revealed, different events will occur. The Eldritch tentacle will go on the Elder gods' board. When this overflows, all tokens from the discard zone and these tentacles will go back into the draw bag and the Elder gods' strength will increase. This will in turn increase the amount of tentacles drawn each turn and cause the players to lose if the track reaches maximum.
Chaos tokens will be placed on the player mat to a maximum of two. These are used as wilds throughout the game and are great for players to have.
Madness tentacles of three colours will be placed on the town the tentacle pointer is facing. Each town can hold three tentacles of each colour. If this overflows the tentacles will be added to the shambler board, removing them from potentially going into the draw bag. The Elder God’s power related to that tentacle colour will now activate.
A shambler will spawn in the town opposite to where the tentacle pointer is faced. Each town can hold three shamblers, if a town overflows all shamblers here, they will return to their board and the eldritch tentacle on the town will go onto the Elder God’s board. This increases the probability of eldritch tentacles being drawn for the rest of the game. The Elder God will also get placed on this town. A player cannot be in the same location as the Elder God during the first phase of the game, so if this is your location then your player piece will be moved.
The active player will then perform three actions (explained below). These actions can be repeated within a turn and consist of moving, collecting tentacles, banishing shamblers, using a town ability, translating a page during phase 1, or sealing a portal during phase 2.
Actions:
Move:
Players may move based on the amount of blue tentacles they have. Either one, two or three movements for zero, one or two tentacles, respectively. Every time the player passes or stops on a town card with an unrevealed page, the card will be revealed. When moving, a player cannot move onto the same location as the Elder God. When the player finally stops on a town card, they will draw tentacles from the bag equal to the amount of shamblers in the town. The tentacles are placed like normal, however, madness tentacles are placed on your character sheet. Any overflows will cause all madness tokens of that colour to go on the discard section and cause the players delirium to increase, bringing them closer to madness but allowing the player to re-roll Cthulhu dice when rolled. The higher your insanity raises, the more you can re-roll.
Collect Tentacles:
Players can enhance their abilities or set up the tentacles needed for the pages by collecting tentacles. From the town, a player can take one, two or three tentacles as based on whether they have zero, one or two green tentacles on their character sheet. This is also an important action used to reduce overflow from occurring in the current town.
Banish Shamblers:
To banish a shambler from a town the player must roll dice equal to the amount of shamblers in this town. The player will then have to spend madness tentacles off their sheet matching the colour of the chosen shambler and the highest cost on the rolled dice. Chaos tentacles may be spent as a part of this cost.
If a shambler is defeated, the player will discard them to the shambler mat and move the paid tentacles to the discarded tentacles pile. Any chaos tentacles used will return to the general supply. Based on the number of red tentacles you had on your character sheet at the start of the action, you will be able to rescue either 1, 2 or 3 madness tentacles of the shambler colour from the shambler mat. This number is decided by having had zero, one or two red tentacles on your mat.
Use a Town Ability:
Each town has a special action that can be activated if your character is at that location.
Translate Pages (Phase 1 only):
Whenever you enter or pass a town, the face-down page will be flipped face-up. These pages can only be fulfilled if you’re currently in that town, and they require you to return tentacles from your character, whereby reducing the strength of your actions.
Once fulfilled, the page card will go to the player and the pages gained will be placed on the left-most open space of that number on the Necronomicon. If any row or column is filled, a chaos tentacle will be added to the discarded tentacles. Once the Necronomicon is full of pages, players can move into phase 2. When this occurs the Elder God’s sheet flips to the other side and their strength is reset back to the start. All the tentacles in the discard area will also be placed back into the draw bag.
Seal the Portals (Phase 2 Only):
Now that the Elder God has reached the second phase, they are able to be attacked. This means that players can move into their location and no longer have to flee when the Elder God enters their town.
When in the Elder God’s location, you can seal any portal of your choice. The amount of dice you can roll is based on the amount of page cards you own that match that colour (to a maximum of three). If the value of the tentacles rolled equals or exceeds the chosen portal, you will be able to seal that portal. When closing the portal, place one madness token (or chaos token) matching that colour onto the portal. When all portals are sealed the players will win the game.
Push your Luck:
This game is constantly filled with push-your-luck decisions, from the way players increase the strength of their actions, to how they manage the shamblers and tentacles throughout the towns. An example of this is the decision of whether you run the risk of moving into a location with the tentacles you need to finalise a page, or move into the town first and then find a way to gain the tentacles, whereby reducing the chance of you going insane.
Another good example of this push-your-luck decision is the tentacle bag/discard pile. When it starts to run low there is a higher risk of eldritch tentacles being drawn, creating a stronger Elder God and speeding up the end of the game. Players have to constantly manage this by eliminating shamblers. These decisions are part of the fun of a Cthulhu game and I believe Tiny Epic Cthulhu has captured this perfectly.
Interaction:
This is the kind of game where players will constantly lose during the first phase before reaching the second phase. This is due to the amount of things players have to keep an eye on as they get closer to overflowing. That's the beauty of cooperative games, though. I prefer cooperative games where players have to work together. It also helps that each player has unique character abilities which lead them towards certain tasks. Once an Elder God is finally defeated, the players can face the new challenges of one of the other three Elder Gods (four more added in the Cult of Chaos expansion), all with varied overflow effects.
Determination:
- Interesting wheel of madness.
- Challenging gameplay that requires players to work together as there is plenty to keep an eye on.
- It is a lot of rules to digest the first time you play and a lot to set up.
Firstly, I would like to say Tiny Epic Cthulhu will be staying in my collection. This is a challenging and interesting cooperative game in a compact package. Due to it being a pure cooperative game, it's array of challenges work perfectly together. Essentially, in the first phase players are trying to gain as much madness tentacles to then translate pages as fast as possible. The challenge with this is that players will face several tracks that run the risk of overflowing. If these aren't correctly maintained the tentacle draw bag will get smaller and the chance of drawing eldritch tentacles will increase, ultimately losing the game for the players. It is no easy feat to maintain this balance and may even cause the players to go insane. If phase one is planned and executed properly, and players have the right pages in front of them, they will now be able to defeat the Elder God. With its interesting atmosphere of push your luck and challenging gameplay, this is a perfect addition to your collection, especially if you’re a fan of Cthulhu or cooperative games.
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