Bloodstone Brings MMO Raid Bosses to Your Table

Don’t worry about getting burnt to ash or flayed by chains. The necromantic power of the Bloodstone will bring you back again and again… forever.

There are a lot of board games based on high fantasy novels. But far less common are high fantasy novels based on board games, and among them now is Bloodstone. Bloodstone is primed to be an entire setting with the amount of content already in the works for it. Alongside the board game, which is on Kickstarter right now, there is a novel that expands the lore of the game’s world and also several sequels of the game in the planning stages. I learned all this and more during my digital playtest and Q&A session with the designer of Bloodstone, James Hudson. I had a great time learning about the world of Bloodstone and picking his brain about some of the inspirations behind the design elements.

Bloodstone is either competitive or cooperative arena combat game with dice rolling and unique characters. The competitive mode has players each picking a fighter and battling against each other until one reigns supreme.

But the cooperative mode pits the players up against a giant boss, which they must work together to defeat. Hudson specifically mentioned having MMO-style raid bosses in mind while designing these beasts. Each boss uses unique mechanics and will require the players to think carefully on how to engage and sustain during the fight.

The boss minis range from 30 mm to 115 mm tall!

This is all well and good, but the real meat of this game comes with the actual mechanics of the characters and bosses. Each character will have a pool of dice they will throw on each of their turns in order to do their fancy stuff. However, each character’s fancy stuff is very different. Some characters will add Bleed or Burn dice to another player (or bosses) dice pool, which will have negative effects when they are rolled. Or some characters add additional special dice to their own pool, which in turn will spark additional attacks, damage reduction, or other effects. Or even some characters can add unique tokens to the board as environmental hazards or attached to other players, incurring some penalty.

My point is there are a lot of different abilities with each of these characters, meaning lots of different playstyles. You got supports, tanks, damage, control. Every raid role you might need.

Now, I come from a background of Team Fortress 2 and Overwatch, with well over 1,000 hours in each. So, as someone who loves team-based combat games with a unique set of characters, Bloodstone is the perfect blend of quick, exciting combat with tons of ways to mix up the tactics with each playthrough, thanks to the great cast of characters.

Thanks again to James Hudson for giving me the chance to get an early look at the game. It is currently on Kickstarter (and was fully funded within hours) and won’t be getting a full retail release. So, go check it out. I don’t think I really have to spell it out, but I will: I’m super into this game and will be supporting it myself.

Bloodstone – $125 – Kickstarter ends March 12th

Author: Matt Sall

Matt has loved games of all kinds his whole life: board, video, war, roleplaying. He's worked as a writer for BoLS since 2017. He's worked as freelance editor for board game rulebooks and has designed many of his own games as well.