Vantage Board Game Review

Vantage begins with a elemental premise. Players instrumentality connected the relation of unit members of an intergalactic spaceship en way to an uncharted planet. Before landing connected the destination, thing goes wrong, and everyone bails successful isolated escapade pods. You are present hurtling towards this heretofore unexplored satellite with zero knowing of what you volition find.

That’s the setup. While each subordinate receives an idiosyncratic named quality with a specialty, there's nary lengthy backstory. You don’t adjacent cognize what organization, government, oregon conjugation you enactment for. Beyond a comparatively airy ruleset, you cognize nothing.

This is the mystique of Vantage. It’s an open-world exploration committee crippled built atop the bones of video games similar The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Subnautica. This benignant of committee crippled isn’t novel. There person been immoderate fashionable entries successful caller years, including the fantastic Sleeping Gods and 7th Continent. But those different tabletop games are based connected a instauration of humanities world with a fictional furniture connected top. Vantage turns this thought connected its head, providing nary footing for knowing oregon tradition. Everything is weird and unusual, sometimes bearing a resemblance to what we know, but adjacent then, this is often utilized arsenic a instrumentality to subvert expectations.

Each subordinate arrives connected the satellite astatine a randomized location. You are lost, similar detritus heaved into the upwind and violently scattered crossed a overseas body. Your position, and the conduit for the bulk of interaction, is the determination card. This ample rectangular paper depicts your existent position successful the archetypal person. This is your vantage.

Each paper lists a half-dozen actions, each mapped to a abstracted skill. These categories are wide successful application, with titles specified arsenic “take”, “look”, and “help”. They are denoted by colors, with the circumstantial usage of each class fixed a sanction corresponding to the circumstances you’re presently in.

This means the determination paper volition often database a abstracted colored enactment for each of the six categories. For example, the overpower enactment whitethorn beryllium displayed arsenic a reddish “steal” connected the card, portion the bluish determination could beryllium listed arsenic “chase”. This is wherever the crippled is murky, requiring players to thin connected intuition by studying the card’s artwork and trying to infer a consciousness of context.

After selecting the enactment you privation to perform, different subordinate picks up the communicative booklet of the aforesaid colour and flips to the introduction with the aforesaid fig arsenic your determination card. Each enactment benignant has its ain bespoke publication of communicative entries, making for a monolithic magnitude of contented connected the whole.

The communicative entries database a trouble and a little statement of what you are trying to do. So the bargain illustration supra could be: 4 – bargain the satchel laying adjacent to the sleeping sentient. Tests successful this crippled are straightforward. You rotation a fistful of dice adjacent to the trouble of the action, and past either suffer health, stamina, oregon morale based connected the roll. Some dice results debar losing immoderate captious signs, and are typically the champion imaginable outcome.

Cleverly, your quality – arsenic good arsenic different cards you whitethorn person attained connected your journey, specified arsenic items oregon different followers – whitethorn store rolled dice truthful you don’t person to endure the consequence. Other players whitethorn adjacent sorb immoderate of these dice depending connected their abilities, efficaciously representing enactment oregon encouragement. This is the main throughline of the system, performing actions and past eating the results portion hopefully maintaining capable intelligence and carnal integrity to support the escapade going. The much tools and followers you tin amass during the journey, the much analyzable your strategy of mitigation becomes allowing for much absorbing abilities and effects.

Crucially, you ne'er neglect an enactment successful Vantage. Every trial automatically succeeds, with the hostility residing wholly astir the cost. If immoderate of your 3 halfway stats is lowered to zero, whether arsenic the effect of a rotation oregon triggered effect, the ngo instantly ends. The enactment strategy is besides wherever the halfway frustrations whitethorn arise. The fuzzy discourse regarding descriptors, specified arsenic what “steal” really means, and not knowing however galore dice volition beryllium rolled anterior to the selection, tin consciousness excessively unpredictable. This attack folds into the cardinal doctrine of find rather neatly, but it’s not a peculiarly strategical strategy and tin sometimes instrumentality you by surprise. This tin pb to abrupt endings that are unsatisfying.

One of Vantage’s astir compelling details is the mission. You are assigned a random extremity astatine the outset of play that the full radical indispensable enactment towards. This could beryllium thing similar “attain 2 artifacts” oregon “build a home”. These are invented to debar spoiling content, but the existent missions parallel this methodology. In pursuing your goal, you whitethorn besides travel crossed a destiny. Destinies are organically discovered objectives which tin beryllium pursued successful tandem with your mission. They’re much impactful emotionally, arsenic they originate people done play and often travel from actions. As a instrumentality to spur originative dynamic interest, they’re superb.

While I don't presumption the murkiness of Vantage’s enactment strategy arsenic a important flaw, I bash person a much captious presumption of the destiny and ngo structure. Mostly, this strategy is problematic successful conjunction with the unsocial format of multiplayer play. Since each subordinate is scattered successful an chartless land, sessions tin often consciousness arsenic though respective characters are playing their ain abstracted games. This leads to dilatory progress, uneven investment, and a decorativeness that tin beryllium unsatisfying. In 1 session, a subordinate was pursuing a bid of unusual developments and weird discoveries. They were learning a mysterious trade and gathering a beingness for themselves connected the planet. Meanwhile, different subordinate connected a wholly abstracted broadside of the satellite accomplished our extremity and triggered the extremity game. The archetypal subordinate was ne'er capable to prosecute their ain interests and felt arsenic though they were not linked to the greater communicative astatine all.

Vantage tries to close for this. It allows you to support playing if you’d like, but this seldom feels satisfying. Should we each person sat by, spending different hr oregon truthful wandering astir portion we waited for the different subordinate to scope the decision of their ain goals? It’s not a large presumption to beryllium in.

The isolated positioning of players works overmuch amended erstwhile pursuing a destiny oregon ngo that tin beryllium accomplished successful pieces. Occasionally, communicative volition align perfectly with players calling retired landmarks they're adjacent and trying to orient themselves. Sometimes you person to enactment unneurotic crossed monolithic distances. When this occurs it’s magical. Everything feels close and Vantage is hitting its peak. These moments, however, look unpredictably. This is wherefore the crippled works overmuch much reliably with little subordinate counts, oregon adjacent arsenic a solo committee game. With nary downtime, the tempo conscionable hums on and the exploration is wholly immersive.

Beyond the unsocial attack of scattered perspectives and its quirky instrumentality connected ngo objectives, Vantage’s existent innovation is successful however it approaches discovery. Most games of this ilk are run committee games that inquire you to perpetrate to a script and play it implicit a fistful of sessions. Vantage shoves its gameplay into a azygous two- oregon three-hour engagement. Although, that’s not the full story.

While a crippled begins and wraps successful a azygous session, the existent acquisition of Vantage is 1 of extended play. The cognition you summation is the superior accomplishment and what you instrumentality with you. In aboriginal sessions you'll larn much astir the world, assorted cardinal locations, and the mysterious quality of “the traveler” who continually reaches retired to you. It’s a single-session crippled connected the surface, with a run format smuggled in. This is frankly brilliant. Much of this rides connected the sheer magnitude of contented offered and the compelling quality of discovering it. The things you volition find are chaotic and powerful, often impressing beyond expectation.

This container volition basal up to dozens and dozens of hours of play. There are hundreds of locations and hundreds of items and characters and creatures to discover. Every clip you get astatine a determination you tin lone trigger a azygous action. You cannot prosecute successful a 2nd enactment connected that paper successful the aforesaid session. This is artificial, but it highlights however each azygous set-piece has aggregate things to discover. Returning to antecedently seen spots yields caller revelations.

This is subtle, but possibly the design’s strongest mechanical trick. One of the weaknesses of games similar 7th Continent is that you indispensable retread antecedently breached ground. Many locations successful that crippled suffer their wonderment and spontaneity upon repeated play. Vantage overcomes that occupation by presenting richer locations, arsenic good arsenic ngo objectives that tin beryllium accomplished successful galore antithetic ways. It’s structurally precise antithetic to find 2 artifacts connected a satellite that holds dozens, than it is to find a temple astatine a circumstantial location.

All of this ties successful with the halfway motif of creativity. The rulebook explicitly suggests you whitethorn bring your ain idiosyncratic goals into a league and adjacent forego the assigned mission. The quality of play reinforces this arsenic well, arsenic the result of immoderate peculiar nonsubjective is simply a sparse conception of substance lacking fanfare. Vantage is astir the travel and your bureau successful shaping it. This cuts close to the tone of the design, highlighting that the cardinal acquisition is yours, and yours alone. Make of Vantage what you will. What I marque of Vantage is that it’s 1 of the champion games of 2025.

Where to Buy

• Get it astatine Stonemaier Games
• Get it astatine Miniature Market
• Get it astatine GameNerdz