boardWhile we all take care to bide our time while we await more news on the release of Warhammer: 40,000 – 9th Edition, we miniature gamers look to projects and games to fill the gaps!

From developer Steamforged, the company behind Dark Souls: The Board Game and the incomparable fantasy football title Guild Ball, Godtear sees two players face off to hunt for the literal tears of gods that have fallen to earth to be harvested by Champions.

Godtear plays almost like a MOBA – Each player controls Champions, each different characters with unique abilities, who also fit into a Class which defines their playstyle. Each Champion is accompanied by a group of followers completely unique to them.

Utilising your followers and how they interact with your Champion, while also navigating the opposing Champion(s) and followers, while ALSO focussing on the mission at hand (of which there are 6), make for a game which is fairly rules lite, but with extreme strategic depth.

The two-player boxed game comes with two Champions and their followers, as well as everything else you need to play including custom dice, and beautiful double-sided Hex maps.

Yes, like a lot of modern miniature games, Godtear does away with traditional forms of measurement. This actually allows the game to focus more on strategy, rather than minute movements that can never be 100% accurate.

Steamforged has taken great strides in it’s line of single-mould miniatures over the last few years, and Godtear is no exception.

All the models for this game are ready to play right out of the box with no assembly required. They’re also colour-coded to the Class to which each Champion belongs, so even if you’re not into the painting side of the hobby, you’ll be able to distinguish your models from that of your opponent.

If you want to get the fully fledged Godtear experience, you’ll be fielding three Champions and their followers– this will allow for a game of approximately an hour in length, and will be so full of unique abilities it’ll give even the more seasoned wargamer a lot to consider with every activation.

The game itself plays with alternating activations that keep both players involved at all times, and help with the pace of the game. The unique aspect to Godtear is the distinct phases – planning, where you’ll dish out your buffs and prep your spells and (for all purposes) declare your intentions to your opponent for the turn.

Next is the action phase, where you take it in turns with your opponent to activate your Champions and followers, moving them around the board, and using their Skill to attack, defend, buff, de-buff and lay claim to the fallen Godtears.dolls

The game plays until on player has 5 points. The points distribution method is super unique, and I won’t get into specifics here, suffice to say it’s designed so that most games of Godtear will be over by round 3, and cannot go beyond round 5.

What’s great about the starter sets for God Tear is that there are two of them, each coming with different Champions. There are also a full line of individual Champion boxes. This makes the buy-in for the game very reasonable. You can split a starter set with a mate and buy yourself another Champion or two, or do like me and get one Starter Set and one other Champion so you’re ready to start harvesting Godtears!

Godtear is an excellent title, regardless of whether you treat is as a boxed game to play one-on-one from your board game shelf, or go full-slog and stock up on Champions to find the ultimate team to field against your like-minded opponents.

 

Godtear is available right now from Good Games, and our online store offering free shipping Australia-wide for orders over $100, so get on it!