Tend (Deluxe) Components Overview and Impressions
Whenever you back an IV Studio game on Kickstarter, or purchase one of their games at retail, you are going to pay a pretty hefty price for the game you are about to play. There are many reasons why I would advise against someone dropping a lot of money on a board game, but I always have a few exceptions; IV Studio is always an exception because I personally play their games a lot, and the quality is always some of the best in the industry. It was true of Mythic Mischief. It was true of Fractured Sky. It was true of Moonrakers. And now, it’s true of Tend as well.
Tend is beautifully illustrated, and it outside the white sheets of your badge sheet and cargo manifest, it’s a game that really pops when down on the table. I have the Kickstarter edition of the game, which means the box includes enough sheets for 200 individual plays of the game. This should be more than enough for anyone, and perhaps is actually a bit overkill. All of these extra sheets means you’ll be handling one VERY large and VERY heavy box each time you play the game.
Tend has a lot of really great production elements going for it that you don’t often see in board games. The design team has opted for a neoprene central mat instead of a board for all the cards you will use round-to-round. The dice included in the game are all etched, nothing printed. This is huge, because I have talked to more than enough publishers who have told me it’s not really feasible to do etched, custom dice. Screen printed dice wear down quickly, and so I’m really impressed with IV Studio’s production choice here.
The Deluxe and Super Deluxe version of Tend also included two sided markers; one side of the marker has a fine tip like you would normally find on a marker, while the other side has a little stamp icon that you will use to put resources into your cargo manifest. Again, this is a great little touch and an added production element that not every company thinks about. We don’t need little stamps for the cargo manifest, a simple ‘X’ in the correct colour would do. But it takes an idea and elevates it, which I love to see. And, according to an IV Studio video – I can’t find it, but I know they said it! – they sourced these markers from an art supply company; no mass produced, cheap markers here.
I don’t put anything past IV Studio when it comes to production, but the last thing I expected in this box was linen finish cards. I generally don’t sleeve my board games because we own so many; I’m not about to sleeve 500+ games! That said, when a game needs to be sleeved, I spend the money and sleeve the cards. This isn’t one of those games. The card quality here is phenomenal, and with fairly minimal shuffling – mostly just pre-game – I don’t feel the need to shuffle these cards at all.
OK, despite all the cool production elements we have talked about so far, we haven’t even touched on the coolest element, but also perhaps the one I’m the least excited for: scratch off cards. If you love scratch off lottery tickets, you are in for a real treat as Tend includes 200 scratch off cards representing the mines and forests of the game. There are also small coins you can use to scratch the cards. I love a good scratch card but I hate the mess, and these I think are going to require me to vacuum off my board game table after each and every play. I would say I’d be annoyed by this, but IV Studio has thought of this too: you can use an app to mine and cut trees instead of the scratch sheets!
Honestly, despite the mess, I’m scratching those sheets; how can you not!
Tend looks phenomenal, and while it is a lot bigger than I was anticipating, I’m really excited to get this game tabled again and again. I’m pretty excited to see how this game plays, especially with large groups!
Article By Adam
