King of Tokyo

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Dumarest

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Bought King of Tokyo with a gift card I received for Father's Day and we had a four-player game this afternoon. Lots of fun but it seems to go by really quickly. My six-year-old daughter somehow accrued 20 victory points and won while nobody noticed. Seems to me you should have to occupy Tokyo to win but the rules don't say so anywhere or I must have missed it.
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Bought King of Tokyo with a gift card I received for Father's Day and we had a four-player game this afternoon. Lots of fun but it seems to go by really quickly. My six-year-old daughter somehow accrued 20 victory points and won while nobody noticed. Seems to me you should have to occupy Tokyo to win but the rules don't say so anywhere or I must have missed it.
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You don't have to occupy it. Was she buying cards left and right or getting lucky rolling sets of numbers?
 
You don't have to occupy it. Was she buying cards left and right or getting lucky rolling sets of numbers?
She was forgoing attacks and energy and going for threes of a kind almost every turn and usually getting sets of 3.
 
Why didn't the other 3 people playing attack?

We play it on occasion, but we get pretty ruthless, so, there's that.
 
Why didn't the other 3 people playing attack?

We play it on occasion, but we get pretty ruthless, so, there's that.
They were concentrating on their health and trying to get the energy crystals to buy cards and not noticing that she was racking up victory points. I noticed but didn't care because she's six. It was also our first time playing it.
 
Bought King of Tokyo with a gift card I received for Father's Day and we had a four-player game this afternoon.
I think this is really one of the best family games there is. It's accessible to every age group and too breezy to ever be boring.
Lots of fun but it seems to go by really quickly. My six-year-old daughter somehow accrued 20 victory points and won while nobody noticed.
The second sentence explains the first. :smile:
Seems to me you should have to occupy Tokyo to win but the rules don't say so anywhere or I must have missed it.
In one sense, you should, but if your opponents let you quietly rack up victory points in the corner, then you don't have to. On the other hand...
I noticed but didn't care because she's six.
So as you can see, there's a perfectly sound strategy for winning KoT without holding Tokyo: the old be-a-six-year-old-girl-playing-with-her-father strategy. Like I said, it's a terrific family game.
 
I think we're playing it again today so we'll see how it goes.

The gameboard is pretty dull, I must say. I expected to move monsters around on a map of Tokyo. I'm thinking about making a larger map, at the very least, so we can roll the dice on it and make it more visually interesting. I'm also thinking about seeing if there's a way to make the monsters distinct with some sort of individual ability as right now it makes no difference which monster you are. Going to play a few times and see before I start changing anything, but the map would be change regardless of anything else.
 
I'm also thinking about seeing if there's a way to make the monsters distinct with some sort of individual ability as right now it makes no difference which monster you are.
Isn't that what the cards are for? Buy them to give your monster unique abilities?
 
I think we're playing it again today so we'll see how it goes.

The gameboard is pretty dull, I must say. I expected to move monsters around on a map of Tokyo. I'm thinking about making a larger map, at the very least, so we can roll the dice on it and make it more visually interesting. I'm also thinking about seeing if there's a way to make the monsters distinct with some sort of individual ability as right now it makes no difference which monster you are. Going to play a few times and see before I start changing anything, but the map would be change regardless of anything else.
Get king of new York.
 
We usually play King of New York, which has an expanded map and more interaction - you can blow up things for fame, and Manhattan is bigger and you rampage through it, rather than staying in just one area. It's a bit more complex than Tokyo, but not by a lot.

There are expansions for both games, Power Up!, that add unique powers for each monster. I think I prefer the King games without powers, as they add a little too much to remember, but that might be just me; I'd put them in the same sort of "casual opener", "trash-talking enabler" space as Exploding Kittens (But Ko* is far better as a game in it's own right).
 
King of New York might be a bit challenging for a six year-old, but there's only one way to find out. It's a better game but not necessarily a better family game.
 
Thanks, but I bought King of Tokyo with a Father's Day gift card so I'm not looking to buy any with my own money. We already have a ton of boardgames...I just thought they'd like being monsters and wrecking the city. The game imagery is a bit misleading since you don't actually do anything to the city, which is why I'm thinking now of making a map and little buildings for them to knock down and destroy as just sitting there and trying to roll certain symbols or numbers on the dice isn't all that interesting to them. Using even just some Legos for buildings was more fun for them today. I'm thinking about finding a medium-sized board and putting some sort of buildings on it and maybe ships for Tokyo Bay. Then when they roll the claws class and hit someone we can knock the monsters into buildings and wreak havoc on the denizens of the city. :thumbsup:
 
The game you want is TERROR IN MEEPLE CITY. That game features actually knocking down model buildings as the primary game play.

I disagree with the assessment of King of New York as the better game: It's got more fiddly bits, but that's not the same thing.
 
Dumarest, KoT isn't a board game, it's a dice game. Also what you're describing is King of New York.
 
I like King of New York better than King of Tokyo, but I especially like that you can use monsters from both games in both games.

Just practicing some necromancy.
 
I bought this for one of my brothers' unruly brood and they instantly got excited about playing the monsters. I hope they enjoy it.
 
Monsters Menace America fills my itch for this kind of game, although it's way too complex for a six year old.
 
I have played King of Tokyo around 20 times and I don't think I have ever had someone win by getting 20VP :smile: It always ends up with all but 1 being defeated :smile:
 
Isn't that what the cards are for? Buy them to give your monster unique abilities?
No, because every monster can buy any card. I mean abilities that are unique to one monster.
Dumarest, KoT isn't a board game, it's a dice game. Also what you're describing is King of New York.
Incorrect on both counts, but thanks for playing!
 
No, because every monster can buy any card. I mean abilities that are unique to one monster.

Incorrect on both counts, but thanks for playing!
He's not that far off. The board in KOT is really irrelevant. You could replace it with a flag you put in front of the player in Tokyo and functionally nothing is different.

KoNY on the other hand has a relevant board and you do destroy tanks, planes and buildings like you were asking about.

Someone mentioned Monsters Menace America. I've played it once and what struck me there is that it's almost two completely different games where the first two thirds of the game is stopping across America to get things and trigger the end game. The end game has a catch up mechanic that almost makes the first part of the game irrelevant. I wanted to like the game but it felt long and failed to have that emotional impact ameritrash games are supposed to leave you with.
 
King of Tokyo is a visually appealing repackaging of king of the hill, I think. And it works.

But yeah, King of New York has a lot more to do on the board and I believe all the monsters are always on the board somewhere, even when not in Manhattan.
 
I personally love KoT for what it is - a simple game that has so many possible and unexpected winning strategies that no two games are ever much alike. It's brilliantly designed. The map is irrelevant. The only thing that matters is if your monster is in in the city or in the bay. When I bought it, I thought it was what the pictures on the front implied - but it was OK. We switched expectations and had a blast!

It is not what it says on the tin - and that is the problem! It is not the game Dumarest thought he was buying - a game about Kaiju destroying Tokyo. Dumarest - make the game do what you want it to do. All the power to you! Have fun with the kids! :E

It does look like the 2nd Edition has a different cover which just shows the different Kaiju, without any Tokyo being destroyed. A step forward!
 
I have played King of Tokyo around 20 times and I don't think I have ever had someone win by getting 20VP :smile: It always ends up with all but 1 being defeated :smile:
I actually won a game like this a few weeks ago, by sitting quietly and letting everyone fight while I ran up the VP's.
 
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