by Brant Guillory, 16 May 2024 ~ #UnboxingDay
A Gest of Robin Hood sits at the intersection of several different games. It’s part of GMT’s “Irregular Combat Series” so it’s sort of COIN-adjacent. There’s been a few Robin Hood games floating around for a while now, from publishers as diverse as Worthington and Kosmos and Spin Master, and now we get one that’s also infused with the political sensibilities of designer Fred Serval. Leaving the gameplay and design philosophy aside, let’s take a look at what’s in the box.
Mandatory boxiness
click images to enlarge
“What’s in the box?!” {/Brad Pitt voice}
It’s just one countersheet that’s mostly coins and control markers.
There’s a double-sided player card for each player
Both players also have a player screen to keep their hands in front of them semi-secret
There’s 3 books in here, with a ton of great info in them
The Rules of Play gives you the all the cut-&-dried rules if you need to look something up during the game
The Learn to Play book walks you through some turns, and treats the reader as a participant in a conversation
And finally, the Playbook gives you background on all the cards, the extensive designer’s notes, and some well-written historical background
The map is gorgeous with the right combination of period ‘feel’ and playability, with all the necessary tracks on the board to keep the footprint down.
Here are some sample cards from the larger deck of cards
And here are all the cards in the smaller deck
And finally, a sampling of some of the playing pieces, which look like the COIN series raided a Levy & Campaign game for spare parts, but hey, if it all works, then it all works!
We’ll let you know more as we get a chance to dig into it.
Thanks for joining this month’s #UnboxingDay with the Armchair Dragoons and we hope you enjoyed a look under our hoods! You can always leave us your feedback in our #UnboxingDay thread, or in the comment area on this article, below.
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