We brought four new characters to the table for Game Night. Three of them were a hit. One… didn’t get any love.
We alternate between our house and my daughter’s house on game nights. At our house, we have four players, and at theirs, five. We usually try to play lighter, faster games when we have more people — games like Terraforming Mars, Flamecraft or Lords of Waterdeep.
One of our enduring favorites is the long-running Red Dragon Inn, a collection of nine base games and an ever-growing supply of additional characters that let players roleplay what adventurers do when they’re not adventuring.
They drink, they tell tall tales, and they gamble. And they do so in the inn.
Most of the games, aside from the single character boosters, come with four characters. The characters from all boxes can work together… I think I have about twenty characters now, all gathered together in the Big Box that came with the fifth expansion.
Every player gets a board with a row of numbers starting at Drunkenness, at zero, and Fortitude, at twenty. When Drunkenness meets Fortitude, the character heads to bed. Each character also has a certain sum of gold coins to spend on drinks or gambling. When they run out of money, the bouncer tosses them out into the street. The last one at the table wins the game.
Each player draws a hand of seven cards. The cards include Action cards, which usually roleplay an action that helps themselves in some way, or interacts with another player, usually losing them money, fortitude, or sobriety. Sometimes cards need a trigger action to play, and Always cards can be played at any time.
Some Action cards start a round of gambling — the best way for people to lose and gain gold. Once gambling starts, everyone is forced to play (unless they have a card that lets them duck out). Gambling continues until someone cheats their way to a win, or everyone has run out of gambling cards.
A running joke is that the tavern wench is alert to gambling going on, and will occasionally swoop in and grab the pot because she just innocently assumed it was her tip.
Red Dragon Inn 7 brings the Tavern Crew to the table as playable characters. From the Slugfest Games website:
Warthorn Redbeard
It’s pronounced “War-thorn”, though he’s been known to chortle whenever anyone pronounces it “Wart-horn”. This dwarf is the jovial owner of the Red Dragon Inn, and after years of entertaining adventurers at his fine establishment, he can spin a yarn like no other!
The Good: Warthorn knows a bit about almost everything!
The Bad: …and he’ll happily talk your ear off about it!
Molly the Stablehand
Molly is a chipper halfling who works a normal, stable… er, reliable job at the Red Dragon Inn… or at least it would be, if only adventurers would ride horses like everyone else! Unfortunately the patrons’ clever animals frequently get out of hand and refuse to accept the concept of “indoor” and “outdoor” beasts.
The Good: Molly’s made friends with a whole menagerie of magical and mundane mounts!
The Bad: They’re not always friends with each other… or the furniture… or you…
Jasper the Bouncer
An amiable retiree from the adventuring life himself, Jasper is still tough as nails and ready to step in on any kerfuffle. You’ll have a bear of a time gazoozling this wizened wizard because he’s got his eye on all you whippersnappers at this here groggery!
The Good: Jasper keeps folks from sneak-thievin’ the customers.
The Bad: He does, however, frequently lose track of his teeth.
The Wench!
The hardworking and ever-professional woman known by most patrons (but not all!) simply as “The Wench” is here to serve up drinks and take a minimum of your nonsense. With the keys to the tavern’s special reserve in her pocket, she’ll show you why it’s her job to play with the drinks.
The Good: The special reserve drinks are some of the best in the land!
The Bad: The special reserve drinks are some of the most potent in the land!
I played The Wench. I was able to occasionally grab the gambling pot and force other people to tip me. In return, I gave them “special reserve” drinks to send them under the table in record time.
Groans were heard whenever Warthorn, the owner of the inn, launched into another one of his long-winded stories that would send the fortitude of anyone within earshot plummeting.
Molly’s mount menagerie wouldn’t keep themselves confined to the stables, either. A particular fight between a pegasus and its rival giant hamster spilled out into the tavern. (The pegasus lost).
Red Dragon Inn is the kind of game you have to see played with people who really enjoy digging into their characters before you understand it. If you love roleplaying in card game form — this might be the game for you. Each main box supports two to four players, but additional boxes and decks let any number of people play. The seventh expansion brings in characters who were previously in the background, and so this might not be the best box to start with for gaming tables new to the series. Other expansions take the characters out of the inn and into the dungeon for a very different fight against someone whom the characters may already know…
