Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion

The Game

Gloomhaven was once the #1 game on BoardGameGeek.com. Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion is a standalone game set in the same universe and not an expansion. It uses similar mechanisms and is slightly simplified. It is currently ranked #9 on BGG, which is amazing. Whether Gloomhaven and Jaws of the Lion should be ranked so high is debatable. They are legacy games, which means to truly experience it, you need to be committed to play through the whole campaign. Players who are willing to make that kind of commitment are probably big fans of the genre. They are already inclined to like the games. Those who are not very interested will not likely buy or try the game. So legacy games naturally filter out players who may not rate them high. This is how they have some advantage over non-legacy games in the BGG rankings. The Pandemic Legacy games which I like have this advantage too. 

Jaws of the Lion is a fantasy-themed roleplaying tactical battle game. This type is not really my cup of tea, but given the opportunity to try this popular game, I was happy to give it a go. The game is scenario based. One game is playing a specific scenario in the scenario book. Every scenario has its own map setup and objectives. The game comes with 25 scenarios. That's not as many as Gloomhaven, but if you manage to get 25 plays out of a game, it's great value for money. 

I picked this character to play - the bomb guy. There are four characters to pick from. Every character has its own deck of cards. Your actions in the game are all driven by your deck. At the start of a game, you hold all your cards in hand. Every turn you play two cards to perform actions. Each card has two halves. You must use the upper half power of one card, and the lower half power of the other. As you play, you will eventually run out of cards. You will then need to perform a reset to take your played cards back into your hand. As you do this, you randomly lose one card. You go through this cycle multiple times and you will have fewer and fewer cards. You must complete the mission before you run out of cards. This is the time pressure you have to face. 

This is a cooperative game, so you are working together with your fellow players to complete the mission. As you gain experience and money, you upgrade yourself and buy equipment. These are the legacy elements of the game. 

The tutorial (learning scenarios) in Jaws of the Lion are well done. You don't need to read through the whole rulebook to start playing. You just follow the tutorial booklet. There are five tutorial scenarios, and they introduce rules to you bit by bit. By the end of the 5th scenario, you will know the full rules. The first two scenarios are a little simple, but from the third one onwards this very much feels like the full game. Map setup is easy, because the maps are already printed in the booklet (see photo above). You don't need to assemble scenario maps using multiple game pieces. You still need to place some monsters and treasures, but overall it's not much work. 

The cards are the core of the game. At the centre you see an initiative number. Of the two cards you play on your turn, the one with the lower number determines your initiative. Lower means you go earlier. The monsters have initiative values too. If theirs are lower, they will move and attack before you do. On this card above, the two tiny numbers on the left, at the corners of the upper and lower sections, are the basic actions. You may choose to forgo the main actions for these instead. The basic actions are moving two steps and melee attacking at strength 2.  

This is an event card. These cards have story elements. You read the passage, then decide what you want to do. The outcome can be good or bad, and is only revealed after you make your decision. These events are mostly random and generic. You draw them from a deck after all. 

One of the four characters you can play.

There are different types of monsters, and within each type there are different levels. The yellow and white bases represent monsters at different levels. 

This game component is used to keep track of monsters in play. It shows the health points, movement range and attack strength. The six sections on the sleeve are used to track injury dealt to up to six monsters of this type. Slot number 4 has two round tokens, which means monster #4 on the board has been dealt 2 damage. 

These two are equipment cards. You spend money to buy equipment. Any leftover money can be kept for future games. This is part of the legacy element of Jaws of the Lion. Some equipment are worn, e.g. the boots. You can't wear two pairs of boots at the same time. You can't carry too many weapons at any one time, since you only have one pair of hands. 

This little board is used to keep track of elements in the game. Elements are a kind of magic force. There are six types of elements. Some actions you take generate specific elements. You shift the marker for that element to the rightmost position, signifying that this element type is available. Certain actions when taken with the presence of specific elements become stronger. At the end of every round, the element markers shift one step left, representing the elements waning. Eventually the markers will return to the leftmost position, which means the corresponding elements are no longer active. Characters can generate elements for themselves and for one another. This is one way you cooperate and boost one another's abilities. 

The Play

The learning scenarios in Jaws of the Lion are very well structured. I could start playing very quickly. Although the first two scenarios were short and simple, the experience of learning the game was smooth and easy. Now I am not a particular fan of fantasy roleplaying battle games. Jaws of the Lion doesn't feel particularly different. To me, it is mostly just another one of this type of game. The core mechanism of managing your cards is interesting. This is a little different from other games of this type that I have played. You don't roll dice. Sometimes you draw from card decks. There is still some luck. However you can plan out many steps in detail. Much of the game is deterministic, like how the monsters behave and the effects of your actions. You can plan meticulously. Completing a mission is like solving a complicated puzzle. It is planning a long sequence of actions, taking into account how the monsters will react to your actions.  

Allen and I ganging up on a monster

Some maps have treasure chests

These acolytes in red are a pain

Water snakes

The golem is slow, but incredibly strong

For some scenarios, the booklet is not big enough for building the entire map, so a supplementary booklet is used (see the lower part of this photo). 

This time it is he hero being surrounded by monsters

The Thoughts

A few years ago when Gloomhaven was still the #1 game on BoardGameGeek, I almost started a campaign with a few other friends. The pandemic was still happening then. We never got around to start our campaign because we were busy with all sorts of different things. Now that I have tried Jaws of the Lion, I consider that item on my to-do list checked. Jaws of the Lion is pleasant but not surprising for me. Take that with a grain of salt, since it is not my type in the first place. The card mechanism is interesting. The scenarios are immersive. I'm not sure yet whether I'll continue. I still have not done tutorial scenario 5. Since I have only played a handful of scenarios, I can't comment on the overall legacy campaign and the story. That should be an important part of the experience. I'll share more if I do continue the campaign.