Good for those who like playing aggress⛦ively in wargames
A worthy addition to the Aᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚxis & Allies game system
You can fight whales with giant turtles
Asymmetric factions
Randomness of dice rolling to determine combat outco🥂mes
The Little Mermaid makes you angry
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Axis & Allies is one of the longest-running and well-known wargames in the board game space, having been around now for over 40 years. For most of that time, its strategic dice-based combat and troop deployment gameplay was relegated to strictly recreating real-world skirmishes and wars such as World War I and II, or the battles in North Africa or the Battle of the Bulge. Now under the care of Renegade Games, the studio is adapting that same classic gameplay fans have come to love and taking it outside of the grit and grime of real-world settings with the "Powered by Axis & Allies" line of titles, with its latest – and second – release, Battle for the Deep. Its undersea warfare has sparked my imagination as to what the future of this series could be, and while it won't necessarily rank amongst the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best board games, I hope it acts as a blueprint for similar releases in this line ꩵgoing forw𒁃ard.
Price | $59.99 / £59.99 |
Ages | 14+ |
Game type | Area control / wargame |
Players | 2 - 4 |
Lasts | 90mins |
Complexity | Moderate |
Designers | Matt Hyra |
Publisher | Renegade Game Studios |
Play if you enjoy | Axis & Allies, Undaunted, Risk |
For those unfamiliar with Axis & Allies, gameplay takes place over a series of rounds, each divided into a series of Phases: Purchase Reinforcements, Combat Move (moving any units that will take part in combat that turn), Conduct Combat, Noncombat Move (moving units that did NOT take part in any combat), Check Stacking Limits (each region can only hold so many units), Deploy Reinforcements, and Set Victory Points. Once a player has taken their turn, it passes to the next, and this continues until either one team reaches 30 combined victory points, if a team controls an enemy's base zone, or after seven rounds of play, at which point whichever group has th෴e most points wins. Much of the core gameplay loop and systems will be familiar to anyone who has played previous editions of the series, allowing you to quickly transition into this latest theater of war.
As the name implies, Battle for the Deep takes the fighting from the land, air, and sea, and puts it far under the waves where brand-new and fantastical factions are waging war. This time around, instead of forces like Italy, Germany, America, or the Soviet Union, players can pick from asymmetric factions such as the Undersea Kingdom, the Leviathans, the war turtles of The Pro💙tectors, or the Lovecraftian Denizens of the Deep – each army with unique troops with unique powers and abilities. This alone would greatly set BftD apart from its other A&A peers, but that is just one of a few. Neither the Axis nor the Allies exist under the sea, and alliances are chosen instead by the players, meaning that the team-ups can change from game to game – a feat𒀰ure that wouldn't quite be historically possible in the other titles but makes such a difference here.
On the component side of things, Battle for the Deep is your pretty standard A&A fare – paper rulebook, solid mi🅘nis, a large game board, and cardboard tokens that leave a bit to be desired. Each of the factions' minis has a distinct look, and it's fun to see little dolphin riders swimming around the board in contrast to large whales and turtles. You certainly won't have any issue telling them apart, which is a plus with games like this that field a bunch of units, and you need to know what you are fighting against before sending your troops into the fray. The included reference cards, one for each player, help with denoting what unit is what a﷽nd show the progression of turns on the back, but overall, I found them to be a letdown thanks to the lack of descriptions of what the various unit abilities do. Not having this information - information that would be helpful to new and returning A&A players alike - on the reference cards means players will have to keep consulting the rulebook instead. There is plenty of space on the back of the card where they could have put this information, and its omission is a bit of a head-scratcher.
Each of the four factions has a unique roster of four units that they can take with them into fights. While the stats from one group to the next are nearly identical across the board, featuring a typical "grunt" and heavy units, the additional two units all feel largely unique to that army. This is on top of most units also having unique abilities they can utilize too. These can range from the Undersea Kingdom's Dolphin Rider units that let them move after attack, or, my personal favorite, the Denizens' Tentacles that grab enemy units instead of dealing damage to them. These grabbed units can be used in place of hits on their own forces, turning enemies into cannon fodder against their o🎶wn army. Seeing how these all played out against one another was a blast, and their accompanying miniatures were a standout highlight of the game for me. More of this in the future, please!
Instead of set areas that each faction starts in, players get to instead choose from a handful of possible options, marking a first for Axis & Allies. The asymmetrical nature of the factions combined with this open-ended deployment direction gives Battle for the Deep an added degree of repඣlayability that the other mainline games lack.
Axis & Allies' biggest competitor would probably be the Undaunted franchise. We were particularly keen on the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Battle of Britain vers🔯ion, which we said "throws you constant cu𝔍rveballs."
I like the dice-rolling-focused nature of Axis & Allies, and Battle for the Deep captures that feeling splendidly, but if I have one main complaint w🉐ith this release, it's that I wish the team at Renegade had pushed the new aspects this game offers just a little bit further. I wish that we had more than just four factions, allowing for more flexibility in matchups. I would have been fine keeping it at 2v2 (though I would love 1 faction vs. 1 faction variant rules), requiring players to pick from a larger pool, meaning every faction wouldn't always be on the board. This could additionally be addressed if each faction didn't have only f🉐our units they could bring out and instead either had more options available to them (normal A&A games have far more unit options), or perhaps had an either-or situation where you would still only have four options, but two of those slots would have a choice between a couple of options to fill the spot with – decided at the start of the game. Still, as only the second of these "Powered by A&A" experiences, I think Battle for the Deep is a compelling and fun offering whose foundation lends itself well to the side series' future.
If you are coming at Battle for the Deep with previous experience from other Axis & Allies titles, some aspects may take a bit of time to get used to here. Perhaps the biggest adjustment will be that in this game, you won’t be able to carry over unspent resources from one round to the next. In the mainline games, while you may not be able to carry over all of your unspent money, you could🔥 bring over some, which isn’t the case here. This is an easy enough thing to homerule in if you and your game crew want to, so go fo⭕r it. The other difference I felt was that this game came off a bit more aggressive than the mainline titles, with a heavier focus on attacking, thanks to that base capture win condition. Perhaps it’s more just on how my gaming group plays in general, but the whole experience felt more like a race than a traditional A&A game, which some players may prefer and others may be put off by. I enjoyed it and thought it made the game feel more exciting and quicker.
The aesthetic and theme for Battle for the Deep may not be quite my cup of tea, but it has gꦰotten my imagination running wild for what could be. The foundations set up here, I would love to see taken into the science fiction realm with spaceships and a galactic conflict or in a high fantasy realm where factions of orcs and elves and more do battle – slinging spells and shooting arrows. As someone who also spent time checking out Renegade's first "Powered by Axis & Allies" title, G.I. Joe: Battle for the Arctic, this second entry feels far more like a solid wargame and less a novelty focused on nostalgia. Battle for the Deep is a fun and engaging entry point into the Axis & Allies ecosystem, or as an option if you aren't particularly attracted to the real-world war setting of their flagship entries.
Criteria | Notes | Score |
|---|---|---|
Game mechanics | There is a reason that Axis & Allies has been a♍round for more than 40 years at this point. It offers a good mix of strategy and luck, and Battle for the Deep brings much of that over along with📖 some cool new asymmetric factions, but I wish they had pushed things a bit further. | 4/5 |
Accessibility | Battle for the Deep manages to avoid the pitfall of some of the other games in the series with distinct unit molds that stand out from o𒈔ne another far better. I never had to worry about confusing a dolphin with a whale, or tentacles with a turtle. The use of symbols along with colors helps a lot to help folks with color blindness too. The only part I found lacking is the reference card and the omission of the ability descriptions. | 4/5 |
Replayability | The asymmetric factions and the choice of starting locations help Battle of the Deep stand apart from other A&A games, and the ability to choose what the team compositions are helps keep things fresh. I only wish there were a couple of additional factions you could pick from so that you weren’t alwa⛎ys playing t😼he same four every time. | 4/5 |
Setup and pack-down | Setup for A&A is always a bit of a chore, and Battle for the Deep is no different, but as there aren’t as many pieces to worry about, or as bඣig a board, it isn’t too bad. The lack of any sort of real organizer included, opting just for plastic baggies, always a pet peeve of mine, makes the process feel a bit messy. It’s not bad, but not great either. | 3/5 |
Component quality | While the board and pieces are solid enough, the cardboard tokens and cards just d🌺on’t feel good. The token♛s are far too thin, and simply punching them from the boards resulted in small tears. The card stock is more serviceable, but lacks detail to make them really worthwhile reference cards. | 2/5 |
This review was conducted using a sample💝 provided by the publisher.
Our reviewer played Battle for the Deep multiple tiꦿmes and with other gamers to get a better sense of how it performed 𒀰under different circumstances. They also used their experience with the Axis & Allies franchise to compare and contrast.
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Born and raised in Metro De🧜troit, Scott White has a particular fondness for RPGs, randomizers, fighting games, all things tabletop, Gundam/Gunpla, and Mega Man (OK, really anything involving fighting robots). You can find his words and videos featured all over the internet, including RPG Site, IGN, Polygon, Irrational Passions, and here at GamesRadar+! He also hosts the RPG podcast RPG University, which features guests fr𒉰om around the industry and more.
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