The Goldilocks Zone

Over the years, I have become (in case you had not noticed) a very hard gamer to please. I guess that it got worse when I ran Dungeons & Starships, where a poor product was money down the drain and thereby not in my bank account.

There is a tale of a well known company rep, who tried to tempt me, time and time again, even offering 3 times the value in his company's stock in place of those of other companies. He just couldn't understand that I would rather have £1 of stock that I could sell, rather than £3 that would stay on the racks for years. Well, in the end, he was physically escorted from the store.

Anyway, where was I?

Oh yes...

It's therefore, a rare game that meets my standards in every way, but as you will have read in previous posts, I was taken somewhat by the figures and rules produced by 'Crooked Dice' at Triples over the weekend.

Firstly, Karl, one of the evil genius overlords behind CD engages with the customer without coming across like a hard up Persian rug salesman. He is enthusiastic about his products and confident as to the quality without hard selling. And believe me, the products sell themselves. I had a good long chat with Karl at the weekend, which is something I rarely do and without ONCE giving me a sales pitch, I walked away having spent £125.00. What he did do, was listen to my questions and meet my requirements. By doing this I was more than happy to spend more than I planned. 

(As an aside, an adjacent trader decided that I was a possible shoplifter and 'signed' to one of his colleagues to watch me - damn my shifty features. Having seen this in my peripheral vision, I decided that this would mean that £47 of my planned spend with this trader would not see his money belt, and I parted somewhat grudgingly under the circumstances with £3.00. I believe that the same trader also lost other potential sales as a result)

Getting back to CD, the figures are wonderfully cast by Griffin and thereby are clean, crisp and coupled with the top class sculpting such things make for the perfect model. The fact that the range portrays characters who happen to resemble favourite film and television stars of the 60s and 70s is just the icing on the bun for me. Add to this that there are sprues of alternate heads, allowing a great deal of customisation and I'm sure you'd agree that a gamer could not ask for more.

But more, there is.

CD have also produced a VERY slick set of rules in A4 hardback format and priced at a very reasonable £20 with which you can recreate epic confrontations between the forces of good and evil in all of the genres presented in the aforementioned shows.

It's a rare day that sees me buy a modern set of rules, but a flick through the '7TV' book convinced me that what I had in my hand was a high production value product, created with a passion that I have rarely seen since the mid-80s. It's slick, oozes with genre atmosphere, and is written with wit - something sadly missing in the majority of rules these days.

All in all this adds up to 'The Crooked Dice Experience' being very enjoyable. True, I would like slightly cheaper miniatures (who wouldn't?) but quality costs money and I am a very happy camper.

And so that leads me to call this  a 'Goldilocks Game' because everything about CD is 'just right'.

You can check out Crooked Dice at http://www.crooked-dice.co.uk


TTFN

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