Kickstarter Feature – Moonstone the Game

A month or so ago I stumbled across, as one does, a new game and miniatures range on Facebook. Called Moonstone, I was immediately taken with the visuals (very important in any game!) and it being Facebook I Liked one of the pictures. Much to my surprise, they contacted me and offered to send me one of their test models – a Firespitter.

I said yes, because who turns down a free miniature? And I thought it would be good to try a mini-review of a toy soldier, something I’ve not done before. It turned out that the Kickstarter was going to launch soon, so I also asked Tom from Moonstone to tell me a bit more about the game and their plans.

The Firespitter

I don’t have a lot of experience with resin models, I have to admit. Bearing in mind that this is a test cast, there was very little flash to clean up, and a quick scrape with a knife did the job.

I am all thumbs when it comes to sticking fiddly bits together and I admit I eyed the bendy piping piece in particular with a little wariness. However, I needn’t have worried as the fittings were all great and the parts went together very simply. Put together in the ‘flesh’, I’m impressed by the amount of character and expression and I’m looking forward to painting this fella at some point soon. The detail’s very strong so some washes will really pick out the textures, I reckon, though if you have better suggestions let me know in the comments. I’ll post an update when I get started with a brush.

The History of Moonstone the Game

Tom: The game is set in a whimsical world reminiscent of the 80’s movies The Labyrinth and Dark Crystal. I’m a big Fan of Brian Froud’s art and the idea of creating a game in this sort of setting was a big inspiration, there doesn’t seem to be a game out there at the moment that quite fits this niche. From an artistic point of view I’ve also been quite influenced by some of the artists that contributed to Rackham’s Confrontation, such as Paul Bonner.

I also had some ideas for using card mechanics in a miniatures game brewing for a long while. It started when playing Malifaux and being frustrated that although I was using cards, the way they are used seemed a bit limited, flipping cards off the top of a deck just felt like rolling a 13 sided dice. As a poker fan, I wanted to add some of those elements into a miniatures game. I wanted a hand of options to choose from and methods to mislead my opponents.

I’m also a big fan of deck building games and wanted to introduce some feature of building up killer combo’s, and finding the counters to your opponents’ choices.

My third big influence is that besides table top war-games I also train in Historical European Martial Arts (i.e. competitive sword fighting), so had ideas brewing for a close combat system that was dynamic and involved player decision on how they wanted their character to fight which also lead me to explore card mechanics.

Any my fourth big influence is I have enjoyed playing CCG/board games in both two player and multiplayer modes. The political scheming element you get from group games is a really interesting alternative way to play which some people (especially female gamers in my experience) prefer. So I wanted a miniatures game that would work equally well with two players as with 3 or 4.

The Game

Tom: The game is typically played with 12 miniatures on a 3’x3’ board. This could be two players with 6 each, 3 players with 4 each or 4 players with 3 each. At the start of the game, a handful of Moonstones (D4’s) are dropped in the middle of the table and players try to harvest them out of the ground and then fight/steal them. After 4 turns the player holding the most stones wins.

Apart from the Moonstones themselves (which are dice, but not used in a conventional way), the game mechanics are all card based. There are two custom card decks, the Arcane Deck which is used to cast spells and shoot ranged weapons or heal and the Combat Deck.

We’ve been play testing for about 6-7 months so I’m feeling confident to publish the rules as a Free Download PDF as soon as I get a few more bits of artwork done for it.

The Kickstarter

That all sounds very cool to me. If you agree, I suggest you take a trip over to the Moonstone Fantasy Skirmish Game Kickstarter page and show your support! You should also sign up on their Facebook page, follow them on Twitter @moonstonegame, and take a look at their website.

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