Red Raven Games has posted a preview of its upcoming fantasy board game “Knight Fall” designed by T. Alex David and Ryan Laukat. The plot of the game centers around Thornmar Abbey, an ancient order of holy knights, which is tasked with keeping the gates of the underworld sealed.
The gates themselves are an extinguished ancient portal that is warded against the demons and horrors that lay beyond with the knights standing guard of the elders who maintain the protection spells in place. But as the years of peace have dragged on, the order’s power has waned, and demons are now making forays from across the veil.
Each player takes the role of a knight tasked with fighting back against the hordes of the netherworld and taking the fight to the enemy. But hold on, because not all players are called to noble deeds, and some of you will have to choose and embody the demons that pour through the portal to flood the world in unimaginable horrors.
In the latest preview of the game, Laukat spoke about what inspired him to pursue “Knight Fall,” and how the project kept on growing to create a distinct title in the board gaming world.
Bringing Team versus Team in Board Games to Bear
Laukat said that “Knight Fall” was inspired by an original design by Davis which imagined a medieval horror board game in which teams of players worked to help each other in achieving their team’s objective.
Laukat confirmed that he immediately got onboard with Davis and they struck a partnership, bringing Andrew Bisley, a prominent artist known for his work on “Mission: Red Planet,” “Tapestry,” “Citadels,” and “Everdell” among others, to help with the art. “He blew us away with his illustrations,” Laukat said.
The pair first came together in 2017, after which they spent three years refining the game. In 2020, the game’s first crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter went live, but was cancelled shortly after. In the new update, Laukat explained that he had made some “production decisions” he wasn’t happy with bringing him to close the campaign as the game needed more polishing.
Part of the objectives in designing the remainder of the game since that time have been fleshing out of the setting, developing a captivating campaign mode and a better cooperative mode. Davis worked hard on bringing more action cards and character powers into the game to make it more diverse and replayable.
Revealing Bits of the Characters, Power Cards, and Game Modes
The update came with a number of interesting reveals, showing some of the nineteen unique characters. They are divvied up between demons and knights. Laukat featured some of the power cards with dozens of unique actions available to players to influence the outcome of a skirmish or even the entire game.
According to Laukat, there is vast decision space that rewards clever and tactical thinking adding a skill factor to the game. What power cards you secure and how you put them to use are all part of the experience, the designer says in the update.
As to the modes, the designer has shared details as well revealing the Standard, Co-op and Story Campaign that are all part of the experience. Players in Standard will compete to secure control over the Abbey as they lead the armies of demons or knights to victory.
The victory condition is pretty straightforward. Demons gain points by slaying elders and knights and knights gain points by vanquishing demons. The Cooperative mode is also there for groups of players who wish to be in it together, so you can all take the roles of knights and fight back, and not least – there is a pad of maps that will allow you to embark on a unique Campaign experience. Oh, and to really get you into the setting of the game, there is a cool soundtrack that is released for the game.