Kingdom Death: Phoenix Hunt Reenactment Beta Box Review

The settlement celebrates the unlikely victory over the timeless Phoenix. A whirling dance of iridescent feathers sparkles at the settlement's center enshrining the memory of the settlement's perseverance.

The Model

While I wouldn't want to use this model during gameplay due to the fragility of it, I absolutely love this one as it has a playful aspect to it we haven't seen since Ledla (The Smog Drummer). It not only echoes the Phoenix, but also Sirens/Harpies in a delightful manner and I do wish that the Dancer Armor from the Lion Knight expansion looked like this. The Beak knee pads in particular are such a fun touch. About the only critical note I have here is that from some angles the head looks weirdly flat (that's why I've chosen this picture here, you can see it, for alternative angles where it doesn't look so off check out the KDM Collector page here).

Really no other notes at all on this front, this one clearly should not be a gameplay piece in this material, but as a thematic world building sculpt it's fun. While this one may be a bit too cheesecake for some people's tastes, I'm fine with something like this which is a costume that echoes the kind worn during the Carnival of Brazil. In world this is an art/performance costume and it's cool to see. I really do hope someone builds a diorama of this little event because that would be a beautiful sight to behold.

The Gameplay Element

This is a “Settlement Event Extension” card, which is a new kind of card one would assume that Team Death are going to create more of in the future, otherwise they're once again creating more mechanics and complexity without revisiting them.

When you draw the Hunt Reenactment Settlement Event (SE) card and choose the Phoenix you get to replace the usual table results with a new card, before we get into the new version, we'll just refresh ourselves on the original SE card so we can compare.

We will draw this card and follow the normal process, only deviating to the Event Extension if we choose the Phoenix. For everything else we'll roll on the table with a Female Survivor being chosen as the Monster (In case she gains Monster Claw Style, because Female Survivors are in some cases better F&T fighters than Men). The outcome for the Quarry option (which is what we would be replacing with this Event Extension) is either a dead hunter + Monster Claw Style on the Monster survivor (30%), a Dead Monster survivor and 0 Insanity on the hunter (40%) and a Max survival for all departing survivors this lantern year (30%). In truth it's usually better to pick a Nemesis monster in the default options because that gives Fated Battle (40%) for both survivors and Last Man Standing for the Hunter (30%). So having a replacement event for the Phoenix goes a long way towards potentially changing the decisions made during this card. Let us see what it does now:

First of all, if we have Timeless Eye on the “Monster” then we're getting a +2 because they're more Phoenix like than normal. I appreciate that extra piece of mechanical flavour a lot, but I'm not sure how I could easily justify a Timeless Eye survivor being my “least favourite survivor” (Which is who the monster is supposed to be according to the rules on the original Reenactment) except for Timeless Eye – Sculpture settlements.

For the Odds I'll split them as follows (Normal/With Timeless Eye) so we can see how that adjusts things. Quick additional note here; Arc Survivors with Timeless Eye are rare, so this card drops in value if you're on the “Arc Survivors Forever” train. Choo choo!

(50%/30%) of the time the monster dies and the hunter gains the Aichmophobia disorder, that disorder is wildly variable in how it affects the given survivor, if you're a blunt weapon user then it's a non-issue, but if you use sharp weapons this one is going to need to be removed before you go back on the hunt. The main pain here is having a Timeless eye survivor die, but if you're like me and normally put Timeless Eye on the sculpture innovation that might not be as much of an issue.

(40%/40%) of the time you either gain Forbidden Dance, an excellent innovation that I think is a benefit to every kind of settlement, or you get +1 movement for the monster survivor and +1 weapon proficiency for the hunter survivor. I really like this result, its thematic and gives out some incredibly desirable benefits no matter which of the two options you get.

(30%/50%) of the time the settlement gets its own Rite of Passage specifically for hunting the Phoenix, we can see that a settlement may only have one Rite of Passage (future proofing for additional cards like this) and it is a big old reward that survivors get to roll for when departing to hunt the Phoenix, +1 courage during the settlement phase is always desirable as it puts Matchmaker on the table, but +1 Luck is a huge boon and a stat that I value greatly when hunting the Phoenix (and in general). This is a nice carrot to help make the Phoenix a more desirable quarry and for myself it works, I would absolutely increase the amount I hunt the Phoenix in settlements where I have this Rite and also I am keen to see what these Rites look like for other monsters.

Summary

I really, REALLY like this redesign of having Hunt Reenactment having specific events called for a particular monster. That's super cool, though if this makes the move across to plastic I want it to be in a box that includes multiple different monsters and cards. I'd support a box with plastic miniatures that covers all the core quarry and nemesis monsters for a start.

This boxed set on its own however is not great gameplay value for money, one needs to have the Phoenix as a quarry, and have hunted it AND draw the Hunt Reenactment SE card AND choose the Phoenix. So it's another edge piece of content and that's why I could recommend it if it came with other cards to broaden the cases where it works, but I can't recommend it here on the basis of its gameplay elements no matter how well they are designed.