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Following on from the excitement at receiving the first batch of reprints of Games Workshop‘s Revised 4th Edition of Talisman from Coiledspring Games last week, there was another flurry of activity today after the postman had been!
This time it was a delivery from probably the friendliest game store on the planet, Fan Boy Three in Manchester, with the remaining four expansions The Reaper, The Dragon, The City and The Woodland.
(Note: Images are actually larger than they appear here. Right click and open image in new tab to see more detail.)
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| Second batch of reprints in shrink. Here’s hoping for more soon! |
You will notice that I have not taken comparison pictures of the card fronts and backs this time around, as this was covered last time. The remaining expansions are no different and will blend seamlessly in with your existing game should you be playing with the Fantasy Flight Games printing of the game.
There are some extra images to highlight some of the differences between the printings this time around, which will be discussed in the blurb below!
Oh, and I may have got a bit flustered when taking the pics earlier, so the GW or FFG versions might be on the left or right of the picture – Oopsie…!
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| The Reaper Expansion Box Front | The Reaper Expansion Box Rear | ||
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| The Reaper Expansion Contents | The Reaper Expansion Credits Page | ||
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| The Reaper Expansion “R” Comparison | |||
The Reaper is mostly the same as its predecessor and, as with all of the boxes from this current reprint, it comes with a FREE code for Talisman: Digital Edition on Steam from Nomad Games.
As with the Talisman base game, there is a little bit of confusion with the trailing and truncated “R” from the Windlass font used in the game, though the Character cards are unaffected.
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| The Dragon Expansion Box Front | The Dragon Expansion Box Rear | ||
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| The Dragon Expansion Contents | The Dragon Expansion Credits Page | ||
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| The Dragon Expansion Box Comparison | |||
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| The Dragon Expansion “R” Comparison | The Dragon Expansion Dragon Spawn Rules | ||
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| The Dragon Expansion Minis – Box | The Dragon Expansion Minis – Actual | ||
The box for The Dragon is the same overall size as the original one, rather than the smaller form box used for The City and The Woodland, but I suspect the large token sheets could be the reason for that. I wonder if they could have been made into smaller sheets and the board folded once more, but I guess a larger form box would be needed for The Cataclysm when that eventually receives a reprint. The box itself is actually slightly shorter though, as you can see. Anyway, enough rambling…
You can see above that the errant “R” issue is evident in the rulebook, but not on the cards of the expansion!
As mentioned last week, there was a potential issue highlighted over on the BoardGameGeek forums about the Dragon Spawn rules section of the rulebook. It was thought that the image of the dragon was printed over the text, however I can confirm that this is NOT the case, and the section of text thought to be missing is actually over on Page 19 of the rulebook.
Another concern was raised over on Facebook when it was revealed that the game now included a set of six base rings for the playing pieces. It was noted that some characters in later expansions had square or other-shaped bases, for instance the Dragon Rider and Ogre Chieftain. Looking at the rear of the box, I was a little worried as the playing pieces appeared unchanged.
I was really pleased to note however that, not only does each medium expansion come with a full set of base rings to use but, the playing pieces in question have been remade on round bases!
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| The City Expansion Box Front | The City Expansion Box Rear | ||
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| The City Expansion Contents | The City Expansion Credits Page |
As expected, The City uses the smaller form box that was latterly brought in by Fantasy Flight Games which led to somewhat of a bone of contention amongst players, with the introduction of a “3 Fold” corner board for The Woodland.
Players found that the newer configuration did not sit as flat as the original “2 Fold” boards, though if the joint is hyper-extended very slightly, I did find that this issue went away.
However… the board in the box is actually a “4 Fold” board!
I’m guessing that it was brought in for a reason, given that the cuts are now even along both sides and the board folds up into a square, but we shall have to see how it holds up in play.
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| The Woodland Expansion Box Front | The Woodland Expansion Box Rear | ||
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| The Woodland Expansion Contents | The Woodland Expansion Credits Page |
After opening up The City, I then checked out The Woodland, fully expecting it to be the same. However, the board contained in the box is of the “3 Fold” variety as found in the original printing!
Cue a perplexed Jon again, but I guess it doesn’t actually affect anything in play and is more to do with the original print files having the folds marked on them.
Everything else is as you would expect, with the base rings and the code for a free copy of Talisman: Digital Edition!
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| City Board Comparison | Two Fold Board | ||
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| Three Fold Board | Four Fold Board |
I’ve just put a few comparison shots of the different boards above for you to see. I think it’s more of a novelty for hyper-fans like me to see the different versions than it is to actually make a difference to playing the game. A bit like the one piece board and jig-board versions of the 2nd Edition of Talisman from way back when.
On a personal note, if you happen to have a three fold board for either The Dungeon, The Highland or The City expansions going spare for whatever reason, I’d be interested in getting hold of it for my collection! Please let me know if you have one available.
As with the previous overview, I hope that you are able to see that the reprints from Games Workshop will quite happily blend in with the previous printings from Fantasy Flight Games.
The addition of base rings to the base game and larger expansions still excites me possibly too much, but I think it’s a great little touch. The retooling of the minis from The Dragon Expansion so they could be used with them was great to see too.
I’ve yet to hear any news about a schedule for the reprinting of the remaining expansions, but as soon as there is any news to report I shall announce it on the site and likely via the Facebook page. I keep forgetting about poor old Twitter sadly, so wouldn’t rely too much on that medium!
Again, if you want to know anything about the reprints that I have not covered here, or you cannot see in the pictures, then send me an email or a message via Facebook and I will endeavour to help find the answer for you!
2017 Reprint Overview – Part One
CoiledSpring Games on Facebook