by wpflug13
Lalaji wrote:
- my son can only read a littlr, but we manage to play quite a Number of deck building games includes hero realms, Harry potter, clanks, DC comics DBG and legendary etc... Because we explain the cards to him and he can memorize the cards very well. I believe he would have no problem to understand the game play of aeon end?
If he can interpret the cards for those other games, he should do fine with the basic game play of Aeon's End. Cards generally follow a similar pattern (e.g. a gem is Gain X$ and do a small effect). I actually just started playing through the Legacy campaign with my four year old, and he can read enough of the cards to know when to ask questions. More complex cards he'll ask me about once or twice during the game, but sounds similar to your son in that he memorizes them quickly. There are portions of the game that he doesn't always track as well (i.e. he may not have known that a new minion was Spawning every time the counter ticked past ten), and he certainly isn't playing optimally, but he grasps the big picture well enough to decide what cards to buy, what bad guy to hit, etc.
- I heard the game can be quite punching even to adult players, and I heard it also depends on how many players too. With my wife, my five year old and myself. How challenging the game can be? Are we likely to lose most of time, especially my son is probably a weaker player amongst us?
It's tough to say. The average player playing with an average five year old is likely to lose most of the time. If you're a good player, and if your five year old is unusually quick to pick up board game strategy (which it sounds like he is), I'd expect you can do reasonably well. If you find that the game is too punishing for your tastes, add some additional tier 1 and tier 2 cards to the nemesis deck. If you're playing with three players, you'll have at least a few extra.
- As the deck does not reshuffle, I believe player needs to memorize and strategize the deck. I think it can be hard for my son to do that well, would that be a game changing issue?
As Ghyslain mentioned, there is no game play issue with looking at your deck (assuming something hasn't caused you to shuffle it). The game is balanced assuming that you are arranging your deck in an intelligent manner and tracking when your cards come up, but it isn't intended to be a memory test. Letting him peek at the deck will slow the game down a bit, but it won't break any mechanics. The bigger challenge is less memorizing your deck but ordering your discard. Doing that optimally requires a bit of planning ahead, but you get 80% of the way there by just discarding your best cards first, which should be a simple enough concept for him to grasp.
- how long is the game time for a new player group and an experienced one?
I typically expect that a game (including setup and tear down) takes around 45-60 for a single mage, and adds another 15-30 minutes for each additional mage. So figure a three player game is going to be around 1.5 hours +/-.
Aeon's End is definitely not a game that a typical five year old is playing, but if your kid is playing the other deck builders you mentioned and having fun, I'd bet that he'd enjoy Aeon's End, too.
One thing to think about is the subject matter. Aeon's End has a bit of a Cthulu mythos vibe going with the monsters, so some of the artwork can be a bit creepy. Nothing as mature as LE: Aliens, but you might want to flip through the nemesis cards before fighting a new boss just to make sure there isn't anything that will cause problems for your kid.