Game Overview

Game Name: Millennium Blades
Publication Year: 2016
Designer: D. Brad Talton, Jr.
Artist: Fábio Fontes
Solo Mode: Included in Millennium Blades: Set Rotation

The amount of required table space might be a little large, yet the visuals are worth it! I feel like the art style perfectly captures the vibe. There is a playful undertone to the way the game pokes fun at the CCG world. It mocks while also making fun of itself… Which makes enough sense to me. Ha! The humor here is multidimensional, though.

Starting a Strategy

Although there are a number of starter decks, I’ve been using the official variant that creates a random starting hand of 15 cards from the store deck. Amazing!

But I won’t pretend to be good at strategizing. I drew an interesting deck box and decided to go with it.

There are some keywords mixed throughout the cards, but they’re very reasonable. Most are explained, like scurry in this case. Not too much memorization is needed!

Shur Wen Na’s unique tournament power allowed her to play 7 instead of 6 singles. If only I could use that properly.

Fun with Promos

Perhaps the easiest way to add variety between plays without sorting and redoing the store deck is to replace the promo decks. These 3 decks can contain anything!

With the way the sell tokens work, only 1 card from these sets is typically seen during a play. More variety!

Tomb Trader made me laugh out loud as it mashed up a few series I recognized. Or so I thought. Close enough!

Some promo sets work better for the solo mode. It’s important to note the difference between an opponent and a player, for the solo opponent isn’t actually a player.

A Face with the Deck

Every co-op boss, otherwise known as a solo opponent, simply utilizes a deck. The decks themselves have unique personalities, in a way, but I wanted a little more…

So I randomly drew an unused character card to go with the deck. Voila! There he was. Fulton Suitcase. Nemesis #1.

This is another example of one of the small things I sometimes add. Definitely not necessary, but try telling me it’s absolutely useless. I like yelling at my opponent!

Since the full campaign involves playing through multiple tournament rounds, this might come in handy: Brackets!

Turning to Cthulhu

As I prepared to go up against the Eldritch Entertainment Group deck, I had to get a little evil myself…

It wasn’t the card altar, though. Double platinum premium sleeves?! No! That right there is pure evil. As we know, it’s a rare occasion when I have sleeved cards.

All in all, these accessories were pretty terrible. I only wanted to limit the flipping of my cards, although this pair couldn’t exactly do too much. Bad store deck, indeed!

But I thought I had a pretty solid strategy built up, and I was excited to roll. Or just… Deal? Or use lots of bad jokes.

Is That My Table?!

The last time I played, the possessed flippable table was mine… All mine! So how did the solo opponent have it?

Once again, I forgot to show all of the mini-expansions I added in recently. One of them includes player copies of the co-op boss decks with relevant abilities and text.

Brilliant. Part of me wishes it went the other way a little more so there would be more potential solo opponent decks to strategize against… But that’s a minor gripe!

Even the awful fashion ring felt different this time around with the cards I had to work with. 

A Fierce Battle

At the end of the tournament, this is what the solo opponent’s tableau looked like. Not exactly a cuddly bunch right there… But what fun to think through it all!

Shur Wen Na’s tournament ability allowed me to place a card faceup before shuffling the solo opponent’s deck, then find out where it was in the deck.

So I had a little advance warning, but not much! I had to change my strategy so many times, though.

It wasn’t just about maximizing my points. Guarding against the worst effects without losing points was vital.

Evil Overload Alert

Rude, Fulton Suitcase. Just rude. It was all random, but his snarky look confirmed my suspicions. Everything was just too evil to handle as the tournament came to a close!

The +1 tokens were pretty dangerous. Each accessory gave the solo opponent 50 more points if there were 3 or more.

So I had to limit the actions I took, along with the number of my cards that were flipped. Not too easy!

And then an Eldritch summoner showed up to make things a little more dangerous. Why, thanks! It all just got so evil. I think Fulton had it packed in his… Suitcase? Ha!

Experience the EXP

Early on, I picked up this wonderful EXP factory worker. I loved the flavor text so much, that I knew I wanted to make him a major part of my deck strategy.

Hey, I admitted before how I don’t exactly make the best decisions! Humor wins out, and I lose so much… What’s another loss in the grand scheme of things? Ha ha!

Still, I had a pretty good idea of what I could do with my cards. It just didn’t look like it was going to be enough.

Evil is hard to beat. But I wasn’t going to give up hope until I tallied the final points. Could Shur Wen Na win?!

Session Overview

Play Number: 7 and 8
Main Expansion: Millennium Blades: Set Rotation
Other Expansions: Mini-Expansions #1-6
Solo Mode: Included in Millennium Blades: Set Rotation
Play Details: Standard Difficulty Level
Required Play Space: 32″ x 26″
Setup Time: 10 Minutes
Play Time: 30 Minutes per Play
Outcome: 155-175 and 113-255 (2 Losses)

That’s right. I played again right after this near victory. No cameras. No holding back. All for a shameful score. Ha!

Affordability

Price & Value

10

Functionality

Challenges & Mechanics

10

Originality

Design & Theme

10

Quality

Components & Rules

7