3...2...1...Tessen! Our preview of a real-time card game
A few weeks back a few of us here decided to check out DexCon, a pretty local gaming con filled with tabletop gamers of all kinds. We played a bunch of very fun games that day but for me none were better than Tessen. To put it simply, Tessen is a set collection game with the gas pedal stuck to the floor. After playing a few rounds, and I'm pretty sure breaking an actual sweat, we sat down with designers/creators Chris and Suzanne Zinsli from Cardboard Edison to chat about the game on our podcast.
Now the game has found it's way to Kickstarter, and in addition to it being an insta-back for me I want to take a few moments to tell you about the game as well.
The Basic's
Tessen is made up of two equal decks of cards representing two different clans that will do battle. The cards in each deck are representative of various species of animals. So you have cards for Cranes, Monkeys, Foxes, Elk, etc.
When both players are ready to go someone shouts "Tessen!" and play begins. At this point players draw cards from their respective decks as fast as possible, never going over the 5 card hand limit. Of course the point of the cards isn't to just draw them into your hand, but to play them into sets on the table, hopefully to then save them for points. So it's a multi-step process to go from draw deck to points. First you draw the card into your hand, then you can play it into one of five spaces in front of you (you can never have more than 5 piles at once). The card can either be played into an empty slot or into a pile of identical cards. When one pile has at least 3 matching cards in it you can save that stack by saying "save!" and pulling it out of your lineup, both securing those points and freeing up the slot for more cards.
If you have 5 cards in hand and no where to put anything when you draw you need to discard one until you get something you can play. Five different piles may seem like a lot but there are 8 different animal cards with 4 copies of each so it's really easy to run out of room, and that's before we even factor in the attacks from from the other side of the table. Wait, what?
Yup, in addition to trying to sort these cards as fast as possible, drawing, playing, saving, repeat there are also warrior cards in the deck that you can play on one of your opponents forming decks, yelling out "Attack!" as you do so. At this point, they have to stop playing cards and deal with the attack. They can either play a warrior of their own to block it, or give up that stack to you AND place that warrior in the empty pile's place using up one of your 5. It stays there till you play a warrior card to clear it out. 5 piles already weren't enough, now you need to know that you'll constantly be under siege to lose those precious few.
When one person exhausts their stack they yell "Tessen!" and the round is over. Points are totaled and you go on to play another round. Typical game is best of 5.
"Hold on a second, I think I'm starting to sweat." This game is fast. F-A-S-T fast. The first few rounds are a sort of blur of cards as you figure out how to minimize movement to draw and play cards quicker, just getting them into sets so you can save them quickly. After you start to get that down then you begin to realize that if you really want to win you really need to have one eye on your cards and the other on your opponents since finding the best time to steal often means the different between winning and losing.
Of course that strategy goes straight out the window once you get an attack card on you, since all your efforts need to shift to dealing with that. It hurts to lose the cards, and once someone commits to taking them it's hard to fight them back. More than once we ended up in a spiral of "Attack!" "Defend!" "Attack!" "Defend!" "Attack!" "Defend!" as we emptied our hands of warriors over a single pile of cards. Whichever way these battles turned out there was always a collective "whew" let out after the back and forth was over. Then you slide right back to your speed drawing.
Here's the deal, playing Tessen is a great amount of fun. Just.... fun. There are games that I enjoy and appreciate for their confluence of mechanics or theme or ease of play or bits or what have you. And while I certainly respect and enjoy those things about Tessen my biggest takeaway from it was just how "fun" it was to play. That and I desperately want to play it again. I considered trying to steal the deck from them right then and there.
Battlestar Galactica or Lords of Waterdeep are good examples of good "lean back" games. You lean back, you look around, you consider your options and your opponents, think a few moves ahead, etc. In Tessen it's the opposite. You're leaned forward, tensed up, fully engaged and making quick snap decisions and living with them. Second guessing a move afterwards is wasted seconds. The feeling felt similar to another real-time card game we reviewed called Jab.
I'm undecided how someone that has the ol "Analysis Paralysis" would deal with this game. Maybe they'd freeze up by having to make so many quick snap decisions. Maybe it would be freeing because there's simply no time to consider options, and really... there aren't many anyway. You just have to go for it. I don't have the over analysis issue, so to me the game is a no-brainer, but if you play with someone that tends to REALLY like to take their time making choices (or if you do) then it's something to consider. If there's a reason to not like Tessen that would probably be it.
Me? I'll be backing the game on Kickstarter on day one, and once it's available retail I'll be suggesting it all over the place. We've been blessed lately with small, cheap enjoyable card games like Hanabi and Love Letter. Tessen can stand right along with those excellent titles.
