by tabletop_4world

The Gulpax’s Secret expansion for Roll Player Adventures takes us two thousand years back, to the origins of the story we’ve read in the base game. We get an opportunity to learn more about the events that led Ulos to where it is now and about the characters involved in them.



*The copy we have was sent to us for review purposes. All opinions are our own.*

[heading]Gameplay Overview[/heading]
Gulpax’s Secret introduces a whole new campaign, split in 7 adventures, in a similar fashion to the base game. It requires Roll Player Adventures in order to be played but it adds a lot of new cards to all the secret decks, new enemies and a bunch of new characters to choose from.

The rules are exactly as we know them and include the updated version for Rest and a Revised Legendary mode. The only new addition to the gameplay is the Professions.

At the beginning of the first adventure, each character is asked to choose a Profession from a list. There are eight available Professions, each one linked to a special ability.

Once chosen, a Profession cannot be changed. The character gains the appropriate Profession card that gives them a special ability that is unique to them. Each one works differently and the rules are clearly explained on each card.

In addition to that, there are special entries within the adventures that are specific to the characters with a certain Profession. They involve decisions that are thematic for the character and are usually just a few paragraphs long. If there are any choices involved within these entries, it’s up to the character with the specific Profession to make them.

Other than that, the game stays exactly as we know it already.



[heading]Components[/heading]
As mentioned above, Gulpax’s Secret includes lots of new components that are relevant to the new campaign, including the Storybooks and their adventure maps, enemy cards, discovery, title and rare cards, new pre-generated characters and more.

The quality is exactly as we know it from the base game, which, in our opinion, is a good thing.

All the new cards can fit within the insert of the base game together with the decks we already have in their appropriate slots. While we played the campaign, we swapped out all the Storybooks from the base game and put them in the expansion box to make room for the new ones to fit in the big box. In that way, we only had to open the base game box when we wanted to play, exactly as we did before.

[heading]Setup, Rules & Game Duration[/heading]
With the above adjustment, the setup time was minimal, as it always was. The insert works perfectly and it only takes a few minutes to get everything ready and start playing.

The extra rules for the Professions are only a couple of paragraphs long and are very simple to understand and remember. The Profession cards have detailed explanations for the specific rules so they are very easy to reference during the game.

The duration of each session is quite similar to the base game.



[heading]Our Thoughts[/heading]
Before getting into more details, I think that if you enjoyed Roll Player Adventures, you’ll enjoy Gulpax’s Secret too. If not, the addition of the Professions will not change your mind. The gameplay is exactly the same, with a new exciting story to explore. That’s probably all you need to know if you’re trying to decide whether to get this one or not.

Of course, that’s not all we have to say.

The main concern we usually have with expansions is if the content is enough to be worth it. While the new campaign is not as long as the main one, it provides tons of new content that, once more, can justify multiple plays. Similarly to the original campaign, there are many different possible endings to the story and of course we want to see more of them by making different choices along the way.

Similarly, we only got to see two of the new characters and professions, so we know that the game would feel different if we got to play again. We also made a conscious choice to advance our characters in a completely different way this time around and we are pleased to report that it worked equally well. We now know that there is freedom in how each player or group wants to shape their characters and they won’t suffer because of it. This is not specific to this expansion, but since we just got the opportunity to test it, it’s worth mentioning it.

We enjoyed the addition of the Professions and how they add something unique to each character. The additional story bits are also very interesting. It’s fun to put the spotlight on a specific character for a moment and the side stories are not too long so it doesn’t get boring for the rest of the players if there are any.

The new rules aren’t too many either, making the expansion very easy to start playing. The ease of play is something we enjoyed a lot in Roll Player Adventures and we’re very happy that this didn’t change here. It’s the same game we love, with a completely new story.

As for the story itself, it’s engaging, interesting, it involves lots of tough choices that we knew had long lasting impact to the outcome and most importantly, it is linked to the original story. It’s a neat little trick to get us back into playing the base game and let me tell you, it works. Now that we learnt a thing or two about the history behind the events of the main campaign, we are so excited to go back and see it all through a new lens.

Lastly, we’re pleased to report that the expansion includes a nice amount of special combats and skill checks that kept us on our toes. We always liked those because they change the routine of the game without shaking things up too much.

Roll Player Adventures holds a special place in our hearts and Gulpax’s Secret did not disappoint. We went in with high expectations and as we all know, that’s usually a recipe for disaster. Well, this is one of the rare cases that our expectations were met, if not exceeded!

Source: View source