The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31 Review - with Tom Vasel

Tom Vasel takes a look at The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31 from Project Raygun!
00:00 - Introduction
01:38 - Game overview
10:22 - Final thoughts
BGG link: boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/2...
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[@alexbiersner3350]

Someone on reddit or something, came up with a two person variant of The Thing. One player plays as MacReady and the other player plays Blair who's The Thing. It's pretty cool and I'm trying to adapt it and make it somewhat better. The guy even came up with a high score playstyle with this variant. The two players then switch sides and try to beat the other player's score

[@The_Red_Comet]

I think the imitations have more room to play than you might think. A lot of these skills transfer over here from the Battlestar Galactica game. If you announce that you don't have the necessary cards for a mission, even when you do, you can convince other players to play their strong cards, and deplete their resources. On the other hand, you can play strong cards that are good for the mission when you know they aren't necessary - when other players announced they can already put in a lot and beat the mission. Then you can have a weak hand and not even lie about it, so you can't help the team on missions very effectively. Don't use things like Molotovs to help and don't admit when you have flashlights or extinguishers. As captain, argue that you need to discard one of the mission cards to improve the chances of winning even if the chance is good - sometimes you flip a sabotage and fail the mission. If a sabotage requires you to discard specific cards, just pretend you don't have them. Or pretend that you do have them to pass a low-stakes mission and convince everyone else that you're good. Always be on the lookout for tabletalk and behavior you can point out. Who went on what mission, which missions failed, that sort of thing. You can get a lot out of chatter, much like in Avalon. Of course this does rely on having a talkative group, the game rulebook even encourages this.

[@andrewv3515]

I'm glad someone gets it. It's more about the table talk then the mechanisms. Early on you need to be conservative as the Thing but that doesn't mean you can't subvert things. Once there's a potential 2nd Imitation you can play fast and loose. First play-through the two Imitations had us until a slip up before the final mission prior to escape - one declared a card that wasn't played in an effort to make it onto the mission which in turn revealed the other Imitation who had blood tested his counterpart and declared him as human. Second play-through I was fairly aggressive and torched but my wife played much more covertly and make it on the chopper leaving a human behind. If you want a heavier Resistance and Lighter Dead of Winter that plays 6-8 this hits the sweet spot. Obviously Dead of Winter is a better game but only plays 5 and takes forever. I've avoided Battlestar Galactica because of the length. This checks a lot of boxes for me and everyone I've played it with (14 different people) would play it again. I guess I'm biased but I think the game is fun as hell and the theme is awesome, especially since I'm a fan of the movie. This game relies on a lot of debate and discussion. If you want to focus on just sneaking onto the chopper at the end you can do that, sure. But then you're definitely going to hate the game.

[@brycecastle9694]

That was my takeaway from it as well. I have been able to escape on the helicopter as an imitation because of smart card play throughout. It's always nice to get them to waste a flame thrower on a blood test for someone who's human so you can't be torched! Doesn't seem like a lot of people got that. Glad someone else did though! Although I've found it's good to build trust a bit by offering to put out fires for rooms we need occasionally while the other things distract attention away from me.

[@bgambin7039]

Feel like you’d really need to put the thing music on while playing this

[@JollyGeneral]

I don't understand why everyone says the Thing can just coast by playing it safe and then getting on the copter. If you play it too safe you risk too many Blood Tests being available at the end.

[@arandombard1197]

Since their inception, hidden traitor games have struggled to properly implement the mechanic and it seems as though that problem still exists. Most of the issues fall into 3 categories. 1) There isn't enough gameplay space for the traitor to actually betray the group without being immediately outed. (Shadows over Camelot, Dead of Winter to a certain degree) 2) The traitor can turtle the whole game and then blindside the players with an all-in betrayal that ends the game, effectively giving the player zero counterplay because there was nothing suspicious until now. (Dead of winter) 3) Optimal strategies that allow the traitor to mostly avoid the intended game experience. (BSG. Cylons should just reveal straight away and fuck the group up as much as possible as early as possible) The Thing seems to suffer from all 3, with their not being enough space to betray the group and with the 'playing it straight the whole game and winning by getting in the helicopter' strategy being optimal.

[@blkbird]

Love the card art. Love this style so much.

[@SEdwards2881]

@3:30ish you don’t HAVE to fill the roles, but there are benefits if you do (something about discarding and drawing more cards, I can’t quite remember) *****EDIT**** if you don’t fill the rolls I think* the capt. can’t discard a card and draw before reveling hand

[@angewomon143]

Can you just add a house rule to throw a card in from the deck for smaller player counts?

[@zakkchambers263]

I reckon 'Who Goes there?' by Certifiable Studios coming out next year will be a better version of The Thing i reckon

[@kevinsayers5985]

let's hope....

[@zakkchambers263]

It should have more of the growing paranoia which is what The Thing is all about, and Things in the game who ever they are will have more opportunities to do stuff rather than waiting till the very end like this game

[@DickmanComedy]

This guy reckons.

[@dorpth]

Dark Moon is out now and is a better version of The Thing.

[@stevenotjackramsey]

Twice in one comment, that's a lot of reckoning. Or just drunk KZbin commenting late at night.

[@thediceodyssey4690]

Whoa, tom looks so very different, love that blue jays hat but it threw me off not seeing the more wild Willy hats he normally wears. Good review tom, I was looking forward to this one.......wanted to be Mcready. Might still give it a whirl.

[@heathercupelli1398]

Vasel, "I just wish the imitation had more THINGS to do".... LOL

[@WebMonkey741]

Why is Tom wearing a Blue Jays cap?

[@mrdarlok]

i played this twice at pax unplugged with 5 players and two imitations identified early the good players couldn't last/survive. it made me feel kind of like we had no options to win as the good guys. the one imitation didn't even know who the other was and we still couldn't mitigate the situation...

[@ColdDeck45]

Played four 5 player games of this. So far it seems virtually impossible to win as the good guys. We made it to section 3 on three of those 5 occasions. The best we did was the one time we found a flamethrower right before the game ended. If you're an Imitation and found out you'll have a boring time yet still probably win. IMO, the hand size of supply cards is too small. By mid section 2 i found most humans were complaining about having too many sabotage cards in hand and not enough opportunities to discard. Most games the humans ended up having a realistic hand size of 2-3 cards instead of 5. A huge game changer. Especially at this point where there's most likely another imitation added to the roster and, we found, most missions were 4-5 player which meant we were bringing along the 2nd thing every time. Which means you need more cards in hand to defeat the sabotage cards as well as the mission and the possible battle. Something is bound to fail on every turn and the infection track with jump ahead like no body's business. After our four games i was still left convinced we must be playing the game wrong as it seemed very much unbalanced and even with the knowledge of most of the cards at his point, we weren't able to see a viable strategy. I came across this video looking for that "ah that's what we were doing wrong!!!" moment.

[@ColdDeck45]

There were two occasions (that i know of) where a human was forced to play a sabotage card because that is all that remained in hand.

[@Noonycurt]

So, as fast as you can, think of something to do! You will have to get rid of Thing One and Thing Two!

[@prufrock1977]

I wonder how this compares to Dark Moon

[@tony1l11]

Dark Moon was the shorter game based off of Battlestar Galactic, it would have made a better comparison to The Thing, i think the infected in DM has a better choices than Imitations in TT

[@dorpth]

YOU HAVE MY AXE! And my...flashlight.

[@Fririshman]

Love the Toronto Blue jays hat.

[@gabrielesimionato1210]

Chris Thibeault I had one of those back in the 1990. My grandma brought it to Italy from Toronto

[@hatueydiaz7929]

Can’t help but feel this game could stand to borrow yet another mechanic from Dead of Winter. The fact you HAVE to start the game with an infected seems totally broken, especially with smaller groups considering some of the mission player counts. If you over draw cards like in DOW, and leave the possibility that there are no infected at the beginning, I can’t help but feel that the tension would just go up. It sounds counterintuitive but I think it would be a major improvement.

[@Jose-xm3tq]

Excellent... Now watch the whole movie!!!!!

[@satekoi]

Which movie? There are three movies made. First is "the thing from another world"(1951). Second is "the thing"(1982). Or "the thing"(2011). I only watched two movies 1982 and 2011. And you?

[@Melvin7727]

@@satekoi Obviously the 1982 one.

[@carlosaponte44]

This game rocks. You just can't suck as the imitation. There are plenty of subtle ways to play the imitation. Or sneak til the end and get on that chopper with your social persuasion skills. I do agree if a bad imitation gets revealed early it ruins the game.

[@warpaint9385]

I thought cards to complete missions are played secretly. Tom mentions people saying things like "I'll throw in a flashlight or an axe" etc. Yes/no?

[@a1investigations433]

World of Warpaint you can say what you are playing (and lie if you want). Perhaps that should be taken out, and changed to (I can help some, I can't help much, etc).

[@warpaint9385]

Michael Gardner that almost allows the game to be broken. Like Tom said if the imitation announces an axe and there is no axe, everybody knows straight up who the imitation is, stupid. Why does the captain shuffle up the cards played then? I don't get it. As a house rule I would remove any player mentioning what card they are playing/promise to play as I believe that allows a situation where the game is broken and the imitation can be easily identified. I haven't played the game just watched videos and read the rules online, maybe I'm wrong on this. Would love to know what other people think, people who have played it.

[@a1investigations433]

World of Warpaint agreed.

[@kevinsayers5985]

Yes, they are tossed in secretly, that doesn't change that someone can say "i'm playing the flashlight we need" because if the captain turns over the cards and there is no flashlight, everyone would know that person is lying or if the captain discarded a card, then either that person or the captain is lying. Which is exactly what Tom was saying is too dangerous for the Thing to do.

[@jdteney]

As a imitation you got to pick your spots. I only played this game twice and both times imitation won easily. I think it's harder for humans to win so making imitation easier to identify makes it easier for humans. I had a situation I said I was throwing a axe in because I heard others said they had a axe. They found out one of us was lying but it was fun as a imitation trying to blame the other two and made for some awesome moments.

[@Melvinshermen]

This look fun

[@verticalisland]

This game, currently, is hard to find. :( I wish Barnes and Nobles or something like that had it.

[@R2M0G7POLYWOG]

Nice hat

[@supac7328]

Alot of people complain that this is difficult to play as imitation as there is very little wiggle room for deception. One way that I played is by restricting who reveals what card they put in during the mission so it gives the imitation a better playing field

[@JollyGeneral]

That's not a house rule - that's how you're supposed to play it.

[@bgambin7039]

Somebody in this camp ain’t what he appears to be...

[@jtrdc123]

My only problem with this game is the escaping to the helicopter. One of the best parts of the thing is the part where the helicopter is disabled and they stay there to the death

[@kevinsayers5985]

I'm pretty disappointed about this game. I love The Thing, but a lot of people on BGG were saying the exact same thing as Tom just said, that the best way to win as the thing is just play straight the whole game so they don't suspect you, but that literally takes all the fun out of the social deduction, hidden role games. Too bad, I guess I will pass on this game...

[@jdteney]

kevin sayers just make a house rule. If no Sabotage cards are played you get a couple more blood test

[@adriandevries8716]

I actually think the blood tests mitigate this a lot more than Tom's giving it credit for. If you play straight the whole time, the humans get two blood tests, which is a lot at maximum player count, and almost an easy win at at smaller player counts. I played it the other day and the game ended most climactically with the humans winning. Can't wait to play it again.

[@PressEnter42]

Look up the game Who Goes There. It was on kickstarter and is based on the thing and looks much better

[@kevinsayers5985]

I've seen it. I don't love the art but i've been keeping my eyes on it as well.

[@999slawter]

me too :/ And the Who Goes There is based on the book and not on the movie :/

[@MrBombphoon]

It's interesting that it's called infection and there doesn't seem to be any kind of infection mechanic. It would have probabley added a lot.

[@danielvilllareal9726]

i was thinking the same thing. that wouldve been awesome

[@BoardGameCavern]

There is an infection mechanic. Every time the group moves to the next sector, there is an Infection Phase. Players shuffle the remaining Blood Sample Cards and each take one, then return one of their cards to the Blood Sample Space on the board. If you receive an Imitation Blood Sample, you are now infected. It happens twice in the game.

[@wilpuriarts5895]

I need this. Love the movie.

[@angewomon143]

Blair is my hero, just saying

[@isocubesoftware2713]

First, thank you for a great video. I am not a board gamer by any stretch, but I recently began to play Stratego again, the last time was in 1985. The Thing is one of my favorite movies, so I was curious about this game. However, after watching a couple of minutes of the rules, both my wife and I totally zoned out. Maybe we are too stupid, but games like this seem very involved. I can't help but think that this would be better as a computer game - having the computer keeping track of those things, while still having a (virtual) board, cards and pieces. It would also be easier to get hold of other players..I am never in the same room as 5+ people in my free time.

[@zacharycayer3234]

I don't like the blood pool rules. The Thing player needs to infect people somehow, it's just silly it happens at random by drawing a card.m

[@flynryan3053]

Component Drop 1:10 Final Thoughts 10:19 Final Judgement 16:27

[@beatlecost]

I completely disagree with the whole "imitation doesn't have nothing to do". He can sabotage the shit out of everything, without even playing sabotage cards. He can pin them to other players and because this is a vocal game, where you can accuse everyone (just like in the movie), you can create that tension. We have had great games with 6 and more players in this. The only problem with the imitation is that he cannot infect directly others. That would have been an awesome feature. Also, and I cannot stress this enough, who cares about other similar games that are NOT the Thing? I'll take the theme of this game anyday over D.O.A and others.

[@mrchavezanthony]

Well I wanted to buy the game, but three years later and its selling for $300 used.

[@ringofasho7721]

I bought it for 60 bucks brand new at BAM today

[@heathercupelli1398]

Fun game but so/so with 4

[@andrewv3515]

Needs 6 or more for sure

[@BoardGameCavern]

Agreed. I've played two games with 8 and it rocks. 3 Imitations!

[@falconwind00]

Take a drink every time he says “the thing”.

[@ColonelKurtz]

I say tow-may-toe... I say Pee-tree...

[@TheCubanGamer101]

Idk why I'm watching a tutorial of a board game that I won't be able to play since I have no friends

[@rutheames979]

Same! Wondering if I can roleplay it by myself :D

[@Crs9072]

How Tom describes the game gives me the feeling that this game is actually broken. How can it be good if the "bad" guy plays straight the whole game and wins because he wasn't tested? That sort of beats the whole purpose of the game seems very much broken mechanism. Also the miniatures are really bad looking. The one guy doesn't even have a hole between his hands! This review reminds me of the Coaster Park review...

[@andrewv3515]

Sure, you can play straight through the game but there's a higher possibility you're blood tested at the end, plus 1-2 flamethrowers (can't recall) are available in the third sector for blood tests. This means there's approx. 50% chance you can be outed at the end. Plus playing like that is boring as hell. I've played this twice, once with 7 and once with 6. Both times the imitations played aggressive. And both times everyone's had a blast.

[@MechaJoezilla]

Because the Thing wins if it gets on the chopper.

[@kevinsayers5985]

higher chance of blood testing? It looked like on the board it said 2 end blood tests if you finish as good as possible, so if your playing with 8 people, they only have a 25% chance to test the thing. That seems like a lot better odds than outing yourself trying to sabotage missions..... reviews on BGG have all been all been saying similar things about the thing being broken. Very sad, I was super excited for this game.

[@jdteney]

kevin sayers the flamethrower adds blood test too

[@Crs9072]

It still doesn't change that if you play straight, the game turns into random testing or burning to make it so that you don't lose which you still can, and that probably isn't fun for anyone. Sure, you don't need to play like that, but the fact that the game has such a win condition, means it's broken.

[@XShrike0]

This game is garbage with 4 to 5 players. The imitations have it way too easy. The 4 to 5 player missions require 3 to 5 players, mostly 4, and require specific classes to participate. You are almost never able to refuse to bring someone even if you know they are an imitation. The players own the equipment they get as captain. If the imitations get the rope they can either refuse to use it or waste it. The worst is if they get the flamethrower. You might as well just end the game at this point. This game needs a way to veto a captain without need to find rope first.

[@skinflutey]

XShrike I’m wondering if a house rule where you vote for the captain each round would work. Maybe make it where you can’t vote for the same captain from the previous round.

[@JazzCing]

I’m really late to your comment but here’s a suggestion, MAKE HOUSE RULES!

[@XShrike0]

@@JazzCing here is a better suggestion: Don't buy games that need house rules to be playable. That is bad game design.

[@Trae_Lenox]

Am I the only one feeling like this is an obviously inferior game to Dead of Winter? I always say that DOW is “The Thing with Zombies”

[@greywolf466]

In DOW you dont have a guaranteed traitor.

[@ampedcam19]

this plays much lighter and faster than DOW.

[@WakeupChesterfield]

your intro is too long

[@treyalsup]

Great theme. Garbage mechanics. Missed opportunity. Certainly never play the 6 player option. Poorly playtested.

[@Brian-qn7fn]

This game is not very good.