Disney Villainous – Despicable Plots Expansion Pack

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How despicable are you willing to go to get what you want? Disney Villainous from Ravensburger and Prospero Hall saw players as villains from popular movies. Disney Villainous: Despicable Plots is both an expansion and a standalone game. You can play it as a 2-3 player game in its own right. You can also get your evil on by combining it with the main game, or the other expansions. T…
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Awards

Value For Money

Rating

  • Artwork
  • Complexity
  • Replayability
  • Player Interaction
  • Component Quality

You Might Like

  • Getting to play your favourite Disney Villains
  • Being able to mix and match with other Disney Villainous games
  • Replayability increases the more Disney Villainous games you own
  • Strategy as well as luck of the card draw
  • Directly influencing your opponents game via the fate card

Might Not Like

  • The level of luck from drawing the cards
  • Having your powers covered by pesky heroes
  • Some characters seem to have easier objectives to meet than others
  • Disney Villains / Disney themed (though if this is the case this was probably never going to be the game for you)
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Description

How despicable are you willing to go to get what you want? Disney Villainous from Ravensburger and Prospero Hall saw players as villains from popular movies. Disney Villainous: Despicable Plots is both an expansion and a standalone game. You can play it as a 2-3 player game in its own right. You can also get your evil on by combining it with the main game, or the other expansions. This means you can combine up to six villains, all cackling their way to victory!

In Disney Villainous: Despicable Plots, the core gameplay remains. Each player plays as a different villain: Gaston (Beauty and the Beast), Lady Tremaine (Cinderella), and The Horned King (The Black Cauldron). When you play as a villain, you get your own ‘fate’ deck of cards and a player board. Like the base game, each villain has a wonderful 3D symbolic faux-glass player piece.

Each villain has a unique win condition. The Horned King wins if you can control the world with Cauldron Born. (You need to have four of them, and there’s five in your deck.) Lady Tremaine wants to marry off one of her two daughters (Cinderella’s step-sisters) to the prince. You need to first unlock the Ballroom, get a daughter in there with a gown, and have the prince there, too. Gaston wants to remove eight obstacles (two per location), so he can have Belle all to himself. Each win condition is asymmetrical and provides a fun-filled back-and-forth between the players.

On your turn, you relocate your villain to a different spot on your player board, taking the action(s) there. Often this involves clever hand management! Your cards are all linked, of course, to the villain’s film. Some are characters, others are items, and so on. Your villain’s win condition revolves around their cards. But, because you’re a prepared, sneaky villain, you can attempt to scupper your rivals by messing with their fate deck…

Disney Villainous: Evil Comes Prepared is yet another wonderful addition to this series. Disney fans will love this – the artwork alone is jaw-dropping!

Player Count: 2-3
Time: 40-60 Minutes
Age: 10+

 

 

Go Forth, My Deathless Warriors! Destroy All In Your Path!

Driven by personal desire, the Horned King hatches despicable plots to unleash an army of skeletal zombies upon the world in an attempt to become a god among men. Once the black cauldron has been claimed, he must use his cauldron born warriors to control the world and win the game. It’s up to… erm… well other villains to try and stop him by using his own fates against him. Play heroes Taran, Gurgi, Princess Eilonwy and more against him to try to foil his plans and save the world from his tyranny and destruction.

Well, I See No Reason Why You Can’t Go, If You Get All Your Work Done

Lady Tremaine ambitiously attempts to orchestrate the wedding of Anastasia, or Drizella, to Prince Charming. I mean she doesn’t massively care which daughter so long as it’s not Cinderella whom she treats like a servant in her own home! Lady Tremaine just wants to increase her social status whilst not being burdened by the existence of the step child she despises so much. She may not care for the fates as much but those glass slippers are certainly going to put a dampener on her plans!

Look At Her, LeFou. My Future Wife…

Gaston on the other hand thinks throwing poor Belle’s books in a muddy puddle will of course convince her to love him. I mean who wouldn’t love that sexist fiend? Fortunately she has heroes like Mrs Potts and Chip, Cogsworth and even the Beast himself to try to help stop nasty Gaston from convincing Belle he’s the perfect man for her. Whilst other girls may ‘swoon’ over him Belle see’s his nasty temper and knows him for who is really is… he’s the real beast, make sure Belle remembers that!

Knowledge can be power in this game of Villainous… knowledge of how to stop these dastardly villains win that is. Despicable Plots is the latest expansion in the Disney Villainous series for 2 to 3 players to battle against each other to see who will be the biggest, baddest villain of them all.

Like with all other Disney Villainous games you can mix and match characters from the base set of six or any of the other five expansions of three villains each making this game incredibly replayable as many combinations can be made from the 21 villains available. However, should you only choose to purchase this set you have everything you need included to play a great game of Villainous as Gaston, The Horned King and/or Lady Tremaine face off to see who is the most despicable of them all.

Components

The character pieces within this game are lovely and feel nice quality. I particularly love the Horned King’s piece which has some great detail to both the cauldron and the horney king himself. Lady Tremaine’s piece is probably the least impressive, being represented by just her hair style and since Gaston likes to buff out his chest his playing piece is just that, his torso.

Similarly to other Villainous games you have the power tokens which are thick enough cardboard to play with well, albeit I found that they could run out if you had power hungry maniacs playing against you. Other game quality card pieces include the lock to go on the ballroom and the Black Cauldron card. Gaston has obstacle pieces he needs to remove that are placed directly on his player board.

Speaking of player boards, again as with all Villainous games each player has their own playing board. They have their own fate deck that harms their progress and their own playing deck that helps them with their despicable plots to win the game. These individual boards provide a summary of your objective and allow you to take action throughout the game such as earn power, play cards or play the fates against your opponent/s.

How To Play In A Nutshell

If you’ve played the base game or any of the other Disney expansions gameplay is done in exactly the same way. This is slightly different to recent versions of Marvel or Star Wars Villainous. In Disney villainous you have your individual player board and individual player and fate decks. When it is your turn you choose to move to a location on your player board (as long as it is unlocked, if applicable) and can then perform actions based on those available at that location.

If you play a fate card you use your opponents fate deck against them and play their heroes to their player board. When you play a hero to another players location you prevent them from being able to use the top actions of that location as these become covered by the hero card.

You can gain differing amounts of power at locations on your player board from 1, 2 or 3. Though note, Gaston has two locations with 1 power and two locations with 2 power whilst the king and Tremaine only have 3 locations with a power of 1, 2 or 3 and having that power cut off is REALLY annoying!

You could choose to play a card for example add allies to your location, use items, effects or conditions. These all cost you power so make sure you have the power to pay to use the card.

You begin with a hand size of 4 and will refill your hand to this amount at the end of your turn if you fall below. This means if you need to try and find a certain card, like the invitation to unlock the ballroom or get your cauldron born you can use the discard action to burn though those cards.

Other actions include move an item or ally, vanquish or activate. By choosing your actions wisely and playing your cards carefully you need to complete your objective whilst preventing others from completing theirs to become the villain kingpin of Disneyland!

Final Thoughts

This latest expansion brings three new characters to the Villainous world. I enjoyed playing each of them but found Lady Tremaine to be my least favourite playing piece, but favourite playing character. Her objectives were vast but straight forward. Unlock the ballroom, get the prince, have him marry a daughter and get that pesky Cinderella out of the way should she show up. Simple, precise and in line with the movie. The Horned King was my favourite playing piece but his was a hard objective if the cards were not in your favour. Gaston, well, who likes a chauvinist? Though all he has to do is move obstacles… I mean he has an easy ride really. I’d suggest you buy this game yourself to discover who will be your favourite villain!

Welcome to another expansion to the Disney Villainous game – Despicable Plots, where 3 more Heroes Villains need you to help them achieve their goals. As with the others, this set can be played entirely standalone or mixed with any of the other sets. This time we are championing the causes of 2 quite well known characters and 1….more obscure one. Namely, Gaston, surely a Hero to his friends, but to us he is well known as the Villain in Beauty and the Beast. Lady Tremaine, the evil step-mother from Cinderella (nope, I had no idea that was her name either, you’re not alone), and the Horned King. This last one I confess was a mystery to me, but is from a 1985 animated movie called The Black Cauldron. While he might be obscure, he was voiced by John Hurt, so he has that going for him, and some interesting mechanics.

So without further ado, let’s begin!

Core Gameplay

I’m not going to go into depth here about the core concepts around Disney Villainous and how to play, we already have a great review for that. But I will summarise and review the crucial points.

Each Villain has their own goal they are trying to achieve. You can disrupt other players’ progress, but you can only win by completing your specific objective.

Each Villain has a player board, Villain token, Villain guide, fate deck and a reference card. Always pay attention to the Villain guide as it can really help you understand how to play that specific Villain.

Some Villains have specific tokens to set up, including some in this box, but we will cover that later.

When it is your turn in a game of Despicable Plots you can move your Villain mover token to any location on your player board (you have to move to a different location), and then can perform any actions on that location not covered up by Heroes.

You start the game with 4 cards and at the end of each turn draw until you have 4 cards in your hand again.

The first player to achieve their goal, wins.

Got all that? Like I said, I would recommend reading our thorough original How To Play article to really get to grips with it. For now we shall move onwards, to our Villains!

Gaston

Charming maybe, but he still has the beast as competition, which is no small obstacle to overcome. Before you start the game of Despicable Plots, place 2 obstacle tokens in each location on Gaston’s board. Your objective from here is straightforward, remove all the obstacles and Belle will be yours! (Oh and you win the game).

In some ways he’s an easy character to play, you fight whatever Heroes are thrown at you while using card abilities to remove obstacles. There are no movement actions on his board however, so be careful where you place your allies, as there are only a few cards in his deck to help with this. It’s also wise to take a look at his fate deck to see how the obstacle you thought you had removed for good, can return. One common way they return is 1 per location, so it’s wise to fully clear locations before moving onto another one. And the Beast’s Castle can be cleared by defeating the Beast, so if you think that’s in the cards maybe leave that until last. And finally, the other key card is Monsieur D’Arque, who has an activate ability to remove an obstacle if you pay 2 power. Costly, but useful.

Lady Tremaine

Now onto the despicable, I mean loving, step-mother of Cinderella, Lady Tremaine in Despicable Plots. While her name is hard to remember, her goal isn’t. She wants to marry one of her daughters to the Prince. To do this she must 1) Unlock the Ballroom (it starts with a big lock token on it and you cannot move there), 2) Have the Prince in the Ballroom, 3) Have one of her Ball Gown clad daughters in the Ballroom, and 4) Activate the Wedding Bells card. That sounds like a lot, and it is, but she can actually achieve it at quite a pace if nobody slows her down.

More than anything with Lady Tremaine you’re looking for specific cards, so don’t be afraid to discard heavily in search of the right ones. Getting cards like ‘Invitation from the King’ (which unlocks the Ballroom and summons the Prince there) early on, gives you a great head start. On the other hand, if this card is at the bottom of your deck you’re going to want to keep discarding while getting everything else in place. You must play the normal card for one of the daughters before you can play the Ball Gown version, and then finally find the Wedding Bells card. That’s a lot of cards to hunt down before we get into preventing Heroes messing up your day.

So what can go wrong? Well, quite a lot. Cinderella and the Fairy Godmother will stop you moving allies into the Ballroom, which is essential, so these need to be dealt with. But even if you do, those pesky slippers still stick around, and you can’t win the game while they are in play. So if other players manage to get the main fate cards played against you, it’s going to significantly slow you down. And we haven’t even mentioned Jaq, who can discard items, like your precious Wedding Bells if you play them early. The way you deal with these threats is a bit unusual. There are no vanquish actions on the Lady Tremaine board. Instead she uses specific items to either A) Lock up Heroes (disabling their abilities), B) Move them to Cinderella’s Room (uncovering hidden actions) and finally C) Vanquish them. It’s worth noting though that the only activate action is in the Ballroom, therefore you really do need to race to find that invitation so you have more ways of dealing with what fate throws at you, although there are a few cards which can trigger an activate action as well.

So be aware, Lady Tremaine is a strong character who can race to her goal in no time at all, but many fate cards can slow her down dramatically. Consider your plan carefully.

The Horned King

And last but not least (even if a bit unknown), we have the Despicable Plots character, Horned King. I honestly can’t decide if the ‘The’ is part of his title, ‘Horned King’ just sounds like a description…but I digress. This guy has some despicable plans indeed, all focused around the Black Cauldron. His goal is to use the Black Cauldron to create ‘Cauldron Born’ warriors. Once he has one of these in each location, he has conquered the world and wins the game. The Black Cauldron itself is not a card, it’s a special relic tile that can be claimed by the player during the game.

That’s your first step, you need to claim the Black Cauldron by finding the ‘Show Me The Black Cauldron’ or the ‘We Have Made a Bargain’ card, or by vanquishing Hen Wen. You then need to flip the Black Cauldron to the side marked ‘The Power Of The Black Cauldron’, which can be done by either using the ‘Our Hour has Arrived’ card or by using the activate ability on the Black Cauldron. Be aware, every turn the Black Cauldron is on its original side, you have to discard a Cauldron Born, so it can set you back very easily. As there are no activate actions on the Horned King’s board, you have to play the Ancient Soldiers item to add it to a location. Then finally, with the Black Cauldron on the right side, and with Ancient Soldiers in a location, at the start of each turn you can play 2 power to replace an Ancient Soldier item with a Cauldron Born. Quickly get one in each location to win.

Alas, forces marshal against you however. The ‘Gurgi’s Sacrifice’ card will flip the Black Cauldron back over and you’ll start losing those Cauldron Born fast. It can be especially dangerous if you’re low on Ancient Soldiers as it won’t be easy to flip it back. Other than that, there are various Heroes that will slow you down, many of which can be easily moved around (or move your allies around!) and one that can block Ancient Soldiers being played, but you have a fair amount of allies to help vanquish them. There is also a card which forces you to discard your hand, so don’t hang onto crucial cards too long.

In general his plan isn’t the hardest to pull off, but it is a slow and steady build that can suffer badly from setbacks later on in the game if the wrong fate cards come up. As you can only create one Cauldron Born per turn, there is no way to rush his win condition, plus you have to get all the Ancient Soldiers in place first. I recommend settling in and playing smart for this Villain.

Conclusion

Despicable Plots certainly lives up to its name, everything the Villains are planning is pretty despicable (although one could argue Lady Tremaine just wants the best for her daughters…but she’s mean to Cinderella, so still despicable). I confess to not being super excited for some of the characters when first looking at the box, however they grew on me as I learned more about them and played several games. I think Gaston has to be my favourite from the box, he’s easy to play and just overall a fun themed character (the bar song won’t stop playing in my head, send help). Lady Tremaine mixes things up quite a lot from the normal formula, and even the Horned King surprised me. I might even have to track down this mysterious 80s movie and discover why it seems to have been forgotten to time.

Another great entry in the Disney Villainous series and I hope my pseudo How To Play guide for Despicable Plots gave you a good idea how to start playing these characters.

Zatu Score

Rating

  • Artwork
  • Complexity
  • Replayability
  • Player Interaction
  • Component Quality

You might like

  • Getting to play your favourite Disney Villains
  • Being able to mix and match with other Disney Villainous games
  • Replayability increases the more Disney Villainous games you own
  • Strategy as well as luck of the card draw
  • Directly influencing your opponents game via the fate card

Might not like

  • The level of luck from drawing the cards
  • Having your powers covered by pesky heroes
  • Some characters seem to have easier objectives to meet than others
  • Disney Villains / Disney themed (though if this is the case this was probably never going to be the game for you)