Daniel (@dungeondive) previews an Awaken Realms prototype and states the obvious immediately: if your first thought is Bloodborne, you’re right. Grimcoven is a boss battler, and crucially not a campaign — zero to hero, scenario by scenario, which is part of why he agreed to look at it. No money changed hands.
The corruption system is the design he likes most. Experience is called lament, and slotting it into your corruption track unlocks abilities and eventually flips your hunter to a corrupted version with a new miniature — but the higher you climb, the nastier the corruption card you draw each turn, up to attacking your own allies. Push for power, pay for it later.
Boss attack cards each represent a body part with its own health, and destroying one removes that attack from the boss’s arsenal permanently and triggers a reaction card underneath. He compares the targeting to Kingdom Death: Monster.
His favourite element is the environment card deck: a carriage, a well, a pile of skulls, a witch’s hut that adds a whole tile, each keyed into a deck of secret cards that can spin off escort side quests mid-fight. His worry is whether engaging with them ever feels like wasting a turn you should have spent on the boss.
Criticisms: almost no flavour text, and a lot of fiddly tracking. Verdict: wait and see.
Boss battlers keep growing as a sub-genre — what makes one worth the table space?