Hello once again Talisman fans!

Today we’ve officially launched four new Legendary Decks for Talisman: Digital Edition! You can find the full patch notes for this update here.

Specifically crafted for the experienced Talisman player, these decks replace the normal adventure deck from each expansion. When you swap out the adventure deck for an expansion with the Legendary version, the monsters you face pose more of a challenge, and help is harder to come by. If you want to know more about how we crafted these new decks, you can check out our design deep-dive!

We know that our first batch of Legendary Decks were well received by the Talisman: Digital Edition community, and these 4 expansions were the ones most requested to get the Legendary treatment!

If you want to grab all the Legendary Decks we've released so far, you can get a discount by buying them in the Legendary Deck Collection. This is a 'Complete Your Collection' bundle too, so if you've already bought the first 4 decks you'll still grab a tasty discount!

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/14952/Legendary_Deck_Collection/

Want to know more about each Legendary Deck before you take on this new challenge? We’ve got you covered!


One of the most popular expansions for Talisman, The City Expansion was by far the most requested Legendary Deck. We’re excited for players to take to the mean streets of this rebalanced expansion, and see if they can survive!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690082/Talisman__The_City_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/


Another highly requested deck, The Sacred Pool Expansion focuses heavily on your alignment and has a range of creatures, spells and other cards that change effects based on your alignment.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690081/Talisman__The_Sacred_Pool_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/


Adding the wandering Werewolf to the game was always the main draw of The Blood Moon Expansion, but with the Legendary Deck version, now there’s even more to draw you in! The creatures that go bump in the night will now bump you even harder, and the days grow shorter and shorter…

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690083/Talisman__The_Blood_Moon_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/


We might be heading out of winter finally, but the cold just keeps coming with the Legendary version of the Frostmarch! Featuring a host of changes to the enemies, encounters and strangers who want to come in from the cold, this Legendary Deck[/i] offers more challenge whenever you play with this expansion.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690080/Talisman__The_Frostmarch_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/

Please note that just as with the first Legendary Decks we released, you’ll need to own the original expansion in order to play with these new decks. For example, in order to play with the The Blood Moon Expansion Legendary Deck, you’ll first need to own The Blood Moon Expansion in order to swap it out!

Don’t forget to stay tuned to our Facebook, Twitter and Discord for announcements, insights and more from the Nomad games team!

Howdy Talisman fans!

Soon we’ll be launching some exciting new Legendary Decks for Talisman: Digital Edition, but before we do we wanted to sit down and talk through the process of creating both the four original Legendary Decks, and the four new ones we’ll be launching soon. You can find out more about these new ones in our original announcement post!

If you’ve never encountered any of our Talisman: Digital Edition Legendary Decks, they’re rebalanced and remixed versions of the adventure decks that come with each Talisman expansion - especially designed to offer more challenge for the seasoned player.

We had a lot to consider when making these new decks, such as:

• How can we improve the Talisman: Digital Edition experience for more hardcore players?
  
• How can we best accomplish that by rebalancing each expansion?
  
• What would players expect to see in a Legendary Deck?
  
• And how do we do all of this in a way that keeps the core Talisman experience intact?

We’re going to go through each of these to explain how we crafted these Legendary Decks that you’ll soon be able to play with! We’ll also use some specific examples from cards to show how we changed the way they function, and better demonstrate our design choices.


Back before we made the Legendary Decks, we were brainstorming the different kinds of content we could possibly make for Talisman: Digital Edition. In order to narrow down what we could create, we decided to look at the different kinds of players who enjoy Talisman and what they get out of the game as they play it. It’s much easier to design something once you know who you’re designing it for!

One of the demographics we encountered was a group of players who specifically enjoy the challenge that comes from playing Talisman - the more difficult their adventure, the more they felt they’d accomplished by overcoming those obstacles that appeared during the game. We wanted to offer something that would give that group of players more flexibility to customise the challenge they faced as they play. We already knew that more experienced players tend to find the later parts of a Talisman game can become tedious once you’ve outclasses all the enemies and nothing can pose a threat to you.

The most obvious way to increase the challenge was to up the strength and craft of a number of enemies, in order to keep that danger around for longer! This helps mitigate the issue of longer games becoming boring, and also makes the earlier rounds much more deadly - a thrill we knew hardcore players would appreciate. Below are two examples of how we did this:





As another example, for a number of cards we removed the fact that they were discarded at the end of turn. This might seem like a small change but it drastically changes how players make decisions as they play. For example, these three fine fellows no longer go off to the discard pile after you encounter them for the first time:



Having the threat of landing on these cards adds a different feel to the game, and generally makes surviving in Talisman a harder job than it already was!


When we came to creating the Legendary Decks for each expansion, it wasn’t simply a case of ‘make the numbers bigger and then it’ll be harder’. We wanted to update each expansion while still maintaining some form of balance to the game.

On the surface, due to the random nature of Talisman, it can be argued that it’s already an unbalanced game to begin with. However, once you dig deeper into the way each deck is balanced and the different possibilities for cards you can draw, there is an underlying balance to how the game is built. Even if someone gets lucky, the other players also should have an equal chance of being just as lucky (if not luckier!)

Recognising this balance is something that more seasoned players would be able to notice - as that was our primary target audience for this content, we knew we needed to make sure we didn’t cause any balance issues. As they would most definitely get noticed!

So while we wanted to make each expansion more challenging and increase the risk each player would face when drawing a card, we didn’t want to remove that feeling of each player having equal chances to be as lucky (or unlucky) as each other. We also had a chance to make the game scale a bit better compared to the original expansions - with stronger creatures, you don’t have to hunt down multiple creatures to trade in for upgrading your abilities.

Another one of the ways we rebalanced cards for the Legendary Decks is by changing the way they work in the game. Making sure that everyone is on a level playing field is important to ensure that the enhanced challenge stays roughly the same for everyone. If we take the Arnkell card as an example:



Spot the difference? The original specifically says moving normally while the new Legendary version says rolling the die for movement. While on the surface this might not seem like a big change, it’s actually quite the nerf! ‘Moving normally’ covers standard movement and covers movement behaviour within the inner region (where you move 1 space at a time instead of rolling the dice to move). This adjustment makes it unusable in the inner region because you don't roll the die to move there - and stops players skipping to the crown!

So while it’s still very useful during the game, players can’t skip straight to the end of the game while avoiding any challenge.


When we say “We’re making Talisman harder for you”, what do you expect that to actually mean? This is something that we asked ourselves before, during and after the design process. Firstly, we looked at the different expansions that people already consider ‘challenging’ such as The Dragon or The Firelands to see what people actually enjoyed or found challenging about them.

After talking to players and researching feedback, our main takeaway was that certain expansions don’t necessarily increase the ‘challenge’ overall, but instead make different stages of the game more difficult. For example, players often find that The Dragon expansion makes surviving in the early game more of a challenge than normal. Expansions like The Fireland increase difficulty from start to finish, and The Cataclysm increases the challenge by forcing you to be more aware of where you’re planning on moving in the future.

We also found a common consensus with our own experience of playing lots of Talisman - that even if an expansion is difficult, the more expansions you add the less of an effect is has on the game. By adding more cards into the pool of possibilities, you reduce the chances that players will encounter them. (So playing with just the base game and The Firelands expansion will be much more challenging that playing with The Firelands and 8 other expansions, for example!)

So in order to make sure we matched player expectations, we made sure that each Legendary Deck features a range of difficult enemies at all stages of the game. If we’d simply loaded up each deck with super challenging monsters, it’d make the early game too difficult. We also put a unique ‘foil’ finish on each Legendary Deck card, to help better visualise to players when they were battling a tougher enemy. We found that a small visual que like this helps players feel more accomplished for surviving an encounter, and also know where to avoid on the map at a glace.


We’ve already touched on this a bit, but keeping the core Talisman experience intact was something that we didn’t want to lose sight of while creating these new decks. As seasoned board gamers ourselves, we’ve played enough games to know that each one has an ‘experience’ it’s trying to create. From something as simple as Snakes and Ladders giving you the experience of scrabbling to the top of the board to more complex experiences like Hostage Negotiator, which recreates the feeling of a very tense stand-off with a kidnapper, even though you're just rolling dice and playing cards.

In The City expansion, we know that a lot of players use the Assassin to kill other players, as they can pay up to 3 gold and take a life from someone. Being able to take 3 lives from someone is mighty strong, so you can quite often just straight up kill people with it.

In the Legendary version of The City, we adjusted it so that the ability was more expensive and reduced the maximum life you could take. Have a look!



We didn’t want to remove the Assassin entirely, as we know a lot of players do enjoy using them as a way to eliminate other players - we just wanted to adjust how players were able to use them. We also made it so that the card is no longer discarded, so players can plan their next moves with more knowledge of where the Assassin will be. As we knew these decks would be played by more experienced Talisman players, we didn’t have to worry as much about filling up the board with cards that need to be kept track of.


This is the first time we’ve done this kind of design dive into something we’ve made, so we’re keen to hear your thoughts on it! Would you like more of this kind of thing? We won’t know unless you tell us, so pester us on Twitter all you like.

We’re super excited to see what the Talisman community thinks of these new Legendary Decks when they launch - don’t forget to give us your feedback over on the Steam forums or our Discord!

Hello everyone!

To help kick off 2022, we’re happy to announce that we’re bringing more Legendary Decks to Talisman: Digital Edition! This time, we’re giving The City, The Sacred Pool, The Blood Moon and The Frostmarch expansions the Legendary treatment.

If you’ve never played with one of our Legendary Decks for Talisman: Digital Edition before, then we hope you’re up for the challenge. When you swap out the adventure deck for an expansion with the Legendary version, the monsters you face pose more of a challenge, and help is harder to come by. When we launched our first four Legendary Decks back in 2020, experienced Talisman players appreciated the extra difficulty it added to their game nights, and asked for more expansions to get the same treatment.

As with the first Legendary Decks we released, you’ll need to own the original expansion in order to play with these new decks. For example, in order to play with the The Blood Moon Expansion Legendary Deck, you’ll first need to own The Blood Moon Expansion in order to swap it out!

These new decks will be available to purchase on Steam, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, Google Play and the App Store. Stay tuned to our website and all our social media channels to hear when they get released.

Each Legendary Deck has been carefully crafted and balanced by our designers to increase the challenge while keeping the original spirit of each expansion intact!


A fan favourite, The City Expansion has been adjusted so that the streets are deadlier and the shops are more demanding of your gold.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690082/Talisman__The_City_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/


The Sacred Pool Expansion focuses on your alignment, and so does the Legendary Deck version. If you’re not keeping an eye on your alignment, you could end up on the wrong side of some mighty monsters!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690081/Talisman__The_Sacred_Pool_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/


The most well-known feature of The Blood Moon Expansion is the Werewolf NPC, but now you’ve got some new things to fear! With stronger foes and deadlier things lurking in the night, we hope you’re not afraid of the dark...

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690083/Talisman__The_Blood_Moon_Expansion_Legendary_Deck/


Things are about to get much chillier this winter, as The Frostmarch gets even more dangerous! Stay frosty as you try to survive adjusted foes and colder allies.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1690080/Talisman__The_Frostmarch_Expansion_Legendary_Deck

Don’t forget to stay tuned to our Facebook, Twitter and Discord for announcements, insights and more on these upcoming decks!

P.S. We're aware that we still haven't updated the hidden achievements on Steam - in order to do so we need to roll out a patch on all platforms (which takes a long time for us to do, which is why we bundle a bunch of fixes into each patch rather than putting out lots of small ones). We'll be releasing a patch soon as part of rolling out these new decks, so you don't have to wait much longer! ːheartː

Hello everyone!

Welcome to the very first Nomad Games Monthly Mailbag! Every single month we’re going to be dedicating time to answering questions from you! Our lovely community have sent in some questions for us to answer, and it looks like it’s a bumper month due to it being the first ever mailbag. We’d like to think you all had these questions burning away for so long, and you’re finally letting them out. So let’s get to it!

If you’d like to be included in next month’s Monthly Mailbag, don’t forget to send an email over to questions@nomadgames.co.uk.

From Christian Hinse

“Hi Nomad!
Two questions for you:
- Were there situations during development (for Talisman or other tabletop adaptations), where you came to the conclusion that "no, a computer just cannot do that as well as a human player"?
- Will the Xbox version of Talisman ever get expansion-specific achievements?
Cheers!”

Our resident Talisman: Digital Edition expert Jethro Park chimed in with the following:

(For Talisman) Not that I can remember... There were times when we thought that, but were then proved wrong. An example of this is the AI's use of Random. When playing IRL, I think a lot of players (myself included) see Random as an opportunity to try toad another player, and if your target doesn't roll badly, they get a reward and taunt your attempts to thwart them. But because it hasn't got much to lose early on (and nor do the prospective enemy targets) the AI would frequently end up using Random on itself. Naturally, we and a lot of our players noticed this odd behaviour and assumed we knew better thinking there was a bug in there so we had a look into it. The AI's weighting for stats uses a sliding scale and for Strength (one of the rewards), that ends up at quite a high score when you don't have very much (which is why it particularly affected AI that started the game with Random, as 'spell-casters' typically have low strength). With the 1/3 chance of rolling one of the desired results, the AI was felt the negatives were outweighed by the positives and was satisfied with this level of risk to use it on itself. Turns out... it just knew better? (though I'm still a sceptic)

When it comes to expansion-specific achievements, it’s on our radar to do them - we just need to find the time!

From Julio Teh

“First of all, I want to thank everyone at Nomad Games for bringing great digital board games to us. I started off with Talisman: Digital Edition and I can wholeheartedly say that I am a fan of Nomad Games and everything they have released. I hope everyone at Nomad Games is safe, well, and awesome over there!

My question is as follows:
1. Are there any juicy updates for expansions in regards to Talisman: Digital Edition and Talisman: Origins?
2, Any future IP that Nomad Games is working on?

Thanks and all the best - from Malaysia!”

Thank you for the kind words! When it comes to your questions, the short answer to both is nothing we can share right now. Which isn’t a very fun answer! So for a longer answer, we can currently confirm that we’d be very happy to bring more content to Talisman: Digital Edition. We need to figure out exactly how and what that would look like first before we can share anything though. For Talisman: Origins, sadly we saw very little uptake on the expansions we released for the game, so making more expansions is a tougher ask for us from a financial point of view. We’d love to do it, but we need to balance that with making smart decisions!

And for question 2, there is an IP we’re currently working on and are in the design phase of. We’re still hashing out a lot of stuff so we can’t share anything right now, but don’t worry - we’re definitely working on something.

From Wilf

“Have you considered making some changes to gameplay that wouldn't work in the physical version? Or perhaps I should say some *other* changes, since, e.g., the Clockwork expansion's invention system would be horribly cumbersome in physical form. As one example, players currently get no trophies when defeating an enemy that's produced as the result of rolling on the Crags or Forest, etc. - in the digital version of the game, it would be fairly easy to make these 'constructed' enemies behave more like those on Adventure cards and appear as trophies when defeated. (Of course, changes like this ought to be hidden behind a checkbox in the game's options, for those folk who want to have things be identical to the physical game.)

Oh, another question while I'm here: when can we have some more Talisman: Origins DLC - it's a great game, and I want more.”

This is things we’ve absolutely considered! We’ve implemented house rules and expansions like you’ve mentioned that wouldn’t work physically. Seeing what other games are doing in the space of digital-only board games (like Magic: Arena and Hearthstone) shows us there’s definitely an appetite for that stuff. And our digital-exclusive expansions being so popular definitely helps too!

And we’ll stick to the same answer we gave above regarding Talisman: Origins DLC - sadly it’s a hard sell for us to invest in making any more right now. But one of the best things about us doing these community questions is that we get to hear directly from people what they want! You can’t just look at the data alone, right?

From Ash

“What's the order you go in when it comes to making the games? I've always wondered once you start tackling them.”

1. It’s probably easiest to break down the process into a number of different steps!
   
2. We spend some time looking at and playing the physical board game
   
3. We talk about how the design of the game will work, and come up with some concepts
   
4. We let the art team go wild on designing how the game will actually look digitally
   
5. We let the programmers and engineers start working on the actual game itself.
   
6. We keep doing the coding until the game is ready to go!
   
7. Hope that answers your question Ash!

From Memox

• If you still have the time and passion for it, what are you guys playing these days? (Board games, gamebooks and/or videogames).
  
• Would you consider yourself more of a player or a film buff? Or maybe you have other interesting hobbies? Give me some examples of what should I watch/play today, please.
  
• Are you content regarding the current videogame industry? Or do you miss the times when it wasn't an industry, just some guys in a garage developing what they wanted? Personally, I feel that, for a lot of complex and rather mundane reasons I won't discuss for the sake of not boring you, the creativity and passion has subsided a little to give more space to safe bets circa the gameplay structure and whatnot, which in turn is heavily influenced by publishers and investors. Not just the customers, but even the developers are those who suffer the most about this, I think. I'm glad that's not exactly the case for Nomad Games, but I was wondering how you felt about it (of course without naming the software houses themselves) and if you had some anecdotal evidence about this matter or I'm just being overly nostalgic.
  
• Would you rather play a board game with House Rules which speeds up and improves the flow, or would you "endure" it for better or worse just for the sake to play it as intended, with the official ruleset?
  
• What are your favorite reads? What about your favorite gamebooks, if any? (i.e. Fighting Fantasy series).
  
• Are there some franchises that you wish you could adapt into a videogame but you didn't have the chance to do so (either for costs or other reasons)? Of course, feel free to ignore this question if it goes against your contract or anything like that.
  
• What's your favorite class in Talisman? (If you do play your own games )
  
• And most important of all, what's your favorite dish?

Thank you very much for everything you did with some of my favorite pastimes ever. My Board Game Nights during the epidemic have been saved because of your faithful, atmospheric and great adaptation of Talisman. It has really helped our group during this year.

A bumper crop of questions! We’ve answered them below:

• Personally, I’ve been playing lots of Magic: Arena and Apex Legends - it’s much easier to boot up a game when I have some free time and play for a little while instead of sitting down in front of a 200-hour long RPG!
  
• Films bad, games good. Go play Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice if you haven’t aleady!
  
• A number of staff chimed in on this one…
  
• Jethro: I think they're mostly right re: safe bets.. When that moves from being a safe bet on game (e.g. football manager 2014/15/16/17/etc.) to a safe bet on a developer then good things could still come of it I guess .. can't think of any though.
  
• Sam: The larger a company gets, the safer they (feel they) have to bet - but people are still out there in their garages making whatever they want.
  
• Ethan: I feel like big companies that take safe bets by making more games in an established franchise don't take away from indie developers' space in the industry. Maybe I'm thinking about it wrong, but isn't the reason those games are "safe bets" because a lot of people enjoy them?
  
• House rules imposed for the sake of speeding up a game aren't usually my thing because it seems like you want to spend less time playing it and maybe... actually just don't like the game and should play something different?
  
• I’ve recently finished The Terror and I know we have a lot of comic book fans here in the office - too many to name!
  
• Star Wars, Doctor Who, Marvel… all the classics!
  
• 2nd edition- Warrior of Chaos, Digital Edition - The Genie's always seemed pretty chill on his cloud, nice abilities too.
  
• One with high sides so your cereal doesn't spill

From Dana R

“What is your key of success for making mad at nomad customer/gamer/fan become happy angel again? (I mean when we complain about glitches and things we don't like)”

From our QA manager, Michael: “I find that providing plenty of detail in a reply helps calms people down. As it shows that you're taking them seriously, even if their email was a bit ranty. Also it shows that you care about making sure their experience with a title is a good one. I've had a few (not many luckily) people email just to say "your game is filled with bugs fix it or I stop playing" along with some other things that I won't say here. But they calmed down once I replied with a list of questions regarding their bugs, which likely showed them that we're willing to fix said bugs if they help us in our search for it. I've also had people rant at us about things they think are bugs but are actually mechanics in the game or they've simply not switched on the right thing when creating a game. So I explain as best I can how those mechanics work and they've responded positively. Even if the person wasn't "angry" in their original reply, I find that people in general response positively to detailed replies because it shows we've taken the time to address their bug report/feedback/questions etc”

From Kinkku Kankku

“What do you guys consider to be the hardest single challenge currently added in the Challenge update? (No need to account completionist challenges)”

A tricky one, because most of them are designed with the intent that you would complete them through 'normal gameplay'. So the difficulty would probably come from the amount of times it's required, or scarcity of the particular target. There's one due in Sept that could be the hardest.. but currently my vote probably goes to getting the title Emissary of the Nether… which is a hidden challenge, so if you haven’t found it yet then keep looking!

From DaKaT

“Have you ever thought about reworking any DLC character? Maybe they didn't work as you anticipated? Or maybe the community didn't like them as much?”

This is actually something we’ve already done! Following feedback on the Witch Hunter character being too strong in PvP, we adjusted their stats to make them a bit more balanced.

From primalandrew on Steam

“My question is as follows: Would you ever consider adding a, "Talisman Timescape" esque, science-fiction heavy expansion?”

Considered it? Yes. Would we actually ever do it? Very doubtful!

From Oliver

“My name is Oliver and I've been looking into the old editions of Talisman recently. I am fascinated by the Timescape expansion of the 2nd edition, the idea of having the heroes of Talisman face the grim dark future and other dark timelines and their inhabitants sounds like a lot of fun to me.

So I've been wondering if there was any chance we could see the Timescape as a potential expansion for the Talisman Digital Edition in the future? I am looking forward to see new Talisman content and other board game conversions either way.”

Sadly not - we don’t have plans to bring back any older expansions, and Timescape is such an oddball that it doesn’t fit in with modern Talisman! We’re going to bring more things to you all we’re sure, but Timescape is going to be staying in the past.

From Denizu

“Hello, hope everyone at the Nomad team is doing well! I was wondering how it is to work in a smaller studio like yours. Does it feel like it comes with more freedom and a less orderly way of doing work? Or does it come with more strings attached to make ends meet and work on the tables? Do you constantly seek new projects, or are you happy with fleshing out the ones you are currently working on?

Thanks for all your hard work and may you all have a pleasant day.”

Oddly enough, it’s a mixture of both! We definitely have more freedom to make decisions and do what we like, but we always need to keep the bottom line in mind. We’re always on the look out for new projects, because it’s better to have too many and have to choose, than have too few and work on a project we don’t want to be working on!

From Stephen Mullaney-Westwood

“So... first question... Do you have your eyes on any other board game IPs to digitise?... or are you more focussed on adding to the current ones and improving those? Thanks for all your work Nomad... Talisman is very important to me :) & I own and enjoy other games of yours too.”

We sure do! We’re starting work on another board game IP digitisation as we speak. Only we can’t speak about it just yet. But we will at some point! We promise.

From CHRUPPEK

“After years of experience with different types of board games are you planning on creating your own board game?”

Not at the moment! It’s an idea that’s been tossed around jokingly a few times, but it’s a whole different world making physical board games over digital ones.

From Kotołak

“I have one pretty simple question. Will there be new DLC such a pack with cards or characters for Talisman Digital Edition? This is type of game with unlimited potential and this is what I love about your game. Even now Talisman seems to have a huge amount of content and thats why I will not send wild angry Orc to your company. Thanks for what you have done so far.”

We’re very confident that we’ll keep releasing content for Talisman: Digital Edition as long as people still want more content and are willing to pay for it! And we appreciate you not sending wild angry orcs at us, we don’t think that’s covered in the office insurance.

From AP

“So I have some friends that I'm trying to get into the board game. However, they keep saying it has a deep learning curve and that the length bores them. Are there any quick start guides or a way to show the game off without having them sit down for a full session? I really enjoy the game but often can't find fellow players.”

Sudden death mode helps a lot with that! Try setting a number of rounds for the game, then everyone scores based on what they achieved/collected. It's a good introduction to the game and helps speed it up a lot. It also helps to have new players start with as few expansions as possible or just no expansions, as they tend to add more complexity which can be overwhelming to newcomers. Hope that helps!

From JT Holderman

“Any more Mystic Vale expansions coming out for the digital game?!”

Right now we don’t have any plans for more Mystic Vale expansions sadly - if there is enough community demand for more then we’d be happy to take a look.

From ⸸ KHORNE-FLAKES! ⸸

“I’ve been wondering for a while if Talisman Horus Heresy would ever return to Steam or get a re-release. I would have loved to obtain a legal copy of the game and the DLCs. Have there been any talks or negotiations to get the licensing sorted with Games Workshop? This brings me to another question: Have you ever considered/would you consider giving a shot at creating a digital edition of the Relic boardgame? If yes, have there been any talks with Games Workshop about it?

I’ve been enjoying Carcassonne and Talisman Digital Edition a lot, especially since I can’t afford a real Talisman boardgame with all the expansions and your digital exclusive expansions are great, I really like the content they deliver.”

Sadly the licence expired on Talisman: Horus Heresy which meant that we didn’t have the rights to sell it. It’s a game we poured a lot of love into, so we were sad to see it go - but that’s the reality of working on licensed properties! We’ve talked to the folk at Games Workshop about it, and it’ll be brought back up and talked about in the future I’m sure.

And Relic is something we’ve also considered and discussed, but due to it being so similar to Talisman already, we’d rather focus on more unique projects that are different to what we’ve already done.

And thank you for your kind words!

From Sebastian Pospiech

“Have you ever run a simulation to find what is the lowest turn number needed for a game to end? Do you run this kind of test with every new DLC?”

At one point when we were testing loads, we did check that sort of data, might even still be knocking around somewhere… But we do soak-test the game quite a lot, to help check for problems!

From Jeff Persson

“What is the next Smash Up expansion you are working on and when will it be released to Steam, Google Play and the Apple App Store?”

Smash Up is a tough one - we’re happy with the adaptation we made but the uptake for players on expansions has been low compared to our other games. We’ve had some people asking for more content, but we need to still make smart decisions of where we put our resources and time development-wise.

So right now the answer is: We’re not working on another Smash Up expansion at the moment!

From Alessandro Salani

“I read to send questions to you from this on steam... so I took some time to... write to you. First of all let's say that I really love the game of Talisman 4th Edition. I've the board game at home with many physical "DLCs". The online game was a life-saver during previous year and current one, so it's great. I'm full of questions (and feedback) about it! Let's start in order of importance.

This game is lacking a consistent PVE side, are you planning to add more Custom Endings to focus on that? Or allow players to create their own custom ones?

"Remove Drawing Limit Mode". To improve fast-play games I'd LOVE if there will be a mode to remove the drawing card limit from each box.

The Private Online Game Creation allows players to create only one room at once and to continue it even if some day has passed... but what if a player would create more online rooms?

What about adding also Weekly / Monthly challenges?

"Frog Rush Mode is possible"? This is a mad idea that I'd personally. Add 'Frogs' as Playable characters (removing the restriction to not be able to gain strength or craft or followers and/or other restrictions) and try to reach the crown or an ending... 'that way' ahahah. Maybe that's a little insane but surely funny.

Some cards / spells are different from their Board Game description and effect. I'd like it... for each card that has these 'changes' toggle 'on-off' for changes from Board Game edition.”

That’s a lot of questions to get through Alessandro! Let’s go through each of them in order:

Our head of QA Michael chimed in on this one: “For more PVE style endings, we did look into doing a ending pack like two years ago, even had a button for it. I think one or two of those endings had a PVE style rules and even a team based PVP one. We’ll have to try and dig out the design document that was made as I recall one of the team based endings being adapted for Talisman: Origins.”

According to Jethro, our resident Talisman man: “that would get very out of hand very quickly!”

Right now this is a limit because of coding reasons, and having to keep track of multiple online saves put a lot of strain on parts of the game that easily break if too much strain is put on them. We do know this is something people want though, so it’s always in the back of our minds!

Another thing we’d like to do! Offering scenarios that players can try to complete that rotate would be cool - we know a lot of other games do ‘daily/weekly runs’ to much success.

This would definitely be possible… but if we should do it is a completely different question!

This would be something else we can look into, as we know there are a lot of die-hard Talisman fans out there who want the game to be exactly 1:1 with the physical game.

And that’s the end of our very first monthly mailbag! Thanks to everyone who sent in questions, and don’t forget to send your questions to questions@nomadgames.co.uk if you want us to answer your burning queries next month!

Hello everyone!

Here at Nomad, we know that our fans are curious about what happens behind the scenes for us. And we want to help you get to know us better!

Well, starting from now we’re going to be dedicating time each month to answering questions sent in by you! If you want to ask us something fun, or have a burning question about how we do things, you can email it over to questions@nomadgames.co.uk!

And then every month, we’ll pull everyone’s questions out of the mailbag and answer them in a blog post over on our official website! For the best questions, we'll even be giving out some thank you keys for DLC and games in our catalogue. We’ll be posting each Monthly Mailbag blog at the start of the month, so make sure you get your questions in before then!

Also, if our inbox doesn't end up looking like this, we'll be mighty disappointed.

Hi Talisman fans! ːblueTalismanː

Today we've rolled out the latest patch for Talisman: Digital Edition. Check out the official patch notes below, and don't forget to download the update if you want to play with your friends!

General Fixes:

• Fixed the missing SFX for players joining & leaving lobbies
  
• Cross-Region invites should be fixed
  
• Invites should no longer stop working after accepting one
  
• Fixed an issue that happened when 2 players joined lobbies simultaneously
  
• 'Player-Left' message reinstated
  
• Save new lobby preferences after adding/removing players
  
• Fixed space selection sometimes causing a disconnect

In-Game Fixes and Changes:

• Bog (terrain) - No longer draws 2x cards on the space
  
• Cathedral - Correctly draws denizens if drawn on the Cataclysm board
  
• Chapel & Graveyard (Cataclysm) - No longer unable to draw a denizen if your alignment triggered a life to be lost
  
• Glimmer Cloth - No longer works in psychic combat, or when attacked
  
• Holy Blood - fixed synergy with Demons
  
• Shard of the Wild - No longer works for both players in PvP
  
• The Wealthy - fixed being able to choose which fate is gained
  
• The Wealthy - fixed getting a second fate if it's you that gained gold
  
• Undead Hordes - No longer prompted to ignore the effects
  
• Warlock Quests - Should no longer be possible to complete other players Quests
  
• Warlock Quests - Should no longer be possible to complete a quest you've just drawn (and are still choosing which one to replace)

Crash Fixes:

• Crash fixed when rejoining games after choosing alternate endings
  
• Crash fixed on player death via PvP
  
• Crash fixed when selecting cards on the board with a controller

Fixed several AI 'Lock-ups' in the following places:

• The Shrine of Kernos
  
• Whilst concealing (with the Living Doll)
  
• Whilst concealing (with the Lodestone)
  
• At Dice with Death (cataclysm version) as the Vampiress

As always, thanks for the support everyone! ːheartː

Hi Talisman and Warhammer fans! ːBlueTalismanː

Today we're taking part in the massive Warhammer Skulls event here on Steam! If you haven't given your skulls to the skull throne yet, head on over to the showcase page on Steam to check out all the Warhammer goodness on offer: http://store.steampowered.com/sale/skulls/

As part of the Skulls event, we've also added some brand-new challenges and rewards to Talisman: Digital Edition for the duration of the event, which you can unlock in-game to show off to your friends and enemies! You'll be able to find the new challenges under the 'Challenges' tab on your profile.



We've also put everything Talisman: Digital Edition on sale, along with Fury of Dracula: Digital Edition, another digital board game adaptation of a classic Games Workshop title.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/958530/Fury_of_Dracula_Digital_Edition/
And finally, we've also just officially launched Talisman: Digital Edition onto Xbox for the first time! Pretty soon you'll be able to play Talisman on every device known to man, so keep your eye out for an upcoming Sega Game Gear port that definitely maybe possibly is happening (not really).

Embark on your quest for the Crown of Command now, and may Khorne favour you! ːlog_skullː

Hey Talisman fans! ːblueTalismanː

Today we've rolled out a new patch for Talisman: Digital Edition, which improves a bunch of things in the game! The key highlights are:

• End of game stability fixes (We were finally able to consistently recreate this internally, meaning you should now be able to finish games and get your earned EXP!)
  
• Witch Hunter nerfed from 4/4 to 3/3 (We've heard your request to adjust the Witch Hunter as they are too powerful in dedicated PVP scenarios - we'll keep an eye on how people react to him now he's been adjusted)
  
• Fixed losing progress when increasing post-game goals (Along with the end of game stability fixes, this should help make sure you get the right EXP when you finish a game)
  
• Gamepad Board and UI Navigation updated (We've made a couple of improvements to help you get around when using a gamepad, and the UI has also had a few updates)
  
• New Quick-Use menu for Cards in the 'Usable Cards' tab (This is something we've been asked about implementing, so please give it a try and let us know what you think!)
  
• We're hoping that we've also fixed the issue where people's challenge points weren't resetting as they should at the end of the month.
  
• Crash Fixes

In more Talisman: Digital Edition news, we've also just announced that we're bringing the game to Xbox! You can read all about it over on our official website.

Now, onto the full patch notes!

• Avatar Page scaling fixed
  
• Some non-existent decks have been hidden from the deck list
  
• Gamepad Board and UI Navigation updated
  
• Gamepad support for navigating 'spaces of interest/possible moves'
  
• Terrain and Beasts no longer show icons on their card backs
  
• Light & Dark-bound characters now work in Russian
  
• Removed keyboard shortcuts for toggling screen modes
  
• Busy-spinner should show whilst challenges are updating
  
• Fixed losing progress when increasing post-game goals
  
• New Quick-Use menu for Cards in the 'Usable Cards' tab

• Stability fixes to end of game
  
• Better handling of joining games
  
• Fixed issue when changing regions
  
• Games should no longer be able to have multiple game-owners

(Changes)

• Witch Hunter nerfed from 4/4 to 3/3
  
• Resurrection in the Woodland triggers drawing of a Path
  
• Missing turns as a result of losing combat ignores 'cards remaining to encounter' rule

(Fixes)

• AI should no longer be able to complete certain challenges on players behalf
  
• Able to complete quests outside of your turn again
  
• Amarok now joins all forms of combat - not just Battles
  
• Astral Spirit is now correctly optional
  
• Astrolabe challenge fixed (again)
  
• Bog wasn't doing 'Draw 1 Card even if there are already any cards in this space.'
  
• Book of the Dead should now wait when it can be used
  
• Boulders Dodged increases when auto-dodged
  
• Conscription no longer possible in Psychic Combat
  
• Fix for Barrier & Black Ice staying on the board permanently after their caster dies
  
• Flail of Blood's effect no longer triggers when no dice were rolled
  
• Ganymai can no longer bring people back from the dead on 0 lives
  
• Ghosts moving to anticlockwise spaces in the City no longer move clockwise
  
• Harbinger Cards no longer reappear when rolling 3 on his chart
  
• Havenville reveals the Follower given (triggers on-revealed effects)
  
• Lost Warrior & Lost Maiden can no longer destroy undestroyable cards
  
• Merchant can sell items at the Cataclysm Village
  
• Queen Mab's bonuses no longer stack
  
• Swampland now has a minimum of 1 (negative numbers were coming out as 6)
  
• Tapestry Rewoven - should only use your already selected (and only hidden) endings
  
• Tavern Maid pouring drinks to no players issue resolved
  
• Terrain 'reloading issue' fixed
  
• Crash fix when leaving an online game
  
• Crash fix for multi-clicking card 'menu choices' (e.g. wishes)
  
• Crash fix when casting Fiery Retribution

Hi Talisman fans! ːbluetalismanː

First of all, we're pleased to confirm that we've addressed a startup-crash problem that some players have. Talisman: Digital Edition now attempts to continue if a crash occurs when initialising the graphics system and will attempt to use the following APIs:-

• dx11
  
• dx12
  
• opengl

If you still have problems with the game crashing when you start it up, or you know which one you want to use, you can add a launch option to Talisman like this:



And the three different launch options are:

--dx11
--dx12
--opengl

Now, onto the patch notes for todays update!

• Several missing Space SFX added in
  
• Fixed a few places where translations were missing
  
• The stat 'Denizens Visited' wasn't triggering correctly
  
• Astrolabe Challenge fixed
  
• Challenges now show their Expiry date even when completed
  
• Challenges Expiry times should be much more reliable
  
• Challenges no longer determined by local times

We've also made a change to the challenge system which means that the time-based challenges now pull information from our own servers instead of the local computer. This should make it fairer to everyone competing to get those tasty challenge points!

Hey Talisman fans! ːblueTalismanː

We've got a small patch for you all today, just updating some things:

• Rework of stat syncing which should make it more reliable
  
• Movement of Ghost in the Deep Realms has been revisited and they should no longer be getting stuck there
  
• Nomad and Pathfinder's movement abilities should now be working correctly again
  
• Werewolf NPC can now enter shops (but because he doesn't have pockets, he sadly can't buy anything)
  
• Fixed a number of Challenges
  
• Fixed an issue with Challenges not registering as completed until the next turn
  
• Stashed items are now un-stashed when a player stops being the Scavenger
  
• The Cloak of Shadows Spell can finally be claimed and used by the Gypsy

We hope you're all enjoying the Challenge Update still, and we're going to keep working on more fixes and updates as always! ːheartː