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I have finally assembled my print-and-play copy of Barbarian Prince, designed by Arnold Hendrick and published by Dwarfstar Games in 1981. The game is licensed for digital distribution without royalties, and BoardGameGeek user dumarest123 has created a redesign with updated art and quality-of-life edits, which is available here, free.
A picture of my Barbarian Prints.
This is a solo board game where you take the role of Cal Arath, the titular Prince, as he tries to raise 500 gold pieces over 10 weeks to reclaim his stolen throne. The game has hundreds of interlinked events, which gives it a sort of roguelike complexity and difficulty.
Usurpers have assassinated my father, the King of the Northlands, and have captured my palace and throne. Thankfully, my loyal servant Ogab has smuggled me out in a merchant caravan along with two gold pieces, praise him. The merchants unhelpfully deposit me in the northeastern corner of the map, in the mountains at 1901.
All starting hexes are north of the Tragoth River, which I need to cross as soon as possible, since mercenary assassins are hunting me. The first day, I try to move south across the river, but I am lost in the mountains.
Three mercenaries appear, hot on my trail and hired to assassinate me. I decide to fight them. I defeat all three of them after many rounds of combat and earn 12 gold for my trouble.
I am heavily wounded, enough that I will take a -2 to attack rolls and my enemies will gain a bonus of +2, so I shouldn’t try to fight again. Ogab forgot to give me any food supply. You cannot hunt in the mountains, so I begin to starve, further reducing my combat skill.
Instead of crossing the river, I devise a plan to move downstream in order to cross in the hills at 1701. I’ll have to move through more mountains, but it is the nearest hex where I can hunt.
However, I still remain lost in the mountains. Thankfully no mercenary guardsmen show up today I am still starving, further reducing my combat skill.
Things are looking bad. I still cannot manage to leave the starting hexagon.
Then, five mercenaries appear. They outmatch me, so I try to talk my way past. My wits and wiles are not strong enough, and they attack. I am slain on the first blow.
The first outing was over in an unceremonious 30 minutes. I started again.
Usurpers have assassinated my father, the King of the Northlands, and have captured my palace and throne. Thankfully, my loyal servant Ogab has smuggled me out in a merchant caravan, praise him. The merchants helpfully deposit me in between Ogon (Ogab’s hometown?) and the Ruins of Jakors Keep, in the countryside at 1701.
This is as good a place as any to cross the Tragoth River, so I look for a river crossing. I meet a raftsman who is willing to take me across, but I have no gold. I also don’t need to go along the river, just across it to get away from any would-be assassins.
On the other side of the river at 0702, I am surprised by a Great Hunting Cat, who makes two attacks before I can get one in, wounding me twice. I cut it down quickly. On the other side of the river, it’s still the countryside. I’m pretty fresh so I manage to hunt for 4 food units, eating 1 and ending the day
I move into the forest to the southeast. There, I encounter a dwarf and approach to talk. But she is not alone… I am surrounded by a band of dwarves! They look a little rough, but I manage to use my wits to avoid a fight.
In the forest, I hunt for another 4 food units, eating 1 and ending the day.
I continue southeast towards the unfortunately named town of Cumry. I make good progress, hunting every night until I’m full up on food.
On day 5, I’m in the hills to the northwest of Cumry, but I get lost! Disappointed, I decide to rest on day 6. Then on day 7, I finally make it into town.
On my first day in town, I ask around, thinking maybe I can find a job or rumor to scare up some gold. Unfortunately, I am taken in by a local who says they have an “amazing opportunity” which ends up being half-price lodgings. I still have no gold, so I sleep on the street.
The next day, I decide to seek an audience with the local authority. I enter the town hall, but the guards are hostile, and attack me when no bribe is forthcoming. They are not too good at fighting, and look pretty wealthy, so I go a few rounds, hoping to dispatch them quickly. I take several wounds and decide to flee, escaping back into the hills northwest of town.
I spend the rest of the week healing and hunting.
Healed up, I decide to head back to town. But I must have gotten lost again after all the hunting and am once again stuck in the hills! I am rolling very poorly.
On this day, while trying to enter town, I get lost and come across a farm. Deciding to approach peacefully, I discover the farmers are starving. I give them 5 of my food units, and then hunt that night and find 8. Good fortune! It won’t last.
Still lost in these cursed hills, attempting to make it into town, I espy a party of 4 Goblins, led by a Hobgoblin. Desperate for gold and glory, I decide to follow them, and they head north into the forest. There, they are camping in some ruins. I’m full up on health and food, and want to see what’s in these ruins, so I decide to attack.
If I can kill one of the weak ones, then there is a chance of them getting scared and fleeing. I quickly kill one goblin, but I’m then wounded. I dispatch another, but they don’t rout. Then the hobgoblin finishes me off.
Since this was my first time, I played aggressively, trying to get a sense of the combat system and Cal Arath’s strength relative to enemies. Hits are determined by calculating the relative strength of attacker vs. defender and then adding the value to 2d6.
A Dwarf (combat skill 6, endurance 7) strikes at the Barbarian Prince (combat skill 8, endurance 9) who has one wound. The Dwarf takes his 6 skill, subtracts the Prince’s 8, for “-2”, then rolls two dice and gets a “10”. No special modifiers apply, so the overall result is 8, which means one wound.
This is made fairly easy by dumarest123’s handouts. The bonuses change in combat as participants take hits (that’s good) but they don’t change too often and the effort is mostly moving little cubes around on a worksheet.
The combat table has sparse coverage, results of 0-2, 4, 6-7, 9, and 15 are considered misses. This has the effect that even powerful characters have a chance of missing weaker opponents, while weaker characters still have a chance to hit, but will do less damage.
The Barbarian Prince combat table shows hits and wounds.
I found this sparseness to be a bit grating, and I think the math could be changed around so that it’s easier to know how likely you are to hit given your relative strength. I will probably put this in a spreadsheet at some point and tinker with it.
Would I play this again? Yes! The goblin encounter showcases this game’s power: that was three different events happening in sequence: encountering the goblins, not being seen and choosing to follow them, and then their campsite. The campsite could have been any number of different locations, including a Goblin Fort. Had I defeated them, I would have been able to explore the ruins for treasure, and who knows what would have happened next.
I also appreciate how different events are framed with narrative. As a quick example, event E060 details what happens when you are arrested. It is agnostic of why you are arrested, and it’s the landing zone for several different unrelated happenings. In “Seeking an Audience at any Town” (R211), one of the random entries is “A slanderous aside about the mayor’s wife is blamed on you, E060.” If you “Make an Offering at the Temple” (R121), an entry reads “High Priest insulted by your northern manners, arrested E060.” Even if you don’t have a choice and are rolling randomly, you at least understand why you are in jail, which feels extremely satisfying and is fun to recount.
That’s the combinatoric complexity I like. Like Magic Realm, another favorite of mine, it’s a story engine. This game has the juice.