Talisman - Fifth Edition - A Casual Conversation 

When I was a teen, the local news came to the con and filmed us playing Talisman. The reporter pretended to play with us. This must've been 1987 or 1988 in Los Angeles.

Thing I would change are... turning into a frog would still lose items but keep followers. there still needs to be a risk to turning into a frog. (Best memories is being around the table chanting...roll a 1...roll a 1. Next is if your character dies then keep your items but turn into a ghost until you can reach you starting space and if you land on another player then take one life. *keeps the people playing and give a goal" but everything else looks great.

I’ve had my copy of fifth edition for a little over a week, but my game group is getting together tomorrow to play it for the berg first time. Can’t wait!

A really enjoyable video Daniel, thank you. I think that talisman is very underrated. I think a lot of people see its shortcomings, but as a game, it is foundational and has inspired many people to dive into the field of fantasy games. It’s also accessible for younger players and introduces some amazing art that really triggers the imagination. Thanks again for the video!

“Folding technology” …cracked me up 😂

For level up I think I'd split the difference like use experience points but you can decide the stat and you pay the amount equal to the next value. Also if I'm remembering the Talisman Warhammer Relic game, they used cards for fate with numbers on them. And you can use a card for a re-roll or use the number on the card for any roll.

Played 5th edition yesterday with my son and nephew we had a blast.

Great to hear your thoughts and review , thank you. I've collected talisman since first edition as it's the game I grew up with as a child. My first dungeon game. First edition had a folding board but always loved the puzzle second ed. Excited for the 5th ed expansion to see what direction they take things in

LOVE Talisman. We played the hell out of 2nd edition back in the day. Played 3rd a few times. I just could never get past the art in 4th. At least the base game. Can’t wait to get this! I’m hoping the changes speed it up yet keep the feel.

Wow. I LOVE the playing card mechanism! I'll be trying it over the next few days. My copy arrives tomorrow...

Fantastic, I was looking forward for this video

Excellent video!! Looking forward for my LFGS to get in a copy🎉

I really like the idea of Talisman, but the pvp stuff puts me off. Can’t wait for the co-op expansion and then maybe a Black Friday deal to pick them both up together!

Wow, one hour on Talisman? Respect! My first contact with fantasy genre yet back in communist Poland. What a fantastic experience that was!

Even though I don't own 2nd edition, I *love* that black void mod. The potential for everyone to just get annihilated is a beautiful doubling-down on GW's version.

wow! the fact that the giude can giude you through the sentinel without a fight is huge!

The Assassin seems rather OP if you can assassinate any creature you fight in Battle with Strength (which means theoretically you can assassinate the final dragon), whereas the older version you can only assassinate any Enemy card already face up on the board.

I sold off most of my games a while back, I had all the 2nd and some 3rd stuff. I regret selling my 2nd edition stuff. It was one of my favorite games back in the day.

Thank you, that was a great preview and comparison video. I also have 2nd edition with the dungeon and city expansions. From what you showed I did get a surge of nostalgia and am considering the new 5th edition, my decision will rest until I see what the future content will offer, and the possibility of solo and co-op modes certainly sounds appealing. Any changes made to streamline and speed up the game are always welcome.

From memory, second edition just had colour art on the cards--perhaps real cards rather than those you had to tear up. I owned first, second and third editions; I only played third edition once before returning to second edition (with a few house rules). I skipped fourth edition and swooped in to grab fifth. In the fifth edition, I love the cards (size and artwork, although one of my cards was delaminating) but loath the board art and configuration of each space art. BTW, in previous editions a dead character is replaced with a new character; if that's an early-game event--no problem, in late game, that new character will have no chance.

I was on the fence about getting this as I’ve only ever played the digital version and wasn’t too impressed. But your enthusiasm is very infectious, so on Monday I’ll be cracking my copy open 👍🏻 looks like it would make for a good family game.

I’m tempted to buy it, but I already have everything for Revised 4th Edition. I own everything, but I only use a few expansions. Cataclysm and Harbinger are my two favorite, and if 5th edition doesn’t bring something similar to the game, I don’t think I need or want a new edition.

Talisman is such a simple but enjoyable adventure session. I've tinkered with a few editions, but never went all in. I have my copy of 5th and am very excited to see where it goes in this modern renaissance of board games. This might be my first "complete" edition. I don't know where you stand on digital "board games", but 4th edition has a very good 1:1 implementation. This is extra nice as while the 4th had a bottomless pit of adventure or modified mechanics to encounter via all their expansions, it also became physically unwieldly (IMO). The digital experience really helps with the volume of content, but also easily curating a session to include only this or those expansion(s). Having an instant save option with physical footprint is nice for a long/ space eating game like Talisman too. It also includes AI opponents which is great for a solo iPad Talisman session. And there is all kinds of statistical tracking built in if you setup a Nomad account. Secondary to Talisman Digital, there is also Talisman Origins which is the digital game, but taken in a super Warlock type quest mode which is great for solo. If 5th ends up having a lot of legs (and I hope it does), I think I will just rely on digital for the 4th edition experience and 5th ed. for the true physical presence solo or with others. Those are some great house rules. I may have to give some of them a try.

I am tempted to try out 5th edition. I remember in Poland in the 90s I use to play first edition (abroad it was second one - the one with 4 pieces board) this game itroduced me to RPG and boardgaming. I collected timeescape, dungeon and city as expantions too. Much much later I tryied out and eventually collected also 4th with all expantions... So it is hard to justify for me to buy new version... Too many Talismans already on my bookshelf... :D

First time I've seen a puzzle board. It seems like a way better idea than folding boards. The amount of times I've accidentally torn folding boards is too high.

I mostly agree with your opinion about the expansions. Having new stuff will help 5e stand out, but I’d at least like a city and or dungeon expansion as well since I never got to get 4e

I would like to see a Talisman board which looked like a medieval map.

Funny, I did not know that the second edition was not a folded board. The old German edition is based on the second and uses the artwork, but has a folded board already! However, the rules were much less detailed and only had a few pages, right between second and third edition apparently. German translated games from that era were sometimes reworked by the local publisher heavily. Some games like Empire even have completely different rulesets per region...

Nice video!! ..you know I love ALL things Talisman!! Have you had a chance to play this yet? ..Looking forward to your video on the coop/solo expansion when that hits later this Fall!!

Well, I think you've sold me on Talisman ....2e Talisman that is. The art of this vestigal edition is wonderful - especially the board. Apparently I was only familiar with the later versions which had never enticed me much, but 2e looks a treat. So just when you think you've dodged a rabbit hole...

It was always fun to take that risk and be the first there only to die because of the horrible dark void. Sucked a little if it was you but if it was your smack talking little brother who pulled that card and ran off crying... it just brings a smile to your face. 😂

Gary Chalk's art is the best; he is still illustrating, I wish he would illustrate a modern fantasy game....you should ask him to illustrate the game you are designing! : 0

I also kinda hope they don't make corner expansions. My table isn't big enough! 😂 I already have to use side tables to play.

I hope the solo and coop rules are worth it though I don’t like the idea of them being legacy based. I’m sure you will bring us a vid on them when they are out so I will wait and see before buying in… I have almost everything for 4th edition and am fine with my house rules for solo and coop….

Interesting - my Talisman 2nd edition board is a foldout, not a puzzle.

Great video Daniel!

Awesome video review! Are you able to shed any light on the 5e solo rules?

i dont know anyone that doesn't play with 3rd edition leveling up rules.

To be fair, they did have the folding tech. Earlier editions had the folding boards, but they moved to the puzzle boards to save money (cynical answer) or because the folding boards were prone to tearing (positive answer)

Yikes!! Those fate tokens to move seem incredibly OP to me. If you are evil, and replenish your fate at the graveyard, getting to the graveyard will be incredibly easy, just get to a half of the board where you are within 6 of the graveyard, and you can use 1 fate token to get all of your fate back. CORRECTION: I just checked, and found that the graveyard only grants ONE (1) fate to evil characters, in the 5th edition. Phew! That rebalances the game quite a bit -- I always thought that even with the 4th edition movement rules with fate, the game was tilted towards evil players due to their facility with fate.

Just got it today, I love the art. I had 4th and 3rd

I am very curious about jumping back into Talisman (I let it be after 3rd) with this edition, purely for the solo/coop. But I am genuinely struggling with the art design of the box. What a dull and static scene. It feels like the artist left to take a break before starting work on a brave adventurer climbing the stairs trepidatiously. But the summer intern intervened accidentally, forwarding the piece in its current state to the box layout department.

Ive never played Talisman and i ended up getting this 5th edition. Any chance you make a play through on this one?. I looked but only seen few other versions and also noticed few with house rules for solo controlling 2 characters. Also i noticed a small number on the adventure cards and was wondering what does it represent?

The original character from the 4th edition were famous for being incredibly unbalanced. And with the power creep of the expansions it was all just made worse. Priest, Monk and Sorceress were seldom picked as they had unnecessary and unbalanced downgrades like the priest and the monk's inability to use weapons and armor while the Sorceress had an easier or harder time depending on other characters alignment. The prophetess is still after all of the 12 expansions that include characters (which brought the number up to 69 characters in the end) the best character in the game imo. To alone discard an adventure card and draw a new one can often be a literal life saver but then to on top of that give her a bunch of spells AND the ability to look at other characters spells just made her broken. I'm SHOCKED no see almost absolutely no balanced changes to these characters. It is RIDICULOUS how they haven't changed anything. The characters that don't need to roll in the crags of forest have received a slight boost since rolling there is way more dangerous now, and I saw that the only character to have received a change in their character card is the Priest. Now he can save automatically destroyed spirits as trophies. He was considered the worst character in the entire game so this will most certainly help him. It's actually really good and I'm glad to see this change. I only wish it had happened more. Plus they removed the 2 coolest characters from the base game, the minstrel and the druid, like if you're gonna pick someone to replace don't go for my minstrel my man! Last thing: Another reason why many of the starting characters were shit was because they had many abilities that gave them specific alternatives for specific adventure cards. Which is stupid when you're going to ad so many more adventure cards with expansions in the future. The fact that Dwarf can ignore the maze and gets +1 on his die roll in the Crags means NOTHING when you have a thousand adventure cards. I'm flabbergasted that no effort was made in balancing when making this edition of talisman (with the exception of the priest). Oh and by the way i'm not playing with those dumb new rules: No random characters, no characters deaths, being a toad is barely annoying now like geese who asked for this? Since this box is almost identical in content to the fourth edition I hope they take an alternative rout for the expansions. I really liked the expansions for the fourth edition and would like to see some reprices but would love to see some innovation and creativity in making new and exciting expansions for old fans who want to experience something different. And just.. for the love of god, please balance your characters Talisman!! /A man who has been playing Talisman since he was little girl.

ok the new adventure cards are larger, but is the text size larger as well? my old eyes are having trouble reading the mini cards of 2nd edition. I’m wondering if I should get 5th just for the larger cards..?

I am curious to know your thoughts on the adjacent Talisman games and how they compare to the standard game(s). These being the themed games or Batman, Harry Potter, Star Wars and the 40k Relic. I have watched videos on each and think I would like the minimalist graphics of Batman. I still refrain from any of these do to the lack of solo rules though.

Played the digital one. Seemed a bit rng. But still good fun.

I really dislike the look of 5th edition. I will say it has a hell of a lot better minis than 4th, but still not nearly as cool as 3rd. My biggest issue is it seems to have the most generic fantasy art in the wntire series and the worst board (art and presentation) by far.

Absolutely disagree with you on Timescape. Talisman is a fantasy game and doesn't need any scifi element!!!

No real critique, maybe you realy love but I don't think its good reedition.