Episode 280: Rock Hard 1977

In Rock Hard 1977 (designed by Jackie Fox and Published by Devir Games} you are an up and coming musician dreaming of making it big with your band. Over the next few months (ie rounds), you will rehearse, play gigs, write songs and promote your band. With a little luck and planning you will earn the most fame (ie points) and become the best new artist of the year (otherwise known as the winner of the game).

Each player will get a player board fashioned to look like an amplifier. There they will place their character board (which describes their unique ability) and track their 3 stats (chops, reputation, and songs) and of course those…..go to 11. Also here you can track your cravings…cravings for what you ask? That’s right candy. It just candy. But more on this later. Finally you can track your royalties on this board as well, which is referenced at the end of every month to remind you to collect fame and money.

Before the start of the game each player will select a day job, which you can chose to work during the game to earn money or you can ignore it and lose said job. Then you will draft a manager that will give you some kind of power during the game, but you have to pay throughout the game. You will also pick some personal goal cards that are end game objectives and lastly some starting life experiences that is just some narrative fluff, but also gives you some icons used for set collection during the game.

The game is played over 9 months. A month is broken into 3 parts (the Day phase, night phase and after hour phase). Each phase is broken up into various actions that are mostly reserved for one player, so player order can be important. Before the month start, an event is triggered that affects this round, mostly good, some can be bad. In the Day Phase most the actions are various ways to improve your stats. If your stats are good enough and you have a Demo tape, you can negotiate record deal, which is where you get those royalties. In the night phase, if your stats are good enough there are various gigs you can play to again improve your stats or get more money. There is also a random gig space here that changes month to month. In the after hours, there are various hangouts you can go to to flip a card and gets stuff (stats, money, candy whatever). Also each of these hang out cards give you an icon, which you can collect and turn in for points. In the after hours you can also make that needed demo tape. Also on the top of all these phases are actions anyone can go to instead. There you can earn money, write a song, or by candy. Depending on where you go in the after hours phase will set the player order for the next month.

Candy is used during a phase to flip card for a chance to get 0-2 extra actions. Some of the spaces you cant go to if you are on..I mean eating candy, but most are available. If you get an extra action your cravings dial increases. Then you roll a die to see if you have succumb to your cravings (meaning your die roll is lower than your craving). If you fail this roll during the next day phase you MUST go to recovery.

At the end of 9 months whoever has the most fame wins. Now lets get back to the table and see if Rock Hard 1977 brought down the house or was a mosh pit of one.