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This is a good 7-8 out of 10. I love this game but also hate it so much, particularly the game design. I have the boardgame, beaten the game twice on deadly and finished almost everything you can do in this game. I would not recommend this game if you do not have the patience or the time to learn or appreciate the game. It is very easy to exploit and riddled with RNG mechanics that can tip the scales drastically into losing a scenario or winning. Overall, it is a good turn based game and has a lot of content to explore.
-Characters: This is the strongest point of gloomhaven. There are several different characters with different builds. Surely you will find a mercenary that you are enamoured with. A lot of variations and most of them are bloody fantastic to play with. I would say many of the secret characters are broken and can make the game trivial.
-Digital version: There are more pros then cons for having the game on steam. Having to setup the boardgame can take up to 30 minutes and clean up is equally as long. Here, you do not have to worry about clean up and setup. Unfortunately, there will be cases in which I would prefer more control over my game/rules.
For example: When choosing a card during an attack with advantage. For some odd reason, the computer loves picking 0 + color than +2 and I noticed it when playing "Jaws of the Lion" expansion. It mostly ruined turns as I was counting on a +2 but it picked a 0.
There are house rules and is a very nice addition, wish there were more added to customise your campaigns more. There are also differences from the boardgame. They made some changes like minor stamina potion gives 2 cards back in the boardgame and in the digital version, only gives 1 back. To be honest, the changes are very insignificant but if you have played the boardgame, you will notice. I do not mind the changes.
-Game design: It is really terrible if you ask me. I do not have space for all my gripes with the game so I will summarise.
Playing two cards per turn sucks and gets very tedious when playing 3 or more mercenaries. Since you always have to play 2 cards unless when you are resting, doing nothing means you are getting tired. Doing nothing is the equivalent of sprinting and attacking. This means doing nothing = doing actions and you will exhaust at the same time as a player that is doing actions. Absolutely stupid. If there was a way to only use one card out of the two and get the other refunded, this game would be insanely way better. Hell, doing nothing should refund both cards in my opinion.
Battle goals are useless, temporary and very stupid. Retiring characters is not only the best incentive for anyone to get more permanent bonus perks, it gives bonus prosperity and possibility to unlock new quests and items. Never try to go out of your way to get a battle goal because you could just ruin the scenario out right. Why risk it when you will retire the character anyways and, lose any gold/perks you have accrued? Absolutely stupid.
The basic mechanic for items sucks. You need to long rest to refresh your items. It is a stupid gimmick and it should be replaced with a system of uses/charges. For example: You can only use boots of speed 3 times, non-consecutive in a single scenario. Also most items give very slight bonuses to the point they are not really worth it the gold you pay, especially early. I would prefer if chainmail just gave a flat +1 shield permanently than having to track charges in which when depleted, it gets spent and you need to long rest to get it back, If that is not a solution then just make it have 6 charges, once depleted it is gone. I would prefer weapons and armour just gave flat attack and shield bonuses.
Enemy action cards is a terrible system. Having enemies doing random dumb actions is not engaging and feels massively exploitative, sometimes cheating. For example: Skeletons healing themselves at full health points. It makes absolutely no sense at all. Why they would heal? It would be better if each enemy had abilities like bosses have. Action 1, 2 and 3 and they all have thresholds. For example: Skeletons if below 50% HP rounded down, ability 3: +2 heal +2 shield. Skeletons if able to be adjacent to 2 or more mercenaries, ability 2: Receives target 3. Skeletons if only able to only single target, ability 1: Target 2 and all attacks hit the same target. I think this system would not only benefit the digital version, but also the physical version. This would avoid enemies not taking actions when they should be attacking.
There are more dumb mechanics I can think of but to be fairly honest, it works very well but super exploitative. These are just frustrations I have, nitpicks.
-Game Balance: It is bloody dreadful. When picking new cards when you level up, there is never really a choice. You are making a huge mistake for choosing the wrong card and the game will punish you severely. Sure there can be different builds and such, but the reality is most builds all look the same with different variation of some cards. There is obviously a meta, with half of the cards being bad cards and the other half being good. You will learn eventually which ones are good.
Same thing with mercenaries, there are mercenaries that completely suck in certain situations and others that are godlike level one and can do everything. Once you get the secret characters, you basically never touch the basic 6 mercenaries. The amount of crazy stuff the secret characters can do made the entire game trivial. I was breezing through deadly like nothing, beating most scenarios pre-round 15 while I was suffering early scenarios with the basic 6 mercenaries. Retrying deadly scenarios 10 times in a row trying to beat them and just constantly failing, mostly because of terrible RNG.
-RNG: Like I stated previously, it is definitely the worst part of the game. You can have a tank selecting all his shield abilities and ramping everything up, to then have the enemies not attack because.... reasons. Or having a CC/moderate dps oriented group and have all 6 cultist summoning skeletons 4 times in a row. It is truly a pain in the ass even when you are playing perfectly. RNG can ruin your scenario attempts and it all boils down to terrible game design. You know how to negate all RNG? Unlock and level up secret characters because they are busted and can breeze through the content.
-Graphics: Looks decent enough. Having the scenarios with their correct aesthetics adds to the immersion which is fantastic. Looks faithful to the boardgame but, the art design of some of the characters are off from the original.
-Multiplayer: Have not played it but it is there. Great addition to the digital version and I wish I had friends to play with.
-Mods: Exactly what this game needs. Great addition but you might have issues adding mods to your current campaigns. I definitely did.
-Theme: I think this is where this game absolutely rocks. I really enjoyed the city gloomhaven and being a party of mercenaries doing quests. Travelling to different locations and fighting off varied enemies is great. Also the rewards are sparse but there are definitely gold mines to find. It is very well done.
-Story: It is alright, typical RPG type story telling. Nothing too special and did not really pay attention to it. Did not mind it and the voice acting is pretty good.
-Bugs: There are bugs here and there. Also my fps were all over the place even though I have an extremely good computer. I am shocked that I cannot run this game on the highest setting, as most of the time I am getting 30 fps even with everything on low. I also noticed that the more you play your campaign, the longer and longer the loads get. My new deadly campaign that I completed fully now takes like a minute to load.