I love this map, both because I was playing gauntlet in the arcade as a kid and because it's just a fun, fast map with a really unique four-quadrant narrow-connection layout. I think it's very well balanced, and that's supported by so many people complaining about Thyra, who is in fact awesome.

This board is one-of-a-kind and delightfully counter-intuitive.

I want to love this board. It is incredibly clever and a nice change from the typical eliminate-your-opponents approach.

The problem I've got is that gameplay seems fairly one-dimensional and frequently boils down to luck. One can usually pick up every quest item in two or three turns, rendering strategies relying on the pools fairly ineffective; most games seem to devolve into a blitz for quest items, followed by a waiting-period in which you find out if someone's blind luck will result in a successful sabotage.

For what it's worth, the elimination rule makes complete sense to me and I wouldn't change it. You might be able to make it slightly friendlier without affecting game-play by not having the characters revert to neutral.

I love this board, both the stripes and 3-player 8x8 variants. It's a clever idea and the strategic options are endless. Still, there is a little room for improvement. On the smaller board, the initial setup can be completely outcome determinative. On the larger board, the tweaks to starting units aren't quite there; many players seem to offer to surrender on the second turn. But once it gets going, it's an absolute joy to play.