Hostage Negotiator from Van Ryder Games has been a very entertaining and popular solitaire game (as seen in the last several months of Top 10 tracking). However, to me, one thing seems missing. Hostages. We have meeples for the hostages, but the game never told you just who those hostages were. We know who the Abductors are. We know who the Negotiators are. Why not a little back story on the men and women behind the meeples.

This is a project I’ve been planning for several months and finally was inspired to get it done over the last several nights. So to that end, I present the “Hostage Cards” print and play expansion for Hostage Negotiator.

This Hostage Cards (unofficial) expansion is designed to add a little bit more realism to the game, by putting names, faces, and backstory to those you rescue — or lose — in your games of Hostage Negotiator. 27 different hostages are included to give some variety to your game (and since 27 is divisible by 9 cards per page, why not?).

I was not content to just use text, so I paid for 28 stock photos from online site Fotolia to bring these characters to life. I processed them to look more like painting/comic/artwork instead of raw photos (Hey Star Trek game makers, it can be easily done!). I tried to mix up the cards between men and woman, various races and ages, etc. Not for any PC reasons, but for a realistic potential mix.

I also attempted to breathe life into the characters in the small space that I allowed myself. You’ll find a little detail about them, a quote perhaps, and then an explanation of why they were in the crisis location. As each scenario can differ it was hard to do this without being specific. I hope you’ll forgive any inconsistencies that may occur between my explanation and the scenario location. Just go with it.

Using the Hostages
Using the Hostage Cards in a game of Hostage Negotiator is simple. Instead of placing the yellow hostage meeples on the player board at the start of the game, shuffle your deck and deal out (face down) a stack of yellow hostage cards equal to the number of meeples you would have placed. Set aside the rest of the cards.

When a hostage is rescued ( or killed 🙁 ) reveal the top card of the hostage deck to learn which was affected and put it in the appropriate stack. If a terror card adds more hostages to the pool, then add that many more cards to the stack from the remainder of the starting deck you set aside.

You may find it easier to still use the meeples on the board itself and then draw a card when you move a meeple to either rescued or killed.

The instructions for the expansion include more information on how to use them and some variant options. I hope you will enjoy this addition to the Hostage Negotiator system.

Instructions
https://www.dropbox.com/s/u6dwlgcvuxqkjb2/Hostage%20Cards%20…

Cards PDF
https://www.dropbox.com/s/426hpk6pelgw90y/Hostage%20Cards%20…