by KingCroc
First of all, I think the notion that all paths to victory need to be balanced is a mistake in most games. Alternate paths to victory are just there to ensure that it is possible to win in more than one way. If one path is more reliable or easier than the others, it doesn't necessarily negate the reason multiple game win conditions are in place.Secondly, I find it odd that collecting points is considered boring when this is a dice game. All you're doing is rolling dice and collecting points. Sure, some of those points are used to damage your opponent, heal yourself, or gather resources to buy advantages, but in the end, it's all points. Just points used for different things.
Finally, King of Tokyo shines when players are paying attention to the other players. Victory Points are appealing because they're the least interactive part of the game (that's true), but the other players should be watching VP and responding accordingly. A monster that's focusing on VP is usually not healing and not attacking, and as such, isn't a direct threat to the other players, who should be quickly smacking him around as much as possible.
Of course, it's entirely possible for the group of players to all decide that one course of action is the best and if so, then the game will quickly settle into groupthink. The only way to change that is to break away from the groupthink and try something different.
While my experience is only anecdotal, I will say that over the dozens of times I've played KoT, the victories seems fairly even, though even VP victories are fairly close as the monster who is about to claim them is usually one turn away from getting knocked out when he scores them.
The amount of pressure any player feels in KoT is entirely dependent on how the other players play the game. If everyone is going for VP, then the game is indeed just a boring game of who can roll higher faster. But if the other players start wailing on any monster that starts pulling ahead on VP, the game remains highly competitive (and very dynamic, I feel).