Everyone Listens to Reason

Civilization

2012-01-17T05:15:00.001-08:00

Fantasy Flights Sid Meiers Civilization game has been on my wish list since it was released. I played the computer games and can remember many evening playing it and having "Just one more Turn".

The Board game version looked interesting, it was a distilled version of the game that took away a large part of the micro management and was getting favorable reviews. But I held off, I wasn't sure how often I would get to play the game and was unsure if Fantasy Flight had done a good job or just filled a box with as many cardboard bits as possible.

I picked up a copy as a Christmas present along with a copy of the expansion, Amazon had it for a good price and I was struggling to find gift ideas to suggest to family. I opened it up and looked through the masses of tokens, cards and boards. All produced to Fantasy Flights usual high standards. The bits looked lovely and the artwork worked really well.
I started on the rules and faltered, the rule book was well written but its quite big. Usually I start piecing the game together as I am reading the rules but as there were so many bits I hadn't started punching and bagging yet. Christmas celebrations came and went and I still hadn't finished reading the rules.

Then a night was set to play, I had 2 weeks to get my head around the game. I watched a couple of videos from the geek and started to bag the pieces. The rules were read and then reread again. I don't think I have read the rules to a game so many times in such a short period of time.

Last night the game hit the table, there were 4 of us and it was the first play for all of us. I had warned people in advance that it was going to be a long one and as the clock struck 8 the game started. I had spent the previous 20 Min's running through the rules and bits and anything we were unsure of or would need later we would deal with as and when the situation arised.

The game started smoothly enough, civilizations started developing and cities were being built. It really felt like you were playing a condensed version of the computer game. Analysis Paralysis did start to set in once we all got to 3 cities a piece but the pace of the game was still going well.

My Egyptians were doing well with there technology research and culture but I was starting to be harassed by two other players. I managed to research flight then built a stream of airplanes while researching as fast as I could. America was building up its culture and its cities were creating money and trade quite freely. Unfortunately China decided to nuke one of Americas cities which caused it to stall. Rome was doing well, its economy was moving along nicely and was getting to around 12 coins.
It soon became apparent that Egypt was going to win and two players decided to send there troops in to attack. I had luckily won a battle the previous round and take a much needed 3 points of trade to get my last level 4 technology. I just needed to hold my ground and not loose any trade this round.
China went first and made the mistake of dealing with an American battle first, he lost a few units but won the war. There were 2 battles against my cities but his depleted forces were no match to my air power and I won both battles. I then managed to research the final level 5 tech and win the game.

It was just passed midnight and we had been playing for 4 hours. It was a test of the game that we only went through one packet of crisps and 2 rounds of coffee. We were all hyped about the game that hunger and thirst were put to the back of our minds.
The story the game tells is brilliant, America will definitely not forget the nuclear attack from China, while its archers very tank battles would like to be forgotten.

Simply put I love this game, its going to get a 10/10 score and I cannot wait to play it again. Everything about it just works, the components are lovely. The rules are pretty straight forward once you have played a few turns and the varied victory paths make the game a good challenge.

Games of 2011

2011-12-14T01:55:00.000-08:00

As the year is coming towards its end I thought I would post about the top 5 games that I have played this year. 2011 has been a cracking year for games, there have been so many good ones but these are my top 5.

1 A Few Acres of Snow - (My best 2 Player Game of the Year)
This has been my favorite game of 2011. I like most of Martin Wallace games and this one could be his best in my mind. Its a 2 player game that uses deck building mechanics and has a play time of about an hour. For me it fills the gap when there are 2 players who haven't got teh time for a game of Twilight Struggle.
I have played it quite a few times now and although its a little unbalanced for new players its definitely one that been asked for repeated plays.

2 Lord of the Rings the LCG - (Best Card Game of the Year)
Production and support on this one is great, which is understandable as its a Fantasy Flight Game. Its a solo or 2 player card game where you are trying to win an encounter by using a deck of cards. The game plays very well and you feel like you are actually controlling the characters from Middle Earth as you are trying to complete your chosen adventure.
Its been heavily expanded with monthly packs of cards. I don't have all of them but the ones I have picked up have added to the game.
I am now attempting to create some custom decks with the cards I have so there is still plenty of game here for me.

3 Quarriors - (Best light and Dice Game of the Year)
Mix up a deck building game with dice and you get Quarriors. Its a light game that plays very quickly. A 2 player game can take around 10 minutes. There is a high degree of luck in the game, but another game can be setup really quickly. It's probably the lightest game I have played this year but its short playing time has meant its been played the most.

4 Mansions of Madness - (Best production of the Year)
As far a box size goes this is the biggest I bought this year and for good reason. I love this game, its a Cthulu Mythos inspired game similar to descent. The boards and minis are brilliant and I have enjoyed every game of it. My biggest gripe with the game is the setup time. There are so many cards and counters this can take a while and you have to make sure you do it perfectly otherwise you will break the game. I haven't played this enough mainly for this reason. I like to set up the game ahead of time and I don't always get the time.
Expansions for this have started to appear and I expect to see a big box with more minis is in the pipeline.

5 Troyes - (Best Heavy Game of the Year)
I like dice games and this one get you rolling them quite a bit. But the luck factor is taken away as you can use other players dice for a cost. This is quite a heavy game and it takes a few plays for it to sink in. But once it does you will be playing a fantastic game.

Biggest disappointment of the year, generally I will play any game and see some good in it. The designer has put the time in to create the game and a publisher has invested in getting the final product to market. That said my biggest disappointment this year has been Barons. I liked Glory to Rome and expected something as good but the game just didn't work for me. It seemed a little too easy and would quickly end once players built churches. The cards and artwork seemed a bit too harsh and it came in once of CCG's trademark plastic boxes.

More Meeples for those Sea Monsters

2011-11-11T07:39:00.000-08:00

I really like Survive as do most of the game groups I bring it to. The problem, it only plays with up to 4 players. So when a 5-6 player expansion hit the shelves it was a must buy, especially when its only a few quid.

The expansion comes in a little box and opening it up you get a whole host of little plastic meeples and some tiles. The meeples are nice, but they are not as good as the wooden ones in the base game. You also have to put numbered stickers on the base of all of them which takes a while. When playing with 5-6 players you use different combinations so as to even things out. Reading the numbers on these new meeples is much easier than the base games which is good. I just wish they had kept up with the wooden ones.

The tiles were a bit of a mystery, but reading the rules that came with it there was apparently a printing problem with the first run. One of the mountain tiles was left with white border so players could quickly figure out what tile it was. These replacements are used to resolve this. Not sure about this, were they free or am I actually paying to fix someone else problem?

Happily the game plays quite well with 6 players. It's always going to be a bit of a bun fight but with more players it does become a little more hectic. Meeples are very quickly dispatched by an assortment of monsters swimming the shores of a shrinking island. It's a fun game and one that you can't really take too seriously. In my last game I lost every single meeple under my control. I was doing well at the start, head down and happily being ignored by all the other players. Then things turned nasty when they all realized I had not lost a meeple. One by one they were eaten, drowned or sucked under by a whirlpool.

To spice things up we had also decided to play with the Giant Squid expansion. This adds a number of large white squid to the game. These can be particularly nasty as they can pluck poor meeples off of beaches and out of boats. Nowhere is safe! As an expansion goes its pretty small and cheap and a great accompaniment to the 5-6 player expansion. It just adds to the fun and chaos.

So Survive continues to be a popular game and its nice to see that the mini expansions that have been so far released have added just enough to the game. It's not changed drastically or made things more complicated. It's just given you the opportunity to kill off more players meeples in different ways.

Domain in space......

2011-11-08T03:11:00.000-08:00

Gaming has been mental the last month, both face to face gaming and on the web. A lot of new games have hit the table but I wanted to chat about just one for now.

Eminent Domain has hit UK stores and after a demo I picked up a copy. Its been touted as a space version of Dominion, and although it does have deck building elements I feel that it is more than just a Dominion clone.

Game play is very simple, there are 6 different base cards in the game. With each having its own Action and Role ability. All players start with the same distribution of these cards as well as a home world. You then shuffle and draw 5 cards from your starting 10.

The first thing you have to do is decide which card you are playing and use its action section. This action only affects you and can range from warfare cards which give you fighters, to survey cards which add more cards to your hand.

You then pick another card to play, but this time instead of one from your hand you take one from the piles of cards in the center of the table. This acts as the timer mechanism, the game will end when a number of piles are empty. This card is now played for its role ability. Most of the time its the same as the action but usually the person picking the card gets a bonus or different effect. Every other player can now discard cards of the same type to also use that action. So for example if I chose the colonize card I can now tuck it under a planet to go towards its colonization cost. If I also had 2 more of these cards in my hand I can also put them down. Other players that also have colonize cards can also put them into play. If they don't or don't want to use them they take a card from there deck instead.

Finally you discard and draw back to 5. Pretty simple so far.

The only part of the game which can slow things down is the research action, if you have enough of these cards and choose the research role you can take a research card. These are limited in number and give you different actions or effects. Usually altering or improving the strategy your are playing. For example the improved warfare allows you to build more fighters. You can play without these cards if you want a more basic game, but if you have played any deck building game before there's no reason not to put them in.

Planet cards are discovered with survey cards and can be either settled using colonization cards or forcibly controlled using warfare. Once the requirements have been met the planet is yours to use. Planets will usually allow you to produce and trade resources for victory points. They will also be worth points at the end of the game. Finally you will need more matching planets to research the higher tech levels. So planets are what you are aiming to get in front of you throughout the game.

The game plays well, once players have got there heads around the action/role differences they should be getting to grips with the game. What I like is that you can always choose the role you want, so your never really stuck trying to work your strategy. If you don't have a colonize card in your hand but want to settle a planet, just pick one from the table as your role.

Component wise this game is lovely, good strong box, good looking artwork and loads of lovely plastic fighters. Tasty Minstrel have really put together a good game here.

I am hoping that there will be a future expansion, it's crying out for ways to trade with other players attack there planets and steal technologies. As well as more technology cards and different planets there is quite a bit of scope for the game.

Lego

2011-10-11T02:17:00.000-07:00

I am happy to play any game. I might not be good at some of them but I am still happy to pull up a chair and give it a go. I also find it difficult to give a game a really low score on the geek. Generally I feel like there might be something in there and someone has spent the time on putting a game together and getting it published.

Every once and a while comes along a game that I really have problems with and last weekend it was Lego Creationary. My kids like Lego, they seem to get more and more every year and are happy to build whatever there imagination creates. A couple of years ago Lego came up with a range of games, we picked up a few of the cheaper games and they were pretty good. Usually roll and move or roll and pick type games. Nothing ground breaking but they are fun and the kids enjoy them.
Creationary on the other hand is just terrible, the concept is quite good. Mix up pictionary with a box of lego and you have a new build and guess game. Players roll a dice then pick a card from one of the 3 piles of cards. Each card has 4 different objects to build on it, one for each colour on teh dice. So if you rolled a yelloe you would build the yellow transport object, green the nature object. The piles are supposed to be in different ability levels so the objects should be harder to build.

All sounds good so far, rules are a bit light with players getting a "determined" amount of time to build. We went for 5 mins, not wanting to drag things out. The ability levels of cards don't score any more or less points. I decided to handicap myself by using the level 2 cards while the kids went for level 1. I quickly changed to level 1 for the reasons below.

There are 2 major problems with this game, the amount of Lego you get just isn't enough. Not only are you limited with the amount of pieces but also the colours. My first object was a bee, easy I thought until I realized there were no black pieces in the box. I had to substitute brown for black. This happened a couple of times, Flynn got a tiger and started building one. Quickly telling us the yellow was actually orange. He ran out of pieces after building 4 legs.

Teh second issue I have with teh game is the objects. The Arc de Triumph maybe a great site in Paris but its difficult for a 7 and 8 year old to know what it is. Model T Ford, its a car!. Well yes, i'll give you that. You see a Lego car looks like a Lego car. Especially when you only have 4 big wheels and 4 tiny wheels in the box. How are kids supposed to know the difference between a transporter plane and a passenger plane. It's tough and there were a few moments when they both yelled airplane.

So, Lego Creationary is a good idea but poorly implemented. I would love to see the design team make all of the models on the card using the Lego in the box. I know that you could argue about cost and such but I think they fell short here.
The card design needs a little help, adding the names of things would also help and teach them a little as well.

Will I play it again, probably. The kids seem to enjoy it and I like to get involved but I think there will be some tweaking along the way. The best thing about the game is that the cards have sparked there imagination with other things to build which is a bonus.

It's a bit chilly

2011-09-07T03:43:00.000-07:00

This week is shaping up nicely on the gaming front. Monday saw Quarriors getting played along with A Few Acres of Snow, tonight should see more games being unboxed and hopefully Quarriors will get another outing.

I enjoy playing wargames, but as much as I enjoy playing combat Commander I usually prefer to play something that plays a bit quicker. Memoir 44 usually wins here, probably because its quick to play and with the overlord bits can take more than 2 players. If a wargame is on the cards its usually been booked up in advance, playing a 3 hour Twilight Struggle doesn't usually just happen.

This is where A Few Acres fits in nicely, its a 2 play war game that uses cards to perform actions. It should only take about an hour to play and it has enough depth and strategy to keep it going for a while. It's not going to replace Twilight Struggle as my favorite 2 player war game but I can definitely see it being played more often.

The game follows the war over modern day Canada, with players taking the roles of either the British or the French. They both start with a number of settlements and to win the game have to either take the opponents capital or use up there settlements. Scoring then happens and the one with the most points wins the game.
Each settlement is represented by a card, as you settle you add more cards to your deck. In addition you can buy other cards to help with your money, military and settlement actions. These cards have symbols on allowing you to use them to perform actions. For example, if you wanted to settle a location you would have to play a card that connected to that location. Then another card showing the correct travel symbol. Finally a third card with a settlers symbol on it. Cards played are then put on the discard pile and you draw back to 5. This is only one possible action of many available to the players. The first time I played I was slightly overwhelmed with the options available to me. Settle, raid, siege, fortify, generate income, put cards in reserve .... getting the right combination of cards to perform the actions is a different matter.
There is an element of deck building going on, as your deck increases with cards from new settlements and other cards you purchase, but only drawing back to 5 at the end of your turn can really hinder you.

Our first game was a bit of a learning one, I won but we realized that the game should have ended a fw turns earlier. We also realized that we were too busy trying to expand and siege each other to think about how we would score in the end. That said it was a really good game, we were left discussing it for a while afterwards. Thinking about what we had done right and wrong and how we always seemed to be limited in what we could do. There were times I was desperate to expand but just couldn't get the right cards in hand. Realizing now that I should have been using the reserve action a bit more often. But then I would have needed more money.......argh!

So, A Few Acres is a very good 2 player wargame. But I think labeling it as a wargame could put people off, is Twilight Struggle a wargame? Both games are set around a time of conflict but there are no combat tables and piles of dice being rolled.

I really think Martin Wallace has come up with a great game here and its one of my favorite games of the year so far.

It's all about the dice.

2011-08-31T04:31:00.000-07:00

Dice, you either love them or hate them. They also seem to come and go into fashion in the gaming world, and at the moment it looks like they are definitely coming back.

Recent games such as the excellent Space Frontiers and Troyes have brought dice back into favor. Both games get you to roll a number of dice and place them on the board in various worker placement guises. Troyes also allows you to buy dice from your opponents which is a really nice way of getting around those really bad dice rolls.

With Quarriors being released I think we are going to see a new wave of dice games. This is because Quarriors is the first dice building game. When Dominion was released it created a big buzz. It was the first deck building game and has spawned a number of copies and games based on this mechanic. Thunderstone being one of my favorites.
Quarriors takes the cards out and replaces them with custom dice. You draw dice from your bag, roll them and then use then to summon monsters or buy other dice from the pool in the center of the table. It sounds simple and I am sure it is, but working out the dice combos and efficient dice management techniques is going to be the hard part.
Although my copy hasn't arrived yet I am really looking forward to trying this. It has gone down very well across the pond and I believe all of the copies sent to the UK were sold out by pre-orders.

I suspect like Dominion, Quarriors will spawn not only a number of expansions but also some other games that use a similar mechanic and I am sure that some of these will be just as good.

More Thunderstone, this time online...

2011-08-17T08:17:00.000-07:00

Thunderstone, the deck building game with theme is now available to play online over at Yucata. They have done a very good job of making this one and I am now feverishly playing a handful of games.

If you haven't managed to try Thunderstone its a deck building game where you are building up a deck of hero's and items. You can then delve into the darkness of the dungeon to fight the monsters and try and claim the Thunderstone.
There are a few elements that make a good hand, you need light. Without it you get combat penalties that get worse the deeper you try and go into the dungeon. So torches, lanterns and wizards all help generate light. Weapons increase your combat value but you have to be strong enough to wield them. Food helps here by bolstering the strength of your heroes.

there is an element of leveling up your heroes as well, as you defeat monsters you gain experience points. These can then be used in the village to upgrade your heroes to the next level. Each hero type has 3 levels and there powers and abilities improve as they level up.

As well as experience points, monsters are worth victory points, as well as the highest level (Level 3) characters. The Thunderstone card is also worth points but its hidden somewhere in the bottom of the 30 card dungeon deck.

Thunderstone has been very successful and spawned a number of expansions. Each adding more cards and slight rules additions to mix things up. The game was also re-released as Dragonspire.
This edition added a dungeon board and makes things a little easier to understand. It's probably where you should start if you are thinking of buying into the game. Although its not necessary if you already have the first base game.

Other than Thunderstone online gaming has been a little quite recently. 2 Weeks in Italy helped recharge the batteries. Or at least top them up with the local Chianti. Ryanair's luggage restrictions meant that I could only squeeze in a few card games to keep me going. But Coloretto and No thanks always go down well and helped while away the evenings.

Hopefully this months purchases should arrive soon, I am expecting a few games including the expansions for the excellent Lord of the Rings LCG. I will talk about these more after a few plays.

Deliveries

2011-07-13T04:31:00.000-07:00

This month has seen a few parcels delivered. It's always nice to see those jiffy bags and packages waiting patiently for me when I get home.

So what did I get, well 7 Wonders Leaders was a must. 7 Wonders was my most played game of last year. The fact that its simple to teach, can handle 7 players and is pretty quick makes it a great go to game. I wasn't bored with the original as I think it still has plenty of life in it but I am a sucker for expansions. Especially if they are reasonably priced.

Leaders adds 40 cards, a few tokens and a new wonder, the Collosium of Rome. the meat of the game is the 36 leader cards. The artwork on these is really nice and I hope it will get players into researching who these people were and what they did. They are a really diverse selection that effects how the game is played, but not enough to make it too difficult.

At the start of the game everyone is dealt 4 Leaders cards. They pick one and pass the remaining 3 along. From these 3 they pick one and pass, and again until you have 4 leader cards.
Now at the start of each Age you get to play a leader. You can play the cost in gold and add it to your area to activate its ability. You can discard it for 3 coins or finally use it to build a part of your wonder. similar actions to the main game so nothing to difficult to understand.
The abilities are ranging from VP gaining abilities, cheaper card building, extra science cards, etc. The icons make them easy to understand and the rule book does a good job.

So far I am really impressed with this expansion, it adds enough to the game without making it overly complex or bloating it with useless rules. I can see every game of 7 Wonders will now include the Leaders expansion.

Paperclip Railway was a game I was very keen to try at the UK Games expo. It sounded like a fun little train game that uses paperclips to represent the railway tracks between stations. Unfortunately it was sold out at the expo, but I received an email last week offering me a copy as there were several pre-orders not picked up. I couldn't say no so a copy was posted out.

I haven't played it yet, its down to be played tonight but after reading the rules and pouring over the components it looks like it will be a lot of fun.

I will post some thoughts on the game after its been played.

Lastly there is Barons by Cambridge Games Factory. They are mainly know for the excellent Glory to Rome. Barons promised to be Glory's little brother. I saw that the first print run was quickly being snapped up so ordered a copy.

I have played it a few times now and although its a pretty good game, I have played better. The players are trying to win the game by building a Cathedral. To do this they need to spend cards from each of the 4 coloured decks. Cards in the game can be used in many ways, as "money", lands that increase the size of your barony and as action/buildings or knights.
you basically start of playing cards face down as resource generating lands. These are taxed to add more cards in your hand. This increases your options, so you can then place more lands or spend the cards to use them as knights/buildings or actions. You quickly realize that you are not going to be able to buy all the cards you want and deciding what you will have to use as payment starts to hurt. Its a balancing act of increasing the size of your realm to generate more cards as well as building up the special ability cards. All this while playing knights to attack the other players and defend your realm.

I really can't put a finger on why I am not overly enamored with this game. The components are ok, some of the cards have been cut a little wonky and the plastic box that the game comes in is a little cheap. The game itself is ok, its just missing something.

I am now eagerly awaiting the first expansion for the Lord of the Rings card game. I played my first 2 player game of it last week and it worked really well. In fact maybe too well as we managed to blitz the starting scenario. Previously playing Solo I wasn't doing that well against it. Having 2 players seemed to help with multiple cards. We were using the Spirit and Tactics decks and questing seemed too easy. We were maybe a little lucky in that we didn't get that many attacking mobs.

First print run has sold out, but I believe that the second run is hitting distribution shortly.
This has so far been my favorite game so far this year. It's just so easy to get a game in by myself that it's replacing time on the Xbox.

I'm playing Solo

2011-06-13T04:51:00.000-07:00

The usual questions a gamer asks is, how can I get my partner to play or what games can I play with my kids. These are usually because gamers want to game and a weekly or monthly meet just isn't enough.

There are a few games that can be played solo, but I have had mixed results with them. Deathwing was ok, while Runequest just seemed to go on and on.

I recently picked up the new Lord of the Rings Living Card Game. It's a co-op/solo card game set before the LotR films. As its one of the LCG range the cards you get are fixed, this cuts out the booster addiction of trade able card games but does make things expensive if you want to build your deck with multiple copies of the same cards. As of now there are no expansions for the game, but I expect there to be new cards coming out every month.

The game itself is very good, the player cards are divided into 4 decks. Each deck is completely built up of cards from its theme or power. So there is a very strong "tactics" deck with lots of combat cards another, the spirit deck is very strong on quest completion.

Playing the game is relatively straight forward, although there are quite a number of steps to each round. You or the players are trying to complete a quest. This is made up of 3 separate card locations with each requiring a number of quest tokens played on it. Once there are enough tokens you move onto the next card. So each round you have to put some of your characters forward to help fulfill the quest. To counter this cards are drawn from the encounter deck and values are compared. If you have more than the enemy you put some tokens down if not your threat level increases.
Threat is measured on a spinny dial thing. If you ever reach 50 then its game over! After you have quested you get the choice to travel, this enables you to take out a card location from the encountered area making questing easier in the future. Although quest tokens are now placed on this card as opposed to the main quest cards. In effect acting as a buffer from you completing the quest.

The next couple of parts of the round deal with combat. You have to compare your threat level with the enemies in the encounter area. If your threat is higher then they will attack you. Combat is pretty simple, you first have to declare defenders to stop the incoming attacks. Then declare attackers to fight back. There never seem to be enough characters on your side of the table, but cards can be played to help.

Played cards cost resource tokens, you get one of these for each character at the start of the round as well as a new card to add to your hand. Add the end of the round your threat counter increases by 1, in effect acting as a clock and pushing you forward.

The base set comes with 3 quests, I have played the first quest 3 times now and still haven't completed it. the first time I made some mistakes with the rules while the last 2 have been very close. Games are taking around 30 minutes to play which is really good. I can get a quick game in while the wife is watching something on TV without ruining a whole evening. With more cards on the horizon I think there will be more quests available and a greater selection of cards. I might even start changing decks around to see if I can build on things.

Overall the Lord of the Rings LCG is a really good package. The cards and bits are of really good quality, something Fantasy Flight are always good at. The rules seem a little daunting at first but give them a couple of reads and watch the online rules trainer and it should all fall into place.
Due to the short play time and the four starting decks this game is going to be picked up quite a bit in the future.

Dice

2011-05-27T04:36:00.000-07:00

Unlike the kitchen boy I love playing new games. Even just the once ;-)

One of the new Hotness games is Alien Frontiers. I have managed 2 plays of dice based game and I can see why its gathering pace as a great game.

The game is a usual chase for victory points, but to get them you have to colonise the planet and have the majority in its areas. To do this you have to gather resources, build ships, crab cards and build colonies. All of this is performed with dice.

Dice are usually the bane of my life. They hate me, but they feel so good. The clinking sound of dice being shaken always draws a look from other tables and in Alien Frontiers its all about the dice.
Once you have rolled you dice you place them on the board into the different placement areas. Certain dice combinations can only be placed in specific areas. For example to build a ship you have to put a "double" in the ship building area. To use the resource stealing space raiders you need a "run". Add to this the fact that there are limited spaces and the players dice are only removed from the board when its there go can make some resources harder to use.

There is a deck of cards in the game. These represent alien artifacts and technology that can affect the dice and the game. For example there is a card that will allow you to flip a dice. Or reuse one. Or even take a pip off of one dice and add it to another. These can sometimes be invaluable when you are desperate to roll a double to build your last ship.

Both times we have played Alien Frontiers its been a very close game. With the winner winning by 1-2 points. My only issue with the game is the last rounds can take a while. When you are down to your last colony and getting it into play can win you the game you mind has to go through a number of choices. Trying to optimise your dice and card powers can sometimes take a while. However this isn't enough to put me off the game.

Finding a copy is a little tricky, Clever Mojo games have pretty much sold out of there second print run. I belive that Ystari have picked it up for the Euro market. But not sure if they are doing an English language version. But until then if you are intersted in the game and can find a copy, grab it now.

Its a Ripper

2011-05-18T02:31:00.000-07:00

This week I managed to play Letters from Whitechapel. It's a very strongly themed Jack the ripper game where one player is Jack while the rest are the policemen trying to apprehend Jack before he can make it home.

If you have played Scotland Yard then you will have a very good grounding on how the game plays. I like Scotland Yard but think that Letters is a much better game. The components are better, the theme works really well and the mechanics of the game make for a tense experience, especially if you are playing Jack.

Game setup is very simple, the board is placed on the table. There is an explosion of numbered circles and black boxes on the board. Jack uses the circles to move while the police use the squares. Jack picks a location for his home from one of the circles. This is hidden from the rest of the players. To win the police have to apprehend Jack and knowing where he is moving to each night is a great help.

The game now plays over 4 night, each night Jack will determine which of the 7 locations he commits the murders. He must then make his way back home while the police are trying to close in on him.
All of Jacks movement is hidden and recorded on a separate sheet. He has a couple of special moves to play. These allow double movement with a carriage or sneaking through alleyways. These are limited per night and the number available decreases through the game.

The police move 2 squares and can then ask Jack if he has moved through a neighbouring numbered circle. If he has a clue marker is placed. This helps the police try to determine where Jack is going and ideally the location of his house.
If the police are certain that they know where he is, instead of asking for a clue they can arrest the location. If jack is there the police have won.

On my first play I was Jack and made it to the end of the third night. I was one step away from my house when I was caught. The last few rounds of trying to out maneuver the police was incredibly tense.
We played it again straight after, this time I was part of the police team. We managed to block Jack from getting home on the first night. Partly from a lucky break with the placing of the police but after you gt a few clues you can try and figure out where Jack has been.

Letters from Whitechapel has successfully built on the Scotland Yard game and delivered a strong game with lovely pieces and a solid theme that ties everything together. I would definitely recommend trying it out.

Dice Tower Awards - 2010

2011-04-26T12:11:00.002-07:00

The Dice Tower 2010 award nominees have just been released. It's a bit of a mixed bag in my mind. There are a few that will definitely get my vote while others I really want to try.

String railway and Dominant Species both sound really good, but its impossible to get a copy so I doubt I will get to try them some time soon.

Best game for me, 7 Wonders. I have played this game so many times and still enjoy it. As for the other categories, I need to think a bit more.

2011-04-26T12:11:00.001-07:00

RPGs a couple of hours.

2011-04-06T04:27:00.000-07:00

I used to play many RPG's when I was at school and college, but commitments change and its been years since I have filled in a character sheet or described a dungeon. Sometimes I miss it, but I really don't think I have the time to invest in a weekly RPG meet or the extra time needed to design and prepare as a DM.

Every now and then I hanker back to the good old days and pickup a RPG manual in the shops or browse an article online. They always remind me of some amazing times when my Elven Ranger managed to save the party or when my Street Samurai went berserk in New York.
As RPG's are all about the storeys they weave through amazing set pieces and player interaction you just can't fault them for theme and for leaving you with these great memories.

Board games on the other hand don't quite compare. Sometimes they do, grabbing that Dominion win by using a great card combination or a game of Combat Commander where your brave Russians managed to defend the grain silos of Stalingrad. But these seem to be thin on the ground.

There are a few RPG crossover games now, Descent and Mansions of Madness seem to be the main ones that I have played. Although there are a few others that I have yet to try. What I like about these games is that they can distill the elements of a RPG into a few hours of game play.

Descent seems to be the best of the Fantasy games, with the Road to Legend expansion adding some campaign play into the mix. I have played Descent a few times and its been quite good fun. Although I would prefer to have more puzzles and RPG like additions to it. It seems to be more about monster killing and treasure grabbing.
Mansions of Madness seems to have hit the sweet spot a little better. But then Cthulhu was always more about the insanity than the combat. I like the way the game plays out with the party having more to think about than just follow the path to the big monster.

Mansions seems to have captured the imagination of its players, with home brew scenarios and extras being talked about. I have been intrigued with what I have read and come up with a few ideas myself. The game just seems to lend itself to being built on. And with its lovely components it's hard not to think about what you can add to the game.

I would like to try a sci-fi themed game or even better a cyberpunk themed game. Getting a complete game down in an evening would certainly get my vote and if Vladamir Genocide the crazy Russian Street Samurai could make an appearance then even better.

El Grande

2011-03-30T04:43:00.000-07:00

El Grande is in my eyes a classic board game. In the realm of Settlers and Age of Steam. A solid design that is still playable. My favorite area control game is probably Shogun, but I think there is maybe more player interaction and screwage in El Grande.

Monday night saw it hit the table, and it went down very well. It was a very close game but I was pipped by Mudhoney by 5 points in the end. I was doing really badly but managed to pick the scoring card a few times and having the majority in my designated area scored quite well several times over. What I didn't manage was to score enough points over multiple areas. I tended to keep to only a few areas.

The Castille played its part with numerous cubes being placed into it then moved onto the board. This is one of my favorite parts of the game. Trying to think where to put your cubes on the board but also trying to make sure they help you get the majority and not swallowed up by an influx from the other players.

Why is it that all good area control games have to have a tower?

We also played a couple of games of 7 Wonders, the first I lost. I was just too spread out and had the Mausoleum as my wonder. Playing the B side doesn't allow you to score that many points. The second was a tie but decided on coins, I lost.
I still really enjoy this game, its quick and easy to teach and has enough options to keep it entertaining. I am looking forward to the leaders expansion later in the year.

Must do better.

An explosion of Plastic

2011-03-23T08:44:00.001-07:00

It seems to me that every new game has some plastic piece in it. I am not adverse to them if they add to the game but I wonder if they are really necessary?

When I rebooted my board game hobby it all seemed to be about wooden cubes and meeples. Plastic mini's were a rarity other than in a Games Workshop box.

My copy of Dungeon Twister and Arkham Horror came with cardboard figures and that worked fine. Yet Mansions of Madness is filled to the brim with plastic figures for the investigators and monsters.

I wonder how the amount of plastic affects the cost of the game? If there were two versions of the same game, one with plastic figures and one with cardboard at a cheaper price what would the sales figures be like?

Personally I don't mind plastic figures but if they are not there or as extras I wouldn't really be that bothered. If the plastic figures could be bought as an expansion that would be nice, especially if they were pre-painted.

Are there any games that you couldn't possibly play without plastic parts? Battlelore comes to mind, yet C&C Ancients works well with sticker'd blocks.

Anyone?

Madness

2011-03-10T03:17:00.000-08:00

I have fallen for the hype and bought a copy of Mansions of Madness. I like the Cthulhu setting and have Arkham Horror and Mansions looked quite interesting. It looked like it was going to play like Descent but with a slightly different feel.
Reviews were good although I suspected it had a bit of a fanboy following and the bits looked really nice. Cost was going to be a bit of an issue, yes its expensive but you get a lot in the box and currently the game is cheaper than a tank of petrol! (Don't get me started on that one)

On Monday we tried out the game, I played the role of the Keeper controlling the board and the monsters. The three investigators made there way into the house trying to find clues as to what had happened to its owner. It played along quite nicely, I made a couple of mistakes along the way but the game progressed along nicely. The game mechanics work quite well. The investigators need to listen to the narative and try to find and follow the clues. The team got a little waylayed after teh first clue not realising that the time was ticking.

The game ended in a draw, but we all agreed that it was fun and the mistakes made were due to it being the first time we played. I enjoyed being the keeper but could have been a little more evil, I was aware that I wanted everyone to enjoy the game. I forgot to spawn some monsters and left a zombie out in the garden instead of moving it into the house to cause more trouble.

I think the bigest downside to the game is the setup. It takes a while to put together the board and sort through all the cards. There are a lot of cards so this can take a while. I think next time I will sort out all teh cards I need before hand to speed things up but it does add time to the game.
Components are up to usual FFG standards, the minis are great and the abundance of cards and counters are overwhelming. I now need to decide wether or not to paint the minis.

I need to read the rules again and give it another play before it get a BGG rating from me. But so far I am not disapointed.

Blight of the Immortals

2011-02-27T07:10:00.001-08:00

As well as playing board games I spend quite a bit of time playing on the Xbox and other web games. I was introduced to Blight of the Immortals by Jay, one of the designers of the game. Its an online strategy game that reminds me of Pandemic and Defenders of the Crown.

The world is becoming over run by zombie hoards and its up to you and your fellow players to rid the world of the zombie threat. When you log into your game you get to see the overview of the world and your troops, settlements and how the spread of the zombies has progressed. You then raise taxes once a day which is determined by some random dice rolling. Its then time to spend your coins on the different army types that you control. You can also spend your money of improving the defences of your towns or increasing the size of their markets. Markets provide coins so there is a balance of troops vs money.

The troop types are your standard fantasy fair but as everyone is against the zombies your army can consist of Orcs, Elves, Dwarves, Centaurs ..... In fact the races are constantly evolving, Harpies were released this week. Each race has its own ability that will help against the zombies. Orc sorcerers with their flaming winds are my current favorite.

Combat is decided on the size of army, fortification levels and some random dice rolling. Its pretty easy to win, just make sure you have enough troops to outnumber the enemy and activate some special abilities. If you loose however, the dead become part of the zombie hoard.

I have been playing three consecutive games of blight and am now really enjoying it. At first I though it was a little basic, but once you start expanding and making a dent on the enemy it becomes more interesting. I find myself logging in a couple of times a day to check on the progress of things and to collect taxes.

Its a cooperative game, but there is a strength rating so you can see which player is currently leading. I haven't finished a game yet but I am doing ok in all but one game so far. I have noticed that there are quite a few players dropping out. If you don't take a turn within 4 days you are removed from the game.

So if you liked Pandemic or Defenders and have 10 mins spare a day, log in and join a game.

Note : I was given a free one month premier account by Jay.

Sleeves

2011-02-16T05:08:00.001-08:00

Do you sleeve your games? I have a few games sleeved, and it really depends on how much use the game is going to get and how many cards need sleeving. My copy of Pandemic was quickly sleeved as it was getting played time and time again. While I have only sleeved the character cards in my copy of Citadels.

Dominion is a tricky one, it gets played quite a bit but I haven't sleeved it. I should, but I know its going to hurt now I have every expansion. Also I bet the cards won't fit back in the box properly.

Thunderstone was sleeved when I bought it. Mainly as I was going to take it to the monthly POB meet in the Pub and the tables are not always the cleanest. However I went cheap on Ebay and the sleeves were a little too big. So they fit back in the box at a bit of an angle. Not great but it was ok. Now I have the Doomgate expansion I have more cards to sleeve and went for a large bundle of sleeves from Mayday games. These fit perfectly but I need to re sleeve all the cards from the base game and the Elementals expansion. I have been putting this off even though there have been a few rainy days recently.

If you need card sleeves and are based in the UK then look over at BoardGameExtras. they have Mayday sleeves for most games as well as a few other game components such as draw bags and cubes.

Appart from sleeving cards there has been a bit of gaming going on and I am now beta testing a new online game called Blight of the Immortals. Its an online cooperative game in a fantasy world. I have only scratched the surface of the game so far and will probably write up something more indepth late this month.

This weekend War of the Ring has been proposed. Never played it before but I ams ure its going to be a great game.

Thunderstone Freebies

2011-02-04T04:41:00.000-08:00

Quick post to point that AEG are giving away some free Thunderstone cards. Just hop over to

http://www.alderac.com/thunderstone/free-thunderstone-promo-pack/

Register and hopefully there are still enough to give out. First pack is free, if you want more you have to pay.

I am really enjoying Thunderstone as an alternative to Dominion. I think that although its not as "clean" a game the theme works really. well.

Epic, part 2

2011-02-04T03:56:00.000-08:00

After last weeks Epic game of Command and Colours : Ancients, this week we decided to try Epic Battlelore. The table was set, commanders were chosen and cards were dealt. We used the same teams as before and started to play.

As everyone was familiar with how C&C works it didn't take long to explain the differences. We took the army of the King of Portugal. We had a reasonable plan but all of our cards were for the center and right sections of the board. Consequently we were immediately attacked on our Left flank.

We made a few foolhardy rushes in but didn't do enough damage and quickly became on the end of a few vicious attacks. Failing to keep our units supported lost us the opportunity of battle backs and we were slowly being pounded on the left flank.

The right flank fared better with a few cavalry charges and we slowly started to take the lead. The winner was the first to 7 flags and we made it to 5. Mainly due to a goblin lizard rider rush in the center that was beaten back. Our next round had some of the worst dice rolls and we knew we had lost. The other team quickly attacked on all fronts and managed to defeat 3 units ending the game.

It was a great game, we didn't learn from our mistakes in ancients. Support your troops!

I have now splashed out on some Memoir 44 expansions so we can try Memoir 44 Overloard. Rounding out the 3 C&C epic games. I am really looking forward to trying some of the scenarios. Tigers in the Snow and Operation Market Garden both look really good.

I need to start reading rules over the weekend.

Epic

2011-01-28T00:54:00.001-08:00

This week it was Command and Colors Ancients turn to make use of the table and it did so in a big way. As there were 4 of us we had decided before hand to try an epic game. One of the expansions provides another board and a special deck of cards to allow multiple people to play.

We split into two teams with each side having one member who has played the game and one who hasn't. I was teamed up with Gornad and we had a quick chat about the strategy in the game.

The scenario picked was Cannae, one that I haven't managed to win in the past. We decided to play quite aggressively and push hard on both flanks while the warriors ran into the middle. It took a few turns until we had picked up how the game was playing and managed to get in the lead, mainly due to some heroic action by our heavy horse on the Left flank. The warriors in the middle were busy harassing while our light infantry and horse were trying to hit and run on the right flank.

We needed 3 blocks to win against the Romans 5 and we thought that was quite possible. However the dice were against us and we didn't hit anything. Unfortunately the Romans had the luck of Fortuna and came back strong and picked off enough units to win the game.

It was a really good game and playing with teams was really interesting. I was worried that there wouldn't be enough to do for the General after he handed out his orders. As there was only 2 per team the general controlled the center of the board which was good. Watching your commander interpret your orders was a bit stressful. I had plans of hit and run on the right flank drawing the enemy in towards some heavys but it didn't happen.

It was a very good and interesting game. It also looked awesome setup on the table, Ed did a great job of setting up the blocks and packing it away afterwards.

I am now tempted to get some Operation Overlord expansions for M44 and try that with more players.

We managed a game of Defenders of the Realm afterwards which was interesting, but as I am playing it again next week I will talk about it more then.

Release the Kraken!

2011-01-21T00:37:00.000-08:00

I finally managed to play Cyclades this week. It's been brought to the game group a few times in the past but I have never been quick enough to get to the table. It always looked good from afar and Gamethyme has been raving about it for a while.

I managed to score the win, but I felt a bit deflated. Three of the four players had managed to build Metropoli and were working towards their second. My first was built by heavy use of Athena and trading in the 4 cards. I had managed to grab 2 more cards and was set to win. All I had to do was get Athena again, but even though I bid high I was outbid. I managed to move around the gods making sure everyone else bid high then ended up getting Apollo for a few extra coins.

As everyone had bid high there wasn't much for them to do and I knew if I could get Athena again I would have the win. I picked the god who wouldn't be available and the others were turned over. Athena was there, but the last of the three gods. Then the monster was turned over and it was the Pegasus. I knew I was in trouble here as it meant one of the others could send in their forces by air ignoring the need for boats. John went first and picked up the Pegasus, I had 1 guy in my Metropolis and he had 2 attacking so it was down to the dice. I won the first attack, then the second being 1 up. That was it, the others couldn't get near me and Athena brought home 2 more cards to win me the game.

I did enjoy the game, but I was expecting more to happen on the board. We all just expanded a little then hunkered down. There was only the 2 dice rolls in the game!
I liked the bidding mechanic, that was really nice and worked well. The components are lovely and the theme of Greek gods helping the players works really well.

I definitely want to give the game another go, but I think next time I will be a little bit more aggressive. Trying to capture islands from the others and building up my Metropoli in other ways rather than handing in white cards.

What is the plural for Metropolis anyway?

I also managed to give Dominion Prosperity a go, it been on the shelf since November unplayed which is a shame. The new cards and treasure mechanic worked really well. It was interesting that players were struggling to get to buy the 11 gold Colony cards when before you always ended up 1 short of being able to buy a province. Royal seal was one of my favorites. When played as a treasure it was worth 2 gold, but the card you used to buy it with end up on the top of your deck. Useful until another player plays a spy card.
But I expect there are better cards in the box somewhere....

Forward Brothers!

2011-01-13T03:12:00.000-08:00

I played Spacehulk a lot. I still own the first edition and all expansions but it doesn't get played that much. Mainly due to it being a 2 player game and its with most of my GW games up in the loft.
The new edition of Spacehulk is lovely, I have only played it once but it did look really good and played very well. However the price tag put me off and as I don't play my other copy that much it wasn't going to join my collection.

Death Ange l continues the spacehulk genre but is condensed into a couple of decks of cards and scales to 6 players. It's been called spacehulk light and I can see why.

When my copy arrived I opened it up and started reading through the rules. Then put it down again, the rules just seemed to be a mess. Any rulebook that tells you to jump to page 22 then page 21 during setup has not been put together properly in my mind. FFG gets a bit of a bad wrap about there rule books and sometimes its for good reason. I ended up watching a couple of videos on the geek and the picked up the rules again. It didn't seem that bad afterwards and was ready to play.

The game is for 1-6 players and takes about 30-60 minutes. So its got the potential to be a quick solo game which is nice. Our initial game was 5 players. Initial starting location is determined by the number of players and a number of location cards are randomly selected and placed on the table. These represent the areas the marines are going to fight through to make their way towards the mission objective. Other landscape cards are placed on the table to represent corridors and doors. These are where the Genestealers are going to spawn from. Each player chooses a marine team and the cards are collected, shuffled and dealt out to make the marines formation. Marines are facing different ways which can cause challenges in the game.
Lastly a number of Genestealers are but into blip piles on each side of the location card.

Play then commences with each player choosing one of their action cards. These are either move and activate, support or attack. Any card you play stays on the table and cannot be used the following round. This stops you just playing attack cards continually. Each team of marines has different effects on the cards to represent the equipment they are carrying or the abilities of the marine.

All cards are revealed and played in numerical order, the support cards generally go first followed by move then the attacks are dealt with. Attacks are easy, you just roll a dice and hope you get a face with a skull on it. Some cards effect the number of genestealers you remove but generally its only one.

Then its time for the genestealers, and marine engaged with genestealers must roll a dice and get a number higher than the number of genestealers attacking him. If not he dies. This is where support tokens come in. You can place them on marines using support actions and they allow you to re roll an attacking or defending roll. So if you have any you can discard them to roll again. Unfortunately if you are being attacked from behind you can't use them.

An event card is then drawn and resolved, them more genestealers are spawned and then moved depending on the icons on the card. Play continues until one of the 2 blip piles is empty, then the marines get to move to the next location in the deck. This continues until the last location is reached where the marines have to fulfill a final objective to win the game.

We managed to win our first game, although at the end our squad of marines was down to 3 men. So only just, I don't think we could have survived another round. The genestealers were piling up and most of the heavy hitters in the squad were down.
The game felt like spacehulk, slightly claustrophobic with a feeling of dread. Play moved along at a reasonable pace, you had a couple of choices in what to do each round which helped. Although you have to work as a team supporting each other and moving to be in the best spots to attack. I think different teams work better than others but there is enough variety in the box to keep the game interesting. I suspect that there will be an expansion for it which will build up the rules and add new locations and marines. Although I don't think I will need anything extra for a while.

So for under £20 you get a pretty decent co-op game that can be played solo. I need to give it more plays to see how well the solo play works but it looks very good.

This page on the geek lists a number of common mistakes and is worth a read if you already own the game.

Toy Soldiers

2011-01-07T07:46:00.000-08:00

I was late to the world of Memoir 44, it always sounded like a great game with lots of support but the price tag put me off. Then along came Battlelore as the new kid on the block and I decided to start with that. I wanted to be at a level field with expansions and experience the C&C game system.

Battlelore was great and I picked up a couple of expansions but then it died. Meanwhile M44 was still getting lots of support and a friend offered to sell me his copy. I was a fool to say no and quickly snatched it up with intentions on trying it out with my eldest.

If you don't know much about M44 its a WWII combat game that uses cards to determine which of your troops are active and dice to determine combat results. It's quite a simple system that has been built on with expansions and extra rules.

I played my copy a couple of times, but getting 2 player games to the table is a rarity and knowing that a mate near Warwick was a heavy player asked him for advice on playing online. Vassal was used along with Skype and numerous battle were played out recreating the Normandy landings, the push to Paris and the siege of Stalingrad on the Eastern Front. It all worked quite well in a heath Robinson kind of way.

Now Days of Wonder have released their own Memoir 44 online system. It's still in Beta but its been put together very well. It looks exactly like the board game which is great. The board and pieces make the real game in my mind. You can either play solo against the AI or against another online player. Games cost "gold bars", but you get 130 bars when you sign up. Additional bars can be bought online for real money, but the initial shipment of precious metal is doing fine at the moment.
I am not sure when its going to come out of Beta, I can't image its going to be long. I am also hopeful that more scenarios are going to be released. The main Western Front scenarios are suffering from being over played.

If you like Memoir 44 and don't get enough time to play it give it a go. a typical game takes around 15-20 mins so its perfect for when you have a little down time. If you haven't played it before the rules are available on the web site, give them a read and jump right in. You can't do anything wrong.

client and instructions can be found here.

If anyone wants a game, drop me a mail or add a comment.

7 Questions

2011-01-01T03:41:00.000-08:00

The last month has been busy, busy at work and pretty busy with gaming. Lots of games have been played both new and old with some surprises. Zombie Dice was well recieved for a push your luck filler game. I think I prefer Can't Stop but it fills a hole and doesn't take up much room.

7 Wonders continues to be played and now the core players know the game it doesn't take longer than 30 mins to get a game in. My copy is now sleaved using the mayfair cards from www.boardgameextras.com especially as they looked as though they were going to start showing some wear.

Santa brought a few games, my Secret Santa sent me a copy of Small World. I have played it and enjoyed it but never bought a copy for myself. I think that my boys could probably get into the game so it was a good choice. Other Christmas games included a copy of Scotland yard and some Small World and Memoir 44 expansions.

Memoir 44 has become my favorite C&C based game. The fact that you can now play it online with the very good DOW client has helped. I am now looking for someone to work through the Eastern Front and Ardennes scenarios.

Gaming for the year finished with a game of Gambit 7 on New Years Eve. I have often brought a game or 2 to try and last night there was a bit of interest. I came last, terrible at this game and it went down well. So there is a glimmer of hope that other party style games could be well received in the future.

So for this year I am going to make an effort to stop buying so many new games and play the ones I have more. Also to play more games with the kids. They are at the age now where they should be able to understand some more games and their reading skills have improved. So I am going to try the family version of Agricola and maybe Memoir 44 and Small World this month. Also I am determined to get Apples to Apples and Dixit out and see if the wife enjoys them.

So here's to a new year of gaming.

More Wonders

2010-11-02T07:03:00.000-07:00

7 Wonders is my hot game at the moment. We had a mini meet again last week and managed to fit in 3 plays of it. This time around I tried a few different strategies.

I always made sure I would be able to make the third part of my wonder. A mistake that caught us out the first time we played.
In the first game I tried to build every military card I could, and if not use it to build my wonder. This managed to score me the full 18 military points.
On the second game I tried to build as many green science cards as I could. This worked well, but I had no access to paper so couldn't build any of the tablet cards. This hindered my final scoring.
The third game I screwed up by not building enough resource cards. I managed to finish my wonder off very quickly but didn't manage much after that other than a few blue cards.

It was interesting that in each of the 3 games different people won with different strategies. I really think you need to score the highest in a minimum of 2 categories to win the game. Keeping an eye on resources available and what other people are doing is also very important. This gets a bit tricky with more players, don't ignore the people you can't trade with.
Coins seem to produce the least vistory points, but nobody has really played a coin producing strategy yet. Maybe something I will try next week.
Military is very good, getting 18 points is definately a good strategy but winning a fight in the third age can wipe out any negative score you have picked up earlier in the game.

Score wise, the winner of every game we have played so far always had around 50 points, with everyone else scoring low to mid 40's. So the games have always been quite close.

Hopefully this will get a few more plays in next week.

7 Wonders

2010-10-26T04:50:00.000-07:00

Lot's of gaming has happened recently but the best was last night. My copy of 7 wonders arrived after being bought at Essen last week. It's got a lot of buzz at the moment and for good reason. It's a cracking game.
I had read the rules last week so we would be ready to give it a go and they seemed very simple. The rules themselves seemed to jump about a bit, but the basics seemed easy enough.

the game was punched explained and cards were sorted and dealt. The first age went very smoothly except for the fact I had no red military cards. I was trounced in combat on both sides but I had built a few civic building to generate VP's.

Age 2 started and more resources were available. Wonders started taking place but again I had a very poor military force.

Age 3 arrived and it all clicked. Well, we all realised that we couldn't build the third stage of our wonder. We had all passed up resource cards thinking we could trade them or already had them. I had 1 paper resource but needed 2 in order to complete my wonder. The only other paper was on the other side of the table! resources had been spread around the table. Guild cards were played to good effect in the final rounds and it was a close finish.

We all scored around 46 with the winner winning with 49. It was a very enjoyable game and I am now desperate to give it another go. I am sure this game will win a couple of awards this year and I expect an expansion sometime next year.

The other game we played was another new Essen release. Diver, Die, Deep (?) a push your luck diving game. It was quite fun but I was useless. Either diving too deep or staying under too long and running out of oxygen. It plays as a group push your luck that lasts several rounds. As a group you determine how much oxygen is in the tanks with hidden cards and each round you roll a dice for oxygen consumption. It gets a bit tense at times but sometimes you know you have made the wrong decision. A fun game that I would play again.

I also picked up a copy of Gosu, loving the look of the cards and box but need to read teh rules and give it a try.

A spot of Painting

2010-10-01T01:55:00.000-07:00

A week has passed and Thunderstone hasn't hit the table. Instead Fresco got its first outing and it's a pretty good game.
When I first heard about Fresco the idea of mixing paints and keeping your workers happy sounded like a good theme. It was the strong "euro" in this years SdJ and I was on the lookout for something else to try with the kids.

At its heart its a worker placement game with a few twists. You decide the playing order each round by deciding how early your going to wake up your workers. First up gets to do things first but paints from the market cost more and your workers happiness drops. If your last out of bed you don't have much to choose from at the market but its cheap. Your workers are happy and you may even recruit a new one.

So after you have bought paints its then time to use them to complete tiles on the Fresco part of the board. You have to use up your workers and paints to complete these tiles. followed by the ability to earn money by painting portraits, mixing your base colour paints to make different colours and finally sending your workers to the theatre to increase their happiness.

so each round you have a few things to think about, mainly what time to get up, whether you are buying paints, painting the fresco or mixing new colours. All while trying to keep your workers happy.

The board and components are really nicely put together. All the tiles are good heavy card stock and the graphic design is beautiful. Layout of the board is well put together, visually it helps resolve each round. Queen games always seem to do well on their pesentation and design so I wouldn't expect anything less.

The first play went very well, its a smooth game to play with no real rules questions. It just seems to make sense. It's not very difficult to grasp, so I think its going to become my first gateway game to introduce new players.

The game also comes with 3 expansions. These add extra rules and things to think about to increase the complexity of the game. I haven't tried these yet but its nice that they added them into the base game instead of releasing them as a seperate expansion.

A bit more Thunderstone

2010-09-15T05:53:00.000-07:00

The Thunderstone expansion has been delivered, unboxed, sleeved and collated. This expansion is brilliant, not only for the extra cards but for the built in filing system you get. Having a way to sort through the cards from both boxes now is a great bonus.

I have tried the expansion twice now and both games have been very good. We mixed up cards from the base set and expansion and they worked well. I did tweak the cards on the second play as we had no magic attack cards available and some of the elemental monsters needed magic attacks. both games played out well, although there was the inevitable stall point where a big monster blocks the dungeon and the players are busy trying to get cards into their deck to defeat it.
This is my only sticking point with the game. Whether its a creature only defeatable by magical attacks, or another that has such a terrible penalty if you don't have particular cards can hinder the game. It's not insurmountable, you just carry on grabbing cards until someone manages to get a good hand. It just sometimes stalls the game for 10 minutes when things were running smoothly.

My Dwarf promo cards haven't turned up yet which is annoying. I seem to be having problems with my post recently. Halo Reach is 3 days late and that's more annoying than the lack of Dwarves!
Hopefully I will have some packages to open soon.

More Thunderstone

2010-08-20T03:28:00.000-07:00

Thunderstone has hit the table again this week. It seems to be one of the most talked about games and I am really enjoying it. Although the next time I play I have vowed not to use the suggested starting set of cards.

I had the same problem when Dominion came along, followed by its expansions and promos. The base set of cards suggested do a good job of bringing people into the game. There are enough cards to add variety without adding too many that have either too much to read so they are ignored. OR change the game around too much to make it confusing. The trouble is I have all these other cards that I am dying to add into the mix and it never happens. I like to make the first play of Dominion not too overwhelming for new players, so after a game with the recommended set of cards I will then swap in 2 or 3 other cards to add a little to the mix. Usually the Witch and a couple of others to add a little interaction. Hopefully after that they have a better understanding of the game and I can add some new cards in the next time.

Unfortunately Dominion has become a monster and its impractical for me to cart 4 boxes of cards to play one or two hands. I could really do with a carry box that I can use to bring over everything I need to play a couple of pregenerated hands.

Thunderstone is going the way of expansions, and the first one looks like its going to be a winner. Not only can it be played stand alone so you don't need the base game it has solved this storage problem. The original storage for the cards was weak, just a few holes in the box and no real strategy of what to put where. Divider cards were supplied but they were not great and after I have sleeved my cards they are just lost in the box. Now the new expansion will hold all the cards from the base set and provides some foam inserts to break up your cards plus some sizable divider cards. This sounds perfect, I will be able to bring along all the cards in one box and get things setup efficiently. Now I just have to wait for it to be released.

Other gaming has been mixed. Last night I had a half game of Memoir 44 using Vassal. Normally it works but technical problems hit us after half an hour of play so we gave up and moved onto Dominion on BSW so the night wasn't a total disaster.

Dice Tower awards are looming and will be interested in what people think of the winners. Till then I'm waiting for my Dwarven Thunderstone from the Geek. Not that it will get played ;-)

Orc Rush in the cold

2010-08-12T03:25:00.000-07:00

Another night another game meet for the P.O.B. group. Last night I managed to get a game of Ur in. It's a new game to me and one that I have just started playing on mabiweb. To be honest I was confused on the online version but after the game was explained to me it made more sense. I came last mainly due to building two Zigurats near the start on my Agriculture tiles and then shafting my cube production. Live and learn eh!

Next up was Thunderstone, second play and it really clicked this time. I lost by 1 point but it was an enjoyable game. We used the starting set of cards again as I was the only player out of the three who had played before. The Sphinx card has tripped us up both times now. Needing a magical attack of 8 seems really harsh. We all struggled to combat her and having the thunderstone behind it made it the game winner. I bought as many fireballs, wizards and flaming swords as possible but they just didn't hit my hand at the right time. In the end I ended the game using the Elf wizards ability to put a monster to the bottom of the deck. I thought I had killed enough monsters but hadn't leveled up enough of my hero's. A really good game and I will look out for the expansion now.

Lastly I managed a game of Summoner Wars. This is getting lots of love at the moment. The Dice Tower guys really like it and with the Dice Tower awards being revealed soon I am sure its going to get something. It got my vote!
It's a nice quick miniature battle game that uses cards instead of miniatures. Contradicted myself there but it works really well. The rules are simple but playable. However the Orcs seem to have won every game so far. I am not sure what I am doing wrong with the Elves. I know they have better range attacks but its difficult to get them in position without being overrun by the Orcs. More plays and a rethink required on this one.
The play mat still annoys me on this one. For the cost of the game I would prefer something better but then games seem to be getting more expensive anyway.

To Sleave, or not to Sleave?

2010-08-06T07:41:00.000-07:00

I usually only sleeve cards in games if they are going to get repeated use. The character cards in Citadels were some of the first non CCG cards I sleeved. Mainly as they are continually being used, shuffled and swapped around the table.

Other games I have sleeved have been Combat Commander as I wanted to pimp out the game with coloured sleeves and card decks for the forces. But I don't really play the game enough to really warrant the sleeves.

Thunderstone arrived last week and inside are 530 cards and I chose to sleeve them all. I have dominion and haven't sleeved that mainly because of the large number of cards so I have no real excuse here. Other than the fact I have all the expansions so the number of cards is now well over the number in Thunderstone.
The main reason I sleeved Thunderstone is that our gaming group, P.O.B. meets in a pub in Portsmouth. We get the room for free which is great but sometimes we have to use a room where the tables are a little grubby and sticky. I wanted to protect the cards from the wear and tear of this environment. It's a bit harsh and I have thought about sleeving some other cards as I am loathed to bring them to play.

Maybe I am to O.C.D. but I like to keep my things as mint as possible.

Sleeving has its downsides. The cards are a bit more tricky to shuffle now, but I can put up with that. Extra cost was negligible, about £4 for the sleeves from ebay. Maybe not the best but they do the job.

As for the game, well it's no Dominion. It's not as slick or polished as the daddy of the deck building games but it was enjoyable and I am looking forward to giving it another go next week.

More on the game will follow as I think it needs a few more plays till I can really comment on it.

Shogun

2010-07-27T03:46:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since I played Shogun, so last week a game was organized and our samurai troops shuffled around feudal Japan. It was a great game that ended in a 4 player draw with the winner decided on the number of war chests. As I had calculated to spend all my chests I ended up last but it was a monumental game.

Shogun is one of my favorite games, its more than an area control game with players having limited number of actions to perform and the cube tower is a great piece of kit.

For those that don't know about Shogun I will break it down. The board is made up of Japan's provinces with players having a number of cubes in the provinces they control. Everything starts off even with each player controlling the same number of provinces and having the same number of cubes. You have a card for each province that you control.

The game is broken down into 2 years, with each year having three playable seasons followed by the winter season where scoring and other processes happen.

For each of the three main seasons players have to decide what their province is going to do. Each player has a board showing all 10 options and they must place a province card upside down onto the action they want. The actions are broken down into 3 building actions, castle, temple and theatre. Obtaining Rice which is used to feed your provinces in Winter and war chests which are the currency of the game. The other actions revolve around building up your troop types and moving them around the board attacking adjacent provinces.

Once all of the players have chosen a province then the order of these actions is revealed and a turn order bid happens. One of the nice mechanics is that only the first 5 of these 10 possible actions is viewable at the start of the round. As the actions happen, the remaining actions are flipped. Sometimes this means that you may not be able to afford to build your armies as the war chest action hasn't happened yet. Either way you only get to do 3 possible actions in a province before winter happens.

Taking rice or war chests from a province makes the local peasants unhappy and revolt markers are placed in the region. These have two effects, one the farmers will not help the defenders in battle and two, if you have more than one token in a province the peasants will revolt against the occupying player.

Combat is handled with the cube tower. It's one of the best parts of the game. It's a cardboard tower that you drop in the attacking and defending cubes. They rattle around inside and a number of cubes will end up in the tray at the bottom. These are then used to determine who wins and the attrition of the battle. Sometimes your cubes will end up in the tower to come out at a later time. It works really well, especially as you seed the tower at the start of the game.

When Winter arrives players must have enough rice to feed all of their provinces. If not then more revolt markers are placed on the board and players can loose the provinces if the peasants revolt and win. Scoring then starts with players earning points for the number of provinces they own, the number of buildings they control and for the majority control of each building type per region.

After the first year has ended, all revolt markers are removed and the whole process starts again.

Its a fine balance between attacking for more provinces, defending provinces that you have built on and building to gain the majority in each region.

Most of the game is spent planning, which can lead to a bit of analysis paralysis. It also takes a bit of time to setup, the names of the provinces take a while to find on the board but after the first year new players should have a good idea of what they are doing and how to win. Subsequent plays help round the strategies of the game out.

Overall I really like this game and wish I could play it more often. It's a big game so it takes a bit of thought and table space but this shouldn't put people off.

Viva le France!

2010-07-09T03:09:00.001-07:00

It's all been about the French recently. A two week holiday to the South of France meant for little gaming. Apart from a couple of hands of Franks Zoo and Colloretto there wasn't much gaming going on.

I did however manage to visit Carcassonne, inspiration for one of the first games I bought in my resurgence into the hobby. It's an amazing place and well worth a visit if you enjoy wandering around castles. However be warned, anything game related costs a fortune. I had the idea of buying an expansion for Carcassonne while I was visiting, it seemed to make sense buying Traders and Builders while wandering around the historic courtyards. However the prices soon put me off. In the castle gift shop the base game was selling for 38 Euros. Yep £31 at today's exchange rate. That would buy me two copies here from my favorite online supplier. The expansions didn't do much better. I decided to wait till I got back home to spend any money on game related items.

I had arranged for two nights of gaming when I got back. The first brought Glory to Rome and Macao to the table. I really like Macao, it has everything. Tiles, Cubes, Dice and Cards that all work very well. Yet again Hannah won the game continuing her winning streak. I messed up early on in the game picking up cards I couldn't build. Next time I will think hard about this.
Glory to Rome was good, it took a little while to get going as it was new to me and the others had only played it once. I was so close to winning but didn't quite manage it. If I had one more go I would have been the new Emperor. I really enjoyed this game and will be looking for a copy when the reprint hit the shelves later this month.

Tuesday night put me back in my French mood as I took the rains of my French army on the lookout for water slides and Ziggy Piggies. Waterloo had been picked up at the recent UK Games Expo by Rich and it was the first time it had hit the table. Luckily Rich had setup the game ready, although a few pieces were missing you get a lot of chunky wooden bits in the box.
I managed to win the game by continually harassing the English troops and managed a win by 3PM just as the Prussians arrived for tea. Overall a good game that felt a little restrictive at the start. My troops seemed hemmed in by the sheer number of other pieces and an annoying ridge line in the center of the board.
Next time I will play the role of the British and see if I can put history back on track.

Spiel des Jahres

2010-05-31T11:01:00.000-07:00

The nominations for this years Spiel des Jahres has been released.

Dixit Official Site | BGG

Identik (Portrayal) Official Site | BGG

Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age Official Site | BGG

a la Carte Official Site | BGG

Fresco Official Site | BGG

Out of all the games I think Dixit will win. It's a very good game that would suit families. It's not too complex and looks very nice. Roll through the Ages is a good game and one I enjoy playing and Fresco looks like a nice euro game but I am not sure if there is anything that new in its mechanics.

So, Dixit gets my vote.

Dungeon Lords

2010-05-28T03:35:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy week of gaming with two meets. The first we played a couple of fillers No Thanks and Franks Zoo followed by Power Grid.
It was a close game with all of us rushing to build 17 cities, We all managed it but only Dobbie could power then and scored the win. I think it was the closest Power Grid game I have played.

Later in the week we had a P.O.B. meet and I finally managed to give Dungeon Lords a go. It turned out to be a pretty clever but unforgiving worker placement game. I enjoyed teh game but played it very badly ending up loosing all my dungeon in the first year. I was then on teh back foot and managed a final score of -2. Not the best. A few early mistakes seaaled teh deal, I was just too evil and the Paladin decided that my dungeon was in most need of being cleansed. I think he must have had a bottle of Cilit Bang with him as it was sparkly white when he was finished.

Its a very good game and now on my wish/want list. I want to give to another play, just so I can beat my negative score.

The rest of the evening was filled with filler games, No Thanks, Franks Zoo and Pack'n'Stack.

Automobile

2010-05-16T04:42:00.000-07:00

We had a mini game session on Friday night and Ed chose Automobile as the main game of the evening. If anyone knows Ed he likes his economic games and Automobile was a pretty good one. I have mixed reviews of Martin Wallace games, I appreciate the technical aspex of the game but I find them a little hard to get my head around. Brass lived on my shelf for ages till I managed to get it to the table. Perikles is still there.

Automobile is all about building car factories, recuiting sales people and producing cars and selling them. Its a balancing act of building as much as you think you can sell, with unsold cars loosing you money. I was suprised it only plays for 4 turns, and the game lasted about 2 hours. I suspected it to last a little bit longer.

I won the game, not sure how I managed it but I went for a high end approach, building as many high end cars as I could and making sure they were all sold. Mid range cars bulked up the rest of my production. It seemed to work as I had only a few loss cubes, mainly for having sales guys twiddling there thumbs.
I will be happy to play it again, now I know what to do its definately going to make a difference. Also I thing the next play may be a little bit more aggressive, we were all playing fairly and not trying to under cut each other.

We had a little more time after Automobile so I pulled out Dominion Seaside as the others haven't seen or played with the cards. It was a good game but I just couldn't get my money engine running. We managed to end the game with all the points cards being bought up. The last province card ended the game, never seen that before.
I had enough cards to beef up my hand each round but no where near enough money in it to actually buy anything. Lesson learnt.

The house now has an Ipod Touch so I need to spend some time on teh app store looking for those board game conversions. The only problem I can see is wrestling the thing out of my sons hands. I may have to add another one to a virtual basket sometime soon.

New Games

2010-05-13T04:01:00.001-07:00

I haven't bought as many new games recently. Mainly because I have been trying to hold back and the other is I have been buying a few games on the Xbox. Most months its either one or the other.

Well today I have ordered up a few games.

Macao
No Thanks
Franks Zoo
Are you the Traitor?
Cthulhu Dice

Originally I was looking for a couple of card games to take on holiday. I always envision playing a few games while sitting in the sun but it doesn't always happen. My kids are happy to play but its difficult finding games that are portable and playable for them. Last year Uno and Colloretto were both played heavily, Uno I can take or leave while I do enjoy coloretto.
I am hoping that Franks Zoo and No Thanks will hit the spot, and I am tempted to take along Carc. Mainly as we will be 45 minutes away from the real place and a visit is going to happen.

After adding the light games in I tend to look for something for me, Macao was a good price and it sounds like a nice game. The Spiel guys talked about it a few eps back so it was added to the basket. The others were just fillers to bulk up the order.

Hopefully these will be delivered by Monday in time for some testing next week. I am also going to try and dig out a chess set so I can start teaching the kids how to play. Maybe I should start with Checkers!

Player Aids

2010-04-12T04:50:00.000-07:00

One of the best resource on BoardGameGeek has to be the abundance of player aid's. As soon as pickup a new game I will always have a shift to look for any player aids that are going to help. Sometimes these player made files are invaluable, the recent player aid for Ghost Stories helped by putting all of the icons and symbols onto a single sheet. These were printed and laminated and have proved invaluable.

So why don't publishers put decent player aids in the box to start with? I recently played Twilight Struggle, one of my favorite games. The player aids that come with it are ok, but no exactly inspiring and certainly don't convey enough information. It was half way through the game before I remembered that coup's in battleground countries reduce the defcon level. Oops!

For me a player aid needs to have all the key points on a single sheet, with maybe a second sheet if cards or buildings need explaining or summarizing. The player aid should be colourful, with different areas marked out, not just a black and white sheet of paper.

Some publishers, you know who they are seem to have a thing about stopping player aids. I understand copyright, but if its something that's going to help get you game played and sold then surely there should be no issue in allowing players to create and share there work. Personally I think great player aids should be incorporated into reprints with the designer acknowledged.

Maybe next time my commrades should have one of these. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/filepage/46383/major-sholtos-coolest-ever-guide-to-cold-war-opera

Iconica

2010-03-13T11:10:00.001-08:00

Latest game ordered is Iconica. A post of the Geek Dad feed brought the game to my attention and the artwork really stood out. I have ordered a copy of the base game along with some extra cards to save on teh postage.
I must admit it was a bit of an impulse buy, I know very little about the game but the artwork is worth a look. Guys on the geek seem to like it and for the cost its worth a punt. I will be on the lookout for some larger prints of this if it goes well.

Other gaming has been Kids of Carcassonne with the boys. It's a very good version of the game simplified for young ones. Still enough in there to give them something to think about without overloading them with rules.

No other gaming planned for this week, so Yucata will have to sate my appetite for victory points.

Black Ops

2010-03-11T06:38:00.001-08:00

Netrunner was played last night and it was great. Just as good as I remembered it and I am now ready to get the rest of my cards out the loft and start sifting through them building decks to play.
I played Corps first and managed to score the win. I was very lucky in that the runner didn't harass me even though I only have a couple of pieces of ice defending my forts. When he did break into my HQ I had 4 agendas in my hand and he missed them all. Systematic layoff allowed me to quickly score an agenda to win the round.
Next up I was the runner and I ran and ran. HQ and R&D were constantly hit and inside jobs allowed me to sneak past the first level of ice. I was knocked back a few times but at the cost of the corp paying up loads of bits to rez his ice. A few lucky runs on R&D and I had 7 points of agendas and it was game over.

A good pair of games that helped bring the rules back from a dormant part of my brain. REady for another.

The evening finished off with more card games. Battleline is a favorite and I won that one due to some lucky card play. We didn't play with the tactics cards, I admit I am not a great fan of them. We also played a game of Jambo, this time playing as African traders. Won that one as well, I had a good evening. Jambo always suprises me, sometimes I dismiss it as its a card game but there is a bit more to it than its "filler" status in my mind.

So from Alexander the great to Crash Everret, Inventive fixer all in one night.

Hidden Agenda

2010-03-08T03:10:00.001-08:00

I'm a sucker for cyberpunk, give me Snowcrash or Neuromancer to read and I'm a happy man. When I heard about Netrunner back in the 90's it was as if they had made a game for me. I was heavily into Magic at the time and a Cyberpunk based CCG filled with hackers against corp was music to me ears. I remember taking a trip to London on launch day and grabbing starter decks and boosters then reading the rules on the train back home.
The game was brilliant, it fitted the world very well and the rules were simple and elegant. Needless to say it was played again and again. Boosters were bought and around singles were swapped using new technology called email and newsgroups. I even travelled to play in some sealed tournaments organised by newsgroups. My £20 a month pipex account was well used then.
The first expansion came out out, Proteus and I travelled to Brighton to pick up a box of boosters. I have never bought a box of boosters before or since, I was that enthralled with the game.

Then the news of it being dropped hit. Why! its such a great game, but the market was being saturated with CCG's. I was buying Xfiles, Mech Warrior, Star Wars, L5R and others but none came close to using Black Dahlia on that ice infested run.

I haven't played Netrunner for a few years now. It occasionally hit the table after a bit of nostalgic banter and this Wednesday sees it rise again from the ashes. Decks have been sorted, rules have been read. Hopefully Wednesday will involve some good games, that said the fact that Netrunner is going to be played means there will.

Wu-Bob!

2010-02-26T04:41:00.000-08:00

Ghost stories was played on Wednesday night and after a false start (read every haunter and tormentor, not ones on your board, yikes!) things went well. I am very pleased with the look and feel of the game, the artwork is really nice. The plastic ghosts are good and there is enough bits to make a good game without needing hundreds of baggies to keep things organised.

Needless to say we lost. We managed to get about half way through the ghost deck before we forgot to use out yin-yang tokens to flip back some villager tiles. A noobie mistake but we were busy trying to fend off hoards of ghost. The ghosts did seem to appear think and fast and boards were being over run quickly. Mainly due to the black curse die bringing in more spooks.

I also found that we didn't use the villager tiles as much as I though. Probably because we are not really up to speed with what they do. We also missed opportunities with our special powers. I was yellow and didn't use my enfeeblement ability the first few turns as I forgot about it.

I am going to give it a solo try over the weekend, more to get the rules down. I hope to get a bit further through the deck.

Afterwards we played Stone Age, one of my favorite games. Things progressed well with Gornad choosing the action I wanted pretty much every time. Mudhoney struggled but it was his first time and it was getting late. I managed to win the game by a sizable margin. Mainly due to holding lots of cards. They always seem to be the game winner for me.

A good nights gaming, but I always leave wanting to play more games.

Who you gonna call?

2010-02-24T03:50:00.000-08:00

It's nearly the end of February and things have been busy. If I haven't been delving into virtualization at work I have been running with an aim of completing a 10 mile run at the end of the year.
This hasn't left a huge amount of time for gaming, and even less for typing up what's been going on but some gaming has been had.

POB has met up again, last week and it seemed to be a night of the classics. Settlers and Tigris were played. I even managed to scrape a win in Tigris. It's a game that only just "clicked" and made sense. I was lucky in that 2 of the 4 players hadn't played the game before. I can sympathise with them as its a complex game and one that you have to think about.
Other games played were Stone Age, Poo, Pirates and a prototype card game designed by a newcomer.

Other gaming has seen Dominion: Seaside hit the table and I really enjoyed this one. I am desperate to give it another play as I have only used 10 of the new cards. The delayed action mechanic is nice, having a trail of caravans supplying you with cards is very handy.

New purchase of the month is Ghost Stories. I have had my eye on this for a while but the price has put me off. I finally managed to scoop up a copy on an auction. This looks great and hopefully its going to get played tonight. I hear it's hard, but I hope its enjoyable enough to want repeat plays. Nothing worse than playing a game only to find nobody else liked it.

A game that has caught my eye is the new Fantasy Flight war game set on Westros. I am a big fan of the GRRMartin books and FFG always puts a lot of effort into there games. The fact that it uses Battlelore as a system, or part system is interesting. The only downside I can see is the cost. Games just seem to be getting more expensive these day.

King Kong was never like this.

2010-01-29T03:50:00.000-08:00

We had a P.O.B meet this week and the Wine Vaults is turning out to be a really good venue. It's quiet on a Wednesday so we don't get many distractions and the beer is good.

A good turn out this week meant we had 3 tables of games running. I setup Steam on one and we had a 5 player game running. Most of us had played Age of Steam or Steam so only Neil was learning the game. It played out well and was quite close at the end with Peter scoring the win. Initial cube deployment was very random so it was all about economic track placement and Peter did well from the start. I came in last due to some poor track placement and not getting the city growth when I wanted it.

Another table were playing Chaos in the Old world which looked quite nice. I know very little about this game but wouldn't mind giving it a go later on.
After these were finished a few people left so we settled down to some card games. A 5 player game of Race for the Galaxy was started and I pulled out Poo!. I bought it as a throw away game but our 4 player game was so much fun we played it again. The game is all about throwing poo at each other and trying not to reach 15 poo markers. Our first game was hilarious as 3 of us managed to get to 14 while Neil hovered around 8. His final card would have taken all of us out but some nifty card playing from Ade and Rob managed to deflect poo back at him in there final death throws. It was a classic ending and a game that will be remembered for a while. All in a much better game than I expected.

Closing orders were rang but not before we squeezed in a quick game of Mow, the RftG game was called as we had run out of time.

It's all so Quiet!

2010-01-20T05:54:00.000-08:00

Gamers where are you? It's been deathly quiet on the gaming front. I don't think anything has been played since new years and its getting to be a bit of a problem. It's not that I have masses of new games to play but I would like to replay some of my last purchases or even some of those ones at the top of the shelf.

A POB meet has been arranged for next week so hopefully some gaming will happen in January. On a different note Agricola is no longer No1 at the geek. Puerto Rico has grabbed its Stanna stairlift and motored its way back to the top. I enjoy both games, but neither are really my favorites or number ones really. I maybe enjoy Agricola a little more than Puerto Rico but I understand why PR is so popular. In fact I struggle to think of what my No 1 game would be. Different games are for different groups or times and there are many games that I would happily play at the drop of a hat. Picking my No 1 is just too difficult.

Maybe I haven't played it yet?

No fly's on me, well maybe a few.

2009-12-30T08:06:00.000-08:00

Holiday gaming was a bit light but I did manage to gets the guys together for one nights gaming. First up was MOW! which has become my favorite card filler game. It's a basic game of putting numbered cards in sequence and not being caught out with no cards to play. One of the guys hadn't played it before and really enjoyed it. It can get bit vindictive as some cards allow you to change the direction of play, but its all good fun.

After this we played Endeavor another new favorite. For a 5 player game it played out different than I expected. Only 3 of the regions opened up and then only in rounds 5-6. There was not much shipping going on and more attacking than usual. I managed to score the win, but I have played it more than the others so I did have an advantage. Some of the others were stuck on low level buildings and slow population growth, next time they will have a better idea.

The only other gaming has been with the kids new Lego games. Between them they have 4 and the quality varies. The best one so far is Minatourus, its a maze navigation game that also has a Minator that can attack the players and movable wall pieces that you can use to block your opponents. There is scope to add to the maze and use additional rules, but for now its enough of a game for the kids.

I'm a Storyteller

2009-12-21T03:13:00.000-08:00

Last week was full of gaming as the various groups met up before Christmas to play a few games and have a drink.
The first game played at P.O.B. last week was Dixit. Initially we were a bit sceptical about the game. We had been dealt a hand of cards and told we needed to tell a story. Auctions we can handle, bluffing not a problem but asking us to make up stories seemed a little odd.

Actually the game was very good, when its your turn you pick one of the cards in your hand. These are beautifully illustrated pictures of mainly surreal states. You then say a word or phrase that would tell a story about that card. It's then placed face down on the table. The rest of the players then need to pick a card which they think would also match the story and place them face down.
Cards are then shuffled and turned over, each player then places a token on the table matching the card position that they think belongs to the storyteller.
Points are then awarded to each card with tokens and the storyteller can gain more points if his card is chosen unless it chosen by all or no players. So the story you tell cannot be too vague or too simple.
The rounds flew by and there were several "What!" moments as non of the cards seemed to match the story.
After our initial scepticism I really enjoyed the game. Putting down cards that matched very close to the story was fun knowing that I could get more score from the other players. I lost out to Mudhonney my one point but would be very happy to play it again.
It's classed as a party game and I would play it over Wits and Wagers any day.

Stone Age

2009-11-24T12:19:00.000-08:00

I had a package delivery on Friday while I was out and the only item to big to fit through the letterbox that I was expecting was my Santa gift.
I couldn't pick it up until yesterday and resisted opening it for all of.....5 seconds. I kidded myself into finding out as I had a few other games on Christmas lists. I wouldn't want two copies of the same game would I?

A copy of Stone Age greeted me as I ripped upon the box. Fantastic, I love this game and have had a game running on Yucata since I found out about it. Now I have my own proper copy and it should hit the table this week.

Thanks BGG Secret Santa.

Looks like P.O.B. has a new venue, we will be at the Wine Vaults tomorrow night if anyone is in the area and wants a game. Hopefully this venue will last longer than previous ones. Tomorrows games are going back to old school Euros. Puerto Rico is making an appearance along with some others, I am tempted to bring along Caylus as I haven't played it for a while.

Santa's on his way

2009-11-18T09:46:00.000-08:00

Boardgamegeek run a secret Santa every year and this years one has just kicked off. This will be my third year and the previous two have been really good.

Once everyone has signed up Tom Vassel supplies each participant with there target, you can then spend some time looking at there profile and wish list. You can also use a Santa account to start sending anonymous emails to your target which is fun. My last targets have been in America and Australia, this year its a Canadian and they have a pretty good list of games on there wishlist.

I rarely get games for Christmas and this makes sure that I get at least one good one. I am not hoping for any one particular game this year, although Dungeon Lords and Dominion Seaside would be nice additions.

Looks like P.O.B. has found a new home. The Wine Vaults pub in Southsea, our first meet there is next week and it will be nice to have the room for everyone to meet up and play some of the new games.

Gaming wise here has been a bit slow, maybe because of Modern Warfare 2 being released but also work has been busy. Endeavor and Notre Dame have seen the light recently and they have been well received. Endeavor continues to impress me, last game I tried to go for a building strategy as I am usually stuck with lower buildings. The last game went well for me with the other players missing on attack options so I managed to take over enough cities to claim a large share of the trade routes.

Civilization with dice

2009-10-21T02:50:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy month with work and home but a few games have been played. I was lucky enough to get Endeavour and Roll Through the Ages last week as presents. Endeavor looks amazing and it should get its first play tomorrow night. RTtA has been played and I am pretty impressed.
i haven't yet played its grown up companion but there is a very good game lurcking in the small box.
First play was against Dobbie and we quickly started rolling the lovely wooden dice. I went for getting a few early developments while Dobbie wanted more cities and the great wall of China. the dice were rolled and after 30 mins I checked over the winning conditions. First to 5 developments, wait up I have 7 already. Ooops. Dobbie had finished his great wall so we decided to have two more rounds then score. We both then went for pure score with me finishing a hanging gardens while Dobbie went for everything else.
I won 33 to 27, Dobbie would have won but he had more disasters than me.

I am going to give it another play tomorrow but first impressions were very good. there is a free expansion available for it as well that adds a bit more meat to it, but I think I can live without that for a bit.

I have also finished painting the robots from my Robo Rally set. They look pretty good, so I will post some pics of them soon. Until then, I need to re-read the Endeavor rules as I don't want to miss the game end conditions on that one.

My Brain hurts!

2009-09-10T03:48:00.001-07:00

Last night I played Neuland and it was painful. Don't get me wrong I enjoyed it but it was certainly a thinking game and one that we struggled to get our heads around.
After a few rounds we had grasped the mechanics of the game, but were no where near knowing how to win the game.

It's a very clever game of resource and time manipulation. You have to use your workers to produce resources to then convert resources so that you can build bigger resource processing building. Each action takes time and the more actions you take the longer it will be until your next turn.
I screwed up my last go and left it wide open for Hannah to win, next time I really must pay more attention to the other players workers on the board.

After that brain draining game we finished off with a quick game of Ubongo. I started out strong but failed to beat the others so two game losses for me.

Other gaming in the week has been Pitchcar with my kids and there friends which was really good. They are getting pretty good at it, but tend to flick a bit hard at times causing there cars to shoot off the track. Plus a bit of Carc and Catan on the 360 against Gornad which has been good.

Pandemic expansion is released next week and I am really looking forward to that one, I hope its going to add some great bits to the game.

On a side note, Monopoly has released an online version that uses google maps as the board. So far the servers are being absolutely hammered, but keep trying if you want to buy your road.

Moooooo!!

2009-08-27T00:46:00.000-07:00

Another mini games night this week and the expansion to Kingsburg made an appearance. To Forge a Realm is really 5 mini expansions all of which are pretty good and add to the base game. We played with the soldier tokens expansion and it did add to the game. I was determined to keep the 4 point token to the end to help scoring so went for a military strategy and built as many +battle buildings as I could. I started out well with Gornad in the lead by a couple of points, but the others caught up. At the last round things were very close and even closer at the end when 3 of us tied for first place, what was worse was we had all spent our goods for extra soldiers in the last winter battle. So the game ended with a tie, but it was a good game.

Dominion was also played, this time with no Intrigue cards mainly because carrying two boxes around is a bit painful. I thin I need to invest in a carry box that I can use to transport a couple of decks around. My economic engine stalled and I always seemed to end up with 7 gold, never enough to buy a province.

the night ended with a game of Mow, its French for Moo! Its a clever card game where players build up herds of cows and try to not pickup the cow cards with flies on it. It's similar to 6 Nimt but maybe a little less stressful.

Another mini session is organised for next week, so plenty of gaming is happening at the moment which makes a change.

Please sir, can I have some more?

2009-08-20T00:42:00.000-07:00

It has been a pretty good few days game wise, Pitchcar was played with the kids on Sunday and the 2 games we played were very close. Each was won by mistakes, or a bad flick on the last lap. Pitchcar is a fun game and its so easy to just setup and get going. I must have a look at the expansions some time, the ramp expansion looks like it could be fun.

Last night I visited Mudnoney's for a few games, we had arranged to give Dominion a go with some of the Intrigue cards. I have had Intrigue for over a month now and not played it. We used one of the suggested setups and it was a very strange game. A bit slow as there were few opportunities to make money. Or we missed them. Some of the new cards are just mean, the Torturer gives the other players a choice of either discarding 2 cards or taking a curse. Used with a throne room it was very nasty. I managed to win the game by just burning through the estate cards and finishing off the remodel pile. I enjoyed it, but did feel it went on a little longer than usual, but there were new cards to read.

Next up was Agricola, playing with the "I" deck. It was a good game and I lost out by 5 points in the end. I made a stupid mistake in the first round and couldn't feed my family so picked up my first ever begging card. things trundled along for a bit but Mudhoney played a summer house card for 8 points at the end securing a big points advantage. It was a good, close game and other than the begging problem I wasn't sure what else I could have done to win.

Lastly we played Cant Stop, something a bit lighter to end the evening. I am usually very bad at luck games and things started out badly. I just couldn't stop and lost everything for the two rounds. My typical fare, but I came back strong going for the 5-6-7-8 columns and just kept on rolling. I managed to score the win but it was a close one with the others each finishing on two columns as well.

No more gaming is planed for the next few days, so it will be back to Stone Age on Yucata. But we were discussing holding a Formula D tournament with the group, that could be fun.

The Dice Tower Awards

2009-08-13T04:57:00.001-07:00

The 2008 Dice Tower Awards were revealed last week. For those of you that don't know the Dice Tower is a podcast hosted by Tom Vassal and covers board and card games. It's a good listen with some good humour and lots of information on new and old games.

This year I was asked to be on the panel and I jumped at the offering. After the initial selections were made we all had to vote on the different categories. I managed to get plays in on most of the games in the categories which helped out.

Anyway, the categories and winners are

Best Game of the Year , Dominion
Small Publisher of the Year, Fragor Games for Snow Tails
Best New Designer, Donald Vaccarino for Dominion
Best Reprint, Formula D
Most Innovative, Space Alert
Best Expansion, Descent : Road to Legend
Best Artwork, Battlestar Gallactica
Best Family Game, Formula D

I am pretty happy with the games that won, they are all good games and ones that I enjoy playing. I think Dominion was going to win Best Game hands down, its one of my favorite games of the year and I haven't even used any of my Intrigue cards yet.

Formula D also did very well, its another good game that has benefited from the reprint. I wanted it to win Best Artwork as well but Battlestar is a worthy winner.

Gaming has been a little light at the moment, but a session has been planned for next week so hopefully some new games will hit the table. I am dying to give Dominion: Intrigue a play, so we shall see.

El Grande

2009-08-06T05:47:00.001-07:00

A mini meet was held last night as I wanted to give El Grande a go. I recently picked it up as its in the top ten games on the geek and looked pretty good. After reading the rules earlier in the week I thought it looked like a very basic game and one that I was surprised had such a high rating.

Anyway, four of us sat down and started the game off, after the second round we realised something was wrong. We were playing the power cards wrong so started again. This started off well for me and even better in round 2 when I was able to bid the highest and use an action card to score a whopping 27 points. This put me well in the lead. for the rest of the game it was a race for second place. I think I finished on around 135 points, a very good game. Simple but very well thought out.

My luck turned for the next game, Mow is a card game about flies and cowes. Its all about playing numbered cards in order and not being unable to place a card. Its a fun game that is very easy to pickup and play. I came last after three appalling rounds where I picked up between 30 and 40 flies.

With an hour to go I pulled out a few games to choose and Blokus was picked. Four player Blokus is a very good game and one I enjoy playing. Lost the first game and won the second with only a single 3 point piece left that I was unable to play.

A diverse mix of games, area control abstract and flies. El Grande stood out and I was really impressed with it. Price point is maybe a bit high but it did come with 5 expansions so there is plenty of game play in the box.

Noticed that the Kingsburg expansion has just been released so that on a wish list, also the new Middle Earth Quest game has appeared out of nowhere. That needs a bit of a look to see what its all about. But above all the expansion for Pandemic is slated for this month and that's a must buy.

A game of musical chairs

2009-07-28T05:40:00.000-07:00

We had a POB meet last night although there were only eight of us we still managed to get in a good number of hours play.

First up was Space Alert a game that I have been interested in for a while. It's a co-op game where the players work as a team to stop there space craft from being destroyed by alien ships. The novel factor of the game is that you play along to a mission CD. This is telling you what phase of the game you are in and when enemies attack. While this android voice was talking we were frantically trying to plan out our moves. These included firing lasers, powering up shields and wiggling the mouse to stop the computer going into screen saver mode. When the mission CD ends you all end up with a series of programmed moves that you then play out.
Space alert is one of the most frantic and stressful games I have played in a while. It was like watching an episode of Laurel and Hardy as we bumbled our way around the ship shooting at baddies that hadn't appeared then moving off while someone else moving into position to find that laser had run out of power. Teamwork wasn't our thing and we lost.
I really enjoyed the game and look forward to giving it another play sometime.

The other table had finished cutthroat caverns so we rejoined and Game of Thrones was pulled out. I have only played this game once and was sorely beaten by Steerpike. I suppose life in the castle had turned him into a Lannister and his red troops had won the game by turn 3 of my first game.
Tonight was different, 5 players and we were all ready. Unfortunately Squid boy managed to sink my navy in the first turn and subsequently took over house Lannisters ancestral home the following turn. Meanwhile Ollie and Rob were expanding in the south and Mike's Starks were pouring down from the north. I was sandwiched between two fronts and had to spend more time defending than expanding.
The game drew on and it was obvious that it was either going to be Ollie or Mike to take the win. In the end they both finished with the same number of strongholds but Ollie had the higher supply so won the game.
The game had run for nearly 3 hours and it was gone midnight so we packed up.

A good nights gaming, the other table had played a couple of games of Race for the Galaxy during our epic battle of Westeros. I am not sure when a Game of Thrones will be played again, it takes a while to play but I am hoping it won't be as long as last time.

Modern Art

2009-07-23T08:32:00.000-07:00

I have recently been playing Stone Age on Yucata. I think I first heard about it on the Meeples and Minatures podcast and I kind of brushed it off. I was probably busy with Pandemic at the time.

It's on Beta at Yucata and I have really been enjoying it, I have about 5 games of it on the go at the moment. One of the best things about the implementation is that you can see the board and cards as they really are. I think the board is one of the best looking boards I have seen.

I am a sucker for things that look nice and I am sure if I had seen this earlier a copy would be on my shelf already. I have had a look back over the games and wondered how many I have bought just because they looked good. Suprisingly not a huge amount. Does this mean that I have missed out on some gems or just don't appreciate good board game art.

Dominion is a great game, but I find the art a bit bland but functional. Some companies seem to spend more tiem on the artwork than others. I suppose it's down to cost. After developing a game can they justify pasting on some uber artwork hoping that it will be enough to entice the geek crown into buying it?

So, my top 5 best looking game boards at the moment are probably

Stone Age, its new.
Formula D, I love the cartoon look of the reprint.
Hannible, rome vs Carthage. Sucker for map boards and this is gorgeous.
Thebes, works well with the theme and its another map board.
Age of Empires III, yet another map.

Any others I should be looking at?

Back to Gaming

2009-07-17T13:46:00.000-07:00

After a two week break enjoying the sights and sun of Spain I am ready for some gaming.

This week a couple of the guys came over as we had planned a game of Shogun. It was a great game, playing with 5 players is always my favorite number as it increases the conflicts.
A couple of the guys hadn't played it before but after the first year had been scored things were making sense. I was in the lead mainly down to being left alone to build in two regions while Panzerfaust started his warmongering ways.
Year two heated up with a few of us loosing provinces that were ready to supply us with gold for the season or further supplies. I came in second to Moley after he managed to take over enough provinces with buildings to score a good number of points. Well played, you managed to keep quite and just amass armies ready for a massive summer offensive.
I was a little disappointed in that we all managed to keep our peasants under control and feed during the winter months. It always adds a bit of tension when players start loosing badly defended provinces due to lack of rice.
Everyone enjoyed it and all agreed we should setup another game sometime.

Next up was the bean farming game Bonhanza. This has been on my shelf for a while now as I was never that sure about it. I had read the rules before going on holiday and watched a couple of web videos on how to play.
I explained the rules, ran through a couple of dummy hands and it seemed to make sense. The cards were dealt and after a couple of hesitant rounds it clicked. Stink beans were soon being traded for Chili beans and the game started to flow nicely. Unfortunately it was getting late so we decided to just play through one run of the deck. Romeo won and surprisingly everyone was very keen to play it again another night. I had just worked out some strategies and realised that you really had to trade away cards from your hand so you could plant and harvest your own. Then the game ended. Next time things will be different.

Games on there way are El Grande and Mow, probably two extremes. One set in ancient Spain where players vie for control over Spain's provinces, the other a french game about cows and flies.

Game group meet soon and a Game of Thrones is planned, just need to read the rules again and maybe get some strategy tips from Steerpike ;-)

Gaming a plenty

2009-06-25T02:06:00.000-07:00

There has been a plethora of gaming going on recently and some fantastic games have hit various tables.

My copy of Steam arrived and a 4 player game was arranged, playing only the basic rules as we were all relatively new to games involving shipping cubes between cities. It played really well, a cut down, sleek intercity 125 version of Age of Steam. I lost due to not having enough cubes to move around without scoring heavily for my opponents.

Cutthroat Caverns has also been played and I was pleasantly surprised with it. Backstabbing is always fun and set it in a fantasy dungeons and dragons setting is going to appeal to any old school RPGer. Again I lost this but enjoyed it enough to put it on my wish list.

My losing streak continued into last weeks POB meet, where I was soundly beaten at Bang, hustled by Leanne at Small World, dun over at Intrigue (Not the Dominion expansion) and killed off at Shadow Hunters. A great nights gaming even if I didn't win a thing.

Last night everything changed, Moley dropped in for a couple of hours gaming and my luck changed. War of Edath was played twice, its a good game that is growing on me. Now we have the base rules down I can only see it getting better. One game a piece, although I foolishly suggested we just pick our armies. I went for variety, Moley went for heavy cavalry. Enough said.
My copy of Intrigue is on its way, but the base game of Dominion still cries out to be played. A random selection of kingdom cards made for a very interesting game. Only one the laboratory and spy cards were giving out extra actions so a hard game was fought. Luckily my adventurers always managed to help find me some gold and the game was mine.
Rounding off the night was a game of Battleline, where I managed to score a pretty easy victory even if I forgot that there were cards numbered to 10 in the game. I blame those Scottish types.

Mini Game Session

2009-05-29T02:54:00.000-07:00

Last night was an impromptu game session. Moley and Mudhoney came over and we decided to have a Euro only game session.

First up was Ticket to Ride Switzerland, second time I have played it and the first with 3 players. It was a much more cut throat with 3 players as we were all trying to get to similar places. Moley won in the end by scoring a huge amount of points with his destination cards. I came in last after being blocked off on some of my cards.
It played well with 3 players, much more planning needs to be done to control the choke points on the map.

Next up was Princes of Florence, this game doesn't get played much and I don't know why. I really like it and have made an effort to play it a bit more often. After a quick recap of the rules for Moley we started. Things were pretty even at the start, I made a few mistakes at the start. Bidding for builders and not using them. I also usually go for a couple of jesters but only managed to get one.
Final scoring was close and I thought I had it, but Mudhoney had bought a couple of Prestige cards and the helped him win by 2 points. A well played game and one I am desperate to play again.

That was it for the night as it was getting on and we all seemed to be in need of a rest.

Project for the weekend is Dune Express which is a free print and play game that is getting some good reviews. I should be able to get a decent sized board made and the dice ready for next week. It will give me something to do.

Steam is on its way to me and probably bouncing in the back of a royal mail van as I type. This one looks very good, an updated version of Age of Steam and will be my first proper train game. Apparently its not supposed to have been released until June 25th, but IGUK have a few copies that you can buy now.

New releases..... Meah

2009-05-18T03:51:00.000-07:00

There seems to have been a bit of a drought in new releases so far this year. Marring a few reprints there has been nothing that I have really been looking forward to.

I am hoping that the year 2009 won't be known as a bit of a dud and I am sure that there will be lots of good stuff released around convention time, but so far its been a bit lacking.

Age of Steam 4th edition looks ok and I need to have a good train game in my collection, but with Steam being released in the next couple of weeks I am holding off.

Space Alert looks good, but the price has put me right off. Although I may be tempted after a game. It sounds like a good co-op game and the CD sounds like fun. Although it could be a bit gimmicky.

Small world was one I was going to buy, but after a couple of games I will hold off. Its a good game, but maybe I was expecting something with a bit to it. Not to say I wouldn't say no to a copy, its just there are other games that I would prefer to play.

There are a couple of expansions that I will definitely part my hard earned cash for. Pandemic's expansion is a must, what I have read about it looks really good, and playing with a traitor or 5 players will certainly add to the game.

More Dominion cards can't be bad, but I am worried about the cost. Do we really need another set of victory and money cards? I can understand why they are doing it, they want it to be playable without the base set, but does that make it an expansion?

Lastly the expansion for Kingsburg will finally be released this year. Kingsburg is a great game and one I overlook. Having a number of small expansions in one box is a good idea as you can bring them in slowly to expand and change the game.

So, I am back to playing some older games. Princes of Florence and Brass have been played recently and they are both good solid games. I am hankering after Powergrid and Agricola again and this weeks POB should see them hit the table on Friday.

There are rumors that a copy of Dune may find its way to POB on Friday, now that should be fun.

From out of Africa

2009-05-14T02:45:00.000-07:00

Last night was another Wednesday gaming night. This time my mate Moley was over with a present. A handcrafted Mancala set from Sierra Leone. Its really nice and after running through the rules we played best of three.
First game I lost big time, I missed out some of the moves and handed it to him on a plate. Next game I won and the last I lost. I was too busy looking at what I was doing and not what both sides could do. A typical failing of mine.

Mancala is a nice simple abstract game and looking it up on the web I see that there are other games that you can play with the set.

As we still had several hours of gaming I wanted to get a couple of need games to the table. The first was the Switzerland expansion for Ticket to Ride. This turned out to be a bit more cut throat than a typical game, but I managed to win by about 18 points. All thanks to a lucky ticket draw at the end of the game. The map worked really well and the new destination ticket types were really good. However the board quality was a bit poor. On one side half of the number were chopped. Plus there was a 5 train link on the board and no mention of how to score it!

Next up was a new card game. War for Edadh which has been self published by some uk designers. It took a bit of time to get our heads around it, slowly working through the basic rules but it has potential. I think we only just scratched the surface of the game and I want to give it another go. It will be in the bag to POB next week.
The artwork of the cards is really nice, I like the style even if some people have commented on how "busy" the cards are with information. I will probably do a review of this for the IGUK site later in the month.

Time was upon us but after another cup of tea we played a game of Lord of the Rings the Confrontation. A game that I like but never get to play enough. I lost with Moley managing to get the hairy footed Frodo to Mordor after Sam managed to snafu the witch king from me. A good game and one that I will make a point of playing again soon.

A good nights gaming with some new and old games hitting the table. Not sure whats planned for next week, will have to wait and see.

Lend us a pony.

2009-05-06T01:45:00.000-07:00

Gaming has been virtually non existent the last week, bank holidays tend to have that effect with me. I have to many jobs to do around the house and other things going on to think about gaming.

Luckily Brass is going to see the light of day again tonight if all goes well. I am quite looking forward to it after narrowly loosing last week. I have a better grasp of the game now and what I should be doing and looking out for. Also taking a loan out early in the game seems like a good thing you don't loose as many points and the cash increase is well worth it.

Taking loans in games always seems wrong to me, I hate being in debt but in some games it seems you have to do it. Age of Steam is a good example as is Container. I don't think you could win in those games without taking a loan.

Its one of my kids birthdays this week, unfortunately he didn't ask for Twilight Imperium for his birthday present, but he is getting older and closer to being able to play some more interesting games. I think Carcasonne or Bonhanza are up next for the mini gamer. I am sure Stink Beans will apeall.

Brass

2009-05-01T00:33:00.000-07:00

I finally managed to play Brass this week. It's been on my shelf for about a year after a trade with Steerpike. I like Martin Wallace games even if I find the rules a bit tricky at times. Brass has not really been played because I found the rules a bit hard going.
Mudhoney and Hannah came over on Wednesday after deciding to give it a go. They had played it before last year, so after a quick refresh of the rules and a cup of tea we setup the game.

The basics of Brass is an economics game where you are trying to expand your empire throughout Lancashire with a view to produce coal and iron, and sell cotton from your mills. It reminded me a little of Powergrid mixed in with Caylus. The game takes place over two ages, the first is the canal period where you build canals to move your goods around and the later is the railway period.
The Canal period ended with me and Mudhoney having exactly the same score with Hannah trailing a little. At the end of the railway period Mudhoney had gained a lead of around 18 points over me. I had gambled on selling some cotton in the last turn and blew it loosing me 12 points. Not enough to win but it would have closed the gap up considerably.

Brass was really good, I am eager to play it again now that I know how to play it. I am not sure how well it will play with two players, I need to check. If it's ok then it may see an outing next week.

Catan, sheep anyone?

2009-04-14T05:32:00.000-07:00

Gaming over Easter was pretty non existent, other than a quick game of Hey! that's my fish with the kids all other gaming was online.

I decided to rack up the difficulty level of Catan on the 360. I have won every game played on easy AI so upped the AI to moderate. I expected it to be tough, but I am sure those AI players are in cahoots. I played it three times over the weekend and in each managed to get a good clear lead to around 6-7 points then was shut out of all trading and received the robber more times than anyone.
What really galled me was when the other AI players caught up with my score they still wouldn't trade with me but happily swapped wood for sheep between themselves.

If this is what Medium is like, Hard must be a killer!

Catan is very well produced on the 360, it looks and plays really well and I can't fault it other than my experiences with the AI. If anyone wants a game, just let me know.

Bocage

2009-04-10T07:38:00.001-07:00

Combat Commander was played again this week, Hedgerows and hand grenades was the scenario and my Americans were beaten. The scenario was a nightmare for movement and line of sight. The hedgerows funneled my troops into one area and my hand management got them stuck. I had 3 ambush cards for most of the game, desperate to use them on a close assault but a lack of move cards held me back.
My artillery attacks initially did very well, but I never had the troops available in the right place to capitalize on it. In the end Mudhoney managed to win on sudden death with the majority of the VP's.
It was a good game if a little frustrating for me. It has however taught me more about hand management.

Other gaming has been only online. Yspahan has been released on the Yucata web site and I really like this game. It's a mid weight euro game that seems to tick the boxes for me. I have also got Catan for the Xbox 360 and enjoyed playing it this week. I think I have played 4 or 5 games against the easy AI and won easily. I think it's time to up the skill level a bit.

Jungle speed and the Swiss ticket to ride expansion arrived recently. I am desperate to give the Swiss map a play. The rules look really good and I am sure its going to make for some tense games. Hopefully this will hit the table soon.

Brutes attack

2009-04-05T11:32:00.000-07:00

Anyone who wants to give my brute a fight, click here.

A Weeks Gaming

2009-04-03T08:11:00.000-07:00

A varied week of gaming started of on Sunday night in Guildford. Games hitting the table were Blokus, Ubongo and Formula D.

Blokus went down well and it became quite an aggressive game with lots of blocking going on. Frank managed to win 2 of the 3 games but most were very close. I was trying to start off with different pieces trying to gain the edge on getting the most number of corners into the center. It worked well, but not well enough.
Ubongo is a good quick game and I managed to grab the win. Frank didn't really like it but the other 2 did so I expect it to be played again. Some of the puzzles seemed to be harder than the others but I am sure its not the case.

As the Formula 1 started on Sunday it was fitting to play Formula D. Due to time constraints and a diversion on the way home we only played a single lap. I started in pole position but ended last. Typical ! We played the advanced rules for the first time and they made a huge difference. You couldn't afford to be too gung ho with your car.
I do like Formula D and the new expansion is tempting but the dice just hate me.

In the week I played Heck'n'Peck with the kids. I thought that they would get the game but it was a bit of a struggle. My youngest beat me by 3 worms so he must have been doing something right.

Delivered this week was Ticket to Ride Switzerland as I was after a TTR map that played well for 2 players and Jungle Speed as it looks like a great laugh. I am sure the POB guys will have a blast with it.

3,3,3,3,1,1,1,2,2,2,1,1,1 !!!!

2009-03-23T09:58:00.000-07:00

Last Friday was the March meet of P.O.B. and we had a good turnout with some new faces. Plenty of games were played over the 5 hours of gaming. 5 hours! yep, bet it went by in a blurr.

First up I played Pit, maybe the loudest game I have ever played. It was fun, especially when one player thought he had to collect one of every card type. The rest of us couldn't figure out what was going on until he asked if it was really possible to collect one of each kind. Good fun.

Next up we split off into some smaller groups and I played Cleopatra and the Society of Architect's which was a card management type game. It had some lovely pieces that you used to build up an Egyptian area that looked amazing at the end of the game. I managed to win the game by about 10 talans which was good. Can't really say I expected to win but I just went hell for leather on the build using corrupted resources. Then offered huge amounts to the gods to off set the corruption.
Next up was Chicago Express which is a great train game. Not as deep as Age of Steam which was running on another table but has more than enough strategy to keep it fresh. I struggled a bit at the start although I have played it before. Its all about bidding enough money for the railroad shares without paying over the odds. I did OK, but not enough to win.

The other games, Age of Steam and Age of Empires 3 were finishing up now so we decided to play a couple of games of werewolf to round off the evening. Unfortunately Mudhoney had forgotten his cards, luckily I had a copy of coloretto with me. So stripy chameleons were werewolves and green ones were villagers. It all worked out well, especially for the werewolves who managed to win both games.

Next meet has been scheduled for the 24th April if anyone fancies coming along.

Go home to Mama

2009-03-04T08:02:00.000-08:00

Monday saw Combat Commander Mediterranean land on the table courtesy of Mudhoney. We have been trying to get some regular plays in of Combat Commander as we both enjoy the game.
We played the scenarios Saint Agthna which involved an American patrol coming across some Italian defenders. The Italians had the advantage of numbers, plus they could hide some of there troops and deploy them when the time marker hit 2. the Americans had better weapons with a hvy machine gun and light motor as well as a couple of medium machine guns.

I played as the Americans and deployed my units in two areas on my side of the map. My plan was to move one group armed with the hvy mg into a building while the rest were to move up the edge of the map and flank the Italians.

Things started out well, I quickly took hold of the buildings at the bottom of the map taking out the Italians that were using it. Meanwhile my other squad was getting pinned down by a medium mg in the woods. Over the next few turns my hvy mg was making mincemeat of any Italians I could see from the relative safety of there building. My other flank had now lost its leader and was not looking so good.

The Italian reserves appeared and Mudhoney decided to spread then about a bit. Unfortunately they were in range of my hvy mg and they didn't last that long. The number of Italian casualties was mounting and things were not looking good for them. Several had routed home to mama which I couldn't really blame them for. Things were getting worse on my other flank. I had lost my leader but gained a hero only to loose him again. Without a leader movement and firing was hard work. Especially as the Italians were dug into foxholes in the woods on top of a hill. My mortar rounds were ineffective as were any shots I sent that way. I sent another group that way to help relieve them and to add more firepower but it wasn't looking pretty.
Next thing we know a fire had started near the Italians and was spreading both towards them and a small unit I had sent that way. Fortune came my way with a jam and subsequent break of the Italians mg which allowed me to move up a veteran unit. They survived some pot shots and then advanced into combat with some ambush cards. I won the fight and the game as the Italians had now hit there surrender limit.

I was trailing on VP's all the way through the game as I couldn't get to the objective areas. I was pinned down in a couple of places and was loath to move my heavy gunners out of there cover. I was pushing for a surrender win and it eventually came.

It was a good match and if Mudhoney had placed his reserves in a different place things would have changed for the worse.

Using the Chapel

2009-02-25T04:10:00.001-08:00

I have been playing Dominion quite a bit recently. Mainly using the BSW site as its nice and quick. The system does all the shuffling and works out all the actions and gold which makes life quite a bit easier.

My play of Dominion has evolved over the last couple of weeks. I used to grab as many village cards as I could. Those +2 actions are always useful but to many in your deck and all you end up with is lots of unusable actions. Smithy's are always useful as they can help get you more action cards but sometimes I felt like I was just fishing around for something to play.

Recently I have started playing around with the Chapel card. Initially I couldn't get my head around why you would want to discard cards but after being beaten online it started to make sense. Once a card has served its purpose its just going to clog your hand. When there are no more curse cards left your witch is an over priced moat. Also when you have started to buy or mine the higher money cards it can be useful to trash the lower "1" value cards.
It's all about making your deck as sleek and efficient as possible and is something that all good players strive to.

So the village card is not always the first card I grab, sometimes its the Chapel. Or maybe something that will increase my buying power. Anyone for a woodcutter?

P.O.B @ the Festing

2009-02-22T09:46:00.000-08:00

Last Friday saw P.O.B use a new venue. The Festing Pub in Portsmouth, it's probably the best place we have used so far. A bar and pizza service certainly makes the evening more pleasant and a large room with plenty of space to play is ideal.

We started off splitting into two groups with Winners Circle being played on one table while I ran a game of Dominion. We played the starting set of cards as the others have only played it once or twice. It was a very close game with myself and Moley finishing with the same score, unfortunately Moley won as he had less turns than myself. Dominion continues to impress me, and I manage to get a couple of games in a week on BSW when nobody is about.

As Winners Circle was still in play I setup Pitchcar over a couple of tables and the flicking began. I came third with Mudhoney taking the win and Romeo coming second. Moley trailed in at the end after some poor flicking. It's a great game and the expansions are on my wish list. That jump looks like it will make the game even more enjoyable.

When Winners Circle finished some heavier games were pulled out. One group went off to play Battlestar Galactica while Container was opened on another table. I love Battlestar, its a good co-op game especially when you are a cylon but I wanted to give Container a go.
After Mudhoney ran through the rules I was a bit lost but figured I would pick it up as we went along. Container is a very good economic game, one that I am not very good at. I came in last, but would be happy to play it again especially now as I know what I should be doing.

A couple of other players had now turned up so For Sale started on another table while Pitchcar had another race. We were filling in time until the toasters finished off the Battlestar.

By now the group had grown to around 13 and time was running out. With this many Werewolf had to be played and after a quick explanation we started up. We used a couple of new characters in the mix. The lone wolf and masons were used, but to be honest I thought they didn't really add that much to it. I died on the first night! typical I wasn't suspicious at all. Damn werewolves.

A good evening of 5 hours gaming. All agreed that the Festing would be the new home for P.O.B so roll on March's meet. If you want to join in look for us on line.

Stalingrad

2009-02-17T00:45:00.000-08:00

The last weeks gaming has been very different. First up Mudhoney came over to give the new Stalingrad expansion for Combat Commander a go. We are both keen Combat Commander players but there are so many games in our collections that it doesn't see the light that often.

Stalingrad gives you more scenarios, rules to cover urban combat and some more counters. All in not a bad little bundle, its just a tad over priced. We played the Sea Devils scenario which saw my rag tag band of Russians attempting to defend the important grain silo from the invading German Wehrmacht. I had less units but spread them over the center of the map and both flanks and awaited the impending assault. The game played really well, my troops were generally decimated but luck was with me. A couple of well placed mine cards and slung satchel charges took care of a few Germans and time event cards slowly brought the end closer. After a few hard fought incursions I had lost a few objective areas and the victory point marker was on 0. We were in sudden death and things were not looking to good for my comrades. Luckily another time event was pulled. I got 1 VP for defending and Mudhoney pulled a card. Sudden death was triggered and it was all over. I had scraped a win by 1 point. All in a great game and a lovely scenario, edge of your seat gaming.

Zooloretto has also been played twice in the last week. The first time with my 5yr old son who seemed to get it and lost by 3 points. Last night he wanted to play it again as did my youngest (3) and my wife was brought in to help out. She isn't a big gamer but after a couple of rounds had picked up the game. Things were going well with us all managing to fill our enclosures when the tiles started to turn bad. Well for me they were. I was being hosed by my kids.
Game ended with Noah winning by 2 points. Everyone enjoyed it so I am expecting it to be played more often.

I have managed to post two reviews on the IGUK blog, dominion my favorite new game and Army of Zero a new English designed and produced game. Give them a read when you have a few minutes.

Pitchcar arrives tomorrow, just in time for the gathering of POB on Friday. Festing pub in Southsea from 6:30PM if anyone is free.

I'm a villager!

2009-02-08T06:42:00.000-08:00

Friday was an impromptu gathering at Mudhoney for some game time. It was a pretty good turnout with 9 of us eager to play some new games.
We split into a couple of groups with 5 playing Snow Tails. It's a game where players are each racing a team of huskies over a snow and ice covered course. I never played it but it looked like good fun.

I took the others off to teach them how to play Ubongo. Its a puzzle game that I have mentioned earlier and it went down really well. IT played fast enough for us to get two games in with me winning the first and Hannah winning the second. Four players was a lot more hectic than my previous 2 player goes. Scrabbling for gems after solving the puzzle was a lot more tricky.

As the others were still mushing there huskies we needed something else to play. Pandemic was to hand so the four of us attempted to save the world, but failed. The outbreaks just game to fast at the end of the game with black and blue cubes multiplying across Europe at an astonishing rate. We managed to get 3 cures but not the last one. A good game but you can't always win them.

By now everyone had finished playing and as there was a decent enough number of players Werewolf was suggested. I quite like Werewolf, in fact it was shown to me the first time I met up with the POB crowd. My comment of "I'm not a Villager" always bring a laugh. I wasn't a villager but the seer. My ineptitude at the game had my strung up by the villagers then but times have changed.
We played 4 games of Werewolf and the furry killers managed to win 3 of them. I was the seer in the last game and immediately told the rest of the players who I was and who a villager was in the first day. I knew I was setting myself up to die but I really wanted the villagers to win for a change. I didn't die that night as the werewolves wanted to sow some seeds of doubt into the mix but on the second night I was pushing daisies. Too late for our silver phobic friends they were outed that day.

All in, a good night gaming with a variety of games being played.

Ubongo, Ubongo they play it in the jungle!

2009-02-03T13:46:00.000-08:00

Lastest purchase was a used copy of Ubongo. It's been on my games radar for a while and after a recent episode of the spiel I ramped up my effort to grab a copy.
I have not bought a used game before, I like that new game smell and unpunching cardboard bits but as Ubongo has been out of print for a while I had no choice.

Ubongo is a puzzle game and a type of game that I have not played before. Basically users race to use Tetris shaped pieces to cover a pattern on a board. Sounds easy but when you are under pressure it can get a bit tricky.
After you have finished your puzzle you have to yell Ubongo! then move your player piece on a board and grab a couple of coloured jewels. Player with the most of a single colour wins.

The rules are all pretty simple and there is a fair bit of re playability in the game. It's also nice and quick. I managed to get 3 games in over lunch today against Dobbie. Both enjoyed the game as we are pretty competitive.

I have heard that there is a reprint by Z-Man games later this year which is good news as its a great game and something different from the more mainstream types of games.

Otherwise gaming has been pretty good. Dominion has hit the table again and this game just gets better. There are still cards that I haven't played before and combo's to be put together. I keep promising a review on IGUK but the game is getting played too much.

I also managed to get a face to face game of Tigris in. This game has had me puzzled for ages. It's one of those games that I really wanted to play but after a couple of online attempts I just didn't get it. Face to Face changed this (Thanks Hannah & Ed) and I now understand the rules enough to actually play the game. Winning is a different manner but a few more games and this may change.

POB is having a mini meet this week so more games to be played, unless we get snowed in.

Gaming in Year 2009

2009-01-16T00:50:00.000-08:00

So a new year is upon us and I am sure there is a whole raft of games out there waiting to hit the shelves and make a dent in my pocket. So what am I looking forward to in this year?

Well, I think this year is going to be all about expansions. I know that there is going to be an expansion for Pandemic some time this year so that is definitely going to be of interest to me.
A expansion for Command & colours Ancients that add scenarios about the Rome civil war also gets a nod.
Formula D is going to get some new tracks which should be fun and probably needed by at least March. There is only so many times you can go around Monaco.
Dominion is my latest purchase and I will be putting up a review on the IGUK site later and this is literally been made for expansions. I can see a couple coming this year, especially as the base game is doing so well.

As for full games, Days of Wonder is teasing us with images of factions for something. Amazons, Skeletons, Orcs. All sounds interesting but not sure what it all means.
We shall just have to wait and see, but knowing Days of Wonder I am sure its going to be good.

Gaming recently has been very good, I managed to play Battlestar Galactica this week and it was a huge amount of fun. I played the Chief character and while repairing vipers managed to win/loose the game by sending the rest of the fleet towards the attacking cylons. Much to the surprise of the human players. Yep, I was a cylon and it was great fun seeing the look on there faces.
Dominion continues to take center stage, mainly due to its quick play time, easy to teach rules and mainly because its on BSW.

So, keep an eye out on the Days of Wonder site, somethings brewing and watch your back for anyone with red eyes. They have either been playing Dominion till the early hours or are a frakkin toaster.

Indigo growing F1 drivers

2009-01-09T05:03:00.000-08:00

Wednesday night saw Dobbie and Moley over for a few hours gaming. I had planned to teach them Puerto Rico, my new favorite game. I had missed Puerto when it was realease and it just sort of fell by the wayside.

After explaining the rules the game started and the others picked up the rules and the way the game plays quite quickly. The colonist supply started to drain very quickly due to lots of building large process buildings. Dobbie setup a good trade route with repeated use of the captain role. Moley managed a fair bit of trading but was slow to apply manpower to his wharf and harbour.
I went for a mixed building and shipping plan. Just enough shipping to get a few points but built a couple of the larger VP buildings.
end score was me on 42, Dobbie 40 and Moley on 30. A good game.

Next up was Pandemic, another new game for Dobbie. The initial spread of virus's was harsh. Black was very concentrated along with red. Outbreaks were rife for the first quarter of the game but we managed to cure blue and eradicate it. By then Moley the medic had calmed down Black and we were making good work against Red. Cures for Red and black came next. Yellow had been ignored up until now and was started to spread. All hands to the deck and a bit of card trading and a cure was in site. We finally won the game with 6 outbreaks, a good session with a few tense bits and it felt like we had worked hard to win the game.

Finally Formula D hit the table, basic rules on the Monaco track. Two cars each and lots of dice rolling to be done. Moley initially stormed into the lead while the middle pack kept together. Dobbie and Moley both had a trailing car but half way through the game Dobbies had caught up with the middle pack. By now we realised that pushing your car through a corner for WP damage was not the end of the world so the last third of the track saw some crazy dice rolling and damage. Unfortunately it was all a bit too much for Moleys trailing car and he crashed on the second to last corner. It was all down to first place and a just high enough dice roll from me clinched the win.

All in a good evening of gaming, plus a copy of Dominion to open. But more on that later.

Christmas Gaming

2009-01-04T06:10:00.001-08:00

Didn't get a huge amount of gaming in over the Christmas period. Mainly because we did a fair bit of visiting and the Xbox 360 was used maybe a bit too much.

Anyway, new additions to the gaming libary are

Puerto Rico, my BGG Secret Santa present. I was a bit suprised to recieve it but after playing it I absolutely love it and want to give it another go asap.
Dungeon Twister Expansion #1, I love Dungeon Twister but find it hard to get opponents to play against. I am hoping that new character may spark a bit of enthusiasm into the game again.
Munchkin, I used to play D&D allot and this game looks like it could be fun.
Formula D, The new Asmodee version. Components look fantastic and I have given it a quick game against the wife. Really enjoyed it and look forward to giving it a go against more players.

Hopeing to get more gaming in over the next week, and I will try to blog a bit more on whats going on.
Also expect more game reviews on the IGUK blog.

Vikings Tournament at IGUK

2008-12-16T12:58:00.000-08:00

New Tourney is up, so join up if you want to win £10 store credit.

This weeks gaming

2008-11-16T07:20:00.001-08:00

Well gaming this week has been a mixed bunch, the new Xbox 360 has dented my free time. But I have bought and played Carc and Ticket to Ride on it which have both been implemented really well. If any xbox live people want a match just yell.

Otherwise the Descent group came over on Monday minus the Overlord and Ollie so we played a couple of games. Race for the Galaxy first which I either drew or won by 1 point. Can't quite remember. I was going the military route and was hanging on for the card that scores for rebel cards. In the end I just played the 12th card to end the game. It was a good match and the game is really starting to make sense now.

Next up was Monty Python Fluxx, I won this with a Grim Reaper, Dead Parrot Goal. Its a fun game that as long as it doesn't drag is ok. Not my favorite but i'm happy to play it.

We finished off with a game of Shadows over Camelot (Its only a model). First time I have played, even though I have owned it for a while now. Really enjoyed it, but I do like my co-op games. Thanks to Panzerfaust for explaining it, it really helped.
No traitor this time, but maybe next.

On Tuesday Dobbie came over and we had a monster game of Twilight Struggle, this game just rocks. I absolutely love it. I managed to win in turn 9 by controlling Europe and playing a score card. Dobbie was a bit miffed, he forgot about that way of scoring and was concerntrating on tehmiddle east and south/central america. I wasn't going to tell him to put some extra influence on France now was I.
Still , good game and well played for a first attempt. I know the next game will be tougher.

Secret Santa on Board Game Geek has kicked off and this time my target is in America. Last year I had an Oz guy and it was fun. Hopefully this year will pan out to be good as well.

And now for something completely different

2008-10-28T06:47:00.000-07:00

The latest Fluxx offering from Looney Labs is a Monty Python set of cards. This arrived today at work, so myself and Dobbie have just bust open the packaging and given it a couple of goes.

I am not a huge fan of Fluxx, its ok but there isn't much skill involved in winning a game. But its usually a bit of fun and this version is the funniest I have played so far. If you like Monty Python you will love this version. So many of the cards are inspired from the tv series and the films its great.

We manged one win each over lunch, with myself getting the finger of God and "The Foot" as a Goal, while Dobbie won his with the Animator and the Grim reaper. Although to get there we had to quote Python lines, sing verses and giggle our way through a number of cards.

My, thats a big dragon!

2008-10-17T04:21:00.001-07:00

Our Road to Legend game has finally started, if you are particularly board you can catch up on its progress here.

I need more Power

2008-10-15T01:01:00.000-07:00

So it was my birthday yesterday, another year older but what about the games!

Well, my brother bought me a copy of the new Powergrid expansion. It has maps for China and Korea on it. It does lookk rather nice and i'm itching to give it a go.

Otherwise it was an assortment of books, dvd's and cash. All of which were hurriedly spent on a xbox360. So now I have another gaming platform to add to the mound of consoles.

I now need to grab some games for it.

Wacky Races

2008-10-13T03:25:00.000-07:00

Sunday group met up last night after a failed attempt last week. Its been a good week of gaming with two monster games of Twilight Struggle in the week. This game is so good I just love playing it. After 3 games I have a much better understanding of the game and how to play it.

Last night I introduced Poison, Race for the Galaxy and WOW: The adventure game. All game went down well.
We started off with Poison and it soon become round after the cauldrons added up to 13. Its a nice little game, not too taxing and a good filler.

Next up was Race for the Galaxy, San Juan is enjoyed in our group and RftG pushes things on a bit. It was a good game with Sid James just winning with 35 points after going for a military route. I am now getting the hang of this game, after a few games the consume/trade/produce element makes sense and strategies are forming.

We rounded off the night with a game of WOW:TAG, we are all Warcraft players so the game mimicked the WOW world very well. My only issue with the game is the time it takes. As time was against us we decided to play until 11PM then see who had the most valour points.
Moley won with the orc warrior, who I think is probably the strongest character in the game.
All in its a good alternative to Runebound, but I think all of these game suffer from the same problem, the time it takes to play.

Tonight Descent is finally going to hit the table, yeah right we shall see.

Pob at the council

2008-10-03T23:36:00.000-07:00

Last night was POB night but unfortunately our usual location was unavailable due to decorators so it was off to the Civic Offices where it all started. We had a good turnout, 11 of us in all and we managed to play a couple of big games.

Shogun went down a treat after everyone got the hang of it. Panzerfaust played the warmonger and managed to take a number of my provinces complete with there castels, temples and theaters.
He eventually won the game with Leanne trailing by a couple of points. I brought up the rear as my weary samurai only managed to hold 6 provinces.

Some of the others played Conquest of Paradise which looked really good. Gornad managed to win using some sneaky Victory Point cards. The game looked really interesting and one that I would like to try soon.

Romeo and Harriet turned up a bit late but managed to get a few games of Battleline and Heroscape in.

The evening rounded off with some games of Poison and another number/colour card game that the name escapes me. Security came round at 10 to remind us that our time was up and that was the end of our nights gaming.

All in a good evening, pity it ended so soon.

The Order is in

2008-09-15T13:13:00.000-07:00

Well I am eagerly awaiting a friends return from Vegas, why?
Because he has a bumper load of games for me

Command & Colors : Ancients
Race for the Galaxy
Twilight Struggle
Poison

Three great games and one that's ok (but for the kids, honest). All games that have been high on my wishlist for some time but the cost has put me off. All in £64 which is great as Ancients alone is £40+ in rip of Britain.

Now I just have to wait for his return.

Pandemic Averted

2008-09-13T23:54:00.000-07:00

This week I was sent up North for business so managed to make some time to meet up with Earthquake and JohnnyB at the Coventry Scimitar club.

We played a few different games, I brought along Pandemic which went well. We managed to win but only with 3 player cards left. Unusually we only had 2 outbreaks so it wasn't the most tense game I have played.

We didn't have enough time for another monster game after that so Neil opened up his games bag and brought out Race for the Galaxy, Colloretto and Poison. Race for the Galaxy is a great game but I am only just getting the hang of it. Needless to say I was whupped.
Coloretto was fun, and always a blast to play. Poison was new to me and although it was a bit over produced played well. It's been added to my wish list.

All in a good evening of play, and I should be back in Coventry in a months time.

A New Cold War

2008-09-06T06:57:00.000-07:00

I finally managed to get to play Twilight Struggle in the week and what a game. It was absolutely brilliant and even though it took nearly four hours to play I enjoyed every minute of it.

Its a two player game where each player takes the role of either the USA or the USSR. You then play cards over a number of rounds to apply influence to the countries of the world. Certain cards then score the areas and whoever has the most control gets the most points.
Sounds easy enough but when the cards you have can also help your opponent its sometimes tricky to know what to play.

Throw in a space race, coup's and a decreasing defcon status and it all adds up to a fantastic game.

The worst thing about this game is the cost. You don't get a huge amount for your money and they definitely didn't go all out for a great looking board. But if you can get over that its a game worth playing.

An icy wind blows in Arkham

2008-08-23T07:48:00.000-07:00

With the road to legend taking a break, well its not really started our Thursday night group decided to give Arkham Horror a go. It's a very good if difficult game set firmly in the Cthulhu Mythos.

The intrepid investigators of myself, Romeo and Gornad took our heroes through a whirlwind game. It's been a while since we have played it so rules and player aids were well used. We were doing ok until a rumors card appeared and with it 5 monsters in the university. If we had of kept these in check all would have been ok but when this particular card got to 8 monsters all hell breaks loose. Needless to say it did and with a terrror level of 10 hitting Arkham the shops shut and the monster limit went out the window.

We struggled on and managed to close 4 gates before the great one, Ithaqua made his presence felt. We struggled on and managed to get him down to 3 tokens before he managed to consume Gornads struggling salesman.

Good game but next time we need to stay on top of things.

The Road to Legend hits another snagg

2008-08-08T06:06:00.000-07:00

I was all set for Descent last night, but a few of the guys dropped out. Other commitments and communication problems abound.

In the end it was just myself and Romeo and rather than call it off we pulled out a bunch of two player games to fill the void.

First up was Battleline, I love this game but I am crap at it. I lost two games to Romeo.
Next up was Battlelore, armed with my newly painted heacy infantry I managed to win both games. We played scanrio 5 which introduces lore to the mix. Romeo has the game but has never used lore so was quite keen to give it a go. I enjoy Battlelore, its a great game nad my recent online exploits have helped me out with a few tactics.

To round off the evening we played Jambo, a new game to Romeo and one that I have forgotten about. Its a nice card game that plays like a CCG but without being collectable. I lost after handing over a card that allows the player to buy and sell at a better price. Doh!

I have noticed that Play.com has teh new WOW: The Adventure Game for £17.99 and i'm tempted. I love my Runebound but find it a bit long and this looks like a shorter and a more interactive game. Will have to see how the month goes.

Follow the yellow brick road

2008-08-07T04:25:00.000-07:00

Tonight if the planets are alligned we will be kicking off a game of Descent : The road to legend. Its been planned for a couple of months now but we have had problems getting everyone in the same place at the same time. Fingers crossed this will happen tonight.

I have not played Descent yet, its always appealed, but the price tag hasn't. Although now I have seen what you get I could be converted. It looks like a great dungeon crawl of a game and after playing its older brother Doom I quite like the rules set.

So hopefully tomorrow I can post a report on what happened in our first campaign.

Gaming has generally been a bit slow the last week, I was absolutely thrashed in the first round of the Shotten Totten tourney by Harry the Lime. Hopefully next round won't be so bad. Battlelore against Steerpike and Earthquake continues, although we are now using lore or the hundred year wars expansions to add a little more to the game.
I am desperate to get Agricola out again and have a good game. I have thought about the game a bit and have a few strategies I would like to try out, but thats going to have to wait a week or two I fear.

I have also managed to paint all but 4 of the heavy infantry from my Battlelore set, the volume of medium infantry is still causing sleep issues so next up will be some archers.

Anyway, I need to sharpen my broadsword and find Pico ready for tonight.

Earth Elemental

2008-08-01T13:39:00.000-07:00

I have been getting back into Battlore recently, mainly as its pretty easy toget a game up on Vassal. My main opponents are Steerpike and Earthquake. Both of which are giving me a sound beating.

I blame the dice.

Anyway, I didn't preorder the original game so didn't get the promo figures of the hill giant or earth elemental. I have been looking for a suitable replacement for both and found this one on ebay.

Its the Loyal Earth Elemental from a D&D collectable mini's game. It's maybe a little bit too big but its better than nothing. The cards are available on the net as images, a quick google will find them. So I'm now ready to give him a go.

Next up is a replacement for the hill giant, better start googling.

Plowed field wins game

2008-07-26T08:15:00.000-07:00

Last night was POB at the Pub. The Portsmouth On Board group meet up usually every month at the Stamshaw Arms in Portsmouth for a few hours of gaming.

Last night we played Pandemic, Agricola, Battleline and Gheos.

Pandemic started off first while we waited for some others to show, Myself, Mudhoney, Ade and Methsdrinker managed to fight off the deadly infections and win the game. Quite a good win actually with 4 rounds of player cards left. I really should start playing at a harder level but after being soundly beaten when I tried it I always feel I need a bit more practice.

Some of the otehrs had turned up now so we decided to play a bigger game. Agricola was chosen and we settled in for a 5 player game. Things progressed quickly as we all knew how to play except for Methsdrinker. 5 players was harder as we were all fighting for actions, particularly the build fence one. Starting player was swapped frequently.
In the end it all came down to 1 point with Ollie managing to win the game. Luckily using a plow action as his last action to fill up an empty spot on his field.

Agricola gets better and better the more I play it, the posabilities and options are just fantastic.

Lastly the group seperated with Mudhoney, Princess of Florence teaching Ade how to play Battleline while the rest of us gave Gheos a go.
It was my first attempt at teh game and I found it a bit bewildering at first. Probably because I was a bit tired but I kept up. Scoring confussed me at first but after I had watched the others play I picked it up. I must have done as I went on to win the game ;-)

That was it for the July meet, hopefully August will bring along some other games.

Knights of the Brush

2008-07-20T09:39:00.000-07:00

Since my games of Battlelore have increased, I thought it would be an idea to grab the paint brushes and start giving some of the mini's a bit of a paint job. I used to paint mini's all the time back in my Warhammer years but girlfriends don't get it so I stopped.

Now I am married I just get sarky comments and I have to admit I kind of missed it. Its a very relaxing way of spending some time.

Needless to say most of my Citadel Paints had dried up, but Earthquake pointed me in the direction of a new source, Vallejo paints and they are really nice.

So these, red knights are my fist ones finished. The spider and a squad of blue's are nearly finished.

Now I need to find some way of storing them and they probably need a varnish.

Disease and Cow Cubes

2008-07-11T08:57:00.000-07:00

A few of the guys came over last night and we played Pandemic and Agricola. It was a first for most of them and we had some good gaming.
Pandemic was first and we lost the first game to a violent outbreak of red cubes in Asia. Our hard pressed Medic just couldn't keep up with the epedemics while the rest of us tried to be in the right location to swap cards.
We all decided to play a second game, even though Agricola was at the other end of the table looking very inviting. Roles were dealt and cubes were placed. We quickly managed to cure Black and remove it from the game meanwhile yellow and blue were getting a bit lary.
Some quick moves from the dispatcher and we have yellow and red cured. I finally managed to cure blue with 3 cards left in teh player deck. Close but a win none the less.

Agicola then hit the table with all its boards and bits. The rules were explained and as it was a first play for the other 3 we just decided on an open game with all questions asked and hints passed. The game went on and we all experimented with different occupations and improvements. As I had played before I knew that I needed to have as big a farm as possible and lots of animals. We played through, Ollie played the dancer occupation to gain more food. I went for a berry picker as it worked well for Hanna last week.

Game ended with me winning on 33 points. I totally put it down to remembering what I needed to score. Everyone enjoyed it and its definately a hit so will be played again.

I now need to find a source of animeeples as I am getting all cubed out.

Vassal

2008-07-07T08:26:00.001-07:00

I have just finished a game of Battlelore using the Vassal online engine. My opponent was Earthquake of the Meeples and Minatures podcast. It was good to get a game in, even though I lost.

The Vassal engine is a great bit of software, it provides you with a virtual table, dice and counters and keeps track of the cards played during the game. You still need to know how to play the game as the rules are not there, but if you want to play either live or using a pbem system its perfect.

My games have so far been PBEM based, where you record your moves into a log file and mail it to your opponent. They then replay the log file and then create a new one with there moves. It's simple and works, as long as you know the rules. I have been brought up for court martial for doing a few things wrong but now I know better.

I also lost a game to Steerpike, much to his amusement. Damn those weighted virtual dice.

I am ready for a rematch, and if anyone else wants a game, just holla.

Agricola - First Game

2008-07-05T23:36:00.001-07:00

Thursday night saw Agricola opened and played for the first time. Joining me in my night of farming was Croppertarty, Mudhonney and The Princess of Florence.

It was the first time for all of us and we took it slow for the first few rounds. Setting up the game took a bit of time and space, but after a couple or rounds we picked up the basic rules.
Nobody had any real idea of strategy, just making sure we had enough food for the harvest turns was the main one. Trying out the other actions such as stables, ploughing and occupations was also used.
Croppertarty was the first to expand his family and house and started getting more actions per round. Princess played a key occupation, Yeoman Farmer that would eventually win her the game. I continued fencing and letting my sheep breed but didn't get anything to turn them into food.

When we got to the last round we were all in the swig of the game and wished we had a few more rounds. Scoring was close

Croopertarty : 7
Count Zero : 8
Mudhoney : 8
Princess of Florence : 11

Cropertarty blundered in the last round by expanding his family to 5, but failed to feed them so a begging card negated his 3 points for the extra family member.

ll in, a great game. Now we know how to play the game we can concerntrate on learning how to win the game.