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#boardgames

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mosesvsjesus@pod.g3l.org
MosesvsJesus

Hey everyone, I’m #newhere. I’m interested in #anticorruption, #art, #boardgames, #cardgames, #cars, #chess, #cricket, #datascience, #football, #gaming, #guns, #gunsareforeselfdefense, #humanrights, #humanrightsabuses, #knives, #libertarianism, #manchesterunited, #motorcycles, #movies, #nobs, #pcgaming, #playstation, #privacy, #security, #selfdefence, #selfdefense, and #xbox.

I'm fed up of Facebook's intrusive advertising, data collection, surveillance, and overall BS. Looking for a better social network.

wiegeabo@pluspora.com
wiegeabo

Only 3 of us for last week's game night. We played Cryo, Shard of Infinity, and Fantasy Realms.

It was the first play of Cryo for all of us. Even including going over the rules our host had read before, it only took us an hour and a half to play. We figure now we could probably knock out a 3-player game in an hour. And since we liked it, that's a good playtime for a worker placement game.

We didn't really know what we were doing the first couple of rounds, but after that we started to get how you get a resource engine going, handle rescuing and settling survivors. It wasn't late in the game when we understood why you may recall drones at any time rather than after placing all drones. Although we didn't do that until the very last round. Me and our host tied at 29 points (although they won the tie-breaker), and our third squeaked by with 34. Nice close first game.

We followed up with Shards of Infinity, one of the go-to games when it's the three of us. I started off getting a lot of shields and being impossible to hit. Our host started getting a lot of healing and attack. Our third was feeling left behind...until they suddenly became the powerhouse because they could draw through their deck every other round. And my shields stopped coming up when I needed them. We did a bad job recognizing just how dangerous our third had become, so I was the first one knocked off. After that, our host didn't stand a chance.

We ended the night with Fantasy Realms. Once again we added the expansion cards, and played with the cursed deck for the first time. And once again, we never really used the expansion cards. We just don't seem to be able to find any good combos that work with them.

We played two games, I think I came in last and second. The cursed deck was odd. They don't feel very cursed because you only get penalized by their negative victory points when using them. If you just let them sit idly, nothing happens. It really feels like you should have to play the negative points if you don't use them. The cards we pulled weren't the great, but we did find some good cards with a quick scan through the deck. So now we're thinking, since there's no penalty to not use them, that we should house-rule it so that everyone starts with two cards. (We drafted two cards for the second game, and that felt a little better too.)

#boardgames

wiegeabo@pluspora.com
wiegeabo

Been a long time since I've been able to play games with my regular group. but we were finally able to meet up the last two weeks. It was so nice to play larger games, which my family aren't really into playing.

Last week we learned Raiders of Scythia. It's a worthy addition to the Raiders series, and nicely streamlined. I had a decent combo where I could raid Persia at will, avoiding wounds and getting discounts. But when Persia was used up, things slowed down. Ended up in third place in a relatively close game. Didn't help that, in the back half of the game, pretty much anytime I wanted to buy an eagle or horse, either the action wasn't available, or the animal I wanted got purchased

Finished the night playing Fantasy Realms. It's one of our favorite wrap up the night games. In this case we played with the new suits from the Cursed Hoard expansion, but not with the cursed items. While it is annoying that the new cards don't match the artwork from the originals, it is kind of nice getting the extra card in hand and extra game time as the trigger is twelve discarded cards instead of ten. We really didn't do anything with Outsiders and Undead. Came in third.

This week we played Lost Ruins of Arnak. It's a nice worker placement crossed with a deck builder. The action economy is tight and, based on how this game played out, moving up the research track as quickly as possible is essential. I came in a distant last as I couldn't get any real action economy after the first couple of rounds. It also seemed that every time I needed certain cards in my deck to come up, they wouldn't come up that round. I thought it was a decent worker placement game, possible even a good game to introduce players to worker placement. The theme is fantastically implement though.

Next we tried the Kickstarter release of Tutankhamun. A nice little game of tile selection and planning to try and score majorities. But this version was waaay overproduced. With everything being shiny, and stretch goal components that literally add nothing to the game (they don't need to be used, and actually get in the way), while providing a bag that's only barely large enough to hold tiles, but not large enough to draw tiles to build the river.

Once again we finished up the night with Fantasy Realms with the new suits. And once again no one really did anything with the Undead and Outsiders. Those cards just aren't impressing us so far. But I did win with a score of 329, so I can't complain about that. Got a pretty decent deal at the start, and some good cards came up for me as the game went on.

#boardgames

craigmaloney@pluspora.com
Craig Maloney

Pulling back from board games

I'm finding my tastes are pulling back from board games. There's several
reasons for this. The first is that I've had way too many games that
have just sat on shelves unplayed. I got caught up in the moment (damn
you, Rahdo, The Dice Tower, and Shut Up and Sit Down for making board
games seem lie fun!) and found myself checking out a lot of different
games. Unfortunately many board games seem to scrimp on the rulebooks
which can make learning them more complicated than they need be. And
while there are many resources for learning board games it feels like a
chore just to get to where you can play your first few solo-plays before
unleashing the game on the rest of your group. That feels like work to
me. The second reason is that board games are now optimized for a more
ephemeral experience. Witness the number of games that are tuned to
attract audiences on Kickstarter, with their large plastic pieces,
miniatures, exclusives, and stretch goals galore. They're not here for a
long-term engagement. At best these games become highly sought after
until the next big thing rolls around to take its place. Worse, some
companies have a difficult time with reprints after the initial
Kickstarter and have to rely on expansions and what-not to keep an
influx of cash. Lastly, many of these games have one unique thing that
drives them while surrounding that with a bunch of mechanics and victory
conditions that are more of a chore than fun. If the game is more about
what I can't do on my turn then you're essentially driving me through
your game design like a tour guide. Also, if it's impossible to
determine who is "winning" because the cards or what-not aren't tallied
until the end of the game then that's a silly design.

So I have put up a good number of games for trade or sale with more on
the way. Check my Board Game Geek page (link below) for more details.

I don't think board games as a while are necessarily bad, but I'm
finding that my patience for the current trends of expensive games with
exclusives (or worse, "legacy games" that customize the game during
play) are not for me. I'm more apt to bring up a RPG and play with that
because it doesn't require as much for me to get started and the stories
can be more interesting. We'll see if that changes in the future, but
for now I'm removing a lot of "adventure" games, point-salad Euro games,
and games that don't have a strong solo component. I'm also pulling a
lot of games that are "single-taskers" where I can replace the gameplay
with a printed board and Looneylabs Pyramids. If I can replicate your
core mechanics with those then that's one less thing I'm keeping in my
collection.

We'll see how this all turns out.

http://decafbad.net/2021/06/21/pulling-back-from-board-games/

#misc #Adayinthelife #BoardGames #Games

stuart_lamble@pluspora.com
Stuart

Christmas afternoon was a lovely time, spent teaching my nieces and others the joy of Wingspan. I don’t usually teach expansions for the first game, but I felt that the Oceania expansion adds enough to warrant the effort: it opens up the game and makes it more friendly.

At the end, the reaction was very positive, so I think that there will be more games of it coming in the new year.

#boardgames #wingspan #family

wiegeabo@pluspora.com
wiegeabo

Three three-player games in a sort of replay session last night: Paladins of the West Kingdom, Shards of Infinity, and Drop It

Our second go at Paladins. We liked it and thought it was solid the first time, and the second play feels just as good. Although this was a weird one as we all scored pretty low (I thought it was just me as we played). After a couple of rounds I was getting things done, but the pace didn't feel as fast as before. No big combos. And it turned out the others felt the same way. I did mess up my game by switching in my head the bonuses you get for attacking a enemy and converting an enemy, but I don't know if that really mattered much. The King's Orders weren't that helpful, and some of my end game points were canceled by a last play Inquisition that not only gave me a debt, but took away a Conspirator that my Thief would have given me a point for. I ended in last, but to put perspective on our scores, the winner of this game had a lower score than the last place player of our prior game.

Shards has been getting a lot of play from us. And it's a good filler for 3-players. I think it might even play better with 3 than 4. This game was intense as we were quickly hitting each other for a lot of damage, yet not going down. I knocked out one player with 20 attack, and then me and the remaining player kept just hitting each other for not quite enough damage. One the last play I my shields kept me alive with 2 health, and I was going to do over 20 damage to them while they only had 8 health and no way to block or heal enough. But then they realized one of their cards triggered for 2 more attack, knocking me out in the last second. It was an exciting last few rounds of fast-playing cards and Wreath damage combos. Pro tip: the player with the most Mastery will be the first one knocked out ;)

Our host brought out Drop In because it plays quick. And it does. We got in two games in just 10 or 15 minutes. And that includes rules explanations. But it was a fun time of pieces bouncing in weird ways, spearing through other pieces to touch colors or shapes we didn't want the to touch, and one case of a "magically magnetic" circle that somehow just flew across the tower instead of falling straight down. Through both games we would stay even, and when someone broke out in score, they'd get stuck and the others would catch up, with the winner only pulling ahead with one of their last pieces. Great little mid or end night game.

#boardgames