What Board Game Are You Currently Playing?

[Hahma]

Originally Posted by chas

I just found out that Mare Nostrum will be kickstarted on March 14. This is "the one that got away" for me. I played it at a convention years ago, but never saw it again. Turns out it had an English language version distributed in Britain as part of a European release, but was never put out here in the USA. It was a beautiful game, set in an alternate Ancient world where six of the most famous powers were all expanding at the same time: Egypt, Babylon, Greece, Carthage, Rome, etc. It seems to have been considered a good game that could use a few tweaks; the expansion was somewhat controversial, as it included Atlantis!

It is now being redesigned as MN 2.0 (without Atlantis I believe, although I'd have no problem with that sinking nation). The kickstarting is quite a surprise. Although I'm glad we'll have some information on it soon, I've become a bit relaxed about Kickstarter; I probably won't go in early, and may even wait until publication. Expensive games like this cost $80 or more these days, and I'd rather wait for some reviews, etc.


I finally have a Paypal account, but that doesn't mean I want to throw my money out the window! I know there is a separate Kickstarter thread, but I'm interested in hearing from anyone here about KS if they have anything to say; including those who don't participate. The Great War, the Borg WWI game is also being KSted, but I'm going to wait on that one too. (Some people are banding together from all over the country to buy TGW at the KS group rate, which is pretty smart). I think patience is a virtue when it comes to the unknown. My score on buying bad games is pretty low, and I'd rather keep it that way!
.

I have played Mare Nostrum a couple times, probably close to 3 year or more ago. One of the guys in the group has it and the expansion. I really enjoyed it and it's cool that they are doing a re-print.

My buddy Brian is running 3 of the group orders (6 games in each order) for The Great War. It was just going to be one group order for our group, but needed a couple more to get in, so he posted on BGG about it for NW Indiana and Chicago people that wanted in. Then he got people from all over the country wanting in. So then he opened a 2nd group order, and then it led to a 3rd group order where he finally said that's all he can do. Very nice of him to do that do all the work to re-ship them to people around the country. Even though they are paying the postage, it will still only end up being $70-$75 total rather than $107 total if KS individually by people.

[Taeblewalker]

Today I played a solo game of Thunderstone Advance: Numenera. The game beat me 54 to 41 victory points.

Then I met with my local gaming group and played Cyclades, without the expansions. One of the other guys won. It was interesting to play the original game, as it's been a few years since I played without any expansions.

After that was Istanbul, which is a tolerable Euro game. And then we played King of New York, where I finally won one. I was Kong.

[Johngee]

Originally Posted by Jim

Kickstarter doesn't take Paypal. Credit/Debit Cards only. That being said, I have backed far too many KS projects. Many have been really good. Also-many* haven't.

I have only backed 3 KickStarter projects so far: #1. A set of metal Fantasy Coins for gaming - NO PROBLEMS! I'm very pleased with the product and it's timely delivery. #2. "DoubleSixes" twelve sided d6's for use in one particular game I have called Leviathans from Catalyst Game Labs - still waiting or delivery, but there has been good communication explaining each delay in the production process. #3. The Tokaido Collectors edition; just today I received a very lengthy email explaining all of the delays step-by-step in the design, redesign, production, switching factories, re-tooling machines, painting, quality control, and final approval of each process, whew! It will soon be an entire YEAR since the KS was funded.


I believe that all of my transactions went through my Amazon.COM account, but I can't remember if I used my PayPal or not, since I have the same credit card linked to both.


Anyway,


Last night I drove the 100 miles to my old neighborhood to support and encourage a new Gaming Group that just getting started there. Well as soon as I walked in, I sat right down to "Imperial Settlers" that was being set up and explained. ( This is for you @Gurei_Ornery ) Well my friend Tom is a Chinese Engineer and probably a mathematical genius, but his broken English and thick mumbling accent make it extremely difficult for anyone with impaired hearing to understand him. He thought that he had explained ALL of the rules sufficiently and then walked away to play something else. That left Greg, Sarah, and I to go through the motions of collecting our resources to construct buildings from the cards in our hand, sometimes scoring points and sometimes attacking one another for a particular resource that we may have been lacking. I had not clue what the heck I was doing and came in third. I think that I will endeavor to at least read the rules myself before attempting to play this one again. There were a lot of things going on and I suspect that I was missing out on some of the synergies that would have provided more victory points.


Then because a few more people had arrived we spent the last hour ( from 9 - 10 ) playing three rounds of The Resistance. Bluffing and Deducting whom among us is the traitor(s) is not my favorite genre. I'd rather play with a map, some miniatures, and dice, no matter what the theme is, any time. But some of them really got into it and it made for hearty laughter.

[Johngee]

Way to go @Taeblewalker ! Congratulations. BTW: The King of NY has to be KONG.

[IAmBatman]

More Dead of Winter last night -- one play with three and there was no betrayer, and we all made our win conditions with 1 Morale left to go. Then three quick games of 7 Wonders, which I'm just not very good at.

[1Mmirg]

Been working and traveling too much. Thankfully, I have been making time for my kids and family, even if I've selfishly haven't visited here so much. Sorry, guys, I have to put my work and family first, though you know I love you all!

--

Finally played Spyfall, Mysterium, Rattlebones, BattleLore 2.0, and Star Realms. Really enjoyed all of them.

Spyfall and Mysterium will depend on your group, but they are solid and I'll look to pick them up when they get more available. Rattlebones just has a wonderful toy factor (love popping the sides off of the dice and changing them around. BattleLore is just a wonderful 2-player game. And Star Realms was an insta-buy after I played it.

We've also played several "old" favorites: Galaxy Trucker, Legendary, Village, X-Wing, and RoboRally.

And some new favorites: Roll for the Galaxy and Diamonds.

Really like the trick-taking variant in Diamonds and Roll is a great new way to play/strive for the galaxy; jury's still out on just how good it is, but it's definitely very good, at least.

[A3n]

I now have power again as of last night. Yea.

But we did play a few games whilst the power was out. If I didn't have to still work each day I'm sure I could've got the kids to play more.

There were a few games of Lost Legacies. A game of Carcasonne, Ticket to Ride -Europe, Tiny Epic Kingdoms, Pixel Glory, & Rise to Power. The kids started a 5 player game of C3G-scape (I was basically the going around to each of them to advise what they should do), but dinner beckoned. I played a game of Marvel Legendary.

I received my KS for Harbour 2 days ago & on that night played a 2 player game against myself to see how it plays. Then yesterday morning whilst waiting for my wife to get ready before I had to leave for work I started the single player variant with the training dummy. And last night had a game with my middlest child. I like it. It's simplistic in its play but there is a surprising amount of strategy. When you know what you are doing it plays nice & quickly & can be a little cut-throat at times .

I also received my KS for Tiny Epic Defenders yesterday but haven't taken the opportunity to play it.

[japes]

That is one of the side effects of no power...more board/card games. At least that's what happened with us.

[Matthias Maccabeus]

Originally Posted by 1Mmirg

Been working and traveling too much. Thankfully, I have been making time for my kids and family, even if I've selfishly haven't visited here so much. Sorry, guys, I have to put my work and family first, though you know I love you all!

--

Finally played Spyfall, Mysterium, Rattlebones, BattleLore 2.0, and Star Realms. Really enjoyed all of them.

Spyfall and Mysterium will depend on your group, but they are solid and I'll look to pick them up when they get more available. Rattlebones just has a wonderful toy factor (love popping the sides off of the dice and changing them around. BattleLore is just a wonderful 2-player game. And Star Realms was an insta-buy after I played it.

We've also played several "old" favorites: Galaxy Trucker, Legendary, Village, X-Wing, and RoboRally.

And some new favorites: Roll for the Galaxy and Diamonds.

Really like the trick-taking variant in Diamonds and Roll is a great new way to play/strive for the galaxy; jury's still out on just how good it is, but it's definitely very good, at least.

We're did you pick up mysterioum at? My FLGS and CSI don't seem to have it.

[chas]

Big game day yesterday here in Brooklyn:

Two rare four player games of Star Trek Fleet Captains. Used the old two faction team rules from the original game for the very first time--with two Federation and two Klingon players as team mates. Each side won one game. We had lots of fun (for more details see my post on my thread for STFC). Played with Taeblewalker, Sherman Davies, and my pal Tag. Each game had many twists and turns! Tag had brought along some custom alternate Klingon ships some pals of his had made to "test," and they worked very. We had such a good time that we're playing again next Thursday, when Tag will bring a few Federation custom ships along. I've paid for these new ships as well. We used a couple of prepainted ships from ST Attack Wing to highlight the customized ships (who had different ship cards with new values and powers). Rumors have a new Borg Expansion in the offing!

Follwed up after Tag left with a dinner break, and a short evening game of Cyclades:Titans. This is such a fun game that the sly playing is even more important than the winning. After our last epic 7 hour game, I'm happy to report that this fourth game we've done only took 2+ hours! I always lose at Kemet, but usually win at Cyclades. An expansion for Kemet is due out in August/September.

[Jim]

Originally Posted by Matthias Maccabeus

We're did you pick up mysterioum at? My FLGS and CSI don't seem to have it.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I ordered my copy (in Polish) directly from Portal Games in Poland when they had a very reduced shipping sale. It isn't due to be released in the US in English until much later this year.

There is also a Ukranian version, which has slightly different rules. I like the final phase of those rules much better than the Polish version, so I took the translated Polish rules, Photoshopped out the text in that section, and added the (IMO) better rules in. I also changed the backstory on the first page to make a little more sense, then I added in the official variant that Zev, from Z-Man Games, came up with. If you want this file, it may be downloaded here.

[stubobj]

Does anyone here use Vassal? I just installed it to try out some Skirmish games for Imperial Assault. While I was getting the IA module I figured I might as well grab the one for Xwing as well. So if anyone is interested in meeting on vassal for some games just send me a pm and we can work out a time. I also have OCTGN downloaded and SWLCG and Doomtown installed if anyone is insterested in those games as well.