What Board Game Are You Currently Playing?

[chas]

Dadscaper,

The designer has already done an FAQ, and is preparing a How To Use the various cards guide, as well as a Faction Guide. I suggested he note which match ups at which player counts are the easiest and most difficult.

Maybe he'll also make more factions some day...

[Dad_Scaper]

Originally Posted by chas

Dadscaper,

The designer has already done an FAQ, and is preparing a How To Use the various cards guide, as well as a faction guide. I suggested he note which match ups at which player counts are most difficult.

Maybe he'll also make more factions some day...

I am sure, if there are guides with which you are already familiar, chas, you know more than I do.

Well, you asked who had played it, and I answered as best I could. Enjoy it when you get it.

[akden]

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

I played it at GenCon.

It seemed really, really good. The combat system in particular is unlike anything I've seen before, and is ingenious.

It was a teaching game and we started too late at night, so we struggled through some things. It's my sense that three is its sweet spot. We played with four and the game play was not quite symmetrical, for reasons that I will leave it to others to discover for themselves, because maybe I'm just wrong and I don't want to trouble people with my problems. I'm told that experienced players will compensate for what we (thought we) discovered for ourselves.

It deserved the hype. I think the comparison to Blood Rage is fair. The game play is different, but they scratch a similar hybrid Ameritrash/Euro area control itch.

I've played three times, once each with 2, 3, and 4 players. I picked it up on preorder at Gen Con and do enjoy it. My 14 year-old son also thoroughly enjoyed it. Each time we've played, a different faction has won (none of them being a faction that I controlled). Each faction plays differently, and one or two are definitely easier to understand, so I can see why some have said the factions aren't balanced well. Win or lose, I enjoy the chance to try different play styles, so I like the variable abilities. And as @Dad_Scaper mentioned, the combat system is unique and very cool. I recommend the game and look forward to some expansion factions.

[chas]

Just played a dynamite series of two games here with the gang on our monthly play date: "Is General Tso Chicken?" The first game was a four player 600 Point Classic Scape and Customs Kill 'Em All on our usual giant 20+ x 30+ space battlefield, the second added a 600 Point AOTP (Post Innistrad) army for each player to their Scape armies, using my own Blender Rules.

If you are interested, you can check out my new report on our thread here:

http://www.heroscapers.com/community...23#post2110023

The rules work, the scenarios was fun, and we gamed from noon until late evening.

COWABUNGA!

[chas]

Today's GMT update puts C&C Epic Napoleonics on their Shipping Schedule for late October. Next month! Hooray!

[Ranior]

Had a good game session last night.

Got to play

Love Letter x1
Codenames x1
Secret Hitler x3
Robinson Crusoe x1
Evolution: Climate x1

Love Letter and Codenames continue to be easy and quick ones to play while waiting for everyone to show up. Always a good time.

Secret Hitler was a new one that someone in the group had recently kickstarted. I'm quite a fan of Resistance/Avalon and this is very similar in many ways. Yet after the three plays I can say that I find the changes to pretty much be for the worse. The game is fine and enjoyable but it's not special or incredible. I'd rather just play the Resistance/Avalon as this doesn't offer anything better, and I specifically can point to several elements that I think makes the game less fun.

Robinson Crusoe we played last week and beat scenario one so we moved on to scenario two....only to discover it was much easier and we cruised to a win. Looking online it seems the consensus is that the future scenarios will be harder and that scenario two is probably too easy. Fun game but we were expecting a bit more difficulty like scenario one. Sounds like we'll get that with the next scenarios.

Finally, Evolution Climate is a good time. Cory kickstarted this one and I'm glad he did. I enjoy this game and find it a fun time. It can have the issue of not drawing the cards you want to, but that does seem to be part of the theme of the game which is to survive based on the current environemnt and choices. It's not much for long term strategy since you cannot really plan things out much, but have to constantly adapt and play with what you and others are given. Occasionally it means you may really be in a bad spot, but in the long run I thing the game is just far more tactical than strategic and it really is pretty fair, but several in the group complained about the randomness of their card draws not being what they wanted them to be. I'm not sure if it's just not the game for them or if they will grow to like it as they better understand all the interactions and options.

Good night of gaming as always though.

[Hahma]

Originally Posted by Ranior

Had a good game session last night.

Got to play

Love Letter x1
Codenames x1
Secret Hitler x3
Robinson Crusoe x1
Evolution: Climate x1

Love Letter and Codenames continue to be easy and quick ones to play while waiting for everyone to show up. Always a good time.

Secret Hitler was a new one that someone in the group had recently kickstarted. I'm quite a fan of Resistance/Avalon and this is very similar in many ways. Yet after the three plays I can say that I find the changes to pretty much be for the worse. The game is fine and enjoyable but it's not special or incredible. I'd rather just play the Resistance/Avalon as this doesn't offer anything better, and I specifically can point to several elements that I think makes the game less fun.

Robinson Crusoe we played last week and beat scenario one so we moved on to scenario two....only to discover it was much easier and we cruised to a win. Looking online it seems the consensus is that the future scenarios will be harder and that scenario two is probably too easy. Fun game but we were expecting a bit more difficulty like scenario one. Sounds like we'll get that with the next scenarios.

Finally, Evolution Climate is a good time. Cory kickstarted this one and I'm glad he did. I enjoy this game and find it a fun time. It can have the issue of not drawing the cards you want to, but that does seem to be part of the theme of the game which is to survive based on the current environemnt and choices. It's not much for long term strategy since you cannot really plan things out much, but have to constantly adapt and play with what you and others are given. Occasionally it means you may really be in a bad spot, but in the long run I thing the game is just far more tactical than strategic and it really is pretty fair, but several in the group complained about the randomness of their card draws not being what they wanted them to be. I'm not sure if it's just not the game for them or if they will grow to like it as they better understand all the interactions and options.

Good night of gaming as always though.

Nice list Ranior

I enjoy Love Letter and Codenames quite a bit.

My group quite enjoys Secret Hitler. We have enjoyed Avalon and Resistance in the past as well. While there aren't any roles really in SH, there is the Chancellor aspect that's different, as well as the things that can happen after certain number of things passed. I think that both have their value. I don't care for Werewolf or One Night Werewolf though.

Haven't played Robinson Crusoe in awhile. First scenario was a rough one and have lost that many times. Second one wasn't too bad. Haven't played the other ones yet.

Haven't tried Evolution Climate yet.

[Hex_Enduction_Hour]

Hahma, I may just be tempted to buy Crusoe's newest edition.
The shaky nature and rules discrepancy of the first version always kept me away.

My wife and I have played Codenames with our young children, but it has not been as an amazing of an experience as we would like. One of my gaming buddy suggests trying the game with older players.

Love Letter is fun. My wife didn't think so, but I've played with my nephews and we have all enjoyed the game.

Lately, my wife and I played Birds of a Feather, designed and drawn by two brothers from Oakland. The theme is excellent to me, but the gameplay feels like the card challenge from Ingenious Challenges.

I played some Heroscape and have tried the Arena of the Planeswalker stuff. It's decent, but it's no 'Scape. I'm not a fan of the cards, but do appreciate seeing what multi-life squads could have been like in Heroscape.

My wife and I played Yatzhee Steal the Deal tonight.
Simple fun and basically a re-skin of Risk Express/Age of War.

This morning I got in a game of Hermann Luttmann's Invaders from Dimension X!
Luttmann is one of my very favorite solitaire game designers. He created Dawn of the Zeds and In Magnificent Style. Invaders is chaotic fun with marines trying to achieve their goal with fickle aliens creating all kinds of random deviousness around the board.

[Hahma]

Originally Posted by Hex_Enduction_Hour

Hahma, I may just be tempted to buy Crusoe's newest edition.
The shaky nature and rules discrepancy of the first version always kept me away.

My wife and I have played Codenames with our young children, but it has not been as an amazing of an experience as we would like. One of my gaming buddy suggests trying the game with older players.

Love Letter is fun. My wife didn't think so, but I've played with my nephews and we have all enjoyed the game.

Hey Hex, long time no see! Still doing your art and checking out birds?

Regarding Robinson Crusoe, I hope the newer rules are better, as the older ones were tough, but I got through it. Played solo a few times before introducing it to others, so at least the rules struggle was my own

I've only played Codenames with adults, so that's all I can go by. Also, we always have at least 6 people, but up to 8 or 10 at times. Ends up being a party game that we can all laugh at failed clues or people not picking up on certain clues. As the other team, you can say you know what the other team's clue giver is referring too, and have a blast watching their team struggle. We also like to try to through off the other team with suggestions, to kind of throw them off.

Love Letter can be hit or miss. Some in my group like it, and my daughters really like it.

[Hahma]

Yesterday we had our monthly all-day Saturday event that goes from 10am to 10pm+. I only stayed from 10 to 6:30.

I played:

The Grizzled - co-op card game set in WWI. It only lasts about a half hour and is really difficult. Generally you will lose, so a win is something to be savored. We lost.

Fuse - a real-time game of trying to defuse bombs. You have cards that tell you certain requirement of combination of color and or number for dice to be added to the card before completing it. Every player starts with 2 and there are more in the center to grab after completing yours. There's a bag of dice numbered 1-4 and in colors black, blue, yellow, red and green. You set the 10 minute timer/app and the start player draws out 5 dice and rolls them, then everyone yells out what they need and takes it, or discuss what options are, but quickly. You can only take one die. If there is a die left, you roll it and anyone with that color and or number showing on their card (some dice are stacked), they have to throw them back in the bag. Then the next player draws and rolls the dice etc. Tough game and we lost. But it's like Hanabi, where you add up the scores to see how many points you got and there's a chart to say how well you did. We did okay on the chart.

Skull - a light bluffing game that was my first time playing. Pretty fun.

Cacao - a light tile laying game where you have meeple symbols on edges of tiles. There can be 1 on each edge, or 3 on one edge with 1 on another, or 2 on one edge and 1 on two other edges. But there are always a combination of 4. When you place your tile next to a jungle tile, you get to benefit from that jungle tile as many times as you have meeples on that edge of the tile. There are ways to get more jungle tiles out and you have to be careful not to help out opponents when you are adding new jungle tiles. Fun light game.

Flick 'em Up, with the Red Rock Tomahawk expansion - We played 2 games of this, one with 8 players and one with 9 players, and we played 2 different scenarios. This expansion adds Indians/Native Americans to the game. They are neat, as instead of being able to flick bullet discs like the cowboys, you have to either use a tomahawk or bow. The tomahawk is shaped as such and stands on it's handle when you flick it. Kind of tough to be accurate, but when you knock over a cowboy with it, they get a marker on them to indicate that their first action next time has to be a move action. There is a template that you slide across the front of the Native American, and a edge with a gap on the side to be able to fit a longish piece of wood on there and you flick it as an arrow. Hard to explain, and kind of tricky to use. But this was fun for sure.




Burgle Bros. - This is a co-op game of getting your thieves through each of the 3 floors of the building. Each thief has it's own special ability and there are guards trying to capture you. You have to find the safe and roll the right combination, as well as stairs to the next level. The tiles start out flipped over and could be all kinds of rooms or traps with alarms to lure the guard. If the guard moves onto your space, you lose a stealth token. You start with 3 and if you get caught again after losing your 3rd one, then the team loses. Very awesome game.






Five Tribes, with the Artisans of Naqala expansion - Only my second time playing this and I won. This is a cool game that is kind of difficult to explain, but one of the main mechanics is that the board is like a mancala and you have to pick up all meeples from one tile and drop one off on each tile on your way to the last tile. But the last one you drop off has to be of the same color of one of the meeples on that last tile. You then pick up all the meeples of that last meeple color from that tile and use them for their color specific ability. If all the meeples on the end tile end up being the same color, then you get to place one of your camels there and claim it for points later. Also, each tile has it's own ability that you can use if possible when you pick up meeples from there. Fun game, but thinky and mathy.

[Hex_Enduction_Hour]

Dang, Hahma, what a great day of gaming!
Five Tribes is thinky and mathy, huh. I'd still like to try that one someday.
Wow, Burgle Bros. looks like a ton of fun!

Not doing much art, but I would like to.
Birdwatching is still happening. Very interesting to note local changes in my area from year to year: Bluebirds are all over the place and I've seen the visiting Kites return annually, but recently raise a fledgling. For a while there, I was documenting online my bird sightings for a site compiling the information, but the process for each entry was a bit unwieldy, so I gave up.
I was also taking photographs of local birds. This image of a Western Scrub Jay is one I'm most proud.This one is the funniest, I think.


Here is an AAR I spent waaay too much time creating as a submission on BGG for the game I played yesterday. Lots of pictures to follow!

Invaders from Dimension X!
I finally had a chance to play Invaders from Dimension X!
I chose the first scenario, Running the Gauntlet with the winning victory for the marines to get off the map on the eastern side two Logistics, one HQ, and one combat unit.

Several mistakes were made, some were caught, others I didn’t realize until reviewing these photos. I hope these images offer a sense of the fun and campy, sci-fi b-movie adventure this game has to offer.



My two scouts were incapacitated by alien attacks.



On the next turn, the Heavy Weapons and HQ units advanced along the road while Scouts began to improve their dire situation


The Multi-frequency Phase Nulifier did not have much affect on this game.


HQ doing what it does best!


The Scouts continue to come back


One Scout attempted his Jump Pack action and had some success.


Meanwhile the Heavies were taking potshots at the Invaders, but coming up empty on their ammo.



The Invaders, sensing something was up with these Humans, answered with their own strategic responses...chaos of the Warp Jump!


On another turn, the Invaders decided to let their Warrior #2 shut down and go dormant. Weird.
What were those critters up to. Regardless, the other Scout was able to return to Active duty.


As the Marines made their way across the map, the Aliens revealed their hand: Drop Pods.
Of course, how obvious!


One mistake I made and later realized were the double 1s the Heavy Weapons had rolled earlier when attacking one Invader.
They hadn’t attacked since that point, so it was simple enough to remedy


The Scout takes out the dormant Warrior #2. “Sweet dreams, Sleeping Beauty!”


The marines in the southeast were dealing with an alien in the Blasted Hills.


With some breathing room, the marines decided to attempt do some Recon.


The Heavies, suspecting the Invaders to launch an attack, attempt to establish Strongholds with some success.


During the Invaders’ activation, Recon discovered a Warp Jump was in operation.


The Warp Jump brought two aliens within very close proximity to the marines.
The marines continued their long trek.


On the next turn, one of the dropped Invaders works itself into a frenzy and eliminates the furthermost marine.
“Curse you, Buggy!”


Seeking to return the favor, the Marines switch into battle mode firing at the Warior #3 in the Blasted Hills, but that buggy is dug in good.
The other Invader, stalking in the forest, proved just as difficult to root out and terminate.


On the next turn, the Marines succeed in another Recon probe...


As well, HQ calls in reinforcements in the form of more HQ.


When it’s time to reveal the Invaders plan, Drop Pods are on the schedule.
“Look alive, boys.”
What happens next could only happen in a chaos filled game like Luttmann’s:
The single drop pod lands smack dab on the HQ reinforcement!

Too funny!

With the tragedy fueling their determination, the marines fought on as best they could muster!



The Invaders were not going to take this aggression lightly.
They deployed the Phase Shift Depolorizer. A nasty-sounding device to be sure,
Stunning all marines within four spaces of itself.


What followed next round revealed the chaotic nature of these alien adversaries.
The Warrior #3 entrenched in the Blasted Hills decided to bug out.
The Marines got wind of an option the Aliens had in mind: “Decapitate Command Control.”
Interesting...


Marines took some time to shake themselves out of their stunned status.


The Aliens, sensing this arising of their enemies, deployed more warriors via Drop Pods


The Marines continued their advance toward the eastern border, struggling to defeat the nitty nemesis while grasping at faulty reconnossaince.


They eventually scored a major hit against a buggy in the badlands.


But the bugs belittled the aggression with appropriate responses themselves!
No matter, the marines were determined to secure their victory, moving three requisite units off the map.


The bugs felt passive and allowed the marines to advance.
Perhaps there was an ulterior motive to the silence?
What were they planning for the next scenario?



Final thoughts:
* With Dawn of the Zeds and In Magnificent Style staying forever in my game collection, there was no doubt this Hermann Luttmann game was going to be anything but entertaining and be a welcomed edition.

* I have have done something wrong to get off with such a strong victory?
There were low numbers rolled for the Drop Pods, so perhaps that that swung in my favor.

* It was a chaotic session and I probably should have played a game or two without documenting with a camera.
I need to go back over the rules and see if I missed something about the yellow Alien objective chits. Only one was pulled during this game.

[Hahma]

The thing about Five Tribes, is that you have to figure out what needle action you want to take, so that can determine where you want to end up after moving the group of meeples, but you also have to consider the destination tile ability. Some meeples have an ability that has multipliers based on surrounding tiles with blue VP circles instead of red. There is also the issue of someone before you either moving the meeples you wanted to move, or dropping one off in the one you wanted to start from, which means you have to move an extra tile to be able to drop off that extra meeple, which could mess up your planned destination. So you have to be able to adjust. Also, there is an auction at the start of each round to bid on turn order. So if you really want to make a specific move without risking getting screwed over, you have to bid higher for turn order. Money is vps at the end, so it's a balancing act.

Burgle Bros. is a blast for sure.

Those are great pictures of the birds. We usually have Robins nest in out trees every year, and have some bird houses for sparrows. Have some morning doves and Hawks around too.occasionally we have hummingbirds come in our yard.

That Invaders From Dimension X looks neat. Is it complicated?